Filmstruck

Started by ono, June 13, 2017, 01:43:08 PM

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ono

Ever since Hulu lost the Criterion Collection, I've been looking for a service that picked up the slack.  Looks like Filmstruck is it.  Anyone used it?  Me, I'm waiting for the PS4 app to be ready.  That looks to be some time later this year.

Gold Trumpet

I want to but I haven't because ever since upgrading to an ultra-HD TV, all my streaming services look relatively shitty. I dropped Hulu and now only use Netflix and Amazon on my laptop. I also went back to buying blu rays of movies I like to get better quality potential. I'm pretty sure FilmStruck wouldn't do justice for my TV so I haven't gotten it yet. I am intrigued but it at least renewed my desire to have a physical collection so I am buying Criterion again.

jenkins

when i went into filmstruck with my 30 day voucher, i couldn't find a helpful resource for discussion of the movies within it. i was very disappointed in the internet so here is a helpful resource for "best movies on filmstruck", "movies to watch on filmstruck" etc.

The Crowd (1928)

QuoteAsked in the 1960s why no one was making films about ordinary people, Jean-Luc Godard said "Why remake The Crowd (1928)? It has already been done."

a lot of people in a city have the same kind of problem. there are a lot of different kinds of people with the same kind of problem. they don't really make movies about that anymore. it was really surprising when cities and cinema were building themselves, at the beginning of the 20th century, my favorite time period, but after it wasn't surprising everyone acted like being nothing was nothing, when in fact i think it's something.

Miao Miao (2008)

this movie is about being trapped in a glass cage of emotions, i knew it would be, that's why i watched it right away. everyone alive has their own fight, and most Hollywood movies are about the most interesting fights. i like movies about regular emotions and this movie delivered. it's about rich people and sacred emotions.

Welcome, or No Trespassing (1964)

following calamities and innocent youth rebellion, in the end the camp leader really should have had a nicer perspective. that's the feeling. be nicer. that's always the feeling. have you seen Over the Edge? imagine that but in a camp and that was this movie. parents just don't understand. like most european classics, this has major art, some fantasy.

Meantime (1984)

Mike Leigh is maybe better now, definitely, but those are great actors who get to play roles they aren't asked to play anymore. some arresting performances and an ending with a lingering feeling. i activated my filmstruck promo to avoid doing things like buying this particular movie.

Ugly, Dirty and Bad (1976)

how huge life here feels, in this shantytown overlooking Rome. this movie feels full of life. the narrative is a bunch of human nature. this is the Italian director of Il Sorpasso, A Special Day. a recurring quality within his movies is a strong human pulse. this one combines that with an outrageous trash-humans narrative. this is a beautiful trash version of Amarcord, this movie is a beast.

Judex (1963)

i own this on a R2 dvd which i can't watch, so i see this movie whenever i can because of that. the elegance of this fantasy narrative astonishes me. this is an outrageous movie that's fine tuned. straight-faced outrageous. it's a total inspiration to me.

Suntan (2016)

Greece, my god. this isn't even like current popular Greek movies, this is like current popular art house. this movie aches. the protagonist aches. one can feel it. the camera rests atop the feelings. and it's a rather devastating story. there's a lesson to learn, about choosing how to look at things. one should watch this movie to remind oneself not to choose to see things in such a way that fucks shit up bigtime, damn.

The Smallest Show on Earth (1957) [Big Time Operators]

this movie is razor sharp except its ending is lame. but the build up is totally worth it. England knows how to build character based narratives. Peter Sellers is in this an old man. he's the theater's projector. most of this movie takes place in a movie theater.

The Neighbor's Wife and Mine (1931)

the first Japanese movie with sound i learned, but that's not why i watched it, i watched it because of the year, the title, the synopsis mentioning a "jazz party next door." a person whistling is a central part of the opening scene. later there's jazz and discussions about eastern/western culture, living in a modern age, in the time of speed. it's not only a product of its time but a fabulous representation of it.

