Third viewing; latest previous viewing on July 10, 2006; first viewed on February 15, 1988.
English title: For a Few Dollars More.
Two bounty hunters team up against a bank robber and his gang.
My 2006 review of this movie on this blog went as follows:
[begin quote]
Synopsis: Two bounty hunters get involved with a bank robber and his gang.
Appraisal: It is my second viewing. The first time I saw it I must have been in a state of semi-conscience, because I gave it a very low rating. In fact, it is a good movie, and the first half hour is truly anthological. After that amazing half hour, the film shifts into a more conventional gear, but never becomes less than interesting.
[end quote]
I'm amazed at the near-identity of my synopses then and now. My appraisal has not changed much either, but I feel now that the film has a good one hour of anthological cinema (rather than just half). That makes up approximately half of the movie. The remainder of it is where plot takes over, and, while one can still sense the formal command of a young master director, I could not help the perception that indeed it had "shift[ed] into a more conventional gear". Also, I must grapple with the reasons I did not like it in 1988 in a more honest way than saying I was "in a state of semi-conscience". The main reason for my dislike probably has to do with a perceived artificiality of the movie. I was somewhat of a purist that disliked anything that was not "authentic", "true-to-life", etc. Also, I sensed some infantility to the whole proceedings, and I think I was right in that perception, but wrong in my reasons for disliking it. The film is very open about it, too, as made manifest in a line by one of the children about the behavior of the two protagonists, comparing it to the games the former liked to play. In order to make sense of this movie, and in fact of the whole non-American western genre, one has to understand that these works are a response to American cultural colonization of the rest of the world. "Serious" non-American films were either being politically confrontational about America, or else tried to depict local cultures away from American influence. Here, the tactic is completely different, akin to the concept of "anthropophagy" postulated by Oswald de Andrade. For a Few Dollars More (and many others) absorb the American culture and process it in such a way that it is robbed of its essence, displaying instead only a outward resemblance to its source. While the result may appear culturally alienated, it is in fact subtly charged with subversive cultural traits. For example, American cinema was gradually becoming more liberal in the 60s, and Westerns were no exception. Italian westerns completely ignored that trend, and turned out to be quite an influence on the subsequent American filmography.
Rating: 68 (up from 62)
Sunday, November 23, 2014
Monday, November 17, 2014
Heaven Can Wait (1943)
Second viewing; first seen on January 11, 1990
A man dies and voluntarily heads towards Hell. At the entrance he meets the Devil and proceeds to tell him his life. The film then flashbacks to his early days and narrates his life, with emphasis on his amorous achievements.
A very good film on the preponderance of Nature over Nurture. Genetics is the mainstay of the whole structure, with abundant smart observations and a recurring catchphrase: "Where does he get it from?" We get to see a demonstration of how the human race gets aesthetically perfected from generation to generation, through the practice of free association between the sexes (rather than the old-fashioned marriages of convenience). Dramatic tension arises from recessiveness, which causes the dominant gene's phenotypical expression to skip one generation. This is implicitly shown as beneficial, as there is also need of conventional types with a strong work ethics and not much imagination. A good review by Ted Goranson may be read at the User Comments section on IMDB, or at his site (you must enter the film title on the search box). Here's a partial transcript:
[begin quote]
Out of the Barrel
Author: tedg (tedg@FilmsFolded.com) from Virginia Beach
6 July 2005
*** This review may contain spoilers ***
A good story will charm even the devil.
Here's an uncharacteristically layered story. It has a thread of reality which we only peek. A man has been bad all his life. He's lied and cheated and as a result he's been sent to the anteroom to Hell where his case is reviewed.
He's given the option of telling his life and his version is what we see, a layer on top of that reality. In this layer, everyone loves him in spite of his lies, including his wife who ages little in 25 years. This version is rosy enough to convince the Devil to send him elsewhere.
The power of this story is reinforced just before it starts. A shrill woman with poor storytelling skills gets quickly sent through the floor to the flames.
Because this is somewhat formulaic, there's a small summary of the story embedded within, a well crafted comedy bit about the Katzenjammer Kids. Seems the week before, the Captain was entombed in an inescapable barrel. The comic this week (in a drawn out explanation) shows how he escaped. Something about a snake.
