The Lost City of Z (James Gray, 2017)

Discussions of specific films and franchises.
Message
Author
User avatar
Foam
Joined: Sat Apr 04, 2009 12:47 am

Re: The Lost City of Z (James Gray, 2017)

#26 Post by Foam » Wed May 03, 2017 4:29 am

No, you are making sense. And I appreciate the attempt to engage with what I'm saying.

Maybe I wasn't completely clear about one thing though. It's not primarily the lack of big drama that I have a problem with in Gray (although I do sometimes think he is drama-phobic.)

Rather it's what I see as a lack of definition in how dramatic beats (whether Big Drama or low drama or just "drama" in its most descriptive sense) are placed within the larger texture of the film. Maybe I ran over it too quickly, but in addition to the operatic moments in Coppola I also mention the scene in Harold & Maude when Harold floats in the pool while his mother continues to swim, willfully ignoring him. We could argue about whether it's more appropriate to call this a small moment or a big moment in the film, but what's important to me about it is how the staging and the rhetorical disinterestedness of the camera solicit a kind of engagement which clearly defines what's narratively interesting about the moment. There's something sharply communicative about it. And I guess what I'm saying is that Gray's last three films seem to lack this sharpness. To the point that I often ask myself why I'm supposed to be interested in what I'm seeing, other than its most superficial charms.

As I indicated in my last post though, I'm willing to grant that this kind of "sharpness" isn't the defining element of 70s Hollywood, even if it's one of the most important elements to me. And I'm sure it's entirely possible that a big part of what people like about Gray is precisely that his films don't have this kind of sharpness... they prefer the relatively soft edges of the narrative's unfolding and would be horrified if Gray started to use the sorts of techniques I privilege (which one could alternately consider relatively overdetermined, after all).

I also don't want to give the impression that I am against what I guess I've started to call "narrative softness" as a rule. Just that I'm not sure how it's functioning in Gray's cinema exactly. If I was a kind of "sharpness" fetishist then it wouldn't make sense for Morvern Callar to be one of my favorite films (which it is). But I have an instinctual response to that film and many others with a similar approach, but not Gray's for some reason that I'm still frankly trying to articulate!

User avatar
rohmerin
Joined: Mon Aug 07, 2006 10:36 am
Location: Spain

Re: The Lost City of Z (James Gray, 2017)

#27 Post by rohmerin » Thu Jul 27, 2017 5:19 am

Was I the only who thinked and thinked again about Evelyn Waugh's A Handful of Dust?
Excellent, beautiful film. I highly recommend Mountains of the Moon, an under rated masterpiece.

And it's told for and by White people, not like The serpent embrance, film that I couldn't stand or undestand at all because its native etnographical arty perspective.

Charlie Hunnam is gorgeous, the new blond macho man. Ufh, I'm afraid I want to see his King Arthur.
I did not catch Franco Ner's accent. He doesn't sound Italian,m or Spaniard, or Portuguese. Misterio. In Italian he is always dubbed by others, so his own voice we can only in Englis films.

User avatar
NABOB OF NOWHERE
Joined: Thu Sep 01, 2005 12:30 pm
Location: Brandywine River

Re: The Lost City of Z (James Gray, 2017)

#28 Post by NABOB OF NOWHERE » Thu Jul 27, 2017 5:50 am

rohmerin wrote:
Charlie Hunnam is gorgeous, the new blond macho man. Ufh, I'm afraid I want to see his King Arthur.
Is this an euphemism or Barcelona rhyming slang?

User avatar
rohmerin
Joined: Mon Aug 07, 2006 10:36 am
Location: Spain

Re: The Lost City of Z (James Gray, 2017)

#29 Post by rohmerin » Thu Jul 27, 2017 5:50 am

and yes, if you want to trip with God's drug, or even with Aguayasca, finally both arrived to Ibiza this year and they are a sensaion from 200 euros per person

https://politica.elpais.com/politica/20 ... 12847.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

User avatar
NABOB OF NOWHERE
Joined: Thu Sep 01, 2005 12:30 pm
Location: Brandywine River

Re: The Lost City of Z (James Gray, 2017)

#30 Post by NABOB OF NOWHERE » Thu Jul 27, 2017 5:53 am

rohmerin wrote:and yes, if you want to trip with God's drug, or even with Aguayasca, finally both arrived to Ibiza this year and they are a sensaion from 200 euros per person

https://politica.elpais.com/politica/20 ... 12847.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Is there a decaff option?

User avatar
rohmerin
Joined: Mon Aug 07, 2006 10:36 am
Location: Spain

Re: The Lost City of Z (James Gray, 2017)

#31 Post by rohmerin » Thu Jul 27, 2017 5:55 am

I don't know, never been into Ibiza. Probably you can find a softer version. Lol
and I don't understand about the rhym or slang. Anyway, I'm not from BCN.

