To Have and Have Not (1944 Howard Hawks)

Hemingway novel, adapted by Jules Furthman and William Faulkner. (Q won't watch Once Upon a Time in the West either. Or The Eagle Has Landed.)

It's a sync thing, the throwing / catching? The chemistry between Bogie and Bacall, the way she keeps interrupting him, is the central joy to the film. Bogie looks relaxed. The Walter Brennan character is a fucked up soul indeed.

Less persuasive is Dan Seymour as Capt. Reynard, which is itself lifted from Casablanca is it not? With a Waxman / Hickox / Nyby team it can't quite argue that film's technical brilliance, though it is a Warner Bros. film.

According to her autobiography, Betty did record the song herself then mimed to it in the take.

To Walk Invisible (2016 Sally Wainwright & scr)

It is ironic that the Bronte sisters' worries about how they would sustain themselves after the death of their father were pointless as they all died in their thirties. Weird sound mixing in which quotes from work overshadowed by music; at other times sisters' whispering does nothing for the plot. The brother is such a bad drunk we wished he had died earlier, but the finale - meeting the publishers - is a welcome ray of sunshine (before all the untimely deaths).

Finn Atkins (Charlotte), Chloe Pirrie (Emily), Charlie Murphy (Anne; Happy Valley), Adam Nagaitis, Jonathan Pryce, Joe Armstrong.

Witness for the Prosecution (2016 Julian Jarrold)

Opened out or true to source? Originally a short story - in which the suspicious-sounding Leonard Vole gets away with it, then Agatha changed the ending for the play to the one in Wilder's version. Thus the sub-plot about Toby Jones' family is all new, as is the Le Touquet ending. We didn't mind Sarah Phelps' version, though she has as anticipated stripped out any funny material, but the ultra diffused photography - creating what looked like a fog enshrouded court room - is distracting and the production design is from the new Rillington's grimy and gritty look.

Andrea Riseborough is very good; with Kim Cattrall, Billy Howell, Monica Dolan, David Haig, Tim McMullern.

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (2004 Alfonso Cuaron)

Usefully reviewed here. I noticed the camera is always moving, giving it a lovely momentum.

I didn't recognise Pam Ferris as the buoyant aunt, but Emma Thompson is priceless as Prof. Trelawney.

JK's most ingenious story.

Dutch (1991 Peter Faiman)

Very familiar John Hughes material involving a teenager who can't get along with his parents, a cross-country journey etc. Ed O'Neill is perfect as the guy who won't take any shit from Ethan Ambry, also good. Good fun, sweet moments.

Marple: By The Pricking of My Thumbs (2006 Peter Medak)

Written by Stewart Harcourt, Geraldine McEwan is joined by Greta Scacchi, a rather hammy Anthony Andrews, June Whitfield, Claire Bloom, Steven Berkoff and Josie Lawrence. About the disappearance of a baby 22 years before, and a grown up doll house in the woods, rather a few fairy tale nuances find their way out before the end.

I love that inquisitive, gimlet look of her Marple, like a dog with a super keen sense of smell.

Café Society (2016 Woody Allen & scr)

Such is the beauty of the breathtaking cinematography by first time collaborator Vittorio Storaro (75) in Sirk's unusual 2:1 aspect ratio, that it overwhelms you at first - you can see the tones changing as the camera moves through rooms, so sensitive is it to light. Also the tones in LA and New York are markedly different.

“Visual expression goes back to cave paintings, painting on wood, on canvas, black & white photography, colour, 3D. Now is the time for digital. Through all of my experiments, I have pushed to have a specific level where I can feel comfortable. The only camera, in my opinion, that is at that level is the Sony F65 – not only because it can give us 4K, 16-bit colour, which is the minimum that we can consider to be as close as possible to the level of film, even if it’s not yet there. 

“For me, it’s either 4K 16-bit or film negative. The F65 and the F55 are not perfect yet, but very close. But the camera also can deliver the 2:1 aspect ratio that I love, inspired by Leonardo da Vinci’s painting of ‘The Last Supper’. Woody was not willing in the beginning, because he was used to film. But I convinced him to make this step – and I think we made a great experiment between the two of us.”

