Victim (1961 Basil Dearden)

Silvia Syms died on January 27, aged 89. I was intrigued to read in her obituary that she was warned not to appear in the film - which several other actresses had turned down - as it might ruin her career. But 'one of her friends had died by suicide after  being outed, and she had seen how the perpetual fear of being blackmailed affected fellow actors, including Sir John Gielgud. 'I wanted to do it because I wanted the law changed.' After many cuts, the film was eventually released with an X certificate. It proved a commercial and critical success, and has been credited as helping to pave the way for the 1967 Sexual Offences Act that partially decriminalised homosexuality."

Barrister Dirk Bogarde learns that a young man who he has been associated with has taken his own life rather than betray their relationship and so sets out to trap the blackmailer, knowing full well it might end his own career (which it probably does; the ending is equivocal). The gay world is well portrayed, the police largely sympathetic. It plays like a good thriller, photographed in inky tones by Otto Heller.

Syms is Bogarde's wife who ultimately will stand by him. The cast looks familiar without being able to name them - Anthony Nicholls, Peter Copley, Norman Bird, Peter McEnery (the unfortunate 'Boy' Barrett), Donald Churchill, Derren Nesbitt (the blackmailer: Where Eagles Dare, The Blue Max, Monte Carlo or Bust), John Barrie, John Cairney, Alan MacNaughton, Nigel Stock, Margaret Diamond. Though Dennis Price needs no introduction. But who plays William, Bogarde's loyal assistant?

Written by Janet Green, who had worked with Dearden on Sapphire; with John McCormick.

The pub is The Salisbury in St Martin's Lane; other London locations look familiar. London looked quite seedy anyway in 1961.

Imitation of Life (1959 Douglas Sirk)

I think I nailed it last time.

It's still massively timely (More in the US than here).

Sirk: "I tried to make it into a picture of social consciousness - not only of a white social consciousness, but of a Negro one too. You can't escape what you are. Now the Negroes are waking up to 'Black Is Beautiful'. Both whites and blacks are leading imitated lives.. There is a wonderful expression: seeing through a glass darkly. Everything, even life, is inevitably removed from you. You can't reach, or touch, the real. You just see reflections. If you try to grasp happiness itself your fingers only meet glass. It's hopeless." [Thus the mirrors everywhere.]

Of the funeral scene, Sirk admits he knew this would be his last film - he'd had enough of Hollywood. Ironically he also left on a financial high - it was at that time Universal's most successful picture.

And on Russell Metty: "He was original. He understood. After a while, he came to me with ideas which I had used. The director must listen, too. And in his own way Metty had a feeling for what I was after. His lighting was the best."

And "Every [camera] movement followed one rule, which was a rule of iron with me. (It has been discarded today.) That is, that a camera movement ought to be justified by your actors' movements, and that that your actors' movements must be justified by the camera. The camera is interested in you. The good camera is curious."

He was a very interesting guy.

The following night, Q came up with the brilliant observation that the Lana Turner character is the same as the Susan Kohner character - they both are more interested in their own theatrical careers than their families. This fits in neatly with Sirk's preoccupations with split characters and duality. (Kohner was Oscar-nominated. She pretty much retired after Freud in 1962.)

Kings Row (1942 Sam Wood)

Thoughts: I love Ann Sheridan. She is in fact star billed, even though she doesn't appear until an hour and three minutes in. Does she have a slight, cute double chin? Do I care? She was filming this concurrently with The Man Who Came to Dinner.

It's a studio picture. All of Kings Row was created on the Warner Brothers back lot by William Cameron Menzies. The stretch of river bank is probably where The Adventures of Robin Hood was shot.

It's - as we all know - a sensational score by Erich Wolfgang Korngold.. BUT, you get extra marks for realising that it is orchestrated by Hugo Friedhofer.

The fact the disc went wrong 1, 19 in wasn't annoying at all.

