A CLOCKWORK ORANGE (1971)

Country: U.K. / U.S.A.

Genre(s): Comedy / Crime / Sci-Fi

Director: Stanley Kubrick

Cast: Malcolm McDowell / Michael Bates / Patrick Magee

Plot

Sometime in the not-too-distant future, all-around hoodlum Alex is selected by the British government to undergo an experimental treatment intended to eliminate his immoral impulses.

What I Liked

The novel “A Clockwork Orange” by Anthony Burgess is one of my very favorite novels.  Apparently Burgess was none too impressed with director Stanley Kubrick’s interpretation of his most famous work.  Speaking for myself, outside of a few exceptions, I found the film to be a pretty dead-on interpretation of the book, capturing everything that I admire about Burgess’ text.  It’s also a satisfactory blend of political satire and science fiction, two genres at which Kubrick had already proven himself to be a master by 1971.

One of the novel’s most obvious and impressive features is the invented language – called Nadsat - which the author gives to main character Alex and the other young delinquents with him he spends his time.  By using this language for Alex as he tells the story in first person, Burgess allows the reader to unintentionally sympathize with a set of characters one would otherwise find repulsive; by the time I got toward the end of it, I found myself occasionally even thinking in Nadsat.  Kubrick too allows Alex to narrate the movie in Nadsat.  However, since the need for narration is much less frequent in a visual medium like film, the language has less opportunity to induce the same effect on the viewer as it does on the reader.  Nonetheless, the use of the invented language still allows the viewer to feel as if he has a special insider’s knowledge of Alex’s mind which is unavailable to other characters in the movie.  It is almost as if one can feel Alex nudging us with his elbow at some inside joke each time he whispers his thoughts to us.

As Alex, Malcolm McDowell is perfectly cast.  There is a constant and murderous delight in Alex’s eyes throughout, which became something of a signature of McDowell’s performances after this film.  Thanks to McDowell and Kubrick, the character is convincingly maniacal, sarcastic, and intelligent all at once, exactly as he should be.  Though Alex is surrounded by supposedly educated authorities and institutions, virtually all of these are bumbling, cartoonish, or completely impotent.  Alex is easily the most aware and intelligent character we come across in the film.

Incidentally, my personal favorite character is that of the head prison guard played by Michael Bates.  He’s basically a uniformed imbecile who loves for nothing else but stomping his boots and speaking in terse, staccato barks.

What I Didn’t Like

As much as Kubrick successfully captured the novel’s themes and satirical nature, in the end this movie lacks one of the components essential to any first rate film: emotional impact.  The dark humor is there, yes; but outside of that, as a viewer I’ve never felt any real emotional investment in or connection to what is happening on screen.  Perhaps that’s why I’ve only bothered to watch the movie twice, when I love the novel so much.  I just kind of watch it and think about, smirking occasionally, while waiting for it to end.

Most Memorable Scene

Maybe the most iconic scene of torture in all of cinema history, the scenes where Alex is in a theater, forced to watch films of violence and Nazism, are easily the most imitated and influential images from the movie.  That said, the home invasion followed by a gang rape, incredibly graphic for 1971, is a close second for sheer memorable impression.

My Rating: 3 out of 5

TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD (1962)

Country: U.S.A.

Genre(s): Drama

Director: Robert Mulligan

Cast: Gregory Peck / Mary Badham / Phillip Alford

Plot

Life in the Jim Crow South is experienced through the eyes of a young white girl whose lawyer father, Atticus Finch, accepts a case in defense of a black man unjustly accused of raping a white woman.

What I Liked

“To Kill a Mockingbird” is almost universally regarded as one of the finest motion pictures America has ever produced for many reasons, but it mainly comes down to this: like most timeless works, it works as popular entertainment, social commentary, and universal art all at once.

Like the novel it is based on, the film tells its tale almost exclusively through the eyes of a child, that of the restless and curious tomboy Scout.  This is the key to the film’s depth and power.  From an entertainment perspective, we are able to experience that sense of wonder and adventure adults lose somewhere during the growing up process.  By bringing the camera down to a child’s height, everything about the world seems bigger, more fun, and at times more frightening.  Most importantly, these scenes are never overly sentimental; they are full of truth and meaning, setting the film apart from films concerned only with nostalgia.  For Scout, her brother Jem, and their friend Dill, every question or dilemma becomes an excuse for investigation, exploration, and discovery, a universal truth that magically resurrects the best part of being a kid.

