Last Seen Movie - The Latest Movie You Have Seen; ratings

[Reza]

It Happened Here (Kevin Brownlow & Andrew Mollo, 1965) 10/10

Now this is a film that could never be made during today's politically correct climate as the screenplay goes into vicious directions about the "jewish problem" as dicated by the fascists. It is 1944 and Britain has lost the war and under German occupation. The country has been converted into a fascist state. Some Britons collaborate while others resist. Amongst the collaborators are many who don't believe in the cause but are forced to join up in order to survive and earn a living. The story follows a trained nurse from the Midlands who is evacuated to London along with most civilians. She joins a pro-Nazi civilian organization known as Immediate Action (one character refers to it as sounding like an advertisement for a laxative), which she does even though she is avowedly non-political. However, once in the job, she is faced with horrifying complicity in a number of disturbing acts being conducted by the organization like forced euthanasia on humans considered to be "useless" to the State. One of the very early films in the alternate history genre was the brainchild of the then 19-year old Kevin Brownlow and it took 8 years for the film to be completed. Fascinating amateur film is full of disturbing images, a scene where a group of people are casually seen discussing a lecture on the "repugnant" Jews vs. the "superior" Aryans, and a propaganda newsreel is shown in the old style and tone blaming the rubble of the Blitz on a Jewish and Bolshevist conspiracy. The film poses the question “How is it possible to fight fascism when the only means to do so are to use its own methods against it?”. The resistance movement is seen as being just as bad as the Nazis, which is a darkly contrary outlook to the prevailing attitude that saw World War II and the continental resistance as a just cause combating a profound evil. The film was completed with the help of Stanley Kubrick who donated film stock and Tony Richardson who helped to distribute it. An important film that needs to be seen more widely.

No Way to Treat a Lady (Jack Smight, 1968) 6/10

Amusing black comedy about a cat-and-mouse game between a serial strangler (Rod Steiger) and a police detective (George Segal). The killer has a mother fixation and uses an assortment of disguises to entrap elderly matrons who he sweet talks followed by strangling them. He leaves a lipstick mark in the shape of lips on their foreheads. After the first murder he begins to contact the detective on a regular basis boasting and divulging details about his latest kill. The exasperated cop, with an overbearing jewish mom (a funny Eileen Heckart), starts dating a witness (Lee Remick) who glimpsed the killer. Steiger is creepy and his usual hammy self as the psychotic. Remick has a hilarious scene with Heckart as she tries to win over the old lady. Segal gives the film's best performance as the frustrated but dogged cop, a gentle lover to Remick and an irritated but accepting son to Heckart.

Gente di rispetto / The Flower in His Mouth (Luigi Zampa, 1975) 8/10

More than the mystery at the center of the film is the fascinating Southern Sicilian city of Ragusa where the events play out. I liked how Zampa uses this small city, built on a wide limestone hill between two deep valleys, as the actors walk through the narrow alleys around the baroque buildings and we get to see the sweeping views of public parks with churches, fountains and piazzas. A school teacher (Jennifer O'Neill) arrives to take up a position in a small school. She is harrassed by a man on the bus and later in a crowded piazza which she ignores. The following day the man is found seated in the town square, shot dead with a flower in his mouth. The townfolk think she had a hand in the execution. Also adding to the mystery is her rich landlord (James Mason), once owner of the town and still privy to most of its secrets, who allows her to stay in one of his apartments free of rent. Sympathetic to her situation is a colleague (Franco Nero) at the school who soon becomes her lover but wants to keep the relationship a secret. When a second man is found killed - he also offended her - the townfolk begin to think she has some mysterious power which she then uses to her advantage by getting the local government officials to pass rules in favour of education breaking old traditions that still prevail. The mystery turns out to be rather underwhelming but the film's almost dream-like quality and the stunning beauty of both O'Neill and the city makes it worth a watch.

[Precious Doll]

Beast from Haunted Cave (1959) Monte Hellman 4/10
A Sun (2019) Mong-Hong Chung 4/10
McLaren (2017) Roger Donaldson 2/10
On the Rocks (2020) Sofia Coppola 4/10
Story of Judas (2015) Rabah Ameur-Zaimeche 4/10
Saladin (1963) Youssef Chahine 4/10
Hammamet (2020) Gianni Ameilo 5/10
Babenco: Tell Me When I Die (2019) Barbara Paz 4/10
Two Monks (1934) Juan Bustillo Oro 5/10
Stage Mother (2020) Thom Fitzgerald 1/10
First Cow (2020) Kelly Reichardt 7/10
Waiting for the Barbarians (2019) Ciro Guerra 1/10
Made in Hong Kong (1997) Fruit Chan 7/10
A Decent Man (2016) Emmanuel Finkel 5/10

Repeating viewings

Mädchen in Uniform (1931) Leotine Sagan 7/10
Pixote (1981) Hector Babenco 9/10

[Reza]

