mik-19 Reviews

Lady Windermere's Fan (1925)

Pure cinema

[9/10 · 8 August 2011]

Nobody was as savvy about the intricacies of the human heart as Lubitsch, and of how virtue is never an absolute.

This warmly empathetic, highly sophisticated gem is an adaptation of Oscar Wilde, with virtually none of the play's dialog utilized, but as suggestive and outrageous as Wilde himself, conceived, framed and edited as pure cinema.

From the exact same period as Cecil B. DeMille's infinitely more crass sex comedies and Charles Chaplin's equally brilliant and morally ambiguous 'The Woman of Paris', but carried by an indistinguishably European sensibility. Irene Rich as the woman who sacrifices herself in secret is impossibly glamorous and subtle, May McAvoy is truly heartbreaking as the socialite suspicious of her husband's philandering, but Ronald Colman, alas, is left with nothing much to do except smolder sexily at the fringes with those impertinently raised eyebrows.

A highlight is the Ascot game, a marvel of choreography and mime, a delicious baiting of upper class hypocrisy.

"Giliap" (1975)

Magical

[9/10 · 23 February 2009]

I remember how this film feels - vividly. I watched it at age 14 or 15 and was completely overwhelmed by it. Slowmoving, yes, magisterial, but brimming with sensibility and content. After being condemned to the periphery of the film industry after the commercial failure of 'Giliap', director Andersson had a belated and very much deserved international comeback with 'Songs from the Second Floor' and 'You the Living'.

Since then 'Giliap' is among a handful of films that I have been clamoring for on DVD, alongside Resnais' 'Providence', Stroheim's 'Greed', the original 'Island of Lost Souls' etc. etc. And alongside the great masterworks of Swedish director Bo Widerberg. So far, no luck ... Please, give us 'Giliap' on DVD, it remains - I sincerely believe - among the most magical of European films.

Border Incident (1949)

Pure cinema

[8/10 · 17 July 2006]

At the outset here, I have to ask, Who cares if this is a film noir or not? If not, does it detract from it? If it is, does that enhance it as a work of art? Of course it doesn't, the debate is arbitrary and nonsensical. It makes no difference. Film noir was not a concept until the 1960's anyway, so the discussion is not only irrelevant, it is decidedly un-academic.

First and foremost, 'Border Incident' is a miraculously involving, dynamic piece of cinema. The voice-overs in the beginning and the one at the end have dated really badly with their flag-waving patriotism and faux-documentary style, but the 75 minutes in the middle are riveting.

Ricardo Montalban and George Murphy are detectives, respectively Mexican and American, with a mission to protect the Mexican braceros, farm workers, who are smuggled over the border and robbed, murdered and dropped in the quicksand, when they come back with money in their pockets. They infiltrate themselves into the the band of cutthroats to stop the trafficking.

The theme is contemporary to us, to say the least. And the way the story is told is relentless, stylish and urgent. It is brilliantly shot, wonderfully lit and edited like no-one's business. And it is tough as nails, there is a gruesome scene involving some farm machinery ... I will not go into details, but you might want to put your kids to bed in time.

A truly great movie, pure cinema. And call it what you want, for all I care. Noir, western-noir, whatever.

The Chase (1946)

A roller-coaster of a noir

[8/10 · 15 July 2006]

Young shell-shocked war veteran (Robert Cummings) finds employment as a chauffeur for gangster kingpin (Steve Cochran) and falls for his mistreated wife (Michele Morgan) with whom he arranges to flee to Havana, Cuba. Once there, she is stabbed and killed, and the chauffeur is framed for the murder.

Don't worry, there are no spoilers in the above which only covers about half of the film! There is much, much more to come, and the surprises are really surprising. This may not be the most coherent of movies (but easily one of the least coherent), but in a feverish, shell-shocked kind of way it makes perfect, nightmarishly perfect, sense. The script, judged from scene to scene, is brilliant and challenging, the acting no less than superb, especially by the sinister couple, Steve Cochran and Peter Lorre. Cochran almost steals the picture as the sadistic gangster, almost a Byronic anti-hero with an immense sadness in him. And Lorre's performance as his jaded, cynical sidekick could not be bettered.

The movie changes pace so many times in its tightly-packed 86 minutes, and you often feel like you are on a roller-coaster. With the couple's flight to Havana the movie becomes heavy with longing, melancholy and heartache, and downright sexiness, and the soundtrack is burgeoning with lush romantic music, steeped in nostalgia. Then Michèle Morgan, shockingly, is killed, and we are led into the maze of a Havana working district where the Cubans actually speak Spanish and not American with a poor Latino accent. These sequences has a distinct authenticity.

