The Apartment (1960 Billy Wilder & co-scr)

 

Above: It's Chagall, 'I and the Village', his memories of growing up in Belarus.

Tom Newman double bill: Erin Brockovich (2000 Steven Soderbergh) / The Help (2011 Tate Taylor)

Erin Brockovich was nominated for Best Film, Screenplay (Susannah Grant), Director and Supporting Actor (Albert Finney) and won for Best Actress (Julia Roberts); BAFTA had the intelligence to see that Anne Coates' editing was also nominee worthy (lost to Pietro Scalia for Gladiator). Only the BMI Film and TV awards thought of giving Tom any attention - he won, but so did lots of films. So that seems like something of a hollow award.

Here's Anne talking about that last great scene:

As I'm sure you know, often when you don't have a scene you really need toward the end, and it's written later, it stands out like a sore thumb, because it's not very good, and it doesn't do what you want. But this scene, which was written by Richard LaGravenese, did exactly what we wanted in exactly the right place. And they both played it so beautifully. It made the difference to the film, I think.

Sheryl Crowe also gets some soundtrack time.

Tom's music is less to the fore in The Help but when needed, he underscores the scene brilliantly. I'd love to be able to cite an example, but I can't. It's another brilliant screenplay, by Tate Taylor, including:

"Whose story you got left to tell?"
"Mine."

and

"You broke her heart."

Huh. I managed not to get any screen shots of the irresistible Emma Stone. I was thinking about how lovely it is for us to have experienced her career taking shape before us.

It's also a lovely job by Stephen Goldblatt, but no one but me noticed. Edited by Hughes Winborne.

I love the way the cast is credited in surname alphabetical order as though to say 'This is such an ensemble piece that no one gets billed over anyone else."

Hercules the Bear: A Love Story (2025 Michelle Friel

Maggie Robin dictates the crazy story of her, her husband, wrestler Andy Robin and the grizzly bear they adopted, who became a part of the family. And the tense four week period when Hercules went missing on a Hebridean island and in all that time didn't hunt or kill anything... that was because he liked his food cooked.

It was one of those things that we came in on in the middle and just had to watch the whole thing.

Invisible Women: Anne V Coates (2025 Us)

Another huge project, a feature length portrait of the work and life of probably this country's most famous film editor, with contributions from her daughter Emma Hickox and Oscar winner Paul 'Tindsley' Rogers, who was clearly a big fan.

She's perhaps best known for That Cut in Lawrence of Arabia, but her work in Soderbergh's Out of Sight - the hotel room sequence for example - is phenomenal, the breakdown of sequences from Murder on the Orient Express is fascinating, her description of Burton and Taylor in Becket hilarious, and it's fun to see clips from odd films you wouldn't really associate with her like To Paris With Love, Those Magnificent Men in their Flying Machines and Man Friday, pictured above.

Blended (2014 Frank Coraci)

We had tried to watch Me and My Gal which in theory should have been great, pre-Code fast talking wisecracking Spencer Tracy as a cop, but there was this drunken character who was so annoying that we just couldn't watch any more. (We'd also had to abandon The Murder Man as the print was so bad.) Then we thought we'd enjoy Sandra Dee as Gidget but the fucking bastards had cropped the CinemaScope print to 4x3! Making it obviously unwatchable.

I bought this solely because Emma Fuhrmann from The Magic of Belle Isle  was in it, but fortunately it turned out to be largely enjoyable, a sort of Partridge Family retelling.

It opens with a disastrous blind date in which to be fair Adam Sandler behaves atrociously, watching the game on TV rather than look at his date and drinking Drew Barrymore's beer. (Music and Lyrics was 2007.) But of course yadda yadda they end up in South Africa together (and it actually is South Africa) with their offspring, his daughters Bella Thorne, Fuhrmann, and Alyvia Alyn Lind and her sons Braxton Beckham (The Good Place) and Kyle Red Silverstein.

They are tweakled by a cheery MC Terry Crews and a chorus of sarcastic black South Africans.

