What classics did you see last week ? (8 Mar - 14 Mar 2020)

My Name Is Julia Ross / Joseph H. Lewis (1945). Columbia Pictures. Cinematography by Burnett Guffey. Julia Ross (Nina Foch) is jobless and without family in London and behind on her rent so eagerly accepts the offer of secretary for the kindly Mrs. Hughes (May Whitty) and her friendly son Ralph (George Macready). But when she reports for her first day, she is drugged and moved to a remote house in Cornwall. When she wakes up, everyone, including Mrs. Hughes and Ralph, are calling her by another name and insisting she is the mentally ill wife of Ralph. The more she protests to others that she is not crazy, the crazier she sounds. I really enjoyed seeing May Whitty (often thought of as a typical Sweet Old Lady) do evil. She does it very well (she did get a Dame for her acting, after all). I enjoyed this Brit noir thriller very much.





Whirlpool / Otto Preminger (1949). Twentieth Century Fox. Cinematography by Arthur C. Miller (3-time Oscar winner). When I first ran across “Whirlpool” I realized that here was a Preminger/Gene Tierney noir that I had never even heard of. I quickly remedied that. This is a major work, with reservations noted. Ann Sutton (Tierney), the wife of rich and famous psychiatrist Dr. William Sutton (Richard Conte) is caught shoplifting from a department store. She is saved from arrest and a scandal by fast-talking David Korvo (José Ferrer). Korvo offers to help her with her psychological problems but it slowly becomes clear that he is up to something dark and dangerous. Ferrer was already a renowned stage actor when he appeared in this, his second film. He would win a Best Actor Oscar the very next year. He is magnificent as the shady hypnotist/amateur psychologist. For me, he almost makes the movie. Gene Tierney, though, is close behind as the troubled Anne who had been compulsively lying and stealing from childhood but hiding it from everyone until being caught this once. She lands in jail for a murder that she doesn’t know whether she is guilty or not. The solution to the “impossible” murder is far-fetched, to put it charitably. It almost sinks the wonderful film that came before it. But, at least while you’re watching it, José Ferrer almost sells the thing with his performance. It’s just afterward that you say, “Hey, wait a minute. Could that really happen? No, it probably couldn't.” Still, highly recommended.



Jose Ferrer and Gene Tierney


A successful psychiatrist’s wife drives a current year 1949 Ford Custom Convertible



Panic In The Streets / Elia Kazan (1950). Twentieth Century Fox. Cinematography by Joseph MacDonald. Timely film noir. A sailor from eastern Europe jumps ship in New Orleans. He gets into a poker game with Blackie (Jack Palance) and his fawning sidekick Ray Fitch (Zero Mostel). When the sailor becomes sick, Blackie kills him for the winnings and they dump his body in the harbor. An autopsy shows that the sailor was sick with Pneumonic Plague, the airborne version of the Middle Ages Bubonic Plague. National Health Service officer Dr. Clint Reed (Richard Widmark, 3 years and a thousand miles away from Tommy Udo) knows that the men who killed the sailor, at minimum, are carriers of the disease and must be found at all cost. He also opposes alerting the public through a press release because if the men find out they are hunted, they will leave town and spread the disease even farther. Late in the film, a city official says the rest of the world can go hang, let’s just be concerned about our own town. Reed, in what is practically a throwaway speech, says that everyone is related and the world is a community. Anyone in an airplane can be halfway around the world in a day. It has been suggested that, however quickly it goes by, this is the first such sentiment ever from a Hollywood movie. Reed is partnered with a gruff, doubting police captain well-played by Paul Douglas. Barbara Bel Geddes makes a full human being out of the thinly written role of Reed’s stay-at-home wife. This was Jack Palance’s movie debut and he makes the most of it. His Blackie has a smooth, silky voice that will convince you that he is your best and sincerest friend – until he starts to choke the life out of you. The movie raises some interesting questions about a free press and a transparent government. Kazan shot every foot of it in New Orleans. There is not a single sound stage interior. This movie shows how the past keeps coming around again into the present.



Richard Widmark and Paul Douglas


Jack Palance and Zero Mostel



Account Rendered / Peter Graham Scott (1957). Major Pictures. Cinematography by Walter J. Harvey. This brief (59 minutes) English murder mystery doesn’t waste a single second. First, the set-up for the murder is presented. Next, the alibis for all the usual suspects are laid out. The police investigate. Question everyone. Find the one detail that spoils a perfect alibi and corral the murderer. Efficient light entertainment. Lucille Ainsworth (Ursula Howells), married to merchant banker Robert (Griffith Jones), likes to take lovers, make them fall in love with her, and then coldly dump them. Her husband is just starting to catch on to this. One of her boyfriends, an artist, has painted her portrait showing her with an evil face. Another, a business associate of Robert, has a suspicious wife with a nasty tongue. There are lots of suspects when Lucille is killed out on the heath, but they all can account for their time when the murder was committed. Enjoyable for what it is.






Galveston / Mélanie Laurent (2018). Hit-man Roy (Ben Foster) has lung cancer but his boss Stan Ptitkin (Beau Bridges) tries to have him killed anyway over a woman. Young escort Rocky (Elle Fanning) is at the scene of the hit so goes on the run with Roy. This movie, the first English language film directed by the French actress and director Mélanie Laurent, is supposed to be a poetic neo-noir about a seasoned mob killer with a life threatening disease who meets a damaged 19-year-old who needs rescuing but is light on story and heavy on scenery both beautiful and sleazy and on driving. Lots of scenery. Lots of driving. Not really full of incident. The hit-man art film hasn’t been perfected quite yet.

Those rave comments are from quote whore sites





Greed / Michael Winterbottom (2019). Sony Pictures International Productions. Uneven satire comedy that truly scores when it hits but with too many slow passages. Shy young film maker Nick (David Mitchell) is hired by British mogul Sir Richard McCreadie, a.k.a Greedy McCreadie (Steve Coogan) to film his approved documentary life story. Nick soon encounters McCreadie’s young trophy wife (Isla Fisher), his young son (Asa Butterfield), his spoiled actress daughter (Sophie Cookson), and his elderly but nasty mother (Shirley Henderson). A large portion of the movie, including a long concluding set-piece, takes place at McCreadie’s villa in Greece where he is about to celebrate his 60th birthday with a lavish bash requiring the guests to dress in ancient Greek costume. Things do not go well. Coogan is absolutely the right actor to play this self-centered, cheating, crooked, bully of a billionaire. Shirley Henderson almost steals the show as the mother. It is hard to either recommend or not recommend this film. When it is good, it is very good but when not…it just runs too long.