LES BICHES
***½
France/Italy
A seductive, innuendo-driven thriller generally considered to be the
beginning of Claude Chabrol's 'mature' phase. And no, the title doesn't
mean what you think it means (though don't you wish it did?). Rather it
translates as "The Does." I've read that in French, the word
carries certain connotations which are lost in translation. This may
explain why it's also been known by alternate titles including "Bad
Girls," "Girlfriends," and "The Darling Ones."
The picture is principally concerned with an unorthodox love
triangle that develops between a wealthy lesbian (Stéphane Audran), her
penniless artist girlfriend (Jacqueline Sassard) and a blank-faced
architect (Jean-Louis Trintignant) who inexplicably manages to seduce
both. Little of what transpires is tangible - the picture principally runs
on seamy subtexts and undercurrents. You're tempted to try and approach it
on psycho-sexual character-study terms, but few of the characters'
impulses are recognisable from real life. These French arthouse lesbians
sound more sophisticated than their Hollywood B-movie counterparts but
they are about as believable. You just know that their only options in the
end will be to die or go nuts and kill kill kill.
Fortunately though, you have the option to take things on a
surface level and just enjoy the atmosphere. Chabrol is a master at
atmosphere. St. Tropez, where most of the action takes place, is made to
look very attractive. Chabrol doesn't waste time on empty panoramic shots,
but he does make sure that his characters only need to go out at the times
of day when the light is most flattering.
As the elder 'biche,' Stéphane Audran possesses the screen
from the moment she enters it, draped in black, sizing up the young
Sassard from above and looking every bit the predatory lesbian. She rarely
gets a chance to be un-human and thoroughly lascivious, so she makes sure
to really live up every moment of it. Everybody else just does what
they're told.
The general feeling that sustains the picture is of an orgasm
continually delayed. Also, you leave thinking you got to see far more
flesh than you actually did.
dir: Claude Chabrol
wr: Paul Gégauff, Claude Chabrol
ph: Jean Rabier
cast: Stéphane Audran, Jacqueline Sassard, Jean-Louis
Trintignant, Nane Germon, Serge Bento, Dominique Zardi, Henri Attal
THE BRIDE WORE BLACK
***½
France
A suicidal widow is determined
to avenge her husband's death upon the five men involved in his murder.
An entertaining but at least partially misguided Hitchcock homage, saved
by the great Jeanne Moreau at her most diva-esque.
dir: François Truffaut
cast: Jeanne Moreau, Michel Bouquet, Jean-Claude
Brialy, Charles Denner, Claude Rich, Michael Lonsdale, Daniel Boulanger,
Alexandra Stewart
BULLITT
***
USA
A San Francisco cop hired to
protect a witness suspects greater corruption.
A single memorable car chase cannot justify an otherwise tedious crime
thriller.
dir: Peter Yates
cast: Steve McQueen, Jacqueline Bisset, Robert Vaughn, Don
Gordon, Robert Duvall
THE COLOUR OF POMEGRANATES
**
USSR
A surreal celebration of the
life of 18th-century Armenian poet Sayat Nova.
You tell me what's poetic about a skinny, hairy leg stomping on a pile of
grapes again and again and again. And again.
dir: Sergei Paradjanov
cast: Sofiko Chiaureli
THE
CREMATOR
****
Czech Republic
Made around the time when the Czechs were really eager to misbehave, this
grotesque, high-pitched allegory is ostensibly telling the story of a
family man who runs a crematorium in the days leading up to Nazi rule. But
the subtext relating to what in 1968 was a much more contemporary evil is
pungent and throbbing. Director Juraj Herz mixes absurdist, surrealist,
gothic and expressionistic flavours with free abandon. It's very grating
to begin with, but the surface quirks become much more intriguing as the
underscoring menace rises through and a relationship between the two
becomes apparent. It's all still much-too-much, but it becomes easy to
ignore all the excessive bits in favour of all the arresting bits. It's one of those cases where the experience of a singular,
piercing vision renders the many flaws irrelevant.
wr/dir: Juraj Herz
cast: Rudolf Hrusínský, Vlasta Chramostová, Jana
Stehnová, Milos Vognic, Zora Bozinová, Ilja PRachar, Eduard Kohout,
Jirí Menzel
FLESH
**
USA
A day in the life of a hustler married to a pregnant lesbian who wants an
abortion.
