My 10 favourite films (2023 list)

One film per director. 

Persona (dir. Ingmar Bergman)  

Sunset Boulevard (dir. Billy Wilder) 

Ran (dir. Akira Kurosawa) 

Casablanca (dir. Michael Curtis) 

A Star Is Born (dir. George Cukor) 

The Conversation (dir. Francis Ford Coppola) 

The Phantom of Liberty (dir. Luis Bunuel) 

The Flavour of Green Tea over Rice (dir. Yasujiro Ozu) 

Raise the Red Lantern (dir. Zhang Yimou) 

F for Fake (dir. Orson Welles) 

My favourite comedies

To make it simpler, I’m going to mention only 1 film per director, and group series together. 
I’m also not going to mention comedies I saw only once and it was more than a year ago, even if I remember laughing a lot, such as The Big Lebowski or The Nice Guys. 
Here’s my list of 10 favourite comedies: 
Modern Times (1936, dir. Charlie Chaplin) 
Bringing Up Baby (1938, dir. Howard Hawks) 
Some Like It Hot (1959, dir. Billy Wilder) 
The Phantom of Liberty (1974, dir. Luis Bunuel) 
Love and Death (1975, dir. Woody Allen) 
The Gods Must Be Crazy 1 and 2 (1980 and 1989, dir. Jamie Uys) 
The Naked Gun (all 3: 1988 and 1991, dir. David Zucker, and 1994, dir. Peter Segal)
A Fish Called Wanda (1988, dir. Charles Crichton) 
The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014, dir. Wes Anderson) 


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I’ve just got back from a short trip to Edinburgh, but I’ve been thinking about this: do comedies get worse over time? I hate most of today’s comedies (based on trailers and clips mostly but sometimes a whole film)—they’re just crude and painfully unfunny. Rom-com stuff is even worse. 
Meanwhile I’m reading P. G. Wodehouse’s Carry On, Jeeves. He’s probably the best of humourists.

Changing tastes

1/ A few days ago I watched Breakfast at Tiffany’s again, probably the 3rd time. 
My bf had never seen the film before, but knew about the controversy, which I assume most people would—the controversy about Mickey Rooney playing Mr Yunioshi. Put aside the fact that it’s a white actor wearing make-up and prosthetics to play an Asian character as comic relief, which is seen as offensive, it’s just not funny. Was it ever funny, when the film was released in 1961? It’s crude and unnecessary, and doesn’t fit in with the tone of the film. 
The Yunioshi character was the reason that I could never fully embrace the film. Now, seeing it again, I don’t like it much anymore. Audrey Hepburn is still charming and elegant, the cat is still cute, and Paul’s speech at the end of the film is still poignant, but maybe Breakfast at Tiffany’s is not for repeated viewings. Certain flaws become more obvious, some of the speech sounds expository. Maybe it’s one of those films that should be remembered, as a lovely charming thing, rather than seen again. 

2/ Every year I watch about 100 films, some of which are revisits. 
Some films demand multiple viewings—each time you see something new. Persona, the Mount Everest of film criticism, is an example. Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter… and Spring is another. Or F for Fake. 
Masterpieces like Sunset Boulevard or Chinatown, which I saw again over the past year, never become boring or outdated. They are perfect. There are films I’ve seen 6-7 times and will still see again: The Godfather, Casablanca, The Silence of the Lambs, The Shawshank Redemption… 
Some films lose their magic on revisit. I enjoyed re-watching The Phantom of Liberty, which is whimsical and brilliant, but I no longer felt the fun upon my revisit of The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie—its charm relied too much on the random unexpectedness, which obviously was no longer there when I knew what was going to happen. Mother the 2nd time around was not as good, which is probably the case for films which rely heavily on the mystery and suspense of solving the case/ finding the murderer, and on the twist. As you watch it again, it no longer has much to keep your interest.  
That’s why a film like Chinatown still retain its magic on multiple viewings. I don’t watch it for the answers. I watch it for Jack Nicholson’s performance, for the character of Jack Gittes, for the great dialogue—sharp and full of meaning, for the tight structure and pace, and for John Huston and Faye Dunaway. 
And sometimes, watching a film again, we don’t like it anymore just because we have changed. I just don’t like American Beauty, Edward Scissorhands, or Scarface anymore, though I used to. Our tastes change over time. 

3/ A blog is a great place to make note of what I like, and keep track of how I’ve changed over time. 
In 2015, I listened to Billie Holiday all the time, obsessively, for a long period. Then it passed. Since then, it’s mostly Ella Fitzgerald and Nina Simone that I listen to. Sometimes Aretha Franklin. Sometimes Etta James. Sometimes Sarah Vaughan. 
Sometimes I wonder how many artists I like now, I will still like in 30 years, or 50 years. My formative years were the time in Norway—that was when I discovered classic cinema, photography, 19th century literature, Russian literature, and jazz. I reckon that for the rest of my life, these things will always be important to me, especially classic cinema, Russian literature, and jazz; it’s my views on the individual artists that change. 
Shall I try to predict? 
Tolstoy, I’m sure, will always be there. He is a giant, not only in Russia but in world literature, and his impact on my life cannot be overstated.  
Same with Nabokov. 
With Melville, I’m not sure, but Moby Dick will always be a favourite and an important novel. With Jane Austen, I expect to still respect her in 30 years, or even 50 years, because I already went from disliking her and thinking she was chicklit, to discovering the great depth and sensitivity in her works, but maybe one day I will no longer care about stories of growth, understanding, and self-understanding. We never know. 
In cinema, I think I will always like Ingmar Bergman and Billy Wilder. I once had a Wong Kar-wai phase, a Martin Scorsese phase, even a Stanley Kubrick phase, but Ingmar Bergman is a director whose films have everything that I think are important about cinema: great cinematography and lighting, striking imagery, creative and haunting use of sound, good editing, great acting and memorable performances, style, depth, personal vision, exploration of relationships and human consciousness, and formal experiments that push the boundaries of cinema. He was also the director that I discovered, and learnt from, during my 3 years at the film school, and who influenced my first short films. 
It’s also hard to imagine a time when I wouldn’t like Billy Wilder. Is there any other writer-director who writes more memorable dialogue and makes so many great films in such different genres? I love his sharp wit and humour, and the humanity of his films. 
About music, I know a few people who listen to jazz their whole lives, so I don’t suppose I will stop loving jazz. It’s just hard to say if I will always like John Coltrane, whom I’m focusing on at the moment. But I expect Louis Armstrong and Ella Fitzgerald to always be there, on their own or together. I don’t like watching Louis Armstrong—his grin makes me uncomfortable, but I can listen to him all day. People talk about his optimism, which isn’t wrong for songs such as “What a Wonderful World”, but there’s nothing so haunting like the pain in his performance of “Black and Blue”. 
Louis Armstrong and Ella Fitzgerald on their own are fantastic. Together, they’re recognised as the greatest duets in jazz. Her velvety voice softens his edges. My favourite of theirs is “Summertime”. 
Well, let’s see how things turn out.

