What was the last film you watched?

[James from London]

We (me and wifey) have been watching some of our favourite movies with our daughter and THE BREAKFAST CLUB has been on my mind with mixed feelings. Would my daughter get the film, or will she find it completely boring comparing it with some of her favourite ‘coming of age’ dramas.

Funnily enough, I recently listened to a really interesting podcast where Molly Ringwald, who's obviously in The Breakfast Club, talks about the experience of showing it to her own teenage daughter.

The Blunder Years - This American Life

Producer Ben Calhoun talks about the moment when the cool teacher at school told the girls they should pay attention to Ben, and they did.

www.thisamericanlife.org

(If you fast-forward the red line at the top to where it's just above halfway through the word "Listen", that should take you to the right part.)

 

[Willie Oleson]

Today was a "Trevor Howard's Way" double feature.

THE THIRD MAN (1949)



There's Abigail and there's Ann-Margret, and then there's the actress who's credited only by her last name. How novel!
Peyton Place star Wilfrid Hyde-White features in a supporting role and I think I need to see more of him, in leading roles.

I understood some of the German spoken dialogue and even though it was only trivial to the story (unless someone translated it to Joseph Cotten) it kinda felt like hearing more than I should.
Trevor Howard is the cool and practical Major Calloway in glossy leather and Orson Welles plays Harry Lime who gets involved with the more sordid part of the black market.
The story plays out like a conspiracy murder mystery, but the film is so bedazzling with all its awesome scenery and many characters I don't think I was paying too much attention to it.
What intrigued me the most was the one thing they didn't show - the friendship between Holly Martins and Harry Lime.

It's possible that I've missed it but I still don't know exactly what kind of job Harry had in mind for Holly.
Since (Alida) Valli's character was so much in love with Harry - or was it disproportionate gratitude? - it's hard to think of him as a villain.
I have this funny theory that he felt he had gone too far, and wanted to be caught. Not by the authorities and definitely not without kicking and screaming, it needed to be a true defeat.
I think he plotted the whole intrigue just to make sure that his friend would get involved. And so Holly Martins became the gunslinger hero in his own real-life potboiler.
But what the heck do I know? I don't even know who the third man was.


So pretty.


BRIEF ENCOUNTER (1945)



When the very first scene, before I even get to know the characters, oozes with drama and heartbreak, then I just know it's going to be a very good one.
In many ways it feels more like a 1970s drama, I kept thinking of some of the Woody Allen films.
Celia Johnson's fantastic narration informs us of the how and what and when, and of course everything she felt at that time.
But it's done in such a spontaneous way that it also comments on trivial stuff, like "being sick of musicals", and some of her thoughts are unintentionally catty.
"Perhaps she (Dr. Alec's unseen wife Madeline) is upstairs in her bedroom, not feeling well".
It's easy to imagine a remake starring Mia Farrow and Ben Cross.

About halfway the film the affair becomes a de facto thing and that takes some of the pleasant tension out of it, but then I began to realise that her monologue was an imaginary confession to her husband, and then it's almost as if that becomes the love story.
It's just incredibly well done. Incredibly.
With Anton Karas' Third Man Theme still ringing in my ears it kinda overbears the Brief Encounters soundtrack, but that's OK. It works for both films.

 

[James from London]

What a double bill! Somehow I don't think I'd ever consciously (Joseph) cottoned onto the fact that Trevor Howard starred in both. He just sort of disappears into each role in a terribly discreet, English sort of way.

THE THIRD MAN (1949)

I always think of this film in conjunction with The Fallen Idol, a little gem of a British film made a year earlier with the same writer (Graham Greene) and director (Carol 'father of Oliver' Reed).

In many ways it feels more like a 1970s drama, I kept thinking of some of the Woody Allen films.

There is a 1970s remake of Brief Encounter which I've never seen and which sounds highly blasphemous, but because of its casting, also irresistible:

If I've got this right, Brief Encounter itself was originally adapted from a one-act stage play called Still Life which was also adapted for TV in the 90s, bizarrely featuring Joan Collins as the gossipy tea-lady at the station who won't stop talking. (I haven't seen that either.)



What I have seen is Falling in Love, an unofficial American remake, from the 80s, starring Robert de Niro and Meryl Streep at their most twitchy and inarticulate, which I don't think is very popular, but which I absolutely loved.

