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She Will (2021)
Good Opera Prima
«She Will» is one of those first-time films in which the young talents introduce so many subjects that concern them, that they overload their works, but which all integrated are too interesting to underestimate. Executive produced by Dario Argento, the story is narrated with great images and is at times impressive as a horror drama, when nature is a living expression of the protagonists' psyche.
Veronica Ghent, famous actress and retiree, arrives at a retirement home in a remote place in Scotland, accompanied by her nurse Desi, to recover from a mastectomy. The area is infamous for the hundreds of women who were burned for alleged witchcraft. This outrage has a deep psychic and physical resonance in Veronica, a victim of abuse at the age of 13 by a film director, who is preparing to shoot a remake of the drama "Navajo Border" in which she played the lead. Veronica begins to levitate and feel strange forces and, in particular, the desire for a "revenge" from a distance, which endangers the director's life. For her part, Desi is attacked by a local worker, ready to forcefully possess her.
In this environment, Veronica evokes images of herself mistreated at 13 years old, and the soil seems awake, as if infused with the blood shed and the ashes of the victims' charred bodies. Visually, the film illustrates emotional states that are an allegation against patriarchy. Night after night the events move towards the inexorable fulfillment of the law of retaliation.
Although Colbert and screenwriter Kitty Percy cannot resist creating attractive scenes that prolong the drama rather than enrich it, alternating simultaneous actions in the forest and in the city, the film is strong as a drama of female solidarity, reinforced by the magnificent acting of Alice Krige and the admirable cinematography of Jamie Ramsay. Clint Mansell's music is everywhere, but the use of a chorus of female voices is a welcome aural attribute. Recommended.
Shadows and Fog (1991)
One of Woody Allen's Best
This is one of my favorite Woody Allen films, and indeed one of his most underrated, made on the eve of personal tribulations that would change his life. A very good expressionist/surrealist nightmare/comedy, with homages to authors, filmmakers, and classics, from Kafka, Lang, and Bergman, to "The Process", "M", and "The Silence". It made such a positive impression on me that I returned to the cinema and took a few friends with me, who had no idea what they were going to find, and they all loved it. Great atmosphere and poetic resolution, in a mix of suspense, horror, and intrigue around a strangler of the night, a quest for liberation and happiness, in a kind of dark circus movie populated by wonderful faces.
The Shadow of the Cat (1961)
The Tabitha Curse
Beautifully shot in black and white by expert Arthur Grant, there is nothing much to this Hammer production: it is a little film about an avenging cat called Tabitha. In the story, Tabitha witnesses the murder of her "slave" (according to experts on cats' perceptions), by relatives who want the old lady's fortune. Other greedy characters arrive and Tabitha's revenge takes effect.
It was John Gilling's idea to materialize Tabitha, instead of recurring to her shadow whenever one of the evil characters dies, and using a distorting lens to suggest Tabitha's point of view of her. Not much happens, but enough to fill an hour of entertainment. As usual, Freda Jackson overacts, but she gets her way with honors.
The Sensualist (1966)
A sexploitation product for the 1960s
Second feature directed by avant-garde filmmaker Peter Emanuel Goldman, who is unknown to many of today's cinéphiles. David King writes in TCM that "Goldman was given a check by sexploitation producer Stanley Borden to produce a film that would play in the seedier cinemas around the country", that as "a sex film the film was a failure, but as a work of art it has many positive moments, including a wonderful performance by Ilona Lys" and that "a 'sexploitation' film in 1965 could probably be shown on children's television today". No copies seem to have survived, so until further notice "The Sensualist" seems to be a lost film.
Sedotta e abbandonata (1964)
Excellent Germi film
If you liked "Divorzio all'italiana" you will probably enjoy this comedy as well, but there are a few of us who rate this one higher than Pietro Germi's 1961 film: perhaps it is because this time Germi (and clever screenwriters Age & Scarpelli) painted a vivid fresco of a Sicilian town, and the fight for "honor" reaches a powerful combination of personal drama, lunacy and irony. With an outstanding performance by Saro Urzì as the seduced girl's father, the tale unfolds with impetus and involves girls in heat, selfish consorts, corrupt politicians, ruined aristocrats, and an entire moralistic town responsible for the tragicomedy. An outstanding comedy that tells many dramatic truths.
