Two (maybe three) must sees over the holidays.
1. Emmet Otter's Jug Band Christmas- Jim Henson creates a vibrant and sweet tale of yuletide spirit plus it has a jug band! Tremendous for all ages.
2. Santa Claus- a non-traditional tale of redemption and temptation from Mexico. Quick synopsis Santa with the help of his good friend Merlin battles the Devil and his minions for the soul of lil' Lupita. Mexican Christmas Madness must be seen to be believed.
3. A tie between It's a Wonderful Life and Home Alone for the more traditionally minded.
All of the above are available at your favorite video store give yourself a present this Christmas and come see us at Alternative Video.
Now on to some other business. Bullitt, those of you who know me are already rolling your eyes. (Great Sean's going to talk about Bullitt again.) In my defense I have a new co-worker here at MHS who wants me to lend him some films over the break and Bullitt is one of these.
So here is my simple attempt at explaining my fanatical fascination with Peter Yates' film.
I find this one of the most electrifying films of that very fertile period in Hollywood that lasted from 66 until roughly 74. This time produced Easy Rider, The Godfather, and The Wild Bunch classics all. Each of these films produced many imitators and provided clear signposts for other filmmakers to follow. Easy Rider was the birth of independant filmmaking, The Godfather reestablished the perfection of the Hollywood apparatus to create fully realized worlds, and The Wild Bunch signaled the end of an era and spoke in a new way about violence, Vietnam and the fluid nature of a culture's ideals
What did Bullitt bring to the table? A dynamic new sense of action and drama. The one thing most often mentioned in conjunction with Bullitt is the “car chase”. While the chase is awesome (and uses montage editing borrowed from silent soviet cinema), and McQueen did all his own driving this is not the reason I fell in love with the movie. The film plays out with long sections that contain no dialogue. These silent spaces are filled with information and characterization that Yates lets you see for yourself. This is a show-don’t tell movie in the most visual of art forms.
The other reason this film lasts is the effortless ease McQueen brings to the no nonsense role of Frank Bullitt. Polite and determined this is a cop that does his job. No flying off the handle, no yelling at the stupid chief, no swearing and demanding everyone capitulate to his every whim, he just efficiently does his job as does the film.
"Look Chalmers, let's understand each other... I don't like you."
PS- sorry about the varied font sizes. I don't know how it works...Goodbye Folks.
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