Sight and Sound Movie List: The Treff/Liang

Drop Dead Gorgeous (1999, Michael Patrick Jann)

This mockumentary on the beauty pageant world is so full of satire that it is hard to believe Christopher Guest was not involved.  An unfortunate victim of bad marketing (selling itself as a teen thriller, which it is not in any way), it never gained a huge following.  Nonetheless, this movie will make you laugh so hard you will fall over. I promise.

Gaslight (1944, George Cukor)

I've been told that as a younger woman, my Grandmom looked a lot like Ingrid Bergman, and I've loved her movies as long as I can remember.  This movie is thrilling in a wonderfully understated way, and the casting of romantic hero Charles Boyer as the potentially sinister Gregory Anton was a stroke of genius.

Lord of the Rings Trilogy (2001-3, Peter Jackson)

I'm cheating and including the trilogy as one entry on this list.  The expansive story receives loving and respectful treatment from Peter Jackson, and is accessible to hardcore fans and the uninitiated alike.  Besides, it's impossible not to cheer at the screen when Eowyn throws the Witch King of Agmar's prophesy back in his face.

Laura (1944, Otto Preminger)

I’m a sucker for film noir, and this one tops the list. The movie both relies on and plays with the genre’s most famous tropes in a refreshing way.  Dana A ndrews’ Mark McPherson also feels more accessible and human than the more aloof Philip Marlowe.

MirrorMask (2005, Dave McKean)

I know this will be a controversial choice, but I promise my love for this movie goes beyond the big names in the credits.  The visuals are stunning and unique, with Dave McKean's hand clear in every scene.  The story may be a bit abstract and philosophical for some, but fans of Neil Gaiman's more retrospective writing will appreciate it.

Pan’s Labyrinth (2006, Guillermo del Toro)

It was a tough choice between this and Hellboy, but Pan’s Labyrinth’s depth, combined with its beautiful visuals, overcome my natural preference for lighter fare.  It is also the perfect vehicle for Doug Jones to show off his amazing ability to defy both physics and biology.

Pride and Prejudice (BBC Version) (1995, Sue Birtwistle, Julie Scott, & Michael Wearing Producers)

This is my one chick flick concession.  The story is timeless, and the intentionally long play time allows the director to cover plot points that are omitted in other versions.  Jennifer Ehle’s Elizabeth Bennet is deliciously sassy, while Colin Firth in period dress is the perfect eye candy.

The Princess Bride (1987, Rob Reiner)

Yes, I realize this is a cop-out.  But there are very few movies I can watch on loop, and this is one of them. Besides, I know I’m not the only one who can recite the “to the pain” speech from memory.

Some Like it Hot (1959, Billy Wilder)

I think this is probably the funniest movie of all time.  The dialogue absolutely sparkles, and Jack Lemon and Tony Curtis play their roles with just enough camp to be funny without going over the top. 

Spirited Away (2001, Hayao Miyazaki)

I knew from the start that a Miyazaki film would be on this list; the challenge was figuring out which one to go with.  I chose Spirited Away because it strikes the best balance between the beautiful worlds of Princess Mononoke and Howl's Moving Castle, and the wide-eyed innocence of Ponyo. 

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The Frank Martin Mass

Now that Janacek is finally getting something resembling his due as the cosmic genius he is, there are a number of remaining candidates for Most Underrated Composer of the 20th Century. But surely Frank Martin is right near the top. He is in some ways a 1-note composer, using almost seraphic-sounding harmonies to create an ecstatic sound be his music instrumental or vocal - even during his 12-tone phase this remains true of him. But if he is a 1-noter, then so are all sorts of religious composers from Bach to Bruckner. As for the Mass for Double Choir, I would be hard-pressed to name a greater piece of 20th century music for unaccompanied chorus.

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Quote of the Day

Jordan: Before wikipedia there was Evan.

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Sight and Sound Movie List: Il Barone

Chungking Express (1994, Kar Wai Wong) – This film, probably more than any other I’ve seen, reinforces why I love movies so much. Its stylistic flourishes evoke the best of filmmakers like Godard, and the two different romantic stories in the film unfold at an exhilarating pace.



