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

[Reza]

Slightly Dangerous (Wesley Ruggles, 1943) 7/10

Lana goes screwball. Well almost. Bored hick town soda jerk (Lana Turner), gets into a tangle with her boss (Robert Young), and ups and leaves for New York leaving behind a written note that is interpreted as a bid for suicide. She ingratiates herself in the household of a millionaire (Walter Brennan) posing as his long lost daughter. Meanwhile her boss turns up after seeing her photo in the papers. Chaos ensues. Lovely Turner has a ball tip-toeing through slapstick routines around her - her blindfolded soda jerk sequence is a superb bit which was directed by the great Buster Keaton. The wonderful supporting cast - Dame May Whitty, Ward Bond, Alan Mowbray, Florence Bates, Eugene Pallette - add a lot to the main plot.

These Glamour Girls (S. Sylvan Simon, 1939) 6/10

Drunk rich college student (Lew Ayres) invites a dance hall girl (Lana Turner) to the big college dance. When she turns up he has no recollection of her but she proves to be popular with the rest of the boys and shows two fingers to the all the snooty girls who look down at her. Ayres is too old to be convincing as a college student while glamourous Lana Turner does not look like a girl from the wrong side of the tracks. Its fantasy and the plot moves accordingly. Smart Jane Bryan, tragic Marsha Hunt, dimwit Ann Rutherford and bitchy Anita Louise play assorted girls with problems of their own. But clearly Lana is the whole show dancing up a storm as MGM grooms her for stardom which was just around the corner.

Train d'enfer/Operation Double Cross (Gilles Grangier, 1965) 5/10

One of many James Bond rip-offs that came in the wake of the real deal. This one has a convoluted plot bordering on the nonsensical involving a Nazi scientist and his laser gun. Jean Marais is far too old as the secret agent trying to solve the mystery which begins with the discovery of a dead chauffeur found in the sea with a dumbell tied around his neck. One winces each time he gets socked during the many fist fights shot in and around lavish homes. Tall willowy Marisa Mell is a stunner as the femme fatale and the film uses lovely seaside and rural locations in Spain. The bombastic score accompanying the action is by André Hossein father of director-actor Robert Hossein.

Orders to Kill (Anthony Asquith, 1958) 8/10

Grounded American bomber pilot (Paul Massie) is tasked with assassinating a french resistance worker who is a double agent. The assignment becomes difficult for him once he meets and gets to know the man. Tautly directed psychological thriller starts off as a straightforward action piece as the man goes through intense training for the mission via his handlers (Eddie Albert & James Robertson Justice). However, the mood of the film switches once the agent begins to doubt that his proposed victim is a traitor. He is tartly put back on track by his french contact (Irene Worth) who berates him on his cowardice and lack of maturity. Worth, in two brief appearances, runs off with the film - she won a Bafta award. As did Massie and the screenplay by Paul Dehn. In a delightful cameo Lillian Gish is strangely cast as the agent's elderly mother.

Atrangi Re / Funnily Weird (Anand L. Rai, 2021) 6/10

A madcap girl (Sara Ali Khan) tries to elope with her lover (Akshay Kumar) but is forced by her family to get married to the first available bachelor (Dhanush) who goes through the deed while kidnapped and drugged. Later both decide to go their separate ways with their respective love partners but their wedding video goes viral and his fiancé calls off their wedding. Further chaos ensues when the newly-wed groom discovers he is now in love with his wife while a bizzare truth is revealed about her boyfriend that involves her tragic childhood. Only Bollywood can come up with a screwball comedy with heavy dollops of heartbreak punctuated throughout making this a very unusual love story. Both Dhanush and Sara Ali Khan are memorable. The melancholy score is typical of A.R. Rahman.

Sardar Udham (Shoojit Sircar, 2021) 8/10

Udham Singh (Vicky Kaushal), an Indian Revolutionary, travels all the way to London and assassinates Michael O'Dwyer (Shaun Scott) to avenge the 1919 Jallianwala Bagh massacre in Amritsar. During intense rioting against British rule, O'Dwyer - the Lieutenant Governor of the Punjab in British India - gives orders to shoot at sight during all public gatherings. A peaceful gathering of men, women and children in a public park ends in a massacre when General Dyer orders his troops to shoot, repeatedly killing almost 400 innocent civilians while gravely injuring over a thousand. The screenplay charts Singh's journey across continents, his life in London as a salesman and a welder, his final act of revenge 21 years after the massacre, his prison sentence, trial and hanging. The film's highlight is the harrowing massacre shown in flashback at the end as human beings are literally mowed down with bullets and Singh and a few other people desperately attempt to save wounded people left to die out in the open by the British. Kaushal gives a quietly moving performance. Painful true story was just one of several different but equally harrowing events through the centuries of British colonial rule in India. Wherever you had the white man it was always tinged with rampant racism, greed, a divisive form of rule and outright robbery.

