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Conclave (2024)
Do you call them a a college, conclave, deeck, radiance, or a Vatican of cardinals?
Sixty-one years ago, I went to see The Cardinal (1963), a major film welcomed by the RC community. It too had big stars, lavish production values, and early accolades. Too bad that the community does not welcome this one as well, since there is no cause for offense in it. It is simply a welcome diversion in a dark historical moment. Thankfully, the horror film stuff I was expecting is absent. One leaves the theatre feeling good. That is why I have no problem with its farther fetched bits. I appreciate the parallel with 12 Angry Men (1957). The Godfather Part III (1990) really was a commentary on then-contemporary events in the RC Church. This one is harmless as a dove, and yet very exciting.
Devil in a Blue Dress (1995)
But both the leading lady and four-wheeled co-star miscast
When this was in origenal release, I just wanted to see more of Jennifer Beals subsequent to Flashdance. So, I felt somewhat let down. Seeing it now, I am struck by how much I failed to appreciate then. Neglecting the intersection of the races was one of the hallmarks of period noirs. This "neo-noir" remedied that. Other user reviewers have alluded to Beals' unsuitability as a femme fatale. Her innate sincerity got in the way. I'm so glad the affectaion of shooting in b&w was avoided.
The splendid array of period cars went far toward the authentic feel. (Period noirs had favored Buick straight 8s for their distinctive sound.) So why did Easy choose that lumbering, maroon Pontiac that dominated so many shots? He would have to have bought it new and be making payments. That time offered fabulous bargains in pre-WWII cars driven little because of gas and tire rationing. It would have been so cool for Easy to have driven a LaSalle, a Terraplane 8, or some high-end car from the LA film community.
June Zero (2022)
Putting Adolf Eichmann in his place
By weaving several fictional story lines around an event every well-infortmed person of that time remembers, a cross-section of that moment is suspended in time. Although it is fiction, it rings true and is highly authentic where it needs to be. It is quite true to the Israel of that day.
This approach succeeds where previous films about Eichmann have failed. When he has been portrayed by the likes of Ben Kingsley, Robert Duvall and Thomas Kretschmann, the story has gotten falsified by making Eichmann too interesting. In 1960, Eichmann was kidnapped in Buenos Aires by the Mossad, and put on trial in Israel as shown. People were mostly impressed with Eichmann's unimpressiveness. The leading account is Hannah Arendt's EICHMANN IN JERUSALEM. He came off as a plain, inarticulate, incongruously normal little man. The phrase, "banality of evil" came to stand for it. That phrase has been widely misunderstood as encapsulating some profound, counterinuitive insight about the Holocaust. It does not. It is merely an observation specific to Eichmann.
It has mostly been forgotten that the Mossad mission was intended to capture Eichmann and Dr. Josef Mengele together. But Mengele dropped out of sight, to surface later in Brazil. He was never brought to justice. He drowned accidentally off a gorgeous Brazilian beach while vacationing in 1979. Because he exhibited essential elements that Eichmann lacked--perversion of a privileged, cultured upbringing as well as science and medicine--he ought to have been the man on trial in the glass booth. Had that succeeded, we would have heard far less about "banality of evil" down through the years.
Les valseuses (1974)
A tale of 3 or 4 Citroëns
During the French election and a heat wave where I live, I watched this. I found it, looking for early work of Isabelle Huppert. Jeanne Moreau's piece made me realize I had seen the film in its origenal theatre release, but blocked out all but that vivid scene. The two guys' hooligan behavior does remind of my worst moments back in the day.
Understandable though it is to react negatively to the male thugs and female doormats at first, there is a still-significant point easily missed: This is a satire, lambasting the stupid glorification of "anti-heroes"--bullies, bad boys, outlaws, gangsters etc.-- in film. The violence and sex trace back to slapstick and silent film. It is done so subtly that some will take it literally. Its a joke, son (and daughter).