On Sidney Lumet (and other directors)

I’m reading Sidney Lumet’s Making Movies, which I think is a very good and enjoyable book, especially for aspiring film directors. 
Look at this: 

Isn’t that such a good “defence” of dialogue? The writer-director who has created the most memorable lines is Billy Wilder, who has 3 contenders for the best closing lines of all time—The Apartment (“Shut up and deal”), Some Like It Hot (“Nobody’s perfect”), and Sunset Boulevard (“All right, Mr. DeMille, I'm ready for my close-up”). Dialogue is not uncinematic. It is only uncinematic when it is superfluous exposition, and worst if it’s the director’s way of explaining the film to the audience (which is common in Christopher Nolan’s films). 
Now look at this passage: 

That is fascinating and scary at the same time—would I be able to tell? 
The book offers some invaluable insight and advice about directing. I admire Sidney Lumet immensely, and now love him even more as I read the book. He is not an auteur, he might not even be seen as a stylist, but does it matter? I would say that 12 Angry Men and Dog Day Afternoon are masterpieces, and Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead is a great, heartbreaking film that should be better known. Many of his other films are also highly acclaimed, such as Serpico, The Verdict, Network, Murder on the Orient Express, Long Day’s Journey into Night... Why are some other directors ranked higher just because their films are more stylistic or technically more impressive? 
That leads me to another point: is the ability to work with actors not important? The directors who I think are masters at getting the best performances out of actors are Ingmar Bergman, Elia Kazan, Sidney Lumet, and Francis Ford Coppola. And perhaps Roman Polanski (Adrien Brody never had anything remotely as good as his performance in The Pianist). 
Some other directors who are also good at working with actors are Billy Wilder, Clint Eastwood, Martin Scorsese, Zhang Yimou, Krzysztof Kieslowski… (I don’t include Kurosawa and Mizoguchi because Japanese acting is a different style). 
As you follow a director’s work, you realise what their main strengths are—they are better at some aspects of filmmaking than others. Fellini’s main strengths, for example, are in blocking/staging, cinematography, and visual storytelling. Billy Wilder’s are in story, structure/ pacing, dialogue, and working with actors. Orson Welles’s are in cinematography (especially lighting), structure, editing, and sound. Luis Bunuel’s are in story/ plot, ideas, and pacing. Andrei Tarkovsky’s are in ideas, cinematography, sound, and atmosphere. 
You also notice, not weaknesses, but that some aspects don’t interest a director as much as others. There isn’t much to say about cinematography and lighting in Luis Bunuel’s films, for example; or editing in Tarkovsky’s; or story in Wong Kar-wai’s.  
It is not without reason that I think Ingmar Bergman’s the best director of all time, because his films do have everything—good story, interesting idea, depth, pacing, great cinematography (especially lighting), great sound, great editing (most notably in Persona), good production design (at least in Cries and Whispers and Fanny and Alexander), wonderful performances, good visual storytelling, experiments… But usually, directors have their strengths, and they may be weaker, or at least not as spectacular, in some other aspects of filmmaking, so why is it that directors who are good at techniques valued much more highly than directors who are good at drama (emotional complexity in a scene, and pacing for the film as a whole) and working with actors? 
When a film looks good, it is visually pleasing, but at the end of the day, so what? I like good acting. I like touching stories. I like films that make me see life differently and learn something about myself. I never use the word “great” for directors like Quentin Tarantino or Wes Anderson—they’re good at what they do, and their films are entertaining, but have no depth and offer no more than that. But even if we talk about Stanley Kubrick, a director I admire very much when it comes to techniques (especially the production design, cinematography, and use of music), none of his films has ever touched me on an emotional, personal level like 12 Angry Men or Dog Day Afternoon has. In Dog Day Afternoon, people talk a lot about Al Pacino, who indeed delivers a fine performance, one of the best in his career, but we should also talk about John Cazale—for some reason, I can never forget the incredibly sad look on his face when Al Pacino asks where he wants to go if he could go anywhere, and he says “Wyoming”. 12 Angry Men shows Sidney Lumet’s talent at working with actors, and also his ability to make an engrossing film in an enclosed space. I’d choose Sidney Lumet over Kubrick anytime. 
But that’s enough. Get Making Movies. It’s a good book. Even Roger Ebert said: 

“Invaluable… I am sometimes asked if there is 1 book a filmgoer could read to learn more about how movies are made and what to look for while watching them. This is the book.”