Passione d'Amore / Passion of Love (Ettore Scola, 1981) 9/10

Scola's bitter romantic drama, based on the 1869 novel "Fosca" by Iginio Ugo Tarchetti, is an ironic reversal of the fairy tale, "Beauty and the Beast". It is also a look into the human psyche showing how guilt, pity, power and a self destructive nature can move a person into strange areas. Giorgio (Bernard Giraudeau), a handsome Italian soldier with good career prospects, is involved in a passionate affair with a beautiful married woman (Laura Antonelli). He is transferred to a remote outpost on the frontier where he is invited by the Colonel (Massimo Girotti) to dine daily at his house with him and a few senior officers. The Colonel's psychologically scarred and strikingly ugly cousin, Fosca (Valeria D'Obici ), misinterprets the young man's kindness towards her and forms a pathological attraction towards him. Suffering from assorted ailments, including hysteria and fits of epilepsy, the regimental physician (Jean-Louis Trintignant) thinks contact with the young man may help, so he encourages Giorgio to spend time with her. However, her manipulative nature puts a strain on him and he falls sick. In the meanwhile his affair with his mistress comes to a deadend when she refuses to leave her husband because of her child. When news of his transfer is announced during a Christmas party the pathetic woman goes into massive hysterics in front of all the guests which inexpicably leads that night to a consummation of their relationship, followed by a duel the next day that seals his fate as a career officer. Does he finally show passion towards the woman out of love or does he go to her out of pity? The entire film's success rests on the shoulders of Valeria D'Obici who is made up to look grotesque - a receding hairline, a hooked nose and large teeth (a bit like Nosferatu but with hair) - and she nails the part. Apart from her off-putting appearance Fosca is otherwise a sensitive and cultured woman but with an unfortunate past. For her the young man appears to be her "last hurrah" and she uses every delusional trick up her sleeve to nab him. Despite his blunt protestations at first his genuine kind nature allows him to respond to her desperate pleas for love. He realises that nobody has ever loved him like she has. This unusual "love" story starts of with the audience wondering how this woman will fall in love with the handsome man but in fact it turns out more about the man gradually falling for this disturbed ugly woman. The story's central themes of love, sex, obsession, illness, passion, beauty, power and manipulation formed the basis, many years later, for the Tony winning Broadway musical "Passion" by Stephen Sondheim.

Soldier Blue (Ralph Nelson, 1970) 6/10

Revisionist Western about the 1864 Sand Creek massacre in the Colorado Territory is actually an allegory for the then raging Vietnam War and in particular the Mai Lai massacre where unarmed South Vietnamese civilians were murdered by U.S. troops in 1968. A naive cavalry officer (Peter Strauss) and a white woman (Candice Bergen), who has lived with Indians, are the sole survivors of an attack by the Cheyenne on their group. The two join hands as they struggle cross-country through Indian territory to reach Fort Reunion where the U.S. army is stationed. She is scornful of him, calling him "Soldier Blue", because of his beliefs which are sullied by years of army propaganda about the "savage" Indians. Nelson tries to make the film "contemporary" for the audiences at the time and has Bergen act "modern" by having her dialogue liberally littered with four letter words and her general behaviour far from what a woman from the past would act like in those circumstances. The entire central part of the film is like a dreamy sun-dappled comic romance as the two banter and fall in love (Bergen gives a really bad performance while Strauss is terribly bland) with brief suspenseful encounters with Indians and a wily gunrunner (Donald Pleasence wearing a strange set of dentures). The film's savage and brutal end caused controversy with some calling it "an exploitative gore-fest of blood and amputated limbs" while others praised it for its pro-Indian stance - an antidote to all the John Ford-John Wayne Westerns that glorified cowboys and treated Indians as dastardly villains. The shocking scenes of violence - women and children being impaled by bayonets, women's breasts being sliced, heads chopped off, children being shot through the face and their heads being hoisted by whooping soldiers on wooden sticks - is stomach churning. This slaughter (and many others since) was a reality what the United States army was doing in Vietnam at the time. This radical film forever shattered the enduring movie myth of the cavalry as good guys riding to the rescue. The film was not a success in the United States but was a hit elsewhere.

Laws of Attraction (Peter Howitt, 2004) 3/10

Audrey (Julianne Moore) and Daniel (Pierce Brosnan) are high-powered divorce lawyers. She works strictly by the book while he relies on cheap theatrics to usually win his cases. They find themselves battling in court for their respective rich clients - a rock star (Michael Sheen in grunge mode) going through a nasty split with his dress-designer wife (Parker Posey) who are trying to decide on the settlement of an Irish castle. The lawyers end up at the castle to get details and trying to avoid a growing mutual attraction reluctantly attend an Irish festival. A wild night results in both finding themselves married to each other. This rather lame attempt at a screwball comedy is no "Adam's Rib", which is clearly what the silly premise hints at. Midling film also has the misfortune of having zero chemistry between the two stars. The usually suave Brosnan has annoyingly disheveled hair and one keeps wanting to reach into the screen to slap it down into place. Moore writhes about eating junk food after every altercation with Brosnan which is meant to be funny but after one too many of those scenes it becomes tiresome. Frances Fisher, as Moore's tart-tongued mother, has a few funny moments but they are not enough to put over the general boredom of the main plot.

Manhattan Murder Mystery (Woody Allen, 1993) 7/10

Long gestating project with it's main plotline initially a part of "Annie Hall". It was put on the back burner by Allen and after his acrimonius breakup with Mia Farrow - he had originally written the part for her and she had been all set to do the project - his old flame Diane Keaton was roped in to co-star in the film with him. Keaton is delightful, takes to the role and runs off with it. The film is inspired by the screwball comedies of the 1930s and in particular the characters of amateur sleuths Nick and Nora Charles from "The Thin Man" series of films. A middle-aged couple - a book editor (Woody Allen) and his daffy wife (Diane Keaton) - suspect their elderly neighbour of having murdered his wife. She begins to take a perverse delight in trying to prove that something foul took place much to the irritation of her rather straight laced husband who is horrified to learn that she has broken into the old man's apartment in search of clues. Helping her on this madcap quest is her friend (Alan Alda) who is just as enthused at the possibility of a murder. Meanwhile the editor, jealous of the friend who is spending so much time with his wife, decides to join in on the search while meeting up on the side with an over-amorous client (Anjelica Huston) who teaches him how to bluff on the poker table. Lighthearted amusing film benefits from a witty screenplay with many one-liners and Allen harking back to his earlier comedies by playing the book editor as a Bob Hope-style scaredy-cat character. The film also benefits from the sexual tension between the four characters. Allen ends the film in wacky style which is clearly an homage to Orson Welles' "The Lady From Shanghai". As with all his films Allen's inspired use of music - nostalgic jazz here - sets the tone for the goofy plot. An amusing rumour about the film was that despite the very public and nasty breakup between Allen and Farrow she actually came at the start of production for costume tryouts until she was abruptly told she was no longer in the film.

