?Directed by Orson Welles? ?Written by Sherwood King, Orson Welles?
The review:
Orson Welles does an Irish accent and takes the noir film to a bunch of sunny locals for an interesting night at the cinema.* Everyone really dug into their characters, none more so than Glenn Anders, who played his part with a sweaty dedication. There were also twists a plenty, and some dramatic visuals as befits the dude who made Citizen Kane.**
The verdict: Good
Cost: Free via TV Time app on Roku TV (But get ready to see the same commercials repeated.) Where watched: at home
Consider also watching all of the Filmspotting 40’s Noir Marathon movies:
*So much sun and fun! (But that underbelly of darkness followed them, don’t worry) I loved that we seemed to be getting location shots, rather than sound stage shots. **”This movie is awesome!” I cackled aloud near the end.
Questions:
What did you think of the treatment of all the people of color who wandered through this film?
What are your favorite Rita Heyworth and Orson Welles movies?
Favorite IMDB trivia item:
Columbia Pictures boss Harry Cohn told Orson Welles he would never again hire one man to produce, direct and act because he could never fire him.
Also this:
In the aquarium scene, the tanks were shot separately, enlarged, and matted in to make the sea creatures appear more monstrous and loom closer to the actors.
?Directed by Edgar G. Ulmer? ?Written by Martin Goldsmith?
The review:
There are three reasons to watch this film and the least of the reasons is that it’s 68 minutes, so it won’t take much of your time. The other two have to do with the road trip conundrum* and the incredible performance by Ann Savage.** I can’t say I know a ton about noir, but I can say that this film is a great place to start, if you are among the noir curious.***
The verdict: Recommended
Cost: free from the Multnomah County Library (I even got the Criterion Collection version.) Where watched: at home
*Though “back in the day” is often portrayed as a time when hitchhiking was a thing that everyone did, Tom Neal’s character mentions how hard it’s been for him to get a ride. **She doesn’t appear until the movie is nearly halfway over, but man, does she make this film work. ***And like I said, 68 minutes!
Questions:
What was Al Roberts first misstep?
How you would have navigated this particular jam?
Favorite IMDB trivia item:
The budget PRC gave director Edgar G. Ulmer for this film was so small that the 1941 Lincoln Continental V-12 convertible driven by Charles Haskell was actually Ulmer’s personal car.
?Directed by Emerald Fennell? ?Written by Emerald Fennell?
The review:
If I tell you this movie is a revenge thriller you’ll probably get a very specific picture in your mind.* But it’s not that movie at all, it’s a candy colored confection that is funny, sweet, and can spark some incredible conversations about consent and the things we tell each other.** Carey Mulligan is a chameleon, putting off and taking off personalities, and she’s backed by a talented cast.***
The verdict: Recommended.****
Cost: $1.30 from Redbox (I waited so very patiently for the $19.99 price to drop, and then had a Redbox Coupon that saved me 50¢) Where watched: at home
*Dark, moody, angry, and either containing a ton of spattered blood throughout or at least a massive bloodbath at the end. **Ideally things are starting to change, but this is the kind of change we need now, not eventually. Also, it will make you like a Paris Hilton song. ***Me during the opening credits: Beau Burnham is in this?!! Alison Brie! Laverne Cox! Connie Britton! ****The movie ended, the bonus features started, the bonus features ended, and I started the movie again. Then watched it for a third time the next night with Matt.
Favorite IMDB trivia item:
The title is a reference to Brock Turner, a Stanford University student who was convicted of sexual assault in 2016. Despite his conviction, he was referred to by some as a “promising young man.”
?Directed by Otto Preminger? ?Written by Jay Dratler, Samuel Hoffenstein, and Elizabeth Renhardt?
The review:
Dana Andrews* is our hard-boiled detective investigating the murder of Laura Hunt (Gene Tierney,**) a charismatic and beloved career woman shot in her apartment. Like all good noirs, somthin’ ain’t right and we can place our bets as we learn more about Laura through flashbacks narrated by Clifton Webb,*** Vincent Price,**** and others. This movie has great dialog and a great twist I didn’t see coming that made this a very satisfying story.
The verdict: Good
Cost: $3.99 via Google Play (I could have gotten it from the library, if I had planned ahead.) Where watched: at home
*I found him to be flat in this, though I’ve liked him in State Fair and his performance in The Best Years of Our Lives (that movie is slow, though and I don’t recommend it.) **Incredibly likable! ***The single-and-fussy (and you can use your 1940s translator to understand what that really means) columnist who adores Laura. ****He was once young!
Questions:
It might be fun to have a marathon featuring movies from the 40s through the 60s with women who have careers. What comes to mind?
Would you have dated Shelby Carpenter?
