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>Should I simply go through
>alphabetically (talking about these films on my website would
>be easier alphabetically, but I realize it's less than ideal)?
I'm slow today. How would it make it easier? You mean, like, saving time and not wondering what to watch next?
>Should I do one director at a time, shoot straight through
>their films?
I used to do that, doing my own retrospective, but it's not necessary. It's kind of taxing especially if it was a director I wasn't really into.
Nowadays, I rarely dedicate my watching to just one director at a time. I'm more into variety especially mixing in old and contemporary stuff.
>Is there an order in which I
>should watch each director's films?
The only case in which it's necessary is Truffaut's Doinel films. Those you watch in order. This'll help:
http://www.imdb.com/character/ch0027246/
Other than that, no, IMHO, unless there's another series by any of the filmmakers you mentioned (e.g. loose trilogies or whatever) that's escaping my mind at the moment. You can watch the films of Bergman's trilogies in any order.
The benefit of watching their flicks in order is to see their development/trajectory for better or worse, but you can still notice that kind of stuff going non-chronologically.
A note on Godard. Just keep in mind that his work can be very different depending on which period it was made. Roughly, one can divide his stuff into pre-/post-Week End or his stuff up to and including Week End as the end of his first period. Then you got his political filmmaking and film essays. Then his stuff changed again in the 80s. I'm not up on 90s Godard. Then his 2000 and beyond work gets even more ambiguous on a denotative level.
Notes on Bergman. I'm not a fan of probably his most famous film The Seventh Seal. It's iconic, though, that's for sure. But it's not the first Bergman I'd recommend. Bergman is more than a cold intellectual. For your first Bergman, I'd recommend Smiles of a Summer Night because it's a fun film and critics cite The Marriage of Figaro and The Magic Flute as influences on the film. I read that one of the characters also hums the same melody a character in one of Mozart's operas hums or something like that.
Back to Truffaut, the 2nd Doinel film is a short "Antoine and Collette" that's part of the film "Love at Twenty." So look for "Antoine and Collette." It's on The 400 Blows disc that's part of the Criterion Doinel boxset not the stand-alone Criterion The 400 Blows disc. Don't know which one Netflix sends out and if it differs from shipping center to shipping center. Otherwise, it's also available on another Truffaut short film DVD that includes Les Mistons & Antoine and Collette. The former is one of the best narrative short films I've seen so far and the latter is great, too. Les Mistons is also available on the Criterion boxset supplement disc.
Just to throw in my suggestions:
In short, for starters, The 400 Blows, Breathless, La Dolce Vita, and Smiles of a Summer Night.
The 2nd long-winded part of my response:
major Fellini I'm a fan of: La Dolce Vita
minor (major?) Fellini I'm a fan of: I Vitelloni, La Strada, The White Sheik
a Fellini everyone should give a chance sometime: Juliet of the Spirits (a companion piece to 8 1/2)
major Bergman I'm a fan of: Scenes From a Marriage, Persona, Wild Strawberries
major Bergman I really like: Smiles of a Summer Night, Through a Glass Darkly
major Bergman everyone should try: Smiles of a Summer Night, Fanny and Alexander, Shame
If anything, the actresses in Bergman films from 61-73 could comprise a Top 5 female performances of all-time list. Bibi Andersson's monologue in Persona is one of the all-time monologues, IMHO. And Sven Nykvist is arguably the greatest cinematographer of all-time.
major Godard I'm a fan of: Breathless, My Life To Live
major Godard I like: A Woman is a Woman, Contempt
overlooked Godard I kind of like: 80s Godard for visual reasons
Don't get me wrong. I do think Godard is more than worth exploring. Lots of people love lots of his work. I personally coldly admire rather than love his work as a whole.
major Truffaut I'm a fan of: The 400 Blows, Shoot the Piano Player, Jules and Jim
other Truffaut I'm a fan of: Les Mistons, Antoine and Collette, Day For Night
other Truffaut that I like and are comparatively overlooked: Small Changes, The Wild Child
overlooked Truffaut worth watching: The Last Metro, The Green Room
>I'm wildly unfamiliar with most European directors. It's
>embarrassing, but growing up in the South, and having
>constantly been studying/reviewing contemporary American film,
>I just always have assumed I'd get around to it some other
>time.
Don't sleep on contemporary stuff. My advice: mix immediate and distant contemporary stuff in and don't just focus on Europe. But that's another post.
Have you seen In the Mood For Love and Chungking Express? If not, go watch them in that order ASAP.
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