Category Archives: 1963

The Silence (Tystnaden)
Directed by Ingmar Bergman
Written by Ingmar Bergman
1963/Sweden
Svensk Filmindustri
First viewing/Netflix rental

[box] Ester: All this talk… There’s no need to discuss loneliness. It’s a waste of time.[/box]

I’m still wrapping my head around this powerful, depressing film.

The first half of the film contains almost no dialogue.  Two sisters, Ester (Ingrid Thulin) and Anna (Gunnel Lindblom), and Anna’s young son Johan are on a train.  Their destination is never stated but we know from the start that they do not understand the language spoken.  Ester is desperately ill and coughing up blood.  Anna reacts to her sister’s plight coldly.  All she can think about is the heat.

The party arrives and takes up residence in a grand hotel.  We see Anna treat her son in a very sexualized way.  But she can’t stay in one place for long and soon departs all dressed up for a walk.  In fact she leaves without knowing that her son is wandering the corridors of the hotel.  He meets up with some midget performers who will reappear throughout the film.  They are never mentioned by anybody.

Ester is aided only by an ancient waiter who answers her calls for food and drink.  While Anna is away, she hooks up with a bartender.  Later she brings him back to the hotel for sex.  Both Ester and Johan are all too aware of this.  Ester confronts Anna who unleashes her long unspoken hate for her sister.

While all these things are going on, we see, as our characters are looking out the window, a seeming stream of refugees, plenty of soldiers, and eventually a tank on the city streets. None of the characters is concerned in the slightest beyond their own private psychodrama.

Almost the only honest communication in this film occurs between the sisters and people who cannot understand them.  I think the message is people fail to communicate and then they die alone.  This was not a lesson I particularly wanted to spend an hour and a half learning.  The film is undeniably beautiful though with outstanding cinematography by Sven Nyquist.  Warning: The sex here is remarkably explicit for the time and there are plenty of bare breasts on view.

U.S. trailer – I totally missed the lesbian love part – perhaps because it wasn’t there

Horror Castle (La vergine di Norimberga)
Directed by Antonio Margheriti
Written by Ernesto Gastaldi, Edmund T. Greville and Antonio Margheriti from a novel by Frank Bogart
1963/Italy
Atlantica Cinematografica Produzione Films
First viewing/Amazon Instant

[box] So I may not have had a gothic childhood, but childhood makes its own gothicity. George Saunders [/box]

This Italian Gothic horror show contains many genuinely creepy moments.

Max Hunter and his new wife Mary travel to Max’s family castle.  The castle features a museum of torture in its basement.  Max keeps leaving Mary alone and she quickly discovers a murdered body in the “Virgin of Nuremberg”.  Max reassures Mary that she has dreamt this but her experience grows more frightening as the body toll mounts.  There are many suspects including the scarred servant Erich (Christopher Lee).

This movie does not pull any punches in the torture department!  It kept my interest throughout.  I watched the dubbed Americanized version on Amazon Instant, in which the director is listed under his pseudonym Anthony Dawson.

Trailer

From Russia with Love
Directed by Terence Young
Written by Richard Malbaum; adapted by Johanna Harwood from a novel by Ian Fleming
1963/UK
Eon Productions
Repeat viewing/Amazon Prime

[box] James Bond: So, you’re Tatiana Romanova.

Tatiana: My friends call me Tania.

James Bond: Mine call me James Bond.[/box]

My favorite Bond ever is back in another action-packed romp.

Ernst Blofeld is also back as the head of the international terrorist organization SPECTRE. He has lured Rosa Klebb (Lotte Lenya) from the KGB to steal a Soviet encryption device. This involves an elaborate double cross that will draw James Bond into a plot to steal the device for MI-5.  The bait is unwitting and beautiful Soviet agent Tatiana Romanova who will seduce Bond for her country.  Bond is wise to the Soviet-angle but plays along.

The rest of the story involves lots of humor, sex, and gun-play culminating with Bond’s stand-off against SPECTRE henchman Grant (Robert Shaw).

This sophomore effort is no slump but solidifies the franchise’s formula of wit, sex, and violence.  If Zatoichi is a popcorn series, order a double serving for Bond!