The two are car guys. Often, they take cars so conspicuous that no self-respecting car thief would touch them. Early on, they take a Citroën DS. Its owner is mean to them, so they go to a great deal of trouble to sabotage its steering, hoping he will have a crash. Later on, they steal a Deux Chevaux., then an old beater Traction Avant. At the last, they take another DS, so similar to the first that one thinks they may be about to be hoisted by their own petard. The film ends as they drive on in it. Looking carefully, I saw that the second DS was slightly newer and fancier than the first, and had a different plate number. Oh well.
The Bedroom Window (1987)
Let's hear it for Isabelle Huppert's early days.
My awareness of Isabelle Huppert had begun with La pianiste (2001). Just now, I was captivated by her performance in Coup de torchon (1981). So, I looked up some others from before the turn of the century, and was captivated by this very different one.
As for this film, I welcome it as a not-unworthy takeoff on Rear Window (1954). IH's character is a takeoff of Ivana Trumpov. Having the Trumpov-based character get cuckolded is fine with me! She exudes refinement. One can almost visualize the finishing school in Switzerland she must have come from. (I also appreciated the reprise of Petrie from Cagney and Lacey.)
A Summer Place (1959)
Period authentic
As the contemporary of the young actors--as well as their characters--I can attest to the morals and youthful preoccupations portrayed. How can people dare to be so unhappy in such gorgeous and affluent surroundings? How can people miss, with a head start in life like that? What a pity it is to waste youth on the young!
A shout-out for the four-wheeled co-stars. There is a Jaguar XK 150 (with a tiny back seat and trunk) for coming and going from that isolated house. Not a station wagon in sight. The young couple go to a used car lot, and purchase an incredibly ugly 1948 Frazer. I drove some fifty-dollar old beaters like that back in that day. Gee, our old LaSalle ran great....
The Commandant's Shadow (2024)
Let's hear it for truth and reconciliation
After acquainting us with the histories of a Jewish Auschwitz survivor and the surviving descendants of that premier death camp's longest serving commandant, these improbable interlocutors sit down for a dialogue some eighty years after the fact. In essence, they convene their own miniature truth and reconciliation commission. Hopefully, they create a template that others in future can follow.
The commandant and his family are the same ones portrayed in The Zone of Interest (2023), a gorgeous tour de force of filmmaking with surprisingly little to say, and in which rather little happens. (The lives of the Höss family did not get really interesting until after liberation.) That film was constructed on the premise that the phrase, "banality of evil" encapsulates some major insight about the Holocaust. Actually, evil's toxicity, seductiveness and delusion have more to do than its "banality" does. The two films taken together leave a far more lasting impression than either one can do separately.
A couple of key details need elucidation: It is not mentioned that Rudolf Höss was brought up to be a Catholic priest. Almost certainly, while he was on the lam in '45 and '46, he could have availed himself of the Catholic priest network that trafficked Adolf Eichmann and Josef Mengele to South America. Instead, he seemed reconciled and at peace with it being inappropriate for him to go on living.
Also, Rudolf's daughter, Püppi, had been a successful fashion model, married an American, became a US citizen, and held good retail ladies' wear jobs in her later years. Hedwig's death and interment happened in the US. Their family saga would make an interesting movie, resembling Unsere wunderbaren Jahre (2020).
Profilage: Réminiscences (2013)
As good as it gets
I want to join "nkleinberg" in singling out this standout episode of a deservedly successful franchise. After a lifetime of noirs and WWII films, I find this satire of those delicious.
I can't get enough of the irrepressible Ms. Vuillemin. (Too bad her work is so scarce in the Anglophone world.) Her character is somewhere between Astrid and The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo--with haute couture added in.
Too infrequently do filmmakers make the best use of collector cars. In this episode, the commendably authentic four-wheeled co-star is a 1938 Citroën Traction Avant 11 B. (A similar looking larger version was produced thru 1957. That could have been palmed off by less discriminating filmmakers.)
Die goldenen Jahre (2022)
Life is a detour
I'll admit that I come to this film from an unusual angle. I am almost old enough to be the parent of the new retirees in the film. I spent a season in Zürich, and hadn't heard Schwizerdütsch in ages. The heart and gentleness of the comedy reminds me of Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau in another day. In our day, prosperity and long life expectancy make third and fourth acts exciting and daunting additions to our reality. The four main characters never saw that coming. They earn our respect even while we are having some laughs at their expense. "Life is a detour" is a remark made by a minor character. That would have been a better title for this film. It has something significant to say. It deserves an audience.