The Battle of Algiers (1966, Gillo Pontecorvo) – It’s hard to believe you aren’t watching an actual documentary when seeing this film. It’s gritty, visceral, and difficult to watch at times, but looking in the eyes of the characters, you feel like this is real. I think it is the best movie about terrorism, its roots, and its consequences that has ever been made.



The Conformist (1970, Bernardo Bertolucci) – This is a strange and surreal journey into Fascist Italy prior to World War II. Beautiful cinematography captures Bertolucci’s interpretation of the era, and the protagonist, Clerici, may be one of the most fascinating (and pitiful) character studies out there.



Barton Fink (1991, Joel Coen) – A farcical, yet honest look at the creative process and what is described as “the life of the mind.” I also think this is the Coen Brothers’ best homage to a particular era, as sometimes their attention to details outweighs the value of the film itself.



Apocalypse Now (1979, Francis Ford Coppola) – Most likely my favorite war movie of all time (and based on one of my favorite novels), it utilizes the Vietnam War as the perfect backdrop for looking at the process of how one is driven to madness. It contains a number of unforgettable scenes and images that are difficult to shake.



The Virgin Spring (1960, Ingmar Bergman) – The gold standard for the ultimate “revenge movie.” Max Von Sydow’s performance as a tortured father of a girl who is raped and murdered is just one of many highlights of this film. It’s still powerful today; I can only imagine the responses it elicited back in 1960.



Dead Man (1995, Jim Jarmusch) – I believe that the majority of Westerns fall into the “romantic” or “violent” portrayals of the Old West. But I like Dead Man’s portrayal; that the Old West was a bizarre era in history filled with strange people. I like the spiritual journey that unfolds in the film, and Neil Young’s instrumental soundtrack is perfect for the setting.



Blade Runner (1982, Ridley Scott) – Neo-noir at its finest, and I think, one of the best science fiction films of all time. The score by Vangelis fits in perfectly, and Rutger Hauer’s speech to Harrison Ford at the end of the film remains one of my favorite scenes of any film.



8 ½ (1963, Federico Fellini) – It’s probably best to watch this film a couple of times, because the first viewing might seem like an irreverent blur. It’s not just a “movie about making a movie,” but deals with issues that many men struggle with. The “harem” scene is one of the most accurate portrayals of what a strange dream is like (at least in my weird mind).



Reprise (2006, Joachim Trier) – This film is most famously known as a story about what being a struggling young writer is like, but the study of the relationship between the two friends is what makes this movie so good in my mind. It captures the best and worst of what it is like to live through our early and mid-20s.




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800 Words: For DFD (1925-2012)

(Schubert: Death and the Maiden)

If you really wanted to take in the scope of Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau’s achievement, you would have to resort to hyperbole long before you did it justice. When you hear the epoch-making Schubert, Bach, Brahms, Mahler, Schumann, and Wolf lieder and compare them to any other singer of the early stereo era, you realize that this is the greatest lieder singer of his generation. When you hear his Verdi, Mozart, and Wagner – you may first bristle at the diction or the wrongness of the timbre, but then you hear the intelligence and thought he puts into each word and you realize that to rely on brains in such well-known operatic repertoire for which so many empty-headed singers coast on beautiful sounds makes him also the bravest singer of his time. And then you hear all the unfamiliar new composers he championed: Britten, Shostakovich, Hindemith, Berg, Barber, Henze, Hartmann, Krenek, Lutoslawski, Reger, Matthus, Zillig, Von Einem, Reimann, and Busoni – and you then realize he was also the most responsible singer of his day. It’s only then that you begin to realize that DFD was something above a mere generational figure – he was a once-in-a-lifetime gift to vocal music who can neither be replaced nor equalled.

