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573,704 | 4,532,636 | 1,125,849 | 8 | Great Film Only Slightly Marred by Hokey Ending | In " The Wrestler , " Mickey Rourke finds himself matched with the perfect role at the perfect moment in his career , and gives a performance that makes you wonder why he waited this long to show the world how good an actor he can be . Rourke plays Randy the Ram Robinson ( real name Robin , but don't call him that ) , a professional wrestling has-been , relegated to third-tier matches in out-of-the-way towns , attended by a smattering of fans who still remember who he is . After a particularly brutal and gimmicky match involving barbed wire , glass and a nail gun , he suffers a heart attack and undergoes bypass surgery . Faced with the prospect of not ever being able to wrestle again ( which to that point has been his whole life ) , he decides to reconnect with his estranged daughter ( Evan Rachel Wood , effective in a few brief scenes ) and makes romantic overtures to a woman who works at his favorite strip joint ( Marisa Tomei ) . Much of " The Wrestler " feels like a documentary about the behind-the-scenes workings of professional wrestling , or more accurately , about what happens to professional wrestlers after they're spit out of the entertainment mill . We see Randy locked out of his trailer when he can't muster the rent and begging for more hours at the supermarket where he works . He's the Norma Desmond of the wrestling world , waiting patiently at autograph signings barely attended by anybody , carting around VHS tapes of his professional highlights to sell to anyone who might still actually own a VCR . He's a relic from the 1980s , as illustrated in a wonderful scene in which he and Tomei discuss those good ' ol days and the great bands they produced , until Kurt Cobain came along and ruined everything . Rourke plays Randy as a gentle giant , whose tender and warm way with people belies his fierce professional persona . He gives a marvelous performance , achingly sad but not maudlin . This is pretty much his movie entirely ; Tomei and Wood each get a few moments to shine , but Rourke holds the screen and doesn't let it go . The only thing that marred this movie for me was its ending . Most of the movie is completely lacking any of the phony Hollywood trappings that mar so many other movies . Therefore , the " Rocky " - style ending , with Randy's true love racing the clock to get to his match on time , and us left wondering whether or not he's going to drop dead of a heart attack right in the middle of his big moment , felt like a cheat . But otherwise , this is one of the better movies I've seen this year . |
574,478 | 4,532,636 | 22,958 | 8 | Joan Crawford Steals the Show | Movies like " Grand Hotel " were to the 30's what disaster movies were to the 70's : all-star , fluffy escapist entertainment unabashedly aiming for box office success . But " Grand Hotel " shouldn't be dismissed for those reasons . It is fluffy to be sure , but it also happens to be wildly entertaining , so I guess you can call it a supreme success as it does exactly what it sets out to do . A bevy of big , big stars - - Lionel and John Barrymore ( where was Ethel ? ) , Greta Garbo , Wallace Beery and a young Joan Crawford ( before she turned scary ) - - act up a storm in this glorified soap opera that takes place solely in the eponymous hotel . Barely a melodramatic plot twist is left unturned . So what if much of the plot is laugh inducing , and so what if half the cast seems to think they're still acting in silent film . Best not to take too critical an eye with this one and just enjoy the goings on . Joan Crawford pulls the rug out from under every other cast member and walks away with this film ; indeed , she's so good , she seems to be acting in a completely different movie . And she's actually pretty , the one and only time I can make that accusation in regards to her . Wallace Beery walks around speaking with a guttural German accent and looking grumpy ; don't feel too bad for him , though , since he won an Oscar that year ( albeit for a different movie ) to cheer himself up . John Barrymore is as animated as a tree stump , but he skates by on his matinée idol looks anyway . Words cannot describe the level of atrocity to which Greta Garbo sinks , however . She's putrid ( capital " P " , capital " U " , capital " Trid " ) as a dying ballerina ( or something ) and acts like she's starring in her high school play . Garbo's allure has always escaped me ; I just don't get what's so great about her . With that deep voice and those broad shoulders , I'm still not sure she wasn't secretly a man , though in that case I would have to rethink my thoughts about her acting ability . The set for " Grand Hotel " is its most valuable asset . Before the days of sophisticated cinema trickery , this set had to have been quite an achievement . It's enormous and detailed , and director Edmund Goulding makes great use of it , sending his camera soaring around its interior . You'll have a lot of fun with this one , especially if you like to make fun of Greta Garbo , and especially if you don't believe there ever was a time when Joan Crawford wasn't frightening . |
574,233 | 4,532,636 | 443,680 | 8 | Pitt the Major Flaw in This Otherwise Strange and Beautiful Western | 2007 is shaping up to be the year of the Western revival . There's not much need of a plot summary for " The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford , " because it's all right there in the title . And there's not much plot to summarize anyway . This is a movie more interested in character than plot and more interested really in aesthetics than character , and it's a strangely fascinating film . It's certainly one of the most beautiful films I've seen in a long time . The young actor Casey Affleck is a revelation as James's assassin . His Robert Ford is awkward and stammering , whose appearance and behavior leads people to believe he's dumber than he is . His idolatry of Jesse James is fueled by the dime novels he collects and in which James so frequently appears . The character as written is somewhat obtuse ; I'm not sure I completely ever understood what makes Ford turn on James , or when the change in his feeling occurs . But Affleck does wonders with what he's given to work with and gives one of the best performances I've seen thus far in the year . Unfortunately , at the film's center is Brad Pitt , and he creates a vacuum which the film succeeds in spite of rather than being dragged down by . Pitt is simply not a good actor , but his good looks and sheen of Hollywood glamour will assure that film makers keep giving him starring roles . I kept thinking about Russell Crowe's marvelous performance as an outlaw in " 3 : 10 to Yuma " and couldn't help but wonder how much better this film would have been if Crowe had been cast instead . Pitt doesn't sink the film , because the cast he's surrounded by does such good work ( in addition to Affleck , Sam Rockwell is a stand out as Robert Ford's older brother ) , but he prevents it from being even better than it otherwise could be . Some may be turned off by the film's formality ; virtually every shot looks like a carefully composed photograph . But I thought the film's tone and visual style matched the subject . After all , we're talking about a legendary figure here , someone who's as much myth as man , so why not give the movie the imprint of myth as well ? " Jesse James " isn't much interested in ideas , though I think it wants to be . Only in the movie's final moments , after Ford has assassinated James and then suffers the harassment of a public that decides to idolize James in his death and deride Ford as a coward , does the film toy with the question of what distinguishes a hero from a villain . It doesn't come to any conclusions , and because of Pitt's inadequate performance , it never explains why James was able to make himself into a legend while Ford died a figure of infamy . But I was willing to let the film's sheer physical beauty and fine supporting cast sweep me along with them and cause me to not care too much about anything else . |
573,582 | 4,532,636 | 82,474 | 8 | The Muppets Take Big Ben | Anglophile that I am , I love " The Great Muppet Caper , " and think I might like it even more than the original " Muppet Movie . " The gang find themselves foiling the plot of a group of crack diamond thieves led by Charles Grodin , and it's a hoot to watch the slick , professional thieves ' preparations and actions juxtaposed to the loud , crude antics of the Muppets . There's a pretty funny musical number that finds Miss Piggy ripping off Esther Williams , and another lovely song performed while the entire group goes bike riding . Long before the days of jacked up special effects when anything can be done using a computer , I remember being astounded by the fact that this special effects team could make the Muppets ride bicycles . Ah , what a more innocent time . . . . |
573,628 | 4,532,636 | 74,937 | 8 | One of the Best Casts Ever Assembled for a Movie | This very funny murder mystery spoof is a hoot , and the kind of movie you want to own so that you can pop it in whenever you're in the mood for something lighthearted and reliable . A mad genius millionaire ( played by Truman Capote , of all people ) gathers the world's five best detectives to his spooky house over a weekend and challenges them with a murder he doesn't believe anyone can solve . An insanely impressive cast provide dead-pan comic caricatures of some of the most iconic characters out of crime / mystery fiction . David Niven and Maggie Smith are Dick and Dora Charleston , stepping in for William Powell and Myrna Loy . Peter Sellers is Sidney Wang , not to be confused with Charlie Chan . James Coco is Milo Perrier , a grumpier and much hungrier version of Hercule Poirot . Elsa Lanchester is Jessica Marbles , a dead ringer for Miss Marple . And , best of all , Peter Falk is Sam Diamond , snatched right out of a 1940s film noir , who sleeps in his trench coat and fedora . In addition to these crack comedians , the film features Eileen Brennan as Sam Diamond's girl Friday ; Estelle Winwood , absolutely hilarious without doing anything as Jessica Marbles ' 80-something year-old nurse ; James Cromwell , who dons a priceless French accent and at one point mesh pajamas as Perrier's chauffeur ; and Nancy Walker , as the deaf and dumb cook who doesn't do any cooking . To top it all off , there's Alec Guinness , as the blind butler , who threatens to steal the show away from everyone , no small feat given who he's up against . A very silly , very fun , very enjoyable movie . |
573,791 | 4,532,636 | 107,943 | 8 | Testing the Boundaries of Propriety with Merchant / Ivory | Very well done Merchant / Ivory adaptation of the Kazuo Ishiguro novel . People remember Anthony Hopkins for playing Hannibal Lecter , but it's performances like the one he gives here that prove how masterful an actor he can be . He plays an English butler who prides himself on his absolute servility and adherence to the codes of decorum and propriety , but who begins to sense a crack in his world when it becomes apparent that those he serves are Nazi sympathizers . Emma Thompson plays an outgoing housekeeper who falls in love with him and tries to break through his icy exterior . Hopkins and Thompson had of course worked together the year before on " Howards End , " so they were a natural choice for this film . Thopmson does an admirable job , but her character exists more as a plot device , and it's Hopkins who gives the fascinating characterization . Of the Merchant / Ivory productions I've seen , I'd probably have to say that this one is the best . |
573,419 | 4,532,636 | 22,913 | 8 | Don't Be Fooled | Don't let people convince you that " Freaks " is a horror movie , because it isn't . It's actually a quite sad and sympathetic look at the way abnormalities were treated in the early part of the 20th century , and has direct parallels to the obsession with physical perfection causing eating disorders today . Tod Browning of course asks us to consider who are the bigger freaks : those with deformed bodies or those with deformed souls ? The two " normal " people who are out to cheat and steal are monstrous , whereas the freaks are quite likable and charming . The ending is disturbing to be sure , but it's hard to condemn the freaks for acts that seem largely justified . Is it a coincidence that in several shots showing Cleopatra reclining on a sofa , she appears to be deformed herself ( in one shot it looks as if she has no legs ) . Has anybody else noticed this ? " Freaks " was obviously way ahead of its time . There's a very interesting documentary on the DVD about its reception in 1932 ; it bombed and pretty much ruined Browning's career . Thank God that the general public is not allowed to be the final arbiter of a film's value . Think how many priceless films we would have lost by now if that were the case . |
573,683 | 4,532,636 | 44,829 | 8 | A Goofball Charmer of a Movie | This film is a blast . It's completely unmemorable , but in this case , that's a compliment , because it's unmemorable for really good reasons . It's just silliness , without any big themes or points to ponder , and it's airy and breezy and goofy , like watching an utterly insubstantial but extremely well made sitcom . Alec Guinness and Stanley Holloway make a crackerjack comic pair , and their bumblings and pratfalls will make you continuously chuckle if not laugh out loud . " The Lavender Hill Mob " is like cotton candy : it dissolves immediately upon contact , but it sure is enjoyable while it lasts . |
574,212 | 4,532,636 | 9,887 | 8 | A Zany Harold Lloyd Short | In this Harold Lloyd comedy short , Lloyd plays one of many suitors wooing a rich girl with a very busy father . In order to win her hand , they have to get her father's permission first - - if they can even get an appointment to see him , that is . This funny film is chock-full of physical pratfalls and sight gags . Lloyd storms the father's office , determined to talk to him at all costs , even if he has to don a suit of armor , impersonate a rampaging suffragette and out smart any number of office booby traps , not the least of which is a movable walk way that sends unwanted visitors sailing out the door . I loved the ending of this movie too . Let's just say that things aren't always worth the effort it takes to obtain them . |
574,112 | 4,532,636 | 311,648 | 8 | Took Me By Surprise | This film blew me out of the water . I was expecting an amiable , slight comedy , serving more than anything else as a launching pad for Katie Holmes's career into the Hollywood big time . But instead , this movie is a substantive and very moving story about a young girl who desperately wants to make a nice Thanksgiving dinner for a family from whom she feels somewhat estranged . It's extremely warm but extremely sad , and left me with a huge lump in my throat . Katie Holmes is winning and sweet as April , and whether or not you like Holmes , I bet you'll be rooting for her by the film's end . For one day , her whole world becomes about planning one successful dinner party , and her lack of skill forces her to fall back on the kindness of neighbors she's never taken the time to meet . Meanwhile , her family ( mother , father , brother and snotty sister ) are on their way into the city to April's apartment , whining and complaining about having to visit a crummy part of town and missing no opportunity to criticize April , while trying to ignore the white elephant in the room , the fact that their mom has cancer and may not live to see another holiday . Of course , the conversations they have with each other communicate heaps of back story and clue us in to the family dynamic , and we learn that April's biggest critic , her mom , also happens to be the most like her daughter . Patricia Clarkson has become one of my favorite actresses , and her Academy Award nomination for her performance as the mom in this film was richly deserved ( I think she should have won ) . She beautifully plays this role with just the right amount of sarcasm and wit to prevent the movie from ever getting bogged down in sentimentality . When she finally is reunited with April at the very end , what could have been an icky , maudlin ending instead knocked the wind out of me with its simplicity and honest emotion . " Pieces of April " just feels like one of those movies that is based on actual events in the life of its writer or director . It's full of tiny details of behavior that make the characters feel completely authentic , rather than creations . And there's a total understanding on everybody's part of the dynamics at play in a family that doesn't always get along and of that tendency of families facing some sort of crisis to latch on to one thing that's pretty mundane in order to avoid dealing with something else that is too big for the individual family members to deal with on its own . |
573,448 | 4,532,636 | 84,707 | 8 | Soap Opera with Superb Acting | A high-brow soap opera , but an awfully good one . Meryl Streep delivers an absolutely heartbreaking performance as Sophie , a woman who was forced to make a terrible choice during WWII that haunts her for the rest of her life . The choice is so horrific it can't even be comprehended ; therefore , it's a bit tacky that it's used as one of those last-minute plot reveals to make an emotional impact . Streep's performance , though , is never tacky - - it's deeply sincere . Kevin Kline , of all people , delivers a frightening performance as Sophie's abusive boyfriend . It's hard to reconcile the Kevin Kline in this film with the one who would play such nutty characters in later films . Even if you're resistant to the film's melodramatic pandering , it's hard not to be moved by it . |
574,456 | 4,532,636 | 39,973 | 8 | Forgotten Thriller Is a Lot of Fun | A nifty little thriller that has lawyer Edmond O'Brien hired as bodyguard for business tycoon Vincent Price . Of course it doesn't take a detective to figure out that someone is setting someone else up , nor does it take a college diploma to figure out who those someones might be . Still , the cast ( which also includes Ella Raines and William Bendix ) is obviously enjoying themselves here , and if they're not going to take things too seriously , why should you ? It's best not to think too hard about the plot developments ( like why would a tycoon hire a lawyer to be his bodyguard in the first place ? ) and just enjoy the slick ride . |
573,601 | 4,532,636 | 356,721 | 8 | An Existential Comedy ? Yep . | David O . Russell belongs with the recent new generation of film directors who are bringing a hipper , edgier sensibility to modern movies . I'm thinking of Paul Thomas Anderson , Wes Anderson , Darren Aronofsky and Alexander Payne , to name a few . His films are at least as good as many of the films by this group , but I feel he's still being underrated by the film community . " I Heart Huckabees " delivers on its promise to be an existential comedy . It's certainly not for everybody's tastes , as is illustrated by a quick scroll through the existing comments here . But if you're of the right mentality and are watching this movie in the right frame of mind , it's wonderful . Russell brings together a top-notch cast and lets them go to town with the material . The film is Altmanesque in its tendency to let its ensemble run rampant through the compositions , and the viewer must decide on which part of any given shot he's going to place his focus . I guess others may feel this is chaotic and scattershot , which it kind of is . But it fits the material perfectly , since this movie is about a group of people who are struggling with whether or not their lives have any significance in a potentially anarchic universe . Russell doesn't really bring any new insight into the whole existential debate , that's true . But he also avoids heavy-handed treatment of the material . It's as if he realizes that so many " serious " attempts have been made at investigating the existential crisis in film and literature that the only thing left is to make fun of it . He pokes fun expertly , but not without also drawing some poignant conclusions . And now for the cast : what a terrific ensemble Russell collected for this film . Lily Tomlin and Dustin Hoffman nearly hijack the movie with their pitch-perfect comedic performances . They walk through the film simultaneously aware of nothing and everything going on around them . Mark Wahlberg is turning into a fine actor , and he's hilarious here as a fireman who is questioning the meaning of his existence in the wake of . Jude Law and Naomi Watts are a yuppie couple whose relationship unravels as they realize the material comforts they've padded their lives with can't protect them from the doubts they have about themselves . And Jason Schwartzman is perfect as the anchor of the film , young , neurotic , annoying and lovable , all at the same time . " I Heart Huckabees " is truly original , so if it doesn't always work , it gets a break from me for trying to be something different . It joins " Flirting with Disaster " and " Three Kings " as a list of Russell projects that have been wrongfully ignored . Here's hoping the film community starts making things up to him and fast . |
