So Long, Sidney Lumet

One of my favourite directors, Sidney Lumet died today, and as I heard about it on the news, there was one scene that immediately sprang to mind. Dog Day Afternoon was one of the films that really made me love film; it contains so many wonderful, moving, funny and heart-breaking moments, it's unimaginable.

The two-disc DVD of it is a treat, there's fantastic audio commentary by Lumet, as well as several fun features. It's a great tribute to a great film. My favourite scene is the one where Sonny calls Leon, and they have the saddest heart-to-heart ever captured on screen. All credit to Frank Pierson for the beautiful dialogue.

A phonecall between two estranged lovers, who know they probably won't see each other again. There's cops listening in on the conversation and it's just awkward as hell. It's only that scene that the estrangement between Sonny and Leon becomes so painfully clear to the viewer and you realise just exactly how bleak their situation is -- not with any big revelations of unhappiness, but everyday chit-chat that just goes round in circles. It's the precise moment Sonny loses any hope he had left.

It's five minutes between Al Pacino and Chris Sarandon. On the DVD commentary, Sidney Lumet explains how they shot it. The phonecall between Sonny and Leon ("his male wife", as Lumet puts it) and Sonny and his female wife Angie took about 14 minutes to film, but as a film reel only holds ten minutes and Lumet wanted to film the scenes consecutively, Lumet set up two cameras and curtained Pacino off from the rest of the set. The other actors were on the end of the phone, acting with Pacino.

After they did the first take, Lumet told Pacino he wanted to go again, and "he looked like I'd shot him, cos he was exhausted". It's the moment after the phonecall with Leon, when he drops his eyes.

"The only thing that was missing in the brilliance of the performance, was the exhaustion of having been there since two-thirty that afternoon, and we were now maybe ten at night, and the exhaustion of doing it a second time shows in his face and that was the reason for going again." -- Sidney Lumet

It's not on YouTube, but I promise you it's worth buying the DVD for.

Looks of love: Sur Mes Levres

Oh, hi blog, kind of forgot you existed.. oops. Blogging makes me feel totally inapt, is it supposed to?


Maybe it's just the fact that French men do more for me than the standard Hollywood types, but what is it about French films and romance? There's a couple of French films I've (re-)watched recently that just haunt me for days on end. They get under my skin. Christophe Honoré is a usual suspect, who fills his films with throwaway looks and lines that send my heart all a-flutter, but Sur Mes Lèvres (aka Read My Lips) is another favourite.

Down to lazy broadcasting, I saw the film three times in the span of six months (on Dutch and Belgian telly) and every time I see it I enjoy it more and more. Emmanuelle Devos (she gets my cutie-patootie vote over Audrey Tautou any day) is Carla, a partially deaf secretary who hires Paul (Vincent Cassel), recently released from prison. Both ignored at work, they embark on some sort of illegal deal (her lip-reading comes in handy) and in the mean time there's electric chemistry between the two of them.

I find French films really interesting to watch because not a lot happens in them, usually. The plot is usually pretty thin, can be summed up in one sentence, and still it's a captivating 100 minutes.

Looks of Love: If....

When a film deals with a harrowing subject matter like Lindsay Anderson's If.... does (fagging in British all-boys' public schools), it quite easily gets monotonous. Recently I saw Another Country which is quite like If...., although in Another Country Rupert Everett ends up a Cold War Russian spy, when in If.... Malcolm McDowell deals with his frustrations with some good old ultra-violence.

Another Country lacked many of the things that made If.... so great; it might have been the fact that it was a play brought to screen (I'm beginning to think that's just never a good idea), but it felt so uninspired. Films with younger actors always excite me because anything seems possible, but where If.... still feels fresh and original after 42 years, Another Country was dull and traditional.

There's many moments that stick out when I think of If....: the ending of course, the scene where Mick Travis shoots a gun at pictures on his walls (perfectly aiming for Audrey Hepburn, which infuriated her husband Mel Ferrer when the film came out), the infamous "dance" with The Girl.. but my absolute favourite is the scene where Bobby Phillips falls in love with Wallace.