One of the great, if also extremely idiosyncratic, noirs.

All Night (1918)

Gorgeous in his PJ's

[6/10 · 11 July 2006]

The young Rudolph Valentino makes all the difference in this pleasant, if not overly inventive comedy of mistaken identities, a French bedroom farce by way of Hollywood 1918.

The story is preposterous, but the basic premise has Rudolph Valentino and the girl he adores, Carmel Myers, play spouses in order to guile their weekend guest, a brutish, rakish, completely insufferable millionaire into sponsoring their good friend's business venture.

There is so much sheer fun in the film that you forgive its shortcomings to a certain stage. I loved the scene in which the millionaire insists that the couple retire to their matrimonial bed, and escorts them to the master bedroom, hearts all a-flutter, cheeks ablaze. He goes so far as to undress Valentino and tuck him in, and you will note that Valentino looks gorgeous in his PJ's. At a point he realizes that no good will come of the venture, and that they will probably all end up with their heads banged in, and he proclaims that he will go upstairs to freshen himself up: "I want to look nice when the ambulance arrives ...". Hilarious.

The Prisoner of Zenda (1922)

"While you're unhung, Rentzau, hell lacks its master"

[6/10 · 10 July 2006]

A retiring English country gentleman, Rassendyll, is mistaken for his distant cousin, King Rudolph of Ruritania. When the king is taken hostage by his jealous brother, Black Michael, Rassendyll agrees to act as the king in the coronation ceremony.

It takes a long time for this version of 'The Prisoner of Zenda' to get moving. The first hour or so is stodgy and less than riveting film-making, and then it gradually picks up momentum, and the last half hour packs a decent punch, especially action-wise. But all in all, a rather more lackluster, even crude entertainment than I had expected after the exhilarating 'Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse', also by Rex Ingram.

The script is largely at fault, with the scenes so disjointedly put together that it does not in long stretches make a lot of sense. It has the makings of some interesting psychological insights, but does not explore them. I would have made more - MUCH more - out of the fact that for a long while Black Michael seems a pretty decent fellow, genuinely in love with Antoinette and understandably preoccupied about leaving the fate of his country to his feeble-minded brother. But Ingram makes nothing of it and seems curiously uninspired.

The youngish Lewis Stone is an earnest Rassendyll/Rudolph, and sort of holds his own in the climactic sword-fight with, among others, Ramon Novarro. And now we are getting somewhere. This is Novarro's film. He was hardly a star when it was made, and his role does not take up a lot of screen time, but Novarro eats up the scenery with his monocled, slick diabolism. "While you're unhung, Rentzau, hell lacks its master!", Stone says, and right he is. Novarro is pure evil, and a delight to watch.

Wife vs. Secretary (1936)

"I'm the best, aren't I?"

[8/10 · 3 July 2006]

This is a perfect little film, absolutely well-rounded and exquisite. Beautifully scripted, intelligently directed, ebulliently acted.

Clark Gable is the successful publisher, newly married to society lady Myrna Loy who, although very modern and not jealously disposed, begins to suspect that he is carrying on an affair with his bleach-blonde secretary, Jean Harlow. As Gable's mother states, laconically of her son, "You wouldn't blame a boy for stealing a piece of candy".

All fluff, right? Light as air, unsubstantial? Of course it is, it takes masters of their craft to make this plot stick, to make the movie plain unforgettable. Gable was never better, he seems to relish every second he is on screen, and there is none of the masculine stiffness about him that his worst performances have. He is a joy to watch with the always delightful Loy, their scenes together bristle and self-combust, and they are a really sweet, engaging couple. Loy has to be the most sophisticated creature ever to be filmed, she is SO cool and contemporary ("I'm the best, aren't I?", she says with just the slightest sardonic hint.) Harlow isn't given as much to work with, and she has to downplay her sassy sexiness in order not to tip the scales. But she is still almost all Harlow, and they go as far as they possibly could under the Production Code. The scene with Harlow and Gable in the Havana hotel room is all about sex, as we are left in no doubt.

So, watch it and love it. It is as perfect a piece of 30's film-making as you are likely to see.