574,369 | 4,532,636 | 55,505 | 8 | Unpredictable Plot Twists Highlight This Mystery Thriller | Though it's listed here at IMDb as " Taste of Fear , " the version I saw was titled " Scream of Fear . " Either way , it's a generic title for what is actually a rather stylish little mystery thriller . Susan Strasberg plays a wheelchair-bound accident victim who comes to stay with her father and his new wife at their French country manor . She begins to suspect the worst of her step-mother and her doctor friend ( played by Christopher Lee ) , believing that they have killed her father and are trying to drive her insane , thus rendering her incompetent and ensuring that his estate will pass to the step-mother . But don't worry - - this rather predictable set up gets a few jolts of surprise with some clever plot twists late into the film . And the film makes the most of its small budget - - the black and white cinematography is executed well and creates a lot of moody atmosphere . |
573,839 | 4,532,636 | 756,729 | 8 | Molly Shannon Surprises in a Small But Very Strong Film | Anyone who's ever felt an activist instinct - - even a mild one - - should be able to relate to " Year of the Dog . " Molly Shannon , in an impressive display of dramatic acting ability , gives a fearlessly unflattering performance as Peggy , a woman whose life unravels when her beloved dog dies . Socially , Peggy is insecure and inept , and when the energies she used to put into her pet are redirected at the human world around her , things go badly wrong . A number of famous actors pop up in supporting roles , playing people who only serve to reinforce to Peggy how different she is and how badly she fits in . Laura Dern is her type-A supermom sister-in-law , who won't let her kids get a dog because of her fear of allergies ; John C . Reilly is a next-door neighbor whose love of hunting serves as a catalyst for some of Peggy's most anti-social behavior ; Peter Saarsgard is a volunteer for an animal rescue shelter whom Peggy would like to like but who doesn't like her back ; Regina King is a fellow co-worker who acts as the closest thing to a confidant Peggy has . " Year of the Dog " is surprisingly meaty , and it makes a lot of interesting observations about people who believe in causes and the need for those people to be wary of the line between staying committed to their beliefs and trying to force their beliefs on others . Peggy isn't very likable for much of the movie , but Shannon lets us see that she's a deeply good person who's in the wrong environment . One of my favorite aspects of the movie is the ending . Peggy decides to devote herself to animal rights activism , and the last time we see her , she's on a bus with fellow advocates traveling somewhere to forward their cause . I was pleased that the movie wasn't condescending to her character , and didn't suggest that all she needed in order to be " normal " was a boyfriend and a makeover . Instead of changing herself to fit in with those around her , Peggy finds people who understand her the way she is . That to me is one of the most positive messages I've seen in a movie this year . |
573,648 | 4,532,636 | 20,827 | 8 | Boys Will Be Boys But Girls Get Divorced | Undaunted by the new technology of sound , Norma Shearer acts up a storm in this pre-code " women's film " about a society woman whose husband goes philandering , and decides to retaliate by doing some philandering of her own . The philandering husband is played by Chester Morris , while Robert Montgomery plays his best friend and Shearer's fling . The movie points to the hypocrisy in marital expectations that expects wives to look the other way when their boys are being boys , but entitles husbands to toss their wives aside when they do the same . Everything of course ties up nicely and happily for the couple , and in a way that would never happen in real life . But it's a lot more frank and honest than countless films on the same topic that would be released over the succeeding decade , when the production code wouldn't let filmmakers even acknowledge the existence of things like affairs and divorce . Shearer won her Academy Award for this film , and just try to take your eyes off of her whenever she's on screen . |
574,268 | 4,532,636 | 379,786 | 8 | A Sleeper Hit | Serenity is one of those movies that flies in under the radar , quietly plays out its theatrical run , and then slowly but surely builds a solid base of fans and praise until sheer curiosity compels you to see it . I think it's based on something I'm not familiar with : a t . v . show or comic book series or something . And I'm not even a sci-fi / fantasy fan . I CAN enjoy sci-fi , but it has to be of a certain kind . Well , " Serenity " is that kind , and I had a lot of fun with it . It's greatest asset as a sci-fi movie is its sense of humour and its refusal to take itself too seriously . Just when things get too geeky or intense , there's a throw-away line or bit of physical comedy tossed in to help you regain your bearings . And the main hero ( a Han Solo type ) speaks with a strange old cowboy movie dialect ( " darlin ' " ) that takes a while to get used to but adds a sense of fun and silliness once you do . " Serenity " has an attractive cast with a lot of chemistry between them . And unlike other sci-fi stories , the characters here go beyond simple types easily summarized with a word or two , and instead become full-bodied personalities that you care about , so that when they're put in dangerous situations , you have something vested in what happens to them . The special effects are fine , but they're not what you come away from the movie remembering , which is a compliment . For once , spectacle doesn't drown story . |
573,725 | 4,532,636 | 40,427 | 8 | Memorable Direction Distinguishes This Standard B Flick | Alfred Werker is credited with directing this cross between a docu-drama police procedural and a crime thriller noir , but annals have it that Anthony Mann was the film's true director . Whatever the case , the direction is one of the most distinguished things about this movie , which looks spectacular and has all sorts of memorable moments , not the least of which is a climactic chase in a sewer that instantly brings to mind Carol Reed's " The Third Man " from two years later . Richard Basehart is the villain in this one , and it's fun to see him give himself so completely over to a nasty role , that of an armed robber who will kill if he has to . Jack Webb has a small role as a forensics expert , and one of the film's most interesting scenes is one in which he uses the feedback from an assembly of Basehart's victims to reconstruct a picture of what their unknown suspect looks like . The movie is better as individual pieces than it is as a whole - - there's not a whole lot of cohesion to the script , and it just abruptly ends without much conclusion , but for lovers of the genre it's fun none the less . |
573,823 | 4,532,636 | 78,902 | 8 | 1979's Answer to " Little Miss Sunshine " | One of those " little films that could , " " Breaking Away " is a competitive cycling version of " Little Miss Sunshine " : a group of lovable underdogs go up against the rich privileged kids and you want to see them win with all your heart . It's low key and unambitious , but breezy and utterly enjoyable . A bunch of actors who would later become regular faces - - like Dennis Quaid , Daniel Stern and Jackie Earle Haley - - appear looking impossibly young , and the wonderful actor Paul Dooley , along with Barbara Barrie ( Oscar-nominated ) do nice work as a mom and dad . Instead of the original score or pop songs you might expect on the soundtrack , the film is instead set to a bunch of rousing classical pieces . A fun and lovable movie . |
573,554 | 4,532,636 | 408,236 | 8 | Swing Your Razor Wide , Sweeney | Sweeney Todd , Tim Burton's big-screen adaptation of the classic Stephen Sondheim musical , was faced with the nearly impossible task of meeting the expectations of both Burton and Sondheim fans alike . So if it falls a little short , I'm willing to forgive and forget . I think Burton made probably the best film that could be made from Sondheim's musical , but his movie also confirmed something I already suspected : " Sweeney Todd " is inherently theatrical , and though Burton mostly succeeds in reinventing the musical as a film , he doesn't totally succeed in justifying the necessity of doing so . I felt during " Sweeney Todd " the way I so often feel watching screen versions of stage musicals : the medium of film only serves to highlight the weaknesses of stage shows . Things simply work on stage that don't work on screen and vice versa , and that's the case here . I thoroughly enjoyed " Sweeney Todd " the movie , but I've enjoyed live performances of the show much more , and despite all of my efforts to forget the stage productions while watching the movie , I couldn't help but compare the two . But let's talk about the movie . It's a deliciously macabre and dark story , and Burton deserves great credit for resisting the urge to make it more palatable to mainstream film audiences . Indeed , his interpretation of the tale is darker and bloodier than any stage version I've seen , and the film's final moments left me chilled and disturbed . Johnny Depp plays Sweeney , a vengeful barber who declares war on humanity for the wrongs he has suffered at the hands of a malicious judge and beadle . Helena Bonham Carter plays Mrs . Lovett , whose meat pie business becomes revitalized when she starts using Sweeney's victims as , ahem , ingredients . Carter and Depp have tremendous chemistry together , maybe because they look so much alike . Depp does a good job with Sweeney , but he's limited from the start because Sweeney is a one-dimensional character . Depp delivers an intense and frightening performance , but aside from the interest inherent in whether or not he'll be able to pull off Sondheim's notoriously difficult music ( which he does just fine , thank you very much ) , I didn't find the performance itself that interesting . Carter , however , if a weaker singer than Depp , does wonders with Mrs . Lovett . This is the first version of " Sweeney Todd " I've seen where I actually felt bad about what happens to her character . Carter balances the role beautifully between ruthless accomplice and maternal caretaker . She doesn't play the role big and blowsy like Angela Lansbury did in the original stage version , or like Patti LuPone has played it , and she'll probably be criticized for taking too meek an approach to the material as a result , but I think her's works wonderfully as a film interpretation of the role . Sondheim's score sounds glorious , but I was disappointed at the many cuts made to it . A few songs are missing altogether , and there's hardly one left that isn't at least shortened . My one bit of unqualified praise goes to the film's visual style , which is magnificent . The production design couldn't be improved upon . " Sweeney Todd " might get better with subsequent viewings , once the automatic screen-to-stage comparison is flushed out of the system and one can watch the movie for what it is . As it is , I liked the movie a lot without thinking it was one of the best of the year . |
573,817 | 4,532,636 | 78,872 | 8 | A Movie About a Kid Made for Adults | Chalk this up as one of those movies I had no clue I would enjoy so much . This boy / horse story has all the ingredients of a syrupy Disney sugarfest , but it's nothing like that . It's about a boy , but it deals with very adult emotions . The scene I remember the most comes when the little boy is begging with his mom ( a wonderful and warm Teri Garr ) to let him race his horse , and she's reluctant for fear that he will get hurt . The scene is played beautifully by both actors , the son who's trying to articulate feelings he isn't old enough yet to express , and the mom understanding that her little boy is on the cusp of making an adult decision for the first time in his life and needs to have the freedom to do so , no matter how much it hurts her . It's a wonderful moment . Mickey Rooney also stars as a gruff but lovable grandfather figure for the boy , and manages to mostly keep the hamminess at bay . And the cinematography and score are exceptional . |
573,521 | 4,532,636 | 90,605 | 8 | James Cameron's Powerhouse Sequel to " Alien " | Say what you will about James Cameron's attempts at more " serious " film-making ( " Titanic " ? Ha ! ) , the man does know how to put together an action movie . He takes a completely different approach to this second film in the " Alien " series than Ridley Scott did to the first - - whereas Scott's film was slow , creepy and scarier for what you didn't see than for what you did , Cameron's is nearly non-stop hard-core action . It works though , and for all the difference in their styles , the two films cohere very well together . In this sequel , the focus moves away from the science / research angle of the first and instead focuses on a group of marines sent to a ghost town of a space station to investigate the disappearance of the colonists . Ripley ( Sigourney Weaver ) is along for the ride again , and Cameron uses her fear of what they could potentially be walking into effectively . Whereas in the first one , we were scared because we shared the scientists ' cluelessness about what was going on and only learned things as they learned them , in this one we're scared in the same way Ripley is , precisely because we know what's going on and how terrifying it is . And Cameron ups the ante here - - instead of one single alien as a nemesis , this group of marines has to deal with hundreds of them . I'm not really a fan of the subplot involving Newt , the little girl the marines find and who forms an attachment to Ripley . But the story does give Ripley's character a lot of motivation and makes her stand off with the aliens much more personal . I've seen this film a few times , so you'd think it wouldn't hold any suspense for me now , but I just watched it again over the weekend and damned if I wasn't on the edge of my seat . |
574,135 | 4,532,636 | 42,593 | 8 | An Unpredictable Pseudo-Noir | In a Lonely Place is widely considered to be one of the best of the film noir genre , but I can't quite bring myself to give it noir status . It certainly has the ambiguity , sense of paranoia and seedy underworld setting of the standard noir , but it's also lacking in a few crucial elements that in my opinion give a film noir its noir : the femme fatale , the sense of underlying corruption . When Gloria Grahame first slinks her away across the screen , you think " Ah ha ! Here's our femme fatale . " But she's not , and this is only one instance of the way this film unpredictably turns the audience's expectations upside down . The film is very unusual in the way it tells its story . Bogart plays a struggling screen writer suspected of murdering a young , star-struck girl . We know he hasn't done it , and we expect the film to be about the unraveling of the mystery surrounding her death in Bogie's attempts to prove his innocence . But that's not at all what we get . The murder is forgotten , never very important to begin with , and the film settles into a character study of Bogie , not concerned so much with whether or not he committed a murder but rather with whether or not he has the CAPACITY to commit murder . The cool , unflappable persona that greets us at the beginning of the movie ( the Bogie we're used to ) , deteriorates into a paranoid , jealous , nearly psychotic loner by the film's end , and Gloria Grahame ( who we early on suspected of having some devious aims ) becomes our chief object of concern . The movie is all over the place in a good way , truly surprising and fresh . The title of course refers to the lonely place of the interior psyche , and the demons that can haunt a man who has too much time with himself . Bogie spends so much time in the imaginary worlds he creates for his screenplays , that he can't seem to deal any longer with the reality of the material world around him , or maintain relationships that don't rely on his bullying his way into getting what he wants . And the saddest thing is that he knows this about himself . It's a great display of acting on Bogie's part and a neat deconstruction of the Bogie screen persona . Enjoy . |
574,379 | 4,532,636 | 381,849 | 8 | This Wild West Belongs to Christian Bale and Russell Crowe | I went into " 3 : 10 to Yuma " with fairly low expectations , given James Mangold's track record as a mediocre director and the fact that I'm not necessarily a fan of westerns . How pleasantly surprised I was , then , to find that this particular western is slick and supremely entertaining . " 3 : 10 to Yuma " has all the trappings of the traditional western - - outlaws , humble ranchers , gunslingers , salty old-timers , buxom saloon barmaids - - but Russell Crowe and Christian Bale , the outlaw and humble rancher , respectively , bring a contemporary sensibility to the material that feels integrated rather than incongruous . Bale's rancher , Dan Evans , is suffering from feelings of male inadequacy as a result of being on the brink of losing his farm to debt ( he's already lost a leg to the Civil War ) . For two hundred dollars , he joins a group of upright townies who are escorting Ben Wade , vicious bad guy ( Crowe ) , to the train that will take him to Yuma prison . But Wade's loyal band , led by Charlie Price ( Ben Foster as the film's one weak link , giving a grating performance ) , won't let Wade go without a fight . Through clever writing and wonderful performances by Bale and Crowe , the two men almost become allies in making sure Wade gets to the train on time . Wade is so impressed with Evans ' integrity , even though he doesn't understand it , that he almost wants to see Evans succeed , even if that means he himself goes to jail . It's really a fascinating relationship , and it's that element of the film that makes it more than just a standard genre exercise . The last quarter of the film is a nailbiter ; Mangold falls back on that old reliable convention that westerns practically invented , the real time show down , with clocks placed here and there keeping time for the audience , and he does it well . The film belongs to Bale and Crowe , but there's strong acting throughout by the rest of the cast , notably Gretchen Mol in a few brief scenes as Evans ' wife and Peter Fonda as the requisite crusty old-timer . |
574,078 | 4,532,636 | 317,705 | 8 | Pixar Does It Again | The Pixar team continues its winning streak with this sharp , snappy , surprisingly adult animated adventure film about a family of former superheroes who cannot fit into " normal " society no matter how hard they try . I'm actually surprised that kids stayed with this film long enough to enjoy the fast-paced non-stop action of its second half ; the film's early scenes are a quite funny commentary on bland , middle-class suburban America and the insidiousness of mediocrity that it encourages , obviously aimed more at its adult audience than it is at the kiddy crowd . My only complaint is that Pixar animation always looks slightly creepy when applied to human characters . The actors and animators do as much as they can to infuse the characters with warmth and to make them engaging , but they can't completely get around the fact that there's a plastic , lifeless quality inherent in digital animation that doesn't exist in its hand-drawn counterpart . But that's not a huge detriment here and doesn't prevent this film from being a lot of fun . |
573,379 | 4,532,636 | 465,551 | 8 | Could Be Called Beauty and the Beast | Notes on a Scandal is like " Fatal Attraction " as produced by the BBC . It's wildly entertaining , tremendously acted , and deliciously tawdry . But it's also pretty smart , so this is one guilty pleasure you can enjoy without feeling too guilty about it . The scandal that gives the film its title - - a young and pretty art teacher named Sheba Hart ( Cate Blanchett ) , who teaches in a rough-and-tumble lower-class English school , has an affair with a fifteen-year-old student - - is not a very original or interesting one . We've seen real-life versions of the same thing on our evening news , and we pretty much know how it has to play out . The filmmakers , therefore , are wise to use the scandal merely as a background for the far more interesting interplay that takes place when the teacher's dalliances are discovered by a lonely , spinsterish colleague named Barbara Covett ( Judi Dench ) who also happens to have one hell of a case of sexual repression . Barbara doesn't really care that the affair is illegal , nor does she care about the young boy ( she's long since given up on teaching what she perceives to be a generation of thugs , and instead refers to modern-day teaching as no more than " crowd control " ) . She only cares that Sheba , to whom she's formed a sort of fascinated and obsessive attraction , cares for something and someone other than Barbara . She sees the opportunity to use her knowledge to her advantage , and manipulate Sheba into a friendship and perhaps something more . In a way , she acts like she and Sheba are sixteen year old girls , who share a harmless secret that they can giggle about together at sleepovers . Of course , this delicate balance can only last for so long , and tensions eventually boil over in a stupendous cat fight between Sheba and Barbara that goes down as one of the most marvelously acted scenes of the year . What I admired most about " Notes " was the intelligence of its script . You might think that Blanchett and Dench , two of the classiest actresses around , would be slumming it with material like this , but that's not so . The screenplay is sharp and incisive , and the two characters ' back stories are filled with small details that make their actions and behavior perfectly natural and understandable . These are not caricatures in the " Fatal Attraction " vein . Sheba makes stupid decisions , but she's not entirely without our sympathy . Barbara is a nut job , but Dench plays her so well that we see the person behind the nut , and we don't know whether to loathe her or feel sorry for her . Dench's performance provides one of the most affecting and disturbing portraits of loneliness and isolation that I've ever seen . All of the talk this year has been about Helen Mirren in " The Queen , " and while Mirren was spectacular in that film and completely deserving of all the praise she has received , I have a feeling it's Dench's performance that I will still be remembering a few years from now . " Notes on a Scandal " revels in its excess , but it never lapses into silliness . There's a degree of cheekiness about the film , and you sense that everyone involved knows just how seriously to take themselves , which isn't too seriously . Indeed , almost every line that falls out of Dench's mouth , whether it be spoken to another character or part of the rambling voice over narration that we hear whenever Barbara is making another of her copious entries in her diary , got a laugh out of the audience I saw this with . And lastly , a word of praise for Philip Glass's splendidly frenetic score , that drives relentlessly forward and makes every moment feel more fraught with significance than it should actually be . I know many people find his scores intolerable , but I love them . They all sound the same , but when matched with the right material , they work beautifully . |
