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The Train (1964)
A Fascinating World War II Film
"The Train" is an interesting, well-made movie that takes place in France two months after the Normandy Invasion. The Allies are heading toward Paris, which is still under the control of the Germans. The Germans realize they can't stop the Allied advance, so they are busily moving troops and supplies out of France and into Germany...by train.
This brings us to Colonel Franz von Waldheim, played by a very dour Paul Scofield. The Colonel, while stationed in Paris, has collected many, many paintings by great artists, including Van Gogh, Monet, Renoir, Picasso, and others. He has taken them from museums and brought them to a centralized location where they are under his watchful eye. In the process, he has become an admirer of the art. He hasn't just been sacking Paris, he's become attached to these wonderful paintings. Other German officers don't understand why the paintings should take up precious space on the trains heading to Germany. Colonel Waldheim explains it in a way they will understand: The paintings each have extraordinary financial value, and that wealth can help Germany's war effort.
French museum curator Mademoiselle Villard is desperate to keep the artwork in France. She approaches French Resistance leaders, letting them know that help is needed to prevent the theft of the paintings. These Resistance leaders include Paul Labiche (Burt Lancaster), an official of the local trainyard. Labiche reacts like many of the German officers did: "I won't risk lives for paintings," he says. But as he sees how others are willing to sacrifice their lives to save such an important part of French heritage, he soon throws himself into the effort to slow down the German movement out of France, hoping that "any day" the Allies will arrive and liberate the city.
Burt Lancaster plays this part with the deep weariness of a man who has been under the thumb of the enemy for over four years. In this, he and Colonel Franz are alike...they have both been worn down. That they can each take up (in their differing viewpoints) the cause of the artwork is because, somehow, they can still dig deep.
The French Resistance fighters undertake a variety of clever ploys to keep the paintings from getting into Germany, and these efforts make up much of the rest of the film. Each time he is thwarted, Colonel Franz becomes all the more determined to succeed in his own efforts.
John Frankenheimer directed "The Train," which is filmed in a gorgeous black and white that gives it an almost documentary feel. The many train sequences are superbly done, all with real trains, no miniatures, no special effects. Train buffs will love this movie, so will World War II aficionados (the events portrayed are drawn from actual events). But any viewer will appreciate the "cat and mouse" gamesmanship (some of which is very deadly) as the movie's two male leads each try to achieve their individual objective while the clock is ticking.
The Devil Wears Prada (2006)
Meryl Streep's Best Performance
"The Devil Wears Prada" starts off in similar fashion to Anne Hathaway's earlier role in "The Princess Diaries": She is the "ugly duckling" who eventually becomes a swan, mentored by Julie Andrews in "Diaries" and Meryl Streep in "Prada." But that's where the similarities end. Julie Andrews was a bit stern but ultimately a warm and caring grandmother in "Princess Diaries." In "The Devil Wears Prada," Meryl Streep--playing a version of real-life "Vogue" editor Anna Wintour--is as cold and haughty as we've ever seen her. Streep received an Oscar nomination for the role, and won a Golden Globe, and many film critics consider this to be the greatest performance.
Freshly graduated from Northwestern University where she edited the daily school newspaper, Hathaway's "Andy" (Andrea) turns down law school admissions to try journalism in New York City. A fashion magazine isn't at all what she's looking for, but it's the one place where she is able to talk herself into a job. She is the assistant to the assistant to Streep, with a young Emily Blunt in an excellent comedic turn as the "first assistant." This is a movie about workplace mentorship and career decisions, sometimes deliciously funny, and sometimes almost horrifying. Andy makes a lot of mistakes at first--it's almost impossible to ever please Meryl Streep here--but her toughness and smarts eventually start to shine through, with a little help from the magazine's art director, played by Stanley Tucci, who, among other things, helps Andy learn to dress for the industry that now employs her.
Streep publicly called this her "last ever" effort at method acting. She stayed in character as the unpleasant editor even when not filming, and was unable to form any friendships with the other members of the cast, or, for that matter, have any fun at all during the filming. When not on set, she stayed in her trailer, depressed. We certainly benefit though, from a movie that is very good, and ultimately very satisfying.
