frankde-jong

"Torn curtain" is about double espionage during the Cold War. It belongs to the many espionage films Hitchcock made, such as "The 39 steps" (1935), "Notorious" (1946) and "North by Northwest" (1959).

For a long time I thought that "The birds" (1963) was the last good Hitchcock movie, but recently "Frenzy" (1972, very good) made me doubt about this.

"Torn curtain" almost "re-assured" me that there really are weak late Hitchcock movies. In a couple of reviews this is attributed to the lack of chemistry between lead actors Paul Newman and Julie Andrews (contrary to Cary Grant and Eva Marie Saint in "North by Northwest"), but to be honest the storyline in the second half of the movie is just slow and unconvincing.

Hitchcock wouldn't be Hitchcock if even in a weak film there wouldn't be a couple of memorable scenes. For me those were the following scenes.

The murder scene, that is just as explicit as the famous "Frenzy" murder scene.

The scene in which doube spy Newman tries to extract information from an East German professor by pretending to be dumber than he really is.

The scene in the theatre which made me think of the famous Royal Albert Hall scene in "The man who knew too much" (1934).

"La balia" is based on a story by Luigi Pirandello and shot by cinematographer Giuseppe Lanci. Viewed in this way it can nearly be seen as a successor to the Taviani films "Kaos" (1984) and "Tu Ridi / Kaos 2" (1998), which were also adaptations of Pirandello short stories shot by Lanci.

In the film an upper class woman has a difficult child birth. After the birth she doesn't manage to feed the child. Her husband has to search a wet nurse on the country side.

The main theme of the movie is the triangle between mother - baby and nanny. The nanny does her work very good but that's just the reason why the mother feels sidelined.

A second theme is poverty. It is emphasized by the subplot of the husband of the nanny being in jail because of socialist political activities. In my opinion this subplot is unnecessary. Looking at the selection and recruitment proces of the nanny it is clear enough that there are hugh differences in power between the nanny and her boss.

The selection is done by putting all the fertile women of the village in a row and let them expose their breasts. It makes for a strange and uncomfortable image that somehow reminds of human trafficking.

In the recruitment it is taken for granted by the man that the nanny will outsource the care of her own child in order to take care of the baby of the boss.

Another review descibres the film as "subtle". That is truth, and in my opinion both a strength and a weakness. "Strength" because the most important relations are portrayed in a convincing way. "Weakness" because the story line contains very few surprises.

Yes there are underlying tensions between the mother and the nanny but don't expect plot twists like that in "The hand that rocks the cradle" (1992, Curtis Hanson).

Yes there grows a kind of intimacy between the father and the nanny but it remains (far) removed from an openly sexual relationship.

Norwegian films are on the rise. Just a few years ago a film from Norway was a rarity and the Norwegian film industry was small compared to their neighbors Sweden and Denmark. Hitchhiking on the success of Joachim Trier directors such as Erik Poppe and Dag Johan Haugerud also released successful films in recent years.

"Dreams" was the final episode in the Oslo trilogy of Haugerud that I saw. The Oslo trilogy of Haugerud was inspired by the "Three colors" trilogy (1993 - 1994) of Krzysztof Kieslowski and must be distinghuised from the trilogy of the same name by Joachim Trier.

The Oslo trilogy consists of the episodes "Sex', "Love" and "Dreams". Each episode highlights (sexual) relationships from an alternative / liberal angle. "Sex" was a bit too alternative for me. "Love" in which one lead character develops from changing sexual contacts to monogamous and the other lead character the other way round was better. "Dreams" is in my opinion the best episode of the trilogy.

In "Dreams" a teenager falls in love with her teacher. The film is less about what really happens in this relationship and more about the reaction of relatives (mother and grandmother) of the teenager.

The film portrays the relationship more or less as just a puppy love while in general a relationship between pupil and teacher is deemed unethical and unprofessional. That the portrayel in "Dreams" is nevertheless convincing depends I think in no small measure to the fact that both characters are female. A relationship between a male teacher and a female pupil would have been regarded far more toxic.

Funny thing is that in "Love" a similar thing happens in a relationship between doctor and patient. In this instance both characters were male.

Just as in the other episodes "Dreams" spent lots of (screen) time at the portrayel of Oslo. Walks from one home to the other are used to portray the different neighborhoods of Oslo without contributing much to the overall story. The images are beautiful so it didn't disturb me.

Last but not least do notice the symbolic way in which staircases are used.