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Recently Watched & Favorite Movies: Personal Reviews & More

126K views 888 replies 95 participants last post by  revahS 
#1 ·
My answer has always been Casablanca (even over Citizen Kane) since in my opinion there is not one single wasted scene in the movie.

However, after once again seeing American Graffiti last night on TV (with commercial breaks which should be illegal) I am revising my opinion. It has to be American Graffiti!
 
#686 ·
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The Truth about Cats and Dogs from 1996 with Janeane Garofalo, Uma Thurman and Ben Chaplin

This is either a terrible movie or a bad-but-okay movie as, at times, I couldn't stand it, but at other times, I found it mildly amusing. I think I liked it more when I first saw it twenty-plus years ago.

It's an awkward riff on the Cyrano de Bergerac story where Ben Chaplin mistakes ditzy model Uma Thurman for smart-but-plain-looking radio-talk-show-host Janeane Garofalo. He's attracted to Garofalo's brains and Thurman's looks - sigh.

The girls then allow the mistake to continue in a kinda-sorta plan to get Chaplin to fall in love with Garofalo, but of course, he falls in love with Thurman as that is whom he believes he's dating (plus, she's Uma freakin' Thurman). This, naturally, causes a rift between Garofalo and Thurman as, shocker, both girls now want Chaplin.

Yes, that's the story and it is as stupid as it sounds. Most movies ask you to suspend reality to some extent, but The Truth About Cats and Dogs, often, asks you to be an idiot. (I'm ignoring the syllogism about being an idiot and still watching the movie.)

Yet, darn it, just when I was fed up with The Truth About Cats and Dogs and about to shut it off, some cute scene or funny dialogue exchange would keep me watching, despite the movie being a series of cliches.

Thurman is only "dumb" because she's so beautiful she's never had to develop her mind - sigh. Garafalo is a vet because animals don't care what you look like and she's a radio host because your viewers can't see you - sigh again. Thurman's last boyfriend abused her because she has no self esteem. Garafalo lives with a cat and too many candles to avoid having a personal life that she believes will be filled with rejection.

It's ridiculous, but Garafalo, Chapman and Thurman are good in their roles and the movie has its fun parts wrapped inside all its stupidity. Thurman's sincere-but-clueless attempts to improve her mind - as when she struggles, with dictionary in hand, to read just one page of a philosophy book - is a hoot. I'd almost like to say I just hated the movie, but have to admit, irritated as I was at times, I did watch the entire nonsensical thing and chuckled occasionally while doing so.
 
#687 ·
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The Paradine Case from 1947 with Gregory Peck, Alida Valli, Ann Todd, Charles Laughton, Charles Colburn, Ethel Barrymore and Louis Jordan

The pieces of this Hitchcock movie are better than the whole, which might be why it's generally considered one of the master director's middling efforts.

But some of those pieces are outstanding, as is the incredibly talented cast with the one weak choice of Gregory Peck, a fine actor otherwise, in the lead.

Ostensibly, the story is about a young, beautiful woman, Alida Valli, accused of killing her older, blind and wealthy husband with Peck brought in as her brilliant defense attorney.

Yet, it is really about Peck becoming so besotted with Valli he risks his marriage and professional objectivity. This, in turn, means he's risking his personal life and career all over his platonic "affair" with Valli (she's being held in jail the entire time he knows her).

That is also the story's weakness as Peck's "falling in love" with Valli, pretty much at first sight, is never convincing. Valli is just too cold; beautiful, yes, but chilly. Peck, meanwhile, seems more angry with Valli for disturbing his thoughts than in love with her. The entire movie balances on this weak pivot.

If you just go with it, though, you get all these wonderful scenes and relationships. Ann Todd, Peck's arrestingly beautiful and smarter-than-him wife, immediately senses what is going on and tries to give her struggling husband room and time for his dumb mental infidelity to burn itself out. I'm firmly against physical violence, but kept hoping Todd would just punch her stupid husband in his face.

You also get Charles Colburn as Peck's friend and legal mentor having an incredible tête-à-tête with his whip-smart young daughter who sees Peck's descent into idiocy before Colburn.

Equally engaging is the scene where bullying Charles Laughton, the judge in the case, belittles his perceptive but browbeaten wife. She, also, comes across smarter than her "brilliant legal mind" husband. Say what you will of sexism from that era, but almost every woman is smarter than every man in The Paradine Case.

When the movie finally shifts to the climatic courtroom scenes, the drama is solidly engaging. Peck's crafty defense convincingly shows that the butler did it (well almost, the husband's aide, Louis Jordan). But then (spoiler alert), Valli, his client, destroys her own defense by confessing to the murder. This exonerates Jordan, whom she now acknowledges has, all along, been her lover (this is a dagger right through Peck's lovesick heart).

After that, it's all clean-up as Valli is off to the hangman, while Peck assumes his career and marriage is all washed up. But once again, it's his wife, super Ann Todd, to the rescue.

Here's when you know you have received more than you deserve in life. Ann Todd agrees to marry you. Ann Todd is your good loving wife. You then act like a complete *ss to Ann Todd over an infatuation with another woman. But when it's all over, understanding Ann Todd takes you back, not because she's weak, but because she's strong and accepts your weaknesses. Ann Todd deserves better. Roll credits.

N.B. A rule of murder mysteries: never trust the rich woman (pathologically aloof Valli, in this case) who sleeps in an overly ornate room with an elaborate headboard that includes a large narcissistic portrait of herself.
 
#688 ·
Another rather splendid review in which you clarify the competing logic's and strategies in the film, helping your reader to make an informed decision on whether or not the movie, The Paradine Case is one to be searched out and watched, or perhaps skipped over to accommodate more pressing viewing priorities. Realizing you caution that this is not one of Hitchcock's best efforts, I find myself drawn in by the incredible acting talents of Gregory Peck. Consequently, I found a You Tube presentation of this film and watched the first 17 minutes and 38 seconds (Peck has finished telling the vixen in distress that he will be taking her case and that this will just be a brief skirmish for the Royal Marines!), before returning to AAAC to complete my efforts with the brotherhood. Afterwhich, I will return to You tube and watch the rest of the movie!
 
#690 ·
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Our Very Own from 1950 with Ann Blyth, Jane Wyatt, Farley Granger, Ann Dvorak and Natalie Wood

TV was less groundbreaking than it appears when you realize that most of what TV would eventually do in its first thirty or forty years had already been done in the movies.

B movies, going back to the 1930s, were often quite similar to what would become TV-style dramas or soap operas by the 1960s. Equally ahead of TV, serial stories were quite popular in the 1930s and 1940s where audiences would come back week after week to see the next "installment" of these, mainly, kid-oriented pictures.

In the 1940s and 1950s, there were many low-budget movies that were the antecedents of the 1970s TV After School Special. In those efforts, a "challenging" issue relevant to kids or young adults was highlighted and addressed in an edifying manner.

Our Very Own is a 1950 movie version of a 1970s After School Special with the seventeen-year-old daughter of a comfortable and loving middle-class family accidentally discovering she was adopted. As was a common practice then, the parents had kept the adoption secret from the daughter, so the discovery is a crisis moment for the daughter and parents.

Until then, Ann Blyth is a "normal" teen worried about her boyfriend, Farley Granger, excited about her dress for graduation and regularly doing battle with her younger sisters, the youngest being twelve-year-old Natalie Wood.

When she learns she was adopted, all that gets pushed aside as she immediately knows she wants to meet her "real" mother. This is a dagger right through the heart of her adoptive mom Jane Wyatt (warming up for her future role on Father Knows Best as one of TV's perfect 1950s mothers).

After a trip to biological mom, Ann Dvorak - nice but rough around the edges and struggling financially - and a conversation with her best friend whose mom died when she was a baby, Blyth comes to the only conclusion the script allows: she is darn lucky to have been adopted by such nice people.

The movie ends with class vice president Blythe giving a graduation speech about the value of citizenship and a heartfelt admonition to her fortunate fellow students to feel gratitude to their parents and country.

It's easy to be snarky and cynical about these movies, especially today when any pride in one's country is mocked by many (at least in America; although, those same people probably respect and understand it when practiced in other countries). It also doesn't help that, as is the wont of these movies, the messaging is heavy handed and obvious.