It's just incredibly well done. Incredibly.

"Thank you for coming back to me." Yes, it's just perfect.

 

[Willie Oleson]

Today was a "psycho killer" double feature.

AND SOON THE DARKNESS (1970)



I don't know if it was the first, but it's a great example of what would become the "tourist horror" subgenre.
The film looks contemporary but not fashionable by 1970s standards and it really helps to create the feeling that this could be happening now.
Its fantastic opening-and-recurring theme is very fashionable and those who are old enough to feel nostalgic about the seventies will want to step right into the film.

Of course I already knew that this wasn't going to be a gay little holiday story, and the camera work is very effective in creating a sense of uneasiness even before anything happens.
I am familiar with those old cafés in the middle of nowhere-ish and somehow it never looks more depressing than it does in France and Belgium. But I'm always fascinated by life in obscure locations, or obscurely constructed - like houses built on steep hills.
Here it's all about the openness and endlessness contrasted by bits of forest that seem inherently secretive and foreboding, which is why Red Riding Hood's mother told her daughter not to go there.

Pamela Franklin and Michele Dotrice are very enjoyable as the bickering friends and I would have liked to see more of it. In case that would have undermined the flow of the story then I'd gladly watch an hour of deleted scenes.
The supporting cast is great and everybody looks just suspicious enough. I wondered if it was going to be one of those "evil community" crimes, like the Wicker Man without a Wicker Man.
It's co-written by Brian Clemens and it does indeed look like Thriller - THE MOVIE. Directed by Robert Fuest (The Final Programme, The Avengers).
The DVD special features features an interview with Kim Newman (he also did it for The Final Programme) and the way he talks about the director and his films kind of explained (to me) why SOON looks so awesome and why PROGRAMME didn't look awesome enough.

No matter how much suspense is created, at some point the characters are going to realise that they are in "that" scenario, followed by actions and the conclusion.
And just when I thought that the film would end with a minor dip there was that unexpected "gosh!" moment.
What struck the most was that Pamela Franklin, the uncrowned queen of scream, remained dead silent. There's zero blood and yet it's so horrific.

I figured this would be a great warm-up to the previously infamous and now much celebrated British nasty PEEPING TOM (1960)



Camera man Mark Lewis tells tenant Helen that he's lived in the house his whole life, which also means that he's the landlord that nobody knew.
I thought it was a peculiar comment because the bizarre casting of Karlheinz Böhm almost suggests as if they're retconning him into the history of British cinema.
And why him, indeed? And talk about against-type-casting, the former Prince Charming of the SISSI films. Maybe we should do a thread about that too.

The film with all its popping colours is pretty to look at but doesn't have any of the alluring sordidness that, say, WHO KILLED TEDDY BEAR has.
Whereas TEDDY BEAR almost makes the viewer an accomplice, TOM is a little judgmental and kept me at arm's length (or should I say spear's length?), the POV theme notwithstanding.
The sound and vision of the documentary of little boy Mark Lewis is effective, but grown-up Mark as a weird loner seem to have no personality at all.

Some of the more dramatic moments are unintentionally hilarious.
The police men discuss the particularly disturbing facial expression of the victims - "never seen anything like it before!" - and it just felt like watching a scene from Commissioner Gordon's office. Discussing what will turn out to be the Joker's latest prank.
In one of the last moments, Mark tells Helen: You'll be safe as long as I can't see you frightened. So stand in the shadows, please.
I found it inappropriately gothic and bombastic, as if he were about to turn into a vampire or something. "Don't show the blood...I can't, I can't...resist".

PEEPING TOM has been in my to-watch list for years but somehow it was always unavailable or out-of-print. This DVD is so new I had to pre-order it.
Unfortunately it won't make the shelves because I can't think of any reason why I would want to watch it again. It's not offensively awful like DRESSED TO KILL, but I feel it's all reputation and no substance.

The Fallen Idol, a little gem of a British film

It is a gem, and a love story that sort of happens from the corner of the eye.

bizarrely featuring Joan Collins as the gossipy tea-lady at the station who won't stop talking

What a great find!
It's a small world, isn't it.

