The Return of the Living Dead (1985)

☆ ☆ ☆ ½

The Return of the Living Dead (1985) – D. O’Bannon

I saw this sometime closer to its release date and Ayako reports that she saw it during its release in Japan.  We own the DVD but hadn’t put it on for a long time.  I never realized that it was directed by Dan O’Bannon (writer of Alien and Dark Star).  It is a superior zombie film, definitely of its time (1980s) with a number of punk rock characters and fashion and music to suit (not always punk but definitely 80s).  I think we can agree that this is a comedy rather than a horror film, although the action and effects are as aggressive and gory as anything you would see contemporaneously.  Unlike in George Romero’s classic films (Night of.., Dawn of…, and so on), these zombies move quickly and have a degree of intelligence (“Call More Paramedics!”).  The plot:  Two inept guys working at a medical supply warehouse accidentally spill some tin drums of military origin stored in the basement.  They release a gas which brings the dead back to life (and also infects them).  Unfortunately, the warehouse is located next to a huge cemetery.  Some punk kids are hanging out there.  The whole group escape to a nearby mortuary with the head of the medical supply company (Clu Gallagher) and attempt to defend themselves.  No real social commentary here (of the kind offered by Romero) but just some fast-paced gruesome fun with a light dose of cynicism (at the end). 

A Bay of Blood (1971)

☆ ☆ ½

A Bay of Blood (1971) – M. Bava

I keep hoping that I will find another good Mario Bava film.  There is a big cult around him but they seem to be primarily focused on Bava’s ability to stage a gruesome (and bloody) murder, rather than my interest in the creepy/spooky mises-en-scene he was able to create in such classics as I Vampiri (1957), Black Sunday (1960), Black Sabbath (1963), and even Planet of the Vampires (1965).  I suppose his success with Blood and Black Lace (1964), which saw fashion models in an elite agency picked off one by one, encouraged him in this direction.  A Bay of Blood is supposedly the progenitor of the slasher film, inspiring Friday the 13^th (1980) and apparently being ripped off directly in Friday the 13^th Part 2 (1981).  I wasn’t a big fan of that genre (although I did see Friday the 13^th Part III (1982) in the theatre in 3D), so why did I watch this?  I guess I am still hoping to find a clearer missing link between Bava the mentor and his protégé Dario Argento (who took the giallo form to higher heights with The Bird with Crystal Plumage and then creeped/grossed me out with Deep Red, Suspiria, and Inferno but has recently made nothing but crap).  Anyway, A Bay of Blood does capture some spooky feeling out there by the lake (I mean, bay) where a few lonely houses stand and Bava’s prowling camera peers at and stalks the cast.  An initial murder planned to spur an inheritance leads to a virtual killing spree (not all by the same murderer, it seems) and a lot of opportunities for Bava to go grand guignol (including with some young people who stumble into the action and get naked and dead).  But, in the end, I guess I’m telling you that late Bava doesn’t seem to be worth it -- unless you are a part of the gore cult (and I’m not).      

Hud (1963)

☆ ☆ ☆ ½

Hud (1963) – M. Ritt

The opening bars of Elmer Bernstein’s melancholy guitar theme and James Wong Howe’s exquisite black-and-white cinematography immediately put me in the mood for something special.  However, Martin Ritt’s version of Larry McMurtry’s novel wasn’t as compelling as I first hoped.  Sure, Paul Newman (already a star) offers up some brash method acting as the rancher’s wild son, Hud, unable or unwilling to care about anyone except himself, spending most of his time loaded and getting into trouble with other men’s wives. And Melvyn Douglas (a Hollywood stalwart since the 1930s) is solid as the widower rancher who can’t open his heart to his wayward son but has plenty of time for his grandson (Brandon De Wilde), who has naturally fallen under the sway of Hud.  Patricia Neal won an Oscar as the worldly family maid who attracts (possibly) unwanted attention from Hud, who can’t manage his impulses in an adult way.  In the background, an outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease threatens the ranch and the family’s way of life. So, this is character-driven drama rich with conflict -- but the arc of the story (straight down) and the fact that Hud is so damned unlikeable (not even pitiful once you know his backstory) makes it hard to enjoy.  The return of Bernstein’s guitars at the very end, when we know Hud is lost forever, didn’t quite reclaim the film for me.  I could imagine a better one with a less constricted protagonist but I ain’t from Texas.

