Classic Film : What classics did you watch this week? (9/12-9/18)

Re: Informer Queen Three End Aji Bang Soup 84 Lambs Women Katwe

McLaglen is effective, no denying that but there's something a little off and not quite believable in his performance for me. I could see Charles Laughton in the role. He could be physically imposing and have brought more shading to his character than McLaglen. But it is what it is and McLaglen's performance is/was admired so there you have it.

I didn't intend to slight Ted Levine. His Buffalo Bill is a genuinely creepy characterization but really, everyone in the cast down to the most minor role is just about perfect. If they gave Oscars to casting directors, Howard Feuer would have won that year!

In ancient Egypt, cats were worshipped as gods. They have never forgotten this

McLaglen, Levine

Victor McLaglen was a limited player with a strong screen presence. John Ford really seemed to guide his career in Hollywood. He was in the silent The Unholy Three and the massive hits What Price Glory and The Cockeyed World, yet his career never quite took off like that of the other big lug, Wallace Beery; but then they were with different studios.

Ted Levine is in some ways a sad case of a gifted actor who sort of got lost in the shuffle. Not quite so extreme as Andy Robinson in the wake of Dirty Harry, but comparable in some respects. His work in Silence Of The Lambs is both haunting and hilarious. He nailed the character of Buffalo Bill without going over the top: it was BB who went over the top .

My favorite line and classic SOTL Ted Levine moment is when the senator's daughter is down the well in the basement, BB lowers the basket instructs her thusly: "it puts the lotion in the basket". No response. "It puts the lotion in the basket". No response. "Put the *beep* lotion in the basket!" . The movie is a gift that keeps on giving where line readings are concerned.

Re: Get Heydrich - but don't get Hur


you just choose to be your cynical self as usual while watching this.
I thank the godless Universe for cynical Trevor and his reviews!


You are alive and living now.
Now is the envy of all of the dead

Cheers! - nm




"Security - release the badgers."

Re: Informer Queen Three End Aji Bang Soup 84 Lambs Women Katwe

John Ford's reputation was already established by the time he did THE INFORMER; done at RKO (Ford was under contract to Fox) for a very small budget, it shows how imaginative Ford could be. There are only a few sets, but he employs fog effects and lighting to enhance the visuals. As drama, this is fairly blunt (Ford had shown much more subtlety in movies like PILGRIMAGE and ARROWSMITH) yet it's powerful in a crude way. It was the first of Ford's films to be honored: he won the Best Director Oscar as well as the New York Film Critics award (and that was in the first year of those awards, when it meant something).

Thorold Dickinson is one of those directors whose career has not been sufficiently known. He had bad luck in some of his projects: his version of GASLIGHT (1940) was (literally) suppressed by MGM when they bought the rights for a remake; SECRET PEOPLE (1952) was a thoughtful thriller about refugees in London, but it was suppressed when the co-star, Audrey Hepburn, was cast in ROMAN HOLIDAY, and the Paramount publicity machine proclaimed that she was introduced in that film, which meant making sure her previous films were undistributed. QUEEN OF SPADES is a stunning movie, with terrific cast; it's also a film that's hard to classify, since it has elements of horror, but it's also a psychological study.

When Anne Baxter started freelancing in the 1950s, she had a hard time finding appropriate roles; THREE VIOLENT PEOPLE is one of her better vehicles, but she's still miscast. She was a good actress, but she lacks the sexual magnetism for this role. Charlton Heston is ok, but there's nothing new in his role; when Tom Tryon gives the best performance, you know you have a problem. It's a pretty good Western, it just doesn't quite lift off into something special.

AN AUTUMN AFTERNOON is quite a lovely coda to Ozu's career; though it takes up the theme of a parent marrying off his daughter (LATE SPRING, LATE AUTUMN), it's done in a more rueful manner.

The end of the studio system by 1970 caused a great deal of disruption in terms of careers and films. One problem was that a lot of the old-school producers were putting people under contract, and the results were mostly disastrous. Mike Francovich put several people under contract, including Goldie Hawn, Dyan Cannon, and (yes) Liv Ullmann. But the crap he put them in! He just about destroyed any possibility of Liv Ullmann having a career in the US (thankfully, she would continue with Jan Troell and Ingmar Bergman, where she would give some of the greatest performances in film history). Dyan Cannon he stuck in things like DOCTORS' WIVES, but after CACTUS FLOWER, Goldie Hawn was cast in comedies that played up her daffy, goofball skills, like BUTTERFLIES ARE FREE, but it was a case of diminishing returns, and THERE'S A GIRL IN MY SOUP was one of the nadirs of her career. As for Peter Sellers, he seems to know how horrible this part is, and he flounders but it makes him even more unappealing.

84 CHARING CROSS ROAD is really a specialty film, but for those of us who love books, it's a real gem. After THE GRADUATE, Anne Bancroft's career was very uneven, but here, she's at her best, and the rest of the cast are wonderful, with Anthony Hopkins showing how charming he can be.

And now for something completely different, Anthony Hopkins in an entirely different mode. Jonathan Demme's career was unusual. Films like MELVIN AND HOWARD, MARRIED TO THE MOB, and SOMETHING WILD were so personable, so ebullient, that their box office failures seem aberrant. But flops they were! So when he did THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS, it was seen as his last gasp: if this flopped, his career was over. And it didn't: it finally became the box office success that he should have had since the 1970s. It's spooky and nervewracking and genuinely chilling, and the cast is perfect.

WOMEN HE'S UNDRESSED is flawed (i also feel that the acted parts are extraneous, and don't add much that a simple voice-over accompanied by photos might have accomplished better) but it's still a fascinating documentary, especially for those of us who love Hollywood lore. I loved the interviews with other notable costume designers. I understand the need to draw some attention to his personal life, but i wish there were more about his professional relationships, for example, how he became part of George Cukor's team in the 1950s, along with Hoyningen-Huene as visual consultant and Gene Allen as production designer. But still, it's quite a good Hollywood saga.

Re: Informer Queen Three End Aji Bang Soup 84 Lambs Women Katwe

Sorry about the delayed response but you posted after I stopped checking in!


after CACTUS FLOWER, Goldie Hawn was cast in comedies that played up her daffy, goofball skills, like BUTTERFLIES ARE FREE, but it was a case of diminishing returns, and THERE'S A GIRL IN MY SOUP was one of the nadirs of her career
Ironically, when she tried to break away from the goofball roles and showed some range in Spielberg's Sugarland Express, the public stayed away although it got very good reviews. They wanted their dizzy adorable Goldie, not an emotionally and mentally unstable woman kidnapping her child from a loving foster home. Sometimes an actor's fans are their worst enemy. They want you the way they discovered you which can be a strait jacket for an actor.

