A Complete Unknown (2024 James Mangold)

The arrival of Bob Dylan, 1961 - 5, from Elijah Wald's book 'Dylan Goes Electric!' who caused some controversy at the Monterey Folk Festival. Written for the screen by Mangold and Jay Cocks, it established Dylan's relationships with Pete Seeger (Edward Norton) and a very unwell Woody Guthrie (Scoot McNairy). Timothée Chalamet gives a sublime performance / impersonation of Dylan and it also covers complicated relationships with Sylvie Russo (Elle Fanning) and Joan Baez (Monica Barbaro). With Dan Fogler.

Francçois Audouy's production design is fabulous, particularly the recreation of Greenwich Village - no CGI at all. (The sound design here is great too.) And it's all beautifully shot by Phedon Papamichael, who with Audouy was amazingly overlooked by the Academy. Edited by Andrew Buckland and Scott Morris.

And you have to remain impressed by most of Dylan's songs.

Did feel, like most biopics (even going as far back as The Great Ziegfeld) that it was too long. and that some of the characters were under-developed (could perhaps have been simplified.)

Mangold made  Girl, Interrupted and Walk the Line.

Passport to Pimlico (1949 Henry Cornelius)

Written by Tibby Clarke. The tough, resilient, post-War humour of the Brits is well caught near the beginning, when a paper boy completely ignores a warning sign and drops a newspaper on the demolition team below:

It was 27°C.

The Quiet American (2002 Philip Noyce)

Graham Greene's novel adapted by Christopher Hampton and Robert Schennkan. An exotic, romantic, tragic, political and personal thriller. It seems the main historical thrust of the story was entirely accurate (the competing factions, the massacres, the bomb in the square).

Michael Caine is the floating journalist in Saigon, having affair with Thi Hai Yen Do. Brendan Fraser gets involved as the political situation hots up. Tzi Ma is the useful assistant. Caine gives a fantastic performance (Oscar and BAFTA nominated, lost to Adrien Brody in The Pianist and Daniel Day-Lewis in Gangs of New York).

Stunning photography from Christopher Doyle. Music from Craig Armstrong, editor John Scott.

His Girl Friday (1940 Howard Hawks)

It doesn't seem as fast as it used to. Highlights include Rosalind Russell rugby tackling fleeing man. Ben Hecht / Charles MacArthur play adapted by Charles Lederer. 

With Cary Grant: Ralph Bellamy, Porter Hall, Ernest Truex, Cliff Edwards, Clarence Kolb, Roscoe Karns, Frank Jenks, Regis Toomey, Abner Biberman, John Qualen, Frank Orth, Helen Mack, Billy Gilbert.

Photographed by Joe Walker. Columbia.

T-Men (1947 Anthony Mann)

The first collaboration between Mann and cinematographer John Alton arrives under the structure of a formally-voiced infomercial for the work of the Treasury Department, which to be honest is the one thing that weighs the film down a little. But once the story gets going, that two T-Men have to impersonate crooks to get into a gang suspected of being involved in counterfeit currency, it becomes good and tense, and in places, quite shocking. Dennis O'Keefe and Alfred Ryder are the T-Men, Wallace Ford 'The Schemer'. Charles McGraw (The Killers) makes a strong impression as the heavy 'Moxie'. John Alton lights from blackness in only the way he can.

With Jane Randolph, June Lockhart (T-Man's wife), Mary Meade (photographer). Written by John Higgins from a story by Virginia Kellogg. Music by Paul Sawtell. Makeup by Ern Westmore (Many credits since 1925).

Conflict (1945 Curtis Bernhardt)

From a story by Robert Siodmak and Alfred Neumann, sold to Warner Bros. Bogart didn't want to do it. Eventually did.

He bumps off his wife Rose Hobart as he fancies her sister Alexis Smith, but then there's weird signs that she might be still alive.. Unfortunately it's a bit easy to guess what's going on. Flashes on a Bogart we hadn't really seen up till that point are rewards. A then-fashionable dose of psychiatry is buttered on.

With Sidney Greenstreet, Charles Drake, Grant Mitchell, Edwin Stanley. Music by Frederick Hollander, photographed by Merritt Gerstad.

