World War III
"Epic" mini-series not so much about World War III as about the event that triggers it. The United States has enacted and encouraged other nations to enact a grain embargo against the Soviet Union, this causes wide spreed hunger and unrest in the USSR and ironically also hurts the US economy. Elements with in the Soviet government conspire to send an elite squad of commandos into Alaska and threaten to disable the famed oil pipeline and further hurt the US economy, that is unless the Americans agree to lift the embargo and encourage the other participating nations to do the same.
The Soviet Squad eventually engage in a prolonged stand off with a small group of American solders, consisting largely of an Eskimo lead unit of the Alaska National Guard and a recently transferred Colonel who is "some kind of frustrated genius or something". As an unsteady stalemate holds in Alaska U.S. president Rock Hudson (a little thought of pol who recently succeeded to the office after the death of his much admired predecessor) attempts to negotiate a settlement with the Soviet Premier (who never approved of the expedition to Alaska but is being constrained by extremist elements in his government), while also attempting to keep the whole situation secret from the American public. Needless to say despite his best efforts Hudson fails and the movie ends just moments before the third world war is about to begin.
The first half is far too slow but it becomes genuinely interesting in the second; ironically the combat sequences in Alaska are less engaging then the geopolitical maneuvering in Washington, Moscow and Iceland (where the two world leaders meet for a secret conference). Reminds me a lot of Virus in its end of the world theme and largely snow covered setting.
Fair
Hugo
The operative metaphor in this films is machines, that we are all necessary components in the big human machine with parts to play. This is perhaps a bit of a strange metaphor for a film that is largely about imagination and a sense of wonder, or in short about creativity. The consistent presence of gears, and clockwork, and even an automaton does lead one to an increased awareness of just how well constructed this film is, which shouldn't be surprising considering that Scorsese is directing. Do to its children's book origins and non violent story line your not going to see many of the standard Scorsese elements and themes in this film, save for the extraordinary love of "the movies" displayed throughout.
Though the title character of Hugo (Asa Butterfield) is a young orphan who maintains the clock works at a large Pairs train station in the late 1920's, the character who is the films true center is that of Georges Melies (Ben Kingsly, actually not slumming for once). Melies is a real figure and an exceedingly important one in early cinema. Beginning in 1896 the former stage magican produced and astounding 531 films in a seventeen year period. These short, imaginative, and technologically revolutionary films are mostly lost today, but the ones that survive amply illustrate the energy, genius and sense of fun of their maker.
As the film starts out Melies is a forgotten man, running a small mechanical toy shop in the Pairs train depot. He is constantly trying to forgot the past, bitter about the demise of his movie making career as the worlds attention turned to less fanciful things at the outbreak of the first world war. The movies central thrust at first is Hugo's efforts to repair an old automation left to him by his late father. The automaton turns out to have been originally constructed by Melies, leading Hugo and his friend Isabel (Chloe Moretz) to delve into the mystery of Melies secret past and reawaken his joy in life.
The film is supplemented by a number of secondary stores concerning people who work in the train station, including Sacha Baron Cohen as the station inspector, a veteran of the war with an artificial leg who is constantly trying to catch Hugo and is the films primary source of comic relief. Emily Mortimer, Jude Law, Christopher Lee and Michael Stuhlbarg all have supporting parts. The films man attraction to many however will be its 3D, a first for a Scorsese movie, and excellently handled; in addition to the expected swooping and roller coaster shots there is a truly unique montage of Melies silent films that is like nothing you've ever seen. Hugo is a warm, play full, and at times even enchanting film in which Scorses lets lose in a new direction and a love for the magic of movies is on full display.
Great
Another Year
I love Mike Leigh films, I love the poignancy of his human renderings. I think I can safely say that no director working today is better able to convey the true essence, the inner humanity of his characters, then is this great writer/director. The stories Leigh puts on screen are of the sort that mostly go unmade, dealing as they do with the unbeautiful people, the working men and women, poor to middle class. They don't have plots in the traditional sense where everything is leading to a tightly wrapped conclusion, but rather take us into the lives of his characters over a short period of time and show us who they really are, by going deeper, beyond the surface and beyond caricature.
The time frame for this film is of course larger then most for Leigh's work; it takes place over the course of a seemingly average year in the lives of married couple Tom (Jim Broadbent) and Gerri (Ruth Sheen, wonderful) Hepple and a small circle of their friends and family. The films presentation is in four episode, each spanning only a day or so and taking place in successive seasons. The 60ish couple both work, he as a geologist and she as councilor, they have one child, a thirty year old son named Joe (Oliver Maltman) who is a solicitor specializing in helping poor people keep their homes. Tom and Gerri ('you get used to it') are still very much in love, they enjoy spending time together tending their plot of community garden, hosting visiting friends, and being one anothers confidants.
Among their friends are Ken (Peter Wright) a chum going back to their more radical days in the 1960's (the couple is still rather liberal). Ken is divorced, he smokes, he over eats and over drinks and is incredibly lonely, he's of retirement age but won't give up his job because otherwise he wouldn't know what to do with himself. Mary (Lesley Manville, also quite good) is a receptionist at the health center where Gerri works. We're given to know that Mary had one bad marriage, and and an affair with a married man whom she considers her true love and who she hasn't seen in perhaps decades. Like Ken, Mary is also very lonely though she rejects the formers advances when they meet. Once a party girl she pines for her younger days and is deeply hurt that most men no longer find her attractive, she drinks to excess. She has so little going in her life, and accomplished so little in it, that the biggest thing in her life at the start of the film are her planes to buy a car (she hasn't driven since 1984).
Mary gets the most screen time out of the friends and she is the most interesting. Manville's performance has got to be admired, she plays such a sad, pathetic figure, and she brings out her soul, her wants, her needs, her resentments and desperation. Mary develops an unhealthy infatuation with the Hepple's grown son, and reacts in an uncomfortably competitive fashion when Joe brings a new girlfriend (Karina Fernandez) to meet his parents. Toward the end we meet Tom's brother Ronney whose wife has just died and whose lone child Carl (Martin Savage) hates him. Indeed unhappiness is rife throughout this film, but so is love and life's simple pleasures, the kaleidoscope of feelings that mark any human year, or even human day. As always with Leigh's films Another Year is a carefully observed character work which finds in the subtlety of human neediness a soul piercing sense of the profound.
Great
Thursday, December 29, 2011
Sunday, December 25, 2011
Holiday Affair (1949), It Happened on Fifth Avenue (1947), Blossoms in the Dust (1941)
Three lesser known, vaguely Christmas entries that were all surprisingly good.
Holiday Affair
Would you buy Robert Mitchum as a toy salesman? Well neither would I, but you don't have to buy him as one for long in this little Christmas romantic comedy. Produced by RKO it feels as though the studio just wanted to include their biggest star in some kind of a Christmas offering so they hit on this. Janet Leigh is a war widow with the request precious son (Gordon Gebert). Leigh has a job as a 'comparison shopper' for a department store (mom works for department store and child has no father figure, and its Christmas, cribbed from Miracle on 34th Street perhaps?), which mean she goes around and buys products and returns them (why she doesn't just 'compar the prices' instead of making awkward purchases is beyond me). Anyway she ends up costing Mitchum his job, which he wasn't too attached too anyway as he's just saving up money to go to California and build boats. He does however become interested in Leigh (and her progeny) and engages in a surprisingly civil competition with her blandish, nice guy, Ralph Bellamyesq boyfriend Wendell Corey. No surprise who gets the girl (and son) but its genuinely pretty amusing; I love Corey and Mitchums prolonged awkward idol chatter upon first meeting at Leigh's Place.
Good
It Happened on 5th Avenue
Solid, lightly screwball period comedy that would likely be better known if not for having a no name cast. There all good though, especially Victor Moore whose Aloysius T. McKeever should have been a star making turn. McKeever isahobo of sorts, he'd be homeless if not for his habit of squatting in the mansions of traveling millionaires. His winter residence for the last three Christmas's has been the 5th Avenue home of the worlds second richest man, photography averse land developer Charles Ruggles, who winters at his other home in Virginia. Ruggles 18 year old daughter Gale Storm runs away from finishing school, goes to the 5th Avenue house and encounters McKeever and a displaced returned G.I. (Don DeFore) he's taken in after Ruggles company demolished his apartment building. Storm pretends to be a poor Midwestern girl hopping that DeFore will come to love her for who she is and not for her fathers money. Gradually more and more people end up squatting Ruggles mansion, including Ruggles himself who pretends to be a penniless man named 'Mike' in order to get to know DeFore at his daughters urging (father can't say no to daughter). Soon the Ex-Mrs. Ruggles (Ann Harding) comes to stay and a rekindling of lost love seems imminent. Meanwhile DeFore and some of his war buddies attempt to purchase an abandoned military base from the government in order to build affordable housing for returning service men and there family's. Of course there's a bidding war going on between the vets and Ruggles company, only at first neither knows that the others there computation,comedy of errors. At the end there are to be two marriages resulting from the collective trespassing and McKeever heads south to summer at Ruggles Virgina Residence. As good any comedy to come out of that era, this movies a surprise treat and worthy of your two hours.
Good
Blossoms in the Dust
Bio-pic of pioneering children's rights advocate Edna Gladney is a perfect vehicle for star Greer Garson, she's a brave, noble, crusading women of dignified bearing and tender heart, in short Mrs. Miniver. Gladney's story is a surprisingly long one, Edna is born in 1880's Wisconsin to a locally prominent family, her adopted sister commits suicide after her perspective in-laws through a fit about her 'illigetimat' statues. Edna marrys and moves to Texas to be with her husband ( of course Walter Pidgeon ) who owns a granary and experiments with hybrid wheat's. They have a baby, the baby dies young and Edna's unable to have more, she grows bitter, she rediscovers purpose in running an early daycare, the granary goes bust, the couple sell most of there belongings and move to Ft. Worth where Pidgeon takes low level job and continues to experiment with wheat's in his off hours. Edna founds a progressive orphanage/child placement service, the city cuts her funding, her husband patents a successful new breed of wheat and then dies. The wheat money allows Edna to expand her adoption services, and later she takes on a Texas law that brands children of unwed partners as illigament in government documents such as wedding licences and birth certificates. I was surprised to learn as well that for some time 'illigetamit' persons could not hold civil service jobs. So yeah, Edna Gladney's a near absurdly admirable women, and that's why Greer Garon's fit to play her.
Good
Holiday Affair
Would you buy Robert Mitchum as a toy salesman? Well neither would I, but you don't have to buy him as one for long in this little Christmas romantic comedy. Produced by RKO it feels as though the studio just wanted to include their biggest star in some kind of a Christmas offering so they hit on this. Janet Leigh is a war widow with the request precious son (Gordon Gebert). Leigh has a job as a 'comparison shopper' for a department store (mom works for department store and child has no father figure, and its Christmas, cribbed from Miracle on 34th Street perhaps?), which mean she goes around and buys products and returns them (why she doesn't just 'compar the prices' instead of making awkward purchases is beyond me). Anyway she ends up costing Mitchum his job, which he wasn't too attached too anyway as he's just saving up money to go to California and build boats. He does however become interested in Leigh (and her progeny) and engages in a surprisingly civil competition with her blandish, nice guy, Ralph Bellamyesq boyfriend Wendell Corey. No surprise who gets the girl (and son) but its genuinely pretty amusing; I love Corey and Mitchums prolonged awkward idol chatter upon first meeting at Leigh's Place.
Good
It Happened on 5th Avenue
Solid, lightly screwball period comedy that would likely be better known if not for having a no name cast. There all good though, especially Victor Moore whose Aloysius T. McKeever should have been a star making turn. McKeever isahobo of sorts, he'd be homeless if not for his habit of squatting in the mansions of traveling millionaires. His winter residence for the last three Christmas's has been the 5th Avenue home of the worlds second richest man, photography averse land developer Charles Ruggles, who winters at his other home in Virginia. Ruggles 18 year old daughter Gale Storm runs away from finishing school, goes to the 5th Avenue house and encounters McKeever and a displaced returned G.I. (Don DeFore) he's taken in after Ruggles company demolished his apartment building. Storm pretends to be a poor Midwestern girl hopping that DeFore will come to love her for who she is and not for her fathers money. Gradually more and more people end up squatting Ruggles mansion, including Ruggles himself who pretends to be a penniless man named 'Mike' in order to get to know DeFore at his daughters urging (father can't say no to daughter). Soon the Ex-Mrs. Ruggles (Ann Harding) comes to stay and a rekindling of lost love seems imminent. Meanwhile DeFore and some of his war buddies attempt to purchase an abandoned military base from the government in order to build affordable housing for returning service men and there family's. Of course there's a bidding war going on between the vets and Ruggles company, only at first neither knows that the others there computation,comedy of errors. At the end there are to be two marriages resulting from the collective trespassing and McKeever heads south to summer at Ruggles Virgina Residence. As good any comedy to come out of that era, this movies a surprise treat and worthy of your two hours.
Good
Blossoms in the Dust
Bio-pic of pioneering children's rights advocate Edna Gladney is a perfect vehicle for star Greer Garson, she's a brave, noble, crusading women of dignified bearing and tender heart, in short Mrs. Miniver. Gladney's story is a surprisingly long one, Edna is born in 1880's Wisconsin to a locally prominent family, her adopted sister commits suicide after her perspective in-laws through a fit about her 'illigetimat' statues. Edna marrys and moves to Texas to be with her husband ( of course Walter Pidgeon ) who owns a granary and experiments with hybrid wheat's. They have a baby, the baby dies young and Edna's unable to have more, she grows bitter, she rediscovers purpose in running an early daycare, the granary goes bust, the couple sell most of there belongings and move to Ft. Worth where Pidgeon takes low level job and continues to experiment with wheat's in his off hours. Edna founds a progressive orphanage/child placement service, the city cuts her funding, her husband patents a successful new breed of wheat and then dies. The wheat money allows Edna to expand her adoption services, and later she takes on a Texas law that brands children of unwed partners as illigament in government documents such as wedding licences and birth certificates. I was surprised to learn as well that for some time 'illigetamit' persons could not hold civil service jobs. So yeah, Edna Gladney's a near absurdly admirable women, and that's why Greer Garon's fit to play her.
Good
Sunday, December 18, 2011
Carnival of Souls (1962), Fall from Grace (2007), The Story of Mankind (1957), The Mortal Storm (1940)
Carnival of Souls
Kind of famous in the small circle of independently produced horror film aficionados; Carnival of Souls concerns a young woman (Candace Hilligoss) who mysteriously survives a crash off a bridge in which neither her fellow passengers or the car itself is recovered. Shortly there after instead of taking time to deal with her trauma, recent music graduate Candace heads off to a small community just outside of Salt Lake City where she has landed a job as the organist for a small (what I perceive to be Episcopal) Church. Candace has visions of a mysterious man as she travels at night to her new home, and once there develops a fascination with the abandoned Saltair to which she feels strangely drawn. Between organ practices and fending off the advances of her neighbor, Candace continues to have bizarre experiences including seeing the mysterious man and periods in which she can hear no noise and is apparently invisible. This stresses Candace out. She confides in a local Doctor, visits the Saltair, wanders around downtown Salt Lake (true guerrilla film making, I doubt they had permission to film on Temple Square) and basically goes crazy. When she returns to the Saltair she finds it inhabited by a group of ghosts who look like the somnambulist from The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari. Film contains a creepy Twilight Zone type ending. Intriguing.
Verdict: Fair
Fall From Grace
Documentary about the Rev. Fred Phelps and his Westboro Baptist Church. These are the people that travel around protesting pretty much anything and claiming that all the bad stuff that happens to this country is because of societal tolerance of homosexuality. Their signs declaring 'God Hates Fags' and 'Thank God for 9/11' are infamous, as is there practice of protesting at the funeral and grave side services of fallen solders. This Kansas based congregation has only around forty members and most of them are decedent of the Rev. Phelps, who turns out is a disbared lawyer (many of the Phelps kids are lawyers, one wonders who hires them). In short the WBC hates everybody and everybody hates them, thus K. Ryan Jones is a brave man.
Jones started this project as part of his film studies courses at KU (home of the Jay Hawks). He established a working relationship with the Phelps's by striving for an intense objectivity, one which eventually produced a film that both pro- and anti- Phelps forces perceive as being fair, even supportive of their side; thus he is also good documentary film maker. There's a lot here, and even the special features are as interesting and reveling as the film its self. (Jones speaks about the awkwardness of having the Phelps's be nice to him and call him by name when he's filming their protests.) The members of the WBC seem to get off on offending people and think they are the center of the universe. The best example of the latter point is when a protesting Phelps girl asks an upset man if he thinks its a coincidence that U.S. solders are being killed by IED's given that an IED was set off on the Phelps's property in the 1990's (no one was injured). Well yes, I'm going to say that it was a coincidence. These people are morbidly fascinating though I'll give them that.
Verdict: Good
The Story of Mankind
Movie starts with two divine stars talking to each other (ala It's a Wonderful Life), followed by a celestial trail in space (ala A Matter of Life and Death) and winds up in an open ended cold war parable (ala The Butter Battle Book). Old Scratch (Vincent Price) and The Spirit of Man (Ronald Coleman) argue the nature of man in front of divine Judge Cedric Hardwicke. They are aided in making their arguments with hokey vinyets taken from (largely western) history and staring a cornucopia of (mostly B level) stars including Virgina Mayo, Peter Lorre, Dennis Hopper, Agnes Moorhead, and the Marx Brothers. Kind of reminiscent of vintage educational film.
