Napoleon (1927)

Introduction:
Finally after much searching I have found a version of Abel Gance's 1927 masterpiece, Napoleon.
I was expecting a lot, as I had heard many great things about this film and was anxious to see it, I felt that my education in film would be incomplete if I didn't.

All I can say is that this film greatly impressed me, as a film buff and as an admirer of Napoleon.

So here are my thoughts on this magnificent film as well as the many reasons you should see it. 

The Dead (1987)

John Huston has always seemed to me to be very much an "American director", that is one of the reasons I haven't seen much of his work as I generally dislike those old American "Classics"; although I will admit that The Maltese Falcon was a good film.

Yet this film, his final film, is very different from what you might expect if you're familiar with his other more famous films such as The African Queen and Treasure of The Sierra Madre.

Aaah! The French and their obsession with changing the titles of films, I'll never comprehend it!

Stalker (1979)

After seeing Solaris and being rather disappointed, I didn't look into Tarkovsky's filmography much until recently when I decided to watch Stalker.

I was very impressed...

 

Henri Georges Clouzot

Recently I thought to myself, you really should see more French films seeing as you live in France and speak the language...

So I did some research and came across Clouzot, he is a Director who is known for his quality films and has often been called a "French Hitchcock" due the enormous amounts of suspense contained in his films and their excellent scripts.

The White Diamond (2004)

Over the past couple of  decades Herzog has been gradually departing from film, and veering more towards Documentaries, with some spectacular results.

His most successful was probably Grizzly Man, which received numerous awards and is in my opinion a fascinating and a moving work. Other great docmunetaries he made over the past years include The Wheel Of Time, Encounters At The End Of The World, Lessons Of Darkness, My Best Fiend.......
Grizzly Man might be Herzogs most acclaimed documentary but in my mind it still doesn't surpass the brilliance that is The White Diamond, it does come close too surpassing it though...

The White Diamond is sadly not very well known, it was quite hard for me to find and I noticed that not many people were familiar with it.
Yet it is definitely worth discovering as it is a work of such beauty, majesty and humaneness, that it would be a crime not to see it.

Gosford Park

Gosford Park

Introduction:

Robert Altman is, in my opinion, a second rate director, the only one of his films that impressed me was The Player. Others such as MASH, The Long Goodbye and Gosford Park were all disappointments.

Gosford Park was Altman’s most successful film, yet I was unimpressed, now I will attempt to explain why.