As an interesting side note, most "real world" designers and models declined to appear in the film, for fear of alienating Anna Wintour. They did, however, allow their clothes to be used, ironically giving the movie some of the most expensive costumes in film history. As to Anna Wintour, she later said she liked the film and Streep's performance! Who'd have guessed?
The Haunting (1963)
The First and Best
There are lots of movies these days whose titles are either "The Haunting" or start with "The Haunting of..." Don't be fooled. The granddaddy of them all was made in 1963, and was based on the superb novel by Shirley Jackson.
The 90-year-old Hill House has a sad history of deaths and suicide, and rumors of hauntings and ghosts. Dr. John Markway (Richard Johnson) decides to try to study any paranormal activity there, and assembles an interesting team, including a young heir to the house (Russ Tamblyn), a psychic (Claire Bloom) and a woman who was tormented by poltergeists as a child (Julie Harris).
Over the course of three nights in the house, supernatural phenomena do seem to occur, but screenwriter Nelson Gidding and the great director Robert Wise keep the scares going in such a way that the audience is never sure what is real or imagined. The only thing that is certain is that things keep getting scarier as time passes, and the viewer is kept on the edge of his seat. High marks go to the cast too, particularly the wonderful Julie Harris who was most famous for her work on the stage, but who also built a terrific resume of television and film roles. Among those investigating the house, Harris's character becomes more and more attached to it. Will it let her go?
What makes this movie great is how the terror is created by sound, by shadow, by imagination. No slashers here. But it's spooky as hell. No subsequent "Haunting" movie has ever outdone it.
The Omega Man (1971)
Very, Very Good
"The Omega Man" is based on the great Richard Matheson's novel "I Am Legend." The novel was filmed previously, in 1964, as "The Last Man on Earth," starring Vincent Price. "The Omega Man" is a tough, gritty film, depicting a world after biological warfare has killed off nearly everyone, except for mutants (they are albino and nocturnal) who call themselves "The Family," led by a fine Anthony Zerbe.
The Family attributes to humans the development of all kinds of warfare, including biological, and believe that any remaining humans need to be cleansed from the planet. The Family even eschews machinery of any kind. They carry out their cleansing with fire.
Charlton Heston is terrific in the role of the only human to survive the plague. He is all strength and toughness as he spends each day trying to find the "nests" where The Family members hide from the daylight, in an effort to exterminate them. But, as Heston plays him, he is also barely clinging to sanity. He also keep his house/fortress up and running, making sure the generator is filled and the lights are on and the doors are as impregnable as he can make them. Each night The Family gathers outside and taunts him, throwing flaming spears at his windows.
Inevitably, Heston encounters a human woman, played by Rosalind Cash. He learns she is part of a small group of human survivors, mostly children. Since Heston is immune to the plague, he endeavors to develop a serum from his blood that could inoculate the other human survivors. Heston and Cash embark on an interracial romance, and we see them kissing, and there is a "morning after" scene. This was ahead of its time in 1971, but it's not surprising that Heston would seek out such a role: In the 1950s and 1960s, Heston was part of a small group of Hollywood actors who spoke out against racism, and actively participated in the Civil Rights Movement. Twenty years after "The Omega Man" was in theaters, Whoopi Goldberg commented on that "interracial kiss" and its importance in film history.
Truth be told, the film might have been better if "The Family" had actually been vampires, or zombies, as they were in the Vincent Price version and, much later, in Will Smith's "I Am Legend." But that's a minor quibble. "The Omega Man" is very atmospheric, at times scary, and among the early film efforts at depicting a dystopian future, it is a very, very good one.
The Man Who Knew Too Much (1956)
A Good Hitchcock Film
Alfred Hitchcock's 1956 remake of "The Man Who Knew Too Much" isn't Hitchcock at his very best, but it's still good fun, and certainly an improvement over the 1934 original. The McKenna family (the parents are played by James Stewart and Doris Day) are vacationing in French Morocco when Dr. McKenna tries to help a dying man, only to find himself thrust into the middle of an assassination plot. This is the director's tried and true "wrong man" formula, with the innocent tourists--including their son--now wrapped up in international espionage. The film takes time to set up the genuine relationship between parents and child (the son is bright and funny and we get to know and care about him). The bright color cinematography is an improvement over the bland, dark scenes of the 1934 film. A delightful scene in a Marrakesh restaurant not only generates laughs, but gives the film an international flavor (as does the location photography). Jimmy Stewart turns in a strong performance in the lead role, and is as engaging as ever. Doris Day lends star power, and even sings "Que Sera Sera," a song written for the film that went on to win the Oscar for best original song (even though Doris Day claimed not to care for it). This remake could have used similar star power in the role of the villain, and it's a shame Peter Lorre wasn't invited back to reprise his role from the 1934 film.
