Mr Cat Dog

only Eraserhead and Pulp Fiction as of right now, I believe. he saw something about Synecdoche, New York which interested him and it might be my favorite movie ever so I think we plan on watching that soon. me and user Harley Quinn might also start watching some together as well -- think we've got Paris, Texas on the hook.

hahahah he actually told me that he wanted to watch this one on his own presumably because of how Special he finds It's Such a Beautiful Day. but we have watched films together before and it is very fun.

yup I plan on watching it today. thanks for notifying me. poor Alex is away for the next few days so he can't watch it yet sucker

I KNOWWWW

Matt and I are gonna watch it soon

and omg FINAL STRETCH OF MAD MEN EPISODES ON THE HORIZON! Are you excited or are you excited???

Two Lovers! Very beautiful movie, though I haven't seen it in quite a while. There's so many things going for it; the acting (Joaquin hit another home run here but Isabella Rossellini was particularly poignant), the tremendous amount of pathos Gray nurtures for each character and placing them in this incredibly ambivalent and painful relationship story where no one wins, Gray's devotion in depicting a specific community (and he does so quite beautifully with the Russian-Jewish people), but above all his flair with tone is so on-point here. I'm not sure how I can explain that in particular, but it's just so full to the brim with mood. Heck, even that one scene where Joaquin dances in the club had an unmistakable hint of melancholy. Genuinely lovely all-in-all, and I felt like my heart got torn to pieces in the end, which is a testament to how potent the film was to me (I'm usually unfazed by romantic films otherwise).

REGARDLESS, this movie poster for Two Lovers is top-to-bottom vom material.

Also! Nice to see Spirited Away at the top of your list! I might watch Porco Rosso or Princess Mononoke when I get the time. School piling up once again. I have my Professional Medical Exams 1 this August so I've pretty just been studying. I get to see one movie or two on the weekdays but I pretty much just binge the hell out like a pig on weekends. It's funny especially considering my movie craves usually start at the end of the year and go away around the time the Oscars wrap up... but the constant craving's staying a lot longer than I've expected.

Don't bother with Season 1 aka the Forgotten Season aka The Season of No Budget, start with Season 2. Season 3 is my personal favourite.

I like Violet, but that's more because I want to suck her off rather than her drag talent. Other than that, there's really no one else I want to root for. See, the problem that's been around for the last three or so seasons is that it's become far too focused on the comedy/crazy queens. There's just not a healthy mix and the challenges have changed to reflect that, these last four episodes being outlandishly, well, bad. There's not enough focus on the clothing aspect of drag. Season 6 for example had no fashion queens or really any other type of performer aside from the aforementioned comedy queen.
While I hate to use the term so unwillingly given to us by the Fonz, Drag Race has jumped the shark.

finished it like 20 minutes ago and honestly this season is so awful

Oh God. Why'd I put it away for so long. It's as great as people say it is. By the end, when they played this when Chihiro lets her hand away from Haku's, I started welling up (not to mention the scenes where Chihiro eats that rice cake and crying and where Haku finally gets his name back). F-ckkkkkkkkk, movies don't ever do that to me. Such a great film. I can't thank you enough for forcing me to see this. What an experience. Can't wait to tell my friends about it, even though I'm pretty much so late to the Miyazaki party.

Damnit Cat! Alright alright alright, I'm gonna watch it right now but on MY OWN CONSCIOUS VOLITION (I'm half-kidding, that incredible stare gif single-handedly guilt-shamed me into it).

Oh no, poor cat! Gadzookey (!) is amazing and I'm so glad it's reaching its funding goal. And that video is everything to me right now. ♥

DON'T CRUCIFY ME PLEASE but I haven't seen Spirited Away, and quite a lot of the other Ghibli films as well (I've seen three: Arrietty, The Wind Rises and Kaguya). I need to fix that pronto! Quite a few of my friends use it as a running gag against me; it's getting pretty bad.

Dear White People! I just saw it the other day. It didn't make much of a splash for me but I did like the stylishness and concept of it. And I have a mind to watch Girlhood; the TIFF trailer looks wondrous. And I really won't mind a viewing of another French female coming-of-age drama (one other movie I've watched that fits this criteria is Blue is the Warmest Color which was pretty excellent).

Mates wanna go see Kingsman again so I'll probs do that this Saturday, but I need to let my cinephile/TV-phile self take over! (this would constitute watching films or shows by myself allllllllll day in the bed)

Definitely see some of your criticism, but I'm glad we can agree that Elisabeth Moss is so astonishingly great in this. The portions with Moss might just constitute my favorite parts of the film as well (though that's not to say I don't love everything else). This includes that one shot where she comes out victorious after degrading Philip when he tries to come home. So gratifying and amazing. And Gatzuki (?) the cat is just the greatest. He's almost as great as the two marmalade cats in Inside Llewyn Davis.