Casual viewers may wonder what this little play within the play is for. It is completely out of the mainstream of the story and is the only scene not directly concerned with our hero's life. Its there because the 20th Century rulebook said all big stories need a miniature version of itself within. Alert viewers will remember that everything we see is supposed to a remembrance of a life told to the Devil and everything except this would have been personally experienced by the narrator. So it really stands out because he cannot have recalled this.
Well, our hero escapes the barrel by telling the snake a story, and a good one (though the pacing is slow by today's standards).
Along the way, we get some of the lushest sets I've ever seen. It is as if all the cheap ornamentation of the dames in his memory have gone into decorating his imaginary barrel.
(...)
[end quote]
Regarding the "Captain in the Barrel" sequence, it provides a comment on the "marriage as a prison" theme, which is central to the movie; so, the sequence has indeed a lot to do with the "mainstream of the story".
Rating: 80 (up from 69)
A man dies and voluntarily heads towards Hell. At the entrance he meets the Devil and proceeds to tell him his life. The film then flashbacks to his early days and narrates his life, with emphasis on his amorous achievements.
A very good film on the preponderance of Nature over Nurture. Genetics is the mainstay of the whole structure, with abundant smart observations and a recurring catchphrase: "Where does he get it from?" We get to see a demonstration of how the human race gets aesthetically perfected from generation to generation, through the practice of free association between the sexes (rather than the old-fashioned marriages of convenience). Dramatic tension arises from recessiveness, which causes the dominant gene's phenotypical expression to skip one generation. This is implicitly shown as beneficial, as there is also need of conventional types with a strong work ethics and not much imagination. A good review by Ted Goranson may be read at the User Comments section on IMDB, or at his site (you must enter the film title on the search box). Here's a partial transcript:
[begin quote]
Out of the Barrel
Author: tedg (tedg@FilmsFolded.com) from Virginia Beach
6 July 2005
*** This review may contain spoilers ***
A good story will charm even the devil.
Here's an uncharacteristically layered story. It has a thread of reality which we only peek. A man has been bad all his life. He's lied and cheated and as a result he's been sent to the anteroom to Hell where his case is reviewed.
He's given the option of telling his life and his version is what we see, a layer on top of that reality. In this layer, everyone loves him in spite of his lies, including his wife who ages little in 25 years. This version is rosy enough to convince the Devil to send him elsewhere.
The power of this story is reinforced just before it starts. A shrill woman with poor storytelling skills gets quickly sent through the floor to the flames.
Because this is somewhat formulaic, there's a small summary of the story embedded within, a well crafted comedy bit about the Katzenjammer Kids. Seems the week before, the Captain was entombed in an inescapable barrel. The comic this week (in a drawn out explanation) shows how he escaped. Something about a snake.
Casual viewers may wonder what this little play within the play is for. It is completely out of the mainstream of the story and is the only scene not directly concerned with our hero's life. Its there because the 20th Century rulebook said all big stories need a miniature version of itself within. Alert viewers will remember that everything we see is supposed to a remembrance of a life told to the Devil and everything except this would have been personally experienced by the narrator. So it really stands out because he cannot have recalled this.
Well, our hero escapes the barrel by telling the snake a story, and a good one (though the pacing is slow by today's standards).
Along the way, we get some of the lushest sets I've ever seen. It is as if all the cheap ornamentation of the dames in his memory have gone into decorating his imaginary barrel.
(...)
[end quote]
Regarding the "Captain in the Barrel" sequence, it provides a comment on the "marriage as a prison" theme, which is central to the movie; so, the sequence has indeed a lot to do with the "mainstream of the story".
Rating: 80 (up from 69)
Sunday, November 09, 2014
Dead of Night (1945)
Third viewing; previous viewings: October 15, 1988 and December 19, 1994
The Hearse Driver is based on The Bus-Conductor, by E.F. Benson (1st publishing 1906).
The Christmas Party is apparently not based on an outside source; it does, however, reference a real-life crime.