Sure, better writing would help and some of the thinking doesn't align to today's unforgiving standards, but heck, somebody, somewhere was trying to do some good. Which means, kids then probably felt like kids in the 1970s did about those After School Specials.

My friends and I used to sometimes watch and, of course, openly mock them, but also, maybe only quietly to ourselves, learn something from them as well. For us today, Our Very Own is also pretty good time-travel to the cars, clothes, architecture and norms (seen through a Hollywood filter) of the day.

N.B. In academic "game theory," the "crowd watching the crowd" is a big deal as it's one of the ways a culture signals its norms and practises (and, in today's vernacular, memes) to its members. One wonders if movies like Our Very Own didn't both reflect and help create the teenage culture of the 1950s.

Parties, music, dancing, necking, dress, speech, attitudes toward parents and school are all very 1950s "teenager" in the movie. At a time when entertainment hadn't split into a million silos like today, these geared-toward-teenagers movies probably had a pretty powerful "crowd watching the crowd" effect.
 
#691 ·
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The Nuisance from 1933 with Lee Tracy, Madge Evans, Charles Butterworth and Frank Morgan

Once again, behold the pre-code: Successful ambulance-chasing lawyer Lee Tracy makes up false claims from whole cloth, hires fake witnesses, has a corrupt doctor, Frank Morgan, alter examination records and x-rays and suborns perjury. Today's tort lawyers could take notes. Yet, Tracy is not presented as a really bad guy despite the stunning fraud.

At one point, Tracy is negotiating a settlement with a streetcar company's lawyer over damages for an accident victim, literally, as the injured man dies in front of them. Without missing a beat, all that changes is the two men start arguing over a much-higher figure. I'm not proud of myself, but I was laughing out loud at their ruthless indifference.

Lee Tracey, at this moment, was MGM's answer to Warner Bros'. James Cagney and Pat O'Brien. Tracy, just like those Warner Bros. stars, is talking so fast in The Nuisance, the dialogue struggles to keep up.

Also like Warner Bros. MGM, at least for this instant, didn't flinch from calling out Germany and Hitler. Check out this exchange, and remember it is 1933:

German immigrant: "All good doctors are Germans"

Charles Butterworth as a pragmatic American: "I understand all that's been changed since Hitler got elected."

And how respected was Prohibition in 1933? Tracy has a bootlegger on call, a well-stocked bar at home and the local drug store all but openly sells booze from behind the counter. The "Noble Experiment" had become the national joke.

Back in the plot of The Nuisance, the streetcar company, tired of writing out big checks to Tracy's clients, hires super-adorable Madge Evans to masquerade as a client of Tracy to document and expose his corruption.

Just as she starts to make real progress, she - you know it's coming - begins to fall for Tracy as he does for her. Tracy and Evans have good chemistry and even better banter, but it's a tough square to circle in a relationship when you're about to sell out your boyfriend.

All that's left is a bunch of misunderstandings, hurt feelings, wounded pride, recriminations and, finally, Tracy and Evans trying to top each other in self sacrifice to prove their love after first saying horrible things to each other. You know, basic last-minute romcom stuff.

But since it's still pre-code 1933, the closing scene has Tracy assuring his now wife Evans he's reformed, while in the next breath, he's setting up a new big-money fraudulent claim. What does Evens do? She basically shrugs. For about four years, from 1930-1934, the pre-code movies refuted every wholesome narrative subsequent movies, produced under the code, would attempt to portray for the following thirty years.

An inside-Hollywood N.B. While made at MGM, this is a Warner Bros. movie in spirit as it shows illegal activity in an all but favorable light. Additionally, there's the aforementioned speed-talking Tracy doing his best Cagney/O'Brien and the very Warner Bros.' swipe at Hitler.

Finally, Charles Butterworth, as Tracy's amoral sidekick, is MGM's answer to Warners Bros. character actors like Frank McHugh. But proving you can never do things as well as the master, The Nuisance runs for an hour and twenty three minutes; warp-speed Warner Bros would have wrapped it up in an hour and five without losing any story.
 
#692 ·
View attachment 59934
The Nuisance from 1933 with Lee Tracy, Madge Evans, Charles Butterworth and Frank Morgan

Once again, behold the pre-code: Successful ambulance-chasing lawyer Lee Tracy makes up false claims from whole cloth, hires fake witnesses, has a corrupt doctor, Frank Morgan, alter examination records and x-rays and suborns perjury. Today's tort lawyers could take notes. Yet, Tracy is not presented as a really bad guy despite the stunning fraud.

At one point, Tracy is negotiating a settlement with a streetcar company's lawyer over damages for an accident victim, literally, as the injured man dies in front of them. Without missing a beat, all that changes is the two men start arguing over a much-higher figure. I'm not proud of myself, but I was laughing out loud at their ruthless indifference.

Lee Tracey, at this moment, was MGM's answer to Warner Bros'. James Cagney and Pat O'Brien. Tracy, just like those Warner Bros. stars, is talking so fast in The Nuisance, the dialogue struggles to keep up.

Also like Warner Bros. MGM, at least for this instant, didn't flinch from calling out Germany and Hitler. Check out this exchange, and remember it is 1933:

German immigrant: "All good doctors are Germans"

Charles Butterworth as a pragmatic American: "I understand all that's been changed since Hitler got elected."

And how respected was Prohibition in 1933? Tracy has a bootlegger on call, a well-stocked bar at home and the local drug store all but openly sells booze from behind the counter. The "Noble Experiment" had become the national joke.

Back in the plot of The Nuisance, the streetcar company, tired of writing out big checks to Tracy's clients, hires super-adorable Madge Evans to masquerade as a client of Tracy to document and expose his corruption.

Just as she starts to make real progress, she - you know it's coming - begins to fall for Tracy as he does for her. Tracy and Evans have good chemistry and even better banter, but it's a tough square to circle in a relationship when you're about to sell out your boyfriend.

All that's left is a bunch of misunderstandings, hurt feelings, wounded pride, recriminations and, finally, Tracy and Evans trying to top each other in self sacrifice to prove their love after first saying horrible things to each other. You know, basic last-minute romcom stuff.

But since it's still pre-code 1933, the closing scene has Tracy assuring his now wife Evans he's reformed, while in the next breath, he's setting up a new big-money fraudulent claim. What does Evens do? She basically shrugs. For about four years, from 1930-1934, the pre-code movies refuted every wholesome narrative subsequent movies, produced under the code, would attempt to portray for the following thirty years.

An inside-Hollywood N.B. While made at MGM, this is a Warner Bros. movie in spirit as it shows illegal activity in an all but favorable light. Additionally, there's the aforementioned speed-talking Tracy doing his best Cagney/O'Brien and the very Warner Bros.' swipe at Hitler.

Finally, Charles Butterworth, as Tracy's amoral sidekick, is MGM's answer to Warners Bros. character actors like Frank McHugh. But proving you can never do things as well as the master, The Nuisance runs for an hour and twenty three minutes; warp-speed Warner Bros would have wrapped it up in an hour and five without losing any story.
The Nuisance...a well written and informative review! An ambukance chaser story is generally a fast mover and is usually fun to watch. I'm convinced...The Nuisance is well worth the sacrifice of an hour+ of my attention and remaining life energy! ;)
 
#694 ·
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The Sandpiper from 1965 with Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Burton, Eva Marie Saint and Charles Bronson

I have to stop watching Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor movies as they aren't very good, at least the four or so I've seen (one was okay). But like driving by an accident scene, once I take a quick look, I continue watching. To be fair, they made eleven movies together, so I might just not have seen the good ones yet.

In The Sandpiper, Taylor is a "free-spirited" artist who has been kinda sorta homeschooling her (in the language of the day) illegitimate nine-year-old son. After the boy has a few incidents with the law, the state intercedes and places him in a nearby Episcopalian school run by Reverend Richard Burton.

This is the setup for the Reverend, representing traditional culture and values, to "clash" with Taylor, representing late-'60s-hippie culture and values. It's also the setup for Burton, married for twenty-plus years to nice wife Eva Marie Saint, to have an affair with Taylor.