Favorite IMDB trivia item:
Despite the Oscar snub of the score, David Raksin’s music proved to be so popular that the studio soon found itself inundated with letters asking if there was a recording available of the main theme. Soon, sheet music and recordings of the instrumental music were released and proved to be a huge hit with the public.
?Directed by William Wyler? ?Written by Howard Koch?
The review:
From the first dramatic scene to the last, this movie is plenty of fun.* Bette Davis is both flip and overwhelmed as a woman who had to kill her neighbor when he tried to assault her.** But once a letter floats to the surface, we see the difficult choices her lawyer must make.***
The verdict: Good
Cost: $2.99 via Google Play Where watched: at home
Further sentences:
*Death comes in both of those scenes, so we’re not talking barrel of laughs fun, but there’s something about how overwrought everything is that is so incredibly enjoyable. **So she says. ***All leading to a very dramatic ending. Note: This was filmed in the 1940s and is set on a rubber plantation. In terms of racist portrayals it’s not great. I’ve seen much, much worse though.
Questions:
What was your turning point?
What did you think of Victor Sen Yung’s portrayal of Ong Chi Seng?
Favorite IMDB trivia item:
The first scene that William Wyler shot was the famous opening shot in which we see Leslie shoot Geoffrey Hammond. The opening shot, which lasted two minutes on screen, took an entire day to film, and that was before even a single word of dialogue was spoken. The studio expected him to shoot at a rate of 3-4 script pages a day, but the opening shot reflected a mere paragraph on page one.
★Directed by Ike Barinholtz★ ★Written by Ike Barinholtz★
The review:
I forgot to write a review for this movie and now it’s more than three months later and things are hazy, but I can tell you that there are some funny parts of this, but also that tonally it’s off.* It may that it’s a Too Soon! movie** or that Barinholtz just wants to push buttons that I wasn’t in the mood to have pushed, but I could see people putting in their best effort, but it just didn’t come together. It was interesting to see Haddish play the straight man, so there was that.
The verdict: Skip
Cost: Monthly Disney+/Hulu charge ($8.99) Where watched: at home
★Directed by Christopher Nolan ★Written by Christopher Nolan
The review:
I managed to see Tenet in the year 2020, even though for many months that wasn’t a sure thing,* and I can say it’s a quality Christopher Nolan film.** Both John David Washington and Elizabeth Debicki were great additions to the usually-white-and-male Nolan players, and I had fun with swarmy and evil Kenneth Branagh. While I couldn’t tell you precisely what happened, it was a fun ride while I was in it.***
The verdict: Good
Cost: $1.80 (we were all ready to pay $19.99 for VOD, but I had a look at Redbox while buying New Year’s Eve supplies and lo, it was there.) Where watched: at home
*Things we contemplated: driving to Salem to watch in a theater there; driving to Washington to watch in a theater there (which turned out not to be feasible because Washington switched their level of open); paying the big bucks to rent out an entire theater (which AMC was doing in the fall). **I mean, he’s a known quantity by now, so you are either in (I love barely holding on to what the heck is happening!) or out (Jesus, man, just make things a bit more clear!) and I’m in. ***And my head did hurt from concentrating.
Questions:
Can you sum up the plot for an interested party?
What do you think of films that don’t have a name for their main character?
Favorite IMDB trivia item:
The production team purchased and then crashed a real 747 airplane into a hangar. The stunt was all practical effects, with no visual effects or CGI. Director Christopher Nolan had originally planned to use miniatures and set-piece builds; however, while scouting for locations in Victorville, California, the team discovered a massive array of old planes and it became apparent that it would actually be more efficient to buy a real plane of the real size and perform the sequence for real on camera.
Directed by Ben Wheatley Written by Jane Goldman, Joe Shrapenel, Anna Waterhouse
The review:
While this new version of Rebecca brings us the story of the second Mrs. de Winter in Technicolor and with a bigger budget* than its predecessor, it manages to drag, even though its runtime is eight minutes shorter.** I appreciate Kristin Scott Thomas’s take on housekeeper Mrs. Danvers, but it wasn’t as effective as Judith Anderson whose performance made the 1940’s version so enjoyable. Overall, the kind of newer version that is fine, especially if you haven’t seen the previous version, and perhaps it will encourage people to seek out Hitchcock’s classic.***
The verdict: Good
Cost: Netflix monthly fee ($8.99) Where watched: at home
*So much lingering on vast vistas! Perhaps that’s what made it seem long. **On the plus side, though Maxim’s proposal retains its put down, Lily James has a bit more agency as the second Mrs. de Winter, especially near the end of the film. ***Which, if your library doesn’t have it, is a little hard to find. This needs to pop up on streaming tout suite!
Questions:
What’s your Rebecca pleasure? 1940 or 2020?
Would you like to live in the suite of rooms that were Rebecca’s?
Favorite IMDB trivia item:
The car is a 1937 Bentley.
I got some great Cruella de Ville vibes from the driving scenes.