Fireflies in the Garden (Dennis Lee, 2008) 3/10

Dreary, meandering family melodrama, written by the director, which seems inspired by his personal memories still festering in his mind. If it's true then I feel sorry for him having to live out his childhood with a monstrous father (Willem Dafoe) who here has an antagonistic relationship with his sensitive son. The film switches back and forth between the young boy's miserable childhood and the present where the family are gathered together after a terrible car crash kills his mother. She had just finished graduating from college which she had earlier missed out on as she was busy raising two children. Constantly picked upon by his high strung writer father, he finds love and support from his mother (Julia Roberts) and finds a friend in his aunt - his mother's much younger sister - who comes to stay with them during the summer. The scenes during the present are set just before and after the crash at the home of his aunt (Emily Watson) where father, who survives the crash, and son (Ryan Reynolds) continue their war. Adding to the family woes is the sudden arrival at the funeral of his alcoholic ex-wife (Carrie-Anne Moss) who has unexpected news of her own and startling information is divulged about the late matriarch. The screenplay predictably moves towards the expected reconciliation between the father and son but does it in such a hurried clumsy way that it seems impossible to believe anyone could forgive someone who has spent his whole life being an asshole. Dafoe is memorable as the prickly old man but Reynolds is such a damp squib giving a one-note deadpan performance. Roberts shines in her brief role while Watson struggles with her Texan accent. Tiresome repetitive drama with just too much shouting going on between people you just don't care about. Skip this one.

[Reza]

And ouch for Monsoon - I've been looking forward to Monsoon for so long. I missed it at a film festival earlier in the year and it is opening in a couple of weeks at a cinema that I have been boycotting since January. I was going to purchase the British Blu Ray to be released in November but I think I will wait for Monsoon to stream in the new year now.

Precious please check your inbox message.

[Reza]

Werk Ohne Autor / Never Look Away (Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck, 2018) 4/10

Monsoon (Hong Khaou, 2019 3/10

Ouch for Never Look Away but I concede it's a tad overlong and becomes less interesting as it progresses.

Yes really overlong. It really gets boring after they leave East Berlin. The film was overstuffed with far too much.

[Precious Doll]

Werk Ohne Autor / Never Look Away (Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck, 2018) 4/10

Monsoon (Hong Khaou, 2019 3/10

Ouch for Never Look Away but I concede it's a tad overlong and becomes less interesting as it progresses.

And ouch for Monsoon - I've been looking forward to Monsoon for so long. I missed it at a film festival earlier in the year and it is opening in a couple of weeks at a cinema that I have been boycotting since January. I was going to purchase the British Blu Ray to be released in November but I think I will wait for Monsoon to stream in the new year now.

[Reza]

Werk Ohne Autor / Never Look Away (Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck, 2018) 4/10

Triple 9 (John Hillcoat, 2016) 6/10

Hillcoat seems to be channelling Tarantino, Guy Richie and Michael Mann (without the sheen) in this relentless dirty-cop heist story involving the Israeli-Russian mob. The idea of seeing Kate Winslet as a Russian mobster's tough wife sounded like such a hoot but she fails to pull it off - she has the "look" - the tarty make-up, the big blonde hair and the flashy dress sense - but she fails to get the woman's toughness considering what all she does through the course of the film. A jailed Russian mobster instigates a robbery from a safe to retrieve something he wants. Pulling the strings on the robbers is his wife who on the side runs a meat factory. Holding the young son of an ex-cop and Special Forces ace (Chiwetel Ejiofor), she cajoles him into robbing a safe with his gang consisting of ex-military and an active cop (Anthony Mackie) whose straight laced partner (Casey Affleck) is the nephew of their Chief (Woody Harrelson). The film has three tightly shot and very suspenseful set pieces involving different heists but the overall plot is extremely hard to follow as the screenplay leaves out important facts so when all the double crosses come fast and furious one is not sure what the hell happened. Most of the characters are extremely unsympathetic (the actors are all very good) and there is a dire gloom about the whole enterprise which drags the film down. Amongst all the macho posturings - from the cops, the criminals, the gang members - Winslet does stand out but it would have been far more fun to see her chewing the scenery instead of holding back.

Monsoon (Hong Khaou, 2019 3/10

Young British Vietnamese (Henry Golding) returns to the country of his birth after 30-years. As a child he had escaped Saigon when the Vietnam War started. He finds the country much changed as he reconnects with estranged relatives, struggles with his cultural identity, searches for a place to scatter his parents' ashes and falls in love with an African-American whose father had fought in the War. Boring, slow film that meanders along while a loud score keeps drowning out the dialogue.

The Glorias (Julie Taymor, 2020) 6/10

It takes four actresses to journey through the life of feminist Gloria Steinem. Taymor literally shows the woman on a journey as monochrome shots of her traveling in a Greyhound bus are interspersed throughout as she looks out at the world passing by in vibrant colours. There are also a few wacky touches - the "Wizard of Oz" homage - which don't quite come off. This is basically a by-the-numbers screen biography zipping by all the important events in her life which Taymor scrambles by playing with the timeline structure. Alicia Vikander plays her from age 20 through 40 - her years at Smith College, the time spent traveling in India with poor downtrodden women in villages and small towns, the start of her writing career and her groundbreaking undercover work in 1963 inside the Playboy Mansion when she wrote an article about the condition of waitress bunnies inside. She is taught public speaking by Dorothy Pitman Hughes (an excellent Janelle Monáe), a pioneering African-American small business owner, activist, child-welfare advocate, mother of three daughters and the co-founder of Ms. Magazine with Steinhem. There are flashbacks to her childhood (played by Ryan Kiera Armstrong) with her struggling but loving entrepreneur dad (Timothy Hutton) and teen years (played by Lulu Wilson) when she cared for her ailing mother - a journalist who was forced to publish under a male
pseudonym - which brought on her desire to fight for other women and their rights. Juliane Moore takes over during her life after age 40 with the years dealing with the magazine as Taymor incorporates generous amounts of fascinating real life newsreels of the time throughout the film. Both Vikander and Moore are standouts. Bette Midler is funny and grotesque as fiery Bella Abzug leader of the Women's Movement who was one of the founders of the National Women's Political Caucus. Overlong film - with superbly detailed production and costume design, and lushly shot by Rodrigo Prieto - is an interesting companion piece to the recent television film Mrs. America as it revisits an important tumultuous era.