The Day the Earth Caught Fire (1961)

Supreme film-making

[9/10 · 3 July 2006]

What an absolutely devastating movie! I am still completely engrossed in it, and it has been a while since I took the DVD out of the player.

Was any science fiction movie ever more ambitious than this one? The staggering opening, tinted in reddish yellow and brilliantly composed in widescreen, looks like Tarkovsky and Lars von Trier, and has the same dry wasteland quality to it. Callous and unpublicized nuclear tests by both the Soviet Union and the US have upset the environment, causing record-breaking heat waves, floods, cyclones, eclipses, and what not, and we gradually find out that Earth has tilted and is hurtling towards the Sun where, in four months' time, the universe will savor "the delightful smell of charcoaled mankind", as put by a cynical newspaperman. The largest nuclear bomb ever made will now be detonated in Siberia, and no one knows what will happen now ... The environmentalist discourse seems extremely contemporary to us today.

Now, how to make intelligent, thoughtful entertainment out of that pulp?! Leave it to writer-director Val Guest who more than rose to the task. He put a heartbroken, newly divorced and slightly alcoholized reporter in the center, working for the London Daily News. He tries, with his science editor and surrogate father, to delve into what went wrong and who is responsible, and he falls in love with a switchboard girl with a cleavage. All this to keep the movie grounded, the drama realistic. All of this naturalistic drama is cross-edited with stock newsreel footage of natural disasters, and it works. It works supremely well, and you are sucked into the action, as the end of the world approaches.

All the actors are brilliant, not least Edward Judd as the main reporter, cynical, witty, vulnerable.

Dot the I (2003)

Meta ... indie ... muck ...

[5/10 · 20 January 2006]

Young Brazilian guy in London falls in love with Spanish girl about to be married to a rich English man. Featuring heaps of video cameras ...

Preposterous and badly written, the visual style is jarring and too self-consciously cool for the story to make much sense. Films like this one are too easy to make. They are all about coming with with a new surprise twist every 15 minutes, and they don't even have to be good, so long as they keep us surprised they don't need to add up. And then, if you say that it is a meta-indie-flick, all opposition among cineasts must be stilled.

Or ...? Well, I don't buy into it. The recent 'Wicker Park' tried to do the same, boasting a non-linear plot line that covered the fact that there was no actual story to tell. 'Memento' had something it wanted to convey, but that was the exception. Too many movies nowadays ape this faux-documentary style because they hope the jarring aesthetics will keep us riveted, but without substance I dare say they will not.

The film's first-time director, who, alas, is also the writer (almost always a bad idea) insists on not giving away his secrets, knowing that his house of cards will tumble down first chance it gets.

The lead character Carmen is utterly unsympathetic, in the tradition we know from fatal French cinema, 'Betty Blue' and so on, her English boyfriend is a convenient caricature of the rich papa's boy slash cynical rich fart. The most startling thing about the film, in a good way, was James D'Arcy's suicide scene which was really well-played, and I must say that he was the only actor to actually get something out of this venture, although his part stinks.

Gael Garcia Bernal seriously needs a career counselor, he won't survive much more muck like this one

Golden Boy (1939)

Heavy-handed but charismatic

[7/10 · 12 January 2006]

"They are good for only one thing now - slugging!", Joe Bonaparte says with self-disgust, looking down at his broken hands after a middleweight prize fight at Madison Sqare Garden.

Joe had the option to be a great classical violinist, but the girl he was in love with wet his appetite for the quick buck and the American dream. "It's a big city, little people don't stand a chance", says Lorna, egging him up, playing up to his male ego. "Money's the answer". And the poor Italian immigrant kid grabs the bait, hangs up the violin and sells out.

'Golden Boy' is a piece of vintage Americana that is a bit hard to take today. Clifford Odets' controversial play was openly socialist and crammed with sudden, badly integrated political insights about "competetive civilization" and "a man hits his wife, and it's the first step towards fascism". It is all about the flip side of the American dream and gets a bit heavy-handed at times.

Lee J. Cobb is almost unbearably schmaltzy as the all-embracing, tearful Italian Papa, whereas Adolphe Menjou balances his performance carefully as the basically benign boxing promoter whose mistress is Lorna, Joe's chosen one, "just a dame from Newark" as she presents herself.

Barbara Stanwyck is more or less going through the motions as the hard-as-nails Lorna, and the real star of the picture is 21 year old newcomer William Holden, impossibly handsome and hunky, starting out with perfectly tousled curly hair. His performance is as yet immature and unfinished, but he has his moments and makes up for a shaky ride with loads of charisma, and he more than holds his own in the climactic title fight at the Garden, playing against the Chocolate Drop, "the pride of Harlem" in this race-segregated boxing haven.