The most significant things that happened to me in 2018

1/ Losing my grandma: 
In April. 
Before, my family was only her and my mom. Now she’s gone. 
This is a short film I made in the summer about her: 
https://vimeo.com/284810414
Death is a strange thing. It seems natural and expected, until it happens to someone really close to you. 
2/ Making Footfalls in spite of grief and obstacles: 
Footfalls is the 2nd short film I directed at the Northern Film School, after Bird Bitten. I lost my grandma the week before filming, and it was probably the most difficult shoot I’ve ever had. But I completed it, and later, on the editing table changed it completely and gave it a rebirth, so to speak. In spite of its flaws (for I know it is a flawed little film), it means a lot to me personally and I’m proud to say that on the editing table, the editor and I created the best version of the film possible, with the footage we got. 
3/ Having Footfalls screened at Viet Film Fest in California: 
And then it was mentioned on Vietcetera as the most surprising or unusual Vietnamese film of 2018 (near the end): 
http://vietcetera.com/viet-film-fest-presents-the-best-vietnamese-films-of-2018/ 
I don’t take it too seriously—as a film student and aspiring filmmaker, I know my own strengths and weaknesses, and I don’t see that as a testament to my abilities or anything. But that does mean a lot, because Footfalls feels very personal to me, not only because of the hard time when it was made, but also because it’s loosely based on a tragic true story, and that could have easily gone wrong and become cheap, exploitative, or corny, but it didn’t. At least I know that I could tell a story completely with feet and shoes, without faces, and without words—the feet show the actions, express the emotions, and say something about the characters. 
4/ Moving in with my bf: 
Which makes him my partner, but I’m used to referring to him as bf. Things became much better. 
My mom also lives with us—she no longer wants to live in Norway after the loss of my grandma. 
5/ Creating a Vimeo page and a Youtube channel: 
Vimeo: https://vimeo.com/haidinguyen
Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/user/joyceannenguyen/videos?view_as=subscriber 
Also, I’ve made the 1st video essay, about Persona. 
6/ Regarding books, this year I read 2 books by Nabokov: The Gift and Speak, Memory. 
Another great book I read in 2018 was The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy. 
7/ Here are the 10 best films I watched in 2018: 
The Innocents (1961), dir. Jack Clayton 
Yojimbo (1961), dir. Akira Kurosawa 
F for Fake (1975), dir. Orson Welles 
Thelma & Louise (1991), dir. Ridley Scott
Sideways (2004), dir. Alexander Payne 
Eyes without a Face (1960), dir. Georges Franju 
The Third Man (1949), dir. Carol Reed 
The Last Detail (1973), dir. Hal Ashby 
Trainspotting (1996), dir. Danny Boyle 
Letter from an Unknown Woman (1948), dir. Max Ophuls 
Special mention is La Jetée (1966), dir. Chris Marker, which is a 20-minute film. 
All of these are important, but the 3 films that have a greatest impact are The Innocents (blocking and framing), F for Fake (narrative and editing, as well as the themes), and La Jetée (the ideas and the form, which is a film told in still images). Because of The Innocents, I’m currently reading Henry James’s The Turn of the Screw. 
I watched some more Bergman films, but I think the 2 most significant directors this year, to me, are Luis Bunuel and Orson Welles. Orson Welles, because of his enormous talent and fearlessness—I watched F for Fake, The Trial, The Lady from Shanghai, Touch of Evil, The Magnificent Ambersons, and The Stranger. As one of the masters, he has very few great films, in fact, I think only Citizen Kane and F for Fake are truly great, among the ones I’ve seen, but they are always fascinating in terms of blocking and cinematography, especially lighting, and have some magnificent moments, offering a lot to learn from. 
With Luis Bunuel, I rewatched the last 3 films—The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie, Phantom of Liberty, and That Obscure Object of Desire; and also watched again Belle de jour, which I now perceived differently and started to really like. Bunuel is a favourite director that I would hesitate to call an influence, because I can’t say what his style is, but he does make me realise what kind of films I want to make—mixture of reality and dreams. My current project Non-Person is a surrealist film. 
8/ Directing my own script for graduation film: 
This includes 1st time of pitching on a stage (at a cinema), 1st time making a film about a Vietnamese character, and 1st time pitching to the camera. 
I started writing the script of Non-Person in the summer, and pitched in October. My script got greenlit (only 12 scripts out of 29), then recently the production also got greenlit, and we’re filming in February 2019. 
We are crowdfunding at the moment because our budget from the film school isn’t enough. If you want to have a look, this is the link: https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/non-person-short-film--2/x/19967365 
Please donate if you can. That would be greatly appreciated. Or you could share it on social media. 

How was your year?

Underrated films: a list

This is my list of favourite underrated films. 
To explain, I don’t mention films such as Cries and Whispers—generally speaking, most people haven’t watched it, but it’s regarded as one of the peaks of Ingmar Bergman’s oeuvre and recognised as among the greatest films ever made. 
By underrated films, I’m thinking of the films that are overlooked—the films that people don’t often include in the list of best films or films you should watch, and the films that people forget when talking about an important director. 

The list (strong favourites in bold): 
Letter from an Unknown Woman (1948), dir. Max Ophuls 
In a Lonely Place (1950), dir. Nicholas Ray 
Gion Bayashi/ A Geisha (1953), dir. Kenji Mizoguchi 
Street of Shame (1956), dir. Kenji Mizoguchi 
The Killing (1956), dir. Stanley Kubrick 
Nights of Cabiria (1957), dir. Federico Fellini 
The Bad Sleep Well (1960), dir. Akira Kurosawa 
The Innocents (1961), dir. Jack Clayton 
My Fair Lady (1964), dir. George Cukor 
The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes (1970), dir. Billy Wilder 
The Last Detail (1973), dir. Hal Ashby 
The Phantom of Liberty (1974), dir. Luis Bunuel 
Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore (1974), dir. Martin Scorsese 
3 Women (1977), dir. Robert Altman 
On Golden Pond (1981), dir. Mark Rydell 
My Left Foot (1989), dir. Jim Sheridan 
Bound (1996), dir. The Wachowskis 
Happy Together (1997), dir. Wong Kar-wai 
Happiness (1998), dir. Todd Solondz 
Memento (2000), dir. Christopher Nolan 
Sideways (2004), dir. Alexander Payne
Fracture (2007), dir. Gregory Hoblit 

This list would expand.

