Pride (2014 Matthew Warchus)

Review here. Directed in a dynamic style where the camera is often moving (tracking), this film has pace (Melanie Oliver edited). Stephen Beresford wrote nothing else (a play 'Last of the Haussmans') but won the BAFTA for Outstanding debut. Of the great cast, Ben Schnetzer is our charismatic leader, has several films in pipeline and some dark ones out there (e.g. The Riot Club). Faye Marsay is the lesbian (GOT, Love, Nina). And rest of cast: George Mackay, Nighy, Staunton, Gilpin, Scott, Dominic West (rather charismatic himself), Freddie Fox.

Tiny Furniture (2010 Lena Dunham & scr)

The film Judd Apatow saw and liked, approached Lena and Girls was born.

Reviewed here.

Once Upon a Time In the West / C'era Una Volta Il West (1969 Sergio Leone)

Filmed mainly in Almería, but with a memorable scene in John Ford's Monument Valley, a real big (it stays with you for days, months later you start singing Robards' signature theme...), emotional western, unique in Leone's work for the central character of the strong woman (something Bertolucci brought to the table) - Gina Lollabrigida is wonderful. Tonino Delli Colli's camera cranes and sweeps and the deep focus of his Techniscope lenses is remarkable.

The length Leone spends on some scenes is incredible from the opening onwards (the gunmen are Jack Elam, Woody Strode and Al Mulock) and indeed by the final showdown between Charles Bronson and the perfectly evil Henry Fonda I was laughing away at the over-the-topness of it - the film is knowingly funny. Here, there's three minutes of Bronson and Fonda just lining up in front of each other .. then, with the flashback, another three minutes before the shot is fired! But these's also very simple scenes like where Marco Zuanelli goes to the train and we have this lovely train come towards us and then out of frame leaving those tracks going back into infinity - lovely framing.

The soundtrack even without the music is amazing.

As Q observes, it's all in the eyes. And even in widescreen, Leone does get that intimacy through his huge close ups:

With Jason Robards, Gabriele Ferzetti, Lionel Stander, Paolo Stoppa (The Leopard) and Keenan Wynn. Fantastic production design from Carlo Simi and editing by Nino Baragli.

Compare to this GBU shot

The Sin of Harold Diddlebock (1947 Preston Sturges & scr)

Sadly only available in the awful print kindly made available by the bandits at Elstree Hill, this is not prime Sturges but recognisably his and a great entertainment - certainly more successful than the following year's Unfaithfully Yours. I wouldn't be surprised if he was pissed when he wrote it. Title is questionable (omit 'The Sin of'?)

Harold Lloyd is very successful in the lead, supported by a whole host of Sturges' favourite actors - Jimmy Conlin, Raymond Walburn (Christmas in July), Rudy Vallee, Franklin Pangborn, Robert Dudley and Robert Greig, plus Lionel Stander and Frances Ramsden (her only lead role). Full of cherishable lines and moments (e.g. Lloyd doing the nails of manicurist Arline Judge) and featuring the sensational Jackie the Lion, about whom I could find nothing - though it seems he was the MGM lion from 1926 - 1956. Scene with him on ledge is hilarious and terrifying.

Released by RKO after Howard Hughes recut as Mad Wednesday in 1950.

School for Scoundrels (1959, released 1960 Robert Hamer)

Based on Stephen Potter's novels, ostensibly (see below) screenwritten by Patricia Moyles and Hal Chester, film delivers a good story of oneupmanship usurped by decency and love - a cop out, then, though the end credits show Terry-Thomas is going to get his own back... Ian Carmichael is at his most sprightly (we loved his tennis racket twirling), Alastair Sim superbly shady, Janette Scott delectable. With Dennis Price and Peter Jones, Hattie Jacques, John Le Mesurier, Irene Handl, Kynaston Reeves.

Corus Hotel Edgware stands in for tennis club (and is also seen in Endless Night), Carmichael's flat is in Hendon, 'Yeovil' railway station is in Hertford. The cars - Thomas's 'Bellini' is a 1954 Aston Martin DB3S and Carmichael's new sports car is a 1958 Austin Healey 100/6:

Oh, hard cheese!

Erwin Hillier's photography is robust, though somewhat shadowy in interiors. Music - John Addison.

