Lol at seventh seal. :)
I was watching this Japanese film by Mizoguchi: The Life of Oharu (1952)
...which is a film having 100% on Rotten Tomatoes, one of Ebert's 'great
movies' and can be found on almost all serious best of lists. It is a
masterpiece.
Well, so far watched 1 hour and 45 minutes - and goddamn what a
pretentious bore! What makes it so 'great' must be the director and his
style: everything happens in slow motion and the shots are very long...
and it made Ebert cry because it's so melodramatic a story. And
everybody compliments its cinematography.
Obviously Ebert never saw old Finnish melodramas...
I paused the film to watch an old Finnish melodrama
Cross of Love (1946)
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0038870/reference
... and dear lord... the cinematography was thousand fold better than in
Mizoguchi's film, and the story was just as melodramatic but told in
less tedious way. The female lead was ten thousand fold more attractive.
Not sure what my point is other than that damn it's a shame most people
never heard of these old Finnish films while tedious Japanese films from
same era tend to be regarded as masterpieces of cinema.
Oh well, guess I'll finish Oharu now, so far she has tried being a
substitute mother, prostitute, wife and a nun... and I never felt
anything for the character. Still half and hour to go and notch more to
my cinephile belt I guess...