Kansas City Confidential (1952 Phil Karlson)

A bank job is beautifully executed. But some poor slob ex con delivery man is roughed up by a suspicious police force. He's naturally extremely pissed off by this, and sets off to find the real culprits. You're immediately struck by the acting. The wrong man is John Payne, from Miracle on 34th Street. The actual criminals are the interesting-looking Jack Elam (one of the three assassins at the start of Once Upon a Time in the West), Lee Van Cleef, and hard man Neville Brand (DOA, Stalug 17). These people look tough and the action is violent. Also involved are Preston Foster and his daughter Coleen Gray, and a Mexican (actually, African-American) vamp Dona Drake.

The plot is rather crafty. It was written by George Bruce and Harry Essex from a story by Harold Greene and Rowland Brown (Green and  Brown, geddit?? Ha. Ha.) George Diskant shot it. It's an independent production released through United Artists. Paul Sawtell is the composer.

Jack Elam. Such a loser you can't help feeling sorry for him

The idea that the three are masked, so they can't rat on each other, is rather brilliant. Thanks to Eddie Muller, who pointed me this way via 'Dark City'.

Words and Pictures (2013 Fred Schepisi)

A beautiful screenplay by Gerald Di Pego, who had adapted a Nicholas Sparks novel Message in a Bottle (Costner, Robin Wright Penn, Newman) and The Forgotten (Julianne Moore), neither particularly well rated, and some even lowlier TV movies, it was like this was the one. He's done nothing since - retired on a career high. Good for him.

I have no information as to how Juliette Binoche and Clive Owen got on with each other, but they're both wonderful.

Down and Out in Beverley Hills (1986 Paul Mazursky)

Mazursky created (with Larry Tucker) The Monkees, then had hits with Bob and Carol and Ted and Alice, Harry and Tonto, Moscow on the Hudson, the autobiographical Next Stop Greenwich Village and An Unmarried Woman.

René Fauchois was a prolific actor and playwright who wrote 'Boudu Sauve des Eaux' in 1919; it was filmed in 1932 by Jean Renoir. It was adapted by Mazursky and Leon Capetanos and given a very specific 1980s LA vibe which has stood up well.

"What do you want to hear? Real sorrow, real heartbreak? It's boring."

All the acting's good: Nick Nolte, Richard Dreyfuss, Bette Midler, Elizabeth Peña. The brilliantly trained Matisse is played by Mike. It's most enjoyable, with an interestingly open ending.

Editor Richard Halsey cut most of Mazursky's other films, as well as Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid, Rocky, American Gigolo, Joe vs the Volcano and  Edward Scissorhands. Donald McAlpine shot it and The Police's Andy Summer's wrote the score.

Set decorator Jane Bogart and first assistant director Paul Bogart are not related to Humphrey, but are to each other (she's his mum!)

Avanti (1972 Billy Wilder & co-scr)

Not only had we just returned from Italy, it is Billy Wilder's birthday.

Brilliant though Lemmon and Clive Revill are, the film wouldn't have worked nearly as well without Juliet Mills.

At two hours 25 minutes if does prove that - occasionally - comedy can work at this length.

Jaws is 50 (1975 Steven Spielberg)

Quite odd watching the beach scene without Q's explanatory voice over it, see Invisible Women.

Is John Williams' theme the most recognisable in movie history? It won the Oscar as of course did Verna Fields' editing and the much underestimated sound design, which was by Robert Hoyt, Earl Madery, Roger Heman Jr. and John R Carter.

"What am I supposed to tell the kids?"
"Tell them I'm going fishing."

I Walk Alone (1947 Byron Haskin)

Yes, Siegel’s mate from Warners, ‘Bun’. Interesting that other people behind camera became directors, e.g. Art director Nathan Juran (made Sinbad movies) and editor Robert Parrish (In The French Style),

Burt Lancaster has been in prison 14 years, revisits old pals Wendell Corey and club owner Kirk Douglas, gets involved with club singer Lizabeth Scott. Wants what’s owed to him for taking the fall, but Douglas is a rat. Tries to frame Burt for murder  

Scott isn’t the femme fatale for a change, which is something of a shame. With a Kristine Miller, Jorge Rigaud, Mike Mazurki, Marc Lawrence. Photographed by Leo Tover. Music by Victor Young.  Hal B Wallis production. 