Problematically, Elizabeth Taylor is playing a free-spirited twenty-something year old, but she's actually thirty something and looks closer to forty something. This isn't being picky or mean-spirited, as much of the movie pivots on several middle-aged men lusting after her youth and beauty. If an actress is representing the youth movement of a time, the actress should herself look youthful.

The story itself is painfully dated with both sides of the cultural divide coming across as cliched and two dimensional. Much of the dialogue feels like speeches from this very political period masquerading as conversation. A problem many screenwriters in our very political modern times also have.

Rather than making the audience sympathetic to their affair, Burton and Taylor are unlikable characters in a small way. They don't do great evil, just selfish little things that hurt others. I don't think it was the intent, but instead of their affair looking like some great love, it comes across as shabby and self-absorbed. Instead of making the "new" free love look liberating and fresh, it looks immature and narcissistic.

Hollywood was trying to show traditional Christian morality banging (ha-ha) into the flower-power generation. But The Sandpiper is too heavy handed, plodding and miscast to be anything more today than just a dated melodrama. It does have some beautiful scenic shots of the California coast though.

N.B. #1 In addition to Taylor, another awkward casting decision is Charles Bronson as Taylor's hippie artist friend. Even with long hair and a counterculture wardrobe, nothing about Bronson's mien reads bohemian.

N.B. #2 The titular sandpiper is a wounded bird that Taylor nurses back to health, refuses to cage (so that it learns trust) and then sets free. Got it - see the heavy handed symbolism? Sigh.
 
#695 ·
Indeed The Sandpiper plot has its challenges and the casting was.....was.....well is was just wrong with a couple of the characters, but I've got to say, from a sartorial perspective, Richard Burton sported a number of noteworthy men's styles throughout the movie and I think it was that great wardrobe of his character that helped persuade the lovely Ms Taylor to so readily jump into bed with him. As a young man, if I had experienced as many internal conflicts and incurred the oppressive guilt that The good Reverend felt over engaging in the bed sheet tango with such a young lovely, I think I would have declared myself celibate and stuck to that pledge! It has been a long time since I watched this film you reviewed and this is the best my memory can do today! LOL. Thank you for another great review.
 
#697 ·
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Metropolitan from 1990

Writer and director Whit Stillman's low-budget debut film about the fears, insecurities and, maybe, hopes of a group of college-age, went-to-the-right-schools-and-have-the-right-last-names New Yorkers is enjoyable and witty even if a bit self conscious.

Like most of us, my upbringing has almost nothing in common with these upper-class kids, but the film's smart writing and sincere-if-uneven acting sympathetically draws you into their world.

It's a world these kids know is past being on the wane and is almost over. Instead of the clear advantage being of their class once offered, it is now almost a burden as the doors don't open the same way and their putative "privilege" is looked down upon, but the expectations for those within their world haven't changed.

They aren't facing poverty or failure in the sense of those words to you and me, but what for them is failure: a life of mediocrity. We can sneer, but you can't pick your start in life and the implied pressures and expectations these kids face are real, at least to them.

All of this comes out as we follow a small clique of Upper East Side scions during their Christmas break's march through the balls, receptions and after-parties of the "debutante" season - a symbol of their anachronistic fate.

The movie shines when these young adults informally gather before or after the formal parties in one of the ridiculously nice Park Avenue apartments of their never-present parents. Here, these smart, articulate and pseudo-worldly kids discuss their fears, sometimes mockingly, sometimes sincerely as they know their post-college world looms.

If there is a story in this slice-of-life, talkfest-analysis movie, it's the "love lives" of this group who seem to date amongst themselves, sleep with each other and, like almost all young kids everywhere, passionately feel the joys and pangs of early love and heartbreak.

There's the cocky kid who has it all figured out, the shy one, the go-along-get-along one, the "outsider," the jock, the intellectual, etc. Like Stillman as a writer and director, these were all but unknown actors at the time who had various skill levels.

Yet, it is their inchoate acting talents, a combination of hesitancy and bravura, that work perfectly for the roles of alternatively diffident and confident college kids trying to segue into adulthood.

While that well-tread territory wasn't new even back in 1990 - the 1930s and every subsequent decade have plenty of coming-of-age movies - the added fun here is the time travel to that era's much-improved-from-the-1970s New York City.

Back then, I had just moved to the city out of college. While I only tangentially knew some of these types of kids from work, Stillman captures the feel of the city and the attitude of those kids at that time incredibly well.

A chatty, almost plot-less movie about a bunch of rich kids bemoaning their fate shouldn't work, but it does because the emotions, passions and postures of the kids feel real and, well, at an hour and half in length, they don't overstay their welcome.
 
#699 ·
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Looking for Mr. Goodbar from 1977 with Diane Keaton, Tuesday Weld, Richard Gere and William Atherton

Looking for Mr. Goodbar is definitely an entry in "The Most 1970s Movie Ever" contest with its pot, drugs, porn, orgies, cigarette smoking, Ruffino, Jimmy Carter, muggings, disco, battleground New York City and lots of hair.

Diane Keaton's young school-teacher character is torn trying to reconcile her traditional Irish Catholic upbringing with the new freedom of the 1970s. Fair or not, many in that era dealt with a lot of guilt attempting to jettison all they were taught growing up while working (and that seems like what it was for many) to enjoy the new culture around them.

It's hard to appreciate today, but the gap between that generation's parents and kids, owing to the late 1960s cultural revolution, was massive. Today's gap is an inch wide compared to what happened back then.

Parents who believed in religion, sexual abstinence before marriage, not using drugs, etc. - even if they fell short of these ideals, they were still their strived-for values - saw their kids, not just break these taboos in the shadows, but openly and gleefully flaunt them. The intergenerational stress was off the charts.

Keaton's character represents all of this when she moves out of her parent's house (no more "our house, our rules") into a dive apartment in NYC where she tries to embrace the sex, drugs and disco nightlife of the era.

Greatly complicating matters for Keaton psychologically is that she has congenital spinal scoliosis (painfully corrected in childhood with surgery and a year spent in a body cast), which has convinced her she shouldn't have children.

Perhaps lost in all the 1970s excess of the movie, that disease seems - more than free love and more than giving a big middle finger to her father and the Catholic Church - the real reason Keaton is almost always angry when it appears she should be happy. All her emotions are off as even her fun appears joyless (like many experienced in the 1970s).

While the dominant narrative around the movie is women's sexual (and other) liberation, Looking for Mr. Goodbar is also about a woman living dangerously on the edge. I'll stand shoulder to shoulder with anyone fighting for freedom for women to have equal opportunities in every single thing, but when men or women choose to exercise those freedoms in personally dangerous and, honestly, stupid ways, they risk paying a price.

Regularly bringing random men you just met in bars in NYC back to your apartment, many who are drunk and on drugs, late at night is not a statement of freedom, but of (choose) stupidity, a pathological need for risk or some suicidal tendency. Ditto constantly taking random drugs given to you from strangers at parties or bought from unknown dealers in bars or on the street.

Despite all that, Keaton's character is engaging and sympathetic. Her passion as a teacher for hearing-impaired children seems so much more real to her true self than her touching-a-hot-stove nightlife. When you see her falling into the 1970s sex-drug vortex, you hope she'll eventually spin out to something stable.

(Spoiler alert). But it's not to be. It's been argued that her gruesome murder at the end was "punishment" for a woman attempting sexual freedom. Maybe it felt that way at the time, but at least today, that looks like a politicized reification of a complex character in a complex time. I saw it more as a warning about a dumb and dangerous lifestyle; more a coda for the excesses of the 1970s than a rebuke of sexual and other liberations.

Nota Bene section:

N.B. #1 How many cigarettes must Keaton have smoked that even her Hollywood-capped-and-cared-for teeth have a yellowish tint?

N.B. #2 It turns out Richard Gere wasn't born the day he starred in American Gigolo as there is an even younger Gere here playing a similar character.

N.B. #3 I met Richard Gere about ten years ago at a small business breakfast. He came across as a genuinely nice guy.

N.B. #4 Annie Hall would be horrified with Keaton's character in Looking for Mr. Goodbar.

N.B. #5 What sort of meta time warp is it that seeing NYC in Looking for Mr. Goodbar, with all its street grit and hustle, reminded me of the NYC presented in HBO's recent 1970s period show The Deuce?
 