The Thing Called Love (1993 Peter Bogdanovich)

River Phoenix got himself on the film, recommended Dermot Mulroney and Anthony Clark, wrote some of his songs and brought in the duet between him and Samantha Mathis. It was his last film. She is still working, lately in Billions, mainly on TV, though was also in The American President; deserved better. The romantic triangle referred to in The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance extends into the story, which is credited to Carol Heikkinen though undoubtedly has Peter's stamp. (Allan Moyle also came in to rewrite.)

When Peter asked River how he was going to convey his character's pent-up violence, this feeling of danger, he thought for a moment, then said 'Silence', which the director thought was 'brilliant'. In fact Peter didn't really 'meet' the real River Phoenix until after filming was completed, so much in character did he remain. The actor particularly enjoyed the long takes without a cut.

K.T. Oslin is rather good as the bar owner - she herself was a C&W singer. And Bullock has a good comedy touch.

It's a lovely film. In interview, Peter's also interested in what happens after the film is over - it could go many ways.

Your Place or Mine (2023 Aline Brosh McKenna & scr)

'Reese colour groups her books too', Q told me, confidently, whilst I was thinking how McKenna had gone off. This was an original screenplay - well, original if you haven't see Pillow Talk and all those other Doris Day films. This was a welcome return to... no it wasn't.

Reese and Ashton Kutcher are friends without benefits. For the flimsiest of reasons (the exposition is poorly done) he travels to CA to look after her son Wesley Kimmel whilst she travels to Brooklyn or somewhere CGI'd to study accountancy when it's clear to all she should be in books. Books - ah. There's the rub! But this ain't no 84 Charing Cross Road.

The supporting characters / actors are also lacking - Tig Notaro as her ?Gay friend is particularly colourless, Jesse Williams in a similar vein; Zoe Chao has some zing. Steve Zahn's character is particularly badly developed.

Florian Ballhaus is on camera. I was mildly excited to see that This Is Us's Siddharta Khosla wrote the score.. but there isn't any, it's all tracks from the nineties.

I'm surprised Reese put her name to this.

Slow Horses - Season 1 (2022)

Having failed a counter-terrorism exercise, MI5 agent Jack Lowden is relegated to 'Slough House', the pits, run by the most jaded man on television, played by Gary Oldman (though you already know the old has-been is going to come into his own at some point). But rather than keep his head down, he breaks open a secure despatch case and steals information about a right wing journalist of interest to the intelligence service. Then a Pakistani comic is kidnapped...

With Kristin Scott Thomas, Freddie Fox, Saskia Reeves, the irrepressible Olivia Cooke, Samuel West, Jonathan Pryce. Lowden was in Small Axe, Fighting with My Family, The Long Song, Dunkirk, The Dreams of Bethany Mellmoth, A United Kingdom

Written by Will Smith (not that one; a writer on things like The Thick of It, Veep and Paddington 2), from Mick Herron's novel. When Oldman tells Lowden not to leave the sensitive data 'on the bus', you can't help feeling that's a deliberate reference to some government person who did in real life leave a load of sensitive data on a bus - just the kind of writing you'd expect from someone with these credits.

It's an exciting tale, laced with humour - I like the right-wing nutter doesn't realise the 'castle' is a more recent folly - but his Asian-British captive does. The perpetrators of all the double-dealing, namely Scott Thomas and West, get away with everything, of course - the scapegoat journalist (the unlovely Paul Hilton) goes under a bus (almost) literally. But there's a shock denouement involving the truth behind Reeves' husband's 'suicide'. Liked also the developing story between 'Slow Horses' Rosalind Eleazar and Dustin Demri-Burns. The main nutter: Brian Vernel (also Gangs of London).

Jack Hawes directed them all, and other writers were involved.

Apple TV. Theme tune, sung by Mick Jagger, is a sort of twangy Peaky Blinders-alike.

