Movie-Viewing Experiences 28/2/18 - 7/3/18
A+ = Adored Masterwork A = Excellent A- = Very Good B+ = Good B = Nice Try B- = Tolerable
C = Significantly Flawed D = Pretty Bad E = Truly Dreadful: Looking Into the Void F = Vile & Repugnant: The Void
HOBSON'S CHOICE (1954)
A MOVIE JUKEBOX
d: David Lean
CAST: Charles Laughton; Brenda de Banzie; John Mills; Daphne Anderson; Prunella Scales
> the nominees for David Lean's Greatest Films are usually Brief Encounter, Great Expectations and Lawrence of Arabia...but I've always voted for this one, the master director's only comedy (that works...feh on Blithe Spirit); perfection in casting (Charles has never been funnier) with some beautiful set pieces (the moon-in-the-puddle scene is pure Laurel & Hardy) and gorgeous frames (I love the burgeoning relationship between Brenda & John beginning on a bench, overlooking a mucky river); while the-morning-after hallucinations are, I think, a step too far into silliness, the central romance is genuinely invigorating and touching
Award-Worthy Performances
Charles Laughton; Brenda de Banzie; John Mills
NEBRASKA (2013)
A FIRST VIEWING...NEW MOVIE JUKEBOX INDUCTEE
d: Alexander Payne
CAST: Bruce Dern; Will Forte; June Squibb; Bob Odenkirk; Stacey Keach
> old age is a right bugger; Bruce is the old guy who is thought-scrambled but is clear on one thing...he has to get to Lincoln, Nebraska to pick up a million dollars which an unscrupulous marketing ploy has announced is his...his son agrees to drive him there, along the way calling into the old hometown; the perfect blend of sadness and humour, fact and memory, this movie is in the company of 1999's The Straight Story and 2017's Lucky...and just as good as both; my fave sequence is the re-meeting of extended family, with the realisation that all you've got in common with these people is blood and childhood; a kind hand on your aging shoulder
Award-Worthy Performance
Bruce Dern
THE BRIDGE ON THE RIVER KWAI (1957)
A MOVIE JUKEBOX
d: David Lean
CAST: William Holden; Alec Guinness; Jack Hawkins; Sessue Hayakawa; James Donald
> a WWII film which, even after 60 years, is worthy of all the accolades it received upon its initial release; it works as a P.O.W. story + as a Men-on-a-Mission actioner + as a jungle epic (you can smell the sweat) + as an anti-war polemic ("Madness! Madness!" = "The horror. The horror.") + as a blowing-up-big-things spectacle + as a character study of two lonely, rigid fools posing as leaders; surprising little touches of humour pop up (love the nudie calendar in Saito's office!) and the Colonel Bogey march-in is a classic entrance; criticism is often directed towards the muddled ending, but I don't agree...I can tell exactly what is going on
Award-Worthy Performances
William Holden; Alec Guinness
OLIVER TWIST (1948)
A- THIRD VIEWING
d: David Lean
CAST: John Howard Davies; Alec Guinness; Robert Newton; Kay Walsh; Henry Stephenson
> I played Mr Bumble in a school production of the musical Oliver!, so for purely nostalgic reasons, I am always going to prefer that 1968 movie-retelling of the Dickens classic; this is appropriately darker and grimmer with a couple of scenes of appalling violence (the killing of Nancy...actually, the reaction of the dog...is a shocker); the capture of Bill Sykes seems to be rushed in this and Kay overdoes the tart-with-a-heart routine, but little John is the eternal-best Oliver; Alec equipped with one preposterous proboscis is the Cruikshank drawing brought to life and visually overwhelms the scenes he is in; spectacularly shot if you're a fan of dank
Award-Worthy Performances
John Howard Davies; Robert Newton
MARY REILLY (1996)
B+ FIRST VIEWING
d: Stephen Frears
CAST: Julia Roberts; John Malkovich; George Cole; Michael Gambon; Glenn Close
> exalted critic David Thomson raves about this film / everybody else bagged it all the way to the Razzie Awards / I play inbetweenies; a rejigging of the famous Jekyll & Hyde story, this version focuses on housemaid Mary and how she stirs lust in Jekyll & rouses love in Hyde; a morally crooked story (evil raises its head via child abuse and it lingers throughout), the motivations of the two (3?) main characters are more than a little iffy; stunning cinematography (makes the greys rich) is matched by a Bernard Herrmann-ish score which adds a lush dread; Julia gives the best performance in the film, as someone who is meek yet somehow credibly controlling; biggest flaw is the playing of John (he should have been ideal as Jekyll/Hyde)...he keeps his distance from both personas; still, the film stays with you
NEVER SAY NEVER AGAIN (1983)
B SECOND VIEWING
d: Irvin Kershner