In ancient Egypt, cats were worshipped as gods. They have never forgotten this

Hail Cesar! and Star Trek IV

Hail Cesar! - The Coens latest satire of old time Hollywood, I found it disappointing and disjointed. Yes, some great scenes and some good acting, but noting seemed memorable. A definite cut below "barton Fink".

Star trek IV - a nice little star trek movie, more light-heated and comic than previous ones, as our Gang have to beam down to 1980s San Francisco to save the earth by saving the Humpback whale. Seeing the location shots of 80s SF was a hoot, although I don't remember the place being that ugly.

Re: Hail Cesar! and Star Trek IV


I found it disappointing and disjointed
I couldn't agree more. The film lacks the usual dark and pungent Coen Brothers wit. The biggest problem is that the Coens don't have a genuine affection for the genre they're spoofing and if there's no love, it's just condescension. What I found most interesting was the Coens premise that there was a communist infiltration in Hollywood and that it wasn't just red paranoia.

In ancient Egypt, cats were worshipped as gods. They have never forgotten this

Re: Get Heydrich - but don't get Hur

Hi, Percy.

A more Godless version of Ben-Hur that more cynically uses a guy in a beard paraphrasing the Bible badly in the hope of suckering in the faith crowd would be hard to imagine, and it would be even harder to imagine anyone with genuine passion for their faith showing such a complete lack of interest in the way they chose to portray Jesus.


"Security - release the badgers."

Get Heydrich - but don't get Hur

Despite having a great and ultimately tragic true story – the assassination of Reinhard Heydrich and the Nazis monstrous revenge on the Czechs – that has already inspired four previous films that's attracted talents as diverse as Fritz Lang, Bertolt Brecht, Douglas Sirk, Jiri Sequens and Lewis Gilbert, Anthropoid is one of those solid films that isn't exactly bad but really should be a lot better. While in some ways it may be the most accurate, it never translates that into a compelling human drama despite decent performances from Cillian Murphy and Jamie Dornan as the two assassins.

Although the film literally hits the ground running with them landing in occupied territory and almost immedietly inadvertently falling into the hands of Czechs who will sell them out, the biggest problem is the absence of the very real threat the real assassins faced in a country ruled by terror where betrayal was always moments away. People talk about the Nazis and we see them in the background, but the heavy yoke is never really seen or felt until after the assassination so that the fears of reprisals that turned out to be horrendously underestimated carry no weight. Worse, the massacre and destruction of the entire town of Lidice feels almost glossed over in a brief line or two of dialogue that understates the scale of and arbitrary rationale for the atrocity. There's one striking torture scene played on the face of a bespectacled bureaucrat checking a statement from an offscreen informer as he's being beaten to jog his memory that shows that director Sean Ellis can do this without going overboard, but it happens so late in the film that Heydrich's assassination becomes more of an abstract practical problem than a dangerous necessity. And just as Heydrich is reduced to a name and a brief bit of archive footage, it never manages to make you really care about the characters despite giving them moments of human fallibility so their fate never hurts the way it should, something Lewis Gilbert's Operation Daybreak did surprisingly powerfully despite the questionable accuracy of its source novel.

It raises intriguing questions – was the mission just a suicidal gesture by the marginalized Czech government in exile to prove their countrymen could still fight? Was it worth wiping out what was left of the Czech resistence to carry out? Were thousands of lives simply being sacrificed to impress the very allies who had willingly and contemptuously given Czechoslovakia, that far away country “of whom we know nothing,” to the Nazis without a fight for a few months of peace (and who would sell it out again after the war)? What happens when platitudes about true patriots being willing to die for their country are tested by the reality? – and then ignores them beyond the odd line about regretting nothing or the whole nation being behind them that feel like the price of co-operation from a Czech government who are still working from the old propaganda movie playbook.

It's at its best in its two most visceral scenes, the horribly botched assassination – Heydrich died of sepsis rather than his wounds because his doctor decided not to treat him with antibiotics – and the German assault on the cathedral where the seven men were hiding. Yet it botches the horrifying epilogue as the Nazis gassed and then flooded the crypt where the last few men were hiding (the most genuinely moving part of Lewis Gilbert's film by far), opting for a stylised approach that adds a hideously misjudged spiritual reunion moment for one character that simply doesn't ring true and takes you out of the film. It's not the only old war movie moment the film throws in (Murphy's the hard-bitten one who really cares deeply while Dornan's the idealist whose nerve threatens to fail while both men inevitably fall in doomed love with the women they use as cover for their surveillance trips), but it's the most wildly misjudged in a film that at once honours the real people involved while never bringing them to life again on the screen.


There are very good reasons that Paramount and MGM kept their underfunded synopsis (it's too short to qualify as an adaptation) of Ben-Hur under wraps for so long with no footage or stills leaking from the set and then dumped it. I had a couple of free passes that expired yesterday and saw it and it's the first time in years I've actually seen people throw things at the screen at the astonishingly insulting rushed ending, and according to staff it's not the first night that's happened (I was wondering what those stains on the screen were when it started), so I'm assuming the word of mouth is pretty toxic on this one, and deservedly so

It's a curiously lazy, passionless product that feels like a reluctant contractual obligation no-one wanted to fulfil: the three words that sum up the attitude of everyone involved in the film, both in front of and behind the camera, is "Will this do?" The changes to the two main characters' relationships drag the first half out but don't create any emotional connection, nor does Ben-Hur have any journey from complacent pacifist idealism to all-consuming vindictive hatred to redemption and spiritual resurrection because the second half is so incredibly rushed. Attempts to give Messala more depth by having him agonise over the innocent civilisations he helps conquer for Rome to progress his career (yeah, right) and being forced into betrayal by his mean and nasty superiors and having a bit of a chip on his shoulder about being adopted (in this version they're adopted brothers rather than childhood friends) may be an improvement on the one-dimensional bully in the 1925 version but just ends up making him look a lightweight wimp compared to Stephen Boyd's embodiment of the ruthless ambition of the empire behind its cultured and charismatic façade, spitting his hate to the very end in the 1959 one.

None of the cast are any good – Toby Kebbell looks unfortunately like comic actor Stephen Mangan's not so bright hoodie brother, more squaddie than ambitious social climber, Jack Huston seems to be cast because he looks a bit like Jude Law at the beginning and a bit like Rufus Sewell at the end (though I'm guessing looking like the Monty Python "IT'S!" castaway in the middle was unintentional) but has no real screen presence in the role, Morgan Freeman delivers his platitudes like a man who thought he'd won a free holiday to Italy but has to sit through a nine hour timeshare presentation instead, stuck with a nothing role Ayelet Zurer can only manage to make Mum Hur a bit of a bitch and the only miracle associated with Rodrigo Santoro's bland and lifeless turn as the screen's most anonymous and unmemorable Jesus is getting third billing for a few minutes of exceptionally uninspiring footage. It's a film whose main roles are filled by colorless but inoffensive supporting players who'd usually be playing the sidekick's friend in a couple of scenes but no genuine leads to carry it despite the film screaming out for some real starpower to give it a lift.