"Explaining it to you lot's like trying to explain Norway to a dog", and other lines that aren't quite as funny as they think they are

Shotgun Wedding (2022 Jason Moore)

"No", I said, when I saw the trailer. But it was OK (suggesting, in fact, that the trailer was poor), some moments of extreme daftness (where the hell did her hair extension come from suddenly; when did the owners end up in the pool?) but quite enjoyable - Q particularly liked Jennifer Coolidge blasting away at a pirate with a machine gun. 

The Philippines was played by the Dominican Republic. Other cast: Jennifer Lopez, Josh Duhamel, Lenny Kravitz, Sonia Braga, Cheech Marin.

Written by Mark Hammer (appropriately enough) for Amazon Studios.

Nolly (2023 Creator / Writer Russell T Davies)

The Crossroads actor who was unexpectedly fired at the height of her popularity in 1981, expertly played by Helena Bonham Carter. With Augustus Prew, Con O'Neill, Mark Gatiss (as Larry Grayson), Antonia Bernath (as the 'daughter'), Chloe Harris, Lloyd Griffith, Richard Lintern, Clare Foster, Emily Butcher, Bethany Antonia.

Her triumphant return to Crossroads came too late, unfortunately. Perhaps the best scene is the one where she engages with the (female) fellow travellers on a bus.

Perhaps after the moving power of It's A Sin it feels like medium-grade Lewis.

Directed by Peter Hoare for ITV.

The Crowd Roars (1932 Howard Hawks)

Hawks actually just nicked a story Warners already owned set in a circus and changed it to the world of racing, which he himself had been in as a young man. For rather questionable reasons, older brother racing champ James Cagney chucks his long time girl Ann Dvorak when his brother Eric Linden gets into the business - the latter's head has been turned by her friend Joan Blondell. By way of revenge, Blondell seduces the boy, but falls in love for real, causing a rift between him and his brother. Cagney acts like an unattractive asshole.

Some quite exciting racetrack stuff, in terrible dirt conditions, or in fiery crashes (one of which claims Frank McHugh - well, we knew he was a goner because he forgot to take his lucky mascot kids boots out on the track with him).

Has a crazy ending where the brothers race each other to hospital then fades out abruptly after an hour 10.

Not one of the best Hawks, photographed by later collaborator Sid Hickox, and John Stumar.

Happy Valley Season 3 (2022 Sally Wainwright)

Mark Stanley plays an aggressive teacher, whose wife Mollie Winnard in terror has started seeing and taking drugs from pharmacist Amit Shah, who himself is being threatened to pay a drugs gang. One of the teacher's pupils is Sarah Lancashire's grandson Rhys Connah, who is the son of James Norton.

Things really kick off when Norton escapes... I personally thought when he finds the photo albums that he is going through some kind of regret or pangs of conscience. 

With Siobhan Finneran, Susan Lynch, Con O'Neill, Rick Warden.

Lancashire is particularly good in overall good cast. Love the way she off-handedly solves the murder of the pharmacists's wife right at the end.

Music Ben Foster.

All That Heaven Allows (1955 Douglas Sirk)

Well reviewed here.

Notice the framing (I didn't) in these shots, the window that's ever-present. Is this lighting / composition or is it symbolic?

"In melodrama it's of advantage to have one immovable character (Hudson) against which you can put your more split ones (Wyman).... One of the first of all American literary impacts on my thinking, when I was thirteen or fourteen, was a book my father gave me: 'Walden' by Thoreau. This is ultimately what the film was about... it was like a sun going up over my youth, this strangely clean language.." ('Sirk on Sirk' Jon Halliday.)

Peg Fenwick adapted Edna and Harry Lee's novel. The film was nominated for no awards of any kind.