Royhati
Joined: Tue Sep 05, 2017 2:07 am

Re: The Lost City of Z (James Gray, 2017)

#32 Post by Royhati » Sun Oct 08, 2017 9:48 pm

With Columbus Day being observed where I live this weekend, I decided to watch The Lost City of Z last night. It's the first of Gray's films that I have seen.

I was very impressed by his director's commentary on the DVD. He came across as exceptionally articulate in explaining what he was trying to achieve in the film and why he had made various choices in adapting the story and in filming the scenes as he had. He is clearly a very intelligent filmmaker, with a passion for the artform. In many ways, he sounded as if he could be a professional critic or scholar of film studies.

But in listening to the director's commentary, I was also struck by how often it seemed he had made or acceded to choices that made the cost of production higher than it might have been. He mentioned that they had had a boat built for them for one of the scenes (or some of the scenes), and that in doing so they strove to be as authentic as possible. Why the need for authenticity? Why not take advantage of "the magic of moviemaking"? If you've got strong actors and a capable design and production team, shouldn't they be able to convince the audience that what was artificially created for the screen is authentic--possibly saving a decent chunk of production money in the process? (Money that could then be available for promotion, if nothing else?)

Another example is how he describes that because he insisted on shooting on 35mm film rather than digitally, it was hard to find a lab to develop the reels. Since they had chosen to work with a lab in the UK (part of the filming having been done in the UK), and wanted to stick with the same lab for the whole project, they ended up having to have each days' reels of unprocessed film flown out from the middle-of-nowhere in the Colombian jungle back to the lab in the UK. Wouldn't it have made more sense to just shoot digitally in the first place? Can typical viewers tell the difference? Was the cost of processing 35mm shots from the middle of the jungle worth the expense and effort?

Perhaps I just don't understand who Gray sees as his target audience. Maybe it is a very rarefied group for whom such attention to authenticity and detail matters. (Perhaps he is one of those auteurs who is making films intending mainly to please himself.)

I noticed that none of his films seem to have been particularly profitable, at least so far as the estimated costs and box office receipts listed on imdb/wikipedia/boxofficemojo seem to suggest. Something like $30 million est. costs for The Lost City of Z, with only $17 million domestic + foreign generated at this point. (And I say that even with the acknowledgment that The Lost City of Z was partially financed, I think, by Amazon, and is now offered online as an Amazon Prime streaming option, which puts it somewhat outside of traditional measures of profitability.) I suppose those numbers could change if it gets nominated for Academy Awards ...

But that just left me wondering how he continues to be able to get financing for his films, however much they might be appreciated by film festivals' juries.
This is the economic system in a nutshell, right? Five directors make Marvel, and then there’s the rest of us who are trying to scrounge around to find the money to make films. And it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy: If the audience only gets to see Marvel, then they only want Marvel, and then if they only want Marvel, only Marvel is made. I don’t even have a problem with Marvel. The problem is not the specifics of each movie, the problem is it’s the only movie you can see now in a multiplex, and when it’s the only game in town, you’re looking at the beginning of the death throes of an art form.
http://www.vulture.com/2017/04/lost-cit ... films.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

So, to sum up, I guess I am wondering why he can't just be a little more compromising, instead of insisting on making "uncompromising movies." The holy grail is something like a Slumdog Millionaire or Trainspotting--made on relatively modest budgets yet wildly successful financially because of their nearly universal appeal to wide audiences as well as critics. Once you've made one of those, financing for future projects becomes a whole lot easier, doesn't it? Which would allow for a bit of auteurist self-indulgence.

User avatar
knives
Joined: Sat Sep 06, 2008 6:49 pm

Re: The Lost City of Z (James Gray, 2017)

#33 Post by knives » Sun Oct 08, 2017 11:08 pm

I'm not a fan of Gray, but all the same so what? If he personally likes authenticity as he defines it in the commentary and somehow got away with doing just that good for him. If he doesn't want to be Boyle that is fine as well.

User avatar
pzadvance
Joined: Mon Nov 21, 2011 7:24 pm
Location: Los Angeles, CA

Re: The Lost City of Z (James Gray, 2017)

#34 Post by pzadvance » Sun Oct 08, 2017 11:13 pm

Weird to read this considering the fatal compromise he made in casting Charlie Hunnam, who for my money completely sinks the film... can't imagine him being any director's first choice.

Royhati
Joined: Tue Sep 05, 2017 2:07 am

Re: The Lost City of Z (James Gray, 2017)

#35 Post by Royhati » Mon Oct 09, 2017 12:58 am

Hunnam wasn't his first choice. Gray originally got involved in the production when Brad Pitt, who had secured the rights to the book, approached Gray. According to Gray, Pitt was originally supposed to play the role, but he dropped out when he went to do World War Z. Then Benedict Cumberbatch was slated to play the role, but he also dropped out--his wife had gotten pregnant and he didn't want to be off in the jungle when she was due to deliver. The production company then came up with Hunnam's name, which Gray was initially against, not really knowing Hunnam's work and assuming he was an American because of his role in Sons of Anarchy. It was after he had found out that Hunnam was actually British and he had had a chance to meet him and discuss the project that he agreed to his being cast to play Fawcett. (Gray also mentioned in the DVD that his wife thought Hunnam is one of the most handsome actors ever and was thrilled to hear he was being considered.)

