bob.decker

Listening to Timothée Chalomet mouth words and ideas that would occur only to a much, much older man is just one of the grotesque aspects of A Rainy Day In New York. Equally bizarre is being presented with the spectacle of a 21-year-old woman being plied with drinks by men old enough to be her father, as if in 2019 this should be considered the stuff of comedy. From Woody Allen's point of view, A Rainy Day in New York is obviously an attempt to remain relevant, but that players like Cherry Jones and Selena Gomez would want to have any part of it is astonishing. Skip it if you're a fan of Mr. Allen's, if only to avoid spoiling your memory of his 1980s pictures in which he was young enough to put across his New York bachelor routine without the need to play it out through an adolescent surrogate who's still learning his craft.

Several critics have dismissed Mama Weed for squandering the talent of its leading lady. Indeed Ms. Huppert is utterly miscast as Prudence Portefeu, but this is not the first time the French mega-star has ended up in a project that was much beneath her-think of Tip Top, for example, which is a much lesser effort than Mama Weed. Compared to the popular novel on which it's based, Mama Weed is saccharine in its portray of the relationship between Patience and her mother, but any stereotypes in its portrayals come directly from the book, which probably would do better as a miniseries than as a feature length film.

Laura La Plante is perfectly cast in this pre-code drama that sounds from the title as if it ought to be a Western (perhaps deliberately?) but is in fact an adult romantic story that could as easily take place in 2023 as in 1931. Beyond the fine performances from the leads, some excellent cinematography and set decoration lift this above what one might expect from a so-called Poverty Row studio in the depths of the Depression. Highly recommended also for fans of the Duke, who towers over the other players with his bashful physicality. Mr. Cohn is credited producer on this one. Once again, well recommended.

I found a free copy of this in the little library outside the Presidio Y, so no big investment here, but I was really quite well pleased with this as a pizza night movie. Whoever put it together knows how to make a movie, and if you dig noir in general, and have reasonable expectations, this won't disappoint. The New Jersey locations add a touch of the exotic, and the performances are perfectly fine throughout. Some viewers may find the ending predictable, even so this rises to about the same level as various serial noir pictures of the classic era and avoids any excessive violence or embarrassing eroticism.

With all the talent on hand at MGM in 1940, it's difficult to account for the failure of the Nick Carter films to succeed as mysteries or farce; the plots make no sense, the master of detection shows no discernible mastery of anything, and it's rare that any of the characters rise above level of caricature. Sky Murder is no exception. The most one can say in praise of this entry is that it has nice sets, a stellar turn by Dorothy Tree doing her thing as a Nazi spy, and a couple of nice looking bit players. Otherwise not much to recommend it, other than as a production based on a total contempt for the audience. Skip it!

This isn't a particularly good movie but it's worth watching as a measure of what RKO achieved the same year with "Born to Kill." In both pictures, poorer, older sister falls for a homicidal heel, brings him into the family home only to be dumped in favor of her richer, younger sister. Now her challenge becomes how to protect little sis from the big lug. In this rather sappy G-rated version of the story, most of the noirish elements that made "Born to Kill" great are missing; what makes it watchable is the transformation of Faye Emerson, who, like Tilda Swindon in "The Deep End," gets sexier and sexier the more she's in danger, completing the beauty arc from bespectacled stenographer to leggy siren in under 90 minutes.

Bourgeois snobs who can't just enjoy a movie without trying to categorize it might have a hard time watching this picture without feeling guilty, but this low-budget effort has become a cult classic for delivering 80 minutes of fast-moving entertainment, and whether any of it makes any more sense in terms of a believable story is rather beside the point. What you get is a pretty smart script, a young Lee Marvin showing a comedic side for which his later work provided only occasional outlets, and future industry veterans doing the kind of great character work that results in long Hollywood careers. To pull this off on an Allied Artists budget and have people talking about it 55 years later is no small accomplishment. One is even led to assume that the very experienced Edward Dein and the others involved in putting this together knew exactly what they were doing.