574,303 | 4,532,636 | 465,538 | 8 | Good , But Not the Rousing One Against Many Film You Might Expect | The anti - " Erin Brockovich . " It's George Clooney's turn to take on corporate bigwigs who are determined to give cancer to all the decent folk living out in America's heartlands . He plays Michael Clayton , fixer for a big time law firm acting as a defendant in a class action law suit leveled at the cancer-causing conglomerate . When his good friend and the lead attorney assigned to building the defense ( Tom Wilkinson , excellent ) goes off his rocker and starts babbling about the evils of what he's been aiding and abetting , and even begins to help the prosecution with its case , Michael is called in to " fix " the situation . But he of course suffers a crisis of conscience when it turns out that his crazy friend is the only sane person around , and it becomes his job to make sure the corporation doesn't get away with its dastardly deeds . " Michael Clayton " is well acted and written , but it's awfully dour and gloomy . Every movie like this has a big payoff scene at the end , where our hero gets to tell off the corporate jerk to the rousing applause of the audience ( " Erin Brockovich " consisted of nothing but scenes like that ) , and this movie is no exception . However , the one here is relatively muted , and we're not allowed to enjoy it for long . The final shot of the film is of Michael's face driving away from the big showdown in a cab , and it's not wearing an expression of triumph . It's the face of a man who's been worn out by the injustice of life , and I don't know that I've ever seen Clooney look worse on screen ( though I hope that the bags under my eyes look as good as his ) . The film suggests that facing the evils of the world and doing the right thing can still hollow you out inside . This approach makes the movie better than a film like " Erin Brockovich , " but it may disappoint people who come into it thinking they're going to get to enjoy two hours of George Clooney telling people what's what . Along with Clooney and Wilkinson , the fine cast features Tilda Swinton , lips so thin they're practically non-existent , as the uptight corporate bitch who gets her comeuppance ; and Sydney Pollack as head of Michael's law firm . |
573,736 | 4,532,636 | 67,328 | 8 | Whiling Away the Hours in Abilene , Texas | Peter Bogdanovich created a sombre and quietly devastating film from Larry McMurtry's coming-of-age soap opera about a bunch of teenagers stagnating in a Texas backwater in the years following WWII . Sam Bottoms and Jeff Bridges play best friends who wind up duking it out over the small town's resident spoiled and bored rich girl , played by Cybil Shepherd ( pretty but vacuous , just what the role calls for ) . A host of other sad characters populate this glum story : Cloris Leachman's wall flower coach's wife , who begins a tentative affair with Bottoms when the coach is looking the other way ; Ben Johnson's world-weary cowboy , who serves as a kind of sage to the young boys ; Clu Galager's stud , who takes Cybil Shepherd on a pool table ( or is that scene in the book only ? ) ; Eileen Brennan's salty diner waitress , who I wish was in the movie more ; and , best of all , Ellen Burstyn , as Shepherd's reckless mom , who makes us see exactly from whom her daughter inherited her wayward tendencies . Filmed in stark black and white , the film has a brooding atmosphere , and Bogdanovich's no-frills direction perfectly captures the feeling of a forgotten place in which nothing ever happens and nothing ever will . Children and parents alike waste their days away in bored ennui , and both turn to the same things to fill their time : sex , booze and brawling . The children have two choices : turn into their parents , or run away and never come back . It's a shame that Bogdanovich never directed anything else as accomplished as this , because he proves himself to be a director in complete mastery of his medium . |
573,402 | 4,532,636 | 443,453 | 8 | A Hilarious ( and Much Needed ) Assault on Decency | Sacha Baron Cohen comes to America in the guise of Borat Sagdiyev and wreaks his own brand of Kazakhi havoc in this very very funny film . In our age of uber-political correctness , " Borat " comes sweeping through like a brisk and refreshing wind , completely bounding over every cultural taboo we've erected around ourselves . Thus , no one is safe : Borat takes on Jews , blacks , gays , feminists , middle-Americans , religious fanatics , frat boys . The only weapon against the bumbling Borat is a sense of humour , which this movie shows most Americans painfully lack . Indeed , if there is any message to be had from " Borat " ( and I'm not sure there is much of one , beyond its fascinating cultural experiments ) , it's that everyone needs to lighten up and not take themselves so seriously . The image of Americans projected in this film varies from the heartwarming to the downright frightening . New Yorkers threaten Borat with physical violence when he approaches them on a subway . Feminists walk out on him when they find his views on women too much to tolerate . Folks out in the heartland commiserate with him over his hatred of gays and Jews ; a gun shop owner even helps him pick out the best weapon for shooting Jewish people . A sweet Jewish couple give him a place to sleep , and bring him a homey meal ( that is , before they turn into invading cockroaches ) . A group of manic Pentecosts help him find Jesus . An RV full of frat boys make complete asses of themselves by espousing their hopelessly ill-informed views on minorities in our country and the need to revert to slavery . The majority of people treat Borat in the condescending way of those who want to think of themselves as being culturally aware without really knowing anything at all about other cultures . These people become rude the second Borat offends their sense of propriety . On the other hand , the disenfranchised of America greet Borat with open arms , and we see a group of gays and a group of blacks interacting with him as if no cultural boundaries existed at all . The film's sweetest ( and most unexpectedly so ) moments come from Borat's befriending of a black prostitute . Of course , this is a carefully crafted work of fiction , and Cohen only lets his audience see what he wants them to see . I would probably react much the same as many of the people in this film if this crazy-looking and sounding man appeared out of nowhere and began to antagonize me . But the movie does make Americans look like a bunch of awfully self-important , uptight stiffs , and I've been to enough places in this country and met enough people to realize that the way events play out in this film ( even if they are manipulated or staged ) probably come very close to the real thing . Thank God for movies like " Borat . " If nothing else , they remind us that our cultural boundaries only matter as much as we let them , and that all of the fears that govern political correctness are mostly ungrounded . After all , virtually every person in this film was offended at one point or another , and as far as I can tell , all of them lived to tell about it . |
573,878 | 4,532,636 | 51,383 | 8 | Worth Remembering for Great Rosalind Russell Performance | Rosalind Russell tears through this film like a force of nature , giving one of the best and most underrated performances of the 1950s . The film revels in all of the excesses that make much of cinema from this time period seem so tacky now , but somehow the excess here works . Garish production design plastered across a mile-wide CinemaScope screen ; cameras that don't really play a role in the film but rather sit in one spot and record action ; over-the-top acting ; and a running time that stretches a wisp of a plot out to 140 minutes - - it's all here in its 1958 glory , and damned if it's not a pretty good time . Director Morton DaCosta makes no effort to make his movie feel like a movie - - he even resorts to stage lighting blackouts to transition between scenes . But a movie like this doesn't need fancy direction or even cinematic direction . It just needs a leading lady who can do the role of Mame Dennis justice , and with Roz Russell , it has that in spades . She's a hoot ( just watch her trying to mount a horse for a fox hunt ) and single-handedly makes this artifact of a movie worth treasuring . |
574,293 | 4,532,636 | 96,463 | 8 | Career Women with Big Ideas and Even Bigger Hair | A pure fantasy served up by Mike Nichols , but a vastly entertaining one . Melanie Griffith is the secretary with massive hair who pretends to be a corporate business woman when her boss is layed up with a broken leg . The catch is , she finds out she's pretty good at it , and things get complicated when she ends up spearheading a business deal and falling in love with her key partner ( Harrison Ford ) , all the while trying to keep what she's doing from her boss ( Sigourney Weaver ) . It's the kind of movie that could just as easily have been made as a screwball comedy in the 1940s , perhaps with Barbara Stanwyck in the lead role . The film is a classic in its own small way , one of the best comedies to emerge from the 1980s . Griffith is matched well with her role , so her limitations as an actress don't draw too much attention to themselves . But it's Weaver who steals the show as Griffith's imperious boss . She's a riot as a confident and powerful career woman from hell . And Joan Cusack steals a few scenes of her own as Griffith's best friend and fellow secretary , who sports hair as big as Griffith's and a Joisy accent to boot . Nichols knows how to direct a comedy so that the funny bits speak for themselves . |
574,496 | 4,532,636 | 101,921 | 8 | Girl Power in the Deep South | A heartwarming female bonding movie that has all the elements of a good ol ' Southern yarn . It was a good thing that Kathy Bates made this movie so soon after " Misery . " She had made such an impression as a psycho in the earlier film that she might have had trouble getting herself out from under the mantle of Annie Wilkes . But she plays a completely different character here , a dowdy , bored housewife who befriends a little old lady forgotten in a retirement home ( Jessica Tandy ) . Tandy begins to tell her the story of a female relative , Idgie Threadgoode , and her deep friendship with Ruth , which is played out in flashback by Mary Stuart Masterson and Mary-Louise Parker . The story is one of those melodramatic , life-affirming ones , but it's acted extremely well by the four women , and the film mostly avoids the treacle that threatens to come pouring in around the edges . |
574,034 | 4,532,636 | 49,223 | 8 | Where the Wild Things Are | This sombre sci-fi film can't help but look dated , and it's full of the usual cheesy 1950s sci-fi trappings , but one can't deny the influence it clearly had on the genre , and one can see the thumbprint of this film on any number of subsequent science fiction offerings . A very young Leslie Nielsen plays the leader of a group of American astronauts sent to a distant planet to find out what happened to a previous group of explorers . He comes across a man ( Walter Pidgeon ) and his daughter ( Anne Francis ) living alone with their robot servant ( Robby ) . Pidgeon has discovered the advanced technology left behind by a previous race of beings , the ability to harness inconceivable power through mind control . But Nielsen realizes that Pidgeon's subconscious is truly in control , and it's responsible for creating the monster that wiped out the former group of American visitors and comes to decimate Nielsen's crew as well . The love story between Nielsen and Anne Francis , whose role consists almost entirely of skipping around in miniskirts , would feel obligatory in any other sci-fi film , but here it takes on interesting dimensions . The presence of a woman brings out the animal sexual urges in the American crew ( who haven't seen a woman for a very long time ) , a theme that ties into the idea that mankind's largest obstacle to progress are its own base urges . " Forbidden Planet " suggests that the scariest monsters come not from the depths of space , but rather from the dark corners of man's own mind . What helps " Forbidden Planet " to stay fresh despite its dated look is its message about the responsibility man has to use wisely the technology he creates . The fact that much of the technology we have created over the years is responsible for beginning the slow death of our planet makes the film not only relevant , but prophetic . The movie is unsettling in an undefined way . It's not full of action , space wars , bizarre aliens or any of that . It's quiet and abstract , and it's more about ideas than it is plot . |
574,287 | 4,532,636 | 96,438 | 8 | Dazzling Special Effects in Toon Town | A dazzling mixture of live action and animation is this film's selling point , but it helps that it's anchored by a smart script that tips its hat to the detective noirs of the 1940s and by good performances from both its human actors ( Bob Hoskins and Christopher Lloyd ) and its voice performers ( Kathleen Turner is especially memorable as Jessica Rabbitt , perhaps the sexiest cartoon woman in history ) . Computer animation has made special effects passé , but at the time of this movie's release , its effects were state of the art , making Disney's previous efforts to blend live action and animation ( like " Mary Poppins " ) look hopelessly antiquated . You'll have a blast spotting the cartoon celebrity cameos . It's like a Merrie Melodies version of " Around the World in 80 Days . " |
573,501 | 4,532,636 | 101,889 | 8 | Whimsical and Lovable | A warm and touching drama from visionary director Terry Gilliam , with just the right amount of magical whimsy to make it unique without being cloying . Jeff Bridges and Robin Williams give wonderful performances as a shock-jock radio DJ and the homeless vagrant with whom he strikes up a friendship . Williams , allowed to be outrageous and goofy , received much of the attention , but the film relies on Bridges , whose performance is quieter and less showy but all the more impressive for that . Mercedes Ruehl and Amanda Plummer take on the supporting female roles , and Plummer in particular gives a delightfully kooky performance . The film manages to be eccentric without being in love with its own eccentricity , a characteristic I attribute to the way it's directed . |
573,415 | 4,532,636 | 82,766 | 8 | Words Can't Do Justice | It seems almost pointless for me to add any comments here , since everyone else who's posted has done such a great job of summarizing this film's merits , but I can't resist . How do you rate a movie like this ? On the one hand , it's one of the worst movies I've ever seen : completely lacking in coherence , shameful acting , writing so bad it seems to be making fun of itself . In fact , I'm still not convinced this movie isn't supposed to be a parody of Christina Crawford's book rather than a serious attempt to adapt it to the screen . On the other hand , it's such a rip-roarin ' good time of a show that I'm tempted to give it 10 stars on the strength of its sheer entertainment value alone . Faye Dunaway gives the most jaw-droppingly mesmerizing freak out ever captured on screen , whose bizarreness cannot even be topped by Halle Berry's Oscar acceptance speech . Dunaway must have realized early on that she was a rat in a sinking ship , but instead of deserting , she decides instead to devour the crew . I don't know if her performance comes anywhere close to capturing the real Joan Crawford , but if Crawford was even a tenth of a percent as loony as Dunaway portrays her here , I would have been high-tailing it to Canada if I were either of her children . The fabulous lines , many of which are quoted on this site , can't really be done justice when removed from the context in which they appear , and you really have to see the faces of the actors as they're delivering them to get the full effect . The wire hanger scene is of course a classic , but it's really the floor scrubbing scene immediately following , with Dunaway in kabuki makeup squatting on the floor like a Sumo wrestler , that remains more memorable . Watching Joanie jog is a sight to behold , especially when she starts talking to herself and scrunching her face up as if she's imitating Alvin or one of his chipmunks . There's the " I can handle the socks " moment , one of the most seductive moments ( hee , hee ) in film history , and of course the coup de grace comes when Joanie tackles Christina across the coffee table and begins banging her head into the floor like she's in a women's prison movie . The editing in this film is atrocious . There's no sense of time ; events follow each other in a loosely chronological fashion , but they don't make dramatic or narrative sense . Frank Perry , the director , must have been dozing off through much of this production ; either that or his film crew carried out a mutiny , tied him up , threw him in a shed , and went ahead without him . But it seems churlish to criticize a film like this for its poor film making . It's like kicking a dead horse . All I can say is , if you watch this movie with the right people in the right frame of mind ( i . e . with alcohol ) , you will be howling . I watched this with a group in college , and we had to periodically pause the movie in order to allow everyone to recover before continuing . Thank you , Ms . Dunaway , for giving us " Mommie Dearest . " The world will never be able to repay you for your kindness . or ( depending on your perspective and level of sobriety ) |
574,141 | 4,532,636 | 59,742 | 8 | Springtime for Hitler Ain't the Only Show with Singing Nazis | The Sound of Music is easy to ridicule . It's sappy , corny and sentimental to the extreme . It hopelessly simplifies horrible world events , and makes it seem like all anyone needed to do to escape the iron fist of Hitler's regime was to schlep over some hills on a bright , sunny morning and say " hello " to Switzerland . But I'm still recommending this movie , because it is one of the most accomplished movie musicals ever made . Robert Wise knew how to make a stage musical feel cinematic on the screen , as evidenced here and by his earlier " West Side Story . " He could open up stage musicals so that they felt right at home on screen , and he was expert at using on-location photography to enhance material rather than highlight its limitations . In " Music , " the Austrian scenery is dazzling , and nearly becomes a character in itself . And the music sounds great , though it's not one of Rodger's & Hammerstein's best scores ( it falls well below " The King and I " and " Carousel . " ) Julie Andrews is perfect in the lead role ; I can't imagine anyone else playing Maria . She had a knack for toning down overly-sentimental material until it almost became believable . And Eleanor Parker is the other stand out in the cast as the hilarious Baroness Schrader . My favorite moment comes when the family has burst into song for the umpteenth time and she leans over to Max ( Richard Haydn ) and whispers sarcastically , " Why didn't you tell me to bring along my harmonica ? " I forgive anyone who thinks this movie is just too gag-inducing to bear , but I still get some pleasure from popping it in every now and then . |
573,332 | 4,532,636 | 38,499 | 8 | So Bad I Didn't Want It to End | If you can suspend disbelief long enough to swallow Jennifer Jones - - in spray-on tan and flamenco outfits - - as a half-breed Indian girl , then you're on your way to enjoying this quite bad but embarrassingly entertaining howler . Jones goes to live with her distant relatives after her father is hanged for shooting her mother in a jealous rage . The ranch she ends up on is run by a hammy Lionel Barrymore and a soft-spoken Lillian Gish . It's not long before the two sons who live on the ranch - - brooding and dangerous Gregory Peck and bookish lawyer Joseph Cotten - - are fighting over Jones and her overdone snarl . The duel of the film's title comes at the finale , and boy what a finale it is . Let's just say the duel is not between the two characters you might expect it to be , and you've never seen worse acting than the sorry display Jones puts on . Director King Vidor films everything in over-saturated , feverish color , and the results are quite striking and endlessly fascinating . I couldn't quite decide whether or not Vidor might have been attempting to make a bad cult classic all along , but intentional or not , that's exactly what this film is . It's ridiculous , over long , corny and even somewhat pointless , and I couldn't get enough of it . Along with the big-time names that headline the cast , the supporting players include Herbert Marshall , Charles Bickford , Harry Carey and notably Walter Huston , as a slimy preacher . |
