Seconds

A successful banker with a boring wife living a monotonous suburban existence is recruited into a mandatory program where he will be reconfigured as an attractive, artistic type (Rock Hudson) and placed in a California coastal community with like people. John Frankenheimer's Seconds plays like an extended version of a Twilight Zone episode, never dull but still sterilized, shocking and hard to watch. It drives home its theme well though with a solid performance by Hudson who is himself surrounded by strong supporters, and is intriguingly filmed with great camerawork and use of closeup by James Wong Howe.

*** out of ****

Le Deuxieme Souffle

A principled criminal (Lino Ventura) escapes from prison, returns to Paris, and reacquaints with old friends before being roped back into the life, taking part in an execution and a deadly heist while being pursued by a wily detective (Paul Meurisse). Harsh and violent, Jean-Pierre Melville's undemonstrative Le Deuxieme Souffle (Second Wind) is another of the director's takes on gangster ethics and boasting a strong performance from Ventura.

*** 1/2 out of ****

The Battle of Algiers

As the FLN led Algerian fight for independence against the occupying French continues to escalate, both sides take drastic measures on the very different battleground of urban warfare. Gillo Pontecorvo's The Battle of Algiers is an exquisitely shot documentary mimicking film, superbly edited, and scarily relevant to this day. The leftist film is somewhat distressing considering the bias in favor of the revolutionaries and its future influence on those seeking to employ similar guerrilla tactics and, to be fair, on those trying to combat them.

*** 1/2 out of ****

What's Up, Tiger Lily

With some creative overdubbing, the Japanese spy yarn International Secret Police: Key of Keys turns into a thriller detailing a black market syndicate's relentless search for a top secret egg salad sandwich recipe. What's Up, Tiger Lily, Woody's first as a director, is a high concept film, sporadically funny though largely silly and pointless. Not so much a hint of his genius that would follow but rather a forgettable instance of his early career infantilism.

** 1/2 out of ****

Au Hasard Balthazar

The life of a self-sacrificing donkey in a provincial French town and the many hardships and abuses it must suffer, even at the hands of its initial loving though neglectful owners. Robert Bresson's Au Hasard Balthazar is a deceptively simple tale that deep down is actually complex, meditative, spiritual parable that offers more than meets the eye while telling an overarching story that touches upon the whole human experience and, in turn, sparks a wide range of emotions. The film is beautifully shot, perfectly cast, and entirely affecting.

**** out of ****

The Good, the Bad and the Ugly

Sergio Leone's epic spaghetti western, which details the uneasy alliances formed by the eponymous characters (played by Clint Eastwood, Lee Van Cleef, and Eli Wallach) as search the unforgiving territories in search of Confederate gold, has been heralded as THE definitive western and makes many top 10 all time lists. Revisiting it again I was taken by the vacant landscapes, Ennio Morricone's inimitable score, Leone's brash direction, and the ending of the unrivaled final sequence. Clint's image was cemented here in this film, Van Cleef is an impeccable baddie, and Wallach's performance (forgetting how most of the film really centers on him) is kind of remarkable. Only complaint: for such a lengthy picture, the penultimate bridge detonation sequence really does slow things down.

**** out of ****

Persona

A nurse (Bibi Andersson) is assigned to care for an actress (Liv Ullmann)  who suffered a breakdown and has ceased speaking entirely. The two women retreat to a seaside cottage in hopes the tranquil settings will help in the form of therapy and quickly form a powerful bond and find their personages beginning to fuse together. Ingmar Bergman's is challenging, quintessential art house fare that I'd be damned to offer any meaningful analysis on. It is dark, beautiful, hypnotic, haunting, and cryptic, filled with jarring imagery and containing excellent performances from its female leads.