#700 · (Edited)
We watched Uncorked the other night. A young man (Mamadou Athie) works in the Memphis barbecue restaurant run by his father (Courtney B. Vance). Father wants son to take over the business, but son wants to become a sommelier. The tension is appreciable, but mom, played by Niecy Nash, deals with it beautifully and directly, and the protagonist starts a relationship with Sasha Compere who is a wonderfully mature and self assured woman. A few sad and quirky characters drift through the film, including a wealthy oenophile with a Harvard degree and his own daddy issues, played well by Matt McGorry.

The film is a fun wine flick but not in the same league on wine matters as Sideways or Bottle Shock. It deals very beautifully with the father/son dynamic and the challenges of pursuing something like becoming a sommelier if you are not wealthy, it also provides an interesting glimpse into black family dynamics but it barely skims the added challenges that must surely be presented for a black man trying to break into the world of the sommelier.
 
#701 ·
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The Legend of Bagger Vance from 2000 with Will Smith, Matt Damon, Charlize Theron, Bruce McGill and Joel Gretsch

Charm and whimsy are hard to build a movie around, especially if you don't want to end up with a treacly mess on your hands. But it works in The Legend of Bagger Vance because part of director Robert Redford's brand is doing period films with charm and whimsy that know their limits.

Who wouldn't want super cool, kindly and insightful Will Smith as a guardian angel? While Will Smith anchors the charm and whimsy here, an equally talented cast moves this two-hour effort about a mythical Depression-era golf match along with enchanting ease.

Charlize Theron, the wonderfully named southern-bell-with-grit Adele Invergordon, facing bankruptcy as her deceased father's luxurious golf resort struggles to stay afloat in the 1930s, hits upon the idea for an all-star golf match.

The challenge is she needs to convince her estranged husband, former young golf phenom, Matt Damon to be the local star player joining famous golf champions Bobby Jones and Walter Hagen.

Damon, a World War I vet, suffering from what we'd come to know is post traumatic stress disorder, hasn't played golf or, well, with his estranged wife, Theron, since returning from the Great War. Yet, without his participation, the creditors won't support Theron's Hail Mary to save her resort.

In one of the movie's highlight scenes, Theron offers herself up to a mildly drunk and dispirited Damon in return for his agreeing to play in the tournament. But Damon, knowing he's lost his golf swing - sure it's a metaphor for his post-war life and sex drive - rejects a beguiling and disrobing Theron. Wait, what? Yup, she had to put her dress back on and leave untouched.

Enter Will Smith as Bagger Vance, the ethereal philosopher caddie. Playing Damon's conscience and spiritual advisor, Smith forces Damon to confront his demons and decide if he's ready to fight to get his golf swing and, by proxy, his life back.

With the tournament now on, Smith deftly guides Damon through the emotional preparation for play as well as offering real caddie advice. The movie could have coasted from there into a quick match focused on Damon's resurrection.

But Bobby Jones, played with professional cool by Joel Gretsch, and Walter Hagen, played with perfect zeal by Bruce McGill, take the movie up another notch.

The tournament becomes a metaphor for different approaches to golf and life itself with Jones representing the consummate and methodical professional; Hagen, the gambler player making great errors and great saves; and Damon, the underdog comeback story of a man finding his way in life again.

(Spoiler alert) Sure it's a well-crafted adult fairy tale, but as Damon reclaims his swing, you can't help cheering him on. When he and Theron re-unite afterwards dancing under the stars, you feel happy.

Charm and whimsy, as noted, can overwhelm a movie, but with Redford at the helm, wonderful source material (a novel by Steven Pressfield) and a talented cast, The Legend of Bagger Vance strikes a balance that leaves you smiling.

N.B. The movie is 1920s and 1930s eye candy from beginning to end. The cars, clothes, architecture and other period details are beautiful, which, combined with Redford's directing, make the era look prettier than it probably ever really did.
 
#702 ·
View attachment 60691
The Legend of Bagger Vance from 2000 with Will Smith, Matt Damon, Charlize Theron, Bruce McGill and Joel Gretsch

Charm and whimsy are hard to build a movie around, especially if you don't want to end up with a treacly mess on your hands. But it works in The Legend of Bagger Vance because part of director Robert Redford's brand is doing period films with charm and whimsy that know their limits.

Who wouldn't want super cool, kindly and insightful Will Smith as a guardian angel? While Will Smith anchors the charm and whimsy here, an equally talented cast moves this two-hour effort about a mythical Depression-era golf match along with enchanting ease.

Charlize Theron, the wonderfully named southern-bell-with-grit Adele Invergordon, facing bankruptcy as her deceased father's luxurious golf resort struggles to stay afloat in the 1930s, hits upon the idea for an all-star golf match.

The challenge is she needs to convince her estranged husband, former young golf phenom, Matt Damon to be the local star player joining famous golf champions Bobby Jones and Walter Hagen.

Damon, a World War I vet, suffering from what we'd come to know is post traumatic stress disorder, hasn't played golf or, well, with his estranged wife, Theron, since returning from the Great War. Yet, without his participation, the creditors won't support Theron's Hail Mary to save her resort.

In one of the movie's highlight scenes, Theron offers herself up to a mildly drunk and dispirited Damon in return for his agreeing to play in the tournament. But Damon, knowing he's lost his golf swing - sure it's a metaphor for his post-war life and sex drive - rejects a beguiling and disrobing Theron. Wait, what? Yup, she had to put her dress back on and leave untouched.

Enter Will Smith as Bagger Vance, the ethereal philosopher caddie. Playing Damon's conscience and spiritual advisor, Smith forces Damon to confront his demons and decide if he's ready to fight to get his golf swing and, by proxy, his life back.

With the tournament now on, Smith deftly guides Damon through the emotional preparation for play as well as offering real caddie advice. The movie could have coasted from there into a quick match focused on Damon's resurrection.

But Bobby Jones, played with professional cool by Joel Gretsch, and Walter Hagen, played with perfect zeal by Bruce McGill, take the movie up another notch.

The tournament becomes a metaphor for different approaches to golf and life itself with Jones representing the consummate and methodical professional; Hagen, the gambler player making great errors and great saves; and Damon, the underdog comeback story of a man finding his way in life again.

(Spoiler alert) Sure it's a well-crafted adult fairy tale, but as Damon reclaims his swing, you can't help cheering him on. When he and Theron re-unite afterwards dancing under the stars, you feel happy.

Charm and whimsy, as noted, can overwhelm a movie, but with Redford at the helm, wonderful source material (a novel by Steven Pressfield) and a talented cast, The Legend of Bagger Vance strikes a balance that leaves you smiling.

N.B. The movie is 1920s and 1930s eye candy from beginning to end. The cars, clothes, architecture and other period details are beautiful, which, combined with Redford's directing, make the era look prettier than it probably ever really did.
My friend, the two of us seem to have similar tastes in the movies that we choose to watch. I have seen The Legend of Bagger Vance, two times, I think, but having read your well written and arguably perfectly organized review of the movie, I find myself motivated to see it again. I think it is the background comments that you add, throughout your review that amp up one's interest in watching it again. Thanks for another great review.
 
#704 ·
Trousers Furniture Table Coat Black

The Unfaithful from 1947 with Ann Sheridan, Lew Ayres, Eve Arden, Zachary Scott and John Hoyt.

The Unfaithful is a good movie that could have been much better if it had decided what kind of movie it wanted to be. Instead, it's a little bit noir, a little bit crime drama, a little bit soap opera with a tiny bit of mystery wrapped in. It's all just a little bit too much for its straightforward plot.

With her husband away on business, happily married Ann Sheridan is attacked by a man in her home late one night and she kills the intruder. The initial police investigation is reasonably consistent with her story of self defense against an unknown burglar, but a few loose ends dangle.

Immediately after the murder, Sheridan's lawyer, Lew Ayres, is approached by an art dealer offering to sell him a sculpture of Sheridan - at a very high price - which, he tells Ayres, was made by the dead man who, we learn, was an artist.

Ayres immediately gets the implication of this threatened blackmail, but at times, the movie acts as if the audience wouldn't have connected those simple dots. But we get it; Sheridan had an affair with the artist while her husband, Zachary Scott, was fighting overseas. She met Scott two weeks before they married and he shipped out.

