Erkki

OH. MY. GOD. I just saw The Girl Who Knew Too Much. How is Mario Bava so little talked about? In my opinion, this movie is on par with some of Hitchcock's best work. Maybe not exactly as well-focused as Psycho or Rear Window, but close. Next up: Bay of Blood, Planet of the Vampires, and I hope I can find a good copy of Danger: Diabolik.

Another note, I saw it in 3D and I thought it was subtle, but quite well done. Since I actually recently saw some old 3-D from early last century, and mentally made some notes what seemed to work in 3-D and what didn't, I was now watching with that in mind, but... I think it broke what I thought was a hard rule that everything should be sharp, because blurry stuff will seem jarring to the eyes in 3D. I was surprised that there were out-of-focus stuff in many of the scenes, but it didn't look jarring at all. Maybe it was because the depth in the scenes was limited and I don't remember anything coming out of the scene. I haven't paid attention to this stuff before, but maybe they have improved the 3D technology/techniques enough nowadays that they can get around some of the limitations of earlier 3-D? Better cameras or what? Or maybe my home 3D projector and DLP-link glasses isn't comparable to cinema 3D?

It's excellent! To me it was almost like the experience of seeing Mad Max: Fury Road. Both I saw without too many expectations, and in both cases watched an old favourite from the 80s come to life again in very pure form. In the case of Blade Runner it's maybe even more surprising thanks to some talk about bad marketing, but actually I think the same preceded Fury Road and at this point I think I'm starting to ignore when people complain about marketing - it's not part of the movie, if it's not perfect, who cares in hindsight (only the people in marketing business). Movie of the year so far! Unfortunately, the theater I went to ruined the mood by switching the lights on just a fraction of a second even before the final scene ended. BTW I think it actually hurts the movie a bit when it obviously references the original - it kind of pulls you out when you make the comparison, but then I'm not sure how they could have made it a proper sequel without any referencing. I mean, the original had some pretty memorable and outstanding imagery.

Or come to Tallinn - https://kinokosmos.ee/

Thanks, that was good advice. I actually went ahead and watched the next two lessons and the next homeworks are way less overwhelming, while getting more practical. But I did get the feeling that this masterclass can only provide so much, with about 10-15 minutes video per lesson it seems to just summarize Herzog's view on how one could get started making films and how he did it. But I do find something motivational about it. In general I'm now also getting the feeling that maybe I'm trying to move too fast - I got started with photography only slightly more than a year ago, and I felt like I got enough of a basic grasp on that so that I could move on to film, but actually I spent almost none of that time doing portraits, which actually might be the most filmic genre of photography due to the nature of the work, as it involves lighting setup, hair & makeup, and actually going on a shoot with people on a location. And also I didn't get confidence to photograph people really close up, which is probably a must to do a movie with people. So I'm kind of thinking I should go back and start doing portraits, while I can continue practicing video shooting and editing skills. And another area where I'm lacking is reading and writing - I haven't properly read books in a while, and hardly even long form internet articles. The only writing I do is forum posts and code... I haven't even written a technical blog post for two years. And I haven't written any fiction in even more years. At least I have watched a lot of movies, but I can't say that I've gained some systematic knowledge about the structure of films from that. I got into film as hobby quite late and even as I watched a lot of classics I watched them for the first time and in more of an entertainment mode than to learn how they are made. So the plan is to keep following this course at a probably rather slow pace, to keep doing short videos, maybe slowly starting to involve people and stories, and perhaps do some portrait photography, and start reading again and try to get back to writing fiction as well.

