Sometimes there just isn't anything to say and THE PASSION OF JOAN OF ARC (62)

I've been back from SF for one day and in that time I've sat in front of a multitude of computers, scrambling to put together a magazine. Aside from that I've done almost nothing of interest. Beers have been consumed, enchiladas devoured, bits and pieces of movies about fanatical French lesbians have been viewed. But in truth, I've done nothing that warrants the opening slot on this here website.

As per usual, I'm unable to not write anything in this opening slot though, so you've been subjected to a bland retelling of a fairly mundane 24 hours of my life. I have a pile of "sucker" name tags in the corner, if you'd just put one on ... yeah, that looks great.

The Passion of Joan of Arc (62) has an amazing back story. For years and years and years no
body could find a complete print of Carl Th. Dreyer's supposed masterpiece. There was scraps and reels that had been pieced together, but strangely the original copy, the full goddamn ball of wax was lost to the world ... until 1981, when the film was found in a janitorial closet in a mental institution in Oslo, Norway. A JANITOR'S CLOSET! That's absolutely amazing. Why was this landmark of cinema, lost to the ages, just sitting between buckets and brooms in a loony bin in Norway? No one knows, and sadly, no one ever will as Carl Th. Dreyer died almost fifty years before it's discovery.

That said, this film could be called "The Passion of Renee Falconetti's Face" as with out the tight close-ups of her boyish mug, this film would be six minutes long. I'm actually really enjoying this film, there's a real sense of foreboding religious oppression in the film that Dreyer manages to evoke through the wonderfully characteristic faces of the clergy. I don't know what happened to Ms. Falconetti after this picture, but I hope it was something amazing, as her portrayal of a 19-year old, tom boy, religious warrior is pretty brilliant. There is a wide-eyed, vacant stare Ms. Falconetti is able to pull out at any moment that often times has me wondering whether or not they just wrenched the actress from Senior Lunch at Ye Olde Nut House. Aside from that the woman can cry seemingly at the drop of a hat. This movie is called The Passion of Joan of Arc (62) and lord almighty is there a lot of tearful passion in the film. Every scene is pretty much a barrage of questions aimed at Joan of Arc that end up with her stoically sobbing in front of the camera. And you know, I think most people, with any love of old cinema, would actually enjoy this film. I'm shocked that I do.

I'm 22-minutes from Joan's eventual burning at the stake, so, if things go right, we should be able to wrap this up tomorrow.

Thursday: The Passion of Joan of Arc (62)

Pretend parenting and THE PASSION OF JOAN OF ARC (62)

For circumstances outside of my control, I spent the last three days of my life with Alex taking care of a two year old Guatemalan child through all the ins and outs of the day. This wasn't just wake up in the morning and head on over to a house where you spend the day drinking coffee, and letting the kid roll around in the dirt. Oh no. This was 24-hour care - diaper changing, food getting, snot-wiping, tear-blotting and everything else a nearly two-year old can manage.

What we ended up referring to as "Noah's Ark" contained these things: two lofts (both startling luxurious), two cars (including a behemoth of an truck that made me feel a bit like I was drop kicking the environment in the crotch), a dog named No-Pants, a bird named Thunder (that bit me and then flew in to a wall, furthering my belief that pet birds are worthless), and at one point two children (the aforementioned Guatemalan and the smartest three-year old you've ever laid eyes upon). As you might well think, I've derived a few thoughts about child-care and such, and, well, I'd like to share them with you:

- I can't believe that people do this for 18 years. I spent three days as the coach of the B-team (this meaning I was only there to dance like a muppet and occasionally pick a child up by his feet) and I'm exhausted. Hell, I didn't change diapers or prepare food or bath any snot-covered children and could lay my head down right now and sleep for days.

- To paraphrase JM, kids are great, they really are - bundles of energy and excitement that as we get older we can only wish we could muster. But Jesus, after spending 72 hours with one, a little quiet time where you aren't worrying what they're putting in their mouth, or what steep incline they're running down, or what that smell emanating from their trousers might be, is a sort of serene sublimity only those who take care of kids can enjoy.

- It is amazing how much liquid can flow from a two years old face. It doesn't matter what type of industrial strength face cleaner you're using, these children, sick or not sick, acquire a layer of filth over their entire dome piece, unimaginable. Weirdly enough, after a couple hours of spending time with Marco (my Guatemalan pretend-child) the crust of goo encapsulating his face was more endearing than disgusting and maybe that's just what being a parent is.

