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What is there to say about a film that for many years was the highest grossing film ever? A film that is universally beloved? A film that has been covered and studied and dissected endlessly?
Well I saw E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial this week in IMAX so I’m going to try. But I’m not going to add much new to the discussion of a film that’s exactly correctly rated in our culture. It’s a timeless classic. And I have no issue with it.
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For starters, I have been a massive Pink Floyd fan since high school and although I know The Wall is one of their best-selling and most highly regarded albums, to me it has always been one of their least interesting efforts. That’s not to say I have ever disliked it, but next to the likes of other big albums in their discography like The Dark Side of the Moon and Wish You Were Here (my favourite of theirs), it still sounds highly underwhelming because too much of it seemed like meaningless filler and the occasional great song comes then and there. As a matter of fact, I hadn’t really loved a Floyd album after Animals because it almost felt to me as if Roger Waters was wearing the Floyd name to back up his solo efforts and it leaves everyone else feeling suffocated. So what’s to be said about a film based around said album, written by Roger Waters?
It still amazes me that after thirty years of being butchered from studio interference and having been ignored during its original theatrical run, Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner still feels refreshing as if it were something that had only recently came out. Like the best science fiction films it isn’t one whose wonder lies within the excitement created by its distinctive visual style but how it presents itself – not as a showcase for hypnotic set pieces but as a meditation on life, pushing towards what we are afraid to ask. Even today the genre subversions still feel present and on rewatches I only find myself appreciating it all the more, after having already been left fascinated with a first watch. But it wasn’t until more revisits mere fascination grew into adoration, and soon the resonant effect of Blade Runner only made itself clear.
From the many times Robert De Niro has collaborated with Martin Scorsese and created many of the director’s most famous (and best) works whether they go from Taxi Driver to Raging Bull and Goodfellas, one of the least recognizable in that bunch is The King of Comedy. Yet the fact it feels so forgotten in comparison to many of Scorsese’s most recognizable works has not been able to overshadow what was most important, The King of Comedy is also one of his finest efforts. Arguably his most demented work under his body of work, this deserves more recognition than what it has at the moment.
Mankind’s greatest fears put against itself, removing all sense of connection with the outside world. If that is not enough to describe John Carpenter’s The Thing, then another way of going about would be talking about how it is one of the greatest horror films to have ever been made. It would already be easy enough to commend the incredibly consistency to John Carpenter’s own body of work in comparison to many other great artists who have extensively left their touch on the horror genre, but if there were one that stood atop all, then The Thing is the clear frontrunner. Although it is easy to commend Halloween for the incredible influence that it left upon many slashers that followed, it was not until 1982 when he accomplished the very most of his capabilities; a stunning achievement to be remembered through all of time.
Ingmar Bergman is fully at grasp with what he had been meaning to address the whole time, how all the themes which he had been handling through all his career had affected him so personally by placing it inside of what appears to be an image of growing up through childhood. Childhood is one thing that Ingmar Bergman’s masterful Fanny & Alexander is about, for soon what we have is a picture of Sweden, family dynamics, abuse, and the peacefulness within the state of mind. The five-and-a-half hour running time may be daunting, but within due time, it earns every minute for this truly is one of the best films about experiences to have ever been made, and at that, one of the greatest of all cinematic achievements. Continue reading →
Ingmar Bergman’s supposed theatrical swan song, Fanny & Alexander, is a film that I wish to call one of Ingmar Bergman’s finest but after having viewed the masterpiece within the television version – a revisit of this version did not go as well as I had hoped. That is not to say it is a bad film, but while more of the good manages to shine over the bad, it is rather evident that it is an incomplete film. We have the elements that could easily make a great film at hand, and even with a daunting length of a little bit over three hours, I cannot help but unfortunately feel that not enough of the details had been left for us. It is indeed a good film as it stands, but it is only best viewed in all of its complete glory, the only version which I choose to go with as of now. Continue reading →
Cinema from the Spectrum 
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