La Sirène rouge (Red Siren)
directed by Oliver Megaton
written by Alain Berliner, Robert Conrath, Oliver Megaton, Norman Spinrad
based on the novel by Maurice G. Dantec
starring Asia Argento, Alexandra Negrão, Frances Barber, Jean-Marc Barr, Andrew Tiernan, Edouard Montoute, Johan Leysen
A young girl in search of her father stumbles into a Paris police station with what appears to be evidence that her mother is a heinous killer. The police don’t believe her so the wee lass escapes and hides in the backseat of a car driven by a hit man and gang member who agrees to take her to Portugal to look for her dad.
Alice (Negrão) is nearly 13 and she’s subsequently awkward and shy. She is on the run because she loathes her Mother Ava (Barber) and everything she stands for. It is revealed that Ava is the head of a notorious criminal syndicate who sends out her goons to capture Alice and bring her back whatever the cost of life. Everything goes down in a small coastal town in Portugal where the efficacy of blood ties is ultimately challenged.
The film opens with a character named Hugo (Barr) who is holding up in what looks to be an underground warehouse space of sorts. He has his assault rifle ready to shoot whomever gets in the way of the bullets. He stands alert and ready but is startled by someone coming up behind him. He turns around and fires thinking he is killing a soldier only to discover that he has shot a ten year old boy. Years later he is pulling away from what may be a hit when Alice sneaks into his car and he is forced to deal with her presence and decide whether or not he wants to help her out.
Asia Argento plays an Italian detective named Anita who is put on the case and becomes far too involved in sorting out the details of the girl’s sad plight. The film focuses mostly on the chase of Alice who is determined to meet up with her father, Travis, (Leysen) who everyone assumes is dead after a boat accident three years ago.
Ava is portrayed by Barber as a woman who genuinely wants her daughter if only to groom her to take over the family business–murder, extortion, drug and human trafficking, and other nice, wholesome activities that any mother would be proud of instilling in her daughter. She is certainly cold and fleshed out in the grand tradition of the femme fatale but there is something pathetic and desperate about her personality that makes her at least partially sympathetic. We never get a firm grasp on precisely what activities Ava is involved in only that she has the ability to hire hit men to do her dirty work and suss out the recovery of her daughter. Barber is certainly geared up for her character’s unwholesome presentation. Ava is dire, deranged, and most certainly off kilter for much of the film. Barber plays up her demonic side through gesture and posture mostly. She captures the characters rottenness coupled with her longing to have Alice with her so she can extend her legacy. Ava is getting old and thinking about the end. She wants to be able to pass on her skills to someone she imagines she can trust. Barber gives off an icy quality that is delivered bluntly and without pretense. Ava doesn’t come across as a woman too terribly gifted in the art of motherhood. She is conniving, cruel and seemingly ruthless in getting what she wants out of other people. It’s never quite clear at first if she is capable of murder but by the end all doubts are decimated as she reveals herself at last.
The mother-daughter dynamic in this film is never fully developed. It isn’t clear if they have any type of normal interaction or if Ava is a warm and caring mother when she’s not trying to turn her daughter into a black widow. Alice is simply portrayed as a poor girl who longs the safety and calm that she remembers from living with her father. She is not complicated and its easy to forget her amidst all the gunfire that surrounds her when she and Hugo are holed up in a motel along with Anita and her partner who are both looking for Alice. A gun battle ensues and many of the goons are put away for good as Hugo fights his way out of his predicament. Alice escapes again and heads to where she knows her father is living and there is naturally a somewhat touching reunion scene between father and daughter. Of course the situation turns and more killings erupt leaving everybody dead who should be dead and the heroes of the story shaken but not defeated.
This is a standard thriller with no particularly novel or significant elements to elevate it above the mediocre. The story is scripted in a rudimentary fashion and events transpire predictably and nothing much of note takes place. It doesn’t matter in the end what happens with the girl because the audience is not allowed to gain much insight into the nature of the character. She’s simply a tormented pre-teen who is torn between her filial obligations to each parent.
The film has a familiar look to it as it is quite murky for much of first hour. It’s grim and typical of these type of films and subsequently it doesn’t possess a distinct style to set it apart. The story doesn’t allow the film to work beyond its limitations and the acting is consistently wooden and lacking in nuance or an obligation to express emotional truths garnered from the hell that is put on screen. Even Asia Argento seems to lack the natural style that she’s used to inform some of her other roles.
Overall, this film has no direction. It ends up in a specific place but one doesn’t particularly notice or care. There are scenes of beauty and longing mostly due to the coast line and the great view afforded by various locations. There is an elegance to a few scenes but they are trumped by the ugliness that is brought forth by the methods that are employed to film the action sequences who again aren’t exactly special in their execution. Granted the fighting is raw and there is a natural quality to much of it but it isn’t anything that hasn’t been done in hundreds of films at this point. Several of the characters aren’t provided with much of a storyline to work with. They are merely periphery and add nothing to the core story being presented. Anita gets caught up in Alice’s life but she doesn’t have anything to do with facilitating the child’s ultimate release which if one has seen any thriller in the past eighty years knows is going to be actualized. The response to this film that makes the most sense is in the end it doesn’t carry any weight. There is one scene that cements the mother-daughter relationship which is handled effectively. It brings a close to a chapter that is poorly written but it does manage to create a type of closure that is above the mark that most of these films shoot for. Still, the story as a whole lacks imagination, style and meaning. There just aren’t enough scenes worth remembering in the end.
Wednesday, January 7, 2009
Film Review--Friday the 13th Part 2
Friday the 13th Part 2
directed by Steve Miner
written by Ron Kurz
starring Amy Steel, John Furey, Adrienne King, Kirsten Baker, Stuart Charno, Warrington Gillette, Walt Gorney, Marta Kober, Tom McBride, Lauren-Marie Taylor
Crazy Ralph (Gorney) warned ‘em. Don’t go to that camp, ya punks. He’ll get ya. Yer all doomed. He said it and they ignored him cause he’s called Crazy Ralph and no body pays any attention to him. Too bad for them. Well, actually, too bad for Ralph too ‘cause he gets it with a garrotte by some unknowable creature who is also stalking and killing thoroughly annoying camp counselors one by one.
Now, the kids gather to learn how to boss little turdlings a bout with the least amount of effort and the most effectiveness. The film opens with a crazy dream by Alice (King), the lone survivor of the first installment in the franchise. She relives the end of the first film which means we do too. So for ten minutes we see everything that happened with shots of Alice tossing and turning intercut to remind us that this is indeed a dream. Then poor wee Alice gets an ice pick through her head and the drama begins. Then we are thrust into the story proper and are introduced to the first pair of nitwits who will most likely be slaughtered. It’s clear the girl will because her breasts are the only feature on her body that one remembers. That’s a rule with this film. Obvious breasts equals grisly death. There is another girl we meet who is actually never wearing a bra so it’s clear as crystal she’s going down hard and will never get up again. The other sure ticket to oblivion is as every horror fan knows: sex. If you have sex, you die. Actually, if you think about having sex and make preparations for it, you die.
The deaths are of course the only interesting thing in this film. Outside of the aforementioned breasts, there isn’t much here to get all jazzed about. The people are dull and dismal and lack even a semblance of personality. It’s a pleasure to watch them knifed, or to have a hatchet buried in their skull. They really are the highlights of every one of these films and the only point in remaining with the series is to see new and interesting ways of dispatching morons and creeps. Here the results are tentative as to how inventive the various slayings were. We have a hammer claw, a knife, a double impaling, an ice pick, a piece of barbed wire, and a machete. All are worthy methods of killing someone but none of them are particularly exotic or novel. Indeed, they are fairly obvious tools that can be found around any household or work shop. Still, they work well to convey the untimely deaths of a group of people who do nothing particularly odious to deserve their fates other than to lack a definable persona worth investing time in.
It takes a hell of a long time for this film to kick it in to high gear. The film makers try as they might to create fascinating characters that the audience will miss when they are dead but this never happens. It’s just a waste of time when the counselors could be being butchered slowly and methodically. That’s the one thing this film lacks and that the Saw films tried to perfect but failed. It could have given us characters worth knowing, worth crying over, and worthy of all of our attention–and then killed them wretchedly, tormenting them, torturing the fuck out of them and making there deaths into something that guts us as we try to watch. One of the best examples of this is “The Strangers” which introduces us to two people we can wholly relate to and then proceeds to kill them”. It’s always more satisfying to meet someone, develop a relationship with them, and then to watch them die. These films merely create ciphers to whom we share no particular allegiance and when they die it doesn’t matter in the slightest. It’s quite sad when the only reason you want a character to survive is because of her ample bosom. But that is what these films reduce a person to.
Back to sex. Jason Voorhees seems to have a difficult time with seeing girls who clearly are built for sex or who are in the process of having sex. He is terrified of what sex does for and means to a person. He’s a voyeur so he suffers from at least one psychopathological trait. He’s also fond of penetrating women with various implements which suggests latent at least a passing interest in fornication and release. It is unclear what he gets out of his acts of mayhem; it would be interesting to see if he obtains any type of gratification out of his deeds. Of course all that is beyond the scope of this film. It merely wants to show a madman killing young people and that’s really it. The joy is in the killings and the audience is supposed to root for the killer, in this case Jason. It’s not clear how much of this sympathy comes from the fact that he witnessed his mother’s death and is essentially a lost orphan forever searching for her and finding them instead. Personally, I don’t care who is doing the killing and I don’t identify with his pain in the slightest. I just like to see twits get butchered as strangely as possible. I assume that’s the case for many people who follow these films.
We do get to see a cripple tossed down a flight of stairs which makes one laugh, actually. I suppose people in wheel chairs naturally gain our sympathy considering their condition but it still doesn’t prevent their deaths from eliciting great peals of laughter. It’s never clear why this is, precisely. A non-handicapped person getting the same treatment wouldn’t be funny in the slightest. It’s a conundrum that will never be solved.