The Woman in Question (1950) [Five Angles on Murder]

same year as Rashomon, same type of narrative involving one story told from five perspectives. another British movie. how is its cinema? legit. but I was most gripped by the words and i thought of the movie like a radio show. distinct personalities were well carved and story integrated. the story was people telling detectives about a person. the detectives wonder what the person was really like. the person ended up being a kind of mixture of what everyone said. the ending was lame, but they brought me all the way there and i wasn't mad.

The Trial (1962)

i've seen it on dvd, seen it in the theater, watched it again anyway. the beginning is killer and the part with the disabled lady dragging the trunk through the lot in front of the sprawling apartment complex in the night with city lights showering the scene. those are my current lasting favorite scenes, although it's Welles, Kafka, and Perkins, so (spoiler) i'll keep returning to this movie.

Daddy Longlegs (2009)

the director of Frownland is the lead and Abel Ferrara has a side part. this is the Safdie brothers. i was able to correct my problem of not having seen this movie. more than glad i watched it.


Losing Ground (1982)

i enjoyed this movie very much, agree with it being placed in the company of excellent movies. it's an 80s indie that's the second movie ever written/directed by a black female, the movie is about black intellectuals, and some of the acting is bad sometimes, based on the script and actors, like many indies, but the pulse of the movie is sublime, like the indies worth watching.




Escape from Dartmoor (1929) [A Cottage on Dartmoor]

Anthony Asquith, the director of The Woman in Question. this movie is amazing. amazing. this and The Crowd are my favorites so far, confirming my opinion that this time period slays. the barbershop scene in this movie—slays. it's a highly cinematic movie but some parts of the beginning bored me in that silent movie way that's so dangerous, but from the barber scene to the end this movie slays. love-blood gushes. the criterion opening says Asquith made a great movie because he was interested in great movies, so him and Hitchcock are the two early examples of Britain doing a great job of making movies.

The Man Who Knew Too Much (1934)

so i went back to early Hitchcock, to compare. i could've watched The Lodger for a more direction comparison. i forgot to mention that in Escape from Dartmoor the protagonist was very anxious, it was clear from the beginning. Hitchcock is all about waiting to show. making the audience wait. but this movie is a lot of fun, you know. the cult. the shoot out. it was a well built movie but i've seen better Lorre movies and better Hitchcock movies (M and Psycho). is the remake better? i forget. i don't think it is, i think they're the same. i think Hitchcock has been around better characters.

Taipei Story (1985)

Hou Hsiao-Hsien is a lead in an Edward Yang movie. i was in from the beginning, sure. this movie is about depressing shit. it feels like real people living real depressing lives. Hsiao-Hsien thought he'd play professional baseball but now he can't and he feels fucked. in a bleak way. just, all the time: fucked. that's the bleak way. this is the type of style used in Suntan in a more futuristic context, with this style already laid out—here's when this style was being laid out. this is post-Antonioni stuff my friends, this is Anotioni fused with Italian neorealism, is what it is, when i say it like that.

Cameraperson (2016)

i woke in the morning and watched this, which for some reason has been a good idea through my life, waking in the morning and watching certain documentaries (Hoop Dreams, Sans soleil). it just feels right. i was in the right mood and it felt like the proper temporal environment for learning of other people and places, which this movie excels in portraying.


How to Get Ahead in Advertising (1989)

Richard Grant, Withnail, you know. seeing him do some things was really impressive, parts involving running around and putting cardboard on his head. he was the everything of this movie, except for two animated birds at one point. i really liked his table manners comeback when he was being called irrational. he didn't like how she said it.


Greed (1924) [4hr cut]

i watched the first fifteen minutes, which were full of still photos. the 2hrs of the movie that was saved are within the 4 hrs? i would've done 4hrs for a fractured cinematic narrative but not for an imaginary one. i checked later moments and saw segments of glorious cinema—all the film saved is glorious—but i saw more still shots and i just couldn't give 4hr of my life to this enterprise. i watched the final ten minutes. i like how this was the first movie shot entirely on locations. i wish i could see this entire movie as a movie, however bad it became. but i gave up on this 4hr version with its still photos.

