After getting home yesterday from drinking with Pixelmatsch and 6451, I had to sleep until 11, but even then I wasn’t really able to get over my tiredness. I cooked and saw Loris, who is rather difficult to talk to (at least for me), because I feel like I should be witty and smart and interesting and considerate all at the same time. It takes a significant amount of brain muscles and subsequently physical effort to be funny on a speed level of your average screwball comedy. (Ok, I am not that good even if I tried.)
The Unknown
USA 1927, Tod Browning, 63′
I knew that I wanted to see this film because I find Lon Chanley to be a great actor (which he was in this film no doubt). All in all, the movie itself wasn’t too interesting, at least not interesting enough to keep me awake. I have missed some of the more suspenseful parts of the film. I saw the exposition that introduced the characters (Alonzo who is in love with the woman who is afraid of men’s hands) and then I woke up when Alonzo got his arm operation and came back. What I saw was okay. I liked the character of Alonzo – of course Chanley helped with his believable acting – and found the story rather interesting. But the execution was okay at best, and after just having seen the energetic “His Girl Friday”, it was difficult to get back into the mood of a ‘drama’ like this.
All in all, I have not seen much about this film, but at this point, I am not too sad about this fact.
The General
USA 1926, Buster Keaton, 75′
This is my first re-watch of a film in quite awhile, and definitely the first time where the second watch was so much more impressive than the first. I have previously mentioned how a movie theater can destroy you when it’s a bad film (see “J’accuse”), because you cannot skip over stupid parts or stop watching the film altogether, but the risk of seeing something bad is so incredibly worth it when a film turns out to be great. Especially for comedies, the laughter of other people is the most beautiful music to the film. It was the first time when I found it a little sad that the music played was overwhelming the laughter.
“The General” is the perfect film for a situation like this. The movie theater was full, and we had Neil Brand, perhaps the best pianist in the whole festival. With suitable music, the film becomes just amazingly funny. There were so many details I didn’t even notice at the first watch, but became subtly amusing when everybody else started laughing. With his nonchalant face, Buster Keaton is just amazing when it comes to subtly funny scenes, just a single look of his can make the audience roar with laughter. Even if “The General” is his best film, it’s an absolute masterpiece solely for its potential to be that funny on screen.
Intolerance
USA 1916, David W. Griffith, 192′
“Intolerance” has broken my heart a little bit. After spending 3 hours on it, I realized that movies are a little bit like lectures: I am used to 1.5 hour lectures, and that year when I had 3 hour lectures, I had a hard time not falling asleep (in fact I felt asleep no matter what). There is one single movie in this world that I absolutely loved throughout its whole run, the four-hour long “Ai no Mukidashi”. Apart from that, I typically suffer through a long movie, and “Intolerance” was no exception.
The problem with “Intolerance” is that it is very similar to “Metropolis” in that the story is rather silly. A movie of this scope and length, with the title “Intolerance”, is expected not only to be beautiful, but also do justice to its complex and tragic topic. Unfortunately, “Intolerance” can only do the beauty part. The mass scenes are absolutely epic, the historical costumes absolutely beautiful and worth their while to sit through it for 3 hours, finally cinematography and direction are wonderfully crafted.
But we are dealing with D.W. Griffith, a man who managed to do “The Birth of a Nation” after all. Either he pretends to be political or apolitical (he’s a little contradictoyr when it comes to that), and “Intolerance”, ironically, is another example of his political naivety. “Intolerance” has four parts, and has exactly four messages: Puritan society is wrong, treason and genocide out of religious reasons is wrong and, of course, the crucification of Jesus was wrong.
Especially because the film looks so luxurious, a lot of it seems cheap. Griffith uses beautifully sounding words to make up for lack of depth of content; some dramatic ‘running after the governor’ scenes to save the main character’s life compensate the lack of actual suspense; four stories instead of one because each one of them doesn’t carry all that far.
“Intolerance” definitely is a film worth to see, especially from a film historic standpoint. I’m also convinced that I would rather prefer positive political naivety over “The Birth of a Nation’s” racism, but ultimately you cannot get me with a few beautiful words and brilliant pictures alone.