(Bach: Ich habe genug)

I remember once that Professor Berard played us recordings from a couple songs of Schubert’s Die Schoene Mullerin cycle: one was of Sanford Sylvan, the other DFD. The tempos were virtually the same, but after the unaffected naturalness of a fine American singer, the professor put Fischer-Dieskau on, and every note, every word, even every vowel seemed to have its own interpretation. It seemed so mannered, so over-controlled that it was almost funny. Yet that too was a part of Fischer-Dieskau’s greatness – in the Age of Rock when anyone when anyone with a fine natural voice can be considered a great singer, Fischer-Dieskau might seem utterly mannered. But in the 1950’s and 60’s, when singers were recording thousands of unfamiliar lieder as though they were issued from a factory, DFD put the same incredible interpretive mind to the service of all that music he sung and compelled his listeners to listen all the more closely to the meaning of every song he recorded. No singer of the recorded era has ever made music mean more.

(Schubert: Du Bist der Ruh - stunning)

It couldn’t have been done without that voice – that voice! It wasn’t huge, at least it wasn’t until DFD completely overwhelmed my speakers with a passage of stentorian, Hotterian power. The range was baritone, but it had all the sharp overtones of a tenor and all the resonance of a bass. It had the kind of breath control that seemed to sing without a noticeable breath for minutes on end, and it seemed to achieve infinite dynamic gradations with no noticeable strain. In its way, it was as much a miracle as Pavarotti or Boris Christoff. What did he have to do to make it work like that? Is there a single singer today who can do with their voice what Fischer-Dieskau did with his?

(Richard Strauss: Morgen - just as beautiful)

And then there’s his influence. It’s thanks to DFD that the lieder recital itself still exists. Even in the age of the single and the album, it’s still possible in the world’s capitals for a great singer and a piano to sell out a big concert hall – just try and tell me that’s not utterly improbable; or that it couldn’t have been done without a truly great singer to remind music lovers what could still be achieved in the recital hall. Thanks to DFD, great classical singing is still not confined to the opera house. And just look at how many great baritones we have today: Terfel, Goerne, Hampson, Hrovotovsky, Leiferkus, Keenlyside, Finley, Gilfrey, and Quasthoff until recently– just to name those I can think of in the first 30 seconds. Today’s world doesn’t have many great Mezzos, or Tenors, or Basses, but Baritones it seems to have in infinite supply. Fischer Dieskau initiated a golden age for Baritones, all of whom are as influenced by him as they are different – each trying to carve their own individual path as distinct from DFD’s shadow as possible. No baritone (maybe Hampson…) dares over-interpret in Fischer-Dieskau’s manner anymore – in an age when music is more instinctive than intellectual, I suppose that’s appropriate, but I still can’t help thinking that something terrible’s been lost. It’s not appropriate to beat up today’s singers with yesterday’s, but one can’t help looking at it that way.

(Mahler: Ich bin der Welt abhanden gekommen)

So many of today’s opera singers sing on instinct, with barely a thought in their heads as to how they interpret. This might be forgivable if the average opera star’s technique were anywhere near the technical prowess of earlier eras. But so many of today’s opera singers have neither the technique nor the brains it takes to sing well – no wonder opera’s no longer popular with the public. Instead of singers acting with their voices as opera singers have been required to do for hundreds of years, opera in today’s world is controlled by theater directors who ostensibly do the singers’ interpretations for them. But why add the naturalism of the theater world when opera is already at the disadvantage of taking place in a universe where people sing rather than speak? Why add the spectacle of the movies when the opera stage is limited by how many times a set can change? Classical singing is what it is, and will lose to the other arts every time people try to make it more like another art. What opera and lieder has to offer the public is singers who, after years of constant toil, can draw the audience into a meaningful and unique synthesis of music, theater, and literature in which music always takes precedence – a synthesis that’s seems utterly pathetic when theater is given the biggest spotlight.

