Track the Films You Watch (2011) - Page 2

Shanghai Express - Figured I might as well go from one Marlene Dietrich flick to another (having watched A Foreign Affair the day before). Like most of von Sternberg's films, I didn't really develop a deep affection for it, but I found it highly enjoyable and very well done. Actually, this is now one of my favorites by him. A well-brewed mix of drama, comedy, romance and action with a few interesting characters, but the main draw is Marlene. She constantly appears to be in complete command of the situation, utterly unflappable... and yet her darting eyes belie a nervous insecurity. In a film full of magnificent shots, most of them are centered around her face. But one of the most striking images doesn't show her face at all. As her travelling companion (and presumably fellow prostitute) Anna Mae Wong is being raped, Dietrich goes into her compartment and turns out the light. All we see is a shaft of light from outside, illuminating her hands, clasped in prayer. A marvelous shot. The real drawback of this film is that I really didn't care to see her hang all her love on a clod like Clive Brook. Oh well. Rating: 8

Caro diario - Writer/director Nanno Moretti presents a three-part video "diary" of sorts. In chapter 1, he tools around on a Vespa, talking to various people (including Jennifer Beals, proving she can't act in two languages), admiring the architecture, visiting the site of Pasolini's murder. In chapter 2, he goes island-hopping with his television-obsessed buddy. In chapter 3, he traverses a medical labyrinth in an epic quest to cure his incessant itch. Although each part has its charms, not all are successful. I was mostly annoyed with his persona in the first chapter, and was kind of dreading that the whole movie would consist of him harassing random passersby. The next section fares slightly better, although TV guy gets old quick and culminates in a rather dumb bit of comedy. I really enjoyed the third part, which goes the furthest in terms of experimenting with the form and it also seems the most personal (although I have no idea exactly how autobiographical it is, if at all). The film as a whole reminded me a great deal of one of my favorite authors, Italo Calvino. Not just because of the shared nationality, but also the freewheeling narrative structure and also... oh, how do I put this... casual humanism? Just the attitude of it. I ought to have liked this more, but the real barrier for me was I just didn't care for Moretti as a screen presence. Maybe the first segment soured me too much on his personality. Rating: 7


The Marquise of O - Rohmer's only German-language film at first appears to be an ill-advised attempt at a period piece, dull and dreary. Eventually it unfolds to be a pointed critique of early 19th-century morality, and a rich exploration of cruelty and forgiveness. The story develops one wrinkle after another, and the interplay between characters -- although buried in typical period stodginess -- is as revealing as Rohmer's contemporary work. Terrific performances from all four principals: Edith Clever, Bruno Ganz, Edda Seippel and Peter Lühr. And such remarkable photography by Nestor Almendros. Gorgeously lit scenes arranged in compositions that can only be called "painterly". In fact, this may be the film's biggest drawback... the tableaus are so artfully composed that they lend the proceedings a certain artificiality. This hinders the film from being as deeply involving as Rohmer's other movies, but it still packs a punch. Rating: 8

Departures - A laid-off cellist finds work preparing bodies for cremation. I thought the cast (including familiar faces from Bright Future, Café Lumiere, The Bird People in China, and Hana and Alice) was wonderful, very personable and mostly genuine. The film is not quite as profound as it seems to aspire to, but is very engaging and hard not to be moved by. A handful of the emotional beats are a little too easy and/or predictable, but most of them are nonetheless effective and there were several moments that choked me up a bit. As for the bits of black comedy, most of them work as well. As a mild Japanophile, I really enjoy seeing any fresh perspectives on the culture, and I just love those little villages. Rating: 8


Out 1: Spectre - I have a lot of different thoughts about this and no idea how to organize them. So I won't even try.

I have to start with a caveat. The copy I watched was of horrible quality. It looked like someone pointed an old video camera at an old television and taped it, then uploaded it to YouTube. It's certainly possible that I would have enjoyed the movie more with a proper presentation. I hardly feel qualified to comment on the photographic aspects, but I will say I didn't see anything that struck me as particularly good camerawork, except the occasional use of mirrors.

How do you cut a 12.5 hour film (Out 1: noli me tangere) down to 4 hours? What's in those other EIGHT HOURS that's so unimportant it can be removed? Do they flesh out the shadowy "conspiracy" that's always being alluded to... or is it just more of the same random pieces of non-information?

And what am I supposed to make of this mysterious plot, involving "the 13" and the often-referenced-but-never-seen Pierre and Igor? Perhaps it flew over my head because I don't know enough Balzac or Aeschylus, but I had the impression that there was no logical story behind it. The fact that most of the film was improvised explains much, but excuses nothing. Watching people "make it up as they go along" is usually just as boring as listening to someone describe his dreams. Why should I care about something inherently meaningless, if it can't at least be entertaining?

And little of this is entertaining. I really enjoyed Juliet Berto's character, and Leaud was mostly interesting, but whenever it cut to the theater groups I was bored out of my skull. Their plays looked absolutely fucking terrible and I was pleased when eventually they stopped rehearsing them. However, I will also say that around the final hour and a half, I started to become slightly more engaged, as the plot seemed to thicken. Although I still wasn't very connected to the personalities involved, I found myself wanting to know more about the conspiracy, despite being aware that there probably wasn't anything else to know.

So is the point of all this just the structure of it? Because as intriguing as it is, it's not intriguing enough for 4 hours (much less 12) with the content being so barren. Why is it so highly regarded? Well, I really really hate to get this dismissive, but it's got two aces in the hole. One, it's extremely long. I think people hate to admit they sat through something this long without it being some kind of transcendent experience. Granted, some of my favorite films (Satantango, War and Peace, The Decalogue) are massive, but not every epic-length movie needs to be canonized. And I'm hard-pressed to think of one that isn't. The other thing about this movie is that it's hard to see. People LOVE to be part of a special club. It's like you get to rub everyone's nose in it: "Oh yeah, I saw that, it's the most amazing ever... too bad you'll probably never get to see it nyah nyah!" I don't want to write off all Out 1 fans as disingenuous liars, but I bet a lot of them are. Or at least are kidding themselves to some degree.

Still, I was somewhat intrigued, especially after I had settled into the film for a while. I would possibly give it a second chance, especially if it was a good presentation of the longer version. And it certainly hasn't soured me on Rivette. But my first impression isn't nearly as strong as it was for La belle noiseuse or Celine and Julie Go Boating. Rating: 5


Cul-de-sac - Here Polanski shows a slightly better knack for comedy than in Fearless Vampire Killers. Slightly, but not much... though it's an amusing farce, only once did it bring me close to an actual laugh. But the interplay between Donald Pleasance, Françoise Dorléac (Catherine Deneuve's sister, who died tragically young) and Lionel Stander is inspired, and the film has a few sly comments about gender roles and 60's social politics. Most impressive was cinematography, with imagery rivaling that of Repulsion. Few comedies have such strong visuals. Fun, but falls short of greatness. Rating: 7

01/08/11: VIOLENT BLOOD BATH (Jorge Grau, 1973)

I had never heard of this one until recently, but was definitely intrigued by the involvement of “Euro-Cult” exponent Grau as well as stars Fernando Rey and Marisa Mell. The sensationalistic English moniker suggests a Giallo or even a Gangster epic, but this is a relatively serious treatise of schizophrenia coupled with a plea against capital punishment (PENA DE MUERTE being the film’s original title).

The plot is interesting: Rey is a stern ageing judge who goes on holiday, only to find the crimes of people he had sentenced to the guillotine years before literally coming back to haunt him!; Mell is the man’s much-younger dissatisfied wife (also irritated by his OCD!) who eventually rekindles a romance with writer Espartaco Santoni, actually there to compile data for his next book – which just happens to revolve around her husband’s illustrious career! The subsequent investigation into the multiple murders also takes in a local Police inspector, a girl whom Rey had befriended and who had connections to one of the latest crime scenes, and her actor boyfriend; both the latter and Santoni himself (being familiar with the trials of the original cases, of which we are given intermittent snippets, he is obviously knowledgeable of their killers’ modus operandi) are among the initial suspects.

Still, the identity of the perpetrator of the copy-cat killings is not at all hard to guess; in fact, it is virtually a replica of the latter-day Boris Karloff vehicle THE HAUNTED STRANGLER (1958) sans face-twitching antics! As I said, the film makes little concessions to the sleaze and gore which typically exemplified the “Euro-Cult” style – perhaps the presence of Luis Bunuel regular Rey inclined the director towards a more level-headed approach here (though, to be fair, this was also true of the two other efforts of his I have watched so far, and his most popular, BLOOD CEREMONY [1973; whose viewing actually followed in quick succession to the title under review!] and THE LIVING DEAD AT MANCHESTER MORGUE [1974]).   

01/09/11: BLOOD CEREMONY [International Version] (Jorge Grau, 1973)

This is one of those films I said I would watch immediately upon acquiring (in view of its reputation) but only got to check out at a much later stage. Incidentally, I had agonized about whether to purchase the MYA DVD or not because it only featured the clothed Spanish print; eventually, I settled on a fuzzy-looking edition (with at least one noticeable audio drop-out) of the more explicit "International Version" accompanied by unremovable Finnish subtitles! Curiously enough, the copy I watched ran for 86 minutes…though other sources claim its full-length as being 102!

This is the fourth film I have watched revolving around the legend of Hungarian aristocrat Erzebet Bathory after Hammer's COUNTESS Dracula (1971; in which she was portrayed by the late Ingrid Pitt), Harry Kumel's modern-day rendition DAUGHTERS OF DARKNESS (1971; with Delphine Seyrig) and the third episode of Walerian Borowczyk's IMMORAL TALES (1974; with Paloma Picasso, Pablo's daughter!). I was let down by the Hammer version and, while I admire Borowczyk, the above-mentioned film was not one of his strongest; Kumel's is easily the best of the lot, though it is deemed too arty by some.

To get back to Grau, I was very much impressed with BLOOD CEREMONY: it presents a reasonably authentic period and location sense (complemented by Carlo Savina's evocative score) but, more importantly, the plot holds the attention amid the expected violent/nude highlights. Interestingly, Lucia Bose''s Bathory here is not the historical one but rather a descendant of hers who, noticing her looks fading away, is persuaded by her devoted female servant to follow in her ancestor's footsteps; though the original Bathory was said to have killed hundreds of virgin girls and bathed in their blood to sustain her youth, we only get a handful of murders here (though they undeniably exude a kind of gruesome beauty) and, in a couple of cases, one seriously doubts their all-important virtuousness!

The film puts forward a number of interesting embellishments to the familiar tale: there is a vampire plague before the protagonist even begins her depredations – though this is eventually revealed as a sham by the skeptical local doctor Silvano Tranquilli; still another 'undead' appears in the form of Bathory's own aristocratic companion – played by Espartaco Santoni (as in Grau's own previous effort, VIOLENT BLOOD BATH [1973], he cuts quite a dashing figure here) – whom she 'wills' into procuring her prey!; an unusual development, and possibly a first in the vampire subgenre, has Bose' being haunted by the decaying corpses of her victims; later still, after she catches Santoni being unfaithful with village beauty Ewa Aulin (this was a fine swan-song for the CANDY [1968] starlet, even if her own role was somewhat underwritten), she kills him and, while his corpse is being tried for his vampiric activities(amusingly presided over by a judge named Helsing!), she calmly confesses all and has no qualms about implicating her elderly accomplice as well!! Their subsequent punishment is quite harsh: the latter has her tongue sliced out, while both are walled up alive inside Bathory's mansion; by the way, the film features some gratuitous animal cruelty to boot (such as falcons chewing on live doves and truant children setting a bat bound to a tree on fire!).

Surprisingly, Bose' flourished in this field during the decade – including another collaboration with Aulin, the underrated Giallo THE DOUBLE (1971); she is ideally cast here, though not quite as memorable as Seyrig had been (on a personal note, both actresses had worked for my favorite film-maker, Luis Bunuel, as did character actress Lola Gaos, here playing a sort of witch who advises Aulin on matters of love). The film is extremely well-made for a "Euro-Cult" product (though, again, it does not scale the classy heights of DAUGHTERS OF DARKNESS)...and I am not sure it is not actually superior to Grau's more renowned take on another much-abused monster, the zombie, in THE LIVING DEAD AT THE MANCHESTER MORGUE (1974)! Incdentally, that same year also saw the release of two other excellent Spanish horrors, namely Claudio Guerin Hill's A BELL FROM HELL (completed by Juan Antonio Bardem after the latter's mysterious death) and Bardem's own THE CORRUPTION OF CHRIS MILLER. As for Grau himself, I still have to catch up with his SUMMER NIGHT (1962), an award-winning drama with a good cast (including yet another Bunuel alumnus in Francisco Rabal!)...  