Scars of Dracula (1970)
Average Dracula
Not a bad Dracula movie, but it is affected by clumsy special effects (the castle, the bats, the fire), too reddish solutions in the art department (from make-up to drapes and wine), rather sloppy cinematography (with poor day-for-night shooting, and not enough care to match location shooting with interiors), and Jenny Hanley as the heroine when she had strong competition from the other actresses' acting and faces.
On the positive side, it is tense, fast, with two young and handsome male actors (Dennis Waterman and Christopher Matthews) adding action and fresh solutions (instead of old Van Helsing's methods), and a good supporting cast, including Wendy Hamilton as a waitress, Patrick Troughton as Dracula's servant, and Anouska Hempel as the female vampire in residence.
The screenplay by "John Elder" (Anthony Hinds) is a compilation of scenes, characters, plot points, etcetera, of the Stoker-Murnau-Universal-Hammer legacy. I could not help smiling as I saw how Hinds toyed with the story (as having the servant fall for the heroine's photograph, instead of Dracula), but Roy Ward Baker's execution was dispassionate and rushed. Not the best script in the world, but with a bigger budget and a little more love from its creators, it could have been better.
Saturday Night Fever (1977)
Classic
One may like or not disco music, Travolta and the Bee Gees, but this motion picture is a good illustration of its times. It was based on British author Nik Cohn's article "Tribal Rites of the New Saturday Night", published a year before in New York Magazine, and although he later revealed the piece had nothing to do with young proletarian New Yorkers, and that he based his writing on his British friends' antics, I feel that what the motion picture shows was universal, a compilation of emotions, actions, and decisions that were experiencing all those of us who were young back then.
I belong to the generation that kind of founded discos with other type of music, where dancing was truly a "tribal rite", when bodies moved in unison to the beat of, say, Eddie Kendricks' "Girl, You Need a Change of Mind", or The Supremes' "Bad Weather".
When "Saturday Night Fever" was released, things were changing, the disco experience was losing spontaneity and becoming a mechanical fad, songs were formulaic, choreographies on the dance floor became obstructive to the collective disco madness. And I guess the Tony Manero story precisely illustrates that, the gentrification of the disco space, with a boy in white outfit, with gel on his head and showing off all those dancing mannerism.
A true classic motion picture.
Satanás de todos los horrores (1974)
Mexican adaptation of Poe's classic
During the years of transition of horror film in México, from the bizarre movies, sometimes surreal, sometimes baroque that was produced in the 1950s-60s to the "cinéma de qualité" made by Carlos Enrique Taboada, «Satanás de todos los horroeres» was released, a not bad, little known adaptation of Edgar Allan Poe's «The Fall of the House of Usher», although I may say it is more a rehash of Richard Matheson's screenplay for the 1960 version directed by Roger Corman. Although no credit is acknowledged, screenwriter Alfredo Ruanova and director Julián Soler lifted several scenes from Matheson's script, and even shots from Corman's mise-en-scene, and mix it all with a Satanist subplot foreign to Poe.
Sapphire (1959)
Racism in the late 1950s
Basil Dearden liked to tackle the delicate issues of his time as homosexuality in «Victim», corporative espionage in «The Secret Partner», religious fundamentalism in «Life for Rose» or racism in this (melo)drama that has not aged very well. It is set among the poor, the emigrant and the seedy. By 1959 the "angry young men" were already making realistic movies about the working class, under the "free cinema" banner. Dearden's school of realism seemed too old fashioned, elaborate, and "industrial" when compared to the "kitchen sink" cinema.
However, Dearden benefited from a fine script, good actors (especially, Michael Craig as a racist policeman, Nigel Patrick as his boss, and Bernard Miles as a domineering father), and John Dankworth's musical direction. The cast also included in small roles Fenella Fielding making her first film, before appearing in comedies of the "Carry On" and "Doctor" series, and Barbara Steele and John Richardson playing students before becoming stars the following year in Mario Bava's «La maschera del demonio».
