MOVIES

The Phantom President (1932) In the first of his two sound picture appearances, George M. Cohan plays a dual role as a stuffed-shirt banker with presidential aspirations and the coincidentally identical stranger, a medicine show mountebank with the pep and personality needed to pull off a successful campaign.  Claudette Colbert is another of the dead stick banker's aspirations which is also taken over by his double - despite the obvious decades of age difference.  Jimmy Durante is the double's eccentric gibberish-spouting factotum and they perform a couple of  Rodgers and Hart numbers together with excellent chemistry.  There are few opportunities nowadays for us to ascertain what Cohan's appeal was, but his charisma and personality are obvious and his blackface performance lacks the smarmy emotionalism of Jolson's and doesn't even go into dialect.  There is some effective political satire here, showing that the only way to win the presidency is to put on an entertaining spectacle.  I was also impressed with the sophisticated direction and camerawork, with the double scenes handled very effectively.  It's all pretty weird, but entertaining, and Colbert is well-dressed in sleek satin with huge puffy feather collars or fur sleeves.  Worth seeing for historical value, 7/10

Movies

Smarty (1934)  Joan Blondell is cast out of type as a manipulative upper-class featherbrain who goads husband Warren William to violence in this rather unsettling divorce farce. The message of the film is stated in so many words, by a woman, that some women need to be socked in the jaw to bring them into line and the unfortunate thing is that he didn't do it sooner and more often.  This whole movie is looking to be slapped down for its advocation of violence and adultery.  Blondell is as toothsome as always, especially in a black backless gown which her exasperated ex yanks off of her in one swift motion, but the role is outside of her range.  There are any number of actresses who could have done this irritating nitwit role to perfection, but Joan is the wrong choice for it.  On the plus side there is a fashion show at a high end couturier where the styles are pushed just beyond the brink of absurdity, and plenty of leg, back and negligee throughout.  Edward Everett Horton and Frank McHugh lend a hand but in the end this was just wrong.  Especially the end.  4/10

Watch Out, We're Mad (1974) Bud Spencer and Terence Hill just want their dune buggy replaced by the gangsters who crashed and burned it, or they will get mad.  They eventually do get mad. Watch out. Utterly moronic with no pretensions of being anything else.  Starts right off with a kind of motocross race for cars with lots and lots of jumping, rolling, crashing vehicles.  Mindless violence and ludicrous brawls, and Donald Pleasence behaving absolutely idiotically.  It was exactly what I needed to see at the time and I tittered giddily.  6/10

Hey mister, your car's on fire.

Movies - recent viewing

Narok (2005) is a Thai hell movie.  A group of people are erroneously sent to hell even though they are all still alive in the emergency room.  Buddhist hell, where they saw people in half, hang them from hooks and smash their hands and feet with mallets forever.  Not much of a story is necessary in a Hell movie - you are there and you want to get out, some do and some don't. It was great to see a Buddhist slant on it.  I don't think there are nearly enough hell movies.  This one is okay as a horror ordeal story, 6/10.  I recommend more highly the Nobuo Nakagawa film Jigoku (1960) which makes maximum use of its limited resources.

The Invisible Man vs. The Human Fly (1957) goes by other names but it is a Japanese movie about a good guy with an invisibility ray against a bad guy with shrinking gas which makes him so small he just drifts around and floats into locked rooms to murder people.  It is a movie about people you can't see.  The next day I couldn't remember what I had watched the night before.  3/10

The Nitwits (1935) is the Wheeler and Woolsey comedy said to have been remade as Genius At Work, previously reviewed.  Two goofy guys get involved with a mysterious serial murderer and there the resemblance ends.  The difference between the two movies is W&W have distinct personalities and chemistry as a team, they do and say amusing things in amusing ways, and there are jokes and humor included in the script, as well as a couple of good musical numbers.  As good a Wheeler and Woolsey movie as was ever made - harmless fun and gentle entertainment.  7/10

The Ghost Writer (2010) directed by Roman Polanski, is in many ways similar to his earlier The Ninth Gate, entering an obscure byway of literature by way of a protagonist just intelligent enough to work his way into a baffling maze but not to get back out again in one piece.  Similar too is the depiction of the soullessness of wealth and hollow opulence where genuine evil hides behind banal smiles.  Not a single ray of sunshine is seen in the cold bleak settings or in the hearts of the grim characters laboring under the weight of the contents of their own minds. Eli Wallach's brief appearance is memorable, and the stark locales and settings are simultaneously wide open and claustrophobic.  9/10