'Golden Boy' is not, though, one of director Mamoulian's happier efforts. It is far too maudlin to look like anything Mamoulian ever did, it is not like him to lay it on this thick. It has none of the quirks or edge from 'Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde' among others, but it is lushly, richly orchestrated in the vein of 19th century European music.

Manpower (1941)

Trademark Walsh dynamics

[7/10 · 29 December 2005]

Power-line repairman Edward G. Robinson marries prostitute Marlene Dietrich, but she finds herself enamored by hubby's best friend and colleague, a gallant George Raft.

There is much to enjoy in Raoul Walsh's exhilarating melodrama, and although it adheres rather too strictly to a proved formula, Walsh, always a great master at this, gives depth and dimension to the action. Walsh paints a vivid and loyal picture of this blue-collar environment of camaraderie and pranks, and Alan Hale's repairman is the whole deal rolled into one, there is not ONE joke about high voltage that he doesn't know, or doesn't repeat, ad nauseam. Every workplace has one! 'Manpower' is full of the trademark Walsh dynamics, comparable to the electric power, the frequent thunderstorms and the high tempo. The action is engrossing, the film overall is smoothly produced, briskly edited, brilliantly lit, designed and photographed. Never did sleekly wet, black raincoats photograph more memorably.

Robinson and Raft are congenially cast, but Dietrich is a long-shot as the prostitute turned housewife. "How's this dame stacked up?", Robinson asks of Raft, before he is introduced to her. Raft, waveringly: "Oh, just a dame ...". Well, she photographs like a goddess, and is impossibly glamorous. And quite improbably so.

Don't expect another Walsh masterpiece, but brace yourself for a hugely enjoyable flic that just whirls by you.

Executive Suite (1954)

Brilliant ensemble piece

[9/10 · 23 November 2005]

If you ask me, director Robert Wise could do no wrong. He hardly ever set a foot wrong, and 'Executive Suite' is vintage Wise.

Mr. Bullard, bullying president of a huge furnishing corporation, dies, leaving everyone in doubt as to who should take over. The vultures are closing in, the major stockholder, a loose canon, is shamelessly wooed, dirty deals are struck, and there is even some insider trading taking place. It sure ain't pretty, but it's the name of the game and anything goes.

Robert Wise sets a steady pace, a brisk, business-like unfolding of a drama that deserves comparison with Shakespeare. It is done with quick cutting, drab, corporate sets, and filled to the brim with those covert glances that, in the end, decide the outcome. "Efficiency has become a dirty word, budget control has a bad odor", says prospective new manager Fredric March (another brilliant, Oscar-worthy performance) when he senses that he is losing the battle, and young gun William Holden rises to the occasion with an attention-grabbing speech that is not likely to be quickly forgotten: "We will never again ask a man to do something to poison his pride in himself or his work".

'Executive Suite' is an ensemble film, and one could go on praising every single member of the cast. And yet Robert Wise remains the engineer of this masterpiece of dynamic and still highly relevant cinema.

The Street with No Name (1948)

Undeserving DVD release

[6/10 · 16 November 2005]

I have been full of praise for the Fox Film Noir Collection on DVD until a couple of recent entries that have completely baffled me. What on earth made Fox think of titles such as 'The House on 92nd Street' and now this one as deserving for release on DVD? I had a hard time getting to the end of 'Street With No Name'. I especially loathed the upbeat march-like music that accompanied every scene that had the heroic and infallible FBI in it, and I simply can't stand the pretentious faux-documentary-style footage showing grave men in suits running about their business, looking self-righteous.

Yes, Richard Widmark, noir icon if ever there was any, is in it, but he has little to do but sneer and look suggestive, a far cry from standout performances in masterpieces such as 'Night and the City', 'Panic in the Streets' or 'Pickup on South Street'. Lloyd Nolan is a benignly clever FBI top-dog, a role he perfected and always played in exactly the same way. Mark Stevens is the all-American captain-of-the-football-team cutie-pie as the FBI agent posing as a hobo to get to Widmark.

I am afraid that a scene or two of noir-by-the-book lighting is all that Keighley's film has to recommend it. It is a seriously substandard noir.