Still struggling to read the book. I'm about 40% through, but looks like in the end it will have taken me a month to do the first homework... I'm still determined to do it, though, instead of skipping the assignments and just watching through the video lectures. I'm starting to have some doubts about the usefulness of this masterclass.com format, though. For example, because of this It might seem ok for filmmaking, and other things which should be self-teachable more or less easily, but is anyone really going to learn tennis from a few hours of online courses, even if it's from one of the top athletes in the world? I doubt it, getting good at tennis should require years of practice (even with trainers) as far as I know and I don't see how a few online lessons could help much. Anyway, I'm now thinking the same might apply for such filmmaking courses by celebrities, maybe I was just blinded because I'm actually interested in it and like some Herzog movies. I found another course that is more technical, more about cinematography, but might be more immediately useful https://www.mzed.com/courses/philip-bloom-cinematic-masterclass. I'm thinking it's kind of too expensive for me right now, though.

Hmm... I loved the first season, which I finished a couple of days ago, but now in the middle of the second one I'm kind of getting a vibe of The Matrix sequels vs The Matrix. Or it's just becoming too drawn out for me, and some of the characters staring at relatively mundane things with mouth-open awe for seconds is getting old. And while I love the diversity, I think the show is becoming more and more like a power fantasy, just not for white teenage males this time. It's probably good that different people are now getting power fantasies they can more easily identify with, though.

Thanks. I also had the teachers from the course I took in August give some feedback on this and they also noticed that some shots were too differently colored, among other things. Basically based on the feedback I have an idea how to make this into a better 3 minute film instead, but I think I'll just keep making new ones. I posted two in another thread:

God damn, this homework is too much to start off the course. I'm unable to really focus on the book, I've only read about 1/3 and it's already 2 weeks since I started... :/ Well, at least during the time I've made a couple of dumb shorts (both filmed and edited during a single day or a half), no thanks to Werner Herzog.

American Vandal was indeed good. I watched the entire thing in a couple of evenings... at some point I thought, hey, they could have made it as a 2 hour movie, but then maybe it wouldn't have worked as well because the series format was kind of natural since it covered a long time period.

I pretty much liked season 2 better than season 1. The pigfucking episode is just ridiculous... Season 3 is probably my favourite, though. I was checking if any of it is on Letterboxd (which only has movies and some exceptions for mini-series) and found that there's a movie named Black Mirror from 2011 that seems to have no relation to the TV-Series Black Mirror which started in 2011. The synopsis sounds interesting and I actually want to see it: It also has a very high rating of 4.1 on Letterboxd, but maybe it's again a case of misattributing ratings to a random movie somehow connected to a TV series - this shit seems to be happening there. But also relatively highly rated on IMDb http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2492564/ [edit] this is a short and not a full length movie https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QUfn1X2i_cM

Thanks, I think that's what I was thinking about, also remembered it myself. However, I just read one review that said it doesn't hold up for very long so I might just be satisfied with Fugl and Tacoma and whatever else is in my backlog

Is this the right thread? My vacation started and I thought I should finally play some games again. I also remember that something cool maybe just came out, but what was it? It's not Tacoma or Fugl, already bought those.

Has anyone read The Peregrine by J.A. Baker? I am reading it as homework for Werner Herzog's masterclass.com and I can see that it has some extremely well written paragraphs, but it's kind of weirdly jumping between describing birds over a landscape, sometimes through the author's own person therein and sometimes the structure of the work itself. And I find that there's nothing really pulling me forward, so I end up reading just a few pages at a time.

Hmm... I might consider the book later, although lately I've tended to not finish books, so I think I better finish some first. For some of the other movies, I'm keeping an eye on Amazon UK Blu-Ray prices - unfortunately I hesitated and missed a really good price on Bay of Blood. Or I might get them elsewhere too if I get in Bava mood again.

