Sniper's Nest. Ed Whitmore. Director David Richards.
One of those ones in which (one of the) perpetrators is someone you haven't met during the whole two hours, so it seems like a bit of a cheat. Random sniper strikes. Like some of the other films, pathology doesn't seem particularly relevant.
Zoe Telford and Sean Gilder are up against it. Adam Wilson is good as the juvenile murderer (and we thought of Adolescence).
"Your name's Sadie.. And your mother's a cook." Edward Arnold plays the most annoying drunk since that Spencer Tracy film we couldn't watch. Actually he's not as annoying as him, but.. Oh yeah, it's Mrs Merton's question - "What was it about millionaire drunk Edward Arnold that appealed to you?" His horribly drunken behaviour is just Pre-Code, as is fade out on kiss in hotel room.
And all because the guy she's run away to New York with to marry proves to be a worthless whore. Will decent but privileged Franchot Tone save the day?
Joan Crawford, Gene Raymond, Esther Ralston (man-stealer), Earl Oxford, Jean Dixon (world weary friend), Leo G Carroll (his debut), Akim Tamiroff (his first credited role), Helen Ware.
John Meehan adapted a story by Viña Delmar. Oliver T Marsh photographed, one of 15 Crawford films he shot from as far back as 1925.
Great little song 'After You've Gone' performed on piano, guitar and double bass by Gene Austin, Candy Candido and Otto Heimel.
28.40, 30.26, 36.10.
Thorne has preserved much of William Golding's story and even the time period, probably a good idea.
The island location is good (Malaysia), the music different (Cristobal Tapia de Veer, The White Lotus), the extremely wide lenses weird (Mark Wolf). Mátyás Fekete / Andonis Trattos edited alternately.
Directed by Marc Munden.
Good cast: with Winston Sawyers (Ralph), Lox Pratt (Jack), David McKenna (Piggy), Ike Talbut (Simon).
Second part, Ralph, features a brilliantly handled pig hunt.
Is Jack's half brother Owen McDonnell the killer of a schoolgirl? No, or course not, but he is ultimately responsible for other dodgy stuff that gets him nicked. Leaving us clinician Liam Garrigan a prime suspect.
The murderer attempts to kill Jack but is somehow unsuccessful. Their identity is somewhat unlikely.
Ashley Walters investigates with bad grace. Haydn Gwynne is a stand in pathologist. Kirsty Besterman, Clare Calbraith, Teresa Churcher, Daisy Ridley.
From a play 'It Etait Une Fois' by Francis de Croisset, which had been adapted as an Ingrid Bergman Swedish film En Kvinnas Ansikte in 1937, and it was she who came up with the ending - that she would face trial for murder but the outcome wasn't known. This of course had to be changed to the happier ending that MGM audiences were expecting, by Donald Ogden Stewart and Elliot Paul. It was a big hit.
The scarred faces compared:
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| Bergman's diary reveals she cried in the studio - not from the pain of the makeup but because she was so 'bad' |
Thanks to Musings for saving me the trouble.
Both versions take the form of a trial in which various witnesses come forward and present the story of the scarred and (emotionally) ugly woman blackmailer, beginning with a cohort in Donald Meek, who explains how Crawford blackmailing an adulterous woman Osa Massen leads her to meet plastic surgeon Melvyn Douglas, and her transformation begins. But she's being manipulated by evil Conrad Veidt (was he ever the good guy?) who wants her to kill his nephew, a little boy, and so we are led to the snowy, er, hills of Hollywood, and Albert Basserman, Marjorie Main and young Richard Nichols.
There's a very exciting sled chase / race at the end, edited by Frank Sullivan (and without music) and Robert Planck's photography of these scenes and Ms Crawford's face are equally good. Bronislau Kaper's score is not to the fore.
Lots of recognisable people in cast include Reginald Owen, Connie Gilchrist, Gwili Andre, Henry Daniell, George Zucco, Robert Warwick.
To get over the bad taste left by the Louis Theroux doc we turned instead to abduction, torture, rape and murder - how very British of us.
In a Lonely Place by Ed Whitmore and Tracey Malone (Whitmore) takes place in the Scottish Highlands. Not one but several bodies are uncovered - effectively depicted as sniffer dogs one by one sit on places of corpses. It all links to a seedy pole dancing club.
Martin Compston investigates along with his old 'pals' Robert Cavanah and Gary Lewis, principal suspect is Christopher Hatherall. It's got quite a merry-go-round of a plot (though Q thinks table tennis is a more apposite analogy).
