Friday, July 18, 2008

"HAUNTED HOUSES" IS THE WINNER



My poll 26 ended with nine votes. Thank you very much for everyone who participated in it. Here is the result:

THESE GREAT FILMS/PLAY MAY BE SELF-REFLEXIVE OR STORYTELLING-CONCERNED. WHICH ONES DO YOU LIKE?

1.HAUNTED HOUSES (2001, Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Thailand)

It got 3 votes, or 33 %.


2.BACHELORETTE (Michel Gondry, a music video of Bjork)
+CLOSE-UP (1989, Abbas Kiarostami, Iran)
+CONTEMPT (1963, Jean-Luc Godard, France)
+EDEN AND AFTER (1970, Alain Robbe-Grillet, France)

+OM (INDIRECT) (2008, Somchai Wachirajongkol, Thailand)
+SOMETHING HAPPENED (2007, Keren Cytter, Germany)
+STORYTELLING (2001, Todd Solondz, USA)

Each of them got 2 votes, or 22 %.


9.ADAPTATION (2002, Spike Jonze, USA)
+DANGER NEARBY (DIRECTOR’S CUT) (2008, Chulyanon Siriphol, Thailand)
+I MOVE, SO I AM (1997, Gerrit Van Dijk, Netherlands)
+MAI PEN RUENG (2006, Pachruja Kanjanakosol, Thai play)
+TRISTAM SHANDY: A COCK AND BULL STORY (2005, Michael Winterbottom, UK)
+TWILIGHT ZONE TV SERIES: EPISODE “PERSONAL DEMONS” (1986, Peter Medak, USA)

Each of them got 1 vote, or 11 %.


15.DRAMA, STRINGS AND HORNS (1998, Gunter Krueger, Germany)
+MURDER BY DEATH (1976, Robert Moore, USA)
+OPEN REEL (1976, Dalibor Martinis, Croatia, black and white, 4 min)
+THE OPPOSITE OF SEX (1998, Don Roos, USA)

+A PLACE AMONG THE LIVING (2003, Raoul Ruiz, France)
+THE POSITIVELY TRUE ADVENTURES OF THE ALLEGED TEXAS CHEERLEADER-MURDERING MOM (1993, Michael Ritchie, USA)

Each of them got 0 vote.


--I’m very surprised that HAUNTED HOUSES got the most votes, because this film is hard to see. But I’m glad that it got the most votes, because I like it very much. I particularly like the scene when a character treats a very cheap vehicle as if it is a very expensive vehicle. I also like the idea of this film very much. Apichatpong can tell a very entertaining story without using realistic acting and realistic sets at all.

Filmsick wrote about the obsession of poor Thai people in TV series about the bourgeoisie in HAUNTED HOUSES in Thai here:
http://filmsick.exteen.com/20071224/entry

Brian Darr wrote about other films by Apichatpong here:
http://hellonfriscobay.blogspot.com/2008/07/apichatpong-weerasethakul-connections.html


--Gloria Withalm wrote an interesting article about self-reflexive films here:
http://www.uni-ak.ac.at/culture/withalm/wit-texts/wit00-porto.html

Her article makes Mel Brooks’ films look more interesting than before. Her article also mentions the TV series MOONLIGHTING. It was shown on a Thai television (Channel 11) when I was in high school, but at that time I was not interested in this TV series. I regret it now.
http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51K6FRieFML._SS500_.jpg

--There is a scene that I like very much in a cult film called TONGAN NINJA (2002, Jason Stutter, New Zealand, B+). It’s a fighting scene in which a mike boom appears on top of the screen. When the mike boom appears, the film stops portraying only a fictional world and seems to announce to the viewers, “You are watching a film.” The appearance of the mike boom may seem to imply that the filmmaker of TONGAN NINJA was so careless that he let this kind of thing happen during the shooting. But he wasn’t careless. After the mike boom has appeared for a while, the protagonist gets very annoyed with it and suddenly snatches the mike boom from the film crew and uses the mike boom as a weapon to fight the villains.

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51K82HK5W5L._SS500_.jpg

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