Monthly Archives: February 2023

Real Life (1979)

Posted on February 5, 2023 | Leave a comment

Real Life
Directed by Albert Brooks
Written by Monica McGowan Johnson, Harry Shearer and Albert Brooks
1979/US
IMDb page
First viewing/Amazon rental
One of 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die

Albert Brooks: Our research was so thorough the computers actually coughed up two perfect families. If I were a liar, I could tell you that we chose one over the other for complicated psychological reasons. But I’m a comedian, not a liar. I can afford the luxury of honesty. The Feltons lived in Wisconsin; the Yeagers lived in Arizona. YOU spend the winter in Wisconsin…

I thoroughly enjoyed Albert Brooks’s first film, a mockumentary.

The film was made in homage to “An American Family” which was a multi-episode TV show on public TV. In it an embedded camera crew captured many intimate moments in life of a dysfunctional family. The show was quite controversial.

In this movie, Albert Brooks gets the same idea. But the “rules” are ridiculously complicated, the technology is hilarious, and the director (Brooks) is clueless about people, a control freak and an idiot. The plug is pulled after only two months of the year long experiment.

My humor and Brooks’s humor are on the same wavelength. I hadn’t seen this one before. I kept getting a “This Is Spinal Tap” vibe. Then I noticed that Harry Shearer who co-wrote this and appeared as as one of the helmeted cameraman was also a co-writer and performer in Spinal Tap. This film made me laugh and I loved it.

A MUST SEE – hilarious! None of this appears in the actual film

1979

Posted on February 5, 2023 | Leave a comment

1979 was one of those great years for movies as can be seen by the sheer number of films of that year showing up on the 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die list.

We lost a number of great directors that year including Jean Renoir, Nicholas Ray, George Seaton, Dorothy Arzner, and Ernest B. Schoedsak. Other notables who died in 1979 were Nino Rota, Mary Pickford, Jim Hutton, John Wayne, Jean Seberg, Dmitri Tiompkin, Merle Oberon, Ann Dvorak, and Joan Blondell.

Rosanna Arquette, Ted Danson, Matt Dillon, Danny Glover, Mickey Rourke, and Patrick Swayze made their film debuts.

Just some incidents in a tumultuous year. Iran became an Islamic Republic upon the arrival of the exiled Ayatollah Khomeini and the ouster of the Shah. 63 U.S. Embassy employees were held hostage by “students” for 444 days starting November 4. The crisis in Iran sparked an international oil crisis which saw gasoline prices soaring. The first Black government took office in Rhodesia, whose name was changed to Zimbabwe. The Sandinista National Liberation Front took power in Nicaragua. Islamic extremists took pilgrims hostage during the Haj in Mecca – 250 people were killed. A series of accidents at the nuclear power plant at Three Mile Island, Pennsylvania caused a partial melt-down.

The Billboard top single of the year was “My Sharona” by The Knack. “The Stories of John Cheever” won the Pulitzer Prize for Literature. “Buried Child” by Sam Shepard won for Drama. The Ayatollah Khomeini was Time magazine’s Man of the Year.

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Here’s the list of films I will pick from for 1979 viewing.

1978: Recap and Favorite Films

Posted on February 3, 2023 | 2 comments

With one thing or another, it took me 18 months to watch less than 40 films for 1978. I hope to get through 1979 at a more normal rate! Anyhow, the following were my favorite films of those I watched. I watched Reinhard Hauff’s Knife in the Head years ago. It features Bruno Ganz in a fabulous performance as an amnesiac with a traumatic brain injury. It would probably be on the list if it had been accessible to me during this round.

The Last Waltz (dir. Martin Scorsese)

Days of Heaven (dir. Terence Malik)

Invasion of the Body Snatchers (dir. Philip Kaufman)

Dawn of the Dead (dir. George Romero)

Autumn Sonata (dir. Ingmar Bergman)

The Buddy Holly Story (dir. Steve Rash)

La Cage aux Folles (dir. Edouard Molinaro)

Beauty and the Beast (Panna a netvor) (dir. Juraj Herz)

Gates of Heaven (dir. Errol Morris)

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Posted in Movie Reviews

The Tree of Wooden Clogs (1978)

Posted on February 3, 2023 | 2 comments

The Tree of Wooden Clogs (L’albero degli zoccoli)
Directed by Ermanno Olmi
Written by Ermanno Olmi
1978/Italy
IMDb page
First viewing/Criterion Channel

Don Carlo: Above all, try always to love one another. The love between two people is something money can’t buy. God says not to seek worldly riches but the blessings of paradise. And remember that paradise begins with the love that we show each other here on earth.

This film is three hours long with relatively little dialogue. I wasn’t looking forward to it but it is so beautiful in every way that it captured me from the start.

Film takes place in a feudal farm in Bergamo Italy at the end of the 19th century. All the dialogue is in the Bergamese dialect and the actors are amateurs. The story follows both the life of the community and the life of the members of the Bastini family. We get birth, love, a wedding, death, and unremitting field work. There’s plenty of love and help to neighbors in need to set off the poverty of the people.

Director Olmi did the fabulous cinematography himself. The music is dreamy. Recommended.

This is the last film I will watch from 1978. It took me 1 1/2 years to watch less than 40 films! 1979 looks to be a particularly good year so here’s hoping!