(chris, about your quote about hartley being overbearing: i semi-agree (could he possibly be more overbearing than woody allen?), but isn't this sort of clunky posturing somehow more interesting than the sort of glossy fluffing
Ian smartly wrote: that goes on in all manner of 'mainstream' films? *cf _pretty woman_, an admittedly overused example<<<< I think both Hartley and Allen are far, far superior to anything mainstream. However, Hartley is a fledgling while Allen has proven himself to be, in my opinion, one of the greatest film-makers America has. I would put his Husbands and Wives as well as Todd Haynes' Safe ahead of Scorcese's GoodFellas in the best American films of the decade. As far as the humor goes, Hartley is more overbearing than Woody Allen because he makes his actors pause too much at the 'punchlines' or the supposedly funny bits, the timing is all off and out of proportion. I personally think the humor is fairly throwaway in both of these directors' films, but Allen's fits much more easily into his overall serious themes than Hartley's does. Allen is much more casual with his humor and it blends easily, if you don't happen to find it funny it doesn't diminish the film so much, but Hartley's sticks out like a sore thumb and I don't think it's halfway funny enough to deserve so much space in his films; he ends up trivializing himself, while to me Allen's films, at least since Annie Hall, have always had resonance whether they're 'comedy' or 'drama' or both. However, that being said, I haven't seen even half of Hartley's films and my interest is picqued enough by what I've found worthwhile in the ones I have seen to make me want to see more. Regardless of my minor divergence of taste with him, thanks to Mr. Connelly for keeping film discourse on the list! Unchallenged opinions are the most uninteresting sort. 75% of people are bound to find this whole thing far too pretentious but if I can get one person to watch Husbands & Wives or Safe then it's all worthwhile... 'One simply can't live without the cinema.' -Two or Three Things I Know About Chris +----------------------------------------------------------------------+ +---+ Brought to you by the reborn Sinister mailing list +---+ To send to the list mail "sinister@majordomo.net". To unsubscribe send "unsubscribe sinister" or "unsubscribe sinister-digest" to "majordomo@majordomo.net". WWW: http://www.majordomo.net/sinister +-+ "legion of bedroom saddo devotees" "tech-heads and students" +-+ +-+ "the cardie wearing biscuit nibbling belle & sebastian list" +-+ +-+ "jelly-filled danishes" +-+ +----------------------------------------------------------------------+