Flickers in Time

Man with a Movie Camera (Chelovek s kino-apparatom)
Directed by Dziga Vertov
Written by Dziga Vertov
1929/USSR
IMDb page
Repeat viewing/Amazon Instant
One of 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die

I’m an eye. A mechanical eye. I, the machine, show you a world the way only I can see it. I free myself for today and forever from human immobility. I’m in constant movement. I approach and pull away from objects. I creep under them. I move alongside a running horse’s mouth. I fall and rise with the falling and rising bodies. This is I, the machine, manoeuvring in the chaotic movements, recording one movement after another in the most complex combinations. – Dziga Vertov

My non-existent 100 Greatest Films of all time list will always include room for this one.

The film chronicles a day in the life of a Soviet city in line with the “city symphony” documentaries of the time.  However, in this case, an amalgamation of three different cities in Ukraine stands in for the city in question.  We watch the city come to life in the morning and then follow inhabitants through their everyday activities.  Birth, death, marriage, divorce, work and more work, leisure and recreation.  Everyone looks happy especially when they are working.  There are a lot of shots of machinery operating and various forms of transportation.  The only “character” is the camera man, Mikhail Kaufman, Vertov’s brother.  The film is full of editorial flourishes and fancy camerawork and we are often showed how this was accomplished.

This may sound like a propaganda piece.  Maybe it is but it is anything but dreary or bombastic.  Vertov edits with an infectious energy that can’t help elevating the spirit.  Absolutely recommended.  Some experimental films are indeed must-sees!

The film is available for free in multiple different versions on YouTube.  The big difference will be in the score.  I prefer the one by the Alloy Orchestra.

Restoration Trailer

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Real life won’t seem to leave me alone.  I’m going back to a simpler time in my movie watching.  It occurs to me that I have not posted many reviews from my 1929-1934 viewing on this blog.  So I’ll dip into that and post when I can.

Grease
Directed by Randal Kleiser
Written by Bronte Woodward from the original musical by Jim Jacobs and Warren Casey
1978/US
IMDb page
Repeat viewing/YouTube rental
One of 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die

Danny: You can’t just walk out of a drive-in.

I had a lot of fun watching this.  It was better than I remembered.

Danny (John Travolta) and Sandy (Olivia Newton-John) have an idyllic summer romance on the beach.  Sandy is from Australia and they sadly part, thinking the odds are that they will never see each other again.  But Sandy’s plans changed and she finds herself in the senior class of Rydell High, which Danny also attends.  Problem Sandy is a good girl and Danny is a greaser, perhaps the head greaser.  However, they continue to be in love with each other though Danny does his best to conceal this from the guys.

Sandy is adopted by the Pink Ladies, girls that date greasers.  She begins a rivalry with Rizzo (Stockard Channing) who has a yen for Danny and Rizzo does her best to sabotage the romance.  The story covers such musts as multiple misunderstandings; a dance contest; and a drag race. The movie is filled with upbeat music and fantastic dancing that celebrates the joys and pains of highschool.  With an outstanding cameo cast including Eve Arden as the principal; Sid Caesar as the coach; Joan Blondell as a waitress; Frankie Avalon as a Teen Angel; and Alice Ghostly as the school’s car mechanics teacher.

I saw this first as a stage play and when the movie was released I was kind of disappointed because it did not capture the 50’s the way the play did.  However, on repeat viewing I didn’t care about that.  I just enjoyed almost two hours of high energy entertainment.  If you can tolerate musical comedies and want something that will put a smile on your face, I can recommend.

Halloween
Directed by John Carpenter
Written by John Carpenter and Debra Hill
1978/US
IMDb page
Repeat viewing/Amazon Prime
One of 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die

Tommy: Laurie, what’s the Boogeyman?

A classic of horror cinema.

The setting is Haddonfield, Illinois, a small town mid-America. High-schooler Laurie (Jamie Lee Curtis)  spends most of her evenings babysitting. She doesn’t date much because the boys think she is “too smart”.  She is best friends with obnoxious and mean Annie and Lynda. Her friends both have horny boyfriends.  On Halloween night Laurie and Annie are both babysitting and Laurie plays musical houses with her friends so they can fool around with their boyfriends.

In the meantime, Michael Meyers escapes from a mental institution.  Meyers had murdered his sister when he was six years old.  He has been diagnosed as a soulless killing machine. He heads straight to Haddonfield where he terrorizes the girls and their boyfrienfds.

I waited a long time to see this because I am a wimp.  I needn’t have worried since there is very, very little gore involved.  There are a ton of jump scares however.  Well done on the part of Carpenter, who also wrote the creepily effective score. Recommended.

The 36th Chamber of Shao Lin (AKA “Master Killer”) (Shao Lin san shi liu fang)
Directed by Chia-Liang Liu
Written by Kuang Ni
Hong Kong/1978
IMDb page
First viewing/Amazon Prime (free to members)
One of 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die

San Te: I should have learned Kung-fu instead of ethics.

I read that this is a jewel of kung fu cinema and I can see why.

Liu Yu-tei  (Gordon Liu Chia-hui) is the latest in a long line of patriots who have fought back against the evil Manchu Government.  During a brutal counter-attack, our hero’s father is killed.  He decides to learn kung fu so he can take it back to the patriotic side and avenge his father’s death.

Liu applies to the Shao Lin Buddhist monastery for training.  The abbot is sympathetic and takes the boy in, naming him San Te.  But it is only after a year of manual labor and a lot of begging that San Te is allowed to start his training.  Each “chamber” in the monastery has a lesson to teach and they must be completed in order.  Final exams are arduous and dangerous but they must all be passed.  Most of the movie concerns San Te’s training.  Then he tries it out on some bad guys.

The kung-fu choreography is this film is simply amazing.  There is very little wire work which helps a lot with the suspension of disbelief in this regard.  The production is handsomely mounted.  Recommended.

Dawn of the Dead
Directed by George A. Romero
Written by George A. Romero
1978/US
IMDb page
Repeat viewing/YouTube
One of 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die

Dr. Millard Rausch, Scientist: This isn’t the Republicans versus the Democrats, where we’re in a hole economically or… or we’re in another war. This is more crucial than that. This is down to the line, folks, this is down to the line. There can be no more divisions among the living!

George Romero turns the gore up to eleven while at that same time making sardonic digs at consumer culture.

Two of Philadelphia’s SWAT police officers, a traffic reporter and his girlfriend are forced to hole up in a shopping mall by marauding hordes of zombies.  The zombies are also attracted to the mall by some instinctive vague memory of that is where they should go. The mall includes a gun store and the four blow away dozens of their slow-moving foes.

Finally, a group of non-zombie thugs spot the mall and get the same idea.  Then things get much worse.

This movie is non-stop bloody action and is really a ton of fun.  The blood is so over-the-top that it doesn’t disgust or horrify.  It looks like the cast must have had a lot of fun making it.  Recommended if the description appeals