I watch all kinds of stuff.  I also recently enjoyed the second of the King Naresuan historical epics from Thailand which goes beyond any other historical epic I have seen for vast rampaging spectacle.  I sort of enjoyed Lizard in a Woman's Skin (1971), a trippy Italian giallo starring Brazilian actor/director Florinda Bolkan as a woman who appears to have dreamt the stabbing death of her neighbor exactly as it happened.  Didn't really enjoy L'anticristo (1974), an Italian Exorcist rip-off which I had seen before and for some stupid reason watched again, and didn't even make it half way through some damn thing called Female Yakuza Tale: Inquisition and Torture (1973) also, perhaps more literally, known as Story of a Wild Elder Sister: Widespread Lynch Law.  It is the stupidest and lousiest cheap Japanese exploitation flick I have ever tried to watch.

Movies

I got a set of mostly pre-war Bing Crosby movies from the library and bailed out of Waikiki Wedding (1937) in the middle of his first rendition of Blue Hawaii. I just couldn't take all that phony hawaiianity (and Martha Rae), even with Grady Sutton as occasional relief. In Double or Nothing (1937), Bing, Bill Frawley, Martha Rae and Andy Devine are honest strangers brought into an Eccentric Will to compete against the machinations of greedy relatives and win the million dollar inheritance. Rae is invariably repellent to me - if she would keep her mouth shut and take her clothes off more often she wouldn't be so bad. Bing's aggressive pursuit of a young woman is supposed to be cute I guess but I found it rather disgusting. The real interest in this for me was a series of bizarre vaudeville specialty acts ranging from hand shadows to knockabout dancers, and a spectacularly literal deus ex machina finale. 5/10

Goodbye Love (1933) is a short bill-filler in which Charlie Ruggles is a rich man's valet who masquerades as a wealthy big game hunter while his employer languishes in Alimony Jail, a sort of men's club where victims of the alimony scam bemoan the loss of their happy homes to unscrupulous gold-diggers. Since alimony is just a con game villainous women use to rob decent men, it is okay to plot a stock swindle and crash the market to get out of paying it. Of interest mostly for this skewed world view - there is not much depth to any of it and the marcelled vamps are rather frightening. Hattie McDaniel appears. Better than not watching a movie. 5/10

Movies

Black Moon (1934) Voodoo thriller - a woman is mystically drawn back to her island birthplace to take her place as white voodoo queen. Interesting to me was the fact that the leaders of the creole-speaking natives are depicted with a certain threatening dignity, while the Georgia-born "good darkie" (Clarence Muse, who rarely had an opportunity to show his real talents) is an unfortunate stereotype. As these things often do, the story is turned into a symbolic victory of christianity over paganism. The mass voodoo ritual scenes suffer greatly from not having been shot at night. Cast includes Fay Wray in her dark haired mode, cute but not a great actress. A good try but not a real success. 4/10

Kentucky Kernels (1934) Comedy duo Wheeler and Woolsey are guardians to orphaned Spanky McFarland, who falls heir to a Kentucky feud. Sometimes it is funny, and there is a song. 5/10

I Thank You (1941) British comedy duo Arthur Askey and Richard Murdoch, trying to get financing for a show, must take a job as a husband and wife footman and cook. Wartime references include sleeping on subway platforms, unavailability of foodstuffs, and firespotting from rooftops, and many of the supporting players are probably recognizable to those with a greater knowledge of the British music hall. Sometimes it is funny and there are songs. 5/10

Johnny Cool (1963) Henry Silva stars as a Sicilian bandit recruited by a deported Italo-american gangster to enact his vengeance. Wide-eyed and beautiful Elizabeth Montgomery is an aimless socialite awakened to the realities of life by her brief encounter with this dispassionately violent man. At times startling and fierce in its action and imagery, it seems to have been a break from drivel and trivia by producer/director William Asher, and it shows where his real strengths were - not here. A sophisticated, not always believable story with numerous flashy cameos including an uncharacteristically threatening appearance by affable John McGiver. Many of the cameos, like Mort Sahl's, have a "Look who's here!" feel, and it is easy to see who is a real actor and who isn't. Kind of great in certain ways, and overall an interesting and unusual experience. 7/10

