What was the last film you watched?

[Mel O'Drama]

Cadillac Man (1990)

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If memory serves, this was a recommendation from Prime after I added Falling Down to my watch list. I haven't seen the latter, but from its reputation I would say it's a logical pairing, with both having that "day from hell" thing going on.

Curiously, according to Amazon's description this is set "in 1970s New York". I'm not sure where they pulled this from, since there is no period setting (at least, not by the standards of the day. In 2026 it's something of a time capsule).

It would be a stretch to describe myself as a big fan of Robin Williams, but this feels like the perfect vehicle (pun not entirely attended) for him. He's surrounded by actors who can match his energy while (somewhat paradoxically) reining him in. There are occasionally some big performances, but there's a naturalism which grounds it. It helps that New York is a character, as it's a place where some of the larger than life characters feel perfectly at home and, if anything, expected.

Tim Robbins - as I've no doubt mentioned before - I always conflated during this era with Bruce Greenwood, Sam Neill and probably another actor or two. His character, Larry, spends the most time with Wiliams's Joey. At times I found myself a little irritated with how easily Joey took control of the situation and influenced Larry and, despite it being established that Joey is a convincing salesman first and foremost, feel it could have been sold better in this particular situation. Still, the screen chemistry is good, and the negotiation scenes where Joey, gun pressed between his shoulder blades, manically relays the hostage taker's message to "go away" are hilarious. I especially enjoyed the little detail of him giving the "time out" signal to them as the pair shuffles backwards into the showroom.

The rest of the cast is pretty solid with everyone being the right level of sleazy, pushy, weary or demanding. Lauren Tom was a standout as the dim sum waitress (it's a little mind-blowing that she can be so funny here, while her thankless Friends role a few years later was written so blandly. At least she was better serviced in Futurama). Inexplicably, I instantly recognised Fran Dresher's name from The Nanny (it must have gone in by osmosis from spending so much time around these parts), and I was curious to get my first look at her, hoping it might pull me towards a series I haven't watched. I did check out a few clips afterwards, but only to see if she used the same voice there which would dash any hope of me watching. Funny how Lauren and Fran use a similar register, but the timbre of one works for me while the other grates like a gratey thing.

I didn't recognise Elaine Stritch as the widow in the opening scene. In fairness, she did wear a dark veil for most of her scene.

I appreciated the film's early scenes, which spent a great deal of time establishing its characters, dynamics and settings, just following Joey round as he went about his weekend. It would have been great (if impossible) to watch this without knowing a thing about the film's premise, because there was really no sense of where it was going for the first third of the film. This groundwork really paid off when it hit the fan. I also applauded the genuine sense of jeopardy. It felt as though anything could happen, and the ending could go several ways.

Outrageous as the whole thing seems, this is a film that can really only work when played by people who are not only funny but also good dramatic actors. And work it does.

 

[Mel O'Drama]

Then She Found Me (2007)

It's taken me quite some time to get round to watching this one. The British poster image of Helen Hunt and Colin Firth facing one another in profile and touching foreheads is somehow embedded in my memory (presumably from seeing it on the side of buses back in the day), and it just says "generic romcom". I prefer the poster above, which I don't recognise. At least it alludes to the meaning behind the title, whereas the other poster suggests a couple who were lucky to find one another (still true of the plot, but also the more generic part).

After the film, I read that Matthew Broderick, Bette Midler and Colin Firth had all worked for minimum pay to help Helen Hunt complete this passion project, which raised the film in my esteem. Even before that I'd thought it was charming and quite touching.

All performances are great, but it possibly goes without saying that Helen Hunt is the best thing in this. She's got such class and has that rare gift of getting the viewer to feel what her character is feeling (which I suppose is ultimately the aim of any acting performance, even though it happens so rarely). It's probably a little sledgehammer to measure how good she is by how well she cries, but my god - the way those real tears flow when she lets loose. I think she only has one big crying scene here, but she always looks as though she's about to cry anyway, with those furrowed eyelids concealing so much pain (even though she's in the enviable position of choosing between Matthew Broderick and Colin Firth). Helen performs double duty here, since the film is her directorial debut, and it looks perfectly fine to my eyes.

Colin Firth plays the stressed-out abandoned single parent role that usually wins awards for actresses. His intensity at times is almost frightening. And Matthew Broderick does the adorable-but-frustrating man-child thing so well.

