1960 - BREATHLESS - or À bout de souffle

Goddard's first film in his peculiar choppy style is sort of a takeoff on a cheap American gangster film.  In fact, Francois Truffaut has a story credit on the film.  However Goddard essentially improvised the film so I doubt the film and Truffaut's story have much in common.

Considering the direction Godard's film career was to take this is a very watchable film.  The locations in Paris which are fun to look at were filmed by Raoul Coutard who specialized in on location photography for the French "New Wave." 

Jean-Paul Belmondo is the petty gangster who acts like Humphrey Bogart and Jean Seberg is his American girlfriend.  Breathless has a very long scene with these two actors which involves Belmondo trying to persuade Seberg to sleep with him.  There is also an appearance by Jean-Pierre Melville as an author spouting lots of trite musing about women and the nature of love.  Godard was a big fan of Melville who was essentially an independent filmmaker before they invented the word. 

I enjoyed Breathless a lot because believe me it gets to be a real chore watching Godard films as his career rolls along.

90 minutes, written by Jean-Luc Godard story by Francois Truffaut.

2015- AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON - more of the same

Successfully marketed and hyped as one of the must see summer films, this film isn't that bad and in fact is rather entertaining although way to long.

The gang is back from the first film and this time they are fighting an evil robot who has decided to destroy mankind and take over the world for reasons that aren't entirely clear.  The dialog isn't too bad the action scenes while not really exciting are pretty decent and the whole cast seems to be into the spirit of this superhero spectacular.

So what's the problem.  Well the law of diminishing returns may be starting to kick in.  Ultron the evil robot while evil,  is actually kind of a charming fellow with a personality not unlike the Robinson robot from Lost in Space.  Actually it would have been fun to see his evil plan succeed because if would have at least moved the series into a different direction rather than the usual superhero's save the world stuff.  After all there is only so much you can do with these comic book story lines.

Probably one of the major reasons I enjoyed this film was that it was showing at a decent 2nd run movie theater.  Paying $3.00 a ticket is certainly less painful than full first run prices.

141 minutes

1963 - IT'S A MAD MAD MAD MAD WORLD, on Blu Ray

Stanley Kramer's over the top slapstick comedy has a real over the top cast of comics.  How a filmmaker like Kramer who usually made dreary 50's and 60's preachy liberal films got it in his head that he was the guy to film this epic widescreen comedy will probably forever be a mystery.

This film is essentially a car chase comedy.  The cars race around the California desert highways while the cast does it comedy shtick thing.  The film also has some spectacular airplane stunts and Johnathan Winters is funny as a dumb tow truck operator who destroys a gas station when he loses his temper.

Dick Shawn (dancing with Barrie Chase) is the ultimate "mama's boy" the son of the very loud Ethel Merman.  Towards the end of the film Kramer throws in Peter Falk and Eddie "Rochester" Anderson as a couple of cab drivers just to mix it up more.

Frankly Kramer's director is in his usual blunderbuss get it done style.  The basic comedy situation and the expert stunt, model and miniature effects make the film work.  Let's not forget no computer generated effects were used in this film.

161 minutes. written by William and Tanya Rose.

1940 - THE LETTER, classic 40's Hollywood at it's best.

Bette Davis is the British wife of a planter played by the great Herbert Marshall.  The film opens will Davis emptying a revolver into a man she claims was trying to rape her.  As the plot proceeds Davis's lawyer realizes that the dead man was actually her lover who had planned to break it off with her.

This is classic Hollywood film studio stuff.  The director was William Wyler.  The writer Howard Koch adapted the Somerset Maugham play based on a real incident.  But towering over everyone is Warner Brother's diva star Bette Davis who expertly inhabits her leading role.

Apparently the strong willed Davis, who could be a terror on a set. However she  worked well with the equally tough minded Wyler, a professional who always insisted on doing it his way. These two personalities made three good pictures together. 

Finally, you have to give a lot of credit to the studio technicians who made it happen, The Letter was filmed completely in the studio, the film's technical aspects are at a very high level.

95 minutes.

