I'm not complaining really, but these rules are kind of hard cheese on Heaven and Earth Magic (1962), which is basically an experimental short except that it lasts about 62 minutes. I probably wouldn't mention it if it weren't the source of the cover art for Slowdive's 2017 reunion/comeback album (which fellow BEA member imacgill is currently using as an avatar)... I might put it on my Top 100 Features list if I manage to submit one, but I'll admit it would be a lot better at 20 minutes or even less.
Watching Cleo From 5 To 7 shortly after The Battle of Algiers was a bit surreal. Seeing the (guerrilla) war acted out then followed by a movie set in Paris with radio snippets (and further references) to the war was chilling. Highly recommend both films by the way, but maybe not in the marathon I watched them in. _________________ 51 Washington, D.C. albums!
Watching Cleo From 5 To 7 shortly after The Battle of Algiers was a bit surreal. Seeing the (guerrilla) war acted out then followed by a movie set in Paris with radio snippets (and further references) to the war was chilling. Highly recommend both films by the way, but maybe not in the marathon I watched them in.
Never thought of pairing those together— suppose it would make for a layered double feature. Those sort of coincidences can definitely add an extra nuances to two separate pieces of media (especially when it's based on something historic, harrowing, etc). I also recently rewatched Cleo From 5 to 7 (well, early summer). It'd been a few years.
Still working away at my list (my watchlist for this poll is some 30 films long ), along with the shorts list (getting close to finalizing a top 25), but I just want to give a quick shoutout to one of the best cinema movements of the 60s, Czech New Wave, along with some lesser-watched films from it that'll be on my list—
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Lemonade Joe is hilarious. A satire of the American western, it's genuinely a very funny film. It centres around Lemonade Joe, gunslinger, salesman, and soft-drink drinker. While, yes, it's umm... anti-American propaganda (essentially), it's still enjoyably bonkers and quite clever. Imagine a Czech Mel Brooks— full of slapstick and ironic scenarios.
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The White Dove is more a poem than anything. Symbolism-heavy, has vibes of Iranian/Indian literature (and some French cinema)— a simple story (in theory), but packs a punch. Sad that it typically lands under the radar.
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Diamonds of the Night is a shorter film— 63 minutes— but one of my favourites of the decade, and absolutely masterful. Odds are it'll land my top 20. A brisk on-the-run plot, featuring two boys who jump from a train heading to a concentration camp. A brutal story— based on those last two lines, you know this one's a little bleak— but also strikingly human. (Note, the film is extremely visual and there's little dialogue). A lot of the heavy lifting came down to the cinematographer, Jaroslav Kučera, who's the husband and frequent collaborator of—
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—Věra Chytilová, who just always seemed to be able to splatter cinema onto anything. Vera's of course known for Daisies (above), but her 60s run also includes her debut Something Different, a semi-doc-semi-fiction experiment well worth a watch.
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The Cremator is hardly a secret— it's a masterpiece of the movement— but I may as well mention it just incase someone's like 'YOU FORGOT THE CREMATOR'— (give it a watch if you haven't)
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Marketa Lazarová is another masterpiece of the movement, and will most likely land somewhere in my top 10 of the decade. Maybe top 5. Maybe top 3. It might even be the best Czech film ever. A savage medieval epic. (Barbarous?). Blood. Pain. Also incredibly visually stunning. There aren't a lot of films like it— (think Bela Tarr before Bela Tarr could ever be Bela Tarr, mixed with a bit of Tarkovsky). Mammoth of a film.
Vladislav Vančura, who wrote the novel the film is based on, was murdered by Nazis in WWII.
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The Fabulous Baron Munchausen is a stunner of experimental mixed media. Live-action/animation fusion a la Georges Melies and... (maybe René Laloux? not sure who else to toss in there)— quirky, charming, free-sprited— a bit of a party balloon amid some of these other entries. Think Verne.
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Closely Watched Trains, based on the Bohumil Hrabal masterpiece of the same name, is somehow just as good as the book. Albeit another bleak WWII story, it's a beautiful film. Heartbreaking work. Like I said though— if you haven't, and you have time, etc etc, read the novel. Hrabal's so good.
Happy End is a black-comedy in the like of the early Coens, but more... slapstick. And, honestly, weird. You'll get the gist from the first minute.
