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dromasca
living in Israel
makes a living out of computers and computer networks
best films ever - Casablanca, The Great Dictator, Citizen Kane
likes travelling, blues, rock and jazz music, reading, sports (especially football), and of course - films
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Voulez-vous danser avec moi? (1959)
Brigitte Bardot investigates
Director Michel Boisrond had already secured in the mid-1950s a name for himself in the history of French cinema, being among the first to cast in leading roles Brigitte Bardot and, a little later, Alain Delon. The collaboration with Brigitte Bardot would continue and among the most successful films with the public was 'Voulez vous danser avec moi?' ('Come Dance with Me!' in the English distribution), whose premiere took place in the last week of the 50s. The exuberant beauty and naive charm of the French star still fascinates today, 65 years after the film was made. However, I think it would be unfair to say that it is the only quality of this production. While his New Wave contemporaries were blowing up cinematic conventions - including cursive narration - with sometimes baffling experiments, Boisrond was making films that would entertain the masses. And yet, 'Voulez vous danser avec moi?' was no stranger to what was going on in the neighboring studios.
The story begins as a romantic comedy. Virginie falls in love at first sight with dentist Hervé when she comes to him to treat her father, a wealthy industrialist. The next scene is the wedding and the one after it a heated argument, after which Virginie leaves the apartment of the young people, married not long ago. Depressed, the dentist drowns his sorrows in a bar, where he meets a beautiful dance teacher, who invites him to her apartment for one last drink. These are the first five minutes of the film and the beginning of complications that include dance lessons, blackmail and a murder in which Hervé becomes the prime suspect. Virginie, turned amateur investigator, is ready to face any danger to prove her husband's innocence. If you look for a comedy where a hot blonde investigates a crime in the world of dance schools, nightclubs, cops and crooks, this is the movie you're looking for.
Brigitte Bardot is formidable. Her magnetism has survived the passage of time intact, and in this film she also proves that she could dance, and that she had temperament and comedic talent. The film was produced in 1959 and I can't help but suspect the influence of 'Some Like It Hot' that premiered in March that year, a film also dominated by a blonde whom no one can resist and in which the gay theme is approached with empathy and humor, which was news to the studios and a shock to many viewers. The filming in the nightclub is perhaps also influenced by the American cinema that also fascinated the directors of the New Wave, but the musical numbers in transvestites are, I think, a first in the French film. I didn't like Henri Vidal, Brigitte Bardot's partner in this film, on the other hand I enjoyed Serge Gainsbourg's small role. 'Voulez-vous danser avec moi?' remains to this day an entertaining worth watching film.
Kuolleet lehdet (2023)
a simple love story by master Aki Kaurismäki
The 2023 'Kuolleet lehdet' ('Fallen Leaves' in international distribution) is a formidable display of minimalist virtuosity by Finnish maestro Aki Kaurismäki. The director, who is also the author of the original screenplay, seems to be responding to a challenge. What are the minimum requirements and simple (and cheap) means to make a great movie? A good script - that is, emotional and/or interesting -, actors who live their roles with sincerity and commitment, and a filming style that draws the audience into what is happening on the screen. Seems simple, doesn't it? So why are so few great movies being made?
They say that Finland comes out on top in the rankings of the countries with the happiest people in the world. The heroes of this film do not seem to be part of the category of those who answered those surveys. Ansa and Holappa are two lonely people in a world of lonely people. They are also very poor. Both work in low-paying jobs where their employers exploit their social and economic weaknesses and from which they are fired one after another. He has a drinking problem and is caught drinking following an accident he was not responsible for at work. She is fired from a supermarket for giving out expired food to people in need. They meet at a karaoke night, no words are exchanged, the relationship starts from glances. They lose each other, look for each other, find each other, break up, look for each other again, fate seems against them. Can the two loneliness be overcome and become a relationship?
Stories like this have been told before and will be told. That's why the way they are told matters. The modest eco-social conditions of the main characters give Aki Kaurismäki the pretext to build minimalist settings around them, avoiding almost all the technology objects that have become part of our lives. The musical instruments in the bars through which the heroes wander are from the 60s. So is the radio they listen to the news on. Mobile phones seem to be from the turn of the century, no iPhone or other 'smartphones'. Even for the Internet connection, the heroine goes to rent half an hour of connectivity at a cafe. Aki Kaurismäki's world is almost timeless, frozen somewhere in the past decades, and we have the feeling that the film could have been made back then and it would have looked much the same. To express the loneliness of the heroes, the director films them from angles and with colors reminiscent of Hoffer's paintings, with blank stares, avoiding eye contact and communication with each other. Several key scenes take place in a cinema hall and at its entrance, with homages to French New Wave films and zombie horror films. The news about Ukraine are always on the radio. The threat of war seems to belong in another world, but we are in Finland, the country neighboring Russia, which in its not too distant history has known the threat from the East. All the actors and extras are excellent, starting with Alma Pöysti and Jussi Vatanen who play the main roles. The story in the film unfolds over several months, from summer to the brink of winter, the title of the film - 'Fallen Leaves' being another homage, to the French song 'Les feuilles mortes'. This sonically illustrates the formidable finale, which is also linked to the movies Kaurismäki loves. I found to be remarkable the entire soundtrack, mostly composed of Finnish songs, some of them maybe famous. 'Fallen Leaves' is a simple and moving film, an unmissable cinematic experience.
Fly Me to the Moon (2024)
Apollo as a romcom hero
The Apollo 11 mission and mankind's first steps on another celestial body is probably the most significant event I have witnessed, thanks to live television, in my lifetime. It is not surprising that the first landing of a human crew has already spawned a cinematic genre, with quite a few productions in different formats - documentaries, feature films, television series. Sub-genres did not take long to appear. In addition to biographical films and space dramas, there have also been comedies and films that propagate or - on the contrary - satirize conspiracy theories related to the 1969 space mission. 'Fly Me to the Moon', the 2024 film directed by Greg Berlanti belongs to these last two sub-genres, but it is first and foremost a romantic comedy. For Berlanti, who is best known as a producer and takes on directing duties about once a decade, this is the first big-budget film he's directed. Depending on the expectations of each viewer, 'Fly Me to the Moon' is likely to appeal to many viewers looking for a romantic comedy or summer entertainment, but also to be disliked by those expecting a movie that strictly adheres to the history of the Apollo missions.
Every romantic comedy tells a story about a boy and a girl. The boy is Cole Davis, the head of the Apollo 11 program. The character is inspired by Deke Slayton, a former pilot in the Korea war, test pilot and candidate for the first flights of the Mercury program, who was turned down at the last minute for medical reasons and became the crew chief of the Apollo astronauts. He's super-serious, super-professional, his life is his job (at least until he meets the girl), and he's superstitious about black cats (justifiably so, we'll see). The girl, Kelly Jones, is a completely imaginary character. Beautiful and elegant (her wardrobe is a veritable collection of 60s fashion), she is a master of communication and advertising. A mysterious head of government services hires her to create the PR campaign in favor of the program, with the aim of countering Soviet propaganda but also - or primarily - to ensure continued funding. The American-Soviet race for the Moon cannot be lost. And if success does not happen in reality, then it must be simulated and filmed as if it happened. Conspiracy theory confirmed? Not really, let's not forget the c... word in the expression 'romantic comedy'.
The romantic side is especially supported by Scarlett Johansson, whose character conquers everyone who sees and hears her, less, sometimes, the one she falls in love with. The roles are created in such a way that the two represent a couple that has no chance of working. On screen, it's pretty much the same and the main fault in my opinion is the casting of Channing Tatum in a role for which he is so suitable that at no point can we believe that he can also be in love. On the other hand, Woody Harrelson creates a character that evolves from being a cynical and sinister manipulator to one of those legendary hat-and-umbrella spy bosses in English movies. To the list of acting that I liked, I'll add Anna Garcia, Kelly's slightly plump and funny assistant, who warns her boss that nothing good can come out by working for Richard Nixon. Actually, a love story came out for the characters, even if not very convincing. One of the hit comedies of the summer came out for viewers, filmed under the luminous Florida sun. Without being disrespectful, 'Fly Me to the Moon' is also a satire of the Apollo program and its people, conspiracy theories and films dedicated to the subject. The only people who might be upset would be Apollo program fans who would take the movie too seriously. Be warned!