The Dancer (Maihime) (1951)

☆ ☆ ☆

The Dancer (Maihime) (1951) – M. Naruse

Just before his big successes with Meshi (1951) and Okaasan (1952), Mikio Naruse made this soapy family drama, scripted by Kaneto Shindo (who went on to direct films of his own).  We enter the story in the middle, with the professor father returning from time away to find the ballet teacher mother in the midst of an affair and the two nearly grown children distant and distracted with their own lives.  Mieko Takamine portrays wife/mother Namiko as full of angst and guilt, unable to decide whether to abandon her cold and angry husband for the gentle caring Takehara-san or to continue to suffer in order to support her children in the name of family stability.  Atypical for Naruse, this is a well-to-do family who have “high culture” tastes and don’t seem to be suffering economically (although there is talk of the war having interfered with their goals and dreams).  Daughter Shinako (played by Mariko Okada who went on to work for Ozu) is following in her mother’s footsteps as a ballet dancer, realizing that she may be the vessel into which Namiko has poured her crushed hopes and dreams.  A few minor subplots take us nowhere and at last there is a major confrontation at the dinner table – an unusual emotional eruption for Japanese families that makes it even more consequential.  And then the ending is happy/sad/perplexing.  It all feels slightly off-key for Naruse who, at his best, was a master of family melodrama and its emotional implications for women. 

  

Wendy and Lucy (2008)

☆ ☆ ☆ ½

Wendy and Lucy (2008) – K. Reichardt

Kelly Reichardt’s movies are probably an acquired taste.  Some use the word “minimalist” to describe them but I’m not exactly sure what it means in this context (anti-Hollywood, for sure).  If it signifies that there’s not much going on in her movies, just plainly told stories of everyday events, unfolding slowly and shot with a clear-eyed skill in observation, then OK.  However, less is often more, as they say and, if you give in to them, Reichardt’s mundane stories somehow become sublime.  Perhaps it is her eye for beautiful compositions that heightens the experience or the inner resolve that her characters have or need to muster.  Wendy (Michelle Williams) is on her way to Alaska in a junky old car with her dog, Lucy.  She seems to have very little money, sleeping in her car, washing up in gas station restrooms.  Her relations with other people seem strained.  And, of course, somewhere near Portland, OR, things go wrong (she loses Lucy among other trials).  Apart from Williams, many or most of the other actors seem to be non-professionals and the action takes place on the streets (or in the woods) in real locations.  What happens to Wendy could happen to you or me, if things took a wrong turn.  The desperation is real and Reichardt is wise not to sensationalize it. 

J. S. A.: Joint Security Area (2000)

☆ ☆ ☆ ½

J. S. A.: Joint Security Area (2000) – C.-W. Park

No time like the present to watch this mystery-drama that takes place in the Joint Security Area between North and South Korea.  However, despite the apparent focus on the tensions between the two states, threatening to ensnare the whole world, the movie is actually a John Woo-styled look at male bonding across an insurmountable divide (political rather than legal).  Director Chan-Wook Park (whose biggest hit is the notorious Oldboy, 2004) plays with both time and truth, delivering us different versions of the pivotal event (the killing of two soldiers in the North’s gatehouse by a lone Sgt from the South) in flashback based on the legal depositions of those who survived and then on both memories and confessions.  A half-Korean member of the Neutral Nations investigation team (from Switzerland) interviews all of the men involved on both sides of the border; she follows the usual rulebook but is compromised in the end.  Park’s direction is always stylish and he uses a variety of camera moves to keep things interesting (such as a quick pan from character to character).  There’s less action than you would think but tension is maintained until we reach the requisite five-way armed stand-off.  Apparently, Tarantino loved this film and you can see why in the plotting (but not the dialogue).  Kang-Ho Song (excellent in Joon-ho Bong’s Memories of Murder, 2003) is charismatic as the North Korean Sgt but all of the four male principals are solid.   

A Pigeon Sat on a Branch Reflecting on Existence (2014)

☆ ☆ ☆ ½

A Pigeon Sat on a Branch Reflecting on Existence (2014) – R. Andersson

Great title.  Perhaps if this were the first Roy Andersson film that I watched, I would have been more exhilarated by it, but since it is the third (and stated to be last) film in a trilogy about being human, a bit of the novelty has worn off.  That’s not to say that the Andersson style isn’t still something wondrous to behold.  He meticulously sets up each shot with actors positioned statically around the frame with all elements of the setting perfectly colour-coded (in this case, heavy with beiges, greys, pastel greens, and browns) and the depth of field shot such that everything looks flat and characters in the background are fully in focus.  With everything static, very tiny movements (or splotches of colour) capture the eye and focus the mind – this gives an existential or humanistic flavour to the proceedings, asking us to consider the relevance/importance/uniqueness of the action in focus.  There are some really great set-pieces.  And, as in the earlier films, Songs from the Second Floor (2000) and You, the Living (2007), the film unfolds as a series of disconnected scenes, wry or absurd anecdotes featuring situations that we’ve all experienced or that elicit an emotion that we all know (such as embarrassment, awkwardness, shame).  The tone is dysthymic but affectionately comic – we’re let off the hook for having also been in these predicaments.  There are a handful of recurring characters, principally a pair of novelty salesmen trying to “help people to experience fun” by way of the traditional “laughing bag”, extra-long vampire teeth, and a horrible old man mask.  The joke is that these things never really work to bring fun to anyone’s lives.  Funny joke, right?  You get the point of the film then.  Worth your time, especially if you’ve also seen and enjoyed the earlier films in the trilogy.