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Re: Essential Viewing

The love of silent movies in this thread warms my heart. Buster Keaton was the man. Quite possibly the greatest physical comedian in the history of cinema. I'd throw in some Laurel and Hardy too, especially Way Out West and The Music Box (although, these are talkies). I'd say watch the others first and only really get to L & H if you have the time. There's no rush.

Anyway, how about some Jackie Chan? He's like an Asian Buster Keaton with added martial arts. A lot of his stuff is very heavily influenced by stunts in silent comedies. Just look at the hanging from the clock scene in Project A. I recommend that and Police Story. smile

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Re: Essential Viewing

Jackie Chan essentials are Armour of God 2, Meals on Wheels, and the aforementioned Project A.

Eddie Doty

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28 Reply by Jimmy B (edited by Jimmy B 2012-05-30 06:28:20)

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Re: Essential Viewing

Wheels on Meals is excellent, don't think I've seen Armour of God 2. (EDIT: I have, but know it as Operation Condor. Thanks Wiki)

No love for the first Police Story, Eddie? It's probably more stunt orientated than martial arts heavy.

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Re: Essential Viewing

Police Story 1 is possibly my favorite Jackie Chan film, the shopping mall climax is one of the all time great action set-pieces. Love Operation Condor as well, though with Jackie films I always struggle with the abrupt tonal shifts (police story really has this problem, it swings between being like a light romantic comedy to a gritty/brutal dirty-harry type flick).

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Re: Essential Viewing

Yeah, the tone is all over the place but that mall scene is fantastic. And the film influenced so many others that totally ripped it off (Tango & Cash, Bad Boys II to name less than three)

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Re: Essential Viewing

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Re: Essential Viewing

Well there are enough movies on here to last you a couple months, so  I'll just add that you should watch all of the works of Hayao Miyazaki (with emphasis on Princess Mononoke), as well as Akira.

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Re: Essential Viewing

Best Jackie Chan movie? Killer Meteor. Best Jackie fight sequence ever.

You should also watch City Of God. Good flick, tho dark as all hell.

I was kidding about Killer Meteor btw. It's pretty funny, tho.

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Re: Essential Viewing

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Re: Essential Viewing

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36 Reply by paulou (edited by paulou 2012-05-30 00:45:21)

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Re: Essential Viewing

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Re: Essential Viewing

Paranoia Agent falls into the "made to look deep but there's nothing there" camp, as admitted by the creators on the commentary. All dialog that would tell you what the fuck was going on was removed, and they started animating with no idea what the ending was. That said, yeah it's a fun show smile (other shows of this type include Lain and Key the Metal Idol)

Cowboy Bebop is a great show. Many, at the time, said that Firefly was ripping this off. However, the show Firefly is more similar to is the not quite as good Outlaw Star, which actually starts with a mysterious nude girl found in a suitcase. Either an amazing coincidence, or Joss saw that and said, "I can do a western in space with a nude suitcase girl better than this!"

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Re: Essential Viewing

Since I'm a documentary guy, I'll give you my essential Doc list as well:

Mr. Death
My Brother's Keeper
Twist of Faith
Capturing the Friedman's
The War Room
Gimme Shelter (featuring camera work by some kid named George Lucas)
The "Up" series by Michael Apted
Thin Blue Line
Dogtown and Z Boys
Jesus Camp
Spellbound
E-Dreams
Roger and Me
Vernon, Florida
Hoop Dreams
The Interrupters
Decline of Western Civilization (all 3)
Ken Burns Civil War
Why We Fight
When We Were Kings
Baraka
Woodstock
Fog of War
The Bridge
Hearts of Darkness
Overnight
Gates of Heaven
Marwencol
Dark Days
Z Channel
Kid Stays in the Picture
Dear Zachary (please check yourself into a 72 hour suicide watch immediately following this film)

Eddie Doty

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Re: Essential Viewing

I would also add 'gasland' and 'exit through the gift shop' to Eddie's doc list.

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Re: Essential Viewing

I tend to judge a documentary based on subject rather than, perhaps, craft, so have to mention 'In the Realms of the Unreal'. If nothing else it will introduce you to Henry Darger.

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Re: Essential Viewing

I recommended King of Kong to a few people the other day who aren't that much into documentary and they all loved it.

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Re: Essential Viewing

Zarban's Website

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Re: Essential Viewing

Trey's Website

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Re: Essential Viewing

Grizzly Man was on my short list.  It nearly made that cut.  It is pretty fantastic, and I feel bad about having no Herzog and only one Pennebaker/Hegedus film on there.  Cave of Forgotten Dreams is in my instant queue and I plan to see it soon.  Same with Herzog's death row doc.

Eileen: Portrait of a Serial Killer nearly made it, but man I cannot STAND Nick Brooomfields style.

I also felt bad about not including my former employers Fenton Bailey and Randy Barbato.  THey've made some truly great docs, starting with Party Monster, Eyes of Tammy Faye, 101 Rent Boys, Monica in Black and White and in my mind their best work, their doc series One Punk Under God.

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Re: Essential Viewing

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Re: Essential Viewing

Is Werner Herzog primarily a doc guy?  I haven't seen many of his films.

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Re: Essential Viewing

He did a lot of docs early in his career, but came up as sort of an avant garde storyteller.  He's best known for his stuff with Klaus Kinski.

Eddie Doty

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Re: Essential Viewing

I think his full name is Klaus Crazyasaloon Kinski.

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Re: Essential Viewing

Werner actually made a doc about their relationship called My Best Fiend.

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Re: Essential Viewing

I really need to see My Best Friend, most of the stuff I've heard about Herzog/Kinski is hilarious.

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