Movies

Le gendarme de Saint-Tropez (1964) The first of what was apparently an extremely popular series of French comedies starring Louis de Funes as the titular gendarme. I only made it through about half an hour of this primitive uninteresting comedy. I was trying to figure out what exactly is the appeal of de Funes and it is beyond me. I think I have done my duty in this regard and feel no obligation to seek out his work - in fact I will probably avoid him in the future. This movie is simplistic pratfall slapstick - literally so because he falls on his butt in the middle of the road for no reason in the very first scene; a comedy of embarrassment, frustration and anger, lacking any sort of dynamic timing or imaginative staging. 1/10

Movies

Two Weeks to Live (1943) The first movie based on the Lum and Abner radio show. Bet you didn't even know there were any. One of them inherits a worthless railroad and mistakenly thinks he has only two weeks to live so they look for dangerous jobs to make ten thousand dollars to pay back the townfolk who invested in the railroad. Includes Franklin Pangborn, a gorilla suit and a rocket to Mars. Aimless but kind of funny sometimes. 5/10

Comme un cheveu sur la soupe (1957) stars Louis de Funes, who still has a pretty good head of hair, as a composer of popular songs who is a failure in love and life. He tries to kill himself, or find someone to kill him, and has no luck until he becomes famous and successful overnight, then the people who said they wouldn't kill him change their minds. Ridiculous slapstick, including utterly needless "pie in the face" and "stack of dishes" gags, ending with a huge brawl. But, there is a cute girl (Nadine Tallier) singing a couple of good songs, and it's so absurd I had to laugh in spite of myself. 5/10

Movies

The Week In Review - I have fallen behind in meticulously chronicling every damn thing I see, which I know is a real disappointment to my two or three occasional readers. I will here catch up.

Four Sided Triangle (1953) is a nice British example of genuine Science Fiction packaged as a mainstream melodrama. The science aspect is the creation of a matter duplicator, the human problem addressed is two scientists but only one girl. What could go wrong? Slightly ridiculous concept but very nicely done. 6/10

Zombie and the Ghost Train (1991) is a Finnish film by Mika Kaurismaaki, less stylized than the work of younger brother Aki. Not a story that solves a problem, it follows the decline of an aimless fringe character (Zombie) following his encounter with a mysterious rock band with lots of gigs, but which nobody has heard (The Ghost Train). Interesting to see, if you need to see a kind of Euro-art film. 6/10

The Ghost Train (1941) is quite the opposite, a British wartime light mystery thriller at a haunted railway station, with halfpint comic Arthur Askey there to keep everyone in a constant state of irritation. (If anyone who ever reads this has the slightest idea who Big Hearted Arthur Askey and Richard "Stinker" Murdoch are, leave a comment so I will not feel so terribly alone.) I will just tell you right now because you will never see this movie, that if it is wartime and there are ghosts, it is Nazis. 4/10

The Secret of the Telegian (1960) Japanese thriller in which a teleportation device is used to effect vengeance. Seems kind of pointless since the guy ends up in prolonged foot-chases after every bayonet murder anyway. So why not just drive. Kind of boring. 3/10

Lotosbluten fur Miss Quon (1967) Is a slow, cheap, German-made unthrilling thriller set somewhere in Asia, involving diamonds. Also kind of boring. My IMDB review is the first and only one. See that for more details. 3/10

From Hell it Came (1957) Dying man's curse + radiation = TABONGA, the walking tree monster. One of those monsters it is nearly impossible to escape from because they walk so slowly. Nice "monster carrying a woman" scenes, and there is quicksand as well. I liked how someone would come running into the village saying they saw Tabonga, and someone would say "Are you SURE it was Tabonga?" like there are all these other walking tree monsters out there. Also, the blonde female scientist who gets carried by Tabonga is one of the worst screamers I have ever heard, a harsh grating AAAAKH AAAAKH scream, not the clear piercing EEEEEE so necessary to a good monster scream. Almost stupid enough not to be boring but still pretty boring. 5/10

Made it halfway through the 1961 Edgar G. Ulmer version of L'Atlantide, Journey Beneath the Desert, and it amazes me that one can make something like the discovery of a lost civilization so damn tedious. Big colorful cheesy Italian sets and soundtrack do not enliven it much. 1/10

