Charles Chaplin’s THE CIRCUS, ALADDIN, EASY RIDER Screenings

Among the upcoming screenings in the November film series of the Library of Congress’ Packard Campus for Audio Visual Conservation in Culpeper, Va., are vehicles for just about everyone, from Charles Chaplin to Dennis Hopper; from Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland to Robin Williams‘ voice.
I’ve never seen Disney’s Aladdin, though I know it was a big hit when it came out. Robin Williams was particularly praised for his voice work as the Genie — some even went as far as to demand that the Academy come up with Oscars for best voice performance.
No one came up with that demand when Charles Chaplin’s The Circus was released, perhaps because the film has no audible dialogue. I’m not a big [...]

THE LIMEY d: Steven Soderbergh

The Limey (1999)
Direction: Steven Soderbergh
Screenplay: Lem Dobbs
Cast: Terence Stamp, Lesley Ann Warren, Luis Guzman, Peter Fonda, Barry Newman, Joe Dallesandro, Nicky Katt, Amelia Heinle, Melissa George

 

 
By Dan Schneider of Cosmoetica:
Director Steven Soderbergh’s 1999 so-called crime drama The Limey is easily the best Soderbergh effort I’ve seen. That’s partly due to the innovative narrative structure, which makes all but the last few minutes of this great film a flashback. The rest is due to an excellent script by Lem Dobbs, whose other great success came a year earlier, in Alex Proyas’ sci-fi thriller Dark City. Both films, despite their apparent differences, are acutely focused on human memory and [...]

THE LIMEY II – Terence Stamp

THE LIMEY – Part I
Aside from memory, there are superbly rendered details that distill the characters: Wilson radiates affection for Eduardo’s help in tracking down Valentine by fondly calling him Sancho (as in Panza). All of these things — along with Eduardo’s and Elaine’s motivations, and the portrayal of the relationship between the hitmen — work well. In fact, they work so well precisely because there are no specifics, but generalities sharply etched so that the viewer ‘feels,’ as well as understands, the motivations and relationships. That allows the viewer to feel what goes on inside Wilson, thus creating a stronger identification with him than would be gotten were all things laid [...]