Jason is at the height of his game, fashion wise. He’s got the disgruntled lumberjack thing working for him and he’s quite a catch. One hopes he’s found a little foxy mutant farming woman to bed down with at night but that’s probably not happening. Still, he deserves love just as much as everyone else and should be able to find it amongst the garbage and the flowers. Jason in love would have been a thrilling new direction for the franchise but we never got a chance to see it. Or maybe we did, I cannot remember.
Overall, this film does what it sets out to do and satiates the audience’s thirst for blood. Although the deaths are all over too quick and the victims don’t seem to squirm enough, the actual implements that are used in these acts take on a iconic status as soon as they are employed to take out one of the sniveling brats. They are all elevated to a higher level and become symbols of great import in our minds as the film progresses. We tend to worship them and wait for their return with fangs bared. It’s certainly true that we watch these films to see how many can be done and the various methods that are brought to bear on their weak flesh. It’s a treat to watch them fall and allows the audience to project their own pet fears and animosities on the “victims” of these atrocities. All our hatreds can be released and we feel much better with each killing. There is nothing like watching a meager puppet get butchered for our amusement and edification. It helps if you add sex to the equation because we truly enjoy watching sexually alluring human beings get theirs in as grisly a fashion as possible. Maybe it’s just me.
directed by Steve Miner
written by Ron Kurz
starring Amy Steel, John Furey, Adrienne King, Kirsten Baker, Stuart Charno, Warrington Gillette, Walt Gorney, Marta Kober, Tom McBride, Lauren-Marie Taylor
Crazy Ralph (Gorney) warned ‘em. Don’t go to that camp, ya punks. He’ll get ya. Yer all doomed. He said it and they ignored him cause he’s called Crazy Ralph and no body pays any attention to him. Too bad for them. Well, actually, too bad for Ralph too ‘cause he gets it with a garrotte by some unknowable creature who is also stalking and killing thoroughly annoying camp counselors one by one.
Now, the kids gather to learn how to boss little turdlings a bout with the least amount of effort and the most effectiveness. The film opens with a crazy dream by Alice (King), the lone survivor of the first installment in the franchise. She relives the end of the first film which means we do too. So for ten minutes we see everything that happened with shots of Alice tossing and turning intercut to remind us that this is indeed a dream. Then poor wee Alice gets an ice pick through her head and the drama begins. Then we are thrust into the story proper and are introduced to the first pair of nitwits who will most likely be slaughtered. It’s clear the girl will because her breasts are the only feature on her body that one remembers. That’s a rule with this film. Obvious breasts equals grisly death. There is another girl we meet who is actually never wearing a bra so it’s clear as crystal she’s going down hard and will never get up again. The other sure ticket to oblivion is as every horror fan knows: sex. If you have sex, you die. Actually, if you think about having sex and make preparations for it, you die.
The deaths are of course the only interesting thing in this film. Outside of the aforementioned breasts, there isn’t much here to get all jazzed about. The people are dull and dismal and lack even a semblance of personality. It’s a pleasure to watch them knifed, or to have a hatchet buried in their skull. They really are the highlights of every one of these films and the only point in remaining with the series is to see new and interesting ways of dispatching morons and creeps. Here the results are tentative as to how inventive the various slayings were. We have a hammer claw, a knife, a double impaling, an ice pick, a piece of barbed wire, and a machete. All are worthy methods of killing someone but none of them are particularly exotic or novel. Indeed, they are fairly obvious tools that can be found around any household or work shop. Still, they work well to convey the untimely deaths of a group of people who do nothing particularly odious to deserve their fates other than to lack a definable persona worth investing time in.
It takes a hell of a long time for this film to kick it in to high gear. The film makers try as they might to create fascinating characters that the audience will miss when they are dead but this never happens. It’s just a waste of time when the counselors could be being butchered slowly and methodically. That’s the one thing this film lacks and that the Saw films tried to perfect but failed. It could have given us characters worth knowing, worth crying over, and worthy of all of our attention–and then killed them wretchedly, tormenting them, torturing the fuck out of them and making there deaths into something that guts us as we try to watch. One of the best examples of this is “The Strangers” which introduces us to two people we can wholly relate to and then proceeds to kill them”. It’s always more satisfying to meet someone, develop a relationship with them, and then to watch them die. These films merely create ciphers to whom we share no particular allegiance and when they die it doesn’t matter in the slightest. It’s quite sad when the only reason you want a character to survive is because of her ample bosom. But that is what these films reduce a person to.
Back to sex. Jason Voorhees seems to have a difficult time with seeing girls who clearly are built for sex or who are in the process of having sex. He is terrified of what sex does for and means to a person. He’s a voyeur so he suffers from at least one psychopathological trait. He’s also fond of penetrating women with various implements which suggests latent at least a passing interest in fornication and release. It is unclear what he gets out of his acts of mayhem; it would be interesting to see if he obtains any type of gratification out of his deeds. Of course all that is beyond the scope of this film. It merely wants to show a madman killing young people and that’s really it. The joy is in the killings and the audience is supposed to root for the killer, in this case Jason. It’s not clear how much of this sympathy comes from the fact that he witnessed his mother’s death and is essentially a lost orphan forever searching for her and finding them instead. Personally, I don’t care who is doing the killing and I don’t identify with his pain in the slightest. I just like to see twits get butchered as strangely as possible. I assume that’s the case for many people who follow these films.
We do get to see a cripple tossed down a flight of stairs which makes one laugh, actually. I suppose people in wheel chairs naturally gain our sympathy considering their condition but it still doesn’t prevent their deaths from eliciting great peals of laughter. It’s never clear why this is, precisely. A non-handicapped person getting the same treatment wouldn’t be funny in the slightest. It’s a conundrum that will never be solved.
Jason is at the height of his game, fashion wise. He’s got the disgruntled lumberjack thing working for him and he’s quite a catch. One hopes he’s found a little foxy mutant farming woman to bed down with at night but that’s probably not happening. Still, he deserves love just as much as everyone else and should be able to find it amongst the garbage and the flowers. Jason in love would have been a thrilling new direction for the franchise but we never got a chance to see it. Or maybe we did, I cannot remember.
Overall, this film does what it sets out to do and satiates the audience’s thirst for blood. Although the deaths are all over too quick and the victims don’t seem to squirm enough, the actual implements that are used in these acts take on a iconic status as soon as they are employed to take out one of the sniveling brats. They are all elevated to a higher level and become symbols of great import in our minds as the film progresses. We tend to worship them and wait for their return with fangs bared. It’s certainly true that we watch these films to see how many can be done and the various methods that are brought to bear on their weak flesh. It’s a treat to watch them fall and allows the audience to project their own pet fears and animosities on the “victims” of these atrocities. All our hatreds can be released and we feel much better with each killing. There is nothing like watching a meager puppet get butchered for our amusement and edification. It helps if you add sex to the equation because we truly enjoy watching sexually alluring human beings get theirs in as grisly a fashion as possible. Maybe it’s just me.
Tuesday, January 6, 2009
Film Review--Doubt
Doubt
written and directed by John Patrick Shanley
based on the play by John Patrick Shanley
starring Meryl Streep, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Amy Adams, Viola Davis, Joseph Foster, Paulie Litt, Matthew Marvin, Bridget Megan Clark
In John Patrick Shanley’s film adaptation of his own play Sister Aloysius Beauvier (Streep), the principal of the school attached to St. Nicholas Parish in the Bronx, has her convictions and little else to go on as she accuses Father Flynn (Hoffman) of impropriety with a twelve year old boy, ca. 1964.
The film opens with a sermon by Father Flynn where he espouses the idea that doubt can be just as powerful a unifying force as belief. He mentions the current political climate that has seen the assassination of President John F. Kennedy and appears to welcome the simple fact that the populace has been bound together by the singular factor of doubt. According to his presentation doubt is a genuine reaction to troubling times and ought to be understood in this context.
There is quite a bit of humor early on in this film and much of it has to do with Sister Aloysius’s fussiness and the awkwardness between her and Father Flynn.
Sister James (Adams) is a deceptively meek, earnest nun and teacher who possesses a simple belief in the edicts of Catholicism. As the film opens she’s not prone to posing very many questions about her faith, her church, or her decision to become a nun. They are pretty much sealed tight and her codified world suits her very much. Indeed, Sister Aloysius lambasts her for just wanting simplicity back after the turmoil with Father Flynn begins to go down. But she begins to experience grave misgivings about Sister Aloysius’s convictions regarding the manner and she eventually refuses to accept the elder sister’s verdict and forms one of her own. In many ways this is her story and it’s all quite legible on Amy Adams’s face. It’s a treasure trove of information and it reveals Sister James’s suffering through various stages of doubt that confounds her nearly to the point of breaking.
Meryl Streep captures all the pent up rage, loathing, and frustration that go into a life obsessively devoted to rules, regulations, and precise structure. She is so austere, exacting and frighteningly formal in her presentation. Nothing in her character’s life is ever going to be good enough to satisfy her craving for perfection. She hates ball point pens because she believes they make the students write like monkeys, she laments the loss of the fine art of penmanship, she holds Father Flynn in contempt for taking three cubes of sugar in his tea. Yet her longings make great sense within the structure of this film. She expects a certain order and Father Flynn represents to her a subversion of that order and it troubles her immensely. Her easily digestible world is threatened by his very person as he represents to her change that she steadfastly refuses to accept or even acknowledge.
The film has an exceedingly languid pace and events transpire in accordance with a particular time clock. There is a melancholy underpinning throughout the film that is exacerbated by the notion that a trusted man of the cloth may be responsible for something horrific and perfectly ghastly. Every moment is fraught with tension that builds up to a devastating climax where the titular doubt comes beckoning with fangs duly sharpened and ready to pounce and devour.