I thought Hunnam was fine in the role. I was able to accept him as a blank slate, since I haven't seen anything else he's been in, aside from Children of Men, and I saw that so long ago that I don't remember what he was like in it. Whether some other actor could have done a lot more with the role, I can't say, though.

addendum:
But the casting question brings us back to that issue of how much an artist director is willing to compromise. How many A-list actors would be willing to attach themselves to a project in which they would have to spend weeks without the creature comforts of civilization out in the middle of the jungle? According to an account in a Business Insider article, "Hunnam woke up late one night to find that a beetle had crawled into his ear, one of the grips was bitten by a viper, another crew member got malaria, and two people in the AD department got dengue fever." And Gray mentioned in the commentary that Hunnam lost 50 pounds during the shoot in the jungle.
http://www.businessinsider.com/the-lost ... nam-2017-4" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

User avatar
therewillbeblus
Joined: Tue Dec 22, 2015 3:40 pm

Re: The Lost City of Z (James Gray, 2017)

#36 Post by therewillbeblus » Tue Jul 28, 2020 10:01 pm

I liked this the first time, but a revisit showed some very peculiar strengths in how Gray seems to be embracing typical biopics' plot machinations and taking his own slow route through a messy narrative, with a man who is anything but glamorized, only to arrive at a product that imbues the tone of the jungle: Magical and pronounced yet dark and mysterious. There are dramatic contrivances sewing nearly all of the scenes that happen in 'civilization' (the 'apology' hearing, the contentious relationship with his son, etc.) into a clean story- but the narrative that takes place on the Amazon, or on the battlefield, are beating with authenticity. The search is so impenetrable in its roots that we realize how Hunnam's Percy Fawcett is too. We don't really know this man beyond how he's been constructed by acting against these 'civilized' scenes; yet out in the chaotic realm of mystery, he doesn't even know himself or exactly why he's drawn to this secret. The repetitive expeditions don't feel contained and confident to the words of his professed emotionally rational speech to society men. They feel ungrounded, lost, an addiction to a search for the paradox of a tangible enigma. The disorder of space reflects the confusion within the self divorced from society, from those contrivances of narrative, from a personality constructed by its responses to others in a set system of comfort. But when out in the vast spaces populated with the unknown, we get a sense at how little we know of ourselves and our world; our truths bend in favor of a more enticing meaning out of reach.

I haven't listened to Gray's commentary yet, so I have no idea how close this reading is to his intentions, but the juxtaposition is fascinating. I can't help but think of how Pitt would excel in the central role (and he just pulled off what I've now come to believe to be a phenomenal performance of internalized emotion and disorientation of the self in Ad Astra) but Hunnam is a perfect fit in his own way, since he can exhibit the thinly characterized arrogance of the 'civilized' scenes, and also bring a very flat, yet (silently) extremely attentive, attitude when in the jungle. Hunnam is walking a fine line between composed and beguiled, an entirely internalized perf with eyes that signify that he's never been more alive, but with body language and a disposition that express conflict and even hesitance in the frightening essence of venturing to find what you're unaware you're even looking for. Even his declaration of purpose to Holland near the end is a serene outlier to what he shows most of the time, and that moment of bonding occupies a place where the dramatic retelling of historical fiction meets the bizarre wonder of this nebulous territory. Of course when we find out that this scene itself could only be a hypothesis, it becomes clear that Gray could have done whatever he wanted here. That he chooses to treat it as the tall tale it is, creating a cinematic projection of two polarized ideas in both dramatic catharsis and dreamy surreal imagery to close the book and leave it open simultaneously, is as contradictory and enigmatic an approach as the film is between civilization and chaos. The film ends choosing to wrap up a story neatly in design, while recognizing that the open-ended questions still exist in our souls.

User avatar
TheKieslowskiHaze
Joined: Fri Apr 03, 2020 10:37 am

Re: The Lost City of Z (James Gray, 2017)

#37 Post by TheKieslowskiHaze » Mon Aug 03, 2020 10:03 pm

I thought this was the best movie of 2017. My attempts to convince friends and family of this have been largely unsuccessful. All admit it was good, but they think I'm overdoing it a bit.

My enthusiasm may be because I saw it a few months before my wife gave birth to our first, and my head was swimming with that cocktail of fear and love and excitement that comes with prospective fatherhood. So I was primed to get steamrolled by such a gently devastating exploration of the tension between familial selflessness and individual selfishness.

Whatever the case, when the train went by the station and the POV shot showed his family in their beds, I did one of those crumple/gasps I do when something hits me hard and I thought "holy shit, this movie is good."

Ad Astra feels like a kind of sequel, but I hate the narration.

Post Reply