There are a few minor undeveloped interesting ideas like using the gradual building of the circus to both convey the passage of time (something this version is generally spectacularly inept at) and the growing stranglehold of Rome on the population, body and soul, or stressing that both the Roman Messala and the rich, privileged and cocooned Jew Judah are equally hated by the Zealots, but the film is in too much of a hurry to investigate them. The galley sequence is one of those sounded good in principle scenes, shot entirely from a galley slave's P.O.V. of the battle but botched by bad camerawork and editing (and I'm pretty sure the throwaway scene where Judah kills Quintus - here quite literally, and I do mean literally, thrown away as just a mindless thug who never even makes eye contact rather than a shrewd judge of character and eventual adoptive father - wasn't meant to be funny), but it's pretty clear that the only thing the director wanted to do was the chariot race, which isn't terrible but isn't good either. Despite all the emphasis placed on explaining tactics and strategy I have no idea quite how the race ended the way it did, and I suspect not many people involved in the picture did either.

But it's the last ten minutes that really kill the film: figuring the chariot race is the only reason anyone will come and the audience will be wanting to get home once it's over, they rush through a redundant garden of Gethsemane scene, race through the crucifixion, really extract the urine with a sudden cut to his mother and sister saying "We're cured" in a single shot when we've only just found out they're lepers, and then have the two remorseful antagonists fall into each others arms begging forgiveness before - I kid you not - riding off with their reformed family into the sunset. That the director and producers credits literally racing around the arena kicking up a duststorm (in 3D and DBox too!) isn't the silliest thing about the home stretch seems more a final admission of defeat than an in-joke.

It's an astonishingly lazy piece of work, one of the laziest, most soulless I've seen in years, and you can understand why it's so badly miscast - you figure that, like Tom Hiddleston, who was originally in the frame for the lead, as soon as they made the mistake of showing anyone decent the script they ran a mile. And the attempt to bring the faith audience on board was doomed from just how uninterested the film is in Christ, who is lumbered with over simplified Irving the Explainer dialogue (do we really need lines like "You'd do the same for me" after the enslaved Judah gets that much-needed cup of water?) and flat, passionless going through the motions scenes. Whatever else you can say about the faith audience, they can spot insincerity a mile off and it's no wonder they weren't buying. As for the agnostic crowd, they probably found it as dull and uninvolving as I did. Still, at least this time he didn't get sentenced to the galleys because despite his great wealth he was too cheap to get decent tiles fixed on the roof.

It's a genre I'm a sucker for, but even as somebody who has copies of The Last Legion and Caligula on the shelf out of completism, I definitely won't be adding this one to my collection when it hits home video.


"Security - release the badgers."

Re: Get Heydrich - but don't get Hur

Impressive reviews Trevor! To be honest, I had no intention of seeing either movie but I loved reading your comments on both films.

To start with Heydrich - unlike a lot of people, I'm a cold blooded realist, and if I'd been around in Nazi occupied Europe I might have tried to help out refugees, downed pilots, etc. or gathered intelligence. But I would've been completely against futile gestures like killing the local SS official or that German army guard down the street, since it would've accomplished nothing and ended with a lot of innocent people getting killed. The Czechs killed Heydrich and it accomplished what?

So I'm not really interested in seeing a movie about it.

As for the new Ben Hur - how could any new Ben Hur be better than '59 version?

You might as well remake the Wizard of Oz or GWTW.

Re: Get Heydrich - but don't get Hur

Indeed, and for a while the film looks like it might address that - one character is very opposed to it for that very reason and briefly assumed to be a traitor - but you get the sense that, as a Czech co-production they chose to go with national pride for being the only country to do that. Of course, the unbelievably monstrous repercussions were the reason none of the Allies ever tried to kill another extremely high-ranking Nazi again. Again, it's something that Operation Daybreak does handle rather well, with the people who do inform given surprisingly sympathetic portraits because of the intolerable pressure the entire country was put under in the aftermath.

As for Benny - true. One approach, which the 2010 miniseries didn't have the budget for, would be to do a longer mini-series that addresses the very different second half of the novel, but you'd need someone genuinely committed to getting the best out of it to pull it off, and that's what this version is so sorely missing. I doubt that would be better than the 1959 film, but it would be a valid approach that could make for an interesting series rather than a half-hearted attempt to fit in a few bits sort of like previous versions around the chariot race.


"Security - release the badgers."

Re: Get Heydrich - but don't get Hur

Love that BEN HUR review, which captures everything I imagined it to be. We will continue watching the 1959 version (it still gets screened a lot here on cable channels), a rich complex masterwork compared to this one, which is apparently 90 minutes shorter, with no Nativity prologue either.

They did not have CGI in 1959 but the use of models and matte was acceptable, it was the story and the characters and the great setpieces which drew us in. Wyler's direction and the great score add to its richness. I also finally saw the 1925 silent version, which may have been a stunner in its day, but looks ridiculously silly now with no real characterization or depth.

They're on to you - I'm in your room.

http://www.osullivan60.blogspot.com/

Re: Get Heydrich - but don't get Hur

Well, visually the 1925 version is still a stunner- the chariot race, its pictorial narrative with detailed extra focus (scenes of Roman oppression, a prison guard burning his hand, a wounded soldier covered with snakes, a leper dragging himself to a waterhole, a desolate oarsman peeking out a hole, etc.), but yes, the 1959 version is better in story, acting, and core cast characterization (although I will credit the 1925 version's portrayal of supporting characters like Claire MacDowell's Ma Hur, Nigel deBrulier's Simonidies, and Betty Bronson's Mary).
Once upon a time, the 1925 silent version had a seat in comparison discussions with the 1959 version. But now I guess the 2016 version will now be '59's compare partner, with the silent version sadly ignored.

Meanwhile, back in 1925 and 1959…

The film that has become a by-word for the genre and the biggest of the roadshow movies of the fifties and sixties, 1959's Ben-Hur: A Tale of The Christ is from an audience point-of-view still a great movie, and considerably more intelligent than many modern critics would like to believe.

The best of the redemption epics of the Fifties, where suffering in the likes of The Robe or Quo Vadis makes their protagonists better in the creepily smug way that passes for movie righteousness, it turns its hero, Judah Ben-Hur, into a right s**t. Corrupted by revenge, he rejects Christ and turns away from passive resistance. Mistaken for Christ, he is himself betrayed by a friend and returns from his certain death (in this case the galleys) "like a returning faith," in the words of one of his faithful servants, but he has no faith himself. Having initially rejected Messala's overtures to "look to the west, look to Rome", indirectly the cause of his misfortunes, he becomes Romanised and a mirror image of his betrayer. The character exists in a constant state of flux and torment, journeying from slave-owning Jew to Roman slave to Roman citizen to symbol of resistance, never regaining his peace until the finale. It doen't hurt that Gore Vidal and Christopher Fry's uncredited but much publicised rewrite of Karl Tunberg's script gives the journey some fine dialogue, strong characterisation and real dramatic meat to work with.

