Falkner1976

An interesting film written by Daniel Taradash and directed by Roy Ward Baker, it makes the most of the limitations of space, time, and characters it presents: it is shot in real time, in a few perfectly defined and interconnected locations, and with barely a dozen characters, including supporting characters.

Few films take the time to establish spatial relationships between the different locations in which they are set. Here, it begins in the hotel ballroom, connecting with Widmark's room via the radio, and connecting the two hotel rooms where the plot unfolds through the windows overlooking the courtyard on one side, and the elevator lobby on the other, first in an almost subliminal way when we see his wife in the background when Widmarck is on the phone. We can almost draw a map of the hotel. It's also interesting how it manages to connect the characters in the same shot through the telephone and the window. There is a subtle interplay of blinds to reveal, conceal, and invite. The sets, however, are very television-like.

The information about the characters is also provided in a very innovative way, very gradually, causing us to continually readjust our interpretations and expectations. Once things become clearer, the film loses interest.

On the one hand, Marilyn builds her character as a young woman gone mad in a very original and intelligent way, slowing down the tempo of her gestures, almost in a drugged limbo, and from the first moment she is unsettling and ambiguous. She also takes advantage of her legendary vulnerability. But in the close-ups, she talks about her fondness for hotels like Lorelei Lee about her passion for diamonds, and this is not a comedy.

Widmarck was already sufficiently accustomed to his character: Anne Bancroft is fine, but she has too many songs, and Elisha Cook Jr. (a supporting favorite if there ever was one) is magnificent as always in the role of the elevator operator and the girl's concerned relative.

In short, a highly recommended film for lovers of the good surprises that B-movies can give us.

The most surprising thing about watching Roma for the first time today, when Amarcord is of course already a classic favorite, is the extent to which its first twenty minutes are a rough draft of the masterpiece that would premiere just a year later.

Indeed, school scenes, characters (the irate father who eats his dish, the crazy teacher, various Volpinas...), shots of sporting and military celebrations with a Mussolini-esque aesthetic-everything accumulates in a jumbled fashion, and we will revisit it later in Amarcord, where it finally seems to find its place and purpose.

But Roma is more expressionist, more cluttered, more suffocating, and soon takes other paths; we cannot therefore consider it a superfluous rehearsal. Cinecitta's sets have never been more convincing or elaborate. The problem is that it is as spectacular as it is exhausting. Many of the scenes are magnificent, with a virtuosity rarely matched by Fellini himself (the shared dinner in the squares of Rome, the famous church procession, the symbolic disintegration of the frescoes, the final tourist route of the motorcycles). Others are somewhat drawn out (the traffic jam in the rain), and some are downright boring (the central section with the vaudeville show). But above all, it feels too insistent.

The driving force is Rome, both then and now, always Fellini's, a grotesque and exaggerated vision. But the insistence makes it not just hot, but sweaty, not just opulent but fat, not just poor but sordid, not just populist but downright vulgar.

Fellini himself appears shooting the film and is questioned by a group of young intellectuals about the approach he intends to take. He doesn't quite know how to answer, or if he even needs to answer. It's all very reminiscent of Fellini 8 1/2.

An unforgettable final surprise is the appearance of Anna Magnani.

Nino Rota's music seems limited to a pastiche of more inspired moments.

Stylistically, it's an absolute success. No one seems to have mastered the medium and adapted it to his vision like Fellini. The typical Fellinian world populated by eccentric, populaceous characters is extrapolated to the extreme, but here it seems to exclude everything else, and that's why it not only fascinates us but also bores us at times.

A film that can't help but have brilliant successes, that can't be considered minor, but that can't be included among the director's many masterpieces and great films.