- I thought taking care of one child was difficult, but we threw a second kid in to the mix on Monday morning and my head nearly burst. Somewhere near noon I found myself sprawled on a rock, completely drained from hours of sprinkler avoidance and wounded children and the long march of tears and laughter that is every move from car to destination, completely in awe of every parental unit that is able to do this on a continuing daily basis.

- The Backyardagains is one of the most abysmal television shows currently being produced. That said, the sort of comatose state it puts children in certainly allows for a modicum of rest unknown through out the rest of the weekend.

- I do not envy those that have to make the parental journey on their own. I can't speak for Alex, but I'm pretty sure that with out our combined powers, this weekend would've been some sort of hell. I'm not placing any judgment on the hard path of single parents in this world, I'm just saying that I can't imagine taking care of one kid for a mere three days without someone I truly enjoyed by my side. Hats off to those who do though.

So, exhausting weekend in San Francisco taking care of children - anyone else do anything weird?

As I've said before I was not even a bit excited to slog through The Passion of Joan of Arc (62) and I think my incredibly low expectations for this nearly two hour silent film made in the late 1920s actually benefited my viewing of the film. Carl Th. Dreyer, a director whom, sadly, pops up good few more times in this here collection, creates a film that doesn't capture the adventure or the excitement of the more action-oriented Joan of Arc, but rather showcases her final trial, and the, well, passion that this soon-to-be saint carried with her at all times. Joan of Arc (Renee Falconetti) is captured almost entirely in restricted close-ups and Falconetti manages to exude the sort of fervored, probably lunatic emotional state this God-driven martyr lived out her final days in. There's something almost early-90s experimental about the way Dreyers film sucks up the tones of Falconetti, and the slew of skeevy religious figures' faces, almost as if you were watching a slideshow of Richard Avedon's black and white work.

Honestly, I'm not terribly excited by the film, but if anything, I'm interested, I'm captivated, I'm not yearning for it to stutter-stop to an end. The only thing which bothers me is the score the Criterion Collection decided to choose as an optional soundtrack. It's filled with operatic and choral voices and for whatever reason I feel as if it adds a layer of melodrama the film doesn't actually include. A sort of arch-emotional feeling that doesn't jive with how I view the film.

I'll get more in to fascinating history of this print and this film tomorrow after I've finished it.

Wednesday: The Passion of Joan of Arc (62)

Television bores me and MONTY PYTHON'S LIFE OF BRIAN (61)

In the past I've been known to watch, well, a lot of television. It was always with a stomach full of dullard's guilt, but I would find myself for hours at a time flipping between cooking show re-runs and whatever competitive reality show might be playing on Bravo. In the last three months or so, I've cut myself, to a large degree off the old idiot box, invested a lot more of my time in reading, writing and distracted wall-staring. Sure, you can still catch me zoned out in front of over-edited basketball highlights, but for the most part, I've given it up.

Last night my father, the most fairweather of sports fans, invited Big Secord and myself over to their house for a night of pizza and Huskies' basketball. I love my dad, and again I do enjoy basketball, so it seemed reasonable to break the boob tube ban for an evening. You know how if you don't eat food for a while your stomach shrinks? And then when you go back to try and eat your regular amount of food, your stomach has shrunk and you can only get like two bites of Cheeze Whiz and crackers before you feel all nauseous? That's what has happened to my brain in terms of television.

The game was shit sure, but twenty, twenty-five minutes in to my watching experience I found myself reaching for a magazine, more interested in the impressive amount of pizza my father was consuming (8 pieces last night, I shit you not) than the flickering images on the screen. Seriously, basketball is a sport I love to watch, but the idea of just staring at a screen for that long put me in a sort of vegetative state in the past I think I've enjoyed.

Before you start tearing me a new one about the fact that yes, this blog is about watching a television screen for extended periods of time, let me say this: the movie/televison difference is marked by the fact that a film is a time-limited finite text; television on the other hand is an endless blob, likely to suck you in to a mushy, oblivious pit.

I have never been a huge fan of Monty Python and all their assorted satires. I can't explain why, but, even being a huge, huge dork, I can't help but find that the MP films are, well, too, uh dorky. I know that many of them are renowned as satires of history and, in the case of Monty Python's Life of Brian (61), Christianity, but all I can think of is the sweat-pant wearing Magic: The Gathering card players from my days working at a comic book store, sweatily reenacting their favorite scenes. This my friends, is a disconcerting image that still haunts my dreams.

Nonetheless, Monty Python's Life of Brian (61) is an enjoyable film to watch, I just don't see at as a part of the comedic canon so many others do. The film, about a man named Brian who's born right before Jesus, has it's moments: Brian's exposure to his waiting crowd, the chase scene in the middle, and of course the whistling, sing-song, crucified ending. I've seen this film a handful of times, and I always chuckle a bit, but I just can never find it as amusing as every one else.