Set Me Free (1999)

a central question to coming of age movies is why in the hell one would want to fit in this damn world that's so full of shit. that's why i like them. movies of one's past are prime spots for lush textures, just always. these are melodramas that happen as one is a teen, we all know it's real, i like all the movies about this, this is a good one. the lead is shown watching, admiring, and imitating Vivre sa vie (which featured The Passion of Joan of Arc).

The Big Animal (2000)

Kiewslowki is a credited writer and this seemed like a better idea than watching that Tom Tykwer movie (which isn't on Filmstruck anyway). this movie should be in color is a problem. i expected the type of humor it provided. this humor is common over the ocean and only done in america by Jarmusch? it might be true that all the best dry humor comes from over the ocean. i forget if that's true or not, it doesn't really matter. these movies calm me. a straight face amid hysteria calms me.

Desert Hearts (1985)

what, okay. what a fucking tone. there's an emotional tone that elevates this far above just some movie. this movie is a feeling, many feelings, and more. well done.

The Browning Version (1951)

at the movie's end he just accepts that his life sucked but it already happened? perhaps the bleakest of the movies i watched. but still with its strength. art always has strength. it's art. you know. this was the third Anthony Asquith movie i watched, and i might've seen this one before, i think so, but i'm not sure.

The Only Son (1936)

garbage incinerator smokestacks in the background, the son asks his mother if she's disappointed in him. he wonders upon whether he should have ever left the country, if being in Tokyo was worth his mother's hard work. Ozu does this casually, of course. the mother's later reply to her son's fears of feeling like being just part of The Crowd—what a tremendous mother, a tremendous scene! there's a part where the son takes his mother to an art house movie and she falls asleep while he loves it. always with Ozu i expect a good movie, and somehow he always exceeds my expectations. this was his first full talkie. i do not quite know if cinematic expression of human life has ever found a better form than Ozu.

ono

These synopses intrigue, and really make me want to get it.  But still, no PS4 app.  Don't feel like shelling out for yet another device to get it, but maybe I'll crack over the holidays.  Thanks for putting all that together!

wilder

Quote from: jenkins on November 16, 2017, 01:02:17 PMDesert Hearts (1985)

what, okay. what a fucking tone. there's an emotional tone that elevates this far above just some movie. this movie is a feeling, many feelings, and more. well done.

I watched this last night. Great undiscovered gem I never would have heard about if Criterion hadn't resurrected it. There was something familiar about the cinematography from the very first frame and, sure enough, shot by Robert Elswit. I know PT referenced Waterland as the film that made him notice Elswit's DP work, but you can really see the similarities, here. Even if the subject matter doesn't sound like it'll light you on fire I recommend it just for that.



Quote from: jenkins on November 16, 2017, 01:02:17 PMThe Woman in Question (1950) [Five Angles on Murder]

same year as Rashomon, same type of narrative involving one story told from five perspectives. another British movie. how is its cinema? legit. but I was most gripped by the words and i thought of the movie like a radio show. distinct personalities were well carved and story integrated. the story was people telling detectives about a person. the detectives wonder what the person was really like. the person ended up being a kind of mixture of what everyone said. the ending was lame, but they brought me all the way there and i wasn't mad.

I've been wanting to see The Woman in Question for years, now, but when I first made note of it there was no way to watch. Cool to know it's up there. Those screencaps you included from the other Asquith make me excited for that, too.

An aside: We're in such a weird moment for cinephiles. In some ways it's never been better in terms of film availability and the quality of the copies available, and on the other hand I don't think it's ever been more expensive to have access to this stuff (legally). During the past couple years, boutique labels have started to deep dive into catalog titles that never had quality releases before, and so many movies that used to be legendarily obscure or only available in subpar tv rips or bootleg copies are getting the royal treatment and restorations (examples being lots of the stuff coming from Film Movement, or Arrow, or Cinelicious, etc.). But most of it ya gotta buy outright instead of rent. Anyway, Filmstruck is awesome.

jenkins

Monsieur Hulot's Holiday (1953)

i had sold my dvd, expecting to purchase the blu-ray which i haven't. it's just a marvelous movie. its currents, i admire its currents.