The Silencing (Robin Pront, 2020) 6/10

A reformed hunter (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau) turned alcoholic, whose daughter went missing five years before, spends his time hoping to find her. When the body of a dead girl is found it appears there could be a serial killer on the loose who may be the wayward brother of the cop (Annabelle Wallis) investigating the case. A cat-and-mouse game ensues between the hunter and the killer after he rescues a young woman who had been held captive and hunted. Cold bleak thriller is played out in the stunning surroundings of a small mining town in Sudbury Ontario with thick forests and a raging river playing a role during the chase. Despite the familiar tropes of the genre this is an engaging and brutal mystery with Coster-Waldau giving a spirited performance as the grieving father who might have a chance to resolve the mystery of his missing daughter.

Mackenna's Gold (J. Lee Thompson, 1969) 8/10

A perennial favourite from my childhood with an amazing cast, both in the leads and in support. Some of the cardboard sets and the too obvious back projection are quite jarring but the story is quite exciting about a group of people looking for a hidden valley full of gold. A lawman (Gregory Peck), who knows where the gold is hidden, is kidnapped by an old adversary (Omar Sharif camping it up delightfully) and his gang of cutthroat outlaws (Keenan Wynn and Ted Cassidy are both memorable). Camilla Sparv is a beautiful hostage who catches the eye of the lawman who in turn is lusted after by a scarred Indian (Julie Newmar who has a memorable underwater scene in a lagoon where she swims completely in the nude). Also scoring points is Telly Savalas as a greedy and ruthless sergeant. The group of "respectable businessmen" also wanting a piece of the pie are played by an eclectic group of character actors - Eli Wallach, Lee J. Cobb, Raymond Massey, Burgess Meredith, Anthony Quayle and Edward G. Robinson. Ford's Monument Valley is the spectacular backdrop for the film. An underrated Western that deserves a re-appraisal.

Mad as Hell: Peter Finch (Robert De Young, 2011) 7/10

Fascinating documentary about an actor-chameleon who hated being confined to set roles in life. A wanderering soul from Australia who kept moving, getting married - to a Romanian-born Russian ballerina, a South African and a black Jamaican - often uprooting his family between movie stints playing characters who were free spirits. Off movie sets life for him consisted of either quiet time of reflection dabbling in painting or hell-raising under the influence of booze with highly publicized affairs with Vivien Leigh and Shirley Bassey. Despite his tumultuous life he gathered a rewarding and very eclectic list of films on his CV winning Bafta Award nominations for Windom's Way (1957) & The Nun's Story (1959), and winning the award for A Town Like Alice (1956), The Trials of Oscar Wilde (1960), No Love For Johnnie (1961), Sunday Bloody Sunday (1971) and Network (1976). He was nominated for an Oscar for the latter two films, winning posthumously for Network. He also received a posthumous Emmy nomination for Raid on Entebbe (1977). His wives, children and co-stars talk with candor in this documentary about this very complicated man who in the end is remembered mostly for his love of the craft of acting.

[Precious Doll]

The Queen of Spain (2016) Fernando Trueba 4/10
The Virgin's Bed (1969) Philippe Garrel 3/10
Golden Dreams (1981) Nanni Moretti 5/10
Dark Waters (1956) Youssef Chahine 5/10
Gay USA (1977) Arthur J. Bressan Jr. 6/10
The Boys in the Band (2020) Joe Mantello 4/10
Ordinary Justice (2020) Chiara Bellosi 5/10
Pinocchio (2019) Matteo Garrone 7/10
Bad Tales (2020) Daminao D'Innocenzo & Fabio D'Innocenzo 7/10
Ecce Bombo (1979) Nanni Moretti 4/10
Koko-di Koko-da (2019) Johannes Nyholm 6/10
Life for Life: Maximillian Kolbe (1991) Krzysztof Zanussi 2/10

Repeat viewings

God's Own Country (2017) Francis Lee 7/10
Lord Love a Duck (1966) George Axelrod 8/10
Life is Sweet (1990) Mike Leigh 7/10

[Precious Doll]

I haven't tackled The Devil All the Time yet. The last thing I attempted to watch before The Boys in the Band was Enola Holmes, a godawful mess with an unbearable central performance and a total waste of usually very good actors in support.

I've never seen a film in which the breaking of the fourth wall was as intolerable. One minute she's talking to the audience, the next minute the actors in the scene with her, then the audience again, then back to the actors and repeat, repeat, repeat.

I decided to give Enola Holmes a miss. I was tempted but thought better of it and your condemnation of the film shows I made the right decision.

I really don't think you would make it through The Devil All the Time - a candidate for one of the very worst films of the year. I've liked Antonio Campos previous films but this is a disaster of major proportions. The only notable aspect of the film is that Netflix allowed him to film it on 35MM which is a nice change for digital which is rarely no match for film. Still I'd been interested in a what you thought about it.

[Big Magilla]

I watched the new version last night, one of the few recent Netflix additions I was able to get all the way through without being bored out of my skull.

Film wise Netflix makes such a huge amount of garbage and they are putting up their prices from next month. Have you attempted The Devil All the Time Magilla? That is an endurance test if.

I found the remake of The Boys in the Band totally unnecessary - what was the point when there is already a perfectly good version made in the era that it is set that no re-make can possibly surpass.

But Netflix are so so fucked. I've been making my way through the Youssef Chahine films that they acquired and would not have even been aware Netflix were showing if a friend hadn't alerted me to them. What is also annoying is that Netflix doesn't even have a decent algorithm set up to direct to 'product' like Amazon. Apparently, they are only interested in prompting specific films/series regardless of what ones viewing habits are. I have to go through a search every weeks when I watch a Chahine film when it properly encoded system would have them first on my recommended viewing list. I even had to jump through hoops to find The Boys in the Band.

I have to go through those same hoops which are very annoying. I find it easier to maneuver through the obstacles on my computer even though it's easier on my eyes to watch on TV.