According to the BFI:

"Although credited to Patricia Moyes and producer Hal Chester, the screenplay was co-written by Peter Ustinov and Frank Tarloff, an American-born screenwriter who had been exiled to Britain after being blacklisted by the McCarthy hearings. Credited director Robert Hamer would suffer a blacklist of a different kind - a recovering alcoholic, he fell off the wagon during production, was sacked on the spot (Chester and the uncredited Cyril Frankel finished the film), and would never work in the industry again." Hamer died in 1963 of pneumonia, aged 52. A shame - I rather like his films.

Whistle Down the Wind (1961 Bryan Forbes)

Another enigmatic title from Hayley's mum, her novel being adapted by Keith Waterhouse and Willis Hall. Lives of rural children again observed so well - and the acting of Diane Holgate and Alan Barnes is every bit as good as Hayley's (Diane made no other films, Alan just the one - The Victors).

Bernard Lee also terrific in unusual role for him; Alan Bates good in debut.

Grey northern England nicely shot by Arthur Ibbetson. Music by Malcom Arnold.

Airplane 2: The Sequel (1982 Ken Finleman & scr)

Julie Hagerty, Robert Hays, Lloyd Bridges, Peter Graves, Robert Stack, Chuck Connors, William Shatner, Raymond Burr. Music: Bernstein. Photography: Biroc.

About one in every ten jokes works.

The Descendants (2011 Alexander Payne)

For some reason we kept picking films that made us cry. This is George's best performance but he's easily matched by Shailene Woodley - all the performances are great. The Hawaiian soundtrack gives it a unique flavour - especially 'Deep in an Ancient Hawaiian Forest' over the ashes at sea sequence (by Makana).

Phedon Papamichael shoots shallow focus but there's often some great detail in the background - great compositions.

Mask (1985 Peter Bogdanovich)

OK so this was not the reinstated Bruce Springsteen version - oops. Anna Hamilton Phelan wrote it (and also is the puppy lady), Laszlo Kovacs shot it quite diffused. It's again a model of how to edit, create scenes. Here's one of his Howard Hawks moments:

The make up is by Michael Westmore, son of Monte (died young at 37) and nephew of Perc and Wally - his name missing from IMDB for some reason...

Cher, Sam Elliott, Eric Stoltz, Estelle Getty, Richard Dysart, Laura Dern, Harry Carey Jr, Micole Mercurio, Dennis Burkley, Nick Cassavetes.

It's emotional. And very warm.

Vulture.com interview with PB, March 4 2019.

So who was the most difficult actor you’ve ever worked with?
Cher.

Tell me about your experience with her on Mask.
Well, she didn’t trust anybody, particularly men. She doesn’t like men. That’s why she’s named Cher: She dropped her father’s name. Sarkisian, it is. She can’t act. She won Best Actress at Cannes because I shot her very well.
And she can’t sustain a scene. She couldn’t do what Tatum [O’Neal] did in Paper Moon. She’d start off in the right direction, but she’d go off wrong somehow, very quickly. So I shot a lot of close-ups of her because she’s very good in close-ups. Her eyes have the sadness of the world. You get to know her, you find out it’s self-pity, but still, it translates well in movies.Roger Ebert loved Mask and Cher’s performance, writing, “Cher makes Rusty Dennis into one of the most interesting movie characters in a long time.”  I shot more close-ups of her than I think in any picture I ever made.

You can create an award-winning performance with close-ups?
Oh yes, you can. I did a number of times.

What did Cher think of you?
Cher doesn’t like me.

Why?
Well, because I didn’t like her. She was always looking like someone was cheating her. I came to the set one day; I said, “You depress me, you’re always so down and acting like somebody’s stealing from you or something.” But finally, after about seven weeks of this, we started getting to like each other. She said, you know, we don’t watch out, we might end up liking each other. I said that would be amazing. And we did end up liking each other, and then when I sued the studio, she sided with the studio, of course. That was that.

Stage Door (1937 Gregory la Cava)

A treat to have Kate Hepburn and Ginger Rogers together in fast talking RKO drama, written by Morrie Ryskind (Marx Bros. films, My Man Godfrey) and Anthony Veiller (The Stranger, The Killers, Night of the Iguana, Moulin Rouge), based on a play by Edna Ferber and George Kaufman (The Man Who Came to Dinner).  Adolphe Menjou is the producer. With Gail Patrick (the snooty one), Andrea Leeds (the starving one), Constance Collier (matron), Lucille Ball, Eve Arden, Phyllis Kennedy, Franklin Pangborn, Jack Carson.

Shot by Robert de Grasse, music by Roy Webb.

Good.