CAST: Sean Connery; Klaus Maria Brandauer; Barbara Carrera; Kim Basinger
> hailed as "The Great Lost Bond Movie" (it is not part of the official franchise... some legal thing) and derided as "Zero Charisma Machismo", it is business as before (in fact, it's a retelling of Thunderball... some legal thing) but with differences (our martini-man is near retirement age and somewhat portly with it); Klaus is one of the better Bond villains, Barbara is the greatest villainess, Kim is appropriately gorgeous & unclothed as the Bond woman and Sean does the Sean version of 007... and, of course, he does it very well; overlong, dull in patches with crap music, this still has the requisite amount of humour and action (love the shark pursuit... and the motorbike chase... and the World Domination video game... and the jet pod thingies); meh... it's an okay James Bond movie, just like most of the others
SUMMERTIME aka SUMMER MADNESS (1955)
B FIRST VIEWING
d: David Lean
CAST: Katharine Hepburn; Rossano Brazzi; Isa Miranda; Darren McGavin
> aka Overdue Encounter; the great Kate is the middle-aged secretary who hates being a sexless spinster...she holidays in Venice with the hopes of romance...and it happens with a nice local guy who's not too smarmy; while Kate is fine (although I dislike that gaping-hole laugh of hers...she used it in The African Queen too), she's not quite involving enough to make me want to jump in with her and Rossano; being the coldhearted bastard that I am, I infinitely prefer watching the anguish of loneliness rather than the soppy smoochy stuff...which in this film, seems to me to be too Mills & Boon in both dialogue and finale; still, as a travel brochure of Venice, this is affectingly filmed without the typical touristy sights jumping out at you and the characters are people you enjoy spending a little time with; it's pleasant fluff
THE SOUND BARRIER aka BREAKING THE SOUND BARRIER (1952)
B- SECOND VIEWING
d: David Lean
CAST: Ralph Richardson; Ann Todd; Nigel Patrick; Joseph Tomelty; John Justin
> while I accept that Man's need to discover is the reason why we are where we currently are (which is good and bad of course), I don't understand why anyone of normal mentality would risk a horrible death for such a cause, regardless of its nobility...however, moving on...this tells the title's tale from the UK point of view (apparently, Chuck Yeager was highly amused by it); Ann plays that ghastly role of the terribly-British wife who frets at home, drinking sherry and rounding her vowels while Hubbie the Test Pilot regularly gets nearer to his maker; competently acted with some beautiful B&W aerial cinematography, this film puts on full display the British Stiff Upper Lip (until the supersonic breakthrough is finally made...that's when real men openly blub); probably quite stirring for basejumpers and petrolheads
UNDER CAPRICORN (1949)
B- FIRST VIEWING
d: Alfred Hitchcock
CAST: Ingrid Bergman; Joseph Cotten; Michael Wilding; Margaret Leighton; Cecil Parker
> from one extreme ("a lost treasure" David Thomson calls it) to another ("a stinker" Pauline Kael calls it), the one thing that both would surely agree on is that it is not Prime Hitch; while it contains regular Hitchcock ingredients (murder & guilt & secret love & twisted love & stupid authority), this tale set in Colonial Australia days is more Jane Eyre than Lizzie Borden; Ingrid is the anguished mistress of the house, Joseph is the stern master (he is channeling his inner Heathcliff), Michael is the visiting cousin (a skimmed milk performance), Margaret is quietly and perfectly evil and Cecil flusters about in uniformed finery; it's another crossword movie
Award-Worthy Performance
Margaret Leighton
THE NEWTON BOYS (1998)
C FIRST VIEWING
d: Richard Linklater
CAST: Matthew McConaughey; Skeet Ulrich; Ethan Hawke; Vincent D'Onofrio; Dwight Yoakam
> set in a late Western / early gangster era, this is another one of those bank-robbers-as-loveable rogues movies...the big problem is that none of these thieves are particularly loveable...there is no Butch Cassidy or Moses Pray here; it's all fun and games (nitro to blow safes + smalltown hicks talking funny + honkytonk jazz) until someone gets shot in the face (people being robbed are so unreasonable); there is nothing new in this telling and, while it is based on the true story of the 1920's Newton Gang, their exploits soon became criminal cliches (hell, there's even a woman who stands by her man); no actor in the cast makes much of an impression (although Vincent can twitch well); when the brothers eventually luck out, it feels like somebody should be shouting out "whaddya expect, ya dumb bastards!"