I haven't tackled The Devil All the Time yet. The last thing I attempted to watch before The Boys in the Band was Enola Holmes, a godawful mess with an unbearable central performance and a total waste of usually very good actors in support.

I've never seen a film in which the breaking of the fourth wall was as intolerable. One minute she's talking to the audience, the next minute the actors in the scene with her, then the audience again, then back to the actors and repeat, repeat, repeat.

[Precious Doll]

I watched the new version last night, one of the few recent Netflix additions I was able to get all the way through without being bored out of my skull.

Film wise Netflix makes such a huge amount of garbage and they are putting up their prices from next month. Have you attempted The Devil All the Time Magilla? That is an endurance test if.

I found the remake of The Boys in the Band totally unnecessary - what was the point when there is already a perfectly good version made in the era that it is set that no re-make can possibly surpass.

But Netflix are so so fucked. I've been making my way through the Youssef Chahine films that they acquired and would not have even been aware Netflix were showing if a friend hadn't alerted me to them. What is also annoying is that Netflix doesn't even have a decent algorithm set up to direct to 'product' like Amazon. Apparently, they are only interested in prompting specific films/series regardless of what ones viewing habits are. I have to go through a search every weeks when I watch a Chahine film when it properly encoded system would have them first on my recommended viewing list. I even had to jump through hoops to find The Boys in the Band.

[Reza]

These ratings are upside down.

I preferred the cast in the new version. And I thought it was a better looking production overall compared to the original which looked tacky. Yes, Quinto is jarring but then so was Leonard Frey in the role of Harold. Otherwise both films very similar since the remake was almost an exact copy.

[Big Magilla]

The Boys in the Band (William Friedkin, 1970) 6/10

The Boys in the Band (Joe Mantello, 2020) 8/10

Matt Crowley's hit 1968 Off-Broadway play was first filmed in 1970 and then years later revived to great acclaim on its 50th anniversary on Broadway in 2018. This screen remake has the entire cast from the Broadway revival reprise their roles. A group of gay friends gather at the New York City apartment of Michael (Jim Parsons) to celebrate the birthday of their morose, ageing friend Harold (Zachary Quinto). They are later joined by the host's married college friend and a young cowboy stud who is a gift for the birthday boy. As the evening wears on and the host gets drunk he turns on his married friend who has insulted one of the guests and goads him into coming out of the closet. What starts out as a humourous evening full of laughter suddenly turns nasty as every guest ends up revealing hidden skeletons. Ground breaking play was the first to openly present gay characters and treat them with sensitivity. Through the bittersweet but often hilarious dialogue and the intentionally self homophobic and low esteemed characters the play brought to the masses a frank look at gay relationships. The entire cast is superb with Zachary Quinto playing Harold with a jarringly mannered affectation gleefully passing thorny quips at his friends as they all disolve, one by one, into quivering hysteria. The constantly swooping camera manages to make the cramped apartment set seem vast.

These ratings are upside down.

I watched the new version last night, one of the few recent Netflix additions I was able to get all the way through without being bored out of my skull.

Friedkin's version used the cast of the 1968 Off-Broadway phenomenon featuring faultless performances by the entire cast, especially those of Kenneth Nelson as Michael, Leonard Frey as Harold, and Cliff Gorman as Emory. The new version was conceived as a tribute to the original with the actors saying the same lines but without as much conviction in some cases.

I thought Matt Bomer in Frederick Combs' old role and Tuc Watkins in Laurence Luckinbill's old role came off as well as their predecessors, and Robin de Jesus came close to Cliff Gorman as Emory as anyone could expect, but Jim Parsons and Zachary Quinto left me totally cold.

Parsons started out OK but lost me early on with his Bette Davis imitation which was nothing like Bette Davis. It wasn't even Lee Grant imitating Shelley Winters imitating Davis. It was such a bad line reading that it took me a minute to realize what he was supposed to be doing. Quinto's mouthing of Leonard Frey's lines failed to register the bile that Frey brought to them. Both Nelson and Frey, who lived through the pre-Stonewall era, seethed with rage from every pore. Parsons and Quinto seemed to be just be playing games.

I also missed Tammy Grimes' apartment in which the original was filmed.

[Reza]

Play It Again, Sam (Herbert Ross, 1972) 6/10
The Boys in the Band (William Friedkin, 1970) 6/10


Fortunat (Alex Joffé, 1960) 6/10

Two great stars from the opposite spectrum come together and create great chemistry. During the German occupation of France a posh bourgeois woman (Michèle Morgan) and her two children are in great danger when her husband, working for the Resistance, is captured by the Nazis. Trapped on the wrong side of the Demarcation line, they are provided an escape route by an old school teacher (Gaby Morlay). She gets a simple minded drunk poacher (Bourvil) to take them across the river into the French-controlled Zone to wait out the War. Posing as a couple the two gradually find themselves growing close as they befriend a jewish family living next door. A film about hope and love in the midst of a terrible war raging around two lonely people.