Verdict: Fair
The Mortal Storm
Pro-Nazi Robert Young and Anti-Nazi Jimmy Stewart compete for the love of aging professor Frank "That's a Horse of Different Color" Morgan's lovely daughter Margaret Sullivan. Set in a snowy German mountain village in 1933 film does an admirable job of depicting the rise of Nazism and its effects on 'average' Germans. The Roth family is torn apart by this, Morgan's two step sons become Nazi's while his biological daughter and son do not. There is a reason for the dynamics of this particular split though the films 'afraid' to be too explicate; Morgan is never referred to as Jewish (which of course he is suppose to be) but simply as non-Aryan. Still a modestly impressive film which features a rare cross country sky chase.
Verdict: Good
Kind of famous in the small circle of independently produced horror film aficionados; Carnival of Souls concerns a young woman (Candace Hilligoss) who mysteriously survives a crash off a bridge in which neither her fellow passengers or the car itself is recovered. Shortly there after instead of taking time to deal with her trauma, recent music graduate Candace heads off to a small community just outside of Salt Lake City where she has landed a job as the organist for a small (what I perceive to be Episcopal) Church. Candace has visions of a mysterious man as she travels at night to her new home, and once there develops a fascination with the abandoned Saltair to which she feels strangely drawn. Between organ practices and fending off the advances of her neighbor, Candace continues to have bizarre experiences including seeing the mysterious man and periods in which she can hear no noise and is apparently invisible. This stresses Candace out. She confides in a local Doctor, visits the Saltair, wanders around downtown Salt Lake (true guerrilla film making, I doubt they had permission to film on Temple Square) and basically goes crazy. When she returns to the Saltair she finds it inhabited by a group of ghosts who look like the somnambulist from The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari. Film contains a creepy Twilight Zone type ending. Intriguing.
Verdict: Fair
Fall From Grace
Documentary about the Rev. Fred Phelps and his Westboro Baptist Church. These are the people that travel around protesting pretty much anything and claiming that all the bad stuff that happens to this country is because of societal tolerance of homosexuality. Their signs declaring 'God Hates Fags' and 'Thank God for 9/11' are infamous, as is there practice of protesting at the funeral and grave side services of fallen solders. This Kansas based congregation has only around forty members and most of them are decedent of the Rev. Phelps, who turns out is a disbared lawyer (many of the Phelps kids are lawyers, one wonders who hires them). In short the WBC hates everybody and everybody hates them, thus K. Ryan Jones is a brave man.
Jones started this project as part of his film studies courses at KU (home of the Jay Hawks). He established a working relationship with the Phelps's by striving for an intense objectivity, one which eventually produced a film that both pro- and anti- Phelps forces perceive as being fair, even supportive of their side; thus he is also good documentary film maker. There's a lot here, and even the special features are as interesting and reveling as the film its self. (Jones speaks about the awkwardness of having the Phelps's be nice to him and call him by name when he's filming their protests.) The members of the WBC seem to get off on offending people and think they are the center of the universe. The best example of the latter point is when a protesting Phelps girl asks an upset man if he thinks its a coincidence that U.S. solders are being killed by IED's given that an IED was set off on the Phelps's property in the 1990's (no one was injured). Well yes, I'm going to say that it was a coincidence. These people are morbidly fascinating though I'll give them that.
Verdict: Good
The Story of Mankind
Movie starts with two divine stars talking to each other (ala It's a Wonderful Life), followed by a celestial trail in space (ala A Matter of Life and Death) and winds up in an open ended cold war parable (ala The Butter Battle Book). Old Scratch (Vincent Price) and The Spirit of Man (Ronald Coleman) argue the nature of man in front of divine Judge Cedric Hardwicke. They are aided in making their arguments with hokey vinyets taken from (largely western) history and staring a cornucopia of (mostly B level) stars including Virgina Mayo, Peter Lorre, Dennis Hopper, Agnes Moorhead, and the Marx Brothers. Kind of reminiscent of vintage educational film.
Verdict: Fair
The Mortal Storm
Pro-Nazi Robert Young and Anti-Nazi Jimmy Stewart compete for the love of aging professor Frank "That's a Horse of Different Color" Morgan's lovely daughter Margaret Sullivan. Set in a snowy German mountain village in 1933 film does an admirable job of depicting the rise of Nazism and its effects on 'average' Germans. The Roth family is torn apart by this, Morgan's two step sons become Nazi's while his biological daughter and son do not. There is a reason for the dynamics of this particular split though the films 'afraid' to be too explicate; Morgan is never referred to as Jewish (which of course he is suppose to be) but simply as non-Aryan. Still a modestly impressive film which features a rare cross country sky chase.
Verdict: Good
Sunday, December 11, 2011
The Pawnbroker (1964), Jolson Sings Again (1949), The Muppets (2011), House of Saddam (2008)
The Pawnbroker
It took American film nearly 20 years to really deal with the holocaust; the anti-anti-Semitic Oscar winner A Gentleman's Agreement (1947) doesn't even mention it, while The Diary of Anne Frank (1959) is of course not about the concentration camp experience. Director Sidney Lument broke this and a couple of other boundaries with The Pawnbroker. Rod Steiger gives a ligament contender for the best film performance of all time as Sol Nazerman, a holocaust survivor with a tormented inner life who threatens to unravel as the anniversary of his wife's death approaches. Sol's wife and children died in the camps and all he has left is the oblivious suburban family of his sister-in-law, and the wife of an old friend who was killed in the camp and with whom he is having a rather grim sexual relationship. Nazerman runs a pawn shop in Harlem, bringing him in constant contact with a whole other type of human suffering, which doesn't help him any. He has become a callused human being, just trying to protect himself, but as that moral cocoon threatens to burst this tragic figure hopes for death. Riveting. An Amazing movie, a must see.
Great
Jolson Sings Again
Sequel to the Al Jolson bio-pic The Jolson Story. It picks up where the last movie left off, Jolson's composit wife has just left him as he performs in a night club, he searches for her in vain though eventually decides her leaving is for the best, thusly the film makers don't have to pay Evelyn Keyes again. Jolson enjoys a brief come back, followed by a number of years of narcissistic self amusement, followed by performing for U.S. troops in World War II, re-marriage to a much younger southern nurse (Barbara Hale, rather sexy actually), and finally a late in life re-emergence in the Zeitgeist with the success of his bio-pic The Jolson Story. The latter sequences are odd and regressive, including Al Jolson dubbing for Alan Parks dubbing for Alan Parks, also its an excuse to show clips from the first film and thereby save money. It is what it is.
Fair
The Muppets
The fact that writer/star Jason Segel is a huge and sentimental Muppet fan is on emanate display in this nostalgic tribute to the creations of Jim Henson. In fact this has got to be the best Muppet product to come out since Henson's death more then twenty years ago. The basic plot of the Muppets trying to save their old theater has been done before as part of a Christmas special, but here it is profoundly better done and aided by the insertion of a romantic sub-plot for human characters Segel and Amy Adams. This counterbalancing of Muppet wackiness with a more conventional story acts in much the same way as did the secondary plots in the later Marx Brothers movies, providing an anchor that actually makes the true stars more impressive. The film is loaded with cameos ranging from Mickey Rooney to Selena Gomez, and contains some very well done musical work. It was a treat.
Good
House of Saddam
Joint HBO/BBC miniseries production about the former Iraqi dictator and his kin shows us how they where all just one big happy family. Not so much. It reminded me a lot of the prime time soap Dallas, only with more palm trees and executions. I loved how the names of the husbands of Saddam's two daughters were Saddam and Hussein. Production keeps the right balance between indictment and objectivity as well as a surprising amount of context for the last thirty years of mid-east history (I feel like I understand the Persian Gulf War a lot better now).
Good
It took American film nearly 20 years to really deal with the holocaust; the anti-anti-Semitic Oscar winner A Gentleman's Agreement (1947) doesn't even mention it, while The Diary of Anne Frank (1959) is of course not about the concentration camp experience. Director Sidney Lument broke this and a couple of other boundaries with The Pawnbroker. Rod Steiger gives a ligament contender for the best film performance of all time as Sol Nazerman, a holocaust survivor with a tormented inner life who threatens to unravel as the anniversary of his wife's death approaches. Sol's wife and children died in the camps and all he has left is the oblivious suburban family of his sister-in-law, and the wife of an old friend who was killed in the camp and with whom he is having a rather grim sexual relationship. Nazerman runs a pawn shop in Harlem, bringing him in constant contact with a whole other type of human suffering, which doesn't help him any. He has become a callused human being, just trying to protect himself, but as that moral cocoon threatens to burst this tragic figure hopes for death. Riveting. An Amazing movie, a must see.
Great
Jolson Sings Again
Sequel to the Al Jolson bio-pic The Jolson Story. It picks up where the last movie left off, Jolson's composit wife has just left him as he performs in a night club, he searches for her in vain though eventually decides her leaving is for the best, thusly the film makers don't have to pay Evelyn Keyes again. Jolson enjoys a brief come back, followed by a number of years of narcissistic self amusement, followed by performing for U.S. troops in World War II, re-marriage to a much younger southern nurse (Barbara Hale, rather sexy actually), and finally a late in life re-emergence in the Zeitgeist with the success of his bio-pic The Jolson Story. The latter sequences are odd and regressive, including Al Jolson dubbing for Alan Parks dubbing for Alan Parks, also its an excuse to show clips from the first film and thereby save money. It is what it is.
Fair
The Muppets
The fact that writer/star Jason Segel is a huge and sentimental Muppet fan is on emanate display in this nostalgic tribute to the creations of Jim Henson. In fact this has got to be the best Muppet product to come out since Henson's death more then twenty years ago. The basic plot of the Muppets trying to save their old theater has been done before as part of a Christmas special, but here it is profoundly better done and aided by the insertion of a romantic sub-plot for human characters Segel and Amy Adams. This counterbalancing of Muppet wackiness with a more conventional story acts in much the same way as did the secondary plots in the later Marx Brothers movies, providing an anchor that actually makes the true stars more impressive. The film is loaded with cameos ranging from Mickey Rooney to Selena Gomez, and contains some very well done musical work. It was a treat.
Good
House of Saddam
Joint HBO/BBC miniseries production about the former Iraqi dictator and his kin shows us how they where all just one big happy family. Not so much. It reminded me a lot of the prime time soap Dallas, only with more palm trees and executions. I loved how the names of the husbands of Saddam's two daughters were Saddam and Hussein. Production keeps the right balance between indictment and objectivity as well as a surprising amount of context for the last thirty years of mid-east history (I feel like I understand the Persian Gulf War a lot better now).
Good
Sunday, December 4, 2011
Elvis Meets Nixon (1997)
The photograph of Elvis Presley shaking hands with Richard Nixon immediately after their first and only meeting is reputed to be the most asked for photo from the National Archives. Why this picture? What about it is so intriguing, why is it so, well, funny? The shear randomness and incongruity of it perhaps? Elvis and Nixon, they couldn't have anything in common; or could they?
This movie in opening narration by Dick Cavett points out that the two figures had oddly parallel carers, both burst on the scene from no where to spectacular success in the 1950's, fell largely from relevance through most of the 60's, had unexpected comebacks in 1968 (Nixon elected president, Elvis's career revitalizing Christmas special), and meet tragic ends of one form or another in the 70's. So how did these two come to meet? Well its a story made for a Showtime television movie
Just before Christmas 1970 a board and frustrated Elvis Presley made a 'secret trip' to Washington D.C. with an eye to being made a "Federal agent at large" for what was then called the Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs. Elvis snuck out of Graceland, and on his own without an entourage for the first time since he was 21, made his way for the nations capital. While the Nixon scenes prior to his meeting with Elvis are an uninteresting exhausted caricature, the Elvis scenes work because they are true. Elvis buying his own ticket and using a credit card for the first time, Elvis pulling a gun at an all-night donut shop, Elvis not used to being alone at night flying out to California and encountering hippies who don't recognize him.
Elvis, much like Nixon it seems was an isolated figure, living cut off from the world, largely out of sync with the popular culture. "I wonder what my fans would think if they knew I didn't even like rock-n-roll music anymore?", musses Elvis to an old associate. Later an anti-war activist tries to recruit Elvis to the cause, 'you were the first rebell' he says 'you made all this possilble'. But Elvis isn't pleased, the rebel has become a reactionary. Elvis loves America uncritically, he loves Nixon, and while constantly popping pills he wants to help fight the war on drugs. An unlikely and amusing true story.
Fair
This movie in opening narration by Dick Cavett points out that the two figures had oddly parallel carers, both burst on the scene from no where to spectacular success in the 1950's, fell largely from relevance through most of the 60's, had unexpected comebacks in 1968 (Nixon elected president, Elvis's career revitalizing Christmas special), and meet tragic ends of one form or another in the 70's. So how did these two come to meet? Well its a story made for a Showtime television movie
Just before Christmas 1970 a board and frustrated Elvis Presley made a 'secret trip' to Washington D.C. with an eye to being made a "Federal agent at large" for what was then called the Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs. Elvis snuck out of Graceland, and on his own without an entourage for the first time since he was 21, made his way for the nations capital. While the Nixon scenes prior to his meeting with Elvis are an uninteresting exhausted caricature, the Elvis scenes work because they are true. Elvis buying his own ticket and using a credit card for the first time, Elvis pulling a gun at an all-night donut shop, Elvis not used to being alone at night flying out to California and encountering hippies who don't recognize him.
Elvis, much like Nixon it seems was an isolated figure, living cut off from the world, largely out of sync with the popular culture. "I wonder what my fans would think if they knew I didn't even like rock-n-roll music anymore?", musses Elvis to an old associate. Later an anti-war activist tries to recruit Elvis to the cause, 'you were the first rebell' he says 'you made all this possilble'. But Elvis isn't pleased, the rebel has become a reactionary. Elvis loves America uncritically, he loves Nixon, and while constantly popping pills he wants to help fight the war on drugs. An unlikely and amusing true story.
Fair
Saturday, December 3, 2011
The Lady from Shanghai (1947)
In the summer of 1946 needing a last minute cash influx to pay for costumes in his stage production of Around the World in Eighty Days, Orson Wells arranged with Columbia studio head Harry Cohn to direct a film adaptation of a book he hadn't even read (If I Die Before I Wake by Sherman King) in exchange for a $50,000 advance. The film that resulted from that deal, while less ambitious then Citizen Kane, would be saturated with the Wellsion style, almost too the point of self parody. The visuals, the casting (with the notable exception of Rita Hayworth), the melancholy mood, weird characters, and winking sense of humor would all combine with an almost indecipherably complex plot and result in a film that left Cohn flummoxed and more then a little bit irritated.
Into this idiocentric project would come, by her own insistence, Rita Hayworth, Columbia's biggest star at the time. Hayworth was then in a failing marriage with Wells and insisted she be included in the film hopping that their working together would help the marriage; it didn't they were divorced the next year. Hayworth made some sacrifices for her role, she was not playing her usual care-free flirty type, but instead a sort of low key fem-fatal; and to Cohn's frustration cut her signature long red main and appeared instead as a short haired blond.
The plot of the film has Wells playing a Irish seaman (complete with accent) who saves a rich young trophy wife from a possibly staged mugging in Central Park. He takes the woman (Hayworth of course) back home where she informs him that she is about to leave with her wealthy husband on a long Yacht trip through the Panama Canal to California, and would like to offer him a job there on. Wells senses that it wouldn't be a wise idea to go and turns the offer down; the next day Hayworth's husband, a prominent lawyer (Everett Sloane) who looks like Marty Feldman and for some reason sports crutches, tracks Wells down and essentially forces him into taking the job on the condition that he will hire two of his friends as well.
The Yacht trip is awkward, Wells, Hayworth, Sloane and his smiley end-of-the-world obsessed law partner Glenn Anders, as well as a mysterious crewman who turns out to be a PI hired by Sloane (Ted de Corisa). There's tension, somethings off, they all seem to recognize it, and even though they don't address it openly, recognize that everyone else recognizes it. The plot is not clear, we know a somethings afoot, but it comes down to a question of whose plotting with who to kill whom? It is Big Sleep complicated.
Eventually they get to San Fransisco, Wells against his better judgment has fallen for Hayworth and somebodies murdered. Wells of course is the prime suspect but with a little police work I think it would be easy to see that it wasn't him, but the plot demands he stand trial so he is; to be defended of course by Sloane, who may or may not want him to go free. Orson Wells reportedly hated lawyers and he has fun poking holes in the legal balloon throughout that court sequences. Senseless squabbles between the lawyers, plainly gimmicky arguments, a largely impotent judge, and a juror who keeps sneezing. When the verdict is set to be read Wells mounts a sudden escape, scenes in a Chinese opera, and (iconicly) a house of mirrors follow, and in narration Wells admits hes acted pretty dumb.
Its a strange trip, noirish in many ways but also rather Camus. I recommend.
Great
Into this idiocentric project would come, by her own insistence, Rita Hayworth, Columbia's biggest star at the time. Hayworth was then in a failing marriage with Wells and insisted she be included in the film hopping that their working together would help the marriage; it didn't they were divorced the next year. Hayworth made some sacrifices for her role, she was not playing her usual care-free flirty type, but instead a sort of low key fem-fatal; and to Cohn's frustration cut her signature long red main and appeared instead as a short haired blond.