[gunnar]

Sophie Scholl: The Final Days (2005) - Sophie Scholl was arrested in February 1943 along with her brother Hans for distributing leaflets calling for an end to the war. They were part of a non-violent group called The White Rose. Trial and sentencing were carried out with great speed. Julia Jentsch did a very nice job as Sophie and the movie kept my interest throughout.

Toni Erdmann (2016) - A father who likes to play (dumb) pranks visits his daughter in Bucharest just before her birthday. She is an executive at a consulting company and her whole life seems to revolve around her job. It makes for a pretty awkward visit much of the time. I did like the movie, but it is slow and meandering and much of the humor wasn't really all that funny.

The Tomorrow War (2021) - Aliens show up in the late 2040s and by 2051, humanity is almost wiped out. They send soldiers back to 2022 to recruit people from the past to try and protect the future. Chris Pratt stars as a former soldier turned science teacher who gets drafted and sent to the future. It was pretty entertaining even if the premise is a bit out there..

Dangerous Moves (1984) - A Soviet World Chess Champion takes on his former student who has since defected to the West. There is political intrigue and plenty of tension during this Cold War confrontation. I thought it was pretty good.

[Reza]

Deep Impact (Mimi Leder, 1998) 6/10

Why is Vanessa Redgrave in this film when the script only allows her about 2 very short scenes? And she does nothing of significance during her cameo appearance. I think Netflix is running a cut version as I distinctly remember what happens to the Redgrave character. Anyway long story short - a comet is headed earth's way and the upcoming catastrophic event is to be combatted by a mission of young'un astronauts led by a gung-ho oldie (Robert Duvall) who plan on attaching nukes on the comet to blow it up. Mission fails as it breaks into two pieces but still moves towards earth. The concerned *gasp* black U.S. President (Morgan Freeman) - who thought back then this was even possible in a racist country like the United States as Obama was still years away in the future? - keeps making telly announcements giving hope. Téa Leoni is a newscaster and daughter of an estranged couple - Redgrave & Maximillian Schell - while Elijah Wood and Leelee Sobieski play teenage lovers and the original discoverers of the giant comet. The damn thing hits, causing gigantic tidal waves knocking off the head of the Statue of Liberty and collapsing the World Trade Center buildings - a sign of things to come for these buildings in three short years where they would go down but under very different circumstances that would permanently change things around the world. A huge sacrifice by the space mission results in one part of the comet deteriorating but only after the first one hits and causes big-ass tsunamis. The idea was to remake the 1951 When Worlds Collide with Spielberg at the helm but he passed on the film to Leder who thankfully concentrates more on the human element of the story instead of on special effects. So who remembers what happened to the Redgrave character?

Mimi (Laxman Utekar, 2021) 6/10

Small town dancer and Bollywood-actress aspirant (Kriti Sanon) opts to be a surrogate mother for a foreign couple in exchange for a large sum of money. Chaos ensues. A serious subject is looked at through humour especially with the hilarious reactions of the girl's horrified parents (Manoj Pahwa & Supriya Pathak), a local taxi driver (Pankaj Tripathy) who initiates and involves the girl in the foreign couple's plan and her best friend (Sai Tamhankar) who is a solid support when things don't go according to plan. A test result shows that the unborn baby could have Downs Syndrome so the American couple decide not to take the baby after all which causes more mayhem for the unwed mother as none of her family members understand the concept of surrogacy and how that works - the taxi driver is automatically assumed to be the baby's father which causes further hilarity as he is married and his wife and mother also join the horrified spectators wanting quick answers. Contrived plot is saved by the delightful supporting cast while Kriti Sanon's small-town accent comes and goes. The ending goes into full overdrive to wring tears in true melodramatic fashion and succeeds pretty well on that front.