One jarring thing about the movie--by today's standards--is the marital relationship portrayed by Stewart and Day. Doris Day's character clearly has a subsidiary role in her marriage (she gives up her singing career, and even needs to be sedated by her doctor husband at one point). The sedation in particular is shocking--even though it reflects the sensibilities of 1950s America, and the target audience of its day. It's not enough, though, to detract from Hitchcock's powers as a director, and an otherwise enjoyable, suspenseful film.
The Man Who Knew Too Much (1934)
Early Hitchcock
Alfred Hitchcock himself described his work on this 1934 suspense thriller about kidnapping and assassination as that of a good amateur, and he was right: There's some good, and there's some amateur. The film's opening scene, of a skiing accident, is filmed in a way that the viewer can't tell what's happening until the characters explain it after the fact. A major fight scene, which consists of characters throwing chairs at each other, is silly and completely out of place in this film. What should have been the most thrilling/scariest moment of the film, when a kidnapped girl is walking along a narrow roof ledge to escape her captor, is shot in a way that yields no suspense at all. Speaking of the girl, we are supposed to believe that her parents are anxious to get her back from her kidnappers, but we never see any emotion of loss or panic or even much concern (except for what is perhaps the longest fainting scene in film history). The cinematography is surprisingly dark, especially for a mystery that is somewhat tongue-in-cheek. Hitchcock, who would go on to make excellent films, was still learning his craft.
But there is good stuff here too. The male/female roles in the film have a level of equality to them, rare for the 1930s. While the husband/father is clearly the major protagonist, the wife/mother is no slouch, and she coolly shoots the villain at the end of the movie (after a nice setup showing her skeet-shooting skills early on). Filming the climax of the film at the Albert Hall is a good touch, and congratulations go to the production team for landing that venue. And the real star of the film, Peter Lorre in an early role, gives a good performance as the villain.
Zack Snyder's Justice League (2021)
Just About Perfect
"Zack Snyder's Justice League" is a movie that could only have been made now, in the age of streaming, in the age of the "limited series." Because as much as it is a single movie, it also functions quite well as a limited series, and can be viewed in its several parts.
The length is necessary. Each major character gets plenty of backstory. Each major character grows and develops and changes during the course of the film.
With a couple of exceptions, like the Christopher Nolan "Batman" films, and the terrific 2019 "Joker," films based on DC comics have struggled to find their footing, and struggled to find their fans. Zack Snyder changed this with his masterpiece.
This is a film of extraordinary scope, exciting, compelling, and well worth every minute of its 4+ hours. It should provide excellent footing for future DC universe movies.
Sergeant York (1941)
An Okay Homage to an American Hero
I fully expected to love this movie, by one of my favorite directors, with an Oscar-winning performance by Gary Cooper, and about one of the great American heroes of WWI. I didn't, though, finding it to be only a so-so film. Gary Cooper, at age 40 and already with deep lines on his face and bags under his eyes, is too old to play Alvin York when he was just in his 20s, and Cooper also doesn't come off well as a country bumpkin, as York is depicted early on. The other actors are fine, including Walter Brennan (getting his fourth Oscar nomination; he won three), Ward Bond as York's hell-raising friend, Margaret Wycherly (also an Oscar nod) as York's mother, a very young June Lockhart, in one of her very first roles, as his sister, and Joan Leslie, at age 16 actually the right age to play York's girlfriend (Joan Leslie went on to a fine career).
It takes more than half of the movie's running time before York is drafted, and still more time before he joins the war effort in France. The training scenes at Camp Gordon, GA are fine, as York surprises everyone with his backwoods marksmanship skills. Character actor George Tobias--who eventually gained fame as the husband of Gladys Kravitz, the nosy next-door neighbor on "Bewitched"--is fun as another trainee. (Tobias also gives a fine performance in another Howard Hawks film, 1943's "Air Force.")