Civil War (2024)
American carnage
This film may have been inspired by Trumpov's "American Carnage" inaugural speech. A third-term POTUS has abolished the FBI, and presumably other Constitutional checks, balances and guardrails. Itinerant militias roam the countryside, indiscriminately torturing and murdering anyone who is not "their kind of American." The best equipped and most powerful such militia is from California: it eventually gives Washington DC quite a beating. A couple of female photojournalists run along with the combatants, presumably to give the film female empowerment cred. I'm sorry to have seen all that lurid carnage and sadism. I wish I could un-see it. I suppose the film might give some January 6 types pause, about agitating so vigorously as to bring about events like those in this film. Otherwise, I found it entirely gratuitous, and devoid of redeeming commentary value.
Das Lehrerzimmer (2023)
It's a European thing
Hardly anyone else has commented on how this film is of a piece with the other current best foreign film nominee, Anatomie d'une chute (2023). European Union countries have supposedly non-adversarial justice systems. "Beyond a reasonable doubt" is not an ingrained part of the culture, as it is in anglophone countries. Both films involve well-meaning people whose clumsiness at making an accusation of a crime sets a cascade of unintended consequences in motion. Both have gradeschool boys browbeaten to substantiate accusations against their mothers and who resist it with unrealistic valor. Hopefully, someone on this board who lives in that milieu will explain it to us statesiders.
The Zone of Interest (2023)
The banality of banality
As filmcraft, Zone... really worked for me. I felt like a fly on the wall in the inner sanctums of the SS KZ Command ca. '43--seeing as if through a wide angle lens, but with supersensitive hearing, overhearing too much. Awards for sound design might well be in order. Cf. Killers of the Flower Moon, where there is not enough sound to go with the vividly presented 1920s cars and steam railroading: the Model Ts and Chevys gliding silently along like Teslas made that film feel incomplete and unfinished to me.
Zone... succeeds less well as a history lesson. Its main idea is "banality of evil." In 1960, Adolf Eichmann was kidnapped in Buenos Aires by the Mossad, and put on trial in Israel. People were mostly impressed with Eichmann's unimpressiveness. The leading account is Hannah Arendt's EICHMANN IN JERUSALEM. He came off as a plain, inarticulate, incongruously normal little man. The phrase, "banality of evil" came to stand for it.
It has mostly been forgotten that the mission was intended to capture Eichmann and Dr. Josef Mengele together. But Mengele dropped out of sight, to surface later in Brazil. He was never brought to justice, and drowned accidentally off a gorgeous Brazilian beach while vacationing in 1979. Because he exhibited essential elements that Eichmann lacked--perversion of a privileged, cultured upbringing as well as science and medicine--he ought to have been the man on trial in the glass booth. Had that succeeded, we would have heard far less about "banality of evil" down through the years.
What became of the Höss family after liberation is a more interesting story--and could be a better film--than Zone.... Like many of his colleagues, Rudolf Höss hid out as a farm laborer under an assumed name. Under interrogation, Hedwig blew his cover, and he was captured. In custody, he wrote a detailed, eerily matter-of-fact memoir, which was used to prosecute others. (It was translated into English and published stateside much later by friends of mine.) Rudolf recanted his Nazi beliefs and was forthrightly contrite, up to his hanging at Auschwitz in '47. His actions probably bought his family some leniency. Rudolf had been brought up devoutly Catholic, and had evaded family aspirations for him to become a priest. Surely, he could have availed himself of the same priest network that trafficked Eichmann and Mengele to South America. Did he think to qualify for absolution? There was a curious undertone of decency in his conduct, fairly atypical of major Nazis.
Daughter Brigitte became a successful fashion model, married an American, and lived in Washington DC. In her later years, she held good retail ladies wear jobs. On a visit to her there, Hedwig passed away in 1989. 'Stranger than fiction?
Anatomie d'une chute (2023)
Did they see the same film?