The Florida Project (2017 Sean Baker & co-scr)

With Willem Dafoe as a Good Man in Florida, Bria Vinaite as the worst mother in the world, and Brooklynn Kimberly Prince as the six year old daughter with attitude. In episodic fashion we learn just how bad the Mum is. Lots of Steadicam coverage and natural lighting puts us in the story, shot by Alexis Zabe on 35mm film - except for the ending, the rush to Disney World, which was shot without authorization on an iPhone 6S Plus.

The constant background helicopters are there apparently to take richer tourists on aerial tours of Disney World.

To Kill a Mockingbird it ain't.

Everything Everywhere All At Once (2022 Dan Kwan & Daniel Scheinert & scr)

Because Michelle Yeoh was on Graham Norton talking about this and what receiving an original script felt like (and also about her fearless stunt work on the Jackie Chan film Police Story 3: Supercop (1992)). We certainly were bowled over by a riot of action and inventiveness in a film that can best be described as 'bonkers'. I get the critic who suggested it's a lot of noise about a simple idea, but also with the view that there are so many original ideas here that it's truly unique and entertaining. 

And also great performances from Yeoh, Stephanie Hsu (The MMM), Ke Huy Quan, James Hong and Jamie Lee Curtis.

Certainly enlivened by a quirky score from the band Son Lux (Rafiq Bhatia, Ian Chang and Ryan Lott), which reminded me of PTA's unusual scores for Magnolia and Punch Drunk Love, and Paul Rogers' tour de force editing. Hadn't heard of Larkin Seiple the DP either.

The previous film of 'Daniels', Swiss Army Man, sounds no less bonkers, its summary being 'A hopeless man stranded on a deserted island befriends a dead body, and together they go on a surreal journey to get home'. Paul Dano and Daniel Radcliffe star.

I noticed in one of the Michelle Yeoh superstar clips there's actually a moment from a Crouching Tiger awards ceremony.

The Killing of a Sacred Deer (2017 Yorgos Lanthimos & co-scr)

Pitch black dry suburban comedy has such an unlikely premise that it left me bewildered and - despite an interesting filming style and committed performances - a little bored. Though the sight of the children falling over and crawling around is funny, and I like the way everyone's lying to one another. The very dry dialogue is reminiscent of Kubrick (2001 specifically) as is the very wide angles and chilly long shots.

Could be about the dullness of some upper class lives, but I don't really care. Can't claim to be a big fan of bleeding from the eyes either. Although I have to admit, the film did stay around in my head after... And the more it seeped in, the less I disliked it...

Colin Farrell, Nicole Kidman, Barry Keoghan, Raffey Cassidy, Sunny Suljic (Mid90s), Bill Camp, Alicia Silverstone

DP Thimios Bakatakis, editor Yorgos Mavropsaradis, music (or dissonant sounds, to be more precise) isn't credited - ah, I see, it's like The Shining, the score's made up of bits of composed music, even Ligeti, who's common to both films.

This is where Barry Keoghan started being really noticed

Hunky Dory (2011 Marc Evans)

Minnie Driver empathically heads cast. But Joby Talbot's music is mentionable as it somehow delicately sprinkles the film forward in a way that says 'It's the summer of 1976 and school's about to be over - for ever'. (It actually rained all the time.) The actual orchestration and performance of the various songs that appear in her version of 'The Tempest' are also memorable.

With a cast of thousands including Aneurin Barnard, Tom Rhys Harries (his debut. much on stage, also Slaughterhouse Rulez), Adam Byard, man mad Danielle Branch (her only film), Kimberley Nixon, the troubled Darren Evans (Dream Horse, A Street Cat Named Bob, My Mad Fat Diary, Submarine), 'Bob' (Robert) Pugh, Owen Teale, George MacKay, Steve Speirs, Di Botcher, Aled Pugh (these three all from Stella).

Nicely edited by Mali Evans and shot with a nostalgic glow by Charlotte Bruus Christensen.

This is not the clichéd cutsey kids putting on a show number - there's lots of gritty stuff going on as well.

