A Streetcar Named Desire

Top Billed: Vivien Leigh, Marlon Brando, Kim Hunter
Release: 1951 - B&W
AFI Rank: 47


The first of several movies on the list starring the great Vivien Leigh and the great big Marlon Brando (before he ate that girl..he was gorgeous), based on the play by Tennessee Williams, was hardly what I expected. It took us two sittings, nearly a week apart, to actually view in its entirety. No fewer than three times did one of us ask "What the fuck is going on?" Realistically, this movie is extremely difficult to sit through if you're not into theatrics or blocking. It's shot as it would be seen on the stage, and in that regard, is done almost flawlessly. Unfortunately, it's the rest of the movie I have problems with. Yes, there really is a streetcar named Desire. They mention it more than once actually. The story is, as best we can tell, Blanche Duboise, having recently lost their family plantation, travels to New Orleans to stay with her sister Stella and her husband Stanley. The rest is, I guess, Blanche losing her fucking mind. Everybody is angry, everybody including the pregnant Stella smokes, violence against women is par for the course and everyone speaks so quickly that I'm fairly certain I missed at least 45 minutes trying to decipher the previous sentences. The pivotal line? You know the one. Yeah, that happens twice. And neither of them is especially melodramatic. I can't for the life of my figure out why THAT'S the scene people clung to. The whole thing is fairly forgettable. I'm sure I'm skipping a ton of valuable information here, and if we were doing a list of "100 movies that you may or may not remember later" or "100 quirky films that somehow won incredible awards" this would surely be among my highest rated. Since we're not, here's this: Watch it for yourself, or don't. If it was your type of flick or going to change your life any, you'd have seen it.
Three Things We Learned: 
1. New Orleans has ALWAYS been a disgusting city.
2. If we had a time machine to take us to the 50s, we'd also need a 50s to English phrasebook.
3. Seriously, they hit women..a lot.
Rating*:  2 1/2 stars It's dark, it's beautifully depressing and Marlon Brando isn't afraid to smack a bitch.

*The ratings system in place now is the one we'll use for the duration of the project. It's based on staying power, lines we can easily quote later, enjoyability of viewing and personal opinion. Obviously we're using stars ranging from One Star being..Showgirls, and Five Stars being..The Princess Bride.

The Beginning - Sifting Through the Lists and the Lies

A little about us: We are a fabulously wealthy and extremely good looking couple. And lucky, did I mention lucky? Or wait, no, typo. The couple (heretofore referred to as William, Will, Wi, We, I, Me, Us and occasionally, at the writer's discretion, The Damned) undertaking this utterly fascinating endeavor consists, usually, of Will and me, The Damned. I promise that's the last time I'll use that one. We're young, we're broke, and we're both very far from what we normally consider home.

A little about the project: This stemmed from, as most things do, an arbitrary line in a song by a band that'll be obsolete before I finish this blog. Yep, there they went. Regardless of musical endurance, the band reminded me that I've never actually seen A Streetcar Named Desire, as I'm not a theater geek and my only knowledge of Marlon Brando is that I'm fairly certain he ate that girl from The Craft after they finished filming The Island of Doctor Moreau. After making it halfway through Streetcar before I passed out, which was probably not the movie's fault, it occurred to me that there are tons of movies that movie nerds and old people are constantly raving about that have as of yet had the pleasure of putting me to sleep. So, the idea was born.

Now, on to current matters. Googling "100 films to see before you die" brings up about 3 million pages all claiming to have the definitive list, with the exception of snide Mr. Ebert's page, which is 102. Fuck him. I found two of the most official looking lists, one of which was, in fact, Mr. Fuck's 102. They both made me cry. While one of them had Star Wars, it lacked any mention of Streetcar and while the other contained both Streetcar and A Clockwork Orange, it only had Empire Strikes Back listed. What the hell? The one thing both have in common is an unusual hatred of Woody Allen. Discouraged by so many conflicting lists and 1001 comments at the bottom of each page screaming things like "MOAR DARK NIGHT OMGBATAMNRULES!" and "Donnie Darko changed my life." I reached out to my friends and got in return the one man whose movie knowledge and collection puts every cliched Kevin Smith character to shame: Rob. He provided me with the list we'll be using, (AFI's List) and while I can think of probably 25 movies that should go on the list as well (like Fear and Loathing, which I both fear..and loathe. I cannot fucking stand this movie, but I do believe you should see it before you die.) we'll be following them from 100-1 with the exception of Streetcar because fuck you, we already started it.

It's yet to be determined in what increments we'll be watching these, and in the name of science, something to do, and good blog writing, we're rewatching the ones we've seen, even if we hate them...and I'm breaking my own..and only..vow to myself. I'm going to watch Lord of the Rings. Yeah, I've never seen it..any of them, don't judge me, monkey.