Rumble Fish (DVD) 2004

This is a extraordinary film, one that should be shown in all film making schools !!! It shows how Black & White film accentuates textures & it's very limited use of color is brilliant !!! The musical score is outstanding showcasing Stewart Copeland's genius!!! I feel Stewart Copeland could easily be placed in a list of the top 20 Drummers of all time...possibly in the top 10 !!! I would like to think that High School aged children would be able to learn from this film ...but I find that even many young adults don't seem to have the patients to enjoy cerebral films being conditioned to spoon fed entertainment with high explosives over the top special effects & very simple storylines. I see this reflected in the ratings and comments of the movie " Logan" that is filled with intense emotional action that many either can't connect with or don't care. The emotional action in " Rumble Fish" outshines its physical action which there is plenty of coming from well developed complex characters. But this only comes through to those that pay close attention to the dialogue & understand it. But then again maybe I am just to old actually remembering a time when gangs didn't use automatic guns. One thing is for sure when S.E. Hinton wrote her classic stories you get the feeling she was very close to her subject matter!!! Mickey Rourke's acting is incredibly mature in this film often stealing the scene without saying a word, just a subtle tilt of the head and a suggestion of a grin. This is one of those rare occasions when every aspect of the movie making process is at its best!!! Just writing this review makes me want to watch the film again!!!

Rumble Fish is a strange and hypnotic film that follows the character of Rusty James, a young punk growing up in a small sleepy mid-western town, shackled to a drunken father, a group of fickle friends, and continually in the shadow of his enigmatic brother, The Motorcycle Boy. The film, although seemingly set in the present day, uses the style of the old 50's melodramas to great effect, referencing the likes of Rebel Without a Cause and The Wild One with it's stark, stylised black and white photography and it's bizarre compositions, whilst director Francis Ford Coppola uses a number of audio and visual effects familiar from his previous films, most notably, The Conversation, Apocalypse Now and One From the Heart, to give the film a strange, hypnotic and dreamlike quality that lingers throughout the film.As with many of the other films that it references, the plot to Rumble Fish is quite simple, with Coppola building the film around the enigma of The Motorcycle Boy and around the ideas of family ties, small-town ennui and personal redemption. Although Rusty James is the film's central character, he is constantly overshadowed by his mysterious brother, who seems almost shell-shocked by whatever it is that he's witnessed during his years away from home. He is certainly one of the most interesting characters from any of Coppola's greater films, and is perfectly brought to life by Mickey Rourke in what is possibly his greatest performance ever (although, I think he's equally spellbinding in both Angel Heart and Year of the Dragon). Here, Rourke possess all the cool and feckless attitude of Brando and James Dean, but he also brings that damaged, somewhat alienated quality to role, which suggests so much about the characters and his past and also, about the possible future of the younger Rusty James.The cinematic style of the film is exquisite, with Coppola invoking a real period feel through the use of photography and production design, which jars beautifully against Stuart Copeland's very 80's, very anachronistic score. The percussion suits the staccato editing style that Coppola uses in the first few scenes (which highlights the escalating boredom of the characters), whilst the use of time-lapse photography (inspired by the film Koyaanisqatsi, which Coppola produced) works perfectly in demonstrating the idea of time frittering away. The black and white photography works well, conveying the literally "black and white" view point of Rusty James, whilst the titular rumble fish (glimpsed through the window of the local pet store) are the only objects in the film that appear in colour (a nice metaphor). The sound design is purposely muddy, attempting to convey along with the images that skewed, slightly alienated view of the world that these characters possess, whilst Copeland's music also merges with the sound design to heighten the overall atmosphere of the film.The acting is strong throughout, with Rourke coming across as the real standout, although the performance of Matt Dillon as the hotheaded and arrogant Rusty James is also impressive. The supporting cast features a wide array of cult performers and (then) unknowns that have now gone on to greater things, notably Dennis Hopper, Diane Lane, William Smith, Laurence Fishburne, Nicolas Cage, Tom Waits and Chris Penn. After Rumble Fish, Coppola would produce the problematic Cotton Club (possibly underrated), before cementing his reputation as something of a has-been with the third Godfather film, and throwaways like Jack, Peggy Sue Got Married and The Rainmaker. Because of this, Rumble Fish stands as something of a relic to the time when he was one of the most interesting American directors of his era... and is probably a film to rival the greatness of The Godfather, The Conversation and Apocalypse Now.

