De Palma (2015)

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holy mackerel 7 years 3 months ago
Siskoid
When people talk about the young upcoming directors of the early 70s who all hung out together - Scorsese, Lucas, Spieberg, Coppola - they usually forget Brian De Palma was part of the ensemble. He just never had the sustained success, financially or critically, that his friends did. And yet, he's given us Carrie, Scarface, The Untouchables, and if you're more of a fan, Blow Out, Body Double and Dressed to Kill. In De Palma, Noah Baumbach and Jake Paltrow sit down with the undervalued director for a long interview about his career, with a particular focus on where his ideas come from, and he's a lively fellow (Holy Mackerel!) who easily admits to his mistakes, but is also at a place in his life where he doesn't give a shit, so you want to know what went wrong in Mission: Impossible? You'll get it! The overall portrait is that of an auteur trying to work within the Hollywood system and getting frustrated. Many of his films are upsetting and one might say his imagination isn't commercial, but he is, for my money, Hitchcock's best successor. If the sexual content of his flicks makes you squirm, it's supposed to. I don't think the shower scene in Psycho was any more "acceptable" at the time (or Vertigo's perversity!). 4 months 3 weeks ago