(Schumann: Ich Grolle Nicht)

Since his retirement, Fischer-Dieskau’s stock has fallen precipitously. To many singers today, he seems like a warning about the dangers of over-intellectualizing and over-interpretation. But no artist as great as DFD can remain forgot for long. Music lovers, true music lovers, will rediscover him. What remains unique about Fischer-Dieskau is not the amazing technique – it’s the aspirations to which he made that technique serve.  No singer, not even Callas or Schwarzkopf, wanted music to mean more than DFD did. And thanks to him, many people love Schubert, and Wolf, and Schumann, and Brahms, and hundreds of other composers, more than they would have had they never heard him.


(Brahms: O Tod, wie bitter bist du)

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Sight and Sound Movie List - El Aguirre

I was working to come up with a top-ten list of my favorite films and what I found was that several films on the list were related in one way or another. They could be connected by an actor or director, common theme, or via homage. I realized that my appreciation of each film could be enhanced by the other. So, I restructured my approach and I give you:

Ten movies you should watch back to back!

1. Blazing Saddles and Young Frankenstein

Blazing Saddles tells the story of Bart, the first black sheriff in the old west. What looks like a screwball comedy is actually a startling intelligent satire of American racism and ignorance during the civil rights era. Released at a time when many lead parts for black actors were in exploitation films this movie’s lead dared to be smart rather than tough. Watch out for the third act when the whole movie goes off the rails in ways that could never be expected or ever come close to being matched.

Young Frankenstein, filmed in glorious black and white, was the sarcastic send up too the dozens of classic monster movies. The grandson of the original Dr. Frankenstein battles the negative perceptions of his family’s experiments. He does so while also struggling with his own acceptance of his family history. Gene
Wilder stars as the doctor in what is the best performance of his career.

Why watch them back to back:

These two were the easiest to pick for this list because they are also tied for my all time favorite movies. Both released in 1974, these comedies represent two of the three collaborations between director/producer Mel Brooks and actor Gene Wilder, the other being the original 1968 version of The Producers. They
represent the some of the strongest work from both men’s body of work. They will both make you laugh until you cry.

2. Chinatown and Who Framed Roger Rabbit

Chinatown (1974) is the first of two detective films starring Jack Nicholson as J.J. Gittes, a film noir style privet investigator working in LA during the 1930s. JJ is hired to investigate a cheating husband and finds himself caught up in a plot that could change the face of LA forever. A great script and brilliant direction by Roman
Polanski (one of his last before fleeing the USA in 1978) cemented this as one of the best detective stories ever put on film. It has also been credited for making Jack Nicholson a major star.

Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1989) tells the story of Eddie Valiant, a Hollywood detective in a world where cartoon characters are living breathing people (or rabbits, or ducks, or what ever the hell else) just trying to make a living like anyone else. Often confused as a children’s movie because of the presence of cartoons as major characters, this movie is anything but. Sex, murder and infidelity are major themes wrapped around a plot that could change the face of LA forever (see what I did there?). It is dark and at times terrifying (Christopher Lloyd murders a cute anthropomorphic cartoon shoe. Why? Just because he is a jerk, that's why.) With smarter writing and higher production value that might be expected from a film with such a goofy premise, it remains a popular film twenty years after its release.

Why watch them back to back?

Chinatown and Roger Rabbit are so thematically and visually similar that the latter could have been a sequel to the former. Chinatown played such a major influence on the production of Roger Rabbit that to properly appreciate it you need to familiarize yourself with the source material. You will gain a much deeper appreciation and understanding for the silly cartoons that you laughed at as a kid.

3. Metropolis and The Terminator

Metropolis is an early example of science fiction on screen. From German director Fritz Lang and produced in 1927, Metropolis is about a future dystopia called Metropolis, where the wealth and excess luxuries of the rich are built on the backs of the poor, who are forced to live and work underground. The main plot revolves around two star-crossed lovers who are separated by their classes. The story also involves a mad scientist who uses the female of the pair to bring to life his greatest creation, a life like robot that wreaks havoc on the city. Visually striking, this silent era classic is still influencing the sci-fi genre to this day.