Random thoughts on Luis Bunuel and Lars von Trier

1/ For some reasons, Belle de Jour made me think about Nymphomaniac, which is probably the most comprehensive and explicit film about sex ever made, covering sex addiction/ nymphomania, homosexuality, bisexuality, BDSM, paedophilia, threesome, etc. and having unsimulated sex. 
And then I realised, I have never seen a sexy scene from Lars von Trier. It’s hard to explain—there’s only a thin line between sexy and crude/vulgar, and who determines where the line is? To me, Belle de Jour is a sexy film. The orgy monologue in Persona is also very erotic, even though nothing is depicted. 
Lars von Trier’s sex scenes are often crude, explicit, sometimes awkward, sometimes mechanical, sometimes physical and animalistic, sometimes violent, humiliating, or even unbearable to watch. Once in a while, his films depict rape and sexual humiliation. There is nothing joyous in his work that I can think of. Lars von Trier is misanthropic and depressing, without providing the audience with catharsis. 
I’ve seen Nymphomaniac, Melancholia, Dogville, and Dancer in the Dark, with bits of Antichrist, bits of Breaking the Waves, and bits of The Idiots. I can’t remember ever seeing a sexy scene from him. 
2/ My 2nd viewing of The Phantom of Liberty somehow also made me think of Lars von Trier. They are similar in that both are irreverent and challenge conventional norms, and both become shocking as a result. However, whilst Luis Bunuel retains his sense of humour and looks at human folly with amusement, whilst mocking and subverting all sorts of mores and social rules, Lars von Trier seems to me to have such a dark, gloomy, and sardonic view of the world, as though he’s filled with incurable bitterness and fear of everything including life. 
He lacks a sense of joy. 
I have always thought that his misanthropy makes his films hollow and, in the long run, irrelevant. 
3/ Or maybe I just detest Lars von Trier. I admire him, and recognise his inventiveness, but dislike him immensely. 
4/ In literature, I love writers like Tolstoy and Nabokov, who celebrate life and the joy of being alive. George Eliot’s rigid moralism bores me; Elfriede Jelinek’s pessimism and obsession with evil disgust me; Flaubert’s misanthropy and view of everything except literature as pointless make it hard for me to embrace him fully. 
My preferences in film and literature, as it appears, are not different.

Belle de Jour revisit

Belle de Jour is about Severine (Catherine Deneuve), a respectable housewife in Paris who spends her afternoons working as a high-class prostitute because of her unfulfilled masochistic desires.
Bunuel belongs to the rare class of directors who move effortlessly between reality and the world of dream and fantasy. The film is erotic, so erotic, because he knows very well that sex is not only about the sexual act, but also about desires and the imagination. Neither celebrating nor condemning Severine’s choices and actions, Bunuel presents Severine as she is, delving into her world of wild fantasies and fetishes. At the same time, there is hardly any explicit sex, much of the eroticism is suggestive, thus leaving the audience to their own imagination, especially in the sequence of the Japanese man and his mysterious box.
The 1st time I watched the film was in/before 2013. Now, watching it again, I have become more familiar with Luis Bunuel’s work, and also changed as a person, Belle de Jour becomes much better, and more meaningful on a personal level.

Here is an interesting video essay about Bunuel’s fetishism.
Luis Buñuel: FETISHIST from Cole Smithey on Vimeo.

If this doesn’t make you want to check out Bunuel, I don’t know what would.

A few films that have influenced or inspired me

Which is different from my list of favourite films. 
Persona (1966), Wild Strawberries (1957), Hour of the Wolf (1968), and Cries and Whispers (1972) by Ingmar Bergman 
Citizen Kane (1941) and F for Fake (1973) by Orson Welles 
The Exterminating Angel (1962), The Phantom of Liberty (1974), and That Obscure Object of Desire (1977) by Luis Bunuel 
La Jetée (1962) by Chris Marker 
8 ½ (1963) by Federico Fellini 
The Godfather (1972) by Francis Ford Coppola 
Bicycle Thieves (1948) by Vittorio De Sica 
Three Colours: Blue (1993) by Krzysztof Kieslowski
Ivan's Childhood (1962) by Andrei Tarkovsky 
Taxi Driver (1976) by Martin Scorsese 
Dogville (2003) by Lars von Trier
3 Women (1977) by Robert Altman 


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Every filmmaker is influenced by other filmmakers. Sometimes we may even be inspired by some aspect of a film we don’t like, like how I feel about Dogville. 
As a filmmaking student, I’m still learning the skills and techniques, and exploring the form, I have yet to find my style, but it’s still nice to make a list to acknowledge the influences and have something to compare to in the future.
Or maybe I just really like lists. 

My favourite films from the 1970s

The 50s: http://thelittlewhiteattic.blogspot.com/2017/08/my-favourite-films-from-1950s.html
The 60s: http://thelittlewhiteattic.blogspot.com/2018/03/my-favourite-films-from-1960s.html 

