Riders of Destiny: Robert N. Bradbury

Robert N. Bradbury's Riders of Destiny is significant for a couple of different reasons. To start with, it was the first time Bradbury and John Wayne worked together to make a Lone Star Western for Monogram Pictures. Second, it's actually...kind of good. If it had had a bit more polish, a fuller soundtrack, a sharper eye for composition, and more immediate editing, it could have gone down as a thoroughly average Western (no mean feat for a Poverty Row production). Riders of Destiny lives up to Richard Brody's claim that "the Western is intrinsically the most political movie genre, because...it is concerned with the founding of cities, and because it depicts the various abstract functions of government as direct, physical actions." Here John Wayne plays a government agent who travels to a small town to help a group of beleaguered homesteaders fight back against a corrupt landowner who is cheating them of their water supply. One of the most curious aspects of the film is how it pulls a double-switcheroo with the opening sequence: Wayne sees a young woman attacked by two gunmen and he saves her; he learns that the gunmen were stagecoach employees and that the woman had actually robbed them of a satchel of money; then he learns that she was stealing it back from people who were going to cheat her family of it. This is complex plotting for the first third of a 50-minute film! And lastly, Riders of Destiny is significant because it features John Wayne as a singing cowboy. And his songs...well...they're pretty dark and bloody! 'Nuff said!

6/10

Häxan: Witchcraft Through the Ages: Benjamin Christensen

[Revisit Review]

To read this review, go to: http://www.theyoungfolks.com/review/haxan-witchcraft-through-the-ages-1922/43091.

9/10

Paprika: Satoshi Kon

I have never seen a film with the name 'Satoshi Kon' attached to it that in some way didn't leave me floored and spellbound. His last film before his untimely death, Paprika, is no exception. Continuing his tradition of playing with the boundaries of reality, dreams, fantasies, and delusions, Paprika gleefully elasticizes all concepts of time and space to create a film that is stunning to witness. Just like with Perfect Blue (1998) and Millennium Actress (2001), I left Paprika wondering where in the world animation could possibly go next. What techniques could there possibly be left to discover? What stories could there possibly be left to tell? However, Paprika isn't a perfect film. Despite featuring some of the best animation of Kon's career, the film lacks the same narrative cohesion which made his previous films easy to follow and understand despite their stylistic and narrative extravagances. We are never given a solid reason for why dreams and reality merge near the end of the film, nor how/why Doctor Atsuko Chiba developed such a radically different persona as Paprika. Her "romance" with Doctor Kōsaku Tokita is equally confusing, being both abrupt and inexplicable. I'm not saying that every film narrative needs to answer every single question it raises. But this is a film about the nature of dreams vis-à-vis reality; it relies on its narrative to frame the bizarre events and images that it parades in front of its audiences. Maybe another draft would have done the screenplay good.

9/10

Suspiria: Dario Argento

[Revisit Review]

To read this review, go to: http://www.theyoungfolks.com/review/the-film-canon-suspiria-1977/42949.

10/10

The Lawless Frontier: Robert N. Bradbury

I think this is some form of karmic retribution for having watched and almost enjoyed Robert N. Bradbury's The Dawn Rider (1935). After finally seeing an almost passable Poverty Row Western with John Ford, I've watched what might be the worst I've yet to see. There were parts of this film that I literally couldn't see because the cinematography was so bad. What little audio there was (large swathes of the film were submerged in total, awkward silence) was so poor that I couldn't make out most of the dialogue. And this wasn't just a matter of me watching a bad print. Different audio levels were used for different pieces of dialogue, making it seem like some lines were recorded while the actors were standing three studios over. The plot was so generic that even now, with a wikipedia summary right in front of me, I can still barely understand what the movie was about. This movie was pain.

1/10

The Dawn Rider: Robert N. Bradbury

I can't tell you how weird it is to watch a Poverty Row film in the public domain that actually has things happen in it! Robert N. Bradbury's The Dawn Rider may only be 53 minutes long, but it crams in a surprisingly large amount of plot. Of course, that plot is woefully generic: an outsider comes into town, makes fast friends with a local via good-natured fistfight, they fall in love with the same woman, there's a murder, vengeance is sworn, but the killer is the brother of the aforementioned woman. And so on and so forth. It's fun seeing John Wayne in such an early role where he's still developing his acting chops. Even though he seems jerky and occasionally uncomfortable, he still exudes a tremendous amount of authority and charisma. Additionally, there's a surprisingly engaging and impressive action sequence where a gun fight takes place on a moving wagon. Well, it's engaging and impressive by Poverty Row standards. They actually managed some half-decent tracking shots!