The young boy that is at the center of the conflict is named Donald (Foster) and he struggles to make his way at school. He is the first black student ever admitted and it’s not entirely clear if the treatment he receives at the hands of the other students is racially motivated or if they sense something else about him that sets him apart from them. His mother (Davis) suggests so much while communicating with Sister Aloysius about the relationship between her son and Father Flynn. Mrs. Miller does not want her son to be dragged into any potential and wide-spread controversy over the matter. She stands up for her son with conviction and tremendous class and stability. She does not want residual blame to fall on Donald for something, if it is true, that he did not, could not have, initiated. Davis gives a wrenching performance here and her intensity and fears are made manifest with clarity and decisiveness. There is a mesmeric quality to how she approaches Sister Aloysius, a woman she does not have any reason to trust more than Father Flynn. There is a sense that she doesn’t view Donald’s time with Father Flynn as being all that improper and that it is a good thing that he has showered her son with so much special attention. This stems from the fact that her husband beats Donald routinely because he senses that there is something inside Donald that he considers foul and vile and must be beaten out.
Sister Aloysius is a deeply flawed woman who is infinitely sympathetic. As she struggles with the information about Father Flynn afforded her by Sister James, she is faced with a bitter situation; she has no proof but should that be enough to stop her from taking him down? It isn’t a matter of whether he did it or not. Suspicion about these sort of things are enough to cast doubt in the minds of the parishioners and they will no longer be able to trust a man that they suspect might be capable of performing such hideous deeds. Sister Aloysius is not a patient woman who can simply let things ride. She has her convictions and she insists that the present situation be handled hastily and without hesitation. Father Flynn has irked her from the very beginning and she has at last hit upon an opportunity to make him suffer for what she perceives to be improper conduct of the most odious type.
The film offers a stark portrait of a specific mode of being. The nuns are quiet and eat their meals in relative silence. This is contrasted with Father Flynn and his fellow clerics who boisterously tell stories and drink beer and wine with their meal. The sisters drink milk and look truly miserable and somewhat forgotten. It is a signature of a different age that Father Flynn wants to play to. He wants Frosty the Snowman to be performed at the Christmas pageant. He wants to reach out more to the community to prove to them that the Church is no longer build upon a hierarchy that precludes the common touch. Sister Aloysius insists that the reason people go to church is to experience something different than themselves. It is not the Church’s role to connect with people on their level. She is clearly entranced by age old tradition and resents Father Flynn for wanting to change things around to reflect the present climate. It’s the basic disconnect between them and it informs the film in a direct manner.
The idea of a pedophile priest is something of a black eye to the Church. This film handles it gamely without ever actually coming out to say precisely what improper deeds were supposed to have gone on between Father Flynn and Donald. The viewer is left to imagine and it’s a most unsettling experience to have to entertain such difficult and painful thoughts. Still, it is a key component to this story and certainly adds tremendous gravity to the film’s conveyance of such potentialities.
The performances in this film are as good as cinema can offer the weary viewer. Philip Seymour Hoffman gives yet another solid performance that is all told with his eyes. They never seems to waver or show fear as his character confronts his accuser head on. The scenes between Hoffman and Meryl Streep are reminders of what can happen with two consummate pros go at each other in the ring. They both burn with a fiery rage that sears the screen and it’s a rare thing indeed to be so readily accosted with debris that is a necessary effect of the fallout between them. Hoffman is not one’s typical model of a priest: he drinks and smokes and his sermons are unorthodox to say the least. But he’s believable in this role and one wishes he were their Priest if Catholicism were ever an option. Meryl Streep is dynamic yet frightened in this role of a woman who doesn’t understand the way the world has morphed into something she despises. She feels the world is crashing around her and that even the wind is getting away from her. Streep conveys her character’s many misgivings in an understated way that doesn’t call attention to itself. Amy Adams is the face of purity and innocence. Adams readily conveys her character’s kindness and genuine affection for her students. She also shows a woman who is forced to face a dilemma the likes of which she has never encountered before. She does so patiently and with great care. Viola Davis is the hot ticket item in this film and everyone expects her to receive an Academy Award nomination for this performance. Davis gives a heartbreaking turn as a woman who is trying to figure out who to trust again. Mrs. Miller’s husband abuses her son by beating him black and blue and she feels helpless to stop it. One gets a sensation sense of Mrs. Miller’s taut anguish and this is all due to Davis’s restrained performance that doesn’t cross the line into sentimentality.
Overall, this film captures a mood of pressing despair as it formulates a story that might be about the myriad ways doubt emerges and how it can lead to both revelation and difficult, painful outcomes. The film does feel like a play at times but this works to contain the intensity of the emotions that are being expressed by the characters. The film does not manipulate one into feeling a particular way about what is being shown on the screen. It takes its time and allows us to form our own ideas about what we are seeing. All the characters are vivid, living beings with hopes and questions that provide the film with a depth that comes through in every scene. There is brooding quality to the film as very dark material is bandied about with great care and technique. One always feels locked in on the material and there are no moments where the narrative drags or loses traction. This is certainly a film to consider for the Academy Awards and all four principles deserve consideration as well. It’s just an example of what a simple, forthright story and top notch actors can still create in these dire times.
written and directed by John Patrick Shanley
based on the play by John Patrick Shanley
starring Meryl Streep, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Amy Adams, Viola Davis, Joseph Foster, Paulie Litt, Matthew Marvin, Bridget Megan Clark
In John Patrick Shanley’s film adaptation of his own play Sister Aloysius Beauvier (Streep), the principal of the school attached to St. Nicholas Parish in the Bronx, has her convictions and little else to go on as she accuses Father Flynn (Hoffman) of impropriety with a twelve year old boy, ca. 1964.
The film opens with a sermon by Father Flynn where he espouses the idea that doubt can be just as powerful a unifying force as belief. He mentions the current political climate that has seen the assassination of President John F. Kennedy and appears to welcome the simple fact that the populace has been bound together by the singular factor of doubt. According to his presentation doubt is a genuine reaction to troubling times and ought to be understood in this context.
There is quite a bit of humor early on in this film and much of it has to do with Sister Aloysius’s fussiness and the awkwardness between her and Father Flynn.
Sister James (Adams) is a deceptively meek, earnest nun and teacher who possesses a simple belief in the edicts of Catholicism. As the film opens she’s not prone to posing very many questions about her faith, her church, or her decision to become a nun. They are pretty much sealed tight and her codified world suits her very much. Indeed, Sister Aloysius lambasts her for just wanting simplicity back after the turmoil with Father Flynn begins to go down. But she begins to experience grave misgivings about Sister Aloysius’s convictions regarding the manner and she eventually refuses to accept the elder sister’s verdict and forms one of her own. In many ways this is her story and it’s all quite legible on Amy Adams’s face. It’s a treasure trove of information and it reveals Sister James’s suffering through various stages of doubt that confounds her nearly to the point of breaking.
Meryl Streep captures all the pent up rage, loathing, and frustration that go into a life obsessively devoted to rules, regulations, and precise structure. She is so austere, exacting and frighteningly formal in her presentation. Nothing in her character’s life is ever going to be good enough to satisfy her craving for perfection. She hates ball point pens because she believes they make the students write like monkeys, she laments the loss of the fine art of penmanship, she holds Father Flynn in contempt for taking three cubes of sugar in his tea. Yet her longings make great sense within the structure of this film. She expects a certain order and Father Flynn represents to her a subversion of that order and it troubles her immensely. Her easily digestible world is threatened by his very person as he represents to her change that she steadfastly refuses to accept or even acknowledge.
The film has an exceedingly languid pace and events transpire in accordance with a particular time clock. There is a melancholy underpinning throughout the film that is exacerbated by the notion that a trusted man of the cloth may be responsible for something horrific and perfectly ghastly. Every moment is fraught with tension that builds up to a devastating climax where the titular doubt comes beckoning with fangs duly sharpened and ready to pounce and devour.
The young boy that is at the center of the conflict is named Donald (Foster) and he struggles to make his way at school. He is the first black student ever admitted and it’s not entirely clear if the treatment he receives at the hands of the other students is racially motivated or if they sense something else about him that sets him apart from them. His mother (Davis) suggests so much while communicating with Sister Aloysius about the relationship between her son and Father Flynn. Mrs. Miller does not want her son to be dragged into any potential and wide-spread controversy over the matter. She stands up for her son with conviction and tremendous class and stability. She does not want residual blame to fall on Donald for something, if it is true, that he did not, could not have, initiated. Davis gives a wrenching performance here and her intensity and fears are made manifest with clarity and decisiveness. There is a mesmeric quality to how she approaches Sister Aloysius, a woman she does not have any reason to trust more than Father Flynn. There is a sense that she doesn’t view Donald’s time with Father Flynn as being all that improper and that it is a good thing that he has showered her son with so much special attention. This stems from the fact that her husband beats Donald routinely because he senses that there is something inside Donald that he considers foul and vile and must be beaten out.
Sister Aloysius is a deeply flawed woman who is infinitely sympathetic. As she struggles with the information about Father Flynn afforded her by Sister James, she is faced with a bitter situation; she has no proof but should that be enough to stop her from taking him down? It isn’t a matter of whether he did it or not. Suspicion about these sort of things are enough to cast doubt in the minds of the parishioners and they will no longer be able to trust a man that they suspect might be capable of performing such hideous deeds. Sister Aloysius is not a patient woman who can simply let things ride. She has her convictions and she insists that the present situation be handled hastily and without hesitation. Father Flynn has irked her from the very beginning and she has at last hit upon an opportunity to make him suffer for what she perceives to be improper conduct of the most odious type.
The film offers a stark portrait of a specific mode of being. The nuns are quiet and eat their meals in relative silence. This is contrasted with Father Flynn and his fellow clerics who boisterously tell stories and drink beer and wine with their meal. The sisters drink milk and look truly miserable and somewhat forgotten. It is a signature of a different age that Father Flynn wants to play to. He wants Frosty the Snowman to be performed at the Christmas pageant. He wants to reach out more to the community to prove to them that the Church is no longer build upon a hierarchy that precludes the common touch. Sister Aloysius insists that the reason people go to church is to experience something different than themselves. It is not the Church’s role to connect with people on their level. She is clearly entranced by age old tradition and resents Father Flynn for wanting to change things around to reflect the present climate. It’s the basic disconnect between them and it informs the film in a direct manner.
