Anton & Erin's Movie Sketchbook

500 Days of Summer (2009)

2009-04-17T08:16:00.000-07:00

Fox Searchlight Pictures, 2009. Directed by Marc Webb. Starring Zooey Deschanel and Joseph Gordon-Levitt.

We had the chance to see this movie just a few days ago during this year’s Nashville Film Festival, which has reached its fortieth edition, and it was really a pleasure. 500 Days of Summer is a little jewel of an independent film, witty, tender, hilarious at times, and never pretentious. It centers on the relationship established between its two main characters, Tom and Summer (thence the title), who gradually come to find out that their approaches to love and their expectations from their relationship differ greatly. It’s a simple but compelling story very well directed by Marc Webb, who chooses not to chronicle the love affair in a linear fashion but rather prefers to constantly jump ahead and back in time as he tells the story. This works very well because it gives the audience a better idea of the feelings of the characters at different stages of their relationship, and at the same time, it occasionally achieves interesting comic effects.

This non-chronological way of approaching the story is just one of the many metafictional devices employed by Webb, who proves to be rather conscious of viewers’ expectations about storytelling and filmmaking. Thus, the movie begins with the blatant announcement that it is a story of boy-meets-girl but not a love story. In our opinion, however, 500 Days of Summer is, indeed, a love story—perhaps not a conventional love story, but one that stresses different understandings of the ideas of love and steady relationships and ultimately dramatizes the clash between the way we expect our lives to be and the things that reality has in store for us.

Even though Webb sometimes introduces a narrator, the favored point of view is that of Tom’s. This enables us to have direct access to his perceptions of Summer: we constantly see her through his eyes, and little by little, we come to realize that some of the images of her that he is construing are erroneous. And perhaps because of this narrative device, the character of Summer comes across as not as deep and well-rounded as it could have been. Both Zooey Deschanel and Joseph Gordon-Levitt give fine performances as the protagonists, and the picture contains several funny parodies of French and Swedish art films and popular culture in general. This movie was certainly a pleasant surprise for us, proving once again that it is possible to make a good film out of a simple story provided that someone takes the time to find an intelligent way to tell it. And Webb, in his first full-length feature, clearly succeeds.

Anton&Erin.

The Lady in the Lake (1947)

2009-02-26T19:43:00.000-08:00

MGM, 1947. Directed by Robert Montgomery. Starring Robert Montgomery, Audrey Totter, Leon Ames, Lloyd Nolan, and Tom Tully.

Critics usually cite The Lady in the Lake as the first movie to use a subjective point of view shot as its central narrative device, and more often than not, they praise the experiment. In our opinion, undeservedly so. Although it is true that it isn’t without its interesting moments, the film clearly fails in its innovative attempt, which soon grows old and boring. When it was first released, MGM pushed The Lady in the Lake as a groundbreaking interactive movie, one that gave the viewer the chance to experience the events exactly at the same time and with the same intensity as the protagonist. As you can see here on the left, the original poster called the film "the most amazing since talkies began," also underscoring the fact that it was the spectator that solved the murder mystery along with the main character. Yet, even back in 1947, the actual result must have come across as a disappointment.

Based on a Raymond Chandler novel, the picture casts Robert Montgomery (also acting as director) as private eye Phillip Marlowe, who gets involved in a murder plot that turns out to be rather unsatisfying. We have access to the events in the story from Marlowe’s point of view, and as a result, we hardly ever get to see Montgomery, who stays literally behind the camera. It’s true that plot never was Chandler’s forte; he was much more adept at recreating the atmosphere and cityscape of Los Angeles in the first half of the twentieth century. Yet because of Montgomery’s choice of the subjective point of view device, the movie doesn’t capture any of that atmosphere. The gimmick impairs the narrative, which becomes too slow and repetitive: at times the camera moves so slowly that it makes it look as though Marlowe were walking in slow motion. Perhaps the only positive aspect of this narrative device lies in the fact that Montgomery stays off-camera throughout most of the movie, and we only get to hear him talk. In our opinion, Montgomery isn’t as believable in the role of Marlowe as, say, Robert Mitchum would have been, and certainly much less powerful than Humphrey Bogart in The Big Sleep, an infinitely more effective entry in the Marlowe saga.

The Lady in the Lake, then, is the perfect example of a movie constructed around an idea that may have sounded interesting in principle but that doesn’t work at all once it’s implemented. The narrative device used by Montgomery doesn’t help advance the plot, and as a consequence, the finished product suffers greatly, precisely because most movies of the noir cycle are so strongly plot-based. Innovation should always be welcome when it serves a clearly defined purpose, but in The Lady in the Lake, we frankly fail to understand such a purpose.

Anton&Erin.

The Shop around the Corner (1940)

2009-02-17T09:35:00.000-08:00

MGM, 1940. Directed by Ernst Lubitsch. Starring James Stewart, Margaret Sullavan, Frank Morgan, Joseph Schildkraut, and Felix Bressart.