James Cameron’s The Terminator (1984) was the first major hit for the director who would go on to make some of the most successful movies of all time. This sci-fi action movie remains one of the gold standards that all other sci-fi action movies are compared to. You have probably seen this one (if not, why? What is your deal?) but if not, it is about a man sent back in time to protect the mother of a resistance fighter who will one day save the human race from an army of sentient machines. The main villain is a robot Arnold Schwarzenegger, in the role that made his career.

Why watch them back to back?

Because even though these movies are separated by decades they both showcase man’s tenuous relationship with technology. Both Lang and Cameron create worlds where a reliance on technology results in disaster. Both feature machines that look like people and try to overthrow society. Also, after watching a slow moving pre-WWII German film like Metropolis you may need some fast paced action to get you moving again. Unless you really love slow moving pre-WWII German films, in which case I recommend throwing on M, Lang’s 1931 film staring Peter Lorre.

4. Plan 9 from Outer Space and Ed Wood

Plan 9 (1959) is often called the worst movie ever made. With good reason. The plot makes little sense; aliens invade the Earth using a weapon that resurrects three dead people, and sometimes they fly around LA to just sort of let people know they are there. Thats pretty much the whole plan. You can see string on all of the flying saucers. One of the leads has an accent so thick you can’t understand a word he says. And, oh yeah, Bella Lugosi, who stars in the film, died before it even started production and was cut into the movie using old footage and a stand in who covered his face with a cape. Despite all of this, the movie is just a lot of fun. Its utter ridiculousness and camp make it the king of all late night B-movies.

Plan 9 has become such a favorite among fans of B-movies that the story of how it came to be is the plot of Tim Burton’s 1994 film Ed Wood. Staring Johnny Depp as the titular character (long before the pairing between the director and actor started going stale) Ed Wood tells the story of how a very unlikely group of
strange people came together to produce some of the worst movies ever made. Ed, a recently uncloseted transvestite with a dream of being a big name director, is inherently likable and has an inspiring enthusiasm for his work, no matter how bad he may be at it.

Why watch them back to back?

After watching Plan 9 I knew I loved it, but had a hard time putting my finger on why. Then I watched Ed Wood and knew. Because despite how quite terrible Plan 9 truly is, it certainly has heart. Burton explores the strange and comical relationships that lead to the creation of Wood’s most well known work. The
friendship formed between Wood and Lugosi also served as a parallel for Burton’s own relationship with Vincent Price at the end of his life. Like the relationship between Ed Wood and his friends these films really make each other make more sense.

5. Dead Alive (Brain Dead) and Lord of the Rings

Dead Alive is the schlockiest movie I have ever had the pleasure to devote 104 minutes of my life to. The 1992 gross-out comedy-horror zombie movie from New Zealand boasts one of the highest body counts ever put to film. Complete with a zombie sex scene resulting in a zombie baby (not the weirdest part, by far)
this one can hardly be explained, but should not be missed.

Lord of the Rings... you have seen/ heard of this series and there is no reason I should explain it to you. But here we go anyway. Lord of the Rings (2001-3) is one of the biggest film series ever made in pretty much every conceivable category. Adapted from JRR Tolkien’s epic fantasy series, Lord of the Rings made crazy
money and you probably own the DVD. Good choice, nerd.

Why watch them back to back?

Peter Jackson directed both of these. Yeah, five years after wrapping on Dead Alive, a gratuitously violent and disgusting low budget work ($3 million), Jackson started preproduction on one of the most ambitious and expensive ($280+ million) film projects of the late 20th/ early 21st century. You want to see versatility in a director, look no further than these two (ok, I mean four) projects. Put the two next to each other and outside the facts that they were both filmed in New Zealand and were helmed by Jackson, but are both brilliant in their own right.Well... actually Frodo does sort of look like the the zombie baby... hmmm....

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ET: Almanac

“Banks have done more injury to the religion, morality, tranquility, prosperity, and even wealth of the nation than they can have done or ever will do good.”

- John Adams


“I hope that we shall crush in its birth the aristocracy of our monied corporations, which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of strength, and bid defiance to the laws of our country.”


Thomas Jefferson


So much for founder's intent. Read many more quotes of this nature here

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