Aka "Andy Warhol's Flesh". One of those incredibly inept Warhol-Morrissey
collaborations centring around wooden pretty-boy Joe Dallesandro.
Reportedly this is the most accessible of the bunch. It's messy, tedious,
smugly self-conscious navel gazing. It has moderate value as an artefact
of the period, so
if you're curious, pick any five minutes to get a sense of it and you
don't really have to watch the rest. It's just more nothing.
dir: Paul Morrissey
cast: Joe Dallesandro, Geraldine Smith, Patti
D'Arbanville, Candy Darling, Jackie Curtis
HIGH SCHOOL
****
HOUR
OF THE WOLF
***
Sweden
One of Ingmar Bergman's lesser existential-horror-mindfucks. He inundates
you with expressionistic nightmare visions, dense monologues and promises
of perverse sex. But not enough to distract you from the fact that at its
core, this is a tortured, self-hating artist's whine-fest about a tortured, self-hating
artist.
wr/dir: Ingmar Bergman
ph: Sven Nykvist
cast: Max von Sydow, Liv Ullmann, Gertrud Fridh, Georg
Ryderberg, Erland Josephson, Naima Wifstrand, Ulf Johansson, Ingrid Thulin
IF...
*****
UK
Students at a British boarding
school engage in rebellion.
An angry, moody and controversial exposé of oppressive British
boarding schools that develops into a bold and brilliant attack on society in
general. Anybody planning to make a movie about misunderstood young rebels needs
to watch this one several times beforehand.
dir: Lindsay Anderson
wr: David Sherwin
cast: Malcolm McDowell, David Wood, Richard Warwick,
Robert Swann, Christine Noonan
THE
IMMORTAL STORY
*****
France
Orson Welles' most neglected masterpiece is a fable, a fairy tale, a
dialectic and a dream. In 1860s Macao, an heir-less wealthy merchant
approaching a solitary death resolves to reconstruct a legend narrated by
sailors around the world in order to 'legitimise' it.
It's difficult to determine how much of the film's depth and
resonance comes directly from Karen Blixen/Isak Dinesen's novella of the
same name, but
it's also irrelevant. Employing a stark colour palette, elegantly sparse
locations and Erik Satie's lovely, subtle piano, Welles gives it a
somnambulistic pull.
It's quieter than his other films. Like the late-career work
of all great artists, it's deliberate and unshowy. Its formalism doesn't
invite you all that actively to seek out the feeling and poignancy
underneath. This may very well have had some impact on its inadequate
critical standing as has, no doubt, its being a barely-hour-long drama made for French television. And it doesn't help that hefty
slabs of the dialogue are barely intelligible. But if you look past the
technical limitations - which, like every diligent Welles disciple, you
should train yourself to do - it's an eloquent, enthralling piece of work.
dir: Orson Welles
wr: Orson Welles, Louise de Vilmorin
ph: Willy Kurant
cast: Orson Welles, Jeanne Moreau, Roger Coggio, Norman
Eshley, Fernando Rey
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THE LION IN WINTER
***
UK
Eleanor of Aquitaine and Henry
II get together for Christmas, with the latter deliberating over which of
his sons is to succeed him.
A medieval melodrama with hints of wit overwhelmed by the
soap opera. The austere production feels like an attack on
today's Christmas traditions and the score only serves to signal the
self-importance. The performances, however, are revelatory.
dir: Anthony Harvey
cast: Peter O'Toole, Katharine Hepburn, Jane Merrow,
Timothy Dalton, Anthony Hopkins, John Castle
THE NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD
***½
USA
Countryside zombies are revived
by radiation.
A strange, unsettling Z-grade horror that is occasionally cited among the greatest films of all time. Hugely influential.
dir: George A. Romero
cast: Judith O'Dea, Duane Jones, Karl Hardman, Keith Wayne
THE ODD COUPLE
***
USA
Two divorced men move in
together.
Well-acted but claustrophobic and unexpectedly slow, overstretched and
seldom funny.
dir: Gene Saks
cast: Jack Lemmon, Walter Matthau
OLIVER!
