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Peter Greenaway

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Film Student

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on: January 24, 2003, 11:53:51 AM
I've recently gotten into Greenaway, and I'm really surprised he's not more recognized... he reminds of Kubrick in the way he blends personal quirks and eccentricities with universal truths...  The Draughtsman's Contract has got to be one of the best movies I've ever seen, and A Zed and Two Noughts is great too.  The Cook, the thief his wife and her lover is really fucked up but a beautiful film none the less.
"I think you have to be careful to not become a blowhard."
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Cecil

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Reply #1 on: January 24, 2003, 12:21:07 PM
have you seen 8 1/2 women?

Film Student

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Reply #2 on: January 24, 2003, 05:12:38 PM
No i haven't... I heard it was kinda terrible... I've seen The Falls though  :roll:
"I think you have to be careful to not become a blowhard."
                                                                           --Ann Coulter

Cecil

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Reply #3 on: January 24, 2003, 06:46:40 PM
yeah it wasnt that good.

budgie

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Reply #4 on: February 02, 2003, 10:56:12 AM
I always disliked Peter Greenaway, apart from The Cook, which I love. Why 'fucked up', Film Student? I always thought it was his most accessible.

Belly of an Architect I enjoyed also, but Prospero's Books I couldn't stand. It is about time for a rediscovery, I would have thought. The one I still want to see is The Pillow Book, not least for Ewan MacGregor's nakedness.  :oops:

Great Michael Nyman scores though. And the illustrated scripts, if you can get them still, are beautiful.

Ghostboy

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Reply #5 on: February 02, 2003, 12:51:10 PM
I haven't seen as many as I should have, but The Pillow Book is just gorgeous. The Cook, The Thief....is a greater film, but I never had the benefit of seeing it on the big screen (or on DVD, for that matter).

godardian

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Reply #6 on: May 12, 2003, 05:01:11 PM
Quote from: Ghostboy
I haven't seen as many as I should have, but The Pillow Book is just gorgeous. The Cook, The Thief....is a greater film, but I never had the benefit of seeing it on the big screen (or on DVD, for that matter).


Oh, that's a must-have DVD. I have that, Zed and Two Noughts, and fully intend to get Draughtsman's Contract very soon.

My interest sort of fell off after Pillow Book, though I'll still go see anything new he puts out.

His new one apparently has Sting, Molly Ringwald, Franka Potente, Vincent Gallo, and many, many more (originally was even going to have Madonna).

http://us.imdb.com/Title?0307596
""Money doesn't come into it. It never has. I do what I do because it's all that I am." - Morrissey

"Lacan stressed more and more in his work the power and organizing principle of the symbolic, understood as the networks, social, cultural, and linguistic, into which a child is born. These precede the birth of a child, which is why Lacan can say that language is there from before the actual moment of birth. It is there in the social structures which are at play in the family and, of course, in the ideals, goals, and histories of the parents. This world of language can hardly be grasped by the newborn and yet it will act on the whole of the child's existence."

Stay informed on protecting your freedom of speech and civil rights.

Mesh

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Reply #7 on: May 16, 2003, 04:21:38 PM
Quote from: godardian

Oh, that's a must-have DVD. I have that, Zed and Two Noughts, and fully intend to get Draughtsman's Contract very soon.

His new one apparently has Sting, Molly Ringwald, Franka Potente, Vincent Gallo, and many, many more (originally was even going to have Madonna).

http://us.imdb.com/Title?0307596


Those are the two Greenaway DVDs I have, too.  Got Prospero's Books on VHS for $1.