Movies

The Richest Girl in the World (1934) Miriam Hopkins and Joel McCrea in a silly farce showing how terribly inconvenient it is to be unbelievably wealthy. Hopkins is the Girl, who wants to be loved just for herself so badly that she makes it virtually impossible - as a test. She's peppy as hell and cute as a bug and I'd be all over her in a chinese minute if she were not so damn neurotic. If it hit you in the right mood or you hadn't already seen about twenty of these this might be as gay and charming as intended, but I get cranky when the movie could be brought to an abrupt end if any one of half a dozen characters spoke a single sentence, and that is the whole plot of this movie, that nobody does that. So for me, 4/10

Movies

Cry Tough (1959) John Saxon is a first-generation Puerto Rican American faced with the choice between drudgery and crime. A very nice New York independent production with many familiar faces from movies and TV, and a fine performance by Joseph Calleia as the father. 7/10

Flying High (1931) Formulaic aviation comedy of interest to me primarily for the Busby Berkeley dance numbers, but this is the first time I have seen Bert Lahr in something other than a lion costume. Charlotte Greenwood is his comedy mate, and Pat O'Brien takes the leading man role. Fills the time adequately. 5/10

La Nave de los Monstruos (1960) This Mexican singing-cowboy vs. space-monster movie was my choice for a completely ridiculous Family Movie Night. Women from Venus are wandering the galaxy in search of men, but until they arrive at last on Earth they find nothing but crazy looking monsters which they keep frozen in blocks of ice. The most appealing feature of this film for me is the spectacular Lorena Velasquez, also seen in Planet of the Amazon Women. Silly robot, crazy rocket set, nice space model shots probably lifted from another film, goofy monster suits, and of course a singing cowboy still can't overcome its basically soporific nature but it was fun anyway. 7/10

Lorena Velasquez: Beautiful but deadly

Freejack (1992) A chase movie in which Emilio Estevez is snatched from a fatal car crash into the dystopian future of 2009 for a rich man's mind transplant. Lots of running, shooting, driving, crashing, getting chased by non-actor Mick Jagger, and things blowing up; but the numerous huge bloblike cars of the future were great. Also great is any opportunity to enjoy charming Amanda Plummer, here endearing as a shotgun-wielding crotch-kicking nun. It's all kind of stupid but mostly fun. 6/10

What we will drive in 2009

Movies

Sextette (1978) Mae West crawled out of her grave for this unmusical musical unfunny comedy. I swear I thought my face was going to freeze forever in a grimace of painful horror from seeing that scary old grandma hobbling around, croaking vile lewd one-liners. The songs were uniformly as deranged and ghastly as the very worst songs in Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Heart's Club Band, which is as bad as a cover of a song in a movie can possibly be. It was absolutely nightmarish and agonizing. It's not as bad as the Village People movie Can't Stop the Music, but that is the ONLY MOVIE EVER MADE that it is not as bad as. Rating: NEGATIVE INFINITY MINUS ONE. That's just one short of negative infinity, and the second worst rating any movie could ever have.

On the other hand:

I had read the first volume of the Scott Pilgrim vs. the World (2010) comics a couple of years ago and the only difference I could see between it and all the other dozens and dozens of independent comics I have read about the relationship problems of an unemployed hipgeek in a rock band was that it was cartoony fiction instead of painful and embarrassing autobiography like all the rest. So when this movie came out I just ignored it. However, this is the month I am trying to get caught up on some of last year's more interesting seeming movies and I was completely unprepared for how extremely witty, inventive, well-written and well-made this was. Jam-packed with imaginative gimmickry, sharp dialogue, sweet cute romance and hugely farcical action, it is only the somewhat excessive and tiring final spectacle which keeps me from giving it a 10. But it is the kind of movie that makes you feel cool just to be watching it, so it's 9/10.

