This film has long been one of my favorites. I finally saw it on a big screen. Though the Whitsell is a terrible theater in my opinion. The screen is surrounded by white acoustic panels that reflect the light bouncing off of the screen which lowers the contrast of the projected image. The closer you sit you see this milky haze around the edges of the screen. And you ahve to sit kind of close becuase the floor isn't pitched enough to see over the person's head in front of you. The person that introduced the film claimed it was a nice print. I wish she hadn't created that expectation. One reel was pristine, but the rest were in average to poor condition. A faded print in combination with the haze made for frustrating viewing. And the blue-hair art museum members that always show up at Whitsell screenings do a lot of shifting in their seats and are quick to loudly admit that they didn't get it as soon as the credits roll. There were moments in which I longed to be at home watching a DVD.
So all my griping aside, the film is truly a masterpiece. Nuanced and poetic storytelling - it really seems like a story told rather than written, which in my mind is a high compliment. Amazing acting from the principles and the ensemble both. It's Warren Beatty's best performance by far. I've heard he didn't like it, too unpolished for the Hollywood prince. Julie Christie, who was Beatty's lover at the time, was absolutely beguiling. I'm not trying to use a fifty cent word for any other purpose than to describe her performance in deserving high-fallutin' terms. Beautiful art direction and photography. You really get a sense of the place - one of the few films you can actually smell. (Another reason the Whitsell is a bad place to see repertory films - the place is more sterile than Regal Cinemas, making it hard to become synesthetically involved in films, since it doesn't get dark enough to forget you're in a wood-paneled, carpeted institutional theater surrounded by a bunch of bourgeois assholes that support the arts out of social obligation rather than true interest. Where did I ever get the idea that museums had anything to do with artists?)
Down from the soapbox I step. Have I ever mentioned my paternal grandfather was a preacher? And that my father was too as a child? He literally passed out bibles and soap from the trunk of his dad's car. Speaking out about what I feel strongly about is in my blood I'm afraid.
Another anyway is in order. I want to see more films like this one. Hints that what you think is the truth isn't. Quick little looks and raised eyebrows in the background that probably raise more questions than they answer if you even notice things like Julie Christie in the Bearpaw whorehouse early in the film. Altman uses zooms during long takes to direct our attention, but it's more like, "hey check all this out, it interests me", rather than "look here! right now! quick! the whole story rests on you seeing this now!" Instead he puts it all in there and lets it be discovered. Or not.
A fan,
Signore Direttore
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