The social commentary is probably the most praised aspect of “Mockingbird.”  In 1962, concepts like rape and interracial sex were still fairly taboo for mass consumption.  So was open discource about race and racism, at least in mainstream film.  Author Harper Lee and the filmmakers of this movie forced America to take a hard look a shameful piece of its history that was not so far in its past.  The courtroom scene is the most obvious example of this, with the segregation of the white and black audiences (notably, Scout, Jem, and Dill sit with the black people), with the testimony and examinations, and with Atticus Finch’s unforgettable closing argument.  When Atticus stands up in that courtroom, most of the time we watch him from the jury’s perspective; he is speaking to us about America, about our history when he says “The defendant is not guilty – but somebody in this courtroom is.”  The film may have its enjoyable innocent nostalgia, but Harper Lee’s novel was mostly autobiographical and contains many unsettling truths.  It is the effect those truths have on Scout’s and Jem’s image of the world that is among the most memorable aspects of the film.  Also interesting, in many cases the unruly and fanciful children are more honest and rational than the adults and their society. 

Even going deeper than the obvious tackling of race and justice in America, or even the inevitable loss of innocence children endure, there is an even deeper universality to this film, one that is harder to pinpoint.  It is simply an overall sense that, in these characters, particularly the children, we are looking at a portrait of humanity, still wondering at the mysteries of life, it’s meaning, and the world in which it takes place.  Still trying to understand each other and why we do the things we do.  Still longing for belief in that strong moral compass represented by Atticus

Atticus.  He is one of the most iconic characters in all of film history, embodied so immaculately by Gregory Peck, who won an Oscar for his performance.  Through the eyes of his daughter, Atticus is a walking ideal, to the point that he could be called a stand-in for God Himself: creator, teacher, protector, comforter, moral guide, and idol.  Rarely is a character so morally and personally infallible also interesting.  Thanks to Lee, Peck, and the filmmakers, Atticus is the benchmark for the infallible hero against which all such characters will be forever measured.

All of the above gives “To Kill a Mockingbird” an combined emotional and intellectual impact that remains palpable today.  It will make the viewer want to play, to laugh, to cry, and to fight for those things worth fighting for.

What I Didn’t Like

The only possible criticism is that, while making a film obviously meant to criticize racism in America, the filmmakers relied on quite a lot of stereotypes, most notably in the sneering, drunken white trash bigot that is Bob Ewell, who if not a stereotype, is certainly a cliché.  Someone concerned with finding racial stereotypes could even argue that Tom Robinson, black man martyred by American racism, is a character representative of some racial misconceptions.  Robinson comes across as almost a frightened, simple-minded fool who needs an confident and intelligent white man to come to his aid; not exactly a flattering portrayal of African Americans in a film that is supposed to condemn racial stereotypes.  Anyway, most of this can be explained away as being told through the simple observations of a young girl, but it is nonetheless there.

It could also be argued that Lee never intended Ewell or Robinson to be stand-ins for an entire group of people.  However, that argument would then strip the film of some of its power, as it is the way in which the film puts the whole of American history and society on trial that has helped “To Kill a Mockingbird” become one of cinema’s enduring classics.

Most Memorable Scene

Much of what impressed me about this movie was in the production values.  Recreating a small town in Depression-era America doesn’t necessarily call for a huge budget, but the attention to detail in this film was phenomenal.  There is a moment early in the film when the children venture into Boo Radley’s yard and are frightened into fleeing in terror.  A short time later, a gunshot is heard.  In that moment, we hear maybe a half dozen dogs begin barking, seemingly form varying distances.  In several more sedated scenes after this, I also noticed details like distant dog barks and bird chirps that are subtly mixed in behind the dialogue as part of the setting.  It’s little details like this that which heighten the sense of place that lends the weight of truth to “To Kill a Mockingbird.”

My Rating: 5 out of 5

RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK (1981)

Country: U.S.A.

Genre(s): Action / Adventure

Director: Steve Spielberg

Cast: Harrison Ford / Karen Allen / Paul Freeman

Plot

In 1936, the U.S. Army gives archaeologist Indiana Jones the mission of recovering the Ark of the Covenant before a Nazi-sponsored expedition does, kicking off a quest that will take Jones from the mountains of Asia to the deserts of Africa to the high seas aboard a German U-Boat.

What I Liked

I should begin this review by stating that very few films have as much sentimental value for me as “Raiders.”  I spent countless afternoons watching this movie (or “The Last Crusade)” or imagining myself as Indiana Jones as I ran around in the woods or played in a friends backyard.

