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12 Angry Men (1997)
True to the original
My first thought upon discovering this film even existed was why remake a classic? And I delayed watching it as a result. When I finally did, I was sucked into the story all over again, and the time flew by. I loved how there was very little change in the original screenplay, including the ending, and I thought it was wise of Friedkin to resist the urge to tinker with things or put his spin on it. The cast is fantastic, with George C. Scott standing out as the testy old man played originally by Lee J. Cobb, and Tony Danza performing admirably as the baseball fan as Jack Klugman had done. Ossie Davis, James Gandolfini, Armin Mueller-Stahl, Mykelti Williamson, Hume Cronyn, Edward James Olmos, Courtney B. Vance, and Jack Lemmon all put their stamp on the film as well. The story is probably a little contrived, but it stands out as a beacon for rationality and discourse, the best our human nature can be, as well as how the justice system should operate. The power of that still resonated.
Philadelphia (1993)
Groundbreaking
"This is the essence of discrimination: forming opinions about others not based on their individual merits, but rather their membership in a group with assumed characteristics."
The prevailing attitudes of the period in which this film was made can't be forgotten while watching it, and it should be celebrated for the huge step forward it represented in humanizing gay people and dispelling myths about AIDS. It's unfortunate that the sexuality of the gay couple was suppressed which gives their relationship a certain watered down feeling, but it's a damn touching story, told with dignity and grace. The family was loving and supportive which was beautiful (though almost too loving and supportive), but there were conflicted feelings running through many of the characters, most notably Denzel's, which I thought was an effective way of getting the audience to examine its own feelings. It's not a film I jumped at the chance to re-watch, but it still held emotional power over three decades later. Also, Tom Hanks should narrate all operas.
The Sniper (1952)
Had potential
"You know how much coffee I've had today? 17 cups. The Brazilians oughtta give me a medal."
This film held lots of promise for me: beautiful location footage in San Francisco, 62-year-old Adolphe Menjou playing the lead detective, and a story of violence trying to get at the root of it, mental illness, and a plea for early detection and treatment. Unfortunately its views about sex crimes and psychology are amateurish by today's standards, and the way the police work is depicted left a lot to be desired. Because the women all do something to irritate the killer, the film doesn't come across as especially sympathetic to them.
The film is certainly more sympathetic to the killer himself, a man who was apparently abused as a child, and who feels rejection at every turn. That includes a woman in a bar who he lies to, a girl playing stickball, and a woman he delivers dry cleaning to who shushes him out the back door when her boyfriend is coming up. Arthur Franz is not exactly subtle playing the guy, turning on the angst in overwrought ways when these things happen to him. While the prologue points out statistics about violence against women, there is a certain distance viewers must have felt from a man literally using a sniper rifle against them. I thought the film would have made its points re: "sex crimes" better had he been a serial rapist, a much more pervasive problem, and if it had presented the women with more empathy.
The way some of the shootings are depicted is brilliantly abrupt, something that adds to the shock value. Unfortunately, the police work that follows is bizarre, including rounding up any men who've committed rape, "defilement," or peeping tom offenses for a strange lineup / questioning in front of a roomful of other cops, who all chuckle during the Q&A. Along the way there is an impassioned plea for a law to be passed for psychiatric treatment before they even really understand the criminal; even if the heart was in the right place, it seemed didactic and simple. By the time the final pursuit was happening, I was admiring the footage in North Beach more than I was the action.
Blondie of the Follies (1932)
Has its moments
"You must promise me never to speak to him again, or get out!"
"Alright, I'll get out! I'm gonna do what I want, I'm gonna live the way I want!"
Marion Davies is full of life in this film, which is at its best early on, when Blondie, her character, faces tension with her old-fashioned father as well as with her friend (Billie Dove). She's stayed out all night drinking with a rich man (Robert Montgomery) who's taken a liking to her, you see, and it happens to be the man her friend is in love with. The friend has moved up in the world via dancing at the Ziegfeld Follies, and the class comparison between the two during the Depression has a degree of weight, especially after Blondie's sister admonishes the father (You're just an old-fashioned father. The kind you see in the movies. That stuff don't go anymore.") and he has a tender reconciliation scene with her in the friend's luxury apartment.
I liked the liberation in the character even if her options for true independence were somewhat limited, and I thought Davies channeled modern women with her natural acting style. You'll also see her in a cute captain's uniform out on a yacht, as according to Mark A. Vieira in Forbidden Hollywood, per a William Randolph Hearst requirement, "every Marion Davies film had to include a sequence in which she donned men's clothes." It would have been interesting to see the planned scene to check this box, which was the Rocky Twins (identical Norwegian brothers) also dressing up in skirts and performing a number with Davies, but it never materialized.