1959 - SHADOWS - John Cassevettes first film

A film that is an acknowledged "classic" of the independent film movement.  This should strike fear into the hearts of any film lover.  Early independent film means, grainy black and white footage usually filmed in 16mm, poor editing and questionable acting from what is usually a nonprofessional cast.  Shadows has all of these things.

Shadows apparently existed in two versions.  The first was supposedly a meandering improvisation.  Cassevettes reworked this version and added scripted scenes and cut the running time down.  So Cassevettes's title card at the end of the film is somewhat misleading.

But this is a very remarkable piece of work.  Just the New York City atmosphere alone is worth viewing this film.  This film is positively drenched in the feel of late 50's New York.  The acting may be kind of rough but it certainly contributes to the authenticity of the film.

Shadows must have seemed like a real change of pace for critics and serious film goers when it was released.  1959 was the year of North by Northwest and Rio Bravo.  But is was also the year of commercial dreck like Pillow Talk, Operation Petticoat and The Shaggy Dog.

2014 - ANTARCTICA: A YEAR ON ICE, a fascinating film with superb stop motion photography

A New Zealand radio technician named John Powell built his own time lapse cameras and proceeded to film life in Antarctica over a period of a year although it apparently took him 10 years to photograph this film

The film features stunning time lapse photography and breathtaking shots of this continent.  Powell also focuses on the support staff that keep the various research stations functioning  with a particular and interesting segment on what it's like to live in an environment which is completely dark about 4 months of the year.

Highly recommended.  Very well done.

92 minutes.

1975 - THE MAN WHO WOULD BE KING, on Blu Ray

John Huston was one of the few old style Hollywood directors who produced interesting and at times very good films late in his career.  The Man Who Would Be King was one of John Huston's dream projects.  The film reminded many critics of his 40's film The Treasure of Sierra Madre with it's story of greed and adventure.  It also has many similarities to Huston's famous Hepburn/Bogart film The African Queen.

 To play a couple of former soldiers who are essentially crooks.  Huston cast Sean Connery and Michael Caine a couple of larger than life screen personalities.  Christopher Plummer was hired to play the actual author of the original story Rudyard Kipling.  

This story has a very old fashioned feel to it.  It could have easily been made in the late 40's or early 50's.  There is a larger than life quality to the film which benefits a pretty tall tale even for Kipling who was also the author of The Jungle Book and Gunga Din.  Huston's story telling skill kept this film moving along.

John Huston certainly had his bad or indifferent films such as Annie but The Man Who Would Be King is certainly mainstream Hollywood film making at its best although it would probably be considered a slow moving film for today's audience.

123 minutes, written by John Huston and Gladys Hill.

1969 - THE UNDEFEATED, the western heads into the sunset...again

Everyone says that The Wild Bunch and The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance signaled the end of the  western has a film genre.  However John Wayne pretty much kept this genre going in a series of rather mediocre westerns. 

The Undefeated is based on an actual historic event.  After the Civil War, a Confederate General led a group of ex soldiers down to South America to reestablish a Confederate State.  In this film Rock Hudson plays a confederate Colonel leading a group of southerners to Mexico who meets up with John Wayne's former Union Colonel. 

As with a lot of his late career films, Wayne at times seems to be sleepwalking through the story.  At other times he seems completely disengaged from what is actually going on.  Rock Hudson was always a light talent sort of like a light beer.  Not a lot of substance as an actor.  However Hudson at least attempts a southern accent and does bring a little conviction to his role.  Also in the cast are a couple of John Ford regulars, Ben Johnson and Harry Carey Jr..  These guys had been kicking around the film business since the 1940's.  Apparently macho actor Wayne got along very well with closeted gay actor Hudson.

The Undefeated was directed by Andrew McLaglen.  McLaglen had been an assistant director under John Ford, but he certainly didn't have Ford's flair with composition or even handling actors.  It's well known Wayne liked to boss him around on set.  Wayne pretty much directed himself towards the end of his career.  McLaglen is actually a big favorite of this blog, he was a working director.

This film is at best a time killer with enough humor, action and old fashioned star power to keep it interesting.

119 minutes, written by James Lee Barrett.

1975 - BRANNIGAN, John Wayne cop movie set in London.

