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December 30, 2006

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DudeAsInCool

Nice list.

Orion pulled the film [Over the Edge - ed] before it was fully released--it's a shame as it was a classic. We pulled back on Colors, too. There were problems at some theaters with rioters for the latter, and on the former, the leadership didn't want was wary that it might cause some teens to act out. Can you imagine a film company being responsible like that today?

schlarb

I'm happy to see someone else mention that The Long Goodbye is the best celluloid interpretation of Chandler. Gould and Altman are genius together. California Split is a criminally underrated film too.

I dunno if anyone likes audiobooks but if you can find them, Elliot Gould narrates all of Chandler's novels and short stories.

andy

Well, Airport probably did inspire Airplane!, but the movie the latter spoofs is called Zero Hour!, which I just happened to stumble across on TV one day as a kid. Sadly, it's not on DVD, or in print at least, because watching it is almost surreal. Airplane follows the original along quite faithfully--the whole plot is there, but without (intentional) silliness. The lead character's name is even the same. They should really package it with Airplane!, but I'm sure that won't happen. You should try and score it for a double feature at your theater.
I'd suggest, for more Altman, trying McCabe and Mrs Miller, and if you're feeling adventurous, 3 Women (and for god's sake--give Nashville another shot! It's incapable of being overrated!)
I always liked the grime factor of My Bodyguard, too. The school alone is filthy (even his weird mouth-breathing friend is a little gross in a way you don't usually see). I'm gonna have to throw that in my queue. And I was fortunate enough to have caught Over the Edge over and over as a teenager, because it played constantly for some reason on...wait for it...Lifetime. I even did a paper on Over the Edge and Foxes (teens-in-over-their-heads flick w/ Jodie Foster). Foxes is nowhere near as good, but kind of worth checking out for its odd little charms.

Dale Hazelton

See if you can dig up Renoirs' "Boudou Saved from Drowning" as well. Very funny social commentary as well, more screwball comedy than "Rules....". Unfortunately it was remade into "Down and Out in Beverly Hills". You also need to find Herzogs "Enigma of Kasper Hauser" with Bruno S. in the title roll. Fantastic.

DNA

I see "Over The Edge" when I was thirteen! I lived/still live in the Denver area, and we (my family) had to go all the way to an "art-house" theater in Boulder (30 miles away) to see it because it was pulled from "regular" distribution. My mom was a Juvenile Diversion counselor for Adams County (north Denver metro) at the time!

She felt that it was an outstanding film, but she agreed with the prevailing sentiment that it was "too provocative" for general distribution...

A minor point: "Over The Edge" was filmed in Aurora (some parts were filmed in a neighborhood where my grandmother lived at the time), and this is in the eastern part of the metro area approx. 25 miles away from Columbine H.S. in western Littleton.

That said, I couldn't agree more that if people had paid attention to what this movie said in 1979, that it may have prevented what really happened (only 25 miles away) in 1999.

DNA

Oops! That was supposed to say "I DID see "Over The Edge when I was thirteen!"
Yes, I have the DVD of that film..

Mom loved Matt Dillon after that, so next year we saw "Little Darlings" with him, Tatum O'Neal and Kristy McNichol (sorry, it's not on DVD that I know of...)

andy

Yeah, I hated Popeye as a kid, in a way that I hated very few movies, but can appreciate it now. Maybe it's just not much of a kids' movie. Also great is Tanner 88, if you haven't seen it. Quite rewarding. I was half-kidding about Nashville; I don't really think anyone should be bludgened with received wisdom. I don't know how you went into it, but maybe your expectations filtered your experience--that's always been interesting to me, and a whole other topic. I think Nashville's the greatest American movie ever made, but I wouldn't be doing anyone who hasn't seen it any favors by telling them that. Although it's playing here in Portland OR soon, and that's what I've been telling people anyway.

After Altman died I was at a movie theater which happened to sell postcards of its marquee. A woman in line pointed out that Gosford Park was on the marquee in the photo, but that meant nothing to the guy working the concession. She knowingly drawled that "Bob Altman" had directed it, and had just died. I wanted to throttle her. Even his closest friends took no such presumption in their reminiscenes. Bob Altman. Idiot.

G

great review - only thing missing is Merryl's greatest role as the italian emigre war bride of a mid-western potato farmer who bonks off the visiting clint eastwood who's taking "holiday photos" of bridges for national geographic, only to give up the man and his multi-lingual ways, sacrificing it all in the final, rain drenched scene for the sake of her ever so ordinary white bread family in The Bridges of Madison County

TJ Hooker

Amazing list, just added em' all to the ol- NetCue.

Brimming with anticipation!

Thanks!

Kip W

Feh. Altman's idea of Chandler is to make Marlowe a loser whining in a puddle of piss. Mitchum did it so much better. And what's with the gangster disfiguring his girlfriend to impress somebody he doesn't give a shit about? Does he do that for everybody? The movie doesn't stand up to a moment's thought.

Now, Popeye. That was almost a great movie, sabotaged only by the ending and (ironically) some of the songs. The cast was superb, script was great, the sets were perfection.

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