The plot of the film has Wells playing a Irish seaman (complete with accent) who saves a rich young trophy wife from a possibly staged mugging in Central Park. He takes the woman (Hayworth of course) back home where she informs him that she is about to leave with her wealthy husband on a long Yacht trip through the Panama Canal to California, and would like to offer him a job there on. Wells senses that it wouldn't be a wise idea to go and turns the offer down; the next day Hayworth's husband, a prominent lawyer (Everett Sloane) who looks like Marty Feldman and for some reason sports crutches, tracks Wells down and essentially forces him into taking the job on the condition that he will hire two of his friends as well.
The Yacht trip is awkward, Wells, Hayworth, Sloane and his smiley end-of-the-world obsessed law partner Glenn Anders, as well as a mysterious crewman who turns out to be a PI hired by Sloane (Ted de Corisa). There's tension, somethings off, they all seem to recognize it, and even though they don't address it openly, recognize that everyone else recognizes it. The plot is not clear, we know a somethings afoot, but it comes down to a question of whose plotting with who to kill whom? It is Big Sleep complicated.
Eventually they get to San Fransisco, Wells against his better judgment has fallen for Hayworth and somebodies murdered. Wells of course is the prime suspect but with a little police work I think it would be easy to see that it wasn't him, but the plot demands he stand trial so he is; to be defended of course by Sloane, who may or may not want him to go free. Orson Wells reportedly hated lawyers and he has fun poking holes in the legal balloon throughout that court sequences. Senseless squabbles between the lawyers, plainly gimmicky arguments, a largely impotent judge, and a juror who keeps sneezing. When the verdict is set to be read Wells mounts a sudden escape, scenes in a Chinese opera, and (iconicly) a house of mirrors follow, and in narration Wells admits hes acted pretty dumb.
Its a strange trip, noirish in many ways but also rather Camus. I recommend.
Great
Friday, December 2, 2011
Glorious 39 (2009)
In the summer of 1939 the world was posed on the brink of what would prove to be the defining turning point of the 20th century, World War II. While Japan had long held Manchuria and Korea under its control, Italy had invaded Ethiopia, and Germany had annexed Austria and parts of Czechoslovakia the previous year, what we generally think of as WWII wouldn't begin until September of 39 when German troops marched on Poland. Rushing to the aid of there Polish allies France and Britain entered the fray and in a little over two years essentially the entire planet was at war. Great Britain's role in the war is today so iconic and vaunted that it can be hard to believe that in mid 1939 the UK's entrance into the conflict was far from certain.
The First World War had been a horrible thing, traumatizing all of Europe. England had entered that war with enthusiasm largely on behalf of there allies the French. After four years of largely pointless fighting the conflict came to an end with the collapse of the Kaiser's regime; the German people were made to pay unfair reparations after the peace and thusly setting the stage for the second global conflict. Alexander Walton (Bill Nighy) fought in that war and it haunts him, now a member of Parliament Alexander wants to keep out of Europe's newly brewing conflict, and how much he wants to keep out will not be clear till later. Alexander has three children, the first an adopted daughter Anna (Romola Garai) whom he adores and is fast becoming one England's rising film actresses. Anna is in love with Lawrence (Charlie Cox) who works with her brother Ralph (Eddie Redmayne) in the intelligence service. They and others all get together for a surprise birthday party for Alexander. The elder Walton brings with him from London a mysterious associate (Jeremy Northam) who seems displeased when Anna's friend Hector, an enthusiastic young member of Parliament, repudiates Chamberlain and supports Churchill's more aggressive foreign policy in dinner conversation. A few days later Hector turns up dead of an apparent suicide, prompting Anna's suspicion and investigation into the murky goings-on that seem to surround her.
A historical thriller Glorious 39 is continuously exciting and unusually good. For those who think they've seen every variant on the World War II story in film this may prove surprising. The internal politices es of Britain at the time are central to the tale, as are allegations of an alleged conspiracy to keep England out of the conflict. While the later 'conspiracy' under Churchill to get the America's into the war receives more attention, especially on the internet, this earlier effort, no doubt in some degree real and backed by powerful people is lesser known. How organized either of these efforts wear, and the extent to which they may be characterized as sinister cables is an open question, but makes for good viewing.
One of the great things about this movie, and a perspective that we don't see that often, is its projection of the sense of fear and despair that saturated England through much of the war. People fleeing London, children relocated, houses shuttered up, martial law, and one thing I don't think I've heard about before, the mass ethunization of pets. It has a 9/11 vibe, that feeling of fearful uncertainty after a massive global change, this movie brings that home.
This movie is filled with strong performances, but they all pale in comparison to Romola Garai's glorious anchoring of the piece. Memorable as the 18 year old Briny in Atonement, Garai has a slightly different look and her shear presence on screen conveys a a strong sense of depth in her characters. She is the detective of the story, the woman on the run, a person who a strong sense of right and wrong who only wants to be believed by those she loves. Her sense of fear, feeling that she might be going slowly mad is palpable, and her courage enveloping.
This film gives you a more or less contemporary framing story that seemingly gives you a broad outline of whats going to happen, but mixes it up a little at the end, though not entirely satisfactory. Christopher Lee and Julie Christie are big names in the cast with little to do, and Hugh Bonneville steals a couple of scenes as an also ran character actor with whom actress Anna has become close. A very satisfying feature as both history, mystery, and thriller, as well as a good character peice, Glorious 39 comes highly recommended.
Great
The First World War had been a horrible thing, traumatizing all of Europe. England had entered that war with enthusiasm largely on behalf of there allies the French. After four years of largely pointless fighting the conflict came to an end with the collapse of the Kaiser's regime; the German people were made to pay unfair reparations after the peace and thusly setting the stage for the second global conflict. Alexander Walton (Bill Nighy) fought in that war and it haunts him, now a member of Parliament Alexander wants to keep out of Europe's newly brewing conflict, and how much he wants to keep out will not be clear till later. Alexander has three children, the first an adopted daughter Anna (Romola Garai) whom he adores and is fast becoming one England's rising film actresses. Anna is in love with Lawrence (Charlie Cox) who works with her brother Ralph (Eddie Redmayne) in the intelligence service. They and others all get together for a surprise birthday party for Alexander. The elder Walton brings with him from London a mysterious associate (Jeremy Northam) who seems displeased when Anna's friend Hector, an enthusiastic young member of Parliament, repudiates Chamberlain and supports Churchill's more aggressive foreign policy in dinner conversation. A few days later Hector turns up dead of an apparent suicide, prompting Anna's suspicion and investigation into the murky goings-on that seem to surround her.
A historical thriller Glorious 39 is continuously exciting and unusually good. For those who think they've seen every variant on the World War II story in film this may prove surprising. The internal politices es of Britain at the time are central to the tale, as are allegations of an alleged conspiracy to keep England out of the conflict. While the later 'conspiracy' under Churchill to get the America's into the war receives more attention, especially on the internet, this earlier effort, no doubt in some degree real and backed by powerful people is lesser known. How organized either of these efforts wear, and the extent to which they may be characterized as sinister cables is an open question, but makes for good viewing.
One of the great things about this movie, and a perspective that we don't see that often, is its projection of the sense of fear and despair that saturated England through much of the war. People fleeing London, children relocated, houses shuttered up, martial law, and one thing I don't think I've heard about before, the mass ethunization of pets. It has a 9/11 vibe, that feeling of fearful uncertainty after a massive global change, this movie brings that home.
This movie is filled with strong performances, but they all pale in comparison to Romola Garai's glorious anchoring of the piece. Memorable as the 18 year old Briny in Atonement, Garai has a slightly different look and her shear presence on screen conveys a a strong sense of depth in her characters. She is the detective of the story, the woman on the run, a person who a strong sense of right and wrong who only wants to be believed by those she loves. Her sense of fear, feeling that she might be going slowly mad is palpable, and her courage enveloping.
This film gives you a more or less contemporary framing story that seemingly gives you a broad outline of whats going to happen, but mixes it up a little at the end, though not entirely satisfactory. Christopher Lee and Julie Christie are big names in the cast with little to do, and Hugh Bonneville steals a couple of scenes as an also ran character actor with whom actress Anna has become close. A very satisfying feature as both history, mystery, and thriller, as well as a good character peice, Glorious 39 comes highly recommended.
Great
Wednesday, November 30, 2011
Due Date (2010)
Ah, it's an old chestnut the buddy road comedy, and its done well here. They don't start out as buddy's though, Robert Downey Jr. and Zack Galifianakis. It's basically Plains, Trains, and Automobiles minus the trains. Galfianakis gets Downey and himself kicked off an airplane and put on a no fly list. Downey left his wallet on the plane and is strandrad in Atlanta while his wife (Michelle Monaghan, pretty but with little to do in this one) is in L.A. due for a cisarian section in just a few days. Downey must get to her, Galifianakis has a rental car, so away they go. He's a trying one to travel with that Galifianakis, and Downey's very uptight, but thanks to a series of adventures and a little drug use Robert Jr. comes to warm to him. This movie does its genera well, there's some gross out humor but not too much, it mostly concentrates on more traditional comedy very much like PTAA. Rarely do I find a comedy that's this much of a pleasure to watch.
Good +
Good +
Monday, November 28, 2011
Requiem for a Dream (2000)
Well that was rough. I had to watch it in parts, at first because I couldn't get into it, and later because it was intense, and often off-putting. It was effective though I think, Darren Aronofsky is a director that you can't just watch placidly, you have to grapple with everything he does, he makes it that way. The plots, the themes, and the execution, he has an idiosyncratic style. I haven't seen Black Swan yet, and now I both want to more and am afraid to more. I was very impressed with The Wrestler, but didn't like The Fountain.
Requiem is only Aronofsky's second film, it is a story about addiction, an examination of it through four interleted characters. In a way its like an updated more intense and graphic version of The Days of Wine and Roses, a relationship that may have seemed promising but was doomed. Jennifer Connelly and Jared Leto do good work as the doomed couple, and Marlon Wayans is satisfactory as the best friend, but its Ellen Burston's movie.
I love Ellen Burston, she just enhances everything she's in, your drawn to her performances. She's strong even when portraying a weak character like this one, Sarah Goldfarb. Her husbands dead, her son's a trial, she lives in a small apartment on Brighton Beach, and I suspect living off some kind of welfare. She enjoys watching an infomerical over and over again. She gets a call from a casting service saying she has been selected to be on TV, presumably for a game show. She's not told when, or for what program, only that they will be contacting her. She waits, she waits, she gets a form, she fills it out and then she waits again. She's not happy about how she looks, she wants to lose weight for her television appearance, but every diet she tries she finds she can not sustain, a neighbour tells her about these wonderful little pills.
,
The repeated sequences of the drug ritual, Sarah's pill popping, the toking up or whatever it is the other characters are doing. Things spin around and around, going faster and faster. One of my main problems with the film at first, in addition to not having the most relatable characters for me, was how slow it seemed. But the pace picks up and keeps going and going, building and building. By the end were ricocheting between character and character as they repeat parallel mistakes and actions, as the spiral leads to inevitable and unpleasant conclusion, until all is lost.
So needless to say a bit of a downer. But quite something, which even though I didn't really 'like' this movie, I was impressed. Your forced to go to a place you'd rather not, to witness a train wreak, and I don't know if you could ever make a better anti-drug movie. It's something.
Great
Requiem is only Aronofsky's second film, it is a story about addiction, an examination of it through four interleted characters. In a way its like an updated more intense and graphic version of The Days of Wine and Roses, a relationship that may have seemed promising but was doomed. Jennifer Connelly and Jared Leto do good work as the doomed couple, and Marlon Wayans is satisfactory as the best friend, but its Ellen Burston's movie.
I love Ellen Burston, she just enhances everything she's in, your drawn to her performances. She's strong even when portraying a weak character like this one, Sarah Goldfarb. Her husbands dead, her son's a trial, she lives in a small apartment on Brighton Beach, and I suspect living off some kind of welfare. She enjoys watching an infomerical over and over again. She gets a call from a casting service saying she has been selected to be on TV, presumably for a game show. She's not told when, or for what program, only that they will be contacting her. She waits, she waits, she gets a form, she fills it out and then she waits again. She's not happy about how she looks, she wants to lose weight for her television appearance, but every diet she tries she finds she can not sustain, a neighbour tells her about these wonderful little pills.
,
The repeated sequences of the drug ritual, Sarah's pill popping, the toking up or whatever it is the other characters are doing. Things spin around and around, going faster and faster. One of my main problems with the film at first, in addition to not having the most relatable characters for me, was how slow it seemed. But the pace picks up and keeps going and going, building and building. By the end were ricocheting between character and character as they repeat parallel mistakes and actions, as the spiral leads to inevitable and unpleasant conclusion, until all is lost.
So needless to say a bit of a downer. But quite something, which even though I didn't really 'like' this movie, I was impressed. Your forced to go to a place you'd rather not, to witness a train wreak, and I don't know if you could ever make a better anti-drug movie. It's something.
Great
Tuesday, November 22, 2011
Smokey & the Bandit (1977), What! NO Beer? (1933)
Smokey & the Bandit, I'd never seen it. The gold standard of the 1970's trucker genera I'm glad I saw it because I suspect this will make a very good wallpaper film, one of those movies you can have on in the background and just kind of lightly pay attention too. I confess that's what I did with this film. Sally Field cute, Jackie Gleason, we'll he's what you'd want out of a Jackie Gleason character. Turns out Smokey means a cop or patrolmen, where as Bandit means Burt Reynolds. Bandit has a lot of colorful trucker friends who help Bandit keeps the Smokey's off of his tale as he runs a truck load of beer from Texas to Georgia, which for some reason is considered bootlegging and hence a major reason to avoid smokey's . Not spectacular.
Good
What! No Beer. A Buster Keaton talkie. Buster didn't do too well in the talkies, though obviously still revered as a silent genius. Busters voice sounds the way you'd expect it to given his naive stone faced persona, he's perfectly adequate as a talker. Jimmy Durante steals it though, how could he not. Buster and Jimmy made a number of these buddy comedies together, in this one they are two friends who hope to capitalize off the repel of Prohibition by fixing up an abandoned brewery. They jump the gun however and start making the beer the day after the referendums and don't wait for the official repeal. The cops come, but the pair didn't really know how to make beer and turns out there product was alcohol free. The police let them go. Jimmy finds someone who can make real beer but they tell upright Keaton that it's near-beer. Organized crime becomes interested in using them as a distributor, Keaton is smitten by a gangsters moll. Hijinks's. Roughly Three Stogies quality.
Fair
Good
What! No Beer. A Buster Keaton talkie. Buster didn't do too well in the talkies, though obviously still revered as a silent genius. Busters voice sounds the way you'd expect it to given his naive stone faced persona, he's perfectly adequate as a talker. Jimmy Durante steals it though, how could he not. Buster and Jimmy made a number of these buddy comedies together, in this one they are two friends who hope to capitalize off the repel of Prohibition by fixing up an abandoned brewery. They jump the gun however and start making the beer the day after the referendums and don't wait for the official repeal. The cops come, but the pair didn't really know how to make beer and turns out there product was alcohol free. The police let them go. Jimmy finds someone who can make real beer but they tell upright Keaton that it's near-beer. Organized crime becomes interested in using them as a distributor, Keaton is smitten by a gangsters moll. Hijinks's. Roughly Three Stogies quality.
Fair
The Brotherhood (1968)
Quite good proto-Godfather offering. Kirk Douglas helms the film and carries it, his characters interesting enough to hang with for an hour and forty minutes. Douglas's father had been a mobster and now he's one too, part of a powerful syndicate but still fostering deep sentimental ties to the old school Mafiosos who have been pushed aside. He welcomes his brother (Alex Cord) into the outfit after the young man's marriage, Douglas is a family man and loves having him around. He is also a cautious man and when his compatriots decide they want to get involved in a scheme to skim money from the federal government, Douglas decides its too risky and repeatedly vetoes the measure (the syndicate operates as a kind of council that requires unanimous consent from its leaders). Frustrated his fellow mobsters decide that if Douglas doesn't play along they will have him eliminated, they enlist his younger brother to try and talk some sense into him. Douglas won't listen, then he discovers that one of his fellow board members was responsible for the death of his beloved father, he must settle this (kill the guy) and then flee to Sicily. The syndicate later sends the brother out to off him, and the story ends in an interesting way. Good, solid, satisfying, Douglas's character a multi-fascinated one and his performance makes the film. Worthy. Directed by Martin Ritt.
Good
Nosferatu (1922)
Classic example of German expressionistic cinema. F. W. Murnau directed this lose adaptation of the Dracula story (changed so as to avoid hefty copyright fees) set in a fictional Germanic city called Wisborg in the 1830's. Gustav von Wangenheim and his young wife Greta Schroder are happy but not as well off as Gustav would like them to be. He takes a commission for his employer Alexander Granach to travel to Transylvania to sell a house in there town to the reclusive Count Orlok (Max Schreck).