Trailer

America America
Directed by Elia Kazan
Written by Elia Kazan
1963/USA
Athena Enterprises/Warner Bros.
First viewing/FilmStruck

[box] Elia Kazan: [Voice-over] My name is Elia Kazan. I am a Greek by blood, a Turk by birth and an American because my uncle made a journey.[/box]

Could this be Elia Kazan’s masterpiece?

In voice-over at the beginning Kazan tells us that this is the story of his uncle’s journey to America.  Kazan came from a family of Anatolian Greeks.  They, as well as the large minority Armenian population, came under considerable oppression in their native Turkey.

It seems that young Stavros Topouzoglou has dreamed of going to America ever since he was aware there was such a place.  A violent crack-down on Armenians and the murder of his friend only strengthen his resolve.  The rest of his family don’t think much of the America plan.  When things get even worse, though, the father decides to entrust Stavros with everything of value the family possesses and to send him to Constantinople to work with his uncle in a rug business.  The idea is that Stavros will work hard and then gradually move the rest of the family to the capital.

Stavros is tricked and robbed of the family fortune on his way to the city.  He turns up at his uncle’s door with nothing and realizes that the rug business is not and never will be a going concern.  He begs the uncle not to reveal the loss and begins to work unceasingly, almost beyond human endurance, to earn his passage to America.  But nothing will come easily to Stavros.

As the story proceeds we learn that Stavros is willing to do almost anything to achieve his dream.  He hits rock bottom at about the time he finally gets on the ship to the Promised Land.

This film goes immediately on to my Best New-to-Me Movies of 2017 list.  I was skeptical when I learned it is almost three hours long but it kept my interest throughout.  The movie was shot on location in Greece and Turkey and looks stunning.  It is full of heart-felt performances.  Kazan sure doesn’t sugar-coat his family’s history.  This makes the story even more moving.  Highly recommended.

America America won the Academy Award for Best Art Direction-Set Decoration, Black-and-White.  It was nominated in the categories of Best Picture; Best Director; and Best Writing, Story and Screenplay – Written Directly for the Screen.

Clip – opening

Paranoiac
Directed by Freddie Francis
Written by Jimmy Sangster
1963/UK
Hammer Films
First viewing/Netflix rental

[box] Strange how paranoia can link up with reality now and then. — Philip K. Dick [/box]

A well-shot and fairly scary modern thriller from Hammer Pictures.

The setting is a dysfunctional household in contemporary England.  The original owners, John and Mary Ashby, died thirteen years previous.  Their teenage son Tony fell into the sea three years later.  Still living are the remaining two children — Simon (Oliver Reed), a nasty drunkard, and delicate Eleanor (Janette Scott), who has pined for her brother Tony since his death and may or not be insane.  Eleanor is cared for by buxom French nurse Francoise.  Completing the picture is Simon and Eleanor’s stern Aunt Harriet.

After the family’s annual memorial service for the departed, Eleanor starts seeing visions of her brother Tony.  There are lots of twists and turns in the plot and I think I will leave this right there.

I have been watching a fair number of horror duds lately and this movie was a very welcome relief.  Hammer is famous for its Gothic horror but really made all sorts of films. Cinematographer-turned-director Freddie Francis keeps this interesting to look at throughout.  The movie ends up in a place I didn’t quite expect it to take me – always a good thing.

Trailer

Zatoichi the Fugitive (Zatôichi kyôjô-tabi)
Directed by Tokuzo Tanaka
Written by Seiji Hoshikawa, story by Kan Shimozawa
1963/Japan
Daiei Studios
First viewing/FilmStruck

[box] Man at inn: [about Zatoichi] His sword is shiny and ice-cold. The only thing it won’t cut in this whole wide world is oil and the bond of lovers.[/box]

This series is the perfect popcorn viewing!

Our hero Ichi, the blind yakuza/masseur/swordsman, tries his hand at wrestling at which he naturally also excels.  Because he has defeated the champion of a syndicate of yakuza bosses, he is now their number one target for execution.  He also has drawn the attention of a sinister samurai who is now the lover of his old sweetheart Otone. Ichi finds time to unite a couple of star-crossed young lovers while slaying all who dare to challenge him.

This series not only goes well with popcorn but acts like potato chips – you can’t watch just one!  There are three released in 1963 and I am kind of spacing them out to prolong the enjoyment.