Saludos Amigos (1942)
A trip to South America
«Saludos Amigos» (1942) and «The Three Caballeros» (1944) are really ill-advised and unwise Walt Disney productions, which were made during World War II supposedly to improve relations between the United States and Latin American countries, in this case only South American nations, below the Equator line: Bolivia, Argentina and Brazil. Donald Duck does not cross the Panama Canal, nor does he extract oil in Maracaibo, but he does pull the Equator line. Of course, there are some attractive things, such as the proto-psychedelic animation of Mary Blair, but almost by rule the film is offensive (to those who are mocked at) through stereotypes, and cultural derision. In «Saludos Amigos» Donald Duck advances through South America: he goes to Lake Titicaca and abuses a tired llama; then Goofy makes mockery of gauchos in Argentinian pampas, and so on. Disney's «Song of the South» has been kept out of circulation because of "offensive treatment of African-American." Following that reasoning and applying it to Latinos, these two films have a similar effect. These schematic and apparently innocent products do not improve relations between North and South. Audiences should also be taught that "broad and alien the world is," with different people and cultures.
Saints-Martyrs-des-Damnés (2005)
Complicated Business
The plot ot this movie (written by director Robin Aubert) is so convoluted and becomes such an excessively elaborate puzzle to put together, that in the end, as I did not manage to connect emotionally, I did not care to understand everything that was revealed, nor did the uncovered secrets thrill me.
"Saints-Martyrs-des-Damnés" is nothing but a "melodramón", with elements of science fiction and ectoplasmic horror here and there to scare and amuse. The music is unbearably ubiquitous, but yes, Aubert has a great talent for filming outdoors, as he later confirmed in the highly superior "Les affamés".
Sábado, una película en tiempo real (2003)
When Bize Was Wild
Chilean friends and viewers seem to dislike this motion picture. I am not Chilean, so I do not feel inclined to give a low rating or talk bad about this movie. I did like it. But apart from this, it is a good first film by Matías Bize.
Made in a single take, it announces themes and approaches that Bize would also address in his following motion pictures, also dealing with the relations between men and women. Here, a bride discovers on her wedding day that her boyfriend has another woman, so she angrily goes around town to settle the score with those involved and a few others... still wearing her wedding dress.
Blanca Lewin is the center of the story, the leading force, the motor that unifies all the action. She is a good actress, she is very good, as usual, and it is a pleasure to follow her all along this crazy trip around Santiago.
Roter Himmel (2023)
Red Sky
I am not entirely satisfied with "Red Sky" for all that happens after the climax, that is, the moment during the cast's last supper, when Leon learns something he had not imagined about Nadja, something that concerns him and his profession...
However, all the tragedy that follows is also the decrescendo and dénouement of the tale Leon recounts in his next novel. Contrary to some viewers I did enjoy the first 82 minutes very much. The way the various levels of the story are built, due to the dynamics between the five protagonists, as they appear and form several layers of interpretation due to their interaction, is one of the great successes of director Petzold's screenplay. For this reason, the sudden irruption of berserk nature as a kind of sixth character in the last minutes seemed shocking to me. I felt it broke the cohesion, even though imminent danger was always present.
All the time I was wondering if actor Thomas Schubert had to gain weight for the role, because I had only seen him in "Atmen", when he was 18 years old, and he was a slim, handsome young man. He gives a fine, moving performance, as well as the rest of the cast.
Romeo and Juliet (1968)
What Is a Youth?
I was 17 years old when I watched "Romeo and Juliet". The appreciation of this motion picture was strongly associated with its time: it announced what would happen a few months later in 1968 and all the social unrest in Amsterdam, México, Paris, San Francisco, Tokyo... you name it. Even in my countrya, Panamá.... And then there were the hippie revolution, the "Make love, not war" slogan, free love... For anyone growing up at that time the story was a liberating (though tragic) experience. I have not watched it in decades, so I do not know if the film has passed the "test of time". I prefer to think of it as I experienced it in 1968. And it was really striking then, thanks to Pasqualino de Santis' beautiful cinematography, Nino Rota's memorable score, the costumes by Danilo Donati, Lorenzo Mongiardino's production design, and the faces of Leonard Whiting, Olivia Hussey, and Michael York. A good memory.