The thing about sentimental favorites from childhood, however, is that many of them disappoint once you get to be an adult.  Time passes, you see better movies, the standards for effects change, the youthful belief in magic fades, the adult mind criticizes too much.  The great thing about watching “Raiders” is that it was nearly as much fun to watch it this time around as it was back when I was a kid.  That’s because most of the fun of “Raiders of the Lost Ark” is based on quality of craft, which is always timeless.

Let’s start with the performances.  Harrison Ford is perfectly cast as Indy.  In many ways, he reminded me of everything that great about a Humphrey Bogart performance: masculine, ballsy, smart, flawed, and vulnerable.  To this mix, Ford adds a level of self-effacing humor that Bogart’s characters always lacked, making Jones one of the most well-rounded action heroes in cinema.  Jones is cool enough to be envied and relatable enough to fool you into imagining yourself in his shoes.  Despite being a beloved action hero, Jones is no John Rambo or even James Bond; unlike those characters, he doesn’t always get it right and usually pays for his mistakes by taking hellacious beating.

Karen Allen reinvents the action movie girlfriend role as Marion, a tough-talking, hard-drinking spitfire who rescues herself from distress at least as much as our hero does.  Though Marion does wind up in a few classic “tied to the railroad track” type scenarios, in Allen’s hand the character is more heroine than victim.  She is utterly convincing in the role, making Marion in many ways the female version of Indiana.  The screwball comedy style of banter between Indiana and Marion, who is almost always shown to be Indiana’s emotional and mental superior, has a large amount to do with the film’s endearing comedic elements.

Combine those two performances with some of the most thrilling stunts ever caught on camera, exotic locations, a cacophony of gunfire and explosions, plenty of fist-fights, tasteful use of shocks and gore, and some of cinema’s most memorable one-liners and you’ve got arguably the greatest action film every made.

What I Didn’t Like

Indiana Jones is such an terrific movie action hero, it’s a shame that the filmmakers never truly came up with a villain to match him.  In “Raiders” he was usually pitted against his professional rival Rene Belloq, a French egotist who fancies himself the yin to Indy’s yang.  It isn’t that Paul Freeman didn’t play the role right, but just that the part wasn’t written to be very interesting.  Most of the villains in the series, Belloq included, are cribbed directly out of older movies, with nothing about them that makes them the least bit interesting.  In some ways, this allows room for the on screen action to become Indy’s most compelling adversary in the form of one death-defying trap after another.  In other ways, it’s a disappointment that Jones never got the Moriarty, Joker, or Darth Vader.

Most Memorable Scene

The who film is almost one unforgettable scene after another, accompanied by equally memorable dialogue.  Still, when “Raiders” is mentioned, the very first scenes that come to my mind is the opening sequence as Indy and one lone surviving assistant explore an booby-trapped jungle ruin and try to make off with a golden idol.  The whole thing is a fun homage to the old 1930s movie serials, a wonderful series of creepy gags, and a perfect introduction to what is to follow in the next two and a half hours.  I’m pretty sure anyone else who has seen the movie (Is there anyone who hasn’t?) would agree that that opening twenty minutes or so are the most classic in a classic film series.

My Rating: 5 out of 5

THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS (1991)

Country: U.S.A.

Genre(s): Drama / Horror

Director: Jonathan Demme

Cast: Jodie Foster / Anthony Hopkins / Scott Glenn

Plot

FBI trainee Clarice Starling is assigned to interview imprisoned serial killer Dr. Hannibal Lecter regarding his knowledge of fellow psychopath “Buffalo Bill.”  Can Starling get the information she needs from the clever Lecter before Bill claims another victim.

What I Liked

Back in the 1990s, it seemed like there was always some serial killer-based psychological thriller in the theater.  “Seven,” “Kiss the Girls,” “The Bone Collector,” “Fallen,” “Copycat,” the list goes on.  With its clever script, riveting performances, and genre-transcending production, “The Silence of the Lambs” is the film that kicked off the trend, making it one of the most influential films of the era.

His performance as Hannibal Lecter allowed Anthony Hopkins to go from highly regarded actor to full-fledged acting legend.  He also established the character as one of the great film villains and a classic movie monster on the level of a Dracula, Norman Bates, or Freddy Kreuger.   His Lecter is irresistibly manipulative, darkly amusing, and absolutely creepy in equal measure.  Hopkins (and through him, Lecter) is without a doubt the prime reason this film is regarded as a classic.

However, one cannot ignore the importance of Jodie Foster, who is equally capable in her performance of Starling, even if her character is not as juicy as the chilling, demented Lecter.  Starling is the foil against whom Lecter is allowed to shine, as well as the relatable character can be used by the audience as a conduit into Lecter’s demented perspectives.  Starling’s verbal jousting with Lecter is what separates this film’s unique power and timelessness.  Later thrillers tried to piece together similar confrontations, but is the way that Lecter and Hopkins deliver these scenes that truly set s this one apart.