Orlok is of course a vampire. Schreck is an interesting looking man, looking at an old photo of him on the internet you can see how gaunt and morose he seems, with an odd bulbous head. This serves him well as the base upon which one of the most memorable makeup jobs I've ever seen rides. He's scary, this is a scary kind of vampire, unearthly, misshapen, with long claw like hands and a face that honestly looks bat like. He will torment Gustav, he will pursue Gretas lovely neck, and Knack (Alexander Granach) will go made. Good sense of moode in this, maybe a little slow. I like how the rats who accompany Orlok in his dirt filled coffians are worked into the story, they spread plague to fair Wisborg; a little bit Camus. Not as memorable as The Cabinet of Doctor Caligari but still good.
Good
Orlok is of course a vampire. Schreck is an interesting looking man, looking at an old photo of him on the internet you can see how gaunt and morose he seems, with an odd bulbous head. This serves him well as the base upon which one of the most memorable makeup jobs I've ever seen rides. He's scary, this is a scary kind of vampire, unearthly, misshapen, with long claw like hands and a face that honestly looks bat like. He will torment Gustav, he will pursue Gretas lovely neck, and Knack (Alexander Granach) will go made. Good sense of moode in this, maybe a little slow. I like how the rats who accompany Orlok in his dirt filled coffians are worked into the story, they spread plague to fair Wisborg; a little bit Camus. Not as memorable as The Cabinet of Doctor Caligari but still good.
Good
Tuesday, November 15, 2011
Water for Elephants (2011)
Unexpectedly good.
Engaging
I didn't hate Robert Pattinson.
Reese Witherspoon in tights.
Some good supporting parts.
Depression era setting.
Standard framing story for flash back bulk of the film, but it features Hal Holbrook so that's okay.
Christoph Waltz makes this film.
You have to wait like forty minutes before you see an elephant drink water.
Grade: B+
Engaging
I didn't hate Robert Pattinson.
Reese Witherspoon in tights.
Some good supporting parts.
Depression era setting.
Standard framing story for flash back bulk of the film, but it features Hal Holbrook so that's okay.
Christoph Waltz makes this film.
You have to wait like forty minutes before you see an elephant drink water.
Grade: B+
The Protocals of the Elders of Zion (2005)
Lose form
documentary by Jewish filmmaker Marc Levin. The Protocols of the Elders
of Zion is of course a notorious piece of anti-Semitic literature, a
forgery that casts its self as the minutes of a late 19th century meeting of a
cabal of Jews bent on world domination. While the text first appeared in 1903
its still in wide circulation on the Internet and elsewhere, and despite being
debunked numerous times is still held as true by certain white supremest groups,
a distressingly large number of Muslims, conspiracy theorist and some people who
just don't know any better.
In the film Levin travels around and talks to people about the pamphlet, having interviews with white supremacist, people on the street, and a surprisingly thoughtful group of prison inmates. An interesting film, I'm glad it wasn't just about the tract itself in a narrow sense, but rather a broader portrait of the psychological and cultural worlds in which it is taken as fact.
Grade: B
In the film Levin travels around and talks to people about the pamphlet, having interviews with white supremacist, people on the street, and a surprisingly thoughtful group of prison inmates. An interesting film, I'm glad it wasn't just about the tract itself in a narrow sense, but rather a broader portrait of the psychological and cultural worlds in which it is taken as fact.
Grade: B
Wednesday, November 2, 2011
The Devil Rides Out (1968), Fail Safe (2000), The Omen (1976), Berserk! (1967)
Halloween Edition
The Devil Rides Out
Charles Ray and Christopher Lee are two World War One veterans who have agreed to keep an eye out on the son of a fallen comrade. They meet together once a year on the anniversary of the death of Simon's father but one year in the early 1930's Simon breaks the appointment. The two men journey to Simon's new home, only to find that he is already hosting a party, a meeting he says of an astronomical society he has been planing to join. Lee is suspicious, he insists on seeing the observatory that has been added to Simon's home, there he discovers space set up for a Satanic ritual. Ray and Lee knock Simon out and take him to Lee's home (all the homes in this movie seem to be mansions). Lorene Green, leader of the Satanic cult is not pleased.
Ray is unconvinced of Lee's assertions, Simon escapes and the two friends return to his home to look for clues as to his current whereabouts, theyencounter an evil spirit, Ray becomes convinced. Ray tries to seduce a young lady he saw at Simon's party in the hopes of finding his whereabouts before he can undergo his satanic initiation (which mustbe performed in conjunction with a lunar cycle that is about to end).The young women (Nike Arrighi) escapes as Ray attempts to sequester her at the home of Lee's niece (Sarah Lawson) and her husband (Paul Eddington, yeah). Ray has learned that Nike has yet to undergo the satanic initiation that would rob her of her soul and being smitten by the lass hopes to save her too.Lee and Ray meet up, they find the location where the black mass is to be celebrated, thy disrupt it and rescue Simon and Nike whom they take to the home of Lee's niece. Lorene Greens wants his two would-be acolytes back, though they have now recognized the danger to there Souls. A final confrontation is in store.
This was good, a little campy undoubtedly but enjoyable. I've never seen a film quite like it, Satanists are a surprisingly underused horror movie villain. Guilty pleasure.
Grade: B-
Fail Safe
A remake of the sold 1964 film of the same title doesn't seem necessary but the form it takes makes it worthwhile. This film, made for television and shot in black and white was mentas an homage to the classic teleplays of the early years of television. That it was a live broadcast lends it a certain extra energy and quality of immediacy. The cast is all star, Richard Dryfuss, Harvey Keitel, George Clooney, Hank Azaria and more. At first maybe a little stiff, but the strength of the story and dialogue (much lifted from the original film) careis it. Worthwhile effort, I'm glade they made this.
Grade: B
The Omen
This is a classic, semi-revered, and I'd never seen it. The story is familiar, diplomat Gregory Peck adopts a child in Italy who is destined to be the anti-Christ. Years later while Peck, his wife (Lee Remick,so beautiful) and the child Damien (Harvey Stephens) are stationed in London strange things begin to happen, the child's nanny kills herself, animals go mad in Damion's presence and Damon goes mad when he's brought to a church. Peck receives cryptic warning from Catholic Priest Patrick Troughton, and later embarks on a search for Damien's origins with freelance photographer David Warner. Surprise, there is a final confrontation.
It wasn't all that good at first, felt kind of hollow, slow and predictable, but it picked up. It's one you should see just to say you've seen it. A tad disappointing, but significant to its genera.
Grade B-
Berserk
A late career Joan Crawford slumming in horror. She's the head of a traveling circus in England, her high wire artist dies a grisly death in front of an audience, he is quickly replaced by thirty-seven year old Ty Hardin, who improbably pins for sixty-two year old Crawford. There are various circus types including dwarf (George Claydon), human skeleton Ted Lune (who would die the year after the films release), as well as Crawford's comely daughter (Judy Geeson). More members of the circus die, Scotland Yard investigates, and the murdererturns out to be somone whom it would be basically impossible for them to commit all those murders. Watchable but little more, harmed by the ending.
Grade: D+
The Devil Rides Out
Charles Ray and Christopher Lee are two World War One veterans who have agreed to keep an eye out on the son of a fallen comrade. They meet together once a year on the anniversary of the death of Simon's father but one year in the early 1930's Simon breaks the appointment. The two men journey to Simon's new home, only to find that he is already hosting a party, a meeting he says of an astronomical society he has been planing to join. Lee is suspicious, he insists on seeing the observatory that has been added to Simon's home, there he discovers space set up for a Satanic ritual. Ray and Lee knock Simon out and take him to Lee's home (all the homes in this movie seem to be mansions). Lorene Green, leader of the Satanic cult is not pleased.
Ray is unconvinced of Lee's assertions, Simon escapes and the two friends return to his home to look for clues as to his current whereabouts, theyencounter an evil spirit, Ray becomes convinced. Ray tries to seduce a young lady he saw at Simon's party in the hopes of finding his whereabouts before he can undergo his satanic initiation (which mustbe performed in conjunction with a lunar cycle that is about to end).The young women (Nike Arrighi) escapes as Ray attempts to sequester her at the home of Lee's niece (Sarah Lawson) and her husband (Paul Eddington, yeah). Ray has learned that Nike has yet to undergo the satanic initiation that would rob her of her soul and being smitten by the lass hopes to save her too.Lee and Ray meet up, they find the location where the black mass is to be celebrated, thy disrupt it and rescue Simon and Nike whom they take to the home of Lee's niece. Lorene Greens wants his two would-be acolytes back, though they have now recognized the danger to there Souls. A final confrontation is in store.
This was good, a little campy undoubtedly but enjoyable. I've never seen a film quite like it, Satanists are a surprisingly underused horror movie villain. Guilty pleasure.
Grade: B-
Fail Safe
A remake of the sold 1964 film of the same title doesn't seem necessary but the form it takes makes it worthwhile. This film, made for television and shot in black and white was mentas an homage to the classic teleplays of the early years of television. That it was a live broadcast lends it a certain extra energy and quality of immediacy. The cast is all star, Richard Dryfuss, Harvey Keitel, George Clooney, Hank Azaria and more. At first maybe a little stiff, but the strength of the story and dialogue (much lifted from the original film) careis it. Worthwhile effort, I'm glade they made this.
Grade: B
The Omen
This is a classic, semi-revered, and I'd never seen it. The story is familiar, diplomat Gregory Peck adopts a child in Italy who is destined to be the anti-Christ. Years later while Peck, his wife (Lee Remick,so beautiful) and the child Damien (Harvey Stephens) are stationed in London strange things begin to happen, the child's nanny kills herself, animals go mad in Damion's presence and Damon goes mad when he's brought to a church. Peck receives cryptic warning from Catholic Priest Patrick Troughton, and later embarks on a search for Damien's origins with freelance photographer David Warner. Surprise, there is a final confrontation.
It wasn't all that good at first, felt kind of hollow, slow and predictable, but it picked up. It's one you should see just to say you've seen it. A tad disappointing, but significant to its genera.
Grade B-
Berserk
A late career Joan Crawford slumming in horror. She's the head of a traveling circus in England, her high wire artist dies a grisly death in front of an audience, he is quickly replaced by thirty-seven year old Ty Hardin, who improbably pins for sixty-two year old Crawford. There are various circus types including dwarf (George Claydon), human skeleton Ted Lune (who would die the year after the films release), as well as Crawford's comely daughter (Judy Geeson). More members of the circus die, Scotland Yard investigates, and the murdererturns out to be somone whom it would be basically impossible for them to commit all those murders. Watchable but little more, harmed by the ending.
Grade: D+
Thursday, October 27, 2011
The Wicker Man (1973), The Wicker Man (2006)
Robin Hardy's 1973 film The Wicker Man was a deliberate and in my book very successful effort to make a new kind of horror movie. A rejection of the kind of camp horror that was being produced in mass in England at the time, The Wicker Man is creepy, but creepy in a way I've never encountered before. The wicker man (massive spoiler coming) is a reference to a giant man statue, a cage really in which ancient Celts used to sacrifice animals and even people. This titular object of horror will of course make an appearance before the end of the film, but it is the process of getting their that entrances as much (if not more so) as the main event.
Edward Woodword is Sargent Neil Howie of the West Highland Police, he travels by way of a small sea plane to the isolated island of Summerisle, home of a reclusive community known for their ability to grow fine fruit. Sargent Neil has come to the island because of a report alleging that a young girl on the island has disappeared, when he gets there he finds that the local residents claim that the girl Rowan Morrison doesn't exist. Even the woman who is suppose to be the girls mother and who supposedly sent the request for help claims there is no such person as Rowan Morrison (though her verifiable daughter says the Rowan is the name of a Hare that plays in the meadows).
Sgt. Howie must stay on the island overnight, in part because its gotten too dark to fly and in part too continue investigating the increasingly curious case. A very pious and observant Christian Sgt. Howie becomes disgusted by the behavior of the community members, bawdy songs in the pub, open sexuality including intament displays outdoors and propositioning by the innkeepers daughter (played by Swedish model Britt Ekland). Sgt. Howie quickly discovers that the islanders practice a form of paganism and have little use for Christian rigidity. Around the same time that Howie learns this he also learns that there is in fact a real Rowan Morrison, or to be precise there was, but that she died in a fire last fall (the movie is set in the last few days of April and the 1st of May 1973).
Sgt. Howie is confused by the fact that there is no death certificate for Rowan, and why the islanders at first denied her existence, he stays on to investigate. He has a meeting with Lord Summersile at his palatial manner. Lord Summersile is the of the third generation of community leaders, his grandfather having moved to the island in the 1860's to take up the breeding of special strains of fruit that he had developed. To motivate the locals grandpa Summersile reintroduced pagan practices and traditions to the island, in time they drove Christianity out and his son and grandson continued the practice, and apparently even became believers themselves.
Lord Summersile gives Sgt. Howie permission to exhume Rowans grave, when he does so he uncovers a coffin containing a dead march hare. Howie demands answers, the natives suggest he leave before there May Day celebration, he attempts to leave so as to bring back additional officers, only of course the plane won't start. Having become convinced that Rowan is alive and being held captive so as to be sacrificed on May Day to 'atone' for a poor harvest the year before, Sgt. Howie scowers the island, and attempts to infiltrate the islanders May Day celebrations in a stolen costume.
The end I'll leave out here as an incentive to view this remarkable, strange, and literate horror classic. There is certainly enough heft to the film to support a remake but the one released in 2006 leaves much to be desired. Directed by Neil LaBute and staring the perennial lead of bad movies Nicholas Cage, this version is relocated to the Pacific Northwest and contains a strong feminist slant, not out of place in a movie involving pagan religion. I must admit I was mostly with this movie, which surprised me, but I suspect I was mostly riding on the buzz of having seen the original film the night before. Not as awful as I'd suspected, somewhat flat and the ending just, I don't know lacked that oomph, wasn't realized well. Of course no remake could possibly live up to the original but I think I could have made a film better then this. Skip the limp imitation, but see the remarkable original.
1973: Grade A-
2006: Grade C-
Edward Woodword is Sargent Neil Howie of the West Highland Police, he travels by way of a small sea plane to the isolated island of Summerisle, home of a reclusive community known for their ability to grow fine fruit. Sargent Neil has come to the island because of a report alleging that a young girl on the island has disappeared, when he gets there he finds that the local residents claim that the girl Rowan Morrison doesn't exist. Even the woman who is suppose to be the girls mother and who supposedly sent the request for help claims there is no such person as Rowan Morrison (though her verifiable daughter says the Rowan is the name of a Hare that plays in the meadows).
Sgt. Howie must stay on the island overnight, in part because its gotten too dark to fly and in part too continue investigating the increasingly curious case. A very pious and observant Christian Sgt. Howie becomes disgusted by the behavior of the community members, bawdy songs in the pub, open sexuality including intament displays outdoors and propositioning by the innkeepers daughter (played by Swedish model Britt Ekland). Sgt. Howie quickly discovers that the islanders practice a form of paganism and have little use for Christian rigidity. Around the same time that Howie learns this he also learns that there is in fact a real Rowan Morrison, or to be precise there was, but that she died in a fire last fall (the movie is set in the last few days of April and the 1st of May 1973).
Sgt. Howie is confused by the fact that there is no death certificate for Rowan, and why the islanders at first denied her existence, he stays on to investigate. He has a meeting with Lord Summersile at his palatial manner. Lord Summersile is the of the third generation of community leaders, his grandfather having moved to the island in the 1860's to take up the breeding of special strains of fruit that he had developed. To motivate the locals grandpa Summersile reintroduced pagan practices and traditions to the island, in time they drove Christianity out and his son and grandson continued the practice, and apparently even became believers themselves.
Lord Summersile gives Sgt. Howie permission to exhume Rowans grave, when he does so he uncovers a coffin containing a dead march hare. Howie demands answers, the natives suggest he leave before there May Day celebration, he attempts to leave so as to bring back additional officers, only of course the plane won't start. Having become convinced that Rowan is alive and being held captive so as to be sacrificed on May Day to 'atone' for a poor harvest the year before, Sgt. Howie scowers the island, and attempts to infiltrate the islanders May Day celebrations in a stolen costume.
The end I'll leave out here as an incentive to view this remarkable, strange, and literate horror classic. There is certainly enough heft to the film to support a remake but the one released in 2006 leaves much to be desired. Directed by Neil LaBute and staring the perennial lead of bad movies Nicholas Cage, this version is relocated to the Pacific Northwest and contains a strong feminist slant, not out of place in a movie involving pagan religion. I must admit I was mostly with this movie, which surprised me, but I suspect I was mostly riding on the buzz of having seen the original film the night before. Not as awful as I'd suspected, somewhat flat and the ending just, I don't know lacked that oomph, wasn't realized well. Of course no remake could possibly live up to the original but I think I could have made a film better then this. Skip the limp imitation, but see the remarkable original.
1973: Grade A-
2006: Grade C-
Monday, October 24, 2011
Rough Cut (1980), Virus (1980), Von Ryan's Express (1965), Night of the Living Dead (1968)
Rough Cut
Having recently watched the 'Every Which Way' movies with Clint Eastwood I've come to see that a successful formula for Carter era films is a lite tongue in cheek plot which is bluffed through on the bases of how cool the star is. Burt Reynolds is cool, he's at the height of his coolness. Jewel thieves are also kind of cool, as long as there cool like Burt Reynolds. It's also cool for a jewel thief to have a beautiful love interest and be assisted by wackier cohorts like a disco singer and an ex Nazi. David Niven is also cool, the whole jewel thief thing is very Niven retro, though here he plays the long arm of the law, sort off. Reminiscent of To Catch a Thief.