(Enrico Umetelli, Storaro's most trusted camera operator, died last June. His last film though was 2000 - La Lingua del Santo.)

Clearly, Woody enjoyed working with both Jesse Eisenberg (terrific as always, particularly in the subtle shift in his character over time) and Corey Stoll, and his stand-out female here is Kristen Stewart. Great cast includes Steve Carell, Sheryl Lee, Blake Lively, Ken Stott and Tony Sirico.

Plot keeps you guessing, is beautifully ironic and tangy. Like the classic film-makers, he can pack a lot into a short running time - in this respect, the difference between Marty and Woody is about an hour! Also shows he is showing no signs of running out of great one-liners.

Quote from https://www.sony.co.uk/pro/article/broadcast-products-vittorio-storaro-shoot-woody-allen-cafe-society-f65.

Scrooged (1988 Richard Donner)

Written by Mitch Glazer and Michael O'Donoghue, somewhat disappointing update of Dickens might have worked better if not given the Hollywood too-big sledgehammer treatment, replete with sentimental ending. Bill Murray does at least carry it all along well, with support from Alfre Woodard, Karen Allen, John Forsythe, the Marmite actor Bobcat Goldthwaite, John Houseman, John Glover, Robert Mitchum (still acting almost ten years after this) and Michael J Pollard.

Music by Danny Glover, photography Michael Chapman, edited by Fredric and William Steinkamp.

Home Alone (1990 Chris Columbus)

This is what got him the Harry Potter job. Written by John Hughes, thus equipped with the inevitable pukey moments. Your appreciation of the film will depend on how much you find Macauley Culkin and his incessant cries of 'Whoah!' endearing. Slapstick moments of cartoon violence with Joe Pesci and Daniel Stern - and John Williams' music - are for me the reasons for watching.

Black Christmas (1974 Bob Clark)

Here it is at last, Bob's companion piece to A Christmas Story. Considering its vintage and setting in a girls's sorority house, film is refreshingly (disappointingly, depending on one's point of view) devoid of half-naked teens, though does feature some bold obscene phone call material (these calls make for sinister listening). The gore factor is low, humour high e.g. Marian Waldman's boozy guardian, murder to 'Silent Night'. Also has quite a lot of police involvement and suspense, too. Very unusual and distinctive, lots of POV and good writing by Roy Moore apparently inspired Halloween.

Girls include Olivia Hussey (Romeo and Juliet), Margot Kidder (effectively trading on her bad girl persona), Andrea Martin; Keir Dullea is the piano smashing BF and John Saxon the cop (many horror films and TV).

It's A Wonderful Life (1946 Frank Capra)

Short story 'The Greatest Gift' written in 1943 by Philip Van Doren Stern. Cary Grant became interested in playing the lead and it was bought by RKO who then sold it to Capra's Liberty Films with whom they had a distribution deal. The screen play was written by husband and wife team Frances Goodrich and Albert Hackett, with Frank Capra and Jo Swerling.

Special mention to H.B. Warner as the pharmacist who strikes young George Bailey in his bad ear before breaking down with gratitude. The kids are well cast: Robert J. Anderson as George, Jean Gale becomes Donna Reed, Jeanine Ann Roose as Gloria Grahame (who's terrific hysterical in scene where she's arrested).

It's medically proven to clear all olfactory passageways.

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (2002 Chris Columbus)

Remember that song, 'I Don't Like Spiders and Snakes'? Well, this is not the film for that person.

Kenneth Branagh is fun as the celebrity teacher who's a fraud. Introducing: Dobby the house elf (voiced by Toby Jones) and Ginny Weasley (Bonnie Wright).

Jason Isaacs chews the scenery more than Alan Rickman in this one.

Great attention to detail evident in this beautifully designed and aged book:

John Williams' orchestrations are wonderful. Shot by Roger Pratt (The Fisher King, Mona Lisa, Dutch Girls. Brazil, Meantime) and edited by Peter Honess.