The idea of a pedophile priest is something of a black eye to the Church. This film handles it gamely without ever actually coming out to say precisely what improper deeds were supposed to have gone on between Father Flynn and Donald. The viewer is left to imagine and it’s a most unsettling experience to have to entertain such difficult and painful thoughts. Still, it is a key component to this story and certainly adds tremendous gravity to the film’s conveyance of such potentialities.
The performances in this film are as good as cinema can offer the weary viewer. Philip Seymour Hoffman gives yet another solid performance that is all told with his eyes. They never seems to waver or show fear as his character confronts his accuser head on. The scenes between Hoffman and Meryl Streep are reminders of what can happen with two consummate pros go at each other in the ring. They both burn with a fiery rage that sears the screen and it’s a rare thing indeed to be so readily accosted with debris that is a necessary effect of the fallout between them. Hoffman is not one’s typical model of a priest: he drinks and smokes and his sermons are unorthodox to say the least. But he’s believable in this role and one wishes he were their Priest if Catholicism were ever an option. Meryl Streep is dynamic yet frightened in this role of a woman who doesn’t understand the way the world has morphed into something she despises. She feels the world is crashing around her and that even the wind is getting away from her. Streep conveys her character’s many misgivings in an understated way that doesn’t call attention to itself. Amy Adams is the face of purity and innocence. Adams readily conveys her character’s kindness and genuine affection for her students. She also shows a woman who is forced to face a dilemma the likes of which she has never encountered before. She does so patiently and with great care. Viola Davis is the hot ticket item in this film and everyone expects her to receive an Academy Award nomination for this performance. Davis gives a heartbreaking turn as a woman who is trying to figure out who to trust again. Mrs. Miller’s husband abuses her son by beating him black and blue and she feels helpless to stop it. One gets a sensation sense of Mrs. Miller’s taut anguish and this is all due to Davis’s restrained performance that doesn’t cross the line into sentimentality.
Overall, this film captures a mood of pressing despair as it formulates a story that might be about the myriad ways doubt emerges and how it can lead to both revelation and difficult, painful outcomes. The film does feel like a play at times but this works to contain the intensity of the emotions that are being expressed by the characters. The film does not manipulate one into feeling a particular way about what is being shown on the screen. It takes its time and allows us to form our own ideas about what we are seeing. All the characters are vivid, living beings with hopes and questions that provide the film with a depth that comes through in every scene. There is brooding quality to the film as very dark material is bandied about with great care and technique. One always feels locked in on the material and there are no moments where the narrative drags or loses traction. This is certainly a film to consider for the Academy Awards and all four principles deserve consideration as well. It’s just an example of what a simple, forthright story and top notch actors can still create in these dire times.
Sunday, January 4, 2009
Film Review--Fallen Angel
Fallen Angel
directed by Otto Preminger
written by Harry Kleiner
based on the novel by Marty Holland
starring Alice Faye, Linda Darnell, Dana Andrews, Charles Bickford, Anne Revere, John Carradine, Bruce Cabot, Percy Kilbride
In this bitter romance cloaked in all the futile formality of noir, a solid blue lust object is murdered by one of her many would be suitors.
Stella (Darnell) is the focus of just about every man in Walton, California. They come into the diner, Pop’s Eats, where she toils to shamelessly cast their gaze upon her lovely form. She’s a petty thief, taking money out of the till, and plays her hand coolly and with little or no emotional investment. Eric Stanton (Andrews) stumbles into town because he can’t afford the bus ride the rest of the way to San Francisco. He too is immediately transfixed by Stella and the film conveys much of their relationship after a fashion.
This is fairly passable noir. Through the cinematic eye of Joseph LeShelle it possesses all the right cruel lamentations of darkness juxtaposed neatly with the wide open treatment of mostly artificial light. It’s all about creating a criminal mood through shadows that obscure faces and lend the picture the ubiquitous sense of mystery. Stella is a player with a list of eager men as long as her immaculate arm and she gives nothing away, leaving herself ample room to radiate the facade of delicacy and vulnerability. Stanton is on to her straight away and devises a scheme to make her his wife.
Stanton is a soft con artist who tricks people seemingly out of the overarching need for survival. When we first meet him he cons his way into the empty motel room of another con artist named Professor Madley (Carradine) who fools people into thinking he can communicate with the dead. Stanton convinces two sisters, June (Faye) and Clara (Revere) Mills to attend the seance and they are horrified when Madley begins to share their finances with his crowd of dupes. They abscond and Stanton quickly meets up with them. He romances the reticent June and asks her to marry him which he accepts straight away. His devilish plan is to steal all poor June’s money and divorce her immediately so he can be with Stella and give her the home and security she craves.
The film does a fine job setting up its necessary revelation at the end. All of the clues are present if one is able to understand the machinations of obsession and desire. Stella oozes a type of sexuality that we just don’t see much of at the present time. Still, she is favorably matched by the more buttoned up allure of June who is played innocent and naive by the sheepishly lovely Alice Faye. It’s true that Stella is supposed to cast fear into the hearts of all men who see this picture but the true siren exists inside the heaving breast of June just waiting to finally be released. Stella is too obvious and too generic to truly make much of an impact in the end. It is June who scalds the screen because her flesh is far too impossible to caress as she seems scared, delicately so, by the touch of any man who might long to possess her. Stella has seen it all many times over and a kiss means little or nothing to her. But to June, the slightest brush of the hand is like dynamite and it has the potential to pummel her into ash.
The overall impact of the film suggests that obsession can drive any man to extreme lengths. It’s a tight lesson that all great noir films traffic in routinely. In this film Stella is held up as an object worth losing one’s head over. She has all the slinky moves, the silky voice, and the proper amount of indifference to make her into something wholly dangerous to any man that would dare to apprehend her. It is her lack of interest that makes men swoon when they first catch a glimpse of her. She dates men without allowing her emotions to get in the way of a good time and she takes full advantage of the desperate adoration that is afforded her by every man she meets. Then she meets Stanton and all her tried and true measures to remain cold and elusive fall apart at her feet. She finds herself being sucked in against her better judgment and takes him at his word. But then she ends up dead, probably strangled, perhaps with her throat slit, and the film quietly begins to unravel the mystery of her demise.
Pop’s Eats stands in as a viable touchstone where a considerable amount of action takes place. Pop (Kilbride) is an elderly gentleman who harbors his own manic fancy for Stella and early on when she disappears for a short while he is beside himself with worry imagining all sorts of terrible outcomes stemming from her absence. The crowd usually contains an ex New York cop named Judd (Bickford) who is hired on to lead the investigation into Stella’s death. Judd routinely has a panic in his eyes and it’s no mystery why he shows up every day during Stella’s shift to drink his coffee and share in town gossip.
Clara Mills seems to have closed her body off to the penetrating gaze of men. She affects a tired, biblical austerity that holds back the potential outbreak of wanton sexuality. Yet there is something vital and promising about her flesh hidden behind the garments of a first rate spinster. If June holds passions then her sister contains legions that must find some outlet somewhere. Yet Clara is not given an opportunity to realize her carnal aims and subsequently shuffles quietly off into the night. She represents an antithesis to the gay social life as demonstrated by the dance halls and beer joints that Stanton introduces June to in an attempt to show her what she’s missing. June is an easy mark and succumbs to the more worldly viewpoint of Stanton and his big New York sensibilities. June has settled in a small town and knows little of the world’s fast ways so she naturally jumps at the chance to experience life as it can be lived by those who know where to look.
The film creates a small-town aesthetic beset with minor joys and simple pleasures. Stanton represents a more world-weary dynamic and his presence shifts the tension outward toward more vast and potentially threatening concerns. He introduces a perspective that has been forged by moments and textures that are none too familiar to the denizens of Walton who remain oblivious to much of the cruelty with which the outside world amuses itself. A murder in this town of a lovely, dynamic girl who creates a sensation everywhere she goes is the kind of event that townsfolk will remember for many years to come. Where Stanton comes from murders are as prevalent as rain showers. He possesses a more cynical attitude to matters of life and death because he has been privy to more abject inhumanity than Walton’s residents. Thus when he breezes into town he brings with him memories of events, however vicariously experienced, that immediately cause folks in Walton to wag their tongues.
Every role in this film is filled by actors who get the most out of the material they have been handed. Alice Faye is quiet, almost meek, for much of this film. Her character remains distant and elusive in a different way than Stella. She has shut herself off to the world and is in danger of ending up like her sister forever swearing off men as sinister beasts with only one thing on their minds. Instead she opens herself up to life and puts herself consequently at risk. Faye captures June’s longing and determination as well as her ability to be duplicitous when the situation calls for it. Dana Andrews carries himself with trepidation and care throughout this film. His character is always observing in this film be it Stella or any situation he happens upon. Stanton is cool and reserved but ultimately not particularly interesting as a character. He is rather shallow and one doesn’t much desire to follow him throughout the film. Linda Darnell is certainly worthy of the attention her character is paid in this film. It’s clear what the intentions of the film makers are regarding Stella and for the most part they succeed. Darnell brings a sultry urgency to her character although she never quite reaches icon status with this role. She is not achingly desirable nor does her flesh create illicit thoughts of the sort that immediately cause one to blush. Still, she’s lovely enough and perfectly suited for this role.
Overall, this film conveys all the traditional aspects of noir. It’s dark, shadowy, and somebody did someone wrong. There is an elegance to the camera work and the editing superbly captures the essential character of the film. The sexual tension is electric and certainly present for the duration. The main object of desire proves to be secondary to the primal qualities inherent in the flesh of the second tier love interest. It isn’t supposed to focus on the allure of June but she proves to possess the most material for creative outbursts of erotic fury. Stella is a cold fish who has tired of sexual gymnastics and has nothing left to teach. June on the other hand is ripe for the plucking and consumed with many secret and filthy desires that can be released by the right manipulation. Unfortunately, she’s not going to be so awakened by Stanton who will never see what is right in front of him to be seen.
directed by Otto Preminger
written by Harry Kleiner
based on the novel by Marty Holland
starring Alice Faye, Linda Darnell, Dana Andrews, Charles Bickford, Anne Revere, John Carradine, Bruce Cabot, Percy Kilbride
In this bitter romance cloaked in all the futile formality of noir, a solid blue lust object is murdered by one of her many would be suitors.