Chandigarh Kare Aashiqui (Abhishek Kapoor, 2021) 9/10

If it's an Ayushmann Khurrana movie it's invariably going to deal with a "difficult", yaa "hutt-kay", taboo subject that is going to be an eye opener for the conservative movie-going public of the Sub-Continent. People are well aware of these topics but nobody likes to discuss them. Its much easier to scoff, brush them under the carpet or ridicule them. The amazing thing is that the Bollywood screenplays effortlessly incorporate these subjects in such a seamless way fitting the "subject" into a middle class milieu and often shown with great humour that is never at the expense of anyone. Topics as diverse as sperm donation, the marriage between an illiterate man and his literate but extremely overweight wife, male impotence, late-age pregnancy, a cross-dressing male performer, male pattern baldness and homosexuality. Now here comes a romance between a bodybuilder (Ayushman Khurrana) and a sexy Zumba teacher (Vaani Kapoor). Set in the Chandigarh Punjabi milieu the film draws laughs from the antics of a typical middle class family - old loving grandfather, a randy widowed father with an eye towards remarriage, two spinster daughters who make life miserable for their only brother as they keep trying to set him up with a girl so he can settle down. The guy is not interested in marriage and his only ambition in life is to win an annual contest that declares the strongest man. Then suddenly he falls head over heels in love with the teacher at his gym which evolves into a sexual relationship. When she informs him that she is a trans woman all hell breaks loose. Raises a number of important issues involving various intense reactions - anger, ridicule, understanding and finally acceptance. No doubt the screenplay over simplifies a sensitive subject yet it gently cajoles the viewer into exploring with an open mind what appears to be taboo. Acceptance and tolerance are the two strong messages the film hopes to convey. At the center is the remarkably sensitive and sensual performance by Vaani Kapoor who creates such a unique character and makes her acceptable despite the uproar around her. Khurrana matches her every step of the way with his character mirroring our unaccepting and ignorant society whose immediate knee-jerk reaction is to ridicule, abuse and make fun of anything that is out of the ordinary. Both actors deserve to win awards for their wonderful performances.

[gunnar]

Murder on a Sunday Morning (2001) - 8/10 - This documentary covers the trial of a 15 year old black boy who was coerced by police into confessing to the murder of a woman outside a Jacksonville motel early on a Sunday morning. The police did almost no investigating and just picked the boy off the street as he was walking to Blockbuster in hopes of getting a job there. It's a good documentary, but a sad situation and a very bad look for the Jacksonville police.

Muddy River (1981) - 8/10 - Nobuo is a third grader who lives with his family in their noodle shop by the river in postwar Osaka. He befriends a boy his age named Kiichi who lives in a houseboat with his sister and mother and just arrived in the area. This is a very nice film. It's kind of melancholy overall, but has good performances all around. I think being shot in black and white fits the movie well.

The Visit (1964) - 8/10 - Ingrid Bergman plays Karla, a self made millionaire who returns to the town that forced her out of town 20 years earlier as a pregnant 17 year old. They think that she is there to be generous to her old hometown, but she is intent on revenge against Serge (Anthony Quinn), the man who fathered her child and then denied it. Nice performances and one that maintains its momentum throughout.

The Promised Land (1975) - 7.5/10 - Three friends - a Pole, a German, and a Jew - decide to open up a textile factory in 1880s Lodz. The film shows the callous exploitation of labor by the few people with money who controlled businesses. It's a good film and is based on a novel from the late 1890s.

[gunnar]

None Shall Escape (1944) - 7/10 - The trial of a Nazi war criminal in Poland after the end of WWII is shown with flashbacks to his earlier life and crimes. It was no Judgment at Nuremberg, but it wasn't bad.

The Ninth Circle (1960) - 8/10 - A Croatian family arranges to save the 17 year old Jewish daughter of their friends from being rounded up during WWII by having her marry their 19 year old son. It goes well at first, but causes a number of complications. This is a well made film.

Journey of Hope (1990) - 8/10 - Haydar lives in a small village in Turkey and hears from his cousin how well Turks are doing who have emigrated to Switzerland. He sells most of his belongings and travels with his wife and one son on a journey to Switzerland in hoped of greater prosperity. His other six children are left in the care of relatives until he can hopefully send for them. The journey turns out to be more expensive and arduous than he expected. This is a good film about illegal immigration and how the expectations don't necessarily live up to reality.