Smithereens (1982)

this with Variety mean maybe women made the best cinematic depictions of a certain New York City. i appreciate the philosophical through line of the Smithereens narrative. it makes certain remarks about being a certain type of person. how people help and hurt each other.







The Decline of Western Civilization Part III (1998)

this one shook me up. i had seen the 2nd, the 1st one i'll watch next, but this is the one that shook me up. in my past i've been critical of the gutter punks, but sure enough now i understand them far better. i relate to not wanting to be in this world. i relate to rejecting a world that rejects you. i relate to what's bottled up inside these people. and how well they expressed themselves for this movie. watching this affected my emotions in a big way.

The Decline of Western Civilization (1981)

the 2nd i saw at LACMA with a Penelope Spheeris Q&A, i saw it first, about three years ago. i was moved by the 3rd enough that i touched back to the 1st. the 1st is perhaps as good as the 2nd. it's a straight shot of these musicians. Darby Crash before he suicided. Ron Reyes as lead singer of Black Flag. but neither the 1st nor 2nd express as rich and deep a philosophy as the 3rd, but the 3rd was only possible because of this 1st one.


El Sur (1983)

it's beyond next level. every way in which i could think to compliment movie is a way in which i would describe this movie. i'll quote filmstruck real quick
QuoteVictor Erice received widespread praise for his 1973 film Spirit of the Beehive, which told of post-civil war Spain through the eyes of children. But those who have seen El Sur (1983) -- which didn't get nearly as much exposure, owing to money problems and disagreements with the producer -- usually say that it is the greater movie. It tale of a girl in a northern Spanish village and her fantasies about a mystical and wonderful place in "the south" resounds with echoes of a nation finding its way in the wake of four decades of fascist rule.
because i don't know what to say to describe how good this movie is.



Bienvenido Mister Marshall (1953)

that's the narrator being quoted in the above screencaps. the narrator is tied as my favorite character in this movie, along with every other character in this movie. Luis García Berlanga. i'd seen (own) The Executioner, previously filmstruck Placido. he's Altman-good at taking people and discovering movies. his movies feel like life, which is such a wonderful way for a movie to feel.

jenkins



Keisuke Kinoshita, belle of the ball



movies of his i watched, in the order i watched them: Carmen Comes Home (51), Father (88), The Snow Flurry (59), Farewell to Dream (56), Farewell to Spring (59), Thus Another Day (59), The Rose on His Arm (56)



three movies from 1959, and they were all so depressing, but realistic. and great. he was a writer/director. he wrote and directed all three. imagine having a prolific year of feeling depressed! what i adore about his narratives is how they don't have happy endings. one just keeps going. life is more than a badluck story. life is tomorrow. amid grim reality. i was a big fan of this guy.



his letterboxd bio
QuoteAlthough lesser known internationally than his fellow filmmakers such as Akira Kurosawa, Kenji Mizoguchi and Yasujirō Ozu, Keisuke Kinoshita was nonetheless a household figure at home beloved by audience and critics alike, especially in the forties through the sixties. He was also prolific, turning out some 42 films in the first 23 years of his career. For this, Kinoshita explained, "can't help it. Ideas for films have always just popped into my head like scraps of paper into a wastebasket."



stuck being yourself, pros/cons. mainly cons, for most people. The Snow Flurry is a story about the son of a woman who failed her double suicide with the boy's father. and the music is perfect. he's not about cinema, he's about people, he just happens to be great with cinema too. i didn't regret watching any of his movies and in my future may it be that i'll watch more (there are a lot of them available).

Killers on Parade (61) [My Face Red in the Sunset]

this is Masahiro Shinoda, director of Double Suicide, which is a major great art house movie. Killers on Parade is more pop. it's about celebrating being a criminal except there was a movie positive twist ending. so much technique here. so much style. way more style than American and Italian crime genre movies of that time?

A Street of Love and Hope (59) [A Town of Love and Hope]

the first from Nagisa Ôshima, and it's a compassionate human story. i cherished it. a boy sells pigeons which return home after purchased, pros/cons, life=hard, trying his best/trying to figure things out. this movie felt consumed by life, which is my favorite feeling.