It's such a simple scene and the contrast between this scene and the rest of the film couldn't be bigger. Just the amount of shouting and noise early on, and the quiet and concentration two minutes in.. amazing.

Looks of Love: La Belle Personne

Y'know, not to get overly pretentious or anything, but Hector Berlioz once described Beethoven's Mondschein Sonata as "one of those poems that human language does not know how to qualify." Why am I bringing this up? Because it's exactly how I feel about film and specifically certain scenes that show you the exact moment a person falls in love.


Christophe Honoré is quickly taking over Francois Ozon's position as my favourite French director. My favourite of his is obviously Les Chansons D'Amour, but I really enjoyed La Belle Personne recently.

While Ozon works with better scripts, Honoré manages to include little moments of feeling that you don't see anywhere else. Also, I love how he's just doing his own thang; in both Dans Paris and La Belle Personne he lets characters put on a record and he simply forces a certain tune on the audience for about three minutes.

So my love for Honoré might also have to do with the fact that he cast Louis Garrel in nearly all of his films and I might just have a teeny-tiny crush on Garrel. What can I say, I have a thing for noses.

In La Belle Personne, Garrel plays an Italian teacher who falls in love with a 16-year-old student (the stunning Léa Seydoux) who just transferred to his school. She's actually the lead in the film but other than the fact that she cries a lot and everyone falls in love with her, I didn't get much from her character. Garrel is deliciously pervy in the way he looks at her -- only in France!

Here's my favourite scene from the film, where he asks her to read a poem in Italian in class and then translate it. The way she makes eye contact at him when she says "parce que je t'aime", and his mouth twitches into a sneaky smile, then she says it later in the poem and he smiles again? Oh, you slay me, Garrel.

Bobby (2006, Emilio Estevez)

The first time I saw Emilio Estevez's Bobby, I was impressed by it, but also a bit put off by the celebrity-studded cast and over-the-top admiration for the man. Of course, you don't spend close to ten years working on a script if you feel ambivalent towards someone, but still. I first saw the film three years ago and some of the scenes in the film have really stuck in my mind.

In January, I started taking a screenwriting course and it's really made me appreciate Bobby a lot more. For all its flaws, it's a film I feel really strongly about. There's some scenes I'd scrap, some characters I'd throw out, but all-in-all, I really admire what Estevez did with the film. Aside from the politics, it's a beautiful example of how people lead their lives, how politics play a role in their lives and how it influences human interaction. It's not too preachy -- not too believable at times either, but it makes you sit up and notice, and think.

It's interesting to me that Estevez didn't choose to make a film about Kennedy himself, but about how he influenced people. When you see the archive footage of Kennedy (RFK is portrayed by RFK, basically), you realise that's the perfect tribute to him. A movie about Kennedy is a movie about Kennedy, a movie about Kennedy's influence shows just how important he was.

The great thing about Bobby is also that it was made by an actor. It's interesting that Emilio Estevez chose to make the movie with a lot of old friends, colleagues and even his Dad. It's a star-studded affair but when did you last see 'Mighty Duck' Joshua Jackson play a meaty role (pre-TV's 'Fringe')? Nick Cannon has a great serious role, Harry Belafonte and Anthony Hopkins share some amazing screen time and Laurence Fishburne and Freddy Rodriguez share the most intense, gorgeous scene in the film. Also, Lindsay Lohan is loveliness personified but then again, I'm probably the only LiLo-fan left. I'll always sing her praises, she shines in this film.

My favourite thing about Bobby, though? The scene between Demi Moore and Sharon Stone. It may be a result of growing up in the early '90s, but Sharon Stone is legendary to me. I don't think these two great actresses (seriously!) would have ever gotten to share such great material if it weren't for Emilio Estevez. Just genius casting. Sharon Stone got by on her sex appeal for a long time, but the look of hurt on her face in this scene just wipes the floor with me.