Into the Wild - So Sean Penn stars in The Thin Red Line, and thinks to himself, "oh, I can do that".  He's actually not too bad as an ersatz Malick, but the influence is clear... lots of reflective voice-over narration, swooping nature shots, slow motion and the like.  I admit I hated it at first, because I felt like the film was romanticizing a smug, self-righteous little prick, but eventually Chris McCandless becomes a more sympathetic character who learns a couple of important lessons.  The introduction of a few voices of reason definitely helped.  What didn't help was Eddie Vedder, whose voice irritates me to no end, though the instrumental scoring was nice.  As for the performances, I wasn't terribly impressed, but everyone did a decent job.  I liked The Pledge more, but this was okay.  I probably wouldn't watch it again.  Rating: 7

I Am Comic - As someone who likes to think a lot about comedy, reads about comedy, and listens to many comedy-related podcasts, there isn't much new for me. But it's a reasonably entertaining overview of the craft of stand-up. There aren't as many laughs as you'd hope for (or as many as the poster promises) but it's occasionally funny and somewhat informative. There's a ton of great comics participating... and a handful of shitty ones (Tim Allen, Jeff Foxworthy, the contemptible Carlos Mencia). The framing device, featuring Ritch Shydner's return to the stage after a long absence and tracking his progress from downright horrible to somewhat passable, works well in keeping an otherwise scattershot documentary held together. Rating: 7


The Spider's Stratagem - Released at appromixately the same time as The Conformist, this is another brilliant Bertolucci film about Fascism, and the two complement each other well. This one deals with an Italy struggling with its past, rewriting it -- or reliving it -- when necessary. Bertolucci weaves an intricate web, transitioning effortlessly between the present and flashback, sometimes even bleeding one into the other. Giulio Brogi does very well in his double role, but Alida Valli steals the show, with her unique blend of warm and disturbing. I am certain that Storaro's photography is magnificent. Sadly, the copy I watched had a very washed out color palette, and is full frame, which may or may not be the original aspect ratio (IMDb says it is, but I found another source that says it should be 1.66). What a shame... from what I could tell, the film was loaded with stunning images and thoughtful compositions. I hope to one day own this enigmatic, thought-provoking film on a properly restored Blu-Ray. Rating: 9


Touki Bouki - A young, rebellious Senegalese couple dreams of making it to Paris... by any means necessary. The film starts out in a straight-forward, realist style that led me to believe I was in for something along the lines of Sembene. But it quickly develops an array of startlingly modern techniques, bringing to mind any number of other filmmakers. The striking sound design, juxtaposing sound and image in almost shocking ways, reminded me of Ghatak. The loose (sometimes obscure) narrative was Jodorowsky-esque, especially when it took on quasi-mystical facets. The political undertones and revolutionary spirit are Godardian. And the plot is something like a mix of Bonnie and Clyde and The Harder They Come. It all combines in a wholly fascinating and enchanting piece of work that practically demands repeat viewings. Magaye Niang and Mareme Niang (siblings? I have no idea) are both excellent, radiating with charismatic screen presence. Wonderful use of music as well, particularly the repeated Josephine Baker song, beckoning our heroes to Paris. My only qualms are a couple of brief moments of comedy that were a little on the dumb side, and I didn't care much for all the slaughtered and eviscerated animals (though I understand their symbolic purpose). Nonetheless, a great, great movie. I'm buying the DVD, this might be one of my new favorites. Looking forward to checking out Mambety's only other feature, Hyenas, made 20 years later. Rating: 9

Ransom! (1956) Dir: Alex Segal

Production: MGM

When a wealthy businessman’s son is kidnapped, he makes a risky and controversial decision to reject the ransom demands, alienating his wife, his brother and drawing the ire of the public in the process. The story first existed as an episode of The United States Steel Hour titled “Fearful Decision”. When MGM decided to turn it into a film, they brought along the episode’s director, Alex Segal (he mostly worked in TV, this is one of his very few theatrical features). It shows, but not in a detrimental way. There are few location shots, most of the story takes place in the home of the businessman, Dave Stannard (Glenn Ford). This enhances the main gist of the story, which focuses on the psychology of the decision (we never hear from or see the kidnappers), as when Dave seems to be the only person who believes he’s made the right decision, he is all but alone in his own home. The film is dated a touch by some of the happenings and the beginning particularly, showing the idyllic home life of the Stannards, really lays it on thick, but there is a genuine anxiety through a lot of it. The best scenes are quite good: one in which the “percentages” of kidnap cases is spelled out to Dave, which informs his eventual decision, and another where Dave goes on television to announce directly to the kidnappers that not only won’t he pay them, he will use the money as a bounty on their heads. The latter is done as a live announcement in the studio where a program Dave’s company sponsors is shot, and Segal obviously brings a verisimilitude to the scene.

The film makes good use of Glenn Ford, this kind of clenched-jaw, internalized rage being something he’d done before--well. Donna Reed as his wife is somewhat of an afterthought, she’s sedated most of the movie after some early hysterics. Leslie Nielsen makes his debut in film as a reporter who secures inside access to the Stannard home. He’s fine, but the character goes through an obvious arc (antagonist to advocate). The great Juano Hernandez plays the Stannard’s butler, whose inner strength helps Dave at his lowest moment (another good scene). Those keyed into the mechanics of the plot (specifically questions about the kidnapping) might be let down by the resolution. Ron Howard re-made the film 40 years later, taking a distinctly different tact and making the kidnappers a large part of the story.     

out of 4

Pixote - Following in the footsteps of Shoeshine and Los Olvidados, and laying the groundwork for City of God, this is a gritty realistic film that focuses on young boys whose economic situations turn them towards a life of crime, and how the system fails them on all fronts. While I wouldn't say this surpasses any of those other films, it certainly holds its own amongst them. My list of gripes is fairly short. As a relatively privileged white American, I'm not very comfortable using the term "poverty porn", but it might apply here. If not outright sensationalism, it does at least push it a bit far at times, throwing the children into almost every conceivable situation of misery. So maybe a little manipulative (though undeniably powerful). Also, the scene where Pixote attempts to nurse from Sueli's breast is way too on the nose. One of the things I loved about the movie is the formation of a surrogate family (particularly the tension between Sueli and Lilaca as they battle for the "mother" role)... this moment summed it up far too neatly. But that's really all I can complain about. Most remarkable are the performances, not a stinker in the bunch and almost entirely done by non-professionals. The intro informs us that the boys are all actual street children, and Babenco evinces very natural performances out of them. Like Lacombe Lucien and The Return, this story tragically ends with the real life death of its star at a woefully young age. Rating: 8


The Italian Straw Hat - Rene Clair's comedy of manners has its clever charms: the running gags about people being confounded by their clothes and accessories, the stagey re-enactment as the hero tells his story, a 3rd act twist that I should have seen coming but didn't. However, the film often gets bogged down in tiresome bits of business, and ends up being far too long. And the premise is so easily unraveled. There is absolutely no reason for the protagonist to allow himself to be bullied by the insane, douchebag soldier (I guess assholes in the military are universal and timeless). He did nothing wrong, owes the guy nothing, the guy holds nothing over him. All he has to do is say "fuck you, get your own fucking hat, you goddamn lunatic" and kick him out of his house. He's got all his friends and family there. It just doesn't make sense. Clair did wonderful things with his sound pictures, but I wonder if he lacked the particular talents to get certain ideas across in silents. This is the weakest I've seen by him. Rating: 6  

I'll try playing this year.  All ratings out of 5.  First time viewings in RED.

JANUARY

37 total movies, 23 first time viewings, none in the theater.

001 - Fantasia 5/5

002 - Paths Of Glory 5/5

003 - Blood Into Wine 2.5/5

004 - Fantasia 2000 3/5

005 - Head 4.5/5

006 - Easy Rider 4/5

007 - Five Easy Pieces 4.5/5

008 - Drive, He Said 2.5/5

009 - A Safe Place 1/5

010 - The Town 3/5

011 - Resident Evil: Afterlife (2D) - 2/5

012 - The Last Picture Show - 4/5

013 - Heckler 3.5/5

014 - Highlander 3/5

015 - 127 Hours 3.5/5

016 - The Call Of The Cthulhu 3.5/5

017 - The King Of Marvin Gardens 3/5

018 - Tillie's Punctured Romance 2/5

019 - King Boxer (5 fingers Of Death) 4/5

020 - Bigger Then Life 4/5

021 - (01-12) Night Of The Hunter (1955) 5/5

022 - (01-15) The Social Network (2010) 4/5

023 - (01-15) Confessions Of A Superhero (2007) 3/5

024 - (01-20) Monterey Pop (1968) 4/5

025 - (01-22) The Fighter (2010) 3/5

026 - (01-22) Let Me In (2010) 4/5

027 - (01-22) Secret Origin: The Story Of DC Comics (2010) 3.5/4

028 - (01-23) The Searchers (1956) 5/5

029 - (01-24) Charles Laughton Directs The Night Of The Hunter (2008) 3.5/5

030 - (01-28) Shock Corridor (1963) 4/5

031 - (01-29) The Toolbox Murders (1978) 4/5

032 - (01-29) The Lovely Bones (2009) 3/5

033 - (01-29) The Naked Kiss (1964) 4/5

034 - (01-30) The Kings Speech (2010) 3.5/5

035 - (01-30) Jimi Plays Monterey (1989) 4/5

036 - (01-30) Shake! Otis At Monterey (1989) 4.5/5

037 - (01-30) Winter's Bone (2010) 4/5

FEBRUARY

20 Total Movies, 17 first time viewings, none in the theater.

038 - (02-05) The Mechanic (1972) (4/5)

039 - (02-05) Paranormal Activity 2 (2010) 3.5/5

040 - (02-06) Beauty And The Beast (1991) 2/5

041 - (02-07) Three Kings 4/5

042 - (02-07) The Kids Are Alright (2010) 3/5

043 - (02-08) Away We Go (2009) 3/5

044 - (02-11) Modern Times (1936) 4.5/5

045 - (02-12) Death Race 2 (2010) 3/5

046 - (02-12) Stone (2010) 2/5

047 - (02-12) The Troll Hunter (2010) 4/5

048 - (02-13) My Soul To Take (2010) 3.5/5

049 - (02-19) Rabbit Hole (2010) 2.5/5

050 - (02-19) Unstoppable (2010) 3/5

051 - (02-19) All Star Superman (2011) 4/5

052 - (02-19) Repo Man (1984) 3.5/5

053 - (02-20) Cherry Hustlers (1977) 1/5

054 - (02-21) The Black Pirate (1926) 4/5

055 - (02-26) The Green Hornet (2011) 2.5/5

056 - (02-26) The Mechanic (2011) 2/5

057 - (02-26) Due Date (2010) 2/5

MARCH

18 Total Movies, 14 First Time Viewings, 1 In Theater

058 - (03-04) It Came From Beneath The Sea (1955) 3.5/5

059 - (03-07) Earth Versus The Flying Saucers (1956) 4/5

060 - (03-08) 20 Million Miles To Earth (1957) 4/5

061 - (03-12) Tarzan's Magic Fountain (1949) 3/5

062 - (03-12) Tarzan And The Slave Girl (1950) 3/5

063 - (03-13) Tarzan's Peril (1951) 3/5

064 - (03-13) Tarzan's Savage Fury (1952) 3/5

065 - (03-14) Tarzan And The She-Devil (1953) 3.5/5

066 - (03-19) Jackass 3 (2010) 4/5

067 - (03-19) Faster (2010) 1.5/5

068 - (03-19) Season Of The Witch (2011) 2/5

069 - (03-20) Tarzan's Hidden Jungle (1955) 3.5/5 (Gordon Scott, vera mills, new monkey)

070 - (03-20) The Typewriter, The Rifle and the Movie Camera (1996) 4/5

071 - (03-22) The 7th Voyage Of Sinbad (1958) 4/5

072 - (03-25) A Climax Of Blue Power (1975) 3/5

073 - (03-25) Sucker Punch (2011) 3.5/5

074 - (03-26) Tarzan and the Lost Safari (1957) 2.5/5

075 - (03-36) Tarzan's Fight For Life (1958) 2.5/5

APRIL

31 total movies,  23 first time viewings, 2 in the theater.

076 - (04-01) Honeysuckle Rose (1980) 3/5

077 - (04-01) A Coming Of Angels (1977) 3.5/5

078 - (04-02) Tarzan and the Trappers (1958) 2.5/5

079 - (04-02) Black Swan (2010) 4/5

080 - (04-03) Caged Heat (1974) 3/5

081 - (04-03) Jackson County Jail (1976) 3.5/5

082 - (04-03) Tarzan's Great Adventure (1959) 4/5

083 - (04-04) Tarzan The Magnificent (1960) 3.5/5

084 - (04-06) Tarzan Goes To India (1962) 2/5

085 - (04-07) Zardoz 2.5/5

086 - (04-07) Tarzan's Three Challenges (1963) 2/5

087 - (04-07) Tarzan And The Valley Of Gold (1966) 2.5/5

088 - (04-08) Tarzan And The Great River (1967) 2/5

089 - (04-08) Tarzan and the Jungle Boy (1968) 1.5/5

090 - (04-08) Alice In Wonderland (1951) 3.5/5

091 - (04-09) The Sweet Smell Of Success (1957) 4/5

092 - (04-10) Tron (1982) 4/5

093 - (04-12) Tron Legacy (2010) 4/5

094 - (04-16) Harry Potter And The Deathly Hollows (2010) 4/5

095 - (04-17) My Son, My Son, What Have Ye Done (2009) 2.5/5

096 - (04-17) Plastic Bag (2009) 4/5

097 - (04-18) The Georgia Peaches (1980) 2.5/5

098 - (04-19) Chaplin (1992) 3/5

099 - (04-19) Smokey Bites The Dust (1981) (2/5)

100 - (04-22) The Great Texas Dynamite Chase (1976) 3.5/5

101 - (04-22) The Ten Commandments - Making Miracles (2010) 3.5/5

102 - (04-22) The Ten Commandments (1956) 4.5/5

103 - (04-24) Death Race 2000 (1975) 4.5/5

104 - (04-29) Confessions Of A Candystriper (1984) 2/5

105 - (04-29) Psycho (1960) 5/5

106 - (04-30) I Am Number Four (2011) 4/5

May
27 Total Movies, 22 First timers, 3 In The Theater   
107 - (05-02) The Ten Commandments (1923) 3/5
108 - (05-07) Thor (2011) 4.5/5
109 - (05-08) Wallstreet: Money Never sleeps (2010) 3/5
110 - (05-13) Friday The 13th - A Nude Beginning (1987) 2.5/5
111 - (05-14) The Rite (2011) 3/5
112 - (05-14) Hobo With A Shotgun (2011) 2.5/5
113 - (05-14) Thor: Tales Of Asgard (2011) 2/5
114 - (05-15) The Hollywood Revue Of 1929 (1929) 3/5
115 - (05-16) Taxi Driver (1976) 5/5
116 - (05-17) Priest (2011) 3.5/5
117 - (05-20) Hercules In New York (1969) 1.5/5
118 - (05-21) The Long Goodbye (1973) 3.5/5
119 - (05-22) Drive Angry (2011) 3.5/5
120 - (05-22) Rubber (2011) 2.5/5
121 - (05-23) Sanctum (2011) 2/5
122 - (05-24) Stay Hungry (1976) 3.5/5
123 - (05-24) It Might Get Loud (2010) 4/5
124 - (05-26) Plaything (1995) 2.5/5
125 - (05-26) Moon (2009) 4/5
126 - (05-27) Cadillac Records (2008) 3/5
127 - (05-27) Plaything2 (1997) 2/5
128 - (05-28) In Old Arizona  (1928) 2.5/5
129 - (05-28) The Last Of The Mohican's (1992)(Final Cut) 3/5
130 - (05-28) Playtime (1996) 2/5
131 - (05-29) Ozzy Osbourne - Thirty Years After Blizzard (2011) 3.5/5
132 - (05-29) Pumping Iron (1977) 3.5/5
133 - (05-30) The Hangover 2 (2011) 2/5

