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Topics - noodles_leone
1
« on: October 05, 2023, 06:37:23 AM »
So I'm just back from 2 weeks in Andalucia where I saw tons of spots where Leone shot his westerns. I saw places used in DYS (mostly), FAFDM, OUTITW, GBU and also MNIN. Unfortunately I didn't get to see Sad Hill, which is to the north of Madrid (I stayed between Cordoba, Almeria, Granada and Sevilla). I'll share pics and vids later when I get some time. The most striking thing though is the fact Leone's westerns, and especially the dollar trilogy, are spanish westerns way (WAY) more than they are italian ones. Walking around in the cities or the desert in the south of spain felt like being part of those movies. The landscapes, the architecture, the set design of the interiors, the way of life (indlucing empty streets where you can barely see that someone is spying at you from behund a curtain), the weather, the wind, the dust, the flies. Desperately looking for an open bar in the middle of the afternoon in a little village lost in a red canyon. The way all of this makes you feel, walk, talk. The locations inspired way more the final experience than Leone's italian roots. And I'm talking as somebody who has seen some of the Leone locations in the US as well as his share of real wild west. Including around the mexican border, in all of the 4 states. By the way, for those of you who have access to Facebook, the following page was a huge help: https://www.facebook.com/albertogambaricercatoreIt features tons of comparison shots (screengrab from the Leone film + photo of how it looks today) with GPS coordinates. One example that I visited for instance:  Guadix, Provincia di Granada, Spagna
37?18'39.7"N 3?07'30.6"W
2
« on: August 16, 2023, 09:16:37 AM »
So it seems I'll be lucky enough to go check out my tombstone in the Sad Hill cemetary toward the end of september. I'll bring back pics.
Who around here has their name on a cross over there?
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« on: May 19, 2023, 02:08:46 AM »
I don't know how many of you here heard about images generated via artificial intelligence. Not here to debate about them but since they are deeply transforming my industry and in the process of stealing my job, I'm spending quite a lot of time trying to master them these days. So I decided to have a little fun with generating movie stills from a totally invented old school SW. So far the only convincing image I got is this one:  I've made tons of good looking ones but they all seemed too much like CGI, I really wanted to achieve the good old SW look. Sorry for the black bar at the bottom, I didn't edit the picture, it's straight out of the AI.
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« on: April 25, 2022, 07:23:46 AM »
American Cinematographer asked Deakins "six films that have inspired him as both a film buff and a cinematographer". Among those 6, a film that we tend to appreciate around here was mentioned: Leone?s ambitious, atmospheric Western is memorably presented in glorious, widescreen Techniscope. Introduced by Technicolor Italia in 1960, the format utilized a two-perforation negative pulldown per frame instead of the standard four-perf frame common to 35mm photography. Its 2.32:1 aspect ratio could easily be cropped to the 2.35:1 widescreen ratio because it used half the amount of 35mm film stock and standard spherical lenses. Distribution prints for theatrical venues were made by enlarging the frame from a two-perf flat ratio to a four-perf anamorphic ratio. According to cinematographer Delli Colli, this choice suited Leone?s style and saved the production a lot of raw film stock, despite the director?s penchant for shooting plenty of takes.
The movie?s central theme is the fading of the Old West amid relentless modernization and greed, but the narrative can also be viewed as an elegy for the Western genre itself. Each of the characters symbolizes an aspect of the main theme, and while the picture is a veritable mixtape of homages to other famous Westerns, the classic tropes are often revised and reconfigured in new and unexpected ways ? like casting Henry Fonda, known for his famous roles as Western heroes, as the baddest of black-hat bad guys. ?Thematically, it?s similar to The Assassination of Jesse James [by the Coward Robert Ford], or The Wild Bunch,? Deakins says. ?All are about characters whose time is passing on. They can?t keep up, and they feel disconnected with the way the world has gone.?
Deakins notes that the elements of Leone?s signature style, further magnified by composer Ennio Morricone?s immortal score, transform the story into grand opera: iconic set pieces rendered in spectacular widescreen compositions; extremely dynamic close-ups, many featuring solidly center-framed faces or an intense focus on eyes; meticulous staging and blocking; masterful use of depth of field to marry foregrounds and backgrounds; and compelling use of zoom lenses to reframe scenes on the fly. Above all, the narrative is presented visually, with a bounty of small details and some sequences that play out with minimal dialogue. ?It?s a film ? it?s not a novel, and it?s not a radio play,? Deakins observes. ?A film works best when it?s images and sound ? it doesn?t have to be done with dialogue, or linear narrative storytelling. When I?m working on a film, I?m always looking for ways to remove dialogue ? if it?s not needed ? and do a scene visually. I love that.? Citing one of his favorite moments in the film, Deakins says,
?I?ve always enjoyed the initial reveal of Henry Fonda as the bad guy. I read somewhere that Fonda never understood why Leone chose him for the role until the camera came around in that shot to reveal his face. He had played the hero in Young Mr. Lincoln and many other films, yet now he?s this villain telling one of his henchmen to kill a young kid!"