There was never an actor more at home in the genre than Heston, and he is in strong form here, although much of his thunder is stolen by Stephen Boyd as Messala (the role Heston was pencilled in for before Rock Hudson turned down the lead) whose intelligent and nuanced portrayal of ambition is far more Oscar-worthy than Hugh Griffiths' hammily enjoyable Sheik Ilderim. Jack Hawkins and the remainder of the cast perfectly judge their roles, with Wyler's adept direction achieving a perfect balance between the religious, political and human elements of the story. While making the most of the spectacle, he also ensures that it is often the quieter moments that most impress. His sensitivity with actors ensures the film is driven more by emotions than events, and certainly the scenes dealing with his return to Judea are often genuinely moving without seeming so overtly manipulative as they doubtless would have in other hands.

Miklos Rozsa's score is one of the greatest ever written for any motion picture and is remarkably sensitive to the needs of the film (although Wyler did reputedly want to use Silent Night for the Nativity sequence!). The stunning ten-minute chariot race, played in real-time, has and needs no music, relying instead on the infinitely more effective roar of the crowd and thunder of hooves. The sequence also shows canny production design: the arena is suitably high-walled to limit the number of extras needed for the three-month shoot of the scene.

Even in an era of ever larger widescreen TVs, Ben-Hur is a film which still somewhat defies television in all its formats - the cinema is really the place to see this, the bigger the screen, the better. At an extra-wide 2.76:1 widescreen, it's not quite SuperTohoScope, but it's close, but the lack of picture area that was a major problem with definition and colour balance in the old letterboxed video releases is no problem for the gorgeous new Blu-ray transfer, which is the best the film has ever looked on home video and reveals a level of detail lost on the previous DVD release, though it's still not recommended viewing on a small-screen TV. The film is not paced for TV but for the giant screen, inevitably draining some of its effect. Nonetheless, this is a great value-for-money special edition that may not be able to replicate the cinema experience, but does a good job of reminding you of it.

Shot under huge pressure - MGM made it clear that the future of the studio depended on the picture - the resulting stress contributed to producer Sam Zimbalist's fatal heart attack before the film was completed, and the tortuous route to the screen is well documented in the Blu-ray extras through documentaries and even screen tests for Haya Hayareet, George Baker, Cesare Danova and Leslie Nielson! It even covers the popular stage production, which ran throughout the US for a decade grossing an astonishing $10m (in case you're wondering, diagrams are provided of how the chariot race was staged with real horses and carts!). The Blu-ray also includes a new and rather good 78-minute documentary about the impact the film had on Heston's life and career, drawing on plentiful home movie footage, though the man himself is largely absent – there's only one brief interview extract where he tells the ‘rigged' chariot race story again.


The then-fledgling MGM's make or break 1925 silent Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ didn't really take with me the first time I saw it, but on a second viewing a decade or so later it's a much more enjoyable and satisfying epic than I remembered. It easily dwarfs the 1959 version with its colossal spectacle, running through a then astonishing $4m (a sum so great it would take six years to show a profit despite doing huge business) in its troubled two-year production that saw original star George Walsh replaced by Ramon Navarro and original director Charles Brabin replaced by Fred Niblo. It may have been more of a lavish calling card for the newly merged Metro Goldwyn Mayer than a hugely profitable investment, but the money really is up there on the screen in its thousands of extras and lavish sets, not to mention its huge setpieces and early two-strip Technicolor sequences. At times it's like two movies running almost concurrently, one very much a reverential devotional epic showing key moments in the life of Christ, the other an epic melodrama about the wronged idealistic Jewish prince seeking revenge on the childhood Roman friend who condemned him to the galleys and his mother and sister to the leper colony before he finds both retribution and redemption. (The two strands didn't even share a common director: Niblo would have nothing to do with the Biblical scenes, with the Nativity directed by Christy Cabanne.) It's a somewhat leaner film than the sound remake, but still comes in at nearly two-and-a-half hours.

Like many silents, it emphasises height to give the film its epic scale rather than the width of the roadshow extravaganzas of the CinemaScope era, constantly dwarfing its thousands of extras bustling like ants at the very bottom of the frame at the foot of giant walls, towering cities and giant palm trees. Yet it still manages to make them come alive, the extras not just reduced to well disciplined bystanders. Where Wyler's film tends to limit its characters to those who have direct impact on the story, Niblo's Jerusalem is a bustling metropolis filled with ordinary people who are glimpsed in vignettes that humanise the scene-setting a little – even Gratus' fateful entrance into Jerusalem focuses as much on the mockery and discontent of the populace as it does on the hero who really should have spent some of his vast wealth on making sure his tiles weren't loose. There's even some major talent among the extras, in the Hollywood part of the shoot at least, from stars who came to watch the chariot race like John and Lionel Barrymore, Joan Crawford, Gary Cooper, John Gilbert, Douglas Fairbanks, Mary Pickford and the Gish sisters to then jobbing-actors like Myrna Loy, Clark Gable, Carole Lombard, Janet Gaynor and Fay Wray.

There are quite a few differences from the 1959 version: Simonides does not initially acknowledge Judah's identity because to do so would condemn his daughter to slavery while silence would assure her freedom; here it is Esther rather than Judah who brings his leprous mother and sister to Calvary to be cured; there's a lengthy scene where Messala's mistress tries to discover Judah's identity before the chariot race; and, least successfully, at the finale Judah rallies an army to ride to Jesus' rescue. It doesn't go so far as to rewrite scripture beyond adding a couple more miracles, but it is a bit silly.

Ramon Navarro doesn't dominate the film the way that Heston did (constantly putting him in tights and low-cut tunics doesn't help), but he does grow in stature as the film progresses, with one convincing moment of numbed anguish as he glimpses a galley slave through a porthole after being rescued by a Roman ship. As per Lew Wallace's novel, Messala's not much of a character in this version, more a plot device, so there's less impact when the two antagonists face off in the arena (it doesn't help that Francis X. Bushman, an actor almost as fond of overdoing the eyeliner as Richard Harris, plays him like an unnuanced oaf). The chariot race itself is a mixture of the genuinely spectacular slightly let down by the technology of the day. For all the 42 cameras used and the kinetic camera car work, at times it's severely reined in by the fullframe academy ratio that only allows part of the horses to be seen – this is the kind of setpiece that really cries out for widescreen, if only to keep the chariots in the frame. Still, it's impressively handled by second-unit director B. Reeves Eason (with one William Wyler numbered among its small army of assistant directors), who went on to a somewhat schizophrenic career co-directing many serials and doing second unit work on A-movie like the Land Rush in Cimarron and the burning of Atlanta in Gone with the Wind, though his cavalier 'breezy' attitude to safety that saw one stuntman and numerous horses killed is pretty reprehensible.

