SHOOT THE PIANO PLAYER (1960)

A.K.A.: Tirez Sur le Pianiste

Country: France

Genre(s): Comedy / Crime / Drama

Director: Francois Truffaut

Cast: Charles Aznavour / Marie Dubois / Albert Remy

Plot

Restaurant pianist Charlie is pursued by two thugs who are looking for his low-life brothers.  Meanwhile, Charlie begins a relationship with waitress Lena, with whom he hopes to escape.

What I Liked

Sports fans might be familiar with the term ‘intangibles’ as it refers to those qualities in an athlete beyond the immediately measurable physical traits, the psychological and personality elements of an athlete that allow him or her to succeed where others with similar physical traits might fail.  Intangibles can exist in a movie, too.  A carefree mood runs throughout “Shoot the Piano Player.”  There’s not one single element or moment one can point to that is the source of that mood, but it is nonetheless ever-present and makes the film undeniably enjoyable.  Taken individually, the various facets of the film might seem run of the mill.  The plot is simple and derivative.  Character development is used only sparingly.  Everyday dress and locales are used.  In short, no single thing about the movie is special.  Except that coolness that inhabits every scene.

While it is not the sole source of the film’s unnamable entertainment value, certainly lead actor Charles Aznavour, who is also a very accomplished professional musician, deserves tremendous kudos for his performance of Charlie.  Thanks to Aznavour, Charlie constantly exhibits that same casual approach to life that permeates the film as a whole.  Surrounded by a supporting cast of characters that are intentional rip-offs from B-movies and film noir, Charlie’s laid-back strangeness makes him a compelling post-modern hero.

That intangible quality in “Shoot the Piano Player” has clearly had an influence on the work of many important filmmakers to follow director Truffaut.  The film’s underlying cleverness informs everything from the coolness and spontaneity of Jean-Luc Goddard, to the found soundtracks and streetwise neurotic-ism of Martin Scorsese, to the  self-referential wildness of Quentin Tarrantino.

What I Didn’t Like

Probably because of the ways in which later filmmakers built upon what Truffaut pioneered, the film does not feel quite so revolutionary on first viewing as it certainly would have in 1960.  Some of Truffaut’s groundbreaking innovations in his approach to filmmaker (improvised plot, for example) have been explored by later directors whose films I watched before “Shoot the Piano Player.”  But this movie was indeed one of the first to push those boundaries and it remains a pleasure to watch, so it wouldn’t be fair for me to harp on this too much.

Most Memorable Scene

I most enjoyed the cinematography of a montage detailing Charlie and Lena’s trip out of the city and into the countryside.  Gorgeous use of light, camera angles, setting, and soundtrack made me long for the beautiful freedom of a road trip.

My Rating: 4.5 out of 5

CRIES AND WHISPERS (1972)

A.K.A.: Viskningar och Rop

Country: Sweden

Genre(s): Drama

Director: Ingmar Bergman

Cast: Kari Sylwan / Harriet Andersson / Ingrid Thulin

Plot

Three estranged sisters, Agnes, Karin, and Maria are reunited as Agnes battles cancer.  As death draws closer, the sisters struggle with their inability to emotionally connect with one another.  Instead, Agnes finds comfort and compassion in Anna, her devoted maid.

What I Liked

The first element that will strike any viewer of “Cries and Whispers” is Sven Nykvist’s Academy Award winning cinematography.  Right away, we’re treated to the gorgeous melancholia of a country estate in the cascading light of the dewy early morning.  These images are then contrasted with intensely close studies of a dozen or so ornate clocks, the camera peering deeply into every crevice and swirl of their designs.  As the drama itself begins to actually play out, the visual design fills our eyes with two colors so frequently that they feel almost in competition with one another: deep, bloody reds and pure, angelic whites.

The only break we get from those colors are the faces that often completely fill the screen.  Each of the four main characters are shown in such extreme close-up that the viewer almost feels as though the character’s personal space is being invaded.  We are made the uncomfortable witnesses to every twitch of the mouth, furrow of the brow or flutter of the eyelash, pointing out the emotional intensity of truly becoming close to a person physically and emotionally.  Nykvist and director Ingmar Bergman certainly chose the perfect approach to shooting a movie about the lack of true closeness between human beings and the agony experienced in trying to mend that rift.