Movies

For the Love of Mary (1948) Deanna Durbin is a switchboard operator at the White House who is so incredibly appealing that Supreme Court justices and the President himself intervene in her love life. It's amazing what a complicated comedy of errors it becomes. She sings a bit too. Nothing explodes, nobody shoots at anyone or crashes through a window, no huge things come rushing at you. It's just funny and nice. Edmond O'Brien is one of the handsome young suitors. 7/10

Supernatural (1933) Phony psychic tries to scam heiress Carole Lombard, but she becomes possessed by the vengeful spirit of his ex-girlfriend, a recently executed Mad Strangler. Really skewed concept, well presented. I like Lombard in the '30s and this is a uniquely weird film. 8/10

Movies

Mystery of Edwin Drood (1935) Probably as good a movie as you could make of this in 1935, with Claude Rains hamming it up a bit as the villain, and a mostly unfamiliar cast otherwise. If you just want a quick rendition of the story to give you an idea of what it is about, this will do. My choice for Family Movie Night, it left us unmoved. 4/10

A couple of nights ago we watched Trouble In Paradise (1932), an okay Ernst Lubitsch drawing-room comedy. When I got it from the library last year nobody was interested, but if someone else recommends a thing then it becomes a must-see. Has some funny bits, but I don't care for Kay Francis or Herbert Marshall. 5/10

On my own I watched How to Date an Otaku Girl (2009) also known as Fujoshi kanojo and My Geeky Girlfriend. Kind of the flip side of the smash hit Train Man, this time it is the girl who is obsessed with comics, animation and boy-love fantasy. I see some of that sort of stuff but I wanted to see it in context. The hapless male is dragged along to a Butler Cafe, where women are served delicate pastries by beautiful young men, costume shops, and comic book stores catering to women's fantasies of pretty boys making out with each other. It develops into a serious romance story, with each having to overcome different obstacles to find true love. Mostly educational, but it makes learning fun. 5/10

Movies

Mantrap (1953) Also known as Man in Hiding, this is an interesting little contemporary thriller from Hammer studios. Paul Henreid becomes involved with an escaped convict in search of the real killer. Nice to look at, keeps you guessing. 6/10

Here Is My Heart (1934) Bing Crosby is a millionaire radio crooner who must masquerade as a waiter to woo a Russian princess, played by Kitty Carlisle. Supporting actors include William Frawley and Akim Tamiroff. Light and harmless, with their duets better than I expected. 5/10

Movies

Cracked Nuts (1931) Comedy duo Wheeler and Woolsey are competing to be king of a generic comedy kingdom of that era, and perform what is essentially a series of standup routines and burlesque sketches with various straightmen and women. With Edna May Oliver as the obstacle to Bert Wheeler's marital bliss, and Boris Karloff as a shiny-haired schemer. One routine involving mapping out a battle plan includes an early fragment of Who's On First, with a town named What. Q: What's the name of the town? A: That's right! As a scholar of the history of comedy I found this enjoyable. 5/10

Palmy Days (1931) A slightly more sophisticated musical comedy starring Eddie Cantor as a lucky fool who falls into a high-paying job as an efficiency expert in an ultramodern bakery staffed by hundreds of lovely young women in backless minidresses or backlit transparent skirts. Their daily fitness routines are choreographed by Busby Berkeley. Charles Middleton, remembered as Flash Gordon's nemesis Emperor Ming, is a phony psychic after the company bonus money, and George Raft is one of his henchmen. Silly entertainment. 6/10

Paradise.

Movies

Don't Tell the Wife (1937) Guy Kibbee and Una Merkel get top billing in this RKO bill-filler. Merkel is the wife of a Wall Street Hustler, Kibbee the duffer duped into fronting for a phony gold mine company. Takes the idea and runs with it, then flips it around in the last reel so justice is served and virtue rewarded. Some good laughs, but it emits sleep-rays through the middle third which almost put both of us out. You could do worse. 4/10

The Face of Marble (1946) I'll bet you anything that someone at Monogram Studios said, "We need a movie called The Face of Marble and this is when we need it by." Completely incoherent script from start to finish, especially the finish. John Carradine is a scientist working on a means of reviving the dead, but the revived fall under the sway of his voodoo housekeeper and gain the ability to walk through closed doors. A revived dog becomes a sort of ghost vampire. The titular face is a momentary side-effect of the revival process which plays no part in the proceedings. A ridiculous muddle of pseudo-science and voodoo with flashing neon and spark machines, directed by champion hack William Beaudine. The best feature of the film is statuesque Maris Wrixon, who spends most of her screen time in a luscious satin nightgown. This movie stands as evidence that a really lousy script can be far more entertaining than a pretty good one. 6/10

Maris Wrixon, an ornament to any laboratory.

