Gosford Park (2001)

Director: Robert Altman

Cast:Eileen Atkins, Bob Balaban, Alan Bates, Charles Dance

Have I Seen it Before: I have the strongest memory of going to see it during its theatrical run. Based on its date of release, I can only be about ten percent sure about whom I was with when I saw it, and memories of the film itself are even thinner. I remember being pretty thoroughly bored with the film at the time, and I’m pretty sure my date and I got pretty bored with each other shortly thereafter.

I only picked up a used copy of the DVD after thoroughly. enjoying Downton Abbey and remembering the author of that show, Julian Fellowes, wrote the screenplay here.

Several years later, I have yet to even finish that series* (or its later follow-up film), and so the DVD lingered in my pile of to-be-opened discs.

Did I Like It: It’s only after watching the film in its entirety now that I come to the conclusion that I may have walked out of the film, because I remembered hardly any of it. It’s entirely possible I saw some other film way back when.

Oh, well. I’m all for a film eschewing a traditional plot, especially if there is a cleverness in its construction, or an undeniable wit in the dialogue. What always bums me out is when a film tries to rise above those constraints, offer up a depiction of life as it might very well have been at the time, but then tries to force a plot into the proceedings. While it’s clear that Downton Abbey owes a lot to this movie, that series always had a story that moved things a long. This film is about nothing for fully half of its runtime, and then takes a sudden turn into a murder mystery that... ultimately doesn’t matter?

It actually makes me want to skip any of those parts of Downton that missed. Good job, movie.

*I’m not even entirely sure why I stopped watching Abbey. It might have been similar to why I stopped watching Friday Night Lights, in that I always wanted to have new episodes to watch, or it may have been because there’s so much to watch, only so many hours inthe waking day, and the strange desire to re-watch other things.

Popeye (1980)

Director: Robert Altman? It’s always a little mystifying that something like this could have happened. But then again, Coppola directed Jack (1996). Shit’s been weird all over, for far longer than most people have ever bothered to remember.

Cast: Robin Williams, Shelley Duvall, Paul L. Smith, Paul Dooley

Have I Seen It Before?: Never. Until it popped up on Netflix with a runtime and everything, I couldn’t be 100% sure that the movie wasn’t some sort of extended practical joke on the world. I’ve read plenty about the troubled making of the film, but even then I thought it was at least slightly possible that they just decided everyone would be better off not finishing the film at all.

Did I like it?: One cannot deny that Shelley Duvall is perfectly cast. One can really only point to Patrick Stewart’s run as Professor Charles Xavier for a more perfect fusion of established screen presence and iconic role.

The rest of the film is… Well, it’s not nearly as bad as its reputation has sometimes made it out to be.

Still, it’s not a great film, or even a good one. It’s flaws are not in the casting, to be sure (even Williams, who seems unusual casting for the role lives up to it with the help of prosthetics), or even the mere idea that no one ever needed a film based on any cartoon.

It’s more the spirit and energy with which this is all presented. Is it possible for someone to produce a musical by accident? Every song and accompanying dance number is mumbled in the moment as if there was no plan for what effect the filmmakers might have wanted. Given that the aforementioned troubled history indicates the films existence is an attempt for Paramount to compensate for losing the rights of the eventual Annie (1982) to Columbia. At least Annie was based on a Broadway show of some renown, while this appeared to come about as an afterthought, and it shows.