Belle Epoque (1992)
the happy interlude
'Belle epoque', the movie by director Fernando Trueba was made in 1992, towards the end of a period that radically transformed Spanish cinema. His country had awakened to freedom after decades of dictatorship and censorship, and its artists, filmmakers among the first, were practicing and learning to use free expression-both as subject matter and as artistic forms. While several great filmmakers who had survived the decades of dictatorship were ending their careers, new names and exceptional talents were emerging. It was, of course, Almodovar, but he was not alone and Fernando Trueba was among the names that became known in the 80s. The controversial and trauma-filled history of 20th century Spain was also addressed and reconsidered. 'Belle Epoque' stands out among the films made about the recent past by young filmmakers at the time with a positive and entertaining approach. Unlike many of his contemporaries, Trueba looks to the past not with anger but with the intention of finding something interesting and different, that will attract and entertain viewers. The result was beyond expectations, it was successful then (it won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film in 1993) and, seen or re-seen today, it passes the test of time without a problem.
It could easily be a drama, if not a tragedy. The story takes place in 1931, in a brief period of hope, an exception in the Spanish history of the first half of the 20th century. The monarchy had fallen after the abdication of King Alfonso XIII, the republic had been proclaimed and the first rebellions of the anti-republican armed forces had been repressed. Fernando, a young deserter soldier, arrives in a village somewhere in the heart of Spain and finds shelter in the house of an elderly man, the avant-garde painter Manolo. The artist lives alone, hasn't painted for a while (because everything that needed to be painted has been already painted!) and holds philosophical-political discussions with the village priest. His wife, a famous opera singer, is absent all the time, on tour with her lover. On the day Fernando decides to leave, Manolo's four daughters arrive on the same train. Seeing them, the young man decides to stay. One is a widow, another a lesbian, the third is about to get married and the fourth is Penélope Cruz. They are all beautiful. What follows are the gallant adventures of the young man, a naive Don Juan who will share the charms with the four sisters under the indulgent gaze of the father. A happy interlude that takes place in a temporal and geographical capsule of light and joy, in a century and a country beaten by history.
The genre of gallant comedies is not entirely new, and if we look for their predecessors we will find them in the paintings of the 18th century masters, including the Spanish ones. Even Francisco Goya has remarkable works in this genre. A light, bubbly and optimistic approach characterizes the film, despite the fact that it begins with a macabre scene and ends with breakups that could last forever. The characters live their joys and loves, but they are aware of what is happening in the world around them. Starring Jorge Sanz (Fernando) and Fernando Fernán Gómez (Manolo). The four female roles are played by Miriam Díaz-Aroca, Ariadna Gil, Maribel Verdú and Penélope Cruz. 'Belle Epoque' is a film that should not be missed if you have the opportunity to see it.
The Bikeriders (2023)
born to be wild
I have never ridden a motorcycle in my life. I have very little in common and know next to nothing about the bikers gang culture (or counter-culture). That is why I consider that the performance of 'The Bikeriders', produced in 2023 and directed by Jeff Nichols is even more outstanding. The film managed to captivate me, introduced me to a world that was almost completely unknown to me, and has shown me another facet of America in the second half of the 60s and early 70s.
Danny Lyon, whose book is at the source of the screenplay written by Nichols, is known primarily as a photographer. In the 1960s he joined a biker gang in Texas, lived and hit the road with them, and the result was a collection of photographs also published in volume in 1968, with a title similar to that of the film. The end credits are accompanied by photos from that book, and we can immediately recognize the source of inspiration for the cinematography of the film we watched. The script is built as a series of interviews, taken several years apart by the documentary maker, of Kathy, wife of Benny, one of the most active and violent members of the group. Flashbacks triggered by the woman's accounts trace the history of the group, from the first meeting with the gang members, the beginnings of the association, the transformation of the group from an association that deals with a hobby like any other into a way of life that expresses the desire for freedom, the hardships of adaptation to the social framework imposed by the surrounding world, the growth and gradual transformation of the gang into a violent group that gets closer to the world of crime. We also know other members of the group, first of all Johnny, kind of a responsible adult, the leader and the one who until a certain moment had managed to control his evolution. However, the conflict with the surrounding world was inevitable.
'The Bikeriders' exposes another piece of the puzzle in the portrait of the generation that invented the hippie movement, rock music and the alternative world of drugs, faced the Vietnam War and started the largest youth protest movements in the history of America. The way these young people have chosen to channel their anger and protest can seem directionless and purposeless. It is the result of the social structures in the area of the United States where they lived, the influence of Hollywood (the first model of motorcyclists is a hero from a movie with Marlon Brando) and the fetishization of vehicles, another phenomenon originating in America (but also exported to other countries of the world). The overall portrait seemed truthful and diverse. Jeff Nichols was able to create nuanced portrayals of the three main characters and was aided by three actors whom I found all excellent. Tom Hardy plays Johnny, the leader of the gang, who tries to preserve the original core and purpose and limit an expansion of the phenomenon that he feels will lead to self-destruction. His failure will mean the loss of direction and the evolution towards events that get out of control. Austin Butler is Benny, an impulsive but sensitive young man whose entire life is dedicated to motorcycling, until a violent incident calls his ability to be on the road into question. Jodie Comer stars as Kathy, the woman who supports and saves Benny, and the storyteller who makes the story accessible to viewers. The film's soundtrack combines original music with well-known themes, developed and reworked in the style of the time, adding to the authenticity of the visual reenactment of the period. I think that we have in 'The Bikeriders' one of the first films that will be talked about during the nominations for the Academy Awards time of the year.
The Other Boleyn Girl (2008)
another movie about the Boleyn sisters
One does not learn the history of Verona from 'Romeo and Juliet' - neither from Shakespeare's play, nor from Zeffirelli's film, nor from Prokofiev's ballet. This is what historical treatises are written and read for. Likewise, the story of the Tudor dynasty, the reign of Henry VIII, his relationships with the unhappy wives and their historical impact that gave birth to a major current in Christianity, are not learned either from the movies on the big screens, or from the television series nor from historical novels such as Philippa Gregory's, which was the basis of the film 'The Other Boleyn Girl' released in 2008 and directed by Justin Chadwick. The film by the British director, who specializes in television productions and is one of his few creations for the big screens, tries to present the story of the thousand days and the years that preceded them from a feminist perspective, emphasizing the relationships in the family Boleyn and bringing sister Mary on the same plane as Anne - the queen who will lose her head. The perspective is interesting, the realization has some problems.
'The Other Boleyn Girl' is one of the cinematic versions of the story that deviates most noticeably from historical truth. Even if we're not history experts, we've seen the events on screen enough times to know that Mary was the older of the two sisters, that the French exile lasted many years and took place during the sisters' childhood and teenage years, or that a character key to the political intrigue was Cardinal Wolsey, who does not appear in the film at all. Instead, we are exposed in detail to the relationships between the two sisters, mutual loves and betrayals, parallel destinies, one of which would end in tragedy. I have no objection to historical licenses. The problem is that the material we are served instead of a more detailed description of the history of those years is a palace and alcove melodrama that fails to interest or excite. At least that's how I perceived it.
What do we get when watching this movie? A stellar cast, first of all, with the perfect Scarlett Johansson as Mary and the slightly inappropriate - at times - Natalie Portman in the more difficult and complex role of Anne Boleyn. Mark Rylance and Kristin Scott Thomas, two actors I like a lot, are excellent as the sisters' parents. Benedict Cumberbatch, then just before the big roles of his career, seems undercast. The most difficult role in Henry VIII movies always seems to me to be the one of Henry VIII. Eric Bana is a good actor, but his performance emphasizes the predator side too much and did not at all reflect the great dilemmas behind his decisions. In addition, the physical appearance is also far from what we know historically. I'm waiting for the movie where Henry VIII looks like in Holbein's portrait. I found the historical reenactment - sets, costumes - accurate and detailed, British filmmakers are experts at this. 'The Other Boleyn Girl' could and probably aimed to be a film about the fate of women in a man's world and how the relationships between them can change something in the destinies of individuals and - in this case - of the nation. It only succeeded in being yet another film about the Tudor dynasty and not one of the best.