More importantly, once Blondie has moved up in the world herself, the film doesn't seem to know what to do with itself. The back and forth with the love triangle got rather tiring, and after Blondie has become the kept woman of an oil man whose refrain is "I like blondes," he conveniently disappears from the story. Suddenly we get a Jimmy Durante cameo where he talks about Grand Hotel and does a John Barrymore impersonation, matched by Davies doing one of Garbo, complete with the line "I want to be alone." It was charming and reminded me of Davies' impressions in The Patsy (1928), but seemed oddly wedged in here. Drama then ensues, with her father dying and then a dangerous accident on stage, neither moment of which was as powerful as it could have been. This is watchable for Davies, but 91 minutes was too long for its meandering plot.
Dune: Part Two (2024)
Epic sci-fi
In my humble opinion, it would be preferable if the hero of this story was ultimately Chani (Zendaya), the Fremen warrior who sees through the mysticism ("This prophecy is how they enslave us!") and fights simply for her people and their land against powerful colonizers. The arc of Paul Atreides' character (Timothée Chalamet) who goes from being one with their cause and doubting the prophecy to becoming the Lisan al Gaib (the messiah) after drinking a little worm juice, er the water of life, would have been more compelling had it been ambiguous as to whether he was delusional and going to lead them all to ruin or exploit them himself. Maybe that's just me.
As it's only part two of at least three, it's hard to say how it will go (the film has already deviated from the book re: Chani) but regardless, it felt incomplete. I'm not sure if I felt that during the Star Wars trilogies and maybe it's unfair to feel it here. It's certainly delivers on its promise of being grand in scale, and the desert world and the struggle for its precious resources are recreated here quite well by Villeneuve. I'm less impressed by big battle scenes aided by CGI, but there is something undeniably thrilling about the sand worm riding and Zimmer's soundtrack. And even if it is incomplete, the high production value over 166 minutes make this a satisfying meal for sci-fi fans.
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (2011)
Entertaining, but beware
Rooney Mara is so wonderful playing this incredibly strong, intelligent character, and with several plot lines revolving rape and other acts of sadistic cruelty to women, this film has elements of feminism on top of being a thriller. Unfortunately there is a brutal, brutal rape scene that goes on for a very uncomfortable amount of time, and as there are also scenes of nudity and sex, it also felt a little voyeuristic. At a minimum, beware of being triggered.
Mara's character is like an avenging superhero against those who have brutalized women (including herself), and there is plenty of tension as a 40 year old mystery on a remote Swedish island is unraveled by her and an investigative journalist (Daniel Craig). I liked the dynamic between the two and how subtle the clues were. It also helped that the film was set in the harsh wintry snow, which provided for great atmosphere (seriously, watch this film under an electric blanket).
While I liked the story, it was confusing at times as members of the family are introduced in a blur early on. I also thought the young woman's powers started to feel exaggerated, including her photographic memory, ability to quickly hack literally any computer, and her taking down more than one abuser. Lastly, it seemed a mistake for Mara and Craig's characters to become lovers, like it was trying too hard to compensate for the rape and set up an avenue for acceptable ogling, or maybe provide an element of sadness to the ending, which otherwise would have been rosy on many fronts (including an aspect that continues on after the main mystery is solved).
Overall though, despite the disturbing parts, an entertaining, wild ride.
Sur mes lèvres (2001)
Entertaining
I liked the unique aspects of this romantic thriller from director Jacques Audiard - the unlikely, awkward leads, the time the film spent in her office place before any of the crime drama kicked in, and how the pair used leverage against one another in a variety of ways. It was hard to know where this was going and it may have been a tad methodical in getting there, but there were scenes of great tension and I appreciated the restraint Audiard used in giving them to us. Emmanuelle Devos and Vincent Cassel were incredibly natural and the film had an organic feeling to it for the most part, until it revered a bit towards more predictable elements of the genre towards the end - for example, the maneuvering for the final bit of lip reading, or the awfully convenient way the parole officer is removed from the picture. Overall, an entertaining and mature entry for the genre, one I enjoyed.
Córki dancingu (2015)
Fantastic
...And now for something completely different. Key words: mermaids, strippers, Polish musical, punk rock, euro synth-pop, Bildungsroman, fantasy, tragic romance. It's high energy, very stylish, and features the perfect casting of adorable Marta Mazurek and fierce Michalina Olszanska as the two mermaids. Their behavior spans a broad gamut and channels being seducers, objects of male attention, vampires, feral cats, romantic sweethearts, and most notably for the case of one of them, a young woman whose body is unappealing to a man she loves, so she decides to have surgery to suit him. With song lyrics speaking to loneliness and isolation and the theme of changing bodies in adolescence, there is something deeply human at the center of this fantasy, and its story is both empowering and poignant. Most of all, I loved how unique it felt. Impressive debut from Agnieszka Smoczynska.