JUNE
23 Total Movies, 11 First timers, 2 In The Theater
134 - (06-01) The American (2010) 3/5
135 - (06-03) Spartacus (1960) 5/5
137 - (06-03) Deep Rub (1979) 2/5
136 - (06-05) Lolita (1962) 4/5
137 - (06-05) Dr. Stangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964) 4/5
138 - (06-10) 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) 4.5/5
139 - (06-11) A Clockwork Orange (1971) 5/5
140 - (06-12) Scavenger Hunt (1979) 1.5/5
141 - (06-12) Dark Paradise (1997) 3/5
142 - (06-13) X-Men: First Class (2011) 4/5
143 - (06-16) True Grit (2010) 4.5/5
144 - (06-16) Desires Within Young Girls (1977) 2/5
145 - (06-18) A Clockwork Orange (1971) 5/5
146 - (06-19) The Villain (1979) 2/5
147 - (06-19) Barry Lyndon (1975) 4/5
148 - (06-22) The Shining (1980) 4.5/5
149 - (06-23) Green Lantern (2011) 3/5
150 - (06-23) Full Metal Jacket (1987) 3.5/5
151 - (06-25) Green Lantern: Emerald Knights (2011) 3/5
152 - (06-25) The Adjustment Bureau (2011) 3/5
153 - (06-26) Eyes Wide Shut (1999) 3.5/5
154 - (06-26) Shutter Island (2010) 4/5
155 - (06-28) The 50,000,000 Cherry (1987) 2.5/5

JULY
25 Total Movies, 20 First timers, 2 In The Theater
156 - (07-01) Lord Of The Rings:The Fellowship Of The Ring EE (2001) 5/5
157 - (07-03) Band Of Brothers (2001) 4.5/5
158 - (07-06) Kiss Me Deadly (1955) 4/5
159 - (07-09) Sucker Punch EE (2011) 3/5
160 - (07-10) Dirty Mary, Crazy Larry (1974) 3.5/5
161 - (07-10) Race The Devil (1975) 4/5
162 - (07-15) The Lord Of The Rings: The Two Towers EE (2002) 4.5/5
163 - (07-16) Mike Hammer’s Mickey Spillane (1998) 3/5
164 - (07-16) Marwencol (2010) 4/5
165 - (07-16) The Eagle (2011) 2.5/5
166 - (07-17) Deathsport (1978) 3/5
167 - (07-17) Battletruck (1982) 2/5
168 - (07-17) Lord Of The Rings: The Return Of The King EE (2003) 4.5/5
169 - (07-20) The Texas Rangers (1936) 2.5/5
170 - (07-21) The Tree Of Life (2011) 4/5
171 - (07-21) Expensive Tastes (1978) 3/5
172 - (07-22) Canyon Passage (1946) 3/5
173 - (07-24) Kansas Raiders (1950) 3/5
174 - (07-27) Captain America: The First Avenger (2011) 4/5
175 - (07-27) The Lawless Breed (1953) 3.5/5
176 - (07-30) Battle: LA (2011) 2.5/5
177 - (07-30) Super (2011) 4/5
178 - (07-30) Wonder Woman (Pilot) (2011) 2.5/5
179 - (07-31) Jackass 3.5 (2011) 3.5/5
180 - (07-31) Days Of Heaven (1978) 3.5/5

AUGUST
21 Total Movies, 16 First timers, 2 In The Theater
181 - (08-01) The Great Dictator (1940) 4/5
182 - (08-03) The Tramp and The Dictator (2001) 4/5
183 - (08-04) Warner Bros. Big Band, Jazz & Swing Short Subject Collection (2010) 4/5
184 - (08-06) Your Highness (2011) 2.5/5
185 - (08-06) The Ward (2010) 2.5/5
186 - (08-06) Red Riding Hood (2011) 3/5
187 - (08-07) Senna (2010) 4/5
188 - (08-07) The Saphead (1920) 2/5
189 - (08-07) The High Sign (1921) 3.5/5
190 - (08-07) One Week (1920) 4/5
191 - (09-07) Machete (2010) 3.5/5
192 - (08-11) Rise Of The Apes (2011) 4/5
193 - (08-14) Three Ages (1923) 3/5
194 - (08-14) The Goat (1921) 3/5
195 - (08-14) My Wife’s Relations (1922) 3/5
196 - (08-17) Conan The Barbarian (2011) 2/5
197 - (08-21) Our Hospitality (1923) 3/5
198 - (08-21) 127 Hours (2010) 4/5
199 - (08-26) Killers Kiss (1955) 3/5
200 - (08-28) Sherlock Jr. (1924) 3/5
201 - (08-28) The Killing (1956) 4/5

SEPTEMBER
27 Total Movies, 26 First timers, 2 In The Theater
202 - (09-01) The Cougar Club (2008) 1.5/5
203 - (09-01) The Cougar Club 2 (2009) 2/5
204 - (09-02) For Richer, For Poorer (1979) 2/5
205 - (09-03) Superheroes (2011) 3/5
206 - (09-04) Hot Rod For Sinners (2006) 2.5/5
207 - (09-05) Meet John Doe (1941) 4/5
208 - (09-05) The Ox-Bow Incident (1943) 4/5
209 - (09-08) Drive (2011) 3/5
210 - (09-15) The Pacific (2010) 3/5
211 - (09-15) A Thousand and One Erotic Nights (1982) 2.5/5
212 - (09-17) Assassination Games (2011) 2.5/5
213 - (09-17) Four Lions (2010) 4.5/5
214 - (09-17) Red State (2011) 3/5
215 - (09-18) Fighting Mad (1976) 3/5
216 - (09-18) Moving Violations (1976) 3/5
217 - (09-18) Star Wars IV - A New Hope (2011) 5/5
218 - (09-22) Star Wars Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back (2011) 5/5
219 - (09-23) Catalina Five-0: White Coral, Blue Death (1990) 2/5
220 - (09-24) Beastly (2011) 1.5/5
221 - (09-24) Attack The Block (2011) 3.5/5
222 - (09-24) Super 8 (2011) 3/5
223 - (09-25) Deathstalker (1983) 2/5
224 - (09-25) Deathstalker 2 (1987) 1.5/5
225 - (09-25) Star Wars Episode VI - The Return Of The Jedi (2011) 4/5
226 - (09-25) The Warrior and the Sorceress (1984) 3/5
227 - (09-27) Killer Elite (2011) 3.5/5
228 - (09-28) Barbarian Queen (1985) 2/5

OCTOBER
64 Total Movies, 52 First timers, 2 In The Theater
229(10-01) Video Nasties, Moral Panic, Censorship and Videotape (2010) 4/5
230 (10-01) Ban The Sadist Videos (2005) 3.5/5
231 (10-01) Bridesmaids (2011) 3/5
232 (10-01) Laid To Rest (2009) 3.5/5
233 (10-01) Never Back Down (2011) 2.5/5
234 (10-02) Terror In The Aisles (1984) 3.5/5
235 (10-02) Halloween II (1981) 3.5/5
236 (10-02) Anthropophagus (1980) 3.5/5
237 (10-02) Star Wars Episode 1 - The Phantom Menace (2011) 3.5/5
238 (10-04) Absurd (Rosso Sangue/Anthropophagus 2) (1981) 2.5/5
239 (10-04) Lisa, Lisa (Axe) (1977) 2/5
240 (10-05) Star Wars Episode 2 - Attack of the Clones (2011) 4/5
241 (10-06) Chromeskull: Laid To Rest 2 (2011) 3/5
242 (10-06) Star Wars Episode 3 - Revenge Of The Sith (2011) 4.5/5
243 (10-06) The Beast In Heat (AKA Horrifying Experiments of S.S.Last days (1977) 3/5
244 (10-07) African Cats (2011) 4/5
245 (10-07) The Beyond (1981) 4/5
246 (10-08) The Ghastly Ones (1968) 1.5/5
247 (10-09) Bloody Moon (1981) 3.5/5
248 (10-09) Repulsion (1965) 4/5
249 (10-09) Ben-Hur (1959) 4/5
250 (10-10) Cabin Fever (2002) (Directors Cut) 3.5/5
251 (10-10) Piranha (2010) 4/5
252 (10-10) The Bird With The Crystal Plumage (1970) 3.5/5
253 (10-10) Find The Blackmailer (1943)  2/5
254 (10-10) The Smiling Ghost (1941) 1.5/5
255 (10-10) The Boogeyman (1980) 3/5
256 (10-12) The Burning (1981) 3/5
257 (10-13) Blood Feast (1963) 3.5/5
258 (10-14) 2000 Maniacs (1964) 4/5
259 (10-14) Official Halloween Parody (2011) 2/5
260 (10-15) Color Me Blood Red (1965) 3/5
261 (10-15) Follow That Skirt (1964) 2/5
262 (10-15) Basket Case (1982) 4/5
263 (10-16) Cannibal Apocalypse (1980) 2/5
264 (10-16) Cannibal Terror (1981)
265 (10-16) Antichrist (2009) 4.5/5
266 (10-16) The Thing (1982) 4/5
267 (10-17) Maniac (1934) 2.5/5
268 (10-17) The Car (1977) 2.5/5
269 (10-20) The Thing (2011) 3/5
270 (10-20) Contamination (1980) 2/5
271 (10-21) The Evil Dead 5/5
272 (10-21) Succubus XXX (2007) 1/5
273 (10-22) Dead & Buried (1981) 2.5/5
274 (10-22) The Man From Deep River (1972) 3/5
275 (10-23) Delirium (1972) 1.5/5
276 (10-23) The Devil Hunter (1980) 2/5
277 (10-23) Don’t Go In The House (1980) 3.5/5
278 (10-23) Don’t Go Into The Woods (1981) 2.5/5
279 (10-25) Don’t Go Near The Park (1981) 2.5/5
280 (10-25) The Dorm That Dripped Blood (1982) 3/5
281 (10-26) Paranormal Activity 3 (2011) 3/5
282 (10-27) Evilspeak (1981) 3.5/5
283 (10-27) Expose/The House On Straw Hill (1976) 2.5/5
284 (10-28) The Guns Of The Navarone (1961) 4/5
285 (10-28) Bloodeaters (aka Toxic Zombies) (1980) 1.5/5
286 (10-29) Frozen Scream (1975) 1/5
287 (10-29) The Funhouse (1981) 2.5/5
288 (10-29) The Gestapo’s Last Orgy (1977) 2.5/5
289 (10-29) A Serbian Film (AKA Srpski Film) (2011) 3.5/5
290 (10-29) Insidious (2011) 3.5/5
291 (10-30) Burke And Hare (2010) 2.5/5
292 (10-30) Hatchet 2 (2010) 3.5/5

NOVEMBER
43 Total Movies, 39 First timers, 1 In The Theater
293 (11-01) Unaccustomed As We Are (1929) 3/5
294 (11-01) Berth Marks (1929) 4/5
295 (11-01) Men O’ War (1929) 2.5/5
296 (11-03) Perfect Day (1929) 3.5/5
297 (11-03) They Go Boom! (1929) 4/5
298 (11-03) The Hoose-Gow (1929) 3/5
299 (11-04) Night Owls (1930) 3/5
300 (11-04) Blotto (1930) 3.5/5
301 (11-06) Brats (1930) 3/5
302 (11-06) Below Zero (1930) 3/5
303 (11-06) Hog Wild (1930) 3.5/5
304 (11-08) Salo, or The 120 Days Of Sodom (1975) 4/5
305 (11-10) Video Nasties - The Final 39 (2010) 3/5
306 (11-10) Video Nasties - The Dropped 33 (2010) 3/5
307 (11-11) Island Of Lost Souls (1932) 4.5/5
308 (11-12) The Immortals (2011) 3/5
309 (11-12) The Gravedancers (2006) 2/5
310 (11-13) The 400 Blows (1959) 2.5/5
311 (11-13) The Laurel-Hardy Murder Case (1930) 2.5/5
312 (11-13) Another Fine Mess (1930) 3/5
313 (11-13) Be Big! (1931) 4/5
314 (11-15) Citizen Kane (1941) 5/5
315 (11-16) Blow Out (1981) 4/5
316 (11-17) King Kong (2005) 3.5/5
317 (11-19) Furious Five (2011) 2/5
318 (11-19) Transformers Dark Of the Moon (2011) 3/5
319 (11-23) Chickens Come Home (1931) 2.5/5
320 (11-23) Laughing Gravy (1931) 4/5
321 (11-24) Our Wife (1931) 3.5/5
322 (11-24) Come Clean (1931) 2.5/5
323 (11-24) One Good Turn (1931) 3.5/5
324 (11-25) Captain America (2011) 4/5
325 (11-25) Pirates Of The Caribbean: On Stranger Tides (2011) 2/5
326 (11-25) I Think We’re Alone Now (2008) 3.5/5
327 (11-26) Sunrise: A Song Of Two Humans (1927) 5/5
328 (11-29) The Little Ranger (1938) 2.5/5
329 (11-29) Party Fever (1938) 3.5/5
330 (11-29) Aladdins Lantern (1938) 4/5
331 (11-29) Men In Fright (1938) 3.5/5
332 (11-29) Football Romeo (1938) 3.5/5
333 (11-30) Practical Jokers (1938) 2.5/5
334 (11-30) Alfalfa’s Aunt (1939) 3/5
335 (11-30) Tiny Troubles (1939) 3.5/5

