Michael Caine in The Ipcress File (1965, dir. Sidney J. Furie) (via)
A Dangerous Method, David Cronenberg
Running 158 minutes, The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo requires over an hour for Blomkvist’s story to converge with Salander’s and, though things do pick up once reporter and hacker begin pursuing parallel research tracks (as well as each other), it grossly overstays its welcome. Where the shudder-inducing Zodiac, and even The Social Network, resisted closure, Dragon Tattoopersists in pursuing three separate endings and, by the time they wrap, the movie is less a walk on the wild side than an evening stroll through a well-lit topiary garden. (J. Hoberman, Spielberg and Fincher: Taming Creatures)
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Modern Maturity:
In Deeper Into Movies, you described movies as a “supremely pleasurable and dangerous art form. “I get the pleasurable part, but what’s so dangerous?
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Pauline Kael:
At a movie house, you feel alone with the image and you’re affected deeply. The different elements that go into movies—music, cinematography, actors, design—get to you very strongly. That’s why so many educated people disapprove of movies; they’re not used to giving themselves over to that much emotion. They prefer the distance they can keep in legitimate theater.
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MM:
Is that why so-called intellectuals often prefer European films?
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Kael:
Yes, and they associate greatness with foreign films. We tend to think of art as European; there’s an embarrassment about art in America. But The Godfather changed that for a lot of people. When The Godfather II came out and you got the full dimensions of that family, you had a hard time not using the word “great.” Still, I think educated people feel more at home with Czech and Australian films full of humane little lessons.
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MM:
You dislike humane little lessons?
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Kael:
Lessons are for television movies about homosexuality or somebody’s sickness; that’s why they’re so boring.
Troll 2
Diopter shots from Carlito’s Way
Michael Cimino, Thunderbolt & Lightfoot (1974)
Brian De Palma, Carlito’s Way (1993)
