Screwball is all about pacing, timing, syncopation. I would have thought it impossible to make a modern screwball movie today. Its because TeeVee has scrambled the code, replacing the way we receive events. With screwball, they twist in unexpected directions, sure. But it isn't just that they go haywire, but that they do so a half beat before we expect. This hurts our viewing old classics as well, but we make allowances.
In this case, some of that is handled by the setting: between the world wars. But most of it is in the pacing.
That's not just a matter of editing. If it were, we'd have better movies. No, the thing has to be composed on the film with the components of the flow all worked out ahead of time. I suppose this is usually a matter of intuition or just application of the familiar. So when it is done in an odd form like this, it has to be deliberate.
There aren't many actors who I credit as being even a competent director. Actually, I can only think of Welles. Clooney isn't the experimenter he was, and isn't interested in manipulating the narrative or staging. But he's got this notion of playing the pulse of the thing down perfectly.
This is a wonderful picture, and ever so much more attractive if you see how his directing circumnavigates the art of acting.
This story is entirely actor-centric, and yet it still works. I really like this guy.
Part of the game is how he folds the game into the film. The pacing and directing of the game and the film of course. A double joke on playing by the rules, and an act of misdirection. This latter is particularly clever; a football play that involves a disguise and shifting sides, a pack of fake lost army buddies in costume, and a wartime event that revolves around mistaken identity.
Ted's Evaluation -- 3 of 3: Worth watching.
In this case, some of that is handled by the setting: between the world wars. But most of it is in the pacing.
That's not just a matter of editing. If it were, we'd have better movies. No, the thing has to be composed on the film with the components of the flow all worked out ahead of time. I suppose this is usually a matter of intuition or just application of the familiar. So when it is done in an odd form like this, it has to be deliberate.
There aren't many actors who I credit as being even a competent director. Actually, I can only think of Welles. Clooney isn't the experimenter he was, and isn't interested in manipulating the narrative or staging. But he's got this notion of playing the pulse of the thing down perfectly.
This is a wonderful picture, and ever so much more attractive if you see how his directing circumnavigates the art of acting.
This story is entirely actor-centric, and yet it still works. I really like this guy.
Part of the game is how he folds the game into the film. The pacing and directing of the game and the film of course. A double joke on playing by the rules, and an act of misdirection. This latter is particularly clever; a football play that involves a disguise and shifting sides, a pack of fake lost army buddies in costume, and a wartime event that revolves around mistaken identity.
Ted's Evaluation -- 3 of 3: Worth watching.