[lbo-talk] Re:

Brian Charles Dauth magcomm at ix.netcom.com
Sun Sep 17 11:42:57 PDT 2006


Dear List:


> Look, at the end of "M," Peter Lorre gets to make a speech, and it's a
pretty good speech. You leave the theater thinking that maybe good isn't

as good as you thought; and bad isn't as bad.

But it would have been as just at home on stage as screen. Don't you think it a little odd that you would point to a speech as a high point in a work of (supposedly) visual art known as fiilm?


> You never walk away from his movies questioning the categories of
good and evil.

Huh?

Devlin sending the women he loves to sleep with and marry the enemy?

Uncle Charlie the serial killer serving as the most charming and interesting character in the movie?

Scottie's romantic obsessions leading to two deaths?

The good people of LIFEBOAT turning into a crazed mob?


> With Hitch, good is good; bad is bad

So all the scenes of transference of guilt and identity mean nothing?


> But I grant I haven't seen Frenzy.

Make sure you get the new dvd if you cannot see it on a screen as it should be experienced. It is a beautiful evocation of how tenuous are the ties that keep society from crumbling. It is also the only film I know of where violence against women is filmed contra providing visiual pleasure - it is as if the film itself cannot maintain coherence as it tries to depict the rape/murder. The later, the camera acts as if it is in rebellion, and it retreats to the safety of the street. I feel FRENZY is Hitchcock's masterpiece and one of the greatest films ever made.

Brian Dauth Queer Buddhist Resister



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