The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes (1970) by Billy Wilder
Harold and Maude (1971) by Hal Ashby
The French Connection (1971) by William Friedkin 
The Godfather (1972) by Francis Ford Coppola
Cries and Whispers (1972) by Ingmar Bergman 
The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie (1972) by Luis Bunuel 
Last Tango in Paris (1972) by Bernardo Bertolucci 
Cabaret (1972) by Bob Fosse 
Solaris (1972) by Andrei Tarkovsky 
Play It Again, Sam (1972) by Herbert Ross 
Amarcord (1973) by Federico Fellini
The Last Detail (1973) by Hal Ashby 
Mean Streets (1973) by Martin Scorsese 
The Sting (1973) by George Roy Hill 
Sleep (1973) by Woody Allen 
F for Fake (1973) by Orson Welles 
The Godfather Part II (1974) by Francis Ford Coppola
The Conversation (1974) by Francis Ford Coppola
Chinatown (1974) by Roman Polanski 
The Phantom of Liberty (1974) by Luis Bunuel 
Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore (1974) by Martin Scorsese 
Dog Day Afternoon (1975) by Sidney Lumet
Scent of a Woman (1975) by Martin Brest
Love and Death (1975) by Woody Allen 
Taxi Driver (1976) by Martin Scorsese
Network (1976) by Sidney Lumet 
3 Women (1977) by Robert Altman 
That Obscure Object of Desire (1977) by Luis Bunuel 
Annie Hall (1977) by Woody Allen 
Autumn Sonata (1978) by Ingmar Bergman 
The Tin Drum (1979) by Volker Schlöndorff 
Manhatttan (1979) by Woody Allen 
All That Jazz (1979) by Bob Fosse

My new 10 (+1) favourite films; 30/7/2018

Persona by Ingmar Bergman 
Citizen Kane by Orson Welles 
Nights of Cabiria by Federico Fellini 
Yojimbo & Sanjuro by Akira Kurosawa 
Sunset Boulevard by Billy Wilder
The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie by Luis Buñuel
Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter... and Spring by Kim Ki-duk 
Taxi Driver by Martin Scorsese
The Godfather by Francis Ford Coppola
Casablanca by Michael Curtis 


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Once in a while I make a new list of favourites to see what has changed and to keep notes over time. 
Now there have been only a few changes since last year: http://thelittlewhiteattic.blogspot.com/2017/06/my-new-10-favourite-films.html 
Ran is replaced with Yojimbo and Sanjuro. Choosing a favourite Kurosawa is difficult. I love Ran. I love The Bad Sleep Well. I love High and Low. The Bad Sleep Well is a perfect film, and a great example to learn from about the geometry of the scene—about staging and creating a shape in the frame. But finally I chose Yojimbo and Sanjuro (for how do you separate them?) for their dynamic quality and humour, and Toshiro Mifune’s charismatic hero, over the tragic The Bad Sleep Well.  
Persona and Citizen Kane, I love to the point of obsession. They are masterpieces, and I keep coming back to them for inspiration. Citizen Kane has everything you need to learn about cinema, especially in terms of blocking, cinematography, and editing; whilst Persona in particular and European art films in the 1950s-60s in general have changed my view of the possibilities of cinema and had a huge influence on me, especially with the idea of film as dream.


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On this date in 2007, Ingmar Bergman passed away. 
Today is also Emily Bronte's 200th birthday. 

My favourite films from the 1960s

For the 1950s: http://thelittlewhiteattic.blogspot.com/2017/08/my-favourite-films-from-1950s.html

The Bad Sleep Well (1960) by Akira Kurosawa
The Apartment (1960) by Billy Wilder 
Psycho (1960) by Alfred Hitchcock 
La Dolce Vita (1960) by Federico Fellini 
Le Trou (1960) by Jacques Becker
Viridiana (1961) by Luis Buñuel
One, Two, Three (1961) by Billy Wilder
Breakfast at Tiffany’s (1961) by Blake Edwards
Yojimbo (1961) by Akira Kurosawa 
Sanjuro (1962) by Akira Kurosawa
Ivan’s Childhood (1962) by Andrei Tarkovsky
The Exterminating Angel (1962) by Luis Buñuel  
The Trial (1962) by Orson Welles 
Winter Light (1963) by Ingmar Bergman 
High and Low (1963) by Akira Kurosawa
8 1/2 (1963) by Federico Fellini
Knife in the Water (1963) by Roman Polanski 
Charade (1963) by Stanley Donen
Woman in the Dunes (1964) by Hiroshi Teshigahara 
Dr Strangelove (1964) by Stanley Kubrick 
My Fair Lady (1964) by George Cukor 
Persona (1966) by Ingmar Bergman
Blow-Up (1966) by Michelangelo Antonioni
2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) by Stanley Kubrick
The Graduate (1968) by Mike Nichols 
Hour of the Wolf (1968) by Ingmar Bergman
Romeo and Juliet (1968) by Franco Zeffirelli

The favourite 3

Following the previous post, here’s a list of my 3 favourite films of some directors. I also note how many of the directors’ films I’ve watched. 
(I don’t include a director if I’ve only seen 5 films or less. You probably notice that I broke my own rule a few times). 

Woody Allen:
Annie Hall 
Crimes and Misdemeanors 
Love and Death 
(out of 18) 

Martin Scorsese: 
Taxi Driver 
Mean Streets 
The Aviator 
(out of 17) 

Ingmar Bergman: 
Persona 
Cries and Whispers 
Wild Strawberries or The Seventh Seal 
(out of 15) 

Alfred Hitchcock: 
Psycho 
Dial M for Murder 
Vertigo 
(out of 15) 

Billy Wilder: 
Sunset Boulevard 
The Apartment 
Witness for the Prosecution 
(out of 14) 

Federico Fellini: 
Nights of Cabiria 
8 ½ 
Amarcord 
(out of 10) 

Clint Eastwood: 
Million Dollar Baby 
Changeling 
True Crime 
(out of 10) 

Zhang Yimou: 
Raise the Red Lantern 
To Live 
Red Sorghum or Ju Dou 
(out of 10) 

Stanley Kubrick: 
Dr Strangelove 
The Killing 
2001: A Space Odyssey 
(out of 9) 

Joel& Ethan Coen: 
No Country for Old Men 
The Big Lebowski 
Fargo 
(out of 9) 

Kenji Mizoguchi: 
Gion bayashi, aka A Geisha 
Ugetsu monogatari 
Akasen chitai, aka Street of Shame 
(out of 8) 