The House on 92nd Street (1945)

Vulgar propaganda piece

[5/10 · 25 October 2005]

Fox probably had only good and honorable intentions releasing this movie on DVD in 2005, but it was misleading to quite a staggering degree that 'House on 92nd Street' was included in the company's noir collection.

If there is anything 'House' is not, noir is it! It is the earliest pioneering effort, mixing staged drama with documentary footage and a lot of faux-documentary as well. Today this dubious method is used all the time, but at the time it was novel.

'House on 92nd Street' is about a Nazi group trying to build a fifth column in New York up to and during World War II, and a heroic FBI agent's tireless endeavors as a counterspy to catch them. The secret ingredient of the atom bomb is at stake here! The tone of 'House' doesn't sit well with intelligent audiences of today. The propaganda is painted on in broad strokes and is rather annoying in its vulgarity, rather more easy to understand in the context of the political milieu in 1945. It looks with suspicion at other ethnicities than the most apple-pie typical Americans. The heroics of the FBI is wildly exaggerated, and the background music is patriotic and martial ad nauseam.

What is worse, because really fine propagandist movies have been made, movies that make a lot of sens even today - what is worse is that director Henry Hathaway is not given anything to work with. Only in the last 15 minutes or so is there room for any actual mise-en-scene, but by then it is too late to get our nerves on edge.

So what is there to admire here? From a cinematic point of view, not a lot to be sure. The political story is unfocused, the personal drama underdeveloped, the acting perfunctory. But the picture did have a following and it did inspire a whole series of movies with a documentary feel to them, for instance the far better 'Call Northside 777'.

Mata Hari (1931)

Worth a watch

[7/10 · 19 September 2005]

German spy Mata Hari works in Paris during World War 1 under cover as an exotic dancer, and falls in love with a young Russian officer while she is taking advantage of him.

The script is rubbish, dialogue trite at best, and the treatment doesn't hold together well. Adrian's costumes are ridiculously improbable, but in a sinfully pleasurable MGM kinda way. You simply sit there and gape at Adrian's inventiveness and sense of kitsch. And William Daniels photographs them beautifully.

As he does his favorite subject, Greta Garbo. There is no way anyone could call Mata Hari one of the better Garbo roles, although she looks gorgeous at every turn, even in her slightly awkward Balinese dance in the beginning, all arms and legs. And still Garbo manages to be sexy! Notice the glance she sends Ramon Novarro as she draws the curtain of her bed. This was a short period in the history of Hollywood, when there was no functioning censorship, and it is always titillating to see what cinematographers, directors and stars made of it. And here they exploit it to the full.

Not a great film, not even in the Garbo canon, but still worth a watch, absolutely.

Conquest (1937)

Garbo giggles!

[8/10 · 18 September 2005]

Married Polish countess, Marie Walewska, falls in love with Napoleon Bonaparte, savior of her country. They engage in a passionate relationship lasting until his divorce from Empress Josephine is finalized and he is persuaded to marry into the Habsburg dynasty for political reasons.

I watched this movie on Greta Garbo's 100th anniversary, and am moved to remark on her progress as an actress. I admired her fluidity as a screen presence, but she really came into her own in the mid-30s with great performances in 'Camille', 'Anna Karenina' and in 'Conquest'. Of course she looks awesome and wears a costume like no one else, but that's just the tip of the iceberg. Just watch the marvelous scene in 'Conquest', where she, as the noble countess, greets her brother after a long separation. He comments on her hair which has grown longer, making it hard to pull, and she giggles and shrieks as they chase each other through the hallway. This is the most liberated Garbo ever was, and she is adorable.

Charles Boyer is not to be outdid as Napoleon, and he has the meatier part of the two. He is mischievous and arrogant, impetuous and playful. You see the tyrant in Boyer's performance, just below the surface, waiting to be unleashed. His speech to Walewska about his dream of a United States of Europe obviously demands heightened interest in this day and age, and the quiet intensity, even solemnity of Boyer's delivery is brilliant. "I have signed many treaties, but this is the first time I am at peace", he tells her. Boyer's performance is many-layered and complex, neither hero nor scoundrel. Just very, very human.

This has got to be director Clarence Brown's best film. I really liked 'The Eagle', his sprawling silent epic with Rudolph Valentino, but as a rule I find his other Garbo pictures, 'Anna Karenina' first and foremost, vapid and lifeless.

