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Please Murder Me!(1956)
A lawyer's quest for justice to the bitter end
The plot of this film is so ingenious that we just have to give it a full ten points score, no matter how poor the direction is and in spite of the very closed in settings, mostly in just one office without windows and a desk, and with very few actors. But they are the more excellent for being so sparse. Raymond Burr makes a heavy-weight impression as an actor here in a very restricted frame, Angela Lansbury makes herself as abominable as ever, and the few other actors pay honest contributions to the extremely sophisticated drama. The lead here is without doubt the script. The characters seem perfectly honest to begin with, the love relationships are quite sincere, as the lawyer Raymond Burr even keeps them diplomatically convincing in the honest efforts of everyone to make everything turn out for the best for everyone. But nothing is more complicated than relationships, and they all three will have to face that fact with bitter consequences.
La vita ricomincia(1945)
The necessity to rebuild what has been lost and ruined
It's a rather typical post war melodrama but well made to propel the desired effects of great compassion and humanity. Her husband is lost in the war for six years and then comes home to find everything still intact, his family, his home, everything, but his wife Alida Valli has some second thoughts and a secret, and he can't guess anything about it, he doesn't even suspect any second story. And then suddenly one evening when she doesn't come home as she always used to, he learns that she is in prison for a homicide. He can't believe it. She confesses the whole story herself in full frankness to him, their tender son had a dangerous illness, and she had not money enough to pay for a necessary operation. So she accepted the only help she could get, which was to sell her body to someone who could manage all the expenses, and after the war he came back to her to force some extortion. So she had to kill him, and naturally the case was brought to court. The last word comes from an old faithful friend of the family, Eduardo de Filippo, who delivers a finer speech than any attorney of the court. Naturally all Italian hearts must melt to this eloquent exhibition of humanity, and the film was a great success, ensuring the confirmed continuation of Alida Valli's interesting and intriguing career.
A Taste of Evil(1971)
"Why didn't you die?"
Barbara Stanwyck still going strong at 64 makes a great impression here, haunting her own house in search for phantoms or intruders or whatever in a flaming red dress in the darkness, where someone constantly switches off the electricity. The story makes a cheap impression to begin with, a young girl gets ravaged and hospitalized but returns as an adult to deal with her ghosts, which she on the spot feels still are haunting her, or is someone playing cruel tricks with her? It looks constantly worse as she and others eventually bring our their rifles to shoot at whoever appears from nowhere as a disturbing nuisance, never worrying about who it might be, so they just shoot anyone, with consequences. The plot gets muddled, but Barbara Stanwyck is still alive in the end and so are her victims, even those she thought she had killed. Roddy MacDowell makes the only decent part except Barbara Parkins with her dolls, and eventually the whole situation is saved, with the right person finally getting taken care of. Without Barbara Stanwyck my rate would have been lower.
Cry Vengeance(1954)
Scarface in Alaska
This is surprisingly good for being a very hardcore B-feature of ferociously hardboiled cops and criminals, ex-cops and ex-criminals, who none of them have forgotten anything, as they all suffer from too good a memory. When one of them gets out of jail after three years after having been framed and has his wife and child killed, all the surviving crooks start to get nervous, for they know that this framed ex-cop with a murdered family will not be trifled with, although all his friends try to persuade him to leave things alone. That's the last thing he can do. He believes a certain Tino Morelli to be chief responsible for his life's tragedy, but this Tino is long since gone and escaped to Alaska, so the Scarface goes to Alaska. The real villain eventually proves to be someone else, though, and that character, played by Skip Homeier, is one of the nastiest characters ever created for the screen. Every time he shows up on the screen you just want to blow up in fury over his accomplished evil. Mark Stevens makes one of his most interesting and intriguing roles ever as the ex-cop and scarface with a ruined life, and the film is far above the level of any B-feature. It is also interesting to get familiar with the Alaskan environment out in the Aleutians, and the music is perfectly well sustained all through the film.