Criterion Collection, significa remasterizado de calidad, este filme que ha influenciado a muchas personas desde su estreno, es una delicia que no defrauda el verla después de tanto tiempo, sigue vigente, además de descubrir esas secuencias o escenas que otros artistas han retomado. trae además un buen documental chileno sobre el impacto de esta película en sus vidas, y en el cual hacen una pregunta que inmediatamente se hace uno mismo, con que personaje te identificas ? o hubiera gustado protagonizar. y descubres que podrías haber elegido cualquiera de ellos. y a pesar de tenerla que ver en TV, los nuevos televisores de Alta Definición, rescatan el honor, al no poderla ver en 35M en el cine. vale la pena lo excesivamente caro de este BlueRay

"RUMBLE FISH" ES UNA DE ESAS GRANDES PELICULAS DE LOS 80. DE ASPECTO VISUAL IMPECABLE, FUE LA SIGUIENTE PELICULA QUE FORD COPPOLA DIRIGIO TRAS "THE OUTSIDERS" (UNA OBRA MENOR PERO QUE TUVO UN GRAN EXITO DE PÚBLICO DEBIDO EN GRAN MEDIDA A SU DESTACADO Y JOVEN REPARTO).RODADA PRACTICAMENTE EN BLANCO Y NEGRO A EXCEPCION DE LOS PECES QUE DAN TITULO A LA PELICULA Y QUE FUERON FOTOGRFIADOS EN COLOR Y UNA SECUENCIA YA HACIA EL FINAL. CON UNA EXCELENTE BANDA SONORA DEL EX COMPONENTE DEL GRUPO "THE POLICE" STEWART COPELAND, Y UN EXTRAORDINARIO REPARTO ENCABEZADO POR MATT DILLON, DIANE LANE, Y NICOLAS CAGE, Y EN EL QUE DESTACAN ESPECIALMENTE LAS INTERPRETACIONES DE MICKEY ROURKE (EL CHICO DE LA MOTO) Y DENNIS HOPPER. LA PELICULA CUENTA ADEMAS CON UNA EXCELENTE ADAPTACION DE LA NOVELA DE LA ESCRITORA NORTEAMERICANA S. E. HINTON."RUMBLE FISH", "REBELDES" Y "STREETS OF FIRE" (1984) DE WALTER HILL, SON 3 DE ESAS PELICULAS QUE UNO DEBE VER EN SU JUVENTUD. LA ACTRIZ DIANE LANE INTERVIENE EN LAS 3 PELICULAS Y LOGRA ESTAR ESPECTACULAR EN TODAS ELLAS.

Il dvd ricevuto aveva la custodia maciullata (letteralmente) e l'audio solo in inglese, difformemente dall'Ordine.Per fortuna i sottotitoli italiani hanno consentito di gustare comunque questo stupendo film.Tra i più ispirati, a mio parere, di Francis Ford Coppola.Una visione autenticamente poetica, a cominciare dalla fotografia: un bianco e nero ispirato e un taglio fotografico di alto livello; bellissime le inquadrature grandangolari, grandi e nitidissime profondità focali, movimenti di macchina suggestivi.Poi grandi interpreti senza tempo, colti in giovane o giovanissima età - una sorta età dell'innocenza e della purezza, visti i tempi: siamo al 1982 - e in piena forma: Matt Dillon, Mickey Rourke, Nicholas Cage, Denis Hopper, Tom Waits e Diane Lane.Insomma uno di quei film che suscitano emozioni profonde.Un cinema da rimpiangere!