Remade as In the Good Old Summertime, a 1949 musical starring Van Johnson and Judy Garland, and then brought into the internet age as You've Got Mail (1998), a far inferior movie with Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan, The Shop around the Corner is a delightful screenplay by Samson Raphaelson (the writer of The Jazz Singer) based on the Miklos Laszlo play Parfumerie. And in the hands of director Ernst Lubitsch, it turns into a timeless classic.

The action takes place in 1930s Budapest, although it's clearly set against the backdrop of the Great Depression, and the plot is a sort of tragicomedy of errors and mistaken identities, full of witty dialogues and Lubitsch's usual flair for tenderness. At first sight, The Shop around the Corner simply looks like a typical romantic comedy, but it'll only take a little scratching of its surface to discover a great deal of hidden tensions that, in spite of its Hungarian setting, bring us back to 1930s America. For instance, Klara Novak's desperation as she insistently looks for a job and Pirovitch's comments about his family's financial struggles underscore the precarious economy of the working class in the thirties. In this respect, we can hear echoes of Rouben Mamoulian's Love Me Tonight, a musical that enacts a displacement of the Great Depression by setting its story in France and bringing in elements of the fairytale tradition.

Yet Lubitsch's main concern in The Shop around the Corner doesn't seem to lie merely in social commentary; he seems much more interested in human relations and in the effects of work on the interactions between people. Thus, store owner Hugo Matuschek becomes a vital character, as he finds in old age that devoting his whole life and effort to his business hasn't brought him real happiness, but rather that his life has been wasted in an endless search for economic growth. Lubitsch seems to hint at the fact that redemption is still possible for Matuschek, though, but only by means of an awareness of his place in the world and a reevaluation of his priorities in life.

Lubitsch places Matuschek in sharp contrast with the young Alfred Kralik, his oldest employee and, in many ways, his opposite. As is usually the case in a Lubitsch film, even though humor plays an important role in the contrast between both characters, the effect is rather serious. As the movie unfolds, we realize that Kralik's approach to life isn't the same as Matuschek's, that his priorities are different. The purely romantic element of the movie, that is, the relationship established between Kralik and Klara, is another instance of Lubitsch's attempt to go beyond plot-based facts: it becomes a statement about lack of communication and the influence of appearances on human relations. In spite of their daily interactions at the store where they work, both characters need to don a mask and create a world of make-believe where they pretend to be what they really aren't in order to approach and get to understand each other.

In short, The Shop around the Corner tells a delightful story that is sometimes funny, sometimes bittersweet, but always tender and deeply moving. The movie is brought to life by an outstanding cast led by James Stewart, Margaret Sullavan, and Frank Morgan, whose performances are flawless. And, of course, the genius of Lubitsch's directing, with his very elegant treatment of the subject matter and the characters, arguably makes it one of our favorite films of all time.

Anton&Erin.

His Girl Friday (1940)

2009-02-01T10:09:00.000-08:00

Columbia, 1940. Directed by Howard Hawks. Starring Cary Grant, Rosalind Russell, Ralph Bellamy, Gene Lockhart, and Cliff Edwards.

Based on the 1928 play The Front Page, by Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur, the story told in His Girl Friday had already been made into a movie under its original title in 1931, directed by Lewis Milestone and starring Adolphe Menjou, Pat O’Brien, and Mary Brian. It focused on two newspapermen, one of which (O’Brien) wanted to get married and leave the business only to find the opposition of the other one (Menjou), who set about to change his plans. When Howard Hawks decided to remake the movie in 1940, he introduced an important change: he turned O’Brien’s character into female reporter Hildy Johnson (Rosalind Russell), the ex-wife of newspaper owner Walter Burns (Cary Grant). This time it’s Hildy that has marriage on her mind—she intends to marry insurance agent Bruce Baldwin (Ralph Bellamy)—and this element spices up the premise of the film because Walter is still in love with her and is determined to win her back.

In our opinion, the movie is one of the best comedies of the 1940s, full of fast-paced, often overlapping dialogue that attempts to depict the frenzy, as well as the hollowness, of the newspaper business. In this film, journalists don’t try to inform their readership; rather, they invent and exaggerate their stories. Theirs is a world of lies and ornate language, and in their search for sensationalism, fiction usually prevails over fact. Satire on the newspaper world and the shady relations between journalists and crooked politicians is a main element of the original play, yet in His Girl Friday, it seems to take a back seat to the frantic relationship between Hildy, Walter, and Bruce. Indeed, the film is satirical, but the perfectly crafted characters played by Grant, Russell, and Bellamy often overshadow this satire. Social and political criticism is explicit, yet rather light and usually hidden among absurd bits and pieces of blurted dialogue, and this certainly makes the movie extremely enjoyable.

