Master of the House (1925)

blu cover

I wrote my review of Carl Theodore Dreyer’s Master of the House in 2014. I admitted then that I had not seen many silent films and struggled with how to watch them. I’ve seen quite a few more now, but I still struggle with them.

When the story is full of excitement and intrigue, and when the camera is used in interesting ways, I can get into a silent film. But when it is more of a family drama, and when the camera stays pretty static my mind tends to drift.

Dreyer uses his camera well, and the set design is impeccable, but I found the story rather dull and struggled to get through it. You can read my full review here.

Babette’s Feast (1987)

babettes feast

In my review of this film over at Cinema Sentries I talk about how we (used) to have a monthly film night in which we invited some friends over and watched a non-English language film. Not long after writing that review my family and I moved to another state and those foreign film nights dried up. I really miss them. We tried briefly to have a regular movie night (our new set of friends in this place most likely wouldn’t take to films, not in English, sigh) but it didn’t go so well. Then COVID hit and we pretty much never have anyone over anymore.

I think I’d like to try again sometime. Maybe we should have a Midnight Cafe movie night 🙂

Until then, you can read my review here. Babette’s Feast really is a lovely film.