Directed by Alfred Hitchcock Written by Robert E. Sherwood and Joan Harrison
The review:
Rebecca has the usual problems one runs into with a film older than my social-security-collecting parents,* but that shouldn’t keep you from watching it. It’s a whole atmosphere, from the first line** to the last, iconic image, and so much of what’s fun about the atmosphere is the head housekeeper stink-eye provided by Judith Anderson. This is a great intro to Hitchcock, both for the universality of feeling being in over one’s head and for the Hitchcock camera angles.
The verdict: Recommended
Cost: Free via DVD copy from the Multnomah County Library. That copy kept freezing, so I also watched part of it via TV Time, the Roku channel that shows old movies and has commercials. Then the internet dropped out, so I went back to the DVD. It was a journey. Where watched: at home
*Older man treating the woman he loves like a child, the woman in question wandering through her life, the couple “falling in love” in the time it takes a rich lady to recover from pneumonia, the proposal that was a put down, etc. The infantilization of women in classic films is sometimes hard to take. **”Last night, I dremt I went to Manderley again” gave me chills and when paired with the visual and the distant tone in Joan Fontaine’s voice throughout the monologue, propels this first line right to the same territory as: “As far back as I can remember, I always wanted to be a gangster.”*** ***Goodfellas. AFI has neither of these quotes on its list of top 100 movie quotes, but what do they know?
Questions:
What would your reaction have been, coming home to Manderly?
It’s weird that there aren’t any titles used, eh? Like is he a lord, or a commoner from a very rich family?
Favorite IMDB trivia item:
The first movie that Sir Alfred Hitchcock made in Hollywood, and the only one that won a Best Picture Oscar. Although it won Best Picture, the Best Director Award that year went to John Ford for The Grapes of Wrath (1940).
For those interested, back in the 90s, I watched an interesting documentary called Hitchcock, Selznick and the End of Hollywood. I really liked the comparison between the two men and it’s worth searching out. It seems to be an episode of American Masters.
Full opening quote: (Though more fun to watch. I’ve got it queued up here.)
Last night, I dreamt I went to Manderley again. It seemed to me I stood by the iron gate leading to the drive, and for a while I could not enter for the way was barred to me.
Then, like all dreamers, I was possessed of a sudden, the supernatural powers and passed like a spirit through the barrier before me. The drive wound away in front of me, twisting and turning as it had always done. But as I advanced, I was aware that a change had come upon it. Nature had come into her own again, and little by little had encroached upon the drive with long tenacious fingers, on and on while the poor thread that had once been our drive.
And finally, there was Manderley. Manderley, secretive and silent. Time could not mar the perfect symmetry of those walls. Moonlight can play odd tricks upon the fancy, and suddenly it seemed to me that light came from the windows.
And then a cloud came upon the moon and hovered an instant like a dark hand before a face. The illusion went with it. I looked upon a desolate shell, with no whisper of a past about its staring walls. We can never go back to Manderley again. That much is certain. But sometimes, in my dreams, I do go back to the strange days of my life which began for me in the south of France…
It’s baby boomer nostalgia written and directed by our favorite walking and talking baby boomer: Aaron Sorkin.* But this is baby boomer nostalgia that all generations should catch up with because holy cow, the parallels with today. This film has a tight script,** great performances,*** and manages to balance ten-plus main characters in ways that let them have their moments.****
The verdict: Recommended
Cost: Netflix monthly fee ($8.99) Where watched: at home
Consider also watching:
Inherit the Wind
Primal Fear
12 Angry Men
Anatomy of a Murder (interesting just to compare then and now)
*You know, walking and talking like in The West Wing. I had hoped that Sorkin was born after 1965 so I could have said: …baby boomer nostalgia written by everyone’s favorite Gen Xer that includes political parallels that will seem familiar to the millennials and Gen Z-ers. But alas. Sorkin was born in 1961 and he’s too old to be a Gen Xer, so no dice with that sentence. **The intro of the many players is handled in a robust and amusing fashion. ***Tom Hayden and Abbie Hoffman are the main players, and to my great surprise Hoffman was played by Sacha Baron Cohen. I had no idea! ****I liked seeing the different approach to protesting that the various groups brought. It’s common to hear about “the protesters” during the 60s, but they didn’t act as one body.
Questions:
What part of this film reminded you of today?
Which of the seven (eight) did you identify with most?
Favorite IMDB trivia item:
Sacha Baron Cohen admitted he was terrified of having to do an American accent for the film. He had used a few different variations of the accent before for comedic reasons, but never for a dramatic role. He knew Abbie Hoffman had a unique voice, having a Massachusetts accent but also having gone to school in California, and was worried he would “sound wrong.” Aaron Sorkin had to reassure him that the role was “not an impersonation, but an interpretation,” which Baron Cohen claimed did not help much.