Interiors (Woody Allen, 1978) 10/10

After a string of very funny light comedies capped by the Oscar winning "Annie Hall", Woody Allen came up with this stark and very bleak drama. Clearly an homage to his idol, Ingmar Bergman, the film with it's series of opening static shots as the camera views the interior of a beach cottage - a look at a sofa placed against a window, a quick shot of pottery on the fireplace and a look at the dining room through half-open french doors - is reminiscent of the films of the great Swedish director. Although in truth the drama that follows evokes plays by Eugene O'Neill with flashes of Anton Chekov. The film works brilliantly due to the choices made by Allen - a small cast of 8, sparse production design with everything in a muted colour palette and most especially the brilliant lighting by Gordon Willis who keeps depressed and isolated characters in shadows while upbeat characters are brightly lit. Using light in this dramatic way the film highlights every mood that a character is feeling. The film's pivotal character is an interior designer (Geraldine Page), a perfectionist with strongly critical views, whose carefully laid out life suddenly falls to pieces when her husband of many years (E. G. Marshall), a wealthy lawyer, calmly announces at the dining table that he wants a trial separation and later in the story introduces a vivacious divorcée (Maureen Stapleton) he's met on a cruise whom he wants to marry. The couple have three grown-up daughters - a successful poet (Diane Keaton) married to an alcoholic would-be writer (Richard Jordan), an aimless neurotic (Mary Beth Hurt) living with a congenial filmmaker (Sam Waterston) and a pretty but vapid actress (Kristin Griffith). The news of the parents' separation, divorce and father's remarriage effects the daughters but devastates their mother who first remains in denial and then attempts suicide. Page, in the role first offered to Ingrid Bergman - who ironically had to turn down the offer because she was about to shoot her first film with Ingmar Bergman - gives a remarkable performance. There is a stunning stillness about her character which Allen drew out of the actress after many arguments as Page always had a tendency to be very mannered - the scenes of her silently fiddling with a painting on the wall, fidgeting with a vase on a table and insisting on placing a particular chair in a spot where it blends into the overall colour scheme (all pale blues, beige and whites) are beautifully performed by the star. Allen does allow her a scene of hysteria inside a church which is also performed with great subtlety as she first loses control, knocking down candles, but quickly composes herself as she runs down the aisle. In complete contrast to her is the second wife - loud, happy, friendly, slightly vulgar and dressed in dramatic reds and black. Stapleton sharply stands out not only amongst the overall colour scheme of the entire film but as an antidote to all the other repressed and morose characters. Check out her red camisole during the dramatic scene on the beach as she vividly stands out in contrast to the pale yellow sand and the grey crashing waves. Though every other character is fragile, they all revolve around mother Geraldine Page, the least stable of an unstable clan. This is the only film amongst Allen's other dramas without a single joke. It is played dead serious, and hence is incredibly jarring, which is exactly what makes it one of his most affecting films. Allen was nominated for an Academy Award for his direction and screenplay as were Page and Stapleton for their superb contrasting performances. The film is a masterpiece and a must-see.

Killers of Kilimanjaro (Richard Thorpe, 1959) 5/10

Typical film in the African-safari genre, this B-film has wonderful widescreen photography by Ted Moore. Otherwise its a standard adventure film more or less on the lines of "King Solomon's Mines" as a group takes a trip deep into the African wilds led by an engineer (Robert Taylor) who is building a railway track. Along on the trip are his assistant (Anthony Newley) - the comic relief - the lone white woman (Anne Aubrey) in search of her missing father and fiancé and a young stowaway (John Dimech - who would play the boy Peter O'Toole shoots in "Lawrence of Arabia"). The boy happens to be the son of the local slave trader (Grégoire Aslan) who puts obstacles in the way of the group. Colourful location scenery with obligatory shots of assorted animals along with an ageing but still robust Robert Taylor make this a pleasant way to spend 90 minutes even though it's all very familiar.

Curse of the Golden Flower (Zhang Yimou, 2006) 8/10

As in all of Yimou's epic films its the spectacular imagery that stays with you - the stunning cinematography and the detailed production design and costumes (nominated for an Academy Award), with its swirl of dramatic colours - the vibrant reds, yellows, blues and greens. Bloodshed is very much part of every plot as savage violence shatters royal families very much like in the tragedies of Shakepeare's plays. This intense family melodrama, set in the Imperial court of the Tang dynasty in ancient China, plays like grand opera. The beautiful Empress (Gong Li), who has been having an affair with her step son, is slowly being poisoned by the all-knowing Emperor (Chow Yun-Fat). Her own two sons by him are loyal to her. Meanwhile the Prince is in love with the court physician's daughter and plans to run away with her. When he rejects the further sexual advances of the Empress a chain of events is set in motion by her which also involves the physician's wife who holds a terrible secret from the Emperor's past. The resulting palace intrigue ends in a stupendous battle leading to fratricide and filicide. As in all such films the martial arts action set pieces come off rudimentary but still manage to maintain a sense of awe as the graceful balletic movements by the soldiers appear hypnotic. Most Western critics found the film to be an over-the-top soap opera hiding inside a veneer of colour and spectacle. It is all that and more and perfectly in keeping with the kind of entertainment public in the East looks for. Quiet drama one can always find within the privacy of one's own home. At the cinema the audience looks for wild entertainment. And Yimou knows just how to provide it.

The Boys in the Band (Joe Mantello, 2020) 8/10

Matt Crowley's hit 1968 Off-Broadway play was first filmed in 1970 and then years later revived to great acclaim on its 50th anniversary on Broadway in 2018. This screen remake has the entire cast from the Broadway revival reprise their roles. A group of gay friends gather at the New York City apartment of Michael (Jim Parsons) to celebrate the birthday of their morose, ageing friend Harold (Zachary Quinto). They are later joined by the host's married college friend and a young cowboy stud who is a gift for the birthday boy. As the evening wears on and the host gets drunk he turns on his married friend who has insulted one of the guests and goads him into coming out of the closet. What starts out as a humourous evening full of laughter suddenly turns nasty as every guest ends up revealing hidden skeletons. Ground breaking play was the first to openly present gay characters and treat them with sensitivity. Through the bittersweet but often hilarious dialogue and the intentionally self homophobic and low esteemed characters the play brought to the masses a frank look at gay relationships. The entire cast is superb with Zachary Quinto playing Harold with a jarringly mannered affectation gleefully passing thorny quips at his friends as they all disolve, one by one, into quivering hysteria. The constantly swooping camera manages to make the cramped apartment set seem vast.