Invisible Women: Dede Allen (2025 Q and me)

Interesting str.. Hang on. Great beginning - showing that the credits of Slapshot are 1. Paul Newman. 2. George Roy Hill. 3. Dede Allen - what's an editor doing having such a prominent credit?? Yes. Then Bonnie and Clyde, then we move forward.. only later do we hear her earlier history, from no less than her son and assistant editor.

Takes some in depth looks at sequences from these and lesser known material such as Rachel, Rachel, Night Moves and Slaughterhouse Five, all of which look fascinating and should be rewatched. 

Q's voiceover is as always exemplary. Loved this quote from the lady herself:

“I have a definite intention,” Dede said, “a definite starting point: the thematic function of the scene, the psychology of the characters. But when I become absorbed in the material, I suddenly see all the possibilities – a look, a smile after the director has called ‘Cut’, an unintentional juxtaposition of two images. It is the ambivalence, in the collision between the general strategy and the pleasant abstractions along the way, that constitutes editing as art."

Which should be taught at film school.

What's amazing about this is that two unknown Brits somehow managed to make such a fantastic film about this great icon of American cinema before anyone else did.

And I think it's pretty clear that Steve Rotter absolutely worshipped her.

And Then There Were None / Ten Little Indians (1945 Rene Clair)

'Agather' Christie's source material is 'great for my wife, she loves it' but others think 'it's awful'. Yes, I was trying to work out if the / a DVD version is better than ours, which is really shit. And so encountered the voice of the public singing its songs.

Barry Fitzgerald, Walter Huston, C Aubrey Smith, Richard Haydn, Louis Hayward (not a great career, had a short affair with Noel Coward, was married to Ida Lupino for a time, smoked 80 cigarettes a day!), June Duprez (The Four Feathers, The Thief of Bagdad, None But the Lonely Heart), Roland Young, Judith Anderson, Mischa Auer, Queenie Leonard. Duprez and Hayward were both British born.

It's fabulous. Clair has just the right attitude to the material - playful, mysterious, human, fun.

The Matchmaker (1958 Joseph Anthony)

Delightful adaptation of Thornton Wilder play (itself a reworking of his 1938 The Merchant of Yonkers) by John Michael Hayes; unusual for when characters address the audience directly (and at the end, they jointly wish us farewell). Set in 1884 Yonkers / New York.

Shirley Field is fabulous as the matchmaker, Anthony Perkins and Shirley MacLaine sweet as the young couple, Robert Morse bouncy, Paul Ford grouchy, Perry Wilson the additional milliner.

Glowingly photographed by Charles Lang, scored by Adolph Deutsch, edited by Howard Smith, art directors Roland Anderson and Hal Pereira, makeup Wally Westmore, costumes Edith Head. Don Hartman produced, for Paramount, died aged 57 just before it opened. Hello Dolly! is also based on it.

We spent a while studying this interesting menu

The High and the Mighty (1954 William A Wellman)

The antecedent of Airport (book and film series) - and therefore of Airplane too - as a jolly group of passengers consider their fates where a plane develops engine trouble over the 12 hour Hawaii to San Francisco flight. Ernest Kellogg Gann wrote the novel.

In the cockpit: John Wayne, who's killed his wife and child in a plane crash but is somehow still flying, and Robert Stack, who's having a crisis of nerves. Plus invaluable hostess Doe Avedon. And William Campell and navigator Wally Brown.

Doe is quite low billed considering the amount of screen time she gets; Maltin doesn't even list her as one of the main participants. It's funny how all the vibrations and shakes happen to her - almost like she's causing them. In fact her character is underutilised - should have been a romantic element, with a passenger, or the younger pilot... or even Duke himself!

Doe had the sort of crazy life you could make a film about. Her father was a butler to a wealthy New York lawyer, when he died, the family adopted her. She was a friend of Leonard Gershe who wrote the musical Funny Face loosely based on her life. Her first husband was decapitated in a car accident in which she was barely hurt. This was her first film after the accident, which John Wayne 's company produced. She was later married to Don Siegel for 18 years and adopted four children.

John Howard and Laraine Day aren't getting on well. Claire Trevor pals up with businessman David Brian. Jan Sterling is nervously meeting a pen pal. Phil Harris and Anne Doran have just had a lousy holiday where they've been sex-pested by another couple. Robert Newton has to hang on to John Wayne to stop him falling out. John Qualen overcomes a nutter with a gun. With Joy Kim, John Smith and Karen Sharpe (newlyweds who share something of a snog at one steamy point).

