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    Salesman

    J.M. Tyree

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    Selected by the Library of Congress as one of the most significant American films ever made,...

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Jeff Nichols recommended Hud (1963) in Movies (curated)

 
Hud (1963)
Hud (1963)
1963 | Drama, Western
9.5 (2 Ratings)
Movie Favorite

"This one — they’re just kissing cousins, really — but the last Paul Newman film I’ll talk about is Hud — just the greatest introduction to a character maybe ever on screen. You’ve got this goofy kid walking around town and he walks past the bar, and there’s glass on the sidewalk and the bar owner’s sweeping it up. And the kid goes, “Did you have trouble in here last night?” “I had Hud in here last night.” Such an awesome way to introduce the main character of this film. When you first meet him, he’s walking out of this married woman’s house putting his boots on and the husband pulls up, and he immediately blames his nephew. It’s this really incredible thing. I was lucky enough to work on a college professor’s documentary called The Rough South of Larry Brown. Which is about the writer Larry Brown out of Oxford, Mississippi. In that documentary Larry Brown talks about his writing, he says, “Yeah, you read my stuff and you read a little bit and you might think it’s pretty funny. And then you read a little bit more and you realize, it’s not funny worth a damn.” And that’s Hud. You start it off and you’re like, “Gosh, look at this rapscallion, this character,” and then you realize, “Wow, that’s not funny; there is some deep stuff inside that man that is hurt and angry, but is manifesting itself in very evil ways.” The complexity of that — it’s different than Newman’s character in The Hustler. In The Hustler, he’s doing pride, but there’s something deep going on in Hud that’s darker. It’s more about family and legacy and things that I think, because it’s attached to the family, I relate to very much. I had to deal with familial relationships that are complex."

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Horror Noire: A History of Black Horror (2019)
Horror Noire: A History of Black Horror (2019)
2019 | Documentary, Horror
I found Horror Noire, a documentary that focuses on the role and impact of black creators and actors within horror cinema, to be an incredibly insightful watch.

It's covers a wide range of media, from 40s originals like I Walked with a Zombie, all the way up to present day entries like Us, and everything in between. My only criticism stems from this actually - with so many movies to cover, the pacing moves quite quickly, and results in a fairly short feature - I could have happily watched a few more hours!

The documentary features interviews with some genre icons such as Tony Todd, Keith David, Ernest R. Dickerson, Jordan Peele, Rachel True, Tananarive Due, just to name a few!
Listening to them talk about this subject which such fondness is wholesome, but not always comfortable - whereas Horror Noire is of course a celebration of black horror, none of the cast shy away from talking about the difficulties faced by the black community in film, including how they are portrayed, especially in earlier decades.
In 2020, these issues ring truer than ever.
As a white male, the biggest thing I've learned through recent events is that it's not enough to be not racist, - it's important and essential to be actively anti-racist. As a fan of horror for a lot of my life, I, perhaps ignorantly, haven't really attributed these issues to the genre before, so it's refreshing for me to learn about these kind of things and take them on board.

Horror Noire is a truly interesting watch, and has given me some films to add to my watchlist (Ganja & Hess is one I'll be checking out pretty soon). It's eye opening, and certainly deserves attention.
  
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Matthew Krueger (10051 KP) Sep 21, 2020

I need to watch this one.

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Andy K (10821 KP) rated Shoah (1985) in Movies

Jul 20, 2018  
Shoah (1985)
Shoah (1985)
1985 | Documentary
Unforgettable
Director Claude Lanzmann, who recently passed away at the age of 92, spent a significant portion of his life working on interviews, editing and putting together this immaculate epic masterpiece portrait of the Holocaust through the words of people who were there and lived through the torture.

I sobbed for days after watching the more than 13 hours of footage from the documentary and the DVD extras. Some of the descriptions and scenes were so moving I actually had to pause for a moment to collect myself before continuing.

I purchased when Criterion had one of their 50% off sales and it was well worth it. You will be changed forever as a person after watching this and you will start to think all your first-world problems are minuscule in comparison.