The bulk of the movie from here is watching Sheridan, with some help from lawyer Ayres, trying to keep the affair a secret from her husband, while the police investigation, led by a young and well-cast John Hoyt, slowly grinds toward the truth.

Playing on in the background is the social aspect of the murder as most of Scott and Sheridan's middle-class friends happily wallow in the rumors and salacious implications ("she killed her lover - teehee"). No "friend" does the schadenfreude routine better than Eve Arden, who blows in and out of scenes with a verve and cynicism that leaves everyone flat in her wake.

Arden didn't quite have the Hollywood looks to be a leading lady, but she did carve out a heck of a niche as a character actor, usually playing the friend or sidekick with a sharp tongue and loose morality. Here, she comes across as Sheridan's frenemy, but you think there's more to her and are rewarded later on for believing so.

When all the details of the murder eventually spill out, as they always do, Sheridan's husband is shocked, society is (happily) rocked and Sheridan is arrested for murder. After a darn good trial - smartly filmed in quick, impactful snippets - (spoiler alert) Sheridan is acquitted, but her marriage wrecked.

(One more spoiler alert) It takes Ayres as the insightful lawyer and Arden as the, deep down, better friend than most to get Sheridan and Scott to see that (God knows how this got passed the censors) one mistake made by a newlywed, under the extreme stress of years of war-time separation, does not negate an otherwise happy marriage.

Perhaps so much went on, on the home front, when the men were away fighting, the usually hidebound Motion Picture Production Code realized it needed to excuse some behavior to save a lot of marriages. That or the censor was asleep when The Unfaithful was being previewed.

It's a good movie with solid acting that would have been even better if it had picked one or two styles to go with - noir, crime-drama, mystery or soap opera. Despite that, as with most Warner Bros. movies from the era, the studio packed a lot of story into a reasonably short time. Even with its flaws, The Unfaithful moves by quickly and enjoyably.
 
#707 ·
p3255_i_v9_aa.jpg

A Damsel in Distress from 1937 with Fred Astaire, Joan Fontaine, George Burns and Gracie Allen

Sign: Do Not Finger Art Objects.

Gracie Allen: Well I don't blame Art, if I was Art, I'd object too.

Even under the code, stuff slipped by the censors.

Overall, I like Fred Astaire movies, but each one is a high-wire act betting that the magic and whimsy and dancing will overcome the silly plots, unbelievable situations and wash-rinse-repeat storylines. All that gets harder to do without, as in A Damsel in Distress, Ginger Rogers or a co-star of equal dancing talent.

To make up for the missing Ms. Rogers, Damsel has the comedy team of George Burns and Gracie Allen, whom I've always kept at arm's length. But to be fair, they are pretty good here filling in Rogers' gap. (Any comment Gracie?)

Also filling in for Rogers is Joan Fontaine looking insanely cute and doing her best, but she's no dancer. In the one number she does with Astaire - that there is only one duet says it all - she almost looks pained, as most humans would dancing opposite Fred freakin' Astaire on screen.

Burns and Allen have more numbers with Astaire and while Allen struggles like Fontaine to hold her own with the master hoofer, Burns looks pretty smooth and comfortable dancing with Astaire. But even these movies need some kind of plot to hold it all together.

The plot here, which is the same plot in half or more of the Fred Astaire movies, is Astaire pursuing some pretty woman who may or may not like him. Then, owing to a series of mix ups, they each think the other is seeing someone else at crucial times.

Throw in some love foils, parents who get in the way, a bunch of silly contretemps and all hope is lost until a last minute save. You know, it's a Fred Astaire movie.

In A Damsel in Distress, Astaire is a successful American performer traveling in London who accidentally meets and falls in love with the daughter, Joan Fontaine, of a Lord.

That's followed by all the usual just-noted Astaire-movie confusion and mix ups. Burns and Allen were the only thing that held the movie together between the mostly good-not-great solo Astaire dance numbers, which missed a talented partner like, say, oh I don't know, Ginger Rogers.

A Damsel in Distress starts one level above farce and slowly slips until it's in full-farce mode by the last third or so. There's enough good stuff to just overcome its many weaknesses, but that's less an endorsement of the movie than of Astaire, with an earned assist to Burns and Allen.
 
#710 ·
She passed in 2013, probably just a year or two before I was there. I didn't recognize the name until I went downstairs and all her movie posters were in the halls. Not too far from her house was another I was let into. Adams? when I went into the darkroom, large Ansel Adams prints were everywhere. One more? Large white house, but Betty White wasn't in that days.
 
#711 ·
Standing Flash photography Black-and-white Gesture Style

The Sea Wolf from 1941 with Edward G. Robinson, Alexander Knox, John Garfield, Ida Lupino and Barry Fitzgerald

"Better to reign in Hell, than serve in Heaven"

- John Milton Paradise Lost

How is this movie not better known? It is a gem of a psychological and philosophical drama wrapped inside a good "cruel captain commanding a ship of outcasts and criminals" story set in the early 1900s.

The Ghost, Captain Edward G. Robinson's eerie San Francisco-based clipper ship, which seems to only sail in fog, takes on an additional hand, John Garfield, wanted by the police, just before leaving port. Once at sea, it then picks up two survivors of a wreck.

One survivor is Ida Lupino, an escaped convict; the other is Alexander Knox, a well-bred urbane professional writer. Garfield, Lupino and Knox quickly realize they are on some sort of ship from hell with a captain suffering from Nietzsche's Superman complex and a crew of cowed but violent, amoral men.

Knox, in one of the best roles of his career (ditto Robinson, Lupino and Garfield), immediately butts heads with Robinson, who can size men up and find their weaknesses with frightening alacrity.

Robinson dismissively sees Knox as his opposite, a man who makes his living sitting in comfort while typing out words; whereas, Robinson successfully captains his ship using physical violence and psychological intimidation over "inferior" men.

When these two debate the world, the philosophies get muddled a bit as Nietzsche, Freud, Darwin and Christianity are all kinda mixed up and mixed in. Knox represents the "civilized" moral man who believes in honest competition and charity. Conversely, Robinson is the might-makes-right-as-the-only-way-to-survive man.

Mocking Knox's "soft hands" (foreshadowing Quint making fun of Hooper's "city-boy hands" in Jaws), Robinson tells Knox he'll be a selfish and violent man by the time the voyage is over. Knox rejoins that his beliefs and character are not that malleable.

In Robinson's book-filled cabin, Knox and he debate the morality of rule by force - Robinson proffers the famous Milton quote about reigning in Hell being preferable to serving in Heaven. Knox responds with tenets of Christian kindness, brotherhood and fair play.

These two aren't going to find common ground. While Knox and Robinson argue round after round, Knox discovers Robinson suffers from crippling headaches and bouts of temporary blindness - the latter Robinson hides from his crew.

As they sail on, Garfield repeatedly tries to thwart Robinson with physical attacks, but he loses every time. Finally, Garfield and Lupino, the latter's natural delicateness looks outright fragile on this floating den of thieves, along with Knox, ask Robinson to be put off at the next port.

Robinson, who, on the Ghost, has created his own Hell in which to reign, has no intention of letting anyone off as he tries to break all three of his new "passengers."

After seeing Robinson cruelly drive the ship's alcoholic surgeon to suicide, Garfield leads a mutiny that almost works, but incredibly, Robinson retakes command. In a brilliant move of psychological warfare, Robinson lets all the mutineers off without punishment as if to say, "you still are no threat to me."

Further pushing the psyops, he punishes his own stool pigeon who helped him break the mutiny, the ship's cook, Barry Sullivan. Sullivan plays his evil-gnome role here to the hilt. Having never seen Sullivan in anything but kindly roles - sympathetic priest, sensitive horse trainer, understanding father - his turn here as a scary, pathological sycophant to Robinson is chilling and impressive.

But Robinson's reign is threatened as a more powerful ship, captained by his brother (a fascinating thread never developed), mortally damages The Ghost. In a last grasp at cruelty, Robinson - now all but blind, yet still stunningly in control - locks Garfield in a storeroom as the ship sinks, which forces Lupino and Knox to stay on board as they try to free him.