53 Total Movies, 50 First timers, 1 In The Theater
336 (12-01) Duel Personalities (1939) 3/5
337 (12-01) Clown Princes (1939) 4/5
338 (12-01) Cousin Wilbur (1939) 3/5
339 (12-01) Joy Scouts (1939) 3.5/5
340 (12-01) Dog Daze (1939) 3/5
341 (12-01) Auto Antics (1939) 3.5/5
342 (12-01) Captain Spanky’s Showboat (1939) 2.5/5
343 (12-02) City Girl (1930) 4/5
344 (12-02) Batfxxx (2010) 2/5
345 (12-04) Waiting For “Superman” (2010) 3/5
346 (12-05) Dad For A Day (1939) 2/5
347 (12-05) Time Out For Lessons (1939) 3.5/5
348 (12-05) Alfalfa’s Double (1940) 3/5
349 (12-07) Two Mules For Sister Sarah (1970) 3/5   
350 (12-08) The Big Premier (1940) 2/5
351 (12-08) All About Hash (1940) 2.5/5
352 (12-08) The New Pupil (1940) 3.5/5
353 (12-08) Bubbling Troubles (1940) 4/5
354 (12-09) 12 Angry Men (1957) 4/5
355 (12-10) Americas Dangerous Animals (2011) 4/5
356 (12-10) Apollo 18 (2011) 2/5
357 (12-11) Source Code (2011) 4/5
358 (12-11) Where Eagles Dare (1968) 3/5
359 (12-12) Jurassic Park (1993) 4/5
360 (12-14) The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997) 3.5/5
361 (12-15) Coogin’s Bluff (1968) 2.5/5
362 (12-16) The Lady Vanishes (1938) 3.5/5
363 (12-16) Catalina Five-0 - Treasure Island (1990) 2/5
364 (12-17) Catalina Five-0 - Tiger Shark (1990) 2/5
365 (12-17) Stephen King’s Bag Of Bones (2011) 2/5
366 (12-17) Contagion (2011) 3.5/5
367 (12-19) Jurassic Park III (2001) 2.5/5
368 (12-19) Lazybones (1925) 2.5/5
369 (12-20) Any Old Port (1931) 3/5
370 (12-20) The Music Box (1931) 4/5
371 (12-22) Kelly’s Heroes (1970) 3/5
372 (12-23) Predators (2011) 2/5
373 (12-25) The Band That Wouldn’t Die (2009) 3.5/5
374 (12-25) Small Potatoes: Who Killed The USFL (2009) 3/5
375 (12-25) Kings Ransom (2009) 3/5
376 (12-25) Go Chase Yourself (1938) 2/5
377 (12-26) Muhammad And Larry (2009) 4/5
378 (12-26) Without Bias (2009) 3.5/5
379 (12-26) Three Colours: Blue (1993) 3.5/5
380 (12-27) Some Girls Live In Texas ‘78 (2011) 4/5
381 (12-27) The Legend Of Jimmy The Greek (2009) 3/5
382 (12-27) Three Colours: White (1994) 3.5/5
383 (12-28) The Chimp (1932) 2.5/5
384 (12-28) County Hospital (1932) 3.5/5
385 (12-28) Scram! (1932) 3.5/5
386 (12-29) Carlos (2010) 4/5
387 (12-30) The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo (2011) 3.5/5
388 (12-31) Columbiana (2011) 2/5

Theatrical Films Watched in 2011:

January
1/7- True Grit (2010) ***1/2

1/22- The Fighter ****

February

2/20- The King's Speech ***1/2

2/22- The Illusionist (2010) ****

March

3/3- Beastly 1/2 *

3/6- The Adjustment Bureau ***1/2

3/20- Paul ****

April

4/16- Scream 4 ***

4/23- Source Code ****

May

5/14- Rio ***

5/23- Water for Elephants **1/2

5/23- Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides (3D IMAX) *

5/29- Bridesmaids ****

June

6/4- Kung Fu Panda 2 (Digital 3D) ****

6/6- Midnight in Paris ***

6/11- The Hangover Part II **

6/15- Stephen Sondheim's Company ****

6/18- Thor ** 1/2

6/18- X-Men: First Class ****

6/26- Cars 2 (DLP) **

6/26- Super 8 ***
 

July

7/10- Horrible Bosses ****

7/12- Green Lantern **1/2

7/16- Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2(IMAX 3D) **** 1/2

7/20- Bad Teacher *1/2

7/22- Captain America: The First Avenger ***

7/24- Friends with Benefits **1/2

7/30- Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2 (3D, second time) **** 1/2

August

8/6- Rise of the Planet of the Apes **** 1/2

8/9- Crazy, Stupid, Love. *** 1/2

8/14- Glee: The 3D Concert Movie ***

8/29- Crazy, Stupid, Love. (Second time) *** 1/2

September

9/3- Fright Night (2011) *** 1/2

October

10/23- Drive ****

November

11/5- A Very Harold & Kumar 3D Christmas ***1/2

11/6- Paranormal Activity 3- ***

11/20- Twilight: Breaking Dawn: Part 1- **1/2

11/25- The Muppets (2011) ****

December

12/3- Arthur Christmas (Digital 3D) ***1/2

12/18- Hugo (2011-Digital 3D) ****

12/27- The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo (2011) **** 1/2

12/28- Mission: Impossible- Ghost Protocol ****

01/07 Beowulf & Grendel (2005) 3.5/5

The old English poem is brought to life in this story of man against beast in which Beowulf is pitted against the troll Grendel. This is a well thought out story with great acting and beautiful cinematography. The characters are well drawn out and what I especially like is the fact that Grendel isn't completely the villian here but has reasons for his murderous ways. What prevented me from giving this a higher rating was the modern dialogue which completely took me out of the story. Reminds me alot of the 13th Warrior, an adaptation of Michael Crichton's Eaters of the Dead which I'm sure was based on the Beowulf legend.

01/07 Terminator Salvation (2009) 3.5/5

I think this movie gets unfairly bashed by Terminator fans who feel it doesn't follow what came before. Certainly it's exciting enough with good special effects. If you forget the other Terminator movies it's a fairly decent Sci-fi/Action film. The weak link here is the character, John Connor as played by Christian Bale. The more interesting character is Marcus Wright as played by Sam Worthington. It was interesting watching his journey from cold blooded killer on death row to descovering his humanity at the end. To me John Connor just seemed like a throwaway character even though he's important to the terminator saga. In this movie it didn't seem that way. It was cool seeing the CGI Arnie robot. You have to overlook alot of things in this movie but despite that I found it enjoyable enough.

01/07 Forbidden Planet (1956) 4.5/5

It was bittersweet watching this movie again having just recently lost two of its principal actors Leslie Nielsen & Anne Francis. This is probably one of my favourite sci-fi movies from the 50's, innovative for its time. Adams and his crew are sent to the planet Altair to discover the fate of a group of colonists that were sent 20 years prior but haven't been heard from. On the planet they discover only the lead scientist, his daughter, a robot and a murderous electrical creature that seems to be responsible for the deaths of the other colonists. Fascinating story with great acting and some comedic bits courtesy of the robot. Very unique well thought out movie for its time. On the bluray there is a great documentary called Watch the Skies about the 50's Sci-fi movies and how they affected directors Spielberg, Lucas, Scott and Cameron.

01/08 Monsters Inc. (2001) 4.5/5

Not much to say about this one other than the short, For the Birds is worth the price of this movie.

Saturday’s Hero (1951) Dir: David Miller

Production: Columbia Pictures

Surprisingly biting critique of the business of college football, and more. While not the first such film (Wellman’s COLLEGE COACH hit some of the same points back in 1933), it hardly pulls any punches. John Derek plays Steve Novak, the son of an immigrant from a small mill town in New Jersey, whose football talent takes him down to staid, traditional Jackson College in Virginia. The academic powerhouse makes Steve the centerpiece of its first big recruiting class put together in an attempt to give the school a national profile as a football program. It works. But Steve, no fool, is determined to earn his way as a student. However the success of the team, and increasing pressures from a powerful alumnus, conspires to take Steve down a different path.

The film certainly operates as an attack on “the great American hypocrisy of football” as writer-producer Sidney Buchman stated was his intention. Players are bought and paid, grades are fixed, reporters generate hype, doctors do anything to get a hurt star player back on the field, etc. But the underlying meaning of the film is about Novak, and his dream of going from outsider to acceptance, the classic immigrant tale, and how that can ultimately be a kind of fool’s errand. Something drives him to Jackson. All the football powers are chasing him, places where he can be All-American, yet he eschews them for this, at the moment, small-time program. When Novak first arrives on campus, strolling around wide-eyed at the ivy covered walls, we get a hint at what the appeal is for him. It becomes more obvious when one of the few wealthy, well-connected guys on the team is asked to join a prestigious fraternity and it’s clear to Steve that he similarly won’t be. We see the disappointment. While this is all interesting, I had a problem with the ending. After everything comes crashing down around Steve, the ultimate message seems to be to not reach too far outside your station. Because if you do, you’ll be struck down by societal forces and put back into place (you can gather that the Code officials had problems with the script’s “anti-American[ism]”, something that didn’t help one-time Communist Buchman, who was blacklisted within a couple of years). The problem for me is that Steve is complicit in how he ends up, his decisions help write his ending for him, so the fatalism is a little false to me.

The football scenes are actually well done, looking very much like football as played in 1951. Pros and college players from USC and UCLA were used. Derek is the weak spot in the cast. He looks the part, no doubt, but his inability to express much in demanding moments--he tends to just furrow his brow--stands out. Donna Reed has a role that is initially quite disturbing. She plays Melissa, the ‘ward’ of the powerful alum McCabe (a menacing Sidney Blackmer) who runs the program. When Steve first meets Melissa, she is cold, emotionless. She talks in a matter-of-fact way about the many men she’s ‘known’. The implication of her relationship to McCabe, who is also her uncle, is obvious. Soon, Steve will arouse some life back into her and a conventional romance follows. Alexander Knox plays Steve’s faculty advisor and literature professor. He’s initially dismissive of the football player, then surprised by his aptitude and willingness. They have a good scene together, ostensibly to talk Keats (“Beauty is truth, truth beauty”), but really giving us another theme of the picture: maturity is the ability to look deep inside and see oneself as you really are, and Steve is a first generation Polish immigrant. Again, the film’s insistence on being defined by class. Aldo Ray, in his first role (although not the first released), makes a favorable impression as a cynical fellow member of the team, well aware of his worth and realist enough to get compensated for it. Also Elmer Bernstein’s first score, and you might recognize his stamp from the opening credits.

out of 4

Douce - A kind of "upstairs downstairs" romantic melodrama... though whether or not it is "anti-bourgeoisie" seems to be a matter of debate. I would say it's not, or at best not as much as it intends to be. The servants and lower-classes are hardly any better than the bourgeois countess and her progeny in this film, and arguably worse. I'm going to side with Truffaut on this one. Still, the film is marvelously constructed. The remarkable camerawork is reminiscent of Ophuls (Leibelei came to mind specifically), with graceful tracking shots and frequent use of objects in the frame as symbolic barriers. The dialogue is well-written and all the performances are spot-on. And it's an engaging web of romantic intrigue and manipulation. I just wish I had connected with it on more of a gut level. Rating: 7


Il Sorpasso - A fantastic odd couple/road trip movie with an ending that years of watching movies like Planes, Trains and Automobiles left me totally unprepared for. I'm still processing the finale, and haven't decided yet if it's a stroke of genius or a serious misstep. Nonetheless, the rest of the film is pure delight. It follows the familiar formula... the loudmouth extrovert who eventually reveals hidden depths, and the uptight introvert who learns to live in the moment. But from the moment Vittorio Gassman revs through the opening credits in that iconic Lancia Aurelia, the movie races with boundless energy. Never over-the-top or hacky, but always propelling towards the next amusing encounter. Gassman and Trintignant play off each other wonderfully, making their characters fill their opposite roles without seeming like stereotypes, and bring poignancy without sappiness. Great use of pop music, too. You can't help but smile watching this, and the ending is definitely something to chew on. Rating: 8


Mädchen in Uniform - Despite being apparently toned down from the novel and the play, this film is quite overt in its lesbian themes. Though it's not graphic or lurid in any way, it would have never passed muster in Hollywood, even during the pre-Code era. Here we have young girls (14-ish) in a boarding school expressing love not only for each other, but also for their alluring and compassionate teacher. The emotion is not simply lust (these children are starved for any sort of affection) but there is an undeniable sexual element to it. But this isn't merely a story of budding young passions... it also has a strong anti-fascist message, one which the Nazis would try to suppress. Although there's a little too much good guy/bad guy for my tastes, it does make an effective statement. And it's an artful piece of work. Not quite expressionist, but very expressive in its camera language. An intriguing bit of cinematic history. Rating: 8


Woman in the Moon - Coming after the one-two punch of Metropolis and Spies, this is disappointing fare from Fritz Lang. With a title like this (very misleading, BTW) you'd hope for an imaginative sci-fi romp, Méliès-style. Instead you get a rather ho-hum adventure/thriller with a few sci-fi elements. It's a full two hours before they even get to the moon, and once there, very little is made of it. So much time is wasted exploring inconsequential little bits of intrigue that don't matter to an audience that wants to see what's on the MOTHERFUCKING MOON. When the story indulges in some actual sci-fi (the science can best be described as "giddily ludicrous", although it does seem like some thought went into it), it's a hoot. Too bad it takes a backseat to so many less inspiring subplots. Wonderful visuals and special effects, though. Rating: 6

This Side of Heaven (1934) Dir: William K. Howard

Production: MGM

A rather eventful day in the life of the Turner family. Think of the film as a melodramatic prototype of the Hardy family, and looking at the studio, and even the star, Lionel Barrymore, I’d bet that that’s exactly what this was. The Turners are dad Martin (Barrymore), mother Francene (Fay Bainter), daughters Jane (Mae Clarke) and Peggy (Mary Carlisle), son Seth (Tom Brown) and their Southern maid Birdie (Una Merkel). Francene has just had her first book, The Family, bought by a movie studio and they’ve engaged her to come out to Hollywood (meta!). The kids are all absorbed in their own personal dramas; Jane has to choose between two suitors, one a safe, stuffed shirt accountant and the other an impulsive, scrappy newspaper reporter (hmmm, which one will it be?); Seth is in the middle of Rush Week at college, and desperately trying (but failing) to impress the big frat; and Peggy is just about to go off to college for the first time. What no one seems to recognize is their father crumbling apart in front of them. He naively got caught up in an embezzling scheme at work and his company is about to be audited.

Based on a novel called It Happened One Day, you can definitely picture L.B. Mayer thinking of it as a tryout for his dream series, the ups and downs of his ideal movie family (which he would eventually get). The problem here is the family, there’s nothing particularly likable or memorable about them. Peggy and Seth are both irritating characters (and not written with a lot of help to the two actors playing them), while Jane is, well, plain. Martin is kind of a milquetoast, his legal issue arises because he’s pretty easily duped into something stupid, although Barrymore’s breakdown is probably the best part of the movie. Bainter, in her first movie role, has an interesting character, but her thread goes away after 20 minutes or so. The facile treatment of the serious events the family goes through also makes the story seem silly (I think if you were hit by a speeding streetcar you might be in the hospital for more than an afternoon).

Small, amusing bits include a gay interior decorator who exists in the film only to be a gay interior decorator, he has virtually nothing to do with the story (“It strikes me as a bit too gay” Jane’s beau Walter says about a pattern for drapes), and a scene with Peggy and her boyfriend having a romantic picnic and wanting so badly to screw each other that they immediately go off to get married. Dorky Mickey Daniels has an unlikely small part as the star quarterback and frat member at Seth’s college. And Dickie Moore, who was contractually obligated to appear in every third film to come out of Hollywood in the early 30’s, makes his mandatory appearance as a trouble-making student in teacher Jane’s class. The drama in the story is easy enough to roll with, I suppose, but you probably won’t think much of it ever again after it’s over.

out of 4

Martin,

I've already commented on some of your 2011 viewings on "Facebook"...but I just have to congratulate you over here too for having gotten under your belt several rare but highly rewarding movies so early on in the year: AN ITALIAN STRAW HAT (1927; which I own but have yet to watch), COMRADESHIP (1931), GIRLS IN UNIFORM (1931; ditto), SHANGHAI EXPRESS (1932), DOUCE (1943), IL SORPASSO (1962; a veritable Italian film masterpiece that I really need to acquire the 2-Disc Set of one of these days), JUDEX (1963), PIXOTE (1981; owned but unwatched), etc.