What's awesome about the film is that when it was released, religious groups around the world were outraged by the fact that anyone could make a comedy about, huh, Jesus. Groups all over America and the UK splattered their pants trying to get this silly comedy that features lines like, "Blessed are the cheesemakers" banned. Good job fundamentalist Christians, what a great usage of your time.

Two films in two days. Are you guys proud of me?

Monday: The Passion of Joan of Arc (62)

AUTUMN SONATA (60)

Charlotte: You do like me don't you?
Eva: You're my mother.

Autumn Sonata (60) was world famous Swedish actress Ingrid Bergman's last film. And I can entirely see why. This film, set almost entirely in a cottage on a lake somewhere in rural Sweden, is as dark, brutally honest, and painful to watch as almost any I've watched before. It's a film about what armor we build to shield ourselves from the pain too harsh to deal with. It is also a film about the emotional wreckage we are forced to explore when that armor comes crashing down.

The story revolves around Eva (Liv Ullmann) and her mother Charlotte (Ingrid Bergman) a famed concert pianist who has been absent for most of her life. After two years of nearly no communication, Charlotte comes to visit Eva and they spend an emotionally raw evening sussing out the relationship they never truly had. There is a layer of honesty, brutal, brutal honesty on display in Autumn Sonata (60) that makes this film nearly unbearable to watch. The close-up camera angles of Eva as she breaks down her mother in to the cracks and flaws she is built from, pulls us in to her emotional state, and to some degree makes us, the viewer feel as if her harsh, but honest, words are aimed at us. There were times during this film, where I had to turn away from the screen, because the emotion present there made me feel uncomfortable.

There is a character in the film, Helena (Lena Nyman) who has some sort of undefined illness. She is the crux of the emotional revelations in the film, and as more and more shells are peeled away, we realize that each and everyone of these characters is sick. Charlotte is an emotional charlatan, a fake who has left her daughter a barren shell of a woman. While Eva is nothing more than the compiled parts of her anger. Both of these women are so damaged that their eventual reckoning cannot do anything but reveal them for what they are: bits and pieces held together by the hatred for each other still lingering in their hearts. When that emotion is finally exposed, the audience is left wondering, without their pain to hold on to, can these women be anything at all?

Whomever at The Criterion Collection programmed the last few films must've been having some sort of week, 'cause holy hell, these are some films that leave scars on my brain. Seemingly, some one gave this sour fellow/lady quite a hug, as the next film up is Monty Python's Life of Brian (61) and that is anything but a downer.

Jesus, I might need a hug after that one.

Friday: Monty Python's Life of Brian (61)

Tooting my own horn.

Hah, remember when I used to watch movies and write about them on this thing? Those were the glory days.

They'll return, I promise. I just need to get my shit settled.

Until then if you're desperate for my thoughts on some sort of filmic goodness, head on over to Side One: Track One, an Austin-based blog where I've been lucky enough to been given a small amount of space to write up my, decidedly negative thoughts, on the weekly new film releases.

I have a lot of fun writing it and hope that you guys will enjoy it just as much as old Criterion Quest.

You check it out right HERE.

I'll get back in to writing about old, weird movies tomorrow.

Thursday: Autumn Sonata (60)

What's in store and what I think about it.

Exhausted, absolutely exhausted. That's what I have been over the course of the last five days and last night after a fairly marathon bout of sleeping I woke, groggy, but at least staring over the precipice of not being completely consumed by the need for sleep. Criterion films are not always the most exciting of movies. On occasion their subject matter is how may say, numbingly boring. Combine that with the fact that a lot of the films in this canon aren't bogged down with beautiful people, traditional cinematography, or the need for flashy explosions and special effects and, well, these films can be real snoozers.

Mix nap-inducing films with a very tired writer, and what you get is splashes of Ingrid Bergman's, a lot of frantic rewinding, and pretty much no film watched. It's okay though, in my scramble to try and come up with a lame excuse/idea I've actually managed to cobble together an interesting column. I'm going to preview the next four of five films I'll be writing about, give you guys a chance to maybe watch along with me, and let me get out some of my snarkier opinions on some of this high end films.

And away we go:



Film: Autumn Sonata (60)
Director: Ingmar Bergman

I know, I've supposedly "started" this film, but my collective memory so far is of a strange monologue, a beautifully cut story about death, and a mom and a daughter hugging. I've said it before, what I've seen of Bergman hasn't done much for me, but I'm curious to dig a little deeper, expose myself to one of the accepted masters of cinema. I just might need to ingest a little bit more caffeine before giving this one another go.