Imbarco a mezzanotte(1952)
Odd man out in Livorno
This is a unique film in many aspects. It is all Italian neorealism with an all Italian acting crew and filmed on location in Livorno after the war in the aftermath of the war with everything in ruins which only the small boys are at home in and can find their way in. But the director is an American, it is perhaps the oddest film by Joseph Losey, and the hunted man at large is Paul Muni perhaps also in his most unusual role, as a poor hungry man just looking for some bread and to get away by a ship. He happens to a small boy, they try to make it together, but justice is blind and after him, in the long run he has no chance, but the boy gets to understand him and actually pleads for him in the end. It is a very moving and human film, Paul Muni's sad looks and tired eyes could make anyone's heart melt, he is always excellent whatever kind of role he plays, and he had a great register, perhaps one of the greatest for an actor in Hollywood. It is a step down from Vittorio de Sica, it is more painful in depth and misery, but it is totally convincing. And all the Italian actors are perfect.
Thief of Damascus(1952)
Hollywood at its best in oriental swashbuckler shining with splendour
Everything is splendid in this sumptuous oriental adventure, built on all kinds of loose ends of Arabian nights with the action located in Persia in the 7th century. Paul Henreid is the hero, the general who gets defeated and dishonoured but who works his way back in glory, surrounded by three wonderful oriental ladies. There is a great musical score by John Leipold which underlines the extravagant phantasmagoria character, but the script is the best of all, brilliantly conceived with exquisite dialog all the way spiced with wonderful strokes of good and witty humour, and I don't think I have ever seen Paul Henreid this good. Lon Chaney Jr plays the joker Sinbad with Aladdin for a helpmate, it's all like a paraphrase of Michael Powell's "The Thief of Bagdad" two years earlier, and everything here reminds you of Michael Powell and his magic. It's the same vein, not equally sophisticated, but well enough to stand up for a good second. This film is a joy all through, and you will gladly return to it one day.
In the French Style(1963)
You have never seen Jean Seberg like this before
She was a very gifted actress, discovered by Otto Preminger and made all kinds of roles, from Saint Joan to a gangster bride of Jean-Paul Belmondo in Jean-Luc Godard's major debut "A bout de souffle" and with Peter Sellers in one of his best comedies, her second marriage was with Roman Gary, who after her death by suicide at 40 blamed the FBI for it for having hounded her by spreading false rumours, but as an actress she was always outstanding. This is a totally different kind of film. Her character and performance here reminds you of Audrey Hepburn in her very subtle and sensitive, and vulnerable style, and the story is a romantic melodrama about love relationships in Paris, and you must regret that Stanley Baker, always excellent in his crude way, didn't get her. It is a wonderful suave and rather melancholy film like a novelletta, and the music is exquisite.
The Master Plan(1954)
The face of my enemy
More often than not there are minor obscure films without film stars but with long forgotten actors who act better than any established film star. This film is one of them, an early espionage thriller far ahead of its time including no dashing spies but some very beautiful young French ladies, one of them being sharper than anyone could suspect, least of all his fiancé who is about to marry her. How is it that the leading men in so many thrillers never think of the old cliché phrase "cherchez la femme", while they constantly get trapped in that notoriously common pitfall. Here an American veteran is engaged for a routine job in a security office with branches in Rome and Vienna, and all he has to do is to study some files, but one night in Vienna he gets into trouble which he can't get out of, as he is taken advantage of in a brutal way by foreign agents who are interested in the files he is investigating. He is surrounded by three beautiful young girls, one is his secretary who in spite of certain callousness proves reliable indeed, and then there is his employer's girl friend and her equally charming friend. When misfortune strikes they are honestly concerned, but it is a very tricky intrigue where nothing becomes evident until in the end, and the matter is dealt with delicately in spite of all. It is almost better than John le Carré. Norman Wooland makes an excellent performance as Wayne Morris' employer, and the girls are all wonderfully charming. The intrigue is surreptitiously clever in all its crafty deceitfulness, so you must admire the author of the play.