I love a picture like 'Conquest' that affords detail in abundance, and I especially loved Maria Ouspensaya as Walewska' aging and dotty sister in-law who remembers nothing of the past 40 years. When she meets Napoleon in the parlor and he presents himself, incredulously, as the Empress of France, she smiles with tolerance, "This house is getting to be an insane asylum", she sighs, slightly scandalized. "Everybody who goes crazy thinks he is Alexander. If Alexander went crazy, who would he think he was?". "Napoleon, madame?", Boyer suggests.

Watch it. And watch out for its release on DVD.

She Hate Me (2004)

Bigoted, preposterous, homophobic

[3/10 · 30 May 2005]

This is one of the most infuriating films I have watched in a long, long while. It looks like some first-time scriptwriter couldn't get sufficient backing and then directed his script himself. No two scenes make sense when put together, the premise about the businessman getting paid $10,000 dollars each time he impregnates a lesbian is preposterous and embarrassingly realized here. It turns out that, committed lesbians or not, these gals just luuuuuuuuve our main man's sexual prowess and equipment, which is just about the most homophobic notion of any American film this whole decade.

On top of Spike Lee's blatant homophobia and the not too bright racial stereotyping, on top of all that put the hypocrisy of two lesbians talking the ex-fiancée of one of them into making an easy buck with his sperm, and afterwards, having impregnated 19 women, he feels he must pay in hell and now HE'S sorry he got THEM into it.

The whole thing is a mess and devoid of charm or intelligence. Anthony Mackie in the lead is a personable actor, not mention incredibly easy on the eyes, and I would love to see him in something worthwhile.

But it is going to take some time, before this monstrosity of a film is forgotten.

The Last Command (1928)

An ending worth waiting for

[7/10 · 30 May 2005]

Russian emigrant director in Hollywood in 1928 (William Powell) is casting his epic about the Russian revolution, and hires an old ex-general from the Czarist regime (Emil Jannings) to play the general of the film, and the two relive the drama and the memory of the woman they shared (Evelyn Brent), of 11 years before.

Try as I might, I feel it hard to warm to 'The Last Command' for all its virtues. 'The Docks of New York' was indubitably a great film, and 'Underworld' is a film I have always been craving to see, but 'The Last Command' is rather heavy-going. The premise is fascinating, but the treatment does really make the script come to life, except in the sequences set in Hollywood, depicting the breadline of employable extras and the machinations of a big movie production with state-of-the-art technology.

Emil Jannings is, predictably, a marvelous Russian general, distinguishing wonderfully between the traumatized and decrepit old ex-general, transfixed in his misery, and the vigorous, hearty officer of yore.

The ending is great and worth the wait, but in order to get there you must prepared to be slightly bored at times.

Paparazzi (2004)

Tasteless and trite

[5/10 · 29 May 2005]

Up-and-coming action movie-star, Bo Laramie, is almost killed with wife and child in a traffic accident, as the family was being chased by paparazzi photographers. And now he decides to go after them ...

The film's premise is interesting, investigating the vermin of the yellow press, but within the first half-hour 'Paparazzi' has already outstayed its welcome and has become as tasteless as the phenomenon it allegedly set out to scrutinize. First-time feature filmmakers, director Paul Abascal and writer Paul Abascal, do not begin to explore its issues and settles for something far less ambitious and trite. I was looking forward to an investigation of the penis-envy of the paparazzi and the need for a celebrity to preserve his integrity as opposed to his desire for fame. But I got nothing except a couple of not too professional filmmakers going to the motions of a B- picture.

Obviously, the movie would have made more sense and would have been infinitely more fascinating, had the paparazzi not been so abundantly awful, rapists, drunks, drug pushers, lechers, what have you. As if their profession were not reason enough to loathe them. And Dennis Farina is a travesty of Peter Falk's Colombo as the detective.

Hers to Hold (1943)

"Say a Pray'r for the Boys Over There"

[6/10 · 8 May 2005]

This was Deanna Durbin's third take on Penny Craig, who by now has grown into a beautiful young woman featuring in the gossip columns with tit-bits about her love life. She falls in love with dashing young pilot Bill, even volunteers for work at the aircraft factory where he works, but Bill is afraid to commit to her, and when he learns that he is about to go overseas and join the armed forces, he dumps her. But Penny is nothing if not resourceful ...

