Daily Archives: August 26, 2016

The Horse’s Mouth
Directed by Ronald Neame
Written by Alec Guinness from a novel by Joyce Cary
1958/UK
Knightsbridge Films
Repeat viewing/Netflix rental

[box] Gulley Jimson: I like it here: bricks and broken glass, and an old garbage can. It’s the story of my life.[/box]

Artistic genius isn’t too “pretty” in this comedy.

Gulley Jimson (Alec Guinness) has just been released from jail for making harrassing calls to his wealthy sometime benefactor Hickson (Ernest Thesiger).  He is met by Nosey, a young man who worships his art.  Gulley has nothing but bemused contempt for everyone.  He is immediately on the phone to Hickson to try to cadge money for paints.

He also hits up Dee Coker (Kay Walsh), a combative plain spinster.  She wants him to retrieve the paintings his ex-wife gave to Hickson to pay his debts and press-marches him in that direction.  Sir William Beeder, another wealthy art patron has been trying to get his hands on one of Gulley’s early works.

Gulley manages to worm his way into the Beeders’ London flat while they are on vacation and proceeds to destroy it while painting a mural of the Raising of Lazarus.  After he is caught at that, he turns himself to the wall of a church that faces demolition.

This is Guinness’s only screenwriting credit and it’s an antic somewhat messy farce that also manages to say something serious about the creative process.  He’s marvellous as the completely uninhibited painter.  Sometimes it’s all a bit much but mostly the film is very entertaining.

Alec Guinness was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material from Another Medium.

Trailer

Brink of Life (Nära livet)
Directed by Ingmar Bergman
Written by Ulla Isaksson
1958/Sweden
Inter-American Productions/Nordisk Tonefilm
First viewing/You Tube

[box] Childbirth is more admirable than conquest, more amazing than self-defense, and as courageous as either one. — Gloria Steinem [/box]

Bergman looks at the emotions of three expectant mothers.

As the story begins, Cecilia (Ingrid Thulin) arrives at the obstetric ward bleeding heavily. She has already lost her baby, two months into the pregnancy and has a D&C.  The entire experience has convinced her that she is unworthy to be a wife or a mother and that her proper schoolteacher husband doesn’t love her or want the baby.  She is basically an emotional wreck.

Cecilia joins two other women on the ward.  The first is teenaged unwed mother Hjordis Petterson (Bibi Andersson), who also had bleeding but did not miscarry – much to her dismay.  The second is Stina Andersson (Eva Dahlbeck) who is in labor with her first son and is positively radiant and ecstatic.  We follow the stories of these women and their interactions with each other.  With Max Von Sydow as Stina’s smiling, upbeat husband.

It’s a real pleasure to see these three wonderful actresses play off each other.  Bergman, as usual, cuts to the heart of the matter.  There’s a lot of sadness but the film ends on a life-afirming note.