I liked 8 1/2 Women, apparently more than most.

ono

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Reply #8 on: May 27, 2003, 11:14:22 AM
A Zed and Two Noughts is one of the most perfect film titles ever.  I haven't had a chance to see it, though, but I am intrigued by the premises of all his films, and want to see more when I can.  However, The Cook, the Thief, his Wife, and Her Lover was one of the WORST movies I've ever seen.  Not only was it senselessly disgusting and over the top, there were no likable characters (not saying all characters in good films have to be likable, but in this film that would've helped things greatly), and you couldn't understand a fucking thing the Thief said.  It would have been a better play, come to think of it, but you'd have to get an actor who didn't mumble all the time, or have food in his mouth (yeah, yeah, I know, it's a "personality feature" but really, when it detracts that much from understanding what the character is saying, it doesn't help his character at all).  And the ENDING.  Ugh!  What the hell kind of ending was that?

*SPOILER*
The Thief kills the Lover by having his goons force feed him pages from a book with a spindle.  The Wife then has the Cook COOK her Lover, offers him to the Thief at gunpoint, forces the Thief to eat him, and then shoots him dead.  I mean, what the FUCK?!
*END SPOILER*

On the positive side, I did LOVE that bathroom.  It was a beautiful piecee of work.  And, the kitchen wasn't half bad, either -- that's what other reviewers have pointed out about that movie, though I think the bathroom is more splendid.

Speaking of perverted foreign directors, Catherine Breillat, anyone?

polkablues

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Reply #9 on: May 28, 2003, 01:59:32 PM
Anyone else seen "Drowning By Numbers"?  That's probably my favorite.  And how can anyone not like "Prospero's Books"?  Granted, it's impossible to follow, but as far as being something to look at for two hours, it's hard to beat.
That's some catch, that Catch-22.

Mesh

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Reply #10 on: May 28, 2003, 02:30:28 PM
Quote from: polkablues
Anyone else seen "Drowning By Numbers"?  That's probably my favorite.


Long ago.  I remember liking it, but being sorta fed up with Greenaway at that point—I'd seen 'em all in a one-year period.

My VHS copy hasn't been played yet....

godardian

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Reply #11 on: May 28, 2003, 03:06:01 PM
Quote from: polkablues
Anyone else seen "Drowning By Numbers"?  That's probably my favorite.  And how can anyone not like "Prospero's Books"?  Granted, it's impossible to follow, but as far as being something to look at for two hours, it's hard to beat.


I liked Drowning by Numbers quite a bit, esp. the soundtrack. Haven't seen Prospero's Books; am waiting for widescreen DVD.
""Money doesn't come into it. It never has. I do what I do because it's all that I am." - Morrissey

"Lacan stressed more and more in his work the power and organizing principle of the symbolic, understood as the networks, social, cultural, and linguistic, into which a child is born. These precede the birth of a child, which is why Lacan can say that language is there from before the actual moment of birth. It is there in the social structures which are at play in the family and, of course, in the ideals, goals, and histories of the parents. This world of language can hardly be grasped by the newborn and yet it will act on the whole of the child's existence."

Stay informed on protecting your freedom of speech and civil rights.

godardian

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Reply #12 on: May 28, 2003, 03:13:09 PM
Quote from: Onomatopoeia
A Zed and Two Noughts is one of the most perfect film titles ever.  I haven't had a chance to see it, though, but I am intrigued by the premises of all his films, and want to see more when I can.  However, The Cook, the Thief, his Wife, and Her Lover was one of the WORST movies I've ever seen.  Not only was it senselessly disgusting and over the top, there were no likable characters (not saying all characters in good films have to be likable, but in this film that would've helped things greatly), and you couldn't understand a fucking thing the Thief said.  It would have been a better play, come to think of it, but you'd have to get an actor who didn't mumble all the time, or have food in his mouth (yeah, yeah, I know, it's a "personality feature" but really, when it detracts that much from understanding what the character is saying, it doesn't help his character at all).  And the ENDING.  Ugh!  What the hell kind of ending was that?