The three featured stars offer solid performances: Russell shines as an energetic woman who has the know-how to survive in a traditionally male-dominated world; Grant is delightful as a tough, double-crossing newspaper owner with a quick wit and a knack for distorting and exaggerating reality; and Bellamy plays a role that has always been tailor-made for him: that of a nice, law-abiding fellow who simply can’t fit in a world ruled by deceit. The cast also includes Gene Lockhart as the nitwit sheriff and Cliff Edwards (a.k.a. Ukulele Ike) as one of the cynical, cold-blooded reporters always on the lookout for a sensational story at no matter what price. In short, His Girl Friday is arguably the best version of The Front Page, skillfully directed by Hawks, who certainly worked hard in order to keep all the noisy, seemingly chaotic dialogue under control. The story never gets out of hand, though, and will have you grinning from beginning to end.

Anton&Erin.

The Parent Trap (1961)

2008-09-29T05:56:00.000-07:00

Walt Disney / Buena Vista, 1961. Directed by David Swift. Starring Hayley Mills, Maureen O'Hara, Brian Keith, Charlie Ruggles, Una Merkel, Joanna Barnes, and Leo G. Carroll.

Far superior to its unnecessary 1998 remake, the original version of The Parent Trap was one of the favorite movies of our childhood, and as such, we tend to treat it with indulgence when we watch it again as adults. However, the film is good family fun, a movie that never fails to satisfy and that is apt to be enjoyed with your kids and their friends on special gatherings such as Thanksgiving or Christmas. No wonder that this project had a soft place in Walt Disney's heart.

The plot is based on the 1949 book Das Doppelte Lottchen, by the great German children's storyteller Erich Kästner, and it tells the story of twin sisters Sharon and Susan—both played very adroitly by Hayley Mills—who were separated as babies due to the divorce of their parents. When they meet at a summer camp and come to the realization that they're sisters, they decide to make up for lost time by switching places: one goes to California to meet her ranch-owning dad, and the other goes to Boston to see her high-society mom. Their ulterior scheme will be to reunite their parents in the hope that they'll fall in love all over again so that the sisters won't have to live apart. Of course, this role change will bring about many comic scenes that are very well developed and put together. Brian Keith, who is better known for his work on television than on the silver screen, turns in a delightful performance as a rough-edged but ultimately tender family man. Maureen O'Hara is stunning as his ex-wife, and the movie is graced by very charming appearances by an elderly Charlie Ruggles and by Leo G. Carroll, who plays a particularly funny minister.

On the whole, The Parent Trap is an extremely light-hearted approach to social issues such as divorce and single-parent households, with a rather stereotypical plot that sometimes indulges in slapstick comedy. But beyond that, the premise of the movie—the fact that the sisters have been separated for almost fourteen years without even knowing of each other's existence—is rather grim, and the film isn't without its moments of tenderness and downright hilarity. You'll do your kids (and yourself) a favor if you choose the original over the more modern remake; in our opinion, the quality of this 1961 version is way beyond compare. Oh, and the soundtrack is also quite interesting: Tommy Sands and Annette Funicello sing the title track, while the twins themselves (Hayley Mills, that is!) perform "Let's Get Together," a tune that made enough of an impression on Anton as a kid that he's still looking for the original record of it.

Anton&Erin.

Ladies in Lavender (2004)

2008-09-16T15:57:00.000-07:00

UK Film Council/Baker Street, 2004. Directed by Charles Dance. Starring Judi Dench, Maggie Smith, Daniel Brühl, and Natascha McElhone.

Ladies in Lavender may well be the archetype of the movie that lays a quite interesting foundation but that fails to build on those initial premises. Even though it's compelling and very beautifully put together, its screenplay ends up coming across as a good chance that's been wasted away. In the end, it looks as though British filmmaker Charles Dance hadn't dared to follow the road less traveled, and we can't help but feel that, if trodden, that road might have led him closer to a more satisfying work of art.

Set on a remote English coastal town a few months before the outset of World War II, the film tells the story of two sisters, Ursula (Judi Dench) and Janet (Maggie Smith), whose uneventful life is dramatically altered by the unexpected appearance of the young Andrea (Daniel Brühl), whom they find lying unconscious on the beach. The plot is built around a study of the relationship between the youth and the two elderly ladies, but in our opinion, this study is sometimes lacking in depth. For instance, the presence of Andrea awakens Ursula's yearning for a life that she never had the chance to live, and she plunges into nostalgic memories of a past that never existed. As she grows old, Ursula's innermost longings and desires come to the surface as she looks back on her life and is overwhelmed by the wonder of the many things that could have been but never were. Yet the treatment of this aspect of the plot comes across as rather shallow, and we certainly wish that it'd been pushed a little further. The same could be said of the influence that Andrea exerts on the small community that inhabits the tiny village: even though at first it looks as though the film is going to delve deeper into this issue, it's eventually overlooked in favor of Andrea's passion for music.

