William Friedkin

William Friedkin

Host:  Freddy

Freddy's Take:  Friedkin has long been a favorite of mine. It was tough to choose the 3 films I wanted to show Tanner and Chris, but since it was around Halloween when we were doing this, I went with his horror classic and two of his more bizarre films. Yes, it was difficult to not include The French Connection, Sorcerer (very underrated movie from 1977), or To Live & Die in L.A., but what are you gonna do?  I count The Exorcist as one of my favorite movies of all-time and watching it with other people is a treat for me. It's aged very well and even though it's so obviously a 1970's movie, it doesn't feel irrelevant or dated. I think that not having CGI and still holding up is a testament to how much work went into its' production. Bug and Killer Joe are both films that weren't quite made for mass consumption. They end on down notes and highlight the worst side of human nature and mental illness. I have had Friedkin in my pocket since we started doing Director Days years ago and finally had to put him out there. I believe that Chris and Tanner also enjoyed the day and if they didn't, I couldn't tell it or they didn't say it. All in all, Friedkin can be an acquired taste simply because of his eclectic nature and how he doesn't always give the audience a satisfying ending and tends to pull out the most raw and even negative aspects of human nature. That's probably part of why I'm intrigued so much by the work that he has done. 

The Exorcist

Bug

Killer Joe

William Friedkin on his favorite films. 

Ingmar Bergman

Ingmar Bergman

Host:  Tanner

Freddy's Take: The only movie by Bergman I had ever watched was "The Seventh Seal" and I enjoyed it quite a bit. I don't suppose it struck me enough to immediately follow up with Bergman. Tanner brought "The Seventh Seal", "Wild Strawberries" and "Persona", so I was going to get exposure to a couple movies I wasn't familiar with at all. 

The films can be a little confusing at times, but I found them to be so much more sophisticated than many (most?) of the American films I've seen from the same time period. I have to learn more about that, as it seems European film from that era were fairly abstract, open, and challenging, whereas American film was much more focused on story narrative and character and were rarely overt on the topics of race, sex, and politics. Religion and death are points that get touched on quite a bit in "Seventh Seal" and "Wild Strawberries" and Bergman never seems to take a very clear stand on just exactly how he feels about either.  I believe these are three movies that I am going to go back to again and in all probability I'll seek out even more of the directors work.  Ingmar Bergman has a new fan.

The Seventh Seal

Wild Strawberries

Persona

A short segment from a Charlie Rose interview with Max von Sydow, discussing Ingmar Bergman.