The Great Escaper (2023)
Michael Caine and Glenda Jackson were still here
As I get older, it becomes more and more difficult for me to watch movies starring the great actors who have accompanied my life of a cinephile and who have reached venerable ages. The feelings are mixed. On the one hand, I am glad that great actors like Michael Caine and Glenda Jackson (at her last role on screen) were still with us and that - far from being forgotten - they were cast in meaningful, age-appropriate roles and without unnecessary attempts at artificial rejuvenation in 'The Great Escaper', the 2023 film by director Oliver Parker. On the other hand, many of these roles press too hard on the keys of melodrama and the risk is that instead of seeing the heroes of the film, we see the actors whose images from their youth are impossible to erase from our memories. It takes their immense talent to create the characters and push past biographies and creations into the shadows. The most representative film of this category is 'Amour'. 'The Great Escaper' does not reach the heights of Michael Haneke's masterpiece, exposing in too many moments a predictable sentimentality. The main reason for watching remains the presence together on the same screen of the formidable couple of actors. But maybe that's reason enough.
The script written by William Ivory is based on a true story, which happened in June 2014, when the 70th anniversary of D-Day - the landing of allied troops in Normandy - was celebrated. Bernard Jordan, a nearly 90-year-old British D-Day veteran, was living in a nursing home together with Rene, the woman he met during the war and with whom he has spent a lifetime which does not seem to have been marked by extraordinary events. The old man decided at the last minute to travel alone to France, to revisit the places where he had fought and to pay an old debt to a comrade-in-arms who had fallen on the blood-soaked beaches. His departure, unannounced to those who were taking care of him, created concern and then escalated into a media sensation.
The story has three parallel planes of action. The first takes place in the outside world, where the old veteran's decision to undertake the journey across the Channel alone is regarded as an extraordinary fact, which inspires respect, but which is also ridiculously exaggerated by the press and television. Bernie becomes an unwilling hero of a day when true heroes are remembered. The second plane is that of the world of the old couple - a parallel world, where every movement and activity takes place at a different pace, where disease and death become companions, where memories continue to fuel the relationship that has overcome wars and time. The third plane is that of the memories and traumas of the war. That glorious day, celebrated 70 years after by presidents and queens, had been a day of horror and terror that had traumatized those who lived through it for the rest of their lives. What about Michael Caine and Glenda Jackson? At the age of their heroes, it is indistinguishable and irrelevant how much of what we see is acting and how much is living their own old age. What matters is that the two create in Bernie and Rene two heroes we care about, with whom we live the story and whom we would like to help like we do for the elders in our own families. I mention two more outstanding supporting roles: that of John Standing who plays another veteran traumatized by what happened in those days of June 1944 and carrying in his soul the guilt of losing his brother, and that of Danielle Vitalis - extremely natural and believable in the role to one of the nurses close to the old couple. The script does not manage to avoid clichés (for example the meeting with the veteran German soldiers) and does not run away from melodrama, on the contrary, it accentuates it. However, everything is balanced enough not to fall into ridicule, and the presence of the two great actors saves and ennobles the film.
Le rapace (1968)
the loneliness of the contract killer
The life of writer, screenwriter and director Jose Giovanni can be good material for the script of a movie waiting to be made in the future. Giovanni was far from a nice guy in his youth, and when he became a successful novelist and filmmaker he even used and boasted about his past experiences as a criminal and a prisoner, but for a long time concealed the fact that his crimes included collaboration with the Nazi occupiers, and that the death penalty (commuted to prison) he had received was for murder, blackmail and torture. Watching his films today confronts the viewer with the dilemma of separating interesting artistic creations from aspects of the life of the artist who made them. Giovanni 's past experiences when adapting a 'serie noire' novel by John Carrick for the screen provide an interesting perspective on the main character of 'Le rapace' (film released in English markets as 'Birds of Pray') - a lone and seemingly unscrupulous hitman embroiled in a political intrigue in a Central American country in the years leading up to World War II.
We never learn the name of the main hero of the film. He is one of those people who are known by profession (mercenary killer) and maybe by a nickname, who have several names and probably only they know the real one. At the beginning of the film we see him disembark in Mexico and travel to one of the Central American countries on the country's southern border. He is hired to assassinate the president of this country who is going to visit his mistress in a dusty little town. Those paying him are a group of rebels who hope that the assassination will allow them to seize power. Freedom fighters? At least some of them look so, including the young man with whom our hero must carry out the murder and who, if successful, will take the glory of the deed and become a national hero. Accustomed to acting alone, the hitman reluctantly accepts the young man's company. A tense relationship develops between the two, which only events that take an unexpected turn will transform into something else.
The lone gangster is one of the favorite characters of the 'noir' films that were very popular in the creation of directors who started their careers in the New Wave and continued in the commercial cinema of France, from Melville to Giovanni. The origin of the character can be found in the American cinema of the 40s and 50s and the heroes played by Humphrey Bogard and his peers. However, the hero of 'Le rapace' finds himself in a different environment, that of Latin America, and here the influence of Sergio Leone's films is felt. Even the excellent musical score by Francois de Roubaix is visibly influenced by what Ennio Morricone had done for Leone. Lino Ventura dominates the film with his formidable acting, but I'm sure he had seen Clint Eastwood in spaghetti westerns. Even if the other actors don't manage to come close to what Ventura does, the cast - made up mostly of little-known Mexican actors - is interesting. 'Le rapace' is an unexpectedly modern and entertaining film, and we can enjoy watching it, forgetting for 105 minutes the hard-to-digest details of its director's biography.
The Fall Guy (2024)
ode to the stuntmen
David Leitch has already proven that he knows how to make fast and funny action movies that interest and entertain. He tried to do the same thing with 'The Fall Guy' (2024) which borrows the title and the profession of the main character, but nothing more, from a television series of the 80s. The director also bet on the fact that Hollywood likes to make movies about Hollywood and raised the stakes of the production by adding a plea for the stunt job, with its risks and frustrations, a job threatened by advances in digital cinematography that make it possible to program and execute any action scene on computers, as well as to replace actors by computerized doubles. Even if this combination of entertainment and message does not work perfectly, and despite a running time that seems too long, mainly due to repetitions, 'The Fall Guy' manages to be engaging and funny at times.
Colt Seavers is a stuntman. He loves his job, even if he knows that his face is intentionally hidden for the benefit of famous actors and his name is squeezed among many others towards the end credits of movies. His happiness is amplified by the fact that he can film together with his girlfriend, Jody Moreno, a set director. When he's at his best, during the shooting of a movie, what appears to be an accident happens, threatening to end his career. He leaves the movie world and Jody. 18 months later he is called to participate in the filming of the huge production of an interplanetary wars saga, which for Jody is the chance to debut as a feature movies director. Arriving at the filming location, Colt learns that Jody knew nothing about the fact that the producer had called him, and his participation as a stuntman in the filming is only one of the reasons, the main one being the search for the lead actor who mysteriously disappeared. We are in the world of special effects and stunts, where no one is what they seem to be and nothing we see on the screen is real. The adventure is just beginning, and the life of the stuntman and the renewed love between the two heroes will be in danger.
The screenwriters and director David Leitch intended to combine the action film with the parody, putting in the center of the story the stuntmen - people with special qualities who do not hesitate to risk their lives to create the illusions on the screen. The parody works up to the point where the lines become too serious. The film is also a little too long, the story is rather routine (within the genre) and predictable, and when the jokes are repeated and the emphatic lines pile up, the effect is diluted. I enjoyed many of the action scenes. 'The Fall Guy' is a film with and about stunts, and the stunts are done in the style of classic action movies, performed by professionals. Ryan Gosling and Emily Blunt are perfect in the lead roles. Their charisma and the chemistry between them drives the film to a great extent. Fans of the two actors will leave, I think, very satisfied from the viewing. The rest of the viewers will have to settle for a little too long two hours and something of action romantic comedy to be consumed with popcorn. The themes of the fate of stuntmen in modern cinema and of the effects that kill emotions remains to be addressed more deeply by other films.
Strawberry Mansion (2021)
a feel-good dystopia
Are there dystopias that are at the same time 'feel good' films? The couple of screenwriters and directors Kentucker Audley and Albert Birney strive to prove that the answer is 'yes!' with 'Strawberry Mansion', their film made in 2021. It is a pessimistic anticipation of a near and predictable future, packaged as a fantasy film, which despite the visibly low budget manages to absorb us into a different world.