Dimitri Tiomkin provides a suitably stimulating score, Archie Stout filmed it in Warnercolor and CinemaScope. Does go on rather (2 hours 21) but is overall quite fun.

IKWIG (1945 Powell & Pressburger)

 It's Q's favourite P&P.

Amazingly, Erwin Hillier didn't once use a light meter in the shooting of the film.

The Idea of You (2024 Michael Showalter & co-scr)

Showalter is not related to actor Max Showalter.

Er. A 40 year old art dealer falls for a 25 year old member of boy band August Moon. But the age difference, media attention and a teenager daughter conspire against them.

I'm not sure the 'five years later' ending really works as all the above factors would still apply. However it all slips down quite effortlessly and doesn't trouble the temporal lobes much.

The couple are Anne Hathaway and Nicholas Galitzine. With Ella Rubin, Annie Mumolo, Reid Scott (Veep).

The title is really rubbish.

The Christmas Tree (1966 Jim Clark)

Short feature for the Children's Film Foundation directed by erstwhile editor Jim Clark, who writes 'It was made for next to nothing around the leafy lanes of Bucks and was about a group of kids who were trying to get a Christmas tree to a local hospital. I had helped write the script.' It took five weeks and Jim ruefully reflects that the film is probably lost for ever... so it's nice to see that it isn't.

It is also, quite against the odds, an early example of the Road Movie.

Peter Suschitsky shot it.

The kids are William Burghley, Kate Nicholls and Anthony Honour.

 

Indecent Proposal (1993 Adrian Lyne)

It's my own fault for recording another Adrian Lyne film. This is stupid and features stupid people (they could have sold their own house to keep the construction project going and not gone to Vegas to try and win the money for Wilder's sake!)

We rather lost the plot towards the end. I think Demi Moore ends up with Redford for a bit but then she gravitates back to Woody Harrelson, they both having learned life's lesson blah blah.

John Barry's score sounds like leftover bits from Out of Africa. Photographed by Howard Atherton and edited by Joe Hutshing. Won Oscar and BAFTA for Amy Holden Jones' adapted screenplay (not really).

With Oliver Platt, Seymour Cassel and (briefly) Billy Bob Thornton and Billy Connelly.

Demi it seems had a most unsettled childhood and a series of unsuccessful marriages. She had to straighten out her drug taking in order to be in St Elmo's Fire. Her big hits were Ghost, Striptease, Disclosure (directed by Barry Levinson, with Michael Douglas and Donald Sutherland) and A Few Good Men. She's still working, just not in anything particularly notable.

Oliver Twist (1948 David Lean & co-scr)

Sensibly jotted here. It's an extraordinary piece of work, e.g. murder of Nancy, finale on rooftop over London. The dog is brilliant (it shivering with fear, for example.) Lean manages to get fear into the young faces well, and manages John Howard Davies (and Anthony Newley) superbly.

There's lots of wonderful deep focus stuff going on from Guy Green.

The Man Who Came to Dinner (1941 William Keighley)

Expertly edited by Jack Killifer.

Sheridan Whiteside's 'friends' care more about Maggie than about him.

Must check out some other Jimmy Durante films.

Goodbye June (2025 Kate Winslet)

Mm? What's that you say? Winslet is the director?

Yes. She was filming The Social Network and a scene had to be reset and she knew where to come in and cut around the scene and she told that to Danny Boyle and he said 'Actors don't do that'. And she thought, 'Well I'm sorry but I can do that'. And thus when her son Joe Anders wrote a screenplay about the death of his grandmother, she directed it herself.

And assembled a fine cast of Helen Mirren (who contradicted her own rule of never playing anyone ill and dying), Timothy Spall, Andrea Riseborough, Johnny Flynn, Kate herself, Toni Collette, Fisayo Akinade and Stephen Merchant.

It feels fairly realistic but is somehow lacking in emotion, humour and insight. I've a feeling without the Winslet name attached it may never have been made.

