This weekend's viewing has been what you could say is eclectic!
I've already talked about Friday's viewing
Suicide Squad - not good, and my opinion of it is going down every time I think about it!
On Saturday I sat down for the 3 hour epic which is
Andrei Rublev. It's a slow burn for sure, the polar opposite of Suicide Squad! In fact it was so slow to start with that I almost gave up after the 45 minute mark but it got better and better. It doesn't have a narrative arc but is split up into chapters which each concentrate on one aspect of Andrei's life. The final 3 chapters were the best,
'The Raid',
'The Silence' and finally
'The Bell'. In 'The Bell' we get the return of the young actor who played Ivan in
Ivan's Childhood, and he was just as good in this segment as the son of a Bell-maker who's entire family has died of the plague, he lies to Andrei announcing that he alone knows the secret of making the perfect bell!
A lot of scholarly people pronounce this as a masterpiece, while I thought it was very good it was a little too meandering at the beginning for me to think it was perfection. It was very good though.
Sunday afternoon was the perfect time to crack open my cult-labs prize from last week
Critters! It's been ages since I saw it and I totally got a kick out of how 80's it was. It's not a great film by any opinion but it's a load of fun. Billy Zane with his little rat's tail hair-do made me laugh
I'm looking forward to part 2 - I'll probably take a look at that tomorrow evening!
I rounded off the weekend with
Stanley Kubrick's The Killing, a film which I've never seen and I have to say what a way to end the weekend's viewing! While it's not as sophisticated as his later works it's interesting to see how his artistry has developed. Straight away we're plunged into the story, not knowing what's going on but utterly intrigued to see how it all plays out! It turns out to be quite the caper and didn't really end how you would expect it. That final scene had me shouting
No at the TV screen
. You've probably all seen it already but it's highly recommended. Arrow's BD looks bloody fantastic!