Smoke (1995)
Nice ensemble piece
There's something elusive and profound about the photo album of 4,000 images taken one a day from the same street corner, or the story of Sir Walter Raleigh measuring the weight of smoke by subtracting the weight of a partially smoked cigar (plus its ash) from its original weight. There's a similar quality to the story of intersecting lives around a Brooklyn cigar store, lives which have been fractured in various ways and often with corporeal damage to boot. The little moments of empathy which float out of various crises are powerful because they're so quiet, a testament to Wayne Wang's restraint as a director, and because they come from people who are far from perfect. The dialogue is a little stagey and the accents were all over the map, but there are some fine performances here from the ensemble cast, with Harvey Keitel leading the way, and Forest Whitaker, Ashley Judd, and Stockard Channing all terrific too. The Christmas story and how it was told made for a great ending, one that probably nudged my review score up.
De battre mon coeur s'est arrêté (2005)
Entertaining
It's pretty far-fetched to think that at age 28, without having played piano in a serious way in ten years, that a ruffian working in shady real estate ventures could conceive of auditioning to become a concert pianist, but that's beside the point, and hey, he gives it a shot. It's a story of whether a man can overcome his violent instincts, and through music, elevate himself spiritually, something which I suppose could stand in for controlling other sorts of demons that many of us have.
Tellingly his mother was a pianist before passing away, but his father is just like him, a "businessman" who operates outside the law and needs to rely on force to get things done, turning to his son for that as he's now older. So it's also got an element of trying to break a generational cycle of behavior from father to son, and to choose a better path in life.
I liked those concepts, the brooding performance from Romain Duris, and the storytelling from Jacques Audiard, which held my interest from beginning to end. It was tough to empathize with the main character, however, as he did things like beat up immigrant squatters in the apartment buildings he and his associates had acquired through nefarious means, for example, by infesting one with rats. It's hard for him to control his temper and he also screws his buddy's wife, another layer of his impulse control issues. As he was the protagonist and portrayed as a cool, savvy, tough guy, he was a turn off for me and I struggled to invest in him, especially early on.
The film avoids becoming too simplistic a tale of 'can music tame the savage heart,' but not by much. Despite that, I liked the ending, which showed a progression but at the same time, a danger always lurking, something that could play out in different ways had the film kept going. A solid film, worth seeing.
Only Lovers Left Alive (2013)
Entertaining
"It's these zombies and the way they treat the world. I just feel like all the sand's at the bottom of the hourglass, or something."
"Time to turn it over, then."
Nice commentary about the decline of humankind through the lens of vampires who are more interested in the arts, creating music and literature, than in terrorizing people (who they call zombies). Not so nice on how heavily the old Christopher Marlow / William Shakespeare conspiracy theory is pushed, but I took it in fun. Despite its heavy themes and morose, suicidal lead character, there are low-key bits of humor dropped in which I liked, e.g. "You drank Ian." Also loved the vibes in both Detroit and Tangier, Jarmusch's impeccable way with mood, and the soundtrack.
Bai ta zhi guang (2023)
Depressing tone, cliche characters
A quiet study in the disappointments in life, told primarily from the perspective of a middle-aged man who is divorced from his wife, estranged from his father, and has set aside his dreams of writing poetry to become an online food critic. He develops a relationship with the much younger woman who takes photographs for him, and despite her quirky charm, we find that she's dealing with her own emotional baggage stemming from being adopted as a child. Meanwhile his elderly father who once served a year of hard labor for allegedly groping a woman on a bus, a charge he denied (and we're led to believe was untrue), has been bicycling 300km to Beijing to catch glimpses of him and his sister on their birthdays, unbeknownst to them. The man's ex-wife? Terminal cancer. His friends? They range from having multiple divorces, to being despondent over never having married, to committing suicide.
That should give you an idea for the depressing tone of the film, as all of these dreary things are slathered on rather thick. The only source of lightness is the man's adorable little daughter, who I wish we had seen more of. I don't count the manic pixie dream girl character as adding a lot of brightness because even she felt downbeat. Her character being a trope is part of a bigger problem though - these are all cliché characters, even if the performances from are all solid and feel natural. It's a shame because the film is so beautifully shot, and one I really wanted to like. I respected what it was trying to do but it felt lethargic and overlong, without really plumbing the depths of the things it played around with.