How intriguing to realise on watching the end titles that Salman Rushdie had played the doctor. They also mentioned that Tim Robbins had played himself (presumably one of the guests on Midler's character's talk show) which means I've unintentionally watched him in two films on two consecutive evenings.

The plot is very soapy indeed, with each twist soapier than the last. It's carried by the conviction of the performances and dialogue, though, and these are so well executed that there were two or three which took me by surprise even though I should have seen them coming from a mile away. One of them (the last scene to take place in a hospital setting) even had me reflecting on how impressive it was that I'd been enjoying the dynamics so much that I hadn't even considered the outcome, obvious as it was to anyone familiar with the conventions of soapy drama.

 

[Willie Oleson]

Johnny Guitar (1954)



If this is Joan's "greatest triumph" then I really have to ask what made her such a celebrated powerhouse in the first place (compared to Katharine Hepburn and Liz Taylor, just to name two talented actresses).
Indeed, apart from BABY JANE I have yet to see a Joan Crawford film that's actually good, and perhaps this is the time to revise my opinion of MOMMIE DEAREST.
Sure, it may be a bad movie by "Faye Dunaway" standards, but from a meta point of view it's a film about Joan Crawford in the style of Joan Crawford.
Anyway, here we have Johnny Guitar which is really Joanie Guitar, but that's fine - a film doesn't have to be about its title.
In fact, Johnny 'Guitar' Logan is so brutally sidelined that it almost looks as if he isn't there. Comments directly aimed at Johnny are often telegraphed through Crawford's "Vienna": Ask him to.... / Tell him to....

The film operates purely on a melodramatic level which is not exceptional in the Western genre, but it's also presented in a comic book-style string of frames and scenes.
There's no natural flow in dialogue, every line is delivered as an independent statement and the only thing that's missing are the exclamation marks.
If this was a stylistic choice then it deserves to be judged on those artistic merits, and not on what-it's-not or what could-have-been.
I think the problem is in the script because the forceful one-liners are too matter-of-factly, it needed to be more witty and snappy to make it work.
Thirty minutes into the film and we've only got the character introductions, a bunch of angry people having arguments in a nonsensical way. Some characters are accused and instantly convicted based on "because we say so".
The first half of the film is these actors standing around waiting for a cue to shout their monotonous lines, and it made me struggle to stay focused.

The Dancin' Kid's reasoning - if you're going to be convicted of a crime regardless of your guilt then you may as well do something bad - seems almost disproportionately refreshing and insightful compared to what had come before.
This is when the story starts moving, with various results but at least there's something to focus on. The best bits come from some of the supporting characters like Turkey and Tom.
When Tom's dying he says "Everybody's looking at me. It's the first time I ever felt important".
I guess that perfectly describes what it's like to co-star in a Joan Crawford movie (and John Carradine has to share that particular frame with JC, but thankfully no one mentioned it).

I find it peculiar that Joan Crawford has made a career out of playing strong-willed tough broads, but when she has to play it bitchy it looks stiff and unconvincing.
She's much better in the moments when she's a tearful wide-eyed defeated melodramatic character, and for me the reason why she could never have played the role of Baby Jane Hudson (in case it had been considered).
It's possible that she was a bigger bitch than Bette Davis in real life, I don't know I wasn't there.

Mercedes McCambridge as antagonist Emma Small is pure histrionics but the rage is entertaining enough to keep it all together.

I would have liked to see some suffering to make her look less one-dimensional. The scene in which she kills Dancin' Kid (of all characters) should have been a pivotal moment but they do absolutely nothing with it. In fact, the whole shootout is anticlimatic.
Johnny Guitar himself kinda remains a mystery, you have to make an effort to see him even in close-ups, so perhaps the film title is very on topic after all.
Apart from a scene at the beginning of the story he doesn't actually play his guitar, maybe that has something to do with it.

Posting this song (again) - the best Santa Esmeralda song not made by Santa Esmeralda.

 

[James from London]

I have yet to see a Joan Crawford film that's actually good

Have you seen Mildred Pierce?

 

[Willie Oleson]

Have you seen Mildred Pierce?

That package dropped on my doormat today, and will be watched after my "lazy stepsister" nap.