The Haunted Mirror is loosely based on The Chippendale Mirror, by E.F. Benson (1st publishing 1915).
The Golfing Story is loosely based on The Story of the Inexperienced Ghost, by H.G. Wells (1st publishing 1902).
The Ventriloquist's Dummy is based on The Extraordinarily Horrible Dummy, by Gerald Kersh (1st published in 1939). Just for the record, the earliest story about a pathological relationship between a ventriloquist and his dummy seems to be The Rival Dummy, by Ben Hecht, first published in 1928 and filmed as The Great Gabbo in 1929.
An architect is hired to perform a renovation at a country house and, upon entering it, he recognizes the people assembled in the living room from a recurring dream of his. Each of them in turn then proceeds to tell a strange occurrence he or she has experienced or heard about. They involve, respectively, a premonition, an apparition, a hallucinatory mirror, a ghost, and a ventriloquist's dummy. The architect is increasingly overcome by fear of an impending catastrophe involving him and someone else at the house.
This collection of stories provides a sort of catalogue of fantastical motifs which have since become recurrent in the cinema. The underlying structure is an exploration of intrusion in its various forms. The main character enters a house for the first time and unleashes a series of narratives where Reality "cracks" allowing the Absurd or the Irrational to enter, a reflection of the War and the various kinds of invasion it entailed. We have such intrusions as the Dreamed upon the Consciously Perceived, the Future upon the Present, the Dead upon the Living, the Virtual upon the Real, Jealousy upon Love, the Role upon the Actor (or the Creature upon the Creator, or the Text upon the Writer/Reader), Impulse upon Reason (cf. The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde). The circular narrative provides a formal mirror of the structure as the beginning intrudes upon the ending; also, the lighter in tone The Golfing Story was seen by some viewers as an unwelcome intrusion rather than an agreeable interlude. From Christopher Mulrooney, I picked up (although, as usual, I am uncertain about the actual meaning of his words) the parallel between the reconstruction of a house and the reconstruction of a mind (both pointing allegorically to the reconstruction of a nation). I side with the majority in acknowledging the superiority of The Ventriloquist's Dummy over the other episodes, but all of them are good.
Rating: 75 (down from 88)
The Hearse Driver is based on The Bus-Conductor, by E.F. Benson (1st publishing 1906).
The Christmas Party is apparently not based on an outside source; it does, however, reference a real-life crime.
The Haunted Mirror is loosely based on The Chippendale Mirror, by E.F. Benson (1st publishing 1915).
The Golfing Story is loosely based on The Story of the Inexperienced Ghost, by H.G. Wells (1st publishing 1902).
The Ventriloquist's Dummy is based on The Extraordinarily Horrible Dummy, by Gerald Kersh (1st published in 1939). Just for the record, the earliest story about a pathological relationship between a ventriloquist and his dummy seems to be The Rival Dummy, by Ben Hecht, first published in 1928 and filmed as The Great Gabbo in 1929.
An architect is hired to perform a renovation at a country house and, upon entering it, he recognizes the people assembled in the living room from a recurring dream of his. Each of them in turn then proceeds to tell a strange occurrence he or she has experienced or heard about. They involve, respectively, a premonition, an apparition, a hallucinatory mirror, a ghost, and a ventriloquist's dummy. The architect is increasingly overcome by fear of an impending catastrophe involving him and someone else at the house.
This collection of stories provides a sort of catalogue of fantastical motifs which have since become recurrent in the cinema. The underlying structure is an exploration of intrusion in its various forms. The main character enters a house for the first time and unleashes a series of narratives where Reality "cracks" allowing the Absurd or the Irrational to enter, a reflection of the War and the various kinds of invasion it entailed. We have such intrusions as the Dreamed upon the Consciously Perceived, the Future upon the Present, the Dead upon the Living, the Virtual upon the Real, Jealousy upon Love, the Role upon the Actor (or the Creature upon the Creator, or the Text upon the Writer/Reader), Impulse upon Reason (cf. The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde). The circular narrative provides a formal mirror of the structure as the beginning intrudes upon the ending; also, the lighter in tone The Golfing Story was seen by some viewers as an unwelcome intrusion rather than an agreeable interlude. From Christopher Mulrooney, I picked up (although, as usual, I am uncertain about the actual meaning of his words) the parallel between the reconstruction of a house and the reconstruction of a mind (both pointing allegorically to the reconstruction of a nation). I side with the majority in acknowledging the superiority of The Ventriloquist's Dummy over the other episodes, but all of them are good.