Stella (Darnell) is the focus of just about every man in Walton, California. They come into the diner, Pop’s Eats, where she toils to shamelessly cast their gaze upon her lovely form. She’s a petty thief, taking money out of the till, and plays her hand coolly and with little or no emotional investment. Eric Stanton (Andrews) stumbles into town because he can’t afford the bus ride the rest of the way to San Francisco. He too is immediately transfixed by Stella and the film conveys much of their relationship after a fashion.
This is fairly passable noir. Through the cinematic eye of Joseph LeShelle it possesses all the right cruel lamentations of darkness juxtaposed neatly with the wide open treatment of mostly artificial light. It’s all about creating a criminal mood through shadows that obscure faces and lend the picture the ubiquitous sense of mystery. Stella is a player with a list of eager men as long as her immaculate arm and she gives nothing away, leaving herself ample room to radiate the facade of delicacy and vulnerability. Stanton is on to her straight away and devises a scheme to make her his wife.
Stanton is a soft con artist who tricks people seemingly out of the overarching need for survival. When we first meet him he cons his way into the empty motel room of another con artist named Professor Madley (Carradine) who fools people into thinking he can communicate with the dead. Stanton convinces two sisters, June (Faye) and Clara (Revere) Mills to attend the seance and they are horrified when Madley begins to share their finances with his crowd of dupes. They abscond and Stanton quickly meets up with them. He romances the reticent June and asks her to marry him which he accepts straight away. His devilish plan is to steal all poor June’s money and divorce her immediately so he can be with Stella and give her the home and security she craves.
The film does a fine job setting up its necessary revelation at the end. All of the clues are present if one is able to understand the machinations of obsession and desire. Stella oozes a type of sexuality that we just don’t see much of at the present time. Still, she is favorably matched by the more buttoned up allure of June who is played innocent and naive by the sheepishly lovely Alice Faye. It’s true that Stella is supposed to cast fear into the hearts of all men who see this picture but the true siren exists inside the heaving breast of June just waiting to finally be released. Stella is too obvious and too generic to truly make much of an impact in the end. It is June who scalds the screen because her flesh is far too impossible to caress as she seems scared, delicately so, by the touch of any man who might long to possess her. Stella has seen it all many times over and a kiss means little or nothing to her. But to June, the slightest brush of the hand is like dynamite and it has the potential to pummel her into ash.
The overall impact of the film suggests that obsession can drive any man to extreme lengths. It’s a tight lesson that all great noir films traffic in routinely. In this film Stella is held up as an object worth losing one’s head over. She has all the slinky moves, the silky voice, and the proper amount of indifference to make her into something wholly dangerous to any man that would dare to apprehend her. It is her lack of interest that makes men swoon when they first catch a glimpse of her. She dates men without allowing her emotions to get in the way of a good time and she takes full advantage of the desperate adoration that is afforded her by every man she meets. Then she meets Stanton and all her tried and true measures to remain cold and elusive fall apart at her feet. She finds herself being sucked in against her better judgment and takes him at his word. But then she ends up dead, probably strangled, perhaps with her throat slit, and the film quietly begins to unravel the mystery of her demise.
Pop’s Eats stands in as a viable touchstone where a considerable amount of action takes place. Pop (Kilbride) is an elderly gentleman who harbors his own manic fancy for Stella and early on when she disappears for a short while he is beside himself with worry imagining all sorts of terrible outcomes stemming from her absence. The crowd usually contains an ex New York cop named Judd (Bickford) who is hired on to lead the investigation into Stella’s death. Judd routinely has a panic in his eyes and it’s no mystery why he shows up every day during Stella’s shift to drink his coffee and share in town gossip.
Clara Mills seems to have closed her body off to the penetrating gaze of men. She affects a tired, biblical austerity that holds back the potential outbreak of wanton sexuality. Yet there is something vital and promising about her flesh hidden behind the garments of a first rate spinster. If June holds passions then her sister contains legions that must find some outlet somewhere. Yet Clara is not given an opportunity to realize her carnal aims and subsequently shuffles quietly off into the night. She represents an antithesis to the gay social life as demonstrated by the dance halls and beer joints that Stanton introduces June to in an attempt to show her what she’s missing. June is an easy mark and succumbs to the more worldly viewpoint of Stanton and his big New York sensibilities. June has settled in a small town and knows little of the world’s fast ways so she naturally jumps at the chance to experience life as it can be lived by those who know where to look.
The film creates a small-town aesthetic beset with minor joys and simple pleasures. Stanton represents a more world-weary dynamic and his presence shifts the tension outward toward more vast and potentially threatening concerns. He introduces a perspective that has been forged by moments and textures that are none too familiar to the denizens of Walton who remain oblivious to much of the cruelty with which the outside world amuses itself. A murder in this town of a lovely, dynamic girl who creates a sensation everywhere she goes is the kind of event that townsfolk will remember for many years to come. Where Stanton comes from murders are as prevalent as rain showers. He possesses a more cynical attitude to matters of life and death because he has been privy to more abject inhumanity than Walton’s residents. Thus when he breezes into town he brings with him memories of events, however vicariously experienced, that immediately cause folks in Walton to wag their tongues.
Every role in this film is filled by actors who get the most out of the material they have been handed. Alice Faye is quiet, almost meek, for much of this film. Her character remains distant and elusive in a different way than Stella. She has shut herself off to the world and is in danger of ending up like her sister forever swearing off men as sinister beasts with only one thing on their minds. Instead she opens herself up to life and puts herself consequently at risk. Faye captures June’s longing and determination as well as her ability to be duplicitous when the situation calls for it. Dana Andrews carries himself with trepidation and care throughout this film. His character is always observing in this film be it Stella or any situation he happens upon. Stanton is cool and reserved but ultimately not particularly interesting as a character. He is rather shallow and one doesn’t much desire to follow him throughout the film. Linda Darnell is certainly worthy of the attention her character is paid in this film. It’s clear what the intentions of the film makers are regarding Stella and for the most part they succeed. Darnell brings a sultry urgency to her character although she never quite reaches icon status with this role. She is not achingly desirable nor does her flesh create illicit thoughts of the sort that immediately cause one to blush. Still, she’s lovely enough and perfectly suited for this role.
Overall, this film conveys all the traditional aspects of noir. It’s dark, shadowy, and somebody did someone wrong. There is an elegance to the camera work and the editing superbly captures the essential character of the film. The sexual tension is electric and certainly present for the duration. The main object of desire proves to be secondary to the primal qualities inherent in the flesh of the second tier love interest. It isn’t supposed to focus on the allure of June but she proves to possess the most material for creative outbursts of erotic fury. Stella is a cold fish who has tired of sexual gymnastics and has nothing left to teach. June on the other hand is ripe for the plucking and consumed with many secret and filthy desires that can be released by the right manipulation. Unfortunately, she’s not going to be so awakened by Stanton who will never see what is right in front of him to be seen.
Film Review--Fallen Angel
Fallen Angel
directed by Otto Preminger
written by Harry Kleiner
based on the novel by Marty Holland
starring Alice Faye, Linda Darnell, Dana Andrews, Charles Bickford, Anne Revere, John Carradine, Bruce Cabot, Percy Kilbride
In this bitter romance cloaked in all the futile formality of noir, a solid blue lust object is murdered by one of her many would be suitors.
Stella (Darnell) is the focus of just about every man in Walton, California. They come into the diner, Pop’s Eats, where she toils to shamelessly cast their gaze upon her lovely form. She’s a petty thief, taking money out of the till, and plays her hand coolly and with little or no emotional investment. Eric Stanton (Andrews) stumbles into town because he can’t afford the bus ride the rest of the way to San Francisco. He too is immediately transfixed by Stella and the film conveys much of their relationship after a fashion.
This is fairly passable noir. Through the cinematic eye of Joseph LeShelle it possesses all the right cruel lamentations of darkness juxtaposed neatly with the wide open treatment of mostly artificial light. It’s all about creating a criminal mood through shadows that obscure faces and lend the picture the ubiquitous sense of mystery. Stella is a player with a list of eager men as long as her immaculate arm and she gives nothing away, leaving herself ample room to radiate the facade of delicacy and vulnerability. Stanton is on to her straight away and devises a scheme to make her his wife.
Stanton is a soft con artist who tricks people seemingly out of the overarching need for survival. When we first meet him he cons his way into the empty motel room of another con artist named Professor Madley (Carradine) who fools people into thinking he can communicate with the dead. Stanton convinces two sisters, June (Faye) and Clara (Revere) Mills to attend the seance and they are horrified when Madley begins to share their finances with his crowd of dupes. They abscond and Stanton quickly meets up with them. He romances the reticent June and asks her to marry him which he accepts straight away. His devilish plan is to steal all poor June’s money and divorce her immediately so he can be with Stella and give her the home and security she craves.
The film does a fine job setting up its necessary revelation at the end. All of the clues are present if one is able to understand the machinations of obsession and desire. Stella oozes a type of sexuality that we just don’t see much of at the present time. Still, she is favorably matched by the more buttoned up allure of June who is played innocent and naive by the sheepishly lovely Alice Faye. It’s true that Stella is supposed to cast fear into the hearts of all men who see this picture but the true siren exists inside the heaving breast of June just waiting to finally be released. Stella is too obvious and too generic to truly make much of an impact in the end. It is June who scalds the screen because her flesh is far too impossible to caress as she seems scared, delicately so, by the touch of any man who might long to possess her. Stella has seen it all many times over and a kiss means little or nothing to her. But to June, the slightest brush of the hand is like dynamite and it has the potential to pummel her into ash.