Black Hand(1950)
Settling with the mafia of 1900
Although basically an Irishman with Irish parents, Gene Kelly succeeds very well in making a convincing Italian character. It is a great story in which Kelly gets plenty of opportunities to excel in his acrobatics (bur no dancing here!) as he generally insisted on doing his own stunts. Little Italy in New York, in which more Italians lived than in Rome around 1900, is very well recreated with excellent cinematography and photography and comes alive, in all its primitive conditions and circumstances but with the mob no less vicious and insidious than in later Godfather days; and the thriller created is as good a match as any to later New York gangster films. Teresa Celli is even more convincing as the Italian lady of the film, and all other characters are also absolutely right, especially J. Carrol Laish as the intrepid policeman ending up a martyr for not being too careful. The music by Alberto Colombo is also perfect, but I think the prize goes to Paul Vogel for the almost expressive photography.
The Brotherhood of the Bell(1970)
What if paranoia isn't just a delusion?
In one of his last speeches president Kennedy warned against secret societies, and not long afterwards he was assassinated. That naturally triggered a jungle of conspiracy theories without an end which still are flourishing. There are any amount of secret societies all over the world, and one of their chief characteristics is that they thrive on their secrecy - they are afraid of being noticed and revealed, so they go at any lengths to just keep their masks on. This film tries to settle with the nature of one of these secret societies, and although as a thriller it is much exaggerated, Glenn Ford overdoing it as usual, it succeeds very well in pinpointing the menace against society and any people that these secret societies more often than not present, usually under cover and as invisibly as possible. Glenn Ford is perfect for the role of a whistle-blower with desperate integrity, who is prepared to go against all society to expose an infernal racket. If you forbear with the exaggerations, the temperamental outbursts, the momentary hysteria and other unnecessary instances of losing control, it is a good thriller indeed which does make you think, which certainly was the intention.
Dial 1119(1950)
"It is obvious that you have a problem."
A failure of a wannabe soldier who was rejected as unsuitable for the war goes berserk instead and kills anyone who annoys him. He ends up in a bar where he takes all the guests for hostages. His psychiatrist nevertheless still believes he could talk some sense to him and takes action to do so, opposing the advice of the police who know better. The music of Andre Previn adds to the general tension of the drama, which is brilliant in sustaining the steadily increasing tension all the way through. It's a great thriller on a small scale, the script and the psychology is perfect and more than convincing in absolute realism, and the actors all contribute well with splendid performances, especially Andrea King as the perfect professional barfly and of course Marshall Thompson as the mad killer. This is another of those many perfect noirs from around 1950.
Sons and Lovers(1960)
Into the pit of D.H.Lawrence's dreary reality
The problem of this film is to determine who makes the best acting performance. They are all so supremely good that none can be preferred to the other and no one can be found with anything lacking. Wendy Hiller and Dean Stockwell have to come first though, the mother and the son, naturally dependent on each other, which both actors convey more than convincingly. They say it's difficult for great actors to act minor and commonplace roles, but here they are all succeeding with that very feat. Trevor Howard as the father miner is as abominably vulgar as any working class tyrant of a father ever could be, and poor Miriam (Heather Sears) couldn't be more natural in humble simplicity. Mary Ure is the one character sticking out as of a higher level. A striking performance in only two scenes is delivered by Rosalie Crutchley, adding an extra stamp to the humdrum drama. Mario Nascimbene adds the only instance of beauty to the film by a wonderful score. I never liked D. H. Lawrence for his revolting commonness, he appears not at all to have been any sympathetic character either, but this film honours him although he might not have deserved it.