Enjoyably cruel and far-fetched idea to have the victim who got away kidnapped and tortured again - at least she survives - Nicola Grier.
Then in Undertone (Ed Whitmore again, with Declan Croghan) the corpse of a young women, who has had a baby removed, is linked to a drug dealing Turkish gang - this one of the quite unlikely ones. Akin Gazi is memorable as the baddie, Sean Gallagher as the very bad cop, Morvern Christie his subordinate.
Why the other cop is shot at the beginning is I think not explored.
The Alexandra Road Estate (aka Rowley Way) in Camden is a location we've seen before:
... notably in Breaking and Entering.
Loved Jack taking out the bad guy who has him at gunpoint.
Louis chums up with some utterly despicable and twisted people with no brains and decides that their promotion of mancentric things and Matrix-fuelled conspiracy theories are all organised to make sales for them and no one else - Louis' $500 investment managed by 'billionaire brokers' quickly expires.
Utterly depressing - the world has gone backwards.
Funded by Netflix.
New Steve Carrell comedy for HBO revolves around University. Carrell is a best selling author who drops in to look after recently separated daughter Charly Clive, finds himself sequestered (the wrong word I know) by college professor Danielle Deadwyler. Brit Phil Dunster is the ex, who's now with Lauren Tsai ("I'm funnier than everyone thinks"). Eccentric Dean is John C McGinley.
Conan O'Brien is a capable host - some of the skits, like old films remade for vertical, Casablanca over-explained (with Sterling K Brown as Sam) and the advertising that would appear if the Oscars were screened on YouTube are good - some of the 'jokey' bits by presenters are just screamingly awful.
No real surprises here - Wunmi lost out to Amy Madigan for Weapons; Leo lost to Michael B Jordan in Sinners. Sean Penn won again for Supporting. Paul Thomas Anderson won the Wilder hattrick, reflecting how important that film was perceived to be by the Academy.
The K Pop band were rather unfairly musiced over.
But the real seismic event was the first time a woman won Best Cinematography. Women must have won in all the major categories before so rather belatedly they're now caught up on this one. Congratulations to Autumn Durald Arkapaw for Sinners. Rachel Morrison had been nominated for Mudbound in 2017, Mandy Walker for Elvis in 2022.
Despite Jafar Panahi's It Was Just an Accident being in competition for Foreign Film, the Norwegian Sentimental Value won.
Coup de Grace Graham Mitchell / David Richards. Very diffused photography. Nikki helps acquit suspected murderer Michael Socha (pronounced, I am informed, 'So-cha') but then more murders in his style take place. Nikki gets too close to defence lawyer Tobias Menzies. Meanwhile detective Lorraine Ashbourne is convinced they had the right man all along.
Patricia Dainton inherits a family house giving her and her wastrel husband Tony Wright a place to crash, and from where he can 'write'. The house seems inhabited by a poltergeist, as pointed out by housekeeper Anita-Sharp Bolster, which the husband doesn't love, but he's soon after glamorous (by that I mean she's prone to wearing shiny slacks) single typist Sandra Dorne, who's a bad girl and indifferent to stealing a woman's husband. He's a real sleaze, did I mention that? Even to the point of planning to murder his wife. But - and this is a neat twist - the house (or the poltergeist) has other ideas... The ending is the best part of this short 66 minute indie, which despite many shortcomings remains watchable.
Written by Maurice Wilson from a story by Laurence Meynell. Didn't know any of the crew except for nascent director, first AD Douglas Hickox.
I was initially caught by John Veale's opening credits music, which in melody and orchestration sounds like a trial run for Barry's Thunderball theme. The rest of the music is more routine but you wonder.
Commodity. Timothy Prager / Daniel O'Hara.
New pathologist Richard Lintern steps in to take Leo's job (Nikki didn't want it).
Jack has insulted a detective (Adrian Rawlins). So he has to apologise, but Lintern endears himself to us (and the team) by making the DI apologise as well. Then he leaves Nikki with Leo's old creaky chair.
The plot is all about whether a cocky footballer has murdered the ex nanny.
Completely coincidentally both films are linked by mediums. In the first, Pauline Collins predicts Gemma Jones' future, much to the disbelief of daughter Naomi Watts and her husband, Josh Brolin, a writer. She in turn hopes to have an affair with boss Antonio Banderas and he with neighbour Freida Pinto. Jones' ex Anthony Hopkins is in a very misguided relationship with Lucy Punch. And they all make a big mess of everything!
