Filmbrain's Screen Capture Quiz: Round 9, Week 12

Hands down -- no question -- last week's quiz was my personal favorite from all nine rounds. The range of answers submitted was astounding, and many of you made serious efforts to work out what it was. The single most popular guess was "something by Godard", which is understandable. Yet with all the recent love being spread through the blogosphere for Brian DePalma (in anticipation of The Black Dahlia), I sort of expected a greater showing from the film bloggers. Then again, Greetings isn't the most popular of DePalma's early films -- most people actually prefer its sequel, Hi, Mom. Seeing Greetings again after all these years convinced me what a brilliant film it is. This is DePalma in full-on Godard mode, and the film shares much of the silly male camaraderie found in Bande à Part and Masculin, Féminin. Though I've not been able to track it down on DVD in any store, Netflix has it for rent. See it -- if only to get the bad taste of The Black Dahlia out of your mouth. Well, we're at the final week of Round 9, and I'm putting this quiz together in a somewhat frazzled state after having attended eight New York Film Festival screenings in the past two days. Was Bamako the one with Michel Piccoli in a dress trying to attend a soccer match in Iran? They're all blending together. My coverage begins later this week. I didn't leave myself much time to prepare this quiz, so it's nowhere as devilishly difficult as I would have liked it to be. This week: the face is recognizable enough, but is the film? Let your sinister senses guide you to the answer. Be sure to check back next week for the list of winners! Submit your answers to this address. Good luck!

Comments

[Sal C]

I found a copy of Greetings in J&R just the other day for $6 or $7. Didn't realize it was so rare.

[Flickhead]

TOO EASY!!!!!

[James]

Easy, sure, but also too good.

[Ashley]

Shaddap, you two; he needs to throw us Filmistines a bone every now and again.

[Justin Slotman]

Amazon has Greetings for 7 bucks, by the way (though it looks bootleggish.)

[Noel Vera]

Ach, no love for the Black Dahlia either, huh? I suppose you're familiar with Matt Zoller Seitz's take on the picture

[Filmbrain]

Yes, I did see that review, which was a great read.

I'm sorry -- I just can't get past (nor forgive) the unbelievably awful performances. Has an actor ever looked more ridiculous in a fedora than Josh Hartnett? As for Scarlett, well, it's now clear that she's an actress who needs serious direction. She's been lucky in the past, but here she looked (and acted) like a deer caught in headlights.

Yet nothing came close to Hilary Swank's "performance", easily one of the worst I've ever seen in a film. Her entrance - when she walks through the door in the lesbian club - hopelessly trying to do her best Rita Hayworth - made me bust out laughing. Then it just depressed the hell out of me.

Save for a few interesting signature DePalma moments, this is just a mess.

[Eric]

I never realized how much he looks like Indiana Jones!

And to clarify my posts last week, you need to stop quoting song lyrics in your scroll over hints, first NASHVILLE and now GREETINGS. And who would have thought I would have had the theme song to GREETINGS in my head for an entire week. Though, the HI MOM! theme is way better (as is the movie).

[Eric]

And the GREETINGS DVD is not a bootleg, it's just a Pan & Scan sucker.

[DEF]

Yes! Greetings is a wonderful movie. I'll admit that I do prefer Hi, Mom! with its instransigent manipulation of form to the more playful Greetings, but both are really wonderful, bizarre movies. De Palma's inventiveness and search for a form all his own makes his pre-Sisters work especially exciting. Check out the Murder a la Mod DVD that Something Weird just put out. Not a "great" movie, but important in understanding the evolution of this great director's attention to style and cinema.

And yeah, Dahlia was a disaster. It is incredibly depressing.

[Eric]

Murder a la Mod also has a great title song! And after just watching it, there are some identical moments in Black Dahlia, including uncomfortable audition scenes where De Palma once again plays the skeezy director.

But you're right... MALM's a pretty weak movie. There was hope that WB was gonna release his Rabbit film, but that's been postponed till who knows when.

As for Dahlia, I'm clearly in the minority here... but would you guys say it's as bad as Bonfire.... or worse?

[DEF]

De Palma regular William Finely wrote the title song. He also wrote the tune for De Palma's "first" film, the fantastic Wotan's Wake (which can be seen on French DVD).

I need to see Dahlia again because there has been a lot of intelligent writing about it, though my gut tells me its a disaster. Compared to Bonfire? I LOVE Bonfire and think that the criticisms are terribly misplaced.

[Noel Vera]

I think The Black Dahlia's brilliant. More stylish than Hollywoodland, more visually exciting than LA Confidential.

[colinr0380]

Forget Bonfire, is is as bad as Mission to Mars? (!)