[Reza]

Military Wives (Peter Catteneo, 2020) 5/10
Atonement (Joe Wright, 2007) 8/10


The Shiralee (Leslie Norman, 1957) 8/10

An itinerant rural worker (Peter Finch) finds his unfaithful wife (Elizabeth Sellars) in bed with her lover (George Rose), beats him up, takes his young daughter (Dana Wilson) and goes back travailling the outback on the lookout for jobs. Heartwarming story as the two bond and meet an assortment of people from his past - a loveable drunken lug (Niall MacGinnis), a woman (Rosemary Harris) he had an affair with, her angry father (Russell Napier) and a jovial couple (Sidney James & Tessie O'Shea) who take them in when the child falls sick. The child is the "shiralee", an Irish or Aboriginal word meaning "swag", or metaphorically, a "burden." The plot turns sentimental and melodramatic when the child has an accident and his wife tries to gain custody of the daughter. Finch is superb as the wild and furiously independent swagman and is matched by feisty Dana Wilson who stands by her father through thick and thin. Memorable film was shot on location in the outbacks of New South Wales.

Blackbird (Roger Michell, 2020) 6/10

A family gathering centered around the upcoming planned death of a matriarch (Susan Sarandon) makes for a rather morbid and predictable drama. Variations of this plot have come before as long-simmering family toxicity rises to the surface causing consternation and hilarity. A woman, suffering from ALS, plans to end her life on the weekend she has asked her close family members to gather by her side. Her husband (Sam Neill), quietly grieving, is a doctor. The older uptight daughter (Kate Winslet), stuck in a dull marriage to a nerd (Rainn Wilson), is judgemental and controlling. The younger "troubled" daughter (Mia Wasikowska), upset at the upcoming proceeding, arrives late with her lesbian lover harbouring secrets of her own. Both sisters have been perpetually at war with each other and never see eye to eye. Also invited is the dying woman's oldest friend (Lindsay Duncan) whose presence is silently resented by the older daughter. As the weekend progresses prickly issues surface causing emotional outbursts resulting in yet more skeletons crawling out of the woodwork. Remake of Billie August's Danish film "Silent Night" is manipulative as it wrings tears and laughter in equal measure. The entire cast works beautifully together - though it is a bit of a stretch to accept Winslet as the dowdy daughter - with Sarandon sublime as the warm brave woman who insists on handling her life her own way. The highlight of the film is the magnificent house this maudlin drama plays out in. The beach front property is supposed to be in Connecticut but is actually located in Chichester, England. With its honey-toned natural lighting adding to the general fakeness of the whole enterprise the film still manages to score points even though it smells of stale deja vu.

Raat Akeli Hai (Honey Trehan, 2020) 5/10

On the eve of his marriage to a much younger woman an old man is found shot and bludgeoned to death. A wily small-town cop (Nawazuddin Siddiqui) discovers a house full of depraved suspects amongst the family members. Incest, paedophilia, murder, abortion, kidnapping, extramarital sex are just some of the issues the cop has to sift through to find the murderer. Whodunit takes on the mantle of Agatha Christie's "Hercule Poirot" with the cop gathering all the suspects in one room at the end before announcing the complicated manoeuvres that led to the killing. Siddiqui is great fun to watch as the fearless and relentless cop even though the plot seems rather contrived.

The Age of Innocence (Martin Scorsese, 1993) 9/10

Exquisitely produced adaptation of Edith Wharton's novel about old and rigid New York society during the gilded age. Scorsese touches on his favorite city once again but this time he sees a very different aspect of it - a world of wealth where people's polished lives are controlled by tightly held rigid rules even though underneath runs a silent streak of machinations. Wharton's vivid description of how the rich lived is brought to the screen with impeccable detail as the camera of Michael Ballhaus glides like a snake through oppulent drawing rooms filled with lovely period furniture, glancing along the way at delicate crystal ornaments on display around the rooms, perfect crockery and cutlery laid out on dining tables - Dante Ferretti's production design along with Gabriella Pescucci's Oscar winning costumes are beyond exemplary as they help to create a world that no longer exists. An eclectic cast of character actors - Alec McCowen, Geraldine Chaplin, Richard E. Grant, the outstanding Miriam Margolyes, Mary Beth Hurt, Stuart Wilson, Michael Gough, Siân Phillips, Alexis Smith, Jonathan Pryce and Robert Sean Leonard (narration by Joanne Woodward) - play the assorted family members who gravitate around the three main protagonists forming the tragic social love triangle. Newland Archer (Daniel Day-Lewis), a promising young lawyer and heir to one of the prominent families, is engaged to the highly sheltered and beautiful May Welland (Winona Ryder) which is considered in society to be the perfect match. Into their lives arrives her cousin the Countess Olenska (Michelle Pfeiffer) who has left her husband after a scandal and who continues to flout the rules of society with her european sensibility and forward ways. Archer falls in love with her and has to decide if he should live in a passionless marriage with a woman who fits into society versus living with the woman whom he loves but who is deemed an outcast by society. This sense of loss, sadness, resignation, repressed longing and spiritual suffering is presented by Scorsese with elegant authority.

2 States (Abhishek Varman, 2014) 6/10

Overlong but fun film about the trials and tribulations of marrying someone outside the comfort of your own "community" (a clash between Tamil & Punjabi). The obvious comedic and heartache elements aside, the film is a success due to the extraordinary chemistry of the two young stars - Arjun Kapoor and especially Alia Bhatt who is the most natural actress to emerge on the Bollywood scene in a long while. Her smile lights up the screen exactly how decades ago the great Madhuri Dixit managed to charm audiences. I'm glad to see that her last film, Highway, was not a fluke and she has the makings of a great star. Also worth a mention is the great South Indian star, Revathy, who has a marvelous moment in the spotlight as she sings in front of an audience. A wonderful rom-com. But yes, it goes on too long.

La donna più bella del mondo/ The World's Most Beautiful Woman (Robert Z. Leonard, 1956) 6/10

Lollobrigida sings opera and she has a fantastic voice. Fluffy screen biography - Mario Monicelli was one of the script writers - of Italian soprano, Lina Cavalieri (Gina Lollobrigida), and her rags to riches story from an orphan working the music halls to the toast of the opera world in Paris, Rome and New York. Along the way she falls in love with the Russian Prince Alexander Bariatinsky (Vittorio Gassman) who is not given permission by the Tsar to marry her. The crooked end of the love triangle is jealous Doria (Robert Alda), her tutor, who relentlessly pursues her, even resorting to murder. The film's highlight is a duel sequence between the leading lady and another singer. Superb production values and cinematography by Mario Bava. And the film's title perfectly fits the ravishing leading lady dressed to her teeth in gowns designed by Vittorio Nina Novarese.