This sets up Knox and Robinson's final encounter. With the philosophies a bit scrambled again, Robinson asserts, to the end, his might-makes-right ideology, while Knox argues for kindness and compassion.

The outcome sorta gives the nod to Knox, but Robinson's impressive finish, despite being blind on a sinking ship, and a deception Knox has to make to win, results in a less-than-total philosophical victory for Knox.

The Sea Wolf is Warner Bros. at its best. Using its top-talent, an okay budget (Jack Warner rarely fully opened up the wallet like Mayer did at MGM) and strong source material (a Jack London novel), Warners delivers a tense psychological and philosophical action-adventure movie that forces you to think while it entertains. Why this gem isn't better known today is a mystery.
 
#712 ·
View attachment 60981
The Sea Wolf from 1941 with Edward G. Robinson, Alexander Knox, John Garfield, Ida Lupino and Barry Fitzgerald

"Better to reign in Hell, than serve in Heaven"

- John Milton Paradise Lost

How is this movie not better known? It is a gem of a psychological and philosophical drama wrapped inside a good "cruel captain commanding a ship of outcasts and criminals" story set in the early 1900s.

The Ghost, Captain Edward G. Robinson's eerie San Francisco-based clipper ship, which seems to only sail in fog, takes on an additional hand, John Garfield, wanted by the police, just before leaving port. Once at sea, it then picks up two survivors of a wreck.

One survivor is Ida Lupino, an escaped convict; the other is Alexander Knox, a well-bred urbane professional writer. Garfield, Lupino and Knox quickly realize they are on some sort of ship from hell with a captain suffering from Nietzsche's Superman complex and a crew of cowed but violent, amoral men.

Knox, in one of the best roles of his career (ditto Robinson, Lupino and Garfield), immediately butts heads with Robinson, who can size men up and find their weaknesses with frightening alacrity.

Robinson dismissively sees Knox as his opposite, a man who makes his living sitting in comfort while typing out words; whereas, Robinson successfully captains his ship using physical violence and psychological intimidation over "inferior" men.

When these two debate the world, the philosophies get muddled a bit as Nietzsche, Freud, Darwin and Christianity are all kinda mixed up and mixed in. Knox represents the "civilized" moral man who believes in honest competition and charity. Conversely, Robinson is the might-makes-right-as-the-only-way-to-survive man.

Mocking Knox's "soft hands" (foreshadowing Quint making fun of Hooper's "city-boy hands" in Jaws), Robinson tells Knox he'll be a selfish and violent man by the time the voyage is over. Knox rejoins that his beliefs and character are not that malleable.

In Robinson's book-filled cabin, Knox and he debate the morality of rule by force - Robinson proffers the famous Milton quote about reigning in Hell being preferable to serving in Heaven. Knox responds with tenets of Christian kindness, brotherhood and fair play.

These two aren't going to find common ground. While Knox and Robinson argue round after round, Knox discovers Robinson suffers from crippling headaches and bouts of temporary blindness - the latter Robinson hides from his crew.

As they sail on, Garfield repeatedly tries to thwart Robinson with physical attacks, but he loses every time. Finally, Garfield and Lupino, the latter's natural delicateness looks outright fragile on this floating den of thieves, along with Knox, ask Robinson to be put off at the next port.

Robinson, who, on the Ghost, has created his own Hell in which to reign, has no intention of letting anyone off as he tries to break all three of his new "passengers."

After seeing Robinson cruelly drive the ship's alcoholic surgeon to suicide, Garfield leads a mutiny that almost works, but incredibly, Robinson retakes command. In a brilliant move of psychological warfare, Robinson lets all the mutineers off without punishment as if to say, "you still are no threat to me."

Further pushing the psyops, he punishes his own stool pigeon who helped him break the mutiny, the ship's cook, Barry Sullivan. Sullivan plays his evil-gnome role here to the hilt. Having never seen Sullivan in anything but kindly roles - sympathetic priest, sensitive horse trainer, understanding father - his turn here as a scary, pathological sycophant to Robinson is chilling and impressive.

But Robinson's reign is threatened as a more powerful ship, captained by his brother (a fascinating thread never developed), mortally damages The Ghost. In a last grasp at cruelty, Robinson - now all but blind, yet still stunningly in control - locks Garfield in a storeroom as the ship sinks, which forces Lupino and Knox to stay on board as they try to free him.

This sets up Knox and Robinson's final encounter. With the philosophies a bit scrambled again, Robinson asserts, to the end, his might-makes-right ideology, while Knox argues for kindness and compassion.

The outcome sorta gives the nod to Knox, but Robinson's impressive finish, despite being blind on a sinking ship, and a deception Knox has to make to win, results in a less-than-total philosophical victory for Knox.

The Sea Wolf is Warner Bros. at its best. Using its top-talent, an okay budget (Jack Warner rarely fully opened up the wallet like Mayer did at MGM) and strong source material (a Jack London novel), Warners delivers a tense psychological and philosophical action-adventure movie that forces you to think while it entertains. Why this gem isn't better known today is a mystery.
Several of the scenes you describe sound vaguely familiar....I may have watched the Sea Wolf at some point in my past...way back in my past, but I am really not sure. However, after reading your review, it seems a psychological imperative that I lay hands on a DVD of that movie or watch it through Amazon Prime as soon as it can be arranged. The review above has really got my interest revved up! ;)
 
#714 ·
We watched two relatively new action/comedy flicks recently: This Means War and The Hitman's Bodyguard. In This Means War two government agents (Tom Hardy and Chris Pine) who masquerade as a travel agent and a cruise ship captain, compete for Reese Witherspoon, a product tester, in a very formulaic plot, but Reese's sister, played by Chelsea Handler, is a trip and makes it fun. In The Hitman's Bodyguard, Ryan Reynolds must get the hitman, Samuel "Leather jacket" Jackson, from England to the Hague to testify against the evil despot played by Gary Oldman. A ton of fun. Salma Hayak as SLJ's wife. Wow.
 
#715 ·
Being one who much favors documentaries and 'educational' films over drama I still managed to come across "Wartime Farm" on Amazon Prime. It's an eight episode depiction of what it was like to be a British small farmer during WWII. Not only very interesting and educational from a historian's standpoint, there are lots and lots of '40's clothing and tweed. I am enjoying it immensely.
 
#716 ·
Outerwear White Human Black Coat

I Accuse! from 1958 with Jose Ferrer, Leo Genn and Donald Wolfit

A long time ago, I read an account of the Dreyfus Affair. Based on that faulty memory (and a quick Google refresh), the story in I Accuse! seems consistent with the broad outlines of the facts, although Hollywood added its flourishes and twists to "improve" the story. The good news is, today, this miserable event is widely seen as a mark of shame on France and a cautionary tale about prejudice, such as, in this case, antisemitism.

In 1894, the French Jewish military officer, Henry Dreyfus, is knowingly unfairly court martialed for espionage because of antisemitism. Many in the military command wanted to get "the Jew." Also, it was a convenient "solution" to an embarrassing spy scandal for the military, which needed a fall guy.

Once the ball got rolling against Dreyfus, there was no turning back, so even as the evidence mounted over the years that he was innocent, the military dug in its heels through a few more court-martials over the next decade.

After spending five years in the hell that was Devil's Island prison and being found guilty at a second rigged court martial, Dreyfus accepted a pardon - an unpleasant compromise that kept him from going back to prison, but could have been construed as an admission of guilt. Fortunately, five years later, he was exonerated and reinstated in the military.

All along, his case was kept alive by his family, friends, several French intellectuals and members of the Press, which, eventually, turned public opinion mainly in Dreyfus' favor. The famous 1898 open letter I Accuse! to the President of France, published in a newspaper (and the title of the movie), is widely seen as an act of personal courage by its author Emile Zola and a turning point in the case.

Although dated by its wooden style, even by 1958 movie standards, I Accuse! still does a respectable job capturing the venality of the French military command and the ugliness of its antisemitism, while highlighting the heroism of Dreyfus, his family and his supporters.

Jose Ferrer plays Dreyfus as a wound-tight and pretty-aloof character, which seems consistent with historical accounts. But the real acting gem in this one is Leo Genn as Major Georges Picquart who risks his career to defend Dreyfus.