Luis Bunuel: 
The Exterminating Angel
The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie 
The Phantom of Liberty or Viridiana 
(out of 8) 

Wong Kar-wai: 
Chungking Express 
Happy Together
2046
(out of 8) 

Tim Burton: 
Edward Scissorhands 
Corpse Bride
Sweeney Todd
(out of 8) 

Akira Kurosawa: 
Ran 
The Bad Sleep Well 
High and Low 
(out of 7) 

Francis Ford Coppola: 
The Godfather 
The Conversation 
The Godfather Part II 
(out of 7) 

Steven Spielberg: 
Catch Me If You Can 
A.I. Artificial Intelligence 
The Terminal 
(out of 7) 

Park Chan-wook: 
The Handmaiden 
Thirst 
(out of 6) 

Roman Polanski: 
Chinatown
The Pianist 
Knife in the Water 
(out of 6) 

Quentin Tarantino: 
Pulp Fiction 
Inglourious Basterds 
Jackie Brown 
(out of 6) 

Ang Lee: 
Sense and Sensibility 
Brokeback Mountain 
Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
(out of 6)

The 10 best things I’ve done in 2017

(chronological, more or less) 
1/ Choosing Adam, my boyfriend
One of the best decisions I’ve ever made. 
2/ Rereading Lolita
Nabokov has always been a tremendous influence on me, but now, because of my environment and the political climate in the West, and because of the rereading of Lolita, Nabokov’s stance and attitude have influenced me even more—against black-and-white thinking, against bad reading, against symbolism, against generalisations, against the disregard for details and nuance, against philistinism and anti-intellectualism. 
3/ Choosing to direct a short documentary 
We meant to make a short documentary called PC Pavarotti, which fell apart because of the unreliable contributor, who perhaps at the start didn’t realise what he got himself into. We had to find another subject, and finally made Nicotine Tales. 1st time directing, I learnt the hard lesson about filmmaking—shit happens, and people can be unreliable. The experience was invaluable. 
4/ Developing an interest in documentaries 
Previously indifferent to documentaries, last semester I watched many great films such as Man on Wire, Searching for Sugar Man, The Imposter, Tickled, Deliver Us From Evil, Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God, Touching the Void, etc., and discovered the power of documentaries.  
5/ Discovering Krzysztof Kieslowski and Louis Theroux 
Even though Kieslowski is in drama and Theroux is in documentary, these filmmakers have a few things in common—their openness, their non-judgmental approach to characters or subjects, and their humanity. 
(Interestingly, it was Kieslowski who led me back to Ingmar Bergman). 
6/ Taking a trip to Haworth and visiting the Bronte Parsonage Museum 
Haworth is lovely. This was the 1st part of Adam’s birthday present for me, and the 1st time I saw Yorkshire countryside. 
7/ “Rediscovering” Ingmar Bergman and Luis Bunuel; discovering Kenji Mizoguchi; watching Citizen Kane 
I had seen a few films by Bergman and Bunuel before, but it was during this summer that I “rediscovered” them and found them the greatest of directors and auteurs. With their films, I started to like the idea of films as dreams, and to think of films as capable of dealing with the mind, with human consciousness (unlike the common belief that literature is internal and cinema is external). 
I also started watching the films of Mizoguchi, whom I came to prefer to Kurosawa and Ozu. Dispassionate but haunting; tragic but never sentimental.
2017 has been a very important year, because I found these masters and changed my view on cinema, and at the same time, because I directed my 1st film and started to watch films differently (Bergman’s my main influence). 
The single most significant film I watched this year was perhaps Citizen Kane. All kinds of techniques are in there, all the things you need to learn about cinema are in there. Mizoguchi for example is a master of mise-en-scène, but Orson Welles’s Citizen Kane has taught me more about deep focus, staging, and the z-axis, than anything has.  
8/ Travelling to Whitby and going whale-watching 
This was the 2nd part of Adam’s birthday present for me. Imagine how excited I was, as a fan of Moby Dick. 4 hours on a boat, we saw about a dozen whales, I even saw a seal that my bf missed. 
9/ Changing my philosophy about people
After some talks and fights, some disillusionments, and lots of thinking, I realised that curiosity killed the cat, that excessive empathy was harmful and we shouldn’t try to tolerate and wish to understand everything, that I was drawn to people with issues and that was bad for me as well as them, that my philosophy about people was flawed and simplistic. So I changed. 
10/ Having a successful pitch and directing my 1st short film Bird Bitten 
We had a few problems, which is the nature of filmmaking, but I was lucky for having a fantastic cast and crew. Directing is fun, and actually making a film makes me appreciate great films even more. 
I also worked on another film, UV, as 2nd AD. We had 5 different locations, and filmed through the night (till 4-5am), mostly outdoors, in winter (Bird Bitten was shot indoors, during the day). More than expected, I’ve learnt a lot from the experience of working on the 2nd film. 
Overall, (in spite of politics) 2017 has been a great year for me. What about you?
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.

The Milky Way

I love Bunuel’s irreverence. 

(source) 

If The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie and The Phantom of Liberty seem to have little coherence in their dream logic, lack of a narrative, and apparent formlessness, The Milky Way doesn’t respect any kind of temporal or spatial coherence. The film is about the journey of 2 vagrants, Pierre and Jean, to Santiago de Compostela in Spain, where the remains of St. James were reputed to be buried, and they cross paths with people from other time periods. A symbolic journey across time and space, it is about Christian history; about the clashes between different sects or denominations in Christianity; about dogmas vs heresies, and intolerance; and about the contradictions in the teachings of Christ. 
In a way, The Milky Way is anti-religious, or at least, against organised religion, intolerance, and violence; with details and images that might be perceived as blasphemous. At the same time, it feels no more than a well-researched essay of sorts, viewing Christianity and its doctrine from a sceptical perspective. Bunuel takes Christianity seriously as he critiques it and even when he laughs at it. Or perhaps, it’s a more religious film than I realised—the journey can be seen as a spiritual quest, and a search for meaning. 
Full of elusive references and easily missed jokes, it is not as funny as The Phantom of Liberty and The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie, but it’s strange, and interesting in its way.


