What Was The Last Movie You Watched?

[LizzieMaine]

I believe they're doing their own specially-composed score. It's an interesting group -- sort of fusion music, but not so outre as to disrespect the film. They were here earlier this year to play for Harold Lloyd's "Safety Last" and were very well received, even though they missed their cue when I started the film. This time I hope we'll have a proper rehearsal!

 

[Fading Fast]

I believe they're doing their own specially-composed score. It's an interesting group -- sort of fusion music, but not so outre as to disrespect the film. They were here earlier this year to play for Harold Lloyd's "Safety Last" and were very well received, even though they missed their cue when I started the film. This time I hope we'll have a proper rehearsal!

So they write their own score for the movie? That's a pretty big undertaking - no?

 

[LizzieMaine]

It's a two hour picture, so yeah, they're doing a pretty ambitious job. I imagine there are going to be a few quotes from existing themes, as with most silent-picture scores, but most it will be original. In addition to "Robin Hood" and "Safety Last" they've done scores for "Nosferatu" and "Sunrise." I've never seen the latter film with anything but its original Movietone recorded score, and I wish we'd get it, but I think the film might be too much for our 80s-kid director, who doesn't know much from silent pictures.

 

[Fading Fast]

It's a two hour picture, so yeah, they're doing a pretty ambitious job. I imagine there are going to be a few quotes from existing themes, as with most silent-picture scores, but most it will be original. In addition to "Robin Hood" and "Safety Last" they've done scores for "Nosferatu" and "Sunrise." I've never seen the latter film with anything but its original Movietone recorded score, and I wish we'd get it, but I think the film might be too much for our 80s-kid director, who doesn't know much from silent pictures.

Does the theater choose a movie and then ask the group to put a score to it? Just wondering how it all comes together.

 

[LizzieMaine]

With these kinds of groups they have a repertoire of films they have available, usually PD titles they don't have to get separate rights to score, and we'd choose the one we wanted to do from that list. With few exceptions -- notably certain Chaplin productions -- any American film before 1923 is in public domain, so there's a pretty deep pool for an ambitious group to choose from, although in practicality they tend to stick to the more familiar titles and personalities.

Films from 1923 forward are hit and miss so far as PD is concerned -- it depends on whether the copyright was renewed at the expiration of its original 28 year term, or if the film was ever copyrighted at all -- so those years tend to be less well-represented among the various groups, which is why you don't see four or five different versions of, say, "The Big Parade" touring around. Usually when a copyrighted film gets a new score it's one that's commissioned by the copyright holder.

I don't know how they got the rights to do Sunrise, which I believe is still owned by Fox, or Mickey Mouse, or whoever's in charge of that company now.

 

[Fading Fast]

"Devotion" 1931 with Leslie Howard and Ann Harding

• Clunky pre-code, terrible sound, awkward and forced story, but Harding shines as the wealthy, young, beautiful society woman who (not at all believably) masquerades as an middle-aged nanny to get close to putative single-parent Leslie Howard

• Howard is okay, still finding his acting legs, but Harding was constructed to be a pre-code woman
  • As in many of her movies: she defies conventions, bristles at cultural and social limitations imposed on women, but also likes men as friends and partners - a positive rebel not an angry burn-it-all-down rebel (also, like most pre-code society women, had plenty of money but couldn't afford undergarments)

• To watch this one, you have to be a pre-code Harding and Howard fan willing to put up with a film in need of restoration

 

[AmateisGal]

The Girl on the Train. This movie (based on the bestselling novel) had lots of twists and turns. It took me awhile to figure out who the real villain was. Emily Blunt did a superb job.

 

[Worf]

Even though I don't drink... I musta been snockered last night as I spent the evening watching this... ahem... gem.

"I Was a Teenaged Wereskunk"

Yes you read that right... "wereskunk". A modern low-budget send up of the teen horror flicks of the late 50's early 60's. Laugh out loud funny in some spots. Don't waste your time on it unless you're REALLY, REALLY bored and need a decent laugh.

Worf

 

[Worf]

Bad as the above was... at least I only spent 3 bucks to see it. I spent a lot more to see the latest Jurassic Park fiasco.... What a by the numbers piece of crap this was. No heart, no soul, just CGI crap left right and sideways. Man what a mess. Don't waste either your time or hard earned on this one.

Worf

 

[Zombie_61]

Even though I don't drink... I musta been snockered last night as I spent the evening watching this... ahem... gem.