*SPOILER*
The Thief kills the Lover by having his goons force feed him pages from a book with a spindle.  The Wife then has the Cook COOK her Lover, offers him to the Thief at gunpoint, forces the Thief to eat him, and then shoots him dead.  I mean, what the FUCK?!
*END SPOILER*

On the positive side, I did LOVE that bathroom.  It was a beautiful piecee of work.  And, the kitchen wasn't half bad, either -- that's what other reviewers have pointed out about that movie, though I think the bathroom is more splendid.

Speaking of perverted foreign directors, Catherine Breillat, anyone?


I think the word "perverted," in this case, is sort of like the word "weird," i.e. too subjective to mean anything. Just beacuse Breillat depicts things that to some prudish minds might seem "perverted," does that make her or her work "perverted"? I think it's a moot discussion, really.

That aside, I loved Fat Girl and would be interested to see anything else Breillat puts out.

I think you entirely missed the point of Cook. Even if you don't see the film as a wonderful, wicked sucker-punch of an allegorical satire of England under Thatcher (as I have come to do, and it gives me shivers of pleasure every time Mirren says "cannibal" when I think of it this way), the whole thing still works exceptionally well on its own terms. It's an outsized, engorged fairy tale and morality play. I thought The Wife and The Lover were quite likable. It cannot in any way be enjoyed by a literal mind looking for conventional narrative/plot or standard "likability," however. But neither can many of the greatest films.

And I understand the Thief perfectly. He wasn't mumbling; that's called a Cockney accent. If worse comes to worse, I think the DVD might have subtitles...
""Money doesn't come into it. It never has. I do what I do because it's all that I am." - Morrissey

"Lacan stressed more and more in his work the power and organizing principle of the symbolic, understood as the networks, social, cultural, and linguistic, into which a child is born. These precede the birth of a child, which is why Lacan can say that language is there from before the actual moment of birth. It is there in the social structures which are at play in the family and, of course, in the ideals, goals, and histories of the parents. This world of language can hardly be grasped by the newborn and yet it will act on the whole of the child's existence."

Stay informed on protecting your freedom of speech and civil rights.

Mesh

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Reply #13 on: May 28, 2003, 03:38:14 PM
Quote from: godardian

I think you entirely missed the point of Cook. Even if you don't see the film as a wonderful, wicked sucker-punch of an allegorical satire of England under Thatcher (as I have come to do, and it gives me shivers of pleasure every time Mirren says "cannibal" when I think of it this way)....


Refresh my memory on how this angle shakes out.  I first viewed TCTTHWAHL as part of a college course in Thatcherite British cinema, but I can't remember how the allegory lines up....

godardian

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Reply #14 on: May 28, 2003, 03:50:30 PM
Quote from: Mesh
Quote from: godardian

I think you entirely missed the point of Cook. Even if you don't see the film as a wonderful, wicked sucker-punch of an allegorical satire of England under Thatcher (as I have come to do, and it gives me shivers of pleasure every time Mirren says "cannibal" when I think of it this way)....


Refresh my memory on how this angle shakes out.  I first viewed TCTTHWAHL as part of a college course in Thatcherite British cinema, but I can't remember how the allegory lines up....


To me, it's actually very, very simple and direct: The Thief is Thatcher and his cronies are Thatcherites; Thatcher was a socioeconomic "cannibal" by almost anyone's standard, a terrorist vulgarian with an agenda to basically take everything away from the English working classes and restore the positively brutal classist social "order."

Everyone else is The English People.
""Money doesn't come into it. It never has. I do what I do because it's all that I am." - Morrissey

"Lacan stressed more and more in his work the power and organizing principle of the symbolic, understood as the networks, social, cultural, and linguistic, into which a child is born. These precede the birth of a child, which is why Lacan can say that language is there from before the actual moment of birth. It is there in the social structures which are at play in the family and, of course, in the ideals, goals, and histories of the parents. This world of language can hardly be grasped by the newborn and yet it will act on the whole of the child's existence."

Stay informed on protecting your freedom of speech and civil rights.

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