573,387 | 4,532,636 | 105,695 | 8 | The Film That Brought Eastwood Hollywood Street Cred | After years of being relegated to the world of pulp genre films , Clint Eastwood established himself as a major Hollywood filmmaker with this throwback to John Ford , an honor he continues to enjoy to this day . I haven't seen " Unforgiven " since it originally appeared in 1992 , and to be honest I was probably too young then to fully appreciate it . I do remember it being bleak and unsettling in ways I didn't completely comprehend , but now I realize that it was unsettling in the way many classic westerns are , when they deal with some of those existential themes like life and death and what it means to be a man . Eastwood himself gives a good performance , while Gene Hackman won just about every acting award under the sun that year for playing a sadistic sheriff . Morgan Freeman and Richard Harris also appear in supporting roles . One scene that sticks in my mind to this day is the one in which Hackman's sheriff graphically kicks the crap out of Harris . |
574,064 | 4,532,636 | 99,703 | 8 | Huston and Bening Put the Femme in Fatale | A devilish , twisted modern day noir with style to spare . Director Stephen Frears handles the morbid material expertly - - it walks a razor thin line between dark comedy and " too disturbing to enjoy . " John Cusack plays the con-man at the film's center , torn between the affections of his mother and his lover . Anjelica Huston and Annette Bening , playing the two women , tear up the screen . Both of them are like femmes fatale who wandered out of the 1940s and ended up here . We can be grateful that they got lost . A good , good movie . |
574,449 | 4,532,636 | 42,276 | 8 | Charming and Sweet | In Oscar lore , Judy Holliday is known as the actress who stole the Academy Award , undeservedly , one might add , right out from under either Bette Davis's ( " All About Eve " ) or Gloria Swanson's ( Sunset Boulevard " ) nose ( depending on which report you hear ) . Well , there's no doubt that Holliday's win was an unjust upset , but that should only upset you if you don't consider the entire history of the Academy Awards to be one long , uninterrupted unjust upset . Let's not hold the fact that a dumbass awards group decided her's was the best female performance of the year against her . Given the roles Judy Holliday would become known for playing , Billie Dawn certainly doesn't appear to be much of a stretch for her , but there's no denying that she's captivatingly charming in this lightweight George Cukor comedy . Holliday plays a ding-bat blonde numbskull gangster moll who , tired of her boyfriend's ( Broderick Crawford , made a star a year earlier by " All the King's Men " ) constant dismissal of her as just a dumb broad , sets out on an odyssey of self improvement . To help her in her goal , she enlists intellectual and booky William Holden ( we know he's intellectual because he wears glasses ) , who just happens to be drop-dead gorgeous as well ( this is Hollywood , folks ) . This is a sweet movie . I've got a soft spot for any story in which someone identifies his / her own limitations and sets out to improve them against the odds . There's a real excitement in seeing Holliday's character gradually begin to understand the satisfaction a good book can provide or become for the first time in her life legitimately engaged in a serious discussion and have opinions of her own . Holliday and Holden have sizzling chemistry , and even if Holliday isn't delivering Shakespeare , she's still awfully cute to watch . Melanie Griffith did a remake of this movie that I've never seen and never want to - - I don't believe for a minute that it can be anything but worse than Cukor's version . Despite Hollywood's tired attempts to force remakes down our throats , send the studio suits a message and stick with the originals - - they're always better . |
573,577 | 4,532,636 | 460,989 | 8 | A Naturalistic Account of the IR | This fascinating film about the Irish Republican Army in 1920s Ireland has an improvisatory feel about it . Not many scenes in the movie feel scripted . There are many scenes showing groups of men and women arguing , debating and fighting , but it all feels natural , and like the way these kinds of moments would play out in real life . Indeed , thinking back on the movie , it seems like much of it took place without dialogue , or at least without significant dialogue . This may be an odd comparison , but it reminded me of Michael Cimino's style of film-making in " The Deer Hunter " and " Heaven's Gate " : the emphasis on male solidarity up against forces too strong to oppose , the environment almost becoming a character in the film , the loosely choreographed scenes and the fact that much information is conveyed through imagery rather than words . The nominal focus of the film is on two brothers who start out on the same side of the Irish / British conflict , but who become opposed to one another as the IRA fragments into conflicting factions . The brother against brother plot line is of course meant to symbolize a larger and more universal struggle , but it's not dealt with in a heavy-handed manner . A very good and overlooked film . |
573,374 | 4,532,636 | 63,518 | 8 | Probably the Best Version of Shakespeare's Tragedy We're Ever to Get | This filmed version of one of Shakespeare's most famous tragedies is likely to be about as good a version as will ever be produced . Director Franco Zeffirelli had warmed up the year before with the Burton / Taylor version of " The Taming of the Shrew , " but here he nicely transitions from the frantic comedy of the former to the darker and sadder tragedy of this story about star-crossed lovers ( played by Leonard Whiting and the famously big-bosomed Olivia Hussey ) . Zeffirelli infuses the film with the same kind of restless energy that was feeding the youth movement in 1968 , so this is one Shakespeare film that feels completely relevant to the time in which it was released . The film has beautiful production values ( the scene at the ball is a work of art all by itself ) and of course that famous musical theme . It shows reverence for the original text but doesn't feel stage-bound or stodgy ; yet neither does it feel like a product of trendy 60s cinema . And unlike the Baz Luhrmann debacle that passed as a version of " Romeo and Juliet " about 10 years ago , the actors in this version seem to both understand their characters and the lines they've been given to read . |
573,751 | 4,532,636 | 34,583 | 8 | It Took Me a While to come Around . . . . | Ah , " Casablanca . " Is there a line from the film that hasn't become a cliché ? That's not a criticism of the movie . If anything it's the reverse . What greater compliment to a film screenplay can a film audience make than so completely absorbing every word of it into its common cultural consciousness ? It took me a long time and multiple viewings before I warmed up to Michael Curtiz's 1943 film ( by some accounts a 1942 release ) . I'm not particularly a fan of either Ingrid Bergman or Humphrey Bogart , and the film-making techniques didn't strike me as anything inventive or unique and they still don't . At best , " Casablanca " exists as an example of the classic Hollywood style of film-making working at its slickest and most polished . But then on about the fourth viewing , it struck me . The people who love this movie don't love it for the striking visuals or the daring narrative or any of the elements that make , say , " Citizen Kane " such continual fuel for film discussion . People still love " Casablanca " for coming out at exactly the right moment in our cultural history , and somehow it's retained that " right place , right time " allure . America had been involved in World War II for at least two years by the time of this film's wide release , and many women had seen their men leave to face uncertain futures . So no wonder a film with such an intense nostalgic glow about it would strike a universal chord . No wonder the forbidden romance between the Bergman and Bogart characters seemed so intensely poignant . And no wonder the patriotic , " do whatever you must for the good of the cause " propaganda ( for let's call it what it is ) , seemed so stirring ( and still does ) . Is " Casablanca " a great film ? I won't attempt to answer that , though it's not one of my personal favorites . But any film that carries its legacy with it the way this one does can't be completely dismissed either . My grade : |
573,369 | 4,532,636 | 381,061 | 8 | A Bloody Good Show , Mr . Craig | The charm of James Bond films have mostly eluded me over the course of my 31 years . In fact , I've only seen one other as far as I can recall ( " Octopussy " - - and by the way , how did that movie ever get released with THAT title ? ) and I remember virtually nothing about it . I don't think I'm missing much . From the isolated moments I've been able to catch on T . V . here and there , Bond movies look pretty awful - - not , mind you , awful in the tongue-and-cheek , isn't-this-fun kind of way , but awful in the I-wonder-what-else-is-on-T . V . - right-now kind of way . Well , Daniel Craig may make me a Bond convert , at least for the next few films . " Casino Royale " is a blast - - it's an action-packed adrenaline jolt of a movie , full of beautiful people and beautiful locales , and it's a testament to its ability to entertain that I didn't once look at my watch during its 144 minute running time . Daniel Craig looks like a bulldog , runs like the terminator , and has steely blue eyes that usually match the color of whatever body of water he happens to be standing in front of at the moment . The moment he appears on screen , you get the sense that he's out to quash once and for all all of the naysayers out there who assume that he'll make a lousy Bond . And boy does he . He could take on Roger Moore and Pierce Brosnan at the same time with both hands tied behind his back . Sean Connery maybe would give him a run for his money , but I suspect Craig would still pummel him severely . As for his sex appeal , I'll leave that to the ladies to assess , but if my wife's reaction to Craig's entrance half way through the film in a tuxedo is any indication , he's not lacking in that department either . It's almost laughable how regressive these movies are . Women are treated as nothing more than objects to either seduce or save , and Bond usually refers to the lead female in this as nothing more than " the girl . " I bet feminists hate James Bond . |
574,333 | 4,532,636 | 92,699 | 8 | James L . Brooks Does " Network " | A smart and funny adult comedy about a network news station and the lives of those who make it run . William Hurt is the newly-hired golden boy who looks great on screen but doesn't have a lot going on upstairs . Albert Brooks is the sharp reporter who doesn't have the looks to make it as an anchor . And Holly Hunter , blowing everyone out of the water in an amazingly energetic performance , is the driven producer who serves as the object of affection for both men . She's a funnier and more Southern version of the character Faye Dunaway played in " Network " . Like all of James L . Brooks ' screenplays , this one feels like it would be just as at home as a T . V . movie than as a film , but since it's about T . V . , the sitcom trappings aren't as jarring . |
573,622 | 4,532,636 | 315,983 | 8 | Makes a Much Better Movie Than Book | It rarely happens , but in transferring " House of Sand and Fog " from the page to the screen , the film makers have improved the material . If you want to know what I thought about the book , I've written a review at Amazon . In a nutshell , I thought the book was absolutely dreadful and nearly unredeemable . It made me feel bad - - - not bad for the people or for what happens , but just bad to be exposed to such unlikable characters and an improbable plot - - - in short , I was depressed by bad art . The movie , in contrast , made me feel not bad but rather sad - - - sad for the characters themselves , because the screenwriter and actors do a much better job at creating sympathetic characters than does the book's author . The colonel is a bit less of a monster at the end of the movie - - - Kathy seems to come more fully to her senses . Lester's actions don't make any more sense in the movie than in the book , but it's easier in the film to accept that they're impulsive , rash actions being carried out by a desperate man ; the book , on the other hand , wants to justify Lester's actions with heaps of back story , none of which helps in the least . The actors do a fine job . Ben Kingsley's performance is a bit overrated , but even at that it's great . Ditto Shoreh Aghdashloo - - I only wish she had had a bigger role . Jennifer Connelly just does the mopey suffering thing she's done in just about every other movie she's appeared in . It's time for this woman to make a comedy . The biggest treat in the film is the sterling cinematography . If you hated the book , see the movie . If you like the movie , DO NOT read the book . The book deserves to be burned ; the movie deserves to be seen . |
574,222 | 4,532,636 | 23,427 | 8 | Accent Man Paul Muni Goes Italian | Not to be outdone by Jimmy Cagney and Edward G . Robinson , that hammiest of hammy 30s actors , Paul Muni , tossed his hat into the gangster ring to play Tony " Scarface " Camonte , polishing off a nice little trilogy of gangster movies from the early 1930s that includes " The Public Enemy " and " Little Caesar . " The result lands squarely between the other two films in my affection . " Scarface " doesn't have the ability to knock the wind out of you the way " The Public Enemy " does , but it's better than the somewhat limp " Little Caesar . " And say what you will about Paul Muni's overacting , he certainly knows how to hold a screen . He gives a fascinating performance as Tony Camonte , even if he can't hold on to his Italian accent to save his life . Ann Dvorak lands the role of Tony's sister , and it's their strange relationship , one that takes the picture in a surprising direction toward its climax , that lends the film its novelty in the otherwise fairly formulaic gangster genre . Howard Hawks helmed this one , and earned his salary by his creative direction of the opening sequence alone . |
573,594 | 4,532,636 | 1,013,753 | 8 | Good But Not Great | Gus Van Sant's rock-solid account of the rise of San Francisco politician Harvey Milk and his efforts to bring awareness to gay-rights issues is supremely capable and engaging , but there was something about the whole thing that just felt a bit uninspired to me . I knew absolutely nothing about Milk's story before seeing the film - - I was all of three when Milk was assassinated - - so I was very interested in it from a historical perspective . However , I just didn't connect to it on an emotional level . I'm not sure why , because I'm a chump for a good old fashioned underdog story - - which " Milk " certainly is . And there's almost nothing negative I can say about the film that accounts for my lukewarm reaction to it . Sometimes there's just an intangible " something " missing from a film that prevents me from responding much to it , and that's the case here . It does boast a tremendous performance from Sean Penn though , completely lacking in the hamminess Penn has been guilty of in his more recent film appearances . He unfussily gets down to the business of playing the character of Harvey Milk without self-concsiously reminding us that he's Sean Penn playing him . Weirdly , despite Milk being such a flamboyant character , Penn's performance is unshowy . Of the supporting cast , I was most impressed with Emile Hirsch , who plays a member of Milk's campaign committee . Hirsch contributes a great deal of energy to the film whenever he's on screen , and the scenes featuring him and Penn together are some of the movie's best . For once , I didn't like a Danny Elfman score . It's too obtrusive and is at odds with Van Sant's typically objective style . But other than that , I thought the film was extremely well done . My comment may have already made this apparent , but I'm rather puzzled at my own reaction to the film . Instead of being able to give it an enthusiastic endorsement , I rather thought that it was a good but not great 2008 offering . |
573,951 | 4,532,636 | 49,966 | 8 | Pure Camp or High Art ? Or Both ? | This gloriously turgid melodrama represents Douglas Sirk at his most high strung . It eschews the soft wistfulness of " All That Heaven Allows " and the weepy sentimentality of " Imitation of Life " and instead goes for feverish angst and overheated tension . And of course , it's all captured in vibrant Technicolor . The cornball story has something to do with a friendship between Rock Hudson and Robert Stack that becomes a rivalry when Hudson snags the affections of Lauren Bacall , but who's really paying attention to the story ? Dorothy Malone won a Best Supporting Actress Academy Award for her splendidly over-the-top performance as Stack's sister , who takes the family business into her own hands when no one else will . A highlight of the film comes when this high-spirited wild child breaks into a frantic dance in her bedroom , unable to bear the restraints placed upon her by middle-class propriety . As so frequently happens in Sirk movies , the scene is both unintentionally hilarious in its absurdity and yet strangely moving in its effectiveness . Sirk came closer than anyone else to turning pure camp into high art , satisfying the philistines and the high brows at the same time within the same films . His was a unique talent and I don't know that there's ever been another film maker quite like him since . |
573,391 | 4,532,636 | 40,525 | 8 | Into the Funhouse with Orson Welles | Rita Hayworth gets the same treatment given to Barbara Stanwyck in " Double Indemnity " ( 1944 ) in this audacious noir entry from Orson Welles . Fitted out with platinum blonde hair and a heart chiseled from a block of ice , Hayworth is the femme fatale and Welles the object of her malice . The plot is nearly impossible to follow , or at least it was for me on a first viewing . But this is Orson Welles , folks , so the focus should be on the dazzling style , which is highly steeped in German Expressionism . Canted angles , disorienting reflections , whirligig music - - it's all here , the aural and visual equivalent of the funhouse that serves as the setting for the film's unforgettable climax . For Woody Allen fans : this is the movie Allen pays homage to at the end of " Manhattan Murder Mystery . " |
574,249 | 4,532,636 | 299,117 | 9 | A Sleeper Romance | I wouldn't have thought from previews that " Roger Dodger " would have an ounce of romance in it , but it does . The scene between Elizabeth Berkeley , Jennifer Beals ( both very good by the way - - who would have thought ? ) and Roger's nephew is incredibly sweet and touching , but without being overly sentimental or cloying . Campbell Scott gives a fabulous performance as Roger , illustrating how broad his acting range is . My only complaint with the movie is its incredibly annoying cinematography . All of the compositions are cluttered and claustrophobic , sometimes so much so that the main focus of the shot is entirely obscured . And this trend toward hand-held cameras needs to be stopped . I think directors feel that hand-held cinematography lends a gritty , realistic point of view to their films , but more frequently it serves only to distract . But a fairly minor quibble about an otherwise very good film . |
573,937 | 4,532,636 | 427,327 | 9 | Oh What a Beautiful Morning in Baltimore | At last , someone has made a good modern movie musical ! Though ironically , " Hairspray " is good precisely because it's old fashioned . This film , based on the hit Broadway musical that was in turn based on the 1988 John Waters movie ( now we need a non-musical stage play based on the film musical . . . ) , reminded me of the screen musicals produced back in the heyday of Broadway to film adaptations : films like " The Music Man , " " My Fair Lady " and " Oliver ! " that knew enough not to mess around with an already good thing . No one felt the need then to justify film musicals ; characters simply burst into song because that's what characters do in musicals . " Hairspray " is like that - - the songs are not staged as dream sequences like they were in " Chicago , " and they're not part of a stage performance like many of the songs in the woeful " Dreamgirls . " They're just good , solid Broadway songs performed with a ton of energy and verve by a talented and charismatic cast . That cast is largely responsible for making this film the exhilarating success that it is , and the fact that the casting is unpredictable and strange makes it all the more thrilling that it works . Newcomer Nikki Blonsky makes a perfect Tracy Turnblad , the chubby , optimistic teenager who wants more than anything to appear on the Corny Collins Show , a teeny bopper dance television series run by evil ice-queen Velma Von Tussel ( Michelle Pfeiffer ) . Tracy's mom , Edna ( John Travolta in drag , buried underneath heaps of prosthethic cellulite and a hilariously garbled Baltimore accent ) , doesn't want Tracy to expose herself to the ridicule she fears lurks outside in the big cruel world . But Tracy wins support from her dad , Wilbur ( played smartly by Christopher Walken ) , her best friend Penny Pingleton ( the adorable Amanda Bynes ) and the town's black citizenship , namely Motormouth Maybelle ( Queen Latifah ) and her son , Seaweed ( Elijah Kelly ) , who see in Tracy's challenge to the imperious T . V . station a parallel to their own racial struggles . Every single member of the cast has boatloads of chemistry with all the others : Blonsky and Travolta , who perform " Welcome to the 60s " as an anthem to the beauty that can be found in being unconventional ; Travolta and Walken , who stop the show with one of the film's best numbers , the big-band infused " You're Timeless to Me " ; Bynes and Kelly , who explore the touchy terrain of interracial dating ; Queen Latifah with everybody she comes in contact with . Only Pfeiffer comes across as distant , which is a fault I've always found with her as an actress , but which happens to suit this particular role . And Allison Janney makes an hilarious impression in the film's smallest role as Penny's hyper-religious and over-protective mom . For all of " Hairspray's " ding-bat zaniness and froth , it manages to deliver a powerful message about progressiveness and tolerance , and handles its civil rights background action far better than last year's civil-rights-set musical , the far more serious but disastrously terrible " Dreamgirls . " " Hairspray " has a gigantic heart , and it put a smile on my face that lasted long after I left the movie theatre . What a nice change of pace from the usual bang-'em-up , smash-'em-up offerings of summer . |
