Monthly Archives: March 2023

All That Jazz (1979)

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All That Jazz
Directed by Bob Fosse
Written by Robert Alan Arthur and Bob Fosse
1979/US
IMDb page
Repeat viewing/DVD
One of 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die

Joe Gideon: [to God, while wandering the hospital after surgery] What’s the matter? Don’t you like musical comedy?

Roy Scheider is amazing in Bob Fosse’s unique semi-autobiographical musical.

Joe Gideon (Scheider) is a speed-dropping, hard drinking, womanizing genius. He has no morals but he sure can choreograph and direct.

As the film begins, Joe is visited by Angelique, the Angel of Death (Jessica Lange, all in white). She is mercilessly truthful with Joe about his many vices but principally his constant lying and game playing.

Joe has a new movie called The Standup waiting to premiere (an obvious reference to Fosse’s Lenny (1974). He is also casting for a new Broadway musical. We watch that production go from audition to sometime in the middle of rehearsals. We see some elaborate numbers being choreographed. We never really learn what the musical is about because the plot of the actual film is about Joe’s last weeks before his death.

Joe is constantly accompanied in his delirious substance fueled reveries by ex-wife Audrey (Leland Palmer), girlfriend Kate Jagger (Ann Reinking), bimbo Victoria (Deborah Geffner), and daughter Michelle (Erzsebet Foldi). He has treated all these ladies very badly.

Joe continues to abuse his body in every way possible until he has his inevitable heart attack. With Ben Vereen as a sort of MC.

I last saw this on original release when it was all a little bit too weird for me. This time I loved it! It’s a great film that wraps brilliant choreography, biting wit, and something to think about in one spectacular package. All the actors are great but I have a special affection for Jessica Lange. And Scheider is a phenomenon. He’s good in every movie he is in and here he has a chance to lay it all on the line. Recommended.

All That Jazz won Oscars for Best Art Direction – Set Decoration, Best Costume Design, Best Film Editing, and Best Adapted Score.  It was nominated for Best Picture, Best Actor, Best Director, Best Original Screenplay and Best Cinematography.

The Kids Are Alright (1979)

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The Kids Are Alright
Directed by Jeff Stein
Written by Jeff Stein
1979/UK
IMDb page
First viewing/YouTube

Pete Townshend: It’s, “You’ve got to go on, man. Otherwise, all those kids, they’ll be finished! They’ll have nothing to live for.” That’s rock-n-roll.

This documentary is composed entirely of performances on TV shows, filmed concerts, and contemporary interviews of The Who, who by this time were the oldest intact rock band other than the Rolling Stones.

It explores their career from the beginning through triumphs and rocky patches. The boys are all cheeky intelligent interviewees. I enjoyed this a lot.

Night After Night (1932)

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Night After Night
Directed by Archie Mayo
Written by Joseph L. Mankiewicz and Vincent Lawrence from a story by Louis Bromfield, additional dialogue by Mae West
1932/US
Paramount Pictures
IMDb page
First viewing/Criterion Channel

Hatcheck girl: Goodness, what beautiful diamonds!
Maudie: Goodness had nothing to do with it, dearie.

The way Mae West lights up the screen in her debut is the main reason to see this film. She wakes up this rather meh love triangle whenever she appears. George Raft said she stole everything but the camera!

Raft plays Joe Anton an ex-boxer who invested his winnings to buy a lavish mansion and convert it into a speakeasy. He’s not a gangster but he has many chances to stand up to them. Leo (Roscoe Karns) is his valet and enforcer.

Joe is seeing a floozy named Iris Dawn (Wynne Gibson). But he longs for the finer things and takes lessons in proper grammar and culture from Miss Mabel Jellyman (Alison Skipworth).

Joe spots beauty Jerry Healy (Constance Cummings) sitting alone a table in the club every night. It turns out the club is operating in the house where she spent a very happy childhood. The tables turned and now she is going to marry a rich man she doesn’t love (Louis Calhern).

Joe is instantly drawn to Jerry and invites her to tour her old home. The chemistry is right until Jerry informs Joe she is going to marry for money. Then he thinks she is no better than Iris and tells her so. Iris is also not about to let Joe go without a fight.

West’s character acts mostly as a way to entertain Mrs. Jellyman while Joe is off romancing Jerry. She slings around the double entendres with her customary boldness.

This was Raft’s first major role and he does a workman like job without being too exciting. The romance is pretty standard. But if you want to see West before she put on about 20 pounds this the place to do it. She looks gorgeous in her slinky gowns.