The movie finally hits its stride with the battle scene showing the Meuse-Argonne offensive, the largest in U. S. military history. While director Howard Hawks is able to show us how the men on both sides of the conflict were often "cannon fodder," charging with their rifles toward nests of machine guns, he is unable to depict the massive scope of the battle. The ending of the film is rousing and patriotic but, truth be told, it just takes too long to get there. I suppose Cooper won the Oscar because the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences was really honoring his character, the great war hero Alvin York, when the United States was right on the verge of entering the Second World War.
The Devil's Brigade (1968)
An Exciting, Historically Accurate Film
"The Devil's Brigade" is a rousing WWII movie, well-acted by its leads William Holden and Cliff Robertson, and with an interesting collection of supporting actors including Michael Rennie, Dana Andrews, Carroll O'Connor, Claude Akins, Richard Dawson, Andrew Prine, Richard Jaeckel, and Harry Carey, Jr.
Much of the movie stays close to "real life" events. Holden's character, Lt. Colonel Robert T. Frederick, really was given the task of creating the first ever Special Service Force, comprised of Canadian and American troops with special skill sets. The First Special Service Force was deemed so successful that it was eventually awarded the Congressional Gold Medal, and today's special operations forces trace their origins to this WWII unit.
Patric Knowles plays Lord Mountbatten, the British admiral who first has the idea for this unit. And Michael Rennie plays U. S. General Mark Clark, who determined that the unit should begin special operations in Italy as the Allies attempted to drive out the Axis powers there, and take Rome.
The one false step in the movie, making the American part of the Devil's Brigade "misfit" soldiers, some joining the unit from Army prisons like Leavenworth, was no doubt considered an interesting dramatic device, pitting the "misfits" against the well-trained Canadians in trying to form and train the unit. In reality, the American soldiers were crack troops as well. While this does provide some interest, and allows the terrific British character actor Jack Watson to train the soldiers to fighting shape (including teaching hand-to-hand combat), the device actually backfired as "The Devil's Brigade" was released to theaters just a few months after "The Dirty Dozen," which used the same "misfit soldiers" concept. Even though "The Devil's Brigade" started filming well before "The Dirty Dozen" was released, it was unfairly accused of copying the latter film's idea.
That one contrivance notwithstanding, this is a superior WWII film with a great cast, exciting battle sequences, and the viewer gets to learn some history as well.
The Wild Geese (1978)
It's All About the Cast
The best thing about this movie is its stellar international cast: Richard Burton (Wales), Roger Moore (England), Richard Harris (Ireland), Hardy Kruger (Germany), and Winston Ntshona (South Africa). A small band of mercenaries, sponsored by a wealthy English banker (Stewart Granger), plans to sneak into a southern African nation (called Zembala in the film) to free its imprisoned--and dying--president, but only after after the great British character actor Jack Watson, as the Regimental Sergeant Major, puts the mercenaries through a grueling training regimen.
The 50-man mission starts on Christmas Day with a parachute jump into Zembala, and appears to be going well, until a shocking plot twist halfway through the film suddenly makes everything much more difficult for the mercenaries, and puts them in extreme danger from Simba rebels.
The action is well done, but the movie doesn't skirt the ethical, and racial, issues involved. Winston Ntshona's President Limbani is excellent in running arguments with Kruger's racist Lieutenant, and his thoughtful discussion is a highlight of the film.
While all of the acting is strong, Richard Harris comes off best among the stars of "The Wild Geese." Excellent supporting actors in the cast include the superb British actor Frank Finlay as a local missionary who reluctantly aids the mercenaries, and even the American character actor--and highly respected acting teacher--Jeff Corey, who shows up briefly as a Mafia Don in London.
The plot is well-structured and the action is exciting, but don't miss this great collection of fine actors at the top of their game.
The Mercenaries (1968)
Surprisingly Thoughtful
Make no mistake: This is an action film, and there's a lot of it. But "Dark of the Sun" (1968) also gets a lot right historically, depicting the tensions and sometimes chaos as colonial powers withdrew from African nations--in this case, the withdrawal of Belgium from the Republic of the Congo, and the resulting "Congo Crisis" in the early 1960s.