574,526 | 4,532,636 | 65,054 | 9 | An Under-appreciated Screen Musical , One of My Favorites | Shirley MacLaine fills the formidable shoes first worn by Gwen Verdon , who created the role of Charity Hope Valentine in the stage musical on which this film is based , and makes the role her own . " Sweet Charity " is nearly a one-woman show , so the success of any version depends almost entirely on its leading lady , and MacLaine delivers the goods and then some as this New York City " dance hall hostess , " part broad and part waif , who wants nothing more than to just be loved but always manages to pick the wrong guy . It's to MacLaine's great credit that you don't get frustrated with Charity , despite her denseness and her willingness to be treated like a doormat . Rather , you respond to the inherent good in her , the belief against all evidence to the contrary that life can have a fairy tale ending , and which the screenplay and MacLaine's performance convey without an ounce of sentimentality . There's not a whole lot of plot ; rather , the film takes you into the life of this warm character through a number of episodic segments , until finally we realize that Charity's problem is not , as she thinks , that she's not good enough for anyone , but rather that she can't find someone who's good enough for her . Bob Fosse , who directed and choreographed the stage version , takes on the same tasks here , with somewhat mixed results . The choreography is stellar , especially during the " Rich Man's Frug " number , set in a hilariously stylized version of a trendy New York night club ; and during the " Rhythm of Life " number , led by Sammy Davis , Jr . as a sort of hipster preacher who leads bizarre revival meetings in parking garages . But Fosse's direction is a little less sure , and when one compares this film to his later efforts , like the nearly perfect " Cabaret " and the not as perfect but still fascinating " All That Jazz , " one can see how much shakier he is here . He struggles to meld a very conventional style of film-making to his own unique cinematic style , the results being that all of the musical numbers are dazzling and energetic while all of the non-musical moments are a bit flat . He also gives in too much to trendy 1960s flourishes , so the film seems dated now . But the good in this film greatly outweighs the bad . The terrific score retains most of the major songs from the musical : " Big Spender , " " If My Friends Could See Me Now , " " There's Gotta Be Something Better Than This , " " I'm a Brass Band , " and " I Love to Cry at Weddings . " The title song is set to a different tune , and is an improvement over the version that appeared on stage . " My Personal Property " replaces " You Should See Yourself " as Charity's opening number - - again , an improvement . " A Very Nice Face " replaces " I'm the Bravest Individual " as the number sung by Charity when she and Oscar ( a hilariously spastic John McMartin ) are trapped in an elevator , the one song that's not as good as the original . Ricardo Montalban makes a terrific Vittorio Vitali , the virile and lusty Latin lover movie star who takes Charity back to his place only to leave her stranded in a closet all night when his girlfriend shows up unexpectedly , but his big number , " Too Many Tomorrows , " is dropped . And the rubber-limbed Chita Rivera and Paula Kelly , playing Charity's fellow dance hall hostess friends and roommates , don't get their second-act number , " Baby , Dream Your Dream " in the film , but they do great work on " Big Spender " and " There's Gotta Be Something Better Than This , " which the three actresses perform on a rooftop in a scene reminiscent of " West Side Story . " " Sweet Charity " came out a time when the Hollywood musical was dying , and because it was a box office bomb , I feel that it gets lumped in with other bad films from the late 60s , like " Doctor Dolittle , " " Camelot , " " Hello , Dolly , " and " Throughly Modern Millie , " but it's leaps and bounds better than any of those , and is one of the unsung musical gems from that era . |
574,237 | 4,532,636 | 52,561 | 9 | The Verdict Doesn't Matter in This Courtroom Thriller | Television shows like " CSI " exist today because books and films like " Anatomy of a Murder " existed first . " Murder " was somewhat different from courtroom thrillers that had come before it , because it focused almost exclusively on dissecting the forensic evidence ( much of it quite graphic and frank for its time ) that the two sides use to build their cases , and less on the attorney histrionics and impassioned speeches that comprise most movies set in courtrooms . The film casts that benevolent everyman James Stewart as an attorney charged with defending a man ( Ben Gazarra ) accused of murder , who in turn claims that the murder was an act brought about by temporary insanity over the rape of his wife ( a sultry Lee Remick ) . Stewart's benign presence no doubt helped audiences at the time to more easily navigate the rough waters of this film's language and mental images . I don't know that a major Hollywood film before this had addressed the subject of rape so candidly . It's no surprise that Otto Preminger , that most provocative of provocative directors , helmed this one . George C . Scott has a lot of fun with his role as the cocky , snarky prosecuting attorney . He brings a predatory , menacing edge to the film , an edge enhanced by stark black and white photography and a jazzy score . In the end , whether or not Stewart wins his case is beside the point ; in this film , the ride is more important than the destination . |
573,504 | 4,532,636 | 102,926 | 9 | Join an Old Friend for Dinner | The FBI thriller to end all FBI thrillers . We can probably thank " The Silence of the Lambs " for the plethora of CSI shows bombarding our T . V . screens today , but don't hold that against it . This is one of those films that I never tire of seeing , and I can't come across it on cable without stopping whatever it is I'm doing to watch it . " Lambs " came out of nowhere in 1991 as the big film of the year , and the fact that it won the top five Academy Awards has given it prestige . But to look back , it's amazing that this film was taken seriously enough to win big . It's brutal , violent and traffics in all manner of psychopathic nastiness , from cannibalism to sexual deviation . Jonathan Demme's direction is tight but by-the-book - - it's first and foremost a plot driven movie . But the film's ace card is the performance by Anthony Hopkins , who chose to play Hannibal Lecter as a suave and polite Englishman rather than a raving lunatic . His scenes with Jodie Foster , as FBI trainee Clarice Starling , are mesmerizing , and it was a brilliant choice on the part of the screenwriter ( and this probably came from the book , though I haven't read it ) to make the film , under its grisly surface , essentially about a love story . Foster's performance doesn't hold up well all these years later . She's mannered and unconvincing , especially later in the film as her character becomes more frantic . But Hopkins ' creation remains one of the most memorable ever committed to the screen . |
574,331 | 4,532,636 | 93,209 | 9 | Growing Up with the Blitz | A delightful and imaginative film about a young English boy's perspective of the London blitz . Instead of focusing on the weariness , fear and anxiety that the war causes among the adults , this film depicts war-torn England as a source of fantasy and sensory delights for a child who's too young to fully understand its implications . Houses reduced to piles of rubble become treasure-troves and playgrounds ; bombs going off in the night sky become fireworks . The film looks wonderful , and it's artfully directed by John Boorman . The cast is full of mostly unknown actors - - the most recognizable is probably Sarah Miles , who received a Best Actress Oscar nomination for " Ryan's Daughter " way back in 1970 . |
573,324 | 4,532,636 | 32,551 | 9 | Not the Book , But Beautiful in Its Own Right | It's difficult on a first viewing of " The Grapes of Wrath " not to be somewhat disappointed with it . So much of Steinbeck's beautiful novel is left out of the film , and it's hard to see his story and characters wedged into the " gee whizz " style of film-making so prevalent at the time . But once you get beyond a comparison of the movie to the book , you begin to realize that John Ford created a beautiful piece of work of his own , and the film inspires a great deal of admiration , and deserves credit for its gutsiness at tackling a story that wouldn't have gone down smoothly with film executives at the time . Of course the most controversial parts of the book are left out ( like its final image , for example ) , but Ford still managed to work around the constraints forced upon him to fashion a hard-biting film . Henry Fonda is perfect casting for Tom Joad - - never have his otherworldly eyes been used to greater effect . And Jane Darwell is pitch-perfect as Ma Joad - - she captures the tough-as-nails dignity that the character has in the novel . The whole movie is lit by expert cinematographer Gregg Toland , who uses shadow and reflection to cast a ghostly pall over everything . Indeed , much of what Ford wasn't able to include in the film as words he communicates instead through images , and isn't that what a good book-to-film adaptation should do ? One of those films that feels ahead of its time . |
573,991 | 4,532,636 | 47,849 | 9 | Spencer Tracy's One-Armed Man Comes Calling | A superb suspense thriller in the " High Noon " tradition , in which our hero must find a way out of his predicament before night falls and the bad guys come shooting . Our hero in this case is Spencer Tracy , a mysterious one-armed man who shows up in a tiny town ( more a collection of buildings than a town , really ) looking to pay a call on a Japanese rancher . He's met with suspicion and hatred all out of proportion to his purpose , and it doesn't take him long to figure out that something's rotten . As Tracy uncovers the mystery , the band of thugs who runs things , led by Robert Ryan , makes it clear that Tracy will not be allowed to leave , at least not alive . This film is tense and blunt , and delves into post-WWII issues like racial prejudice and man's instincts to brutalize other men . A couple of the townsfolk , like the doctor ( Walter Brennan ) and the ineffectual sheriff ( Dean Jagger ) want to help Tracy , but they must first be shaken from the fog of futility into which they've fallen . A running theme in the film is the uselessness men feel as they get older and find themselves supplanted by a younger generation with a different moral code . Ernest Borgnine and Lee Marvin appear as two of Ryan's henchmen , and it's worth sitting through the movie just for the scene in which Tracy kicks Borgnine's ass . Anne Francis plays the lone double-crossing female . |
574,189 | 4,532,636 | 65,088 | 9 | A Grisly , Sickly Entertaining Film | A brutally bleak screen adaptation of the pulpy Horace McCoy novella , about a Depression-era dance marathon where down-and-outers drive themselves to the brink of exhaustion to win the cash prize . This film has become relevant again today in the age of reality T . V . , where people tune in to watch strangers be humiliated , rejected and made fun of . Meanness and suffering sells today , and apparently it sold back then as well . The M . C . of the dance marathon , played wonderfully by Gig Young in one of his last ( if not the last ) film performances before the troubled actor murdered his wife and then killed himself , creates little narratives and dramas around each of the dancers , so that the audience can have their favorites to root for . Every once in a while , someone will show off a special talent , singing a song or hoofing a little dance number , and the audience will throw change at them , which the performer then frantically scrabbles up like a desperate pigeon . The cast of dancers is led by Jane Fonda , in a break-out role as Gloria , the jaded woman-of-the-world who's seen it all and doesn't want to see anymore ; Susannah York , as a pretentious wannabe actress , who acts up a storm during a mesmerizing breakdown scene ; Red Buttons , as an aging ex-serviceman who struggles to keep up with the young kids around him ; and Bruce Dern and Bonnie Bedelia , as a sweet couple of country bumpkins who are desperate to win the cash for their unborn baby . And yes , that is Al Lewis ( aka Grandpa Munster ) lurking around in the background as one of the dance marathon officials . Director Sydney Pollack vastly improves on the source material , making something much richer and deeper out of McCoy's lurid novella . He uses an edgy , jarring style that's suited perfectly to the material , and which he would never again display . " They Shoot Horses , Don't They ? " holds a sort of grisly fascination over its audience . Bleak as it is , it's also entertaining in a rather morbid way , making us feel like we're members of the audience watching this sick spectacle and making it that much harder for us to condemn the film audience without labeling ourselves as hypocrites . |
574,129 | 4,532,636 | 266,543 | 9 | An Underwater Treasure | Finding Nemo finds the Pixar animation studio back in top form after their somewhat disappointing ( I thought ) " Monsters , Inc . " This group has always had a knack for finding source material that will give them full freedom in unleashing their animation imaginations ( the toy-chest world of " Toy Story , " the insect world of " A Bug's Life , " ) and in " Finding Nemo " they take us underwater and show us the beauty , wonder , and danger of the sea . There are any number of jaw-dropping set pieces in this film : a field of jellyfish , a shark attack , a mass escape from a fishing net . As usual , Disney fills its film with liberal messages about the treatment of wildlife and the environment , much welcome and needed messages in my opinion . But great animation alone cannot sell me on an animated movie - - that's done with the quality of the story and characters , and " Finding Nemo " delivers there as well . The Pixar movies are never as cloying as the traditionally animated films produced by Disney - - there's always a drier , cheekier brand of humour , and you get the feeling that just as many jokes are aimed at the adult audience as at the kids . The voices are terrific , the story is quick and funny , and I thoroughly enjoyed the whole thing . |
573,341 | 4,532,636 | 50,613 | 9 | Fierce and Poetic | With " Throne of Blood , " master director Akira Kurosawa gives us an extraordinary screen adaptation of " Macbeth , " set in feudal Japan . Kurosawa does what I wish more filmed Shakespeare adaptations did : use the original texts as source material but treat them in decidedly cinematic ways . I would rather watch a movie like " Throne of Blood " any day over a faithful but stagy filmed play . This version of " Macbeth " MOVES ; Kurosawa knows how to tell a story visually , and he takes full advantage of the play's opportunities for ghoulishness : haunted woods , opaque fogs , grisly deaths . Kurosawa regular Toshiro Mifune gets the Macbeth role and does well with it , but no one in the movie comes close to equaling Isuzu Yamada's performance as the Lady Macbeth counterpart . Yamada delivers a performance so intense and harrowing that you want to shrink from the screen when she's on it . Her portrait of a woman consumed with hatred and revenge to the point of near inhumanity is one of the most frightening things I've ever seen captured on film , and would alone make this movie worth watching if nothing else did . Fortunately , nearly everything else does too . |
573,314 | 4,532,636 | 72,684 | 9 | Like Stepping Into a Classical Painting | I'm reading Thackeray's " Vanity Fair " even as I write this comment , and what strikes me about " Barry Lyndon " now that I've read something by the author who wrote it is how much the film recreates the experience of reading Thackeray . " Vanity Fair " is nearly 700 pages of nothing much happening , yet it's all fascinating . That's " Barry Lyndon . " Ryan O'Neal plays the eponymous protagonist , and Marisa Berenson his beleaguered wife in this costume drama that follows the exploits of our dear rogue Lyndon from young manhood to weary middle age . And that's really it for lead characters . Neither O'Neal nor Berenson registers much , but no matter . The true stars here are the film's magnificent and jaw-dropping production design , followed closely by its score , which , like in other Kubrick films , incorporates previously existing classical compositions that are perfectly matched with the material . Every shot in this film looks like a painting , which was Kubrick's intention and why he used such a square aspect ratio . The meticulous details of 18th Century court life make this movie endlessly fascinating , even if many viewers have complained that it's emotionally distant ( a criticism that could apply to more than one Kubrick film ) . I loved " Barry Lyndon " the first time I watched it , thought it was hollow and lacking the second time I watched it , and then went back to thinking it a masterpiece the third time I watched it . Let's see how I feel after a fourth viewing . As for now , it's my third impression that sticks . |
573,621 | 4,532,636 | 301,199 | 9 | A Dirty , Pretty Little Movie | This is a slick , atmospheric gem of a film from the always-reliable director Stephen Frears . It's got one of those stories that might sound silly on paper - - - I won't say any more , because surprise is responsible for much of the fun in watching this . At various times , I was reminded of Jules Dassin's " Rififi , " Francis Coppola's " The Conversation " and Samuel Fuller's " Pickup on South Street . " It's hard to find movies anymore that aren't derivative and that can genuinely show you something you haven't seen before . " Dirty Pretty Things " does this - - not in a major way , but even that is part of its charm . It's modest but finely crafted , and that combination can result in high praise indeed . |
574,109 | 4,532,636 | 21,884 | 9 | A Deserved Classic | Frankenstein is really nothing like the Mary Shelley book on which it is based , but it instead takes the story and makes it something all its own . Gone are the philosophical and allegorical qualities of the novel , and in its place is a much simpler tale about man's responsibility to the things he creates and the dangers inherent when Mankind tries to play God . Like " King Kong " two years later , " Frankenstein " manages to create an incredible amount of sympathy for its villain . Like Kong , Frankenstein's monster doesn't ask to be unleashed on the civilized world ; it's not really his fault that he doesn't know how to function in it . There are gorgeous moments in this film , like the scene when the monster communicates with a little girl by the side of a lake , all the more effective because the scene quickly transitions to one of horror . And as is typical for films released in the very early days of the 30s , this movie looks better and more technologically advanced than many films that came out in the succeeding decade . The camera is more fluid , there's a more imaginative use of light and shadow , and the effects , especially in the scenes where Dr . Frankenstein brings his creation to life , and later when the angry mob has trapped the monster in a windmill and is burning it to the ground , are quite good . " Frankenstein " is considered one of the great all-time monster movies , but it's not scary so much as it is sad and fairly moving . |
574,494 | 4,532,636 | 103,064 | 9 | He's Baa-aack | The original " Terminator " movie had a low-budget look about it , but money was obviously not an issue with this blockbuster Hollywood sequel . This time around , Ahhnold is the good guy , sent back in time to protect the son of Linda Hamilton from another and more advanced terminator , ALSO sent back in time to kill him . This new model looks like liquid mercury and can take on the appearance of anyone and anything he happens to be around . This gives the visual effects artists all kinds of opportunities to show off , which they do . These effects were a big deal at the time , and even with all of the more sophisticated computer effects of today , they still hold up well . The film looks dazzling , and it benefits from a sense of humor that the first one didn't have . |