Also giving a strong performance is Donald Wolfit as General Auguste Mercier. Mercier never wavers in his known-to-him-from-the-start dishonest defense of the military's mendacious slandering of Dreyfus. That you hate him so much is a testament to his acting ability to humanize his evil.

Despite those strong performances, I Accuse! is not an actors' movie, but a historical-event effort whose lesson is, especially with antisemitism reportedly on the rise again in several countries, sadly still relevant today.
 
#718 ·
View attachment 61071
I Accuse! from 1958 with Jose Ferrer, Leo Genn and Donald Wolfit

A long time ago, I read an account of the Dreyfus Affair. Based on that faulty memory (and a quick Google refresh), the story in I Accuse! seems consistent with the broad outlines of the facts, although Hollywood added its flourishes and twists to "improve" the story. The good news is, today, this miserable event is widely seen as a mark of shame on France and a cautionary tale about prejudice, such as, in this case, antisemitism.

In 1894, the French Jewish military officer, Henry Dreyfus, is knowingly unfairly court martialed for espionage because of antisemitism. Many in the military command wanted to get "the Jew." Also, it was a convenient "solution" to an embarrassing spy scandal for the military, which needed a fall guy.

Once the ball got rolling against Dreyfus, there was no turning back, so even as the evidence mounted over the years that he was innocent, the military dug in its heels through a few more court-martials over the next decade.

After spending five years in the hell that was Devil's Island prison and being found guilty at a second rigged court martial, Dreyfus accepted a pardon - an unpleasant compromise that kept him from going back to prison, but could have been construed as an admission of guilt. Fortunately, five years later, he was exonerated and reinstated in the military.

All along, his case was kept alive by his family, friends, several French intellectuals and members of the Press, which, eventually, turned public opinion mainly in Dreyfus' favor. The famous 1898 open letter I Accuse! to the President of France, published in a newspaper (and the title of the movie), is widely seen as an act of personal courage by its author Emile Zola and a turning point in the case.

Although dated by its wooden style, even by 1958 movie standards, I Accuse! still does a respectable job capturing the venality of the French military command and the ugliness of its antisemitism, while highlighting the heroism of Dreyfus, his family and his supporters.

Jose Ferrer plays Dreyfus as a wound-tight and pretty-aloof character, which seems consistent with historical accounts. But the real acting gem in this one is Leo Genn as Major Georges Picquart who risks his career to defend Dreyfus.

Also giving a strong performance is Donald Wolfit as General Auguste Mercier. Mercier never wavers in his known-to-him-from-the-start dishonest defense of the military's mendacious slandering of Dreyfus. That you hate him so much is a testament to his acting ability to humanize his evil.

Despite those strong performances, I Accuse! is not an actors' movie, but a historical-event effort whose lesson is, especially with antisemitism reportedly on the rise again in several countries, sadly still relevant today.
I watched I Accuse on you-tube, yesterday. The experience was well worth the one hour thirty one minutes and 56 seconds it took to watch the show (LOL). Over all, I was struck by the incredible arrogance and self serving mentality of the French General staff, reminding me of the same characteristics showcased in the movie Paths of Glory, staring Kirk Douglas that was put out in 1957. In Paths of Glory, it might be remembered three soldiers were selected at random to be executed by firing squad, to atone for a failed attack on an enemy emplacement called the Anthill. In fact the attack failed because, as the pre attact estimates reflected, a 65% casualty rate was the morbid reality of the foolish endeavor (the aforementioned attack) . As I recall, the French command staff in an effort to cover up the ineptitude of the Colonel who had ordered the attack and prevent the French General Staff from suffering the political embarrassment of having backed the wrong pony in the scapegoat derby that had been the foil brought into play, was the primary objective of the most senior officers and politicians.

It is sad to get these all too frequent glimpses of the clay feet of the political leadership structures found throughout the world, then and even more so, now!

I sense the catalyst for bad behavior in I Accuse was at first antisemitism and in the end a combination of antisemitism and tragic level of egotism. In Paths of Glory it was pure stupidity and outrageous egotism that resulted in the three brave soldiers executed by firing squad.

At the end of both films the good guys won, but at what cost and why?

I Accuse...a great flick! Thanks for bring it to our attention.
 
#717 ·
Hairstyle Photograph Facial expression Human Fashion

Libel from 1959 with Dirk Bogarde, Olivia de Havilland, Wilfrid Hyde-White and Robert Morley

Libel is a good movie, with a good story and it's well acted, but it feels forced. After a decent start, you begin to sense yourself being manipulated by the writer and director. It's as if they thought they were so shrewd, they could craft a "smart" story, believable or not, and you'd just go along. They almost got away with it.

In post-war England, WWII-veteran Lord Mark Loddon played by Dirk Bogart, and his American wife, Olivia de Havilland, live in a five-hundred-year-old estate chockablock with family portraits and history. They seem to have the perfect life until Loddon is accused of being an imposter by a former POW buddy.

Since coming back from the war, Lord Loddon has suffered from headaches, large gaps in his memory and a recurring nightmare all compassionately attended to by wife de Havilland. But those symptoms would also be a great cover were Loddon an imposter.

Loddon's accuser believes that a third POW bunkmate and lookalike to Loddon - an actor who studied Loddon's mannerisms and family history when they were POWs - is presently masquerading as Lord Loddon.

When the story breaks in the press, the British tabloids have a field day, which forces Lord Loddon to bring a libel suit to clear his name. After all the usual pre-trial legal and public-relations machinations, the movie's long climatic trial begins.

Up until now, you're going along with the somewhat complicated, but entertaining story. Then, so many crazy twists happen and hard-to-believe details come out at the trial, it becomes just a bit too much hooey to hold together.

The acting is engaging as old pros Robert Morley as Lord Loddon's attorney and Wilfrid Hyde-White as the tabloid's lawyer match wits in that wonderfully understated way the British have, especially in court, of body slamming their opponents with equanimity and surface politeness.

That's the fun part - think The Paradine Case - but you're also asked to look past too many plot flaws, coincidences, reverse-engineered explanations for Lord Loddon's potential doppelganger and "surprise evidence" at trial. By the end, you've become cynical.

There are worse ways to spend an hour and forty minutes; several scenes in it are very good. Plus, suspending belief is pretty much part of almost every filmmaker-audience contract. Yet in Libel, the plot flimflam overwhelms by the end.

N.B. The location shots of London and its surrounds provide wonderful time travel to England in the 1950s.
 
#720 ·
Leg Window One-piece garment Fashion Flash photography

Butterfield 8 from 1960 with Elizabeth Taylor, Laurence Harvey, Dina Merrill, Mildred Dunnock and Eddie Fisher

Every period has its take on "the fallen woman," which is closely associated with the always fun and overwrought Madonna-whore complex, both of which drive Butterfield 8.

In the lightly censored movies of the pre-code early 1930s, "the fallen woman" could often stand herself back up and go on living because, sometimes, that's what happens in real life. But once the Motion Picture Production Code was enforced in the mid-1930s, "the fallen woman" needed to be punished to have any shot at redemption, but usually, it was easier to just kill her off.

Butterfield 8 was made at a time when the code was wobbling but still holding on, so its quasi prostitute, Elizabeth Taylor, is kinda, sorta sympathetic, yet still, punishment must be meted out.

Taylor plays a darker cognate to Holly Golightly from Breakfast at Tiffany's. She's a model slash partygirl slash early social media "influencer" (she gets paid to wear designer dresses to hot night spots so they will be noted in the next day's newspapers) who also, (the movie elides this a bit) sleeps with men for money.

Darker than Golightly how? When we first meet Ms. Taylor, she's waking up after having been railed by some guy who left in the early morning. So, disheveled and still wearing last night's makeup, she stumbles out of his bed wrapped in nothing but a sheet, looks for a cigarette, throws an empty pack on the carpet, finds a loose cigarette, lights up, inhales, starts coughing, pours herself a good-sized shot of whiskey and has the first drink of the day. Good morning.

Today, we take a more understanding and sympathetic approach to almost all human failings (except for the ones current day has deemed unacceptable). Yet back then, the heavy moral disapproval of "the fallen woman" (with a prostitute being about as far as you could fall) meant something, even if it all floated on a narrative of hypocrisy and inconsistency, just as a lot of what we believe today also floats on shaky narratives.