Rating: 75 (down from 88)
Friday, November 07, 2014
Le quai des brumes (1938)
Second viewing; first seen on November 15, 1994
English title: Port of Shadows
A soldier arrives at Le Havre, a French coastal city, probably after deserting from the army. He spends the night at a secluded café, to which he is led by a person he befriended on the street. He meets a few people there, among whom a young woman he takes a liking to. The place suffers an attempted raid by hoodlums, who are after a man who may know something about a missing friend of theirs. The following day brings many complications involving these characters.
Very bleak and with a dreamy atmosphere throughout, alternating extremely lyrical scenes with caricatural depictions of low-life criminals. A particularly hilarious moment is when the villain reencounters the hero in a carnival and gets slapped for the second time. I cannot give a proper account of all the good things in this film, the mise-en scene, the exquisite performances, the beauty of its female star, its musical score...
Rating: 75 (up from 68)
English title: Port of Shadows
A soldier arrives at Le Havre, a French coastal city, probably after deserting from the army. He spends the night at a secluded café, to which he is led by a person he befriended on the street. He meets a few people there, among whom a young woman he takes a liking to. The place suffers an attempted raid by hoodlums, who are after a man who may know something about a missing friend of theirs. The following day brings many complications involving these characters.
Very bleak and with a dreamy atmosphere throughout, alternating extremely lyrical scenes with caricatural depictions of low-life criminals. A particularly hilarious moment is when the villain reencounters the hero in a carnival and gets slapped for the second time. I cannot give a proper account of all the good things in this film, the mise-en scene, the exquisite performances, the beauty of its female star, its musical score...
Rating: 75 (up from 68)
Private Benjamin (1980)
A woman who has just been through a devastating experience is coaxed into joining the army. She is not the soldier type, however.
I was more than willing to enjoy this film, for the reason that Paulo Francis once spoke very well of it. This is the kind of trap that adds the misfortune of spending two unpleasant hours of your life to the sadness of seeing one of your cultural icons be demoted from that position. Anyway, perhaps in part due to my favorable disposition, I rather enjoyed the first half hour or so, and then my annoyance grew gradually and steadily. To tell the truth, there was one sequence that I found moving, namely, when Judy is visited by her parents at boot camp and suddenly revolts against them. Also, the movie's very last scene has a lyrical quality to it, although the situation that gave rise to it ranks among the most over-used cliches of cinema. Also, this film is a curious case of Jews "sticking their necks out", and I recall that the year before there was The Frisco Kid which also did that. In the case of Private Benjamin, however, the critique is bland to say the least. For the most part, this film is just another case of Hate the Men indoctrination, a favorite topic of recent cinema, and justly so, given that female audiences bring big bucks to the industry, and it has the added bonus of winning the minds of a few weakly-defined men in the process.
Rating: 40
I was more than willing to enjoy this film, for the reason that Paulo Francis once spoke very well of it. This is the kind of trap that adds the misfortune of spending two unpleasant hours of your life to the sadness of seeing one of your cultural icons be demoted from that position. Anyway, perhaps in part due to my favorable disposition, I rather enjoyed the first half hour or so, and then my annoyance grew gradually and steadily. To tell the truth, there was one sequence that I found moving, namely, when Judy is visited by her parents at boot camp and suddenly revolts against them. Also, the movie's very last scene has a lyrical quality to it, although the situation that gave rise to it ranks among the most over-used cliches of cinema. Also, this film is a curious case of Jews "sticking their necks out", and I recall that the year before there was The Frisco Kid which also did that. In the case of Private Benjamin, however, the critique is bland to say the least. For the most part, this film is just another case of Hate the Men indoctrination, a favorite topic of recent cinema, and justly so, given that female audiences bring big bucks to the industry, and it has the added bonus of winning the minds of a few weakly-defined men in the process.