Grade: B-
Virus
This was the most expensive Japaneses made movie up till its time. Disaster movie premise, a seemingly unstoppable virus destroys world civilization almost wiping out the human race. Movie is padded with appearances by the likes of Glen Ford, Robert Vaughn, Edward James Olmos and George Kennedy. This movie was a bomb, in fact its already been allowed to land in the public domain, but I kind of like things like this, even in there paint-by-numbers sensibility. Like a cheap made for TV disaster film you'd see on Sci-fi, only this is better. Guilty pleasure.
Grade: B-
Von Ryan's Express
I expected little more then a cheap Great Escape want to be, but this was good. Frank Sinatra, a River Kwai type British officer, a train (like in the movie The Train) full of POW's and a flight through Italy to Switzerland. A Vicar pretends to be a Nazi officer, an Italian sports an eye patch, a group at first divided among themselves come together, courage, sacrifice ect. Plenty of enjoyable little set pieces, pleasantly surprised by the ending.
Grade: B
Night of the Living Dead
A lot of Zombie films are made these days, and to be honest I'd rather watch most anybody elses over those made by George Ramero. He's the godfather of the genera but I just don't think he's that good, the last one of his films before this that I tried to watch I could only make through the first 20 minutes, flat, derivative, poor. But he did launch the genera, develop the standard model that is still largely followed, and Night of the Living Dead is the seed from which the whole zombieverse would grow. This movie was actually very good, I guess Romero's talents just haven't aged well. Its obviously a cheaply made movie, but it still works well, genuine suspense, tension, largely sub par acting. I can see why this film is so memorable. The photo montage and the end sequence with the Sheriffs posy invokes the civil rights era, interestingly the lead role was not specifically written for an African American.
Grade: B
Having recently watched the 'Every Which Way' movies with Clint Eastwood I've come to see that a successful formula for Carter era films is a lite tongue in cheek plot which is bluffed through on the bases of how cool the star is. Burt Reynolds is cool, he's at the height of his coolness. Jewel thieves are also kind of cool, as long as there cool like Burt Reynolds. It's also cool for a jewel thief to have a beautiful love interest and be assisted by wackier cohorts like a disco singer and an ex Nazi. David Niven is also cool, the whole jewel thief thing is very Niven retro, though here he plays the long arm of the law, sort off. Reminiscent of To Catch a Thief.
Grade: B-
Virus
This was the most expensive Japaneses made movie up till its time. Disaster movie premise, a seemingly unstoppable virus destroys world civilization almost wiping out the human race. Movie is padded with appearances by the likes of Glen Ford, Robert Vaughn, Edward James Olmos and George Kennedy. This movie was a bomb, in fact its already been allowed to land in the public domain, but I kind of like things like this, even in there paint-by-numbers sensibility. Like a cheap made for TV disaster film you'd see on Sci-fi, only this is better. Guilty pleasure.
Grade: B-
Von Ryan's Express
I expected little more then a cheap Great Escape want to be, but this was good. Frank Sinatra, a River Kwai type British officer, a train (like in the movie The Train) full of POW's and a flight through Italy to Switzerland. A Vicar pretends to be a Nazi officer, an Italian sports an eye patch, a group at first divided among themselves come together, courage, sacrifice ect. Plenty of enjoyable little set pieces, pleasantly surprised by the ending.
Grade: B
Night of the Living Dead
A lot of Zombie films are made these days, and to be honest I'd rather watch most anybody elses over those made by George Ramero. He's the godfather of the genera but I just don't think he's that good, the last one of his films before this that I tried to watch I could only make through the first 20 minutes, flat, derivative, poor. But he did launch the genera, develop the standard model that is still largely followed, and Night of the Living Dead is the seed from which the whole zombieverse would grow. This movie was actually very good, I guess Romero's talents just haven't aged well. Its obviously a cheaply made movie, but it still works well, genuine suspense, tension, largely sub par acting. I can see why this film is so memorable. The photo montage and the end sequence with the Sheriffs posy invokes the civil rights era, interestingly the lead role was not specifically written for an African American.
Grade: B
Thursday, October 20, 2011
Frozen River (2008), White Zombie (1932), No Way to Treat A Lady (1968)
Frozen River
The frozen reaches of upstate New York, a Mohawk reservation, the Canadian border, people living on the margins and just subsisting, things we're not accustomed to seeing in film. Two woman, one a mother of two whose husbands abandoned the family leaving not enough money to pay for their new trailer home, the other an American Indian widow whose young son has been taken from her by her mother-in-law, at first they have an adversarial relationship but grow to be partners in crime and friends. Strong performances anchored by one of our best under used actresses Melissa Leo. Moving and in its way inspiring.
Grade: A
White Zombie
Considered to be the first zombie movie. Rushed into production at the height of Universals early talkie horror cycle, this film uses left over sets from Frankenstein and Dracula, and of course Bela Lugosi. These are not the zombies your used to from contemporary films, they are the old Haitian voodoo school, people brought back from near death to work as mindless slave labour. Lugosi is the owner of a mill who is recruited by a neighbouring plantation owner (Robert Frazer) to help him win the girl of his dreams. At first the love struck landowner hopped to detain the girls fiance long enough to win her over, but Lugosi convinces him that he could not accomplish this and instead offers to turn her into his zombie love slave, this Lugosi does. Only having a zombie love slave ain't that fulfilling on a relationship level, Frazer asks Lugosi to bring her back to her normal self, instead he makes the remorseful lover a zombie as well. Lugosi, zombies, the girls true love (John Harron), and a Christian missionary (Joseph Cawthorn) end the film in a final confrontation. Also there's a vulture. "Do you have a light?"
Grade: C-
No Way to Treat a Lady
No relationship to the Linda Ronstadt song, this is the story of an actor with a mother complex who uses his makeup skills to disguise himself and kill a series of widowed old women. Rod Steiger is very versatile, he does a great job as the villain and his various alter-egos (though those are mainly very stereotyped performances they are still fun), he's a serial killer worthy of a Dexter antagonist. George Segal is the Jewish detective (complete with over the top nagging mother) investigating the murders and who Steiger torments by phone. Lee Remick and her beautiful blue eyes are a potential witness and love interest for Segal. A satisfying crime thriller.
Grade: B
The frozen reaches of upstate New York, a Mohawk reservation, the Canadian border, people living on the margins and just subsisting, things we're not accustomed to seeing in film. Two woman, one a mother of two whose husbands abandoned the family leaving not enough money to pay for their new trailer home, the other an American Indian widow whose young son has been taken from her by her mother-in-law, at first they have an adversarial relationship but grow to be partners in crime and friends. Strong performances anchored by one of our best under used actresses Melissa Leo. Moving and in its way inspiring.
Grade: A
White Zombie
Considered to be the first zombie movie. Rushed into production at the height of Universals early talkie horror cycle, this film uses left over sets from Frankenstein and Dracula, and of course Bela Lugosi. These are not the zombies your used to from contemporary films, they are the old Haitian voodoo school, people brought back from near death to work as mindless slave labour. Lugosi is the owner of a mill who is recruited by a neighbouring plantation owner (Robert Frazer) to help him win the girl of his dreams. At first the love struck landowner hopped to detain the girls fiance long enough to win her over, but Lugosi convinces him that he could not accomplish this and instead offers to turn her into his zombie love slave, this Lugosi does. Only having a zombie love slave ain't that fulfilling on a relationship level, Frazer asks Lugosi to bring her back to her normal self, instead he makes the remorseful lover a zombie as well. Lugosi, zombies, the girls true love (John Harron), and a Christian missionary (Joseph Cawthorn) end the film in a final confrontation. Also there's a vulture. "Do you have a light?"
Grade: C-
No Way to Treat a Lady
No relationship to the Linda Ronstadt song, this is the story of an actor with a mother complex who uses his makeup skills to disguise himself and kill a series of widowed old women. Rod Steiger is very versatile, he does a great job as the villain and his various alter-egos (though those are mainly very stereotyped performances they are still fun), he's a serial killer worthy of a Dexter antagonist. George Segal is the Jewish detective (complete with over the top nagging mother) investigating the murders and who Steiger torments by phone. Lee Remick and her beautiful blue eyes are a potential witness and love interest for Segal. A satisfying crime thriller.
Grade: B
Thursday, October 13, 2011
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (1945)
I can't believe it took me this long to see this movie, it is just great. The iconic title doesn't tell you much as to what the stories going to be about, I knew a little but I think my viewing of the film was benefited from not really knowing the direction it would take. In fact for a while I though it was going one direction, and then it became much more. A sad beautiful film. Heartbreaking, even devastating. The whole cast with maybe one or two exceptions is putting in bravo performances. Dorthy McGuire gives the kind of performance I didn't suspect she was even capable of, so many levels to it. Peggy Ann Garner is perfect as Francine. Joan Blondell always fun to have around. But it is James Dunn, today little known even by me, who steals the picture. His performance as the luckless dreamer Johnny Nolan is a marvel, one of the greatest feet of acting and pathos I've ever seen. I was surprised how current and emotionally real the film seemed, even while being so firmly rooted in the sensibilities of its time. This is not what you would traditionally think of as an Elia Kazan film, but his handling of the film in a well crafted almost studio director style works wonderfully. This is really an amazing movie, I was surprised, moved and very much pleased.
Grade: A+
Grade: A+
Two Weeks in Another Town (1962)
Vincent Minnelli is a real hit or miss director, Meet Me in Saint Louis is great, Some Came Running I hate. This is a miss though it tackles much the same subject matter as an earlier hit, The Bad and the Beautiful. This move is considered by some a kind of lose sequel to that film, I think some of the backstory is inspired by the later but the characters are not the same. I don't know why they decided not to do a direct sequel, probably because the plot here is borrowed from a book and perhaps there were copyright reasons.
Anyway this is the story of an alcoholic ex movie star (Kirk Douglas, who was also in The Bad and the Beautiful) who has been three years in rehab at a private hospital in Connecticut. Douglas is released from the hospital and then takes an offer of a small supporting part in a film being directed by his one time collaborator Edward G. Robinson. The two had had a falling out but Robinson flys him to Rome where he's shooting the picture (a historical romance). When he gets there Robinson decides Douglas is not right for the part, but that's in an effort to lure him into supervising the dubbing on the film, which is due in two weeks or Robinson loses the right of dubbing to his producer.
While there Douglas finds romance, is kind of stalked by his ex-wife, fights with Robinson and others, then Robinson has a stroke or something and Douglas takes over directing the feature. Robinson recovers, fires Douglas and takes all the credit for the film. Douglas turns back to booze, is almost in a car accident, and then unexpectedly regains his will to live and pursue his career. Douglas's strange epiphany is sudden, it doesn't fully seem to fit and feels almost like an add-on, but I suspect it was in the original script as the movie wasn't particularly well written. To quite Wikipedia:
Bosley Crowther in his New York Times review of August 18, 1962 wrote: "The whole thing is a lot of glib trade patter, ridiculous and unconvincing snarls and a weird professional clash between the actor and director that is like something out of a Hollywood cartoon."
I agree, it wasn't very good. It felt trite and a forced effort to come across as Hemingwayesque, much like Some Came Running. I'd say more but I think I've said it all.
Grade: D+
Anyway this is the story of an alcoholic ex movie star (Kirk Douglas, who was also in The Bad and the Beautiful) who has been three years in rehab at a private hospital in Connecticut. Douglas is released from the hospital and then takes an offer of a small supporting part in a film being directed by his one time collaborator Edward G. Robinson. The two had had a falling out but Robinson flys him to Rome where he's shooting the picture (a historical romance). When he gets there Robinson decides Douglas is not right for the part, but that's in an effort to lure him into supervising the dubbing on the film, which is due in two weeks or Robinson loses the right of dubbing to his producer.
While there Douglas finds romance, is kind of stalked by his ex-wife, fights with Robinson and others, then Robinson has a stroke or something and Douglas takes over directing the feature. Robinson recovers, fires Douglas and takes all the credit for the film. Douglas turns back to booze, is almost in a car accident, and then unexpectedly regains his will to live and pursue his career. Douglas's strange epiphany is sudden, it doesn't fully seem to fit and feels almost like an add-on, but I suspect it was in the original script as the movie wasn't particularly well written. To quite Wikipedia:
Bosley Crowther in his New York Times review of August 18, 1962 wrote: "The whole thing is a lot of glib trade patter, ridiculous and unconvincing snarls and a weird professional clash between the actor and director that is like something out of a Hollywood cartoon."
I agree, it wasn't very good. It felt trite and a forced effort to come across as Hemingwayesque, much like Some Came Running. I'd say more but I think I've said it all.
Grade: D+
Manhattan Melodrama (1934)
John Dillinger saw this movie in a theater immediately before he was ambushed and killed by the FBI, well at least it was a good one. Given its title one might be suspecting one of those 'White Teleophone' pictures common at the time, all plush apartments, heiresses, and tears. Manhattan Melodrama could probably be categorized as a 'crime drama' but its really a story about friendship. The structure or organizing principle of the film is one perhaps most associated with the classic Cagney/O'Brien feature Angels with Dirty Faces, two childhood friends end up on opposite sides of the track and one must ultimately sacrifice himself for the principles of the other.
In this case the two friends are Clark Gable and William Powell. When they are children (Micky Rooney plays Gable as a boy) their respective parents are killed in a tragic steam boat accident (you've got to love a film that features a river boat fire in the first five minutes). The two are briefly taken in by a nice Jewish man but he's killed in a riot and the film then becomes rather vague about how the two survived. Natural born con artist and charmer Gable goes on to become a kind of crime lord lite (he goes by Blackie), while studious Powell ends up an earnest and dedicated lawyer in the district attorneys office. Interestingly the two remain friends, Powell openly lets Gable know that if he's every arrested it will be his duty to prosecute, Gable for his part still respects, even venerates Powell envisioning a successful future political career for his friend.
Eventually Powell is elected district attorney, unable to attend Gable sends his girlfriend Myrna Loy to the celebrations, and of course love blooms. While Gable loves Loy he seems to love Powell even more and wishes the two the best as they embark on a romance that ends in marriage. As time goes by Powell is put up by his party to run for Governor, an associate in the DA's office expects to ride his coattails up the political ladder, but Powell knows him to be corrupt and even dismisses him from his current position. The bitter ex-associate threatens to defame Powell, charging that he purposely let Gable off on the murder of a bookie he is widely rumored to have killed (he is actually not prosecuted for lack of evidence). Loy tells Gable this, Gable kills the crooked former lawyer, Powell makes good on his promise to prosecute Gable if he was ever arrested, Gable's sentenced to death and Powell is elected governor.
Though he loves Gable, Powell refuses to grant him a stay of execution, feeling it would be an abuse of his power to intervene legally for the sake of a friend, as well as a betrayal of the voters who elected him on his anti-crime credentials. On the night Gable is to be executed Loy tells Powell that Gable committed the murder in order to ensure his election as governor. Loy says she'll leave Powell if he lets Gable be executed, he sticks to his principles and says he can not let Gable off. Torn Powell goes to visit Gable as he awaits execution, he moved by his friends willingness to face execution for the sake of his friend, in fact Gable is down right nonchalant about his impending execution. Powell wavers and offers to save Gables life, Gable refuses and is executed.
How Powell got elected governor I'll never know, he is simply too virtuous. Viewing his 'moment of weakness' in offering to save his friends life as making him unworthy of his high office Powell resigns the governorship (kind of a betrayal of what Gable sacrificed his life for if you think about it), he and Loy are reunited. A melodrama to be sure, and a good one. Charming and anchored by fine performances this is an engaging and likable picture, and while too unlikely a story for the real world, as cinematic morality tale it excels.
Grade: B +
In this case the two friends are Clark Gable and William Powell. When they are children (Micky Rooney plays Gable as a boy) their respective parents are killed in a tragic steam boat accident (you've got to love a film that features a river boat fire in the first five minutes). The two are briefly taken in by a nice Jewish man but he's killed in a riot and the film then becomes rather vague about how the two survived. Natural born con artist and charmer Gable goes on to become a kind of crime lord lite (he goes by Blackie), while studious Powell ends up an earnest and dedicated lawyer in the district attorneys office. Interestingly the two remain friends, Powell openly lets Gable know that if he's every arrested it will be his duty to prosecute, Gable for his part still respects, even venerates Powell envisioning a successful future political career for his friend.
Eventually Powell is elected district attorney, unable to attend Gable sends his girlfriend Myrna Loy to the celebrations, and of course love blooms. While Gable loves Loy he seems to love Powell even more and wishes the two the best as they embark on a romance that ends in marriage. As time goes by Powell is put up by his party to run for Governor, an associate in the DA's office expects to ride his coattails up the political ladder, but Powell knows him to be corrupt and even dismisses him from his current position. The bitter ex-associate threatens to defame Powell, charging that he purposely let Gable off on the murder of a bookie he is widely rumored to have killed (he is actually not prosecuted for lack of evidence). Loy tells Gable this, Gable kills the crooked former lawyer, Powell makes good on his promise to prosecute Gable if he was ever arrested, Gable's sentenced to death and Powell is elected governor.
