The Five Year Engagement (2012 Nicholas Stoller)

Good screen play by Stoller and star Jason Segel. With Emily Blunt, Chris Pratt, Alison Brie, Lauren Weedman (chef), David Paymer, Rhys Ifans.

Ph. Javier Aguirresarobe, Panavision.

We've got an Emily Blunt fan club going. The camera loves her, her face is so expressive, and she or her agent are making interesting, varied choices. And she hasn't gone for the accent. We couldn't watch The Wolf Man however.

The film is jolly good and Segel's not bad either!

A Matter of Life and Death (1945 Powell & Pressburger)

Managed to watch most of AMOLAD as had a hankering for Powell's red.

I don't mean to imply any kinkiness on Powell's part but in visiting Taormina I was most surprised to see a familiar image by resident 1900s photographer Wilhelm von Gloeden, surely the shepherd boy scene is a reference?

 

Niven fresh from distinguished military service is in great form, Marius Goring enjoying role as Conductor:

"Pardon? 'Ad a few?"

Extraordinary lighting / camera positions (even more extraordinary when you consider it was Jack Cardiff's first film!), e.g. in opening scene, and where Livesey and Hunter are behind Niven in chair. The scene in which American soldiers are rehearsing Shakespeare is unforgettable (the vicar is Robert Atkins). Well, it all is.

The casting is perfection. Note Kathleen Byron with a perfect halo (frame) around her head.

Brilliant line: "Where's Frank?" "He's gone ahead." Brilliant. And "We'll invent the greatest lie in medical history".

In literature and language, colour, motion, emotion and humorous sensitivity there is more going on in any ten minutes of this film than in the whole of most others. It is quite literally out of this world.

5 August 2012.

Seen for the first time purely about Peter Carter's hallucinations it's enormously clever. Dead centre on the target. Plenty of lines that seem likely are Pressburger's. Every scene, every shot almost, is full of intelligence and interest.

15 August 2010.

Perhaps a perfect collaboration of artists. Edited by Reginald Mills.

The heavenly records office sure looks like a microchip.

18 December 2009.

Cardiff / Powell's red. Kim Hunter close ups. Joseph Zmigrod's piano. Roger Livesey the most reassuring doctor. A surgeon who is also in heaven (the judge, Abraham Sofaer, ends up in Head).

It's totally wonderful and without equal.

"Oh. I'd always hoped there'd be dogs!"

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close (2011 Stephen Daldry)

... who directed the Hours and The Reader.

Scr Eric Roth, who has many screenplay credits, though some of them are a bit suspicious, Benjamin Button being a good example. Also Forrest Gump (he was a friend of Jim Morrison, apparently), Munich, Horse Whisperer.

Thomas Horn, Tom Hanks, Sandra Bullock, Max von Sydow, Viola Davis, Jeffrey Wright (her ex), John Goodman.

Somewhat too much music from Alexandre Desplat.
Some nice images from Chris Menges. (Illness prevented Harris Savides from shooting it.)

Didn't like the title.
A bit Hollwoody schmaltzy.
Good flashes of people he meets. Picks up with Max. We wanted to know what the bequeathment was.

Las Acacias (2011 Pablo Giorgelli & co-scr)

Germán de Silva, Hebe Duarte and Nayra Callemamani.

Subtle, very minimalist film. Truck hardly ever seen (lots of wing mirror stuff).

Dinner Rush (2000 Bob Giraldi)

Scr Rick Shaughnessy, Brian Kaleta.

Danny Aiello, Vivian Wu, Summer Phoenix.

Badly directed. Though seems largely unsympathetic, good story does emerge.

After the Thin Man (1936 W.S. Van Dyke)

William Powell, Myrna Loy, James Stewart, Joseph Calleia (bad guy), Jessie Ralph (the unspeakable Aunt Katherine), Sam Levene (cop), George Zucco (quack doctor - "Good Lord, I was right!"), William Law (Chinaman)

Great, enjoyable first sequel is still written by Frances Goodrich and Albert Hackett. Best line: after Loy asks Law why he saved Nick when he'd sent his brother down: "I don't like my brother. I like my brother's girl."

Nick's associates are as rude and pushy as the bad guys; Nora's relatives aren't much better.

Everyday (2012 Michael Winterbottom & co-scr)

... who did not direct United 93 (that was Paul Greengrass).

John Simm, Shirley Henderson, Stephanie, Shaun, Katrina and Robert Kirk.

An array of cameramen.
Music Michael Nyman.

Incredible experiment. Elliptical. It's irrelevant what he's inside for. Distinctive music.

What's Cooking? (2000 Gurinder Chadha & co-scr)

Two years before Bend It Like Beckham.

Mercedes Ruehl, Douglas Spain, Joan Chen, Will Yun Lee, Lainie Kazan, Maury Chaykin, Kyra Sedgwick, Joanna Margulies, Alfre Woodard, Dennis Haysbert, Ann Weldon.

Seems really old (video store, no mobile phones). Only at the end did I realise we'd seen it before.

Things go wrong over mysterious combinations of Thanksgiving lunches. Set in Fairfax district of LA.

Big Night (1996 Campbell Scott & Stanley Tucci)

Directed somewhat self-consciously. Written by Tucci and Joseph Tropiano.

