MOVIES you watched this week? (DVD)

[Nikolaj]

Hejira wrote: Eynam Pkutoh (Eyes Wide Open) - Perhaps one of the best movies I have seen in years. It's about a married orthodox Jewish man taking over his late father's butcher shop in the most orthodox neighborhood in Jerusalem, where he falls in love with his new (male) apprentice. You can kind of liken it to the Israeli Brokeback Mountain, but it is much subtler and more tenuous as it unfolds within the dark cloaks of the secretive orthodox Jewish world. There is little dialogue (in Hebrew), so much of the story is conveyed through expression and body language. Perhaps that's why I find it all so haunting...


^^^ or 4 posts above, not just the small excerpt above, but all of it was great to read, Hejira. 'Eynam Pkutoh' especially sounds really worth investing the time in to watch. I still have not seen 'Brokeback Mountain' but this sounds like it could be more socially and culturally rewarding than 'BM' which I'd heard enough about from people I respected to know I wasn't going to feel uplifted by watching a negative depiction of what could have been a positive, life-affirming film. I was curious to see the peformances in it, which I'm sure are excellent but I knew the story's outcome, and didn't want to support the film's ulitmately negative premise, though I know the director is brilliant. 'Eyes Wide Open' (easier to type) seems like it will be more of something I'd enjoy, than another account of a gay guy destined for promiscuity and death or hiding behind a wife while really in love with a man. Hmm, guess I figured out why I haven't seen it!
"More Tales" --as you wrote, really couldn't compare to the first 'Tales of The City'- the grandmother brothel owner was kind of too painfully homely to ever really let your eyes not hurt watching her, though her acting was fine, she was just too freaky. The second actor to play 'Bear' -in 'More Tales' - was likeable enough, I guess, but the actor in the first 'Tales' really seemed to be missed, by everyone I knew and in every review I read, at the time.
What stands out now,besides how Laura Linney showed such ripe talent so long before she went mainstream and had the Oscar nominations, is how brave it was of Thomas Gibson to take on some of the male-on-male scenes he played as the bisexual married to a woman man. I respect his talent even more now, because there was no 'Harry Hamlin stigma' for him afterwards. He just has worked steadily ever since 'Tales,' refusing to believe or accept that portraying homosexual or bisexual or, really, maybe just a homo-erotic character should leave him unemployable for long stretches. He's remained a working actor ever since. Hamlin had a promising film career way, way back (I remember 'King of The Mountain' fondly, but vaguely) then along came 'Making Love' and there went his film career. Hamlin didn't even put up a fight, but surfaced nearly a decade later on 'LA Law' but didn't really fulfill the promise of what his career could have been. Gibson either has more talent or more balls and just wouldn't accept being dismissed. The talent may be it . I'm not a big 'CSI' watcher, at all, I think I have seen it twice-- but I caught an episode months ago and Thomas Gibson was Oscar-caliber, even, in his performance, and didn't get an Emmy nominaton. His character was tracking down a elderly male child molester, of boys, 2 of whom now were in their 40s, and rescuing a kidnapped child and dealing with the mass-murdering son of the rapist.
Gibson was unbelievably good in really complex scenes with layers and layers of "reserve"- I guess it would be called. So much behind the eyes, and under the surface, as well as right there about to explode, but not exploding. He really has considerable range as an actor, and maybe an inner strength that wouldn't let him accept he'd be forever typecast after 'Tales'. It's like he wouldn't give in to it, as perhaps Hamlin and Michael Onktean did give in to it, accepting that they were labeled as the stars of 'that gay movie'- Gibson cruises a bathhouse wearing just a towel and has implied sex scenes with men in 'Tales', Now 50-ish, his acting seems stronger than ever. Harry Hamlin's on a reality show with that peculiar wife of his. Good job.
I liked the 'Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman' references in 'Tales Of The City', too.
To me, 'MHMH' is an example of television that is on the level of 'Tales'-- Youtube has a clip of Louise Lasser in what Norman Lear called 'the greatest performance ever given by an actress in the history of television'-- its a very long scene where 'Mary' has a nervous breakdown while on The David Susskind Show, and by the end of the clip, it does seem that Lasser took television acting to an entirely new level- she's brilliant. That very episode isn't even available on DVD, and there doesn't seem to be any followup dvd releases beyond the MHMH dvd that's been out for years .
Suddenly feeling nostalgic for the 7os, between 'Tales Of The City' and 'MHMH.'
Will track down the movie of the Israeli duo Hejira mentioned. It sounds promising, even if one of the guys is married. It happens.