1935 - THE GOOD FAIRY, good 1930's romantic comedy

An early film from William Wyler who was entering his best period as a director.  Margaret Sullivan a rather unconventional actress is an orphan who gets a job at one of those opulent movie theaters which don't exist anymore. She ends up getting involved with three men. A waiter, the theater owner and a morose attorney. 

Wyler was a great director who could work in about any genre and what this film also has going for it is a screenplay by the legendary Preston Sturges.  This film is loaded with his weird characters and goofy situations.

 

If you are a fan of classic Hollywood actors, seeing Frank Morgan, the Wizard of Oz himself and classy British actor Herbert Marshall act like complete fools makes this film a lot of fun.  Margaret Sullivan didn't do a lot of films but she was an excellent performer and managed to play the naive orphan without looking like an idiot.

 

This is a very well made and still very entertaining comedy from as they used to say "the golden age of Hollywood."  Wyler 's direction is very smooth when it comes to moving the story along and working with actors always his strong points throughout his career. A high recommendation for this one.

The running time is 98 minutes. 

1959 - THE SCARFACE MOB, pilot for The Untouchables TV series

Desi Arnez of I Love Lucy fame was also a television producer besides being a band leader and the husband of Lucille Ball.  Arnez bought the rights to Elliot Ness's book The Untouchables and decided to make a two part television show about Ness's attempts to put away mob boss Al Capone in the 1930's.  Arnez hired Robert Stack to play Ness and character actor Neville Brand to play Capone

For a TV show from the 1950's Arnez didn't scrimp on the production values, the film has a fairly decent noir look.  Arnez hired Phil Karlson to direct.  Karlson was good at staging action and violence on relatively low budgets since he had been brought up in the world of B movie filmmaking.   The end result was a tense and violent television film which was considered fairly tough stuff for the 1950's TV audience.

 

Arnez hired Robert Stack to play tough guy federal agent Elliott Ness.  Stack adapted a monotone delivery that made him seem like he was going to blow at any moment.  In real life Elliott Ness after busting up many of Capone's bootlegging operations finally got Capone sent to prison on tax evasion  instead of running booze.

Not to overpraise this film but it's an entertaining gangster story.  You can see where it probably was an influence on the entertaining Brian DePalma remake.  Kevin Costner's performance certainly seems influenced by Robert Stack.  It's also fun to see character actor Keenan Wynn in a film

The film was written by Paul Monash, the running time is 99 minutes.

2025 - MISSION IMPOSSIBLE - THE FINAL RECKONING, overlong supposed wrap up to the series

Supposedly the final film in the series, well maybe.  The plan was to tie together all the previous films in the series and do call outs to characters who had appeared in those films.The result was this overlong mess of a film that drags on for almost 3 hours.  Apparently no one could tell producer Tom Cruise and director Christopher McQuarrie that audiences have very short attention spans.

 

The major problem and simple fact is that the audience knows nothing will happen to Tom Cruise. In spite of any danger he gets into, you just know he is going to triumph.  A ridiculous biplane chase scene at the end although well staged and photographed is just unending because Cruise has to survive.  

 

The fact that for almost 3 hours the audience sits though this weird plot about an evil AI about to destroy the world with all it's high tech hardware and only Tom Cruise flying around in a bi-plane can stop it is almost a call back to Charles Schultz's cartoon dog Snoopy pretending to be a World War  flying ace fighting the Red Baron while sitting on his doghouse. 

  

The film has a large cast but really it's all about unsurprisingly Tom Cruise.  Bringing back some of the characters from the first film and killing off one of the original members of the team really means next to nothing.

 

Expensive and slickly made for a film that was to be the final hurrah in the series it's just a big letdown.  Also this really isn't the end of the series since the open ended epilogue with the characters certainly leaves the film wide open for another improbable mission.  However this was a box office disappointment so it's hard to know if Tom Cruise as Ethan Hawk will show up again.

The film was written by Christopher McQuarrie qnd Erik Jendresen,  the running time is 170 minutes.

1971 - AND NOW FOR SOMETHING COMPLETELY DIFFERENT, a film of recreated Monty Python sketches.

A recreation on film of the supposedly best comedy sketches from the first couple of seasons of the Monty Python's Flying Circus tv series. The original group is here, Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Terry Jones, Eric Idle and Michael Palin.  Terry Gilliam's animated transitional sketches are also featured to tie the sketches together.

I would have to report that 50 years later most of these sketches don't really seem to hold up.  I also hate to say it but the lack of a laugh track is actually kind of missed as well although it really shouldn't be.   What seemed funny on their 30 minute shows is now kind of unending in this 90 minute film. The Python comedy group's once revolutionary style of anything goes humor has been so copied that a lot of their famous sketches now seem rather tired.  The humor actually seems on the stupid and unfunny side.  