River's End(1940)
A spectacular mountie adventure in Canada
This was one of James Oliver Curwood's best stories, and I was greatly and positively surprised that Warner Brothers had made a film on it. Naturally the action is much altered, they always do that in America, but the main intrigue is there and made convincing enough. You miss the Chinaman though, who plays a most important part in the novel, and who is here replaced by more ordinary standard crooks. But the film is well made, there are quite a few breath-taking chases by cart and on horseback and a wonderful extensive saloon fight breaking all the premises down to cinders, as Hollywood is prone to do with a vengeance, the actors are also rather ordinary, but there is nothing wrong with the action and the tempo - you will never be able to relax. They could have made a better film on such a terrific intrigue, but maybe someone else will do that later on, discovering the potentials of the book more thoroughly.
Kim(1950)
The great spying game of India in the 1880s
On a good story you can only make a good film. This is one of Kipling's best stories and as far as I know the only one in which he treats the famous "great game!" of colonial competition between Britain and Russia. Dean Stockwell is wonderful as Kim, Errol Flynn is supreme as Mahbub Ali, a role that suited him perfectly, but the finest performance is that by Paul Lukas as the Lama. He is totally convincing in his fine subtlety and will bring out copious compassion not just from Kim himself, and even the Russians are quite convincing as they actually speak Russian. The 1984 film with Peter O'Toole as the Lama and Bryan Brown as Mahbub Ali is even better, but this early version is quite apt as a precursor and study for the great 1984 film. Kim is the ideal hero for boys and any adventurous minded romantic, and the story like the films will endure for ages.
Show Boat(1951)
Backstage of a showboat, telling the other story
This is a feast for the eyes but also for any music lover as one of the best musicals ever made and filmed with marvellous artists all the way without any exception, while the story reveals hidden and tragic depths. It's not just about the show boat and its glory with all its brilliant entertainments, but actually more about the individual fates connected with it. The crown of the acting goes to Ava Gardner the leading actress of the show boat who gets discarded because of racial laws down the Mississippi and who then hits the bottle and never manages to get over her ruin. Her transformation from a sparkling primadonna to a fallen alcoholic is heart-rending in its convincing realism, and in her downfall she even manages to bring out her invicible negroid features, which endorses her tragedy. This must be one of her best performances. But everyone is outstandingly excellent, while Jerome Kern's music remains universally irresistible, wonderfully enhanced by Oscar Hammerstein's excellent lyrics...
Strogoff(1970)
Another ordeal for Michael Strogoff
This is another Italian version of Jules Verne's most dramatic novel 14 years after the great spectacular one of 1956 with Curd Jurgens as Strogoff. This version is more modest and more intimate and personal, but it has tampered a considerable deal with the original novel, without making the story better, rather the contrary, as is usually the case. However it begins interesting enough with the career of Ivan Ogareff, explaining why he became a rebel and traitor, and it is a stroke of ingenuity to make him quite handsome, actually vying with the good looks of John Philip Law as Strogoff, who all the same is better and more convincing as Strogoff than the bulky Curd Jurgens in the earlier version. This is less spectacular, but it nevertheless has some grand cavalry and battle scenes, although they come late at the battle of Irkutsk fought outside the city, ignoring all Jules Verne's intrigues inside the city. It is not a better version than the previous one, but they complement each other, and Mimsy Farmer makes a great performance as a more complex character of Nadia. Also here the music is beautiful, but the older version remains more impressive for its more spectacular preferences.
Michel Strogoff(1956)
The Italian version of Jules Verne's most dramatic novel
I was curious about this Italian version of Jules Verne's most dramatic novel to see how much they would have butchered it. Surprisedly they had kept the main plot rather untouched with just a few additions and simplifications: all the major dramatic moments of the novel have been whisked away of course, but Curd Jurgens is not unconvincing as the imperial courier although perhaps a little overdone: the role would have suited Cornel Wilde better. The main addition is the love story with Genevieve Page as Nadia, and the important role of Nikolay as the driver is completely done away with. The main assets of the film are the great mass scenes, especially those with the cavalry, this was actually Jules Verne's only war novel, and the war element has been well taken care of in this film. Jules Verne would not have been displeased but not very pleased either.