Vilmos Zsigmond shot it in London.
With Fenella Woolgar, Philip Glenister, Neil Jackson, Ewen Bremner, Anna Friel, Celia Imrie, and briefly, Joanna David.
Darius Khondji shoots the Cote d'Azur beautifully. Great production design / locations. Most enjoyable film.
I quite enjoyed this seventies British thriller, which takes after Performance and its ilk.
Convict Oliver Reed - sporting ugly accent - learns wife Jill St John is leaving him and determines to break out of prison with mate Ian McShane and escape planner Freddie Jones - leading to an exciting scene, well shot, and showing what a difficult and scary task it is.
Reed's mission is to kill her, and it involves fellow criminal Frank Finlay and detective Edward Woodward. There's some good action scenes and a nice twist ending.
Well photographed by Ted Scaife, edited by John Glen, music by Stanley Myers.
A restrained Victor McLaglan leads said British patrol across Mesopotamian desert (now Iraq) to oasis where they are gradually picked off by an unseen enemy - an inspiration on Assault on Precinct 13?
Boris Karloff is a religious nutter. With Reginald Denny, Wallace Ford (no relation), J.M. Kerrigan.
Music by Steiner, shot by Harold Wenstrom, filmed in the Imperial Sand Dunes, Buttercup City for RKO.
Some surprising and memorable deaths, e.g. soldier who has just scaled a palm tree, aircraft pilot; but there's not a lot to it, really, certainly not the **** which Maltin bestows it with. Though I have to admit, almost berserk McLaglen with machine gun and Arabs, and British army finally showing up, is an effective ending.
I was surprised to read that Quentin Tarantino thought it 'a piece of crap' as it's Hitch's last great film, a real change of pace, a nouvelle vague Hitchcock.
Written by Gluck, David A Newman and Keith Merryman..
Justin Timberlake, Mila Kunis. Patricia Clarkson, Woody Harrelson, Jenna Elfman, Richard Jenkins, Emma Stone.
I'm not sure we were in quite the right mood to experience the histrionics of Carole Lombard and John Barrymore, though they are both great in Ben Hecht / Charles MacArthur screenplay. Based on the play 'Napoleon of Broadway' by Charles Bruce Millholland.
With Roscoe Karns, Walter Connolly, Etienne Girardot (mad man).
Ms Lombard in an array of glamorous fashion:
Mr Barrymore's response:
German version of film fair zips along in story of Russian (Uno Henning) who has loved a French girl but they must flee to Paris. I can't tell you how unspeakable some of the men are in this, particularly the vile Fritz Rasp, who whilst embracing blind fiancee Brigitte Helm is also trying to seduce title heroine Edith Jéhanne. He's also boasted to a girl whose eye he has kissed (not a typo) - a sort of Louise Brooks protégée Hertha van Walther - that he's going to kill said fiancee for her money. There's an amusing scene with a diamond stealing parrot, and a wonderful little moment where the couple spy a just married bride... and she's crying.
The uncle is another monster who is absolutely overwhelmed by greed (another standout moment) and who suddenly decides to seduce his niece... For fuck's sake. The screenplay is by Rudolf Leonhardt and Ladislaus Vajda from Ilja Ehrenburg's novel.
Most interesting, though Bernd Thewes modern recreation of an old piano cue sheet leaves something to be desired. Good performances by and large. Sig Arnio, best known to us from The Palm Beach Story, is funny as an investigator. With Hans Jaray, Vladimir Sokoloff, Eugen Jensen.
The agile camerawork is by Robert Lach and Fritz Arno Wagner (Nosferatu, Diary of a Lost Girl, Westfront 1918, The Threepenny Opera, M, The Testament of Dr Mabuse).
Greater Love. Dudi Appleton and Jim Keeble. Directed by Douglas Mackinnon, who has an annoying habit of putting something in the way of his subject and tracking the camera through it, like this:
The gang go to Afghanistan to retrieve a fallen soldier from a water project. Unfortunately they spend a lot of time in debate with others and each other about war vs crime, west vs. everyone else, personal morality, justice, chicken decomposition etc and it seems to be a showcase for polemical discussion rather than the exciting episode it could have been... Until the somehow not unexpected twist and shock ending.
Nikki: "Leo was as close to a father as I'll ever have."
David Caves, Brana Bajic, Sam Hazeldine, Joe Doyle.