Close To The Enemy (2016 Stephen Poliakoff & scr)

OK, we really didn't get Jim Sturgess's accent (like a cut rate James Bond, or the guy from Garth Marenghi). And we found the behaviour of his brother Freddie Highmore frequently annoying. But both are fine actors, and they are surrounded by many others: Alfred Molina, Lindsay Duncan, Robert Glenister, Alfie Allen, Charity Wakefield (actress), Phoebe Fox (the war crimes investigator), Anglea Bassett and August Diehl. And the eyes of little Lucy Ward just bore right into you.

Fantastic locations (the hotel being Martins Bank in Liverpool), typically twisty plot, like Glorious 39 about the behind-the-scenes of WWII, Poliakoff's trademark long shots. He has a way of making his buildings come to life. Contrary to reports, good final seventh episode. We really enjoyed it.

Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone (2001 Chris Col

I can't get my wife to watch Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, Busby Berkeley musicals, The Adventures of Robin Hood or The New World.

http://nicksfilmjottings.blogspot.co.uk/2013/12/harry-potter-and-philosophers-stone.html

Of the young trio, Emma Watson was and is the best man.

Bad Santa (2003 Terry Zwigoff)

Written by John Requa and Glenn Ficara who are producing and directing TV's success This Is Us.

Seem to be hearing Saint-Saens samples in everything from Ill Manors, Masterchef to this.

Said it all last year.

A Christmas Story (1983 Bob Clark)

..who also directed the festive horror film Black Christmas. This is the product of loved American writer and broadcaster Jean Shepherd, who also narrates the film (there's rather too much narration) and wrote the book of small town Americana 'In God We Trust, All Others Pay Cash' (1962) on which it is based. Although most of the cast and crew are unfamiliar (it came out under the MGM label) clearly money has been spent on its recreation of the 1940s.

Melinda Dillon, Darren McGavin, Peter Billingsley.

It's warm but real (soap, swearing, dogs, Chinese Christmas).

The Holiday (2006 Nancy Myers & scr)

Um. The music is a bit OTT. Did Nancy take Bridget Jones as her point of departure? Who cares?

UK scenes in Godalming and Shere (also the home of AMOLAD's camera obscura scene). Good editing evident (Joe Hutshing). Dean (Halloween, Back to the Future) Cundey shot it.

Nancy's written some pertinent digs about the nature of the modern film business.

Come September (1961 Robert Mulligan)

It's the one where rich businessman Rock Hudson's Portofino villa is being used the rest of the year as a hotel (with three stars) by his man Walter Slezak. Somewhat stretched plot has his once a month / once a year (?) GF Gina Lollabrigida (that alone is incredible) come visiting whilst for dubious reasons they continue to pretend it's a hotel. Cue sub plots involving Brenda de Banzie, Sandra Dee and Bobby Darin, leading a band of jerks (Joel Grey good in support - who became Cabaret's ringmaster), who don't exactly set the reputation of USA high.

Story has Hudson in charge of girls' honour and is thus somewhat dated (even then) - could in fact be remade quite effectively, as central idea is OK. Gina's intended and his sisters provide good quips like 'You spent two nights with another man, you're arrested by the police - once we're married this will have to stop'.

Shot by Bill Daniels in CinemaScope. Universal.

Shock news - Rock in pink hat kisses woman!

Films of the Year 2016

Forgot how good they are:
Lost in Translation. Force of Evil. Sirk's A Time to Love and a Time to Die / Imitation of Life. The Door in the Floor. Nebraska. Stars and Bars. Wonder Boys, L.A. Confidential and In Her Shoes (three very different Curtis Hanson films, who died this year too early). The Magnificent Ambersons. Michel Gondry's Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and Be Kind Rewind.

New old classics:
Thieves' Highway / They Drive By Night / On Dangerous Ground (linked by I.A. Bezzerides). A Lady Without Passport. Man with a Movie Camera. Portrait of Jennie. Cluny Brown (undiscovered Lubitsch - thanks Peter Bogdanovich). Gold Diggers of 1933 (staggering stuff from Busby Berkeley).

Discoveries:
Accident. The Optimists of Nine Elms. The Black Stallion. Wrony (Crows).

