bhomatude

No info anywhere on new Made In USA Studio Canal Serie Noir release. Subs anyone?

Dazza

I don't have the disc but I have been told that it doesn't carry English subtitles.

A thread along similar lines: http://www.dvdtalk.com/forum/showthr...hreadid=244092

Dazza.

Norm de Plume

I'm sorry, I really don't want to take a crap in your thread, but....I....can't....help....it....Have you seen Made In USA? It's one of the most pointless, inept, boring films I've ever seen, and I can sit through almost anything.

Well, if you like inscrutable mid-'60s Godard (e.g. Two Or Three Things I Know About Her), then this is more of the same.

bhomatude

Norm you need to eat a bit more broccoli.

Hendrik

...naaahhh... Norm needs to see éloge de l'amour...

. . . . . .

Norm de Plume

I'll take your suggestions under advisement.

BabyBuddha

Norm --

Admittedly, Made in America is far from his best, and even farther from his most accessible (I hate that word).

However, the film is important in the context of film as a whole, in JLG's advancement as a director, and, most importantly, in its politics.

I'd really rather you take a crap in a Ben Affleck thread. ;-)

blessthemess

(chuckles);p heh heh... incidently i love broccoli.... and Godard... Maybe Norm needs to see cinema beyond the entertainment sphere... but at least he was apologetic! Can wait to scratch that itch huh, Norm?

Norm de Plume

That was condescending and presumptuous, unless it was meant in jest. I love thought-provoking motion picture fare, but there's a difference between that and pretentious claptrap. If the director is trying to obfuscate meaning or story/character-development just for the sake of making it difficult, or tailor-made for the pseudo-intellectuals ("Hmmm, this is French (insert: as an aside, I love French films generally) and incoherent; it must be a masterpiece!"), then I really get very little out of the experience.

For example, Robert Bresson's widely acclaimed Au Hazard Balthazar (1966), perhaps not coincidentally one of Godard's favourite films: A simple enough premise (the life and eventual demise of an abused farm donkey) promising a gritty and moving parable is made incomprehensible by the sloppy filmmaking. Throughout, people walk in and out of the frame without us having any idea who they are.
Normally my objections to Bresson's films do not include the direction - he was undoubtedly a master at paring the visual composition and movement down to a graceful bare minimum, a style I very much appreciate - but rather to the screenwriting: As in "Balthazar", characters wander to and fro barely speaking to each other; and not in a realistically sullen "I'm not talking to you" fashion, but rather as if they were not of this planet. It doesn't lend itself well to exposition. In Bresson's L'Argent (1983), the protagonist goes from a gentle man, wrongly-accused of being a petty thief, to committing multiple axe-murders (!?), in a span of what seems like two seconds flat. Through its clumsy development, the transition seems absurd.

blessthemess

Chill Norm. i meant in jest. Matter of fact like you, i question the execution of the subject matter. Is ART solely meant for the high-brow bougeoisie? If not, shouldn't it be done in a way palatable to the masses? Should we not simplify complex human conditions? -So how do we make out of sumthing we do not understand? How many of us do admit out loud: "What was Last Year in Marienbad all about?"

And then of course, there's also the issue of how different films were treated then and now, Godard(cinema as medium) and Besson(as entertainment)..... Yes, Made in USA may be boring(lacking in entertainment value) but was that Godard's intention(to amuse us)? Or was he seeking more(to challenge us)? To call it pointless -in my humble opinion- is definitely an oversight.

Gypo66

Bresson: cinema as entertainment???

Oops... or did you really mean Besson, as in Luc?

blessthemess

yep. Besson as in Luc. Thats what i typed, no?

Gypo66

guess I just had a hard time making the leap from Bresson being discussed in the previous post to Besson suddenly being referenced. Sorry.

blessthemess

Heh heh i understand.... Pas problem....

Norm de Plume

O.K., no offense taken, bless. It just sounded like you were dismissing me as a philistine or casual moviegoer simply because I dared to question the merit of a film made by the cognoscenti's foremost cinema darling.

Godard's intention has never been to amuse or entertain. In fact he is probably the most vocal opponent of Spielbergian mass audience-coddling, and I applaud him for that. When I say boring, please don't misconstrue that to mean slow-moving. Tarkovsky's Stalker, probably the single most slow-moving film ever made (and finally getting some widespread attention thanks to the DVD releases) is one of my favourites. It is riveting, simply through the expression of ideas (and stunningly bleak, beautiful visuals).

Made in USA is pointless to me. I've tried to endure it twice (making it a little further the second time) and it just seems like utterly maladroit garbage to me. Maybe you and others are privy to some sort of insight that makes the film profound to you. It's possible; every person can only bring his/her life experiences and knowledge to bear as a prism through which to interpret a piece of "art" (film, painting, sculpture, whatever).
As a filmmaker, though, I believe one shouldn't have such contempt for the viewer as to make a blanket assumption that one's arcane approach to a narrative need not be put into some kind of explicatory context, however limited one chooses it to be.

Moon33

I confirm the new edition of Made in USA dvd does not have any subs.

bhomatude

Only one thing to say 'bout no subs...