This time round it's the sea battle that makes the even bigger impression, the studio not content with building several huge fullscale warships the size of department stores but unleashing something far more violent and sadistic than the remake could dream of getting away with. Human battering rams, heads on swords, impaled pirates carried overhead on pikes, slaves hanging from their own chains, bottles of poisonous vipers thrown onto the decks, all given extra ferocity by some bright spark having the great idea of having the pirates and Romans played by rival gangs of Italian communists and fascists and descending into onscreen chaos by a real out of control fire on one of the ships that saw extras jumping for their lives. Even the star carried scars for the rest of his life after jumping through a burning sail. It's no wonder that for years later there were rumors that not all of the extras survived.

The Bluray uses the same David Gill and Kevin Brownlow restoration that was previously available on laserdisc and the 4-disc DVD set, and while it's still in standard definition it's a fine looking transfer. The early Two-strip Technicolor is generally surprisingly successful: mainly used for the scenes depicting the life of a constantly off-camera Christ that are the most storybook staged scenes in the film, although one of Judah's triumphs also gets the Technicolor treatment, complete with topless flower maidens (there's a surprising amount of nudity, both male and female, in the film). It's just a shame there's not more about the film on the disc – even the uncut newsreel footage of the location pre-production and the trailer that are glimpsed briefly in one of the documentaries would have been nice (though that documentary does include an interview with the film's production manager). Still, considering MGM tried to destroy all the existing prints in 1959 and even went so far as to initiate criminal proceedings against William K. Everson for screening the silent version until Lillian Gish came to his rescue, that the film survives at all is something of a miracle.



"Security - release the badgers."

Re: Meanwhile, back in 1925 and 1959…

Fascinating comments as usual. We loved the 1959 film when about 12 then. It played for a whole week at our cinema in Ireland - most movies ran for 2 nights. Heston of course cemented that success with EL CID, which we loved even more. Wyler' film, I have seen it frequently over the years, is richly detailed and complex. Boyd really should have won the best supporting actor Oscar, he must have trained as hard as Heston for the chariot race, and his Massala is the black heart of the film. Hugh Griffith's sheik who appears in only a few scenes is really comic relief. Hawkins is ideal too as Arrius, with that natural authority, no wonder Hawks wanted him for his Pharoah and Ford for Inspector Gideon. Hard to imagine the new version without Arrius being a major character.

Gore Vidal wrote amusingly about working on it - advising the set decorator that Mrs Hur would not have tomatoes on the table, for instance, but it seems we will never know what tinkering he did with the script re giving Messala that disputed homoerotic subtext. (Messala though is never seen with a woman, but has Terence Longdon with him all the time - whose position is not clear: assistant, confidant, or current favourite?).

The silent version, though innovative, did not seem to flesh out these parts very much, Esther in particularly being a silly ninny playing with her doves, and not the strong figure in Wyler's film. The shot of the naked slave in chains startles now though, one would not see that in the 1950s. Of course, in the 1959 film, once the chariot race is over, there is still almost an hour of involving Victorian (the novel was written in the 1880s) drama with the lepers and the crucifixion etc. Finlay Currie too adds impact as Balthasar, could any epic be complete without him?, shame he was edited out of CLEOPATRA when they were trimming it down from six hours. (He did some scenes and there is a photograph of him in Roman costume, with Taylor).

The cinema is obviously the place to see it and those other epics of the era, but widescreen HD television and Blu-ray is not too bad these days, it does not look like its heading for 60 years old; and yes - all those extras.
I met Heston briefly at London's NFT (the BFI now) when he was promoting WILL PENNY in 1971, the man just towered over me.

They're on to you - I'm in your room.

http://www.osullivan60.blogspot.com/

Re: Meanwhile, back in 1925 and 1959…

I was lucky enough to see the 1959 version three times on the big screen - once on its last big reissue and the other two times in good 70mm prints at revival houses, and I'd jump at the chance to do so again. But unless that happens - and with most revival houses going digital, I'm not holding my breath - the Blu-ray is a decent reminder, though nothing can truly compare to seeing it on a truly giant screen.


Boyd really should have won the best supporting actor Oscar, he must have trained as hard as Heston for the chariot race, and his Massala is the black heart of the film.


The perfect description of him: I may steal that one...


Hawkins is ideal too as Arrius, with that natural authority, no wonder Hawks wanted him for his Pharoah and Ford for Inspector Gideon.


Apparently Olivier was always consumed with jealousy that Hawkins got all the big roles he wanted, and a big part of his decision to do Spartacus was Hawkins getting Ben-Hur (he may have assumed that having worked with Wyler on Carrie he should have had the inside track on that one.


Hard to imagine the new version without Arrius being a major character.


You honestly wouldn't know who he is from his two minutes of screen time. He comes below deck, bellows at the slaves, kills one for no reason and then disappears until we see him hanging from Ben-Hur's oar only to be casually flicked off to his death by him. That's it.


Gore Vidal wrote amusingly about working on it - advising the set decorator that Mrs Hur would not have tomatoes on the table, for instance, but it seems we will never know what tinkering he did with the script re giving Messala that disputed homoerotic subtext.


I always loved his bitchy comment that they had some wood left over after building the arena so they used it to build Charlton Heston as well. One post from the reliable austendw on the sequel's board offered some interesting details on Vidal's submission to the Writer's Guild over the credit, which acknowledges that Fry wrote more of the picture but that Vidal made pivotal changes to the portrayal of Messala and Judah's relationship:

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2638144/board/thread/260826225?d=261242855#261242855


The silent version, though innovative, did not seem to flesh out these parts very much, Esther in particularly being a silly ninny playing with her doves, and not the strong figure in Wyler's film.


Esther is Mrs Hur before he goes to the galleys in this version and seems to be intended as the film's moral compass, but unfortunately the actress playing her is more attractive than accomplished.



Of course, in the 1959 film, once the chariot race is over, there is still almost an hour of involving Victorian (the novel was written in the 1880s) drama with the lepers and the crucifixion etc.


And amazingly even that omits the last third of the novel, which continues to follow Judah through the rest of his life. The 1925 and 1959 versions compress the narrative and move forward the crucifiction, which works much more effectively for dramatic purposes.



Finlay Currie too adds impact as Balthasar, could any epic be complete without him?, shame he was edited out of CLEOPATRA when they were trimming it down from six hours. (He did some scenes and there is a photograph of him in Roman costume, with Taylor).