Back in Stars Hollow

 Lorelai and Rory summoned us.

Loved when Rory's fractured her arm and Lorelai sleeps in a chair at the end of the bed and we cut to her asleep later and then the camera shows Chris is also there and also asleep. (He's let himself in unbeknown to the girls.) Lovely touch.

Judy Geeson, Seth MacFarlane and John Hamm pop up.

'Oy with the poodles already!'

Alternative title: "Shut up Paris!"

Body and Soul (1947 Robert Rossen)

Terrific boxing movie film noir whose writer Abe Polonsky and star both fell foul of HUAC. John Garfield is great as poor Jew turned boxing sensation, realises the fight game is rigged, but by then only cares about the money. GF Lili Palmer and mum Anne Revere and pal Joseph Penney are on his corner but can’t overcome shady manager William Conrad and femme fatale Hazel Brooks. Nice structure as film starts later on in the story. Good montage work by Gunter Von Fritsch. Good support too from Canada Lee as injured boxer. Jimmy Wong Howe shot it, Hugo Friedhofer provides the music. Really good.

Act of Violence (1948 Fred Zinnemann)

Running, running... When we hear why Robert Ryan is pursuing Van Heflin, our loyalties are switched. But when Heflin gets picked up by Mary Astor (didn't recognise her at all) in a bar, and she introduces him to Taylor Holmes and brutish Barry Kroeger, things get a lot worse. Beautifully done ending in railway station.

With Janet Leigh and Phyllis Thaxter.

Photographed by Robert Surtees, music by Bronislau Kaper.

Is it a noir? Well it doesn't have the great language of Double Indemnity nor a femme fatale (Astor is more of a run down barfly who gets 'kicks'), but... yes, definitely. And in that it's one of those ones that totally undermines what seems to be the typical happy American family it's definitely subversive, and it also has that angle about how the war is still seeping into post-war lives.

Somewhere in the Night (1946 Joseph Mankiewicz & co-scr)

Ah, yes, the "Who is Larry Cravat?" one, co-written with Howard Dimsdale who was blacklisted by HUAC and committed suicide with his wife in 1991.

War-damaged amnesiac John Hodiak (Desert Fury, Lifeboat, Battleground, A Bell for Adano) has only one clue to his identity and seeks Cravat, but it turns out he's connected to a missing two million dollars. Nancy Guild (very few credits) falls for him, Richard Conte gets involved, as does smooth-talking Fritz Kortner (stage actor, then films such as Pandora's Box). As you'd expect with Mankiewicz it's quite dialogue heavy but certainly invokes a nicely noirish world of LA mystery, well rendered by Norbert Brodine. Lloyd Nolan is the friendly copper, Margo Woode in femme fatale role, Whit Bissell as barman, Lou Nova (tough guy), Charles Arnt (man with glasses), Harry Morgan.

Nice touches e.g. long take over crystal ball, Hodiak meeting Josephine Hutchinson, who claims she knows him, and that definitive noir image of a suited man emerging from the window of a mental hospital. Quick simply directed by Mankiewicz.

The night docks scenes sound like they're accompanied by the sound of someone's iPhone ringing on silent.

Music by David Buttolph. Fox.

Bridget Jones Mad About the Boy (2025 Michael Morris)

A needy film which wants you to like it, specifically through reusing elements from the first - and best - Bridget Jones film (the 'wrong' relationship while the 'right' one is staring her in the face, the ending in the snow, Christmas jumper etc.) And rather depressingly, Bridget is only impressed by men's physiques. Still, enjoyable though whilst a little obvious in places. 

Renee Zellweger, Hugh Grant, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Leo Woodall, Mila Jancovic and Caspar Knopf (the children), Sally Phillips, Sarah Solemani, Gemma Jones, Emma Thompson, Shirley Henderson, Jim Broadbent, Colin Firth, Nico Parker.

Suspicious screenplay credit: written by Helen Fielding and Dan Mazer and Abi Morgan. Good array of pretentious childrens' names. Hazily photographed by Suzie Lavelle, well edited by Mark Day.

