Another challenge. I´ll try to do a trimmed top, but I still don´t know how. This should be as troublesome as knitting.

Thursday I watched Rocco e i suoi Fratelli (1960). Interesting to compare the different the levels of "innocence" in Italian and American motion picture stories from similar periods. I was remebering Rebel without a Cause (1955) when viewing Rocco. It was also very long - 177 min - which reminded me of another James Dean movie, Giant (1956) - 201 min.

Friday I watched Irréversible (2002). Jaw dropping. This is the third French movie in a row that impresses me. After watching C´est Arrivé Près de Chez Vous (1992) and Le Fils (2002), I´m beginning to wonder how far French cinema is ahead of American in terms of innovation. On the American side, only David Lynch seems to be trying place the motion picture once again in the art category. Just like Train de Vie (1998) was everything La Vita è Bella (1997) should have been, Irréversible is the movie Memento (2000) dreamed to be. This shocking French movie is world wide known because of Bellucci´s rape scene - and this is bad. Sometimes this can even take the focus from the film itself. Monster´s Ball (2001) is well known because of the sex scene with Billy Bob Thorton and Halle Berry. That scene was completely unnecessary. You could cut that scene off and the film would still work normally. The movie has a good story, but blurred because of that specific scene. The film is then built from that scene on the minds of the audience. Fortunatelly this isn´t the case for Irréversible. It just had to be that way.