El romance del palmar (1938)
A Problem Needing Solution
There is a confusion, originated here, in this page. I do not know who created it. But it is a confusion I once tried to rectify but no one cared and nothing happened.
The confusion is related to two movies in which Rita Montaner was a leading actress, both made in 1938. These films are this one called "El romance del palmar" and other movie is "Sucedió en La Habana".
People give "El romance del palmar" the English title "It Happened in Havana". But this English title refers to the other movie, and it stars Luana Alcaniz, Juan Torena, and Montaner. Alcaniz and Torena do not appear in "El romance del palmar". This mistake is repeated in many sites in the internet. It all began here.
If you care, find "Bitácora del cine cubano" somewhere in the internet, and you will see the proof. I am telling you...
The Road (2009)
The Longest and Dirtiest Road
Curious that all those who claim that "nothing happens" in many (slow) films, praise this movie in which not much happens and what happens takes a lot of screen time. The objective of the two leading characters is reaching the coast, and the main conflict is crossing a barren apocalyptic landscape full of cannibals plus many little sub-conflicts that you have seen so many times. They are so low key that much effort was needed to keep my attention. Water is abundant, but we have to follow its dirty characters for 111 endless minutes. Not a bad movie, but its story could have been told in 30 minutes.
River Silence (2019)
Nature, Man, and Destruction
A documentary that impacts by showing a violated landscape in Brazil: one, the banks of the Xingú River, due to the construction of the Belo Holizonte dam, and second, the town of Altamira, where approximately 40,000 persons were relocated after being displaced by the huge work, one of the largest plants on the planet. Both dramas were researched and edited into a single dramatic coverage, an impressive work. In the end, we realize that we have witnessed the portraits of four women who are heads of families, and vivid examples of resilience in the face of adversity, with beautiful images that even open space for poetry... and a bit of Jorodowskian horror too.
Rincón de San Lázaro (1991)
More memories of underdevelopment
In Cuba on December 17th, year after year, thousands of Cuban devotees go on a pilgrimage to St. Lázaro's church in the town of Rincón, where there still live the few last victims of leprosy. It is a wild, dramatic view of the sick, the needy or the simple devotee, some marching on their knees, some dragging their bodies to reach the saint's altar, while men and women make business out of it, selling purple candles, flowers, relics, holy cards, food, and beverages, as the police tries to control the whole scene. Made by Leopoldo López Salgado, a Nicaraguan graduate of the film school created by Gabriel García Márquez, in the town of San Antonio de Los Baños in 1986, "Rincón de San Lázaro" is different from the official documentary of this practice, which was registered by the Cuban Film Institute in "Acerca de un personaje que unos llaman San Lázaro y otros llaman Babalú...", in its usual way, with a narrator reading images for the viewer: in this student film there are no commentary or interpretations of the people's devotion or their seemingly masochistic behaviors. The images and direct sound need no explanation. This and the perceptive eye of López Salgado, the images by Patricio Riquelme and Vicente Ferraz, the sound by Cristóbal Condoreno, and Alberto Ponce's film editing, are the evidence that makes this short an extraordinary student work. Bravo!
Reflections in a Golden Eye (1967)
Reflections of a Golden Era
Passion contained and tragedy reign in this masterwork by John Huston, within a Southern military post, involving a homosexual officer, his salacious wife, and the military and civil people surrounding them, based on a novel by Carson McCullers. The film was one of the most ambitious artistic projects of the time for several of the persons involved.
The two stars were already mature adults: Marlon Brando was 42 years old and ready to show a more sordid side to the one he had established as a trademark, as a bad boy or tough macho, and Elizabeth Taylor was 35 and willing to venture into dramas that challenged her acting abilities. But above all, Huston was the one who took the greatest risks.
First, "Reflections..." was the first of several films made at the time, connecting homosexuality with the Army, including the drama "The Sergeant" (1968) and the comedy "The Gay Deceivers" (1969). Second, Huston introduced artistic elements that did not fit well with the executives of the big studios of yesteryears, manufacturers of mainstream cinema: on the one hand, the music of the Japanese Toshiro Mayuzumi (who had scored "The Bible in the Beginning...") and on the other, the cinematography of Italian Aldo Tonti, the product of months of experimentation in the Roman Technicolor laboratories to achieve desaturated colors, where the amber tone predominated, to suggest the color gold. The production company and distributor Warner Brothers opposed this version and the film was shown everywhere in standard Technicolor, with the exception of 30 prints in the original color. Fortunately, I have seen both versions and I can claim that the original is magnificent and superior.
