A Cinema Canon for the Ages

[cinemabon]

We moved last year on my birthday (I'm a Yankee Doodle Dandy... that one). I'm getting up there and this place has lots of stuff within one mile (though they could use some good bike paths). Then North Carolina goes Republican on us (WHAT?). I feel like we're slipping back in time (culturally). My son is attending college up the road (UNC system) and Lori is working in Chapel Hill on the UNC campus (a liberal island in a sea of red). I'm with a writer's group. We meet every other Tuesday and authors read their works. I read from my latest work, The Black Sphere, last Tuesday. We had a good turn out - a producer of local movies was there, along with a guy who's in SAG. Another worked with Robert Altman on several pictures. They're in IMDB. We've also some members who are into editing and publication. I cling to them for my sanity.

They've got a very cool (note the hipster terms) restaurant/movie theater where you touch a button and a waiter will bring you anything you want. The chairs are big leather lounge chairs with tray tables, reserved seats and get this... CURVED SCREENS! The place is a hoot. They have eight theaters like that attached to an airplane hanger that has 18 cinemas! The caramel cheesecake was excellent. It's called the Four Seasons Movie Tavern. Get drunk and watch Jason Bourne.

At 63, soon to be that other number, I'm beginning to slow a bit. Somethings always reaching out to touch me with a new ache or pain. Any devils out there? Yeah, I'd sell my soul for youth again but then about making those same mistakes... well, let's chalk it up to fait accompli. If it wasn't for the incredible mind of Chris Knipp, this site would have faded long ago. I drop by once a week or so and read his intelligent insights on what's new. I've always thought he should have written for the Hollywood Reporter, Variety, The Village Voice or the New Yorker. He's that good.

Glad you're ok. I still love cinema. I love the artform. I love you guys. Take care.

[Chris Knipp]

I just can't understand your saying you're "getting up there" when you only mean 63 to 64! It sounds like plenty of nice things are close at hand where you are, including the posh cinemas and Chapel Hill and film people at your reading your work -- except for the right wing takeover. But that means where you are reflects the way of things to dome, doesn't it? Might as well live in the eye of the storm. I admit I live between NYC and Berkeley, which is the opposite. Please come back to contributing. You're not too old for that. You have presented great series on musical movies, on David Lean, on your own personal film school and film work history that are invaluable and that needs to go on coming. Please, I'm much older than you are. It's all in your mind.

[oscar jubis]

Hola amigos,
Yes, I managed to finish two marathons and run competitive times in shorter races from about '88 to '04 even though I've smoked consistently since age 14 until 10 months ago. Being able to run is one thing that helped me make excuses about my smoking; now my health is seriously compromised (but I don't want to know, or talk about it). I am trying to exercise regularly but I lack discipline. I continue to happily live in Miami but I've considered moving if I'm offered a great job (which becomes increasingly unlikely with each passing year). I am still single (divorced in 2010) and plan to try online dating soon to see what happens.
The last two films I watched are Creed (good) and Mississippi Grind (very good).
We showed Aferim! at the Cosford this weekend but I didn't feel like watching it. Go figure.
Oscar

[oscar jubis]

Hello again,
It's great fun to re-watch movies that have impressed me tremendously in the past and put them to the test all over again. The question is whether any film will sustain its impact on me. In the latest update, I have added GROUNDHOG DAY a movie that seems to me like a result of magic or divine intervention because there is nothing in the pedigree of the writer or director that would make anyone expect something so monumentally profound. This movie has inspired a great deal of academic philosophizing as found in many journal essays in the fields of philosophy, psychology, religion, literature, cultural studies, etc. I think it's the rare comedy that measures up to the Golden Age great comedies directed by legends like Sturges and Lubitsch. On a negative note, I had great difficulty watching the cinematographically brilliant RAGING BULL but find its scope and worldview too narrow for my taste. Scorsese's drug-fueled depression and his rote professionalism are palpable. I also added Billy Wilder's last masterpiece AVANTI!(1972)with Jack Lemmon and Juliet Mills.
Films I watched recently that I liked a lot include Xavier Nolan's MUMMY which uses different aspect ratios in meaningful ways and may appear too long at first, relative to its aims, and proves to deserve the longish running time.
My favorite films I've seen this year are HEART OF A DOG and SUNSET SONG. The best foreign language movie I watched is the big Cannes winner from last year: DHEEPAN.

[cinemabon]

In studying time travel for one of my novels, I looked into the Mobius Strip, which represents a mathematical paradox. The question I've heard arise with "Groundhog Day" is that the story literally goes on for years in Murray's life and that we see only the highlights of that endless trip; living the same day over and over - a Dante's Inferno of sorts, a descent into hell. Ramis made several excellent comedies with Bill. However, the one that ironically plays best in my mind - and bears up with repeated viewings - is Groundhog Day. Perhaps it's the number of situations that build each time they're repeated or Murray's mundane throwaway delivery, especially in the diner when he tells Andie about every person there with a little too much personal detail. Ramis sense of humor is both dark and brooding in how Murray - terrified of this repeated existence - tries to end the loop with a series of suicides, each one topping the next. Perhaps that is the dark side of humanity as well; that we laugh each time he tried to end his life in ever more imaginative ways. That he should redeem his life by earning "the love of a good woman" is a little too contrite for its resolution. If that is salvation, think how lucky we married men are... I'll let you finish that sentence... sentence. Is that a pun?

[oscar jubis]

The point of Groundhog Day is, as I see it of course, that a jaded, cynical meteorologist learns to be a better person when he is forced by mysterious forces (the gods of cinema!) to relive one day. We see scenes from many repetitions of this day in the movie but certainly less than a year worth of days. The experience is ultimately the opposite of a descent into anything but more like an exaltation (and thus a defense in the face of wearied skepticism) of humanity's capacity to change for the better.

[Chris Knipp]

Wikipedia:

Time loop duration speculations[edit]
Estimates regarding how long Phil remains trapped in the loop, in real time, vary widely. During filming, Ramis, who was a Buddhist, observed that according to Buddhist doctrine, it takes 10,000 years for a soul to evolve to its next level. Therefore, he said, in a spiritual sense, the entire arc of Groundhog Day spans 10,000 years.[4] In the DVD commentary, Ramis estimated a real-time duration of 10 years. Later, after several on-line sites arrived at a total of eight years, eight months, and 16 days, Ramis told a reporter, "I think the 10-year estimate is too short. It takes at least 10 years to get good at anything, and allotting for the down time and misguided years he spent, it had to be more like 30 or 40 years."[5] In 2014, the website WhatCulture tallied various time duration assumptions and estimated that Phil spent a total of 12,395 days—just under 34 years—reliving Groundhog Day.[6]