On this sad day (link courtesy Nick McGaw), we’ll try to fixate on “Nashville”, “M*A*S*H”, “Short Cuts” and “The Player”, while doing our best to disregard “Popeye”, my significant other’s first home video experience (presumably, Blidworth’s video shoppe was all out of “O.C. & Stiggs”).
“California Split,” c’mon! RIP.
If you get a chance to rewatch Popeye as an adult, do it, the Altman direction in a kid’s movie is positively insane. It’s like he directed an episode of HR Pufnstuf where the puppets mumble and talk over each other and you’re never quite sure what genre it’s supposed to be.
Don
Sad day for American film. Altman was the rare auteur director who was able to keep working once the Spielbergization of movies took hold. His style is so influential – see Babel and Fast Food Nation right now as examples – and he remained fresh to his last. RIP.
“California Split” was always my favorite, closely followed – up by “The Long Goodbye.”