Much of his part hit the cutting room floor in The Fall of the Roman Empire too: he's entirely missing from the 158 minute US general release version after the film did badly in its already cut 172-minute roadshow version and even the original 185-minute version is missing the scene where he's murdered by Eric Porter when trying to speak in the senate near the end - I've got a still of the scene, though the only thing I could find on the net was this shot of Anthony Mann directing Porter:

http://www.gettyimages.ae/detail/news-photo/american-film-maker-anthony-mann-directing-actor-eric-news-photo/106752081#american-filmmaker-anthony-mann-directing-actor-eric-porter-on-the-picture-id106752081



I met Heston briefly at London's NFT (the BFI now) when he was promoting WILL PENNY in 1971, the man just towered over me.


I met him briefly at the book launch for In the Arena (I still have my signed copy) and was struck by the way he still had that natural grace and presence that his generation of actors used to have when dealing with the public, something the studio used to instil but subsequent generations often sorely lack.



"Security - release the badgers."

Re: Meanwhile, back in 1925 and 1959…

I met him briefly at the book launch for In the Arena (I still have my signed copy) and was struck by the way he still had that natural grace and presence that his generation of actors used to have when dealing with the public, something the studio used to instil but subsequent generations often sorely lack.

How true. I recall him being very gracious and pleasant as he signed the programme. Lord Attenborough was another, he even insisted on signing the programme for the Dirk Bogarde lecture/Q&A when I found myself standing next to him and his wife Sheila Sim, as we waited to go into for the Dirk show.

They're on to you - I'm in your room.

http://www.osullivan60.blogspot.com/

Re: Get Heydrich - but don't get Hur


They did not have CGI in 1959 but the use of models and matte was acceptable, it was the story and the characters and the great setpieces which drew us in.


The CGi arena is the closest thing the film has to a star: it's the best special effect in the film, and since the 1959 version used mattes it doesn't feel like gratuitous FX. Being shot at Cinecitta they even use some of the old props from the 1959 version (though sadly not the giant statue that's still on the backlot - http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-RCdyTYvgL00/TZ0z74MqB8I/AAAAAAAAA28/_qB97wP809s/s1600/cinecittastatue.jpg). But the story and characters are massively simplified, with Judah's adoption and Romanisation completely dropped to bring down the running time. The 1925 and 1959 versions were huge rolls of the dice for a studio that had to succeed so they put real thought, effort and their best talents into them: this version just feels like someone in head office decided a remake would be a good idea and sent some of his minions who'd really rather be doing something else to sort it out for him on the cheap and then completely forgot about it until they delivered the finished product.


Wyler's direction and the great score add to its richness.


The direction in the new version is in too much of a hurry to give any scenes the weight they need - neither of the two cup of water scenes have any weight, the first ruined by the film's bland Jesus' "You'd do the same for me" line rather than being played with just silent anguish in the 1959 version, the latter amazingly missing the "I know this man" moment of recognition. It has no faith in its audience's patience or ability to get a scene without it being bluntly spelled out. Unlike bad epics of old (Tai-Pan, Lionheart, Christopher Columbus: The Discovery, etc) it doesn't even have a great score to compensate: Marco Beltrami may have been a pupil of Jerry Goldsmith, but he's none of the great man's ability to come up with memorable themes or great music. It's an orchestral score but it's little more than wallpaper, with nothing memorable to give the film the help it so desperately needs.



"Security - release the badgers."

Re: Get Heydrich - but don't get Hur

I met Heston when he visited my city of Erie to campaign for Tom Ridge for governor in 1994. My uncle managed to swing an encounter with him for an autograph. I used my BEN-HUR: 35TH ANNIVERSARY VHS set for the 'slate' (I had planned to use his AN ACTOR'S LIFE, but my copy was a used ex-library one, and my family figured something more newer would be acceptable). However, the pen couldn't get into the cardboard casing, so he autographed the little booklet that came with the set instead.
I watch both versions every December. '59 a week before XMAS, and the '25 on Christmas Eve (it goes back to watching it as part of TNT's "Silent Night" programming of silent films that night in 1989 and 1990).

Re: Get Heydrich - but don't get Hur

I think I wrote that particular booklet along with the one for the Doctor Zhivago VHS set that came out at the same time.


"Security - release the badgers."

Re: Get Heydrich - but don't get Hur

Thank you, TrevorAclea.

I may have gotten the blu-ray, but I stay loyal in some ways to my VHS versions. I watch the VHS version of BEN-HUR: THE MAKING OF AN EPIC docu (from the set, the chief attraction - at the time- being the 'Leslie Neilsen test footage', although I liked the other contents of the docu more) at the beginning of December to start my Christmas viewings.
For the '25 version- if I have a VCR nearby- I usually watch the MGM/UA VHS, or a 1992 VHS recording (this was part of TNT's programming of MGM films in view of their docu series MGM: WHEN THE LION ROARS, climaxing with a back-to-back broadcast of the two films; to record it, the final part of the '59 version was also included; pan & scan, which cropped out several pieces like the blind beggar dumping the alms, or the side of Esther looking down at the redeemed Judah returning from Golgotha). Both VHS have the 'nailed Christ hand' scene that's omitted from the DVD/Blu-Rays.

Lo, a Cloak and Dagger

Cloak and Dagger (1946) / Fritz Lang. During the later years of WWII in an effort to find out how close the Nazis are to developing an atomic weapon and to rescue scientists who they have forced to work for them, a physicist (Gary Cooper) is recruited by the OSS to go into German held territory to complete this mission. Fritz Lang stumbles with this one. The story and its telling is very slow moving. Scenes and conversations drag out; a major rescue operation takes place entirely off screen while Coop and Lili Palmer (in her Hollywood film debut as an Italian Resistance operative) are hiding out and falling in love. This is even more disappointing considering four action scenes that punctuate the talking which are edge-of-the-seat stuff. One happens early as a submarine drops Cooper behind the lines, another, at the end, is a major shoot-out. In between, Cooper engages in two brutal fist fights that I have got to call “ahead of their time.” The second one has Cooper and Marc Lawrence fighting to the death in an apartment house lobby to the music of an Italian street singer performing just outside the door. It reminded me of the Bond/Red Grant match from From Russia with Love (1963) and the killing of the KGB man from Hitchcock's Torn Curtain (1966), both of which would come two decades later. If the rest of this film had even a fraction of this intensity, we would have had an all-time classic on our hands. Alas. I didn't happen.