Incidentally, Ted Levine is also pretty damn frightening as the skin coveting Buffalo Bill.

What I Didn’t Like

The character of Catherine Martin, while admirably resourceful and brave, is not very convincing to me as a person who has been trapped for days in a dungeon pit by a man who is clearly bent on murdering her.

Most Memorable Scene

As mentioned previously, the scenes of verbal sparring between Lecter and Starling are the most iconic moments of this film.  Nonetheless, like any good climax, the most emotionally powerful moment of the film to me is when Clarice unwittingly stumbles upon the killer and is drawn into his home.  When he initially escapes her attempted arrest and leads her on a terrifying pursuit through his dungeon-like basement, that the anxiety really starts.  Even watching this for the I-don’t-know-how-many time, I was still on the edge of my seat, gritting my teeth, my muscles reflexively tightened.  That’s because the terror on Jodie Foster’s face is completely believable and relatable.  Her entire body appears stricken with adrenaline, and understandably so.  It’s Foster’s change to show that she is every bit the actor that Hopkins is and has an equal mastery over her audience, and succeeds at both.

My Rating: 5 out of 5

SUNSET BOULEVARD (1950)

Country: U.S.A.

Genre(s): Drama

Director: Billy Wilder

Cast: William Holden / Gloria Swanson / Nancy Olson

Plot:

Out of work writer Joe Gillis recounts his final days as the reluctant writing partner and companion of Norma Desmond, who was once one of Hollywood’s great beauties of the silent era.  With her stardom long behind her, Desmond is now a delusional recluse fixated upon the younger writer, whom she clings to as her last hope of recapturing her former glory.

What I Liked

Like any halfway decent noir film, “Sunset Boulevard” is narrated by a dead man.  We know Joe Gillis is dead about one minute in.  That’s not to say that the film is a pure representation of the noir subgenre; it transcends the limitations of categorization.  It has many of the stock characters, gimmicks, and themes of noir: the hard-luck cynic for a protagonist responsible the aforementioned narration, a grim murder, the Los Angeles backdrop, the obsessive use of shadow and sharp angles, and the snuffing out of all things naïve.  However, there are also strong elements of showbiz drama, psychological thriller, and cultural satire.  There is even the faint trace of the horror in the sense of decay and hopelessness that persists throughout its two hour length.  In one of the film’s many famous moments, faded movie star Norma Desmond describes herself as bigger than the movies (“I am big; it’s the pictures that got small.”). In similar fashion, “Sunset Boulevard” refuses the limited confines of simpler film-making.

Though Gillis is technically the film’s main character, it is Desmond who serves as the crux of the film’s intrigue.  In a masterstroke of casting, she is played with magnificence by Gloria Swanson, who, like the character herself, was a largely forgotten star from Hollywood’s silent era.  She lurks about her empty palace of a home with a purposeless grandiloquence that would be downright hilarious if it weren’t absolutely tragic.  Her every gesture and word is a performance for an audience that exists nowhere for her but in her own imagination.  The character is one part Charles Dickens’s Miss Havisham (who is referenced early in the film), one part Orson Welles’s Charles Foster Kane, and one part Swanson herself; she is as compelling to witness as all three put together.  Swanson is exactly as over-the-top as she needs to be while portraying a psychopath who knows of no other way to hide her shattered self-esteem than with pretension and egomania.  When watching her, one wonders where Desmond ends and Swanson begins, and vice versa; that’s what acting is supposed to be.

Incidentally, Swanson isn’t the only major figure of the silent cinema to show up.  Cecil B. DeMille and Buster Keaton actually play themselves while Erich von Stroheim is chilling as Max, Desmond’s former director and ex-husband, who has been reduced to a doting manservant.

What I Didn’t Like

Where the character of Desmond completely destroys and rebuilds the cliché evil dame of noir film, main character Joe Gillis (played by William Holden) is the noir cliché incarnate.  Granted, he does famously start our film as a corpse floating in face-down in a pool and that’s a pretty good jumping off point for any movie, but beyond that the guy is pretty much a bore.  Perhaps he was written so blank so that the audience can easily insert themselves into Gillis in order to properly experience Desmond in all her pathetic glory through his eyes.  Either way, as the dead man told his tale, I found myself impatient for the part where he goes for that final, bullet-riddled swim.

