May 2014

May 2014

The Theatre Bizarre (Various, 2011)|||||3.5
C-/C+/C-/B-/D/C-, sympathetically.
Les rendez-vous d'Anna (Akerman, 1978)|||||8
The Last Temptation of Christ (Scorsese, 1988)|||||7
Pain & Gain (Bay, 2013)|||||4.5
Confidential Report (aka Mr. Arkadin) (Welles, 1955)|||||8
Godzilla (Edwards, 2014)|||||5
The Immigrant (Gray, 2013)|||||7.5
One of those ultra-classical narratives, characterized by old-fashioned naivete, openness to ridicule, a well-constructed screenplay of encompassing dramatic ironies and passionate worldly diatribe.  I don't think Gray quite hits anything out of the park, with consistency, but still a film highly affecting and wise.
Ida (Pawlikowski, 2013)|||||6.5
A pure and essential story, somewhat undermined by Pawlikowski's weakness for narrative efficiency.  Not much under the surface, but the surface is a pleasure.
* Phantom of the Paradise (De Palma, 1974)|||||6.5
Journey to Italy (Rossellini, 1954)|||||7
La promesse (Dardennes, 1996)|||||6.5
Love Affair, or the Case of the Missing Switch-Board Operator (Makavejev, 1967)|||||7.5
The River (Renoir, 1951)|||||7.5
Ugetsu (Mizoguchi, 1953)|||||7
The Holy Girl (Martel, 2004)|||||7
Fellini's Roma (Fellini, 1972)|||||7.5
The Merry Widow (von Stroheim, 1925)|||||6
Daughter of Dr. Jekyll (Ulmer, 1957)|||||5.5
* Prince of Darkness (Carpenter, 1987)|||||76
First of all, so Hawks (also, unrelatedly, sweet smatterings of Argento).  Operatic and portentous.  An all-in conflation of the hysterical imperatives of religion (to reveal Evil and what may lie supernally - or subatomically - to humanity) with the hopeful wishes of the modern, scientific, sentimental age, and so, a bit reflective of the science vs. religion-concerned Exorcist II whose spiritual images are almost matched, well, at least in regularity.  Carpenter seems stricken by a desire to frame icons and computers as the monoliths buttressing our vertical existence.  Around the religiosity is the HAWKS, though, and this film seems to flaunt the largest - and, tellingly, most anonymous, as apostles often are - of Carpenter's teams of do-gooders.  It doesn't quite deliver on these facets by the end, but a quality remains throughout.
* A History of Violence (Cronenberg, 2005)|||||5.5
Blood Simple (Coen, 1984)|||||76.5
So Hitchcock, if he were an American nihilist.  Manages to capture some of Hitchcock's concerting visual poetry (a slo-mo newspaper acting like a kissing Grace Kelly), but to the movie brat's lurid ends.  Finally, a masterful concerto of death and death drives, within a spiraling drainage of meaninglessness and one woman's triumph in the face of meaninglessness, caps it off on a high point.
* Unfaithfully Yours (Sturges, 1948)|||||7.5
Clash of the Titans (Leterrier, 2010)|||||2
Under the Skin (Glazer, 2013)|||||7.5
The Girl in Room 20 (Williams, 1946)|||||6
Shivers (Cronenberg, 1975)|||||4