Bonus: Luis Bunuel’s Quarrel With the Church, an essay about his background, and religion in his films. 

The most inventive/ unusual/ unconventional films I’ve ever seen

Some of these are not great, some of these I can’t stand, but these are the most inventive/ unusual/ unconventional films I’ve ever seen—films that break rules (especially in narrative), films that tell stories in an unusual way, films that are experimental and audacious, films where the directors take the most advantages of film as opposed to other art forms and strive to expand the possibilities of cinema.

Wild Strawberries (1957) by Ingmar Bergman
La Dolce Vita (1960) by Federico Fellini
Breathless (1960) by Jean-Luc Godard
The Exterminating Angel (1962) by Luis Buñuel
8 1/2 (1963) by Federico Fellini
Persona (1966) by Ingmar Bergman
Blow-Up (1966) by Michelangelo Antonioni
2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) by Stanley Kubrick
Hour of the Wolf (1968) by Ingmar Bergman
The Milky Way (1969) by Luis Buñuel
Cries and Whispers (1972) by Ingmar Bergman
The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie (1972) by Luis Buñuel
The Phantom of Liberty (1974) by Luis Buñuel
The Obscure Object of Desire (1977) by Luis Buñuel
3 Women (1977) by Robert Altman
Pulp Fiction (1994) by Quentin Tarantino
Festen (1998) by Thomas Vinterberg
Memento (2000) by Christopher Nolan
Songs from the Second Floor (2000) by Roy Andersson
Mulholland Drive (2001) by David Lynch
Irréversible (2002) by Gaspar Noé
À la folie... pas du tout (2002) by Laetitia Colombani
The Dance of Reality (2013) by Alejandro Jodorowsky
Birdman (2014) by Alejandro González Iñárritu

Viridiana

If The Exterminating Angel, The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie and The Phantom of Liberty give you the impression that Bunuel hated the rich, watch Viridiana and you’ll realise that he also hated the poor. 
Joking aside, Viridiana is a great film with a rather pessimistic view of humanity. Viridiana is a pious nun at the beginning of the film, carrying with her a crucifix and a crown of thorns, and sleeping on the floor. After seeing her uncle’s suicide, for which she’s in a way responsible, and leaving the convent, she attempts to pay for her guilt and do good for the world by giving shelter, food and work to 13 of the most wretched beggars in town, only to be betrayed by them. The paupers’ ingratitude is a warning of well-intended but misplaced charity, or, depending on how you look at Viridiana’s action, a mockery of religion, of the character’s piousness and her carelessly thought-out plan to help others only to ultimately seek her own redemption. 
Above all, it’s about our inability to change the world. There’s a scene in which Jorge, Viridiana’s cousin, saves an exhausted dog tied to a cart, without noticing a dog tied to another cart in the opposite direction. You can try, you can save one, but there’s always another cart with another dog tied to it. Viridiana’s not only unable to help the poor in her town, she’s also unable to change the ones she helps. 
And yet, the film is not depressing. It’s saved from being depressing, by Bunuel’s sense of humour, or, as Roger Ebert has put it, his “cheerfully sardonic view of human nature”. 
A great film. 
Luis Bunuel’s now another favourite of mine.



_______________________________________

I’ve just come across this criticism of the film: 

“…beyond its immediate social context Viridiana is mercilessly pessimistic concerning human nature, and much of the film’s bleakness lies in its lack of dimensionality. For instance, it’s difficult to feel satisfied by her comeuppance when Viridiana remains a thoroughly noble character. She never expresses or betrays self-righteous or vainglorious motivations for her charity, and so the climactic bacchanal that shatters her belief in selflessness comes across as undeserved. Inversely, Buñuel portrays the poor as completely irredeemable: they possess no positive qualities, while the negative ones—rudeness, filth, belligerence, disrespect for property and sexual propriety—fester when not held in check by an authority’s supervision. Indeed, at a slant Viridiana contains a conservative message. According to the film human beings are inherently perverted, lascivious, greedy, mean, and destructive.” 

I don’t agree.
1, I don’t think that the negative qualities mentioned, rudeness, filth, belligerence, and disrespect for sexual propriety, are unfair—the people Viridiana helps are not the poor, the working class, but homeless beggars. The point is that she can’t change them just because she provides them with shelter and food. 
2, the rape attempt of Viridiana by 2 of the beggars is, without doubt, the ultimate betrayal of her kindness. However, because the author of the essay mentions “disrespect for property” among the beggars’ negative qualities that “fester when not held in check by an authority’s supervision”, to criticise the film for “lack of dimensionality”, I would argue that it makes perfect sense for them to break into the house and have a party. It’s not right, but psychologically it is plausible and understandable that they would take advantage of being alone to have a look and then use things they can never afford and otherwise can never touch. At the beginning, they (or at least most of them) mean no harm. The problem is when they become drunk and get carried away. Then come frustration, envy, a strong sense of injustice, and hatred, which make them turn them on the people who have helped them because Viridiana and Jorge would always be above them. 
To me, the film doesn’t appear to send the message that “human beings are inherently perverted, lascivious, greedy, mean, and destructive”. It’s more like an attack on Spanish institutions, which reduce people to that level. 
3, another criticism is that “the climactic bacchanal that shatters her belief in selflessness comes across as undeserved”. There is no doubt that Viridiana is a noble character. However, her main shortcomings are naïveté and misguided charity; and she doesn’t seem to think or plan carefully about how to help the beggars. Note that she has been warned about the leper, who turns out to be one of the 2 rapists, but she refuses to listen.