1984 is 2035 in 'Strawberry Mansion'. The government decided to tax dreams. This requires special technology and officials to implement the legislation. Preble, the main hero of the film, is such a government clark, a tax official. He reads the citizens' dreams and determines what taxes they have to pay. Preble is sent to audit the home of an eccentric old woman named Bella, who has not declared her dreams in a long time. Awaiting him are thousands of VHS magnetic tapes on which she, using outdated technology, had recorded her dreams. He gets down to business and soon learns that Bella has discovered a secret. Citizens' taxed dreams are not theirs alone. They are infested with the advertisements that big corporations use to promote their products. The mind control through constant surveillance in Orwell's novel had been replaced by control through advertising. Bella and her late husband had invented a device, a helmet with colored light bulbs, that protected their dreams. Before long Preble will find himself absorbed in a world where reality, good dreams, nightmares, Bella from 2035 and Bella from her youth, spiders and rat sailors will mix in a colorful and illogical universe, but more important than anything - one free from control.
'Strawberry Mansion' is full of cinematic and literary references, from cinema for kids and surrealist avant-garde films of the first half of the 20th century, through Orwell and American science fiction, to more recent fantasy productions. Everything is done with 'low-cost' means that are as explicitly exposed as some of the progressive ideas that the story tries to convey to us. Kentucker Audley also plays the title role, surrounded by a cast where about half the time the actors are masked or disguised. One can criticize the script saying that the story is not very coherent, but are our dreams often coherent? Dreamlike and extreme, rhetorical and imaginative, this film manages to tell a story about the dangers of manipulation and psychological control in the form of a fable that has only the appearance of a children's film. Viewers may feel good at the end of watching, but those who will think back about the meanings of what they saw will not be able to avoid the warnings. 'Strawberry Mansion' does not avoid clumsiness and naiveties, some intentional, but Kentucker Audley and Albert Birney prove that they are two filmmakers who have something to say and are worth watching, together or separately.
La passion de Dodin Bouffant (2023)
not only for gourmets
From the original French title of the film 'La passion de Dodin Bouffant' the essential word we must remember is passion. The 2023 film by director Anh Hung Tran (English title is 'The Taste of Things') depicts a love story between a man and a woman in the autumn of life (these very words are used in the film) who work together animated by their shared passion for high class cuisine. In fact, the more correct expression would be 'create together', because what they do in the kitchen is art. He is a celebrity chef, she has been his collaborator for 20 years. He conceives the recipes, she executes them by understanding his thoughts and conception. One could not profess without the other. However, the relationship between them is much more than a professional one. Passion manifests itself in many different ways.
It is a period film and the story is quite precisely located in time. We are in France at the end of the 19th century, France where the arts flourish, and culinary art is no exception. The famous chef Dodin Bouffant lives in a castle and prepares exquisite meals for a group of friends who all belong to the wealthy bourgeoisie. Eugénie is his lover and co-worker with whom he works side by side. Without her the dishes he cooks and ultimately his reputation would not be possible, but meals seem to be strictly a man's business. Eugénie is respected by those around her, but not recognized as an equal by a seat of her own at the same table as the men. Dodin would like to get married, but she is the one who refuses him again and again. To express his feelings, Dodin cooks. He will also cook for Eugénie when she would be sick. Can the most exquisite dishes not only express feelings but also change destinies?
The key question of the film is why does Eugénie refuse Dodin's marriage proposals? Does she accept her place and consider herself merely the executor of the plans of a genius creator? Has she gotten used in 20 years of collaboration and cohabitation and she doesn't want to shatter the balance of their relationship? Many of the love stories depict entanglements and power relations between male and female partners (Mars vs. Venus, etc.). In 'La passion de Dodin Bouffant' things are different. Dodin and Eugénie avoid any confrontation, but yet they don't manage to turn their mutual passion into anything other than splendid dishes. But maybe nothing else is needed. They are artists and biographies of true artists must be subordinate to their art. The acting performances of Juliette Binoche and Benoit Magimel (once partners in life) are masterful, both in the romantic scenes and in the cooking scenes (they had a famous chef as their advisor). I also noticed the emergence of a very young actress named Bonnie Chagneau-Ravoire who plays the role of Pauline, an extremely talented teenager who becomes Dodin's apprentice. Pauline in the film is extremely talented in the culinary arts, actress Bonnie Chagneau-Ravoire seems to be equally gifted, and I hope her future career lives up to her promise. The scenes that take place in the kitchen are formidable and I am sure that the recipe books of the dishes prepared in the film are already available. 'La passion de Dodin Bouffant' enters directly and very high in the list of best films with and about the art of cooking and the people around. Not just for gourmets!
The Children's Hour (1961)
breaking taboos
By the time Bill Wyler adapted it in 1961, Lillian Hellman's play 'The Children's Hour' and its big screen adaptations already had a history of nearly three decades. The play itself was the first major hit on Broadway and the first major scandal of Lillian Hellman's career as a playwright. The reason was that the story about the libel that destroys the lives of two women and the fiance of one of them had a lesbian undertone, which was still taboo on most American scenes. So taboo in fact that, in order to make the first film adaptation of the play in 1936, Bill Wyler and the producers at the Goldwyn studios changed the title and removed all references to homosexuality, complying with the code of decency and morality on the screens of Hollywood. The 1961 film is more faithful to the text of Hellman's play, reverts to the original credits and title, and recruits three of the top stars of the day to produce. 63 years later 'The Children's Hour' is a good opportunity to find out again how much some conceptions have evolved and the reflection on screens of some formerly taboo subjects, but also how current others have remained. In many ways, including cinematic ones, 'The Children's Hour' is a film that has not aged very well. And yet, some other taboos were broken by this production and several scenes in the film surprise and make watching or re-watching the film not at all unnecessary or unpleasant.
The story takes place in a small American town not precisely defined as a geographical place. Karen and Martha, friends since college, own a boarding school with about 20 girls in their early teens as pupils. They work hard together with a more aged music teacher who is also a singer in musicals. One of the girls is called Mary and she is an undisciplined schemer who, when punished, invents a story based on the amplification and twisting of banal gestures about an alleged 'unnatural' connection between the two teacher friends. Mary's grandmother, who is also a wealthy patron of the school and the aunt of Karen's fiance, withdraws the little girl from school and spreads the rumor that the naughty child made up. Karen and Martha wake up in one day with the school empty of children, their life business destroyed, their personal lives influenced by the moral judgments of those around them. Furthermore, even if the story is made up, the feelings of one of the two women are still beyond mere friendship.
Love triangles in which one of the relationships is between lovers of the same gender were scandalous in the 1930s, hardly accepted in the 1960s, and are part of the norm these days. The subject of slander, which today we call 'fake news', is as actual as possible, and so is that of moral judgments that can destroy lives or careers and that today dominate not only many communities in cities like the one in the film, but also many other very diverse environments, from universities to corporations, that censor their language or morals according to criteria of extreme political correctness. Bill Wyler's 1961 film introduces yet another innovative plot element - a pre-teen girl who is the source of everything bad that happens in the film. It still took courage at the time to detach a child character from an idyllic vision. Unfortunately, the execution of 'The Children'sHour' is largely tributary to a cinematic style that belongs more to the 40s than the 60s. The background music with sweet violins is downright annoying, and the static interior scenes are a constant reminder that we are watching the screening of a theatrical drama. Audrey Hepburn, Shirley MacLaine and James Garner act in a style that can be used as an example of the term 'overacting'. We have to wait for the final scenes to see emotions that seems genuine to justify the intense acting of the two actresses. Even Wyler eventually breaks free and shoots a terrific final scene, finally out in the open, with the moving camera following Audrey Hepburn in close-up. A single final scene, however good as it may be, cannot save an entire film.
Hang 'Em High (1968)
where is Sergio Leone?