Film: Monty Python's The Life of Brian (61)
Director: Terry Jones

Hilarious to me that this is a Criterion film, but it is. I've seen this one a handful of times and it's my least favorite of the Monty Python features, but it's always an enjoyable, if not remarkably dorky bit of cinema. It leaves me a little accented, humming "...life's a piece of shit..." and remembering my ex-girlfriend and how she thought she was going to really enjoy this film and just hated the shit out of it.

Film: The Passion of Joan of Arc (62)
Director: Carl Th. Dreyer

This is a two-hour, silent film from the late 1920s about world famous loony martyr Joan of Arc. It's revered by cineastes but I'll be honest, I think I'll be pretty bored. TWO HOURS OF SILENCE! I mean sure their will be music, but I sat through the ultra-revered serial killer flick M (30) and I was a picture of snoozy boredom. I'm giving this film a chance, but I'm coming in with low expectations. Sorry film snobs, I'm just not a silent film type of guy.

Film: Carnival of Souls (63)
Director: Herk Harvey

A weird cult horror film about apparitions and, well, spookiness? Count me in. 1960s horror is some of my favorite and this should nicely wash the cloying taste of silence from my maw.

Film: The Third Man (64)
Director: Carol Reed

The Third Man (64) is one of the great old films of all time. It's a mystery about a disappeared friend and the secrets that bubble up to the surface when we start to dig in to the past. It's dark and weird in a proper British manner, the way only Carol Reed and his contemporaries could pull off. It also features Orson Welles, and this I promise, if Welle's name is on it, then it's worth taking a look. I've seen it, many times, and you folk should certainly share in its glory.

Final Thoughts: Not terribly excited for the next few weeks of Criterion watching. Starts out really slow but picks up by the end. I wonder if Criterion programs their line-up like that? Big names, big films and then small, more boring, ones sprinkled amongst. I'm guessing, yes.

Coffee with a dominatrix and the very slightest bit of AUTUMN SONATA (60)

In the past four days I've worked six shifts at my coffee shop, including three doubles and two 5:30 shifts. This is the most interesting event that happened in those six shifts:

Friday night the store is dead. No customers, no walk-ins - nothing. I've tried to read and write in this blank time, but I'm distracted (as is usual in these transitory days) and find myself pacing up and down behind the bar.

When she walks in I almost instantly know something is different about her. She is a big, tall woman, and I believe the proper word for her is handsome. She orders a couple of drinks and as I always do I ask her, "So, big plans for the evening? Anything exciting?"

Smiling from ear to ear she answers, "Oh yes. Quite exciting."

Curious, as always, I inquire, "What exactly are you doing tonight?"

Still smiling, "Having a foursome." I'm not a prude, or even sensitive about sex talk, but this very open, honest admission catches me off guard. I laugh (giggle?) and stutter "Wow. That does sound like quite an evening." I thank her for her honesty and go back to pretending to work.

Twenty minutes or so go past, when the woman approaches me again. "Will you look at some erotic photos that I'm entering in to the Seattle Erotic Arts Festival?" she asks. Without even a blink of an eye, "Of course."

The pictures of certainly the one of the more risque thing I've ever seen in my coffee shop. Chains are attached to scrotums; my new found friend screams in the midst of an orgasm; I'm pretty sure there is something involving a butthole and a device this woman refers to, and aptly so (imagine nails) as "The Seattle Scream." I comment on each picture, tell her which I think are the best, and when she's garnered all the opinion I have, I go back to cleaning.

Dominatrixes, ass-nails, scrotum chains and a wide-eyed barista - all in a night's work at Fuel Coffee.
Since I've barely scratched the surface of Ingmar Bergman's Ingrid Bergman-starring film Autumn Sonata (60), I'm just going to write a few thoughts I've had about the film pre-viewing:

- If beloved film The Seventh Seal (11) is indicative of late Bergman, I'm a little worried about my enjoyment of this film. That film made me feel dumb like only a symbolism heavy Swedish film can. This one doesn't feature a white-faced Death as a main character though, so maybe I'll fare better.

- Yup, it's true this is a film by Ingmar Bergman starring Ingrid Bergman. The Swede's, they do shit differently.

- Loyal customer and reader Matthew described the film in one word for me, "Somber." Ooooooh weee, I can not wait.

- This stretch of The Criterion Collection is a little rough on me. Weirdly sexual Nazi films, quiet, brooding Swedish films, and the ominous presence of a two hour silent film about Joan of Arc looming on the horizon. The Third Man (64) you can not arrive soon enough.

For you my loyal readers, I'll take these bullets.

Tuesday: Autumn Sonata (60)