Fantastic Year for TV:
War and Peace. The Night Manager. Line of Duty. The A Word (Peter Bowker). True Detective: Season Two (much better than touted). Ellen (devastating one off drama). The return of Cold Feet. Humans. This Is Us (Dan Fogelman.)

New (to us):
Irrational Man. Café Society.
The Spectacular Now / The Fault in our Stars. Shailene Woodley (The Descendants) double bill, both written by Scott Neustadter and Michael H Weber.
Bridge of Spies.
Room.
Joy (David O Russell).
Hail Caesar! (the Coens funniest film).
Youth.
The Lunchbox.

Agatha Christie's Marple: Ordeal by Innocence (2007 Moira Armstrong)

A TV director who doesn't know how to use close ups.

Who killed Jane Seymour? Geraldine McEwan finds out, with the help of dithery Julian Rhind-Tutt (who doesn't fall in love with anyone, but is excellent as always). Suspects: Juliet Stevenson, Denis Lawson, Alison Steadman, Richard Armitage etc. with Reece Shearsmith the slow detective.

Agatha's 1958 novel was apparently one of her two favourites, and the plot isn't as labyrinthine as some.

Young and Innocent (1937 AH)

As before. With great casting in smaller parts it's a shame that leads Nova Pilbean are colourless and Derrick de Marney variable.

Hitch is doing that look into camera from end of table again, like Murder.

We assume the dog survives the collapsing mine.

Love Actually (2003 Richard Curtis & scr)

What? It's almost Christmas.

You have to admire the fun Curtis is having, certainly with the three most successful romantic storylines (new PM and tea girl, writer with woman who can't speak English, two sex film stand-ins).

In places though, you have to wonder if this is Curtis's Dirty Old Man movie.

For those who still think Kiera Knightley can't act, I'd refer them to the scene where she's watching the wedding video...

To answer my own question, the opening and closing airport footage is real (not actors):
http://www.vulture.com/2013/10/rom-com-king-richard-curtis-is-a-fool-for-love.html

The Odd Life of Timothy Green (2012 Peter Hedges)

Admiring the work of Hedges I tried to like this, but didn't. I have to blame Frank's son Ahmet Zappa for the story, made for Disney.

Jennifer Garner, Joel Egerton, Dianne Wiest, M Emmett Walsh and CJ Adams as the tree-boy.

Miracle in Soho (1957 Julian Amyes)

Written by Emeric Pressburger in the 1930s ('The Miracle of St Anthony's Lane' - which was not a novel) he finally ventured to produce it himself and used P&P talents Chris Challis on camera, Arthur Stevens editor (Ill Met by Moonlight) and Brian Easdale's music. The idea of setting a film around a gang of road workers is innovative, as is the collection of Soho inhabitants from different cultures. Whilst being warm and charming it doesn't quite work. Is it John Gregson's fault? Is it Carmen Dillon's sets?

Cast incorporates Cyril Cusack (who for once has substantial screen time), Belinda Lee, Rosalie Crutchley (her sister), Peter Illing, Ian Bannen (none of these 'Italians' are very convincing), Billie Whitelaw, Cyril Chaps, John Cairney and Barbara Archer.

Hampered by the fact that it only comes in a fuzzy, cropped print of the Eastmancolor original which cramps the frame and the action.

The Wackiest Ship in the Army (1960 Richard Murphy & scr)

Herbert Carlson story, adapted by Herbert Margolis and William Raynor and screenwritten by the director. Murphy was a writer of thrillers such as Boomerang!, House on Telegraph Hill and Compulsion,  and directing not his strong suit. This is one of that category of WWII hybrids which isn't quite sure whether to be a hi-jinks comedy or a drama, a balancing act which Operation Petticoat probably pulls off better than most. Of main interest for Jack Lemmon, who is as usual totally credible as a put-upon ex yachtsman / skipper.

With Ricky Nelson, fresh from Rio Bravo, and lots of other actors we didn't recognise, though that Alvy Moore is in it again - since the end of Susan Slept Here his naval career isn't going very well (he can't even make a decent cup of coffee). Patricia Driscoll wins Worst Accent of the Year (we assume she was supposed to be Australian but it's a kind of mangled Dick Van Dyke).