Though he loves Gable, Powell refuses to grant him a stay of execution, feeling it would be an abuse of his power to intervene legally for the sake of a friend, as well as a betrayal of the voters who elected him on his anti-crime credentials. On the night Gable is to be executed Loy tells Powell that Gable committed the murder in order to ensure his election as governor. Loy says she'll leave Powell if he lets Gable be executed, he sticks to his principles and says he can not let Gable off. Torn Powell goes to visit Gable as he awaits execution, he moved by his friends willingness to face execution for the sake of his friend, in fact Gable is down right nonchalant about his impending execution. Powell wavers and offers to save Gables life, Gable refuses and is executed.
How Powell got elected governor I'll never know, he is simply too virtuous. Viewing his 'moment of weakness' in offering to save his friends life as making him unworthy of his high office Powell resigns the governorship (kind of a betrayal of what Gable sacrificed his life for if you think about it), he and Loy are reunited. A melodrama to be sure, and a good one. Charming and anchored by fine performances this is an engaging and likable picture, and while too unlikely a story for the real world, as cinematic morality tale it excels.
Grade: B +
Friday, October 7, 2011
Every Which Way But Lose (1978), Hard Candy (2005), Nineteen Eighty- Four (1954)
I watched this and Every Which Way You Can out of order. I don't think the formers as good as the later, this first one feels more somber, can I say that about a comedy featuring and Orangutan? The first one features most of the plot elements, characters, and structure of the second. The theme here though I think is slightly superior. I love the comic sensibilities of these films.
Grade: B-
Hard Candy is something. An independent film, few sets, a small group of then mostly upcoming actors and a controversial and creepy story line. Ellen Page may appear at first to be a naive 14 year old girl who meets a much older man (Patrick Wilson) on the Internet and is destined to be his sexual victim. But she is more then Wilson takes her for, a former abuse victim, whip smart, viscous, determined and out for revenge; she also spouts beyond her years, witty per-Juno dialogue. She not Wilson has actually done the luring. Once at his bungalow she drugs him, ties him up, emotionally destroys him and then castrates him. Fascinating, dark and just damn good. It goes without saying this is not for every one, but for those it is Grade A.
An British television adaptation of George Orwell's iconic book, Nineteen Eighty-Four is one of the best of the black and white era teleplays. Good cast, Peter Cushing as Winston, Donald Pleasence as Sim. Despite flimsy sets and slow parts, especially near the beginning, this is a perfectly decent adaption, and I would suspect strikingly good television for the era in which it was produced. It's neat to have seen this story made in a context of roughly the same time in which the book was first published ( a mear five years later).
Grade: B-
Grade: B-
Hard Candy is something. An independent film, few sets, a small group of then mostly upcoming actors and a controversial and creepy story line. Ellen Page may appear at first to be a naive 14 year old girl who meets a much older man (Patrick Wilson) on the Internet and is destined to be his sexual victim. But she is more then Wilson takes her for, a former abuse victim, whip smart, viscous, determined and out for revenge; she also spouts beyond her years, witty per-Juno dialogue. She not Wilson has actually done the luring. Once at his bungalow she drugs him, ties him up, emotionally destroys him and then castrates him. Fascinating, dark and just damn good. It goes without saying this is not for every one, but for those it is Grade A.
An British television adaptation of George Orwell's iconic book, Nineteen Eighty-Four is one of the best of the black and white era teleplays. Good cast, Peter Cushing as Winston, Donald Pleasence as Sim. Despite flimsy sets and slow parts, especially near the beginning, this is a perfectly decent adaption, and I would suspect strikingly good television for the era in which it was produced. It's neat to have seen this story made in a context of roughly the same time in which the book was first published ( a mear five years later).
Grade: B-
Saturday, October 1, 2011
Take Her She's Mine (1963), Hitchcocks Holocaust Documentary (1945)
Take Her She's Mine
Comedy about a father (Jimmy Stewart) trying to protect his daughter's (Sandra Dee) virtue as she enters college. Reminiscent in tone and style of another Jimmy Stewart film' Mr. Hobbs Takes a Vacation', which came out the previous year. Entertaining enough comedy of errors, a family film but with a touch of the sex comedy about it, but those early 60's sex comedies where nothing compared to the raunch fests of today. Movie has a recurring gag of people mistaking Stewart's character for the actor James Stewart. Neat to see what constituted 'rebillion' in the post beatnik per-hippie window.
Grade: B-
Alfred Hitchcock the Holocaust Documentary
Uncompleted British documentary on holocaust atrocities directed in part by Alfred Hitchcock. The film is missing the final real and has segments where the audio's missing but still an interesting work, its pretty direct and calls out the whole German people for letter this inhumanity happen.
Grade: B
Comedy about a father (Jimmy Stewart) trying to protect his daughter's (Sandra Dee) virtue as she enters college. Reminiscent in tone and style of another Jimmy Stewart film' Mr. Hobbs Takes a Vacation', which came out the previous year. Entertaining enough comedy of errors, a family film but with a touch of the sex comedy about it, but those early 60's sex comedies where nothing compared to the raunch fests of today. Movie has a recurring gag of people mistaking Stewart's character for the actor James Stewart. Neat to see what constituted 'rebillion' in the post beatnik per-hippie window.
Grade: B-
Alfred Hitchcock the Holocaust Documentary
Uncompleted British documentary on holocaust atrocities directed in part by Alfred Hitchcock. The film is missing the final real and has segments where the audio's missing but still an interesting work, its pretty direct and calls out the whole German people for letter this inhumanity happen.
Grade: B
Wednesday, September 28, 2011
Dark Passage (1947)
The structure is interesting even experimental but the plot is classic noir. Bogart and Bacall, a love born of difficult circumstances. The first 20 minutes or more of the movie is first person, you are the camera, your seeing things from the leads point of view. Bogart just escaped from prison (where he was serving time for a murder he didn't commit), only he's not Bogart yet, that's why no face. A creepy plastic surgeon gives him a new face, but he still must deal with suspicious cops, a small time crook who wants to blackmail him, and the person who really murdered his wife. Everything you could want from this kind of picture really, and in unusual packaging.
Grade: B
Grade: B
Capitilism: A Love Story (2009)
I think Micheal Moore is largely right; capitalism is an often cruel inherently selfish system, the problem being that none of the proposed alternative systems have really worked either. It's good to point out the problems however and Moore does a good job of this. It's right up his ally, essentially a compilation of everything he's done into one movie. He trys to confront business men, he feels sorry for poor people, he uses clips from old educational film, he gives you a sort of one sided history of his chosen subject matter. But too me he didn't come of as craven as he sometimes does. Certainly this is a critique of the statues quo that many people would benefit from hearing.
Grade: B
Grade: B
Tangled (2010)
It feels like it was complied from elements of old Disney films, as well as from Shrek. A kind of paint by numbers Disney film taking no risks and offering no surprises, and yet I quite liked it. Mandy Moore and Zachery Levi are perfectly cast as the lead voices, and the songs good if not great, some sounding a little over broadwayesique, as if Disney already has plans for this on the Great White Way. Possessing of the old school Disney feel, as well as a little of that winking knowing quality one found in Enchanted. A minor success.
Grade: B
Grade: B
Friday, September 23, 2011
Any Which Way You Can (1980), 127 Hours (2010), Top Hat (1935)
Any Which Way You Can
Clint Eastwood, an organatange, an aspiring country singer, a neo-nazi biker gang, a bunch of millionaries, crooked fight promoters, fustrated cops, scared tourists, and for good measure Ruth Gordon. Somehow this whole thing works, a surprisngly enjoyable comedy. Wait a second, this was a sequel?! Netfilx que.
Grade: B
127 Hours
Danny Boyle tells the true story of Aron Ralston, an avid mountain climber who had to cut his own right arm off after being wedged in a mountain crevasse for 127 hours. James Franco gives an excellent performance as Ralston and proves that he is one of those actors capable of holding the screen pretty well by themselves. I liked Boyle's cinematic sense for this film, though at first I wasn't quite sure where he was going with it. Combining music with Ralstons memories and hallucinations the film is able to present a character study in a rather unconventional way, and on two fronts really. I hesitate to use the phrase, but rock solid.
Grade: B+
Top Hat
The most iconic of the Astair/Rodgers musicals, clips of this film are seen in such later works as The Purple Rose of Cairo and The Green Mile. The plot, not important (can you say mistaken identity), its all about the Irvin Berlin musical numbers, the stars chemistry, and the lite comedy provided by such character actors as Edward Everett Horton and Eric Blore. Beautiful art deco sets.
Grade: B
Clint Eastwood, an organatange, an aspiring country singer, a neo-nazi biker gang, a bunch of millionaries, crooked fight promoters, fustrated cops, scared tourists, and for good measure Ruth Gordon. Somehow this whole thing works, a surprisngly enjoyable comedy. Wait a second, this was a sequel?! Netfilx que.
Grade: B
127 Hours
Danny Boyle tells the true story of Aron Ralston, an avid mountain climber who had to cut his own right arm off after being wedged in a mountain crevasse for 127 hours. James Franco gives an excellent performance as Ralston and proves that he is one of those actors capable of holding the screen pretty well by themselves. I liked Boyle's cinematic sense for this film, though at first I wasn't quite sure where he was going with it. Combining music with Ralstons memories and hallucinations the film is able to present a character study in a rather unconventional way, and on two fronts really. I hesitate to use the phrase, but rock solid.
Grade: B+
Top Hat
The most iconic of the Astair/Rodgers musicals, clips of this film are seen in such later works as The Purple Rose of Cairo and The Green Mile. The plot, not important (can you say mistaken identity), its all about the Irvin Berlin musical numbers, the stars chemistry, and the lite comedy provided by such character actors as Edward Everett Horton and Eric Blore. Beautiful art deco sets.
Grade: B
Wednesday, September 21, 2011
The Tillman Story (2010), Metropolis Refound (2010), The End of Suburbia (2004), Red Belt (2008)
The Tillman Story
Pat Tillman, a safety for the Arizona Cardinals famously left a multi-million dollar football deal to join the U.S. army in the aftermath of 9/11. Tillman served in both Iraq and Afghanistan, and it was while stationed in the latter country that he was killed in 2004. Originally reported to have died in combat it later came out that Corporal Tillman was killed by friendly fire and that this fact had been covered up. This documentary covers the efforts of Tillman's friends and family to bring the truth about his death to light.
Some have argued that this film is too political, but I'm not sure how it could not be. The nature of the cover up and the use of Tillman's image as a symbol and recruiting tool to be exploited by people Tillman apparently didn't much like, well...
Grade: B+
Metropolis Refound
Story of how the only known copy of the complete version of Fritz Lang's 1927 silent German epic Metropolis was discovered in film archives in Argentina. Okay that's neat that they found the complete film, but we don't need a documentary about this. Even at 45 minutes this is too long.
Grade: D
The End of Suburbia (2004)
Works as a kind of companion piece to the superior Collapse. The idea of suburban living, now so entrenched in the American ethos is an unsustainable one. An inefficient use of space with neither the virtues of city or country living, the suburbs are too spread out and too removed from food production. In the aftermath of peak oil production the viability of the suburbs will plummet, and they may well become the slums of the future. A bleak outlook, but backed up by some knowledgeable sounding experts, and also by the fairly obvious fact that oil is not an unlimited resource. The film is low budget (also Canadian) and hurt a little bit by the fact that host/producer Barrie Zwicker is not a natural in front of the camera and that he is best known for his work involving 9/11 conspiracy theories. Most of the films Eisenhower era suburban footage is taken from the same Redbook Magazine promotional film.
Grade: C+
Red Belt (2008)
This really surprised me, but I should have known better its Mammet. Chiwetel Ejiofor is a former solder who now runs a Jiu-Jitsu studio and tries to live his life under a very strict code of ethics. After an accidental shooting at his studio and saving an over the hill action star from a fight at a club Chiwetel is caught up in a number of situations involving the movie star and his producer, his two brothers-in-law, a cop, a loan shark, a fight promoter, a women lawyer and rape victim, and a rigged tournament. It doesn't really sound all that good but it is, surprisingly subtle in that Mammet way. One of the most powerful closing scenes I have witnessed in some time.
Grade: A-
Pat Tillman, a safety for the Arizona Cardinals famously left a multi-million dollar football deal to join the U.S. army in the aftermath of 9/11. Tillman served in both Iraq and Afghanistan, and it was while stationed in the latter country that he was killed in 2004. Originally reported to have died in combat it later came out that Corporal Tillman was killed by friendly fire and that this fact had been covered up. This documentary covers the efforts of Tillman's friends and family to bring the truth about his death to light.
Some have argued that this film is too political, but I'm not sure how it could not be. The nature of the cover up and the use of Tillman's image as a symbol and recruiting tool to be exploited by people Tillman apparently didn't much like, well...
Grade: B+
Metropolis Refound
Story of how the only known copy of the complete version of Fritz Lang's 1927 silent German epic Metropolis was discovered in film archives in Argentina. Okay that's neat that they found the complete film, but we don't need a documentary about this. Even at 45 minutes this is too long.
Grade: D
The End of Suburbia (2004)
Works as a kind of companion piece to the superior Collapse. The idea of suburban living, now so entrenched in the American ethos is an unsustainable one. An inefficient use of space with neither the virtues of city or country living, the suburbs are too spread out and too removed from food production. In the aftermath of peak oil production the viability of the suburbs will plummet, and they may well become the slums of the future. A bleak outlook, but backed up by some knowledgeable sounding experts, and also by the fairly obvious fact that oil is not an unlimited resource. The film is low budget (also Canadian) and hurt a little bit by the fact that host/producer Barrie Zwicker is not a natural in front of the camera and that he is best known for his work involving 9/11 conspiracy theories. Most of the films Eisenhower era suburban footage is taken from the same Redbook Magazine promotional film.
Grade: C+
Red Belt (2008)
This really surprised me, but I should have known better its Mammet. Chiwetel Ejiofor is a former solder who now runs a Jiu-Jitsu studio and tries to live his life under a very strict code of ethics. After an accidental shooting at his studio and saving an over the hill action star from a fight at a club Chiwetel is caught up in a number of situations involving the movie star and his producer, his two brothers-in-law, a cop, a loan shark, a fight promoter, a women lawyer and rape victim, and a rigged tournament. It doesn't really sound all that good but it is, surprisingly subtle in that Mammet way. One of the most powerful closing scenes I have witnessed in some time.
Grade: A-
Thursday, September 15, 2011
Tamara Drew (2010), Contagion (2011), I Married a Witch (1942)
Tamara Drew
An 'ugly duckling' has a nose job and returns to her home town looking like Gemma Arterton. No longer having a beak like nose Tamara Drew is able to sleep with a couple of men including a rock star and a popular author of mystery novels, pushing off the reconciliation with her childhood sweetheart until the end. There are also subplots about the cheating mystery novelist's much put upon wife and a visiting American English professor, as well as two 15 year old girls and there efforts to meet Tamara's new rock star boyfriend. I've been trying to think of the word to describe the mood or pace of the movie, and I've hit on comfortable. The movie is one you can just be in, the plots not that important and you don't care if it just winds along slowly, though the resolution seemed a bit too quick.
Grade: B
Contagion
Straight forward story, we've seen it before, a mysterious new virus starts up in a remote land (rural China) and spreads around the world. The handling here though is more realistic seeming then most film viruses, the virus comes across as feasible, the symptoms not of an exaggerated nature, and while it kills off tens of millions of people it doesn't apocalypticly crash human civilization (though it does cause a good bit of damage). It's like the story of the 1918 Spanish flu epidemic in a contemporary context, and focuses on the outbreaks victims, profiteers, and the doctors who fight it. Films large and good cast includes Matt Damon, Marion Cotillard, Laurence Fishburn, Jude Law and Kate Winslet. Dr. Sanjay Gupta cameos.
Grade: B+
I Married a Witch
Pro-generator to Bewitched. After having father and daughter witch's burned at the stake, a 17th century puritan is cursed with having all of his descendants end up unhappy in love. Fast forward 270 years and one such descendant (Fredrick March) is running for governor of an unspecified New England state. The tree that the two witch's spirits were trapped in is hit by lighting and they escape the night before candidate March's arranged marriage with the daughter of a newspaper magnate. Witch Jennifer incarnates herself as Veronica Lake (then at the height of her popularity) to tempt March and ruin his wedding, she accidentally drinks her own love potion and becomes devoted to him, much to the chagrin of her father Cecil Kellaway. Hijinks's ensue, 'true love' (though it was induced by a magic potion rendering the whole thing... odd) triumphs. Movie enhanced by the presence of Robert Benchley.
Grade: B-
An 'ugly duckling' has a nose job and returns to her home town looking like Gemma Arterton. No longer having a beak like nose Tamara Drew is able to sleep with a couple of men including a rock star and a popular author of mystery novels, pushing off the reconciliation with her childhood sweetheart until the end. There are also subplots about the cheating mystery novelist's much put upon wife and a visiting American English professor, as well as two 15 year old girls and there efforts to meet Tamara's new rock star boyfriend. I've been trying to think of the word to describe the mood or pace of the movie, and I've hit on comfortable. The movie is one you can just be in, the plots not that important and you don't care if it just winds along slowly, though the resolution seemed a bit too quick.
Grade: B
Contagion
Straight forward story, we've seen it before, a mysterious new virus starts up in a remote land (rural China) and spreads around the world. The handling here though is more realistic seeming then most film viruses, the virus comes across as feasible, the symptoms not of an exaggerated nature, and while it kills off tens of millions of people it doesn't apocalypticly crash human civilization (though it does cause a good bit of damage). It's like the story of the 1918 Spanish flu epidemic in a contemporary context, and focuses on the outbreaks victims, profiteers, and the doctors who fight it. Films large and good cast includes Matt Damon, Marion Cotillard, Laurence Fishburn, Jude Law and Kate Winslet. Dr. Sanjay Gupta cameos.
