Backfire (1950)

☆ ☆ ☆

Backfire (1950) – V. Sherman

Average film noir that has some of the usual trappings (flashbacks, twisty plot, chiaroscuro lighting) but doesn’t really distinguish itself.  Perhaps this is because the lead is played by ho-hum Gordon MacRae who is flat on his back in the hospital for most of the picture, wondering where his ex-Army buddy and future ranch partner, Edmond O’Brien, has disappeared to.  O’Brien, a noir veteran (he shot this one between White Heat and D.O.A.) is always a treat to watch but he has less to do here.  Virginia Mayo is the helpful nurse who helps MacRae to unfurl the plot whereas Viveca Lindfors is the (faux femme fatale) lounge singer who drives the plot mechanics.  Ed Begley (Sr.) makes a solid police captain investigating the homicide of the gambler for which O’Brien is the principal suspect.  You get the point: this is the usual man-trying-to-solve-crime-before-the-police plot with a variety of red herrings and generic settings and situations.  So, in that regard, this is solid viewing – it just isn’t the cream of the crop.

  

The Man from U. N. C. L. E. (2015)

☆ ☆

The Man from U. N. C. L. E. (2015) – G. Ritchie

Slick but pointless, calculated yet somehow flaccid, and of course cynically setting up a franchise (that may never happen) – these may be the trademarks of Guy Ritchie who once seemed interesting (when he made Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels, 1998 but that turned out to be just a Tarantino hangover).  Here, we have a few up-and-coming stars who I didn’t recognise upon first glance (Henry Cavill, Alicia Vikander, Armie Hammer) and a glorified cameo by Hugh Grant to hold them together.  No one embarrasses themselves but proceedings feel hollow.  I never saw the original TV show but somehow I doubt that this matters – it wasn’t too hard to grasp the schema upon which the film rests.  Not worth your time.

  

Sicario (2015)

☆ ☆ ☆

Sicario (2015) – D. Villaneuve

Grim-as-all-hell look at the drug wars, as FBI agent Emily Blunt gets co-opted into Josh Brolin’s operation in Mexico.  It’s not quite clear who Brolin works for but he’s accompanied by brooding Benicio del Toro who we come to understand represents the title character, a veteran of the brutal and sickening war between the cartels.  Canadian director Denis Villaneuve handles action well and the bloody violence here feels less gratuitous than just a matter-of-course for this plot and probably the real thing.  But there is a lot of violence and the dusty desert locations and forboding soundtrack don’t brighten things up at all.  The intrigue lies in trying to understand what is going on but there is little cheerful pay-off in finding out.  Blunt is solid in her role but mostly left clueless and frustrated.  Viewers may feel similarly but the film does move quickly and hits that sad cynical spot.

  

Wrong Move (1975)

☆ ☆ ☆ ½

Wrong Move (1975) – W. Wenders

The second film in Wim Wenders’ Road Trilogy, after Alice in the Cities and before Kings of the Road, also starring Rudiger Vogler.  Here, he fashions himself to be a writer but has nothing to say.  Venturing away from his home by train to Bonn, he picks up several travelling companions, similarly aimless (including Hanna Schygulla as an actress, and teen Nastassja Kinski as a circus performer). The script by Peter Handke is artificial and didactic, focusing on alienation but also referring to (or laying blame upon) Germany’s wartime past and the complicity (or active engagement) by some in the atrocities.  The characters may allegorically symbolise different subsections of Germany’s population (youth, older generation, etc.).  Naturalistic, this is not.  Yet somehow Wenders’ directorial choices, aided immensely by Robby Mueller’s cinematography, keep things fresh.  Tracking shots abound and the countryside is green and the city dotted with bright colours.  Vogler and his companions drift along and we note the things that happen but nothing seems to affect him.  Instead, he is alone and unable to find purpose and meaning.  The other films in the trilogy seem less fully depressed.