*** 1/2 out of ****

Alfie

Alfie Elkins is a Cockneyed cad and a self-styled womanizer who cares nothing for the young women with whom he engages his nightly dalliances. When his lifestyle begins to catch up with him, in the form of poor health, a newborn son, and the arrangement of an abortion for the wife of a close friend, he starts to make strides at emotional maturity. Alfie is something of an astoundment: a sex comedy that doesn't insult its audience's intelligence and lets them use their imagination. Lewis Gilbert's treatment of Bill Naughton's scripting of his own play would surely have failed in other hands but Michael Caine, in his first starring role, makes it funny, compelling, and moving and even succeeds in breaking the fourth wall.
*** 1/2 out of ****

How to Steal a Million

The daughter of an art forger (Audrey Hepburn) resolves to steal her father's product, a replica statue of Cellini's Venus on display at a renowned Paris gallery, in order to protect his reputation when he fears analysis will out him as a fraud. To achieve her goal, she enlists the help of police detective posing as a burglar (Peter O'Toole) who can't help but fall for his lovely target. William Wyler's How to Steal a Million is an incredulous and uninspired romantic comedy invigorated by the aid of its charismatic stars and an entertaining heist sequence.
** 1/2 out of ****

War and Peace (1956 and 1967)

Probably the two biggest cinematic assemblies of Leo Tolstoy's mountainous novel, which detailed the interweaving lives of several Russian families during the Napoleonic Wars, occurred first out of Hollywood in 1956 and then in a Russian adaptation of a no less mammoth scope in 1966. The American version, with marquee names like King Vidor in the helm, Jack Cardiff manning the cameras, and Henry Fonda and Audrey Hepburn in front of it, has gone largely forgotten despite some excellent photography, a fine performance from Fonda, and a generally well done treatment.

Sergey Bondarchuk's version, which has the greater historical reputation but has been about as equally consigned these days, set the record at the time for production costs, extras used, and a slew of other overages in a shoot that spanned several years. Despite its impressive scope, I found it to be murky, muddled, and uninvolving, with the saving grace coming in the form of performers Lyudmila Saveleva and Bondarchuk himself, who fill the same roles played by Hepburn and Fonda. One of the main issues, especially with the 1966 version (which did go on to win the Foreign Film Oscar and international acclaim) is that despite the fact of the sheer length of the novel, much of it is rhetoric or essay, all of which is not exactly fit for the screen and certainly not a two and a half hour movie or a seven hour miniseries.

Django

An enigmatic loner (Franco Nero), traveling alone through the desert and dragging a coffin by his back, stumbles upon a woman being tortured by a gang of soldiers, saves her life, but finds himself the target of their barbarous leader. After being betrayed by a separate band Mexican rebels, he must devise a plan to pit the two factions against each other. Sergio Corbucci's Spaghetti Western, which inspired a series of successors, is cheeseball central and not even the fun variety. Django is an ultra violent, unabashed Sergio Leone ripoff, replete with a graveyard showdown finale and a "man with no name" lead character whose only difference is that he tells the audience everything that Clint Eastwood's iconic antihero was thinking. Seeking this out after watching Django Unchained, I can't see what inspired Quentin Tarantino to craft his considerable film (there's also other probable seeds of inspiration here, including a graphic ear severing sequence), but the best thing I can say about Corbucci's film is that it inspired at least one worthy incarnation.

A Man and a Woman

A recently widowed stock car driver (Jean-Louis Trintignant) meets a beautiful young woman (Anouk Aimee), who has also just lost her spouse, at their children's school and, in spite of their fresh wounds and initial hesitance, the two embark on a relationship. Invariably reviews of Claude Lelouch's A Man and a Woman will refer to it, in one way or another, as the categorical date movie, which it assuredly is. Beyond that, it is a gorgeously photographed picture, alternating between profuse color and stark black and white stock, and features excellent work from Trintignant and Aimee.

A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum

When a bawdy and conniving Roman slave (Zero Mostel) realizes that his master's son pines for the beautiful young woman next door, he sees an opportunity to secure his freedom and works to secure a courtship between the two. After a prominent Roman soldier beats him to the punch and arranges to purchase the girl, he concocts a more outrageous plot. "A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum" is an amusing adaptation of Stephen Sondheim's musical and features his great raunchy songs, a hilarious performance from  the inimitable Mostel, and funny supporting roles from Jack Gilford and the great Buster Keaton in what proved to be his final film.

Fahrenheit 451

In a dystopian future, firemen no longer serve to protect the public from fiery blazes, but instead initiate them on anyone found to be housing books. Among their ranks is Montag who after making contact with a beautiful revolutionary woman, discovers a power and love of the written word and seeks to fight the oppression which he has practiced for so long. "Fahreneheit 451" is a reverential treatment of Ray Bradbury's masterful science fiction novel by Francois Truffaut, who omits much from the novel but still retains the book's spirit in what was his English language film debut. Oskar Werner delivers a marvelous, laconic performance as the hero though Julie Christie, as great an actress and beautiful as she is, throws the movie off somewhat playing dual, pivotal roles. Watching the film, I wanted more from the novel (Faber, the Hound, the great chase sequence, and other elements are altered or omitted entirely), but following the superb ending and Truffaut's clear admiration of the material, I found it hard to complain.

Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

An aging alcoholic college professor and his bitter wife return to their campus home late one night, where they still plan to have the new strapping science professor and his waifish wife over for drinks, which quickly devolves into a night of callousness and debauchery, as old wounds and resentments are revealed. "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?" is Mike Nichols' provocative directorial debut, and filmization of Ernest Lehman's adaptation of Edward Albee's stage production in what appears at first to be an exercise in cruelty, but soon reveals itself as something deeper and more tragic. Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton deliver brave and searing career defining performances, and George Segal and Sandy Dennis are also fine as the young couple. Haskell Wexler's Oscar winning black and white photography wonderfully captures the material and helps open it up for the screen. "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?" was controversial for its time, for its language and sexual frankness. The material is less shocking by today's standards, but few would find it any less powerful or moving.

A Man for All Seasons

When King Henry VII directs his Roman Catholic Chancellor Thomas Moore to write the Pope to secure an annulment for his first marriage with Catherine of Aragon, Moore refuses to go along. When the King finally breaks from the Church, and Moore continues to support his actions, the crown uses deceit and treachery to convict the steadfast chancellor of treason. "A Man for All Seasons" is Fred Zinnemann's literate and powerful screen adaptation of Robert Bolt's play, that is found on a stellar, Oscar winning performance from Paul Scofield, also recreating his stage part. Robert Shaw also has a memorable turn as the bawdy Henry VII. Bolt's screenplay is a tricky dance of semantics that is pulled off swimmingly by Scofield, Shaw, and the rest of the cast, with the rest of the film given great elevation by the legendary Zinnemann, who does a great job in opening up the materal.  The final courtroom scene, featuring Scofield's scornful speech against the actions of the crown, is one of great potency. "A Man for All Seasons" is a great play adaptation and a testament to a man whose courage and faith helped him triumph over a treacherous tyrant.

How the Grinch Stole Christmas!

Of all the great Christmastime television specials, including "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" and "A Charlie Brown Christmas", "How the Grinch Stole Christmas!" is the most endearing, most likely do to its supreme collaborators. The story of the green mountain dwelling miser and canine friend Max who seek to steal Christmas from the Whos of Whoville, only to have his heart changed do to their unflappable resolve comes to the screen from the beloved Dr. Seuss books by way of likewise admired Looney Tunes animator Chuck Jones. With monster movie legend Boris Karloff both narrating and voicing the Grinch and baritone Thurl Ravenscroft crooning the wickedly sublime "You're a Mean One, Mr. Grinch", all the ingredients are in place for a delightfully offbeat Christmas recipe.

Blow-Up

6/9/10 From what I understand about Michelangelo Antonioni and from the few films of his I have seen, he must have been one of the most maddening directors. In L'Avventura, he criticized the idle rich, and the film was anything but an adventure. Now here in Blow-Up, a film that comes packaged as a murder mystery, or rather a film that most who have not seen it understand it to be a murder mystery, it is really a criticism of the 1960s British mod lifestyle. Released in 1966, and what should have been considered very risque for its time, Blow-Up follows a cad London photographer who is tired of photographing beautiful women all day, and who basically takes what he wants from life. One nice day in the park, he is taking pictures and stumbles across a couple whom he begins to photograph. The woman sees him, becomes irate and demands the photographs. After much debate, he agrees to return the negatives, but, enthralled by what may be in them, gives her a different set of negatives. When he develops the photographs she wanted, he discovers that something sinister may have been going on in the park that day. Blow-up is wonderfully filmed, in marvelous technicolor (it has even been said that Antonioni had the grass in the park painted green to achieve the film's effect). There are also largely effective silent segments throughout the whole picture. Though this movie may not appeal to everyone, and I believe movies should be made not for the director but for a larger audience, Blow-Up should be seen by any film lover, if only to see a master technician at work.

***

10/29/11

I revisited this film again and while I still find it maddening, I think it is a hypnotic, incredible example of filmmaking. The scene where David Hemmings develops the negatives of his trip to the park is one of the most spellbinding in the cinema's history.

*** 1/2