It's shot mainly on location (Kauai, which is why the skies look so stormy) by Charles Lawton in CinemaScope (an aspect ratio which isn't used very well), scored by Charles Duning, for Columbia.

North by Northwest (1959 Alfred Hitchcock)

Interesting things with hands going on, e.g. in Grant and Saint's first kiss sequence on board train, then later as Mason's hand is on Saint's neck in auction scene. Also a couple of unusual shots of the back of heads. (Eve Marie Saint from behind on railway platform is replicated exactly in Marnie.)

Most notably though film seems preoccupied with geometry and shapes, from the opening shot of the building and those strangely perspective credits titles; for example, the crop dusting scene is largely composed of different beautifully angled shots of the roadway (figures in a landscape). Even the weird house on stilts uses its construction artfully. Also the scene between Grand and Saint amidst all those perfectly vertical trees.

Many great silent sequences, clever staging, very funny Mount Rushmore climax. James Mason incredibly suave, Martin Landau ominous, Jessie Royce Landis funny as unhelpful mother, Leo G Carroll, Adam Williams.

It's like the personification of a bad dream.

I Love You Man (2009 John Hamburg & scr)

Reasonably crude comedy with Paul Rudd befriending somewhat primal Jason Segal. Fun though to be had in the made-up language of these two (Rudd usually getting it wrong) and co-worker Rob Huebel. With Rashida Jones, J.K. Simmons, Andy Samberg (brother), Jon Favreau. Nothing very interesting going on here.

Rebel Without a Cause (1954 Nicholas Ray & story)

James Dean's struggle to communicate with his useless parents (Jim Backus and Ann Doran) is still the most powerful thing about it. Also notable is how messed up the Sal Mineo character is, though there they are the three of them, a little ready-made family. With Natalie Wood, the three stars were all fated to die too young.

Corey Allen good as 'Buzz' - now long time established as an American TV director. As well as Dennis Hopper as a JD there's Frank Mazzola, best known to me as Donald Cammell's editor. According to Variety's Jan 2015 obit:

In addition to playing the character of Crunch, Mazzola provided technical assistance on the film, advising director Nicholas Ray on creating the reality of rebellious teens from middle class families. He aided in the choosing of the film’s 1949 Mercury 8 Coupe as well as the red jacket worn by Dean in the film, and even helped stage the knife duel between Dean and Corey Allen.

Susan Slept Here (1954 Frank Tashlin)

Mildly risqué but mainly sweet comedy about man 'adopting' runaway 17 year old. Dick Powell, Debbie Reynolds, Anne Francis (the girlfriend), Glenda Farrell, Alvy Moore (in absolutely every TV show imaginable).

Shot in colour by Nick Musaraca for RKO. Alex Gottlieb adapted his and Steve Fisher's play.

P.S. 29 December 2016. Debbie Reynolds died yesterday, one day after her daughter Carrie Fisher.

The Rewrite (2014 Marc Lawrence & scr)

A bit more flabby that Music and Lyrics, with lost opportunities (e.g. why give the odd English Lit professor the gift of Shakespeare one-liners if he doesn't use them?) A bit weak - Allison Janney's wound up professor, J.K. Simmons as too feminine principal, Bella Heathcote's man bait. With Aja Naomi King, Maggie Geha, Annie Q. and Steven Kaplan as students.

Music and Lyrics (2007 Marc Lawrence)

After TV series Family Ties, Lawrence wrote the Michael J Fox film Life with Mikey, then Miss Congeniality, before embarking on a series with Hugh Grant: Two Weeks Notice, Music and Lyrics, Did You Hear About the Morgans? and The Rewrite.

I enjoyed this more than before. Has been pop star (Grant actually doing his own singing) teams up with plant waterer Drew Barrymore to write tune for wacky new pop star Hayley Bennett (Marley and Me, The Girl on the Train). His agent Brad Garrett is like the natural descendant of Herb Edelman and you expect him to be in The Odd Couple. Barrymore also can't get over ex Campbell Scott. Asif Madvi as the tone deaf receptionist was in The Internship, Ruby Sparks and It's Kind of a Funny Story.