Nonetheless, in spite of these drawbacks, the movie is quite entertaining, and its scenes are drenched with emotion and occasional humor. Judi Dench and Maggie Smith prove yet again that they're magnificent performers, and Daniel Brühl and Natascha McElhone add to the consistently high interpretive quality of the film. Overall, then, we do recommend the watching of Ladies in Lavender, a film that is further embellished by its picturesque setting and its beautiful, dramatic music. Yet we wish that Dance had been a wee bit more daring in his approach to the telling of the story—it surely would have gone a long way...

Anton&Erin.

The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951)

2008-09-08T06:44:00.000-07:00

20th Century Fox, 1951. Directed by Robert Wise. Starring Michael Rennie, Patricia Neal, Hugh Marlowe, and Sam Jaffe.

The Day the Earth Stood Still is far from your typical sci-fi movie. It's actually the product of a very specific social and historical context: that of postwar America as it entered the 1950s. Such a film could never have been made before World War II or before the outset of the Cold War. All the fears that plagued the American society of the time creep into the movie—the atom bomb, the menace of a nuclear war, worldwide political instability—but they're handled in a radically different manner, and that contributes to the appeal of the finished product. One of the foremost assets of the film is the fact that it doesn't treat highly delicate political issues in a one-sided way, but it simply highlights their existence and their complexity, making the audience reflect on them.

The plot is very simple, although extremely telling when we look at it in the light of its historical context. It tells the story of Klaatu (Michael Rennie), an alien from outer space who arrives in Washington on a sort of diplomatic mission: warning humans about the concern that their increasing military power is creating on other planets. After a not-so-warm welcome, the storyline follows Klaatu as he mingles with human beings in an attempt to understand the way in which their society works. Therefore, we see human society from the detached point of view of an outsider that is struggling to come to terms with the fact that dialogue doesn't seem to be a viable way to interact with his distant neighbors.

Robert Wise, who directed great B-movies such as The Body Snatcher (1947), offers here an interesting take on the state of affairs of world politics in the early 1950s. Unlike many pictures of this kind during this period and afterwards, The Day the Earth Stood Still doesn't seem to be interested in taking sides, and it doesn't offer a definitive solution either. It simply warns us about the evils of war and points out the dangers of the lack of communication between governments of different political tendencies. If humans had allowed two World Wars to break out, there's no reason why there couldn't be a third one.

When you see this movie, you may claim that its special effects are a little dated by modern standards. Well, even though they weren't when the film was made, that doesn't really matter, because the essential element of The Day the Earth Stood Still is its message. Wise very deftly twists our expectations as spectators of a sci-fi movie. Here, aliens aren't a menace to humans; on the contrary, it's the other way around. Klaatu doesn't travel millions of miles to attack the Earth; rather, he arrives as a friend, trying to draw attention to the dangerous turns that life on Earth has taken. And in his final speech, he's very eloquent: "Your choice is simple: join us and live in peace, or pursue your present course and face obliteration." Of course, Klaatu isn't really talking about an alien invasion. Unfortunately, not many have actually paid heed to his warning, and his words ring as true today as they did in the war-stricken world of the mid-twentieth century.

Anton&Erin.

The Others (2001)

2008-09-04T13:06:00.000-07:00

Cruise-Wagner/Sogecine/Escorpion, 2001. Directed by Alejandro Amenabar. Starring Nicole Kidman, Fionnula Flanagan, Christopher Eccleston, Eric Sykes, Alakina Mann, and James Bentley.

By the time he made The Others, Spanish director Alejandro Amenabar had already proven his abilities behind the camera with two outstanding thrillers, Thesis (Tesis, 1996) and Open Your Eyes (Abre los ojos, 1997). The latter even spawned a far inferior Hollywood remake entitled Vanilla Sky (2001), starring Tom Cruise. But with the highly acclaimed The Others, the wunderkind of Spanish cinema really became an established director, gaining international recognition.

Filmed in its entirety on location in Spain, although set in the English Channel Islands, The Others is a Gothic horror tale told with imagination and gusto, a loose reworking of Henry James's classic novel The Turn of the Screw. One of the reasons why the movie is so effective lies in its plot, very cleverly constructed and developed at just the right pace. Amenabar excels at creating a ghostly atmosphere, building the tension gradually by means of noises, whispers, an elaborate use of light and shadows, and a magnificent soundtrack that perfectly punctuates the most dramatic moments.

The narrative, basically confined to the dimly lit space of an ancient mansion, attempts to blur the limits between time and space, between the world of the living and the world of the dead. The characters' existence is dominated by doubt, fear, longing, and bouts of madness, as Amenabar strives to make sure that the viewer can't clearly distinguish between what is real and what isn't. In such a context, the atmosphere outside the stately walls of the mansion becomes a leitmotif throughout the film. The grim tones of a gray-colored sky, together with the thickness of the ever-present fog, underscore the fact that the characters are in the dark about their past and their present, about their own existence.