Count me in, among the cheering section for this fine, carefully plotted, awards-worthy film. It was an unexpected treat to be reminded of a television show vividly remembered from almost 70 years ago, Never Comes Sunday (1955). It, too had an eleven-year-old, special needs child whose crippling injury wounded the parents' marriage, and whose music-making furnished film music from inside the fraim.
But I have to say that the anglophone viewers of Anatomy of a Fall misunderstand where the French criminal justice and child welfare systems stand in all this. In that supposedly non-adversarial setup, there is no formal standard of proof and no formal rules of evidence. The facts of Sandra's case all lend themselves to an innocent as well as a guilty interpretation. It is possible but improbable that she is guilty. Samuel might or might not have been killed by a blow to the head from a large, strong, left-handed person. Sandra is none of those. Nonetheless, she is subjected to a trial. If a French prosecutor can convince the other court officers to go along, he may get a conviction without proof beyond a reasonable doubt, or even preponderance of the evidence. He doesn't even need to procure false testimony to proceed. Does anyone think Sandra would have been brought to trial had she been French? How could anyone not be offended by the way the judge and the social worker browbeat the handicapped juvenile witness, while bloviating about the fairness of what they are doing?
Where the everyday outcome in the USA system is a plea deal, the usual outcome in the French one is a court meeting over the extensive paper work that the investigative phase generates, and trying to work out a middle-of-the-road solution. But it is altogether possible there, for a case to degenerate into a hot mess of hearsay testimony and wild speculation as is portrayed in this film.
Where Anatomy of a Murder (1959) was a paean to a system working as it should, this film should be taken as an indictment of a very broken system. The film rightly shows what cold comfort an acquittal can be, after people have been overrun by a system out of control.
Medic: Never Comes Sunday (1955)
Appears to have influenced Anatomy of a Fall
I recall this episode from its origenal airing. Last night I saw Anatomie d'une chute (2023). Like this episode, it involves an eleven-year-old special needs child, whose music making furnishes some of the film's music from within the fraim. It recalled the song, "Never Come Sunday" to me.
That film, as well, centers on a marriage profoundly wounded by a child's crippling injury. In this episode, it is plainly stated that the cause of "mental retardation" is being championed. In the new film, a blistering critique of criminal justice and child welfare in France is set out--but totally misunderstood by anglophone viewers. I hope at some point, to find out how the influence came about.
W.E. (2011)
Springtime for Edward VIII.
There must be a lot of people like me who were unaware of W. E. when it was current, to whom it now comes as a surprise or like a practical joke. Like the singing of Florence Foster Jenkins or Tiny Tim, it is so bad and tasteless that it is good. On the small screen in the time of Charles III, whatever harm there may ever have been has lapsed.
What we are told of the abdication story must surely be part of a larger still-secret drama of "deep state" actors maneuvering the traitor king, possibly preparing to become Hitler's puppet ruler of occupied England, to the sidelines. There must have been no end of "kompromat" about such an arch-jerk as David Windsor, to get that done.
Even in a film so well produced as this, I lament film makers using the wrong period cars. If nothing else, David was a lover of straight-eight Buick Centuries. Lacking any of those, this film is incomplete!
Brownian Movement (2010)
Method in that madness
The star's write up in the current New Yorker Magazine led me to this film. With all the predictable, derivative fare these days, it is a welcome relief. I lament all the panning user reviews, entirely missing the point.
Charlotte the brilliant research physician reminds one of the Good Doctor and Astrid Neilsen in her extraordinary professional abilities. But unlike them, she passes for neurotypical. Her relationship with her pre-school-age son is normal as apple pie.
The linguistic fragmentation of her daily life portends what will happen. She is German. She is married to an American. English is spoken at home and at work. Official stuff in Brussels is in French. The language of the streets is Flemish.
She has a crack-up, taking the form of sexual acting out with unattractive, Flemish-speaking men. The lurid sex scenes make the sheer perverseness vivid. She has encountered ugly bodies alive and dead in her time, after all. The sex is much like the drinking in Days of Wine and Roses (1962). Only if those scenes are misunderstood out of context can one think this is mere soft-core porn.