The silly tree scene. How can Bridget be stuck there when her kids are much higher up?

Double Indemnity (1944 Billy Wilder)

Yes, no matter who wrote what (Billy or Raymond Chandler) - and let's not forget those choice lines of dialogue were probably co-written - you can pretty much be sure that the clever construction is all Billy's, for example the demise of the first Mrs Dietrichson, which isn't revealed until an hour and a quarter in, and the stuff with her step-daughter (Jean Heather).

I was noticing in the Hollywood Bowl sequence quite how well the classical (Beethoven or someone) goes with the dialogue.

Mrs D is like a Venus Fly-Trap.

But when Edward G gets going, in those long takes, it's poetry in motion.

Oscar nominated for Picture, Director, Screenplay, music and sound recording, and Actress.

See How They Run (2022 Tom George)

Written by Mark Chappell who co-wrote Netflix series Flaked, which is well rated. But this didn't work for me at all. It's in that category of British farce which hasn't worked for decades, nary a laugh in sight. Gimmicky direction (split screen) doesn't help - has it ever?

Good to hear Sam Rockwell with British accent but in a way he has no charisma or presence, good also to see Saoirse as WPC and David Oleyowo as camp writer. Good production values even though half the time you think you're looking at CGI.

With Reece Shearsmith, Adrian Brody, Ruth Wilson, Harris Dickinson, Pearl Chanda, Shirley Henderson, Tim Key.

Fox Searchlight.

Extreme Measures (1996 Michael Apted)

Has a truly memorable opening. Two naked men escape into the night New York streets. They's clearly something very wrong with them. And someone's after them. They split up. What's going on?

Tony Gilroy adapted Michael Palmer's novel.

I couldn't help but think some studio execs fucked the film up somehow, but I don't really know why.

Hugh Grant is - I fear - badly miscast as the idealistic New York doctor. With Gene Hackman, Sarah Jessica Parker, David Morse, Bill Nunn (Regarding Henry), John Toles-Bey, Shaun Austin-Olsen (who has to give a very physical performance as the first victim).

The film's central plot, and the ending, seem entirely implausible.

Photographed by John Bailey.

Also I didn't like Grant's hairstyle.

Clint Eastwood's 95th birthday double bill: Honkytonk Man (1982 Clint Eastwood) / The Beguiled (1970, released 1971 Don Siegel)

It's also a Bruce Surtees double bill.

There's something about Honkytonk Man  that seems personal to Clint, who was born in the Depression, and aged 16 would sneak down to this bar in LA to play piano in exchange for pizza and beer. And the fact he has his son Kyle playing his nephew (he's second billed) also makes it a most personal work.

After it had finished I concluded that John Ford would have liked it. It is still a criminally underrated film.

Verna Bloom said of the title character "If Clint were a failure, he'd be Red."

The part of the grandfather was offered to James Stewart, who though only a year shy of the character's age, declined.

And, the skill of Bruce Surtees , who must have inspired camera operator Jack Green and gaffer Tom Stern:

The next film was so strange that nobody could get their heads around it and it was a critical and commercial flop. Clint had been spellbound by Thomas Cullinan's novel, and he saw it was an opportunity where he could really do some acting - and as such, it's one of his best films. And regardless of that, one of his best films.

A weird film, a kind of Gothic horror film set in a girls's school in the American Civil War, with certain similarities to Misery. Lalo Schifrin's strange score and Carl Pingitore' s distinctive editing are major contributors to its style. You can also see it as a film about male chauvinism, and in that the man brings all the misery in on himself, a moral black comedy.

Great cast comprises Geraldine Page, Elizabeth Hartman, Jo Ann Harris, Mae Mercer and little Pamelyn Ferdin. Indeed Clint's biographer Richard Schickel comments on how shocking it is that right at the beginning Clint kisses the 13 year old on the mouth. And talking of beginning, former montage king Don Siegel creates something special out of Civil War photos for that credits scene.

Lots of interesting stuff about it here.

The 'Where's the rest of me?' moment

And Siegel promoted camera operator Bruce Surtees (he'd worked on Coogan's Bluff and Two Mules for Sister Sarah) to DP and his work in the low light / candle lit scenes is Alison A. Amazing.