John Wayne sleepwalks through this cop film set in England and lets face it this isn't one of his best films but compared to some of the junk out there this is entertaining and has a fun supporting cast of British actors.

Brannigan is one of those "I know where the plot is going" films.  Duke is in London to bring back bad guy John Vernon to Chicago.  He clashes with Scotland Yard superintendent Richard Attenborough and has former late 60's British babe Judy Geeson who still looks pretty good, as his side kick.  By the time Wayne hit his mid 40's he was no longer comfortable playing love scenes especially with younger actresses.  In Brannigan there is a very mild and chaste flirtation that suits the actor who was in his late 60's when this was filmed.

The film was directed by Douglas Hickox who apparently got along very well with Wayne who had a tendency to direct himself as he got older.  Hickox keeps the action moving along with scenes like a car chase that ends up at the Tower Bridge and a completely anachronistic bar fight at an English Pub.

Brannigan runs longer than it probably should but is an entertaining if minor film in John Wayne's career.

111 minutes.

1983 - UNCOMMON VALOR, a forgotten war film.

This film stirs memories in me regarding a forgotten time in history.  At the end of the Vietnam War there was a lot of speculation that the North Vietnamese government was holding American POW's as slave labor in prison camps.  The United States military even put together a joint task force to investigate these rumors which as I recall were never confirmed.  Uncommon Valor uses this as a starting point for the story of a United States Colonel played by Gene Hackman who pulls together a team of former soldiers to search and find his son who he believes is still a prisoner.

This is a real "guy" movie.  Besides Hackman who bring a lot of authority to his role the film is a list of real tough guys.  Fred Ward is the PTSD soldier who pulls it together for the mission, Randall "Tex" Cobb is the nutcase who never adjusted to civilian life and Reb Brown is the explosive expert who runs around in really short shorts and never seems to be wearing a shirt (hum).  Finally there is "Elliott Ness, " Robert Stack as the millionaire who finances the whole thing.  In other words it's the usual bunch of Hollywood stereotypes.

The film was produced by right wing director/writer John Milius and directed by Ted Kotcheff the man responsible for inflicting Rambo movies on the world.  What the involvement of these gentlemen means is that the film featured plenty of gunfire at the expense of the dramatic aspects of saving the POW's. 

Uncommon Valor is  a standard action film expertly made and a film that exploits the tragedy of the MIA soldier for entertainment value.

105 minutes.

1960 - SHOOT THE PIANO PLAYER, aka Tirez sur le pianiste.

Truffaut makes a film in the American thriller noir style for the first time.  Shoot the Piano Player is filmed in a rather free wheeling style which is to be expected from one of the New Wave directors.  There are a lot of little film jokes and tricks with film editing that really call attention to itself.  But Truffaut was smart enough to keep this film around 90 minutes because a little of this stuff goes a long way especially from a French film nut.

The film has some notable photography from Raoul Coutard who was an expert when it came to making something out of nothing.  Coutard knew who shoot with almost no supplemental lighting and was an expert with the hand held camera.  At times the film has a real documentary flair to it.

92 minutes.

1877 - THE ISLAND OF DR MOREAU, mad scientist time

Yet another film based on the H.G. Welles novel.  The book is sort of the H.G. Welles version of Frankenstein.  This is the usual mad scientist playing with nature stuff and as expected things do not work out very well for Dr. Moreau the mad scientist and the people who happen to be unfortunate to be in his circle.

This version of The Island of Dr. Moreau is nothing special.  Everyone goes through the motions and you know the film is going to end with stuff blowing up at the end.

The director is Don Taylor a 50's actor who didn't have a particularly distinguished career as a film maker although he had a few interesting films on his list like The Final Countdown and the odd spaghetti western hybrid  Five Man Army.  The cast includes Burt Lancaster, Michael York, Nigel Davenport and Barbara Carrera.  Richard Basehart is the "Sayer of the Law"  but sadly the submarine Seaview is nowherw in sight.  Frankly the plot of this film is basically and Irwin Allen TV episode anyway.

The monster makeup was co-designed by John Chambers who was a featured character in the film Argo and had created makeup effects for The Planet of the Apes along with his side career working for the CIA.

99 minutes.