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Despite Vojtěch Jasný winning best director at Cannes for it (tied with the gone-too-early Glauber Rocha, whose daughter Ava Rocha released an album a few weeks ago that I just perchance happened to get around to this morning), All My Good Countrymen has slipped through the cracks. Took 10 years to make. And I think that many people have seen it.
Other noteworthy titles— Birds, Orphans and Fools (will probably land my list), When the Cat Comes, Intimate Lighting, Black Peter, The Fireman's Ball, The Valley of the Bees, The Joke & The Shop on Main Street (technically Slovak, but have to include it— wonderful film).
France and Italy are usually put on a pedestal in the 60s, but the scene in Czechoslovakia deserves its dues. An incredibly innovative time and place in European cinema. I don't think I've watched a film from the scene that was truly bad— maybe not even close to it—
Agree Czech New Wave deserves respect and representation on this list. I was pleasantly surprised by how well Valerie and Her Week of Wonders did on our 70s list, so I reckon there are enough fans of Czech cinema here to get a couple titles on the 60s list. The Cremator (1969) is my top choice. Probably a couple others will make my list. Adding The Hand to my watchlist, gonna try to make a shorts list.
Speaking of shorts, I watched the ones mentioned a few posts ago:
Two - Ray's 1965 short film is perhaps the strongest of the group. A story about two children, one rich and one poor, showing off their toys to each other. A simple story, with a complex array of emotions, that works very well for the short film format. You could interpret it at face value, or you could interpret the kids as a metaphor for something bigger, such as class disparity or the Vietnam War. It's entirely left to the viewer. Great short.
The Big Shave - The bathroom is clean. Maybe the resident is OCD. He starts to shave. Yup, he's OCD, alright. And he ends up turning his clean bathroom into a mess. Whatever. Although, like Two, some claim The Big Shave is analogy for the Vietnam War. Maybe the subject is a soldier trying to get a Section 8 by mutilating himself? If that's the case, maybe he later inspired the Klinger character in MASH. I'm just rambling. Like Two, this short can be taken at face value, or as a metaphor for something bigger. But unlike Two, The Big Shave is one-note, and doesn't generate any sort of reaction other than 'what the fuck?' Marty has come a long way since. His latest film is excellent.
The Wagoner - Decent short.
The Office - For five minutes, Kieslowski criticized government bureaucracy. It's not enough, frankly. By the time you begin to process what he's saying, it's already over and quickly forgotten. It's a student film, so what can you do?
Six Men Getting Sick - The title is all that it is. Interesting visuals but nothing else. This made me wary of the phrase, 'experimental short film.'
Emotion - Another 'experimental short film.' I wasn't even 50% sure what was going on the whole time. Perhaps that was the point. It's kinda dreamlike, and feels like a testing ground for the director's techniques.
Time Piece - I liked this experiment. It begins with a doctor testing a patient's heart rate, and then proceeds into the patient's daily routines. However, we see his daily routines in surrealistic terms, as though we're seeing his life re-envisioned as a daydream, where he does some wildly adventurous things, and the laws of time and physics don't apply. Jump cuts, superhuman powers, random animated breaks...all of which are rhythmic to the underlying music. Then there's a twist at the end, when it cuts back to the doctor's office, that's open to interpretation. I'm not sure what to make of the ending, but it didn't matter much to me. Time Piece was experimental, and unlike the previous two, I found it quite entertaining to boot!
Amlin' - Not mentioned in the post, yet another short I recently saw. Spielberg's short that got him a 7-picture deal. It packs Spielberg's tenderness and the free-spirited 60s, as we follow two hitchhikers who meet on the side of the road, hitchhike together, and their subsequent relationship. It doesn't strongly resonate, but it's nicely made.
... I just want to give a quick shoutout to one of the best cinema movements of the 60s, Czech New Wave, along with some lesser-watched films from it that'll be on my list—
Turns out we had a Czech movies week at the local cinema, completely missed it, unfortunately. Half of these were playing. The last one is playing tomorrow, Pearls of the Deep. Anyone seen it? Worth watching? _________________ Finally updated the overall chart
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), along with the shorts list (getting close to finalizing a top 25), but I just want to give a quick shoutout to one of the best cinema movements of the 60s, 