The Romance of Rosy Ridge(1947)
The little school of the small people in the prairie
Through the entire film you sit waiting for the moment when Thomas Mitchell as the hopelessly stone-hard father has to melt, you know the moment has to come, but it certainly looks sitting stuck hard after the civil war and both sides being still relentlessly hating each other ready to go at any length and even applying force to express their inhuman hatred. Well in the end it does not matter on which side you fought, humanity is always there waiting to definitely overcome you, and so the message of the film becomes universal. Van Johnson is always good, here he is partnered by Janet Leigh in her first role, and he couldn't have found a better partner. Thomas Mitchell is always reliable and impressive, and here for once he does not resort to drinking. It's a wonderful story by McKinley Kantor, who also wrote "The Best Years of Our Lives" among other great stories filmed with success, and the acting is perfect and natural all the way. The musical ingredients add considerable charm to the film and lifts it up to a degree of splendour.
Deep Waters(1948)
Once you have a close relationship with the sea nothing can keep you away from it
His uncle and father were both fishermen lost at sea, so without parents the boy is taken care of by the authorities, but the problem is he keeps running away from every institution that tries to help him. But he is always given another chance. He was finally entrusted to the care of Ann Peters engaged by the welfare state, who recently broke off her engagement with a lobster man, Dana Andrews, because of his dangerous profession with so many casualties at sea. She does not want the boy to get lost at sea himself, so she does everything to keep him off the sea. But the lobster man and his partner Cesar Romero and their fishing activities pose too strong an attraction to him, so he runs off to sea again and is always lost in a storm. Ann Revere as manager of the household for the boy and Jean Peters plays an important part here and does it magnificently. There is also Ed Begley in a wonderful minor part helping this company to come right, and the ending is just a perfect release of affections that have been sore tried. This is one of Henry King's best films and one of his least known ones, and although being basically out of the element here he manages the affair perfectly.
Tank Force!(1958)
Battling tanks and Germans in the Libyan desert
A friend of mine was surprised once to find Robert Ryan, who usually appeared in cowboy films and sinister noirs, acting as John the Baptist in a Hollywood Jesus film, and here is another example of the same kind: Victor Mature familiar in many cowboy roles, like Doc Holliday in the best Wyatt Earp fim, and in many gangster films, both as cop and gangster veteran and victim, here playing around with bedouins in the Libyan desert och robbing tanks from the Germans in the Second World War, but consistently still wearing his American cowboy scarf wnich never seems to get dusty or dirty no matter what tremendous ordeals he gets through by dusty sand storms and blazing tank battles constantly exploding into balls of fire, and so the original títle of the fim, "No Time to Die" is the only appropriate one. Leo Genn makes a fine appearance as usual, and young Anthony Newley adds some good spirits to the occasion. Terence Young always wrote excellent scripts, this an example confirming the rule, and his direction is as apt as in any of his James Bond movies. In brief, it is a great war desert adventure, there is even a short romance, and fortunately at least someone survived.
Obsession(1949)
"Every murderer is an amateur"
Robert Newton was an expert at grisly roles, but here he is particularly grisly as an accomplished doctor who meticulously contrives a perfect plan and scheme to do away with his wife's lover, an American. There is something that goes wrong in every crime, and here you wait patiently for the loose stone that will make the tower crash down. The doctor finally realises his mistake and takes it easy, sitting cozily in his club waiting for the superintendent to come and take him away, and the superintendent who is all the way quite aware of the expertise of the criminal mind he is dealing with is an absolute paragon of the stiff upper lip of the accomplished stoic who just will have to take it easy and wait for the criminal's mistake, which is sure to come, although the doctor never reckoned with a small nice dog importuning and causing a most unexpected upset to his plans, while at the same time he commits the usual blunder of underestimating his victim's qualities. It is a dreadfully nasty drama but dressed up in perfect politeness all the way, they are all perfect gentlemen, and they know how to control themselves to perfection, only the American making occasional desperate outbursts, which is only natural. Edward Dmytryk is another expert handling this claustrophobic case with perfect equilibrium, and no one loses his mind, while the dog is the unintentional hero.