MADELEINE (1950)
C FIRST VIEWING
d: David Lean
CAST: Ann Todd; Ivan Desny; Norman Wooland; Leslie Banks
> this was Director David's least favourite of his films...and with good reason; based on the true 1857 crime of Madeleine Smith (she was accused of arsenic poisoning her lower class lover), this telling is just simply dull; the prime reason for this is Ann aka Mrs David Lean...at no point (even at the end, when she lightly smiles), does she seem in the running for Cold Murderess of the Year; Chuck Berry wisely told us that "you never can tell", but a visual medium needs some sign that evil is actually possible...so, while Ann is polite and prissy, she is never polite and venomous; the court case in the last third means that we are pulled through the whole saga for a second time; only Leslie as the ice-father makes any impression in support; read Rick Geary's excellent 2006 graphic novel The Case of Madeleine Smith for a more riveting account
FOLLOW ME, BOYS! (1966)
C FIRST VIEWING
d: Norman Tokar
CAST: Fred MacMurray; Vera Miles; Kurt Russell; Lillian Gish; Charlie Ruggles
> aka Disney Promotes the Boy Scouts; I was a Scout and must say that becoming one was a turning point in my life...it gave me physical confidence, improved social skills and an ability to tie a bowline in under 10 seconds; this blatantly-bright ad for the movement is mysteriously split into 3 chapters: #1 = the best by far...Fred moves to Smalltown USA, volunteers as a Scoutmaster, unites the boisterous boys and rescues a troubled Kurt from delinquency...nice; #2 = the Scouts get caught up in a war game with tanks and explosions and it tries to convince us that armed conflict is a hoot...questionable; and #3 = a sentimental cuddle for Fred after his years of service, given by the townsfolk and ex-Scouts (most of whom have grown into doctors, governors etc), climaxing with a rousing singsong and march...vomit
Go something you want to tell me?
GO RIGHT AHEAD: masted59@gmail.com
HOBSON'S CHOICE (1954)
d: David Lean
CAST: Charles Laughton; Brenda de Banzie; John Mills; Daphne Anderson; Prunella Scales
> the nominees for David Lean's Greatest Films are usually Brief Encounter, Great Expectations and Lawrence of Arabia...but I've always voted for this one, the master director's only comedy (that works...feh on Blithe Spirit); perfection in casting (Charles has never been funnier) with some beautiful set pieces (the moon-in-the-puddle scene is pure Laurel & Hardy) and gorgeous frames (I love the burgeoning relationship between Brenda & John beginning on a bench, overlooking a mucky river); while the-morning-after hallucinations are, I think, a step too far into silliness, the central romance is genuinely invigorating and touching
Award-Worthy Performances
Charles Laughton; Brenda de Banzie; John Mills
NEBRASKA (2013)
d: Alexander Payne
CAST: Bruce Dern; Will Forte; June Squibb; Bob Odenkirk; Stacey Keach
> old age is a right bugger; Bruce is the old guy who is thought-scrambled but is clear on one thing...he has to get to Lincoln, Nebraska to pick up a million dollars which an unscrupulous marketing ploy has announced is his...his son agrees to drive him there, along the way calling into the old hometown; the perfect blend of sadness and humour, fact and memory, this movie is in the company of 1999's The Straight Story and 2017's Lucky...and just as good as both; my fave sequence is the re-meeting of extended family, with the realisation that all you've got in common with these people is blood and childhood; a kind hand on your aging shoulder
Award-Worthy Performance
Bruce Dern
THE BRIDGE ON THE RIVER KWAI (1957)
d: David Lean
CAST: William Holden; Alec Guinness; Jack Hawkins; Sessue Hayakawa; James Donald
> a WWII film which, even after 60 years, is worthy of all the accolades it received upon its initial release; it works as a P.O.W. story + as a Men-on-a-Mission actioner + as a jungle epic (you can smell the sweat) + as an anti-war polemic ("Madness! Madness!" = "The horror. The horror.") + as a blowing-up-big-things spectacle + as a character study of two lonely, rigid fools posing as leaders; surprising little touches of humour pop up (love the nudie calendar in Saito's office!) and the Colonel Bogey march-in is a classic entrance; criticism is often directed towards the muddled ending, but I don't agree...I can tell exactly what is going on