As for Jacques Rivette's OUT ONE folly, I am one of those lucky(?!) few who've sat through the full 13-hour cut (albeit split over 5 days) on VHS recorded off of a one-off Italian TV screening. Like you, the bits I enjoyed the most were the ones featuring Jean-Pierre Leaud and Juliet Berto; the rest, as Shakespeare said before me, is silence!    

I've been trying to polish off the TSPDT 1000 list before they update it for the new year.  I guess it would make more sense to wait until AFTER they update and then polish off the new version.  But then something like Touki Bouki could drop off the list and then who knows if I would have ever seen it?

I am hoping The Art of Vision drops off though, because I don't know any way to get a hold of it, and that bothers the completist in me.

01/08 Fate is the Hunter (1964) 2/5

It's odd that I read a newspaper story that someone had sent me about a plane on route from US to Germany that got diverted to Canada because of spilled coffee causing the planes security alarm to go off. In this movie the plane crash happens fairly early in the film killing everyone but one. Sam McBane (Glenn Ford) is determined to prove that the accident was not pilot error but the result of something else. Interesting premise for a movie but dull with an especially irritating performance from Rod Taylor as the pilot. The rest of the cast were adequate in their roles. Maybe I'll give this another go sometime when I'm not so tired.

01/09 Battle of Britain (1969) 4/5

The title says it all. The mainly all star cast put in solid performances though some were too brief for my liking (Michael Caine). The air battle at the end was especially striking.

01/10 Girl in White (1952) 3/5

The first female intern in New York City hospitals fights to gain respect from her fellow interns. The movie takes place at the turn of the century. It was extremely rare for women to be admitted into this male dominated world. June Allyson protrays Emily Dunning a young woman who has to fight prejudice from her days in Cornell Medical School to internship in New York hospital. This is an inspiring movie maybe not so much now but the story was weakened considerably by the inevitable love story.

01/12 Shutter Island (2009) 4.5/5 

I was feeling alittle cheated by this movie until the last line of the film which totally redeemed what had come before. This is a great mystery/suspense firm directed by Martin Scorcese probably one of my top three by this director. Teddy and Chuck are US federal marshalls that are sent to an isolated mental hospital for the criminally insane to investigate the disappearance of one of its inmates. The trailer made you think this would be more of a horror story but it's creepy nontheless. Events just aren't adding up at this institution and Teddy is determined to uncover what is really going on.

Top-notch acting here and with the creepy atmosphere of this film Alfred Hitchcock would be proud.

Wild River - I'm not a huge Kazan fan, but he always does a tremendous job with actors, and this ranks right up there with his very best. Montgomery Clift is a Tennessee Valley Authority agent, tasked with getting stubborn Jo Van Fleet to vacate her soon-to-be-underwater island. Along the way he gets involved with the woman's granddaughter (Lee Remick) and becomes entangled in local racial tensions. All three threads of the plot are very compelling, with some unexpected turns and complex character development. Clift (at this point in the midst of an array of personal problems) gives a mighty fine performance, and although Remick fails to impress at first, she comes into her own by the end. Albert Salmi is also memorable as the slimy, sadistic lead racist. But the absolute star of the cast is Jo Van Fleet, who was also so terrific in East of Eden. She does an awful lot with relatively little screen time, and won over my sympathy even after I was certain I'd despise her character. Round things off with a lovely, understated score and some surprisingly good cinematography for a Kazan film... the last few minutes contain some powerful images. A terrific movie about the costs and benefits of "progress." Rating: 9


The Long Day Closes - This film has much in common with its predecessor, Distant Voices, Still Lives. A bittersweet collection of brief nostalgic episodes, with heaps of songs... as before, both diegetic and non-diegetic. Again, the memories are both good and bad, emphasizing the small comforts and minor torments of life. In this case, the painful events are not in the form of an abusive father (in fact, Bud's father is entirely absent and I don't think he's even mentioned) but come from bullies, school humiliations, and religious fears. Although many of the joys come from the same kind of wondrous family moments as in the previous film, there's a fair share of little private moments and more important, escapes to the movies. Bud is often seen going to (or desiring to go to) the cinema, and audio clips from The Magnificent Ambersons and Meet Me in St. Louis, among others, are played over various events. And once again, Davies plays with chronology, although not in a jumping-back-and-forth manner. Instead, time seems to flow like a river, eroding gaps between memories as one flows seamlessly into the next. It's a beautiful film, both haunting and warm, and one that shows a growth in Davies' abilities as filmmaker, especially with so many incredibly striking compositions. I also want to praise Tina Malone and Jimmy Wilde, who provide some terrific comic relief. And I love that Davies has enough faith in his audience to present a racist incident without telling you how to feel about it in any way. Rating: 9


Moana - Yet another semi-documentary bit of ethnography from Robert Flaherty. This one follows a young man and family through their various Samoan routines... hunting, making clothing, preparing food, dance and finally, an elaborate tattooing ritual that ushers Moana into manhood. There's some pretty interesting stuff and Flaherty treats his subjects with respect, but it all feels a bit been-there-done-that, especially after having seen the superior Tabu. Rating: 7


only 25 left to go on the TSPDT 1000 list

01/12 Ondine (2009) 3/5

An Irish fisherman pulls a young woman out of the ocean in his fishing net and his young daughter is convinced that he's has rescued a Selke ( a seal turned human on land). An interesting premise, well acted with a disappointing finish.

01/12 Wandering Eye (2010) 1/5

Pretty dreadful movie of the week about a young neglected wife who decides to have an affair with a connection she made online. She decides not to go through with it but her male "friend" is found murdered shortly after she leaves the room. Not too much to like about this movie.

01/13 Total Recall (1990) 3.5/5

Based on a Philip K. Dick story, this movie still holds up well after twenty years.  Though I never considered Schwarzenegger much of an actor he is perfect for these type of action movies. Not for the faint of heart due to some graphic violent scenes. Rumour has it this is being remade with Colin Farrell in the lead role, God help us!

01/13 In Bruges (2008) 4/5

Slow moving crime/drama about two hit men who cool their heels in a picturesque town in Belgium awaiting further instructions from their boss. The hit men are played by Brendan Gleeson and Colin Farrell, the former delighted with his surroundings while the latter is bored out of his skull. This movie builds slowly and is quite funny at times. There is quite a colourful cast of characters assembled here including the foul-mouthed boss, a comical dwarf, a beautiful con artist and her ineffectual boyfriend. The highlight of this film for me was the relationship between these two hitman almost a father and son type of relationship. Colin Farrell even managed to make me forget my dislike of him since he was quite outstanding in his role.

01/15 The Social Network (2010) 3.5/5

There is no denying this is a well acted and directed movie. I've enjoyed alot of David Fincher's past work Zodiac in particular, and though I admire this film I didn't really enjoy it. Maybe I'm just getting too old but I couldn't relate to anything I was seeing on the screen. My kids BTW loved this film. A big annoyance for me was the soundtrack. Not the contents but the loudness seemed to drown out alot of the dialogue for these old ears. It also didn't help that most of the characters were extremely unsympathetic. This movie will probably be nominated for alot of awards and good luck to it. This just isn't my cup of tea.

Samson and Delilah - This is actually my very first Cecil B. DeMille film. And I wouldn't mind it being my last. I don't have much affection for Biblical epics, even ones with Hedy Lamarr in skimpy outfits. It's kind of fun as a fairy tale, but most of its entertainment value is derived from its pure corniness. Hammy acting (oh Victor Mature, I was just starting to like you) and terrible dialogue. Almost every line is overwritten, leaden with metaphor and mannered speech, as if everyone from that period just spilled proverbs out of their silly faces all day long. Garish costumes and sets that look cheap as hell. Bad special effects and some shoddy editing... the lion fight is particularly laughable. I didn't hate it, watchable as a lark, but hardly my cup of tea. Rating: 5


Europa '51 - It never fails... every time I start a Rossellini movie, I think "oh man, I hate Rossellini" but it never ends up being that bad. Then I go look at my old ratings and realize that I never hated him after all. I'm just usually underwhelmed by him. This one -- about a bourgeois woman who discovers spirituality compassion after a tragic family incident -- has some very beautiful moments. Ingrid Bergman gives a sympathetic performance, gets into some compelling situations, and the cinematography and score are very strong. Where the film goes off the rails is in the final act, when the heavy hand of Rossellini is felt. The melodrama, which was already fairly thick, kicks up a notch and we learn that kindness equals insanity in the eyes of society. Oh, and Ingrid Bergman acheives sainthood. I'm not complaining too much, though... I kind of like the way Rossellini handles religion. It certainly beats DeMille's idea of religion, anyway. Overwrought at times but generally well done. Rating: 7


Zorn's Lemma - It is tempting to write this off as pure wankery, but I found the concept rather intriguing. I won't attempt to describe it, and I can't really explain what it means (for one thing, I've tried to comprehend the mathematical axiom it's named after... and failed). But I did enjoy how it toyed with expectations, the way it gradually replaces one kind of symbol with another. Greenaway has cited Frampton as an influence, and there seems to be a straight line from this to Vertical Features Remake, especially in the meticulous attention to patterns and rhythms. However, what sets Greenaway's film apart is the sense of humor. Getting through an hour of Zorn's Lemma is a tough slog. Yes, I was intrigued, but after 15 minutes the tedium kicked in, and kicked in big time. I was relieved when the film switched gears entirely (and substituting a visual rhythm for an aural rhythm was a nice touch) at the end... but then that became a chore as well. I'm not ready to give up on Frampton, but the next logical step would be the "Hapax Legomena" series, and that's a much bigger time investment. Rating: 5


Rose Hobart - A reasonably compelling experiment in which footage of actress Rose Hobart from the film East of Borneo (a talkie) is chopped up and played with colored filters and a samba soundtrack and made to look like a silent. It reminded me of the deconstructionism of Tom, Tom, the Piper's Son and the recontextualization of Scorpio Rising... while pre-dating them both by some 30 years, making Joseph Cornell something of an avant-garde pioneer. And like Anger's and Jacobs' films, it's not only interesting as a concept but also rather fun to watch. It does outstay its welcome a little, even at a lean 19 minutes, but has a real beauty to it. Rating: 7

My slowly-progressing but complete Luis Bunuel retrospective continues with this very slight rewrite of a 2006 review and a freshly-baked one:

01/06/11: NAZARIN (Luis Bunuel, 1959)

This was the only major Bunuel I had not yet watched and, even if the recently-released R2 DVD from Yume was heftily-priced, bare-bones and featured a reportedly substandard (though, in hindsight, by no means unwatchable) transfer, I ordered

it straight away…and the minute the package arrived I inserted the disc in my DVD player – despite having already embarked on the Halloween horror marathon!

On the basis of this first viewing, I have to say that, on the surface, it does not seem like one of Bunuel’s most enjoyable films though it’s still clearly superior to minor Bunuels like SUSANA (1951) and THE BRUTE (1953), both of which I had rated ***. Then again, given the film’s theme of a priest trying to follow the teachings of Christ literally – and suffering countless ignominies for it – I guess that I had a preconceived idea about what it would be like but, being based on a source novel, it turned out to be somewhat different! Actually, several years back I had read an essay on the film included in Gwynne Edwards’ book “The Discreet Art Of Luis Bunuel” – but, clearly, I had forgotten some of the details in the interim (so I re-read it in preparation for this review)! Still, the more I think of it, the more it seems clear to me how the parallels between Christ and the titular character have been subtly deployed by Bunuel throughout his film.

Bunuel had been trying to make a film of NAZARIN for 10 years and when he eventually did, he transposed the setting from Spain (as it was in the original novel) to Mexico. Like the director’s other Mexican films, this was made on an obviously low-budget which, however, serves to render the setting’s essential griminess – superbly captured by renowned cinematographer Gabriel Figueroa – that more effectively (indeed, oppressively so)! As is to be expected from a Bunuel film, religion is one of his major concerns here: in this respect, it forms a sort of unofficial trilogy with VIRIDIANA (1961; which can essentially be considered a female version of NAZARIN) and SIMON OF THE DESERT (1965).

The film starts (following the credits pasted over evocative period illustrations which eventually morph into the images proper) amusingly enough as it sets up the Priest’s surroundings: his shabby single room at the inn – ironically named “Inn Of The Heroes”, but filled with life’s losers – in which the benevolent Fr. Nazario (Francisco Rabal) lives is used as a passageway to other sections of the building by the fellow residents, so that people are constantly going in and out of it and nonchalantly ‘borrowing’ whatever object takes their fancy! Several ludicrously made-up prostitutes peddle their trade nearby and, when he harbors one of them who is wanted by the Police for the attempted murder of a ‘colleague’, we are provided with a startling image of a painting of Christ at the time of The Passion laughing at her (a scene which I had actually already come across somewhere before, most probably on the feature-length documentary A PROPOSITO DE BUNUEL [2000]). However, the fact that, ostensibly, He could also be mocking the Priest as the latter is confronted by temptations of the flesh while treating the wounded whore, can hardly be ignored. The afore-mentioned catfight between streetwalkers also leads to the film’s obligatory dream sequence as Beatriz (a young villager whose rejection by her callous boyfriend had earlier on almost driven her to suicide) conjures up images of the two of them making passionate love – at one point, even biting his lip, a direct nod to Bunuel’s earlier Surrealist masterwork, L’AGE D’OR (1930).

The prostitute repays the Priest’s kindness by setting his house on fire to cover her own tracks, thus forcing Fr. Nazario to leave town with the two women in tow – much like Don Quixote and his two Sancho Panzas or, if you will, Jesus and his disciples. Concealing his profession, he takes on a job working in the fields but the other workers object to his accepting no wages which, before long, leads to his dismissal and a small-scale revolt in which the foreman shoots a worker and the former is in turn felled with another man’s shovel!! Once again on the road, the three pilgrims now come across a Colonel and a Priest who verbally berate a peon for not saluting them which leads to Nazario rebuking them and being branded a heretic by the older Priest – a direct reflection on the Catholic Church’s backing of rich landowners over the destitute lower classes in Third World countries. Later still, they reach a village which has been struck by a leprosy epidemic. Beatriz convinces Nazario to go pray over a sick child (it is telling that she is herself prone to epileptic fits): this particular sequence is quite powerful as we see superstitious old women histrionically chanting (and, in one case, literally convulsing) and flaunting their herbal remedies; when the girl miraculously recovers, Fr. Nazario – armed solely with his resolute faith in God – is thought of as a healer, with the old women throwing themselves at his feet and touching him in search of further blessings. In a scene inspired by the writings of the Marquis De Sade, another plague victim, rather than accepting his offer of repentance and resignation, calls out from her death-bed for her lover, who is soon seen ousting the ineffectual Priest from the premises!