Ed Wood (1994 Tim Burton)

Had been wanting to rewatch it, then heard Martin Landau had died - it's a fitting tribute. It was an ironic shock to see how he is credited:

His performance as Lugosi is absolutely wonderful (he won the Golden Globe and Oscar) and with the benefit of Rick Baker's make-up (also won Oscar) you frequently forget it is he.

From a biography by Rudolph Grey ('Nightmare of Ecstasy'), written by Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski. Film was nominated for the Palme d'Or and is beautifully made (continuous seeming track through credits, for example) and photographed (by Stefan Czapsky - also Vampire's Kiss and Edward Scissorhands) in pin sharp black and white, like a beautifully restored 50s film.

Johnny Depp, Sarah Jessica Parker, Patricia Arquette, Jeffrey Jones, Bill Murray, Vincent D'Onofrio (Orson Welles), Lisa Marie (Vampira).

At an hour and 45 we found it was running out of steam - or we were. Two hours is too long?

'Give me a script in three days - we've got five days to film it.' It's that kind of joyous madness. 'A second take? What for?'

Bottle Rocket (1996 Wes Anderson)

Owen Wilson and Wes wrote a film in the warm influence of They All Laughed. It bombed.

It's a fun, delightful film, very quirky, filmed in a beautiful style in which characters are blocked in scenes in interesting ways (we often have one of them very near to the foreground), with great depth of field from Robert Yeoman, and good lighting in long tracking shots. There's also evidence of the way Wes likes characters to pop in to the frame.

With Luke Wilson, Robert Musgrave (who was not in Hard Times at Ridgemont High), Lumi Cavazos, James Caan and Kumar Pallana (who looks like he's been told nothing about the plot whatsoever). The bully is played by a Teddy Wilson, but despite my earlier claim he is not one of those Wilsons. And the uncredited cast includes Antonia Bogdanovich and Leslie Mann.

Dignan a hilarious name taken from one of their friends (as is 'Tennenbaum'), great little motorbike, scene with gun, housekeeping etc.

Corridor of Mirrors (1948 Terence Young)

Does this reflect a post-war interest in the supernatural? We pretty solidly neither got nor liked this pale and fishy film. Eric Portman's character is totally unsympathetic and we care less about Edana Romney, who took the trouble to co-adapt the screenplay - she shouldn't have bothered. Auric's music is used badly. The whole thing is rather silly.

How to make smoking look not cool

Of historical interest - Christopher Lee's first film.

Hollywood Ending (2002 Woody Allen & scr)

Another great idea from Woody's bedside drawer - film director goes psychosomatically blind but can't tell anyone or his career is over. Amongst others he's helped by Chinese translator Barney Cheng, pictured below, with investigative journalist Jodie Markell on his right:

Leading to some undeniably funny scenes where Woody blindly confronts sexy actress Tiffani Thiessen, studio head Treat Williams, the problem is that Woody spends a lot of the film looking into mid-air (where you'd look towards the sound source), so there's rather too much of this stuff going on:

No problem with any of the other performances, Woody's agent in particular played with warm stoicism by film director Mark Rydell.

Pictured above Woody, Rydell, Téa Leoni (good in long takes), George Hamilton, Treat Williams.

Debra Messing is Woody's girlfriend, Yu Lu is the cameraman, Erica Leerhsen an actress.

It's shot by Wedigo Von Schutlzendorff and designed by Santo Loquato. (Scene showing the creatives discussing redesigning Central Park is funny - 'I cannot work with green'.)

At 112 minutes it's one of Woody's longest.

"Every husband should go blind for a while."

Café Society (2016 Woody Allen & scr)

What an utterly divine looking film, thank you Woody (81), Vittorio Storaro (76) and Santo Loquasto (72).

I think the first new film we saw in the now terribly trendy 2:1 ratio.

Plot owes a certain something to The Apartment and is satisfyingly ironic, exploits thirties milieu well.

Jesse Eisenberg, Blake Lively (his wife), Steve Carrell, Jeannie Berlin (mother), Parker Posey (New Yorker), Corey Stoll, and Ken Stott ... but Kristen Stewart walks off with the film.

Since You Went Away (1944 John Cromwell)

Margaret Buell Wilder adapted her own novel (a series of letters to her husband) and it was written by David Selznick - probably a mistake, for though the film covers similar territory to Best Years of Our Lives it isn't its equal despite great performances and treatment. Claudette Colbert, Jennifer Jones and Shirley Temple (and maid Hattie McDaniel) let out their home to Monty Woolley, involving grandson Robert Walker and friend Joseph Cotten. A lugubrious dog completes the menagerie. Agnes Moorehead is a bitchy friend and Lionel Barrymore and Albert Bassermann appear briefly. (All acting good.)  The problem I feel is that the film forces sentimentality on you, cranked up by Max Steiner's score. However it is sincere and moving and well acted, with plenty of laughs and interesting detail.

