Yeah, Tokyo Twilight really comes across like a tragic soap opera, right down to the title.  It's not a bad film at all, but if you ever wanted to see Ozu direct Douglas Sirk, this is it:  abortion!  absent parents! child abandonment!

Yeah, Tokyo Twilight really comes across like a tragic soap opera, right down to the title.  It's not a bad film at all, but if you ever wanted to see Ozu direct Douglas Sirk, this is it:  abortion!  absent parents! child abandonment!

That's true, and one of the best scenes in Floating Weeds - the confrontation in the rain on opposite sides of the street between the old actor and the mistress - is fraught with potential violence and the implicit backstory of sex.

That's true, and one of the best scenes in Floating Weeds - the confrontation in the rain on opposite sides of the street between the old actor and the mistress - is fraught with potential violence and the implicit backstory of sex.

I'm at the San Diego Wild Animal Park, but the joke still applies.

I'm at the San Diego Wild Animal Park, but the joke still applies.

Goddamn, I didn't know the Grammar Girl had a podcast.  I'm embarrassingly excited about this!

Goddamn, I didn't know the Grammar Girl had a podcast.  I'm embarrassingly excited about this!

Babe is great, but I just watched Babe: Pig in the City for the first time last week and man, what an intense, totally mad children's movie.  It's as if they were trying to make Delicatessen but, you know, for kids.

Babe is great, but I just watched Babe: Pig in the City for the first time last week and man, what an intense, totally mad children's movie.  It's as if they were trying to make Delicatessen but, you know, for kids.

I feel similarly about his character in Cabin in the Woods.  Could easily have been played as a stock, grating "stoner" character but he did fantastically funny, interesting things with it.  'Course, it helps that Whedon and Goddard were actively deconstructing those stock character types, but it still could have…

I feel similarly about his character in Cabin in the Woods.  Could easily have been played as a stock, grating "stoner" character but he did fantastically funny, interesting things with it.  'Course, it helps that Whedon and Goddard were actively deconstructing those stock character types, but it still could have…

Where's the joke?!

Where's the joke?!

Anything by Ozu.

Anything by Ozu.

@avclub-cfe912f5cb3aa572bd1c9ae2a9b82207:disqus and@avclub-54d4a7482b7342bb1abba0e55c521183:disqus : I did laugh often at Burn After Reading, but I didn't love the film, because for me it displayed the sort of misanthropic quality that the Coens' harshest critics (usually unfairly) accuse them of.

@avclub-cfe912f5cb3aa572bd1c9ae2a9b82207:disqus and@avclub-54d4a7482b7342bb1abba0e55c521183:disqus : I did laugh often at Burn After Reading, but I didn't love the film, because for me it displayed the sort of misanthropic quality that the Coens' harshest critics (usually unfairly) accuse them of.

Pretty much.  It doesn't help that it seems as though it's in the vein of Ladykillers and Intolerable Cruelty.  Not bad films - nothing by the Coens is without its pleasures - but definitely my least favorite of their work.

Pretty much.  It doesn't help that it seems as though it's in the vein of Ladykillers and Intolerable Cruelty.  Not bad films - nothing by the Coens is without its pleasures - but definitely my least favorite of their work.