Most Memorable Scene

As the film was drawing to its close, I began thinking of several key moments that had the potential to stick with me the most and be recognized in this part of my entry.  Then came the closing minute, which not only features what is easily the most famous line of the film but also gives us the inevitable completion to Desmond’s psychological collapse.  She looks straight at us – that audience she and only she has been aware of all along – as horrifically mesmerizing as Medusa.  She leers at us, lures us, and scoffs at us in a matter of seconds and we’re reminded of an earlier line in the film, “We didn’t need dialogue.  We had faces!”  Then, stepping even closer until we have nothing to look at but her, she utters those final, unsettling words, “All right, Mr. DeMille, I’m ready for my close-up.”  With that, we know now there is no escape from the madness; not for Desmond and not for ourselves.

My Rating: 4.5 out of 5

HIS GIRL FRIDAY (1940)

Country: U.S.A.

Genre(s): Comedy

Director: Howard Hawks

Cast: Rosalind Russell / Cary Grant / Ralph Bellamy

Plot

After months abroad, star reporter Hildy Johnson returns to the Morning Post office and editor Walter Burns, who also happens to be her ex-husband, to announce her engagement and intent to live as a suburban housewife.  Walter subsequently uses all of his considerable connections and guile to lure Johnson back into the newspaper game.

What I Liked

“His Girl Friday” is a mainstream screwball comedy with a subversive tinge that adds to its continued appeal.  Typewriter-like rat-a-tat-tat banter between tough-talking urbanites of the opposing sexes is, above all else, the trademark of screwball comedy and there is perhaps more of that here than in any other example of the subgenre that I’ve ever seen.  Reporters Johnson (Rosalind Russell) and Burns (Cary Grant), along with the rest of their hard-boiled ilk, fire off one liners as fast as is humanly possible.  However, if one is able to concentrate hard enough to get beyond the tough talking dialogue, one finds comedy of a different kind: satire. 

The filmmakers did a decent job of constructing a not-so-thinly veiled send-up of the rampant political corruption in local New York politics, with virtually every civic authority presented as a combination of bumbling, pompous, and crooked in varying degrees, depending on the character.  Reference to political figures and problems of the era from the local (ward politicians) to the international (Hitler) are peppered through the dialogue and are strongly present in the sub-plot of a condemned man about to hang in order to serve the aspirations of a political machine as election day draws near.

There is also a much subtler twinge of sexual politics in the film.  “His Girl Friday” has been referred to by some as a feminist film; this exaggerates the case a bit.  Hildy Johnson, despite being a career woman, has clearly never been more than the titular “Girl Friday” to her boss, who also happens to have been her husband until recently.  Though she does spends much of the film operating on her own, in her life overall she seems unable to function without a man guiding her ambitions.  Still, compared to most female film characters of the day, Hildy is certainly a progressive woman.  Temporarily lured by the social pressure to conform to society’s dictation that she must be a married mother serving a dull husband in a safe career, she eventually realizes this is not who she is, nor who she wants to be, and returns to her true passion, being a “newspaper man.”  There are also a few jokes referring to the liberal-minded woman enjoying pre-marital romps with men.  They're uttered so quickly that they pass almost without notice.  But if you pay attention they're there.

What I Didn’t Like

Despite these leanings to social commentary, all in all “His Girl Friday” is a disappointingly typical comedy for its period.  There is nothing original nor dazzlingly entertaining here.  The plot and dialogue trudge out many of the same old comedy-of-the-sexes clichés we’re used to from other films of the era and does very little new with those dynamics.  Many have praised Russell and Grant for their performances but honestly, while a certain comradery did come across, I felt no sexual tension between the pair and really felt like both just phoned in their performances.  They memorized their lines and shouted them out over each other as fast as they could.  Grant makes a few funny faces, Russell rolls her eyes.  That’s about the extent of it.

Most Memorable Scene

The best scene of the film had neither the film’s leading man or leading lady in it at all.  It actually opens with the Sheriff and Mayor plotting their next move with an impending scandal about to hit just before the election.  Veteran character actor Billy Gilbert enters through a door steals the scene while playing a dim-witted runner for the Governor.  The efforts of the Mayor to subsequently corrupt the unwitting Gilbert’s character, Mr. Pettibone, into betraying the Governor and aiding the local political machine are hilariously futile as Pettibone is simply too oblivious to be anything but honest.  The satire is poignant, the absurdity hilarious, and Gilbert gets the more laughs than everyone else in the film combined.

My Rating: 3.5 out 5

THE MAN WITH A MOVIE CAMERA (1929)

A.K.A.: Chelovek s kino-apparatom

Country: U.S.S.R.