The Others turns out to be the perfect vehicle for Nicole Kidman to show once more that she's an excellent actress. Her character, tormented by a past that she's somehow forgotten and by a present of loneliness and grief that she strongly dislikes, isn't an easy role to play, yet she handles it with great elegance and taste. The rest of the cast, laden with fine British actors such as Fionnula Flanagan, Christopher Eccleston, and Eric Sykes, matches Kidman's great performance. Don't expect The Others to be just another bone-chiller populated by ghostly figures and full of special effects. It's actually a delightful, well-constructed little Gothic story whose unexpected twists and turns will keep you at the edge of your seat.

Anton&Erin.

The Lady from Shanghai (1947)

2008-09-02T09:33:00.000-07:00

Columbia, 1947. Directed by Orson Welles. Starring Orson Welles, Rita Hayworth, Everett Sloane, and Glenn Anders

To say that Orson Welles was ahead of his time sounds so much like an understatement nowadays that it may well fall into the category of a widely accepted stereotype. Based on Sherwood King's novel If I Die before I Wake (which Anton took the time to read and actually turned out to be much better than he expected), and graced by fantastic performances by Welles, his then-wife Rita Hayworth, and two fabulous actors such as Everett Sloane and Glenn Anders, The Lady from Shanghai bears witness to this. Welles landed this project merely by chance, when his career as a director was faltering, and he needed money for other endeavors. But no matter, because the movie represents one of those instances when fate and genius come together, and the result is pure and simple greatness.

In The Lady from Shanghai, Welles undertakes a highly interesting generic revision: this is indeed a film noir, yet a very atypical one at that. The movie plays around with most elements of the genre (murder, shady characters, the figure of a femme fatale) but the plot is so elaborate and leaves so many questions unanswered that we often find ourselves completely at sea as spectators. We constantly have the feeling that Welles is playing with us, building up our expectations in one scene merely to shatter them completely in the next one. The characters add to the overall sense of indeterminacy of the film. All of them are complex characters, but their complexity lies mainly in the fact that their development throughout the storyline is conveyed by means of brushstrokes. They are like puppets in Welles's hands, and we only get a very superficial idea of what is hidden behind their masks. For instance, when at some point Grisby (Glenn Anders) stares directly at the camera with a grin on his face and says to Michael (Orson Welles), "Remember that you were only doing target practice," we can't help but feel unsettled because Grisby seems to be winking at us, as though he were announcing that he knows something that we don't.

The plot also moves along unevenly, sometimes almost tentatively, and quite often the events in the story don't seem to be clearly connected. This might be due in part to the fact that Welles's original cut of the movie ran over an hour longer than the final version, which clocks in at roughly ninety minutes. Welles was made to reduce the length of the film against his will, and that definitely influences the way in which the story is told. However, The Lady from Shanghai is also a wonderful example of Welles's highly personal use of the camera: the movie is full of bizarre shots, improbable angles, and strange, almost grotesque settings. This unsettling atmosphere provokes a feeling of estrangement in the viewer, which climaxes in that powerful final scene at the funhouse, a directorial tour de force that embodies what The Lady from Shanghai is ultimately about. As each character pulls the trigger and smashes one another's image on the mirrors, Welles reminds us that, both within the movie and in the outside world, things are hardly ever what they seem.

Although it wasn't well received when it was first released, in our opinion, The Lady from Shanghai is a masterpiece. Like most of Welles's movies, it requires several viewings in order to make sense out of its intricacies. However, don't feel frustrated if you see it dozens of times and you still feel that you can't find convincing answers for all your questions. In most of Welles's movies, greatness isn't necessarily planned; it simply happens.

Anton&Erin.

Oklahoma! (1955)

2008-08-14T08:46:00.000-07:00

RKO/20th Century-Fox, 1955. Directed by Fred Zinnemann. Starring Gordon MacRae, Shirley Jones, Gloria Grahame, Gene Nelson, Charlotte Greenwood, and Rod Steiger. Music score written by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II.

Although most loyal fans of this irresistible 1955 musical would enthusiastically shout out each letter to the title O-K-L-A-H-O-M-A as they sing along to the upbeat score by Rodgers and Hammerstein, the words we are compelled to cheer while watching this film could only be G-O-R-D-O-N M-A-C-R-A-E! In this tale of the farmer and the cowman, and of the looming ratification of Oklahoma’s statehood, no one could fill the big screen or the vista of the golden prairie like the incomparable Gordon MacRae. The depth of his voice carries the audience from scene to scene, and during the sequences that do not feature MacRae, we often found ourselves eagerly awaiting his reappearance. Now, this is not to say that the Hollywood version of the musical does not provide any worthy match for its playful cowboy. On the whole, it offers a well-rounded cast, including the lovely and charming Shirley Jones (who here far outshines her most famous role as Shirley Partridge of “The Partridge Family”), Gloria Grahame, Gene Nelson, and Charlotte Greenwood. The film entertains throughout with sharp dancing, witty solos, and ensemble numbers to match the previous year's Seven Brides for Seven Brothers.