Falling in Love, an unofficial American remake

Thanks. I watched the trailer and it has a lot of generic 80s music in it, but I'll watch it when it pops up on prime.
It looks like a film that these actors really really really didn't need to do in order to advance their careers so perhaps it has a guilty pleasure flavour.

 

[Seaviewer]

Great cast. Lily Tomlin and Jane Fonda have become quite the double act, haven't they?

I was reminded of this while watching Laugh-In on Tubi the other night.
I'm up to the later seasons now. Most of the original cast have left and the show is definitely past its peak. One saving grace is the addition of a young Lily Tomlin and her now-iconic characters Ernestine and Edith Ann.
In this particular episode there was joke about Jane Fonda, who was then not only a major movie star but a controversial figure due to her anti-Vietnam war activities. The idea that Tomlin and Fonda would be collaborating years later was probably the furthest thing from anybody's mind.

 

[Willie Oleson]

Yesterday was an "Alan Bates, mon amour" double feature + an Isabelle Huppert revenge bonus feature.

A KIND OF LOVING (1962)



Apart from being a great time capsule I think it is, as the film poster suggests, "astonishing in its daring frankness".
Whereas glamorous fictional characters or freaks like Peeping Tom is about "them", Vic Brown (Alan Bates) and Ingrid (June Ritchie) is about the "us" of that time, and therefore more confrontational in a way that cannot be shrugged off so easily.
I'm not saying that people are always aware of their place in history at the time it happens, in fact I think it usually takes some retrospection to see the bigger picture.

Nevertheless, the rise of realistic working-class drama in film must have signalled the possibility to watch "ourselves" on the big screen.
Of course this is just my personal interpretation but I felt that this change spills over in the story itself since Vic and Ingrid are of a generation that was precisely in the middle of the old ways and the new ways.
Vic Brown may not represent an entire generation but there's a sense of new opportunities and choices that cannot be achieved yet because it's too early to dismiss the traditions of how it "should be done".
The previous generations didn't think they had to worry about love and happiness and idealism and individualism, but the characters in A KIND OF LOVING do.
However, not so much that it goes full on counterculture and anti-establisment. It's the beginning, just the smell of it, that puts these characters in the could-have-beens and possible missed-out-ons, especially in that particular way of living.
It is therefore not surprising that it ends with a compromise by lowering the stakes and just hoping for the best, and I'm sure this is what happened to many people of the very last Till Death Do Us Part generation.

Vic and Ingrid are, for better or worse, guided by various family members, most notably the parents.
Ingrid's mother is a real horror show who constantly criticizes "these people" who are standing in the way of a comfortable life for everyone, thus completely contradicting herself. She's a lot of fun to watch.
As the situation becomes more unbearable they are taking sides from a male or female point of view, and this turns out to be the heart and soul of the story.
"It's rotten to be a girl, sometimes" Ingrid says.
But when there's more than one woman in the room then it can also be rotten to be a boy.
From a female point of view there's the exhausting need for validation, over and over again. From a male point of view there's the ongoing expectations of performing in a satisfyingly manner.
One could argue that they had to go through all this in order to reach the end point which is actually more like a new marriage.

I searched the internet for CALL DR. MARTIN, Ingrid's favourite soap, but it looks like it only exists in this film.


THE GO-BETWEEN (1971)



Interestingly, A KIND OF LOVING also featured a go-between in order to advance the romance between Vic and Ingrid.
I experienced this film from 1971 as a LADY CHATTERLEY'S LOVER without the loving, and the way young protagonist Leo becomes part of that romance doesn't quite pack a punch as it did in THE FALLEN IDOL.
Even for a boy in the first phases of puberty in Edwardian England he comes across as frustratingly simple-minded. Instead on focusing on the erotic forbiddingness complicated by that very puberty we spend a lot of time with the most boring hoity-toity characters. In the gardens, in the carriage, in the breakfast rooms.

Michel Legrand's score is nice but it's often used in nonsensical and startling ways. On the other hand, this may have prevented me from dozing off.
Alan Bates' solo performance was the best musical contribution to the film, imo.
There's one character (forgot his name) who delivers a little bit of humour, with varying results.

I did spend some time thinking about it after the film had ended, and while I'd normally consider this to be a good thing in this case I found myself wishful thinking more drama into it than there really was.
To add insult to injury I started to realise that Julie Christie's character was a bit of a cunt and it just totalled up to a strong feeling of dissatisfaction.
I had to watch something to make that feeling go away.