This is not among the handful of really wonderful Deanna Durbin vehicles, although sworn fans won't be disappointed. Her character here is a gutsy, no-nonsense go-getter, and it is quite a moving experience to watch and hear her, as she takes the podium in the factory canteen, singing first 'Begin the Beguine', this most glamorous of show smoochers, in her assembly-line outfit, no MGM glitzy witzy style her, and then when she touches everyone's heart with the languid and heartfelt 'Say a Pray'r for the Boys Over There', one of the great Durbin moments.

Joseph Cotten certainly never looked handsomer, oozing charming insolence, as aviator Bill.

Trader Horn (1931)

A parade of exotic animals

[6/10 · 8 May 2005]

'Trader Horn' is screen history. It influenced the evolution of the adventure epic immensely and was a direct inspiration for director W.S. Van Dyke's own effort from the year after, the first Tarzan movie with Johnny Weissmuller. 'Tarzan the Ape Man' is not among the best of the Weissmuller Tarzans, nor can I say of 'Trader Horn' that in itself it is a great movie by any standards.

Trader Horn is an experienced trader on the African savannas, and takes his young sidekick Peru on an extended journey to show him the wildlife and the fauna of his home in the wild. After being caught by a hostile tribe they escape with a white young girl who was abducted when she was a baby, and both Trader Horn and Peru fall in love with her.

Yes, it is very simplistic, no more than a pitch for a cartoon really. Trader's education of his young protegé is much too didactic to bring any kind of life into any work of fiction, but we do get to see a lot of exotic animals, which in 1931 would have been more than enough point. The film overall is brought down by Harry Carey's strangely unsympathetic portrayal of Trader. It is not so much his racism, that was a given in Western movies at the time, no escaping it, but Carey's Trader is sullen and mean-spirited and condescending to each and everybody, you tire of him quickly. And I got very severely fed up with his way of always addressing Peru as 'lad' or 'boy' in this fake Irish accent. Peru, played by dazzling young Spanish actor Duncan Renaldo, is nothing if not sweet, transcending matiné-idol cuteness, and you forgive him his delighted outburst, "They are not savages, they are just happy, ignorant children!" So watch it and appreciate its historical impact. Just don't expect a serious contender to any of the later and infinitely better adventure yarns.

6/10

Wonderland (2003)

Get it over with already!

[5/10 · 4 May 2005]

First of all: People who embark on 'Wonderland' in the hope of some cheap semi-pornographic titillation had better opt for P.T. Anderson's barely disguised John Holmes biopic 'Boogie Nights' instead. It is almost incidental to 'Wonderland' that John C. Holmes war a porn-star, actually it could be anyone caught up in the mess that is the plot of 'Wonderland'.

Personally, I lose interest interest in films devoid of redeemable characters, and 'Wonderland' is one such. Everyone in it is both plain unintelligent and violent and afraid to face reality. Holmes' first wife, valiantly played by Lisa Kudrow, is the exception, but why she continues to help her ex-husband out is a mystery to me, but I bow to the fact that the actual Sharon was probably like that. Holmes' teenage girlfriend Dawn is not terribly bright and quite incredibly naive, and as a film character none too interesting.

Holmes himself is portrayed without any bright shades. It's not that I distrust that interpretation, it just doesn't make for very involving cinema, if you don't care one way or another what happens to the protagonist. The film focuses on whether the four people that were bludgeoned to death on Wonderland Ave were just betrayed by Holmes, or whether he took actual part in their macabre murders. Problem is, again, the victims of the crime are as unsavory as their executioners, and to be honest I didn't care who killed whom, so long as they got it over with.

The film is marred by a frantic, mannered style that betrays the beginner in film-making. Every tiresome effect in the book of cheap narration is being utilised here, and after about ten minutes it was obvious to me that the director and cinematographer were running out of ideas.

Criminal (2004)

"What's with the raped-virgin look?"

[7/10 · 3 May 2005]

Con-man Richard (John C. Reilly) enlists Mexican petty thief Rodrigo (Diego Luna) as his new temporary partner, and soon they are engaged in a huge scam involving counterfeit money, being helped along by Richard's skeptical sister Valerie (Maggie Gyllenhaal).

In 'Criminal' you soon learn not to believe ANYTHING you see! It is an object lesson in distrust, but an engaging and wonderfully entertaining one. Who is going to f... whom over, that's what it is all about. Richard conned his two younger siblings out of their share of the inheritance after their mother, but he whines and bitches at every turn, and he proves himself to be both antisemitic and anti-black. When once again he has tried to cheat his new partner out of his cut, he exclaims, "What's with the raped-virgin look?". Richard is a terrible, terrible person, a thoroughly rotten apple who believes that "F...ing, that's when you're handcuffed on the pavement". Anything short of that he can deal with, squirming like a worm. Of his victims he says, "I don't feel anything for them. They're marks. Some of them are dumber than f ... pets!". John C. Reilly is very good in the part, although I found myself longing for just one other color on the palette, just some surprise, something not too predictable.