Lo and Behold, Reveries of the Connected World (2016) / Werner Herzog. Excellent thought-provoking history of the Internet and its effect on the modern world. There is a room in a science building at UCLA that claims to be where the Internet was invented. The original equipment is still there. That first day in 1969, the UCLA computer was to make contact with another computer at Stanford U. As one person typed, another was on the phone with Stanford. They began by starting the word “login.” The operator typed “L.” The phone guys asks, “Did you receive the L?” Stanford replies, “Yes.” The operator typed “O.” “Did you receive the O?” “Yes.” Then the system crashed. Thus the first word sent over the Internet was “lo” – as in Lo and Behold. The film consists of ten “Chapters” with titles like “The Wonders of Technology,” “The Dark Side,” and “The Internet on Mars.” Herzog doesn't attempt a through line of history or its interpretation. He sort of hits all over the place, giving us a patchwork quilt, but at the end you feel it is all of one piece like a quilt would be. We see some of the marvels that the new technology has wrought as well as the bad things like cyberbullying, gaming addiction, and people who are forced to live off the grid because of sensitive skin allergies caused by the huge amounts of electromagnetic waves that are given off in a typical day's course. A riveting survey.

mf

Trust me. I'm The Doctor.

Cloak and Dagger

Fritz Lang's Cloak and Dagger emerged in theatres in 1946 as a rather leaner and less contentious picture than the one he set out to make: the bleak last reel was dropped entirely as were most of the comments critical of the nuclear weapons program, with only one surviving outburst from Gary Cooper's nuclear scientist-turned-spy about the government throwing billions into the arms race but ignoring medical research. Not that this was ever going to be a message movie – it's very much a ‘Now it can be told' flag-waver for the previously hush-hush OSS, with Coop despatched behind enemy lines to find out just how far advanced the Nazis atom bomb research is. The film quickly dispenses with the idea of analysing scientific intelligence in favour of the usual spyjinks as Cooper gets involved with rescuing an Italian scientist and his daughter from the hands of the fascists, but the first hour or so, as he discovers a real aptitude for blackmailing Nazi spies and dirty dealing, is surprisingly gripping stiff.

Unfortunately things slow down and take a turn for the predictable with the entrance of Lilli Palmer, who makes about as convincing as an Italian as John Wayne, albeit for different reasons. As the hardened resistance worker whose heart is melted by Coop as she rediscovers her pre-war femininity she's neither credible nor particularly good, though she would at least make amends with a similar role in The Counterfeit Traitor. Worse, the romance takes over the picture and leads to a particularly hokey farewell scene that was ruthlessly parodied in Top Secret. Yet while the second half of the film is predictable and formulaic stuff, it does throw in one remarkable brutal prolonged fight between Cooper and Marc Lawrence that's surprisingly violent and fairly realistic for its day – both hero and villain fight very dirty indeed with no holds barred. As well as being hard to ignore the similarities to the infamous ‘difficult' killing in Torn Curtain two decades later, it's a reminder of how good the film could have been had it stayed with its original course


"Security - release the badgers."

Re: Cloak and Dagger

Thanks for those comments. I'm glad to know that the tense moments that remain were intended to be for a different kind of movie than it turned out.


with only one surviving outburst from Gary Cooper's nuclear scientist-turned-spy about the government throwing billions into the arms race but ignoring medical research.


At the end of that speech, Cooper says that if science were given a billion dollars they could cure cancer in a year. Then, his rant finished, he lights a cigarette. Oh, if they only knew.

That fight with Marc Lawrence really is a jaw-dropper, isn't it? Amazing.

Thanks again

mf

Trust me. I'm The Doctor.

Re: Cloak and Dagger




That fight with Marc Lawrence really is a jaw-dropper, isn't it? Amazing.


It really is. And as an admirer of Lang and other German directors of the 20s (not surprising since he served his apprenticeship in Germany in the silent years), I really wouldn't be at all surprised if Hitchcock saw it and filed it away for further reference.


"Security - release the badgers."

The Two Heroes

Snowden (2016) – Oliver Stone – 7/10 – Yes

Sully (2016) – Clint Eastwood – 6/10 – Yes

jj

Re: What classics did you watch this week? (9/12-9/18)

-The Spy In Black 1939 7/10
-The October Man 1947 7.2/10
-Turn The Key Softly 7.2/10
-The Intuder 1962 7.9/10
-Fog Island 5/10
-Lured 1947 6.5/10
-The Thief 6/10
-Fallen Angel 7.3/10
-The Lodger 1944 7.3/10
-The Creeper 6.4/10
-Fear In The Night 7.4/10
-Green For Danger 7.4/10
-House By The River 1950 7.2/10
-The Prowler 7.4/10
-See No Evil Hear No Evil 6.9/10
-Zulu 6.7/10
-Clouds Over Europe 7/10
-Mesa Of Lost Women (awful, just awful 3/10)
-Terror In The Haunted House 7.4/10
-Jennifer 1953 7.7/10
-Claudia 1943 7/10
-Mister 880 7/10
-Shadow On The Wall 7.2/10
-Talk About A Stranger 7.2/10
-The Long Haul 7.3/10



--Every man's death diminishes me...because I am involved in mankind--

Re: What classics did you watch this week? (9/12-9/18)

Green For Danger👍
Zulu 👍

Re: Green for Danger

I love Green for Danger!

~~~~~
Jim Hutton (1934-79) & Ellery Queen =

Re: Sept 18th weekly dropping

Mostly old faves this week. Not much time for movie watching.

~~~~~
Jim Hutton (1934-79) & Ellery Queen =

Re: What classics did you watch this week? (9/12-9/18)

WAKING SLEEPING BEAUTY ( 2009 )
Fascinating, nostalgic documentary on the Disney Animation wing from 1980 thru 1994. Archival footage of the early days of now great animation writers, directors, songwriters and lyricists ( JOHN LASSITER, ALAN MENKEN, RON CLEMENTS, ROB MINKOFF, etc ) who contributed to the "Renaissance" of Disney animation. And all isn't honky dory. A lot of it was bad, very bad, with many accounts of how Disney animation came this close to shutting down forever. I was amazed that Disney let all the bad press, infighting, distrust, trash talk, revolts, mutiny stories be aired out.
9/10

CRIMES AND MISDEMEANORS ( 1989 )
Woody Allen contemplates morality in this intelligent, fascinating dual tale of a doctor, Martin Landau, debating to kill his mistress, and failing documentary filmmaker, Allen, debating having an extramarital affair with Mia Farrow, an assistant to Allen's successful brother in law, who is a hack comedy writer / producer. Expertly performed by the entire cast. Movie is downbeat and cynical, on purpose, which enhance the film's themes and questions.
8/10

----------------------------

Re: CRIMES AND MISDEMEANORS ( 1989 )

Just to clarify, I don't the key misdemeanour of Allen's character in the film is meant to be the affair that he considers, but rather the way he chooses to edit the documentary about Alda's character. Great film, whatever the case; I consider Crimes to be Allen's masterpiece and I don't blame him for continuing to explore ideas regarding the ethics involved with killing in more than half a dozen subsequent motion pictures. His second-latest, Irrational Man, is an especially interesting variation on this theme.