 

Mad Max (1979)

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Mad Max
Directed by George Miller
Written by James McCausland, George Miller and Byron Kennedy
1979/Australia
IMDb page
First viewing/Amazon Prime rental
One of 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die

Nightrider: Born with a steering wheel in his hand and lead in his foot. He is the Nightrider cruising at the speed of fright! This is the Nightrider, and we ain’t never coming back! I’m a fuel-injected suicide machine! I am a rocker! I am a roller! I am the out-of-controller! I am the Nightrider!

If you like brutal violence, explosions and the squealing of tires, this might be the movie for you. Mel Gibson’s film debut made him a star and this blockbuster provided the template for others in coming decades.

The year is sometime in the near future. The setting is outback Australia. Anarchy has overtaken society. Max works for a relatively weak police force trying to keep the peace for the populace by taking out the violent, sadistic motorcycle gangs that are terrorizing the countryside. Later when the gang gravely injures his partner and kills his his wife and child, Max’s pursuit of the gang becomes personal and he earns the name “Mad Max”.

I’m not a big fan of explosions, brutal violence, and screeching cars. So this was not made for me. It works well for what it is.

If I Had a Million (1932)

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If I Had a Million
Directed by James Cruze, H. Bruce Humberstone, Ernst Lubitsch, Norman Z. McLeod, Stephen Roberts, William A. Seiter, and Norman Taurog
Written by a host of different writers including Joseph L. Mankiewicz
1932/US
Paramount Pictures
IMDb page
First viewing/Criterion Channel

Mrs. Mary Walker: You wouldn’t fool an old lady, would you?
John Glidden: Not for a million dollars.

This is an anthology film meant to showcase the creative talent at Paramount Pictures.

The gimmick is that an ailing old multimillionaire (Richard Bennett) is on his last legs. He cannot find anybody worthy to take over his business. So he decides to start handing out million dollar checks to random strangers. It’s not so easy cashing a million dollar check. The effect of the gift varies in each story.

The cast includes: Gary Cooper, Charles Laughton, George Raft, Jack Oakie, Charles Ruggles, Alison Skipworth, W. C. Fields, Mary Boland, Roscoe Karns and May Robson.

The stars are appealing and you get to see a lot of them even if it’s only in bits and pieces.


Tribute to Wynne Gibson with very good big band music from Artie Shaw

Wise Blood (1979)

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Wise Blood
Directed by John Huston
Written by Benjamin and Michael Fitzgerald from a novel by Flannery O’Connor
1979/US
IMDb page
Repeat viewing/Criterion Channel

Hazel: Your conscience is a trick, it don’t exist, and if you think it does, then you had best get it out in the open, hunt it down and kill it.

Flannery O’Connor is one of my very favorite writers and John Huston did a magnificent job of capturing the Southern Gothic milieu and the black humor of her novel.

The time period is sort of unclear. The location is a smallish city in the Deep South of America. Hazel Motes (Brad Dourif) has just returned from army service dressed in his military uniform and looking spiffy. He goes home to find a burned out empty shack. But Hazel has a mission he can only carry out in the city: to do things he has never done before. He switches into civilian gear and picks out a black hat which makes him look like a preacher to every one he meets. Hazel had a hellfire and brimstone preacher grandfather (John Huston, in flashback) and his main character trait is he does not believe in anything.

The first thing he does is hook up with a prostitute whose name he found on a bathroom wall. He then proceeds to preach the gospel of the Church of Christ without Christ on the streets. He is successful enough at this that later he attracts a copycat (Ned Beatty).

He meets up with kind of an idiot young man named Enoch Emory (Dan Shore) who refuses to stop following him around. He also meets blind preacher Asa Hawks (a great performance by Harry Dean Stanton) and his randy daughter Sabbath Lily (Amy Wright). He is fascinated by the preacher and eventually moves into the boarding house where the two live.

Flannery O’Connor’s universe is populated by antiheros and heroines who are running from God in one way or another. But God always has his way with these in the end. Whether the experience is positive or negative varies. Hazel is one that is profoundly changed when he is finally hunted down.

I love this movie. All the acting is great and the tone and meaning of the novel are captured perfectly. Highly recommended.

Broken Lullaby (1932)

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Broken Lullaby (AKA “The Man I Killed”)
Directed by Ernst Lubitsch
Written by Samson Raphaelson and Ernest Vajda from a play by Maurice Rostand
1932/US
Paramount Pictures
IMDb page
First viewing/Criterion Channel

“Nobody should try to play comedy unless they have a circus going on inside.” – Ernst Lubitsch

I have never seen a Lubitsch melodrama. I hope never to see one again.

The film begins with images from the Armistice festivities following the German surrender in WWI. Paul Renard (Phillips Holmes) was a French soldier in the war. He is wracked with horrible guilt for killing German soldier Walter Holderin, whom he attended music conservatory with in France.