'Hang 'Em High', made in 1968 and directed by Ted Post, marks the return of Clint Eastwood to the United States after becoming an international star in the series of three famous spaghetti westerns made by Sergio Leone. Most film historians today consider Leone to have saved the genre, or, if not saved it, at least revolutionized it, adding realism and color, alternating slow cinematic exposition with bursts of lightning-quick action, creating memorable lead and supporting characters and soundtracks that entered in every film score charts of all time. American critics and viewers of the time were not convinced and considered European Westerns to be violent vulgarizations, detached from the historical background that represents one of the fundamental myths of American nation building. The screenplay of 'Hang 'Em High' tries to use Eastwood's success but compensate for the lack of authenticity of films made overseas. I think it succeeds quite well in this regard, setting the story in a historical moment known to Americans and raising some moral and legal issues worthy of being addressed on screen. Eastwood's character is basically a continuation of the one in Leone's films. Eastwood really wanted and recommended the Italian director for this film, but he was already busy with the casting of 'Once Upon the Time in the West' and would not make a film in America until 16 years later. Ted Post was eventually chosen to direct the film. The result is not without qualities but leaves the impression that it could have been a great film under the guidance of another director.
'Hang 'Em High' is a revenge movie. The story takes place in Oklahoma, which was one of the last US states to join the Union, in 1907. During the long transition period that preceded this act, the power of the judges was extremely high and they were assisted by armed federal officers called 'marshals'. The frail institutions of the law could not cope in a huge territory, and often the population did its own justice. Or injustice. One such incident triggers the story in the film, when ex-cop Jed Cooper is wrongly accused of stealing a herd of cows and murdering their owners. He is condemned on the spot and hanged in the middle of the prairie by a group of men who were on his trail. They don't do their job well and Jed is rescued by a lawman and brought before Judge Fenton, who understands the situation and releases him, proposing that he become a 'marshal' under his comand. Jed accepts, with the goal of using his newfound powers as a lawman to catch and punish those who had wrongfully convicted and nearly killed him. The balance between justice and revenge, between the need for order and the avoidance of unjust punishment, will be tested several times in the events that follow.
The script has a fairly solid historical basis and raises interesting issues related to the power of justice, crowd psychology, and the irreversibility of the death penalty. Eastwood brings back to the American historical background the character created for him by Sergio Leone. As a vengeful gunslinger he is flawless. The problem is that the group of 'bad guys' he faces is kind of undifferentiated, none of these characters give us, viewers, time and enough reason to hate him. There is also a romantic sub-conflict, a rather thin one, the only point of interest here being the presence of Inger Stevens, a beautiful actress of Swedish origin, with a tragic destiny (she would die two years later). A very interesting character could also have been that of the all-powerful Judge Fenton, but unfortunately Pat Hingle plays him rather without nuances and the expositions of his motivations are too rhetorical. I found the public execution scene exceptional. Dominic Frontiere's music tries to emulate Ennio Morricone's, but it's far from adapting to the story as it happened in the European films. To create good film music, it's not just the sound that matters, but also the sync with what we see on the screen. 'Hang 'Em High' seems to have aspired to match Sergio Leone's westerns and be as captivating as them, but Sergio Leone is missing.
Carbon (2022)
the ashes of the empire
I very seldom have the opportunity to watch films from the Republic of Moldova, and that's why I was happy that 'Carbon', released in 2022, directed by Ion Bors based on a script written by Mariana Starciuc, was included in the program of a Romanian film festival thatI could attend. The film is a co-production of studios from Spain, Romania and the Republic of Moldova, but the subject, cast and most of the technical team are from Moldova. Going back three decades, to the beginnings of the Republic of Moldova, 'Carbon' presents, in the form of farce mixed with thriller, not only an episode from the birth of one of the youngest European states, but also draws with the tools of satire a picture of the main lines of one those unresolved conflicts that smolder on the periphery of Europe and of the former Soviet empire.
The story takes place in 1992, in a Moldovan village on the right bank of the Dniester. The Republic of Moldova is preparing to celebrate one year since its independence, but changes are happening slowly. Plates with the names of stores or even those of state institutions, are written some in Latin characters, others in Cyrillic. The tricolor flags are still uncertain about the choice of colors. The mayor and the militia man also seem to be descendants of previous periods, while agricultural work is still done in the kolkhoz. Only the priest has gained more influence, but he doesn't quite know what to do with it. A few kilometers away, an armed conflict is taking place between the new Moldova and the pro-Russian separatists on the other side of the Dniester. It seems more like a conflict between gangs of mercenaries, ex-soldiers returned from Afghanistan, and anyway, the fate of the confrontation is being negotiated thousands of kilometers away, in Moscow. The main heroes of the film belong to different generations. Vasea is a veteran of the wars of the former Soviet Union. Dima is a young man who sees no way out of his hopeless village life except by enlisting in the army in order to receive the benefits promised to war heroes. Vasea will lead Dima to the front, but on their way, on the side of the road, they find a charred corpse. The dead deserves a proper burial. If it is the body of a Moldovan soldier, even a hero's funeral. But what if it's the dead body of an enemy soldier? Or maybe even of an important personality, because next to it is the burnt carcass of what used to be a luxury car. The complications are just beginning for the two, but also for the mayor, militiaman, priest, head of the collective farm and for the entire village.
The story in the film is a combination of history with absurdity, thriller with dark humor. The characters are genuine and human, and viewers will quickly fall under their spell and accept them with their pains and weaknesses. Where does this humor come from, humor without which the heroes could not survive and films like this would turn into dark dramas or horror stories? "Carbon" is inspired by classical Romanian playwright Caragiale's social and political satire but also by the adventures of Soviet writers Ilf and Petrov's heroes, who acidly described the phenomena of another revolutionary transition, the one from the beginning of the Soviet system. But there is another influence here, and it is that of the movies of filmmakers such as Emir Kusturica, films that describe the breakup of the former Yugoslavia and the violent ethnic conflicts that arose almost overnight between those who until yesterday had been neighbors and coexisted more or less peacefully. I thought the acting was excellent. I will mention the names of Dumitru Roman (Dima) and Ion Vantu (Vasea), but the whole team is playing very well. My last reference about a director from Moldova is related to the films of Emil Loteanu, made 50 years ago. Ion Bors (for whom 'Carbon' is the debut feature film) and his generation colleagues seem determined to write a new page in a cinematography that defines its artistic identity, along with everything that happens around.
Oameni de treaba (2022)
at the edge of Europe
What genre of movie are we watching? This is one of the questions that the viewers of the film 'Oameni de treaba' (the title in the English distribution is 'Men of Deeds'), made in 2022 by the director Paul Negoescu, which I saw during the Romanian Film Festival in Israel, initially scheduled for October 2023, are asked to answer. At some moments we have the feeling that we are watching a comedy, then a thriller, later a a drama of personal failure and permanently a political satire of the eternal Romanian unreality. It's yet another demonstration of how relative the divisions in cinematic categories and genres are. A good movie is a good movie. The shelf on which film critics or historians place it is less important.
The story takes place in one of the most beautiful areas of Romania, in Bucovina, in a village at the border of Europe. 'Oameni de treaba' has two main characters: a rooster who escapes to an uncertain freedom from a truck transporting poultry and a policeman named Ilie, a man in his 40s who has not really succeeded in life and who lives alone, dreaming of buying land for an orchard and remarrying, after his first marriage ended in divorce. He is the village policeman and the trusted man of the mayor Constantin, kind of as 'godfather' (as in the mafia), who controls almost everything that happens in the village, legal or especially illegal. A young police officer is assigned as his subordinate just when a crime happens in the village. The curiosity and probity of the young man, who begins to investigate the crime, risks disturbing the order that had kept the village relatively prosperous (compared to other surrounding villages) due to the fact that things were going 'as always'. When the violence escalates, Ilie will be faced with the dilemma of continuing to accept submission and collaboration with the corrupt environment. But what is the limit of accepting compromises?
Iulian Postelnicu achieves an exceptional acting creation in 'Oameni de treaba'. Policeman Ilie belongs to that category of heroes that we don't know exactly how to categorize - positive or negative? He is the policeman devoted to the mayor, obediently carrying out his orders, convinced to a point that this is the way things were always and will be forever. Always astounded by what happens to him, he tries to overcome the impasse in which his life was and knows that he can only do it by accepting compromises and deluding himself that everything is for the good and the tranquility of the community. And yet, when the injustices around him exceed the limit of violence, when people he knows and who depend on him and his position as a lawman are hurt, something happens. But the price of rebellion is huge, even for a man of the system. Another formidable performance is that of Vasile Muraru as the corrupt mayor, who reminded me of the late Ernest Maftei in several memorable roles. The combination of drama and comedy, thriller and satire works quite well, but what stays in the memory, and thanks to the actor for this, are the long close-ups of the hero's moments of solitude and balance. Romanian viewers will recognize themes already covered by the Romanian films, related to the endemic corruption and the disintegration of rural society, but for me the personal dramas are the ones that impressed me the most. The ending is memorable and changes a lot in the perspective of what happened up until that point. I would have cut it a minute earlier. It would have been brilliant. ('Let's go fishing somewhere else.')
