Bourbon Cookie Comments:
“Who’s afraid of Virginia Woolf, Virginia Woolf, Virginia Woolf?”
I love this film. I’m a sick fan of Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton. ‘Cleopatra,’ being a guilty pleasure, and the old tabloid shows of their tumultuous relationship get me every time. But ‘VW’ is different. The Oscar rules were used: putting on weight, unflattering lighting, married couples acting together, breaking out of your personal/professional mold, etc., but this time it worked beyond what any award show could predict. Taylor went there. There was a freaky, behind closed doors quality about her. A lifetime of acting, studios and broken hearts came out full force from her with a great big ‘Fuck You…I deserve it…I’m the best!’ She knew what she was doing. Burton brought it to the table with a quiet, intelligent, confident air that showed, even with all the drinking and fighting and public exposure, he is/was the heir apparent. Not to say it was all about them. The supporting characters made this film possible. How often can you really watch a film from beginning to end with only four players on the screen for your enjoyment? With VW, no one else was needed.
The combination of story and the abilities of the actors to tell the story came together to present a bittersweet truth that no matter how wordy it gets, hits home. As a follow up to ‘The Apartment’, VW was perfect. ‘The Apartment’ ends with the happy couple sitting on the couch saying they would send out fruit cakes next year. What happens next year, in five years, in ten? ‘Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolfe’ happens. My mother is a college professor. I know these people, we all know these people.
Thank you Zack for a lovely reminder that Valentine’s Day is a marketing gimmick and that candy’s dandy but liquor’s quicker. Cheers.
Brandon Comments:
"We all peel the labels off, baby."
I truly never thought anyone would have brought “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf” to MovieNight, not in a million years. It was a film I debated bringing several times (twice), but with my current track record of dubious Selections, I couldn’t afford the gamble of this classic film. But now that Nubs introduced it unto our canon, I feel great pain that it was not me who took the risk.
“Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf” is probably the bravest film I have ever seen in my life, especially considering its release date of 1966. There is so much great writing, marvelous acting and beautiful stage-play that it’s almost too much to watch. It embodies the qualities of “a writer’s film” as well as “an actor’s film” and embraces both. And strangely, within all of its ugliness of arguments and fighting, it still entices you to be a part of it. While viewing it, you almost wish your life was as disturbing and colorful and malevolent as theirs. You wish you drank a bottle of bourbon every night, argued with your wife, broke the hearts of people around you, destroyed the dreams of innocent people with a smile on your face…just to make your own life less painful and more enjoyable. But then at the same time, with all of this lust for malicious wickedness, you, as the viewer, are also so relieved that your life is not like theirs, that you have a sane woman to come home to, that you don’t thirst for 90-proof liquor every six minutes, and that you don’t find pleasure in destroying the lives of others.
Nubs, you brought a great film to all of our Wednesday. You took a risk on a dark, black-and-white film that didn’t make us all feel real good on the inside when it was finished, and almost made you want to take a shower, swallow three vitamin Cs, and get a good night’s rest from the oncoming celluloid hangover you felt was coming….but your gamble paid off BIG TIME. If my vote counts for anything, I would have to call this Selection a Slam Dunk.
SELECTOR Comments:
As our night and my Pick simultaneously debuted with a stunning shot of the clouds parting to reveal the brightest moon Dicks street has seen, I was content with my choice. The helicopters definitely were a distraction to a piece that relies heavily on quiet speeches contrasted with intense silence, but you take the good with the bad of the Dicks I suppose. As I said, in my preamble, the better movie always prevails.
‘Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf’ is not just a better movie, it is probably one of the best pieces of film making to ever grace our screen. The performances are a definition of the categories of leading and supporting for which all were nominated. Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton are phenomenal and throw out all vanity and pride, which was quite astonishing for it's time and given their bodies of work. Edward Albee is one of America's greatest playwrights and all the actors do an incredible job of being the vessel that bring his groundbreaking realism to life. As good acting should be, the hard work is never seen or considered, the world just is.
What a world the rest of the production crew brings to life. The lighting and cinematography were already revered in Tooda's ‘Visions of Light.’ I can't believe that, again, I get to be the first to bring one of cinema's greatest directors to the stucco/screen, but I'm more surprised it took 3 years to get to our first Mike Nichols. He takes on the impossible task of taking a dialogue-heavy, one-location play and makes it more than deserving of cinema. The early use of hand-held shaky camera shots, the extreme close-ups in contrast with the lonely overhead shots of the abyss outdoors, his placement of his storytellers on the stage and dance floor in the bar, to name a few, are pioneer and perfect film directing.
It all ads up to our Crew not being able to give up on this exhilarating, alchohol-driven classic despite some overbearing helicopters.
As for it's theme, well, this was my Valentine pick and, as dark as cynical a choice, I think this movie speaks cuttingly to our fairy tale idea of love. I was thrilled to follow Netti's excellent Valentine pick, ‘The Apartment,’ because in a different vain it showed us the idea of love and marriage or love versus marriage, and ends with the beginning of a beautiful relationship. ‘Who's Afraid of Virgina Woolf,’ as Bourbon Cookie put it, shows us that relationship many hard years later. Though it is a painful to spend one night with these two miserably doomed couples, do not be misled, at the root is love. I wanted to say multiple times throughout this showing, that me and Joby are fine. Nevertheless, this movie, shows us love and marriage, truth and illusion. We get all aspects of love in that as much as they tear each other down for their own dashed hopes and aspirations, it means nothing unless their partner is there to witness. Her drunken desperate search for him in the metaphoric woods outside their home makes the whole movie for me. Truth and illusion show us that love and marriage passionately manifests in both beauty and ugliness when two people know each other so intensely.
You complete me. You and loads of alcohol, baby. You too, Movienight.
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