THE PIANO TEACHER (2001)



It's possible that I got more than I had bargained for, but at least the images of boring beautiful gardens were exorcised from my mind.
I think I'm going to buy a Schubert greatest hits CD. It's very interesting stuff.

 

[Willie Oleson]

BEAU IS AFRAID (2023)



I think this is a very interesting film with some distinctive tonal shifts and it's obvious that the filmmaker didn't want to make any concessions to make it more like a "film experience".
The first part is almost like a standard dark comedy, a nervous man who lives in a nerve-racking world.
"Extremely dangerous violin spider on the loose!"
I loved the play in the woods and the story within that story, and it was only the last part with the mother that felt like waiting for it to end.

Beau is sleau, and he responds sleauly, after pauses. It doesn't really help to overcome the film's epic running time.
As far as chronicles/odyssey type of stories go I think THE HOUSE THAT JACK BUILT did it better, but still it's interesting to see how the maker of BEAU has pieced together the various chapters.
On a side note, casting the very talented film favourite Joaquin Phoenix in the main role does feel like a a concession - a safe choice, as it were.
It would have been great if the role had been given to a somewhat "forgotten" actor, the way it happened in Lars von Trier's film.

 

[Willie Oleson]

Last night was a "German chaos" double feature.

AGUIRRE(,) (THE) WRATH OF GOD (1972)



There doesn't seem to be a definitive title, hence the (parentheses).
AGUIRRE is, without doubt, the most beautiful, most powerful and most important film I have ever seen in my entire life.
The overwhelmingly profound and emotionally devastating intensity of this film turned me into a blubbering mess. Masterpiece, masterpiece!

Even if it was supposed to be a documentary-style retelling of an historical event then it still wouldn't be good enough, but since it was promoted as a Klaus Kinski film I'm sure it wanted to be more than a dramatized documentary.
The story is completely devoid of drama and character, it hops from scene to scene in a very clunky way and as for the actors - well let me put it this way: I've seen better performances from theme park crew members walking around in Goofy or Mickey Mouse costumes.
Apparently, Klaus Kinski performed more ferociously off-screen (and in this case I can't blame him) and as for Werner Herzog himself he seems to make the most of Kinski's infamy. I think there's something tacky about it.

So, we should adore it because the locations (allegedly) made the filming process such an incredible challenge? Well, it's nice to know that all the other filmmakers had had so easy.
There's beautiful scenery in it but that was already there. Personally I'm more impressed by fabulous sets exclusively constructed for one particular film.
Nobody has to create a sea or jungle or mountains, it only needs to be filmed.
AGUIRRE has a very lovely, synthy-trance-y score, and the more I watched it the more I was convinced that this should have been a non-talkie movie.
Perhaps a psychedelic mood piece like this:

To illustrate just how bad this El Dorado film is, the Goombay Dance Band did it better.

DAS BOOT (1981)



It's certainly a step up from the previous chaos feature. The way the U-boat dives in and rises up from the sea gives it an almost fairy tale-esque quality.
Overall, it looks like an extremely well-organised production, Jürgen Prochnow is a very handsome lead and the sound is simply amazing.
But...after an hour or so it gets a bit repetitive and since I was watching the Director's Cut...well.

To quote Alexis from season 9: auf wiedersehn.

 

[Willie Oleson]

Last night was a "the kids of '52" double feature.

FORBIDDEN GAMES (1952)



Since I had been searching for the best of this-or-that in the various online recommendation lists, and because I found this one, I already had an idea what it was all about.
The first surprise was the opening theme, I hadn't heard it before but I knew the music from Julio Iglesias' 1975 smash hit "Quiero".
The second surprise was the humorous tone of the story, most of it is in the Hatfields & McCoys feud between the neighbours.
Michel and Paulette's forbidden games is perhaps somewhat similar to the "imaginary friend", a place where they can go and have their own secret which is based on Paulette's confusion and Michel's desire to indulge her. It's something that the war can't touch.
A great film, all my expectations have been fulfilled.


HUNTED (1952)



Orphan Robbie may as well have been Paulette's twin brother, his white-blond hair makes him look like a lightbulb in the darker scenery.
This unlikely duo of runaways has to do a lot of jumping, climbing and ducking, and just like Michel in the first feature little Robbie gets shoved about quite a lot.

