The other week I watched September by Woody Allen. It was a small film, a domestic, but satisfying on some level. I really love Dianne Wiest, and it was fun to see a young Sam Waterston (from Law and Order) play the tortured, blocked young writer obsessed with his father. Poor Mia Farrow--has she ever been in a film where she gets to play a character with any...self-actualization? I think this was a 1977 film and I don't know if she and the auteur were together or not at the time. I'm guessing yes.
And...Denholm Elliot! The wizard from The Wizard of Oz. Wow. What a great voice.
A while ago, for some reason that I can't remember, I loaded my Netflix queue with Allen films. I was really repulsed by his films after a while, so took a decade-long break. Perhaps I'm less threatened now by self-absorbed, egotistical chauvinist artist sensibilities. (But why would I want to watch them?)
I enjoyed Celebrity--it was really entertaining to watch Kenneth Branagh do Woody Allen. I have great respect for his seemingly bottomless well of hamminess (e.g. Frankenstein and Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets) and he was in fine form in Celebrity, where he plays the neurotic writer protagonist juggling multiple beautiful women. Before that, I watched Hollywood Ending, where he plays a director who has gone blind--which was pretty funny. Of course he's also fending off beautiful women. Tea Leoni was charming as his ex-wife. Where is she? I like her. The last thing I saw her in was the last Jurassic Park with William H. Macy, who, strangely enough, is a producer for one of the PBS cartoons that my kids watch (Cyber Chase?).
Maybe some day I will get to meet my diasporic comrade Soon-Yi Previn.
I just ordered a slew of Korean films. Since I won't be taking Korean language class this summer, I will have to self-educate. While reclining. I fear the gray matter is too old and stiff to really learn much Korean, but I am going to try my best.
I'm kind of obsessed with directors and actors. Sigh. I seem to have a quasi-photographic memory for actors' names, and what else they've been in that I've seen. It's a really...sort of useless...and embarrassing "talent." It won't be very helpful in the End Times, unless I can transfer the skill set to edible plant identification and so forth. Summer is movie time. During the school year, I am generally less interested. I like an action or mild horror film once in a while, but nothing challenging. I'm looking forward to taking back up with documentaries and foreign films.
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