approximate chronological order

This was originally started on Myspace, and I haven't yet gone over it to see how much that influenced it.

Some performances are movies in themselves, intials noted. (some without initials have great perfs, too.)

vertigo. Obsession, performance, identity--and vertigo: themes of my life. I am both Scotty and Judy.

suddenly, last summer. (for k.h.) "But what a blessing to them, Doctor, to be just...peaceful," Katharine Hepburn purrs as Violet Venable, contriving to get the good doctor to give her niece a lobotomy. Tennessee Williams' anxieties about being homosexual taken to the nth.

breakfast at tiffany's. Okay, just two days, of my whole life, to breeze around looking like Audrey Hepburn.

the misfits

the children's hour

what ever happened to baby jane? Bette Davis's genius is most compelling not as the ribald harridan feeding rats to her wheelchair-bound sister, Blanche, while polishing her comeback as Baby Jane, but at the end, covering her ears, quietly pleading, "Please stop", when Blanche is, after a lifetime, finally telling Jane the truth. And Joan Crawford masterfully works our sympathy throughout.

sweet bird of youth (for g.p.). The imperious movie queen Alexandra del Lago, whose roots are small-town slutdom, may be a cliche by today, but Geraldine Page is wicked funny and powerful.

the birds. Slowly, the open space is filled by birds; by the end of the movie, they dominate the landscape. In one scene a group of birds mercilessly attack a group of kids in a schoolyard. A shot of glasses pecked out.

the graduate (for a.b.). Benjamin, and the second half of the movie, don't deserve Anne Bancroft's Mrs. Robinson, who in the first half melts the edges of the frame.

take the money and run: One of "the early, funny ones" that haunted Woody a few years later.

the prime of miss jean brodie (for m.s.):

they shoot horses, don't they? (for j.f.): As a teenager Jane Fonda learned that her mother's death had actually been suicide, by reading about it in a movie magazine. Her Gloria hates the absurdity of tragedy.

willie wonka: what is my thing for Violet Beauregard, anyway

klute: verisimilitude: in one scene, Bree Daniels (J. Fonda) is so terrified, she weeps, and snot drips out Fonda's nose. But it's more her vibrato--Kenneth Tynan said she "can quiver like a tuning fork"--that makes Fonda unforgettable in (only) a handful of movies.

the trojan women:

the lion cub (elizabeth R: part one)

the bitter tears of petra von kant: The parasitic Petra Von Kant can "keep" her lover, but she can't hold her. Fassbinder.

cabaret (for l.m.): You don't want to be there when Liza sings "Mein Herr" and I think I'm alone. Oh!--but maybe you're a fan of gay prancing.

everything you always wanted to know about sex. The best-selling 70's book with this title is terrified of homosexuality. Woody waiting with the other sperm, pre-ejaculation, worried they might end up splattered on a wall (if it's masturbation), is more realistic

chinatown: I want to make a movie where Dunaway's Evelyn Mulwray meets Fonda's Gloria from TSH,DT?. Two tragic women, from polarized socioeconomic worlds, co-existing in L.A. in the '30's. Would they "get" each other? No one else in their worlds do.

the conversation: Gene Hackman in a tense, trippy, low-key thriller directed by F. F. Coppolla. Alienation and being drawn to someone through their electronic impression (years before the Internet).

dog day afternoon (for a.p.): Pacino at full force. And the sidewalks of New York, to boot.

love and death: Metafiction? Though parody may not satisfy that taste. All these non-sequiturs so popular in blogging--Woody was the master.

taxi driver: I understand, now, why some people exalt DeNiro. In their scene together, Scorsese is perfectly competent; but DeNiro inhabits the interstices. All props to Scorsese as director, though.

carrie:

the late show

3 women

annie hall

new york, new york

close encounters (not the special edition)

julia (for j.f.)

the goodbye g***

coma (for g.b.)

interiors (for g.p.)

the china syndrome (for j.f.)

manhattan

road warrior

the elephant man

the empire strikes back

wise blood

cattle annie and little britches (for a.p.)

reds

blow out

superman 2

star trek II: the wrath of khan

e. t. (but why did he wait till the end to fly?)

blade runner

the last american virg

rumble fish

zelig

the right stuff

silkwood (for m.s.)

terms of e (for d.w.)

crimes of passion (for k.t.)

mike's murder (for d.w.)

choose me

mrs. soffel

a passage to india

purple rose of cairo

ran

breakfast club (for a.s.)

peggy sue got married (for k.t.)

pretty in pink (for m.r.)

crimes of the h (for d.k.)

colors

la ley del deseo

raising arizona

svanmajer's alice

high tide

dead ringers

enemies, a love story

music box (for j.l.)

everybody wins

the sheltering sky

vincent & theo

my own private idaho

dogfight

soapdish

silence of the l (for j.f.)

batman returns (for m.p. and danny elfman)

manhattan murder mys

heavenly creatures

citizen ruth

fargo

secrets and lies

marvin's room (for d.k.)

female perversions

afterglow

romy and michelle's h.s. r.

face/off

jackie brown

opposite of sex

jawbreaker

american p**

titus

election

boys don't cry (esp. for c.s. & h.s.)

snatch

waking life

moulin rouge (after hating it first time)

the others

party monster

adaptation

the hours

school of rock: "It's a long way to the top" was in my head for days, occasionally being bumped out by "Teacher's Pet".

monster: Surely we're set up to relate to Aileen Wuornos--I'm astonished how much I did.