So, when upstanding businessman, Laurence Harvey, married to social-registry wife, Dina Merrill (the blonde Madonna in our story), falls in love with his girl-on-the-side Taylor (the brunette whore), all sorts of things get smashed up, starting with poor Dina Merrill.

Beyond being ridiculously attractive, Merrill is an unbelievably understanding wife who tries to give Harvey "space" to find his way back to her. Most women's definition of "space" in this case would be a bullet with their husband's name on it, but Merrill loves her husband and wants to save the marriage.

She believes marrying into her wealthy family - which gave Harvey instant status, wealth and a job with a fancy title at her family's firm - destroyed his self esteem. Harvey plays the "victim" role to the hilt. He angrily mopes his way through the movie as the aggrieved party because, well, his wife made his life too easy for him. We now have a winner in the "rich people's problem" contest.

Maybe Harvey really loves Taylor or maybe he just wants to spit in his wife's face, but Taylor believes she loves Harvey and sees him as the moral lustration she needs to scrub clean her past life of sin and debauchery.

Just as Harvey is about to ask his wife for a divorce so that he can marry Taylor - a do-I-leave-the-Madonna-for-a-whore moment - he comes face to face with Taylor's past. He knew about it, but to this point, had done his best to make believe it didn't exist. Yet he can't ignore, when in a bar, several men casually joke with him about his new "girlfriend" Taylor by saying, "welcome to the fraternity, we meet once a year in Yankee Stadium." Ouch.

Harvey, it turns out, belongs to that odd niche of men who knowingly fall in love with prostitutes - nothing wrong with that, everyone should find love where they can - but then begin to hate the object of their affections because she's slept with a whole lot of men. In logic, that's called a "category error," as Harvey is angry at something for being exactly what it is. It's like hating a top for spinning.

As the movie climaxes, Harvey, even when he breaks with Taylor, wrecks his marriage to Merrill. Taylor, meanwhile, leaves New York to start afresh with wholesome intent, this time, in Boston. But don't forget the Motion Picture Production Code which, basically, (spoiler alert) says, "The Whore Must Die!"

So, at the end of a silly and forced car-chase scene, where Harvey pursues Taylor in an attempt to get her back, she is killed as her very cute two-seater Sunbeam Alpine flies off the road. Taylor is dead; the Code is satisfied; Harvey is crushed and, unbelievably, wife Merrill is willing to take him back.

It's saponaceous melodrama on steroids with an overlay of fire and brimstone condemnation. But tucked inside and countering the "bad whore" narrative are Taylor's mother, the wonderful Mildred Dunnock, and Taylor's childhood best friend, Eddie Fisher, who provide a sympathetic view of Taylor's life.

The Code was buckling a bit in 1960, but it was not yet ready to let the whore live. However, in about a decade, the 1970s would bring a new and forgiving perspective to the prostitute.

N.B. Butterfield 8 is wonderful time travel to early 1960s New York City from the Village to the fancy apartments of Fifth Avenue, including many of the bars, restaurants and nightclubs in between. There's even a neat moment where, in the background of super-lit-up-at-night Times Square, you can see a movie marquee advertising Ben-Hur.
 
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View attachment 61334
Butterfield 8 from 1960 with Elizabeth Taylor, Laurence Harvey, Dina Merrill, Mildred Dunnock and Eddie Fisher

Every period has its take on "the fallen woman," which is closely associated with the always fun and overwrought Madonna-whore complex, both of which drive Butterfield 8.

In the lightly censored movies of the pre-code early 1930s, "the fallen woman" could often stand herself back up and go on living because, sometimes, that's what happens in real life. But once the Motion Picture Production Code was enforced in the mid-1930s, "the fallen woman" needed to be punished to have any shot at redemption, but usually, it was easier to just kill her off.

Butterfield 8 was made at a time when the code was wobbling but still holding on, so its quasi prostitute, Elizabeth Taylor, is kinda, sorta sympathetic, yet still, punishment must be meted out.

Taylor plays a darker cognate to Holly Golightly from Breakfast at Tiffany's. She's a model slash partygirl slash early social media "influencer" (she gets paid to wear designer dresses to hot night spots so they will be noted in the next day's newspapers) who also, (the movie elides this a bit) sleeps with men for money.

Darker than Golightly how? When we first meet Ms. Taylor, she's waking up after having been railed by some guy who left in the early morning. So, disheveled and still wearing last night's makeup, she stumbles out of his bed wrapped in nothing but a sheet, looks for a cigarette, throws an empty pack on the carpet, finds a loose cigarette, lights up, inhales, starts coughing, pours herself a good-sized shot of whiskey and has the first drink of the day. Good morning.

Today, we take a more understanding and sympathetic approach to almost all human failings (except for the ones current day has deemed unacceptable). Yet back then, the heavy moral disapproval of "the fallen woman" (with a prostitute being about as far as you could fall) meant something, even if it all floated on a narrative of hypocrisy and inconsistency, just as a lot of what we believe today also floats on shaky narratives.

So, when upstanding businessman, Laurence Harvey, married to social-registry wife, Dina Merrill (the blonde Madonna in our story), falls in love with his girl-on-the-side Taylor (the brunette whore), all sorts of things get smashed up, starting with poor Dina Merrill.

Beyond being ridiculously attractive, Merrill is an unbelievably understanding wife who tries to give Harvey "space" to find his way back to her. Most women's definition of "space" in this case would be a bullet with their husband's name on it, but Merrill loves her husband and wants to save the marriage.

She believes marrying into her wealthy family - which gave Harvey instant status, wealth and a job with a fancy title at her family's firm - destroyed his self esteem. Harvey plays the "victim" role to the hilt. He angrily mopes his way through the movie as the aggrieved party because, well, his wife made his life too easy for him. We now have a winner in the "rich people's problem" contest.

Maybe Harvey really loves Taylor or maybe he just wants to spit in his wife's face, but Taylor believes she loves Harvey and sees him as the moral lustration she needs to scrub clean her past life of sin and debauchery.

Just as Harvey is about to ask his wife for a divorce so that he can marry Taylor - a do-I-leave-the-Madonna-for-a-whore moment - he comes face to face with Taylor's past. He knew about it, but to this point, had done his best to make believe it didn't exist. Yet he can't ignore, when in a bar, several men casually joke with him about his new "girlfriend" Taylor by saying, "welcome to the fraternity, we meet once a year in Yankee Stadium." Ouch.

Harvey, it turns out, belongs to that odd niche of men who knowingly fall in love with prostitutes - nothing wrong with that, everyone should find love where they can - but then begin to hate the object of their affections because she's slept with a whole lot of men. In logic, that's called a "category error," as Harvey is angry at something for being exactly what it is. It's like hating a top for spinning.

As the movie climaxes, Harvey, even when he breaks with Taylor, wrecks his marriage to Merrill. Taylor, meanwhile, leaves New York to start afresh with wholesome intent, this time, in Boston. But don't forget the Motion Picture Production Code which, basically, (spoiler alert) says, "The Whore Must Die!"

So, at the end of a silly and forced car-chase scene, where Harvey pursues Taylor in an attempt to get her back, she is killed as her very cute two-seater Sunbeam Alpine flies off the road. Taylor is dead; the Code is satisfied; Harvey is crushed and, unbelievably, wife Merrill is willing to take him back.

It's saponaceous melodrama on steroids with an overlay of fire and brimstone condemnation. But tucked inside and countering the "bad whore" narrative are Taylor's mother, the wonderful Mildred Dunnock, and Taylor's childhood best friend, Eddie Fisher, who provide a sympathetic view of Taylor's life.

The Code was buckling a bit in 1960, but it was not yet ready to let the whore live. However, in about a decade, the 1970s would bring a new and forgiving perspective to the prostitute.

N.B. Butterfield 8 is wonderful time travel to early 1960s New York City from the Village to the fancy apartments of Fifth Avenue, including many of the bars, restaurants and nightclubs in between. There's even a neat moment where, in the background of super-lit-up-at-night Times Square, you can see a movie marquee advertising Ben-Hur.
How terribly sad to have crashed a Sunbeam.
 
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