Did notice the Roland D50 in the 1984 Pop! video was wrong (it wasn't released till 1987). Adam Schlesinger wrote most of the songs, which aren't bad ('Way Back Into Love' and 'Don't Write Me Off'). Funny, I thought Lawrence would have written the lyrics at least.

Anita and Me (2002 Metin Huseyin)

Meera Syal's autobiographical novel was published in 1996 and she adapted it herself and took the part of the wife's best friend - therefore something of a personal project. 1972: the Midlands (cue a variety of dodgy accents). She doesn't shy away from violence and racism present in backwater town. Marks off for not featuring any Bowie in the soundtrack.

Anna Brewster and Chandeep Uppal are the titular couple, with Ayeesha Dharker and Sanjeev Bhaskar as parents. With Omaid Djalili, Lynne Redgrave, Max Beesley, Kathy Burke, Mark Williams and Christine Tremarco.

Outsourced (2006 John Jeffcoat & co-scr)

...with 50 First Dates' George Wing. Fine-featured Josh Hamilton (good) heads to India to run call centre, with Asif Basra and Ayesha Dharker (The Indian Doctor, Anita and Me, City of Joy). It's a sort of familiar story which could have ended with any number of feel good moments but somehow doesn't... Loosely based on Jeffcoat's travels in India and Nepal.

Suitable music by BC Smith. Teodoro Maniaci (mainly documentaries and TV) shot it.

It's a bit rose-coloured but politely enjoyable.

School of Rock (2003 Richard Linklater)

Hardly an original idea, film is carried along by Jack Black's gusto and the performances of kids who can really play - evident in long takes, especially the end credits, a single take which reveals the players' virtuosity and Black's exuberant inspiration (he gave them all their nicknames, for example). Writer Mike White plays the real Ned Scheebly, wrote the film for Black, Joan Cusack is the principal. We hadn't seen it for 22 years.

Shot by Rogier Stoffers.

Jack should play it straight in a thriller. He's been in HBO satire The Brink with Tim Robbins.

The Cry of the Owl (2009 Jamie Thraves & scr)

Based on 1962 Patricia Highsmith novel. Fifty minutes in we're still wondering who is nuts and who will be killed, but by this time everyone's looking dodgy: Paddy Considine (mental breakdown), Julia Stiles (stalker), James Gilbert (volatile boyfriend) and ex Caroline Dhavernas (bitch). Plot is sinewy, leaves audience with cliffhanger. (Not sure we care greatly about the main character, a problem which Highsmith herself had).

I think there's one nutter too many, and Stiles' suicide seems bonkers. I think I would have written her as the normal and supportive character, who finds herself beginning to suspect Considine. Thus maybe making her the sympathetic one? There you go, I'll go off and rewrite it.

Dark photography in widescreen by Luc Montpellier, brooding score by Jeff Danna. Shot in Canada, a Canadian-German co-production.

Thraves made music videos Including Radiohead's 'Just', the short I Just Want to Kiss You in 1997 with Martin Freeman, and debuted in 2000 with The Low Down which has mixed reviews, some of the 'brilliant' sort. His material here is nicely restrained.

Father Brown (1954 Robert Hamer & co-scr)

Thelma Schnee helped Hamer adapt G.K. Chesterton's novel into a concise and zippy film. Alec Guinness is the detective-vicar after international criminal Peter Finch, who finds Joan Greenwood one good reason for going back to church. Refreshingly, crisply filmed in French locations by Harry Waxman with a typically bumptious score by Georges Auric.

With Bernard Lee, Cecil Parker, Sid James, Ernest Thesiger.

Ill Manors (2012 Ben Drew & scr)

I must say, I was hooked from hearing a rap track which samples Saint-Saëns ('I Am the Narrator'). Plan B's most inventive debut, in which he raps the characters' back stories in ultra tough inner city tales (Forest Gate) - deprived and abused childhoods seem to figure largely in characters' lives. Nasty in its depiction of violence towards women - it's a wonder they don't all group together and kill the shit scum who abuse them.