Most people think I'm mad. At least I know I'm mad.

Re: What classics did you watch this week? (9/12-9/18)

As a counterpoint to Waking Sleeping Beauty, be sure to check out Yume to kyôki no ôkoku (2013) The Kingdom of Dreams and Madness for a look inside Studio Ghibli. The differences between the two studios are instructive.

jj

Re: What classics did you watch this week? (9/12-9/18)

A wall

A sadly topical issue, the purveyors of walls might like to reflect on this one,; they'd probably see its prisoner and imaginary creator only as a waster, but it would be worth pointing out how much he is, among other things, a war victim. Pink Floyd The Wall, Alan Parker, 1982, then (really? 1982? I'm sure I remember singing 'Brick in the Wall' on the school bus, so I take it the songs predated the film), is a work of stunning visual - and aural - imagination,with something remarkably accurate hooked into it about a certain side of the mid-century British psyche, obsessed with World War II as its last moment of glory and danger. The Wall is an afterwar film, which captures the trauma of an event which the protagonist can't even remember, although he's stifled by its consequences: the absent father; the terror of the blitz recounted in immediate secondhand (I will put all of my fears into you - my mother too was haunted by recurring nightmares of planes passing over, although with a greater distance and more balance she managed to keep them out of my head); the ever-more-rigid figures of Good and Evil migrating from history into allegory; the constant reiteration of comforting, orderly, old-boy heroic, casually racist, second-rate films of the experience.) On the downside is the way this is translated into hallucinatory misogyny - misguided, obviously, because Pink really is increasingly insane, but nonetheless validated when Gerald Scarfe's foul judge takes the women's part. On the other downside - but I could be wrong - is an uncomfortable feeling that Waters and Gilmour are exploiting, rather than sharing, Syd Barrett's experience of total breakdown. I should say that I had seen this before, but a very very long time ago. mixed, though with some admiration.

REVISION SECTION
Covers everything else this week.

LAST WEEK
I was the minor con-comedy Courte-tête, which Godard, surprisingly, liked, and it does have its moments. Recognised by Roger the Movie Man

II http://i17.photobucket.com/albums/b99/aliinwonderland/sep12II_zpslynhw00j.jpg
I did say this was very tricky. It's Annie Girardot and 'husband' (I've forgotten who, I'm afraid) in the 'Divorce' section of the compilation film La Française et l'amour. It's a good short-story, to be fair: probably the best piece in the film along with the very funny opener.

III http://i17.photobucket.com/albums/b99/aliinwonderland/sep12III_zpsqlsc1tvk.jpg
Another compilation but a better known one, and the director here is very well-known indeed, although this is definitely not his finest hour - or the film's, come to that. Godard's section of Paris vu par ...

IV was Who Framed Roger Rabbit?, recognised by salmau

V. http://i17.photobucket.com/albums/b99/aliinwonderland/sep12V_zpsohh1jrh6.jpg
The face in that uniform had to be hidden, or no mystery could have remained: Frankie Howerd in Up the Front

THIS WEEK
Guess who's coming to dinner* (and drinks, and breakfast...).
Nothing over Level 3, and they should all come down a level quite quickly ...

Revision I
http://i17.photobucket.com/albums/b99/aliinwonderland/sep19I_zpsbtrdwu6v.jpg
OldAussie again, on a roll with these: this one (and not III) is The Honorary Consul

Revision II
http://i17.photobucket.com/albums/b99/aliinwonderland/sep19II_zps1nhclibx.jpg
To OldAussie, Hook

Revision III. Who is this cross lady cross with?
http://i17.photobucket.com/albums/b99/aliinwonderland/sep19III_zps4gm4wrar.jpg
As salmau realised - and without even seeing the film, and he's a Canadian - it's Nixon that his wife is giving a piece of her mind to.

Revision IV. Drinks before dinner?
http://i17.photobucket.com/albums/b99/aliinwonderland/sep19IV_zpso4kvxj9m.jpg
Clayton had first dibs on this one, Blue Ice channelling Casablanca very hard indeed.

Revision V. Breakfast?
http://i17.photobucket.com/albums/b99/aliinwonderland/sep19V_zpsxauceinu.jpg
To OldAussie, Michael

Revision VI. OK, I couldn't quite keep the food motif going through six random minutes...
http://i17.photobucket.com/albums/b99/aliinwonderland/sep19VI_zpsxin4vo8q.jpg

* This film does not feature at any point ...

If they organise the revolution like they did this meeting, what'll happen?

Rev 2

Hook

"He was a poet, a scholar and a mighty warrior."

Rev 5

Michael

"He was a poet, a scholar and a mighty warrior."

Re: Rev 5

Yes, yes. Possibly they both were poets scholars and mighty warriors, but not in these films (one of which I like, nonetheless, one of which is abject)

If they organise the revolution like they did this meeting, what'll happen?

Re: A wall

I. The Lonely Passion of Judith Hearne
III. The Honorary Consul
IV. Mona Lisa
V. Michael


You are alive and living now.
Now is the envy of all of the dead

Re: A wall

Ugh! Well, V was right but you missed the boat. One of the other titles is there but it's not the one you said it was and I don't think that was just a slip. The other two aren't there at all. So ... recalibrate Mr. Friend (you really should )

If they organise the revolution like they did this meeting, what'll happen?

Re: A wall

Then IV must be Blue Ice?


You are alive and living now.
Now is the envy of all of the dead

Re: A wall

Argh. Yes it is, but the IMDb calculator says Clayton got there first. And Sal has III (ahem, that was your friend), so your last hope is #6. I assume everyone knows what they're doing now so you have competition ...

If they organise the revolution like they did this meeting, what'll happen?

Re: A wall

Different Milhouse (I am, after all, not a crook).

Is VI. Rainbow?




You are alive and living now.
Now is the envy of all of the dead

Re: A wall

Fair do's (hey, I know, and you're only his friend, anyway, right? )

No, not Rainbow (I don't know anything about that one so can't even make a smartass comment...)

If they organise the revolution like they did this meeting, what'll happen?

Rev 1

The Honorary Consul ?????

"He was a poet, a scholar and a mighty warrior."

Re: Rev 1

Yes, that's right. Not III as Friend of Milhouse said...

If they organise the revolution like they did this meeting, what'll happen?

Re: Rev 1

Lucky guess - saw it in early 80s and haven't heard of it since.


"He was a poet, a scholar and a mighty warrior."

Re: Rev 1

Very Greene, very obnoxious protagonist (not the Consul, I mean, though he'd be no fun to live with either).

If they organise the revolution like they did this meeting, what'll happen?

Since I'm on a roll, some wild guesses….

Rev 3 Upside of Anger ????
Rev 4 Half Moon Street ???

"He was a poet, a scholar and a mighty warrior."
Top