A Romance of Happy Valley (1919)
Needed more Gish
Lillian Gish getting lovey dovey in her cute hats is the highlight in this creaky old film, but it's interesting that her budding romance is set within the context of country vs. City, a dynamic that's carried forward to the present day. Here New York is referred to as "Sodom and Gomorrah" by a preacher when the young man she has an eye on has aspirations of moving there. He's played by Robert Harron who's got good screen presence as well, but unfortunately this story fizzles because it veers away from being a romance for too long.
In the city there is no great temptation that he faces, just an innocent request to go out "stepping" (dancing), which he declines, so that he and the film can instead spend time rather anemically on him trying to get a toy mechanical frog working, which was a bit like watching paint dry. When he eventually does return home, a crime drama is cooked up with a stranger, which is compounded by a near fatal case of mistaken identity. I don't know if the film was aware of the irony of the crime and violence occurring in the town instead of the den of iniquity of the city, but regardless, it was completely uninteresting, and I longed for Gish to return to the screen.
The Other Half of the Sky: A China Memoir (1975)
An interesting window into China in 1975, but a lot of propaganda
A difficult film to rate. Made at a time when China was softening after about a quarter century of isolation, it's an utterly unique window into the country, at least as it presented itself to this group of travelers led by Shirley MacLaine, as well as a window into their decidedly American reactions. The spirit of the undertaking is certainly noble. To travel to a place and meet its people always has a way of demythologizing it, and what one says, that "they're just human beings," cuts through preconceived ideas and stereotypes at the most basic level.
Unfortunately, it's also quite a propaganda piece. MacLaine is spoon fed the party line and the virtues of Mao in scene after scene. When she asks a couple of wives what they like about her husband, they talk about the purity of their partner's political ideologies. When she asks children what they want to be when they grow up, several state they want to be part of the People's Liberation Army and be a success for the revolution. The happiness of the people is on full display, all of the time, and it's a bit much.
In one of the more lucid moments, one of her traveling companions offhandedly says "They're programmed." In another, MacLaine practically touches the third rail with the hypothetical question about a genius artist who wants to create art not for the collective. The response is that such a person would be given the books of Marx, Engels, Mao, et al and "persuaded" to change his thinking. It's a terrifying answer alluding to re-education camps delivered through a smile, and not even over political dissent. There were no other hard questions or allusions to (for example) the terror of the Cultural Revolution, though while in China that would have been off limits to MacLaine and bad form besides, as she was a guest. She did seem to buy most of what she saw, however. It's a smaller thing, but she also repeated the myth that the Great Wall can be seen from the moon, perhaps an indication of her willingness to believe things.
On the other hand, seeing people and activities in China in this time held my interest. There are good points made about the advance of women's rights under Mao, though the comparison to the older women interviewed who had their feet bound when younger was not apt, as the practice had already been nearly eliminated before the Communists took power, something that isn't mentioned to MacLaine (nor does she ask). The exercises and games for small children instilling cooperation and the greater good seemed virtuous and beneficial, not indoctrination (at least at that age), though it's notable that similar teaching of cooperative behavior and simple ethics was also being done in Taiwan. Lastly, the Caesarean birth with acupuncture instead of anesthesia was pretty incredible, though far too graphically shown for my taste (seriously, beware if you're squeamish).
I corpi presentano tracce di violenza carnale (1973)
Entertaining
A nice blend of giallo and early slasher, I really enjoyed this. The visuals are beautiful, including the filming in the university town of Perugia, a killing out in a forest at night that felt positively primordial, and, it must be admitted, the ample female nudity. Sergio Martino is really over-the-top with his adoration/exploitation of breasts; even when they're covered, we often see nipples, including a scene early on where three women walking in the background are all braless, which I chuckled over. If gratuitous objectification is something that will bother you, this is probably one to skip.
While Martino doesn't show a lot of restraint in that department, he does when depicting the murders, which was effective. The tension in the scene in the house in the final act is gripping, and not because we see graphic violence or blood spraying everywhere. The pacing and buildup are quite good as well.
Aside from the unevenness of restraint, there are contradictions in other ways. There are moments that look quite real, like a guy without a helmet on a motorcycle crashing and pitching head first over his handlebars, and there are moments that are comically fake, like a little boy falling off a cliff, his arms and legs not moving a bit because he's obviously a mannequin (I laughed out loud and watched it again). The backstory relating to childhood trauma is ridiculous and highly cliched, but the film does a pretty good of keeping us guessing who the killer is, so it didn't matter too much to me.
Overall, this is well constructed especially for the genres, and one to see.
