tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329706.post4745168379687073322..comments2024-03-21T12:51:21.667-04:00Comments on Whisky Prajer: What four films define you? (No, really)dpreimerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09905531259256800022noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329706.post-91087984148585886802018-05-01T07:15:03.913-04:002018-05-01T07:15:03.913-04:00Mm. Bit of a digression, so bear with me: audience...Mm. Bit of a digression, so bear with me: audience/singular to audience/collective gets me reflecting again on <a href="https://whiskyprajer.blogspot.ca/2006/11/come-back-toby-tyler.html" rel="nofollow">Toby Tyler</a>. It bothers me somewhat that in my case the audience/singular hasn't changed much over the years -- some part of me still wants to ride in to the town of my birth and impress with a few stunts on the horse. Now I'm wondering if/how the culture of the audience/collective has changed around me.Whisky Prajerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14076228013022881173noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329706.post-89279549629609740812018-04-29T16:53:08.452-04:002018-04-29T16:53:08.452-04:00Yeah, I expect that’s true — though I’d probably d...Yeah, I expect that’s true — though I’d probably do better to comment after having seen it again. Today the surprise might well be that I was taken by surprise at all, then, 25 or 30 years ago. But it can be difficult to assess change in oneself as an audience separately from change undergone by ‘audience’ on a cultural-wide level, obviously.pdbhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11456119076535946138noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329706.post-26764072536546363292018-04-29T05:43:12.871-04:002018-04-29T05:43:12.871-04:00Cool. If that scene registered with you as a youth...Cool. If that scene registered with you as a youth, you can be pretty sure it drew gasps back in the day. I have to wonder what it would take to be similarly surprised today.Whisky Prajerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14076228013022881173noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329706.post-70948062934917096632018-04-28T17:41:23.603-04:002018-04-28T17:41:23.603-04:00Not so much an answer as a nod. Apologies!Not so much an answer as a <a href="https://pdbowman.studio/quareidfaciam/river" rel="nofollow">nod</a>. Apologies!pdbhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11456119076535946138noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329706.post-86531600669818726472018-04-25T06:30:54.279-04:002018-04-25T06:30:54.279-04:00Oh man, those are all great choices. And I hate to...Oh man, those are all great choices. And I hate to say it, but I have only seen the Big Four on small(ish) screen. Don't know why <i>The Thing</i> slipped under my radar -- I was (I thought) a big John Carpenter fan. Saw <i>Halloween, Escape From New York, Big Trouble In Little China, They Live</i> ... but never bought a ticket for <i>The Thing</i>.<br /><br />I get a bit stuck on the "Define" element. <i>Why Should The Devil</i> is not a film I need to dust off once a year -- heck, I'd rather watch <i>The Filth & The Fury</i> or <i>End Of The Century</i> for the umpteenth time. But <i>Why</i> is where I come from, while <i>Filth</i> is where I'm happier residing, currently.<br /><br />Hm. I'm recalling seeing <i>To Live & Die In LA</i> when it was in theatres, and having my cage completely rattled by the rape scene, the principal's death, and the conclusion: "You're working for me now." Kinda want to include it in this list now.Whisky Prajerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14076228013022881173noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6329706.post-78376138107721920122018-04-24T09:56:59.936-04:002018-04-24T09:56:59.936-04:00My four are:
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid -...<br />My four are:<br /><br />Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid - I remember as a kid all the adults talking about this one. This was the first movie I got to see with adult concepts in it. It is still one of the better film narratives I've ever seen. George Roy Hill was a master at his craft. I think he used enough dynamite. "Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head" still plays on the mental jukebox regularly. <br /><br />Silent Running - I first saw a documentary on how they made the robots using amputees walking on their hands, creating my first "must see" movie. (Robots have been an obsession of mine prior to my forming a memory of why, though perhaps "Lost in Space" was the culprit.) It was full of brand-new concepts like ecology, fighting for things you believe in, and the stunning evil of indifference displayed by the inhuman acts corporations can commit. <br /><br />Andromeda Strain - Few movies get their geek on like this one. I watched this a couple times without seeing the beginning, because the lab scenes are so entrancing, every time I flipped past it on the dial, I'd go back and watch to the end. I'm a sucker for this format; you put a bunch of super smart scientists snarking at each other over a boggle, and I'm there. I found the concept that alien life might simply be toxic to us interesting and how much thought had been put into such an encounter by the (fictional) scientific community. The simulations of the a-strain killing things always gave me a nasty thrill, too. (First watch, turned to mom, "Did the monkey die?!?")<br /><br />John Carpenter's The Thing - Dean Koontz has always maintained you should start a story as far into the action as you can. This movie is the poster child for this, as we open with someone in a helicopter shooting at a doggie. Oh noes. Then it wraps some gooey tentacles around you and leaves you shivering in the snow. What a ride. What a mind-f^ck. I am compelled to watch this every few months or so. <br /><br />Here were the others in contention I listed in order to pick the final 4, in no order whatsoever:<br />Star Wars<br />Robocop<br />Blue Velvet<br />Westworld <br />Altered States<br />Wizards<br />One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest<br />Brazil<br />Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind<br />Harold and Maude<br />Gravity (I still find myself holding my breath at times during this)<br />The Elephant Man<br />The Right Stuff ("Gordo, I have to urinate.")<br />Galaxy Quest<br />All That Jazz<br />Demolition Man ("Mellow Greetings. What seems to be your boggle?") <br />Close Encounters of the Third Kind<br />Young Frankenstein<br />Planet of the Apes<br />The Goodbye Girl<br />Rear Window (the only one made before I was born) <br /><br />While this list might come off as just a list of favorites, they were/are all films that infused themselves into my soul. Left a mark, say. Thereafter, I was different somehow. Yahmdallahnoreply@blogger.com