Jones and Walker were nearing the end of their marriage here.

Typically complicated Selznick production also has Tay Garnett and Edward Cline directing sections. Cameraman George Barnes began it, then Stanley Cortez filmed the first third (he was either called up or sacked, depending on the source) and Lee Garmes finished it - so all those moments of beautiful dark which I confidently asserted were Cortez weren't... though this one could have been:

Also love the modernity of this tracking shot (Cortez again):

The DVD, complete with overture and intermission, runs 177 minutes. It's a bit of an emotional monster.

Endless Night (1972 Sidney Gilliat & scr)

Agatha Christie's crafty later (1967) novel, adapted by Gilliat, given early seventies accoutrements (Moog, sex, zoom lens, flash editing). Gruff Hywel Bennett romances American heiress Hayley Mills to death. With Britt Ekland, George Sanders (a year away from suicide brought on by failing health), Per Oscarsson, Peter Bowles, Aubrey Richards (doctor), Lois Maxwell. That is clearly not Hayls singing the theme song.

The Isle of Wight, apparently

The house - with its one way glass and hidden swimming pool - is far out (Wilfred Shingleton). Shot by Harry Waxman and scored in the familiar doomed love theme style of Bernard Herrmann. The giant eye at the end is risible.

Inception (2010 Christopher Nolan & scr)

Funnily enough it begins right where our last film left off - on the beach. Nolan's inventive film inhabits the same territory as Gondry's Eternal Sunshine - but lacks that film's heart and invention despite some amazing moments, of which the fight in the corridor is the standout - though it's territory Cocteau presented years earlier (very slow fall of van into river also great). The battle in the snow feels like it's wandered in from OHMSS and could have easily been dumped, contributing to a shorter run time than its 148 minutes.

Won Oscars for Wally Pfister's photography (sorry, still not as good as August's for Portrait of Jennie), sound mixing and editing and special effects. Cast includes Leonardo di Caprio, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Ellen Page, Marion Cotillard, Tom Hardy, Michael Caine (fleetingly), Ken Watanabe, Dileep Rao and Cillian Murphy.

Not nearly as complicated as made out, film has really quite a weak premise and kept making me think of Fantastic Voyage (only the gang are voyaging through dreams, not the human body) and Mission Impossible. Also lacks a sense of humour.

Portrait of Jennie (1948 William Dieterle)

A strange and exceptional film, so well shot (Joseph August) it's like a Conrad Hall - take virtually any frame and it's a work of art. Interesting Irish sub-text too. Interesting cast. There's something about this film that is quite different to others. What? The music, the pacing, the atmosphere...the light. Complicated camera set ups like Hitch. In the final moments of the lighthouse there's a little freeze frame - so far ahead of its time. And the moment it turns green is still incredible.

In the portrait scene she almost seems to be slipping away from us...

Bernard Herrmann composed some music that wasn't used but can be heard here. Amazing special effects team headed by Clarence Slifer won Oscar, August nominated (lost to William H Daniels The Naked City). Selznick apparently loved it.

Jennifer Jones, Joseph Cotten, Ethel Barrymore, Cecil Kellaway, David Wayne (becoming a big fan), Lillian Gish, Felix Bressart, Florence Bates.

From a novel by Robert Nathan (1940 - a signed first is $1750), adapted by Leonardo Bercovici, written by Paul Osborn and Peter Berneis.

Clueless (1995 Amy Heckerling & scr)

Thoroughly enjoyed (a little pissed) again, showing it's all about the mood you're in. Many funny one-liners in Heckerling's script ('Surfing the crimson wave' etc.) Alicia Silverstone likeable as lead; with Stacey Dash, Paul Rudd, Dan Hedaya ('I couldn't be more pleased if they were real grades'), Wallace Shawn, Brittany Murphy, Jeremy Sisto, Justin Walker (who belongs in a fifties film).

Cheerily shot by Bill Pope.

