While home video did wonders for increasing film appreciation, I have to wonder if MGM’s embracing of the format for their old catalogue didn’t greatly hinder young people in the 1980s from learning about film. As a child, I had seen MGM, I had seen RKO, I had seen Warner Bros. But I never saw […]
Entries from March 2006
The Razor’s Edge (1946, Edmund Goulding)
March 21st, 2006 No Comments
Recommend on MahaloFlight Angels (1940, Lewis Seiler)
March 21st, 2006 No Comments
When the studio system collapsed, so did the B-picture promotion system–a star of a B-picture could end up the star of an A-picture… For example, Jimmy Stewart started out in B-pictures, so did Eleanor Parker, so did Humphrey Bogart (I think). Occasionally, B-pictures made A-picture money (The Thin Man). It was a good system and […]
36 Hours (1965, George Seaton)
March 20th, 2006 No Comments
George Seaton is a perfectly capable director and he’s got a lot of talent as a writer, but 36 Hours is fairly light. It’s set just before D-Day–and we all know D-Day happened, so the Germans aren’t going to win the big kahuna, which leaves only the little ones. Again, James Garner probably isn’t going […]
Mogambo (1953, John Ford)
March 19th, 2006 No Comments
John Ford not only goes to Africa, he also goes contemporary. Ford rarely directed anything but period pieces–as Westerns do fit under that umbrella–and it’s interesting to see how he handles it. I have to wonder if Mogambo was MGM’s response to The African Queen’s success. While the film does contain some of Ford’s best […]
The Proposition (2005, John Hillcoat)
March 18th, 2006 No Comments
I was expecting something more eclectic from The Proposition, an Australian Western written by Nick Cave. I’m not sure if Australia has their own variation on the Western–I suppose something like Ned Kelly might qualify. The Proposition is an American Western set in Australia, with the Aborigines standing in for the Indians. It might be […]
16 Blocks (2006, Richard Donner)
March 17th, 2006 No Comments
Bruce Willis has had more comebacks–commercial and artistic–than any actor I can think of… Pulp Fiction was artistic, Die Hard: With a Vengeance was a commercial one, The Sixth Sense was both (his performance any way), and he’s due. (I just realized, the trips tend to come with comedic ventures). 16 Blocks is probably not […]
The Bad Sleep Well (1960, Kurosawa Akira)
March 16th, 2006 2 Comments
I had no idea it was Mifune Toshirô (nor did I get the Hamlet subtext).
Kurosawa mixes genres a lot with The Bad Sleep Well. It’s an incredibly romantic film, but not from the start. The start is a twenty minute wedding scene, all told from reporters’ points of view. It creates a distancing effect, it […]