Dick Tracy Meets Gruesome (1947)

☆ ☆ ½

Dick Tracy Meets Gruesome (1947) – J. Rawlins

Low budget serial that was soon to move to TV, featuring Ralph Byrd as the fabled detective.  Here, he comes face-to-face with Boris Karloff as Gruesome, a nasty thug who gets his hands on a scientist’s new chemical that has the power to freeze people in their tracks, virtually unconscious (but actually freeze-framed).  This enables a major bank robbery but fortunately Dick’s girlfriend Tess is in the phone booth at the bank, impervious to the gas and able to call the cops.  The comic book action is writ large and fairly silly but not so much as Batman the 1960’s TV series (for example).  So, things might be a bit dull if the proceedings weren’t lifted by Karloff’s special touch.  Somehow I thought Tracy would be a bit sterner but he seems a fun-loving joe here.  No gadgets anywhere in sight.

  

Virgin Witch (1972)

☆ ☆

Virgin Witch (1972) – R. Austin

I should have known better.  But in my never-ending quest to find spooky supernatural films (without gore, if possible), I descended into the realm of sub-Hammer sexploitation.  Apparently filmed just as Britain was opening itself up to T&A, that’s about all that is on offer here.  The acting is rather somnambulant and the plot (which sees two young girls runaway to London to become models but get mixed up in a witches coven) is far inferior to The Devil Rides Out (1968) or even The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975), two of its peers (the latter if you add sexuality to the mix, although that is more of a spoof of The Old Dark House, 1932).  (If anything good can be said for the plot here, it's that the women have all the power, including the supposed victim.)  At any rate, all I can say is “look elsewhere”.  I’ll tell you if I find something good in this genre (Suspiria, 1977, and Rosemary’s Baby, 1968, are still at the top of the heap).

  

Jedda (1955)

☆ ☆ ☆ ½

Jedda (1955) – C. Chauvel

The first colour film in Australia is dazzling to look at but very problematic in content.  Jedda is a young aboriginal girl whose mother died in childbirth leading her to be adopted by a white woman who had recently lost her own infant. This situation puts Jedda into a similar predicament to those indigenous children who were part of the “stolen generations” (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stolen_Generations), children who were forcibly removed from their families and raised by whites, possibly in order to assimilate the oldest culture on Earth into the invading Western one. On 13 February 2008, Prime Minister Kevin Rudd formally apologised for the Australian government’s role in removing indigenous children from their families and placing them with white families. The effects of their removal on these indigenous people have been drastic:  loss of culture and identity resulting in alienation from both indigenous and white cultures.  There are a number of contentious beliefs on display in the film:  1) the white mother believes that she is “civilizing” Jedda and must protect her from contact with her tribe; 2) the white father believes that indigenous peoples have their own ways and they need to be allowed to live according to their own customs but he implies that they are more animalistic (the filmmakers seem to share these views); 3) the half-caste boy, also raised by the whites, who becomes the head of the jackaroos is seen as a more suitable romantic partner for Jedda than any of the members of her own tribe. As she grows up, Jedda is shown to be fascinated by the indigenous culture around her and aching to take part in the corroboree and to go on walkabout but she is always prevented.  When a rebellious young aborigine from another tribe shows up and shows an interest in Jedda, the attraction seems mutual and sexual tension is aroused.  However, against her will, this young man (fleeing from a prison sentence, it turns out) kidnaps her and heads off into the bush, dragging her along.  Their flight (across amazing terrain) takes up the latter half of the film and ends in doom. 

  

A Night to Remember (1942)

☆ ☆ ½

A Night to Remember (1942) – R. Wallace

Dopey film that is a hybrid of two genres from the thirties and early forties: the screwball comedy and the murder mystery. If this sounds a bit like The Thin Man (1934), then you are not far wrong – undoubtedly the team of William Powell and Myrna Loy were a model for this film’s Brian Aherne and Loretta Young. Aherne is a mystery writer himself (who also seems to like a drink, a la Powell) and Young is his wife who rents a Greenwich Village basement apartment to provide him with more ambience for his creative process.  When a dead body turns up in their garden, we are introduced to a number of suspects from the same apartment building, all of whom seem to be sharing a secret – and perhaps a guilty one!  When Sidney Toler (the second Charlie Chan) shows up as a police detective, you know we are in genre territory.  Unfortunately, despite engaging performances from Aherne and Young, the whole thing feels a bit flat.