There is another side to Oklahoma!, however, that makes the movie stand out from more typical musicals and from the typical accusation that audiences sometimes rashly hurl at the genre: that musicals are just superficial dreamworlds arranged for the showcasing of stars’ smiles and musical prowess. Jud Fry, Aunt Eller’s farmhand (who is deftly played by Rod Steiger), throws a dark edge on the sunshine of Oklahoma!. In fact, the awkward transition between songs and violence that Fry’s character creates calls attention to the dynamics of collective social judgment and other issues not often touched on in such films. One unfortunate effect of this effort for substance, however, is realized in a dream sequence halfway through the picture. Unlike the powerful dramatic exchanges between Jud and Curly or Jud and Miss Laurey, this episode reveals the director’s indulgence in the melodrama of modern ballet, pseudo-Freudian dream suggestivity, and strange double-casting of characters. First of all, why can’t Shirley Jones and the rest of the cast play their own characters in this dream within a musical dreamworld? And second, why cram the serious artistic commentary of the film down the audience’s throats with a sequence like this? It is just not necessary in our opinions. The subtle performance by Steiger is much creepier and so much more effective.

Whether you are looking for a light sing-along or a provoking take on the molding of a state’s history and identity, Oklahoma! will not disappoint – so long as you strategically break for refreshments during the ballet!

Erin&Anton.

The Jazz Singer (1927)

2008-08-12T11:44:00.000-07:00

Warner Bros./Vitaphone, 1927. Directed by Alan Crosland. Starring Al Jolson, May McAvoy, Warner Oland, and Eugenie Besserer.

Usually hailed as the first talking picture, The Jazz Singer is actually a part-talkie, that is, a silent movie that features some spoken scenes and a few songs. Nevertheless, it's a landmark in film history and definitely deserves a place of honor along with the best musicals ever made. Not that its plot is very complex, though: it tells the story of Jakie Rabinowitz, the son of a Jewish cantor who wants to educate him to take over that role in the neighborhood synagogue when he grows into adulthood. But Jakie's heart doesn't lie in religious music, so he decides to become a jazz singer taking up the artistic name of Jack Robin, something of which his father strongly disapproves.

The story is based on Samson Raphaelson's play The Day of Atonement, but it bears a clear resemblance to the real life of the great Al Jolson, the movie's main star. However, it seems that Jolson wasn't the first choice to play the lead in this film; that honor was originally reserved for another fine vaudevillian, George Jessel, who rejected the part. We have no doubt, though, that Jolson was tailor-made for this role. Billed as "The World's Greatest Entertainer," he'd been one of the most popular artists in the country for over fifteen years by the time shooting began for this movie. And, of course, his appearance fills the screen, and his exciting singing style and his larger-than-life stage personality make the film a success. This is clearly a movie for Jolson and about Jolson, and so it would be even if the events in the plot didn't resemble his real life story. In fact, the songs featured here—perennials such as "My Mammy," "Blue Skies," and "Toot, Toot, Tootsie"—don't serve the purpose of driving the storyline forth, but they are simply vehicles to showcase Jolson's matchless artistry. In our opinion, Al Jolson is a superb vocalist that is unjustly overlooked nowadays, and unfortunately, his movies fail to capture the sheer excitement that audiences must have felt at his bombastic personal appearances.

If you enjoy The Jazz Singer as much as we do, you won't want to miss other fine Jolson movies such as The Singing Fool (1928) and Hallelujah, I'm a Bum (1933). In the mid-1940s, long after his retirement from stage and motion pictures, the biopic The Jolson Story (1946), featuring Larry Parks magnificently portraying Jolson, stirred a renewed interest in Jolson's music. This paved the way for a great comeback for Jolson, complete with re-recordings of his old hits and a good deal of radio work. We highly recommend that movie, along with its less interesting sequel Jolson Sings Again (1949), in the hope that new audiences will thereby discover and appreciate the magic of Jolson's art.

Anton&Erin.

Love Me Tonight (1932)

2008-08-10T17:03:00.000-07:00

Paramount, 1932. Directed by Rouben Mamoulian. Starring Maurice Chevalier, Jeanette MacDonald, Charlie Ruggles, Charles Butterworth, Myrna Loy, and C. Aubrey Smith. Music score written by Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart.

With his thick French accent, his ever-present smile, and his joie de vivre, Maurice Chevalier hit the bigtime in the United States in the early 1930s. By the time he made Love Me Tonight, he was the most successful entertainer in his native France, and his singing style and nonchalant approach to acting and to life in general went over extremely well with American audiences in a moment when musicals enjoyed great popularity.

