man i don’t want to be a h8ter and i had some fun watching mother too but a thousand filmmakers much better than aronofsky have taken a million risks much greater than mother
1 Like
I guess I should be more specific about the type of risk I mean–a relatively big-budget project that eventually collapses into impressionism or surrealism while remaining internally consistent in its themes. Not just something that might alienate audiences.
I probably shouldn’t talk too enthusiastically about this one, though, realizing how subjectively it happened to appeal to me. I could easily set someone up for disappointment.
1 Like
who is that beautiful robust horned child
I should probably point out for anyone interested in watching Black Moon based on the above photo of cute animal, that the movie features a couple scenes of fairly brutal animal death (simulated with jump cuts etc, but you get what I mean). This includes the opening scene, which is of a badger getting run over by the protagonist’s car, and also happens to be the official Criterion trailer for the film that you would find on YouTube.
I just watched God Told Me To. I’d had it on my list, along with others mentioned in this thread. But when I learned that it was written and directed by the same guy as The Stuff, I immediately checked whether my library had it. (It did.)
It was hard for me to guess exactly where the story was going, or even what genre the film would turn out to be. And I like that sort of thing.
Apart from the story, I liked the scenes from around New York City in the 1970s. In the special features, several people mentioned how they got permission to record footage of the parade, but no one realized that they were going to insert actors shooting each other. Another funny story from a Q&A was that the person responsible for bringing the rifle for the opening scene failed to bring it, so the director asked people gathered on the roof to watch whether any of them had a rifle with a scope. Someone did, and so they used it.
1 Like
Seeing this thread reminds me: for no particular reason I watched Kamikaze 1989 the other day, the movie that Rainer Werner Fassbinder made immediately before he died. He didn’t direct it though; he stars in it, wearing a leopard print suit that he was apparently buried in.
The film’s a dystopian noir ala Alphaville but not quite as abstract. I wouldn’t even say it’s surreal exactly. It does that trick of using brutalist architecture to represent the far-flung future of 1989, and the costumes and vehicles are pretty strange, but if you can accept all that it’s easy enough to follow. I think it belongs in this thread largely because I’ve had literal dreams about movies exactly like this and I kept flashing back to them while watching it.
It doesn’t get a big recomendation from me, but something about Fassbinder in this is so interesting to watch. I mean, he really looks bad but he runs around and does stunts and even though he seems extremely tired throughout it all he doesn’t appear put out by it.
3 Likes
“A Page of Madness” is a silent film which letterboxd dot com summarises as “a man takes a job at an asylum with hopes of freeing his imprisoned wife”.
while that is technically the plot it doesn’t mention any of the extremely effective and isolating dream/mania sequences that definitely made me think of silent hill the first time i saw them. great use of masks.
1 Like
I recently discovered Roy Andersson’s “Living Trilogy.” All three films are made up of mundane and/or absurdist sketches, with loose, vague storylines that come and go. Occasionally, an actual dream is depicted, but those parts are not necessarily the most bizarre. A few subtly-introduced scenes end up being disturbing.
Everything takes place in drab but striking settings in Sweden.
Songs from the Second Floor
You, the Living
A Pigeon Sat on a Branch Reflecting on Existence
Still gradually working through things mentioned in this thread. I saw these two recently:
I wasn’t sure what to think of this one at first, but I enjoyed trying to puzzle out what was really going on. And the very last scene is perfect. I find that anything by Villeneuve is worth seeing if just for the atmosphere.
It took me a few scenes to realize that one of the actors looked familiar because she played the wife in Possession. The scene that made this movie for me is when one of the neighbors puts on a mask of the protagonist’s face.
1 Like
I just finished watching this, and it certainly is dreamlike. More than once, a scene reminded me of something I’ve encountered in my own dreams.
A few minutes in, I realized that it seemed very familiar because I had coincidentally read the story it’s based on just recently in the anthology The Weird.
I watched Carnival of Souls tonight. I’d been meaning to get around to it for ages.
One thing I didn’t pick up on is how the song that upset the priest differed from the other music she played. I guess it all just blended in with the score for me.
Anyway, I enjoyed this one a lot.
two of my favorite films i didn’t see mentioned:
Under The Skin (it’s on Netflix also):
Mirror (1975) by Andrei Tarkovsky:
7 Likes
under the skin practically top ten
this is alex proyas’s first film, mostly unavailable until recently. it’s not exactly Silent Hill but is absolutely surreal and dreamlike. 3 fucked up post apocalypse survivors seek to escape their personal dust-hell. absolutely drenched in ominous christian symbolism. it’s awesome
1 Like
I’m a little surprised not to see Shutter Island on here anywhere.
The 1991 Japanese cyberpunk movie √964 Pinocchio fits right into this thread.
Kind of a 90’s consumer alienation version of Eraserhead. Weird looking characters wandering around commercial and industrial sectors of Japan, tormenting each other and experiencing weird biological anomalies. One standout is a madly over the top magical realist puking scene in a subway.
The cyborg character even moves with tank controls:
I watched this the other day and I loved the first half of it, but it does really start to drag as it goes on. I’d still recommend it! The sound design is WILD, way ahead of its time. Lots of extremely repetitive, short ambient synth loops that establish this great off-kilter mood in even the most slow segments.
And it’s got a great industrial theme song that would fit right into a Silent Hill game:
6 Likes
i feel like Annihilation fits too?
Annihilation
maybe more glossy than a lot of these other films, but definitely some kind of horror and definitely an unsubtle and expressionistic allegory for grief and trauma. the Shimmer behaves basically like the town of Silent Hill i think
3 Likes
What a wonderful thread. Let me add these two great movies by Hiroshi Teshigahara:
Woman in the dunes
Face of another
3 Likes