Award-Worthy Performances
William Holden; Alec Guinness
OLIVER TWIST (1948)
d: David Lean
CAST: John Howard Davies; Alec Guinness; Robert Newton; Kay Walsh; Henry Stephenson
> I played Mr Bumble in a school production of the musical Oliver!, so for purely nostalgic reasons, I am always going to prefer that 1968 movie-retelling of the Dickens classic; this is appropriately darker and grimmer with a couple of scenes of appalling violence (the killing of Nancy...actually, the reaction of the dog...is a shocker); the capture of Bill Sykes seems to be rushed in this and Kay overdoes the tart-with-a-heart routine, but little John is the eternal-best Oliver; Alec equipped with one preposterous proboscis is the Cruikshank drawing brought to life and visually overwhelms the scenes he is in; spectacularly shot if you're a fan of dank
Award-Worthy Performances
John Howard Davies; Robert Newton
MARY REILLY (1996)
d: Stephen Frears
CAST: Julia Roberts; John Malkovich; George Cole; Michael Gambon; Glenn Close
> exalted critic David Thomson raves about this film / everybody else bagged it all the way to the Razzie Awards / I play inbetweenies; a rejigging of the famous Jekyll & Hyde story, this version focuses on housemaid Mary and how she stirs lust in Jekyll & rouses love in Hyde; a morally crooked story (evil raises its head via child abuse and it lingers throughout), the motivations of the two (3?) main characters are more than a little iffy; stunning cinematography (makes the greys rich) is matched by a Bernard Herrmann-ish score which adds a lush dread; Julia gives the best performance in the film, as someone who is meek yet somehow credibly controlling; biggest flaw is the playing of John (he should have been ideal as Jekyll/Hyde)...he keeps his distance from both personas; still, the film stays with you
NEVER SAY NEVER AGAIN (1983)
d: Irvin Kershner
CAST: Sean Connery; Klaus Maria Brandauer; Barbara Carrera; Kim Basinger
> hailed as "The Great Lost Bond Movie" (it is not part of the official franchise... some legal thing) and derided as "Zero Charisma Machismo", it is business as before (in fact, it's a retelling of Thunderball... some legal thing) but with differences (our martini-man is near retirement age and somewhat portly with it); Klaus is one of the better Bond villains, Barbara is the greatest villainess, Kim is appropriately gorgeous & unclothed as the Bond woman and Sean does the Sean version of 007... and, of course, he does it very well; overlong, dull in patches with crap music, this still has the requisite amount of humour and action (love the shark pursuit... and the motorbike chase... and the World Domination video game... and the jet pod thingies); meh... it's an okay James Bond movie, just like most of the others
SUMMERTIME aka SUMMER MADNESS (1955)
d: David Lean
CAST: Katharine Hepburn; Rossano Brazzi; Isa Miranda; Darren McGavin
> aka Overdue Encounter; the great Kate is the middle-aged secretary who hates being a sexless spinster...she holidays in Venice with the hopes of romance...and it happens with a nice local guy who's not too smarmy; while Kate is fine (although I dislike that gaping-hole laugh of hers...she used it in The African Queen too), she's not quite involving enough to make me want to jump in with her and Rossano; being the coldhearted bastard that I am, I infinitely prefer watching the anguish of loneliness rather than the soppy smoochy stuff...which in this film, seems to me to be too Mills & Boon in both dialogue and finale; still, as a travel brochure of Venice, this is affectingly filmed without the typical touristy sights jumping out at you and the characters are people you enjoy spending a little time with; it's pleasant fluff
THE SOUND BARRIER aka BREAKING THE SOUND BARRIER (1952)
d: David Lean
CAST: Ralph Richardson; Ann Todd; Nigel Patrick; Joseph Tomelty; John Justin