Minnie did her own singing. Aneurin quoted in Indiewire interview: "The whole process of “Hunky Dory” was wonderful in that sense, musically. All the kids in the orchestra were playing the instruments. The choir was actually singing every song. Every actor in the film sang everything live."

The Mistress (1985 Carla Lane)

Another bittersweet fable from Carla Lane - Butterflies was also about infidelity, in the latter case, more imagined than practised. Here, Tony Aitken is definitely leading a double life with wife Jane Asher and mistress Felicity Kendal. And he's a bit of a shit, really.

Only You (2018 Harry Wootliff & scr)

Another film (cf. My Policeman) that doesn't really do anything. Shot entirely handheld, and with improvised social scenes, this comes off like a too-intimate home video, about a couple and their trials when trying to have children - not in itself the most gripping of subjects. Worth watching for two good performances from Josh O'Connor and Laia Costa (Life Itself).

Please someone explain to me how this film won the Douglas Hickox Award for Best Debut Screenwriter at the 2019 British Independent Film Awards. You could relate the story in five minutes.

With Lisa McGrillis again (Maternal), Peter Wight.

Two Way Stretch (1960 Robert Day)

Amusing film written by John Warren and Len Heath (Alan Hackney additional dialogue), with Peter Sellars, David Lodge and Bernard Cribbins as convicts who break out of prison one night to take part in an ingenious jewel robbery. The army and police are always depicted as idiots in comedies of this sort / in this era. And the prison guards - anyone in The Establishment, in fact.

Wilfred Hyde White and Irene Handl as watchable as ever. With Lionel Jeffries, Maurice Denham (prison Governor), Liz Fraser, Beryl Reid, George Woodbridge (easy-going prison officer), Thorley Walters (blundering army type). Way down cast list: Warren Mitchell and Arthur Mullard. 

Some brave stuntman is clearly on top of the train as it rushes through a low tunnel. Reviewed before here; nice to see in its proper aspect ratio.

My Policeman (2022 Michael Grandage)

In flashback to 1957 Brighton, we learn that Gina McKee's husband Linus Roache had an affair with art historian Rupert Everett - now the latter's had a stroke and McKee is nursing him in their home, Roache won't even talk to him.

Their former selves are Emma Corrin (The Crown), Harry Styles and David Dawson - the casting is good.

The wife's known about this all along, but was unable to cope with it.

It's OK, didn't really feel that involved, didn't really need the sex scenes. Nicely shot by Ben Davis again, and I didn't notice a single thing about Chris Dickens' editing.

Written by Ron Nyswaner, based on Bethan Roberts' novel.

I'm reminded of that Monty Python sketch...

The Banshees of Inisherin (2022 Michael McDonagh & scr)

"It was all going fine until he chopped off all his  fingers." I'm sure I remember reading somewhere that when they were young, Martin used to entertain his brother John Michael with his ghoulish tales of people having parts of their bodies chopped off...

Brendan Gleeson and Colin Farrell are reunited as the sparring friends. With Kerry Condon (also Three Billboards), Barry Keoghan (Calm with Horses, Dunkirk, Chernobyl, '71 and, reuniting him with Farrell, The Killing of a Sacred Deer) - all four Oscar nominated. All four fabulous.

This is very funny and bizarre. But it's also a tragedy, as the 'nicest' feller on the island becomes embittered and wants to kill his former friend, whilst the abused young man is rejected by the object of his affections.

Crosses feature throughout

What's it about? There's a Civil War raging on the mainland (it's 1923). Is it about the divisions within Ireland itself?

The incidental music's by Carter Burwell, but lots of traditional Irish music features, along with distinctive songs by Brahms.

Fabulous photography by Ben Davis, edited by Mikkel E.G. Nielsen.

He does something very interesting with the animals. They're always looking at exactly the right place at the right time. I loved the horse that's looking in at the window. I can't help but think of Au Hasard Balthazar...

Film of the year so far, obviously...