The overall impact of the film suggests that obsession can drive any man to extreme lengths. It’s a tight lesson that all great noir films traffic in routinely. In this film Stella is held up as an object worth losing one’s head over. She has all the slinky moves, the silky voice, and the proper amount of indifference to make her into something wholly dangerous to any man that would dare to apprehend her. It is her lack of interest that makes men swoon when they first catch a glimpse of her. She dates men without allowing her emotions to get in the way of a good time and she takes full advantage of the desperate adoration that is afforded her by every man she meets. Then she meets Stanton and all her tried and true measures to remain cold and elusive fall apart at her feet. She finds herself being sucked in against her better judgment and takes him at his word. But then she ends up dead, probably strangled, perhaps with her throat slit, and the film quietly begins to unravel the mystery of her demise.
Pop’s Eats stands in as a viable touchstone where a considerable amount of action takes place. Pop (Kilbride) is an elderly gentleman who harbors his own manic fancy for Stella and early on when she disappears for a short while he is beside himself with worry imagining all sorts of terrible outcomes stemming from her absence. The crowd usually contains an ex New York cop named Judd (Bickford) who is hired on to lead the investigation into Stella’s death. Judd routinely has a panic in his eyes and it’s no mystery why he shows up every day during Stella’s shift to drink his coffee and share in town gossip.
Clara Mills seems to have closed her body off to the penetrating gaze of men. She affects a tired, biblical austerity that holds back the potential outbreak of wanton sexuality. Yet there is something vital and promising about her flesh hidden behind the garments of a first rate spinster. If June holds passions then her sister contains legions that must find some outlet somewhere. Yet Clara is not given an opportunity to realize her carnal aims and subsequently shuffles quietly off into the night. She represents an antithesis to the gay social life as demonstrated by the dance halls and beer joints that Stanton introduces June to in an attempt to show her what she’s missing. June is an easy mark and succumbs to the more worldly viewpoint of Stanton and his big New York sensibilities. June has settled in a small town and knows little of the world’s fast ways so she naturally jumps at the chance to experience life as it can be lived by those who know where to look.
The film creates a small-town aesthetic beset with minor joys and simple pleasures. Stanton represents a more world-weary dynamic and his presence shifts the tension outward toward more vast and potentially threatening concerns. He introduces a perspective that has been forged by moments and textures that are none too familiar to the denizens of Walton who remain oblivious to much of the cruelty with which the outside world amuses itself. A murder in this town of a lovely, dynamic girl who creates a sensation everywhere she goes is the kind of event that townsfolk will remember for many years to come. Where Stanton comes from murders are as prevalent as rain showers. He possesses a more cynical attitude to matters of life and death because he has been privy to more abject inhumanity than Walton’s residents. Thus when he breezes into town he brings with him memories of events, however vicariously experienced, that immediately cause folks in Walton to wag their tongues.
Every role in this film is filled by actors who get the most out of the material they have been handed. Alice Faye is quiet, almost meek, for much of this film. Her character remains distant and elusive in a different way than Stella. She has shut herself off to the world and is in danger of ending up like her sister forever swearing off men as sinister beasts with only one thing on their minds. Instead she opens herself up to life and puts herself consequently at risk. Faye captures June’s longing and determination as well as her ability to be duplicitous when the situation calls for it. Dana Andrews carries himself with trepidation and care throughout this film. His character is always observing in this film be it Stella or any situation he happens upon. Stanton is cool and reserved but ultimately not particularly interesting as a character. He is rather shallow and one doesn’t much desire to follow him throughout the film. Linda Darnell is certainly worthy of the attention her character is paid in this film. It’s clear what the intentions of the film makers are regarding Stella and for the most part they succeed. Darnell brings a sultry urgency to her character although she never quite reaches icon status with this role. She is not achingly desirable nor does her flesh create illicit thoughts of the sort that immediately cause one to blush. Still, she’s lovely enough and perfectly suited for this role.
Overall, this film conveys all the traditional aspects of noir. It’s dark, shadowy, and somebody did someone wrong. There is an elegance to the camera work and the editing superbly captures the essential character of the film. The sexual tension is electric and certainly present for the duration. The main object of desire proves to be secondary to the primal qualities inherent in the flesh of the second tier love interest. It isn’t supposed to focus on the allure of June but she proves to possess the most material for creative outbursts of erotic fury. Stella is a cold fish who has tired of sexual gymnastics and has nothing left to teach. June on the other hand is ripe for the plucking and consumed with many secret and filthy desires that can be released by the right manipulation. Unfortunately, she’s not going to be so awakened by Stanton who will never see what is right in front of him to be seen.
directed by Otto Preminger
written by Harry Kleiner
based on the novel by Marty Holland
starring Alice Faye, Linda Darnell, Dana Andrews, Charles Bickford, Anne Revere, John Carradine, Bruce Cabot, Percy Kilbride
In this bitter romance cloaked in all the futile formality of noir, a solid blue lust object is murdered by one of her many would be suitors.
Stella (Darnell) is the focus of just about every man in Walton, California. They come into the diner, Pop’s Eats, where she toils to shamelessly cast their gaze upon her lovely form. She’s a petty thief, taking money out of the till, and plays her hand coolly and with little or no emotional investment. Eric Stanton (Andrews) stumbles into town because he can’t afford the bus ride the rest of the way to San Francisco. He too is immediately transfixed by Stella and the film conveys much of their relationship after a fashion.
This is fairly passable noir. Through the cinematic eye of Joseph LeShelle it possesses all the right cruel lamentations of darkness juxtaposed neatly with the wide open treatment of mostly artificial light. It’s all about creating a criminal mood through shadows that obscure faces and lend the picture the ubiquitous sense of mystery. Stella is a player with a list of eager men as long as her immaculate arm and she gives nothing away, leaving herself ample room to radiate the facade of delicacy and vulnerability. Stanton is on to her straight away and devises a scheme to make her his wife.
Stanton is a soft con artist who tricks people seemingly out of the overarching need for survival. When we first meet him he cons his way into the empty motel room of another con artist named Professor Madley (Carradine) who fools people into thinking he can communicate with the dead. Stanton convinces two sisters, June (Faye) and Clara (Revere) Mills to attend the seance and they are horrified when Madley begins to share their finances with his crowd of dupes. They abscond and Stanton quickly meets up with them. He romances the reticent June and asks her to marry him which he accepts straight away. His devilish plan is to steal all poor June’s money and divorce her immediately so he can be with Stella and give her the home and security she craves.
The film does a fine job setting up its necessary revelation at the end. All of the clues are present if one is able to understand the machinations of obsession and desire. Stella oozes a type of sexuality that we just don’t see much of at the present time. Still, she is favorably matched by the more buttoned up allure of June who is played innocent and naive by the sheepishly lovely Alice Faye. It’s true that Stella is supposed to cast fear into the hearts of all men who see this picture but the true siren exists inside the heaving breast of June just waiting to finally be released. Stella is too obvious and too generic to truly make much of an impact in the end. It is June who scalds the screen because her flesh is far too impossible to caress as she seems scared, delicately so, by the touch of any man who might long to possess her. Stella has seen it all many times over and a kiss means little or nothing to her. But to June, the slightest brush of the hand is like dynamite and it has the potential to pummel her into ash.
The overall impact of the film suggests that obsession can drive any man to extreme lengths. It’s a tight lesson that all great noir films traffic in routinely. In this film Stella is held up as an object worth losing one’s head over. She has all the slinky moves, the silky voice, and the proper amount of indifference to make her into something wholly dangerous to any man that would dare to apprehend her. It is her lack of interest that makes men swoon when they first catch a glimpse of her. She dates men without allowing her emotions to get in the way of a good time and she takes full advantage of the desperate adoration that is afforded her by every man she meets. Then she meets Stanton and all her tried and true measures to remain cold and elusive fall apart at her feet. She finds herself being sucked in against her better judgment and takes him at his word. But then she ends up dead, probably strangled, perhaps with her throat slit, and the film quietly begins to unravel the mystery of her demise.
Pop’s Eats stands in as a viable touchstone where a considerable amount of action takes place. Pop (Kilbride) is an elderly gentleman who harbors his own manic fancy for Stella and early on when she disappears for a short while he is beside himself with worry imagining all sorts of terrible outcomes stemming from her absence. The crowd usually contains an ex New York cop named Judd (Bickford) who is hired on to lead the investigation into Stella’s death. Judd routinely has a panic in his eyes and it’s no mystery why he shows up every day during Stella’s shift to drink his coffee and share in town gossip.
Clara Mills seems to have closed her body off to the penetrating gaze of men. She affects a tired, biblical austerity that holds back the potential outbreak of wanton sexuality. Yet there is something vital and promising about her flesh hidden behind the garments of a first rate spinster. If June holds passions then her sister contains legions that must find some outlet somewhere. Yet Clara is not given an opportunity to realize her carnal aims and subsequently shuffles quietly off into the night. She represents an antithesis to the gay social life as demonstrated by the dance halls and beer joints that Stanton introduces June to in an attempt to show her what she’s missing. June is an easy mark and succumbs to the more worldly viewpoint of Stanton and his big New York sensibilities. June has settled in a small town and knows little of the world’s fast ways so she naturally jumps at the chance to experience life as it can be lived by those who know where to look.
The film creates a small-town aesthetic beset with minor joys and simple pleasures. Stanton represents a more world-weary dynamic and his presence shifts the tension outward toward more vast and potentially threatening concerns. He introduces a perspective that has been forged by moments and textures that are none too familiar to the denizens of Walton who remain oblivious to much of the cruelty with which the outside world amuses itself. A murder in this town of a lovely, dynamic girl who creates a sensation everywhere she goes is the kind of event that townsfolk will remember for many years to come. Where Stanton comes from murders are as prevalent as rain showers. He possesses a more cynical attitude to matters of life and death because he has been privy to more abject inhumanity than Walton’s residents. Thus when he breezes into town he brings with him memories of events, however vicariously experienced, that immediately cause folks in Walton to wag their tongues.
