Scorsese describes pulling from how Fellini introduces the main characters in the first scene of “I vitelloni” in the director’s commentary track for “Goodfellas,” appreciating the quick and easy approach of merely establishing them one after the other right up at the top instead of pacing it out cleverly—just to get that part out of the way.
Title literally means “The bullocks” — slang for “The slackers/layabouts.”
A semi-autobiographical film.
Robert Altman’s adaptation of the broadway play by Ed Graczyk.
Sandy Dennis is great in this movie, Cher is incredible and a wonderful watch.
“David Gropman has actually created two dime stores, one a mirror-image of the other. They’re separated by a two-way mirror, so that at times we’re looking at the reflection of the “front” store, and at other times, the glass is transparent and we see the second store. Altman uses the front as the present and the…
It was hard to tell whether this film was brilliant or horrible, but it's because it brought me back to an older style of filmmaking which we’ve abandoned for safer narrative structures that I tenderly accept it as brilliant.
This was one of the most bold films I’ve seen in some time, abstaining from any gimmicks or cheap surprises and shock value which is becoming more and more commonplace. Yes: look at the film straight-on and it's too long, redundant,…
David Denby, The New Yorker: "Considered as biography, the achievement (if that's the right word) of 'Downfall' is to insist that the monster was not invariably monstrous -- that he was kind to his cook and his young female secretaries, loved his German shepherd, Blondi, and was surrounded by loyal subordinates. We get the point: Hitler was not a supernatural being; he was common clay raised to power by the desire of his followers. But is this observation a sufficient response to what Hitler actually did?