Along the road, both women begin to feel an attraction to the Priest and the prostitute is evidently jealous of Nazario’s imaginary preference for her younger companion; she soon finds solace, however, with a dwarfish tramp first seen being ‘tortured’ by little kids! On his part, Nazario says that he loves all God’s creatures equally at the exact moment that (a typically Bunuelian touch) he allows a snail to crawl across his hand! The plot contrives to have Fr. Nazario end up in a prison cell with the same group of workers who had earlier intimidated him (the most vociferous among them played by Bunuel regular Luis Aceves Castaneda); when he protects Beatriz from their lascivious attentions, they beat him up, prompting him to exclaim that even a man like himself would find it hard to be forgiving in this case. One of the prisoners, actually, does stand up for him, at once bringing forth similarities with The Good Thief at Christ’s Crucifixion.

Even at such a low point in his life, Nazario is confronted by yet more failures as Beatriz (who had earlier expressed her espousal of the religious life) is taken away from him by her mother and lover; she is last seen with her head on the latter’s shoulder (much the same way as she had earlier stood with the Priest in an earlier scene) driven away in a cart as, unseen by her, Nazario himself is being escorted away from the other prisoners by a guard. It is here that, upon being offered a pineapple by a kindly old woman, Nazario learns to accept the importance of his human nature over his spiritual one. An optimistic ending, therefore, rather than a desperate one and, in fact, NAZARIN turns out to be arguably Bunuel’s most tender and moving film. For the record, the novel ends rather differently with the priest having a redeeming vision of a meeting with Christ.

Francisco Rabal is simply marvelous in the leading role (probably the best he ever had) and he eventually reunited with Bunuel for VIRIDIANA (1961) and a brief but equally welcome part in BELLE DE JOUR (1967). The two women are played by Marga Lopez (Beatriz) and Rita Macedo (Andara, the prostitute) who would later star as the villainess of the piece in THE CURSE OF THE CRYING WOMAN (1961) which, incidentally, I watched the very next day!

NAZARIN makes for a fascinating companion piece to John Ford’s THE FUGITIVE (1947; with which it shares its cinematographer Figueroa), another film dealing with the trials and tribulations of a long-suffering priest who ends up in prison among criminals and whores. Intriguingly, maverick American film-maker John Huston thought so highly of NAZARIN that he ensured that the film was entered in competition in that year’s Cannes Film Festival at which, eventually, it emerged triumphant in the International Prize category.

It must be said here that NAZARIN is at once one of Bunuel’s favorites among his own films but also one of his most misunderstood works and, in fact, in 1995 it went on to form part of that which came to be known as “The Vatican Film List”. With VIRIDIANA, however, these doubts were clearly dispelled once and for all – resulting in multiple outright bans from the Spanish and Vatican authorities! In his autobiography, Bunuel also mentions an amusing anecdote of when he was rebuked by celebrated French screenwriter Jacques Prevert for making NAZARIN because, in his view, it was ridiculous to worry about the problems of priests!

01/07/11: THE BRUTE (Luis Bunuel, 1953)

Although this is definitely a minor Bunuel – being pretty much a straightforward melodrama, with little of the expected subtext – it is still well-made and acted and undeniably entertaining; as opposed to most of his Mexican work, there have been two R1 DVD releases of the film from Cozumel (the first to be released and the one I immediately purchased) and, more recently, Facets. THE BRUTE also provided the director with a rare chance to work with popular Mexican actors who, like EL (1953)’s Arturo De Cordova soon after, already had established reputations in Hollywood – though it is safe to assume that Pedro Armendariz would never again be so rugged nor Katy Jurado so earthy as in their sole film for Luis Bunuel!

As I said, the plot is simple: wealthy but ageing businessman Andres Soler wants to sell a property currently leased to numerous poor families; he presents them with an eviction notice but, through the instigation of a few headstrong tenants, they unanimously refuse to vacate the premises and almost assault their landlord for what they consider his inhumanity and greediness! Arriving home with his pride broken, he does not elicit sympathy from his much younger and determined wife (an altogether startling turn by Jurado, who walked off with a Silver Ariel award for Best Supporting Actress!) but she instantly suggests, metaphorically, that he simply get rid of the opposition and, to this end, Soler hires a brawny but slow-witted slaughterhouse worker nicknamed “Bruto” (Armendariz).

The latter’s first attempt at intimidation, even if he had even hardly touched the man, results in tragedy (due to the victim’s weak physical condition); for this reason, Soler shelters him in his own house, where the boss’ hilariously doddering and cantankerous, yet mischievous, father (played by 81-year old Paco Martinez) also resides; the elderly man’s shtick – his uniquely doddering walk on the way to procure himself some candy behind his son’s back, his constant muttering of the would-be swear word “Pugnales” and even licking tequila off of his daughter-in-law’s little finger – is a source of much amusement throughout the film. Bruto’s defection to the Soler household liberates him from the oppression in his own home which he shares with his live-in girlfriend and her family of ‘leeches’: a bed-ridden, perennially expiring but chain-smoking would-be-mother-in-law; her own lame brother who badmouths her at every turn; her ingrate and unemployed son who only visits to fleece the relief money, etc.! Before long, Jurado turns her attentions to Bruto – who is unable to resist her; in fact, the sexual tension the film displays in their clandestine encounters must have been an eye-opener for its time (certainly when compared with the Hollywoodian standard).

Further plot complications arise when the residents try to teach Armendariz a lesson and, injured by a nail driven through his shoulder(!), he stumbles into the hovel where the daughter (called Meche, just like the milk-bathing girl in Bunuel’s LOS OLVIDADOS [1950]) of his own earlier victim has been living; she unselfishly looks after him, and he finds himself falling for the girl (a young Rosita Arenas, later star of such classic Mexi-Horror titles as THE WITCH’S CURSE [1960] and THE CURSE OF THE CRYING WOMAN [1961]). This turn-of-events – which anticipates Marlon Brando’s fate in Elia Kazan’s Oscar-laden classic ON THE WATERFRONT (1954) – obviously jeopardizes Bruto’s relationship with Jurado and, after she confronts the younger woman and Armendariz gives the boss’ wife a piece of his mind in the only way he knows how, the rejected mistress informs her clueless husband that Bruto had raped her!

All of which leads first to a tete-a`-tete between the landlord and his thug, which leaves the former with a broken back and his face smashed in (again, it was unusual to depict violence in such an unflinching manner back then) and, eventually, Bruto’s own demise in a hail of bullets when he is cornered by the Police (led to him by Jurado herself); curiously enough, there are some who hold the view that THE BRUTE is Bunuel’s retelling of the Frankenstein tale in a modernized socio-political key but, frankly, it did not strike me that way – after all, the creator did not intend his creature to do his evil bidding! Anyhow, Arenas had grown fond of Armendariz in spite of herself and she lies by his side as he expires but, tellingly, the film’s last shot sticks with his other jilted lover – Jurado now left all alone and probably gone off her rocker Tennessee Williams-style as she glares defiantly at a rooster believing it is making fun of her!

01/10/11: THE DRACULA SAGA (Leon Klimovsky, 1973)

This is another film I had never heard of until recently; being a devotee` of both the vampire subgenre and the “Euro-Cult” style I was instantly intrigued, especially since the copy I came across promised to be of a reasonably high quality, having been released on DVD through BCI – unfortunately, though, I had to make do with the substandard English-dubbing since the original Spanish version carried no accompanying subtitles! I was nonetheless rather disappointed by the end result, even if I should have been forewarned of this via the other titles I had watched from the director involved!; the fact that only one member of the cast (the ever-luscious Helga Line`) was familiar to me did not help matters.

Incidentally, the general goofiness on display reminded me I had a number of vintage Mexi-Horror efforts still to catch up with; indeed, the film starts off with a truly weird scene in which the heroine (a descendant of the Draculas) dreams she is being literally menaced by a bat-man! There are several more scenes in this vein: one where it seems that all the inhabitants of a village are impaired in some way (hunchbacked, lame, half-blind, etc.), not to mention the presence of Dracula Jr. as a horrific Cyclops with webbed fingers! Bafflingly, while the seemingly obtuse villagers keep commending the Dracula family to the new arrival, they are surprised by this outburst of vampire attacks...duh!

For this reason, the entire family looks upon the heroine as the last hope of the vampire bloodline (even if she is not one herself), since the girl is pregnant by her lanky blond husband; when the couple finally arrive at Castle Dracula, she asks the keeper to show her the tomb of her grandmother…where the coffins of the current members of the family are also plainly in sight, which she obviously finds not a little odd! Despite the expected emphasis on nudity (this was probably yet another example of an “International Version”) and ghoulishness (with the color scheme intentionally on the dreary side), the film is both plodding (feeling much longer than it actually is) and slapdash (though intermittent ‘filmed-through-a-gauze’ shots seem at the very least to be intentional, albeit superfluous, or else inherent in the negative!).

Ultimately, one regrets the film not being somewhat better than it is, as the script appeared to be striving for something more than the usual blood-sucking fare: the whole ROSEMARY’S BABY (1968)-like subplot, the melancholic/philosophical tone adopted by the atypically elderly Count (though he reverts to camp at the very end when his disembodied head breaks up into laughter!), not to mention a climax in which the leading lady goes berserk and becomes the axe-wielding executioner of her own brood (even if she is herself mortally wounded in the massacre)…though it all contrives to keep the Dracula name alive (after all) by feeding the infant with the dripping blood of its own mother!

01/11/11: THE VAMPIRE HAPPENING (Freddie Francis, 1971)

This is another obscure horror title (actually a spoof), despite the involvement of Hammer/Amicus regular Francis; emanating from Germany, it was produced and scored by Pier A. Caminneci and Jerry van Rooyen respectively, who had been responsible for one of Jess Franco’s most impressive works i.e. SUCCUBUS (1967). From what little I read about the film under review (the R1 DVD release arrived courtesy of Anchor Bay), the general consensus is that it does not work and the director should never have gotten himself involved to begin with. Still, Francis cannot have been too displeased at this change-of-pace since he would embark on a similarly outrageous venture not long after, the result being the equally maligned and even harder-to-find SON OF DRACULA (1974)! Anyway, what we have here is a fairly engaging sex comedy which just happens to take place in Transylvania: having been an Oscar-winning cinematographer beforehand, the director ensures a good-looking film with the traditional (and authentic) Gothic scenery providing the appropriate contrast to the modern-day setting (the title itself being amusingly ‘with it’).

One other coup of the film, however, is the presence (in a dual role of a porn star with an Edie Sedgwick look and her dark-haired vampire ancestor) of leading lady Pia Degermark, though the “DVD Drive-In” reviewer seems to have appreciated her contribution solely on an aesthetic level (claiming he was unable to tell the two characters apart – well, the tell-tale sign was the different color of their finger-nails and, for the record, I preferred the 'older' version)! While she may have been cast due to her liaison with the film’s producer, Degermark (previously from Bo Widerberg’s tragic romance ELVIRA MADIGAN [1967], an established classic of World Cinema that I own but have yet to watch) carries the show with reasonable aplomb – which, at 104 minutes, is saying a lot! Unfortunately, her initial fairy-tale existence and fast living (she came from a wealthy family, for a time dated the King of Sweden and then, at just 17, won the Best Actress award at Cannes and was cited the Most Promising Female Newcomer at the Golden Globes!) spiraled into numerous health problems and, finding herself socially ostracized, even ended up in jail…but, thankfully, she now seems to have mostly picked up the pieces and gotten her life back on track.

To return to the film, it starts and ends with plane journeys: first, we get varied reactions to the in-flight viewing of a "Betty Williams" skin-flick (her name even appears in the opening credits of the movie proper!) and, ultimately, the vampire (having been mistaken for the porn star) landing in Hollywood in her stead! Among the numerous other characters to figure in the plotline are the Baroness’ clumsy elderly servant (he orchestrates many a botched attempt to dispose of the bloodsucker and, at one point, even interacts with the audience!), a young monk (his initial suffering at being aroused by his fetching neighbor is amusing but his eventual sex-crazed antics when transformed into a vampire become tiresome) from the monastery adjacent to the castle, his irascible abbot (complete with funny German accent), a number of teachers (the male immediately becomes the heroine’s lover, while the female is revealed as a lesbian) and promiscuous students from a nearby girls’ school.

We even get the belated introduction of Count Dracula himself (played by THE FEARLESS VAMPIRE KILLERS [1967]’s Ferdy Mayne, with Satanic salute intact!) – arriving at the concluding undead convention in a chopper flanked by Mafiosi(!) and depicted as quite the party animal; indeed, THE VAMPIRE HAPPENING must surely be the only movie which gives us the opportunity to see Dracula wearing spectacles, munching on a banana and even, quite literally, being caught with his pants down at sunrise (“Damn the zipper! Full speed ahead”, he barks to his minions – a long way after Charles Coburn's 1943 Oscar-winning turn in THE MORE THE MERRIER)! There are even a couple of references to another Roman Polanksi horror effort, ROSEMARY’S BABY (1968), as well as a cute jibe at Christopher Lee – interestingly, Francis had himself previously directed the actor’s third stab at his signature role in Hammer’s DRACULA HAS RISEN FROM THE GRAVE (1968)! This lengthy section of the film, then, suggests that everyone, from generals to sheiks to rock musicians and even astronauts(!), is ‘in’.

To be honest, though obviously no classic, I rather enjoyed the film and only felt that it fell apart at the climax (with the multiple fang-work proving especially amateurish!). One unusual and prophetic aspect (little seen in the subgenre prior to the recent advent of the “Twilight” saga, which I actually have little interest in watching in view of its teen fan-base!) is when the bloodsucking Degermark restrains herself from draining the teacher’s blood because she simply wants to re-experience the emotions of a sexual encounter with a living human being (for which the ‘Prince Of Darkness’ later takes her to task).

