The War Game (1965)

 Second viewing; previously viewed on October 31, 2005

In 1966, the U.S. drops an atom bomb on Vietnam; the U.S.S.R. and China declare war on the U.S. and Western Europe. This film describes what happens in England when it suffers a nuclear attack.

Anti-armamentist propaganda with a fictional plot told in a documentary form. It's well made and effective, though at one or two occasions it overplays the sarcasm note in the intertitles. Films like this are generally held in very high esteem and acquire a somewhat sacred aura. I myself was quite moved when I first saw it. But now I wonder whether it has actually prevented any war. I suppose everyone but the very uninformed knew pretty much what nuclear war entails. Politicians, who are the only ones with the power of deciding wars, certainly know it beter than most. And I suspect that the premise is a bit silly (a nuclear attack on Vietnam), and in retrospect nothing of the sort happened in the real Vietnam war. An interesting sequence of the movie shows some common English folks being interviewed about whether they favored retaliation in case of a nuclear attack. They all answer affirmatively. This may look shocking, and possibly that was the filmmaker's intention, but he is being dishonest here. This interview is shown after the point in the narrative where England retaliates, but it is somehow disconnected from the line of events narrated. So, from a game theory angle, it makes sense to answer 'yes', because of the principle of mutual deterrence. But *after* an attack the situation would be completely different, and mutual deterrence would no longer make sense.

Rating: 59 (down from 68)

P.S.: I chose to date it as a 1965 movie, instead of 1966. Although it was first widely exhibited in 1966, some BBC people saw it in 1965 (and banned it from TV because it was deemed too shocking).

Cleopatra Jones and the Casino of Gold (1975)

 The titular agent goes to Hong Kong to investigate a drug ring. She finds out that it is being run from a casino owned by an American woman nicknamed the Dragon Lady. Jones's two assistants are made prisoners, and it's up to her and some Chinese sidekicks to rescue them and foil the plans of the evil Dragon Lady.

Action thriller with a conventional plot which rides on the martial arts wave in the West which was set off by Enter the Dragon two years earlier. The complete inadequacy of the main character's outer demeanor for an action hero is perhaps here enhanced relatively to the first movie for humorous purposes; thus, she is made to wear impossibly encumbering outfits, which she conveniently disrobes when some physical action is required. She then engages in the fights with the usual lethargy, and invariably wins. Her Chinese sidekicks, on the other hand, are agility incarnate. The final action sequence at the casino is quite well done.

Rating: 33

Wrong Is Right (1982)

Second viewing; previously viewed between January 20 and February 02, 1983

Alternative title in some copies shown outside the U.S.: The Man with the Deadly Lens

A TV reporter gets involved in a complicated plot involving an Arab country. It all begins with the murder of an American reporter who was actually a spy; then the leader of that Arab country dies in an alleged suicide. The plot also involves some Arab terrorists and an American presidential election.

Political thriller. Purportedly a commentary on the ubiquitous influence and power of television, it also satirizes American politics. It was considered prophetical of some aspects of the September 11, 2001 attacks, but that is somewhat of a stretch, though admittedly another hypothesis is that the film may have instead inspired the perpetrators of that attack. The fictional plot includes the possibility of a false flag attack; this possibility has also been advocated by some in regards to the September 11 attack. Despite those exciting real life parallels, the film is actually quite bland and not very memorable. It's funny that I didn't change my overall assessment of it after 38 years, even though my understanding of the plot has been considerably better on this second viewing.

Rating: 49 (unchanged)

Cleopatra Jones (1973)

 The titular character is an American international anti-drug agent. In this film, however, she comes back to America to fight drug dealers and police corruption, after a police bust occurs at a charity rehabilitation center for drug addicts.

I guess this film is a way to deal with the age-long dilemma of whether the best way to handle the drug problem is to attack the production centers or to focus on the drug market. Here we have a super-agent who is proficient at both the CIA-like and the FBI-like angles, thus providing a two-pronged strategy. I guess the biggest problem with this routine actioner is that its leading actress totally lacks any appearance of dynamism which would be expected in a character like this. The filming is professionally done though, and the film may prove entertaining, provided one is not expecting much.

Rating: 34

The Three Must-Get-Theres (1922)

 A poor young man from a small village goes to Paris to be a musketeer. Once there, he is assigned, along with his three partners, a mission to return a jewel to the Queen in time for a ball.

Generally funny parody with lots of physical humor and witty intertitles. Probably slightly more fun to watch than its object of mockery, the film version released in the previous year.

Rating: 56

The Three Musketeers (1921)

 Based on the novel by Alexandre Dumas and Auguste Maquet, first published in 1844, and inspired in real characters.

In 1625, a young man from the province goes to Paris hoping to join the king's musketeers. There he befriends three musketeers and joins them in a mission involving a jewel which, through the machinations of the prime minister, could harm the relations between the king and the queen.

Bowdlerized version of the famous novel. The queen here does not have an extramarital affair (though it is implied that she has extramarital feelings which she represses); also, the protagonist's sweetheart is not an unfaithful wife but is unmarried and lives with her uncle. Furthermore, the prime minister's motivation is said to be  to neutralize the queen's influence over the king, but no mention is made of the prime minister's wish to cause a war between France and England. This renders the plot frustratingly vague, even if one doesn't mind the puritanical undertones. I suppose only children would experience a really unfettered enjoyment of this film. Adults should concentrate on the action and forget (or mentally correct) those plot elements. That is not so hard to do, really, since the film is well directed and the actors perform reasonably well.