[Reza]

Salvatore Giuliano (Francesco Rosi, 1962) 8/10

The life of the Sicilian bandit is shot by Rosi in a neo-realist documentary style which is as much a portrait of post-war Sicily as it is of the man who managed to elude the police for a number of years. The film opens with the bandit's corpse sprawled in a street face down - shot to death - and tells his story in a non-linear manner with sudden flashbacks. Giuliano is seen numerous times but only as a corpse while the screenplay focuses on the people around him. A petty black marketeer to make ends meet he is caught at a checkpost and shoots a cop and gets away. Later he shoots another cop and goes into hiding in the hills surrounding his small town and gradually turns into a folk hero while briefly also dabbling in Sicily's separatist movement. His downfall began with the massacre of unarmed communist demonstrators at a rally with many factions turning against him until his final betrayal by a close comrade. Rosi's film was the precursor to a slew of hard-hitting political films that came in its wake like Gillo Pontecorvo’s Battle of Algiers (1966) and Costa Gavras’ Z (1969). The screenplay, via a narrator, covers a great deal of historical background which tends to get rather confusing but the film is full of brilliantly staged stark images (courtesy of the great Gianni Di Venanzo) as Rosi uses his cast of non professional actors to enact the dramatic life of Giuliano.

The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (John Ford, 1962) 5/10

Lee Marvin steals the film away from his far more famous co-stars, John Wayne and James Stewart, who were both appearing on screen together for the first time. Ford shoots the entire film on sets giving it a stagy feel as he handles a love triangle between a tenderfoot lawyer (James Stewart), a gunslinger (John Wayne) and the woman (Vera Miles) they both love. The story's main conflict lies with the hired killer (Lee Marvin) who tries to break up the town moving towards self governance. There are the usual (corny) comic Ford touches involving a cowardly Marshall (Andy Devine) and an alcoholic newspaper editor (Edmond O'Brien). Stylish but slow film, pining nostalgia, is set in a changing West with the legacy of legend superceding fact. Stewart is badly miscast - he is far too old to be playing a lawyer just starting out and his excessive (natural trademark) drawl begins to get on one's nerves especially coming after a decade worth of tough brutal roles where he spoke in a normal voice. While Wayne is his usual flamboyant heroic self his part merely requires him to sporadically wander in and out of the action. Marvin is the whole show as the mean, vicious killer who has absolutely no redeeming quality. One understands why he went on to win an Oscar three years later. Edith Head's costume designs were nominated for an Oscar.

The Mark of the Hawk (Michael Audley, 1957) 5/10

Like most of Sidney Poitier's films this too was one with a political message. Set in an un-named British colonial African country bristling with hatred for the white man where one soul (Sidney Poitier) speaks out for independence but in a non-violent way. Often preachy film has Poitier in fine form in one of his early lead roles. John McIntire is a preacher who has spent an earlier tragic life in communist China - the film goes off into a tangent with a long flashback although there are similarities in the way countries got invaded and locals became prisoners of the occupiers. Eartha Kitt plays Poitier's wife and gets to sing as well.

Ships With Wings (Sergei Nolbandov, 1941) 7/10

WWII British propaganda film disliked by Churchill who felt it showed far too many British casualties and hence bad for morale. It was also criticized for its lack of realism but the film was a huge hit at the boxoffice for all the derring do on display. The plot revolves around a reckless RAF pilot (John Clements) who is expelled from the Fleet Air Arm (one of the five fighting arms of the Royal Navy) but redeems himself later during the Battle of Greece in 1940-41. There is a love triangle with him and two women - a sultry nightclub singer (Ann Todd) is madly in love with him while he is in love with the daughter (Jane Baxter) of the Vice Admiral (Leslie Banks). However, she ends up married to another officer (Michael Wilding) after he gets dismissed from service. Despite the incredibly shoddy special effects this is a good war film with espionage thrown in on a greek island and torture and murder by the Nazis. Michael Rennie, Cecil Parker and Hugh Williams appear in brief but vivid roles.

[danfrank]

The French Dispatch (Wes Anderson, 2021) 6/10

"Anderson's quirky films really get on my tits", said someone. And I agree.

Some people aren’t into quirk, period, and most of the rest of us strongly prefer some flavors of quirk over others. I totally get how Anderson’s films are not for everyone. I have a friend with generally good taste who can’t stomach his films. To me, his quirk hits the mark. I’m glad you can appreciate aspects of his films if not the overall effect.

