A robust movie week offers Todd Haynes' documentary about the influential rock band, Mia Hansen-Løve's meta-movie about married filmmakers in PersonaLand and a lively return to form for Ridley Scott.
Still stoked to see the VU Doc but disappointed that we don't get much in the way of Yule-era focus. I get that Cale is alive and infinitely cool and that Warhol-era is more in the direct bullseye of what Haynes cares about but sad that the part where they hard shift into different sounds probably gets treated as a "then this happened, then The End" kind of thing.
They cover more of that than you might expect, but if you're looking for info on the making of SQUEEZE you're going to be disappointed. An eternal question: Would LOADED, which I love, be a better album with Mo, whom I also love but whose approach I have a hard time imagining fitting in with those songs?
Heh, while I have gotten more enjoyment out of Squeeze than a lot of folks, what I really want the dirt on is Loaded. I totally get the shift from White Light/White Heat to the third album, but Loaded is just so different stylistically than what came before, both in the drumming (another Yule!) and in the general arrangement-style, which I've read is heavily credited to Yule.
The first album is the canonical one but I'm not certain that the Velvets would be as remembered as they are today without Loaded, and Sweet Jane and Rock & Roll sound the way they do on there because of Yule taking Reed's stuff and shining it up, ya know?
Side note that in general, I find Reed-as-a-musician-who-passively-let-other-people-arrange-and-define-most-of-his-best-work to be endlessly fascinating. Like, his idea for music basically stops at his first solo album and then picks up again in the 80's, none of which is the stuff that made him famous (though I love a lot of it).
Also one more nerd note - I suspect the songs would have come out pretty similar based on the 1969 live recordings that are out there, which I believe have Mo on drums (playing what sounds to me like a much more conventional setup, with cymbals and everything). If you haven't dug into this stuff, can't recommend it enough - on Spotify, the "Velvet Underground Super Deluxe" version (that is, the 3rd self-titled) has the best-sounding mix of a few shows from this era where they play some Loaded stuff and it is so very rad.
I picked up the 6xLP Matrix Tapes box set last winter and that might just be my favorite Velvets release now. Agreed that I'd like to have more perspective on the Yule-era, but based on everything I've read that's not Haynes' thesis w/ this film.
I thought The Velvet Underground might very well be one of the best music documentaries I’ve ever seen, up there with The Last Waltz and CODA (Ryuichi Sakamoto). I loved how the form of the film matched the form of the music. I came away wanting to immediately watch it again.
We've caught up on a decent amount of Bergman over the break, but I am not sure enough to catch everything going on. Expected the ending to be a bit twistier than it ended up being. But as the kids say, it was a great vibe.
I really don’t feel like the film intends to have anything more than a light touch w/r/t Bergman, though you can recognize certain locales. (The house she visits with the film student was recognizable to me from Persona.) Really I just enjoyed how UNLIKE Bergman the film is. She transforms that place to her own ends.
The Last Duel was FANTASTIC! It's easy to put a foot wrong with this subject matter, but I thought they handled it really well. I could single out every performance in this movie, even down to the smallest supporting roles (the giggly teenage king! Affleck having the most fun ever!). So happy to see Adam Nagaitis getting bigger roles- after The Terror, that guy should be in everything.
Can we get a new Oscar category for "Least Convincing Blond"? Because Affleck deserves something for having to act through that. It's still jarringly distracting after the 2h mark!
Right? The studio really should have made clear that this is a fun movie, despite its difficult subject matter. Once Affleck turned up, the whole thing clicked for me. His look actually helped, I think, to get me to accept the shift in tone, the anachronisms in the dialogue, etc. Glad you dug it.
It was surprisingly funny- maybe unfair of me to be surprised, given that Holofcener's one of the writers. There were straight out guffaws (any scene w/Affleck), knowing chuckles (everyone rolling their eyes at Damon, all the time), and dark cackles (cutting directly from the rape to the rapist at confession). I can't count how many jokes were made about how ppl see themselves vs how they're seen, but it worked every time. Plus every second with the king and his side-eyeing queen is comedy gold.
The ensemble makes this movie. Watch every background female character's reaction during the court scene, or anyone's reaction to Damon in the last 2 sections.
I'd love to know more about the writing process between the three of them. And speaking of female character reactions: The film had the perfect final shot of Comer, then you get that denouement. WHY?!?!
Yeah, it'd be interesting to hear more. Seems like they collaborated pretty closely, since there are scenes that are almost the same with very telling tweaks/echoes across sections. Or did they just agree on a few key shared scenes, and go off on their own? They carried off the character work perfectly, which can't be an easy thing to do with 3 different writers.
I'm torn on the final scene. It didn't tell us anything new- we know how everyone feels about the situation because they told us in an earlier scene (trying to skirt around spoilers). But not too sad to get that moment for her. A call back- that the land that started this mess was her favorite garden, but just a rent-generating parcel for all these quarrelsome men.
Really enjoyed The Last Duel and revisiting this review after seeing it. The choice to go so subjective with it was truly brilliant, made what could have been something either too saccharine or too maudlin hit just the right balance and allowed it to hammer home its themes without being boringly obvious. Brilliant structural decision, best movie Ridley Scott has made in a while, I think.
