Jan 29, 2014

2 quick things:

Am I the only one who believes that the most recent installment of Sherlock, entitled The Sign of Three, and which is the eighth "film" of the series, was their finest one yet?

The Wife and I practically wanted to applaud at its conclusion.  At home.  Moreover, I believe that Sherlock's absolutely brilliant best man speech will be talked about at weddings, and copied, or referenced/nodded to for the next ten years or more in both the US and UK.

Television on Sundays right now is sick with amazing greatness.

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And, quickly, and completely unrelated to television or Sherlock Holmes, I would like to say that David Thomson's most recent book, Moments That Made the Movies, is vastly superior to his previous book.

Thomson picks about seventy moments from different films and writes around five hundred words on each one.  He touches on Don't Look Now, Pandora's Box, Chinatown, Citizen Kane, The Red Shoes, etc, and etc, ...

The real big highlights for me personally were his thoughts on Mary Astor's stunning acting choices and execution in Dodsworth (I swear, I will write about Dodsworth tomorrow! I swear!), and his thoughts on Celine and Julie Go Boating.  Where he sums up a delicious cinema paradox for me that I have personally been dealing with for years now.

I quote,

"This film has not yet been put on DVD in America, and I like it all the more for that. So, it is hard to get at, elusive, difficult to see -- and its length has always put it in some box-office peril. Still, we should not not be deceived by the chronic availability of DVDs.  We need to know that there are unattainable things, or films that we must search for.  Or wait for.  There is no desire without that frustration.  The ability to dial up any movie on our computer or our inner eye may be useful, and it will surely come to pass, but it is one of the things that may drain away the quality of desire in the medium."

So flipping beautiful and right.  Thank you Mr Thomson.  Again.  (The emphasis in the quote is mine.  I hope he will forgive me.)

One of those movies that really can change your life.  Celine and Julie Go Boating (1974)





















Mwah, ... 


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