He says to Rodrigo, "You got something that money and practice can't buy, you look like a nice guy", and Diego Luna (the 'other' guy from 'And You Mother Too', alongside Gabriel García Bernal) has a puppy-dog appeal that works like a charm. He has genuine, unforced charm and is cuddly at all times.

Obviously, if you have watched 'The Sting' or films like the great French caper 'Les ripoux' ('My New Partner', 1984), 'Criminal' will offer you nothing new or sensational. It does have a really nice feel to it, though, taking its leisurely time to get rolling, enabling us to get to know these people. Or so we think ...

7/10

Tin Pan Alley (1940)

Great showpieces

[7/10 · 2 May 2005]

"All good-lookin' like he is, there's no use in getting' yourself all messed up", a black boy ponders, when 'Skeets' Harrigan (John Payne) drops out of a promising boxing career to pursue his dreams of becoming a renowned Tin Pan Alley song publisher with his friend from the Midwest, Harry Calhoun (Jack Oakie). On their way to the top they meet the Blane sisters, Katie (Alice Faye) and Lily (Betty Grable). 'Skeets' and Katie fall in love, but he is adamantly focused on his career and when he gives a song meant for Katie to a famous musical star, she has had it and leaves for London with her sister. That is when World War I erupts ...

'Tin Pan Alley' has more charm than it has plot, and it's a delightful watch with charismatic actors. Faye and Grable are a wonderful pair of tap-dancing sisters, Oakie is genuinely funny as the befuddled average Joe playing at being a tough guy, and John Payne, a Robert Taylor look-alike, clearly in a role that must have been written for typical Faye co-star Tyrone Power, rises to the occasion and delivers his all, a perfect mix of athletic hunkiness and crooning abilities, not the easiest performance to pull of, as 'Skeets' is quite callous in the way he presses forward.

The film abounds with great music and showpieces, 'Honeysuckle Rose' in Faye's very nice rendition with a boy chorus, 'The Sheik of Araby' featuring glorious tap-dancing by The Nicholas Brothers, the rousing "America, I Love You", and the only song actually written for the film, Harry Warren's 'You Say the Sweetest Things (Baby)", utilized to the fullest in a clever montage.

Shock Corridor (1963)

Bigotry for breakfast, ignorance for dinner

[10/10 · 2 May 2005]

This is one experience I'm not likely ever to forget, it is truly unsettling. One of the most ferocious, savage and disturbing films I have ever seen, and brilliant cinematic art on top of it.

Ambitious reporter has himself admitted to a mental hospital in order to solve a murder there. He poses as an incestuous brother to his 'sister' and real-life stripper girlfriend, and once inside gets to talk to all three witnesses to the murder. Gradually, though, his own mind starts to disintegrate ...

Was there ever an asylum like Samuel Fuller's? Hope not. One of the inmates is singing the Factotum Aria from 'Barber of Seville' around the clock, another savours the words "I am impotent and I like it", but they are the sanest ones. Of the three witnesses one imagines himself to be a general at Gettysburg but suddenly shifts and claims to be a Communist in reaction to "my folks (that) fed my bigotry for breakfast and ignorance for dinner" in a long pathetic virtuoso solo by actor James Best. One, a young black man, dresses as a Ku Klux Klan member, advocating white supremacy, expressing his loathing for blacks ("Oh, they're alright as entertainers, but ..."), and the third, a Nobel prize winner, has retreated into infantilism.

'Shock Corridor', which obviously turned out to be a cult favourite, directed by maverick independent filmmaker and former journalist Samuel Fuller, makes no excuses for itself, and its style is swaggeringly confident, blending pulp and downright tawdriness with high melodrama and noir, in unforgettable, dramatically lit images. Sometimes it's plain silly in its excessive irony, at other times searing in its empathy, and probably the most funny moments are those when the reporter (a wonderful Peter Breck) once more asks his increasingly absurd and irrelevant question, "Who killed Sloane in the kitchen?", and when he finally learns who, he forgets about it immediately! I cannot recommend this film enough, it is one of the great works of art of American cinema. No less.