5/10

Bela Lugosi Meets a Brooklyn Gorilla: William Beaudine

William Beaudine's Bela Lugosi Meets a Brooklyn Gorilla could have been a mediocre Jerry Lewis and Dean Martin comedy if it had actually starred Jerry Lewis and Dean Martin. Instead, it starred Duke Mitchell and Sammy Petrillo, two comedians who made a living impersonating them. Both actors are dead ringers for Martin and Lewis in both appearance and acting styles. And that's why I hate this movie so much. They were plagiarizing one of the greatest comedy teams in American history. Watching this film was almost physically painful. When you factor in the rampant misogyny and racism of its setting and characters (suspiciously white inhabitants of the jungles of deepest, darkest Africa) and you have a film that is downright offensive and annoying. And how bizarre is it that of all of the films that I've watched with Bela Lugosi recently, this is the one that treats him with the most respect? By this point in his career, Lugosi was battling a crippling morphine addiction. And yet, none of that manifests itself onscreen. He comes across as a dignified, elderly statesman of horror cinema. If you look close enough, you can almost see a glimpse of what Lugosi might have become if his career had more closely mimicked that of Boris Karloff.

2/10

The Ape Man: William Beaudine

It's uncomfortably uncanny how well William Beaudine's The Ape Man works as a metaphor for Bela Lugosi's career and personal life. Think about it: a dignified professional is reduced to a mentally unstable ape-man who must prey off others to restore himself to his old self. The less said about the obvious drug addiction symbolism, the better. Lugosi's Poverty Row films were merciless in how they demeaned and disgraced him. But The Ape Man is one of the very worst, stripping Dracula Himself of his dignity. One positive thing that I can say about the film is that I enjoyed how unapologetically evil Lugosi's character is. More than once he is confronted with the fact that the only way he can return to being a man is to steal the spinal fluid of innocent victims, killing them almost instantly. And more than once he says that he doesn't care. It's nice to see a villain who doesn't try to justify their crimes with lofty, ridiculous ideals and reasons.

3/10

The Devil Bat: Jean Yarbrough

I find myself having to agree with Tom Weaver, the author of Poverty Row Horrors!, that Jean Yarbrough's The Devil Bat was probably the best of the films Bela Lugosi made on Poverty Row. While still by no means a decent picture, it at least makes an attempt to create a spooky atmosphere. The design of Lugosi's lab and his fiendish electrical experiments with bats flirt with mediocrity. Dave O’Brien is surprisingly enjoyable as big-city reporter Johnny Layden, who manages to pull off that 1940s brand of cocksure charisma without coming off as a douchebag. The giant bat models are so absurd that they almost veer into the realm of camp. But considering that this film wasn't made ironically and shots of the models were matched with stock footage close-ups of real bats, The Devil Bat doesn't get any brownie points for being enjoyably cheesy.

5/10

The Corpse Vanishes: Wallace Fox

Ah...Monogram Pictures: where the audio is inaudible, the cinematography unwatchable, and the actors all washed up. It's getting harder and harder for me to watch Bela Lugosi in these Poverty Row productions. It's beginning to get to the point where there's a cringe factor involved. After all, wasn't this man Dracula? The Corpse Vanishes may not have been Lugosi's most painful Z-grade picture, but that isn't saying much. This time around he's kidnapping paralyzed brides to steal their "bodily fluids" so he can keep his vain wife looking young. I can't believe there's a film out there that makes Edward Dein's The Leech Woman (1960) seem somewhat credible in comparison. I will say that I enjoyed the spunky female reporter who leads the investigation into the mass bride kidnapping. I definitely got a Lois Lane vibe from her. But alas, by the end of the film she is repossessed by the patriarchy and shoved into a "loving marriage" with a man who jokes that he can't wait for her to do his laundry.