Photographed by Alwin Kuchler and edited by Lucia Zucchetti (Their Finest, Boy A, The Queen, Ratcatcher).

Violent Night (2022 Tommy Wirkola)

An evil multimillionaire (Beverley D'Angelo)  is visited by her relations but a violent armed gang hold them hostage to get their hands on the loot. Santa Claus (David Harbour) just happens to be at the house at this time, and finds he is drawn into the action, thanks to the belief of a little girl (Leah Brady), who's just watched Home Alone...

I mean, what is there to say? "Christmas dies tonight!"

With John Leguizmo (Scrooge), Alex Hassell, Alexis Louder, Edi Patterson, and Cam Gigandet, who in a laugh out loud moment overpowers his captor but then runs away.

It was written by Pat Casey and Josh Miller.

Alex & Emma (2003 Rob Reiner)

A film which - now I think about it - may well have been inspired by Paris When It Sizzles. A stupid writer (Luke Wilson), who is in debt to the mob for $100k, has 30 days to complete a book, hires a stenographer (? where the fuck did that idea come from) to help, Kate Hudson, and she begins to shape the work, which begins to reflect life.

We didn't think much of the make-up.

Jeremy Leven was responsible for the screenplay. It just wasn't good enough.

Sex and stenography- the unbeatable combination

Good Omens 2 (2023 Neil Gaiman, John Finnemore)

Mainly of interest for Michael Sheen and David Tennant. We watched two but the third began with a silly angel in white police outfit and we thought this is just too silly.

John Hamm though funny.

La La Land (2016 Damian Chazelle)

 

Twelve.

How About You (2007 Anthony Byrne)

 

The Holdovers (2023 Alexander Payne)

A quite wonderful film, which moves elegantly through dissolving from one scene to another, with wholly appropriate music (existing and composed), brilliantly acted, though perhaps a little hazily photographed (Phedon Papamichael was perhaps double booked).

That moment where Da'Vine Joy Randolph is upset at the party, and friend Naheem Garcia goes to touch her, and she turns - and is both angry ('Don't touch me!') and shattered and vulnerable at the same time - that same duality that I recently wrote that Adam Driver showed in Marriage Story - it's that kind of thing that shows us what great acting is. And the moment where Giamatti says 'We're not going to Boston' and that look on her face - the immovable object - 'Oh yes you are!'

'Crossing the Rubicon' means reaching the point of no return. 'Alea iacta est' = 'The die is cast'.

Loved also the misdirection in scenes with Carrie Preston.

Q's summary: 'Imperfect people being perfect'.

The Bishop's Wife (1947 Henry Koster)

Henry Koster was born Herman Kosterlitz, started out making films in Germany but fled in 1933 after knocking out a Nazi who had insulted him in a bank. I mean, that sounds like a film in itself. He started out at Universal where he did two things of note, hired Abbott and Costello, and introduced Deanna Durbin, then 14, and made her a star in Three Smart Girls. He also directed Harvey and Richard Burton's first couple of films, My Cousin Rachel and The Robe, but even that didn't stop him, and he carried on making films, whether anyone wanted to watch them or not, until 1966. Rabbit holes.. do I want to watch Winston Churchill's favourite film, One Hundred Men and a Girl? As a student of film I suppose I would watch something with Deanna Durbin, but that doesn't help much with the Bishop's Wife other than to suggest that Koster was something of a good guy to make all these most entertaining films.

In the scene above it looks like Grant is actually playing the harp. But we don't think that's really him in the arguably unnecessary ice skating sequence. Loretta Young does run up stairs beautifully.

Sam Goldwyn originally had William Seiter directing him but was fired. When Koster came in he realised that Grant and Niven were playing the wrong roles - Grant as the Bishop and Niven the angel - and talked them into swapping.

Charles Brackett and Billy Wilder did some rewrites on it, (including a think the final sermon); amusingly Brackett thought Grant 'wildly miscast'! (Although on reflection, maybe he'd seen rushes where the parts were swapped and he though Grant as a minister was all wrong - now that does make sense.)

Q has still not seen Wings of Desire.

Such is the magic of this film that during it Q's phone rang. 'It's (cousin) Debbie' she said, and at that precise moment on the film Grant says 'Hello Debbie!'