Barefoot Adventure (1960)
Window into an era
"Small wave riding has changed drastically over the years, but big wave riding hasn't. It's still basically a matter of survival."
There is something so pure about these old surfing films from Bruce Brown, made at a time when outside of Polynesia and Hawaii, the sport was in its infancy. Despite a low budget and relatively primitive technical gear, he captured fantastic footage of early surfers in various locations in California and Hawaii. At this point he was mostly interested in showing these to fellow surfers to fund the next set of adventures/films. In the introduction to this one, he recalls once renting a 1000 seat auditorium in Anaheim and having just six people show up. As the original narration to Barefoot Adventure was lost he dubbed it 30 years later but was still sharp on details, and this time lag allowed him to point out things with the benefit of perspective and how much things had changed.
For example, a new surfboard in 1960 cost $75, weighed 40 lbs, and the leash had not yet been invented. There were just six flights a day into Honolulu. We see Jack O'Neill wearing an early version of his wetsuit (which he turned into a very profitable business), and no wonder, with the water temperatures in Santa Cruz about 48F.
Brown is a little scattered in flitting us about from place to place, sometimes just for brief scenes, and sometimes a little repetitious in the information he gives us. Some of places which stood out included the big waves of Oahu (at Waimea Bay Sunset Beach, and Makaha), various places in SoCal (Brooks St at Laguna Beach, The Wedge at Newport Beach with its treacherous body surfing, and Huntington Beach Pier), and in Santa Cruz (Steamer Lane, Pleasure Point).
Surfers include Del Cannon, the "Sir Laurence Olivier of Surf Films," Joey Cabell, who has "one of the smoothest and most graceful styles in surfing," and 15-year-old Robert August (who would later appear in Brown's legendary film, The Endless Summer). There are many others, including more unique fellas like Don Golden, who pioneered kayak surfing. It's a little too bad we didn't see more of the only woman surfer who appears, 14-year-old diminutive Joey Hamasaki of Hawaii.
In addition to the surfing wipeouts (of which there are many) and the goofing around which Brown freely admits was corny, we also get the majesty of enormous waves in Hawaii that were impossible to surf following a storm. As for the hijinks, they provide a little comic relief, but it was unfortunate that Brown spent time mocking the old lady tourists taking hula lessons. Maybe the best moment was when he pretends Del Cannon has his brakes go out while driving downhill. Brown deadpans: "Dell said, 'fasten your seatbelts!' Walt said, 'They haven't invented them yet!'" leading to Walt using a rope to lasso a tree and eject himself from the vehicle, which I chuckled over. I'm not sure the rather dramatic blowing up of the car later out in the field and then leaving it there was such good karma, particularly as he points out that Hawaiians weren't always friendly (I was thinking, hmm no wonder).
Overall, certainly not a masterpiece, but as with his other surf films, hypnotically mesmerizing to me, and a great window into an era.
Dramma della gelosia (tutti i particolari in cronaca) (1970)
A little too zany
It was interesting to see Marcello Mastroianni in a role so counter to his usual polished, urbane type, and the same goes for Monica Vitti. This is a zany comedy, one that feels very much of the period, and Ettore Scola uses creativity telling its story, like characters breaking the fourth wall or having us listen in on their thoughts. He certainly doesn't portray Rome in an idealized way; what we see is a dirty mess, especially that beach, but that and the police using force to break up a rally for the communist party are the bits of political commentary he sneaks in here. If only there had been more content along those lines, or at least a little bit of seriousness in the characters of this love triangle. Unfortunately it's all wacky comedy given to us at a manic pace. It felt like it was trying too hard, or in any event, just wasn't funny to me, and my interest waned over the second half. The tragedy of the story failed to resonate because these characters felt too silly to ever really invest in. If you're new to Scola, I would highly recommend checking out We All Loved Each Other So Much instead.
You and Me (1938)
Crime doesn't pay
That moment when Sylvia Sidney and George Raft are going in opposite directions on the escalator and reach out to caress each other's hands in passing is so sweet. She also looks mighty fine with her hair tousled in the shower. This pair under the direction of Fritz Lang, who tries his hand at some experimental things during an otherwise conventional post-Code film, make this a passable effort despite its heavy-handed, rosy messaging re: crime not paying.
Both stars play ex-convicts who have re-entered the work force at the same department store. He's finished his parole, and she has a month or two to go. The owner of the store is a humanistic figure who believes that ex-convicts can be rehabilitated, and moreover (as he explains to his exasperated wife), that they need a job or otherwise they'll be forced to return to a life of crime. Bravo to that.