The murder committed by Dirk Bogarde's character is a crime passionnel and it's easy to see from the very beginning that he's not an evil or dangerous bastard.
Or maybe it's because he looks like Cliff Richard in The Young Ones.
As a result, the story leans towards melodrama. Perhaps the darkest part of the story is Chris Lloyd's wife, a treacherous femme fatale.
Then there's Chris' brother who sneakily crams his own community sub-plotline into the chase drama. I always love this sort of details.

The reason I picked this film is because Dirk Bogarde talked about it in an interview - possibly a special feature on THE SERVANT or VICTIM dvd - and he mentioned that child actor Jon Whiteley started to cry during a scene in which his character was told that he wasn't wanted anymore. He believed it was the actor rather than the fictional Chris Lloyd who told him that.

Again, I got exactly what I wanted and that makes it the most double of the double features. It's also the last one because the rest of the (short) list cannot be combined. Unless I would do "two films released in 1970" but that's a bit lame.

 

[Willie Oleson]

LE CERCLE ROUGE (1970)



The story is OK but the film looks a bit sterile without character drama. They never stopped being strangers.


EASTERN PROMISES (2007)



I find it surprisingly mainstream for a David Cronenberg film but that doesn't matter because it's a lot of fun to watch. Shoulda been Part I of a trilogy rather than ending it this way. Viggo butt naked on all fours, what more do you want?
Ten years later we got MCMAFFIA but that also ended too soon.

 

[Willie Oleson]

REVERSAL OF FORTUNE (1990)



I wasn't sure if I was going to like the film because there was something about Ron Silver's character that irritated me. Maybe it was the basketball game in the opening scene, I hate that sport.
Somehow this put me in the same position as that very character, who had to deal with Jeremy Irons with a phat accent.
In the end, Ron Silver didn't manage to win me over but I'm glad I stuck with him.

As the story goes on and adds layers to certain key scenes, the hedunnit?/hedinnit? gets overshadowed by the question: should Sunny von Bulow have lived longer?
She didn't actually die and was still alive when the film was made - 28 years of care and medication to keep one single person alive. That's perverse.
Overall, a thought-provoking mystery, and that also goes for the village, the mansions without land. It looks absolutely ridiculous.
The inside of the mansion used for the film is awful, it's just a huge space with lots of rooms crammed with expensive stuff. Was there a plan when they decorated the house?
There are lots of people in this world who ought to be prosecuted for Bad Taste.

 

[Willie Oleson]

SERPICO (1973)



It's not as slick and sensational as the copruption stories I had already seen, but SERPICO is based on a biography therefore it makes sense that it looks a bit messy.
Especially the first part is great because I was still figuring out what kind of protagonist he was going to be, and then he gets involved with artistic people and goes to hip parties.
Al Pacino's magnificent coiffure alone is worth the admission. It's a horribly misguided consensus that the seventies looked ugly because the people looked cool and sexy (except for the grey-blonde look for women) and the hair could be as big as it would become in the 80s but without that neurotic gel & spray look.
Soft and shiny and quasi-casual. Fabulous interior design with neo-hippie colours and idealistic flora & fauna themes, it looked almost as good as the sixties - the #1 decade for spectacular and mouth-watering design - but still better than the 80s.

There is some over-acting in the quarrels, particularly between Serpico and his girlfriend (I wanted her to say, with just a single tear, "your garden doesn't look so beautiful anymore") but apart from that Al Pacino is in top form.
It's the corruption that puts Serpico in such a difficult position and yes there are some greedy characters but I'm sure there were others who accepted it simply because it was the easiest way to do. Corruption and any kind of organised crime has the power to chain people while the very reason behind dishonest money is (in a way) to buy freedom. It's a perfect trap.

Regardless, the film doesn't portray Serpico as a very heroic and likeable protagonist because for the most part he acts as the victim he chooses to be. I think that sets it apart from the other, more obvious anti-corruption heroes. In many ways it's just as offbeat as DOG DAY AFTERNOON and I usually like those kind of films.

 

[DallasFanForever]

The Shawshank Redemption (1994)

It’s always been one of my favorites and today I watched it for the first time in quite a few years. As is often the case with these things, I was wondering if I would feel differently about it now.