The Exterminating Angel and the repetition compulsion

In my previous post about The Exterminating Angel, I noted 8 repetitions: 
- The group arrive twice. 
- The 2 female employees try to leave twice. 
- The host gives the same toast twice. 
- The line about someone going bald is repeated. 
- The last part of the evening is replicated. 
- There are about 2 scenes of outsiders being unable to enter the house. 
- The absurd thing at the house is repeated at the church. 
- The scene of the sheep going towards the “imprisoned” people in the room is replicated at the end with the church. 
Last night I watched the film again and noticed another 3 repetitions: 
- 2 men, Cristian and Eduardo, greet each other 3 times, each time differently. 
- The exchange about the dishevelled look by the brother and sister is repeated by the couple in love. 
- A woman sees a hand of a dead man pop out of a closet, and later hallucinates that a hand moves out of the closet. 
The social and political satire aspect of the film is easy to see, but what do the repetitions mean, other than creating a surrealistic atmosphere? 
Here is a brilliant psychoanalytic reading of the film and the repetition compulsion: http://www.asharperfocus.com/Exterm.html
Look at this paragraph: 

“Buñuel introduced the ideas of repetition and the expected and unexpected early on in the dinner party itself. The host, Edmundo Nobile makes a gracious toast to Silvia (Rosa Elena Durgel) who provided the opera they have just seen. The guests all graciously echo the toast. Then Nobile makes the very same toast again but this time, to his puzzlement, the guests ignore him—the predictable has become unpredictable. The hostess Lucia (Lucy Gallardo) tells her guests she is going to vary the usual order of courses with a Maltese dish. The waiter comes in with the platter but stumbles, falls, and spills the food all over. The guests laugh delightedly because it is “quite unexpected,” but one woman comments that “Lucia has a style all her own,” and the other guests praise the fall as though this were all her characteristic plan. Buñuel is asking us to notice the difference between what is accidental and unpredictable and what is characteristic and predictable.” 

The last point is particularly interesting: the fall is accidental and unpredictable, but the guests perceive it as characteristic and predictable, because Lucia is predicted to be unpredictable. 
As for how the repetitions have to do with the film, the author argues: 

“Like any good surrealist, Buñuel represents the psychological fact in physical terms. Being one’s repetitive self is like being boxed in. You are in a cage, the cage of your character—or, in this film, a drawing-room you can’t get out of. Notice that the characters’ confinement is mental, not physical. They go up to the exit doorway and make excuses for not being able to go through. They are just like us. When our character compels us to repeat, we justify what we are doing. “There I go again”—but I go; I don’t not-go. I repeat and find reasons to justify repeating.” 

The characters get worse over time, as they become hungrier and more frustrated, but they do remain characteristically themselves throughout the film. Considering each character in isolation, they only have a few lines that they keep saying over and over again: the “nervous” brother keeps saying he can’t stand it and hates everybody, the grumpy man keeps saying that it’s the fault of Edmundo the host, the doctor keeps saying that they have to use reason, and so on. 
Earlier I wrote The Exterminating Angel could be seen as an allegory of the bourgeoisie being so privileged and self-centred that they’re cut off from the outside world. This is another interpretation: we all are in a cage, the cage of our character. 
The author elaborates his psychoanalytic reading of the film: 

“Buñuel takes his physical representation of Freudian ideas one step further in the releasing of these imprisoned characters. Some of the ways psychotherapy works are through “regression” and “transference.” Lying on the couch, the patient regresses toward childhood and childish patterns, as these guests do. Then follows “transference.” (Indeed the word occurs in the film when the doctor explains quite correctly to his amorous patient Leonora that her passionate desire for him is “transference.”) For instance, a patient, having fought with her parents all through childhood, now fights with another authority-figure, the therapist. She has transferred her feelings toward her parents to the therapist. By becoming conscious of this trait in the safe environment of the consulting room, the patient can perhaps replace an unconscious compulsion to repeat her squabbling with a conscious decision to repeat or not to repeat it. And the hope is that the patient can exercise this conscious control in life, not just with the therapist.
Buñuel embodies in the film this therapeutic recovery from helpless, unconscious repetition to conscious intention quite literally when he releases the party guests from their confinement. “The Valkyrie,” Leticia (Silvia Pinal) has the pianist Blanca (Patricia de Morelos) repeat her playing of the “Toccata in A,” a famous piece by the eighteenth-century Italian composer Paradisi. (Surely performing a memorized piece is as repetitious an act as can be, and the name Paradisi makes a nice contrast to the hell they’re in.) But then Leticia has the guests stand in the same places and deliberately repeat the very comments they made after this same music weeks before. They don’t just repeat, they consciously repeat—and suddenly they are freed! Buñuel has his imprisoned bourgeois enact a miniature psychotherapy.” 

That argument is rather convincing. 
On the end of the film the author comments: 

“At the end of the film, the guests from the middle of the film and a congregation and the priests enact the repetitive rituals of catholicism. Then, as if to underscore the meaning of the repetition, neither priests nor worshipers can leave the church. They are trapped as in the drawing-room, but now we are seeing a whole society, not just some dinner guests, confined in its character, its repetitive rituals and, to Buñuel, superstitious rituals. Outside, soldiers drive off citizens trying to enter the church as earlier the police stood between people outside and people inside the mansion. This bourgeois, religious character will persist and be sustained at all costs. And in the final shot, a flock of sheep enter the church, surely an ironic comment on the mindlessness of the religious rituals and the class structure so savagely enforced. Is this a “flock” seeking the Good Shepherd? Or is this a society of sheep blindly following their leader (Franco?) into endless, meaningless, and cruel repetitions? Or are these sacrificial victims like the sheep in the mansion?” 

You may agree, you may have a different take on the film—The Exterminating Angel is such a rich, multiple-layered work, it can have so many different interpretations.