573,474 | 4,532,636 | 28,333 | 9 | Everything " Top Hat " Isn't | If you've read my review of " Top Hat " you know that that was my introduction to Astaire and Rogers movies and that I was somewhat disappointed in it . Well " Swing Time " made me understand why everyone loves these movies . Everything I expected from " Top Hat " and didn't get was more than made up for by this sparkling musical comedy . The plot to " Swing Time " makes even less sense ( if possible ) so there's really no need to go into it . What sets this movie apart from its immediate predecessor is the energy that goes into the dances . In " Top Hat , " I couldn't get over the impression that Ginger Rogers , as good a dancer as she is , was putting all of her energy into keeping up with Fred Astaire . Here , she seems to be his dancing equal , and the chemistry between the two when they're hoofing around the enormous art-deco sets is palpable . Also , the score ( this one by Jerome Kern ) is much better and full of more memorable songs . " The Way You Look Tonight " is probably the most famous , but " A Fine Romance " is great too , and I especially liked how the two were blended together in the final duet . And not to be outdone by the astonishingly campy " Piccolino " number from " Top Hat , " " Swing Time " gives us the lamentable " Bojangles of Harlem " number , a scene you have to see to believe . However , if you can get past the atrocious idea of black face numbers to begin with , the dancing itself is actually pretty cool , especially when Astaire squares off against a trio of his own giant shadows projected on the wall behind him . Helen Broderick and Eric Blore return again in the supporting cast . Broderick gets much more to do ( does she remind anyone else of Mary Wickes ? ) while Blore gets somewhat less . I didn't really like Victor Moore in his role . He has a really eccentric and distracting way of delivering lines . It's not like I've seen all of the musicals made during the 30s , but of the ones I have , I'd say " Swing Time " is the best . |
574,214 | 4,532,636 | 118,749 | 9 | Boogie Till You Drop | No one will ever accuse Paul Thomas Anderson of subtlety , and if any one word describes his approach to material , " excessive " will do the trick , but the boy sure can put together one hell of an entertaining movie . In a blast of disco and neon , " Boogie Nights " comes blazing from the screen in an orgy of dazzling camera-work and funky 70s and 80s tunes ( one of the best soundtracks ever compiled for a movie ) . Anderson with his camera is like a little boy who just got the toy he wanted more than anything else for Christmas , and he goes wild with it . It swirls around actors in ridiculously long takes , follows them on to the dance floor as they do the hustle , catches elaborately choreographed segments in single shots . The camera gives the sense of never wanting to be left behind by the action , and at one point even plunges under water in a swimming pool to follow one of the many extras at a party scene who decides to go for a dip . Anderson wants to do way too much with the movie , and he doesn't know when to quit . He's like a writer so in love with his story that he doesn't want to leave anything out , even when his material becomes redundant . I can't help but feel that a long sequence late in the movie featuring a wild cameo by Alfred Molina should have been left on the cutting room floor , but then another part of me would hate to miss out on this wonderfully bizarre segment . The whole movie is like that . Even when Anderson pushes too far and too hard , you're carried along by his enthusiasm for his own film . Anderson's style is certainly reminiscent of Altman's , but he's not an Altman rip-off . In many ways he's the opposite of Altman ; you never feel that Anderson is anything less than in complete control of his movies ( and this feeling increases if you watch the documentary of the making of " Magnolia " ) whereas Altman's films seem to come together despite his attempts to instill chaos on his actors . But both share the knack for being able to build a film around a unifying tone rather than any rigidly imposed dramatic structure , and they're both wonderful with actors . And speaking of actors . . . . . " Boogie Nights " would be nothing without its astounding ensemble . Burt Reynolds leads the pack in the performance of a career , but he's certainly not alone . Julianne Moore and Don Cheadle are terrific here as usual , but even Heather Graham , whose career has gone nowhere , impresses . John C . Reilly should probably have been directed to tone down the jokiness of his performance , as he strains credibility in every scene he's in , but he's so damn funny that you don't really care . And Mark Wahlberg has proved himself to be a fine actor , pulling off this difficult role with aplomb . His performance here coupled with his performance in " I Heart Huckabees " convinces me that he may be one of the most promising young actors in circulation . Who ever would have thought that ? " Boogie Nights " may be a step or two shy of greatness , but I dare you to watch this movie and not have a great time . Groove on , man . |
574,030 | 4,532,636 | 340,377 | 9 | Off-Beat Movie About Eccentrics and Misfits | One of those small , quiet films about human behavior that utterly captivates through the strength of its writing and acting . It could have been too quaint for its own good , full of self-consciously eccentric characters , but it's not . Instead , it's warm and inviting , full of the kind of characters you wish you could just stay with after the movie's over . Peter Dinklage plays a grumpy misfit who moves out to a solitary town in order to be left alone . But the outgoing assortment of fellow misfits he meets won't let that happen . Dinklage is good , but Bobby Cannavale , as a goofball who won't ever shut up , and Patricia Clarkson , as a sad and lonely painter , are the stand outs . |
574,344 | 4,532,636 | 246,578 | 9 | Disturbing and Unsettling , But for Certain Tastes , Exquisite | Even if you don't like " Donnie Darko " ( and I'm sure there are many people who hate it , if they've ever even seen it ) , you're not likely to forget it quickly . This film lingers in the mind in a very unsettling way . It left me feeling creepy , and it's actually a fairly nihilistic film , but at the same time I was weirdly exhilarated by it , mostly because it's just so damn good . It's got an expert cast , including the Gyllenhaals ( Jake and Maggie ) , both of whom are two of the best young actors currently working , Mary McDonnell , Patrick Swayze ( yes , Patrick Swayze ) and Jena Malone . All the actors are top-notch and make so much of their characters that they prevent the film from falling into too-quirky-for-its-own-good territory , a fate that befalls many " independent " films . But praise must go to the writing and directing in this regard as well . At first it may seem that events and scenes are thrown in arbitrarily just for the sake of being weird , but everything comes together logically and powerfully . " Donnie Darko " is a movie for people who think too much . For those of us ( and I include myself ) who can never understand how , for example , religious people are so easily able to have a pat answer for everything that's complicated about the world in which we live , this movie gives us something to relate to . It doesn't provide answers , unfortunately , but there's something comforting about knowing other people out there are struggling with the same problems . Donnie almost can't live a functional life because of the anxiety caused by all of the unknowns about existence , and he sees the bland , self-help answers offered by so much of middle-class American society for what they are : shams to hide behind rather than to really help . He wants to be able to live without fear , without having to be convinced that there's a point to it all , but he can't , and watching him struggle with that is poignant and heart-breaking . This is a terrific film that deserves to be seen . I haven't seen the original version , so can't make comparison to the director's cut , but I have no complaints with it as is . |
573,514 | 4,532,636 | 765,429 | 9 | Ridley Scott Knocks One Out of the Park | Director Ridley Scott has surprised me : he's finally made a movie I liked . Since the last one was " Alien " back in 1979 , I'd pretty much given up on him . " American Gangster " is a kinetic , dazzlingly entertaining crime film . It features two strong performances from Denzel Washington and Russell Crowe , but this wasn't a movie that left me remembering the performances . Rather , it's the great writing and assured directing that left me most impressed . Washington plays Frank Lucas , a drug dealer in 1960s Harlem who applies the principal of the American dream and capitalism to his drug trade : make something better and sell it for less , and pretty soon your product will be the one to beat . Crowe plays perhaps the only honest cop in New York City , who's appointed the leader of a narcotics unit whose mission is to bring an end ( or at least curb ) New York's rampant drug market . All of this is based on a true story , but who knows how accurate it all is . And frankly , with a movie as entertaining as this , who cares ? The film only slows down toward the end , when Washington and Crowe finally meet , and the screenplay decides it must tidy things up in a " here's-the-moral-of-the-story " kind of way . The rest is energetic and highly accomplished . The film doesn't join the ranks of " The Godfather " as one of the best American films about organized crime , but I'm not sure it tries to , and that's one of its best qualities . A host of other actors appear in supporting roles , including Cuba Gooding , Jr . , Chiwetel Ejiofor , Ruby Dee ( memorable as Washington's mother ) , Ted Levine ( who I'll never be able to see as anyone other than Buffalo Bill from " The Silence of the Lambs " ) , Josh Brolin ( who has now officially appeared in every movie released this year ) and , chewing the scenery , Armand Assante doing his best Marlon Brando impersonation . Like him or not , there's no denying that Scott does know his way around a movie set , and with " American Gangster " he's given us one of the best and one of the most entertaining films of the year . |
573,904 | 4,532,636 | 23,969 | 9 | A Great Time | I can't say I'm necessarily a huge Marx Brothers fan , but I also can't claim to be an expert on them , since I've only seen this and " A Night at the Opera . " Based on these two films , I've concluded that I like the IDEA of a Marx Brothers movie more than I like the movies themselves . Groucho is such a cultural icon that , like Charlie Chaplin , he inspires warm nostalgic feelings in movie buffs even if you've never seen one of his movies . However , that said , I have to assume that " Duck Soup " is the Marx Brothers at their zaniest best , and it is very funny . This is the film that includes the famous " mirror " scene , in which two men in a doorway becomes a hilarious comedic bit , as one man thinks he's looking into a mirror because the other is matching his actions and gestures . It's inspired scenes like that that seem to have given the Marx Brothers their longevity . You remember individual skits that can be easily shown in a 60 second clip rather than the movies as a whole . |
574,195 | 4,532,636 | 37,101 | 9 | Dick Powell Dances His Way Through the Role of Philip Marlowe | Dick Powell exchanges his dancing shoes for the film noir anti-hero's characteristic fedora in this fiendishly inventive 1944 entry based on the Raymond Chandler novel , " Farewell , My Lovely . " Many at the time questioned Powell's ability to pull off this tough-guy role , but he does just fine with it , thank you very much . His Philip Marlowe isn't as much of a hard case as the Sam Spade inhabited by Humphrey Bogart in " The Maltese Falcon " ; he doesn't have the same imposing physical appearance and he doesn't try to strong arm anybody to get what he wants . He uses a caustic tongue in place of a fist , and if he gets intimidated , scared or ruffled , you'll never know it , because he's always ready with a sarcastic comment to complement his cool exterior . In this movie , private detective Marlowe finds himself mixed up in a murky and byzantine scheme involving a jade necklace and a blackmail plot . Meanwhile , another case has him searching for a missing person , a Velma Valenti , one-time lover of a big ox named Moose Malloy ( Mike Mazurki ) . Gradually , Marlowe realizes that the two cases are connected , and he does his own share of scheming to make sure he's not the dupe that everyone involved seems to want him to be . Claire Trevor appears in a fabulous performance as one of the best femmes fatale ever to grace the genre . She has much in common with that other classic femme fatale from 1944 , Barbara Stanwyck in " Double Indemnity . " She also gets the film's best and most suggestive line - - when talking about a male " friend " and his desire to be a sculptor , she tells Marlowe , " He couldn't get started for fear of failure . " You've got to love film noir for lines like that . Anne Shirley gets saddled with the sweet , wholesome good girl role that all of these films must have in order to balance out the evil vamp ; she's about as uninteresting as you'd expect her to be . Director Edward Dmytryk adds all kinds of flourishes to the film to keep it visually appealing : imaginative use of key lighting , those angular shadows so common to films like this , a bizarre nightmare montage when Marlowe is tripping on heroin . Whenever Marlowe blacks out ( which is often ) , oily black fog comes curling out of the edges of the frame to engulf the screen . Dmytryk maintains a firm but light grip on the material and keeps his film just as playful as it ought to be . For coming so early in the film noir cycle , " Murder , My Sweet , " like " Double Indemnity , " is pretty cynical and bleak ( though it has a much happier ending than the other film ) . It's a high-water mark of its genre . |
574,052 | 4,532,636 | 112,697 | 9 | A Wonderfully Clueless Emma | Who would have thought that the best screen adaptation of Jane Austen's " Emma " would emerge from an updated parody set in a Beverly Hills high school and directed by Amy Heckerling ? But that's exactly what has happened with this film . Heckerling obviously gets that Austen's continuous appeal lies in the fact that her stories remain relevant and timely - - - so why not update it , make the character of Emma ( Cher here , played by the adorable Alicia Silverstone ) a daffy valley girl , and fill the movie to the brim with pop-culture references and one very funny vignette after another ? After all , the spirit and tone of " Emma " emerges unscathed . Comedic performances are always underrated , maybe because they look so easy , but Silverstone really deserves a lot of praise for this movie . It would be nothing without her performance . |
574,351 | 4,532,636 | 808,417 | 9 | Wonderful Film Is Much More Than Just a " Cartoon " | Do not dismiss " Persepolis " as only being a cartoon . It's animated in the sense that it's not live action , but it's more serious minded and sophisticated than many a live action film out there . Marjane Satrapi wrote the source material on which this film is based , and she's its main character . It documents her troubled coming of age during a period when her home country ( Iran ) was experiencing a severe identity crisis . Sent to Europe by her parents when the Iraq / Iran war makes simply living in Iran dangerous , she finds that the land of democracy and bounty that Europe promises is largely a myth for people like her , looked down on as foreign and barbaric invaders . In the end , she prefers living under a militant regime to the " freedom " of the West . " Persepolis " is quite tragic , really . Americans have become so conditioned to think of all Iranians as radical Muslims that we've forgotten it used to be a progressive country not that different from America . Those who are being oppressed now should not be blamed for the choices of their leaders . Would any American want to be held accountable for the attitudes and behavior of our president ? But Iran is still home to these people , and they do the best to make of it what they can . The film is beautiful , with stunning and artistic animation . It's cheeky , and there are many humorous moments , but it will also break your heart . |
573,414 | 4,532,636 | 374,900 | 9 | One of the Best of 2004 | Yes , for all the pomp and broo-hah-hah surrounding last year's " serious " films like " Million Dollar Baby , " " The Aviator , " " Ray " and " Finding Neverland , " this little quirky comedy made its way on to my personal 10 best list when none of the aforementioned films did . It's small , personal and definitely not to everybody's tastes , but it's also hilarious and even rather touching . Overall , it really is just a goofy comedy with low aspirations , but there is a slightly sober tone underlying the goofiness , whether intended or not . This movie is for anyone who's ever felt the unfairness of being labeled a dork or nerd simply for being different , or having interests outside of the mainstream . Napoleon is weird , and his sullen manner doesn't win him any admirers ( though it does provide the film with countless laughs ) , but there's something noble about his refusal to change himself to accommodate the whims of the popular , acceptable crowd . I loved this movie because all of the outcasts have happy endings on their own terms , but the film avoids any dopey life-affirming lessons . But lest you think I'm taking the movie too seriously , let me repeat that it is first and foremost a silly , goofy , stupid comedy , and on those terms it's a classic . |
574,335 | 4,532,636 | 118,694 | 9 | In the Mood for a Truly Cinematic Film ? | It can be surprisingly difficult to find truly cinematic films - - that is , films that tell their stories in a way unique to the medium . Kar Wai Wong's " In the Mood for Love , " therefore , will come as a welcome surprise to cinephiles . I can imagine this story being told in another medium , but certainly not in the way Wong tells it . Set in 1962 Hong Kong , the movie is about a lonely man and a lonely woman who live next door to each other , and who discover that their spouses are having an affair with one another . Thrown together out of mutual feelings of rejection and hurt , the two embark upon a timid friendship that gradually becomes something more . They vow not to become like their unfaithful spouses , but what they do become can not be completely categorized . The movie is vague about how far they take their friendship , but the vagueness feels right , for this is a film not about obvious emotions but rather about the complicated inner workings of the heart and mind that don't always allow for tidy answers . Wong shoots the film in a dreamy , slightly surrealistic fashion . Nothing about the film is overtly avant garde , yet it's not entirely accessible as a traditional narrative film . You might spend the first fifteen minutes or so somewhat confused , but stick with it . Everything eventually makes sense , but it only makes sense after Wong has established a certain pattern and rhythm . Early scenes only have meaning after you've seen scenes later in the film . This is one of those films that gets in your head and stays there . It reminded me at times of both " Brief Encounter " and of the films of Douglas Sirk . |
574,487 | 4,532,636 | 90,037 | 9 | Wonderful Undiscovered Film About Sexual Maturity | A terrific lesser-known film that deserves a better rating than the one given it here at IMDb . Based on a short story by Joyce Carol Oates called " Where Are You Going , Where Have You Been ? " , " Smooth Talk " stars Laura Dern as a bored and restless adolescent who thinks she's more in control of her sexual allure , and more capable of handling the attention she receives for it , than she is . In a deeply unsettling and slightly surreal scene , a hunky stranger ( Treat Williams ) comes calling for her , and she realizes that she's not as mature as she thinks . The film captures the same other-worldly quality of the short story ( the scene with Treat Williams plays out almost like a feverish dream ) , while ably adapting it to the very different needs of a feature length film . Dern gives a wonderful performance , one of the many given by this underrated actress . And another lovely performance comes from Mary Kay Place , who plays Dern's mother . One of the most memorable scenes for me came when mother and daughter are in separate rooms of the house , but unbeknownst to each other are both privately dancing to the same song playing on the radio . I can never hear James Taylor's " Handyman " without thinking of this movie . |