****
UK
A captivating musical adaptation
of Charles
Dickens' "Oliver Twist" and the last old-style classic of the genre.
dir: Carol Reed
ph: Oswald Morris
pd: John Box
cast: Mark Lester, Ron Moody, Oliver Reed, Shani
Wallis, Harry Secombe, Jack Wild, Hugh Griffith
PARTNER
**
PETULIA
****½
PLANET OF THE APES
***
USA
In the future, American
astronauts land on a planet run by hostile apes.
Flawed and poorly acted but surprisingly ambitious sci-fi.
dir: Franklin J. Schaffner
cast: Charlton Heston, Roddy McDowall, Kim Hunter, Maurice
Evans, James Whitmore
PRETTY POISON
***½
USA
An arsonist on probation
seduces a schoolgirl, convincing her he is a secret agent.
A clever, audacious, evil little thriller, with excellent
acting. With tighter handling as well, it would have made for a minor
classic.
dir: Noel Black
wr: Lorenzo Semple Jr.
cast: Anthony Perkins, Tuesday Weld, Beverly
Garland, John Randolph
THE PRODUCERS
***
USA
A Broadway producer sells
25,000% of his new play, expecting it to flop.
A clever little idea with jokes that hit just as often as they miss. A cult
film now, but inferior to many of Brooks' subsequent efforts.
dir: Mel Brooks
cast: Zero Mostel, Gene Wilder, Kenneth Mars, Estelle
Winwood, Renee Taylor
ROMEO AND JULIET
**
Italy/UK
The tragic romance of Romeo and
Juliet.
A bland, unimaginative variation. Difficult to say today why it struck a
chord with a generation. Most likely the glance at Olivia Hussey's rack
did most of the striking.
dir: Franco Zeffirelli
cast: Leonard Whiting, Olivia Hussey, Milo O'Shea, Murray
Head, Michael York, John McEnery, Pat Heywood
ROSEMARY'S BABY
*****
USA
A young woman suspects she is
carrying the child of the Devil.
Eerie, atmospheric, expertly crafted and utterly compelling horror.
wr/dir: Roman Polanski
ph: William Fraker
ed: Sam O'Steen, Bob Wyman
m: Krzysztof Komeda
cast: Mia Farrow, John Cassavetes, Ruth Gordon,
Sidney Blackmer, Ralph Bellamy
STOLEN
KISSES
***½
France
François Truffaut picks up his picaresque tale of Antoine Doinel nearly
ten years after The 400 Blows
(with the sweet but dispensable Antoine
et Colette (1962) having popped up in between). Still played by
Jean-Pierre Léaud, 20-year-old Antoine is discharged from the army and
takes on quirky professions in between unorthodox romances with his boss'
wife (the ever-exquisite Delphine Seyrig) and a pretty music student. It's
all very warm, cheeky and borderline inconsequential, though there's
something unwieldy and transfixing about Léaud's face.
dir: François
Truffau
cast: Jean-Pierre Léaud, Delphine Seyrig, Michael
Lonsdale, Claude Jade, Harry Max, Daniel Ceccaldi, Claire Duhamel,
Catherine Lutz, André Duhamel
THE SWIMMER
***½
TARGETS
****
TEOREMA
****½
Italy
An attractive stranger seduces
each member of the family of a Milan industrialist as well as their maid.
An elegant, amusing, seductive and fascinating fable on matters of bourgeois sex
politics.
wr/dir: Pier Paolo Pasolini
ph: Giuseppe Ruzzolini
cast: Terence Stamp, Silvana Mangano, Massimo Girotti,
Anne Wiazemsky, Andres Jose Cruz, Laura Betti
2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY
*****
UK
A mysterious monolith sends
astronauts to investigate planet Jupiter in the year 2001.
A long, largely obscure but breathtaking sci-fi epic. The first of the
genre to: address major issues - like humanity and the lack thereof;
hypnotize with majestic, wholly convincing outer space visuals; and still feel
contemporary decades later, inspiring intellectual debates that never really lead to a
conclusion.
dir: Stanley Kubrick
wr: Stanley Kubrick, Arthur C. Clarke
ph: Geoffrey Unsworth, John Alcott
pd: Tony Masters, Harry Lange, Ernest Archer
cast: Gary Lockwood, Keir Dullea
voice of: Douglas Rain
WITCHFINDER GENERAL
***
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