Mademoiselle Chambon (2009)
an improbable love story
'Mademoiselle Chambon' is the first film from Stéphane Brizé's filmography that I have the opportunity to watch. It was made in 2009 and the script, on which Brizé is co-author, is an adaptation of a novel by Eric Holder. It's a low-key and unlikely love story between a man and a woman who have little in common, who meet by chance and discover each other's loneliness and vulnerability. Love stories have no boundaries or rules, they say. Is it so?
The heroes of 'Mademoiselle Chambon' are in mid-life. Jean is a bricklayer and a handyman, he does house renovations and is married to Anne-Marie in what seems to be a perfectly normal marriage and, if not happy, at least free of any grievances and problems apart from perhaps those of their ten-year-old son's school grammar lessons. Véronique Chambon is a substitute teacher. For reasons never revealed, she teaches almost every year in a different place in France replacing the permanent teachers who are on medical or maternity leave. Her only passion is the violin, but she hasn't played it in a long time, especially in public. When Anne-Marie is forced to stay at home for medical reasons, Jean takes her place in dealing with their son's school and meets mademoiselle Chambon. An initially discreet and unacknowledged bond grows between the two. Jean is attracted by the woman's vulnerable loneliness but also by the half-opening of a door to other horizons - the music she practices as a hobby, the different places she had known. Véronique discovers the man who represents perhaps what she lacked in life - stability and a support during the long periods of loneliness. The relationship evolves and reaches the point where a decision would trip the balance and change the directions of the destinies of the two heroes, but also of Jean's family. What will be the decision? Does this relationship have any chance?
'Mademoiselle Chambon' is a special film also because Stéphane Brizé chose to cast in the lead roles Vincent Lindon and Sandrine Kiberlain who, in addition to being two wonderful actors, had also been a couple and then husband and wife for a decade before the shooting of the film. Their relationship had ended, but they remained on good terms and agreed to play together. It would not be their last collaboration on the screen. Their presence, the way they interact, the discretion with which they develop their characters and the way they build the connection between them on screen is formidable. However, a warning is also in order here. 'Mademoiselle Chambon' is about psychological depth and subtlety and not about an externalization of feelings as we are used to in many other films with romantic stories. Impatient viewers might be lost in a few scenes where the stares, the silences, the half-open doors, the windows that offer a limited perspective of the outside world, the music played with internalized passion by Sandrine Kiberlain (who honed her violinist skills for this film) play the main role. There are long scenes, some static, that demand to be watched carefully. I was one of the patient ones and I think I had a lot to earn.
The Pink Panther Strikes Again (1976)
the pink panther saves the world
'The Pink Panther Strikes Again' (1976) is the fifth film in the original series of films directed and written (most of them) by Blake Edwards and starring Peter Sellers as Inspector Jacques Clouseau. I can forgive the Edwards-Sellers couple anything, as they authored the brilliant movie 'The Party' (1968), one of the best comedies ever made. Among the series that belong to the cops comedy genre, this is one of the most successful, and this film is considered one of the best in the series. The ultimate criterion for judging a comedy is the quantity and quality of laughter it generates. From this point of view, 'The Pink Panther Strikes Again' was and remains a successful film almost 50 years after its release.
Inspector Clouseau, a walking disaster whose combination of innocence and incompetence solves any case and defeats any enemy, investigates the escape of Dreyfus, his former boss, from the mental asylum where he had been imprisoned. He kidnaps a scientist competent enough to create a weapon that destroys the United Nations building in seconds, and with which he can threaten to further destroy entire nations. The goal? Blackmailing world governments to hand over or kill Clouseau. He is on his trail, but on his trail are the paid assassins of every secret service in the world, all ready to kill Clouseau to save the planet.
The pseudo-detective story intents to be (also) a parody of James Bond movies. The best comedy scenes in this series of Clouseau's adventures might well belong to the period of silent film comedies. 'The Pink Panther Strikes Again' contains several such scenes that would find a good place in the comedy anthologies of the 1920s. It's what merely remains of this movie. Peter Sellers and Herbert Lom are excellent, and we also have the pleasure of seeing Omar Sharif in an uncredited role for a few minutes. Behind the mask of the character, Peter Sellers seems genuinely unhappy. But this is already the subject of another film.
Inspecteur Lavardin (1986)
the body on the beach
With 'Inspecteur Lavardin' (1986), Claude Chabrol followed in the footsteps of the success of the film 'Cop au vin' made the year before, bringing back to the center of the story the same character that gives the film its title. The bet was won, as the second film also enjoyed success with the public and is not inferior to the first, except perhaps for the lack of surprise due to the character of the very unconventional police inspector Jean Lavardin. But Chabrol also links this film to the beginnings of his career as a director and screenwriter, recruiting two of the actors who had appeared in his first film, 'Le beau Serge' from 1958, and in several of the films that followed. The two are Jean-Claude Brialy and Bernadette Lafont, here in the roles of brother and sister belonging to the provincial bourgeoisie, Chabrol's favorite collective character and also the target of his social satires.
When Lavardin arrives in a small oceanside town to investigate a sordid murder (body of a stabbed man discovered completely naked on a beach), he is in for a surprise. The victim's wife is the woman who had broken his heart twenty years before, leaving him without any explanation. The recent widow could also be a potential suspect, as she was on a second marriage, and her first husband had also mysteriously disappeared, lost at sea together with her brother's wife. But we already know Lavardin, and we know that such a conflict of personal interests does not stop him either from the investigation or from enjoying the hospitality of his ex-girlfriend and recent widow, who lives in a sumptuous villa with her brother and teenage daughter. Each of the residents of the villa seems to hide a closet full of secrets. Gradually, Lavardin will discover that things were the same with the victim, a famous writer, author of books that preached Catholic morality. He had led a double life and given many of those he met reasons to kill him.
'Inspecteur Lavardin' is a 'whodunit'. Lavardin even has an assistant he calls Watson who is the local policeman. However, the police plot is unusual because of the main character, but mostly because of the outcome. Jean Poiret reprises his role from the previous film, and Bernadette Lafont remains discreet and mysterious. The most interesting role is played by Jean-Claude Brialy as the widow's brother. In the role of the teenage daughter appears Hermine Clair, a beautiful and talented actress, who decided not to continue her film career (I don't know the reasons), this being the only movie in her filmography. However, 'Inspecteur Lavardin' stays in the memory of the viewers, especially through the very special ending. Claude Chabrol is often compared to Hitchcock because of his moral judgments on his characters, which the Anglo-American master also did, but always made them as if in passing and with a smile on his face. Here, however, we are dealing with a very special interpretation of the expression 'Justice was served'. I wonder what Hitchcock would have said and if he would have dared to include such an outcome in the script of any of his films.
Legend (2015)
the mean streets of London
Brian Helgeland's 2015 film 'Legend' is a biopic of the Kray twin brothers, two gangsters who dominated the London underworld from the late 1950s until 1968 when they were both arrested, tried and sentenced to life in prison for separate murders. The style of the cinematic saga dedicated to crime families immediately brings to mind the films of Coppola and Scorsese dedicated to the world of the American mafia in general and New York one in particular. From a cinematic point of view 'Legend' stands up to the comparison quite well, especially thanks to an extraordinary acting performance in a double role by Tom Hardy, even if it does not manage to reach the level of plot complexity and character richness of the best films Americans of the genre. But perhaps this is also due to the fact that even the phenomenon of organized crime in Britain and London has not reached the proportions of the crime empires overseas.