Undercover Girl(1950)
Doing anything to get her father's murderer
This is a highly unpleasant and nasty noir dealing with the very bottom end of dirty business and criminal rackets, the drug business manufactured and delivered through the respectable front of a doctor, while his gang of hoodlums, gangsters, murderers and inhuman racketeers is one of the worst possible conceivable rogues gallery, one constantly growing more desperate in fear and anxiety (Royal Dano) while the scariest is the bulky thug with a broken neck. They are really monsters all of them, while stepping down to them and standing out of the film with glory is Alexis Smith, always stylish and making a magnificent appearance, here also dressed up extra in the stola and luxury wardrobe of the dame she acts to personify in order to get at the gang and especially her father's murderer. It is one of the most revolting noirs for its abhorrent story but magnificently worked out and made real in nerve-racking realism, while once again you will never forget Alexis Smith.
Terror Among Us(1981)
The laundry man at large
This is an extremely well crafted film, and Hitchcock couldn't have made a better job of it. The great issue here is the problem of knowing your criminal more than well and still being obliged to let him go because of his minor offence being so trivial and petty that justice cannot put him for it, so he is free to carry on which he does with a vengeance, leading to unheard of consequences which no one could imagine. The character of the film, carefully building up to an explosive finale, is almost quite a documentary, keeping intimately close to the criminal all the way making him totally psychologically and logically credible, so this is actually a very realistic film. Ted Shackelford makes a wonder of a convincing character, and so does Don Meredith as the sergeant, who all the way has to tread with extreme caution not to cross the line of the law, although that actually will trigger the catastrophe. It's a great film in a small frame, and whoever sees it will not be likely to forget it.
The Stranglers of Bombay(1959)
The British did not always do too bad in India
It is unavoidable to compare this film of the Thuggee sect with the other one 30 years later with Pierce Brosnan as the hero ( "The Deceivers" of 1988) on the second novel by John Masters, that is a greater story and filmed in colour, this is in black-and-white but actually more efficient without colours and getting closer to the overwhelmingly shocking reality of the matter. Guy Rolfe is more natural and convincing as an ordinary honest Englishman suspecting something fishy going on about all those people disappearing into nowhere, while Pierce Brosnan dashing in flying colours is more the Hollywood James Bond type. This is more like a genuine documentary without any romanticising, and the strictness of the realism brings out the full horror of the actual organised murder of one million people by stealth covered by absolute obligatory silence, which makes Indiana Jones and his temple of doom appear like a distorted adventure caricature. Guy Rolfe is always good and makes a strong impression of honest integrity. He was the surgeon in Francis Durbridge's "Operation Diplomat" 1953 and made good in many other films. This is a startlingly realistic film of India in 1829 and should not be ignored.
The Fearmakers(1958)
Getting mixed up with political racketeers
This is actually a political thriller dealing with corruption in America on the highest level. A polling institute is used to manipulate the public to vote for the "right" politician, and it is a far gone project, when Dana Andrews steps in as an unprecedented factor. He was in the Korea war, lost and presumed dead, and when he suddenly returns from the dead and finds his polling institute taken over after his partner who has died under mysterious circumstances, he tries to dig for the truth. He finds too much of it, he is worked over almost worse than by the Chinese in their prison camps, they try to make of him a worthless wreck of a brainwashed soldier with brain damages (after Korea) and try to dispose of him like they did of his partner, but in the process he learns the whole truth. There are many political turns here, it is difficult to hang on in every bend, the difficult dialog gets tiresome in its intricacies, but it is worth sticking through the drama to the end. Any film with Dana Andrews is worth watching, and this is no exception but rather a confirmation of the rule.