Genre(s): Art Film / Documentary / Propaganda

Director: Dziga Vertov

Cast: Mikhail  Kaufman

Plot

There is no plot to speak of in this film.  It is primarily a collection of candid moments from the lives of everyday people in the Soviet Union of the period.

What I Liked

Having read that this film was mostly an aesthetic and political statement by its makers without a storyline of any kind, I have deliberately avoided watching this film for a while, figuring I would find it dated, pretentious, and boring.  However, while watching it, I was surprised how well this film kept my attention.  Thrilling, it wasn’t.  Yet two elements kept the film at the very least watchable and at times even interesting. 

First, the movie documents the typical minutiae of daily life nearly a century ago, capturing real people in private and everyday moments that would otherwise be ignored by most artists, storytellers, and filmmakers.  Thus it is a compelling and gorgeous historical document of the ways in which people from that time in place lived differently from today, and also the ways in which they were very much the same.  At the movie’s outset, the title cards express the filmmakers’ goal of establishing the cinema as a universal human language.  To do so, they showed the world how beautiful human beings, particularly the working class, were in both their day-to-day activities, their physical forms, and their industrial endeavors.  The filmmakers succeeded surprisingly well in their goal, considering that that beauty remains visible 87 years after it was first put to celluloid.

The second way in which the film remains interesting was through its technical achievements.  This film is as much a tribute to film and filmmakers as it is to mankind in general.  Thus director Dziga Vertov and his wife/editor Elizaveta Svilova assembled pretty much every special effect and technical approach in existence to that point in motion picture history: stop-motion photography, time lapse, double exposure, freeze frame, split screen, and so on.  It must have been pretty astonishing stuff for audiences of the day.  Even today, a first time viewer won’t know what to expect next from one moment to another, even if we are familiar with all of the techniques involved.  Svilova edited the film so that scenes that otherwise seem completely unrelated are juxtaposed against one another in ways that emphasize their hidden similarities.  That the cutting back and forth between these images happens at a frenetic pace helps keep the eye busy, preventing boredom, and really predicting (maybe even influencing?) the more recent filmmaking techniques of men like Guy Ritchie or Darren Aronofsky.

What I Disliked

Even after taking all of the above into consideration, “The Man with a Movie Camera” really was nothing more than a curiosity from a bygone era for me.  Nothing about the movie really moved me emotionally, nor did it provide any significant intellectual revelation.  It certainly didn’t approach anything resembling entertainment, either.  All in all, while I can respect what the filmmakers accomplished, it doesn’t mean I’ll be watching this movie a second time.

Most Memorable Scene

Because this film lacked any conventional scenes or plot structure, it is impossible to describe a scene that sticks out the most.

My Rating: 3 out of 5

GLADIATOR (2000)

Country: U.S.A. / U.K.

Genre(s): Action / Adventure / Epic

Director: Ridley Scott

Cast: Russell Crowe / Joaquin Phoenix / Connie Nielsen

Plot

Maximus, General of Ancient Rome, is betrayed by the newly crowned Emperor Commodus, who murders his family and forces him into hiding.  Living as a slave and then as a gladiator, Maximus returns to Rome to exact vengeance.

What I Liked

The emperors of Ancient Rome liked to keep the masses placated with mindless bloodshed in the various arenas throughout their Empire.  Inevitably, as time passed, the emperors would have to continually top themselves and each other in decorating this bloodshed with increasingly lavish productions, replete with sets, live animals, mock sea battles, and –of course- more and more bloodshed, so as to prevent the audiences from growing desensitized and bored.  In some ways, “Gladiator” can be said to be a worthy product of that tradition as it has continued through the millennia to today’s popular cinema.  It is nothing, if not a two and a half hour visual spectacle with monumental production values.

I chose the word “monumental” because the plentiful set pieces and visual effects continue to be convincing and dazzling, despite the rapid advancements of filmmaking technology which have produced increasingly jaded audiences over these past fifteen years.  From the cinematography of the early scenes documenting Maximus’ escape from Commodus’ forces to his time as a slave in a far off land, along with the magnificent CGI effects that revive the awe of Ancient Rome, remain as gorgeous as they are convincing.

What I Didn’t Like

[Ancient Rome is probably my favorite period of world history and I’ve done my fair share of reading no the subject, but I’m going to resist the temptation to point out all of this movie’s historical flaws, out of respect for creative license and recognizing that it is a work of historic fiction.]