Every role in this film is filled by actors who get the most out of the material they have been handed. Alice Faye is quiet, almost meek, for much of this film. Her character remains distant and elusive in a different way than Stella. She has shut herself off to the world and is in danger of ending up like her sister forever swearing off men as sinister beasts with only one thing on their minds. Instead she opens herself up to life and puts herself consequently at risk. Faye captures June’s longing and determination as well as her ability to be duplicitous when the situation calls for it. Dana Andrews carries himself with trepidation and care throughout this film. His character is always observing in this film be it Stella or any situation he happens upon. Stanton is cool and reserved but ultimately not particularly interesting as a character. He is rather shallow and one doesn’t much desire to follow him throughout the film. Linda Darnell is certainly worthy of the attention her character is paid in this film. It’s clear what the intentions of the film makers are regarding Stella and for the most part they succeed. Darnell brings a sultry urgency to her character although she never quite reaches icon status with this role. She is not achingly desirable nor does her flesh create illicit thoughts of the sort that immediately cause one to blush. Still, she’s lovely enough and perfectly suited for this role.
Overall, this film conveys all the traditional aspects of noir. It’s dark, shadowy, and somebody did someone wrong. There is an elegance to the camera work and the editing superbly captures the essential character of the film. The sexual tension is electric and certainly present for the duration. The main object of desire proves to be secondary to the primal qualities inherent in the flesh of the second tier love interest. It isn’t supposed to focus on the allure of June but she proves to possess the most material for creative outbursts of erotic fury. Stella is a cold fish who has tired of sexual gymnastics and has nothing left to teach. June on the other hand is ripe for the plucking and consumed with many secret and filthy desires that can be released by the right manipulation. Unfortunately, she’s not going to be so awakened by Stanton who will never see what is right in front of him to be seen.
Friday, January 2, 2009
Film Review--Seven Pounds
Seven Pounds
directed by Gabriele Muccino
written by Grant Nieporte
starring Will Smith, Woody Harrelson, Rosario Dawson, Michael Ealy, Barry Pepper, Elpidio Carrillo, Robbine Lee, Joe Nunez, Bill Smitrovich, Tim Kelleher, Gina Hecht,
This film works both as a story of redemption as well as a well-wrought love story between two damaged individuals caught in a whirlwind of suffering and pain.
Will Smith plays Ben Thomas, an IRS agent who spends his time seeking out specific individuals and offering them tremendous breaks that he deems they deserve for mysterious reasons. Ben is something of a mercy peddler and he is determined to make sure that his targets reap the rewards of his generosity. As the film opens Ben is placing a 911 call telling the operator that he wants to report a suicide. The operator asks who the victim is and he says its him. So straight away we know Ben is exceedingly messed up and the film backtracks to tell us how he got that way.
We follow Ben as he makes his rounds. He gives away his house to a woman who has been a punching bag for her abusive boyfriend. We don’t quite understand Ben’s motives but they come awfully clear in the end and it still seems quite peculiar. The story is difficult to relate because so much is revealed in the final fifteen minutes. Indeed, everything is explained and the weeping is supposed to begin. Emile is dying from a weak heart and the film naturally doesn’t let her illness go untreated. I figured the big to-do about half way through. What I didn’t anticipate were the little details that make this a provocative film that is light on sentimentality. It’s effective for the most part because it doesn’t come off as particularly manipulative.
Will Smith is stoic, reserved and dead serious throughout this film. He hardly grins let alone smiles because his character is harboring a gut-wrenchingly awful personal story that haunts him every day. This is why Ben has gone on this mission to help those in need. It’s a cathartic exercise that he hopes will help salve his wounds although this is not his professed motive for completing these deeds. Smith looks so anguished for most of this film, so beside himself with grief, that it’s clear that he’s done something particularly horrific that somehow involves his wife who appears frequently in flashbacks within a flashback. We learn of a car wreck that killed seven people so it’s not a tremendous shock when the big secret agony is revealed.
The film resigns itself to a particularly pedestrian love story that takes up the second half of the film. It’s slow going at first and takes its time building up to anything. Ben and Emily spend a great deal of time together seeming to do nothing at all but be there for each other. They are both almost too fragile to touch one another and their few caresses feel like dynamite. Their relationship is the real focus of the film until the end when every sad and glorious thing is brought into the light. We know Ben lost his wife and that Emily is somewhat wary of men. Their interaction with each other might come across as chiched but the performances of the two leads sell it. It feels right that these two people are together and we want them to have a successful life together. In a way the end allows this to occur but not in a traditional romantic sense.
This film isn’t profound by any stretch of the imagination. It has a simple agenda which is to cause its audience to contemplate their own tendencies toward generosity and what lengths they might go to in order to truly help another in a precarious position. It all comes around nicely and the emotional payoffs at the end are genuine.
Early in the film we see Ben placing a phone call at a company who sells and ships meat products. He speaks to a man named Ezra Turner (Harrelson) a blind vegetarian who suffers the brunt of a series of insults before finally hanging up. We learn that Ben is testing Ezra here to determine if he is a good man slow to anger. Later we discover why this is so important and the realization is brought forth near the end in one of the film’s best scenes. There is a look on Harrelson’s face that is as moving as anything I’ve seen in the theater this year. It’s just a quick moment but it says everything that this film is trying to convey.
The character of Ben Thomas is a conundrum of hostility that he turns ably onto himself. His response to the terrible self-loathing that afflicts him is to force himself to give to those who are without. The strain on Ben’s face is apparent throughout and one can gage the struggle he is undertaking to carry out his self-imposed mission. Smith immediately grasps the audience and pulls us along as we try to come up with some definitive answers to the riddle at the center of the film. Granted, it’s not much of a mystery by the end but the relationship between Emily and Ben provide it with considerable weight and the film stays afloat because of it. It spends so much time with these two characters so by the final scenes their interaction becomes worth holding on to. It’s a bittersweet ending that defines the ultimate act of giving although the motivation for the gift is fraught with tremendous loss.
The penultimate scene involves a rather intriguing use of a box jellyfish that Ben has procured earlier in the film. The implementation of this creature provides the film with an exceedingly poetic spectacle as we are shown several sequences where the jellyfish are moving about their tanks. It’s lovely and trance-inducing and adds an element of grace to the story as it develops.
The actions that tie six of the seven people together are literal examples of the altruistic concept of giving of oneself. The film goes to great lengths to illustrate this concept in the most dramatic form possible. It isn’t at all subtle and admittedly it is something of a let down when everything is revealed. I kept wondering, “Is that really it?” Is that what all the fuss is about? Indeed, the film explains away every one of Ben’s good deeds but it feels like a cinematic trick more than a legitimate expression of one man’s effort to make good a wrong he has previously committed. Still, it’s the spine of the story and keeps the plot together however thin it gets at times.
The performances in this film are all adequate for the material. Will Smith plays it hard and low and for the most part conveys the reticence and sorrow that continue to plague his character throughout the film. Smith is nuanced here and gives off very few emotional cues. It’s nearly impossible to figure out his character’s motivation until the end when all is explained. This is a heartbreaking portrayal and Smith successful brings Ben’s pathos into focus. Rosario Dawson’s character Emily is delicate and perpetually on the cusp of shattering altogether. Dawson does a terrific job conveying Emily’s brittleness with her physiognomy and gestures. One completely believes that this is a woman who’s heart is exceedingly close to stopping her dead.
Overall, this film creates a very dark space and allows a single ray of light to sneak in by the end. The characters are all believable and successful rendered by an outstanding cast. Will Smith relates every ounce of anguish his character is working his way through. He doesn’t smile much and it’s clear that he is carrying a huge burden throughout the film. Smith captures the essence of a man who is at the end of his tether and clings to the only option that affords him even a semblance of the grace he experiences with his jellyfish. Ben seeks out specific individuals in dire circumstances that he knows he can help. His is not a genuine spirit of goodwill but rather a program designed to assuage his guilt. He is not necessarily a good person because he is attempting to rewrite his karma. Still, the film makes a point of saying that any effort to help is better than no effort at all.
directed by Gabriele Muccino
written by Grant Nieporte
starring Will Smith, Woody Harrelson, Rosario Dawson, Michael Ealy, Barry Pepper, Elpidio Carrillo, Robbine Lee, Joe Nunez, Bill Smitrovich, Tim Kelleher, Gina Hecht,
This film works both as a story of redemption as well as a well-wrought love story between two damaged individuals caught in a whirlwind of suffering and pain.
Will Smith plays Ben Thomas, an IRS agent who spends his time seeking out specific individuals and offering them tremendous breaks that he deems they deserve for mysterious reasons. Ben is something of a mercy peddler and he is determined to make sure that his targets reap the rewards of his generosity. As the film opens Ben is placing a 911 call telling the operator that he wants to report a suicide. The operator asks who the victim is and he says its him. So straight away we know Ben is exceedingly messed up and the film backtracks to tell us how he got that way.
We follow Ben as he makes his rounds. He gives away his house to a woman who has been a punching bag for her abusive boyfriend. We don’t quite understand Ben’s motives but they come awfully clear in the end and it still seems quite peculiar. The story is difficult to relate because so much is revealed in the final fifteen minutes. Indeed, everything is explained and the weeping is supposed to begin. Emile is dying from a weak heart and the film naturally doesn’t let her illness go untreated. I figured the big to-do about half way through. What I didn’t anticipate were the little details that make this a provocative film that is light on sentimentality. It’s effective for the most part because it doesn’t come off as particularly manipulative.
Will Smith is stoic, reserved and dead serious throughout this film. He hardly grins let alone smiles because his character is harboring a gut-wrenchingly awful personal story that haunts him every day. This is why Ben has gone on this mission to help those in need. It’s a cathartic exercise that he hopes will help salve his wounds although this is not his professed motive for completing these deeds. Smith looks so anguished for most of this film, so beside himself with grief, that it’s clear that he’s done something particularly horrific that somehow involves his wife who appears frequently in flashbacks within a flashback. We learn of a car wreck that killed seven people so it’s not a tremendous shock when the big secret agony is revealed.
