Astonishingly Internal is a BBC interview show that has Orson Welles, Peter O'Toole and some other older fellow (Ernest Milton) talking about ‘Hamlet’. Orson was well into retirement from attempting film masterpieces, including two ambitious Shakespeare productions. His ‘Othello’ is really something. He’d been in...
Cute and perky college student Alice is invited to a "pool party" by Freida, a female teacher who is actually a lesbian and has designs on Alice. At the party Alice gets drunk, takes acid and immediately becomes a lesbian, taking a bath with Freida. Later Alice gets mixed up with LSD-addicted hippies, rape, more lesbians, more LSD, orgies, suicide, and having sex with guys in boxers.
Showing the Unshowable the root, the filmmakers dilemma has two fangs. One challenge is to take things that people know and bend and filter them in ways that can be seen as “natural” when it gets to the other side, past the set, the film,...
Miss Marple believes she's seen a murder in a passing-by train, yet when the police find no evidence she decides to investigate it on her own.
Tumbling Down history of introspection in film starts with clever mystery writers. Then when talkies fell on us there was a huge experimental breeding ground for techniques that worked. By the 40s that chapter was all over and noir was incubated. Agatha Christie played a central...
An elderly woman confides to Poirot that she fears one of her relatives is trying to kill her for her money. He persuades her to disinherit her heirs, but she is murdered anyway.
Script Mysteries Watching these Suchet versions of Poirot is a real adventure. Following the tradition set by the BBC, each episode has a different adapter and director. The idea is that it is supposed to keep things fresh. After all, the selling points are the...
While crossing the desert, a frontier scout, Jess Remsberg, rescues Ellen Grange from a pursuing band of Apaches, and returns her to her husband, Willard Grange. He is contracted to act as a scout for an Army cavalry unit. Willard, Ellen, and her infant son are along for the ride, as is horse trader Toller, a veteran of the 10th Cavalry. The party is trapped in a canyon by Chata, an Apache chief and grandfather of Ellen's baby. Willard is captured and tortured. Jess sneaks away and brings reinforcements just in time to save the day. Jess learns that the man he has been hunting is none other than Willard Grange.
Old Paint is absolutely amazing to me how badly a movie can age. I saw this one in the theatres when new. I remember thinking it was acceptable at the time. There was an actress that I knew from Bergman. There was the surprise of...
Lorenzo, who's 16 and born to a wealthy family in Parma, tries to make things right toward a showgirl, Aida, whom his older brother has mistreated. In extending kindness and standing up for her, he comes of age. But, is there anything he can do that will alter Aida's situation or her prospects?
Million Dollar Baby watched this together with Eastwood’s “Million Dollar Baby.” I knew I would be challenged by that film (you can read my comment), and I wanted something that I knew would be a safe island after the offences therein. I chose this. Its between...
The Man With No Name enters the Mexican village of San Miguel in the midst of a power struggle among the three Rojo brothers and sheriff John Baxter. When a regiment of Mexican soldiers bearing gold intended to pay for new weapons is waylaid by the Rojo brothers, the stranger inserts himself into the middle of the long-simmering battle, selling false information to both sides for his own benefit.
Joe Meets Akira is an ineptly made film, but which lives because of its sheer importance. It is the reconstruction of the western, the birth of the hardboiled, loveable thug and the reinvention of Kurosawa for the masses. Kurosawa had already been appropriated by the Hollywood...
A mysterious magnetic spool found during a construction project is discovered to have originated from Venus. A rocket expedition to Venus is launched to discover the origin of the spool and the race that created it.
The Beginning 1958 Russia changed the world by launching Sputnik. This really was a shock; modern readers may not appreciate it as of the magnitude (in the US) of 9-11. In terms of national will, there was a more universal mobilisation and commitment of resources...
Hedvig Jensen is a famous ropewalker and is known to her public as Elvira Madigan. She meets Lieutenant Sixten Sparre, a Swedish officer who is married and has two children. They both decide to run away, but since Sixten deserted the army, he cannot find any job and the couple encounters many hardships. Moreover, while on the run, Sixten meets a friend who tries to convince him to come back to his country and family.
Love is When You Borrow Someone Else's Eyes of the simple pleasures of life is to sit in a darkened theatre and have a film capture your soul, not as a single person, but as the whole sigh of the room. I saw this in...
Eight people are trapped on an island when their plane abandons them. They find a large mansion whose butler is expecting them. Then one by one, they die...
Indians is a famously popular film in India. The composition is simple: a story that gives the film an existence, and a series of Bollywood musical numbers. I cannot recall ever experiencing such dissonance, because I am coming at the from a background in Christie....