  

Shirin (2008)

☆ ☆ ☆ ½

Shirin (2008) – A. Kiarostami

To commemorate the great Iranian filmmaker Abbas Kiarostami’s death this week, I watched this very conceptual art film that ironically features 112 of Iran’s top actresses along with Juliette Binoche.  What we see is only their faces, apparently watching a film version of the classic tale of Shirin and Khosrow. The film is about 90 minutes long, so we are compelled to listen carefully to the film’s soundtrack and to see how this registers on the actresses’ faces.  Do they know they are being filmed?  Are they over-doing it?  As is always the case with Kiarostami, there are some questions about fiction and reality here. However, things are not really what they appear (which is also typical of Kiarostami’s work).  Rather than film all of these actresses in a real cinema watching a real film, Kiarostami filmed each of them separately (or in small groups of two or three) in his own living room.  It may have been a bit like Warhol’s Screen Tests.  But what’s more, they weren’t reacting to a film at all but instead to Kiarostami’s spoken direction.  Even more bizarrely, Kiarostami selected the “film” to be watched after the actresses had already been recorded and created the version of Shirin and Khosrow himself with another set of actors and actresses.  The foley artists are really working overtime!  He then edited together the soundtrack and the clips of the actresses to create a seamless whole that relies on a sort of audio version of the Kuleshov effect to trick the viewer into believing in cause and effect.  A bloody battle in the story (replete with the usual sound effect of smashed watermelons) results in an almost comic moment when the stars shrink away from the screen (what did Kiarostami really tell them?).  Of course, the film is something of an endurance test and not for the casual viewer but it is impossible not to begin to have thoughts and to engage interactively with the film and this is clearly one of Kiarostami’s goals – he wants us to wonder what the hell is going on!  In addition, there is an additional subtext about the faces of women in an Islamic society when strict religious tenets might require them to be covered – here they are unveiled.  Is this empowering? Is it taboo-breaking?  Do these women feel even more self-conscious?  But then again they are already actresses.  With Kiarostami, the questions never cease.

  

Eureka Stockade (1949)

☆ ☆ ☆

Eureka Stockade (1949) – H. Watt

Another slab of Australian history from director Harry Watt.  This is the story of the organized and democratic resistance by Victoria’s goldminers (“diggers” of course) against the heavy-handed tax collectors of the Queen led by Governor Hotham.  Although there is initial danger of mob rule when the diggers react to the brutal killing of one of their own, Peter Lalor (played by Chips Rafferty) rises to the occasion to take over the leadership and quell the angry group.  They build a stockade at Ballarat, design their own flag (the Southern Cross, of course), and prepare to defend their rights against tyranny.  They want the right to vote and to represent themselves as part of the governing body of the colony (this is 1854, before Australian Federation (which did not happen until 1901).  Unfortunately, the Governor attempted to stomp out the uprising by massacring the lot of ‘em and very nearly wiped them out (including Lalor).  But this action turned the public sympathy to the diggers and when survivors were brought to trial for sedition, they were found innocent.  Lalor later became a member of parliament for Ballarat.  The film itself is brisk, well-edited, a bit rangy but earnest and engaging.  It might help you to pass the citizenship test!

  

The Overlanders (1946)

☆ ☆ ☆

The Overlanders (1946) – H. Watt

It’s Election Day here in Australia.  So, to commemorate that fact, last night I watched this classic Australian film.  In order to escape the potential Japanese invasion of the Northern Territory during WWII, a drover (played with confident charm by Chips Rafferty) gathers together a team to lead a mob of cattle all the way across the continent to Brisbane, Queensland.  This film is the story of their journey through the outback.  Produced by Britain’s Ealing Studios but filmed on location in Australia and populated with Australians speaking Australian English (although as can be expected, the actors speak with a variety of accents), it’s a real treat to see a story based here in my adopted country. The cattle face numerous obstacles and there is a bit of a love story between cowgirl and cowboy but it’s mostly action, filmed documentary-style by Harry Watt, with hundreds of real cows, dozens of real horses, and a “you are there” feeling.