Rating: 40
Wednesday, November 05, 2014
Pot Bouille (1957)
Second viewing; first seen on December 23, 1994
Based on the novel by Émile Zola, first published in 1882.
U.S. title: Lovers of Paris
Approximate title translation: Stew Pot
A young man from a small town arriving in Paris for the first time takes a room with a relative at an apartment building and a job at a fabric shop. He is handsome and very interested in women; they reciprocate in various ways and degrees.
A light critique of the bourgeoisie, not badly done. It's hard to positively criticize this film, because I do not see faults in it, except if you consider it a fault the fact that it does not really go anywhere. But it is not unpleasant, apart perhaps from a certain monotony in its parade of adulteries and seductions.
Rating: 57 (down from 64)
Based on the novel by Émile Zola, first published in 1882.
U.S. title: Lovers of Paris
Approximate title translation: Stew Pot
A young man from a small town arriving in Paris for the first time takes a room with a relative at an apartment building and a job at a fabric shop. He is handsome and very interested in women; they reciprocate in various ways and degrees.
A light critique of the bourgeoisie, not badly done. It's hard to positively criticize this film, because I do not see faults in it, except if you consider it a fault the fact that it does not really go anywhere. But it is not unpleasant, apart perhaps from a certain monotony in its parade of adulteries and seductions.
Rating: 57 (down from 64)
Tuesday, November 04, 2014
Out of Rosenheim (1987)
Second viewing; first seen on April 30, 1994.
U.S. title (and also of the copy I've seen): Bagdad Cafe
A very fat German woman leaves her husband while they are vacationing in America. They happen to be in the middle of the Mojave desert at the moment. Seeking a place to stay, she finds a nearby Cafe and Motel the owner of which is a permanently furious black woman. The owner's initial reaction towards the new guest is one of bewilderment and irritation, but this German has a way of growing on people.
Bittersweet comedy. The film may be understood as a defense of tolerance, and it is interesting to point out the intrinsic contradictions involved in such a discourse. There is always a narrative 'scapegoat', someone towards whom intolerance must be directed, in order that islands of tolerance may be built. In this particular instance, males are the target of that intolerance, and when that happens they are actually intolerable as devised by the filmmakers, so that no fault falls on the female characters. This film was a big success in Brazil upon its release, one of those cases where the sole responsible for that was the film itself, instead of advertising and other extraneous factors. The film's aesthetical appeal has probably greatly contributed to the film's success; images seem to have a precedency over words, and plot is next to non-existing; the theme song and soundtrack are also key to the creation of mood. It's also a timely film, even more so today when intolerance against whites is reaching intolerable proportions; and it offers a 'magic white' as a complement, if not an antidote, to the current 'magic negro' stereotype.
Rating: 69 (unchanged)
U.S. title (and also of the copy I've seen): Bagdad Cafe
A very fat German woman leaves her husband while they are vacationing in America. They happen to be in the middle of the Mojave desert at the moment. Seeking a place to stay, she finds a nearby Cafe and Motel the owner of which is a permanently furious black woman. The owner's initial reaction towards the new guest is one of bewilderment and irritation, but this German has a way of growing on people.
Bittersweet comedy. The film may be understood as a defense of tolerance, and it is interesting to point out the intrinsic contradictions involved in such a discourse. There is always a narrative 'scapegoat', someone towards whom intolerance must be directed, in order that islands of tolerance may be built. In this particular instance, males are the target of that intolerance, and when that happens they are actually intolerable as devised by the filmmakers, so that no fault falls on the female characters. This film was a big success in Brazil upon its release, one of those cases where the sole responsible for that was the film itself, instead of advertising and other extraneous factors. The film's aesthetical appeal has probably greatly contributed to the film's success; images seem to have a precedency over words, and plot is next to non-existing; the theme song and soundtrack are also key to the creation of mood. It's also a timely film, even more so today when intolerance against whites is reaching intolerable proportions; and it offers a 'magic white' as a complement, if not an antidote, to the current 'magic negro' stereotype.
Rating: 69 (unchanged)
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