Oh man, this is the review that has me excited to see The Last Duel.
Still stoked to see the VU Doc but disappointed that we don't get much in the way of Yule-era focus. I get that Cale is alive and infinitely cool and that Warhol-era is more in the direct bullseye of what Haynes cares about but sad that the part where they hard shift into different sounds probably gets treated as a "then this happened, then The End" kind of thing.
They cover more of that than you might expect, but if you're looking for info on the making of SQUEEZE you're going to be disappointed. An eternal question: Would LOADED, which I love, be a better album with Mo, whom I also love but whose approach I have a hard time imagining fitting in with those songs?
Heh, while I have gotten more enjoyment out of Squeeze than a lot of folks, what I really want the dirt on is Loaded. I totally get the shift from White Light/White Heat to the third album, but Loaded is just so different stylistically than what came before, both in the drumming (another Yule!) and in the general arrangement-style, which I've read is heavily credited to Yule.
The first album is the canonical one but I'm not certain that the Velvets would be as remembered as they are today without Loaded, and Sweet Jane and Rock & Roll sound the way they do on there because of Yule taking Reed's stuff and shining it up, ya know?
Side note that in general, I find Reed-as-a-musician-who-passively-let-other-people-arrange-and-define-most-of-his-best-work to be endlessly fascinating. Like, his idea for music basically stops at his first solo album and then picks up again in the 80's, none of which is the stuff that made him famous (though I love a lot of it).
Also one more nerd note - I suspect the songs would have come out pretty similar based on the 1969 live recordings that are out there, which I believe have Mo on drums (playing what sounds to me like a much more conventional setup, with cymbals and everything). If you haven't dug into this stuff, can't recommend it enough - on Spotify, the "Velvet Underground Super Deluxe" version (that is, the 3rd self-titled) has the best-sounding mix of a few shows from this era where they play some Loaded stuff and it is so very rad.
I picked up the 6xLP Matrix Tapes box set last winter and that might just be my favorite Velvets release now. Agreed that I'd like to have more perspective on the Yule-era, but based on everything I've read that's not Haynes' thesis w/ this film.
I thought The Velvet Underground might very well be one of the best music documentaries I’ve ever seen, up there with The Last Waltz and CODA (Ryuichi Sakamoto). I loved how the form of the film matched the form of the music. I came away wanting to immediately watch it again.
Where are all my other Berg-heads to discuss that movie!
Here for you, of course. Good one, right?
We've caught up on a decent amount of Bergman over the break, but I am not sure enough to catch everything going on. Expected the ending to be a bit twistier than it ended up being. But as the kids say, it was a great vibe.
I really don’t feel like the film intends to have anything more than a light touch w/r/t Bergman, though you can recognize certain locales. (The house she visits with the film student was recognizable to me from Persona.) Really I just enjoyed how UNLIKE Bergman the film is. She transforms that place to her own ends.
The Last Duel was FANTASTIC! It's easy to put a foot wrong with this subject matter, but I thought they handled it really well. I could single out every performance in this movie, even down to the smallest supporting roles (the giggly teenage king! Affleck having the most fun ever!). So happy to see Adam Nagaitis getting bigger roles- after The Terror, that guy should be in everything.
Can we get a new Oscar category for "Least Convincing Blond"? Because Affleck deserves something for having to act through that. It's still jarringly distracting after the 2h mark!
Right? The studio really should have made clear that this is a fun movie, despite its difficult subject matter. Once Affleck turned up, the whole thing clicked for me. His look actually helped, I think, to get me to accept the shift in tone, the anachronisms in the dialogue, etc. Glad you dug it.
It was surprisingly funny- maybe unfair of me to be surprised, given that Holofcener's one of the writers. There were straight out guffaws (any scene w/Affleck), knowing chuckles (everyone rolling their eyes at Damon, all the time), and dark cackles (cutting directly from the rape to the rapist at confession). I can't count how many jokes were made about how ppl see themselves vs how they're seen, but it worked every time. Plus every second with the king and his side-eyeing queen is comedy gold.
The ensemble makes this movie. Watch every background female character's reaction during the court scene, or anyone's reaction to Damon in the last 2 sections.
I'd love to know more about the writing process between the three of them. And speaking of female character reactions: The film had the perfect final shot of Comer, then you get that denouement. WHY?!?!
Yeah, it'd be interesting to hear more. Seems like they collaborated pretty closely, since there are scenes that are almost the same with very telling tweaks/echoes across sections. Or did they just agree on a few key shared scenes, and go off on their own? They carried off the character work perfectly, which can't be an easy thing to do with 3 different writers.
I'm torn on the final scene. It didn't tell us anything new- we know how everyone feels about the situation because they told us in an earlier scene (trying to skirt around spoilers). But not too sad to get that moment for her. A call back- that the land that started this mess was her favorite garden, but just a rent-generating parcel for all these quarrelsome men.
Really enjoyed The Last Duel and revisiting this review after seeing it. The choice to go so subjective with it was truly brilliant, made what could have been something either too saccharine or too maudlin hit just the right balance and allowed it to hammer home its themes without being boringly obvious. Brilliant structural decision, best movie Ridley Scott has made in a while, I think.