Movies

Pepe (1960) An American-made Cantinflas movie. Even though they tried to make it a bloated monstrosity by jamming in cameos and performances by everyone they could get their hands on, it still comes out pretty well with his usual blend of comedy and pathos. All the powers of Hollywood could not conquer his natural magnetism and charm. If you can't find a real Cantinflas movie, this one is good enough. 6/10

Movies

Celebrated Thanksgiving by staying home alone, eating a small lentil and brown rice burrito with spinach in it, and some cake, and watched these movies:

The Creeping Flesh (1973) Peter Cushing and Cristopher Lee are fraternal competitors for the big science prize - both want to cure insanity, but Cushing's technique involves making a serum from the blood of an ancient New Guinean devil skeleton which regenerates its flesh when dampened. Doesn't work out as well as he had hoped. DEVIL SKELETON, I said. Fairly good Victorian Pseudo-Science movie, not a real rip-snorter though and you have to wait quite a while for the devil skeleton to get rained on enough for it to amble about, but it does have the craziest POV shot I have ever seen. 6/10

How the world looks to a partially regenerated devil skeleton.

Puzzlehead (2005) Small, quiet, intelligent SF story exploring what it means to be human. Man builds his android replica and programs it by scanning his own brain - the creation must learn to overcome the weaknesses and failings of its creator. No huge surprises, just a thoughtful, well-made character study. 9/10

Love on the Run (1936) Joan Crawford is the rich girl who hates reporters, Clark Gable is a reporter. Pretty much like a jillion other movies where the girl finds out the guy wasn't being honest and never wants to see him again. Lots of "follow that cab" kind of stuff, competition with fellow-reporter Franchot Tone (who overacts horrifically), and there is a spy subplot tossed in. Some sequences are irrelevant to the story and are dragged on way too long, and at one point Gable suddenly has a black eye for no apparent reason. Kind of a mess, though Crawford seems very human, fresh and almost innocent at certain points. Best part of the movie is Donald Meek's role as an eccentric night watchman at the palace of Fontainebleu. Won't kill or thrill. 4/10

The day before Thanksgiving I watched Fangs of the Cobra (1977), a Chinese lite contemporary romance adventure from Shaw Brothers studio, not the usual costume martial arts for which they are best known. Young man returns from studying abroad to take over management of the large family farm, and falls for the daughter of a tenant farmer. The unique twist is that her pet, best friend, confidante and protector is a cobra - but he hates snakes because his mother was bitten by one when he was a child, and died. The scheming cousin who wants to marry his money ends up naked quite a lot more than I expected, though without sufficient attributes for me to find it anything but surprising. Eventually the hero cobra protects the infant son from being bitten by the evil mongoose and pretty much saves the day all around. Unique and surprising while still being quite mediocre. 5/10

Movies

Donna and I both enjoyed Scott Prendergast's short film The Delicious so much when we saw it a while back, we thought we would try his feature film Kabluey (2007) for Family Movie Night. Luckily I had a backup ready because after a seeming eternity of SCREAMING HORRIBLE CHILDREN scenes we just couldn't take any more and will never get to see whether it is really any good or not. The backup was Caveman (1981), which I wasn't able to easily obtain when we were going through caveman movies a couple of years ago. The animated dinosaurs are the real stars of this not entirely funny comedy, but at least nobody was SHRIEKING continuously in it. 5/10

Addendum: Donna says she is going to try to watch the rest of Kabluey, after reading more about it online. I have wished her luck.

I got back to work after that and watched Beast of the City (1932), a hard-edged prohibition drama. Walter Huston is the police chief dedicated to cleaning up his gangster-infested town. A clear backlash against the gangster movies of the day, and it doesn't pull any punches. The Hollywood Ending was not mandatory at that time and it gets pretty rough at the end. Includes Jean Harlow as a scheming gun moll and Mickey Rooney, a tiny speck of a kid. 7/10

Movies

Woman Chases Man (1937) Miriam Hopkins is the poor girl, Joel McCrea is the rich boy in this screwball comedy. Lots of fast talking, scheming, and absurdly complicated situations. Gets to be a lot of shouting and fighting at the end which I find wearisome, but overall it was pretty cute despite its lack of a negligee scene. 7/10