574,383 | 4,532,636 | 68,182 | 9 | A Highly Unusual and Disquieting Film | Director Werner Herzog has always been interested in telling stories about men with obsessions , especially if those obsessions lead to madness . So it's no surprise that he was engaged by this story about a group of Spanish conquistadors in 1560 trekking through the Peruvian jungle in search of El Dorado , legendary city of gold , and one man in particular , Aguirre , who stages a mutiny and continues to lead the remaining troupe on an increasingly insane and futile journey when all logic and reason compels them to turn back . It's remarkably easy to forget that you're watching staged action during this film , as the movie drips with authenticity . Herzog's approach to the material is one of almost journalistic objectivity ; he never tries to impose emotions or meanings on his viewers . There's very little dialogue and hardly any music ; we don't realize how much we rely on characterizations and scoring to tell us how we should feel until they're no longer there to direct us . The series of events that transpires over the course of Herzog's movie could be considered to be telling the history of man in microcosm - - or the history of any civilization . It's only a matter of time in any group of individuals before one tries to assert his supreme authority , and from that moment the rest break into factions of those who will follow and those who won't . Aguirre uses fear to retain control ; those who oppose him are disposed of . Substitute Hitler for Aguirre and it wouldn't be difficult to read this film as an allegory for Nazi Germany . However , I feel like Herzog is interested in Man in general rather than Man at any one point in time , and he seems to be saying that the obsessions that drove men centuries ago are the same obsessions that drive them now . One of the most striking aspects of this film is its treatment of religion . The film is narrated by a priest , whose diary was the sole surviving record of the expedition . He is determined to tame the savages by bringing them the word of God , but Herzog's irony is not lost on us , for who are the true savages in this film ? The hypocrisy of the church is brought home by a scene in which the priest tells one of the women of the expedition that he supports Aguirre because the church has always allied itself with those who are strong , not those who are worthy . And in another scene later in the film , when someone suggests that they are nearing the city of gold , the priest's eyes glitter as much as anyone's with the promise of fortune and wealth . Herzog doesn't treat any one incident in the movie with any greater emphasis than any other . This is refreshing in one sense , because the movie is utterly lacking any of the phony bombast that plagues so many more commercial films . But this can also sometimes be a disadvantage , because the monotone pacing too often lulled me into a state from which I had to remind myself to pay attention . |
573,544 | 4,532,636 | 70,644 | 9 | Bergman's Version of a Cage Match | After " Wild Strawberries , " this is perhaps my favorite Bergman movie , though be warned : it will take the wind out of you , especially if you watch the full five-hour version in a condensed period of time , as I did . Liv Ullmann and Erland Josephson create perhaps too realistic a version of marriage in this emotionally bruising film . When Marianne ( Ullmann ) finds out that Johan ( Josephson ) has been cheating on her and has decided to leave her , the safe , secure world she has built around her crumbles . She plays Marianne as a wife blind to her own husband's unhappiness and embarrassed that she didn't see it coming , and her's is a convincing portrait of a woman whose partner has decided long before her that what they have isn't working . Josephson makes Johan into a contemptible ass , but he still manages to earn our sympathy . It's easy to dislike Johan but difficult to hate him , so we're in many respects thrust into the same emotional straight jacket as Marianne . The saddest thing about " Scenes from a Marriage " is how much affection and love there actually is between these two people , and how it's going to waste . When they get angry , they lash out to hurt one another with words and even with fists at one point . There are tears , laughs , reveries . It's obvious that there wouldn't be the need for all this if there wasn't so much ingrained affection between them , and it's tragic to see them become each other's enemy rather than each other's ally . For a very good if not quite as brilliant sequel to this film , see " Saraband , " which has Marianne visiting Johan for the first time in many years after each has established a life of his / her own without the other . It brings a peaceful sense of closure and in many ways stitches up the raw wound left by the first film . |
573,861 | 4,532,636 | 30,341 | 9 | Hitchcock at the Top of His Game | A superb Hitchcock thriller from his pre-Hollywood days . Margaret Lockwood plays Iris Henderson , on her way via train to London to marry a fiancée she's not all that crazy about . She meets a kind old lady named Mrs . Froy ( a name I will not ever forget because of the way in which Hitchcock introduces it to the audience ) , played by Dame May Witty , who disappears seemingly without a trace while Iris is asleep . Iris then enlists the help of Gilbert Redman , a fellow passenger played with a great deal of cheek by Michael Redgrave , one of the only people who believes that Mrs . Froy isn't a figment of Iris's imagination , and the two of them embark upon a search of the train and an interrogation of its passengers to solve the mystery of the lady's disappearance . As this bizarre story plays itself out , the WWII propaganda becomes so thick that you can cut it with a knife . By the end , all of the English passengers have overcome their indifference and / or their desire not to get in involved in a potentially messy situation and have joined the cause . It's a bit heavy handed , but easy to forgive given the time period in which it was released and the fact that Hitch keeps things so damn entertaining . Indeed , one of the things that distinguishes " The Lady Vanishes " is how funny it is . It's a virtual parade of dry one-liners and even some physical comedy thrown into the mix . In addition to Redgrave's veddy English performance , the bulk of the comedy comes from Naunton Wayne and Basil Radford , playing two English chaps whose only concern is getting back to London on time for a cricket match . Their refusal to get ruffled , even in the middle of a climactic shootout , is hilarious , old sport . |
573,490 | 4,532,636 | 50,371 | 9 | This Ain't Your Grandmother's Andy Griffith | Whoa ! This steam roller of a movie may just leave you wondering why no one ever seems to talk about it or remember it all these years later . . . . Elia Kazan made one of those films that feels like it could have been made today with few changes . It's so relevant today that the movie was either ahead of its time or it proves that things haven't changed much in the succeeding years . Andy Griffith plays a folk hero who becomes a radio and then television sensation , sees his fame reach its highest point , and then collapse when his ego gets too big to control . The movie is shockingly honest about the simplicity of middle America and its willingness to believe what it wants to hear . The film is part cautionary tale and part fulfilled prophecy . I had trouble with Griffith at first . His performance reeks of over acting , and I just couldn't take him seriously as this charismatic , sexy character who women fall in lust with . But I warmed up to him over the course of the film , and his final scene is devastating . Patricia Neal is the one to watch here . She is a wonderful actress , and she had a natural style of acting that immediately made anyone else on screen with her seem a little less authentic by default . Walter Matthau appears in a rare dramatic role , Anthony Franciosa plays a slime ball and Lee Remick appears as a trampy cheerleader . Kazan did not take the most subtle of approaches to this movie , but it's not a story calling out for subtlety . |
573,646 | 4,532,636 | 455,590 | 9 | A Hugely Exciting African-Set Thriller | With " The Last King of Scotland , " Kevin MacDonald has created a bracing , exciting and totally satisfying thriller . Forest Whitaker gives a titanic performance as Idi Amin , Ugandan dictator who rose to power in the 1970s . James McAvoy plays Nicholas Garrigan , a Scottish physician who travels to Uganda for the adventure and wins Amin's affections , becoming his personal doctor . Garrigan enters into a moral crisis as he begins to realize the kind of man Amin is , and begins to fear for his own life as events spiral more and more out of his control . Whitaker seizes the chance to play this larger than life character and runs with it - - I've never seen Whitaker give so convincing and transforming a performance . However , as good as he is , McAvoy impressed me more . His performance as Garrigan is not as showy , but it's much more textured and subtle , and his character has the bigger arc from start to finish . Gillian Anderson also does terrific work in a small role as a fellow doctor , who understands things about Amin and the African culture that Garrigan does not . Unlike other recent thrillers set in African nations ( " The Constant Gardener , " " Hotel Rwanda " ) , " The Last King of Scotland " is not greatly concerned with the geo-political implications of Amin's reign . The atrocities he committed against Ugandans are given only the barest of mentions , and the film sticks almost exclusively to Garrigan and the danger he himself faces . Some may think the film is irresponsible for this reason - - that the plight of one man pales in comparison to the plight of thousands , and I can see where a criticism like that is justified . But the movie packs a powerful wallop regardless , and complaints like this seem like quibbles when up against such an entertaining movie . |
573,608 | 4,532,636 | 780,536 | 9 | A Movie That Defies Description ( In a Good Way ) | Writer / director Martin McDonagh has fashioned a little gem of a crime thriller / black comedy with his film , " In Bruges . " It's quirky and eccentric , but in a way that comes naturally and doesn't feel remotely forced . And despite the running joke about Bruges being such a boring and dull place to be , the movie makes the city itself look lovely . Ray ( Colin Farrell ) and Ken ( Brendan Gleeson ) play two hit men who hole up in the titular city awaiting orders from their boss , Harry , played by Ralph Fiennes . Both suffer a crisis of conscience - - Ray because his first hit resulted in his accidentally killing a little boy , Ken because his orders once they come are to bump off Ray , who annoys him but who he rather likes . When Ken tells Harry he refuses to kill Ray , Harry comes after the two men himself , resulting in a quite violent finale . McDonagh's background in theatre shows , especially in his writing . The screenplay to " In Bruges " is a marvel , tightly wound and compact . It's fresh and surprising , traits that don't frequently describe movie scripts nowadays . The movie is viciously funny , but the relationship between Ray and Ken is also rather moving , and the violence ( and boy is it graphic at times ) is very disturbing precisely because we come to care so much about the characters it's happening to . All of the performances , but especially those of Farrell , Gleeson and Fiennes , are superb . McDonagh proves himself to be a good director of actors , and he handles his own material masterfully . He even manages to make midget humor ( the stuff of movie comedy clichés ) funny again . |
573,662 | 4,532,636 | 21,749 | 9 | Unashamedly Sentimental - - - Works for Me | I had the pleasure of seeing a screening of this film ( silent , though it came out well into the sound era ) with live music accompaniment by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra . As you can imagine , this added a tremendous amount to the overall effect of the movie , which I had seen once before on video . This is Chaplin at his most unabashedly sentimental , but darn it if it doesn't work like a charm . This feels the most dramatic of the Chaplin films I've seen , with the most " plot , " but that doesn't mean there aren't wildly funny bits , like Chaplin's brief stint as a boxer . I don't cry especially easily at movies , so the ending didn't have me in tears , but you're excused if it has that effect on you , and you might want to have a handkerchief handy just in case . |
574,286 | 4,532,636 | 497,465 | 9 | Speaking Catalan with Woody Allen | Woody Allen's on a roll again . Three years ago he gave us " Match Point , " a nearly perfect thriller that was unlike anything he'd done before , and last year he directed the under-appreciated " Cassandra's Dream . " With " Vicky Cristina Barcelona , " he's proved that this new artistic reawakening is more than a passing phase . Vicky ( Rebecca Hall ) and Cristina ( Scarlett Johansson ) travel to Barcelona for a summer adventure . Vicky is treading water until she marries her fiancé . Cristina , a wilder spirit , is looking for love , or at least lust . Both become involved with a dashing Spanish artist ( Javier Bardem ) and find that the things they took for granted about themselves may not be true after all , and each leaves Barcelona a little less grounded than she was when she arrived . What makes so many Woody Allen films good is the same for this one . He understands both the dynamics of human emotions and the needs of effective drama , so if he's got even half-way decent actors in his movies the material is bound to succeed . In " Vicky Cristina Barcelona , " he's got better than half-way decent actors . Rebecca Hall is probably the least known of the cast , but she makes one of the biggest impressions , and the movie is " about " Vicky more than it is anyone . Johansson and Bardem are well cast and they act their parts well . But it's Penelope Cruz , who storms into the film at about the mid-way point as Bardem's unhinged ex-wife , who you'll most remember . " Vicky Cristina Barcelona " explores the differences between the way different people approach relationships . It's about the difference between those who are artists and those who are not , and it's also about the difference between Americans and Europeans . But it's never judgemental and it doesn't generalize . Every single character , even those with little screen time , is fully developed and respected by both Allen and the actors who play them . This one's a winner . |
573,806 | 4,532,636 | 83,907 | 9 | These Demons from Beyond Scared the Pants Off of Me | SCARY AS HELL ! ! ! ! This is one of the rare horror films that knows how to make gore frightening . But it's not just the blood and guts that terrifies here . it's Sam Raimi's accomplished direction and his fearless ability to make the movie so damn WEIRD that makes it such a good entry in the horror canon . A bunch of kids are staying in an isolated cabin in the woods and conjure up a bunch of demons from beyond . Sounds pretty standard . But Raimi directs with such a unique style - - cartoonish and campy in a way , yet utterly terrifying in spite of , or maybe because of , that approach - - that I wound up watching this film with one hand poised to cover my eyes at any moment , and I don't scare easily . I am not among those that think the film's sequel , " Evil Dead 2 , " is a masterpiece . Give me the first one any day . |
573,714 | 4,532,636 | 66,319 | 9 | Poorly Received David Lean Film Looks Terrific with Age | Poorly received at the time of its release , perhaps " Ryan's Daughter " is one of those movies to whom time has been kind , because I just saw it for the first time and thought it was remarkable . It's based on Flaubert's " Madame Bovary , " but it really only borrows the barest of outlines from that novel . In its details and the outcomes of its characters , it differs greatly . Sarah Miles plays a young woman living in a tiny coastal village in rural Ireland , whose assumptions and illusions about romantic love and passion cause her to marry a schoolteacher ( Robert Mitchum ) on whom she nurtures a former student's crush . The mystery and excitement of man / woman relations fades quickly , as early as the wedding night , and it's not long before she falls for a shell-shocked British soldier who joins the garrison stationed in the village . As the affair between these two becomes known , she's condemned as both a slut and a traitor , and must fall back on the understanding of her cuckolded husband to defend her against the townspeople . Director David Lean and screenwriter and frequent Lean collaborator Robert Bolt spend as much time on the political battles raging between Ireland and England as they do the forbidden love affair , and I liked the film for that , even though it makes it quite long . The film does take its time , but it doesn't overstay its welcome . It's like curling up with a nice , big fat novel that you like so much you don't want to end . Sarah Miles gives a lovely performance in the title role , and Robert Mitchum is also good as her uptight husband , even though he fails miserably at an Irish accent . Of the supporting cast , Trevor Howard is the standout as the village priest and mediating influence on the village rabble who cry out for blood at the slightest provocation . John Mills gives a rather hammy performance as the village idiot and won an Oscar for it . The character is thematically important even if he's too often used for maudlin and sentimental purposes . Cinematographer Freddie Young does jaw-dropping work in capturing the beauty of the Irish landscape , and won the film its only other Oscar . One way in which the film greatly resembles the novel is the emphasis on the natural world , both its magnificence and its potential for violence . Lean and Bolt take the Madame Bovary story and make it a tale of outcasts , of people who don't belong . In this version , Ryan's daughter , the village idiot and the British soldiers themselves are all outcasts , and they're among whom our sympathies lie . It's an interesting approach , since in any other version of this story we would be asked to side with the Irish whose homeland is being invaded by imperialist forces . I wonder if that's partially the reason for the film's poor reception upon release . |
573,779 | 4,532,636 | 418,773 | 9 | Family Dysfunction in Small-Town America | Junebug gets the atmosphere of small-town America just right . It's a place where practicality is a virtue and one's church is the center of one's social world . There's an inherent distrust in anything " urban , " partly the result of judgemental small-mindedness and partly the result of a defensive insecurity . But it's also a place where people can be incredibly loyal and warm when they get to know you , where neighbors know and trust one another , and where people can be refreshingly free of pretension and pettiness . All of this is skillfully conveyed in " Junebug , " Phil Morrison's un-condescending exploration of the tension and strain in one North Carolina family when the oldest son visits from Chicago , bringing along his newlywed wife ( newlywed in every sense of the word ; they knew each other a week before marrying ) . At first glance this family is filled with types : the friendly but distant father , the icy mother , the hostile little brother jealous of his sibling's success and intimidated by his education . But over the course of the film , we see these family members interact , reach out to one another in their small , seemingly insignificant ways , and drop hints as to why and how they've come to fill the roles they do . At the center of the family , where you would think the mom would be , is Ashley , pregnant wife of younger brother Jimmie , who acts as a life force for the rest of the family . She's hopelessly optimistic and naive , the kind of person you think could never function in the real world , and yet she manages to hold the family together through sheer strength of will . It's a remarkable character and a beautiful characterization from actress Amy Adams , who should have won the Academy Award for which she was so justly nominated . Though Ashley is the focus of the family , Madeline , the new wife of oldest brother George , is the focus of the film . She and George are in North Carolina in the first place so that she can talk to a local artist about showing his paintings in her Chicago gallery . The urban aloofness we might expect from her character is non-existent ; she warmly embraces the family , despite the fact that they're almost uniformly ( with the exception of Ashley ) hateful to her . For a while , indeed , her character seems unbelievable , and we wonder how much crap a person would take from virtual strangers before giving up . But as the story develops , and as a tragedy occurs that tests the strength of the family , we realize that Madeline hasn't been as warm as we think she has been . She's not thinking of these people as family ; how they treat her almost doesn't matter , because she's not interested in forming close attachments with them anyway . Director Morrison and his screenwriter do a good job of illustrating that just because some people act the way you expect them to doesn't mean they're incapable of acting otherwise , and that just because some act in ways you're not expecting , they're not necessarily innocent of reinforcing stereotypes . " Junebug " is staunchly resistant to sentimentality , or to giving us an unqualified happy ending , and for that I'm entirely grateful . However , it's a very sombre film , more sombre than trailers or other comments may lead you to believe , and I wouldn't have minded a couple of heart-warming moments just to lighten things up a bit . But overall a wonderful and original drama , and another terrific example of what a great year 2005 was for movies . |