Reggie and Ron Kray were children of the war, living their childhood in Blitz London in the poorer neighborhoods of the East End of the metropolis. Their true path in life was influenced by their parents - the very ambitious mother and the deserter father who lived as a fugitive for many years after the war - but the screenwriters chose to deal very little with this aspect and almost completely left out their characters. At the beginning of the film we already find the two brothers involved in the world of crime. Ron is a true psychopath, violent and sadistic. His brother Reggie, more cerebral and apparently less inclined to violence, is the brains behind the business, which starts in a pub in East London, with ambitions to expand into the clubbing and casino world of the wealthier West End of the city. The two brothers are surrounded by a gang of henchmen, including accountants and corrupt lawyers, who are their accomplices. In the world of London vice they know and buy or blackmail politicians from both sides of the British political spectrum who support them, promote their businesses and often protect them when they get into conflicts with the police and the law. The appearance of Frances, the beautiful sister of Reggie's driver, risks changing the balance of relations between the two brothers for a moment. Frances extracts Reggie's promise that he will abandon the illegal business and transform himself from a gangster to a legitimate businessman, but abandoning the life of crime proves to be impossible for Reggie. The marriage of the two is opposed by Frances' mother, but also by Ron, who sees in her a rival who can divert his brother from 'business'. Ron and Reggie's bond is inevitably headed for tragedy.
The film is based on a biographical book dedicated to the two brothers and accomplices in crime, written and published several years after their fall. The script shifts the focus of the story to the romantic connection between Reggie and Frances, making her the film's voice-over narrator as well. The two twin brothers are described as very different in personality despite their physical resemblance. Tom Hardy's performance is virtuoso, supported by perfect editing. This is the strongest part of the film along with the authenticity of the reconstruction of the landscape of London 60 years ago. The vast majority of the scenes were actually filmed on location, on the streets, in the clubs and pubs where many of the events depicted on the screen took place, or in the interiors of carefully and accurately reconstructed London houses. Emily Browning interprets with sincerity and sensitivity the role of the girl in love who at one point becomes the chance of moral salvation for Reggie, but who in the end cannot escape the fate of becoming his victim. It's a shame her role wasn't given more consistency by the writers. This seems to me, by the way, to be the main problem of the film. Focusing on the figures of the two brothers and relying on Hardy's excellent performance in the dual role, 'Legend' very loosely draws the lines that define the surrounding characters, be it the gangsters who surround the two brothers, members of the Kray family or the policemen who are constantly following them and who will bring them to justice in the end. 'Legend' is more than just a gangster film or yet another violent entertainment. It's a masterfully rendered cinematic study of two underworld characters, but it misses the opportunity to also be a fresco of the complex underworld of London at the time.
Hit Man (2023)
identity games
I always look forward to the films of Richard Linklater, whom I consider one of the most interesting American filmmakers. His films manage to bring to the screens novel landscapes of American reality and characters that involve their viewers. His persistence in long-term projects has managed to transform time perspectives that span many years and decades into plots and images. Linklater is constantly looking for new characters to turn into stories on screen and new forms of expression to tell their stories. However, not all of his experiments are successful to my taste. This is also the case with 'Hit Man', an original combination which, however, failed to convince me.
'Hit Man' is inspired by a real-life character named Gary Johnson, who lived in Houston and assisted the local police as an undercover agent, posing as a professional killer to those looking to buy assassination services and gathering evidence (mostly taped recordings of conversations) to arrest and prosecute them for planning murders. The script moves the action to New Orleans and assigns Gary the job of art teacher, showing him giving moral and life lessons to his young students. As long as he builds the character of the teacher who masquerades as different variants of professional killers, adapting his physiognomy and attitude to the 'clients', the film is interesting and funny. When the romantic component is added, it becomes less believable, not to mention the moral and legal ambiguities. What doesn't work? To a large extent, the role and activities of the police assistant hero are based on the first impression, or if you want, on the prejudices through which people judge those around them. The police disguises may fool the buyers of crime services, but the identity game on which the romantic story is based is more difficult to believe. A relationship based on false identities has no chance of standing the test of time. Or maybe the script wants to tell us that true love can overcome even lies about identity? Such a message is too trivial to support the surprises in the second part of the film. Linklater uses tools from the film noir toolkit mixed with romantic comedies and a little eroticism, but the combination just didn't work for me.
Glen Powell is a good actor, but what he does in this movie constantly reminded me of Ryan Gosling and in cases like this I prefer the original. His romantic partner is played by Adria Arjona, who looks fantastic but whom I need to see in other roles to convince myself of her acting qualities. 'Hit Man' is a movie that many will like, OK as entertainment, but I found it to be one of Richard Linklater's weaker movies. In my opinion, this is one of the highly overrated movies of this season.
Les cousins (1959)
young and angry in the city
After 'Le beau Serge', that I had watched a few days ago, I now saw 'Les cousins' (1959), the other film in the diptych that launched Claude Chabrol's career and was one of the first successes of the French New Wave . The two films have many elements in common. Both were produced, directed and written ('Les cousins' in collaboration) by Chabrol exemplifying and reinforcing the concept of auteur film. The same two actors appear in the main roles - Gérard Blain and Jean-Claude Brialy. Cinematography belongs in both to Henri Decaë. The two films express the same feelings of rebellion of the generation of young people of the late 1950s, a generation whose childhood had been marked by the war and the years of restrictions that followed. Filmmakers who wanted to make films differently chose as their heroes angry young people who wanted to live differently.
Watched together, as I did this week, the two films inevitably invite comparison. It was only a coincidence of lack of funds to film in Paris that led to 'Le beau Serge', set in Chabrol's childhood village, to be filmed and released before 'Les cousins' . In the filmography of the French director, however, this order is better. Even if Chabrol would shoot again later in the countryside, "Les cousins" takes place in the apartments and on the streets of Paris, where many of the plots of many other New Wave films take place. We encounter for the first time in this film the sarcastic vision of the more or less intellectual French bourgeoisie that will eventually become the collective favorite character of his films and the target of the merciless satires they contain. The world of students is also presented, another social category that will play an important role not only on the screens but also in the political life of France in the decade that would follow. In both films one of the heroes is the outsider, the one who tries to enter (or re-enter) the society of the place without adopting its rules, but also without having the power to change them. In this case young Charles comes to Paris to live with his cousin Paul. Both are Law students, but their lifestyles are as different as can be. The cynical Paul explores not only the volatility of love relationships but also the power control in relations of the extremes. The naive and provincial Charles promotes his innocence and makes the mistake of sharing his feelings when he falls in love with the beautiful Florence. Paul tries by all means to corrupt him, including stealing his girlfriend and manipulating their feelings. The game becomes dangerous, especially when several firearms hang on the walls of the luxurious Parisian apartment.
Gérard Blain and Jean-Claude Brialy are formidable, as they were in 'Le beau Serge', although here the roles are completely different. The romantic triangle is completed by Juliette Mayniel, a beautiful and talented actress with a magnetism that propelled her among the stars of the New Wave, but whose career faded after the Wave passed. Stéphane Audran also appears for here for the first time in a film by Chabrol. She who would become his wife a year later and would be his partner and muse for the next two decades. From many points of view 'Les cousins' seems a more complete and mature film than 'Le beau Serge'. I couldn't help but wonder what the two films would have looked like if they were made in reverse order, as originally intended. But perhaps even in film history chance sometimes plays a winning card.
All That Jazz (1979)
life and death of a choreographer
It takes a lot of courage and immense self-centeredness to write and direct a film about your own death. This is exactly what the director and choreographer Bob Fosse did in 1979, the creator of some of the great successes on Broadway between the '50s and '70s of the last century and of several memorable films among which this one - 'All That Jazz' - was declared by Stanley Kubrick as 'the best film I've ever seen'. Creating the character he named Joe Gideon in the film, Fosse transformed his own life and a possible path to death into an exuberant musical spectacle as only he knew how to imagine and create in images, sets, music and dance. Bob Fosse would die 8 years later in the arms of his ex-wife, as if wanting to prove that sometimes not only life imitates the film, but that death can also imitate the film.
I think the best way a viewer can enjoy watching a movie like 'All That Jazz' is to approach it like a Broadway musical. To sit comfortably in the armchair, to listen to the music, to enjoy the ballet numbers, to appreciate the performances of those on the screen especially by their vocal qualities and physical presence. The difference is in the case of this film that the subject matters too. The stressful life of the actors and producers of such shows is not for the first time the subject of self-exposure (see 'The Producers' or even 'Chicago'), but here the personal element is added. Bob Fosse brought his own life and even some of its protagonists to the screen. The raw honesty of the revelation cannot fail to impress.