The marvelous display serves as a terrific distraction from what are ultimately generic characters populating a bare-bones story.  Our good guy, wronged in the worst way and fighting his way up form nothing, is the ultimate underdog who, armed with nothing but his manly stoicism and brute force, triumphs (spoiler?) over a suitably whiny and effeminate bad guy.  Actors Russell Crowe and Joaquin Phoenix are at least suitable in their bare-bones roles as good guy and bad guy, respectively.  It could even be argued that an escapist epic like this shouldn’t bother with moral complexities or underlying themes about society, power, or life; yet it is still obvious that the filmmakers didn’t put half the attention to detail into writing their movie that they did into actually producing it.

Ultimately, “Gladiator” failed to pull at my heart-strings or inspire me in even the slightest way.  This was the second time I’ve seen the movie and I admit I was still thoroughly impressed by the majesty of its visuals, but on an emotional level I was completely unmoved.  This film was a mega-hit upon its release, but today I don’t really hear many people talking about this one when the topic of great movies comes up anymore.  I think that’s because, while it’s certainly worth seeing at least once for the sheer visual power, a second viewing is entirely unnecessary because there is very little to enjoy once one gets over the “wow” of the initial spectacle.

Most Memorable Scene

For a lot of people I’m sure that the multiple scenes of gladiatorial combat that takes place in the second half of the movie are the most memorable, which makes sense, considering the title, as well as the fact that these scenes amount to the dramatic climax of the films plot.  Not to mention the sheer scope of what the filmmakers accomplished technically in pulling those scenes off.  They are truly technical masterpieces.

However, when I think of “Gladiator,” the scene that most often comes to mind is the moments preceding the opening battle between the Roman legions, with Maximus at the fore, and the enemy barbarians.  I’ve been thinking about why that is and haven’t yet come up with a satisfactory answer, but it’s the truth.  Those moments with Maximus and his men preparing for battle just stand out and maybe that’s all there is to it.  There’s not another moment in the rest of the two-and-a-half hours that makes use of silence and suspense over pomp and violence.

My Rating: 3 out of 5

FREEDOM FOR US (1931)

A.K.A.: A Nous la Liberte

Country: France

Genre(s): Comedy / Musical

Director: Rene Clair

Cast: Raymond Cordy / Henri Marchand / Rolla France

Plot

Two prison cellmates, Emile and Louis, attempt an escape, but only Emile makes his way out.  Emile hides his past and, over the next several years, becomes a wealthy industrialist. Once Louis finally gets out, the pair are reunited and Emile must find a way to help his destitute friend without revealing his own true identity.

What I Liked

Few comedies that I am aware of have dared display as much political and social satire so blatantly as does “Freedom For Us.”  With an obviously Leftist bent, director Rene Clair manages to parody or lampoon pretty much the entirety of capitalist society in ways that can still have meaning for a twenty-first century viewer.  Many hot button topics of today, such as a for-profit prison system or the detachment of politicians from the problems of everyday people, have analogs within this film made more than eighty years ago.

Made at the dawn of the sound era, “Freedom For Us” also has an distinctive feel that originated from director Clair’s experimenting with what audiences wanted from – and what was possible in - “talkies.”  For example, where today natural sounds would be used in a film for things like the blowing of wind or the buzzing of a factory assembly line, Clair chose to use sound effects created from musical instruments as part of Georges Auric’s almost constant musical score.

Speaking of the music, there is so much of it in this film that one could conceivably label it a musical.  Typically, the musical isn’t my favorite film genre, but this one gets bonus points for Clair and Auric’s choice to use the music to add the satire.  For example, in the very opening scene, we’re treated to images of flowers and, in the background the voices of men singing about the virtues and pleasures of liberty.  It’s only when the camera pulls back that we realize that we’re watching those same men assemble fake flowers in a prison workshop.  They all wear the same convict’s uniform and sing their song as armed guards patrol around them.  Musical made ironic social commentary.

What I Didn’t Like

For the most part, the physical comedy of the movie falls flat today, which is a shame since it makes up most of the film’s plot and because in truth the film was far ahead of its time and highly influential for its heavily choreographed physical comedy sequences.  Members of the crew would later go on to sue Charlie Chaplin for cribbing from this film for his film “The Great Dictator.”  Fans of “I Love Lucy” and the “Benny Hill Show” will also recognize familiar elements of those shows in some of the movie’s moments.  The problem is, most of us have already gotten our belly laughs for these scenes from the latter rip-off versions, and thus “Freedom For Us” – the originator of so much of that comedy – seems like the tired, derivative knock off.  Factual or not, that’s how it feels and thus I never did let out an actual laugh through the entire course of the hour-and-a-half film.  To the film’s credit though, it remains entertaining and interesting throughout, even without the laughs.