"The Funniest Joke in the World" the "Dead Parrot" and the "Camp Square Bashing" bits simply don't work at all anymore.  "Kilimanjaro Expedition", "Bank Robber" and "The Dirty Fork" are a real ordeal to sit through.

 

Probably the most entertaining elements of this film are the Terry Gilliam animated sequences which are still pretty funny in their surrealist kind of way.  They almost make this dated comedy film seem kind of funny at times.

The film was written by the Monty Python group, the running time is 88 minutes.

2025 - NOBODY 2, a sequel, (what else).

A sequel to Nobody obviously.  In the first film the fun was watching comedian Bob Odenkirk play a dorky office worker who in a past life was actually an assassin for the United States Government.  In this film Odenkirk basically goes back to his former profession. Odenkirk is still killing people while trying to hold his marriage together to Connie Nielsen.  The fact that a guy like Odenkirk could be married to someone like Nielsen actually strains credibility more than his status as a a former hit man.

 

Well in this film Odenkirk and family decide to spend some bonding time while vacationing at amusement park.  Since this is that kind of movie, the amusement park is a front for a drug trafficking organization run by the evil Sharon Stone and since this is that kind of movie a lot of fighting and killing is involved as Odenkirk and the family take on Stone and her minions while slowly destroying the amusement park.

 

The film is entertaining for a sequel because sequels usually have diminishing entertainment value for the viewer.  Bob Odenkirk is a funny guy with a wry sense of humor particularly when he is beating the crap out of someone. The film also cast 86 year old Christopher Lloyd as Odenkirk's retired FBI agent father who for his age is still good at handling large scale weapons and still mighty dangerous.

Nobody 2 is entertaining but the producers should probably get a clue and not continue this series.  However if there is money to be made you can be sure they will continue to wring it out of these characters and this situation.

The film was written by Derek Kolstad and Aaron Rabin, the running time is 89 minutes.

1971 - RED SUN, international cast, mediocre film

Charles Bronson and Alain Delon are the leaders of a gang of outlaws.  Bronson is a bad guy with a few redeeming qualities.  Delon is a bad guy with no redeeming qualities. Anyway the gang pulls off a train robbery loaded with a bunch of gold.  Also on the train is samurai Toshiro Mifune who is on his way to delivery a priceless sword to the President of the United States.  The bad guys steal the priceless sword and Delon double crosses Bronson.  So Bronson and Mifune team up to take down Delon and the gang.

 This is a western set in the United States but filmed in Spain.  It has an international cast. American Charles Bronson, Frenchman Alain Delon, Swiss actor Ursula Andress and from Japan Toshiro Mifune all bundled together in a movie that only a bunch of lawyers and agents could put together.  The film was directed by Englishman Terence Young who wasn't exactly known for filming westerns and probably was available.  

If you think this film might have a rather disjointed and contrived quality to it you would be right.  The film also has a lot of action and for 1971, blood.  If Bronson and Delon aren't shooting someone Mifune is dissecting them with his sword.   

 

Red Sun is for the very discriminating viewer who has caught up on all those old Hopalong Cassidy movies on YouTube which are frankly more entertaining than this poor man's version of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.  

 

The film was written by Denne Bart Petitclerc, William Roberts and Lawrence Roman, the running time is 112 minutes.

1955 - THE TENDER TRAP, really outdated rom-com

 Frank Sinatra is a New York press agent who dates a bevy of babes, a real lady killer.  Debbie Reynolds is a would be actress who as it turns out is only interested in getting married (her Mrs. degree) and having kids in the suburbs.  Frank falls for Debbie, Debbie falls for Frank but will Frank settle down and become that hubby in the suburbs that Debbie wants?

The film was apparently adapted from a three character play that was staged on a single set.  For the film version the play was "opened up" to include locations around New York City.  However a careful look at the film shows that this movie filmed in CinemaScope was shot on the MGM back lot, not an NYC location anywhere in this film. 

The supporting cast features Celeste Holm as an over the hill spinster. Apparently in this film spinster means she's in her 30's.  David Wayne is Sinatra's old buddy who has run away from his wife in Indianapolis or some god awful Midwestern city.  Wayne wants to become a playboy dude like Frankie.

 

Also showing up in a very small part is "Gavin Elster" the chief bad guy from Vertigo played by the actor Tom Helmore

If the plot of this movie wasn't so asinine it would almost be really offensive instead of just offensive.  The age difference between perky Debbie and Lothario Frank has to be close to a 20 year difference.  In fact Debbie Reynolds kind of comes off as not having all her oars in the water with her marriage obsession.

What's good about this film?  Well the theme song by Sammy Cahn and James Van Heusen isn't to bad and Sinatra had a big hit with it.

The film was written by ace screenwriter Julius Epstein, the running time is 111 minutes.