daniel-charles2 Reviews

Paris Under Watch (2012)

One of the best political thrillers of all times!

[10/10 · 13 October 2012]

Breathless, innovative, intelligent... this is an extraordinary movie. To be seen at all costs! I remember when everybody applauded when the Nouvelle Vague freed the images, back in the 60s -well, this is the new Nouvelle Vague. This is not the triumph of the director, or the cameraman's, but of the editor. And still, this is not a boring "experimental" movie, but a sizzling political thriller which doesn't need spectacular stunts to keep you riveted to your seat. The actors are not well known, and to say the truth the acting does not matter much -it certainly matters less than the eyes of the voyeur/ organizer. Until the last seconds, the omnipresent "hero" is faceless. Welcome into the world of anonymous power!

Escape to Nowhere (1973)

One of the best spy thrillers of the 70s

[8/10 · 21 February 2011]

Le silencieux can compete as one of the most undervalued movie ever. I saw it when it went out, and many times since. It might not be as things really were (they were probably worse), but it remains a BGS (Bloody Good Story). Ventura, like in most of his films, is impressive. Lea Massari character is not pointless: she is the lost charm, the lost life, the unattainable past (as unattainable as she was in Deville's "La femme en bleu"): she remains a mystery, and it is her function. Without her, the main character would be without nostalgia. Of course, there is the strange dusty colour of French movies of the 70s, not too pleasant. And the set designer of the MI5 office ought to be shot. But apart that, the movie remains tightly knit, in truth one of the best spy thrillers of the 70s.

The Dogs of War (1980)

Terrible adaptation

[4/10 · 21 April 2009]

What a disappointment! Forsyth's book is one of his more varied, in terms of characters as well as in visual terms. Unhappily, the scriptwriters pretended that they knew better than Forsyth how to tell a story, and they got rid of the mining guy's story, of old Manson's greed and of young Manson's lust, and of the tribal question story, in exchange for a meaningless story about Shannon's wife, and the one of the pain-in-the-ass journalist who gets killed, which distracts the spectator's attention. As a result, the special effects/explosion specialist is given a free hand in a pitiful attempt to fill the holes in the story with smoke and fire... Walken is great, as always,locations are good, but they are no reason to avoid films scripted by Gary DeVore and/or George Malko in the future.Yiiiik! Don't see the film, read the book.

The Love Lottery (1954)

A forgotten pleasure

[8/10 · 4 April 2009]

This is a delightful comedy and, what is more, it is neither devoid of depth nor lacking in intelligence. The idea is simple. Fans make a film star weary. He is so fed up with life than he accepts becoming the prize of a love lottery. He finds love on the way, but can't get married since he is engaged to the future winner. The winner -another girl- realizes after a day with him that her first love is more her type. The End. Admittedly, it's a slim story line, but David Niven makes it great fun, and Charles Crichton adds some delightfully ironical moments (he did make "A fish called Wanda" later). All in all a much under-rated comedy, worth many better-known ones. Definitely worth seeing.

Adorable Liar (1962)

Finger licking!

[9/10 · 25 February 2009]

In this early Deville movie, one finds already the lightness, the apparent frivolity which will still exists 40 years later in movies like Un monde si paisible. Adorable menteuse is the story of an archetypal airhead (hmm- yes, blonde), of her lies and not much else. Not much else apart from: being confronted with reality, the nature of joie de vivre, love and all that. It has the lightness of a soufflé. This sort of inconsequential story is of course the most difficult to tell, but Deville's sure hand avoids all the traps of sentimentality, and gives us a wonderful lesson in cinema. Seen four decades later, this movie acquires also the function of a time capsule: this was Paris in the early sixties, there was an air of joyful excitement which today's politically correct movies lack. Definitely a fingerlicking movie!