[Reza]

The French Dispatch (Wes Anderson, 2021) 6/10

"Anderson's quirky films really get on my tits", said someone. And I agree. However, his use of colour and the witty inventiveness of the production design in his films is almost worth sitting through. Almost. Depends on his screenplays which can often have quite a hit or miss quality. Also worth seeing for the way he uses his star casts, mostly in brief bits, but always presented very vividly. Here we go through different articles in the last issue of an American newspaper (although it seems to be an homage to the New Yorker magazine) in the fictional french city of Ennui-sur-Blasé. The stories come alive through the characters in each news item. The first segment is about an unstable convict (Benicio Del Toro), his prison guard-lover (Léa Seydoux), the abstract nude painting he does of her and the art dealer (Adrien Brody) who pleads for the convict's life and parole. The second item channels the 1968 Paris student protests and features Frances McDormand as a journalist and Timothèe Chalamet as a student revolutionary. The third and last news item deals with a food journalist (Jeffrey Wright) who attends a gourmet dinner at the house of the police Commissaire (Matthieu Amalric) whose son is picked up by kidnappers (Edward Norton & Saoirse Ronan). Many other stars appear in bit parts along with Bill Murray, Tilda Swinton, Owen Wilson, Elisabeth Moss, Jason Schwartzman playing members of the newspaper staff. Oddball vignettes playfully highlighting eccentric characters is a loving ode to journalists. A jaunty score by Alexander Desplat accompanies the almost cartoon-like activities on screen.

The Eyes of Tammy Faye (Michael Showalter, 2021) 6/10

The rise and fall of the garishly made up televangelist Tammy Faye (Jessica Chastain) and her husband Jim Bakker (Andrew Garfield). Starting life from humble beginnings the couple meet at a Bible college, get married and rise up the ladder of success as religious entrepreneurs with a massive broadcasting network empire and theme park. Unlike other evangelists she proposes a message of love for everyone including the LGBT community with compassion for HIV/AIDS patients. The success story ended in disaster with financial improprieties and Jim Bakker's sex scandal which toppled their carefully built empire. Chastain captures the joie de vivre of Tammy with her exuberant personality and motor mouth openly discussing sex, penile implants and other taboo subjects on television. Religion as a business rightfully gets a sound drubbing with both actors perfect as the two hucksters.

Encounter (Michael Peerce, 2021) 7/10

The screenplay takes on the mantle of a thriller as it makes points about PTSD and about America's gun control laws which allow any and all yahoos to act like Clint Eastwood's "Dirty Harry". A disturbed former marine (Riz Ahmed) imagines that aliens have invaded and reside inside human bodies in the form of micro-organisms. He kidnaps his two sons from his estranged wife and they go on a road trip while he tells them he is saving them from the aliens. Along the way there are skirmishes with a cop, a white supremist and his two yahoo sons where guns are involved and used. Meanwhile his parole officer (Octavia Spencer), the cops and the FBI are in hot pursuit. Uneven film starts off in an interesting menacing way with the camera closely capturing insects feasting on whatever they find and then the mysterious actions of the man evolve into a standard chase film with a couple of nerve wracking moments between the three and the derelicts they meet along the way. Ahmed gives an intense performance and has many wonderful moments along the way with the two young actors who play his sons.

[gunnar]

The Door Into Summer (2021) - 7.5/10 - A young inventor is cheated out of his company and inventions, but doesn't give up in finding a way to make it right. This was a pretty faithful adaptation of the Heinlein novel, though with a Japanese cast. I like most of Heinlein's novels and have read this book several times and also enjoyed the film.

It Came from Outer Space (1953) - 7.5/10 - An amateur astronomer/author and his girlfriend are watching the stars in the Arizona desert one night when they see a meteor crash. They take a helicopter out to the crash site and the astronomer sees a ship at the bottom of the crater, but it is soon buried by falling rocks. He tells people what he saw, but is not believed...at first. I thought it was a fun film.

[Reza]

Mass (Fran Kranz, 2021) 7/10

A high school student goes on a rampage and shoots a number of his fellow students and teachers. Six years later his parents (Reed Birney & Ann Dowd) meet with the parents (Jason Isaacs & Martha Plimpton) of one of the victims in the basement of a church. The meeting is meant to enable some form of closure for the grieving parents which starts out awkward and confused, goes on into a passive-aggressive rant followed by some form of understanding about an incident which will never bring forth any conclusive answers. Superbly acted film is a relentlessly downbeat exercise in trying to find some kind of catharsis as frayed human emotions work themselves into a frenzy trying to sort themselves out. Harrowing film is not for the faint of heart even though there is not a single moment of violence on display. However, it can be seen on the gut wrenched faces of these four parents who have lost their children to a violent act.