01/12/11: CAVE OF THE LIVING DEAD (Akos Rathonyi, 1964)

This is a German/Yugoslavian production distributed by Richard Gordon in the U.S. and released as a double-bill with the Italian TOMB OF TORTURE (1963), which I watched recently and was disappointed by. Though issued separately on R1 DVD (albeit both through Image as part of their “The Euro Shock Collection”), they were reviewed in tandem by the “DVD Drive-In” – where it was reported that TOMB was the better effort which, therefore, meant that I went into CAVE with virtually no expectations whatsoever (except for the Expressionist touches which were singled out for praise in the assessment)!

In any case, having last watched THE VAMPIRE HAPPENING (1971) – which saw the involvement of two crew members from SUCCUBUS (1967) – I opted to check out CAVE soon after, since it starred one of the actors (Adrian Hoven) from that same superior Jess Franco picture! Having mentioned bloodsuckers just now, the film under review is also known as NIGHT OF THE VAMPIRES – a title far more appropriate than the one it got stuck with, given that “The Living Dead” are generally associated with Zombies! At the very least, it should have been dubbed “Cave Of The Undead” (in view of the fact that a grotto plays a major part in the narrative)…

Now, after this lengthy intro, let us get to the matter at hand: those NOSFERATU (1922)-like nightly prowlings are indeed creepily effective and, undeniably, the best thing about the film…but it must be pointed out that the whole is a lot worthier than the goofy TOMB OF TORTURE! Hoven is a crack Police Inspector (whose womanizing ways and quick action tactics, as was pointed out by the review I mentioned earlier, seem to be patterned after the “Euro-Spy” fad which emerged in the wake of the James Bond extravaganzas!) assigned to investigate a series of female deaths on a remote island that have occurred over a period of six months and always during an electricity black-out. To be honest, the latter is as much a throwaway oddity (ditto for the presence of a hulking deaf-mute) as the underground resting-place of the chief bloodsucker!

Guessing the latter’s identity proves to be child’s play, but nobody seems to connect the start of the attacks with the arrival on the island of this particular character; that said, the local cops are depicted as buffoons, which is exactly why Hoven was sent for! Even so, while it is clearly stated that the ‘plague’ already numbered seven victims, when the vampire (played by Wolfgang Preiss, the ex-Dr. Mabuse himself, and another definite asset here) is eventually cornered, only the latest member of the ‘cult’ is ever seen by his side! Incidentally, it takes ages for the examining doctor (whose practice should, by all accounts, be steeped in superstition) to be brought around to accept that the supernatural is behind this crime-wave, whereas our hero from the big-city (eventually befriended by the doctor’s black manservant) goes to consult an aged witch virtually the moment he arrives – WTF?! The look of the film deliberately harks back to the golden age of horror – which is certainly commendable – but, unfortunately, the end product in this case is mainly listless and, thus, miles removed from the classics of yesteryear (if not unenjoyable per se)…

01/13/11: THE PLAYGIRLS AND THE VAMPIRE (Piero Regnoli, 1960)

This was one of 3 popular Italian films dealing with bloodsuckers (all starring the brooding-but-bland Walter Brandi) from the county’s initial Gothic Horror outburst. Some years back, I had watched (and was not exactly impressed by) Renato Polselli’s THE VAMPIRE AND THE BALLERINA (1960) – having now caught up with the other two in quick succession, I can see that their reputation has more to do with nostalgia than anything else…or, if you like, for providing a quaint alternative to the contemporaneous Mexican/Hammer model!

As can be gleaned from the title, this sees a group of entertainers (incidentally, their sleazy yet awkwardly-choreographed routines – and especially the taskmaster’s own over-eagerness – are positively embarrassing to watch!) stranded on a stormy night and who manage to find shelter in a remote ancient castle (despite being specifically told not to go there!). Unsurprisingly, one of the many dancers in the troupe proves to be a dead-ringer for the host (Brandi)’s long-lost love!; likewise, while they are warned not to wander about at night, the liveliest lady among them disobeys orders and (apparently) pays the price with her life! However, since it transpires that she was bitten by a vampire, the girl is soon seeking her own victims – and she settles upon the comic-relief manager (played by Alfredo Rizzo, later director of the even worse THE BLOODSUCKER LEADS THE DANCE [1975], which is actually a period Giallo!) who used to give her a hard time. Though she fumbles the attempt, the scene is a striking one because she turns up completely naked before him and, in fact, stays that way for the rest of the duration (though, of course, this being the early 1960s still, we are actually shown very little except brief glimpses of her breasts)!

As for Brandi, it is eventually revealed that he plays two roles: the afore-mentioned aristocrat/castle owner and the rampaging vampire (presumably his revived ancestor) However, the former also dabbles in Science in an effort to cure the latter of his curse! The film definitely scores a few points on atmosphere (particularly the very first wraith-like appearance of the bloodsucker, predating by two years Herk Harvey's in his own CARNIVAL OF SOULS, hiding from the heroine’s sight by the cemetery) and the climax – with the vampire first bloodily disposing of the jealous undead dancer and, then, the Brandis facing it off in the family crypt (where the tombs are adorned by a life-size engraving of their respective occupants!).

Though, at one point, the leading-lady is herself ‘infected’, there is the expected happy ending: she leaves with the troupe, who had conveniently exited the picture during its last act, until it is time for the hero (needless to say, the two have fallen for one another) to join her. For the record, director Regnoli was more usually credited as scriptwriter but, recently, I did catch a not-too-bad noir of his (with mild horror trimmings) from the same year i.e. I’LL SEE YOU IN HELL. 

01/13/11: THE SLAUGHTER OF THE VAMPIRES (Roberto Mauri, 1962)

This was renowned as the best of the 3 virtually interchangeable vampire ‘classics’ emanating from Italy early into their Gothic Horror phase; however, while that may be so, it is still nothing to write home about! I am not sure about THE VAMPIRE AND THE BALLERINA (1960) since it has been some time from my sole viewing of it, but this at least maintains a period setting throughout (beginning with villagers rising up against a bloodsucking couple). Incidentally, while Walter Brandi also turns up here, he is not the monster – the latter, in fact, is played by Dieter Eppler and he proves one of the hammiest ever depicted, while hilariously looking like Criswell from the Ed Wood movies! Brandi, then, makes for an ineffectual lead (he is even bitten twice throughout, offering virtually no opposition to his female assailants!) – though he does contrive to ambiguously participate in the climax, where we are unsure whether he intends harming a little girl or not, before trapping Eppler and proceeding to impale him with the pointed edges of a wooden gate!

During the course of the film, Eppler manages to vampirize two ladies: Brandi’s wife Graziella Granata (who is virtually put under a spell by the villain, whose coffin is hidden in their country-estate’s wine-cellar!) – an unintentionally amusing scene has her responding to Eppler’s disembodied voice, then he nonchalantly appears from behind a nearby tree! – and her maid (who looks an awful lot like a plumper version of Isabelle Adjani!). The most impressive member of the cast is Paolo Solvay, actually a pseudonym for director Luigi Batzella (best-known for the nonsensical erotic Gothic NUDE FOR SATAN [1974]), here appearing as Dr. Nietzche(!) and evoking Peter Cook, of all people, in appearance – in his case, the most hilarious bit has him telling Brandi of Granata’s imminent demise and getting no reaction whatsoever (incidentally, the English dialogue of this one is exceedingly stilted, which may well have been an intentional choice so as to complement Eppler’s stagy performance)! Another future film-maker, Alfredo Rizzo, turns up here as well but in a minor role this time around.

In conclusion, I recently watched an interview with director Mauri on the “Stracult” program on late-night Italian TV: apart from SLAUGHTER  itself (in Italian), this section included scenes from a number of his other efforts…and I was sufficiently intrigued to acquire the black-and-white Giallo NIGHT OF VIOLENCE (1965), the psycho-drama MADELINE, STUDY OF A NIGHTMARE (1974; with Camille Keaton, and whose failure through poor distribution Mauri particularly bemoaned) and THE PORNO KILLERS (1980; albeit in its softer original form) soon after!

01/14/11: THE MARK OF DEATH (Fernando Cortes, 1961)

This film is basically a rehash of the Hammer Horror classic THE MAN WHO COULD CHEAT DEATH (1959; itself a remake of 1944's THE MAN IN HALF-MOON STREET!). Watching it in the wake of several (largely uneven) Italian Gothics, I would say that the contemporaneous Mexi-Horror cycle is rather more fun to sit through; for the record, I have two more of them – namely THE WORLD OF THE VAMPIRES (1961) and THE LIVING HEAD (1963) – lined up for this week-end.

As usual, we have here a mad scientist obsessed by the quest for immortality, sacrificing any number of female lives along the way – until he is caught red-handed, tried, condemned, jailed and hanged for his crimes…and that is just the first 15 minutes of the film (which was re-edited for the U.S. by Jerry Warren and released three years later under the moniker CREATURE OF THE WALKING DEAD)! Anyway, we jump forward 70 years to the immediate future, i.e. 1962, and a dead-ringer relative for the notorious doctor (he even shares his name with him: how unsubtle can you get?!) stumbles upon his secret formula (actually, this is one of the unlikeliest scenes ever depicted, with the laboratory still filled with the rotting corpses of the long-past experiments!) – which he subsequently perfects thanks to the advances in technology (even allowing the unfortunate blood-donors to survive the ordeal this time around) and, rather than try it on himself, unearths his ancestor’s body and revives him (the latter, then, rather fancies all the modern gizmos)!

Much of the running-time is devoted to the new medic’s obligatory long-suffering fiancée (hilariously, he turns up for dinner at her house one night only to abduct the maid!). It comes as no surprise at all that the leading lady eventually ends up on a slab herself…especially when the old doctor (who reverts to the haggard look of his true age a fortnight after each transfusion) finds no more co-operation from his successor! However, before this happens, he locks him up in the lab and takes his place in the affections of his girl, even accepting her marriage proposal which his namesake had long been postponing (amusingly, when he goes out into the modern world, he addresses the butler with the first name that comes to mind, to the befuddlement of the latter, and then is almost made to soil his pants when he is nearly run over by a speeding car)!

Still, he cannot hide the mark of the hangman’s noose (presumably what the title refers to) forever, and the plot slowly works its way to the expected fiery climax…which sees the two docs engaging in a one-on-one, the lovers re-united and fleeing for their lives, and the old man shouting at the top of his lungs that he cannot die. Incidentally, one of the more interesting things about this one is its religious element, with any number of crosses turning up throughout, the scientist somewhat perversely kidnapping his victims just as they exit the church, and also his defiance of God (while laughing in a priest’s face) immediately prior to meeting the gallows pole!  

While certainly atmospheric, entertaining and propelled by a dynamic score (which sounded oddly familiar), one is disappointed that the ‘extra time’ allowed the mad doctor involved is ‘wasted’ on replenishing the all-important concoction as opposed to thinking about what he intends doing for all eternity once he has attained his goal! Without wishing to blow my own trumpet, years ago I had jotted a plotline wherein a scientist devises a serum which obliterates sleep and, hungry for power and feeling invulnerable, he proceeds to become a criminal mastermind…and, when his wife stumbles upon the potion too, with all the time now on her hands, she naturally turns into a nymphomaniac!

01/15/11: YANKEE PASHA (Joseph Pevney, 1954)

To begin with, I interrupted my ongoing parallel Luis Bunuel (Part 2) and ”Euro-Cult” marathons to indulge in an old-fashioned Hollywood oater on the big screen. This was due to an unscheduled, but most welcome, invite by a couple of movie-buff friends of mine (who are actually my Dad’s peers). Since we settled on which film we would be watching at the very last minute, I went into this knowing only the odd title (which I was familiar with alright, but it had somehow never cropped up for viewing until now) and the male lead involved (Jeff Chandler)…and, yet, I had to smile when, upon wondering if this was helmed by Joseph Pevney, his name actually turned up in the opening credits!

Being a Universal production, one has to remember that this sort of mindless crowd-pleasing fare used to be churned out virtually on an assembly-line during this era – with the slightest of trimmings to accommodate the studio’s current top box-office draw (be it Chandler, Tony Curtis or Rock Hudson)! Similarly, several journeymen directors flourished there at the time, proving adept at practically every setting and storyline the executives could throw at them! Now, to get back to the single biggest coup of the film under review, it is the effortless blending of sure-fire formulas which rendered the whole most enjoyable: in fact, proceedings start off in a Western milieu, then the scene shifts to the high seas and a brief interlude of pirate action, before eventually settling into an Arabian Nights adventure! Without wishing to attribute undue subtext to an inherently modest product, I am sure it would have greatly pleased the Surrealists to witness its depiction of amour fou literally transcending genre conventions!

Anyway, here we find trapper Chandler and redhead Rhonda Fleming falling for each other virtually at first sight (though, typically, she is intended for another who unsurprisingly proves to be an arrogant bully). Soon enough, the two men engage in a horse race, which Chandler wins thanks to an Indian yelp (like the one Richard Dix gave in CIMARRON [1931]) which frightens his rival’s steed! Sailing to Marseille with her father, she is kidnapped by pirates and sold into slavery to a Moroccan potentate (or, rather, an aspiring usurper) played by Rex Reason – here billed as Bart Roberts and later promoted to lead status for the sci-fi classic THIS ISLAND EARTH (1955)! The real ruler (an ill-at-ease Lee J. Cobb) fears his own army would not withstand a full-scale attack by Reason’s forces. He is saved by the arrival of Chandler upon the scene, who offers to school his soldiers in quick-shooting tactics in exchange for a place at court in an effort to get wind of Fleming’s whereabouts. For his services, Chandler is not only garbed in the latest Oriental fashion but gets acquainted with their customs (including owning a personal slave-girl in the shapely form of delightfully “cackling” yet jealously conniving Mamie Van Doren, also thankfully the closest thing here approximating comic relief) – prompting him to exclaim at one point, “I can Salaam with the best of them!”

As is to be expected, Chandler eventually regains Fleming and loses her once more to Reason, before himself falling into his clutches. Their obligatory showdown (by the way, there is also a cat-fight between the two girls over their supremacy in Chandler’s harem!) takes place on the prison turret, with the villain predictably getting his just desserts by being impaled on a set of horns which protrude from the walls to prevent convicts from escaping! One thing which I noticed but forgot to tell my host (who is a Victor Mature fanatic) is that Reason’s castle was, in all probability, the very same one to be featured (complete with a strategically-placed palm-tree) in Mature’s own Universal-produced Arabian Nights epic THE VEILS OF BAGDAD (1953), and which had actually been one of the first titles we caught at his private cinema!