I have seen quite a few of his movies now, and here's my ranking so far: Black Sunday - this is just amazing, it would be pure perfection if it wouldn't be for some strange elements of the second half, pointed out by the audio commentary of Tim Lucas. I also found the second half strange, but couldn't quite place it exactly... Lucas suspects it's because the plot was changed in the middle of shooting, and this theory seems plausible. Rabid Dogs - very intense, well made thriller with a unique twist Blood and Black Lace - amazing color photography, every shot is a masterpiece, but somehow there is no suspense Black Sabbath - kind of the same here, amazing photography, but especially the first story The Telephone is weak in suspense except for a short bit. I think the last one, Drop of Water was it?, is really perfect, though. The Whip and the Body - this could be my favourite except it starts to feel drawn out by the end. I think it has maybe the strongest story among all of these films ... I also hope to see Kill, Baby Kill, Lisa and the Devil and maybe more. This makes me wonder how many other amazing directors/cinematographers that I haven't heard of are out there... I didn't know anything about Mario Bava a month ago.

I made another short video using the method of filming a bunch of shit and then seeing how to put together something watchable...

Ok, well, so far the Werner Herzog masterclass is a bit overwhelming. There are PDFs accompanying the short video lectures and in the first one they recommend NOT to watch the lectures in one row, skipping the assignments. And they give a suggested schedule of 7 weeks. However, the first week with 5 lectures seems to contain a tremendous amount of work if you really want to do the assignments properly and also watch the recommended films. Firstly, the PDFs give some recommendations on what films to watch, and the first one recommends 7 Werner Herzog films (of which 2 I've already seen). The second lesson recommends The Mask of Fu Manchu, The Beast of the City, Sporting Blood and Birth of a Nation. These are more of a recommendations, but the assignment is to dig into film culture of Iran, silent era Germany & Italian neorealism and finding commonalities. I'm not sure exactly if it should mean reading about those eras or also watching the films. The third lesson assignment is to read The Peregrine, copy 5 pages by hand and then write 20 pages about something in similar style. It seems to me that it will take me more than a week to do all this and then I'll be over the hump of week 1. Maybe I'm a bit overwhelmed because I almost haven't read any books in several years and the third lesson is all about READ READ READ. And I also haven't written anything for a while...

Holy shit, Blood and Black Lace is amazing looking! I'm starting to believe that Bava was one of the best cinematographers. However I found the movie wasn't all that suspenseful because the killings became so ordinary and expected, so it doesn't get full marks from me.

The Square (2017), Cannes Palme d'Or winner, is quite something. There are some very powerful scenes in it, but I'm not quite sure it's the kind of powerful I like. And I didn't understand the point fully - maybe needs some digestion or a more educated viewer.

BTW On the filmmaking topic, found an interesting read about how the single-shot movie Victoria was filmed http://cpn.canon-europe.com/content/education/technical/filming_victoria_movie_in_one_take.do

I know I can't directly learn all that from someone, but I can get inspiration from taking a class. I actually already took a real world 4-day class last month, and it got me moving forward, but it was kind of expensive. I went ahead and bought this. I at least like to watch Herzog speaking (even though I think he was pretty vile when using animal torture in his movies), I might learn something, and I think the assignments will give me some momentum. [edit] From the second lesson the first watch recommendations are mostly to early racist films like Birth of a Nation, The Mask of Fu Manchu, which I've avoided so far... I hope it gets better.

Good question. I'm not sure exactly. I'm currently stuck in not having a solid idea of what to shoot and what kind of films should I do. I want to make short films of maybe 3 to 5 minutes, but I don't have a lot of extra time so I don't want to just shoot garbage and then think what kind of film to put together from it (which is what I've done so far, mostly). One idea I have is to do a very short city symphony film of Tallinn, a'la "The Man with a Movie Camera". But I only have some vague ideas what I'd like it to be like and I don't even know what to do to put together a plan of shots.

OMG the last episode of season 3 with the was amazing. Going to season 1 now.

I now saw Black Sunday as well. Found a decent enough torrent of the English version, but will likely get it on Blu-Ray as well, it was that good. I especially liked the beginning of the movie - from the beginning up to the point where the evil rises was maybe one of the best sequences in any horror film ever. I would like to see a better restored version some day. So far I don't exactly agree with him being the best cinematographer (my vote probably would go to Urusevsky), but he is definitely really good and I want to see more.