The Flying Saucer (1950)

a movie of more than historical interest

[6/10 · 4 August 2008]

The Flying Saucer started life as a documentary on Alaska -and indeed some of the B&W photography and scenery are not only spectacular, they are beautiful. Then, according to Hans de Meiss-Teuffen "the Big Brains in Hollywood re-wrote the story and made me, without the loss of a single foot already shot, into a villainous Russian spy". As an aside, Hans de Meiss-Teuffen was one of the great adventurers of the XXth cy, singlehanded-sailor, mining engineer, hotel owner, lion hunter, double-spy... (his "Winds of Adventure", 1953, is a wonderful read) As a grade-B movie of minimal budget, The Flying Saucer is much better than most. Continuity, that some have criticized her, is actually decent for its period (and immensely better than in the famed "Flash Gordon"); and it is much less incredible than John Wayne's "Jet Pilot". Definitely worth seeing.

La maladie de Sachs (1999)

A perfect movie

[10/10 · 14 July 2007]

This is everything one does NOT expect from a movie -there is no action, no beginning and no end, no linearity, and such a multitude of characters... all specifics one generally links to boring experimental or "avant-garde" movies (or just self-centered French movies)- and still "La Maladie de Sachs" works, it grips you and you can't leave it. Michel Deville's art demonstrates, better than most films, the magical hold of cinema. It takes a very real situation (one of the doctors in the village next to mine could have served as model)and transforms it into an universal example, a paradigm of man's behavior in front of illness. And despite the subject, this is an optimistic movie, at times delightfully ironical. This must have been a very challenging film for Deville -but it is not at all a challenging one for the viewer, its so easy to see because it is such a complete, uncanny success. One word of caution though: to really get into the film one needs to see it in French, and have a perfect understanding not only of the language, but of the local habits.

The World's Fastest Indian (2005)

wrong fuel

[5/10 · 7 May 2006]

In my opinion, the generous viewers who gave this film top marks believe that engine works on bathos. No: engines work on highly explosive fuel mixture and expertise, none of it visible here. Munro is described as a god old-timer with a bee in his bonnet and some back-in-the-woods good sens. Why do scriptwriters believe that the public is a technical moron in this technical world? Why is it all right to show the highly technical way Audrey Hepburn learns to break an egg in "Sabrina" (1954), and unacceptable to explain a minimum of how to lower a center of gravity, and what's a fuel blend (even Schwarzenegger shows how to blend explosives in The 6th Day)? Viewers are indeed supposed to have a heart, but they are not necessarily brain-dead. This film is only a rehash of The Triumphant Underdog, midway between "It's a Wonderful World" and "Pretty Lady". We don't need a Kiwi filmmaker to make our heart throb: we've already got Hollywood for that.

L'invenzione di Morel (1974)

a surreal masterpiece

[10/10 · 7 May 2005]

Very few movies are as good as the book that inspired them. This one might be somewhat different from the idea I had from the book -the color whiter, the image flatter, but it remains a sort of cinematographic UFO which leaves a long lasting imprint of the memory -after all, this long-lasting imprint is what the film is all about. It looks like a low budget science fiction movie, while its the ultimate movie about love (like the book was the ultimate book about love). Haunting. A plus of the film is fascinating discourse of Morel, in surgical, clipped Italian sentences which make you rush to learn Italian. A unique film.

Tampopo (1985)

Of filming as a what of eating (or the contrary)

[10/10 · 21 December 2004]

Tampopo is a very good movie, good acting, good script, good filming, fluid editing... It is a movie about food, with a comical or satirical frame. Etc: read the other comments for more.What I want to add is that Tampopo, alone in movie history, is precisely like a wonderful dinner. Great food, great company, and of course the discussion goes here and there, the variety itself being part of the pleasure. The film is like this, wandering in wonderful food world. Food as knowledge, food as fuel, as decadence, as a conquest or a tour-de-force, as a seduction tool, as an adventure, food as the first and the ultimate, food as life itself. Food as a philosophy and as a culture. Of course, if you disagree that food is a major cultural item, or that the research of excellence in food stops at the first MacDonald's, forget about this movie: you'll find it quirky, unfunny and very foreign, and you'll be right. Definitely one of the 10 great movies in history, if you list includes Citizen Kane and maybe Monty Python's "The Meaning of Life".