Thursday, December 12, 2024

The Assassination of Trotsky (Joseph Losey, 1972)

This film appeared in the Medveds' 1978 book The Fifty Worst Films of All Time. Like many of the titles included therein, The Assassination of Trotsky isn't quite deserving. But it's a head scratcher for sure. The main problem is that there seems not to have been a script or perhaps it arrived on location in tatters. A screenwriter is listed (Nicholas Mosley, who later wrote a critical biography of his father, British Union of Fascists founder Sir Oswald Mosley). But much of the screenplay consists of Trotsky (a paycheck-mopping Richard Burton) dictating his memoirs which does little to push the narrative (or even any ideological project) forward. Slow, lazy pans document the exile's Mexico City compound lending the production a travelogue feel. Alain Delon is on board as Trotsky's assassin Frank Jacson, canoodling with Romy Schneider and reciting risible dialogue that one hopes was improvised or written moments before shooting. Losey et al. convey so little sense of Trotsky as a Great Man that one could claim the film instantiates a Communist aesthetic. But The Assassination of Trotsky is more a Swiss cheese wheel than a film, car-crash fascinating but not exactly a pleasurable or recommendable experience.

Grade: B-minus

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Tuesday, December 10, 2024

A Sopranos listicle!

SPOILERS!

 

Best character: Livia. Even more fathomless than Ruth Gordon's satanic coffee klatcher in Rosemary's Baby. I could never read the precise level of her deceit/evil. A virtuoso, hypnotic performance from Nancy Marchand even in Max Headroom mode. 

Second-best character: Janice. I've known so many people like Janice in my life and The Sopranos is the only show I know of to get the character right. The accuracy could split an apple in the next county. Aida Turturro, we're not worthy. 

Best episode: "Two Tonys" Season 5, Episode 1

Most infuriating episode: "Two Tonys"

Best season: 5

Most dour season (not a negative critique): 4, the first post-9/11 season

Season with the sharpest, most redolent costumes: 4, particularly Carm's.

Percentage of the series I remembered from when I first watched the thing 17 damn years ago: About 5% including almost all murders ever. 

Amount of times I screamed out loud: Lost count.

Weirdest moment: The freeze frame and wipe in "Cold Cuts" that no one involved with the production seems to remember. See it here

Secret comedic geniuses: The Sopranos kids because they get away with saying shit to Tony that would get anyone else whacked.

Grossest food: The tripe and tomatoes Richie brings Carm. 

Shows The Sopranos is better than (of shows I have watched in their entirety): Mad Men, Game of Thrones, The Leftovers, Succession, others.

Show I cannot say The Sopranos is better than since I am stuck in Season 2: The Wire but... (coughs)

Series that disproves the theory that I loved The Sopranos (and any other series) because I watched it with someone: Rectify (although I did watch it the second time through with the Mr.)

Books that I will read now that I've finished The Sopranos (again): Nick Braccia, Off the Back of a Truck - Unofficial Contraband for the Sopranos Fan; Dana Polan, The Sopranos.

What I would say to anyone who refuses to watch the show due to its thorough unpleasantness: Yeah, don't. 

Best ending to a series ever: The Sopranos

Where I will be going soon to enjoy some onion rings: Holsten's in Bloomfield, NJ

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A Downton Abbey listicle!

SPOILERS!

 

Best character : Mrs. Hughes, and I'm glad she retained her name when she married fuddy-duddy Mr. Carson.

Second-best character: Mrs. Patmore, and isn't she ready to be Head Chef at a Michelin-starred restaurant by series' end?

Character I started out hating but wound up adoring about halfway through: Isobel Crawley. She was so mealy-mouthed, especially with the Dowager spitting staircase wit all around her. But I loved her tough-minded spirit and her ability to plain talk through a situation.

Hottest character: Tough call but probably Henry Talbot, although don't sleep on Lord Grantham's zaddy energy (drool here).

Character treated with the most cruel indifference by the upstairs (for a time!): Moseley - they couldn't find anything for him to do after Matthew died, especially with all sorts of help running around downstairs throughout the entire series?

Character who could have used a fresh Dynasty-style slap and I don't recall her ever getting one: Take a wild guess (rhymes with "scary")!

Character who could have used not a slap per se but maybe a thorough shaking: Daisy, especially because Andy was cute and he had cool hair (see below).

Character who should have gotten some (more): Barrow. Yes, he was a jerk. But maybe he wouldn't have been had he traipsed up to London now and then for some alley nookie. 

Fun, trashy movie featuring Mrs. Hughes (Phyllis Logan): No Way Up (Claudio Fäh, 2024)

Great movie I watched in the midst of watching Downton Abbey: Gosford Park (Robert Altman, 2001)

TV series I should probably check out after watching Downton Abbey: Upstairs Downstairs (the 1970s one)

Already caught up: The Gilded Age

Savviest aspect of the series: The fact that most of the stories come at you in 50-second soapy chunks.

Most elegant aspect of the series: How the theme song plays over the first shot/bit of dialogue in each episode.

One-word line that could have been said to every character who realizes something in the final episode: "Duh!," e.g., Lord Grantham realizing how hard Cora works at the hospital. Duh!

What the title of the final episode should have been: "Duh!"

Level of corn in the final episode: About waist-high but perfectly acceptable. Terrific show!

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