The Ugly American
Directed by George Englund
Written by Stewart Stern from a novel by William J. Lederer and Eugene Burdick
1963/USA
Universal International Pictures
First viewing/Netflix rental

[box] “The bureaucrat has become a self-styled sacred person; and the common man is blocked from finding out what the bureaucrats are doing, let alone controlling them.” ― William J. Lederer, A Nation of Sheep[/box]

Good, frustrating film about how clueless diplomats can be.

Anyone with a name like Harrison Carter MacWhite would seem to be born to be an Ambassador.  As the film begins, MacWhite is being questioned during Senate confirmation hearings as Ambassador to Sarkan, a fictitious Southeast Asian nation that clearly is a stand-in for Vietnam.  He is proud of his friendship with Deong, whom he met when both were resistance fighters during the Japanese occupation of that country. Deong went on to become a revered figure in the country’s battle for independence.  Those opposed to MacWhite’s nomination believe Deong is now a Communist.  At any rate, MacWhite is confirmed and travels to the country.

He is greeted at the airport by an anti-American demonstration that disintegrates into a riot in which the Ambassador’s car is attacked.  When MacWhite arrives at the Embassy he gives the entire staff a dressing down and lets them know that anyone who does not toe his mark will be on the first plane out.  Obviously, he is not about to listen to what any of them has to say.

That evening, he goes to meet with his old buddy Deong who admits to having organized the demonstration but having no idea how it went out of control.  As the conversation continues, Deong and MacWhite practically come to blowsover Deong’s belief that American imperialism, “war-mongering” and support for the dictatorial Prime Minister are destroying his country and that the Americans must go.  MacWhite concludes that Deong is in fact a Communist.

Against the advise of every single person that has been in country longer than he, MacWhite believes the solution to the problem is to expand the American-constructed “Freedom Road” that Deong opposes.  How many people must be killed before he learns the error of his ways?  With Pat Hingle as the altruistic American in charge of construction of the Road.

I thought this got the dynamic of some Embassies pretty darned right, unfortunately. Brando is perfect cast against type as a man who is often wrong but never in doubt.  I liked the film a lot and would recommend it to anyone drawn to the story line.

Trailer – the color on the DVD is much better

Robert Frost: A Lover’s Quarrel with the World
Directed by Shirley Clarke
WGBH
First viewing/FilmStruck

[box] “These woods are lovely, dark and deep,/ But I have promises to keep,/ And miles to go before I sleep,/ And miles to go before I sleep.” ― Robert Frost, Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening[/box]

A reminder of a time when poetry and politics could meet and of a great American poet.

This film was completed just before the poet Robert Frost died at the age of 88 in 1963.  By then he had become an American institution.  He had old ties to the Democratic Party and was a friend to the Kennedy Administration.  We see him wow the crowds at a couple of poetry readings and be interviewed in New Hampshire.

Clarke put together an interestingly cut documentary that gave a real feeling for the man and his thought.  Frost is a great reader of his own work.  It is just short of an hour long.

The film won the Academy Award for Best Documentary, Features.

The Fire Within (Le feu follet)
Directed by Louis Malle
Written by Louis Malle from a novel by Pierre Drieu La Rochelle
1963/France
Nouvelles Editions de Films
First viewing/Netflix rental

[box] Alain Leroy: Tomorrow, I kill myself.[/box]

Well-made but too damned depressing.

Alain LeRoy is thirty-something and for four months has resided in a sanitarium in Versailles where his estranged wife placed him for his alcoholism.  His doctor regards him as cured yet Alain is reluctant to leave, believing he will relapse quickly.  The movie begins with a first trip to Paris where he sleeps with a friend of his wife.  He returns to the sanitarium where he begins to plan his suicide for the next day.

Instead of shooting himself, Alain makes another trip to Paris to say good-bye to old friends, mostly from his drinking days.  Despite all the joy and life of Paris and the obvious love of his friends, Alain relapses.  What will happen the next day?

I don’t know what it is about 1963 but it seems to have been dominated by madcap comedies and complete downers.  This falls into the later category.  Malle shows us some stunning views of Parisian life but can’t overcome his plot.

I have a real problem with suicide in general.  I know that the people are mentally ill by this point but it seems like the ultimate act of selfishness to me.  Thus I had little empathy for Alain and his self-absorbed plight.

Clip