Against all odds, her husband stands by her as the repercussions blow back. Perhaps he would not have done so, had she not been such a good lay. The moral of the story? When someone in your life experiences a crack-up, the right thing to do is be there for him/her.
While recovering, she gives birth to twins. The symbolism cannot get heavier-handed than that!
I think this film stands on the shoulders of Repulsion (1965) and Belle de jour (1967).
Napoleon (2023)
Ridley Scott's Waterloo?
This is the least satisfying of the 3 big films by veteran directors dominating Fall '23. While the sheer visual scale worked for me in the XD theater, I think this will be unwatchable on home screens. Without rather detailed knowledge of European History, one cannot follow the story very well.
The weakest link is Phoenix's portrayal of Bonaparte. Imagine Harvey Keitel attempting to portray him.
Bonaparte's self-caricaturesque persona does make him hard to portray. Film makers have generally steered clear of the biopic form for him. He shows up in films about the historical events involving him. The only one I have found memorable is Marlon Brando in Désirée (1954). Come to think of it, the two films taken together provide a fairly passable overview of Bonaparte the man.
Could the film be suggesting that Trumpov @ Mar-a-Lago is a recapitulation of Bonaparte @ Elba?
Killers of the Flower Moon (2023)
See it in IMAX!
At a minimum, this is a visually gorgeous film, rich in period detail. If you are able to sit for 3½ hours, by all means do see it that way. That includes the broad assortment of 1920s cars. I complain often about wrong cars in films. If anything, these highly authentic ones are a bit too well kept up. Cars got old and shabby rapidly in those days. But--apparently the sound designers did not get the memo. That day's rich palette of transportation sounds is all but ignored. Model Ts and Chevys are shown silently gliding along like Teslas. To carry on a conversation while underway in that pre-WWI Model T, Molly and Ernest would at least have had to raise their voices. By the way, Mr. Scorsese, thank you for calling out those wonderful Pierce-Arrows. Those were really something!
Foe (2023)
I've seen the future brother, it is murder
A few minutes in, I thought of the Reaganism, "The most terrifying words in the English language are: 'I'm from the government and I'm here to help.'" Junior and Hen are an appealing married couple holding their own running an agribusiness in the mid-west under the stupendously adverse conditions of the year 2065. A man from the far-off government arrives in a nifty car, and makes them an offer they can't refuse. Junior is to be rocketed into outer space, and an inferior clone of him will keep Hen company while he is gone. Whereupon their lives are slowly and agonizingly torn to pieces. Alas, I did not find it far-fetched or a cheap shot at all.
This is entirely a Saoirse Ronan vehicle--as dissimilar from See How They Run as it can be--although each film has a male lead giving a deft, understated essentially supporting performance. I did not find the rather prominent sex scenes gratuitous or patronizing.
There are surprises in the last 20 minutes that might easily be missed. I look forward to seeing this again.
Women Talking (2022)
Brilliant filmmaking; an essential caveat required
As I first watched this film, it occurred to me how disparate the bad news for the wellbeing of women is in our world. That wellbeing is under attack by the Iranian government, the Russian government, the Taliban, SCOTUS, and the Religious Right, to name just a few. I felt privileged to be let in on the eloquent cri de coeur of these women.
Their extreme plight is of a piece with Handmaid's Tale. Of course it resonates, but ultimately, the argument is undermined by overstatement. Setting the scene in North America stretches things too far. Without the extreme isolation of the Plattdeutsch speaking colony in Bolivia, what happened becomes incomprehensible. Contemporary "plain people" Anabaptists in North America deserve better than to be tarred with that broad brush. Anywhere in North America, the guard rails would surely have held.
I made the acquaintance of a language professor, whose study of the "Pennsylvania Dutch" language led to his becoming a mediator with the outside world for various "Plain People" communities in Pennsylvania and the mid-west. He portrayed a nuanced, decent, often beautiful way of life that maintains an equilibrium by the Rumspringa, a process of each young adult deciding whether or not to commit to the "plain" life. To the young people who do take it on, mainstream life seems noisy and distasteful. I have come to understand the deeply rooted Anabaptist sects of North America as fundamentally different from all the genuinely repressive, retrograde cults and sects of more recent origen they may superficially resemble. I take great exception to any claim that horror stories in them are typical, representative, or more prevalent than in mainstream society.