Grade: B+
I Married a Witch
Pro-generator to Bewitched. After having father and daughter witch's burned at the stake, a 17th century puritan is cursed with having all of his descendants end up unhappy in love. Fast forward 270 years and one such descendant (Fredrick March) is running for governor of an unspecified New England state. The tree that the two witch's spirits were trapped in is hit by lighting and they escape the night before candidate March's arranged marriage with the daughter of a newspaper magnate. Witch Jennifer incarnates herself as Veronica Lake (then at the height of her popularity) to tempt March and ruin his wedding, she accidentally drinks her own love potion and becomes devoted to him, much to the chagrin of her father Cecil Kellaway. Hijinks's ensue, 'true love' (though it was induced by a magic potion rendering the whole thing... odd) triumphs. Movie enhanced by the presence of Robert Benchley.
Grade: B-
Monday, September 12, 2011
Mon Oncle (1958)
Jacques Tati's second Monsieur Hulot film and winner of the best foreign film Oscar. This is a charming film focusing on the relationship between Hulot and his roughly six year old nephew. It is also a satire on 'modern' (1950's) French life. In the first shots of the film we see a pack of small dogs make there way form a warm, lived in, and slightly dilapidated old neighbourhood into a modernistic one, sterile, empty, artificial.
Hulot lives in the old neighborhood, a friendly place with vegetable carts, open air cafes and children playing in the streets. His nephew lives with his family in the new neighbourhood, one that is fastley encroaching on the old. The nephews family live in an ultra modernistic, uncomfortable seeming house. Even the yard is complicatedly laid out and overly manicured, the setting for the funniest dinner party scene I can think off.
Hulot's sister and brother-in-law desire to make him respectable, meaning part of their social circle. They try to set him up with a neighbour and get him a job in a rubber house factory, suffice it to say none of these things turn out as they hopped. The scenes with the little boy and his friends are also pretty funny, the games they play on the adults, such as whistling while hiding in a small bluff, and wagering on whether the whistle will cause a pedestrian to walk into a light post (this happens about 50% of the time). Again, warm, light hearted, sentimental in its way and quite obviously reminiscent of Chaplin's 'modern' satire City Lights.
Grade A-
Hulot lives in the old neighborhood, a friendly place with vegetable carts, open air cafes and children playing in the streets. His nephew lives with his family in the new neighbourhood, one that is fastley encroaching on the old. The nephews family live in an ultra modernistic, uncomfortable seeming house. Even the yard is complicatedly laid out and overly manicured, the setting for the funniest dinner party scene I can think off.
Hulot's sister and brother-in-law desire to make him respectable, meaning part of their social circle. They try to set him up with a neighbour and get him a job in a rubber house factory, suffice it to say none of these things turn out as they hopped. The scenes with the little boy and his friends are also pretty funny, the games they play on the adults, such as whistling while hiding in a small bluff, and wagering on whether the whistle will cause a pedestrian to walk into a light post (this happens about 50% of the time). Again, warm, light hearted, sentimental in its way and quite obviously reminiscent of Chaplin's 'modern' satire City Lights.
Grade A-
Enduring Love (2004)
From the novel by Ian McEwan. Play write Joe Penhall adapted the source material loosely, a lot of changes are made from the novel but its all in service of the greater theme which must have attracted him to the work (this being Penhall's first screenplay he would later adapt The Road). Like Kubrick or Preminger Penhall took what he liked from his source material and largely adapted it as an examination of the theme from the book in which he was most interested, in this case the nature of love.
The movie starts with a spectacularly staged accident in which a hot air balloon with a man and his grandson briefly lites upon a country meadow, only to be pushed back up by a gust of wind the grandson still inside. A number of passersby converge on the balloon and try to help, as the balloon begins to rise again all but one of the men let go, that man later falls to his death. The movie then follows how a number of figures who witnessed the accident cope, and the profound effect it has on there lives.
Daniel Criag is a university professor (though its hard to grasp precisely what he is a professor of) who obsesses over the incident and pushes live in girlfriend Samantha Morton away. This is all made more complicated by the presence of Rhys Ifans a lonely man who develops de Clerambault's syndrome a stressed induced erotic obsession with Craig. Craig views Rhys at first as a mear nuisance and becomes more and more concerned as time goes on, and for good reason. Yet his own obsessions with the accident and Rhys increasing intrusions on his life are making Craig into an unpleasant man and straining his relationships. Craig's Darwin conceptions of love, Morton's romantic, and Rhy's religiously tinged all come into play in this examination of what exactly love is.
Director Roger Michell, perhaps best known for his romantic comedies, might seem a bit of an odd chose for this piece, but he works. In fact the whole direction is fascinating, the choices made, some unusual shots like those that encompass two rooms at once through doors, or the concentration on mundane activities such as eating, this all adds to something, the sense of being on an unstable brink. The whole film is an excellent mode piece with mounting almost tangibly uncomfortable pressure building. I'm a fan of McEwan's book and am happy to say this movie was up to its task, and in fact even exceeds the book in its creepiness.
Grade: A-
The movie starts with a spectacularly staged accident in which a hot air balloon with a man and his grandson briefly lites upon a country meadow, only to be pushed back up by a gust of wind the grandson still inside. A number of passersby converge on the balloon and try to help, as the balloon begins to rise again all but one of the men let go, that man later falls to his death. The movie then follows how a number of figures who witnessed the accident cope, and the profound effect it has on there lives.
Daniel Criag is a university professor (though its hard to grasp precisely what he is a professor of) who obsesses over the incident and pushes live in girlfriend Samantha Morton away. This is all made more complicated by the presence of Rhys Ifans a lonely man who develops de Clerambault's syndrome a stressed induced erotic obsession with Craig. Craig views Rhys at first as a mear nuisance and becomes more and more concerned as time goes on, and for good reason. Yet his own obsessions with the accident and Rhys increasing intrusions on his life are making Craig into an unpleasant man and straining his relationships. Craig's Darwin conceptions of love, Morton's romantic, and Rhy's religiously tinged all come into play in this examination of what exactly love is.
Director Roger Michell, perhaps best known for his romantic comedies, might seem a bit of an odd chose for this piece, but he works. In fact the whole direction is fascinating, the choices made, some unusual shots like those that encompass two rooms at once through doors, or the concentration on mundane activities such as eating, this all adds to something, the sense of being on an unstable brink. The whole film is an excellent mode piece with mounting almost tangibly uncomfortable pressure building. I'm a fan of McEwan's book and am happy to say this movie was up to its task, and in fact even exceeds the book in its creepiness.
Grade: A-
Friday, September 9, 2011
A Foreign Affair (1948), The Blue Angel (1930)
Leave it to Billy Wilder to dare and make a comedy set in the ruins of occupied Berlin. Jean Arthur is Congresswoman Phoebe Frost (R-Iowa 8th District) who along with a number of her colleagues travels to Berlin as part of a House subcommittee investigating the morale of American solders there. Though their official escorts attempt to put the best possible spin on things Congresswoman Frost quickly notices the high level of fraternization going on between the G.I.'s and the native Frau's. Arthur sneaks away from her escorts to investigate the situation herself and in the company of a couple of solders who think she is a German girl chances upon a seedy nightclub where the troops are being entertained by cabaret singer Marlene Dietrich (always a cabaret singer that one).
When the Congresswomen discovers that Dietrich had been the girlfriend of a high ranking Nazi, and that an unknown American service man is sheltering her from being questioned in Nuremberg, she sets out to uncover the ner-do-wells identity. The officer Arthur enlists to assist her in this search is a member of her own congressional district, Capt. John Pringel (John Lund, a little known actor for whom this film was probably his career highlight). It turns out ironically that Pringel is the one sheltering Dietrich from the authorities as the two are carrying on an affair on the down low. Now Pringel must attempt to 'help' the congresswomen track down the offending solder while at the same time secretly obstructing her efforts to do so in order to save his own hide. When Arthur gets too close to discovering the truth Lund tries another strategy, seducing the romantically inexperienced congresswomen.
In course of time Lund actually falls for Arthur but then Dietrich unmasks him as her lover. Ms. Frost is heartbroken, but Lund is not punished as his superiors intend to use him to flush out Dietrich's old Nazi boyfriend whose in hiding but whose extreme jealousy for Dietrich might flush him out. In end,well what do you think?
Wilder cynicism combines well with co-writer Charles Brackett's more polished studio sensibilities; the two had a long and successful partnership which resulted in such hits as The Lost Weekend and The Major and the Minor. Lund gets suitably exasperated and is good at playing a man caught in the middle of a no win situation; I wonder why he never really made it as a comic even romantic leading man. Arthur is adorable as always, watch how she just melts like butter for Lund in her trademark Jean Arthur way. Dietrich plays a type she'd play many times and is good at it. I love the world worn pragmatism she displays, cozying up to which ever sides in power, as Lund's character comments she goes in for whatever's 'fashionable', 'last year it was a swastika, next year who knows, maybe a hammer and sickle.'
Sly and well executed but also demonstrating that old school Hollywood heart; I'm not sure why this movie isn't a better known piece of the Wilder canon. Grade: B+
The Blue Angel, the movie that made Dietrich a star and the first of her six films with director Joseph von Sternberg, is a well regarded mini-masterpiece. Emil Jannings, who was at the time considered about the best film actor there was, plays Immanuel Rath an esteemed English professor at a local Gymnasium (college preparatory high school) in a moderate sized German town during the post World War I pre-Nazi era. Never married and living in a small rented room, Rath is treated by his students as a sort of comic figure whom they mock behind his back.
One day Rath discovers that some of his students are in possession of 'racey' pictures of a cabaret singer (Dietrich of course). The students are too young to be admitted to the Blue Angel nightclub where she preforms, so Rath goes there in the hopes of catching some of his pupils on the premises.
Rath attempts to confront Dietrich about her apparent sanctioning of the boys visits, but is essentially immobilized by the singers sensuality and simple niceness to him. He goes back to the club the next night to return some of her panties which he accidentally took from her dressing room the previous evening. Rath later attempts to protect the woman's honor by driving off a lusty sailor and Dietrich is genuinely flattered by this having not been treated like a 'real lady' for some time. Some of Raths students discover that he is genuinely love struck and ribe him about this at school; he continues to see her and some of the school authorities find out about this threatening his career. Just before Dietrich and her fellow performers are about to leave town for there next booking Rath purposes, Dietrich accepts, and whole group think having a professor with them will lend the troop an aura of class. It does not.
Years pass, Rath is reduced to selling Dietrichs racy pictures, and he later becomes the groups clown. Dietrich is nice too and genuinely found of the professor but treats him as a cuckold. At a return engagement to Raths home town the professor is humiliated, the whole community seems to have come out to see the depths to which the once great man has fallen. He snaps. He is later found dead in his old classroom.
A tragedy in the true sense Jannings is excellent at playing the slow degradation of this once proud man. Though some of the sets might be slightly surrealistic, the moves goes for realism. Rath was never a really happy man, though he had self respect. With Dietrich he thinks he has found something greater for his life, the love he's never had. He gives up everything for her, and then slowly eats away at himself; once self righteous man he is now consumed by self hate. One of the interesting things about this movie, and apparently a part of von Sternbergs style is his lack of moral judgement, and unusually rounded characters. While it would be tempting to blame things on Dietrich, it is Rath who is really responsible for his condition, and Dietrich never comes across that badly. In German with subtitles I thing this might be the oldest foreign language sound film I've ever seen. That it crossed over to America at that time and made a mark, later allowing the anti-Nazi Dietrich to permanently leave German and continue a successful career in the states, is testament to its greatness.
Grade: A-
When the Congresswomen discovers that Dietrich had been the girlfriend of a high ranking Nazi, and that an unknown American service man is sheltering her from being questioned in Nuremberg, she sets out to uncover the ner-do-wells identity. The officer Arthur enlists to assist her in this search is a member of her own congressional district, Capt. John Pringel (John Lund, a little known actor for whom this film was probably his career highlight). It turns out ironically that Pringel is the one sheltering Dietrich from the authorities as the two are carrying on an affair on the down low. Now Pringel must attempt to 'help' the congresswomen track down the offending solder while at the same time secretly obstructing her efforts to do so in order to save his own hide. When Arthur gets too close to discovering the truth Lund tries another strategy, seducing the romantically inexperienced congresswomen.
In course of time Lund actually falls for Arthur but then Dietrich unmasks him as her lover. Ms. Frost is heartbroken, but Lund is not punished as his superiors intend to use him to flush out Dietrich's old Nazi boyfriend whose in hiding but whose extreme jealousy for Dietrich might flush him out. In end,well what do you think?
Wilder cynicism combines well with co-writer Charles Brackett's more polished studio sensibilities; the two had a long and successful partnership which resulted in such hits as The Lost Weekend and The Major and the Minor. Lund gets suitably exasperated and is good at playing a man caught in the middle of a no win situation; I wonder why he never really made it as a comic even romantic leading man. Arthur is adorable as always, watch how she just melts like butter for Lund in her trademark Jean Arthur way. Dietrich plays a type she'd play many times and is good at it. I love the world worn pragmatism she displays, cozying up to which ever sides in power, as Lund's character comments she goes in for whatever's 'fashionable', 'last year it was a swastika, next year who knows, maybe a hammer and sickle.'
Sly and well executed but also demonstrating that old school Hollywood heart; I'm not sure why this movie isn't a better known piece of the Wilder canon. Grade: B+
The Blue Angel, the movie that made Dietrich a star and the first of her six films with director Joseph von Sternberg, is a well regarded mini-masterpiece. Emil Jannings, who was at the time considered about the best film actor there was, plays Immanuel Rath an esteemed English professor at a local Gymnasium (college preparatory high school) in a moderate sized German town during the post World War I pre-Nazi era. Never married and living in a small rented room, Rath is treated by his students as a sort of comic figure whom they mock behind his back.
One day Rath discovers that some of his students are in possession of 'racey' pictures of a cabaret singer (Dietrich of course). The students are too young to be admitted to the Blue Angel nightclub where she preforms, so Rath goes there in the hopes of catching some of his pupils on the premises.
Rath attempts to confront Dietrich about her apparent sanctioning of the boys visits, but is essentially immobilized by the singers sensuality and simple niceness to him. He goes back to the club the next night to return some of her panties which he accidentally took from her dressing room the previous evening. Rath later attempts to protect the woman's honor by driving off a lusty sailor and Dietrich is genuinely flattered by this having not been treated like a 'real lady' for some time. Some of Raths students discover that he is genuinely love struck and ribe him about this at school; he continues to see her and some of the school authorities find out about this threatening his career. Just before Dietrich and her fellow performers are about to leave town for there next booking Rath purposes, Dietrich accepts, and whole group think having a professor with them will lend the troop an aura of class. It does not.
Years pass, Rath is reduced to selling Dietrichs racy pictures, and he later becomes the groups clown. Dietrich is nice too and genuinely found of the professor but treats him as a cuckold. At a return engagement to Raths home town the professor is humiliated, the whole community seems to have come out to see the depths to which the once great man has fallen. He snaps. He is later found dead in his old classroom.
A tragedy in the true sense Jannings is excellent at playing the slow degradation of this once proud man. Though some of the sets might be slightly surrealistic, the moves goes for realism. Rath was never a really happy man, though he had self respect. With Dietrich he thinks he has found something greater for his life, the love he's never had. He gives up everything for her, and then slowly eats away at himself; once self righteous man he is now consumed by self hate. One of the interesting things about this movie, and apparently a part of von Sternbergs style is his lack of moral judgement, and unusually rounded characters. While it would be tempting to blame things on Dietrich, it is Rath who is really responsible for his condition, and Dietrich never comes across that badly. In German with subtitles I thing this might be the oldest foreign language sound film I've ever seen. That it crossed over to America at that time and made a mark, later allowing the anti-Nazi Dietrich to permanently leave German and continue a successful career in the states, is testament to its greatness.
Grade: A-
Thursday, September 8, 2011
The Divorcee (1930), A Free Soul (1931)
A Norma Shearer double header. The Divorcee begins with a group of friends and family enjoying themselves at a fishing lodge, two of this group (Shearer & Chester Morris) get engaged much to the chagrin of Shearer's would be suitors Conrad Nagel and Robert Montgomery (father of Elizabeth). On the way home that night a drunken Nagel rolls his car disfiguring Judith Wood (1906-2002) whom he later he later marries out of guilt. Shearer & Morris have a high church Episcopalian wedding and on there anniversary three years later Shearer discovers that her husband has been cheating on her with Mary Doran. Morris explains that "it doesn't mean a thing" and heads out on a business trip. While he's gone a distraught Shearer sleeps with Morris's best friend Montgomery (this is pre-code). Guilt ridden Shearer tells her husband that she's slept with some one else (thought she never reveals it was Montgomery) and discovers that he has quite a double standard about these things. They divorce, she sleeps around, he turns to drink, they are both unhappy, they get back together in Paris. The End.