One must keep in mind with any Kay Francis picture from 1932 that no attempt is being made at realism; whether "Man Wanted" or "Trouble in Paradise," the mise en scene is the collective product of the studio's imagination, and no New York editor ever worked in an office quite as plush as the one in which Miss Francis and David Manners as her secretary toil. Yet even if its the intent is merely to provide a glamorous escape from the dreariness of the Depression, "Man Wanted" also succeeds in delivering quite a feminist portrayal of a woman executive who is not the least embarrassed by her position nor inclined to disguise her sexuality with mannish suits (a la Rosalind Russell), masculine dialogue, or any show of weakness. In this respect among others, "Man Wanted" is far ahead even of present-day Hollywood portrayals of capable, powerful women. While our puritanical culture might not like to admit that a wife could view such indulgent bemusement the infidelities of a weak, alcoholic husband, there are plenty of prominent modern marriages whose persistence cannot be explained otherwise. One suspects, therefore, that the reaction of Lois Ames to her husband's philandering is as firmly grounded in realism as the more violent and hysterical reactions we've come to expect, not to mention her extraordinary sang froid when confronted by her secretary's accusatory fiancée (Una Merkel). Moreover this secretary, who finally wins his boss's hand, is hardly some male tower of strength; he can get up the gumption to face her only after undergoing a sloppy bender with his half-dressed roommate (Andy Devine) in their rather sordid apartment. This isn't subversive just for 1932; it's subversive for now, and includes some very nice dresses, props, and a scene at a polo grounds that suggests a bygone era before Los Angeles was fully encased in concrete.

. . . to get this movie released on DVD? I too am among those who saw it on television years ago and who remember bits and pieces of the dialog (like, to paraphrase, "It's like admiring someone from a distance and when you get up close to him you notice he has bad skin." If I recall correctly Candace Bergman speaks this line while looking down on Michigan Avenue from a high-rise apartment, perhaps in the John Hancock building, and it served as a metaphor for what she found out about life in the big city). Its soundtrack was also liable to turn up frequently in the 98 cent bargain bins and this is how I happened to recognize it when it showed up on the CBS late movie in the late 1970s. The Chicago location was unusual for a 1971 film -- well before pictures like "The Blues Brothers," "Ordinary People," and "Risky Business." Candace Bergman's performance, and way of delivering lines, was indeed mesmerizing, and this film's unavailability and obscurity makes unavailable and obscure a certain moment in 20th century American history that we don't think too much about; it is rather like the dark side of the Mary Tyler Moore show, a snapshot of a lost generation. Please, someone bring it back.

I've worked my way recently through about 10 of the films in the Chan series and this is one of the most compelling I've seen yet -- largely due to the good chemistry between Warner Oland and Henrietta Crosman, who is one of the more memorable of the leading ladies in the series. True, the Chan family is missing -- except when viewed briefly in a photograph at the film's very end -- and the San Francisco location isn't very convincing; it is hard to place the "ancient" house where much of the action takes place in a city where most everything was burnt to the ground in 1906. Nevertheless many of the typically alluring elements of the Chan films are present in full force -- society ladies in long dresses, a shady pair of mediums, séances that come to a screaming end, pitch black scenes in secret rooms, and odd applications of 1930s technology. Jonathan Hale is a welcome presence and the comic relief supplied by Herbert Mundin as the butler stops short of being annoying, which is more than one can say for some of the later entries in the series. All in all quite satisfying.

Available on DVD if you look hard enough (but without English subtitles), this 1955 re-make was apparently produced as sort of a memorial to (and fundraiser for the family of) a recently deceased actor in the Hong Kong cinema. It follows the Hitchcock version in some respects and not in others. There is no wisecracking insurance company nurse dropping by to give massages and the girlfriend not only enables but encourages the hero's voyeurism as a way to pass the time. In this version it's her apartment in which he's recuperating, and before she leaves to chastely spend the night at her parents, she provides him with binoculars and with the low-down on all the people in the apartments across the way. These include the fellow who bumps off his wife, the honeymooning couple, a troupe of barechested physical culture enthusiasts, and various vaudeville actors who are present to offer musical numbers. Eventually the murder takes place, suspicions are aroused, and the girlfriend goes over to the building across to snoop -- with just the same results as in the U.S. version. It's a strange mix of Cornell Woolrich meets "International House," but worthwhile for serious devotees of Woolrich, Hitch, and the Hong Kong cinema alike.

In the colonies we're not all that familiar with Arthur Askey, so I nearly skipped this film (which had its TCM preview recently) on account of the negative comments here on his appearance in "Ghost Train" -- which I expected to be thoroughly annoying. Instead I was pleasantly surprised to find myself laughing audibly. The physical aspects of Askey's comedy and his timing when delivering a line suggest what you'd get if Charlie Chaplin and Woody Allen had a baby. There is no comparing him to Bud Abbott or any of the other usual purveyors of comic relief who turn up in films of this genre. One can feel, moreover, the thread connecting Askey to British comedy 30 years later; at least it is clear from an American point of view that he has more in common with the Monty Python troupe than with any of his counterparts over here. As for the rest of the film -- the more movies you've seen, the more likely you'll guess at the ending, but it is still quite entertaining and atmospheric and worth waiting for its next appearance.