  

Lost Hearts/The Treasure of Abbot Thomas/The Ash Tree (1973/1974/1975)

☆ ☆ ☆ ½

Lost Hearts/The Treasure of Abbot Thomas/The Ash Tree (1973/1974/1975) – L. G. Clark

The BBC and director Lawrence Gordon Clark offered Ghost Stories for Christmas during the early 1970’s with a series of dramatizations of short stories by M. R. James.  These three tales all follow the typical formula (also seen in A Warning to the Curious and Whistle and I’ll Come to You) where a naïve outsider stumbles into malevolent horror, sometimes because they make some selfish choices and sometimes (as in Lost Hearts) for no good reason at all -- although the old man who comes to a bad end after dabbling in the occult might be seen to fit the mould, even as the child protagonist is our eyes and ears.  Of the three, I found “The Treasure of Abbot Thomas” to be the most satisfying, with a plot focused on solving a mystery with clues extracted from Latin text (um, a la Dan Brown?) to find the treasure – but with an ambiguous ending.  The Ash-Tree has a weird punchline but it is somewhat more inscrutable, perhaps because the narrative isn’t laid out clearly.  Nevertheless, all three offer some creepy moments and are worth a look.  Now, having partaken in a fair few of these TV versions, I am persuaded to read some of the original short stories – perhaps after I have finished my Lovecraft tome.  Now those would make for some real scares at Xmas or any other time!  

The Hitch-Hiker (1953)

☆ ☆ ☆

The Hitch-Hiker (1953) – I. Lupino

Two guys off for a fishing trip pick up a hitcher who is wanted for murder. He forces them at gunpoint to drive through Mexico to Santa Rosalia on the Gulf – a 500-mile journey.  It’s tense all the way but there is nary a chance for escape.  Even at night, the hitch-hiker seems awake because he’s got a partially paralyzed eye that never closes.  William Talman is brutal and harsh as this thug.  So, it’s a noir set-up and the film is framed as though, it coulda been you who picked him up.  But on closer inspection, the noir logic that dictates that one fatal mistake usually brings on a protagonist’s doom does seem to be operating.  Instead of heading straight to their fishing hole, Edmond O’Brien and Frank Lovejoy take a detour to Mexicali for a drink and possibly some fun away from their wives (O’Brien’s idea).  Nothing happens but if they hadn’t gone that way, they never would have met Talman.  But, hell, who knows what sorts of missteps lay before us, where the fickle finger of fate is always waiting to poke us in the eye? Ida Lupino, a noir veteran in front of the camera, directed this concise thriller.

  

Black Mass (2015)

☆ ☆ ½

Black Mass (2015) – S. Cooper

Haven’t we seen this movie before?  It comes across a bit like sub-par Scorsese with its gangsters and compromised FBI agents.  I was waiting for something to take this further but the faux-Boston accents and make-upped over Johnny Depp just couldn’t do it.  Director Scott Cooper plays this strictly by the numbers, aiming for a commercial hit, no doubt.  Depp is Whitey Bulger, a real-life crime kingpin who evaded the law until 2011 after running rampant in the ‘70s and ‘80s.  He forms an “alliance” with FBI agent John Connolly (Australian Joel Edgerton) with the latter being played for a sucker as he protects his “informant”.  Even Benedict Cumberbatch is here with his Boston accent turned up strong as Bulger’s politician brother.  So, it’s just a genre film, recycling a genre that started in the 1930s with Edward G. Robinson and Jimmy Cagney. Depp fails to bring the charisma needed for the part (though perhaps the real Whitey wasn’t a charmer either).