To the technical and acting achievements, I must add the work of experts such as Julie Harris and Brian Keith, the forceful debut of Robert Forster as the object of Brando's repressed desire, and Zorro David, a Filipino hairdresser who only made this film, as Harris' servant, who has all the philosophical lines that inspire the metaphor of the golden eye.
John Huston is one of my favorite filmmakers of Hollywood's golden age, I know that he is not canonized like Hawks, Capra, Wyler, Ford or the British Hitchcock, but even so, I always make room for him at the top. This movie is one of my reasons. And it is not surprising that Huston himself considered it one of his best films.
Rapsodia satanica (1917)
La divina Borelli
This is an extraordinary variation of the Faust myth, with great lighting and beautiful compositions by cinematographer Giorgi Ricci, in which the influences of Italian aestheticism and German expressionism are harmoniously integrated, to offer a lavish melodrama, a beautiful example of the Italian cinema of great divas.
«Rapsodia satanica» is a hand-painted, tinted black and white silent film, restored in 2007 and performed by diva Lyda Borelli, known as "La divina Borelli." It tells the story of an old countess who makes a pact with Mephistopheles, recovers her youth, and mocks the love of two brothers who court her.
The story receives a fantasy approach and is kept under control by director Nino Oxilia, who finished the film, went to fight in World War I and died on the battlefield. It was also the only film for which maestro Pietro Mascagni composed an excellent musical score.
Of its 55 minutes only 45 have remained, but the film has coherence and is a fascinating opportunity to see the greatest of Italian divas in the leading role, who became a real contessa in 1918, when she retired to marry a member of Italian royalty and ended her film career. Highly recommended.
Radio Belén (1983)
In the Amazonian jungle
In the classes of film appreciation that I used to teach some years ago, I often used this short filmed among the poor people of Iquitos, a Peruvian town in the Amazonian jungle. The action is concentrated in the port of Belén, where the native population live and work, and the children enjoy their river neighborhood, while the music, programs and news broadcasted by a radio station contrast or punctuate their daily existence. A work done with scarce resources, but Italian cinematographer and director Annichini managed to find beauty, humor and true joy of living in this portrait of deprivation.
The Passion of the Christ (2004)
Passion 3
In 2004 I saw "The Passion of the Christ" one day and had to go the next to a TV talk show to discuss it, along with a Catholic priest, two preachers, a young rabbi, and a Social Communications professor. I was there as a film critic and scriptwriter. I ended up siding with the rabbi. We even agreed (on air) that the Bible does not tell everything like it was, that there are other texts telling a different story in some respects.
According to those texts (available everywhere) Pontius Pilate was not a fool. He was a ruthless governor, and he crucified many Jewish persons. Moreover, the texts affirm that it was he, not the Jews, who condemned Jesus. According to the young rabbi, that makes a lot of sense: the Romans were the invaders that persecuted, killed, and tortured early Christians, not the Jews. On the other hand, he said, the gospels were written in hard times, and the authors probably self-censored themselves, because it was not safe to write about the Romans condemning Jesus.
Jesus was immensely popular and had many followers among the Jews. He was captured late at night because the authorities were afraid to cause a riot in daylight. The mob shouting "Crucify him! Crucify him!" belongs more to folk tales; it makes no sense considering that Jesus was a charismatic leader. The "washing of hands" is a Jewish tradition, so it is strange and quite improbable that Pontious Pilate adopted this foreign custom.
I did not like the movie. I did not expect much from a filmmaker as Mel Gibson, who has specialized in violent films. However, that is precisely what he did, a blood-filled version of the Passion, with a effeminate Herod for comic relief and the Devil played by a woman, both stereotypes from a sexist point of view.
Gibson omitted everything Jesus said about the world affairs of his time. According to his vision, Jesus was a sort of hippie who wanted everybody to love each other. Possibly he was and wanted so, but Jesus was also attractive to the masses because he criticized corruption, greed, and those who had invaded his land. As the rabbi said, he was much more than what Gibson proposed, since there was a lot of politics involved in Jesus' Passion.