The pair get married but there are sources of tension all around. For one thing, his old gang is pressuring him to do one more robbery. More importantly, she hasn't told him about her past, or that because she's still on parole, she's not legally allowed to get married. He becomes suspicious and eventually finds out the truth, something which makes him blow his top. As he expresses his ire, I loved the power of his icy glare, even if it felt like his character was being unfair to her.
The Expressionistic cinematography is beautiful and Lang does some unexpected things with musical numbers as well, including a song at the opening of the film and the bit with the ex-convicts reminiscing over prison and how they would communicate with one another via different patterns of knocks. Unfortunately, there's also a ridiculous "crime doesn't pay" lecture from Sidney, who is literally at a chalkboard performing math for the crooks who've already been caught, disarmed, and made to promise they'll show up on time to work the following day. It's all a bit much, even to a sap like me.
The Velvet Vampire (1971)
Terrible acting, but campy as hell and kinda fun
"I think I'd like to drive your buggy."
The good: the desert scenery (those Joshua trees!), the female empowerment (there from the beginning, in an attempted rape), and the soundtrack (blues singer Johnny Shines, the acoustic guitar during dream sequences, and electronica during dramatic ones). The use of color added visual flair, and I liked the ending too.
The bad: the acting is terrible and perhaps only matched by the inane dialogue in the script. Along those lines, the chase in the penultimate scene felt like it came out of a student film project. The double seduction was probably edgy for the period, but it never felt like it fired on all cylinders because the performances had no passion.
Overall: obviously not great, but fun for a B movie, and wisely only 80 minutes. Kinda funny that I had just seen a yellow dune buggy of another sort in the Aussie low budget film Alison's Birthday (1981) too.
Non si sevizia un paperino (1972)
Entertaining
In one of this film's strongest moments, the townsfolk commit a brutal murder out of superstition, and it's never investigated. One of the cops alludes to needing to arrest the whole town if he was to do something about it, which is a pretty damning indictment of the backward villages in what appears to be Basilicata (or thereabouts). But in an even better moment, as the bloody victim crawls to the edge of a roadway, affluent passing motorists with families, presumably on their way to a city while speeding through the Italian equivalent of "flyover country," see and ignore the victim. Yes, there's a serial killer of children on the loose, but how about these other people from both walks of life, Fulci says.
This is certainly a solid giallo, helped by the rugged countryside and a cast which includes Barbara Bouchet and Irene Papas. That title is something too, though if you're concerned, rest assured, no live ducks even appear, much less get harmed. It does tend to creep along rather slowly in places which is a drawback, particularly as it goes through a couple candidates for the murders who are obviously going to turn out to be red herrings. I guessed the killer early on, though maybe this was more of a surprise shocker for 1972, and certainly must have been controversial. The final scene on the cliffs is pure camp. Overall, not a masterpiece, but enjoyable.
C'eravamo tanto amati (1974)
Masterpiece
"The future passed us by. We didn't even notice."
Ettore Scola's We All Loved Each Other So Much is an homage to cinema, a critique of Italy over the three decades following the war, and a bittersweet look at how people can be so tightly connected at a certain time and place, but then have very different trajectories in life from there. That includes how friendships and loves can be found, but how they can also be destroyed in an instant, or alternatively, sustained despite separation. It also includes how ideals can be sacrificed or rigidly adhered to, both to great detriment, and how paths not taken can haunt someone with the feelings of what might have been. It's funny, intelligent, and sentimental, and had an ending that left me tingling.
You can't be on much firmer ground than helping to beat the Nazis in WWII, and that's where the three main male characters meet: Gianni (Vittorio Gassman), Nicola (Stefano Satta Flores), and Antonio (Nino Manfredi).
Gianni is a lawyer after the war, and soon finds himself with the unpleasant possibility of defending a rich owner of a construction firm who faces all sorts of corruption charges (Aldo Fabrizi). The man has no problem firing someone and paying them half of what they're owed, using the Tiber for sewage, or building luxury housing instead of public housing. He says to Gianni, "When you win the struggle with your conscience, you win the struggle of existence," and unfortunately these are the words Gianni learns to live by. Gradually we see him rise in power and wealth through this channel, first by marrying the man's daughter Elide (Giovanna Ralli). It's as if he's sold a bit of his soul relative to morals in business as wealth as the truth of his heart, because he still thinks of a woman he loved, Luciana (Stefania Sandrelli).