> while I accept that Man's need to discover is the reason why we are where we currently are (which is good and bad of course), I don't understand why anyone of normal mentality would risk a horrible death for such a cause, regardless of its nobility...however, moving on...this tells the title's tale from the UK point of view (apparently, Chuck Yeager was highly amused by it); Ann plays that ghastly role of the terribly-British wife who frets at home, drinking sherry and rounding her vowels while Hubbie the Test Pilot regularly gets nearer to his maker; competently acted with some beautiful B&W aerial cinematography, this film puts on full display the British Stiff Upper Lip (until the supersonic breakthrough is finally made...that's when real men openly blub); probably quite stirring for basejumpers and petrolheads
UNDER CAPRICORN (1949)
d: Alfred Hitchcock
CAST: Ingrid Bergman; Joseph Cotten; Michael Wilding; Margaret Leighton; Cecil Parker
> from one extreme ("a lost treasure" David Thomson calls it) to another ("a stinker" Pauline Kael calls it), the one thing that both would surely agree on is that it is not Prime Hitch; while it contains regular Hitchcock ingredients (murder & guilt & secret love & twisted love & stupid authority), this tale set in Colonial Australia days is more Jane Eyre than Lizzie Borden; Ingrid is the anguished mistress of the house, Joseph is the stern master (he is channeling his inner Heathcliff), Michael is the visiting cousin (a skimmed milk performance), Margaret is quietly and perfectly evil and Cecil flusters about in uniformed finery; it's another crossword movie
Award-Worthy Performance
Margaret Leighton
THE NEWTON BOYS (1998)
d: Richard Linklater
CAST: Matthew McConaughey; Skeet Ulrich; Ethan Hawke; Vincent D'Onofrio; Dwight Yoakam
> set in a late Western / early gangster era, this is another one of those bank-robbers-as-loveable rogues movies...the big problem is that none of these thieves are particularly loveable...there is no Butch Cassidy or Moses Pray here; it's all fun and games (nitro to blow safes + smalltown hicks talking funny + honkytonk jazz) until someone gets shot in the face (people being robbed are so unreasonable); there is nothing new in this telling and, while it is based on the true story of the 1920's Newton Gang, their exploits soon became criminal cliches (hell, there's even a woman who stands by her man); no actor in the cast makes much of an impression (although Vincent can twitch well); when the brothers eventually luck out, it feels like somebody should be shouting out "whaddya expect, ya dumb bastards!"
MADELEINE (1950)
d: David Lean
CAST: Ann Todd; Ivan Desny; Norman Wooland; Leslie Banks
> this was Director David's least favourite of his films...and with good reason; based on the true 1857 crime of Madeleine Smith (she was accused of arsenic poisoning her lower class lover), this telling is just simply dull; the prime reason for this is Ann aka Mrs David Lean...at no point (even at the end, when she lightly smiles), does she seem in the running for Cold Murderess of the Year; Chuck Berry wisely told us that "you never can tell", but a visual medium needs some sign that evil is actually possible...so, while Ann is polite and prissy, she is never polite and venomous; the court case in the last third means that we are pulled through the whole saga for a second time; only Leslie as the ice-father makes any impression in support; read Rick Geary's excellent 2006 graphic novel The Case of Madeleine Smith for a more riveting account
FOLLOW ME, BOYS! (1966)
d: Norman Tokar
CAST: Fred MacMurray; Vera Miles; Kurt Russell; Lillian Gish; Charlie Ruggles
> aka Disney Promotes the Boy Scouts; I was a Scout and must say that becoming one was a turning point in my life...it gave me physical confidence, improved social skills and an ability to tie a bowline in under 10 seconds; this blatantly-bright ad for the movement is mysteriously split into 3 chapters: #1 = the best by far...Fred moves to Smalltown USA, volunteers as a Scoutmaster, unites the boisterous boys and rescues a troubled Kurt from delinquency...nice; #2 = the Scouts get caught up in a war game with tanks and explosions and it tries to convince us that armed conflict is a hoot...questionable; and #3 = a sentimental cuddle for Fred after his years of service, given by the townsfolk and ex-Scouts (most of whom have grown into doctors, governors etc), climaxing with a rousing singsong and march...vomit
Go something you want to tell me?
GO RIGHT AHEAD: masted59@gmail.com