I heard people applaud the movie based on what they know, read or have been told about Jesus, and not because of what the film narrates. «The Passion of the Christ» has a script full of holes. For a person who knows little about Jesus' life, the scene where he draws a line on the dust and Mary Magdalene extends her hand lying at his feet, means absolutely nothing. It so simplistic in its description of such a rich and passionate figure as Jesus, that this person must wonder during the projection what did this man do to be treated so bad. Because he said love each other and your enemy too? Because Caiphas wanted his head? And why Caiphas wanted his head? Nobody answers these questions. Instead, the edition relishes every whiplash, every fall and blow. Nothing was left to the imagination of the spectator, as Greek tragedy did, nothing was omitted before his eyes after the tenth lash or the third fall. One cannot help but think that the director wanted an effectist movie with horror elements from grade-Z movies. And he got it.
If in «Braveheart» Gibson (who was approaching 40) gave himself the role of a hero who was around 24, luckily this time he did not dare to play a 33-year-old religious and political leader such as Jesus, a superstar with a clout that has lasted 21 centuries. The Jesus I admire and whose teachings I respect is quite different from this bloody concoction and beyond any of man's awards.
Questa volta parliamo di uomini (1965)
Wertmüller Warming Up
Not a bad sophomore effort written by signora Wertmüller, it works better with the acting duels of Manfredi and his leading ladies: Luciana Paluzzi, as a thief wife, showing a comedy flair that was never exploited in American films, in the first story, "A Man of Honor"; Milena Vukotic in "The Knife Thrower", in a role "a lo Gelsomina" in «La strada», and Margaret Lee, as a dumb blonde wife, in "A Superior Man". "A Good Man", the fourth segment, is a bit too hard to laugh at. It seems an anticipation of «Pasqualino Settebellezze», with Manfredi playing a lazy, horny, unemployed worker, and Patrizia de Clara, as a suffering wife, but with little screen time. The main story linking the fourth segments is left open, without resolution.
Prelude to a Kiss (1992)
It Deserved to Be Better...
If "That's Entertainment!" is Hollywood's motto, many movies betray it: you go out to see a product of Hollywood entertainment, which has been sold as relaxing and amusing, and you return home more bored and depressed than when you left. «Prelude of a Kiss» is a good example. In this so-called comedy, the soul of robust Meg Ryan enters the octogenarian body of Sydney Walker and vice versa, to the uncontrollable crying of her husband Alec Baldwin.
An interesting premise taken from a play by Craig Lucas for the time of AIDS, it aims to show that we fall more in love with people's soul than with their bodies, but it soon has to admit that the body is also important, when Baldwin is in front of Walker's wrinkled face, under which Ryan's soul lives. If the exchange had been with the body of "bodies" of 1992, as Tom Cruise or Brad Pitt, what direction would this story have taken...?
Somehow the film reminds me of the sequence in «Ghost» when the yuppie widow (Demi Moore) has a reunion with her dead husband (Patrick Swayze), through the body of a African American medium (Whoopi Goldberg), and when the time comes for the kiss, "the magic of cinema" conveniently replaced Whoopi with Swayze.
A verbose comedy to death, «Prelude to a Kiss» soon loses its charm, which director Norman René rarely avoids, as in his previous work, «Longtime Companion» (also with a script by Lucas) that suffered of the same theatricality.
Il prefetto di ferro (1977)
A Political Drama for All Times
"Il prefetto di ferro" is a very good political drama, set in Sicily, significantly madre in the 1970s, a decade in which Italy was going through sociopolitical and economic crisis, that affected the national film industry. It tells the story of a prefect sent by the Fascist regime to fight the maffia and corruption. Based on true facts, Giuliano Gemma, who we had previously seen in peplums and European westerns, took the part of Cesare Mori and gave the performance of his life, with strong support from Claudia Cardinale and Stefano Satta Flores. Gemma won the Best Actor award at the Moscow Film Festival and the highly plausible work by director Pasquale Squattieri received the David di Donatello Award for Best Film of the Year.