The King's Man (Matthew Vaughn, 2021) 7/10

Action packed thriller mixes derring-do with actual history (revisionist to its core) as the screenplay churns up a number of historical characters - Rasputin (Rhys Ifans), General Kitchener (Charles Dance), the Austrian charlatan Erik Jan Hanussen (Daniel Brühl), King George V, Kaiser Wilhelm, Tsar Nicholas (all three played by David Hollander) & Archduke Franz Ferdinand - in a plot set during WWI. Fast-moving prequel to two previous Kingsman installments explains how the secret society was set up by the Duke of Oxford (Ralph Fiennes) with help from his two servants (Gemma Arteryon & Djimon Hounsou) as they, along with his teenage son (Harris Dickinson), try first to prevent the War and later try their best to stop it by going up against a mysterious mastermind who is using his own nefarious agents to manipulate Germany into taking on Britain while ensuring that Russia and the United States stay out of the War. This is done by getting Lenin to step-in to oust the Tsar while Monica Lewinsky's "cocksmanship" is hilariously referenced by having Mata Hari go down on President Woodrow Wilson which is filmed and used as blackmail. Unlike the later two films this one is less of a spy spoof as the action gets very dark and violent. Fiennes sails through it effortlessly in a highly dramatic and action oriented performance. Matching him every step of the way is a hilarious turn by Rhys Ifans as the Mad Monk - the witty fight scenes with him resemble a Cossack's dance as he twirls around making moaning sounds as he first goes down on Fiennes with his tongue (the writers seem to be very fond of fellatio) followed by trying to kill him. The film has a number of outlandish action set pieces and a lengthy bit in the trenches and on the battlefield which seems like scenes cut out of Sam Mendes' "1917". Enjoyable film is instantly fogettable as soon as you walk out of the cinema.

Tenth Avenue Angel (Roy Rowland, 1948) 5/10

A precocious cloying child (who else but Margaret O'Brien) annoyingly flutters around her adoring pregnant mother (Phyllis Thaxter), the aunt (Angela Lansbury) in love with an ex-con (George Murphy), the blind news-stall vendor (Rhys Williams) as she discovers that grownups often lie although they like to tell kids to only speak the truth. It takes a Christmas miracle for the child to understand about life, her mother to recover after a very bad fall and the ex-con to stay away from trouble. Good cast in typical O'Brien vehicle where the highlights revolve around the child star quivering and snifling through tears at the drop of a hat. Annoying she may be but O'Brien was a scarily good actor.

Harry Potter 20th Anniversary: Return to Hogwarts (Eran Creevy, Joe Perlman & Giorgio Testi, 2022) 9/10

Highly emotional reunion of the cast and crew on the old sets of the Harry Potter films. The three stars reminisce about how they were cast, how they forged friendships and got to work with such superstars like Maggie Smith, Alan Rickman, Richard Harris and many others. Also turning up for the reunion are Gary Oldman, Helena Binham-Carter, Robbie Coltrane and Ralph Fiennes. Not a dry eye in the house by the end of this reunion.

U.S. Marshals (Stuart Baird, 1998) 6/10

A spin-off from "The Fugitive" after Tommy Lee Jones won an Oscar and his character United States Deputy Marshal Sam Gerard gets his own arc. A formulaic cop-chase flick as the Deputy goes after another fugitive (Wesley Snipes), who attempts to escape government officials following an international conspiracy scandal. Slick action scenes have a deja vu feel to them although there is a spectacular airplane crash sequence that is quite memorable. The laconic Jones is always a welcome presence as are brief appearances by Irène Jacob and Kate Nelligan.

The Riddle of the Sands (Tony Maylam, 1979) 7/10

Erskine Childers' 1903 WWI espionage novel is brought memorably to the screen. Old fashioned adventure film has a boat enthusiast (Simon MacCorkindale) and his acquaintance - a Foreign Office officer (Michael York) - tangle with Germans at the exotic location of the Frisian Islands just off the coast of Germany. They untangle a plot of barges being used by the German army to invade Britain's east coast across the North Sea. A retired German officer (Alan Badel) is involved in the plot while his daughter (Jenny Agutter) provides a bit of love interest. The movie's spectacular location filming is a major asset.

Megaboa (Mario N. Bonassin, 2021) 1/10

Classic premise - trap a group of people in a dangerous secluded environment with a monster on the loose and have it pick off members of the cast one by one. However, do make sure you have a solid screenplay and especially actors who can act. Sadly the film fails on all counts despite a former Oscar nominee in the lead who is surrounded by a bunch of non-actors flailing about as they get devoured one by one. A group of college students head onto an island jungle with their professor (former Oscar nominee Eric Roberts who has forgotten how to act and who's only claim to fame now seems to be that he is Julia Roberts' estranged older brother). Anyway the professor gets bitten by a deadly spider, they save a mysterious hunter who informs them that the poison's antidote is within a rare orchid which they need to find by going deep into the jungle where lies await a mega boa constrictor along with many smaller snakes and a giant spider. With two giant monsters in one film there is the inevitable fight to the death between them. A number of the students end up getting swallowed and regurgitated. Terrible film with really bad acting and shoddy CGI effects. Sad to see Eric Roberts involved in dredge like this.

