Best Shot: Repulsion

This blog has been long dead, but when Repulsion was selected for Hit Me With Your Best Shot, I knew I wanted to participate again, since it's one of those movies that started the era of serious cinephilia for me around the time I turned 20 (was 2009 really six years ago already?). In fact, I had already screengrabbed my favorite shot from it a few years ago:

Cracks in walls/pavement/whatnot is a recurring motif in Repulsion, but I think it's at its most subtle here. This is the image that often comes to my mind when I think of someone "losing it", or even when I'm simply alone in a dark hallway.

Hit Me With Your Best Shot: 3 Women

I wasn't completely sure about choosing the above shot from 3 Women, one of the best films ever made, as my favorite, since it doesn't show Shelley Duvall's face and Shelley Duvall in this movie is utterly amazing. Yet that's what I did, since 3 Women is both very funny in an offbeat way (in the first half) and deeply unsettling (in the second half) and this image of Millie looking like a kooky dementor represents that perfectly. Also, Millie is on the record as saying that her favorite colors are yellow and purple, so I think she would approve this choice.

PS - as I already mentioned in this post from last year, I would attend the hell out of one of Millie's famous dinner parties if I were lucky enough to get invited. They've got Tickled Pink *and* Lemon Satin, not to mention all the delicious hors d'oeuvres!

"Wiiine! You got wiiine!"

Discovery of the Day:

Roman Polanski in The Tenant totally looks like...

...Jennifer Saunders as Edina Monsoon.

HMWYBS: Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

I have to admit that I didn't actually get around to rewatching Eternal Sunshine for this week's Hit Me With Your Best Shot, but I did remember that I had taken one screenshot from it a couple of years ago when I last saw it. So, I'm going to momentarily raise this blog from the dead anyway and repost that shot:

Though I can't be sure if it's my absolute favorite, it sure is beautiful: bright yet soft, dreamy yet melancholic... Ellen Kuras did a great job on this film, just like everyone else involved.

What Is Art?

Indisputable proof that Alec Baldwin's character in Blue Jasmine and Jack Donaghy are the same person: when I saw this...

...I immediately thought of this. "Paintings of horses!"

At Long Last, My Favorites of 2012

Now that I've seen Frances Ha, which I'd been waiting for since it premiered at all those North American festivals last September, and Museum Hours, which wasn't even on my radar until last week, I finally feel ready to choose my favorites of the film year 2012. And we're only five weeks away from 2014!

I'm sure there are some excellent 2012 films/performances still left for me to discover (I've yet to see No, for example), so these top fives might not be set in stone, but it doesn't matter anyway - I just want to use this space to acknowledge the great work of the following people.

Best Film

Amour

Frances Ha

Holy Motors

Museum Hours
Sister

Best Screenwriter

Sean Baker, Chris Bergoch - Starlet

Noah Baumbach, Greta Gerwig - Frances Ha

Michael Haneke - Amour

Antoine Jaccoud, Ursula Meier, Gilles Taurand - Sister

Alice Lowe, Steve Oram - Sightseers

Best Director

Noah Baumbach - Frances Ha

Leos Carax - Holy Motors

Miguel Gomes - Tabu

Michael Haneke - Amour

Peter Strickland - Berberian Sound Studio

Best Actress

Marion Cotillard - Rust and Bone

Greta Gerwig - Frances Ha

Nina Hoss - Barbara

Helen Hunt - The Sessions

Emmanuelle Riva - Amour

Best Actor
Toby Jones - Berberian Sound Studio
Denis Lavant - Holy Motors
Kacey Mottet Klein - Sister
Joaquin Phoenix - The Master
Jean-Louis Trintignant - Amour

Best Supporting Actress
Eva Green - Dark Shadows
Diane Kruger - Farewell, My Queen
Corinne Masiero - Rust and Bone
Ela Piplits - Museum Hours
Léa Seydoux - Sister

Best Supporting Actor
Garrett Hedlund - On the Road
Samuel L. Jackson - Django Unchained
Tommy Lee Jones - Lincoln
Tim Roth - Broken
Michael Zegen - Frances Ha

"27 is old, though."