4/10

Spooks Run Wild: Phil Rosen

Seeing Bela Lugosi drive a car while in his Dracula get-up was really surreal. I guess it was kind of like seeing Boris Karloff as Frankenstein's Monster water-skiing; it's just not something you would have ever expected to see. So at least I can take that away from Phil Rosen's Spooks Run Wild. For the most part, the film is a blasé horror thriller where the East Side Kids get trapped in a spooky mansion along with Bela Lugosi who, of course, is dressed like Dracula. The film relies very heavily on the comedic personae of the East Side Kids. And I suppose they are just as charming as ever (despite the fact that with the exception of Scruno, the African-American member, all of them are interchangeable both in terms of their appearances and personalities). There are occasional odd sequences that last from 10-30 seconds where the action will cut away to people doing one thing or another that are nearly impossible to see because the film is too damn dark! Come on, people! This is cinematography 101 stuff!

4/10

The Changeling: Peter Medak

Do you want to know my definition of a good scary movie? If I'm watching it in the dark and I have to pause it and go turn on my lights, it's a good scary movie. Peter Medak's The Changeling isn't the most subtle of horror films. Any ambiguity concerning whether or not the house is actually haunted is obliterated mere minutes into the run-time. There's an absurd moment where a victim is chased by a possessed wheelchair. And yet, The Changeling is still effective. I love a good slow-burn horror film. And to its credit, The Changeling does take its time to create atmosphere and develop George C. Scott's character. This film is just as much a touching examination of grief as it is a haunted house thriller. Medak and his cinematographer John Coquillon demonstrate excellent control over the use of space with regards to architecture and character framing. The haunted house feels spacious and empty...and somehow occupied by an unknowable something that hovers juuuuust off-screen. And hey, there are few things in this world more frightening than a dead child's disembodied voice.

7/10

Invisible Ghost: Joseph H. Lewis

The only notable thing about Joseph H. Lewis' Invisible Ghost is its wonderful set-up: a heart-broken man goes into homicidal somnambulist sprees whenever he sees the ghost of his beloved wife. The twist is that his wife isn't actually dead; she was merely brain-damaged in an accident and now lives in his basement (without his knowledge, of course), being secretly cared for by one of her husband's servants. Every now and then she manages to escape and wander off. And each time she does, her husband commits another murder...of course, there is no real explanation for why he becomes hypnotized by her image. But when has a massive plot hole stopped a D-grade horror film from getting made? The pity is that I think that a competent director could make a decent film from this plot. Maybe Hitchcock or De Palma? Or perhaps Buñuel or Jodorowsky? Regardless, Lewis was none of these. In time he would become a damn fine director in his own right, directing two of the seminal works of the film noir genre: Gun Crazy (1950) and The Big Combo (1955). And there are aspirations towards art in Invisible Ghost: a clever camera set-up here, a tragic close-up on Bela Lugosi there. But it's not enough to pull Invisible Ghost out of the gutter.

3/10

Charulata: Satyajit Ray

Satyajit Ray's Charulata is a tragedy in three parts. That isn't to say that it's divided into three acts or scenes, but rather that it follows three different interconnected storylines that all inevitably succumb to bitter tragedy. Charu is a lonely housewife who wiles away her days in seclusion reading, dreaming, and spying on her neighbors. Bhupati, her husband, is so blinded by optimism concerning politics and his newspaper that he is oblivious to being robbed blind by his brother and to the fact that Charu has fallen madly in love with his cousin Amal. And Amal? An unmotivated slacker fresh from university, he realizes that he must leave their house and abandon any hope for happiness just when he finds purpose in life in both his writing and in his affections towards Charu. There is much to love about Charulata: its gentle yet devastating examination of its characters' emotions, a wonderful song sequence a little past the one hour mark that is unlike almost anything I have ever seen in the cinema of Satyajit Ray, the wonderful swing set scene where Charu first discovers her love for Amal, and the virtuosity of Subrata Mitra's cinematography.