To a large extent the success and quality of the film is also due to the impressive acting performance of Roy Scheider. It was probably the best role of his career and the one that earned him an Academy Award nomination for Best Actor in a Leading Role (Dustin Hoffmann won that year for 'Kramer vs. Kramer', the other nominees being Al Pacino, Jack Lemon and Peter Sellers). Scheider acts, dances, sings, lives and dies, but most of all he breaks down the character in all its details and presents it to the audience like on a dissecting table. The intense and ruthless, competitive and creative world of Broadway is presented under the harsh light of the strongest spotlights. The cast around is formidable, but the main goal is to put the character at the center of the universe in this film. The notion of 'the movie of his life' has never been better exemplified than in 'All That Jazz'.
Les ripoux (1984)
rotten cops satire
Not all successes of yesteryear stand the test of time. 'Les Ripoux' ('My New Partner' in English distribution) is one of the successful films of Claude Zidi, a director who was very popular in the 70s and 80s, especially with his comedies. The film received three César awards, was a considerable domestic success and was the head of a series of three films with the same main heroes. I didn't see the film when it was released, but I had high hopes for solid entertainment thanks to the cast and its belonging to the genre of French crime comedies that often gave me healthy laughs. I confess that I was partially disappointed. 'Les Ripoux' has not aged very well, many of the gags and effects have completely or partially faded out, and the schematism of the formula is too obvious, despite the nostalgia. There remains, of course, the pleasure of viewing two great actors together, but that is not enough.
The main hero in 'Les Ripoux' is a corrupt policeman from a Parisian arrondissement. He takes bribes here and there, from shop owners and organizers of clandestine gambling, eats for free in restaurants and - without shame and without paying - grabs pork legs from the butcher in the market. He squanders his money on horse races and gifts for bosses. Everyone seems happy, especially since he doesn't make many arrests either, as the police station had received a warning note about making too many arrests because the jails are overcrowded. His life gets a little complicated when a young inspector from the province lands as his partner, inexperienced but enthusiastic and apparently incorruptible. How will the two get along and which one of them will lead the other on the path he sees as the good one?
Philippe Noiret was already an established, popular and award-winning actor, loved by the public and appreciated by critics. Thierry Lhermitte, although much younger, had also recorded some successes in theater and film and was at that time on the rise. The two work very well together and make up one of the first partner cop couples in a series that has become something of a sub-genre of cop comedies in general. Their acting peering is the strong point of the film along with Francis Lai's music. The premises of a good cops comedy exist. The comic effect and success with the audience was, I think, mainly due to the sharp and unmitigated satire of corruption - personal and systemic - in the police. None of the characters, from the ordinary inspectors to the minister of the interior, seems to be safe from moral contamination. Perhaps the film's lack of impact today and the feeling of 'déjà vu' is also due to the fact that we, the viewers, have become somewhat accustomed to encountering and tolerating these misdeeds in everyday life?
Le beau Serge (1958)
the beautiful Serge and the good François
'Le beau Serge' (1958) is Claude Chabrol's first film, considered by many film historians to be the first film of the French New Wave. There are enough arguments in favor of this categorization. Chabrol was the first of the directors of the group associated with 'Cahiers du cinéma' to sit behind the camera in the winter of 1957 and 1958 to make a feature film. He is the screenwriter, producer and director and films on location in Sardent, the place where he spent part of his childhood, including the war years, using the houses, streets and surrounding nature as a setting and as actors in secondary roles and as extras the inhabitants of the village. The music of the film (composed by Émile Delpierre) and the cinematography (signed by Henri Decaë) stylistically anticipate the innovations of the New Wave. On the other side, the story in the film is told linearly, and the plot has a moralistic line that belongs more to classic French cinema than to the New Wave. The heroes of 'Le Beau Serge' are rather reminiscent of the 'angry young men' movies that were dominating American and British cinema in the mid-50s. Chabrol returned, moreover, to this debut of his with a documentary signed by Francis Girod in 2003, which unfortunately I have not seen yet.
François returns to his native village, which he left more than a decade ago, to recover from a lung disease. He had traveled to the big world, to Paris and Switzerland, and the village seems frozen in time as mentalities, with aging people and morals falling apart. Even the village priest has resigned and no longer believes in the mission of bringing his believers to the right path. Serge, his best friend, falls into alcoholism and is unhappy in his marriage with Yvonne. Paul aims to save him, and through him, perhaps, to revive the whole village. In parallel, he has a love affair with Marie, the beautiful and capricious sister of Yvonne, who is probably looking for a way to escape from the status environment in which he lives and from the tyranny of his father, who is also addicted to alcohol. We shall meet the character, reaching the Big City, in future New Wave films. Is recovery possible?
The story seems moralistic but, viewed a little in perspective, I think that when Claude Chabrol wrote it, the intention was to say something more general about France after the war, about its people - especially the young - who were fighting to do something else than the previous generations, in order to change for the better a society frozen in concepts and rituals without a horizon. The expressive power of the two actors who play the lead roles (Jean-Claude Brialy - François and Gérard Blain - Serge) supports the central thread of the story. The film had a duration of almost two and a half hours in its initial form. Chabrol cut about 50 minutes of it to bring it to the standard format of a cinematographic representation at that time. He later regretted this decision, especially since the sequences left out mostly presented documentary aspects about the life of the French village in the years after the war. I haven't seen the initial version and I don't know if it still exists somewhere. I regret. I think that if the full version had been released, both 'Le Beau Serge', and, perhaps, other films of the New Wave and of Chabrol would have looked different.
Les fantômes d'Ismaël (2017)
the impossible return
Arnaud Desplechin does not make light movies. His characters seem to have been born and live permanently among dilemmas and crises, and the director's cinematic visions transport his viewers into the troubled worlds of his heroes. This is also the case with 'Les fantomes d' Ismaël', his 2017 film which takes a classic 'love triangle' formula to confront his heros with painful questions about the ages of love, about presence and absence in relationships, about reality, fantasy and nightmares in artistic creation. The result in this case is a quite chaotic film, but also full of essence, with a charm amplified by an exceptional cast.
The scene that opens the action in 'Les fantomes d' Ismaël' (although it is not the first scene of the film) seems to mirror the key scene in 'Sous le sable', the 2000 film by Francois Ozon. Both take place on a beach and are shot from similar angles, as if it were the same beach. In Francois Ozon's film, the manleaves his wife on the beach and goes swimming in the ocean. He will disappear and the rest of the film will be about the search for him. In Arnaud Desplechin's film, one of the heroines, Carlotta, aseems to appear from the sea, retracing the route in reverse. The woman is the 21-year-old missing wife of Ismaël, a screenwriter and film director. 'Les fantomes d' Ismaël' will be about the consequences of the absence and reappearance in the man's life of the woman who had left him suddenly and without trace or explanation long time before. After many years of waiting and searching, he had declared her officially missing. He had begun a new relationship with Sylvia, a shy astrophysicist, also past her prime youth. He had kept in touch with Henri, Carlotta's father, a Holocaust survivor and famous director. In the middle of creating a new film based on the figure of his brother Ivan - a diplomat and maybe a spy -, Ismaël sees his whole life called into question by the appearance of his missing wife, with his identity, biographical and sentimental landmarks overturned or annihilated.
The narrative style chosen by the screenwriters (including the director) is non-linear and creates the impression of intentional disorder. Looking closely, it seemed to me that it reflects the feelings of the main character, even if he does not appear in all scenes. At the beginning we look at a life that seems to have stabilized, with flashbacks that recall the trauma of the disappearance of the young wife 21 years ago, but also the episodes of meeting and beginning the relationship with Sylvia, that happened two years before. As the story progresses, and especially after Carlotta appears, events multiply and accelerate in the pace of the hero's experiences: memories, nightmares, creative crisis, images from the future film. The finale surprises with a total change of tone. Mathieu Amalric is probably one of the most suitable film actors to bring to the screen the image of a man in deep crisis, overwhelmed by the events of life. Marion Cotillard and Charlotte Gainsbourg are two of my favorite actresses and the joy of seeing them together (and even confronting each other) in the same film was immense. Two more secondary roles caught my attention, giving László Szabó and Hippolyte Girardot consistent creations despite their short screen time. To me, 'Les fantomes d' Ismaël' seems to be an unfairly little watched, discussed and appreciated film.