I mean, look at that fucking poster! Cool as milk, as is the movie. The script is a bit too melodramatic and Schrader is clearly a little too much obsessed with the cinema of Robert Bresson – the ending is almost shot-for-shot Pickpocket (1959). But the movie is pure sleek, art deco deluxe. And to top it off you’ve got Blondie and Giorgio Moroder on soundtrack duties.
Peak Richard Gere. No one plays the narcissist as well as he can.
Once more with feeling:
Terrifying scenes the other evening. It all came flooding back (no pun intended). This was some movie back in the day. And like most of these Japanese and South Korean horrors from the noughties, it was subject to an inferior American remake.
They need to stop doing this because they are still doing it.
Bob Dylan. Not my kind of music. I go for the atmospherics and the bangin’ beats; take me back to the Sensation White Amsterdam era of alcopops and Ajax tops.
I have seen the movie Vanilla Sky (2001) 16 times, though. I know every single facet about the feature and WHY it is incredible yet folk still slate it. Some plebs just hate Tom Cruise; I think he is the best. He puts his all into everything and clearly loves his life. He also gets stick for the Scientology thing, as if every other religion isn’t insane.
Anyway, an album cover from something from Bob Dylan features in the film. I have never listened to the album and never will but it’s a belter of a photo. I feel about Bob Dylan as some do Tom Cruise.
I like to frequent this little Anthony Burgess habitat at least once a year to remind me of one of the greatest movies ever put on celluloid. When I depart I say to myself, “I was cured alright.”
This belter of a human passed away a few months ago.
The hero was more than a mere teacher to me. I have never met a person so inspirational; I got crushed under the wheels of a truck once in 2004 and this lad actually phoned me up (Nokia 3310) and sent over DVDs. The little things mean a lot.
If there’s a heaven, and I fucking hope one exists, this bloke will be up there. He was a polymath teacher who had the rare ability to combine charisma with intellectual prowess; he structurally broke things down for students and demonstrated how things worked.
Best teacher I’ve ever had. He was so smart and his accent was nuts! Every single pupil at Edinburgh College was blessed by his utter selflessness, his empathy, his awesomeness.
He was an incredible person and everything he said and did was right.
I’ll never forget you, pal. X.
http://frasermansell.info/condolences/
This movie had so much potential; during its production I was sincerely anticipating the greatest motion picture event … ever. Upon first viewing I desperately wanted to love it but couldn’t help but make a mental note of everything about the shitter which vexed me. There was something seriously wrong with this movie.
It is pointlessly and relentlessly weird, depicting 1860s New York as something out of a comic book. I’m sure the experience of living in what was by all accounts a cesspit approximating a cartoon strip at times, but it simply can’t have been as baroque as the ludicrous fancy dress show on display in GONY.
The movie has this irritating tendency for revelling in micro details about stuff that has zilch to do with the overall narrative, as if it’s half history lesson and half entertainment. I see no reason for the Manhattan draft riots to be treated with such gravity. This is the only Scorsese film in which he appears overwhelmed by the material, which I find completely baffling as it’s about New York, crime, and religion, his cinema oeuvre.
Weirdly (again), it is bereft of energy. It feels like a painful Baz Luhrmann film, the cinematography and editing just jarring – insert bonkers Speedy Gonzales shot here, a rapid cut there. Even the voice-over is draining. And it ends with a U2 song and a shot of the Twin Towers. Is this MTV?
And why even insert Cameron Diaz in this? Her ‘accent’ (or whatever) is diabolical, as is Leo’s. The latter appears way out of his depth, evidently awed by the full-method Daniel Day-Lewis. I must also confess that I think it’s the great Day-Lewis’ worst ever performance. He’s just comedy, nothing else; I can’t take him seriously any time he gets … serious.
Sadly, I keep giving the film a chance every few years. The only parellel I can think of is when you open the fridge expecting a different result from when you opened it 30 minutes prior.
Shite.
Wanderings and ... wonderings. 