Most Memorable Scene

One of the most obvious moments of social criticism from the film comes when the long-suffering Louis finally makes it out of the meaningless work, conformity, and oppression of the prison to fall right into the meaningless work, conformity, and oppression of the capitalist factory in the same very day.  It was a powerful, risky statement to make in an era before big corporations got their hands on the film industry and made an effort to shut out any controversy in an attempt to make products more palatable for the public.

The scene also works because it’s one of the genuinely funniest moments from the film as Louis, with the most simplistic training possible, is given a seat on an assembly line where he is expected to put a single piece into each phonograph that passes by.  When a supervisor distracts him and a phonograph gets by him, we are able to witness the birth of a classic comedy scenario that will be familiar to fans of both Charlie Chaplin and Lucile Ball.

My Rating: 4 out of 5

BLACK SUNDAY (1960)

A.K.A.: La Maschera Del Domonio / The Mask of Satan / Revenge of the Vampire

Country: Italy

Genre(s): Horror

Director: Mario Bava

Cast: Barbara Steele / John Richardson / Andrea Checchi

Plot

Executed as a witch in the seventeenth century, the female vampire Asa returns to life two hundred years later to wreak vengeance on her royal descendants.

What I Liked

“Black Sunday” is in many ways a triumph of style over substance.  The story itself isn’t particularly creative, the script even less so, and the acting is mediocre at best.  Yet this movie is regarded today as a landmark of the horror genre.  That reputation is in large part due to the talents of director Mario Bava, who made his official directorial debut on “Black Sunday” (though he had in fact done some uncredited directorial work on a couple of films in 1959).  Prior to this project, Bava had made his reputation as a respected cinematographer and it is eye for visual flair that truly allows “Black Sunday” to triumph over its other faults.  The camera is often floating and prowling through a scene like an unseen ghost, the movement keeping the viewer’s eyes entertained while also adding an eeriness to the mood of several scenes.  The movie’s gothic setting may not be anything original, but the filmmakers overcame a modest budget to bring a sumptuous darkness to the film, particularly on the exterior landscapes and forest scenes.

Speaking of sumptuous, Bava’s accomplishments are nearly overshadowed by strange eroticism of lead actress Barbara Steele.  With her raven hair, cat-like eyes, and curvaceous physique, the twenty-two-year-old Steele is easily the most memorable aspect of the film.  She makes the most of her first starring role (really dual roles) by turning the relatively one-dimensional villainous Asa into the focal point of the film’s sex appeal, even if she less convincing as the vampire’s virginal descendant Katia.

Though traditional in plot, “Black Sunday” proved influential on the changes to come in the horror genre.  First of all, Steele’s presence made the film about as sexy as horror got in those days, a dynamic that would be increasingly explore in the years to come.  Also, the films emphasis on gothic themes harkened back to the classic Universal pictures of the 1930s and 1940s, such as “Dracula” and “The Wolf Man.”  Though hardly new ground, one imagines the film's success at mining these classic elements paved the way for the plethora of B-movies to come over the next decade from filmmakers like Roger Corman (“The Pit and the Pendulum” and “The Raven, for example). Most importantly, the film’s explicit gore led it to become one of the most censored movies of the era.  The torture devices, shooting blood, and melting faces will seem quaint to the twenty-first century viewer, but in 1960, were deemed too much for audiences in America to handle; the production company voluntarily cut out its more gruesome scenes.  In Britain the film was completely banned for years.  In hindsight, “Black Sunday” can be seen as paving the way for the more violent horror to come in the 1960s and beyond, for better or worse.

What I Didn’t Like

Despite what I said above about Bava’s making the most of a modest budget through production values, there are several moments where a limited budget was clearly a detriment.  Early in the film, a man is attacked by a giant bat, which we see mostly as a shadow on the wall, presumably because the filmmaker’s couldn’t afford a convincing effect.  As the attack is meant as a gratuitous thrill and has no bearing on the plot itself, one wonders why the filmmakers chose to keep the scene in or didn’t chose to go with a different, more affordable scare.

Most disappointing of course are the limitations of the story and script, also mentioned above.  There is really nothing about the plot or dialogue that is the least bit compelling.  Without Bava and Steele as participants, “Black Sunday” would have been forgotten years ago.

Most Memorable Scene

The film’s notoriously graphic opening scene, where Asa is condemned to death by her brother back in the 1600s is without a doubt the most infamous moment of the film.  Not just the film’s director, but the screenwriter as well, Bava mixes shock value, real suspense, and a little bit of sexualized torture into an opening that doubtless sent some of the more sensitive filmgoers of the 1960s running for the doors.

My Rating: 3.5 out of 5