?I also love the sequence where Claudia Cardinale arrives at the railway station and gets into a wagon, and then the camera cranes up majestically. I don?t usually like those kinds of grand, elaborate shots, but Leone is really creating an opera, so that kind of larger-than-life camera movement works. Throughout the movie, he shoots Monument Valley in such a huge way that it?s nowhere near realism ? it?s almost over-the-top. When you combine that kind of style with the magnificent score, it goes beyond simple narrative storytelling and becomes a kind of poetry. It?s magical what film can do sometimes, and no other medium can do that, really.?
Since I know you guys are fond of lists, the full Deakins list can be found right there: https://ascmag.com/articles/roger-deakins-asc-bsc-six-favorite-films
6
« on: November 18, 2021, 01:37:19 AM »
The Navajo Nation Museum has created a new version of "A Fistful of Dollars" dubbed in the Navajo language. The idea is to spread the language. Trailer included in the following link. Please forgive the article for featuring a screengrab from the wrong movie. https://www.npr.org/2021/11/17/1055897665/dubbing-a-fistful-of-dollars-to-spread-the-navajo-languageThe absence of Native American characters in the spaghetti Western, called B?eso Dah Yin?łjaa' in Navajo, was the perfect choice for dubbing because it didn't contain any offensive stereotypes, Navajo Nation Museum director Manuelito Wheeler told NPR.
I like how Leone's disdain for native americans in western movies just became an antiracist statement.
7
« on: October 07, 2021, 02:45:39 AM »
We love Zodiac. Zodiac had no thread here. The people wanted a Zodiac thread. There is now a Zodiac thread. Let's discuss Zodiac. 
8
« on: September 27, 2021, 09:16:45 AM »
So i'm posting this mostly to piss PowerRR's off. Trailer for PTA's upcoming movie (that isn't called Soggy Bottom despite it being an amazing title): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ofnXPwUPENoAnd yes, that boy is Philip Seymour Hoffman's son.
9
« on: January 25, 2021, 07:50:24 AM »
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« on: December 14, 2020, 02:50:46 AM »
Nice montage by Trois Couleurs, that shows the first and last shot of "iconic filmmakers". It seems they only count feature films. https://vimeo.com/304403176Some of them look like they were conscientiously planned. Hitchcock and Tarkovski, for instance. Also, Sergio might have the best last shot, he sure doesn't have the greatest first one. I love this kind of videos (just like all the "opening and closing shot from great movies" montages): they focus on cinema's grammar and on the inherent value of "the shot" (an idea American filmmakers kind of forgot in the 1990's-2000's and are now coming back to).
11
« on: November 19, 2020, 01:28:34 AM »
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« on: October 08, 2020, 09:38:41 AM »
After an excruciating wait, here is the trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J_NqUYwngr0From Wikipedia: Mank is an upcoming American biographical drama film about screenwriter Herman J. Mankiewicz and his battles with director Orson Welles over screenplay credit for Citizen Kane (1941). The film is directed by David Fincher, based on a script written by his father Jack, and is produced by Fincher, Ce?n Chaffin, Douglas Urbanski, and Eric Roth. The film stars Gary Oldman in the title role, while Amanda Seyfried, Lily Collins, and Charles Dance also star.
Fincher's father Jack wrote the script in the 1990s, and David originally intended to film it after he completed The Game (1997). It never came to fruition, and Jack Fincher died in 2003. Eventually, the project was officially announced in July 2019, and filming took place around Los Angeles from November 2019 to February 2020.
Mank is scheduled to have a limited theatrical run in November 2020, before being digitally released by Netflix on December 4, 2020.
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« on: July 09, 2020, 11:57:55 PM »
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« on: May 23, 2020, 07:42:59 AM »
Yay! Lists! Lists! Lists! https://www.worldofreel.com/blog/2020/5/jfj030p0dzlzh0u97m5btusmavghk4?fbclid=IwAR1JPMf6w9r0UN9L4KsLSMb0pPzZJHACmbnlOoWERiVIbspviF2j8fPC5_sHere is the top 10 if you don't want to dig further away: 1) Mulholland Drive (David Lynch) 2) There Will Be Blood (Paul Thomas Anderson) 3) Zodiac (David Fincher) 4) In the Mood For Love (Wong Kar-Wai) 5) No Country For Old Men (Joel Coen) 6) Children of Men (Alfonso Cuaron) 7) Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (Michel Gondry) 8 ) Spirited Away (Hayao Miyazaki) 9) Yi Yi: A One and A Two (Edward Yang) 10) Lost in Translation (Sofia Coppola) I'm pretty much ok with that top 10. Sure, I'd alter the order and make room for the departed and a couple of others ones, but that's a good list. I wouldn't kill the guy coming up with that list, which, when it comes to film lists, is a pretty great achievement.
15
« on: March 12, 2020, 05:17:05 AM »
I don't think I'm the only one affected by this bug, but in every message i post from Safari on an iOS device (iPhone or iPad), all the ' are changed into ?.
I cannot find a way to avoid that, I need to manually edit all these posts from my PC.
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