Elide's arc from lovestruck klutz to a refined but lonely woman is incredibly poignant. It's a telling moment when she's in bed with Gianni, wearing an awkward retainer and reading The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck (in Italian, titled Furore, or Fury), seemingly haven gotten what she wanted by marrying him, but in her innocence (and perhaps a sign of his selfishness even in bed) having to ask him "what does 'orgasm' mean?" She's devoted to him and trying to grow as a person, but in just the scene before, he was thinking about the fight he had with Luciana that ended their relationship. Later in life, she thinks of Antonioni's The Eclipse as leaving her stunned, that "Other artists have plumbed the depths of the feminine soul, shining a light into its solitude, and its incommunicability with the rest of humankind." The scene with him communicating to her the last time she was alive as well as when she's died are heartbreaking and brilliant.
Meanwhile, Nicola is a professor after the war, one whose strong leftist political ideas defending neorealist films for their commentary on the bourgeois causes him to lose his job. Of De Sica's films he says "It allows us to pinpoint the true enemies of the citizenry: the false defenders of gracefulness, poetry, and beauty, and of all the hypocritical values of your bourgeois culture!" He's a true fan of cinema, in one iconic moment re-enacting Sergei Eisenstein's Battleship Potemkin on the Spanish Steps in Rome, but the trouble is, he's intellectual to an extreme and rather irascible. After getting sacked, he separates from his wife and son and attempts to become a movie critic. There's a hilarious scene where he's on a televised quiz show 'Double or Nothing' and blows a question on his beloved Bicycle Thieves because he tries to provide more information than he's being asked. It's funny but one of the things he blows is a chance to reunite with his wife and son, something he could have done if he hadn't gambled on trying to answer another question.
Federico Fellini and Michelangelo Antonioni are honored in this film, but it's dedicated to Vittorio De Sica, and through Nicola most of all, feels like a special tribute to him. De Sica had died just a month before it was released, and it feels like Scola was speaking directly to him when Nicola is attending De Sica's speech and he thinks this when prompted to go talk to his idol, lines which gave me goosebumps.
"I ought to talk to him about other things: grand illusions, hopes, disappointments. We thought we could change the world, but the world changed us. Sad and depressing tales for me and probably for him too."
In contrast to the other two lead male characters, Antonio is the purest of heart and works as a humble porter, then a stretcher-bearer at a hospital. One day he meets Luciana and falls in love with her for life, and it's through this devotion that most of his story is told.
As the three men who surround Luciana all seem to represent different classes of Italians (Antonio: blue-collar worker, Nicola: radical intellectual, Gianni: the corrupt wealthy), it's easy to think of her as representing the soul of Italy being tugged in each of these directions (maybe too easy). Seeing her move between men, loving Gianni so much that she attempts suicide after they break up, and trying to find work as an extra for Fellini as he films La Dolce Vita at Trevi Fountain all provide great moments, but none are better than when at the end Gianni confesses he's always loved and thought of her and she says "Well I haven't." and that "It's in the past now," which was sensational.
Early on, Scola has Luciana and Antonio attend Eugene O'Neill's Strange Interlude, which aside from being funny (Antonio is bored and squirms when he's told they're only in act 3 of 10), introduces us into the play's technique that Scola will use himself, that of letting us in on a character's thoughts while those around them freeze and fall silent. He doesn't overdo it, and as the thoughts are always those conveying the greatest sense of emotion and vulnerability, it's extremely effective. Scola does other things, like that glorious fade into color on the street artist working in chalk as he moves the story forward in time, or Antonio imagining himself talking to Luciana dubbed onto a scene of (fittingly) Of Human Bondage (1964) with Kim Novak and Laurence Harvey.
How the main characters meet for dinner after a chance encounter 25 years later sets the stage for a stirring ending. The camaraderie between Antonio and Nicola devolves into political arguments and a fight, but it's Gianni who Scola sets his sights on. "Our generation is truly disgusting," Gianni thinks at the table, when the viewer knows it's really him, with his heart that's two sizes too small and his empty riches, who is disgusting. Scola gets some commentary in on the issues continuing to plague Italy even after the progress of legalizing divorce (which didn't happen until 1970), including "fascist terrorism, political cover-ups, economic crises, embezzlements, and high corporate profits." We see Luciana waiting in a giant line outside of a school which has limited admission, hoping to be one of those whose lottery numbers are drawn, an apt metaphor for how the system is failing the people.
I suspect there are all sorts of bits about politics and about Rome that I missed, which must make the film even more meaningful to Italians. One little example that I caught on to is a character quipping "Ridi ridi che la mamma ha fatto i gnocchi" ("Laugh, 'cause mom made gnocchi"), which he humorously attributes to Dante, but is an idiom said ironically to people who are laughing when they shouldn't be.
