The Incredible Petrified World Directed by Jerry Warren Written by John W. Steiner 1957/USA GBM Productions
First viewing/Internet Archive
[box] Lauri Talbott: Sorry you feel that way. I was hoping we could help each other.
Dale Marshall: You don’t need help – neither do I. Not as long as we have two men around us. [/box]
John Carradine is the best thing about this terrible movie and he phoned his part in.
The movie begins with a long documentary sequence about the ocean depths that allows the filmmakers to use some stilted narration and stock footage of a battle between a large fish and an octopus. We then move to the story. Prof. Millard Wyman has invented a diving bell that will allow exploration of the sea deeper than ever before. A team of two men and two women occupy the bell. The cable snaps and the explorers find themselves in underwater caves that oddly include plenty of fresh air and water. They meet up with a menacing old weirdo. After a lot of jealous bickering between the ladies, they are rescued. The end.
This movie looks like hell and is boring. Clearly Carradine was in this solely for the paycheck. There’s not even a monster. Don’t bother.
Tokyo Twilight (Tôkyô boshoku) Directed by Yasujiro Ozu Written by Yasujiro Ozu and Kogo Noda 1957/Japan Shochiku Eiga
Repeat viewing/Hulu
[box] The pattern of the prodigal is: rebellion, ruin, repentance, reconciliation, restoration. Edwin Louis Cole [/box]
Of all Ozu’s domestic dramas, this is the one that made me cry most.
Kisako Sugiyama (Isuzu Yamada) abandoned her husband Shukichi (Chisu Ryu) and three children years ago. The son subsequently died in an accident. Daughter Tatako (Setsuko Hara) was old enough to remember her mother but daughter Akiko was only a toddler. As the story begins, Tatako and her own daughter have moved back in with Shukichi. Tatakoi doesn’t want to talk about it but it seems that her marriage is breaking up as well. Akiko is staying out late at night and worrying her family terribly. She spends much time searching for her erstwhile boyfriend Kenji who has been avoiding her.
She needn’t have bothered. When Akiko finally tracks down her man to tell him she is pregnant, he is no help whatsoever. She is all alone. She feels even more alone later. Then she discovers that the woman at the mah jong parlor who took an interest in her is actually her mother.
Damn, it is hard to be a woman. Or a person really. All of Ozu’s films deal with the dissolution of the Japanese family but this takes it to a new level of frankness. I felt so sorry for each and every person in this movie that the tears started about 30 minutes before the end. None of this is a criticism. The whole thing is exquisitely and sensitively done. Recommended.
Isuzu Yamada was having quite a year. Her most memorable role is as the Lady Macbeth character in Throne of Blood, but there’s the lustful, vengeful landlady in Lower Depths, and her subtly heartbreaking performance in this as well. She was certainly a fine actress.
12 Angry Men Directed by Sidney Lumet Written by Reginald Rose 1957/USA Orion-Nova Pictures
Repeat viewing/Netflix rental
#333 of 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die
[box] Juror #6: [when Juror #8 asks him to “suppose” the defendant’s innocence] Well, I’m not used to supposin’. I’m just a workin’ man. My boss does all the supposin’, but I’ll try one. Supposin’ you talk us all out of this, and, uh, the kid really did knife his father?[/box]
Lumet gathered all the great character actors of the 50’s into one room with Henry Fonda and made a stage play work compellingly as cinema.
The camera takes us into a New York court building and past several courtrooms until we arrive at the chambers where a young Latino is on trial for capital murder, accused of stabbing his father to death. We are there at the judge’s instructions to the jury. Twelve unnamed men gather in the jury room. After some pleasantries, they get down to business. Most think they will be able to leave for the day in fairly short order. After all, It is an open and shut case backed up by a couple of eye witnesses. The jurors are all the more anxious to leave since the room stifling hot and the fan doesn’t work.
The jurors immediately take a vote and Juror No. 8 (Henry Fonda) is the lone hold-out for acquittal. It’s not that he’s so sure the boy is innocent but that he wants to discuss the evidence. This makes some of the other jurors really mad. Some were persuaded by the prosecutor’s case. For others the ethnicity and social class of the accused is evidence enough. Juror 8 brings up a couple of points which make him uncertain. Further discussion changes some other minds. With Lee J. Cobb, Ed Begley and E. J. Marshall as the angriest arguers for a guilty verdict; Martin Balsam as the foreman; and Jack Warden as a guy with tickets to that night’s ball game.
What can I say after I have said that this is a perfect rendition of a stage play? Lumet keeps his camera movement so vital that we never feel claustrophobic in that little room. He also stages the actors brilliantly. The acting is top notch and the theme is thought-provoking and timeless. Highly recommended.
It has always bothered me that Henry Fonda brought that knife with him. It seems to me improper for the jury to be discussing something not in evidence. Now that I think about it though, there could be a safety issue! I wonder what they do nowadays with dangerous exhibits.
12 Angry Men was nominated for Academy Awards in the categories of Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Writing, Screen Play Adapted from Material in Another Medium.
Across the Bridge Directed by Ken Annakin Written by Guy Elmes and Dennis Freeman; story by Graham Greene 1957/UK The Rank Organization
First viewing/Netflix
[writing in 1990] “I have somehow in the last years lost all my interest in films and I don’t think I have seen one for the last nearly ten years.” — Graham Greene
Rod Steiger pulls off a masterful, restrained performance as a corrupt German businessman.
Financier Carl Schaffner (Steiger) has lived in England for several years and is now visiting New York. While there, he learns that auditors will soon discover his swindle of $3 million from investors back in England. He figures that if he can get to Mexico before that happens he can lawyer up and escape extradition for years. The fraud proceeds are already safely stashed away. He has no visa for Mexico but plans to get in by bribing border officials. He takes the train so as not to be spotted on any airline passenger list. But before the train has travelled half way to Mexico, headlines are screaming about his crime.
In the first of many, many coincidences in the plot, Schaffner meets a man, Paul Scharff, who is practically his double and has a Mexican passport. Scharff likes a drink and he passes out at the end of a drinking session with Schaffner. Schaffner begins plotting to assume Scharff’s identity. This will prove to be his undoing. The plot is loaded with surprises and I don’t want to spoil them. With Bernard Lee as a Scotland Yard inspector.
Rod Steiger can be brilliant or the epitome of ham. Here he is marvelous in a role that requires an accent and moves from being unsympathetic to utterly pathetic. At first, I was frustrated with all the plot twists and coincidences because they didn’t seem to go anywhere. The ending was really satisfying though and I forgave everything.
I’ve been a classic movie fan for many years. My original mission was to see as many movies as I could get my hands on for every year from 1929 to 1970. I have completed that mission.
I then carried on with my chronological journey and and stopped midway through 1978. You can find my reviews of 1934-1978 films and “Top 10” lists for the 1929-1936 and 1944-77 films I saw here. For the past several months I have circled back to view the pre-Code films that were never reviewed here.
I’m a retired Foreign Service Officer living in Indio, California. When I’m not watching movies, I’m probably traveling, watching birds, knitting, or reading.
Photographs and videos found in this blog, unless indicated, are not owned by me and are here only for the purpose of education and discussion. Media found here are not intended for any commercial purpose. Copyright infringement is not intended.
Written material belongs to me and is copyrighted by flickersintime.com