Rod Taylor plays a mercenary hired by the Congo's president to recover diamonds from a vault at a diamond mine--the government needs this wealth for weapons, food, and medical supplies. There are also people in danger there, at risk of being attacked by the "real life" militant Simba rebels in the eastern part of the country. Taylor is fine here, playing his mercenary soldier as unlikeable and interested only in getting paid (though the actor is generally better playing "likeable" characters). The real standout is his second-in-command, played by Jim Brown, who has the country's best interests at heart, and who makes the viewer think about the racial issues involved.
Taylor and Brown are given some government troops, and a train, and a three-day time limit to recover both the diamonds and the endangered people. They also pick up an alcoholic doctor (nicely played by Kenneth More), and a woman whose husband was killed by the Simbas (Yvette Mimieux--she also played opposite Taylor eight years earlier in "The Time Machine"). As the rescue and recovery attempt unfolds, things get increasingly difficult, and the violence is over-the-top.
The movie was disliked by many critics upon its release due to the depictions of violence and torture, but in retrospect those scenes are certainly true-to-life. The thoughtfulness of the film is in the many ways Rod Taylor's plans go awry, the discussions and disagreements between Taylor and Jim Brown, and the genuinely unexpected final scene.
Soylent Green (1973)
Lots of Good Stuff Here
"Soylent Green" is a combination police detective story and science fiction/"eco-disaster" film set in 2022. Stars Charlton Heston and Edward G. Robinson (his last performance) are terrific. Heston even cries in the film--real tears--and wrote in his autobiography that the tears came easily due to Robinson's very moving performance. Brock Peters is topnotch as Heston's police chief, and other players--Leigh Taylor-Young, Chuck Connors, Joseph Cotten, and Lincoln Kilpatrick among them--are rock solid.
While the dress, hairstyles, vehicles, and video games are very much of the 1970s, the extreme overpopulation, lack of living space, lack of food, and assisted euthanasia were futuristic by the standards of 1973. The movie is notable for likely being the very first to call out the decline of ocean plankton as leading to both the death of our oceans and rising global temperatures.
See it for the acting, the police procedural, the environmental warning, and the genuinely scary conclusion when Charlton Heston solves the mystery of "Soylent Green."
Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953)
Absolutely Great Fun!
This is a marvelous musical comedy, directed by one of the all-time greats, Howard Hawks. Marilyn Monroe, Jane Russell, and Charles Coburn are excellent (Russell and Monroe at singing and dancing as well as acting). This could be considered the film that made Marilyn Monroe a star: It was only as Fox Studio head Daryl F. Zanuck reviewed the rushes each week that he was finally convinced that Marilyn could act.
Everything works here, including the other supporting actors and dancers. The production design is terrific. The choreography is top-notch. It's just a delight in every way.
Nomadland (2020)
The Strong Influence of John Ford
Professor Scott Galloway, in his book Post Corona, writes that we do not have capitalism in the United States. We have cronyism, which he calls the worst of all worlds, a system that benefits no one but the CEOs of large corporations while hurting everyone else. Capitalism must rest "on a bed of empathy," which it does not. In modern America it rests on its own immorality.
We've seen our economic system's failures during the pandemic, and we saw them during the Great Recession. Chloe Zhao's Nomadland could have been set in 2020 as well as 2011, as the failures of America's economic system wiped out jobs and mortgages and pensions and even entire towns. Based on the nonfiction novel Nomadland: Surviving America in the Twenty-First Century, the movie follows the character of Fern, who leaves her hometown after her husband dies and the town's sole industry closes down, becoming a vagabond living out of an old van.
