Moanrue Fortune
Part One:
Today, I finished my Doctor Who themed quiet book.
My two year old is going to FLIP when I hand him this to play with on our two day car ride!
So Amazing!
Another decade, another Sight and Sound Greatest Films of All Time list. I never find the top films that interesting, given that they tend to smack of needless canon formation. My favourite bit is yet to come, looking at the data and getting to see what films each person asked has suggested. I also love seeing all those films with just one vote. While waiting for that information, here is my pick of ten great films, none of which placed in Sight and Sound’s top 50.
The Ghost and Mrs Muir (1947) Joseph L Mankiewicz
A comedy romance between a widow and the ghost of a sea captain. Its films like this that mean that modern rom-coms can never measure up in my mind. Watch the trailer…
Johnny Guitar (1954) Nicholas Ray
This Western has women who are tougher than the men and are ripping their town apart. Watch a clip…
Meet Me in St Louis (1944) Vincente Minnelli
I love musicals, and I think this is a pretty special one, with Judy Garland. What is particularly nice is that the drama comes from small events that we can all appreciate. Watch the Trolley Song…
North by Northwest (1959) Alfred Hitchcock
Well, I guess everyone has a favourite Hitchcock film, and this is mine. Watch the opening credits by the wonderful Saul Bass, amazing music by Bernard Herrmann.
The Prodigal Son (1981) Sammo Hung
This film combines traditional Chinese opera sequences with martial arts. Most interesting is that the opera scenes are exactly what the stars were trained to do in the opera schools. A magnificent fight sequence featuring Lam Ching Ying and Frankie Chan…
Rouge (1988) Stanley Kwan
A beautiful romance set in Hong Kong. the ghost of a courtesan comes back from the afterlife to find out why her lover hasn’t joined her. The film combines a modern day story with flashbacks to the courtesan’s life in the 1930s. I’d read a lot about this film before I got to see it, and assumed that the writers were just being over the top in their appreciation of this film. How wrong I was. Watch the Trailer…
Profundo Rosso (1975) Dario Argento
I love gialli (Italian crime thrillers) and this is my favourite. Watch the trailer…
Shaft (1971) Gordon Parks
Among other things, I like the street scenes filmed in a New York that no longer exists. Opening sequence…
Spirited Away (2001) Hayao Miyazaki
I felt the top fifty was a bit lacking in animated films and this is my choice. Don’t animated films count as great films? Watch the trailer…
To Be or Not to Be (1942) Ernst Lubitsch
This is a WW2 comedy about a group of actors trying to escape occupied Poland. Tarantino’s Inglorious Bastards rips this off, yet this still remains the better film. Its also Carole Lombard’s last film, released after her death in a plane crash. Watch the opening…
Go Cinderella, go! A fab advert that makes me want the hair straighteners, even though my hair is perfectly straight. Watch till the end for the non-typical ending.
Read about gender and sexuality over at the Superheroes on Screen blog.
Its amazing that something as simple as button remapping can make games more accessible to people with disabilities. Such a simple thing and yet most game companies won’t do it.
Finally a film of one of my favourite comedy books and created by Aardman! And everyone loves pirates…
This is my presentation for a paper about the UK advertising for the Nintendo DS. It appeared at the London Film and Media 2011 conference.
Read about masked Mexican wrestlers over at the Superheroes on Screen blog.
I think a lot of my gal-pals need to see this video. I seem to see too much of the two things this woman describes: -
- not sitting at the table
- leaving before you leave
If you want to play with the big boys, then you have to take part. In the academic world this means going to those conferences and speaking. What you have to say might be rubbish, but I’ve seen big names say rubbish too. There’s no point sabotaging yourself before you start, by not being present. I know I’m guilty of this sometimes, but I try to be aware that I’m doing it.
The comic book movie has had a patchy reception history: when it has led the way in producing new film technologies and spectacle it has often been well-received (for example, the 1970s-80s Superman franchise), but the genre has also seen nadirs in reputation ranging from Howard the Duck (Willard Hyuck, 1986) to Joel Schumacher’s Batman and Robin(1997), and this before a global element of superhero filmmaking is included…. read more at the linky…