Three For Jamie Dawn (Thomas Carr, 1956) 6/10

A bit like Sidney Lumet's later "12 Angry Men" which mainly purpots to describe how a jury in a murder trial functions in the United States but embelishes it with a melodramatic plot. A rich woman shoots her lover dead and a sleazy defence lawyer (Richard Carlson) vows to prove her innocent. He manages to bribe three jury members to abstain from voting guilty - and they are a down and out actress (June Havoc) desperate for a comeback, an old refugee (Eduard Franz) from Czechoslovakia who is desperate to find his son who got left behind and a jobless man (Ricardo Montalban) who along with his wife (Larraine Day) take the bribe. Regis Toomey is the lawyer's slick partner who manages to con the three jurors. Unlike the Lumet film this one has no scenes set in court. Well acted film which fits into the world of B-grade films which is actually well worth seeking out.

Star Dust (Walter Lang, 1940) 7/10

Charming look at the old studio system in Hollywood through two young hopeful actors from the sticks. A movie studio talent scout (Roland Young) searches for fresh faces at a college town in Arkansas. He chooses a football player (John Payne) and a waitress (Linda Darnell), takes then to Hollywood where they are put through elocution lessons, make-up and costume only for their audition to be rejected by a snarky casting director (Donald Meek) who is favoring another starlet (Mary Beth Hughes). However, just when both youngsters are at their lowest ebb a dramatic coach (Charlotte Greenwood) comes up with a wicked plan for the studio head (William Gargan) to view a secret screen test. Fluff was supposedly based on Darnell's own discovery and has Hoagy Carmichael's classic "Star Dust" sung by Mary Healy playing another hopeful starlet. Both Young and Greenwood steal the film with their delightful antics while Payne and Darnell make a very attractive screen couple. That's Sid Grauman himself talking to Darnell as her prints and signature are put in cement in front of the famous chinese theater in Hollywood.

They Made Me a Criminal (Busby Berkeley, 1939) 6/10

Boxer (John Garfield), with a clean-cut image, is actually a womanizing, boozing cynic. When he is set up for a murder by his manager he goes on the run and redeems himself when he falls in love and helps a woman (Gloria Dickson), her grandma (May Robson) and a bunch of delinquent kids (The Dead End Kids). Garfield is his usual tough self and Ann Sheridan has a small part as his floozy friend. Claude Rains (with his clipped British accent) is miscast as a tough chain smoking New York cop.

The Charge at Feather River (Gordon Douglas, 1953) 6/10

A former soldier (Guy Madison) is tasked by the army with rescuing two white women abducted by the Cheyenne. He is accompanied by a band of misfit soldiers who all eventually accomplish the task and end up getting chased by the Indians. One of the women (Vera Miles) is reluctant at being rescued as she was about to marry the Indian chief. Her sister (Helen Westcott) becomes the love interest for the soldier as they do battle with the harsh elements - heat, lack of water, a snake - and the relentless marauding Indians in hot pursuit. B-Western, initially in 3-D, is a typical action packed Western churned out by the truckload by the Hollywood studios during the 1950s.

[gunnar]

Portrait of Jennie (1948) - 8/10 - A struggling artist of mediocre ability comes across a girl in a park who seems to be from another time. He comes across her at other times and places and each time she's a bit older than before. He tries to track her down and find out more about her, falling for her more each time they are together. I enjoyed this one quite a bit.

Altered States (1980) - 5/10 - A scientist is eager to explore realms of consciousness and uses sensory deprivation, drugs, and other practices to try and reach and remember these other states of mind. It turns out to have a dangerous physical effect on him. The visual and sound effects on this film are good, but I didn't care for the story at all and I thought the acting was only so-so.

Nightmare Alley (2021) - 7.5/10 - A man joins a carnival and finds that he has talent as a mentalist. He's got ambition, though, and wants to rise above the carnival circuit. This is a good film and the settings and costumes are excellent. I think that it moves at a little too slow and deliberate pace at times, though, and I don't think of it as among del Toro's best.

[gunnar]

West Side Story (2021) - 8/10 - The film has great set design, costumes, production values, etc. It's been too long since I saw the original to make any real comparisons, but I enjoyed this version a lot. I think Anson Elgort was miscast a bit, though he does a decent job. I liked Rachel Zegler as Maria and the rest of the cast was pretty good as well. My mom liked the movie a lot as well and she saw the original when it came out.