573,957 | 4,532,636 | 35,015 | 9 | A Magnificent " Magnificent Ambersons " | RKO tried its damnedest to butcher Orson Welles ' haunting , fantastic follow-up to " Citizen Kane , " but they only partially succeeded . The movie does fall just short of greatness for me , but that's not Welles ' fault . One can see that if the film he intended to make had actually been preserved , it would rival " Kane " as the premier example of Welles ' cinematic genius . The movie feels rushed due to RKO's hack editing job , and there are odd , disjointed sections in which the pacing and sense of time feel off . Tim Holt isn't a forceful enough presence to play Georgie Amberson , and so Joseph Cotten , a much more charismatic screen presence , becomes the focus of the film , except for the moments when Agnes Moorehead is on screen and blows everyone else away with her caustic performance as Aunt Fanny . This is the one aspect in which the film is inferior to Booth Tarkington's magnificent novel , in which Georgie Amberson emerged as one of the most compelling and colorful characters I've ever seen in literature . And I don't think even Welles ' " true " version would have changed that , since the failing is in the actor , not the editing . However , that aside , " The Magnificent Ambersons " stands as a towering achievement in film art . All of the Welles trademarks are there : the chiaroscuro lighting , the deep focus , the fluid camera . The sense of deterioration that plagues the Amberson elite is palpable in every frame . It's a high compliment to a film when you can say it's only fault is that there should have been more of it . |
574,510 | 4,532,636 | 110,877 | 9 | Lovely Little Film About the Power of Words | A sweet , gentle film about a quiet postman who discovers the power of poetry in winning the heart of his true love . Massimo Troisi gives a warm , wonderful performance as said postman , while Phillipe Noiret plays the poet Pablo Neruda . The setting , a sleepy Italian village , gives the film a cozy atmosphere , and it's got a lovely score to match . One of the rare foreign-language films to be nominated for a Best Picture Academy Award , it lost to the thunderingly stupid " Braveheart . " Mel Gibson could use a little poetry himself . |
573,469 | 4,532,636 | 28,505 | 9 | Sexy and Mature | Myrna Loy was never lovelier than she is in this surprisingly sophisticated and mature 1936 film . Though billed as a screwball comedy , the movie has much more than screwball comedy on its mind . Loy plays wife to Clark Gable , a successful business exec who spends much of his time at the office with his irreplaceable secretary , played by Jean Harlow . Loy completely trusts her husband until a seed of doubt is planted in her mind by her cynical mother-in-law ( May Robson ) . The film examines the idea of trust in marriage , and it's honest about the nature of infidelity . In a fascinating scene that takes place between Gable and Harlow in a Haitian hotel , the film suggests that the key to making relationships work lies not in avoiding temptation ( which it also suggests is impossible anyway ) , but in knowing how to say " no " to it when it arrives . Gable and Loy have as much chemistry together as Loy did with William Powell , her other frequent co-star , and Jean Harlow is as cute as I've ever seen her . I don't normally like her much , but I liked her in this as much as I've ever liked her in anything else . There are no good guys or bad guys in this movie ; Gable isn't a cad and Harlow isn't a floozy . The three just play normal people navigating the tricky waters of male / female relations . This one's a winner . |
573,914 | 4,532,636 | 70,334 | 9 | Are You Stoned , Mr . Marlowe ? | That most expert of genre benders - - Robert Altman - - takes aim at the noir detective film in this delightfully creative and witty adaptation of the Raymond Chandler novel . Altman - - not to mention Elliott Gould , who delivers a wonderfully whacked-out performance as Chandler staple Philip Marlowe - - gives us a hero who's right at home in the drifter , " everything goes " environment of 1970s L . A . His mumbled refrain throughout the film is " It's o . k . with me , " a refrain that sees him through all manner of confrontations , some of them life threatening . The plot is one of those convoluted puzzles for which films noir are known , having something to do with Marlowe's close friend , Terry Lennox , turning up dead in Mexico after supposedly murdering his wife . Marlowe , unable to believe that his friend would be capable of such an act , can't let the case drop even though the police want him to . And of course , in true noir fashion , he's hired for a separate case that at first seems to have nothing to do with the other but eventually turns out to be connected , involving the wife ( Nina van Pallandt ) of a suicidal novelist ( Sterling Hayden , giving a frightening and intense performance ) . But , also true to film noir ( and true as well of most Altman films ) , none of this plot really matters as much as the movie's tone , so artist and genre find themselves perfectly matched . Over the course of the film , we realize that Marlowe is the only honest person in this crooked version of contemporary L . A . , and he begins to seem like more of a relic from a past decade , a shuffling gumshoe that might be at home in a Warners crime film from the 40s , but who is woefully under equipped to handle the dirty dealings of the present . That is until a shocking and cold-blooded finale , in which Marlowe proves himself to be a bit more resourceful than we had given him credit for . There's a hip quality to " The Long Goodbye " - - it's a sustained joke of a film that Altman pulls off beautifully . Our introduction to Marlowe finds him going off in the middle of the night in search of his cat's favorite brand of pet food , and then trying to trick the cat into eating a brand it's not used to . This endears us to him , and we stay endeared to him for the rest of the film , thanks largely to the way Gould plays him . The film looks great too ; Altman's frequent collaborator on his early 70s pictures , Vilmos Zsigmond , does cinematography honors . And John Williams composed a great theme song , that plays in numerous variations throughout the film and contributes a running gag to the proceedings , popping up at one point as the funeral dirge being played by a Mexican band and at another as the tinkling tune of a doorbell . I've liked " The Long Goodbye " more and more every time I've seen it , and have quickly come to the conclusion that it's one of Altman's best . |
574,270 | 4,532,636 | 30,241 | 9 | A Holiday Worth Taking | Holiday belongs right up there with " The Philadelphia Story " and " Bringing Up Baby " as one of the best movies to team Katharine Hepburn and Cary Grant . Watching it today , it's nearly impossible to understand why audiences stayed away from this and " Baby " back in 1938 . These movies have instant classics written all over them . " Holiday " is much closer to " Philadelphia Story " than " Baby " in its style of comedy . Contrary to the labels people have assigned it , it is NOT a screwball comedy - - in fact , it's quite serious and brings a tremendous amount of character depth to its story , much in the way " Story " would two years later . Hepburn of course plays the sister of a shallow girl who's about to be married and who only thinks of living a luxurious lifestyle . Grant waltzes in and finds that he and Hepburn are soul mates . The scenes in which these two , along with an intellectual professor and his wife , lambast the vacuous lives of the stinking and very dull rich , are the movie's highlights . " Holiday " is one of those movies that never becomes irrelevant , not to people who still think that intelligence , imagination , creativity and ideas are more valuable commodities than material possessions . |
574,210 | 4,532,636 | 14,945 | 9 | Harold Gets the Girl ( Of Course ) | I did not enjoy " Girl Shy " quite as much as Harold Lloyd's most famous feature length film , " Safety Last ! " , but I still had a good time with it . Lloyd plays a hapless tailor's assistant who stutters terribly whenever around women ( watching Lloyd stutter in silence , by the way , is hilarious ) . To make up for in fantasy what he lacks in reality , he writes a book about the conquest of his many ( fictional ) women , and travels to the big city with the dream of having it published to tremendous success . The publisher takes it as a big joke and thinks it will be a hit as a piece of comedy . Lloyd is , of course , crushed that no one will take him seriously , but the joke's on everyone else when he manages in true Lloyd style to win the girl of his dreams . I'm only a very recent Harold Lloyd convert , but now that I've seen a few of his films , I have to say that I like his brand of silent humour much more than Charlie Chaplin's . Lloyd's physical stunts are stunning , and " Girl Shy " builds to a tremendously fun and exciting climax as Lloyd rushes to claim the girl before she's wed to another , braving every manner of transportation imaginable in ever-increasing outrageous set pieces . But Lloyd's acting impresses too - - he's not just a silly clown with a knack for physical comedy . Lloyd does as much with his face as he does with his rubber limbs . Another Harold Lloyd winner . |
574,267 | 4,532,636 | 415,978 | 9 | Loneliness in the Digital Age | It's wonderful when any work of art seems to be speaking personally to you as you experience it , but really , how often does that happen ? Well , it did happen for me with this movie - - I finished it and it stayed with me for a long time - - I felt like I'd just had a conversation with the writer and director , Miranda July , and discovered that we think very similarly about the world in which we live . " Me and You and Everyone We Know " resists tidy summation , and I imagine ten people could see it and come away with ten different versions of what it's about . The basic plot involves Christine , a performance artist whose art consists of carrying on imaginary conversations with other people , and who drives elderly people around in a taxi as a day job ; and Richard , a shoe salesman whose marriage has unraveled and who is absolutely at sea with what to do for his two young sons . Watching these two misfits make tentative steps toward reaching out to one another comprises the foundation of this film , but it's the many rich story lines that give it its depth : Richard's co-worker , a galoot of a guy who makes lewd sexual suggestions to a couple of teenage girls but who's terrified when they actually decide to take him up on his offers ; the owner of a gallery , who connects to the performance art Christine produces and spends her free time on an Internet sex chat line ; a next-door neighbor girl who likes to buy housewares for the dowry she hopes to some day bring to a marriage ; and Richard's two sons , the oldest who is drawn to the stable if fictitious home life said next door neighbor girl offers , and the youngest , who does some online chatting of his own . At a more thematic level , " Me and You . . . . " is about loneliness in the digital age , and the feeling of isolation people have when they think they're the only ones not not making connections that they perceive others to be making . July seems to be suggesting that we live in a world where intimate communication is easier than ever , but that in a paradoxical way all of this ease of communication is only making human beings more and more distant from each other . People spend their days talking frivolously on their cell phones or via e-mail , but draw further and further away from being able to communicate face to face with people when it really matters . Everyone's in his or her own private little world , and too many people hide behind their cell phones so as to avoid having to acknowledge the strangers around them . July has fashioned a bitter sweet film around this theme , and it works like a charm . One of the things I liked best about it was the absence of meanness or nastiness . You keep waiting for something just awful to happen , and continuous references to pedophilia and violence toward children seem like hints dropped to prepare you for a shocking surprise . But it turns out that everyone in the film is at heart just a decent person , doing the best he or she can to cope with their private miseries . Pessimist that I am , I still believe that the vast majority of mankind is comprised of essentially good and kind people , so this aspect of the movie felt realistic to me , and I thought it was refreshing that July sidestepped those misanthropic tendencies that too often drag down other " indie " films . And lastly , I loved the ending of this movie . Richard's youngest son is up earlier than usual one morning and hears a strange clicking noise coming from outside . His mom tells him that it's caused by the streetlamps automatically turning off and that it happens every morning . This becomes a sort of mystery for the little boy , until the final scene , when he wanders outside and finds out that the clicking is actually caused by a nice gentleman tapping a quarter against a sign post as he waits for a bus . As the sun rises , the little boy realizes that what he thought was the sound of a mechanical process is instead the sound of a random human action . Beautiful . |
574,326 | 4,532,636 | 68,361 | 9 | A Salvador Dali Painting Come to Life | This playful and surrealist film from Luis Bunuel is a gem from 1970s foreign language cinema . A group of well-to-dos gather for a dinner that never quite seems to take place , since each time they sit down to dine , some sort of bizarre , dreamlike occurrence prevents them from doing so . The film is difficult to describe ; it's like a fever dream visualized - - or like stepping into a Salvador Dali painting . The charms of the middle class depicted here are discreet indeed , nearly to the point of being nonexistent . Bunuel's point , of course . . . . |
574,147 | 4,532,636 | 47,878 | 9 | A Brutal and Twisted Noir | Cornel Wilde plays a police detective obsessed with bringing down crime lord Mr . Brown ( Richard Conte ) , while hoping at the same time to win the affections of Conte's girl , Jean Wallace , in this tremendously atmospheric noir from 1955 . The noir genre wouldn't last much longer ( many contend that 1958's " Touch of Evil " is the last true noir ) , but it went out with a bang , giving us some of its best examples ( this , " Kiss Me Deadly , " " On Dangerous Ground " ) in its last years . Wilde plays detective Leonard Diamond like a man coming apart at the seams . His determination to bring an end to Brown's reign feels as if it's fueled by personal motivations as much as by a sense of justice . This ambiguity in the hero's actions adds to the rotten atmosphere created by director Joseph Lewis , in which the bad guys often have more allure than the good ones . Richard Conte certainly has magnetism to spare ; his monotone , machine-gun patter when belittling Diamond for being a " little man " nearly makes you forget that Wilde towers over Conte whenever they're in the frame together . And , despite his chauvinist treatment of her , one can understand why Jean Wallace's character would be drawn against her will to the more virile Conte than to the " impotent " Wilde . Indeed , the question of manhood - - who has it and who doesn't - - is central to " The Big Combo . " It's a theme common to the genre , but is given one of its most overt treatments here . In this twisted world , the ability to inflict pain - - be it mental , emotional , physical or sexual - - is a measure of one's ability to " be a man " and make it in the world . Those who aren't man enough , like Mr . Brown's gay henchmen or right-hand man , McClure ( played with just the right amount of vulnerability by Brian Donlevy ) , are destroyed . " The Big Combo " boasts arresting black and white images , and a number of thrillingly memorable set pieces ( let's just say that imaginative and recurring use is made of a hearing aid ) . It doesn't beat its kissing cousin from the same year , " Kiss Me Deadly , " in my book , but it's an awfully fun ride . |
574,219 | 4,532,636 | 1,032,846 | 9 | Another Chipper Valentine to Romania | On the evidence of this and " The Death of Mr . Lazarescu , " Romanian filmmakers are trying to convince the world that Romania is the most depressing place ever , and they're very close to succeeding . College student Otilia ventures off into the dark Romanian night to help her friend , Gabita , get an illegal abortion . As the movie unfolds , it becomes less and less about Gabita's abortion , and much more about Otilia herself , who faces her own sort of crisis as she begins to put herself in Gabita's place and wonders if there's anyone in her life who would be willing to do for her what she herself is doing for her friend . The film's most disturbing scene is not the abortion , which isn't at all graphic and carries through without incident , but rather the scene immediately before it during which the abortionist casually humiliates both Gabita and Otilia , taking advantage of his power over them . He's just one of the many surly and callous people whom Otilia comes across during this long , dark night . The film is concerned with issues , but it's not an issue movie necessarily . At various times it explores male / female relations , the divide between the affluent and the working class , the dynamics of friendship , the strain of living under such a strict and oppressive government and the scant choices available to Romanian youths , especially women . But it explores these issues only as they affect our heroine , who may or may not have a pregnancy of her own to contend with . The acting is superb , especially that of Anamaria Marinca , as Otilia , and Vlad Ivanov in a terrifying performance as the abortionist from hell . Like " The Death of Mr . Lazarescu , " the style resembles documentary objectivity , with the camera simply sitting stationary while it records moments in long takes . It's a gray , depressing and deeply unsettling movie , but the grimness of it is somewhat offset by the exhilaration to be found in watching tremendously accomplished cinema unfold before your eyes . |
573,909 | 4,532,636 | 72,274 | 9 | Keith Carradine and Shelley Duvall as Lovers on the Lam | They Live by Night , the 1948 screen adaptation of the Edward Anderson novel " Thieves Like Us , " and other films that have obviously been inspired by it , like " Gun Crazy " ( 1949 ) and " Bonnie and Clyde " ( 1967 ) , have all been so good that it makes you wonder if yet another version of the same story is necessary . The answer is yes , because Robert Altman is behind this version , and if Altman proved nothing else as a director , he proved that he could take any material and make it his own . Altman's " Thieves Like Us " is a beautiful and heartbreaking version of the lovers-on-the-lam story , with Keith Carradine cast as Bowie , the soft spoken , sensitive member of a trio of escaped convicts and bank robbers ( the other two , Chickamaw and T-Dub , played by Altman regulars John Schuck and Bert Remsen , respectively ) . During a lull in their series of robberies , Bowie sets up house with Keechie ( Shelley Duvall ) , a shy , simple country girl , and they take a stab at a sort of domestic bliss despite the fact that Bowie is doomed and it's only a matter of time before the law catches up to him . Meanwhile , T-Dub's sister-in-law , Mattie ( Louise Fletcher ) , who has helped the fugitives because of family obligations , begins to tire of the example the trio are setting for her own children , and becomes an accomplice to the police trying to track down the criminals . Previous screen versions of this story cast gorgeous actors as the lovers and made us fall in love with them . In 1948 it was Farley Granger and Cathy O'Donnell ; in 1967 it was Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway . We fall in love with Carradine and Duvall too , but for different reasons . They are decidedly NOT gorgeous actors - - they're both skinny , ungainly and awkward . But they're both incredibly simple and sweet , and they have some lovely and naturalistic moments together that make us wish these two could just settle down , have a family and achieve their own small share of happiness . Altman constantly reminds us of the happiness these two are denied through use of an endless parade of print and radio advertisements that serves as a running commentary throughout the film . During a horrible depression during which so many people could afford nothing , Altman seems to be accusing the American consumerist culture of incessantly reminding everyone of what they didn't have . The way to happiness , Altman implies , seemed to lie in material comforts ; no wonder the trio of men in this film prefer robbing banks to the alternatives available to them . And there's another theme winding its way through Altman's version , one which appeared again and again in his work , that of frustrated male inadequacy . The men in this film turn to the most destructive behavior ( thieving , drinking , sexual aggression ) in order to cope with a world they feel they've lost control of , and this behavior is continuously juxtaposed to the feminine , domestic sphere represented by Mattie , eternally capable and resourceful , and resentful of the disruption the men bring along with them . " Thieves Like Us " does not have that beautiful , ethereal sheen to it that characterized Altman's other early-1970s films , mostly because he did not use expert cinematographer Vilmos Zsigmond on this outing . But thanks to the winsome performances of Carradine and Duvall , and the touching representation of their characters ' tentative relationship , this is one of his warmest and emotionally resonant films from that time period . |
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