I was pleasantly surprised that I still enjoy this movie just as much as I did 30 years ago. It is an amazing story to watch from the time we see Andy arrive at Shawshank in the late 40’s until his escape almost 20 years later.

Of course there are some things that defy explanation, like the prison guards never once checking behind the Hollywood Starlet posters in all those years to see the tunnel. But I digress.

 

[Willie Oleson]

The Shawshank Redemption (1994)

I've never seen it but I always confuse it with THE GREEN MILE (which I haven't seen either)

 

[DallasFanForever]

I've never seen it but I always confuse it with THE GREEN MILE (which I haven't seen either)

Having seen both I put Shawshank far above The Green Mile but that’s just my opinion of course. I’ve only watched The Green Mile once, whereas Shawshank is one I can watch over and over. I seem to always come back to it at some point.

 

[Snarky Oracle!]

REVERSAL OF FORTUNE (1990)

View attachment 51268

I wasn't sure if I was going to like the film because there was something about Ron Silver's character that irritated me. Maybe it was the basketball game in the opening scene, I hate that sport.
Somehow this put me in the same position as that very character, who had to deal with Jeremy Irons with a phat accent.
In the end, Ron Silver didn't manage to win me over but I'm glad I stuck with him.

As the story goes on and adds layers to certain key scenes, the hedunnit?/hedinnit? gets overshadowed by the question: should Sunny von Bulow have lived longer?
She didn't actually die and was still alive when the film was made - 28 years of care and medication to keep one single person alive. That's perverse.
Overall, a thought-provoking mystery, and that also goes for the village, the mansions without land. It looks absolutely ridiculous.
The inside of the mansion used for the film is awful, it's just a huge space with lots of rooms crammed with expensive stuff. Was there a plan when they decorated the house?
There are lots of people in this world who ought to be prosecuted for Bad Taste.

Oh, that was a good one. It's what the Colbys -- or, ideally, the Fallmonts -- should have been like.

And Von Bulow's girlfriend was Alexandra Molke (Isles) of DARK SHADOWS fame, by the way (the character, not the actress who played her).

 

[Willie Oleson]

And Von Bulow's girlfriend was Alexandra Molke (Isles) of DARK SHADOWS fame

Oh.my.god. How come I didn't realise this?
With this knowledge I must watch it again.

 

[Willie Oleson]

Today was a "sixties babes" double feature.

DARLING (1965)



Julie Christie's character Diana Scott is a liar, a hypocrite, an opportunist and a self-indulgent, immature narcissist.
But that's not saying much in a film that often caricatures the shallowness of the beau monde and the ruthlessness of the entertainment industry.
It's possible that "darling" refers to the situation as a whole, rather than just the female protagonist.
Because of its cynical approach I feel it kinda precedes VALLEY OF THE DOLLS, and without a single character to root for it gets dangerously close to being a downright unlikeable film.

Thankfully it's saved by a delightfully bitchy and tongue in cheek tone, and the more straightforwardly funny stuff is hidden in the details. It's all very cleverly done, imo.
It's one of those extraordinary vibrant films with a bit of voyeurism that always works best in sixties cinema (except for Peeping Tom, ironically) and just like THE SWIMMER you can play it on a continuous loop because it doesn't really matter where it begins or where it ends.
Nevertheless, her last job is that of an Italian version of Princess Grace Kelly of Monaco, and since she was born as "Scott" I'm going to fanwank her into The Colbys universe as Frankie and Sable's cousin who shoulda coulda guest-starred in the soap's third season.


CANDY (1968)



This is an odd combination of American counterculture social commentary and the European softcore folly, a sub-genre that has aged terribly and was never any good to begin with.
It also looks like a remake of ALICE IN WONDERLAND in which Candy encounters various characters of authority, celebrity or self-imposed divinity, and they're all preying on her wide-eyed naivety.
One of the first scenes in DARLING tackles the subject of "breaking away from the conventional", but the interviewer played by Dirk Bogarde puts such a spin on it that the "breaking away" itself has become a conventional thing to do (the first sign that it was going to be good film).
The mockery of the establisment in CANDY is done in such an uncool and sledgehammerish way that it almost parodies the mockery.
Of course it's also possible to watch the film from a completely different point of view. Candy might represent the youth who's being tricked into a war they don't understand, let alone support.
Or maybe it's about a father/daughter relationship...who knows? Candy has a lot of questions and all she gets is bullshit.