Tucci, Tony Shaloub, Minnie Driver, Isabella Rossellini, Ian Holm, Alison Janney, Scott funny as car salesman.

Kind of pointless. Q's decisions today...

Lesbian Vampire Killers (2009 Phil Claydon)

James Corden, Matthew Horne. Myana Buring.

Really not good.

Tortilla Soup (2011 Maria Ripoll)

Based on Ang Lee's Eat Drink Man Woman.

Hector Elizondo, Tamara Mello, various other Hispanics, Klaus's son Nikolai Kinski.

Um.. yeah. Food doesn't come over as well as it should. makes you want to watch the original.

Foster (2011 Jonathan Newman & scr)

He wrote it so its his fault. Maurice Cole (kept reminding me of dummy in Dead of Night), Toni Colette (in a class of her own), Ioan Gruffudd, Richard E Grant, nice to see Hayley Mills, Anne Reid.

With teatime serial music and puke-inducing kid, film is like a puddle. Hamleys is older than the USA! Take that, America.

Outcast of the Islands (1951 Carol Reed & prod)

Scr. William Fairchild, novel Joseph Conrad.

Ralph Richardson, Trevor Howard, Robert (& Annabel!) Morley, Kerima, Wendy Hiller, George Coulouris as a native, Wilfred Hyde White, Frederick Valk.

Music Brian Easdale, photography John Wilcox and Ted Scaife, filmed in Ceylon (Sri Lanka).

Atmospheric. Strikingly edited and shot.

Good Will Hunting (1997 Gus Van Sant)

He's talented - why did he remake Psycho? "It was my sort of anti-remake statement!" It ended up being not a shot by shot   remake because it had to have its own life. Danny Elfman scored it, and said the critics would kill him, which they did.

Written by Matt Damon and Ben Affleck (AA), with Robin Williams (AA), Stellan Skarsgaard, Minnie Driver (who's fabulous - her giggles sound real, then she made me cry when Damon dumps her. Not really made it - all TV lately).

Music Danny Elfman, ph. Jean-Yves Escoffier.

Interesting positioning of camera / lenses. Good interplay between Williams and Damon (something about 'the bad stuff reminds you of the good things you were too busy to notice'). Great ending (Affleck, then car on road). Well overdue.

Revolutionary Road (2008 Sam Mendes & co-prod)

Screenplay Justine Hathe, novel Richard Yates.

Kate Winslet, Leonardo Di Caprio (both rather good), David Harbour, Kathy Bates, Michael Shannon (Take Shelter).

Ph. Roger Deakins. Music Thomas Newman. Editor Tariq Anwar.

Not quite as engaging as Sam's others. Great ending.

Topaz (1969 AH)

Written by Samuel Taylor (Sabrina, Vertigo, Avanti), novel Leon Uris.

Frederick Stafford, Dany Robin (wife), John Vernon, Karin Dor (mistress), Michel Piccoli (Bunuels), Philippe Noiret (Cinema Paradiso), Claude Jade (daughter, Truffauts), Roscoe Lee Brown.

Music - Maurice Jarre. Ph. Jack Hildyard.

Forty years on, Hitch begins Topaz like Blackmail - as a near silent film (and later plays a trick with the audio of a fountain). Another great silent scene featuring Stafford and Brown at a hotel leads to film's best suspense moment: photographing of papers and chase (Browne is unfortunately the most charismatic character in it). Though plenty of good touches (cameras in sandwiches) film is restrained and one of the longest Hitchcocks isn't sustained by enough suspense. Still, much underrated. Hitch appears leaping from a wheelchair!

Stafford-Dor love scenes not very convincing, either.

Attack the Block (2011 Joe Cornish & scr)

Edgar Wright is an exec producer.

Jodie Whittaker, John Boyega, Alex Esmail, Nick Frost

Ph. Tom Townend (Panavision)

Was making me think of tons of 70s movies esp. Assault on Precinct 13, Shivers, The Warriors and even the Zombie films.

Funny and subversive, it even manages a politically pointed conclusion.

Away We Go (2009 Sam Mendes)

Scr. Dave Eggers, Vendela Vida.

John Krasinski, Maya Rudolph, Allison Janney, Jeff Daniels, Maggie Gyllenhaal.

A sweet and subtle look at relationships and their offspring. "Yeah my tilted uterus is a fucking secret". And when he keeps trying to 'argue' with her.

Music Alexi Murdoch. Ph. Ellen Kuras (Eternal Sunshine, Be Kind Rewind, Blow).

Your Sister's Sister (2011 Lynn Shelton & scr)

Emily Blunt, Mark Duplass, Rosemarie de Witt.

Has slightly improvved feel. Good.

Romance on the Orient Express (1985 Lawrence Gordon Clark)

Should have taken a clue from the title.

Cheryl Ladd, Stuart Wilson, Ruby Wax, Julian Sands, John Gielgud.

Difficult to know what's worse: script, direction or leading actors, but it's good to watch bad films now and then to remind you how good good ones are. A clue is that Ruby Wax gives the best performance. Music sounds like it's from Reggie Perrin. The ending is genuinely sick-making.

Made me wonder whether Murder.. was filmed on sets. I beliueve it was, at Elstree. Did they reuse them for this?