"I Was a Teenaged Wereskunk"

Yes you read that right... "wereskunk". A modern low-budget send up of the teen horror flicks of the late 50's early 60's. Laugh out loud funny in some spots. Don't waste your time on it unless you're REALLY, REALLY bored and need a decent laugh.

Worf

Was it at least as good as Bubba the Redneck Werewolf?

 

[belfastboy]

"Somebody Up There Likes Me" an early Paul Newman pic with Pier Angeli. I like Newman's work a lot but this was far from his best work. He played Graziano way too broadly...an over the top palooka....too cartoonish.

 

[Formeruser012523]

Bad as the above was... at least I only spent 3 bucks to see it. I spent a lot more to see the latest Jurassic Park fiasco.... What a by the numbers piece of crap this was. No heart, no soul, just CGI crap left right and sideways. Man what a mess. Don't waste either your time or hard earned on this one.

Worf

That bad, huh? So tired of seeing my loved ones jump and say, "I wanna see that." every time an ad for it would come up on tv. Ugh. Or, any of the latest and greatest. Like I've said before, I'd rather wait to rent a movie, if I care, or watch something older. The last JP movie I did see in the theater and the only scene I liked was when I happened to notice a guy saving his two giant margarita's from the attacking pterodactyl's. Laughed out loud on that one.

Watched Key Largo on TCM a couple nights ago. Very surprised by the dialog in the light of today's events. If the cast and crew were alive today I'm sure they'd be shocked by what they'd created.

 

[Fading Fast]

...Watched Key Largo on TCM a couple nights ago. Very surprised by the dialog in the light of today's events. If the cast and crew were alive today I'm sure they'd be shocked by what they'd created.

I didn't watch it this time, but have seen it enough times that I can guess at what you are referring too, but in a way, that's part of the historical value and interest of old movies. It shows us how conventions, norms, acceptable behavior change over time.

It's a pretty good record that isn't perfect - what is - but along with all the other evidence helps expand our picture of the past. I also find it humbling because I know had I lived back then, just like now, I'd have rejected some of the norms of the time, but would have accepted many as well. I am very comfortable that in fifty years, some of the things we think we are so smart about today and some of our current political pieties will look backwards or worse to that future world.

 

[Fading Fast]

"Mystery Street" 1950 with Ricardo Montalban

• Solid noir that leans toward the "police investigation of the bad thing done" version of noir versus the "watching the bad thing being done" version

• The story (only first-half-hour-of-the-movie spoilers): society man cheats on his wife, gets single "low class" girl pregnant, she doesn't "shut up," he kills her, but before that another man, possibly willing to cheat, gets mixed up in it and looks like the murderer - there are a few more twists, but that's the basic story which is, as noted, all set up very early on with the rest of the movie focused on the post-murder investigation

• I never "got" Montalban until this movie as I was introduced to him growing up in the '70s when he was an old guy in a bad toupee hawking cars with "rich Corinthian leather," but in "Mystery Street" he shows solid acting chops and an ability to carry a movie - and he was handsome

• It is also nice to see Bruce Bennett (also know as Mildred Pierce's first husband from the '45 movie) in a solid role as the Harvard professor helping to bring modern forensic science to police investigations

• Nothing groundbreaking but an enjoyable noir (recorded from TCM's "Noir Alley" which is another TCM win)

 

[3fingers]

I never "got" Montalban until this movie as I was introduced to him growing up in the '70s when he was an old guy in a bad toupee hawking cars with "rich Corinthian leather,"

Or playing a bad fake Indian or as Mr. Roarke on "Fantasy Island".

 

[LizzieMaine]

"KIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIRK!"

 

[Worf]

D

"KIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIRK!"

I didn't know till recently that Riccardo was outfitted with prosthetic errrrr... boobies for that role. Sigh...

Worf (there is NO Sanity Clause)

 

[Formeruser012523]

D


I didn't know till recently that Riccardo was outfitted with prosthetic errrrr... boobies for that role. Sigh...

Worf (there is NO Sanity Clause)

Well, that sweet mullet HAD to be fake.

 

[AmateisGal]

Downsizing with Matt Damon. It was...interesting. I can't say that I really liked it all that well. In fact, it was sort of depressing and not at all what I was expecting.

Murder on the Orient Express (the new one). I enjoyed it quite a bit. I've never read the book (I'm more of a Miss Marple fan) but the cinematography was gorgeous and so were the costumes. The performances were only so-so, though Kenneth Branagh did a superb job as Poirot.

 

[cm289]

Raiders of the Lost Ark in this 1928 theater in Blacksburg with my 8-yr old. And it was free! Good times!

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk