rate the last movie you saw

[Paul MacLean]

DeMille and Bernstein were certainly gypped in not getting nominated.

Wow, I never realized they weren't even nominated. I can maybe understand in the case of Bernstein, who'd been "grey listed" a few years earlier, but I was surprised that DeMille was snubbed.

[Eric Paddon]

Yes, King Vidor for "War And Peace" was the odd-one-out nomination in the Best Director category whose film didn't get a Best Picture nomination. I've never seen that film, but I can't imagine why he would have gotten consideration ahead of DeMille.

In the year Victor Young got his posthumous Oscar for "Around The World In 80 Days" the other nominees were Newman ("Anastasia"), Tiomkin ("Giant"), North ("The Rainmaker") and Friedhofer ("Between Heaven And Hell"). I don't think anyone would have objected if Bernstein at least had gotten nominated in place of either of the latter two.

[Monterey Jack]

Got back from my friend's annual 24-hour Film Fest the other day, both tired and wired. We couldn't do it last year for obvious reasons, but - armed with proof of vaccination and clean Covid tests - we were able to enjoy a lot of varied, eccentric cinema. Bonus points if you can I.D. the films that contain the following...

1.) King-sized monocular mutilation courtesy of Bert I. Gordon.

2.) A time-travel mindbender that brings new meaning to the term "Go @#&! yourself".

3.) A geek-y vintage noir that inspired a recent Oscar nominee.

4.) A silent film with a masochistic clown who receives the Chris Rock treatment.

5.) Jeffrey Combs playing Christoph Waltz playing Bruce Campbell, in a triptych of tales inspired by Lovecraft.

6.) A Jurassic Park knockoff with Asylum-level CGI and annoying Millennials.

7.) A gore-soaked riff on Ted, with a discarded childhood playmate who refuses to let go of a shut-in man-child.

8.) One of the Magnificent Seven giving out free pickpocketing advice.

9.) A vegetarian zombie who has people lining up to take a bite out of them.

10.) An alkie sheriff investigating lycanthropy in a snowy Utah town.

11.) A kid making a failed getaway attempt whilst zipped tight into his sleeping bag.

12.) A kid who gets turned into Krang from TMNT.

[AndyDursin]

11.) A kid making a failed getaway attempt whilst zipped tight into his sleeping bag.

Only one classic contains such a laugh inducing moment.

[Monterey Jack]

Only one classic contains such a laugh inducing moment.

I had been requesting this movie for YEARS, and was delighted to see it finally get a slot (and I was even thanked for recommending it in the program my friend Mike prints up each year). Much funnier watched with a crowd, even the non-sleeping bag bits.

[Paul MacLean]

Only one classic contains such a laugh inducing moment.

I had been requesting this movie for YEARS, and was delighted to see it finally get a slot (and I was even thanked for recommending it in the program my friend Mike prints up each year). Much funnier watched with a crowd, even the non-sleeping bag bits.

According to eyewitness accounts, the audience at the premiere was laughing so hard at scenes like this, that John Frankenheimer and the cast walked out!

[Paul MacLean]

Darkest Hour (7/10)

I can't praise Gary Oldman enough for a phenomenal performance -- as well as Kazuhiro Tsuji for his unbelievable makeup work. Otherwise, I found Darkest Hour rather slow and tedious, which is a shame considering the historic significance of the story on which it is based. The only scene where the film really came alive for me was when Churchill decided -- on a whim -- to ride the London tube, and solicit the opinion of ordinary citizens. The dark, shadowy, expressionistic photography also became tedious very quickly.


Prince Valiant (6.5/10)

I decided this old-fashioned adventure romance might be worth the time, but it turned-out to be a below-average, stilted costume piece. I was partly convinced to watch Prince Valiant owing to preview clips which had beautifully scenic location footage of Scotland and England. Alas the only location scenes are establishing shots, or scenes with doubles filmed from behind. All the sequences with the actual cast are shot on the Fox ranch in Malibu.

The script isn't bad, but not especially great either. The whole visual style of the film is (like so many other medieval films of that era) just cribbed from The Adventures of Robin Hood. The cast mixes people like James Mason and other British character actors with Americans who talk like cowboys. Beyond that there just isn't any dramatic tension. (Robert Wagner's wig is pretty laughable as well!) This film's only saving grace is its terrific Franz Waxman score.

[Monterey Jack]

I loved Joe Wright's The King's Speech, but this film didn't measure-up.

Joe Wright didn't direct The King's Speech, Tom Hooper did.

[Eric Paddon]

More pre-NT spectacles I indulged in prior to Holy Week's beginning.

Samson And Delilah (1950) 7.5 of 10
-This was the film that launched the whole post-war era of big budget ancient world spectacle that lasted through "The Bible". It's funny how despite being made before "Ten Commandments" it sets itself up neatly as a follow-up to that film by beginning with a storytelling talking about Moses. It's not as good as "Ten Commandments" IMO but still has a lot going for it, especially the brilliant performance by George Sanders (perfect in this kind of smooth villainy) and Mature and Lamar do well enough in the leads. Still amazing how even at 25 Angela Lansbury doesn't convey a sense of being that young and yet here she is still with us today, as is Russ Tamblyn (the inference that he grows up to be King Saul though falls flat. Not just from a chronology standpoint as the first Kingdom was a century at least after Samson but Saul was from Benjamin, not Dan, and since Saul didn't exactly turn out all right, that works against the tone as well).

-There are some fascinating actors in small parts. A number of actors who'd been stars in the silent era appear like Fritz Lieber (his last film) who had been Caesar to Theda Bara's Cleopatra in the lost 1917 version. William Farnum who had played Ben-Hur on stage in 1900 as Lamar and Lansbury's father. George "Superman" Reeves as a wounded messenger. And the fat man who gets waylaid for his cloak by Samson? That's the voice of Elmer Fudd, Arthur Q. Bryan!

David And Bathsheba (1951) 7 of 10
-Well-acted by Gregory Peck and well-scripted. It's principal shortcomings I attribute first to Susan Hayward, an actress who impresses me less and less every time I see one of her films. Second, there is a major inconsistency with Scriptural text on a key point. The film has the child of David and Bathsheba dying before Nathan delivers his rebuke and judgment, when in fact it happened in reverse and God's judgment on David was the life of the child. David prayed to God for mercy for the child, but after the child's death accepted God's judgment. The conceit of Bathsheba at risk of being stoned to death is pure fiction. Likewise, the depiction of Uriah as a neglectful husband is also not to be found in Scripture either and seems designed to give us the conceit that he got what he deserved.

Solomon And Sheba (1959) 5 of 10
-While there are flaws in "Samson" and "David" what we have in this film is pure fantasy as the Bible describes only a state visit by the Queen of Sheba and never lists her among Solomon's 700 wives. It's only because of popular secular impressions of the Queen of Sheba as a pagan femme fatale that this kind of melodrama was concocted and while it has some impressive battle scenes, the film falls short. Sanders is the villain again and is too over the top compared to his perfect performance in Samson. Yul Brynner, who was an emergency replacement for Tyrone Power after Power collapsed on-set and died of a heart attack with two-thirds of the film shot, doesn't convey a complex sense of being tormented by his duty to the Law and his desire for Sheba (this was something Peck managed to nail as David).

Alexander The Great (1956) 4 of 10
-This film I found to be a giant snooze-fest. Burton looks ridiculous in his blond wig and Frederic March's obviously fake wig and beard isn't much better. I think another problem is that because this is one of those overseas productions, the lack of more familiar names hurts the film. Had it been filled with more recognizable American and Brit character actors in supporting parts it might have come off better. The Twilight Time liner notes by Julie Kirgo reveal her usual pretentious self in which I must be subjected to the umpteenth wailing about the blacklist and its impact on Rossen then I get about the actual making of the film (I have frankly had it with this obsession with the blacklist by people who probably if confronted wouldn't know what the Gulag was, or the Venona Papers)

Spartacus (1960) 6.5 of 10
-Got the Blu-Ray of this and it had two freeze-ups which necessitated a return for a replacement copy but I managed to finish the film anyway so I could be done with it. I hadn't seen it since Criterion released its DVD version (and I am keeping that for bonuses not duplicated). The film is much better than "Alexander" or "Solomon" but its way short of being the supposed best of the epics that critics who love it for its proletariat-Red undertones and backstory make it out to be. The film has some great parts (Olivier, Laughton, Ustinov, Simmons) and some embarassments. (Tony Curtis and the more I study Douglas's performance I find myself not buying him in this kind of role). Also, the film is much longer than it needs to be and isn't paced properly. There are not enough contextual scenes showing us how Spartacus is having all this success with his army so that its posing a threat to Rome (that might have entailed having to depict Spartacus engaging in wanton murder and plunder of the innocent which did happen, and thus there would go the moral pureness of Spartacus, who in real life didn't give a damn about eliminating slavery as an institution) We get too many scenes of the innocent slaves women and children and old men in this army marching and after awhile all these overly humanizing shots basically again makes one ask how they're succeeding? Also, the final film doesn't show us Ustinov getting Jean Simmons free from Olivier (nor any scene of Olivier's reaction to it) and why isn't her conversation with Spartacus at the cross attracting Roman attention? The film would have worked better if it had been shorter and made Spartacus more complex and less one-note so he could fit into an interpretation favored by 20th century radicals.

[mkaroly]

I hated David and Bathsheba...primarily because David wasn't stupid enough to touch the Ark. I found that scene utterly ridiculous.

[Monterey Jack]

-Ambulance (2022): 7/10

A...good Michael Bay movie...?

[AndyDursin]

SEE NO EVIL (1971)
6.5/10



I picked this up from the Indicator sale and moderately enjoyed it. Mia Farrow plays a blind girl visiting her Aunt and Uncle when a killer strikes, leaving her helpless as she's stuck in the UK country side -- and, really, that's about it for Richard Fleischer's movie. Most of the film is Farrow thanklessly running around into and out of harm's way -- this is not your typical modern feminist tale to be sure, as Mia gets stuck in the mud, stabs her bare feet on glass, and basically waits for someone to rescue her as the audience tries to figure out who the killer is. Fleischer's movies are typically well made and so is this one -- Gerry Fisher's lensing is strong too -- but Brian Clemens' script doesn't generate a whole lot of tension. It's watchable yet not on the level of Fleischer's better films of the era (like THE BOSTON STRANGLER).

The really interesting thing about this film is Elmer Bernstein's score. On one hand, it's surprisingly lyrical and BIG for this kind of movie. On the other, some of it is unintentionally funny, giving off the feel of an epic when Farrow and her boyfriend go horseback riding -- or when the killer, seen in cowboy boot-closeups until the end, is on the loose! This isn't nearly the kind of eerie, moody score you'd expect from Elmer for this kind of film -- but once you realize this was the THIRD score written for the movie, it all starts to make sense. Previewing poorly, the producers dumped scores by Andre Previn and (apparently) David Whitaker, which I presume were less thematic and more dissonant, traditional "suspense" efforts. Either way, it's a weird score that's more listenable outside the movie than you'd expect -- but inside the film, it's strangely "prominent" in a misguided way, one which was likely not the composer's choice but a producer's mandate in an effort to make changes.

[Eric Paddon]

My first wave of Holy Week movie viewing (with a couple leftover pre-NT items). First a trio of vintage DeMille.

King Of Kings (1928) 8 of 10
-I don't understand why Criterion hasn't reissued this on Blu-Ray. At any rate this was the shorter version which gives me the wonderful organ score option that wonderfully interpolates some beloved hymns. I may find time Sunday to watch the original longer cut version which I haven't seen in a while. This shows DeMille at his best in the silent era in terms of spectacle.

Sign Of The Cross (1932) 6 of 10
-By contrast, DeMille's first spectacle of the talking era is a giant step down IMO. There's an overly stilted quality in that the actors at this point don't seem wholly accustomed to talking movies that doesn't help IMO, and I also just didn't find the overall storyline gripping in contrast to "Quo Vadis" (the one it mostly parallels and which I need to revisit later). The Roman orgy moments, in particular the implied lesbian seduction scene would have worked better and seemed less instinctively tawdry had they been done for a silent movie.

Cleopatra (1934) 7.5 of 10
-This effort shows how DeMille and actors by this point had adjusted to the sound era. This compact telling of the Egyptian queen's story is well-done but much like the 63 version, the Caesar part of the story comes off more interesting than the Antony part. Claudette Colbert gets my vote for the sexiest Cleopatra ever with her costumes and her vampish take that avoids going too over the top.

And from later:

Cleopatra (1963) 8.5 of 10
-This just ages better for me with each viewing and it is #1 on my list of movies I wish could be restored to its original intended vision. If Colbert was the sexier Cleo, La Liz is more credible as Cleopatra the ruler with ambition. It's unfortunate that the cuts to the film negatively impacted the Antony section which has the effect of dragging down Burton's performance and also removing some of Taylor's better scenes. However her death scene and the final image of her done up in the costume from her entry to Rome is brilliantly done.

Studio One: "Pontius Pilate (1952) 7 of 10
-Live TV drama with Cyril Ritchard and Geraldine Fitzgerald in a story about Pilate and the Crucifixion followed by a speculative fictional look at him 15 years later (that has no basis in authenticity but makes for some interesting drama). Offers a reminder to me of the limitations of live TV and its theatrical approach but I've learned to appreciate more as the years go by (though the way the narration treats the death of Christ and early Christian martyrdom you can't help but get the distinct sense that a subliminal statement about the blacklist era and linking Christian martyrs to those who refuse to cooperate before HUAC is being made.)

Day Of Triumph (1954) 6 of 10
-This mostly forgotten film produced by a church organization was actually the first feature length film since DeMille to depict Christ on-screen. Lee J. Cobb stars as a Jewish zealot recalling his encounters with Jesus leading up to the Crucifixion. The cheapness of the production and its washed out look (my copy is an old VHS transfer) work against it, though there's nothing really objectionable in it.

The Big Fisherman (1959) 5 of 10
-If "Day Of Triumph" is forgotten because of its low-budget origins, "The Big Fisherman" ranks as the most forgotten of all mainstream Hollywood spectacle epics of this era. While shot at Universal it was released by Disney under its "Buena Vista" distribution label. Walt himself wasn't particularly keen on it, but brother Roy had encouraged the studio to take it on. The problem is that with Disney controlling it, it became the most forgotten film in their entire catalog. It has never had a home video release of any kind and only was seen on TCM in a truncated version a couple decades ago. The version I found was a 164 minute cut (supposedly the original cut was 184 minutes) on YT from a faded pan/scan print that has no sense of the spectacle the film had in its release that earned it three Oscar nominations in the technical category (but naturally lost in the year of "Ben Hur") and makes it look as low budget as "Day Of Triumph" was.

-The story itself is based on a novel by Lloyd Douglas, author of "The Robe" and like "The Robe" it is a work of Biblical fiction that doesn't do a good job of effective historic grounding into the events recorded in Scripture. The film's biggest shortcoming is that Peter himself doesn't appear until over 40 minutes into the film because our primary plot has to do with an Arabian princess (Susan Kohner) who is the daughter of Galilee tetrarch Herod Antipas (Herbert Lom). Antipas had abandoned her mother years before for the beautiful, wicked Herodias (Martha Hyer). This is actually based in fact. Antipas had been married to the daughter of an Arab king and when he fell for the wife of his brother, that resulted in a divorce that put Antipas at war with his former father-in-law that dragged on to the period just after the Gospels end. However Kohner's princess is a totally invented character as is her actual kingdom location and the fictional line of her deciding to go to Galilee, disguised as an Arab boy so she can kill her father in revenge for what he did to her mother ends up not being that compelling (dragged down even further by John Saxon as an Arab prince who loves her who goes after her). Kohner's arrival in Galilee brings her into contact with Simon Peter the "Big Fisherman" who is not yet at this point committed to joining Jesus as a disciple, so we also get a very loose telling of Peter's journey to faith as a parallel plotline.

-Howard Keel, trying to break out of his musical background, has a great larger than life presence as Peter (and this would also explain why according to Keel, John Wayne was originally sought, but the Duke thankfully said no) but he's not given a very good script. There is a lot of modern sounding intrusions (terms like "church" and "congregation") and much like how "The Robe" whitewashed the element of Jewish opposition to Jesus and made it all Roman, "Big Fisherman" actually gives us representatives from all classes of Judiasm, Pharisee, Sadducee, Scribe listening with approval to Jesus's sermons (Christ is heard but never shown, in keeping with conventions of the day that only "Day Of Triumph" had broken and which on the big Hollywood level wouldn't be broken until the 1961 "King Of Kings"). The execution of John the Baptist by Antipas is treated almost as laughably as it was in the worst of all Biblical films of the 50s "Salome" (a character who is not there at all in this film!) and the film's final resolution of matters gives us a false portrait of what happened to Antipas and Herodias while the resolution of the Kohner-Saxon thing lands with a thud too.

-I'm glad I got to see the film and if this film is ever restored to its proper widescreen glory I would like to see it again just to see how much the original spectacle look might elevate the weak underlying drama. But given who controls it and how the older Disney management didn't appreciate it, there is no way the current Disney management (of which I have not a single kind word to say) will ever do anything with it. "The Big Fisherman" might as well already be a lost film.


Young Messiah (2016) 7 of 10
-I'd skipped this the last few years, in part because the comments by book author Anne Rice on how she renounced Christianity because it conflicted with her radical stances on social issues became something of a turnoff to me. I'm willing to at least look at the film as not necessarily her end product and give it another shot and it comes off as sincere and okay in telling a speculative tale of the boy Jesus and the journey back to Nazareth from Egypt after seven years. The through-line at times seems a bit weak, but I guess given my general disconnect with Hollywood today I can appreciate the fact the film comes off as good as it does (though "Risen" which came out the same year is a much better film).

[Paul MacLean]

I'm willing to at least look at the film as not necessarily her end product and give it another shot and it comes off as sincere and okay in telling a speculative tale of the boy Jesus and the journey back to Nazareth from Egypt after seven years.

I wasn't aware Rice's book had gotten a film adaptation. I was impressed when I read years ago she had rediscovered her faith -- and subsequently disappointed to hear she renounced it.

I'm curious, Eric, have you caught any of that crowd-funded series The Chosen? The evangelical / pentacostal community are all over it -- but what little I've seen of it looks amateurish to me.

[AndyDursin]

Rice did have last rites performed by the church so there's that at least. She's someone who grappled with it throughout her life from what little I read.