What Swanky Things are you Watching?

[Scrooge McSam]

Originally Posted by Eliza Hodgkins 1812

I love me some Chris Cooper

Everytime I see him I'm impressed. Loved him in "Lone Star" with Elizabeth Pena

[Kevy Baby]

Originally Posted by Gemini Cricket

I haven't seen 'Adaptation' yet.

I'm waiting for someone to do an adaptation of Adaptation

[Not Afraid]

Chris has been to, I think, three stores trying to buy a copy of it. Everyone is out! Damn. Who wudda thunk?

[Baileykat]

Oh! I'm so jealous Claire! Giant is one of my favorites! Filled right in my very own Texas!

We're watching Mrs. Doubtfire..."Helllllooooouuuuu!"

We just got back from seeing Lemony Snicket's SOUE...I wasn't much impressed. It just didn't get into the story deep enough for me...not to mention that Kat has NOT read the books, so she had a million questions during the movie....AND Bailey HAS read the books..so he had to comment on all the things that were missing or wrong....

So we were the annoying family in the middle who talked during the whole film!

I did enjoy Jim Carrey in this role...he's evil enough for it..but I didn't feel like the script did him justice. Left it wide open for a sequel though...

[€uroMeinke]

Just saw A Very Long Engagement tonight and thought it was awsome. Jeunet has such a wonderful storytelling style and beautifully captures the inner imaginations of his characters in stunning (and sometimes horrific) visuals. We'll definately be adding this one to the archives.

I know it's not represented in the Academy Awards, but damn I'm glad I made the time to see this one before it was shut out by the oscar nomenies

[innerSpaceman]

I've been watching a lot of screeners lately, and some of them are quite swanky. It's the stuff that I missed in theaters cause it just didn't seem "big" enough to pay the money to see it projected large. But swank often comes in small packages.

De-Lovely is the umpteenth film I've seen lately about a real person's life, and it was - - as you might expect from a story about Cole Porter - - most swanky! It got around being a straight bio-pic in a very clever way by using the conceipt and gimmick that it was all vignettes of Cole's life as they flashed before his eyes in the moments before death.

That way, they could present the story in a less literal way, sometimes realistic-seeming and sometimes not. More important, they could feature Cole Porter's amazing songs prominently, and out of chronological order. It was a wonderful device that made the film work in a surprisingly effective way. I think the respective recent paradigms of 'Chicago' and 'Phantom of the Opera' have demonstrated that you can't just have people break out into song in musicals anymore; there has got to be a method for the numbers to work more seemlessly in modern film musicals, and "De-Lovely" tackled this problem nicely. Sweet performances by Kevin Kline and Ashley Judd as well.

I also recently saw 'The Aviator,' which was simply a straight bio-pic. Not bad, but neither was it the type of film that I thought deserving of an Oscar nomination blitz. It was only swanky, and only came fully to life, in the section about Hughes' love affair with Katherine Hepburn. Cate Blanchette was marvelous in that role - - and you simply cannot go unswanky with a good portrayal of Kate Hepburn on the screen.


The other screener I found most swanky was Closer. I think I ought to rent more Mike Nichols films. This was a fascinating tale of messed up love affairs between four well-drawn characters. Clive Owen certainly deserves his Academy Award nom, and there were surprisingly great performances from actors who've certainly turned in their share of drek over the past few years. Julia Roberts, Jude Law and Natalie Portman were flat-out terrific. The clever dialoge and dead-on sexy situations made this a pretty good swankfest. In the end, I was taken by how much the clever dialogue really revealed about these characters with some good acting ladled over the script. A brutal story of hurtful love among four of the more well established movie characters I've seen in quite a while.

[Gemini Cricket]

Originally Posted by innerSpaceman

I think I ought to rent more Mike Nichols films.

Totally. He's one of my favorite directors.

Here are some of his cool flicks:

The Birdcage
Angels in America
Wit
Postcards from the Edge
Working Girl
Gilda Live
Biloxi Blues
Silkwood
Carnal Knowledge
Catch 22
The Graduate
Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?
Regarding Henry

Both AinA and Wit are hard to watch in places, but worth it. (Watch AinA just to see Emma Thompson play a Jewish Rabbi. (!!) )

Skippable:

Wolf - Bleh

[innerSpaceman]

Oh, guess I've seen more Mike Nichols' films that I'd thought.



And, sorry G.C., but I love 'Wolf.'

[Claire]

Originally Posted by innerSpaceman

The other screener I found most swanky was Closer. I think I ought to rent more Mike Nichols films. This was a fascinating tale of messed up love affairs between four well-drawn characters. Clive Owen certainly deserves his Academy Award nom, and there were surprisingly great performances from actors who've certainly turned in their share of drek over the past few years. Julia Roberts, Jude Law and Natalie Portman were flat-out terrific. The clever dialoge and dead-on sexy situations made this a pretty good swankfest. In the end, I was taken by how much the clever dialogue really revealed about these characters with some good acting ladled over the script. A brutal story of hurtful love among four of the more well established movie characters I've seen in quite a while.

I looooooved this movie and not (surprise!) because of Jude Law, although I thought he was intensely dreamy. He was overshadowed by Clive Owens and Natalie Portman...amazing. I'm seeing it again tonight with a girlfriend who hasn't seen it and my sister who has (we saw it together and agreed immediately to see it again). Mike Nichols is an actors' director. He's so good.

Giant was good! I hadn't seen it since high school when I was in my James Dean phase. Damn, but he and Rock Hudson were H-O-T. I watched some of the supplemental stuff. What's weird is that the next movie I have lined up is A Place in the Sun. Same director and Elizabeth Taylor.

We also have Seinfeld Season 1 &2 sitting on the shelf. I'm not sure if I'll get to it anytime soon......I'm not all that excited about it.

[Eliza Hodgkins 1812]

Originally Posted by innerSpaceman

The other screener I found most swanky was Closer. I think I ought to rent more Mike Nichols films. This was a fascinating tale of messed up love affairs between four well-drawn characters. Clive Owen certainly deserves his Academy Award nom, and there were surprisingly great performances from actors who've certainly turned in their share of drek over the past few years. Julia Roberts, Jude Law and Natalie Portman were flat-out terrific. The clever dialoge and dead-on sexy situations made this a pretty good swankfest. In the end, I was taken by how much the clever dialogue really revealed about these characters with some good acting ladled over the script. A brutal story of hurtful love among four of the more well established movie characters I've seen in quite a while.

I saw this play in NYC when it first came to Broadway and was madly in love with it.

It's not as strong on film, but it was a very, very good adaptation. And beautifully peformed, though Owen and Portman really stood out for me. The cast in NYC was awesome. Rupert Graves played Jude Law's character, and I liked him better in the role. Perhaps he may have been a tad too old for the film, but I would have liked to have seen him cast. Ah, well. Mine are bowling pin dreams.