[gunnar]

The Andromeda Strain (1971) - 7/10 - A tiny alien life form kills almost all of the residents in a small town after a satellite returns to Earth. A group of scientists is quickly assembled to find out why a baby and an old man survived. They study the life form and try to figure out how to neutralize it so that it doesn't spread and kill more people. This isn't the most exciting movie, but it's well acted and is interesting.

When Worlds Collide (1951) - 7/10 - A wandering planet is spotted entering our solar system and one scientist predicts that it will pass close enough to Earth to cause devastation and destroy all life on the planet. The only hope is to build a rocket to transport as many people, animals, and supplies as possible to this new world in order to have a chance to survive. It's definitely a bit dated, but it was still entertaining.

Visit to a Small Planet (1960) - 4/10 - Jerry Lewis plays a somewhat simple alien named Kreton who skips class to visit Earth, where he causes a number of problems. I'm not a fan of Jerry Lewis and didn't really enjoy this one much, except for a few bits here and there. Mostly it was just dumb.

[Big Magilla]

The Lost Daughter (Maggie Gyllenhaal, 2021) 9/10

Leda (Olivia Colman), a well-to-do university professor, takes a seaside rental on a greek island for a few weeks of relaxation. While there an incident on a beach involving a boistrous family, a young mother (Dakota Johnson) who briefly loses her young daughter, and a missing doll make her reflect on her youth and a certain painful but exhilarating decision she took which had a far reaching effect on her life. Gyllenhaal's film, based on the novel by Elena Ferrante, is a lacerating look at motherhood. The conflicting demands of family life versus personal and professional fulfilment which can sometimes lead to painful selfish feelings that surface entwined within the role of the family nourisher. It is acted to perfection by the two superb actors portraying Leda the mother - Olivia Colman as the older now successful woman and in the film's superbly edited flashbacks where young Leda is played by the ravishing Jessie Buckley who conveys a young person's contradictions - love for her two young daughters but also acute exasperation at having to raise them while trying to pursue her own passion in academia, indifference towards her husband and lust for a fellow academic (the sex scenes between Buckley and a full-bearded Peter Sarsgaard are highly erotic although chastefully shot). Thought provoking quiet little film is one of the year's best.

I was going to review this in the Official Review Thread of 2021, but this sums up what I liked but mostly didn't like about this movie.

Colman's performance is great. Colman's performances are always great. Buckley is a chameleon. She's wonderfully different in everything she does. Here she looks and sounds so much like Colman that when the film goes into one of its many flashback scenes it takes a moment to realize you're looking at her and not Colman. It's uncanny. The scenery is phenomenal, it's the Greek Islands, after all.

But the story drags. With that title, you would think it would be about Colman discovering a daughter she abandoned as a child, but no it refers to a little girl who wanders off for a few minutes, who is found by Colman who returns her to her mother but keeps the doll the girl is frantic for losing for no rational reason except to give the story a little suspense.

Written by a pseudo-anonymous female Italian author, it's a highly feminist work in which the men are all weak jerks, and the women are all strong, if flawed, who are better off without them.

Johnson and her "boisterous" family are typical American tourists as seen through the eyes of European natives. They are from "Queens", don't you know, were everyone is perceived to be loud and annoying. Colman has emigrated to America but being a high-class Brit, she lives and teaches in Cambridge, Massachusetts "outside of Boston" because she is a woman of culture.

Paul Mescal, Jack Farthing, and Oliver Jackson-Cohen are wasted in the key male roles, and the less said about Peter Sarsgaard and that horrible Rasputin style beard, the better.

And what was Ed Harris doing in this picture as an emigrant from who knows where with a 50-year-old daughter, making her two years older than Colman's character, who seems to be trying to do his own version of Zorba the Greek?

[gunnar]

Palm Springs (2020) - 8/10 - Nyles is stuck in a time loop and wakes up every day at a motel where there is a wedding happening that night. Sarah is also there for the wedding and accidentally gets dragged into the time loop as well. This was recommended to me a year and a half ago and I finally got around to watching it. It was a lot of fun. I still like Groundhog Day more, but this is a good riff on the theme.

The Matrix Resurrections (2021) - 7/10 - For all the high tech special effects, this felt like a less ambitious and relatively minor film compared to the earlier trilogy, though I did like it a lot more than either of the other sequels. It wasn't as bad as some of the reviews I saw indicated and it certianly isn't great, but it was watchable and fun in places.