As Fern moves from job to job and place to place across the modern American west, she meets some people who want to be nomads, particularly retirees in their RVs. Zhao treats the movie's nomads (many of whom are real-life nomads) gently, even admiringly. They are latter day cowboys. Not all of them are there by choice, though, and Fern is not, as becomes painfully obvious several times, particularly when her van breaks down and she learns it will cost more to repair than it is worth. She turns to her sister, who lends her the money she needs and also offers her a place to stay. The two had never been close, and Fern realizes that cannot be a long-term solution, so she declines. Later, she is tentatively romanced by handsome and kind David (David Strathairn) who offers another housing opportunity, but she is still mourning her late husband and by now sees nomadic life as permanent for her. As to the jobs she picks up, they are menial and short-term, the best perhaps being seasonal work in an Amazon fulfillment center. The pay was minimum wage, there was no hazard pay or time off, and the retirees who were used like slave labor at such facilities often met with accidents; Fern's aspirations can never grow beyond merely fixing her van and proceeding with a life without a bathroom or a kitchen.
Chinese-born Zhao is clearly influenced by the American director John Ford, particularly by The Grapes of Wrath, The Searchers, and The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance. Like Ford, she uses the physical beauty of the American West as an ongoing backdrop to her story. For Ford, though, at least in his Western films, that physical beauty suggested the future promise of America. For Zhao, decades later, it is a metaphor for the broken promise of our country. At one point, in a particularly scenic spot, Fern and David do some hiking. "Find anything good?" he calls out to her. "Just rocks," she replies. Like the Joad Family in The Grapes of Wrath, she--and some of the nomads she meets--are displaced by economic misfortune: the Joads by the Great Depression and the nomads by the Great Recession. The Joads lose their home and head West for a better life. When they don't find it they have to keep moving from one migrant camp to another, sometimes meeting other travelers they have met before. Fern treats the search for necessities like a circle, and comes back to certain places and certain jobs in a circular pattern.
In The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, John Wayne's Tom Doniphon is a rancher in love with Hallie (Vera Miles). He is adding a room to his house in anticipation of marriage and children. Hallie, though, falls for the lawyer James Stewart and the promise of a more civilized life "back East." Doniphon likely could have turned his attentions to other single women in the town of Shinbone. Even the portly, cowardly sheriff (Andy Devine) has a mistress in town. But Tom Doniphon only loved one woman, and when he lost her he burned down his ranch house (while Fern's husband dies and her house is taken from her) and then he turned to alcohol, later to die forgotten and alone. Fern, like Doniphon, just didn't have it in her to start another romance. That is why she resists David. Doniphon's character is such that he can no longer live in "normal" society--in houses with families--and neither can Fern. In effect Fern "burns down" that possible ending to her story.
Most influential, though, is Ford's The Searchers. That film contains one of the single greatest shots in the history of film: Ethan Edwards (John Wayne), after years of searching for his niece who was kidnapped in a Comanche raid, finally returns her to her home. She enters the small settlers cabin, and then other family members enter, while Ethan stands alone outside. Like Tom Doniphon, and like Fern, Edwards is a man displaced by civilization. His bravery and fortitude were necessary in settling the American West, but those same qualities also made it impossible for him to partake of the resulting civilized society of homes and families. John Ford films Ethan from inside the cabin while Ethan stands outside, framed by the doorway. In another moment, Ethan turns and wanders away, a man no longer with a mission, nowhere to go and nowhere to stay. Chloe Zhao duplicates that shot at the end of Nomandland. Fern, in her circular wandering, has arrived back at the house she once shared with her husband. The house is empty. The town is deserted. She leaves the house and stands outside, her back to the camera, framed by the open doorway. After a moment, she trudges away, back to life as a nomad.
Nomadland has won the Golden Globe and Critics Choice awards for best picture and best director of 2020. It will likely do the same at the Screen Actors Guild and Academy Award ceremonies. Even so, I can't give more than eight stars because Chloe Zhao was, well...too nice. She pulled her punches. She might have depicted more clearly the horrors of working at an Amazon fulfillment center, for example. Fern, the character she and Frances McDormand created, is too stoic by far. Only a couple of times do we get to see how events are affecting her emotionally, and this might lead the viewer to think things aren't too bad when, in fact, they are. She comes to accept her new life, certainly, but it was an emotionally darker road to get there than we see in the film. Were the director's choices affected by Chinese culture? Is a female Chinese-born director going to use a lighter touch than an American male director may have used? I hope that is true. There has been a clamor for more diverse voices in filmmaking. With those diverse voices should come diverse perspectives we can learn from. Zhao has a long career ahead of her. She is already at work on the next MCU movie The Eternals. We'll have a chance to find out.