It is time for another quick hits. In this edition I watch several Werner Herzog films and manage to feel bad about myself, read on!

Even Dwarves Started Small

dir. Werner Herzog – 1970 – 4.1 – I have a feeling that this film will be placed next to Eraserhead in films I watched but doubt I could watch again, not because it is a bad film as much as it is a good film that is sonically and emotionally traumatic enough to place behind “break glass in case of emergency” shielding. There is a good change that anyone who reads this blog is not the sort of person who will enjoy this movie. Tell me I am wrong, please.

Fata Morgana

dir. Werner Herzog – 1971 – 6.4 – Fata Morgana is a visually appealing film that doesn’t do much more for me than that. The film is Herzog’s visual dreams with a recitation of the Mayan creation myth voiced over. I will need to watch the film again before I could recommend it to more than the people interested in mindful films.

The Land of Silence and Darkness

dir. Werver Herzog – 1971 – 6.9 – When I started watching this film I was experiencing some anxiety with various aspects of my life. Within moments of this movie I questioned my decision on watching it.  This is a documentary about a community of deaf and blind Germans and how they manage to work towards thriving with their unique challenges. When putting my issues up again watching the joy on the face of an elderly woman’s during her first flight has calming aspect when matched with a desire to manage my own, minor in comparison, problems. This is a difficult movie to watch without tearing up and wallowing in other emotions but it can change how you feel about yourself, hopefully, for the better.

Safety Last

dir. Fred Newmeyer – 1923 – 7.1 – This is a film that I watched a while ago but never mentioned here. I do not believe that it is possible to go wrong with Harold Lloyd comedies and Safety Last might be one of his best that I have watched.

Invasion of the Body Snatchers

dir. Philip Kaufman – 1978 – 8.2 – I don’t even know where to begin with this movie. On one viewing it has tapped my top 25 and I am embarrassed that I haven’t watch the movie until now (not really, time is time). I need to boil this movie some more before I can produce any filling thoughts. More to come.  Damn, that ending is perfect.

Suture

dir. Scott McGehee – 1993 – 7.0 – Tara and I watched this the other day, well, I watched it and it sounds like Tara either could not get behind the conceit or didn’t pay too much attention to it. The elevator pitch may have read, one brother fakes his death by killing a newly found, nearly identical, brother, but the twist is that the new brother is a black man who doesn’t look anything like the first brother but nobody can see the difference.  It is not difficult to see why most studios passed on this bizarre film but I am very glad that Arrow Video decided to release it.

As I can see there are two different ways to see the movie. First, and obvious, is to be able to detach the idea of race and skin color and watch a neo-noir, psychological thriller that is on par with many of your favorite Bogart films of the 40s. It is a very good film when viewed from this angle. The second is with inability of making that separation and throwing the film in the garbage without a second through as a few of the performances are wooden. I saw the first movie. I enjoyed that first movie.

Fantastic Four

dir. various – 2015 – 4.6 – To start I feel it is necessary to state that I enjoyed the previous FF movies, with Jessica Alba and Captain America playing Johnny Storm, they are not, by any stretch of the imagination, great, but next to this thing they are masterpieces. Technically Josh Trank directed the movie, well, most of the movie, but there had to be others because this movie was a perpetual fall down a flight of stairs. I watched it because it was on, that’s all. Never again.

She’s All That

dir. Mike Streeter – 1999 – 6.5 – I love this movie and I am completely comfortable saying it. It’s a high school movie with dozens of late 90’s stars doing late 90’s stuff in high school. That’s all, laugh away and feel the manufactured future nostalgia. Like above, please, by all means, disagree with me.