The Spadena House (aka The Witch's House) designed in 1921 by Hollywood art director Harry Oliver - Q's 'Hansel and Gretel house'

Last Embrace (1979 Jonathan Demme)

Easily Demme's most Hitchcocky picture, emphasized by Miklos Rozsa's fabulous score which lends the film an entirely different weight. We seem to be in Spellbound / Vertigo territory in the main, with little references to Psycho, The Birds et al. in most enjoyable thriller based on Murray Teigh Bloom's novel 'The 13th Man', written by David Shaber (who taught screenwriting, though I have to say hasn't been associated with anything else of note - unless you count The Warriors - and who would?)

Roy Scheider is a fantastic actor who in the simplest of dialogue scenes actually looks like he's thinking and listening before answering, rather than just delivering a line. Janet Margolin is good in frankly nuts role. With John Glover and Sam Levene (you know, The Killers and Thin Man films), as a kind of Jewish detective, and Christopher Walken. Roger Corman isn't in this one.

As well as emulating the Master's view / POV travelling camera, Demme and photographer Tak Fujimoto use all sorts of lateral tracking shots, 360-degree rotations and intricate dolly shots, such as the one down the station platform as the train is coming in (giving a wonderful dynamic between the two forces in opposite motion). And he's doing that almost-into-camera thing which is so prevalent in Philadelphia. Even the titles (Pablo Ferro) are classy. Yes it's bonkers, but so cinematically done you don't care (a film lover's film, no question).

Whether or not we have films like Sylvia Scarlett any more is a moot point (Albert Nobbs was terrible) - but to not have scores by the likes of Rozsa any more is tragedy.

Review of 10 January 1995: 'Ludicrous thriller in Vertigo mould is well directed and benefits from lovely music. Scheider is edgily good'.

Sylvia Scarlett (1935 George Cukor)

Well acted, somewhat bizarre film, based on a novel by Compton MacKenzie (author of 'Whisky Galore' and the 'Highland' novels which inspired Monarch of the Glen), written by Gladys Unger, John Collier and Mortimer Offner is particularly suited to Katharine Hepburn, who would drive herself to set in trousers. She's very athletic and good playing a young man, and kept reminding me of David Bowie (Q says 'Station to Station' and 'Heroes' era). Cary Grant though is also good as rather unlikeable character, Edmund Gwenn good as fretful father, Brian Aherne very natural (almost modern) as painter, Dennie Moore the unfaithful singer.

Natalie Paley aka Princess Natalia Pavlovna Paley - a most interesting lady

Yes. Princess Paley narrowly escaped the fate of the rest of Tsar Nicholas's family, was later involved with Jean Cocteau, Antoine de Saint-Exupery and Erich Maria Remarque (who based a character on her in 'Shadows in Paradise')!

Good music from Radio Pictures regular Roy Webb, photographed by Joseph August.

Funnily enough it was on TV the very next day.

I'm All Right Jack (1959 John Boulting)

Based on Alan Hackney's novel and adapted by Frank Harvey and John Boulting (same then as 1956's Private's Progress), featuring a classy cast of Ian Carmichael, Terry-Thomas, Peter Sellars (totally credible), Irene Handl, Liz Fraser, Dennis Price, Richard Attenborough, Margaret Rutherford, Miles Malleson, Marne Maitland (Mr. Mohammed), John le Mesurier, Raymond Huntley, Kenneth Griffith, Donal Donnelly (The Knack).

Liz Fraser - lots of TV since 1955

Love these food producing machines

Good satire of business shenanigans vs. trade unions.

Photography by Max Greene and good editing from Anthony Harvey; music by Ken Hare.

Top of the Lake Season One (2013 Jane Campion and Garth Davis)

Written by Jane Campion and Gerard Lee (they collaborated on Campion's 1989 Sweetie). Elisabeth Moss (completely shaking off Mad Men's Peggy), David Wenham, Peter Mullan (great as ever), Thomas M. Wright (Johnno), Holly Hunter (white-haired oracle who delivers the best line - "There is no match for the tremendous intelligence of the body"), Jacqueline Joe (Tui). And in the commune - Genevieve Lemon (also from Sweetie), Robyn Malcolm (the sweet blonde who goes off with Mullan - to her regret), Alison Bruce (doctor).

Slowly unfurling plot and characters in slightly familiar scenario (self-reliant and educated city cop surrounded by unfriendly locals) in less familiar surroundings (New Zealand's South Island).

But - was Moss really Mullan's child? And despite the 'DNA' tests, we're more inclined to think that Wenham may have been Tui's father, not Mullan....

It has a strong female core to it, which is welcome, and a nice leisurely pace - though the ending is exciting enough. Shot by Adam Arkapaw and scored by Mark Bradshaw.