In this free adaptation of the story of Sleeping Beauty, Chevalier stars as a tailor who shows up at the castle of a duke to claim payment for some suits that he has made. On his way to the castle, he meets Jeanette MacDonald, cast as a young widowed princess, and he falls in love with her. As usual in early musicals, the plot isn't the most interesting element of the movie, but the score by Rodgers and Hart is excellent and features such magnificent songs as the title track, "Mimi" (superbly sung by Chevalier), "Lover," and "I'm an Apache." The pairing of Chevalier and MacDonald sounds a little odd, since their singing styles are so utterly different, but it does work perfectly on screen, and the two actually made a couple more pictures together.

The great director Rouben Mamoulian explores all the technical possibilities of filmmaking at his disposal at the time, even making use of slow motion and fast-forwarding in some scenes, all of which makes the movie rather unusual. The opening scene, which precedes Chevalier's performance of the "Song of Paree," is really a gem. The camera follows all kinds of workers as they start their workday in Paris, and the noises that they make during their labor provide the music for this true symphony of urban life. Although it isn't extremely well known, Love Me Tonight is a very enjoyable musical, and in our opinion, Chevalier's performance adds to its overall charm.

Anton&Erin.

I'm Not There (2007)

2008-08-09T21:44:00.000-07:00

Killer Films, 2007. Directed by Todd Haynes. Starring Cate Blanchett, Ben Whishaw, Heath Ledger, Richard Gere, and Charlotte Gainsbourg.

It's true that Bob Dylan has gotten to be somewhat like a twentieth-century Don Quixote. Like Cervantes' famous knight-errant, he has taken on many different personalities and reinvented himself endlessly. In I'm Not There, director Todd Haynes tries to explore the many faces of the cultural icon from Minnesota, from his early years as a protest folksinger in the early '60s to his embracing of religion in the late '70s. Yet we think that, despite some fine performances by Cate Blanchett, Heath Ledger, Ben Whishaw, and Richard Gere, Haynes fails because the movie comes across as a little too fragmentary, and sometimes very frustratingly so.

There are some interesting qualities to the screenplay, though: for instance, Haynes has six different actors embody six different sides of Dylan's life, and each one of these characters bears a different name, although they are all clearly Dylan. They all share enough common traits to ensure that the idea works, but at times, Haynes puts too much emphasis on aspects that don't seem to add much to the overall portrait of Dylan as a person and as an artist. We were constantly frustrated by the fact that once a story seemed to be starting to unfold, it was suddenly brought to an abrupt end, sometimes not to be picked up again at all.

One of the best elements of the film is clearly the soundtrack. The use of Dylan's songs in the film is satisfactory, even in the cases when it isn't his own version of the tune, and they are very well intertwined with the events in his life. However, we believe that not very much emphasis has been put on showing how the events in Dylan's life shaped his work; there are touches of that here and there, but Haynes seems to be more interested in American history than in Dylan's personal life as it influenced his songwriting. There's no doubt that those who are in the know about Dylan's biography will benefit from it as they watch this very different biopic, yet we sometimes felt that even being familiarized with the Dylan saga isn't a source of very much help.

All in all, I'm Not There paints a portrait of Bob Dylan's life as a sort of chaotic fragmentation, yet we're sure that there's way more to Dylan than just that. And perhaps, as in the case of Don Quixote, a single movie is incapable of containing all his greatness.

Anton&Erin.

The Body Snatcher (1945)

2008-08-07T16:52:00.000-07:00

RKO, 1945. Directed by Robert Wise. Starring Boris Karloff, Bela Lugosi, Henry Daniell, and Russell Wade.

It's sometimes hard to dissociate Boris Karloff from his career-making role as Frankenstein. But we believe that there is much more to Karloff as an actor than just his portrayal of the famous monster, and The Body Snatcher is one of the best examples of that. Not to be mistaken with the sci-fi classic The Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956), this movie is based on a tale by Robert Louis Stevenson and is one of the early works by the great director Robert Wise. It stars Karloff as a shady, cynical man who unearths dead bodies and sells them to a local doctor who uses them for his experiments.

The film is an excellent study of the relationship established between these two characters, and Karloff's performance is, in our opinion, one of the very best of his long career. Bela Lugosi, another actor who was almost always typecast in horror movies after his portrayal of Count Dracula, has a minor role in The Body Snatcher. He and Karloff apparently disliked each other, although they worked side by side in several films, and here they only have a couple of scenes together. Yet the main scene featuring the two of them is undoubtedly one of the highlights of the movie, a powerful, unforgettable clash of two Titans.