I know of two versions of this film, one with 119 minutes and another with 142 minutes of length. The longer one seems to have a more natural frame rate, but I am not sure that it has any additional scenes in it. There seems to be a third version with 128 minutes of length, but I know nothing further about it.

Rating: 52

Warum läuft Herr R. Amok (1970)

 English title: Why Does Herr R. Run Amok?

A middle-class man, with a good-looking wife and a son, leads a mediocre life, dealing with pressures to get ahead professionally and other annoying features of social life among colleagues, relatives and neighbors. He shows no signs of psychological imbalance, until one day...

I was unsure whether to put a "spoiler" alert on top of this review, but decided it would make no sense, given that the film's title is a spoiler in itself. As reported by a cast member, this was mostly (or totally) improvised without a written script. And it mostly succeeds at achieving a reality look. Of course a film is always just a film, and manipulation is inevitable. I guess the film's main virtue is to work as a snapshot of early 1970s' zeitgeist, with capitalism taking over from the libertarian dreams of the 1960s. We see some reviews calling it "nihilistic", but this is probably coming from people who have no idea what those times felt like. Anyway, that kind of mood seems to be gone, which does not mean that new problems haven't appeared. A curious detail is that two writer-directors are credited, one much more famous than the other, but it seems established that the more famous one had absolutely nothing to do with the making of the movie.

Rating: 56

Be My Wife (1921)

*mild spoilers ahead*

 A man is wrongly suspected by his wife of having a date with another woman, and in turn suspects her of having a date with another man. The suspected rendezvous place (where in fact that double infidelity is actually happening with a friendly couple) in both cases is a clothes shop which clandestinely provides that kind of service along with equally clandestine alcoholic beverages (it's the Prohibition era).

I found this comedy quite mediocre, though by no means painful to watch. The mechanical transformation of the shop's fitting room into rendezvous room is kind of funny with the workers always in their respective positions. The most curious bit from a, say, social point of view is the fact that, judging from this film, people in those days called the cops to catch their respective spouses on the act of adultery. Not much else I can find to say about it.

Rating: 42

An Eastern Westerner (1920)

 A young man who leads an inconsequential life is sent by his parents to a Western ranch. His new environment offers him several challenges and an opportunity for love.

A formulaic yet very well done short comedy displaying fine physical comedy and a talented comic star.

Rating: 53

Les surprises de l'amour (1909)

English titles: Love's Surprises; The Surprises of a Flirtation

Second viewing; previously viewed on January 1, 2006

*spoilers ahead*

A family comprised of father, mother, and two adult sons are having a meal together. One by one, the men invent an excuse to leave the table and then surreptitiously evade the house. They all go meet their respective lovers, who are coincidentally one and the same, and, as the next one arrives, the one who is there is forced into hiding. Finally, another woman arrives and starts sadistically beating the hiding men. The men eventually flee the house and meet outside.

Short comedy which is half amusing, half puzzling, and 100% fascinating.

Rating: 42

Der Golem. Wie er in die Welt kam (1920)

English title: The Golem: How He Came Into the World

Faced with the impending expulsion of his community from Germany, a rabbi builds an automaton from clay to defend the Jews. The Golem goes berserk and endangers the community.

Fantastic drama with good special effects and an enjoyably simple plot which is reportedly faithful to the medieval legend it is based on. The characters are well-done caricatures: the rabbi-astrologer, his seductive daughter, the Golem himself, the unfortunate assistant, the hedonistic king, the effeminate courier, etc. The magnificent sets alone would make the film worth watching. 

The restored version is shorter (at 76') than some other versions which have been released; the (apparently) longest version (at 101') does not contain any scenes which alter the narrative in a perceptible manner, and lacks the scene where the little girl throws the "Golem-switch" star of David.

Rating: 57

The Last Time I Saw Paris (1954)

Second viewing; previously viewed on February 10, 1991

Based on the short story Babylon Revisited, by F. Scott Fitzgerald, written in 1930 and first published on February 21, 1931

An American writer returns to Paris, where his daughter is living with his in-laws since his wife died. He recollects his life in the French capital, the parties, and his conjugal quarrels. Now he is asking to take his daughter back, but will his sister-in-law agree?

Though some of the dialogue is copied from the short story, this is not a faithful adaptation. The period it is set in is after World War II, whereas in the short story it is 1930. Also, in the film the protagonist chooses one sister over the other, and the rejected one holds a grudge. When I watched the film for the first time, I hadn't read the short story, and perhaps that caused me to like the film better. Now, analyzing the changes, I think they render the film slightly absurd. There is nothing so special about the protagonist that should make them covet him so promptly and intensely. Furthermore, the sister-in-law was already dating someone else, and it is strange that she would simply disregard him nonchalantly. She would later marry her former suitor, who appears thus to be a real saint. The movie is not as depressing as the short story, but also makes less sense. The screenwriters filled it with witty one-liners, providing a continuous source of amusement, but detracting from the film's credibility (no one talks like that). It's mostly a phony drama, but somehow it conveys many of the short story's ideas, and it's never really boring.

Rating: 51 (down from 63)