Paul travels to Germany to ask Walter’s family for forgiveness. We learn that Walter’s death has left his father (Lionel Barrymore), mother (Louise Carter) and fiancee Elsa (Nancy Carroll) with bitterness and unending grief. Dad also hates the French with a passion. So Paul does not get a warm reception.

But before Paul can pour his heart out, the family misunderstands his story and are absolutely joyful to meet anyone from whatever country that knew their son. Paul can’t bring himself to tell the full story. Then he falls in love with Elsa and she with him. Will Paul’s real story come out? And then what?

There are a couple of short sequences in this film where the Lubitsch touch can be detected – the beginning WWI montage and a 5-minute sequence in the middle of gossips up and down a street discussing the possible romance between Paul and Elsa.

I was moaning, groaning and complaining throughout the rest of the film. I like the actors very much but here they all wrench every bit of melodrama out of every overwrought line. I’m quite sure Lionel Barrymore was never this bad before or since. I wonder why Lubitsch did not restrain his players.

So I hated this movie. It has an IMDb rating of 7.6/10. Go figure.

 

The Marriage of Maria Braun (1979)

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The Marriage of Maria Braun
Directed by Ranier Werner Fassbinder
Written by Ranier Werner Fassbinder, Pea Frohlich and Peter Marthesheimer
1979/West Germany
IMDb page
First viewing/Criterion Channel
One of 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die

Karl Oswald: Afraid someone will think we’re having an affair?
Maria Braun: I don’t care what people think. I do care what you think. And you’re not having an affair with me. I’m having an affair with you.

I love Fassbinder and this movie has become a favorite on first viewing.

Maria (Hanna Schygulla) marries Hermann Braun (Klaus Lowitsch) during the final days of WWII. They enjoy half a day and a whole night together before he is sent to the front. He is then listed MIA for months and months. She refuses to believe he is dead and searches for him at train stations for awhile then gives up looking and gets a job as a bar girl at a US GI bar. She takes up almost immediately with a generous black soldier.

Later, Hermann returns and finds her in the arms of the soldier. But he doesn’t stick around long as he takes the rap for a crime Maria has committed and goes to jail.

Maria faithfully visits him. She launches herself into big business with the help of another lover but Hermann is the only man for Maria. Maria is a great success but this will not prevent the story in proceeding to an unforgettable ironic climax.

This film has many things to say about German post-war politics, the German Economic miracle, and the vagaries of love and human nature. Schygulla is simply mesmerizing and the film is shot with the utmost style and care. Highly recommended.

Camera Buff (1979)

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Camera Buff (Amator)
Directed by Krzysztof Kieslowski
Written by Krzysztof Kieslowski and Jerzy Stuhl
Poland/1979
IMDb page
First viewing/CriterionChannel

Director: “Cinema is the foremost art.” Who said that?
Filip Mosz: Lenin.

This early feature made Kieslowski’s name in cinema circles and it certainly is a small masterpiece.

Filip Mosz (Jerzy Stuhr) is a humble factory worker. He and wife Irka are expecting their first child. He saves up two months wages to buy a movie camera. He hopes to document his new daughter’s childhood with this.

But before too long, Filip’s boss finds out about the camera and asks him to make a documentary about the festivities for an important anniversary of the business. The plant will pay for film and a tripod. This is an offer Filip cannot refuse.

Soon Filip gets the movie bug and starts filming whatever interests him. He shows his work to a few people and then he is chasing film festival prizes. In the process, he destroys his marriage and feels at constant threat of losing his job or worse.

I love Kieslowski and this ranks up there with his best works. It works as a critique of censorship, as a film about filmmaking, and as the story of a simple man who just wants to make stories about real life. Recommended.

 

Honor Among Lovers (1931)

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Honor Among Lovers
Directed by Dorothy Arzner
Written by Austen Parker
1931/US
Paramount Pictures
IMDb page
First viewing/Criterion Channel

“When I went to work in a studio, I took my pride and made a nice little ball of it and threw it right out the window.” – Dorothy Arzner

This is ok but just that. Julia Traynor (Claudette Colbert) is a crack private secretary. Jerry Stafford (Fredric March) is her playboy boss. Jerry has a yen for Julia but she resists, only partly because of her loser boyfriend Philip Craig (Monroe Owsley).

One day Jerry asks Julia to join him for a round-the-world-cruise and accept a diamond bracelet she picked out for another of his flames. This shakes up Julia and she agrees to marry Philip.

After they marry, Philip loses his job and Jerry hires him as his financial assistant. Jerry doesn’t stop loving Julia and when Philip commits an impardonable crime she has a terrible dilemma. With Charles Ruggles and Ginger Rogers as comic relief.

I love these actors but the time or the script pulled really melodramatic acting out of them and made the movie less enjoyable than it may otherwise have been.