What are your fav “Off Hollywood” films

Loomisjohnson

LOL.... "inglorious basterds" LOL...

Loved the story… hated the way it was showcased with it’s litany of subtitles.

If you liked those so much, check out Spike Lee’s “The Mystery of St. Anna”. It has as good a story line as the ones you mention here and plenty of subtitles to keep anyone who enjoys them quite happy. Truth be told I think it’s a better story overall than either of them.

Other pretty good movies lost something IMHO with their incessant volleys of print littering the screen underneath the emotive content.. such as “Passion Of the Christ”…. “Davinci Code”… “Apocolypto”, “The Mummy”… etc.
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it never ceases to amaze me when a film is a regional or period piece that it is still being subtitled. Especially given the intended distribution it will ultimately get if it’s good. Independent movies I can see doing such a thing.

If international distribution is the aim up front, it’s worse a thing still.

Don’t todays audiences have sufficient intelligence to figure out the guys in the German uniforms are German? That they would be speaking German ordinarily? That the fellas in the monster suits are monsters or aliens? The folks wearing fig leaves are well, probably not up on the English language?

We get it. Trust me all you film makers! We get it!

Sheeshhh! Give ‘em accents if you have to but let’s move on from on screen text… save that for commuting to and from work while we’re behind the wheel where no one gets hurt!
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It’s confounding to me.

Especially if that’s what they think then why use sub titles at all? Shouldn’t we be too dunb to read them? Oh yeah… there’s that texting thing again.

Sometimes films try to hard. Get too artsy fartsy as they attempt to envoke more ambiance into the films nature, and by doing so subtract from it’s impact, it’s flow and it’s entertainment coefficient..

BTW… I felt this way long before reading became a serious challenge for me.

If a film is intended for widespread distribution across many language barriers, and as well a major well funded project, some of the budget ought to be spent on adding those additional varied language tracks too.

All that being said… my DVD of the orig version of “Inherit The Wind” featuring Spencer Tracy, has Russian Subtitles! Front to back! Ya gotta wonder how the Russian school teacher presented this to the class. Was it a class on there is no God, or theatrical comedic pursuits, or… How about those crazy Americans!, see how they litter their judicial system with such things?

Sorry…. I’ll put the soap box away now.

bjim, intersting post. on your sayso, i'll definitely check out the spike lee--i've had mixed feelings about his films in the past--some of them were too stylized and or polemical for me, while i though his more straightforward stuff like "inside man" and "25th hour" just great.

A friend lent me his box set of SL films. Jungle Fever, Mo Betta Blues, Do the right thing, Mo money (?)

Since those films knowing only of one previously, I've been inclined to check out his film fare more avidly.

Also try Spike Lee's "She's Gotta Have It" and "School Daze"

Malcolm X, Clockers, Get On The Bus, He Got Game, Summer Of Sam, & The 25th Hour are must see's. Unfortunately, lately the only thing I hear about Spike is his courtside antics at basketball games. He seems to have lost his fire.