The film resigns itself to a particularly pedestrian love story that takes up the second half of the film. It’s slow going at first and takes its time building up to anything. Ben and Emily spend a great deal of time together seeming to do nothing at all but be there for each other. They are both almost too fragile to touch one another and their few caresses feel like dynamite. Their relationship is the real focus of the film until the end when every sad and glorious thing is brought into the light. We know Ben lost his wife and that Emily is somewhat wary of men. Their interaction with each other might come across as chiched but the performances of the two leads sell it. It feels right that these two people are together and we want them to have a successful life together. In a way the end allows this to occur but not in a traditional romantic sense.
This film isn’t profound by any stretch of the imagination. It has a simple agenda which is to cause its audience to contemplate their own tendencies toward generosity and what lengths they might go to in order to truly help another in a precarious position. It all comes around nicely and the emotional payoffs at the end are genuine.
Early in the film we see Ben placing a phone call at a company who sells and ships meat products. He speaks to a man named Ezra Turner (Harrelson) a blind vegetarian who suffers the brunt of a series of insults before finally hanging up. We learn that Ben is testing Ezra here to determine if he is a good man slow to anger. Later we discover why this is so important and the realization is brought forth near the end in one of the film’s best scenes. There is a look on Harrelson’s face that is as moving as anything I’ve seen in the theater this year. It’s just a quick moment but it says everything that this film is trying to convey.
The character of Ben Thomas is a conundrum of hostility that he turns ably onto himself. His response to the terrible self-loathing that afflicts him is to force himself to give to those who are without. The strain on Ben’s face is apparent throughout and one can gage the struggle he is undertaking to carry out his self-imposed mission. Smith immediately grasps the audience and pulls us along as we try to come up with some definitive answers to the riddle at the center of the film. Granted, it’s not much of a mystery by the end but the relationship between Emily and Ben provide it with considerable weight and the film stays afloat because of it. It spends so much time with these two characters so by the final scenes their interaction becomes worth holding on to. It’s a bittersweet ending that defines the ultimate act of giving although the motivation for the gift is fraught with tremendous loss.
The penultimate scene involves a rather intriguing use of a box jellyfish that Ben has procured earlier in the film. The implementation of this creature provides the film with an exceedingly poetic spectacle as we are shown several sequences where the jellyfish are moving about their tanks. It’s lovely and trance-inducing and adds an element of grace to the story as it develops.
The actions that tie six of the seven people together are literal examples of the altruistic concept of giving of oneself. The film goes to great lengths to illustrate this concept in the most dramatic form possible. It isn’t at all subtle and admittedly it is something of a let down when everything is revealed. I kept wondering, “Is that really it?” Is that what all the fuss is about? Indeed, the film explains away every one of Ben’s good deeds but it feels like a cinematic trick more than a legitimate expression of one man’s effort to make good a wrong he has previously committed. Still, it’s the spine of the story and keeps the plot together however thin it gets at times.
The performances in this film are all adequate for the material. Will Smith plays it hard and low and for the most part conveys the reticence and sorrow that continue to plague his character throughout the film. Smith is nuanced here and gives off very few emotional cues. It’s nearly impossible to figure out his character’s motivation until the end when all is explained. This is a heartbreaking portrayal and Smith successful brings Ben’s pathos into focus. Rosario Dawson’s character Emily is delicate and perpetually on the cusp of shattering altogether. Dawson does a terrific job conveying Emily’s brittleness with her physiognomy and gestures. One completely believes that this is a woman who’s heart is exceedingly close to stopping her dead.
Overall, this film creates a very dark space and allows a single ray of light to sneak in by the end. The characters are all believable and successful rendered by an outstanding cast. Will Smith relates every ounce of anguish his character is working his way through. He doesn’t smile much and it’s clear that he is carrying a huge burden throughout the film. Smith captures the essence of a man who is at the end of his tether and clings to the only option that affords him even a semblance of the grace he experiences with his jellyfish. Ben seeks out specific individuals in dire circumstances that he knows he can help. His is not a genuine spirit of goodwill but rather a program designed to assuage his guilt. He is not necessarily a good person because he is attempting to rewrite his karma. Still, the film makes a point of saying that any effort to help is better than no effort at all.
Film Review--The Desert Fox: The Story of Rommel
The Desert Fox: The Story of Rommel
directed by Henry Hathaway
written by Nunnally Johnson
based on the memoirs by Desmond Young
starring James Mason, Cedric Hardwicke, Jessica Tandy, Luther Adler, Everett Sloane, Leo G. Carroll, Eduard Franz
In this biopic of Field Marshall Erwin Johannes Rommel (Mason) the trials and tribulations of war are articulated with a finely honed style and definitive bombast.
Rommel routinely flirts with a plot to Kill Hitler (Adler) that has made its presence felt during the latter half of WWII. He finds the idea to be rather attractive but ultimately is unable to fully commit. Mason plays Rommel as a nervous type who also seems uncommitted to furthering the war effort without the proper accommodations. He storms into an audience with a hysterical, seemingly delusional Hitler who is more interested in all the new magnificent weapons he is convinced will turn the tide and assure a German victory.
Rommel is presented as an able and often brilliant Field Marshall who was in charge of Deutsches Afrikakorps and the German Army in North Africa.. He is also shown as a family man with a wife and a grown son who also joins the army and eagerly enters the fray. He is dedicated on both fronts and the film articulates an iron will that is later challenged by circumstances beyond his control.
The film dedicates much of its time to the plot as various officers and civilians attempt to organize a proper methodology in order to effectively carry out their plan of removing Hitler from the seat of power and replacing him with a person of their choosing. After months of planning the dye is cast and the mission carried out by Col. Klaus von Stauffenberg (Franz) who plants a briefcase beneath a table at a meeting of high ranking German officials including Hitler.
There is a real sense of the futility of the German effort throughout this film. It focuses on many failed missions that stress the German troops and military administration to the breaking point. Much of this is contained in the face of Rommel as Mason reveals much of the agony surrounding the German military. Defeat is the cause celebre and it hangs over ever frame in this film.
James Mason captures a definite pathos throughout this film. His eyes seem to be searching for an answer that will not come. They are resigned to an outcome that means the end of operations and untrammeled defeat for the German military machine within which he performed so diligently and with such integrity. Rommel in this film is a genteel officer and Mason plays his with an elegance and a forthrightness that is fraught with a tenderness rarely afforded such men throughout the history of cinema.
Overall, this film captures the urgency of the plot and provides an intriguing view into the operations of war. There are many scenes of war including one where guns are a blazing and the viewer gets lost in a cacophony of bright lights and incessant gunfire that dazzles the mind and creates a lasting impression on the body. This is somewhat different for war photography in films as it gives a proper sense of the impact of the fighting as sensory overload. Rommel is portrayed with kid gloves and the portrait ultimately is of a goodly man who came to properly loathe the Nazi system and it’s approach to life. It is because of this viewpoint, developed later in life, that Rommel in this film is portrayed in such a shimmering light. He is merely a soldier who came to a place in his development where he could no longer entertain the belief that the Nazi’s were fully competent in performing their duties for Germany and her people. This is a man of integrity who is given the full on treatment in this film as a man of honor despite the very real fact that he caused much death to the Allied forces during his illustrious career.
directed by Henry Hathaway
written by Nunnally Johnson
based on the memoirs by Desmond Young
starring James Mason, Cedric Hardwicke, Jessica Tandy, Luther Adler, Everett Sloane, Leo G. Carroll, Eduard Franz
In this biopic of Field Marshall Erwin Johannes Rommel (Mason) the trials and tribulations of war are articulated with a finely honed style and definitive bombast.
Rommel routinely flirts with a plot to Kill Hitler (Adler) that has made its presence felt during the latter half of WWII. He finds the idea to be rather attractive but ultimately is unable to fully commit. Mason plays Rommel as a nervous type who also seems uncommitted to furthering the war effort without the proper accommodations. He storms into an audience with a hysterical, seemingly delusional Hitler who is more interested in all the new magnificent weapons he is convinced will turn the tide and assure a German victory.
Rommel is presented as an able and often brilliant Field Marshall who was in charge of Deutsches Afrikakorps and the German Army in North Africa.. He is also shown as a family man with a wife and a grown son who also joins the army and eagerly enters the fray. He is dedicated on both fronts and the film articulates an iron will that is later challenged by circumstances beyond his control.
The film dedicates much of its time to the plot as various officers and civilians attempt to organize a proper methodology in order to effectively carry out their plan of removing Hitler from the seat of power and replacing him with a person of their choosing. After months of planning the dye is cast and the mission carried out by Col. Klaus von Stauffenberg (Franz) who plants a briefcase beneath a table at a meeting of high ranking German officials including Hitler.
There is a real sense of the futility of the German effort throughout this film. It focuses on many failed missions that stress the German troops and military administration to the breaking point. Much of this is contained in the face of Rommel as Mason reveals much of the agony surrounding the German military. Defeat is the cause celebre and it hangs over ever frame in this film.
James Mason captures a definite pathos throughout this film. His eyes seem to be searching for an answer that will not come. They are resigned to an outcome that means the end of operations and untrammeled defeat for the German military machine within which he performed so diligently and with such integrity. Rommel in this film is a genteel officer and Mason plays his with an elegance and a forthrightness that is fraught with a tenderness rarely afforded such men throughout the history of cinema.
Overall, this film captures the urgency of the plot and provides an intriguing view into the operations of war. There are many scenes of war including one where guns are a blazing and the viewer gets lost in a cacophony of bright lights and incessant gunfire that dazzles the mind and creates a lasting impression on the body. This is somewhat different for war photography in films as it gives a proper sense of the impact of the fighting as sensory overload. Rommel is portrayed with kid gloves and the portrait ultimately is of a goodly man who came to properly loathe the Nazi system and it’s approach to life. It is because of this viewpoint, developed later in life, that Rommel in this film is portrayed in such a shimmering light. He is merely a soldier who came to a place in his development where he could no longer entertain the belief that the Nazi’s were fully competent in performing their duties for Germany and her people. This is a man of integrity who is given the full on treatment in this film as a man of honor despite the very real fact that he caused much death to the Allied forces during his illustrious career.
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