In fact, watching YANKEE PASHA – via a surprisingly well-preserved 16mm copy, despite the occasional image blurring and emulsion problems – in an ambience which attempted to recreate the full theatrical Saturday matinee` experience (complete with walls adorned by vintage movie posters and musical accompaniment before the performance and during the reel-changing break) heightened the steady dose of unassuming colorful entertainment provided by the main feature. In conclusion, the career of silver-haired Jeff Chandler may have been short-lived but it proved incredibly prolific nevertheless: having checked just now, I have some 23 of his films lying unwatched in my collection – as opposed to the 7 which I have gotten under my belt so far! Given that this year marks the 50^th anniversary of his tragic passing, I might make room for a well-deserved retrospective throughout my proposed generic viewings in 2011…

L'Argent - There's no denying this film has some stunning cinematography, with a surprisingly mobile camera.  Perhaps L'Herbier took some lessons from Abel Gance.  And the performances are generally quite good, and the story has some compelling human drama.  But I have to agree with the one negative review on IMDb: the movie plods.  The first hour in particular is loaded down with a lot of not-very-interesting business deals.  It sets the stage for the rivalry between Saccard and Gunderman, but we don't need to see this much.  I cared a lot about the Hamelin couple, I even cared about Saccard, but still I was fighting boredom.  It felt like it needed a lot of tightening up.  I'll take the Bresson.  Rating: 6


Under the Bridges - This movie has been called "the German L'Atalante" and they definitely share some qualities.  Two men and a woman on a boat, wonderfully expressive camerawork, and such alluring charm and beauty.  It's very easy to get caught up in the gentle, appealing but slightly foreboding rhythms of the film, with so many memorable moments and the camera always finding a unique perspective.  And we're not saddled with an annoying Michel Simon character on this barge journey.  Each of the three leads is flawed but lovable, especially Carl Raddatz and Hannalore Schroth.  If the ending is a bit hard to swallow, it doesn't matter because you really want to see these characters flourish.  It's hard to believe such a lovely film was made under the Third Reich.  Rating: 8

Sunday Punch (1942) Dir: David Miller

Production: MGM

The denizens of a Brooklyn boarding house for boxers get a jolt when the niece of the home’s matron moves in. The boxers are mostly a group of mugs (as played by Leo Gorcey, Rags Ragland, Anthony Caruso and their trainer, Sam Levene), but the one contender is a college boy named Ken Burke (William Lundigan), who made the dubious decision to walk out of Johns Hopkins medical school for the quick riches of boxing. The colorful crew at Ma Galestrum’s (Connie Gilchrist) house is rounded out by the Swedish janitor, Ole (Dan Dailey), and Pops (Guy Kibbee), a washed up manager. Soon after moving in, Ma’s niece, Judy (the super cute, if improbably cast as a hard-bitten cynic, Jean Rogers), whose recent failure to make it as a singer has made her intent on landing a rich man (with just a hint that, at her low point, she resorted to, let’s say, unsavory means for her survival), bonds with Ken over their similarly jaundiced world view. Which soon turns to love, with Ken thinking of going back to school and settling with Judy. That doesn’t sit well with his promoter and the house’s benefactor, Bassler (J. Carrol Naish), who decides he has to break up the couple to get Ken a shot at the title.

Middling material capably handled by Miller, with maybe some less than convincing boxing scenes. The film just about overcomes an early impression that it’s going to be nothing but silliness. There are some likable actors around (Dane Clark makes his debut as a hobo Pop desperately tries to turn into a boxer, and IMDb lists Ava Gardner as a spectator, although I couldn’t find her), but Gilchrist and Dailey both offer up ‘yumpin’ yiminy’ bad Scandanavian accents. The early goofing off by Gorcey, Ragland and Levene quickly dies down (in the opening narration, Levene’s character, who is prone to malaprops, calls Brooklyn a “melting plot”; that’s basically as good as it gets). While Ken and Judy are the obvious romance, Ole, himself smitten with Judy, decides to become a boxer to impress her. Pop sees something in Ole and decides to train him. He’s no good at first, but his strength gives him an ability to land a knock out blow, the ‘Sunday punch’. It soon becomes obvious that Ole and Ken are on a collision course, with Judy, in a way, as the prize. How this eventually resolves itself may keep you checked in as a viewer, but if it doesn’t, nothing else will.

out of 4

Siren of Bagdad (1953) Dir: Richard Quine

Production: Esskay Pictures/Columbia Pictures

Lightly likable ‘Arabian Nights’ type farce. Magician Kazah the Great’s (Paul Henreid) traveling show is disrupted when bandits kidnap his group of dancing girls. Kazah and his sidekick, Ben Ali (Hans Conried) track the bandits to Bagdad and find the girls for sale in a slave auction. After a botched rescue attempt, Kazah is saved by a man named Telar and his beautiful daughter Zendi (Patricia Medina). Telar turns out to be the exiled sultan Samand the Just, and soon, Kazah and Ben Ali decide to help him regain his position from the buffoonish Sultan El Malid (Charles Lung) and his Machiavellian Grand Vizier, Soradin (George Keymas).     

The film’s appeal comes from a ‘Hope and Crosby’ like irreverent regard for genre conventions. Henreid is amusing, throwing himself into the spirit of this send-up (he lampoons himself in a scene where he lights two hookahs…like they were cigarettes). After he bests someone in a swordfight, he remarks “sorry, old boy” as if he were Errol Flynn. Conried is even cheekier. “I’ve always wanted to play the Palace”, he says as they plan a rescue. When it looks like Kazah and Zendi may be split apart, after she volunteers to impersonate a princess that the Sultan has arranged to marry, Ali assures Telar there’s no reason to worry, where he’s from there’s something called a three act formula: “Boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy gets girl…and this is only the end of the second act!” Another funny scene has Kazah turn Ali into a beautiful woman to go on an intel mission inside the palace, yet ‘she’ retains the Hans Conried voice, not that that slows down the attracted Soradin. The movie’s not a classic by any means--that Esskay Pictures means Sam Katzman as producer, so you can imagine the budget--but there is enough in it from Henreid and Conried to be a pleasant surprise.

out of 4

01/15/11: THE WORLD OF THE VAMPIRES (Alfonso Corona Blake, 1961)

Well, it seems like I spoke too soon about the superior quality of Mexi-Horrors vis-à-vis the Italian Gothics, as this is as goofy as they come – almost on a par, in fact, with the notorious THE BRAINIAC (1961; interestingly enough, directed by the helmer of the slightly better effort with which I followed it)! Anyway, back when the Casanegra DVD company folded, I had voiced my disappointment that their otherwise excellent line of releases would be no more. At the time, they had already announced the next two titles on the schedule and, in fact, they were the film under review and the Chano Urueta picture I was referring to earlier i.e. THE LIVING HEAD (1963)…so that I made it a point to somehow acquire them regardless!

As I said, however, the journey was somewhat more gratifying than the destination – this film in particular proving a veritable mess and enjoyable simply because of how ludicrous it was! First of all, this is one from the matinee` idol days of the bloodsucker: as played by Guillermo Murray, the chief vampire here is so stiff that one expects to see moth-balls in his coffin! Besides, given the over-sized neck of his cape, one would not have been surprised to see him extract an electric guitar from some corner of his hide-out cave and break into a Glam Rock number at some point in the proceedings (after all, he frequently sits at his skull-adorned pipe-organ and summons his minions with some funereal sonata)!

Incidentally, music plays a pivotal role here: in fact, the hero is himself a gifted pianist with a great knowledge of how certain melodies can affect the listener (while hilariously looking like a dead-ringer for Clark Gable) – and the first time the two meet is at a party given by the descendants of the Count’s sworn enemies (named Colman and with their eldest member played by Jose` Baviera from Luis Bunuel’s THE EXTERMINATING ANGEL [1962]!), where it transpires that the bloodsucker cannot stand old Transylvanian melodies (the grimaces he spontaneously makes at this are side-splitting)!

In any case, he manages to notch up a few victims along the way, beginning with a couple driving along a desolate stretch of road at night. Atypically, while the vampirization of the girl here has to follow a certain ritual (laboriously illustrated throughout the film no fewer than three times!), the male is mysteriously turned into a hideously hirsute creature (to take its place amongst the Count’s deformed disciples)!! There is also the obligatory hunchback/mute servant who turns up long enough to be chastised for intruding on his master’s ‘meditation’ and, later, to engage in a violent fisticuff with the hero!

By the way, the latter falls prey to the monstrous ‘bug’ himself but, since the transformation is gradual, only his hands ever sprout hair…but which does not prevent him from taking to the pipe-organ at the climax and bring down the vampire since, like I said, musical notes can just as soon drive the bloodsucker off-the-wall as serve the function of a ‘clarion call’ to his sub-human underlings. And, given that the Count’s cavernous abode is conveniently supplied with a pit which has large spikes protruding from the ground, it is inevitable that he would ultimately get his come-uppance in this grisly fashion (with one of Colman’s own daughters, similarly afflicted, joining him soon after)!

01/15/11: THE LIVING HEAD (Chano Urueta, 1963)

This is another popular Mexi-Horror effort – one of a spate, in fact, that were picked up for U.S. distribution by exploitationer K. Gordon Murray. Though involved in it are some of the top purveyors of this goofy-yet-irresistible form (director Urueta, producer/star Abel Salazar and co-star German Robles – the three had previously collaborated on one of the wackiest horror movies ever, THE BRAINIAC [1962]), this one emerges a disappointment overall!

For starters, it feels like a half-hearted attempt at Mummy lore (with the marauding bandaged one replaced by an Aztec high priest, and the added treat of the titular ‘monster’), especially when considering that there had already been three “Aztec Mummy” films (albeit of similarly negligible quality)! Anyway, here we get the usual elements of archeologists falling prey to a curse tied to their latest find (the tomb of various long-dead Aztecs with unpronounceable names!); Robles (as in THE BRAINIAC, made to look older than his years) leads the expedition and the youngest member is played by the same Clark Gable-lookalike from THE WORLD OF THE VAMPIRES (1961; which had immediately preceded this), while Salazar turns up – in a rather thankless role – as the police detective investigating the ensuing ‘mysterious’ deaths.

The film starts off in the distant past (recreating an ancient burial ritual) – with the ensuing passage of time until the present day represented by a montage lifted wholesale from THE BRAINIAC itself (as are some of the musical cues!); a ring that can glow and hypnotize its owner into doing the villain’s evil bidding becomes the object of contention at some point in the proceedings, whereas the disembodied head intermittently renders its helmet transparent (for no other discernible reason than to let us see that the hero is a dead-ringer for its owner, just as Robles’ daughter is for the warrior’s beloved!). THE LIVING HEAD is by no means terrible but clearly uninspired (to say nothing of singularly unfrightening), and decidedly less fun than one would have hoped for (indeed expected from this particular stable)!

Incidentally, given that I have often been taken to task for ridiculing cheap horror films in my comments, a similarly bemused (or, if you like, cynical) viewpoint was adopted by both “External Reviews” pertaining to THE LIVING HEAD on its IMDb page! In the end, I am glad I did not have to fork out my hard-earned cash for either this one (which I honestly can barely recall after just three days!) or THE WORLD OF THE VAMPIRES and, while I regret the Casanegra company’s unceremonious folding, I seriously doubt their financial matters would have been in any way resolved via the potential sales receipts from the DVD editions of these two very minor genre entries…

01/16/11: DRACULA IN ISTANBUL (Mehmet Muhtar, 1953)

I first heard about this (and became sufficiently intrigued by it) over the Internet; it is virtually the only vintage Turkish film to be given reasonable exposure in recent years, apart from the Genghis Khan reworking KIZIL TUG (1952), which I also own but have yet to watch.

This, then, joins the ranks of other foreign-language adaptations of the Bram Stoker horror classic – such as the two German NOSFERATUs (1922 and 1979); two from Spain i.e. DRACULA (1931; albeit filmed concurrently with the quintessential Hollywood rendition on the very same sets!) and COUNT DRACULA (1969; its director, Jess Franco, even made an updated distaff version in VAMPYROS LESBOS [1970]) and the Pakistani THE LIVING CORPSE (1967; which is actually just as obscure and which it most resembles in the long run, not least in the numerous musical interludes). Unfortunately, the copy I viewed was in very bad shape (which perhaps enhanced the expected pervasive mood of dread and inherent strangeness): an exceedingly dark and splicy print, marred even further by combing issues and subtitles that went out-of-synch for considerable stretches!

While the obvious model for this one was the Bela Lugosi milestone (down to refraining from showing the vampire’s ultimate come-uppance…but, then, the camera focuses squarely on the heroine’s shapely figure while she changes into ‘something more comfortable’ soon after!), it proved most interesting in what differed from the usual blood-sucking fare. As for Dracula himself, he is atypically played by a bald-headed fellow (albeit resembling Brian Eno much more than the Max Schreck of the original NOSFERATU!) whose role, once the scene shifts from Romania to Turkey, is so severely diminished that he virtually becomes a supporting character in his own ‘star vehicle’(!!) – for the record, he can disappear and manifest himself at will, as well as take any animal form he wishes (though, understandably, we are only ever shown one very brief bat mutation throughout) via a simple flashing of the cape over his face…which, at the end, results in unintentional hilarity, when he loses the emblematic garment and is thus forced to literally run for his life (incidentally, here we also have the very first depiction of the famous moment in Stoker’s tale where the Count is seen scaling his castle walls, not to mention an off-screen reference to the equally renowned baby-feeding scene)!

To get back to what is novel here vis-a`-vis the source material and the myriad movie versions before and after: Dracula’s properties in Istanbul are amusingly referred to as “kiosks”; the Count’s hunchbacked servant back home eventually turns on him, and pays with his life, in an effort to protect the victimized hero (which is not even appreciated by the latter!); most hilariously, the vampire is warded off not by the traditional cross but rather mere garlic (lots of ’em!)…but, then, characters are made to freely bestow blessings upon one another (perhaps a requisite of the country’s religion?)!; the ‘Mina’ counterpart is a blonde “Follies” dancer (the girl is forever excusing herself to perform for some Red Cross benefit activity!), and she is even made to give a private show, under hypnosis, for Count Dracula!!; another unusual setting is the sea-side one reserved for the ‘Lucy’ substitute’s initial attack (later on, however, it takes her boyfriend and the obligatory elderly vampire-hunter three separate visits to her crypt in order to ascertain the girl’s return from the dead!).

Given the number of classic films that were inspired by Stoker’s original over the years, it is unlikely that this particular version will ever be included in that pantheon – but it is certainly enjoyable along the way and weird enough to withstand more than a cursory viewing from horror aficionados.