Never mind the "how" or "why", CANDY has enough entertainment to put some dolce in your vita, as Walter Matthau's character would say it.
I mean, just look at that cast.
Richard Burton as a rockstar poet who has his own personal "total eclipse of the heart" wind blowing through his hair.
THE Marlon Brando as the enlightened guru trucking through the nation - I think it might his best role ever - and also real life "Darling" Anita Pallenberg as the psycho nurse to James Coburn's matador surgeon.
It's all totally camp and unabashedly chewing the scenery but the production itself looks quite lavish, something that will definitely please the fans of Ken Russell's work.
And even if the film had failed in every single aspect then there's still that amazing soundtrack.
The only thing that holds it back for me is that it doesn't have any serious and memorable shock value. It's feathers, instead of beans.


I really wanted to double feature DARLING with WHO ARE YOU, POLLY MAGGOO? but the latter is only available as part of an expensive William Klein collection box set and I think that's too extravagant for a blind buy. Maybe later, maybe tougher.

 

[Mel O'Drama]

Poltergeist II: The Other Side (1986)

I don't think I've seen this before, but I couldn't swear to it. Almost nothing felt familiar as I watched, though the morning after watching I've realised that the scene of Carol Anne speaking to her grandmother on the toy phone wasn't unfamiliar.

Expectations were fairly low for this one... as would be the case for almost every sequel of the era. In many ways it's exactly what you'd expect.

It's nice to see most of the core cast of the original film returning, but I don't recall the older daughter even being mentioned (actress Dominique Duane had been murdered by her boyfriend months after the original's release). They do good work with so-so material.

The most noticeable absences are offscreen. There's no Tobe Hooper and no Steven Spielberg, whose touches are most certainly missing. This is almost balanced by the return of Jerry Goldsmith whose score is impressive (even that, though, got a bit too boisterous in the last act as it matched the onscreen action).

While the film is essentially more of the same, where it falls down compares with the original is the "prosaic suburbia" motif (a favourite of Spielberg) which opened the first film. After the events of the first film, the family is no longer the people down the road, and so the starting point is on a very different footing. And while it tries for an arc and a buildup, it's simply missing that essential sense of journey from our world to the other side.

It's very effects-heavy and this is not always a saving grace in a film that's almost forty years old. By the standards of the time they're impressive, and some certainly look expensive, but sometimes less is more. H.R. Giger is credited, but apparently hated what was done with his designs by the Hollywood team. There are shades of John Carpenter's remake of The Thing in some of these, but most of it is ultimately quite forgettable.

It's better and has more class than most of its Eighties horror sequel brethren. But at the end of the day, it's still an Eighties horror sequel.​

 

[Biggie]

Megamind 2010.

Normally the whole superhero/supervillain premises find no kinda love with me. Except Supergirl as Melissa Benoist knocks it out the park and into interstellar space, even if she has pierced ears. Sabot kinetic tank rounds bounce of our girl of Krypton but. yeah, the local tattoo parlor can stick a needle through her earlobes... I digress.

So our supervillain fancies getting a piece of the local news reporter Roxanne Ritchi, only to find himself facing a Romeo & Juliet, Westside Story, The Outsiders, Jungle Fever type situation. As old as old is this scene. While another chap is looking to dip his wick in our Roxanne. Two suitors after one lady garden...

Megamind cooks up some insane and convoluted plot to win the hand of Ms Ritchi by disguising himself. While he is wooing the hot reporter that's got no kinda love for Megamind, she get him to see the error of his ways. Think road to Damascus. There some other subplots about thwarting the other chap with amours intensions and unmurdering a wanna be rock star, and the whole invisible car thing..

The romance between the two star crossed lovers taking shape and becoming meaningful, only for the deceit that Roxanne bought into to place a strain on the beginning relationship, and then bonding over a common foe. That played out beautifully. The romance aspect between the to main characters made this movie, a lot of other good stuff, but Supervillain and down to earth reporter steal the movie.

The star of the show was... Roxanne wearing that red dress while indifferent to the fact she's been kidnapped again.