The Lady and the Highwayman (John Hough, 1988) 6/10

Old fashioned romantic adventure, based on Barbara Cartland's book "Cupid Rides Pillion", is a rip-roaring boddice ripper from the old-school Gainsborough films of the 1940s. Swashbuckling tale of romance, betrayal and jealousy is set in England during the Restoration of King Charles II (Michael York). His jealous mistress (Emma Samms) sets the plot in motion when she views a young lady (Lysette Anthony) at court and suspects that she is making a play for the King. However, the young lady, instead, loves the mysterious highwayman (Hugh Grant) who rescued her from the lecherous man (Ian Bannen) she was forced to marry. The intrigues come fast and furious as the two lovers find themselves condemned to die in the Tower of London. An incredible cast of British character actors support the young leads - Claire Bloom, Oliver Reed - hamming it up as the dastardly villain, Sir John Mills, Bernard Miles, Christopher Cazenove, Robert Morley, Gareth Hunt. Lavishly produced by Lord Lew Grade with the use of actual castles for sets thus giving the film an exotic flavour.

Vie privée / A Very Private Affair (Louis Malle, 1962) 8/10

Malle perfectly captures the trauma and boredom of a star trapped in the limelight as paparazzi hound her private life into oblivion. The main character could be any number of stars who experienced fame and lived to regret it but with Brigitte Bardot playing the part the story takes on a very personal look at the private and public life of a star. She was then the world's most famous sex symbol, having taken over the mantle from Marilyn Monroe, and faced not only much adulation but also hatred as the press and public fêted her and also called her a whore. The screenplay - autobiographical in nature with regards to some incidents and details - charts the rise to stardom of a young woman (Brigitte Bardot) - from budding ballerina to a full fledged movie star - and her attempts to escape from the stalking mobs of fans. An Italian opera director (Marcello Mastroianni), her friend's former husband, attempts to shield her from the ravages of fame. Malle uses saturated colours as Henri Decae's dazzling cinematography lovingly captures not only Bardot in all her glory but the visual splendors of Lake Geneva, Paris and Spoleto. The only thing amiss in the production is the shocking lack of chemistry between the two sex symbols - Bardot & Mastroianni. The stars did not get along on set and the film got mostly bad reviews. Watching it today, 58 years on, the film remains spot-on as it scathingly reveals the downside of celebrity which through the years we have witnessed many famous people go that route - while Burton and Taylor enjoyed the relentless attention, it took on a tragic overtone for Princess Diana. The film creates echoes of both.

Meteor (Ronald Neame, 1979) 2/10

One more in a long series of disaster films that graced the screens during the 1970s. This was also one of many that got hideous reviews but its no worse than many that came during the later decades. The formula remained the same. Hire an A-list cast and put them in the middle of a catastrophic event and root for the most ridiculous character to die in gruesome fashion. Here we have a 5-mile long meteor hurtling towards earth and the American and Russian governments join hands to destroy the giant boulder mid-air in space using missiles which had initially been placed by the two countries facing each other. An American scientist (Sean Connery), with a strong Scottish accent, and his Russian counterpart (Brian Keith) attempt to join hands to avert the disaster that threatens to obliterate mankind. Helping the two men converse is a translator (Natalie Wood) who is basically the female lead but with nothing much to do except look elegant even when covered from head to toe in slimy green mud. As the smaller meteor showers begin to hit earth we get to see Hong Kong drown in a huge tidal wave, a gigantic avalanche hits Europe and New York gets decimated by the first wave of the meteor shower - the World Trade Center Twin Towers are the first to implode in an eerie image of things to come. An eclectic supporting cast - Karl Malden, Martin Landau, Trevor Howard, Richard Dysart, Joseph Campanella - play assorted government officials while Henry Fonda, as the U.S. President, makes an impassioned speech. The surviving cast take shelter in a subway station below Manhattan but almost drown in a flood of flowing mud. The effects, which were nominated for an Academy Award, are shoddy beyond belief. Wood, who was of Russian origin, took on this thankless role because it was the first time in her career that she got to play a Russian speaking the language fluently on screen. Too bad she speaks english with an accent that sounds exactly like the spanish accent she put on years earlier in "West Side Story". Truly a disaster of a film.

The Swarm (Irwin Allen, 1978) 1/10

So much talent and all wasted in this turd of a film. America appears to be permanently jinxed if Hollywood is to be believed as yet once more disaster strikes courtesy of Irwin Allen. Killer African bees are on a rampage and out to get the crème de la crème of Hollywood stars playing assorted boring characters - a scientist (Michael Caine), a doctor (Katharine Ross), a General (Richard Widmark), a soldier (Bradford Dillman), a wheel-chair bound doctor (Henry Fonda) who fatally experiments with an antidote drug, a country bumpkin (Slim Pickens), a pregnant café waitress (Patty Duke), a sassy tv reporter (Lee Grant), an inventor of poison pellets (Richard Chamberlain), a nuclear power plant manager (José Ferrer) and a trio of geriatrics - a small-town mayor and drugstore owner (Fred MacMurray), a school superintendent (Olivia de Havilland) and a retiree (Ben Johnson) - involved in a love triangle. Ross gets stung and hallucinates, a nuclear power plant explodes, a runaway train crashes and falls down a mountain, assorted cars crash and blow up, a familiy at a picnic get stung to death and the bees attack helicopters making them crash. The silly denouement involves the discovery that the bees are attracted to the sound of an alarm siren as it resembles the mating sound of the Queen Bee. Needless to say the swarm is then lured towards the call of the siren, doused in oil and zapped with missiles over the Gulf of Mexico. Absurd and extremely tacky film inexplicably even
managed to get an Academy Award nomination for costume design. The production used 15-22 million bees and of the huge cast only screen legend Olivia de Havilland got stung. Absolute crap and one of the worst films of all time.