Better is A Free Soul. Shearer's father Lional Barrymore is a talented but too often drunken lawyer (I'm surprised this part wasn't played by his famously tipsy brother John). Barrymore manages to get "notorious gambler" Clark Gabel acquitted on murder charges. Gable takes a shine to his lawyers pretty daughter, she takes a shine to him thus neglecting her earnest polo player fiance Leslie Howard. Barrymore gets sober enough to insist to Shearer that Gable is no good, she agrees not to see him if father agrees to stop drinking, they go on a three month excursion to Yosmitte to 'dry out'. When they get back to civilization Barrymore immediately goes back to drinking and is presumed killed in a train accident; Shearer scorned by her upper crust extended family goes back to Gable. Gable becomes too possessive and threatens Shearer, jilted lover Leslie trys to defend her, he kills Gable. Shearer realizes she really loves Leslie who now seems certain to go to prison for life! If only there were a talented lawyer to defend Leslie; Shearer stumbles over a drunken Barrymore while looking for him (hopping he is alive) in a seamy part of town (this is set in San Fransisco). Barrymore sobers up enough to defend Leslie with a 'stirring oration' in court, he then dies in front of the jury. In the coda Shearer & Leslie's future together is left somewhat in doubt, but hopeful.
The Divorcee is stylistically superior but members of 'the smart set' sleeping around gets old. A Free Soul is more conventional fair, good in the beginning, ho-hum in the middle, and stronger at the end. I think I prefer Ruth Chatterton to Shearer.
The Divorcee: C
A Free Soul: B-
Better is A Free Soul. Shearer's father Lional Barrymore is a talented but too often drunken lawyer (I'm surprised this part wasn't played by his famously tipsy brother John). Barrymore manages to get "notorious gambler" Clark Gabel acquitted on murder charges. Gable takes a shine to his lawyers pretty daughter, she takes a shine to him thus neglecting her earnest polo player fiance Leslie Howard. Barrymore gets sober enough to insist to Shearer that Gable is no good, she agrees not to see him if father agrees to stop drinking, they go on a three month excursion to Yosmitte to 'dry out'. When they get back to civilization Barrymore immediately goes back to drinking and is presumed killed in a train accident; Shearer scorned by her upper crust extended family goes back to Gable. Gable becomes too possessive and threatens Shearer, jilted lover Leslie trys to defend her, he kills Gable. Shearer realizes she really loves Leslie who now seems certain to go to prison for life! If only there were a talented lawyer to defend Leslie; Shearer stumbles over a drunken Barrymore while looking for him (hopping he is alive) in a seamy part of town (this is set in San Fransisco). Barrymore sobers up enough to defend Leslie with a 'stirring oration' in court, he then dies in front of the jury. In the coda Shearer & Leslie's future together is left somewhat in doubt, but hopeful.
The Divorcee is stylistically superior but members of 'the smart set' sleeping around gets old. A Free Soul is more conventional fair, good in the beginning, ho-hum in the middle, and stronger at the end. I think I prefer Ruth Chatterton to Shearer.
The Divorcee: C
A Free Soul: B-
Monday, September 5, 2011
The Gold Diggers of 1933 (1933), I Knew it Was You: Rediscovering John Cazale (2009), Zero Hour! (1957)
The Gold Diggers of 1933
When you think of depression era musicals you should think of this, as its a depression era musical about depression era musicals about the depression. Three struggling actresses end up taking three rich men to the alter, with varying degrees of willingness on the men's part. Likable. The 'Forgotten Man' musical sequence at the end feels tacked on and clashes with the predominate mood of the film, but it really is a rather impressive Busby Berkly number. Grade: B
I Knew it Was You: Rediscovering John Cazale
Documentary on the late actor John Cazale. In addition to being a distinguished stage actor Cazale appeared in only five movies (The Godfather, The Conversation, The Godfather Part II, Dog Day Afternoon, The Deer Hunter) each of which was nominated for a best picture Oscar. An intriguing looking unusually talented actor he was known for the vulnerability he brought to his performances, and the little looks and ticks he could do that just brought the soul out of his characters and added so much to his portails. Cazale became romantically involved with Meryl Streep and she was at his bed side when he died of lung cancer in 1978. Unfortunately at only forty minutes this documentary (like Cazale life) was too short. Grade: B
Zero Hour!
The plot of this 'airplane in danger' film was later lifted for the immortal comedy Airplane!. In addition to the plot about food poisoning striking the passengers and crew of a commercial airliner mid-flight, large portions of dialogue where appropriated from this film into Airplane!, making this movie unintentionally funny; even the the reluctant pilots named Stryker! Leads Dana Andrews and Linda Darnell are here on the downward slope of their carers and just look leaden and tired. Sterling Hayden in what would later be the Robert Stack role is slightly annoying, so far I've only liked Hayden in the parts he played for Stanley Kubrick. Low budget, set in Canada. Grade: C
When you think of depression era musicals you should think of this, as its a depression era musical about depression era musicals about the depression. Three struggling actresses end up taking three rich men to the alter, with varying degrees of willingness on the men's part. Likable. The 'Forgotten Man' musical sequence at the end feels tacked on and clashes with the predominate mood of the film, but it really is a rather impressive Busby Berkly number. Grade: B
I Knew it Was You: Rediscovering John Cazale
Documentary on the late actor John Cazale. In addition to being a distinguished stage actor Cazale appeared in only five movies (The Godfather, The Conversation, The Godfather Part II, Dog Day Afternoon, The Deer Hunter) each of which was nominated for a best picture Oscar. An intriguing looking unusually talented actor he was known for the vulnerability he brought to his performances, and the little looks and ticks he could do that just brought the soul out of his characters and added so much to his portails. Cazale became romantically involved with Meryl Streep and she was at his bed side when he died of lung cancer in 1978. Unfortunately at only forty minutes this documentary (like Cazale life) was too short. Grade: B
Zero Hour!
The plot of this 'airplane in danger' film was later lifted for the immortal comedy Airplane!. In addition to the plot about food poisoning striking the passengers and crew of a commercial airliner mid-flight, large portions of dialogue where appropriated from this film into Airplane!, making this movie unintentionally funny; even the the reluctant pilots named Stryker! Leads Dana Andrews and Linda Darnell are here on the downward slope of their carers and just look leaden and tired. Sterling Hayden in what would later be the Robert Stack role is slightly annoying, so far I've only liked Hayden in the parts he played for Stanley Kubrick. Low budget, set in Canada. Grade: C
Friday, September 2, 2011
The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1919)
One of the most famous of the German silent expressionistic horror films (yes this implies that there were more of those). Dr. Caligari is a mysterious not particularly trustworthy looking man who displays a freaky looking Somnambulist (a fancy way of saying a sleepwalker) at a carnivale.
While unconscious this somnambuilts can tell your fortune, he can also secretly sneak out at night and kill you. He kills this one guys friend so the one guy mounts a search and eventually tracks Caligari down to an insane asylum he administers.
Odd plot, but neat looking, you can see the influences on artists the likes of Tim Burton (Cesar looks a lot like Edward Scissorhands), Terry Gilliam, and even Dr. Seuss. Arguably better then the more famous Universal monster movies that followed it a decade later. Even the title cards here are unique, though they where probably redone during the 1996 restoration of the film. I can not deny however that the film benefited from its succinct running time (70 something minutes) you wouldn't want to drag this simple story out any longer.
Grade: B+
While unconscious this somnambuilts can tell your fortune, he can also secretly sneak out at night and kill you. He kills this one guys friend so the one guy mounts a search and eventually tracks Caligari down to an insane asylum he administers.
Odd plot, but neat looking, you can see the influences on artists the likes of Tim Burton (Cesar looks a lot like Edward Scissorhands), Terry Gilliam, and even Dr. Seuss. Arguably better then the more famous Universal monster movies that followed it a decade later. Even the title cards here are unique, though they where probably redone during the 1996 restoration of the film. I can not deny however that the film benefited from its succinct running time (70 something minutes) you wouldn't want to drag this simple story out any longer.
Grade: B+
Cowboys & Aliens (2011)
A clumsy combination of western stock characters and science fiction conventions. The aliens, monolithic and uninteresting combinations of the space invaders from Independence Day and the Incredible Hulk are after gold, (pesky aliens are always after one of our resources) so they travel to the Arizona Territory in the year 1873. They blow up cows, rope in humans, and interfere with stock western plots like the cattle baron with the bratty son, the mysterious stranger, the tired old sheriff ect. (I'm surprised there wasn't a comic drunk). This feels like a combination of every summer movie though its surprisingly slow, in fact I didn't get mildly excited until the end. Waste of a good cast and potentially interesting concept. Not really bad per say, but not good. Grade: C-
Wednesday, August 31, 2011
The Resident (2011)
Standard plot, emergency room doctor Hillary Swank has just separated from her longtime boyfriend (he cheated on her) and needs to find a new apartment in New York City. She does, its a nice one, the price seems to good to be true, the hunky landlord (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) also seems to be to good to be true, he is.
Swank and Morgan flirt, make out, she thinks better of it and just wants to 'be friends'. Morgan wants to be more then friends, he stocks her, which indeed he'd been doing all along, it was not by accident that Swank found this great apartment. Morgan has passageways behind the walls of the old apartment building, he uses them to spy on Swank, sneak into her apartment and drug her wine, and at night comes to her bed. Morgan also eventually kills the boyfriend (Lee Pace) just as the two are reconciling. The movie ends in a cool protracted hide and seek chase/fight in Morgans apartment catacombs.
Not a remarkable film, Swank must have just been attracted by the prospect of doing a kind of movie she hadn't done before. With stubble bearded Morgan you get the feeling that he may just be there because they couldn't it Javier Bardem. Christopher Lee, in a small role as Morgans grandfather, is just there to pad the cast. Yet it works, no surprises but you can feel that this movie was just done better then most recent films of its type. So, B-
Swank and Morgan flirt, make out, she thinks better of it and just wants to 'be friends'. Morgan wants to be more then friends, he stocks her, which indeed he'd been doing all along, it was not by accident that Swank found this great apartment. Morgan has passageways behind the walls of the old apartment building, he uses them to spy on Swank, sneak into her apartment and drug her wine, and at night comes to her bed. Morgan also eventually kills the boyfriend (Lee Pace) just as the two are reconciling. The movie ends in a cool protracted hide and seek chase/fight in Morgans apartment catacombs.
Not a remarkable film, Swank must have just been attracted by the prospect of doing a kind of movie she hadn't done before. With stubble bearded Morgan you get the feeling that he may just be there because they couldn't it Javier Bardem. Christopher Lee, in a small role as Morgans grandfather, is just there to pad the cast. Yet it works, no surprises but you can feel that this movie was just done better then most recent films of its type. So, B-
Jefferson in Paris (1995)
This film tells of the story of how Thomas Jefferson's sexual relationship with his slave Sally Hemmings started. I remember when I first heard about Jeffersons reported relationship with the young slave girl, it was in the mid-1990's right around the time this movie came out. I was upset, having then a very rose colored almost sainted view of the Founding Fathers (still for the most part very great men, but far from perfect). Indeed many people where understandably put off by these allegations, and there's been an unwillingness to believe them simply because its Thomas Jefferson. But now, fifteen years later its generally accepted that Mr. Jefferson had four children by Hemmings, its been proven now by DNA evidence.
The film story is of course set in Paris, appropriate given the title don't you think. In 1784 Thomas Jefferson (here played by Nick Nolte) was dispatched as the fledgling American governments ambassador to France; which had just been the only real allie they had in their war for Independence from Britain. Jefferson would stay in his post for five years, witnessing the early days of the French Revolution (which he predicted would turn out well) before being recalled to America to serve as George Washington's first Secretary of State.
While in France and in accordance to his position Jefferson spent a lot of time among the royal court and the French aristocracy. This being a Merchant/Ivory production it really gets the period feel down. The ruling class had long been decadent, they throw themselves lavish entertainments, sumptuous dinner party's, and indulge in every passing fade such as wand healing and mesmerism. Yet at the same time these Frenchmen could be great patrons of the arts and sciences, and exciting things besides politics where happening there, such as early hot air balloon experiments. Amid the French swells Jefferson meets and falls in love with Maria Cosway (Greta Scacchi) the English/Italian wife of the apparently gay portrait artist Richard Cosway.
Jefferson vacillates between his love for Maria and loyalty to an oath he made to his late wife never to remarry and which his daughter Pattsy (Gwyneth Paltrow) won't let him forgot. Apparently unable to decide what to do Jefferson ends up in a relationship with Sally Hemmings (Thandie Newton) which both Pattsy and Maria find out about and are non too pleased, though partly in keeping with the propriety of the times they refuse to speak about this issue openly (indeed in the film nobody seems to address the issue directly). Nolte in the middle of his 1990's hay day is a good Jefferson, which is almost unimaginable now given the current state of his career and public perception. The rest of the cast is very good too and this inherently slow motion picture does manage to sustain interest over its 2 1/2 hour running time.
Grade: B+
The film story is of course set in Paris, appropriate given the title don't you think. In 1784 Thomas Jefferson (here played by Nick Nolte) was dispatched as the fledgling American governments ambassador to France; which had just been the only real allie they had in their war for Independence from Britain. Jefferson would stay in his post for five years, witnessing the early days of the French Revolution (which he predicted would turn out well) before being recalled to America to serve as George Washington's first Secretary of State.
While in France and in accordance to his position Jefferson spent a lot of time among the royal court and the French aristocracy. This being a Merchant/Ivory production it really gets the period feel down. The ruling class had long been decadent, they throw themselves lavish entertainments, sumptuous dinner party's, and indulge in every passing fade such as wand healing and mesmerism. Yet at the same time these Frenchmen could be great patrons of the arts and sciences, and exciting things besides politics where happening there, such as early hot air balloon experiments. Amid the French swells Jefferson meets and falls in love with Maria Cosway (Greta Scacchi) the English/Italian wife of the apparently gay portrait artist Richard Cosway.
Jefferson vacillates between his love for Maria and loyalty to an oath he made to his late wife never to remarry and which his daughter Pattsy (Gwyneth Paltrow) won't let him forgot. Apparently unable to decide what to do Jefferson ends up in a relationship with Sally Hemmings (Thandie Newton) which both Pattsy and Maria find out about and are non too pleased, though partly in keeping with the propriety of the times they refuse to speak about this issue openly (indeed in the film nobody seems to address the issue directly). Nolte in the middle of his 1990's hay day is a good Jefferson, which is almost unimaginable now given the current state of his career and public perception. The rest of the cast is very good too and this inherently slow motion picture does manage to sustain interest over its 2 1/2 hour running time.
Grade: B+
Skidoo (1968)
In an effort to become more relevant to younger audiences Otto Preminger produced and directed Skidoo, a kind of drug comedy that features both mobsters and hippies. Written by Doran William Cannon (later to achieve success for his script of Brewster McCloud); Skidoo stars Jackie Gleason as a retired mob hit man who has taken up a suburban life as the owner of a car wash so as to raise his daughter Darlene (Alexandra Hay, whose very pretty but never really made it as an actress) in safety. One day 'The Tree' the originzed crime outfit Gleason had worked for comes calling to request his services in murdering a former associate turned government informant (Mickey Ronney). Gleason tries to say no but after they murder his best friend he agrees and is sent to prison in order to kill Ronney; he is to be assisted in this by one Freddy the Professor (Austin Pendelton) a brilliant draft dodging druggie who has also been sent to prison for this sole purpose. Ronney safe in a private prison apartment (from which he operates a successful enterprise as a stock trader) proves difficult to get at and in the end Gleason decides he doesn't want to kill him and so escapes with the Professor and another inmate in an improvised hot air balloon.
Gleasons disappearance from home is of course noticed by his daughter and wife Carole Channing (also a former associate of The Tree) who along with a band of hippies and a sort of junior mob bureaucrat in charge of Oregon and Idaho (Frankie Avalon), set out to locate the head of The Tree, a mysterious figure known as "God" (Grocho Marx if you can believe it). "God" is in exile on a yacht in international waters from which he runs The Tree, all the major characters will converge there for the odd musical finally, a lyrically poor but catchy toon called 'Skidoo' sung in a Hello Dolly style by Channing.
The movie is odd and has a reputation as a total disaster, but when approached in the right spirit its quite entertaining and deserving of the 'cult statues' it has achieved. The movie boasts a number of groovy songs (my favorite being the musical number featuring the dancing trashcans) composed by the artist Nilsson who also appears as a 'tower guard'. A strange film that's surprisingly memorable and seems to work by virtue of not quite working. Even the closing credits in this film are enjoyable. Grade: B-
Gleasons disappearance from home is of course noticed by his daughter and wife Carole Channing (also a former associate of The Tree) who along with a band of hippies and a sort of junior mob bureaucrat in charge of Oregon and Idaho (Frankie Avalon), set out to locate the head of The Tree, a mysterious figure known as "God" (Grocho Marx if you can believe it). "God" is in exile on a yacht in international waters from which he runs The Tree, all the major characters will converge there for the odd musical finally, a lyrically poor but catchy toon called 'Skidoo' sung in a Hello Dolly style by Channing.
The movie is odd and has a reputation as a total disaster, but when approached in the right spirit its quite entertaining and deserving of the 'cult statues' it has achieved. The movie boasts a number of groovy songs (my favorite being the musical number featuring the dancing trashcans) composed by the artist Nilsson who also appears as a 'tower guard'. A strange film that's surprisingly memorable and seems to work by virtue of not quite working. Even the closing credits in this film are enjoyable. Grade: B-
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