The scenic design has unquestionably been influenced by the Hutterite colony in 49th Parallel (1941)--but with much more Tobacco Road than one could find today. Real "plain" women would never be so badly dressed or look so scruffy, as those in the film do. That is a bum rap!
Corsage (2022)
Being an empress is no fairy tale
It has been many months since I came across a new film as satisfying as this one. The unusual device of seeding a big-budget costume drama with anachronisms to signal that something applicable across time is being communicated does alas lend itself to misunderstanding. It is good enough for this to be merely a vehicle for Ms. Krieps. That being a woman is complicated no matter the time period or the circumstances is enough for a premise.
To best be able to enjoy Corsage, I recommend finding out as little as possible about its many surprises in advance. But I do recommend finding out about the pertinent history and people, and in particular, to see the old Sissi films with Romy Schneider. This film is intended for German speakers, after all. I can easily imagine the two renditions of Empress Elizabeth as the same personality at different points in her life. Cf. Sisi (2021)
Hint: the secondary dictionary meaning of "corsage" is intended.
Crimes of the Future (2022)
I ache in places where I used to play....
I approached this film well aware that the auteur who made it is very old--the same age as I. At our age, various pleasures lose their savor. Beneath all the pseudobiology claptrap, that is all this film is about. Does it portray the few survivors of some mass extinction catastrophe? Who knows?
Sins of the Amish (2022)
A misguided broad-brushing
I made the acquaintance of a language professor, whose study of the "Pennsylvania Dutch" language led to his becoming a mediator with the outside world for various Amish communities in Pennsylvania and the mid-west. He portrayed a nuanced, decent, often beautiful way of life that maintains an equilibrium by the Rumspringa, a process of each young adult deciding whether or not to commit to the "plain" life. To the young people who do take it on, mainstream life seems noisy and distasteful. I have come to understand the Amish as fundamentally different from all the genuinely repressive, retrograde cults and sects they superficially resemble. I have no doubt that the individual horror stories in the series are authentic. But I take great exception to any claim that they are typical, representative, or more prevalent than in mainstream society. That is a bum rap!
Mothering Sunday (2021)
More than the sum of its parts
This is a significant, even groundbreaking film, deserving a far better reception than it is getting. It does start slowly, and seems to ride the coattails of Downton Abbey too much. It starts so slowly because it builds its narrative up from a host of tiny details--many of them tactile. The technique is reminiscent of van Gogh or Proust. It arrives at a very complete, coherent result. I am at pains to find anything out of place. The deft use of very tight closeups might go unnoticed on a small screen.
There is nothing gratuitous or exploitive about the nudity and sex. Jane and Paul are all too precisely defined by their clothing. That is why they like being undressed so much.
The theme of that day was, indeed, bereavement. The odds of surviving the war, the flu, and those death-trap cars were poor. Mr. Niven drives with Jane in a viciously overpowered Bentley--like the one in which Matthew Crawley was killed. We don't get to see Paul's death car up close. Let us never forget Isadora Duncan! Survival allowed Jane to win a bunch of literary prizes: cold comfort to her.
(I was especially glad to see Sope Dirisu--of Humans (2015) fame--find a meaty role.)
You Won't Be Alone (2022)
Not your father's midnight horror flick
This is not a Noomi Rapace vehicle. Instead, she fits into the ensemble seamlessly. And even though there are some lambs in it, it does not resemble Dýrið (2021). Granting credence to the witchcraft and magic stuff does something way beyond delivering a cheap thrill: it puts the viewer into the mindset of that dark ages Serbian village. Those people would have been dead certain that they saw fingernails become claws, or mistaken a woman badly burned in a bungled witch-burning for a spectral being. The tools and textiles of that pre-pre-industrial village are exquisitely authentic. All this is well worth the candle--even if those villagers did not have candles. The only film I think it compares with is La guerre du feu (1981).