Before there was Quentin Tarrantino's Hateful Eight there was Robert Aldrich's The Dirty Dozen.
As the Hateful Eight went rolling along toward its intermission I thought I saw a shift in genre from John Ford's Stage Coach western to Agatha Christie's locked house mystery, and I was excited by that.
After 12 minutes running around the East 12th Street City Cinema maze during intermission (an architectural mystery of the now and forever Yiddish Theater), I returned to my seat and watched the final chapters unfold, saw the script roll forward by time-shifting back to reveal events from a different perspective. By the end all I could think of was Ma Grisham in that other Robert Aldrich movie, The Grisholm Gang, and that Walter Goggins looks like Kenneth Anger.
Waking up the next morning I am left with a mixture of dreams of additional scenes for the claustrophobic movie. I'm pretty sure there was no nuclear device detonated in a movie theater by the clown man, whose delivery resembled the tour guide delivery of the death proof aukland visitor (Rose McGowan? no it's Zoë Bell, I think... I have no memory of why I wrote this paragraph)..
I suggest that the movie could be even more meta by showing the cast arriving at the theater for the opening. And though a movie is fixed in time, perhaps next time it runs Bruce Dern can answer Samuel Jackson by saying, "I don't see anything. It's you who is visualizing your description. I'm not following..." falling asleep instead of becoming predictably activated.
Ennio Morricone's score has some low register bassoon that is great. His other credits include the Mario Caiano horror movie,The Faceless Monster, and a movie called Bugsy, as well as the things he's famous for... .
The Hateful Eight is a carefully assembled chess game. I imagine I will fragments of it again on cable and will enjoy it more in snippets because it is so artfully plotted and so well acted and so well framed around beautiful characters (such as Ma Grisholm). Oh, I want to acknowledge Jennifer Jason Leigh's great work in general. As always I base my blanket statement on having seen her in another movie, Ulu Grosbard's Georgia.
I also want to acknowledge the necessity of using reversal film for images of snow.
Right now I'm trying to resolve the resemblance between the movie and the dreams that followed. Is the last chapter actually called black man white hell? And does the sudden narration draw from Mark Madsen's journal?
As the remaining two guys string up Ms. Leigh in the most meaningless hanging ever, while they lie dying, coupled on the bed, I realized the arbitrary nature of the entirety of the prior 7 movies.
Whether it's the third reich or the belle south, or misshapen expressions of love as control, we're activated, but no longer because this movie is the key and the cure.
Now back to long term contributions to cinema... I think, as they may be found in Steven Spielberg's road movie, Duel, we'll find them in the Tarrantino road movie, Death Proof, (particularly in the overhead shot of the rain? I'm not justifying my suggestion here.... however...)
There is a distinct narrative in Death Proof. It's divided in two parts. Some terribly shocking thing happens the first time, we go on the same trail a second time, with some kind of more satisfactory vengeful outcome.
Or in the case of Run Lola Run, we go down the same path several times until we get it right...
Psycho takes us down the path twice. Follow the path of Janet Leigh for part 2. Going down the same path twice also happens in Horror Hotel/City of the Dead, and in the Vanishing... I think....
In Death Proof we follow the path of another time with a cleverer group of gearheads, making the advice Serge Gainsborough gives in his song, give up the chick habit, as the credits roll, somehow supported by the denouement.
As the Hateful Eight went rolling along toward its intermission I thought I saw a shift in genre from John Ford's Stage Coach western to Agatha Christie's locked house mystery, and I was excited by that.
After 12 minutes running around the East 12th Street City Cinema maze during intermission (an architectural mystery of the now and forever Yiddish Theater), I returned to my seat and watched the final chapters unfold, saw the script roll forward by time-shifting back to reveal events from a different perspective. By the end all I could think of was Ma Grisham in that other Robert Aldrich movie, The Grisholm Gang, and that Walter Goggins looks like Kenneth Anger.
Waking up the next morning I am left with a mixture of dreams of additional scenes for the claustrophobic movie. I'm pretty sure there was no nuclear device detonated in a movie theater by the clown man, whose delivery resembled the tour guide delivery of the death proof aukland visitor (Rose McGowan? no it's Zoë Bell, I think... I have no memory of why I wrote this paragraph)..
I suggest that the movie could be even more meta by showing the cast arriving at the theater for the opening. And though a movie is fixed in time, perhaps next time it runs Bruce Dern can answer Samuel Jackson by saying, "I don't see anything. It's you who is visualizing your description. I'm not following..." falling asleep instead of becoming predictably activated.
Ennio Morricone's score has some low register bassoon that is great. His other credits include the Mario Caiano horror movie,The Faceless Monster, and a movie called Bugsy, as well as the things he's famous for... .
The Hateful Eight is a carefully assembled chess game. I imagine I will fragments of it again on cable and will enjoy it more in snippets because it is so artfully plotted and so well acted and so well framed around beautiful characters (such as Ma Grisholm). Oh, I want to acknowledge Jennifer Jason Leigh's great work in general. As always I base my blanket statement on having seen her in another movie, Ulu Grosbard's Georgia.
I also want to acknowledge the necessity of using reversal film for images of snow.
Right now I'm trying to resolve the resemblance between the movie and the dreams that followed. Is the last chapter actually called black man white hell? And does the sudden narration draw from Mark Madsen's journal?
As the remaining two guys string up Ms. Leigh in the most meaningless hanging ever, while they lie dying, coupled on the bed, I realized the arbitrary nature of the entirety of the prior 7 movies.
Whether it's the third reich or the belle south, or misshapen expressions of love as control, we're activated, but no longer because this movie is the key and the cure.
Now back to long term contributions to cinema... I think, as they may be found in Steven Spielberg's road movie, Duel, we'll find them in the Tarrantino road movie, Death Proof, (particularly in the overhead shot of the rain? I'm not justifying my suggestion here.... however...)
There is a distinct narrative in Death Proof. It's divided in two parts. Some terribly shocking thing happens the first time, we go on the same trail a second time, with some kind of more satisfactory vengeful outcome.
Or in the case of Run Lola Run, we go down the same path several times until we get it right...
Psycho takes us down the path twice. Follow the path of Janet Leigh for part 2. Going down the same path twice also happens in Horror Hotel/City of the Dead, and in the Vanishing... I think....
In Death Proof we follow the path of another time with a cleverer group of gearheads, making the advice Serge Gainsborough gives in his song, give up the chick habit, as the credits roll, somehow supported by the denouement.
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