Japanese Summer: Double Suicide (67)

this is a different japanese movie titled Double Suicide. i'm impressed by how he's able to compose these characters in this situation. Ôshima again, this was released by eclipse i don't own it. it's maybe better than american sci-fi movies of that time?

La main du diable (1943) [Carnival of Sinners]

this is Judex-good at composing an elegant fantasy narrative. the french, you know, this type of movie is how they get their reputation.



Adventures of a Dentist (65) [Pokhozhdeniya zubnogo vracha]

same director as Welcome, or No Trespassing, he also directed Come and See, earlier i called his style European, Slav might be more accurate, perhaps simply Russian. i don't have much to say about this movie because it didn't quite capture me and i've recently watched better, including from the same director. yet this still had some rippers.

Eating Raoul (82)

another movie i once owned on dvd. i just had to watch this, one of my favorite Los Angeles movies.

The Milky Way (36)

Leo McCarey's father died while he directed this, then he directed Make Way for Tomorrow (and then The Awful Truth). this is the least of those three movies. it's a Harold Lloyd talkie. at the beginning i was full in, i was smiling with the dialogue, but the final 2/3rds play the ridiculous as ridiculous, and Harold Lloyd has such a thin character. just not much, better things ahead.

Cremator (69)

like if Orson Welles had been Slavic. i think this is proper Slavic. the narrative is dense, real dense. the lead is like Orson Welles mutated with Peter Lorre.

i went into the help center to make sure they knew i wouldn't want to subscribe, some days and movies having passed since my voucher ended. now, for what reason i was able to continue watching movies i'm not sure, but i'll tell you i could've kept playing along, and imagine that, an unspoken free account, but there was the day of reckoning i figured, andbut really if i kept filmstruck i'd just keep watching movies. i knowingly sabotaged the continuation of days with the service after the voucher ended, owing to how many movies i still wanted to watch and would keep watching, there were 89 in my wishlist, including Burden of Life, One Way Ticket to Love, Everything Goes Wrong, The Stunt Man, Nine Days of One Year, A Kid for Two Farthings, etc. 89. i had started without finishing La Poison and St. Martin's Lane. lots of possibilities, too many possibilities for me i figured.

Filmstruck is more than solid, bare minimum.

ono

Quote from: jenkins on November 16, 2017, 01:02:17 PM
when i went into filmstruck with my 30 day voucher
How did you get a voucher?

Filmstruck now is running a promotion where you buy a year membership for $99 and get a free Roku Express.  Seems like a good deal.  I may check it out.  I'd been holding out because no PS4 support (still!).  This may make it a moot point.

jenkins

they offered me the voucher some time after i did the 14 days!

ono

This page makes me :)

I ordered the gift the other day.  $99 for a year plus free Roku Express.  Excited for it to get here.  Between that and MoviePass, 2018 is gonna be fun for me, movie-wise.

Sleepless

So are all Criterion releases available on Filmstruck, even most recent DVD releases? There's no way to search on their site unless you start a trial.
He held on. The dolphin and all the rest of its pod turned and swam out to sea, and still he held on. This is it, he thought. Then he remembered that they were air-breathers too. It was going to be all right.

ono

No, it rotates.  Ask, and I'll look one up for you.  Or use JustWatch.

jenkins

ono yeah, JustWatch yeah. and you can search FilmStruck before signing up, here's the link

WorldForgot

They have POISON by Todd Haynes in the Horror Section but not Science Fiction?

Interesting and sad

Sleepless

Quote from: jenkins on January 17, 2018, 06:36:08 PM
ono yeah, JustWatch yeah. and you can search FilmStruck before signing up, here's the link

that's the link I needed, thanks. Was immediately interested in The Lure and Personal Shopper. 1/2 are on right now.
He held on. The dolphin and all the rest of its pod turned and swam out to sea, and still he held on. This is it, he thought. Then he remembered that they were air-breathers too. It was going to be all right.