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Hagane no renkinjutsushi: Renkinjutsu-shi no kunô (2009)
Horrifying
Let it be known: this may be the most horrifying thing I've ever seen.
The Man Who Knew Too Much (1956)
One of Hitchcock's best
It's definitely in my top 10 Hitchcock films, but probably better. Top 5, maybe.
What astounded me is the use of sound and music in this film. Never have I seen it used better. The only competitor is the operatic sequences of Sergio Leone. Look at the orchestra scene. There's dialogue, but you can't hear it, like a silent movie. You know when the shot is supposed to come, and you're listening for it. The music plays, and we cut between the different parts of the scene.
Like others have surely said, the acting is good, the story is standard Hitchcock (blonde and all), and the sets are exotic.
The problem with this movie is structural. Maybe it's just me, but I thought we were approaching the end of the movie at the orchestra scene. Instead we were--what?--two thirds through? Why put the most climactic moment at such a place? And then the ending was so sudden.
Anyway, it's worth watching, and worth listening to.
I quattro dell'Ave Maria (1968)
Ace High doesn't ace
What a strange film.
Every once in a while there's something interesting; much more often things seem completely random. Characters motivations are inconsistent. The plot is needlessly complex. And someone shoved random scenes and plot elements into a shotgun and fired at the script: a multi-barrel gun (which I don't recall being used), a boxing match, a card game to reclaim some money. It's all over the place. At one point, an antagonist makes a racist remark and we get a fast zoom (the funniest shot) on the face of a black character. Racism wasn't an established theme in this movie before this point. And despite the drama, nothing comes of this.
The ending is interesting--contrapuntal music, a timing device, a many-peopled showdown. But it's surrounded by peculiar inexplicable details.
Rope (1948)
Two or three complaints
As you can see from my rating, I liked this film. But the reasons I liked it are uninteresting and obvious. What matters are the reasons I deducted points.
I don't at all fault the long-take thing for being gimmicky or unnecessary. I think it was a sensible choice. But the cuts are often hidden so clumsily. Several times we see completely unmotivated pushes into Brandon's jacket back, which takes up the whole screen. Once the cut is hidden in the chest, but when the camera rises, we see we're closer to it than we were before the cut.
Another thing is the philosophical/character content. The themes are a less well done rendition of those from Dostoyevsky's Crime and Punishment. I was hoping for an interesting arc from Stewart's character, but the reasons he gave for his arc ruined it. It seemed he continued to maintain that his old position was the position of logic and reason (highly dubious) and that murder was never even what he meant by this position (even though it is made clear earlier that it is).
Finally, suspense was not as high as it could have been, because I was not afraid for the characters being caught. What happens if they're caught? Is it a danger to anyone else in the room? No. Only to these two unlikeable (I thought) characters, with whom we don't sympathize. We are therefore not adverse to their being caught, and any danger of it provides little suspense.
Pit and the Pendulum (1961)
Dark-but it could have been better
Be warned: for half of the movie I had it playing only in the background while I worked on something else. Also, I watched it on a phone, sometimes in the Sun's glare. These would tend to make any film less good.
Perhaps that's why I found the first half uneventful. There was a lead, a goal, and a conflict, but it was too mild for my notice.
The first half felt like exposition. (Again, I say 'felt like' because I wasn't paying full attention.)
In the second half, however, the plot ran faster, and the climax really gives something to watch.
There's psychological basis to some of the plot, which deepens the characters (one of them, at least). And Vincent Price shows it-it's fun to watch.
Charade (1963)
A strange film, hard to rate
In the third act the suspense picks up. It was entertaining, but I couldn't forget that the rest of the movie had mostly lacked that.
The dialogue was sometimes clever or funny or well-written--take your pick. At other times, it was horendous (or, perhaps, too clever to get). "Your life isn't worth the paper it's printed on." What? Did anyone proofread this thing?
Out of Time (2019)
You've gotta start somewhere
This is the first film from The 3 Amigos Production Co., and from the filmmakers. There's a worthwhile concept there, but it wasn't developed enough, due to the ten minute limit of the film festival. Cinematography is inconsistent. Dialogue can be who-knows-what. Acting is generally below professional.