Director Robert Wise achieves a very fine contrast of light and shadow throughout the picture, and most of the creepiest scenes are handled with elegance and subtlety. Don't expect a low-quality B-movie like some others that Karloff and Lugosi made; this one is definitely the cream of the crop.

Anton&Erin.

Road to Morocco (1942)

2008-08-05T12:55:00.000-07:00

Paramount, 1942. Directed by David Butler. Starring Bing Crosby, Bob Hope, Dorothy Lamour, and Anthony Quinn.

The series of Road to... movies, starring Bing Crosby, Bob Hope, and Dorothy Lamour, won't go down in film history for their well-made plots. In fact, according to Crosby himself in his 1953 autobiography Call Me Lucky, many of the scenes were almost completely ad-libbed, and the plots --if such a word can actually be used to define them-- were very loosely strung together. Yet there's something very charming about watching Bing and Bob improvise: there's an almost timeless quality to seeing two old buddies having a good time, and that's precisely what makes these movies so enjoyable.

On this one --our favorite Road to... release along with Road to Rio (1947)-- Bing and Bob are stowaways on the North African coast who get a camel ride to Morocco, where they will get involved in many a funny situation as they cross paths with the Princess of Karameesh (Dorothy Lamour) and her suitor (Anthony Quinn). Along the way there will be some crooning on great songs like the title track and the big hit "Moonlight Becomes You," as well as plenty of joking and fooling around on the part of Der Bingle and Hope, whose interplay throughout the picture is absolutely hilarious.

Moreover, the film oozes with metafictional elements, constantly showing its awareness of the artifice involved in movie-making and exploiting the fact that the audience was well acquainted with Crosby and Hope's public personas. There's really no doubt that in this series of films, Bing and Bob are always playing themselves, no matter if their characters have different names, but that actually adds to the overall charm of the movie. In our opinion, with such magnificent artists as Bing Crosby and Bob Hope, nonchalance works every time.

Anton&Erin.

The Happening (2008)

2008-08-05T07:00:00.000-07:00

20th Century Fox, 2008. Written and Directed by M. Night Shyamalan. Starring Mark Wahlberg, Zooey Deschanel, John Leguizamo, and Ashlyn Sanchez.

Whoever told M. Night Shyamalan that it's acceptable to write a story without justifying the key elements of the plot? That's exactly what he does in The Happening: he proposes an interesting idea (people who, for some unknown reason, are drawn to killing themselves), but the idea never gets anywhere. The movie never explains the reasons why this happens, but rather prefers to leave it up to our own imagination: perhaps it's terrorism, or air pollution, or an evil coincidence, or maybe a combination of all of these. Nothing really happens in the movie, and everything seems to come out of the blue.

If you're hoping to see a well-developed film, with a beginning, a middle, and an ending, this is not the one for you. We went to see it at the theater and came out of the room with the feeling that we'd been swindled by the story. Its premises are interesting, but the possibilities that these premises offer are totally wasted away. That's not to say that Mark Wahlberg and Zooey Deschanel don't do a good job: they are good actors, but they are stuck in a story that is not only unbelievable, but that actually makes no attempt at verisimilitude. In our opinion, The Sixth Sense (1999) is undoubtedly Shyamalan's best work, and The Happening is a clear example that either he's run out of ideas or he's become a little lazy at screenplay writing.

Anton&Erin.

The Vagabond Lover (1929)

2008-08-05T06:29:00.001-07:00

RKO, 1929. Directed by Marshall Neilan. Starring Rudy Vallee, Sally Blaine, Marie Dressler, and The Connecticut Yankees.

When Rudy Vallee starred in the film version of How to Succeed in Business without Really Trying (1967), he had developed into a very accomplished actor. But The Vagabond Lover was made in 1929, at the peak of his success as a megaphone-toting crooner, and back then his Thespian abilities were still questionable. He sounds very stiff most of the time, as though he had been made to memorize his lines and repeat them like a parrot. There is no doubt that Vallee is upstaged by the fabulous Marie Dressler, and even some members of his band, The Connecticut Yankees, do a better acting job than he does.

It's also true that there isn't very much to the plot. TCM says that it's based on Vallee's own career, yet in case it really is, we believe it's very loosely so. But no matter, because the movie reaches its goal: showcasing Vallee's great singing at a time when he was one of the hottest singers in the country, only matched by other great names such as Bing Crosby, Gene Austin, and Russ Columbo.

Even if Vallee's stiffness makes it hard to really believe him as a romantic leading man, the music is excellent, and the movie is loaded with great songs like "A Little Kiss Each Morning" and "Nobody's Sweetheart Now." By the way, the title track, "The Vagabond Lover," written by Vallee himself, was one of his biggest hits, and that may be the reason why the picture is titled after it. Vallee doesn't perform the song during the movie, and it can only be heard over the opening credits. Overall, we think this film is only for diehard fans of Vallee's. We certainly love his music, and so we enjoyed it.

Anton&Erin.