Of course, if you’re going to repeatedly fill your screen with the faces of your characters you better have some interesting characters and some capable actors to play them.  Thankfully, both are present in “Cries and Whispers.”  Each sister, and Anna too, has a complex psychology augmented by flashback and fantasy scenes that illuminate her individual struggles, faults, and perspectives.  The characters are so wonderfully developed over the full length of the film that at times it really feels more like a novel more than a film.  Most importantly, the performances are absolutely above criticism.  Each actress seems to truly understand her character and successfully uses that character to illustrate the frail line between passion and restraint that is the crux of the entire film, including its title.  The cinematography and performances combine to make the film almost painful to watch at times for how honestly and palpably it displays the dilemma of humanity.

What I Didn’t Like

*spoiler alert!*

Symbolism pervades nearly every moment of “Cries and Whispers,” to the point where it eventually feels heavy handed.  A film cannot be interesting on symbolism alone.  There needs to be some kind of emotional investment, as well as intellectual.  That emotional investment is slow to develop through the early portion of the movie.  Bergman seems so intent on getting across the dysfunction at the heart of the sisters’ relationships and their shortcomings as individuals, we have very little chance to get to like them before the conflict gets going.  We certainly feels sympathy for cancer-stricken Agnes, of course, but never get to truly feel for her sisters until she passes away about half way through.   Now Bergman does a great job of making up for lost time by doing a great deal to explore the two living sisters and exploring their psychologies, but it would have been nice to have had this happen earlier.  It certainly would have made the first half of the film more engaging.  As it is, you don’t really have an action packed plot; more sympathy for the characters might have made the film less dull.

Most Memorable Scene

Toward the film’s end Bergman gives us what is probably a dream sequence, but whether or not the events on screen were truly part of a dream or not is never explicitly explained.  Instead we are left to wonder if the nightmarish tragedy we witness is the figment of Anna’s imagination or is actually some supernatural happening that the women choose to never speak of again.  Either way, the scene is a heartbreaking illustration of the horrors of mankind’s failure to embrace love.

My Rating: 3.5 out of 5

THE PHANTOM CARRIAGE (1921)

A.K.A.: Korkarlen

Country: Sweden

Genre(s): Drama / Fantasy

Director: Victor Sjostrom

Cast: Victor Sjostrom / Astrid Holm / Hilda Borgstrom

Plot

Drunken vagrant David Holm is visited by the Grim Reaper on New Year’s Eve and made to repent for his wasted life.

What I Liked

I really want to like “The Phantom Carriage,” because there’s a great deal to admire in this dark fantasy film.  Most obvious is the effect described in the film’s title.  Through the use of double-exposure, director/star Victor Sjostrom pioneered the now standard look of spirits and ghosts in motion pictures.  The Grim Reaper, his horse, his carriage, and his passenger are all partially transparent images who pass unseen down city streets and through building walls in search of souls.  Though the technique has been copied and imitated countless times since and though it has now been replaced by the use of CGI, somehow the ghostly images in “The Phantom Carriage” remain chilling, even enhanced by silence and graininess of the faded black and white images of silent film, which can be unsettling for the modern viewer.

Also interesting is the low-key, realistic performances by the actors, at least in comparison with the flamboyant theatrics coming out of early Hollywood at about the same time.  European silent cinema seems to focus more on the subtleties of human body movement and facial expressions than its American counterpart, for the acting here is not all that different from the famously understated performances found in the films of Sjostrom’s Danish contemporary, Carl Theodor Dreyer (“Vampyr,” “The Passion of Joan of Arc”).  I imagine –though I don’t know – that Dreyer would have admired “The Phantom Carriage” very much.  Unfortunately, that same restraint I admire also got in the way of my truly enjoying the movie.

What I Didn’t Like

It took me a very long time to get through this movie.  Weeks.  It’s not that it’s very long, clocking in at just over an hour and a half in length.  It’s just that it felt so unbearably long.  When the Grim Reaper is not present, most of the film is spent on a lengthy backstory telling of David Holm’s descent into loneliness, sin, and poverty and of the idealistic young woman who tries to redeem him.  The problem is that the story is far too long and uninteresting, particularly when it is presented as a series of silent conversations interrupted by constant title cards.  With the exception of a few nail-biting moments toward the end, the film is made up almost entirely of these conversations.  They probably played much better to a 1921 crowd but this desensitized twenty-first century viewer was frustrated and disappointed.

Most Memorable Scene

The first appearance of the phantom carriage and its driver is easily the image that will most often pop up in the memory whenever the film is mentioned and for good reason.  The effect is what really makes the film unique.  Incidentally, there is also a scene where an enraged Holm, uses an axe to chop his way through a locked wooden door to get at his terrified wife.  I was waiting for the “Heeeeere’s Johnny!” title card but was again disappointed.

My Rating: 2 out of 5