With Riz Ahmed (good as usual) and hot-headed Ed Skrein, Anouska Mond (smack hooker), Eloise Smyth (15 year old) and Natalie Press (young mother), Danielle Brent (social worker), Neil Large (fat bastard), Lee Allen (scarred), Ryan de la Cruz (teenager), Keef Coggins (dealer who gets shot), Mem Ferda (Russian) and Nick Sagar. Plan B is himself a taxi driver, not the only nod to that film (La Haine was also a big impression when he was growing up).

Shot by Gary Shaw, who began as a special effects photographer and then a director of car ads.

Alice (1990 Woody Allen & scr)

Mia Farrow lives a sterile, cossetted high life with William Hurt and their children, who are largely looked after by nannies. She is attracted to Joe Mantegna, visits Chinese herbalist Keye Luke, where the fun begins. Film is much deeper than that, however, and rewards repeat viewing - it's one of the overlooked ones, beautifully staged.

Beautifully shot by Carlo di Palma and decorated by Santo Loquasto. With Julie Kavner, June Squibb, Judy Davis, Alec Baldwin, Cybill Shepherd, Blythe Danner, Patrick O'Neal and Bob Balaban.

Superb music choices include:

Jackie Gleason 'Limehouse Blues'
Artie Shaw 'Moonglow'
The Castilians 'La Cumparsita'
Duke Ellington 'Caravan'
Jackie Gleason 'I Remember You'
Wayne King 'Alice Blue Gown'
Bach, Violin Concerto No. 1 in A minor
Thelonius Monk 'Darn That Dream'
Firehouse Five Plus Two 'Southern Comfort'
Neal Hefti 'Flight of the Foo Birds'

Farrow was great. Red seems a prominent theme colour here.

Punch-Drunk Love (2002 Paul Thomas Anderson)

A remarkable film, unlike any other, particularly in its incessant soundtrack, which emulates the workings of a troubled mind. Startlingly, stunningly filmed with remarkable tracking shots, many moments where you could freeze and frame the still (Robert Elswit). A meaty role for Adam Sandler, with Emily Watson, Luis Guzman, Mary Lynn Rajskub, Philip Seymour Hoffman.

Jon Brion also has the room to write a charming love theme. Leslie Jones has put it together.

Chortlingly funny. And we find ourselves back in Hawaii for the third time today ('Modern Family' season 1 being the first).

Seems to me to be a red and blue colour theme thing going on. Noticed certain photos in backgrounds too. Lots of subtle stuff in evidence.

50 First Dates (2004 Peter Segal)

This was George Wing's debut screenplay. Do you know what? I would have been very happy to have written this. It's nothing great but a good little story, romantic and funny. One or two things are a bit lame (concerning supporting characters and marine zoo) but overall good. He then co-wrote Outsourced (US-India culture clash) and the ensuing TV series.

Adam Sandler, Drew Barrymore, Dan Aykroyd, Rob Schneider, Sean Astin, Amy Hill, Maya Rudolph. Nicely shot by Jack Green.

The Black Cat (1934 Edgar G. Ulmer & co-scr)

I find it difficult to take anything with Lugosi in seriously; in this case it's compounded by the fact that Karloff kept reminding us of Phil Dunphy in Modern Family (played by Ty Burrell). Stilted acting (David Manners and Julie Bishop, Egon Brecher and Harry Cording) doesn't help. Controversial, censor-disrupted 'Black Magic' scene is just funny - 1930s audiences surely also found it so. The road is impassable - so who are all those people who suddenly appear at the ceremony?

The film though does have a creepy sense of the perverse - that's Karloff sleeping with a dead woman, isn't it? And Lugosi is about to peel all Karloff's skin off. And Karloff has 'married' Lugosi's daughter, etc etc.

Ulmer manages some quite interesting visuals here and there but the mood is always killed by the use of classical music cues over the action, which are just wrong. (No reviewers seem to notice this.)

Modern production design by Charles Hall, shot by John Mescall for Universal.