I watched this expecting, given the budget limitations of B-picture series, to see only a few "establishing shots" of San Francisco from stock footage, but a surprising number of scenes appear actually to have been shot on location -- or were at least very convincingly matted. Even more impressive is the film's rather successful grasp of San Francisco atmosphere. Too-handsome tough guys, a twisted dame with a streak of brutality, a gloomy Nob Hill mansion, and details like the extras in the nightclub scene and the furnishings in the dame's apartment are all done quite as well as in the higher-budgeted "Out of the Past." Some continuity elements seem to have been left on the cutting room floor, as in other RKO noirs, but to good effect, and it is obvious the bit players (including Dorothy Adams) were carefully chosen. Better preserved than some of the Falcon pictures, this one merits attention beyond the context of the series.

This is a documentary for people who like documentaries done from an insider point of view. It is a documentary for people who love movies. It is a documentary for people who love Los Angeles. When you sit down to watch it, you might wonder whether the biography of the program director for an early "pay TV" station would be sufficiently interesting to span two hours. You won't be wondering when it's over. From any point of view, the subject matter is extraordinarily difficult. No one under 40 (and no one from anywhere but L.A.) will remember what Z-Channel was. The life of the story's hero came to an end in a murder-suicide. It is notoriously difficult to put across in a movie ideas about taste and aesthetics. In fact it is quite easy to become annoyed at listening to other people talk about the cinema and what it means to them. But in this documentary Alexandra Cassevetes has succeeded admirably on all counts and delivers one heck of an emotional wallop besides.

If you like movies that take place on trains, you might get a kick out of this Columbia programmer, in which a wide cast of characters become the usual suspects when murder is committed on an L.A. to San Francisco sleeper. Ben Lyon and Barbara Weeks make attractive leads, and some of the supporting players (Ethel Kenyon, Dwight Frye) are interesting to look at. Less successful is Tom Dugan's "comic" bit as a drunk who for obscure reasons attaches himself to the newspaper reporter hero outside a phone booth in Union Station and makes a general pest of himself. Rather below the standard set by Warners for this genre of picture, but entertaining nonetheless, and about 90% of the picture takes place on the train itself, for which Columbia had provided quite nice sets.

Anyone who enjoys Steven Millhauser's fictional world of 19th century marvels of technology and engineering will be thrilled at the way this is all brought to life in this splendid adaptation, which is a feast for the eyes from beginning to end. Strong performances from Norton, Giamatti, and Sewell, effective scoring by Philip Glass, and excellent location photography (in Prague) add up to one of the best new pictures I've seen in years. A flashback sequence at the beginning which mimics the grain characteristics and transitions of early films is a marvel in itself; not only Millhauser's world is captured, but also the atmosphere of the waning days of the Austro-Hungarian empire. I can't imagine how it could have been better done.

I watched this last night on TCM and found it not only thoroughly entertaining but a textbook example of how a B-grade picture from a poverty row studio could rise above its budget limitations thanks to the efforts of a clever director (William Castle) and strong players (Richard Dix and J. Carroll Naish in particular). Superior in some respects to entries in parallel series based on radio programs (like Universal's Inner Sanctum with Lon Chaney, Jr.), perhaps the most appealing aspect of "The Whistler" is the economy with which the story is told. There are no needless lines, no needless scenes. Whether it belongs within the "noir" cycle is a matter to be debated, but nevertheless "The Whistler" has its share of the quirky characters and shadowy settings that typify that genre, not to mention the creepy portrayal by Naish of a hit-man who reads a monograph on "necrophobia" in his spare time.

This flawed second feature -- about a beautiful floozy, her streetwise little boy, and the millionaire who comes to their aid -- sustains interest only thanks to the attractive stars. Young, with her huge eyes and dazzling smile, has the aura of Joan Crawford in her "Dance, Fools, Dance" period, while Grant, who was 30 when this was made, has not yet fully matured into the character we know from the second half of the 1930s. The story, despite its implausibility, is not unappealing; it is pleasant to imagine oneself being a slum-kid one day and being invited to live with Cary Grant and his affectionate wife the next. The screenplay is oddly structured; the story begins with Young being admired by an odd trio that looks as if it wandered off from the set of "Dinner At Eight" and whom we never see again, and the picture ends just as abruptly. Still, not a bad way to spend 65 minutes.