The soundtrack is also a highlight, feeling completely in sync with the bittersweet sentimental notes in the film, and the standout being the recurring E io ero Sandokan. It's a song about the brotherhood of the partisans fighting in the war, and it was incredibly meaningful that Antonio and Nicola were singing it with others around a fire while Gianni was declaring his love for Luciana in the hope he could take her from Antonio again. The lyrics to this song in English include these lines:
"We were all ready to die
But we never talked about death
We talked about the future
If destiny sets us apart
The memory of those days will always keep us together"
It's notable that even to the pure Antonio, a man who would generally stick together with his war buddies forever, the sight of Gianni at his mansion, diving into his pool is too much for him. He doesn't envy Gianni, he pities him. I adored this ending, how it closed the circle back to the beginning, and was followed with the dedication to De Sica.
Kings of Pastry (2009)
des compétences incroyables
Those who like cooking competition shows will probably like this documentary, which follows three master pastry chefs competing for the prestigious Meilleur Ouvrier de France. The level of their craftsmanship is stellar, the artistry in their creations exquisite, and the tension as they scramble to finish (while not breaking anything!) palpable to say the least. Imagine attempting to do the most intricate sculpture imaginable out of sugar, but with judges watching you like a kettle of hawks. As the competition is held every four years, it felt like the Olympics.
After a bit of a slow start the film picked up when we started seeing chef Jacquy Pfeiffer in his planning phases in Chicago, and it never let up from there. Pennebaker and Hegedus weaved together the human elements of the chefs they focused on, their family and supporters, as well as got a pretty impressive level of access into the competition itself. Along the way we get at least inkling of the many technical challenges (e.g. Humidity being an enemy of sugar), but mostly it's just a marvel to behold these creations. The only thing off for me was the soundtrack, which was annoyingly jaunty and felt unsophisticated, which wasn't a great match for the skill and precision the chefs were displaying.
L'hippocampe, ou 'Cheval marin' (1935)
Decent early documentary
For 1935, a reasonably good short documentary about such a unique creature, the seahorse. The footage of the male giving birth to hundreds of offspring by spasmodically squeezing them out of its pouch, while captured in an aquarium, is fascinating, and Painlevé does convey information in addition to reveling in how "exotic" they are. I'm not sure all of it was completely accurate, as he says the largest seahorses are two feet long and googling around says about one, but this was nearly 90 years ago after all. He also has a tendency to attribute human characteristics to the seahorse, e.g. It's upright posture giving it a pompous air, or its eyes having an anguished expression. Lastly, beware, there are also moments of dissection to show the internals of the seahorse which were a bit jarring, at least to this viewer.
Someone's Watching Me! (1978)
A little uneven, but impressive for TV in 1978
"Rape is when a man consciously keeps a woman in fear."
For a made-for-television film that has a fairly predictable, linear story line, which is a woman being relentlessly stalked, this is entertaining and has a few nice bits of social commentary sprinkled in. That starts with a tough female character (Lauren Hutton), who refuses to hide and even breaks in to the suspect's residence a couple of times. She's also good under pressure at her job, funny, and sexually free (with a supportive new boyfriend, David Birney).
One of the woman's friends (Adrienne Barbeau) is open about being a lesbian, and she's a good, completely "normal" person, pretty bold for TV in 1978. There's also a sleazeball at work early on who has to be told "no" over and over again, which I thought echoed the main story and showed what women have to go through on the job, especially in this period. Meanwhile, in response to her complaints, the police are almost completely useless, and don't believe her as an eyewitness to an attack on her friend.
What holds the film back a bit is the scripting of the character motivations for the woman, which are geared more to produce tension than to make complete sense. For one thing, she doesn't close her curtains or unplug her phone when the harassment ramps up. When she does break into the suspect's apartment, a scene with heavy Rear Window vibes, I wondered why in god's name she wouldn't take the man's log of his badgering calls as evidence and flee, instead of focusing his telescope back on her apartment (oh, so she can see her friend attacked of course), or later why she would pull her desk over on top of herself awkwardly while frightened (ah, so she can discover the listening device he's planted underneath it).
All in all though, a solid effort, completed right before Carpenter began making his breakout film, Halloween, and definitely one to check out for fans of his.
Alison's Birthday (1981)
Has its moments
This indie Australian horror film is not without its charms, but it's very derivative of Rosemary's Baby, and so obvious about it from the beginning that its simple plot loses most of its sinister energy. I liked the natural chemistry and performances of the two leads (Joanne Samuel and Lou Brown), the yellow dune buggy he zips around in, and the scene in the graveyard that ends with him using a pitchfork to pole vault over a fence, which I chuckled over. The ending was pretty good too. There just wasn't a lot of horror or even life to this overall, and when I learned it had been made for television initially, I wasn't surprised.