The Man with Two Brains (1983 Carl Reiner)

Inspired lunacy, written by star Steve Martin, George Gipe (one of only two) and Reiner (now 94). The line 'Pass the Metzenbaum scissors, and get that cat out of here' is so good it's in it twice. Martin is partnered by Kathleen Turner, clad in a variety of lingerie, and David Warner as the mad professor.

There's something strangely touching about a man who takes his brain rowing, then insanity prevails again as he sticks wax lips on it. Anne Uumellmahaye is voiced by Sissy Spacek.

Shot by Michael Chapman; Polly Platt is one of the production designers.

A Renoir gets it

Grosse Pointe Blank (1997 George Armitage)

Tom Jankiewicz, who Wikipedia kindly states was 'best known' for this story (and screenplay contribution) in fact only wrote this one thing while he earned money as a teacher and cashier, and had the idea after his own high school reunion invitation came in (he didn't attend). Subsequently he was in advertising and apparently as a script doctor before his untimely death aged 49, during a Q&A on the film.

So, who is Steve Pink? You often see that name in connection with a John Cusack project. They both came from Evanston Illinois, near Chicago (as did co-star Jeremy Piven) and share a production company with the other co-writer of this D.V. DeVincentis 'New Crime Productions', which made this, High Fidelity and Hot Tub Time Machine (which Pink also directed).

Cusack and co-star Minnie Driver are both special. You watch them closely and you'll be rewarded by something good.

I'm actually not quite sure who Cusack's target is, but who cares? Dan Aykroyd, Alan Arkin and Joan Cusack all seem to be having fun. With Hank Azaria and K. Todd Freeman as government agents.

Armitage started out as associate producer of TV's Peyton Place in the sixties; most recently he directed the Big Bounce remake in 2004.

The eighties reunion theme allows for a classic soundtrack of music notably featuring Joe Strummer.

Cash McCall (1959, released 1960 Joseph Pevney)

From the same author as the 'Executive Suite' novel Cameron Hawley, adapted by Lenore Coffee (The Great Lie) and Marion Hargrove. James Garner is the forerunner of the Richard Gere character in Pretty Woman whose business is buying and selling companies - only this one belongs to Natalie Wood and her dad Dean Jagger, also from Exec Suite, as is hotel manager Nina Foch (in a slightly barking sub plot). Hard-working Henry Jones, familiar to us from Vertigo, Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? and The Girl Can't Help It, latterly much on TV, is the lawyer with a conscience. With E.G. Marshall and Otto Kruger.

Wood doesn't have much to do, really. At one point she and Garner are about to eat chilli con carne with a glass of milk. She had a lucky escape there.

It drifts along quite happily, undisturbed by anything serious. There's a definite cut in the flashback scene of Natalie stripping off (the music track jumps) which needs investigating.

Shot by George Folsey for Warner Brothers.

Murder! (1930 Alfred Hitchcock)

In Hitch's first full sound film I was wondering if it was bad mixing that results in scene where Herbert Marshall decides to get involved in the investigation over a rather too loud broadcast of 'Tristan and Isolde' which, like in a Buñuel, drowns out the dialogue. In fact it's a recurring trick, from the overly loud knocking which opens the film and (in tracking shot) wakes a load of residents, through a domestic scene drowned out by a child's piano practice, and finally in an amusing episode where Marshall's morning bed is invaded by a family replete with annoying crying baby. (There's his trademark car horn 'parps' too, I'm pleased to report.) It was almost as though Hitch said 'You wanted sound - you got sound. Annoying, isn't it?'

Film has plenty of other cinematic tricks up its sleeve as well, such as an expressionistic moment where a carpet seems to be fluid, the shadow of the gallows creeping up a wall, amusing inserts of food, and a subjective camera at each end of a long table interview scene. Plus rapid editing, and a jury scene which almost becomes a musical by Rufus Norris.

Acting, particularly by Marshall, good, including Edward Chapman and Phyllis Konstam (as husband and wife team involved), Norah Baring, Miles Mander, Esme Percy and Donald Calthrop.

Written by Hitch and Walter Mycroft and Alma, from the play 'Enter Sir John' by Clemence Dane and Helen Simpson. Shot by J.J. Cox and put together by Rene Marrison.