Weekends! Rochefort time! What are your plans this weekend Cat?

Oprah is so fake with her reaction plus it's a lego statue lmao

I like Schwartzman in pretty much anything he's in (the Wes films, Funny People, Shopgirl, Marie Antoinette), but he's especially good in this. He gives the tragically disillusioned role of Philip such an acidic tinge. As for the film itself, I love it. I see very much the literary spirit of Roth's The Ghost Writer in it which I like a lot, even though it adapts roughly probably 1/4 of that book's content (neither the protagonist's Jewish problem nor the twist in the Anne Frank story but rather its themes on artistic idolatry and artistic ego) I LOVED the narrative form that the film takes; it opens up very much like a novel, and keeps the story at a steady pace without meandering. And here again, Perry unleashes through his characters, his unmistakable knack for highly combative dialogue (it's not as extensively used here as in The Color Wheel but it's there and it's always cuttingly written and incredibly entertaining). I actually pretty much found it just decent when I first saw it because I expected a full adaptation of The Ghost Writer which it wasn't, but I loved it the second viewing-round when I actually payed attention to what it's offering. Very lovely film, though I can definitely see why people would hate it (it's intensely pessimistic; my roommate loathed it, but I don't mind it honestly).

And Elisabeth Moss. GOD BLESS MOSS. She's in the next Alex Ross Perry film and I can't wait to see what she can come up with next.

And soooooorry for the word vomit. I feel like I reply entire essays to you most of the time!

EDIT: Why'd you hate it? D: Thought it'd be right up your alley.

I'll defo check Rochefort or Model Shop out sometime later in the week, as I'm swamped with university work right now. And yeah, Lola is great but it also builds on the back-story of the man who marries Deneueve's character in Umbrellas (it's an earlier film and apparently both Umbrellas and Lola are set in the same universe), so that's one reason to check it out. Very cool stuff! And this: http://www.criterion.com/boxsets/1055-the-essential-jacques-demy I WANT

Anyways, as I promised: my favorite perfs of 2014.

Best Supporting Actress
1. Patricia Arquette, Boyhood
2. Franziska Weisz, Stations of the Cross
3. Elisabeth Moss, Listen Up Philip
4. Scarlett Johansson, Captain America: The Winter Soldier
5. Melanie Lynskey, Happy Christmas

Best Supporting Actor
1. Josh Brolin, Inherent Vice
2. Ethan Hawke, Boyhood
3. Jake Lacy, Obvious Child
4. J.K. Simmons, Whiplash
5. Michael Lomenda, Jersey Boys

Best Actress (Pike and Stone top this list in a deadlock)
1-2. Rosamund Pike, Gone Girl
1-2. Emma Stone, Magic in the Moonlight
3. Julianne Moore, Maps to the Stars
4. Zaraah Abrahams, Da Sweet Blood of Jesus
5. Marion Cotillard, Two Days, One Night

Best Actor
1. David Oyelowo, Selma
2. Oscar Isaac, A Most Violent Year
3. Jason Schwartzman, Listen Up Philip
4. Joshua Burge, Buzzard
5. Gérard Depardieu, Welcome to New York

I watched The Umbrellas of Cherbourg today. Wow. Catherine Deneueve looking straight into the camera in Umbrellas was heart-stopping every time it happened. And that set design is some of the best I've seen in a while! I liked it so much that I watched another Jacques Demy movie - Lola - right after. WOW. So many great things but one that was pretty much the highlight of this whole love-and-longing film was one brief slow-motion scene towards the end that was so heart-stirring in the best ways. I'm itching to watch another Demy now.

I'm actually still four episodes in on Kimmy Schmidt (yeah yeah I'm a slug). That Martin Short guest role... errrggghhhh.

I like Ellie Kemper and Jane Krakowski and Tituss Burgess with their respective characters. But can you imagine if all three of them were in a scene together? I wouldn't be handle that high-octane craziness.

Maybe it's just the upbringing that I had with my parents playing traditional musical films for the siblings and I frequently that I have a lot of nostalgia for them. I'll defo check out Dancer in the Dark, it's a long time coming anyway. Maybe when I get to sick of the Kimmy Schimdt sunniness. :P

??? :o You've never listened to Illinois before? It's a very famous album, and for the right reasons. Make some time for a listen-through, it's a STUNNER and a songwriting masterpiece. My only criticism for it is that it can be rather blown out sometimes in terms of sound (think Bon Iver, Bon Iver), but it's excellent otherwise. I'm not familiar with his other work (The Age of Adz and Seven Swans were both albums I listened to a long time ago; I have sketchy memories for both), but he's someone I can easily recommend.

Bee tee dubs, I have a copy of the upcoming Carrie & Lowell by Sufjan Stevens (don't ask how I got it, it's not supposed to be out yet!) and I'm not sure why I can't be bothered to listen to it.

I quite like this new Tame Impala track though: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=toU0_qZtOOA