8/10

Millennium Actress: Satoshi Kon

Satoshi Kon's Millennium Actress is a dazzling triumph of both form and function. As a piece of animation, it is breath-taking. As a story, it is heart-felt and devastating. And as a narrative, it takes bold risks and experiments with techniques that I have never encountered before. Where to start? The loving tributes to Japanese cinema, in particular the lives of Setsuko Hara and Hideko Takamine as well as classic Japanese films (most notably Akira Kurosawa's Throne of Blood)? Kon's seamless integrations of present-tense characters in past-tense flashbacks? The evocative art that breathes life to several different eras of history? The palpable sense of yearning on the part of the eponymous actress as she spends her life searching for a man she loves but barely knows, perpetually just out of reach like he was the Holy Grail and she the Knights of King Arthur? To watch Millennium Actress is to experience it. Joyful, melancholy, tragic, and funny, Millennium Actress is essential.

9/10

The Book of Life: Jorge Gutierrez

To read this review, go to: http://www.theyoungfolks.com/film/the-book-of-life-review/42182.

4/10

Gone Girl: David Fincher

To read my article on this film, go to: http://www.theyoungfolks.com/film/amy-dunnes-one-mistake/42094.

8/10

Wolf Creek: Greg McLean

I hate Greg McLean's Wolf Creek. But it's not because of its violence or its treatment of women. First off, the film isn't even that gory or bloody. Critics who claim that it was some kind of abomination need to brush up on their video nasties. And yes, its female characters were treated in a despicable manner. But that's par for the course for this kind of movie. I hate Wolf Creek because it's boring, predictable, and worst of all, not scary. More and more I've found that when I am frustrated by a character's incompetence and stupidity in a horror film my suspension of disbelief is retarded, thereby preventing me from feeling scared or emotionally invested in the story. In other words, bad writing serves to remind me that I'm watching a movie. And the best horror films make you forget that. But not Wolf Creek. There was never a moment where I wasn't aware that I was watching a movie entitled Wolf Creek. Not even the film's impressive cinematography of the antediluvian Australian Outback could distract me from that.

4/10

Redes: Fred Zinnemann, Emilio Gómez Muriel

Fred Zinnemann and Emilio Gómez Muriel's Redes never manages to completely emotionally engage its audience beyond the usual narrative short-hand familiar to films produced and sponsored by progressive/socialist/communist governments of the early 20th century: injustices are carried out against the honest, hard-working poor, someone dies, a community struggles to fight back. I suspect this is due in large part to the film's run-time which barely makes it over 60 minutes. But what sets Redes apart is its technical brilliance. A precursor to Italian neorealism liberally peppered with Soviet-esque montage sequences, Redes is a triumph of the moving image. There are several sequences which stick in my mind: a sombre funeral for a child that takes place immediately after his father was denied a loan for hospital bills by his employer; groups of fishermen merrily pulling in schools of fish after months of empty nets; the assembled fishermen slowly and deliberately rowing to the shore of the town after agreeing to organize and fight back against their exploiters. The fact that a film like this was made in 1936 is nothing short of astonishing.

9/10

Oliver!: Carol Reed

I'm not sure if Carol Reed's Oliver! will ever get the fair shake it deserves from the critical establishment because it beat out Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) for Best Picture. And yes, that's complete nonsense. But if you go into Oliver! with an open mind, you will find a delightful (if somewhat bloated) musical. I need to use this film in the future as a litmus test to see if I am medically capable of still feeling joy. The film departs from the stark drama of David Lean's 1948 adaptation for something more akin to Mary Poppins (1964) of all things: this is a grinning London where even the chimney sweeps sing, dance, and smile with impossible white teeth. But the best part of the film is the opening of the second act entitled "Who Will Buy?" It has nothing to do with the story, but it's one of the film's best songs and helps re-energize the proceedings after the intermission. One of the main reasons why it's so brilliant is that it temporarily smashes the illusion of storybook cheerfulness to reveal that the lower classes are beaten down and weary; their cheerful demeanor is a facade that helps protect themselves from the vagaries and cruelties of the world.

7/10

Inside: Julien Maury, Alexandre Bustillo

I hate the fact that I have to give Julien Maury and Alexandre Bustillo's Inside a low score. Despite its problems, I actually liked it. From a technical standpoint, the film is stunning. The color palette is striking, the cinematography memorable, and the gore effects both brutal and unforgettable (many people thought they were too over-the-top, but considering that this is a horror movie about childbirth, one of the most violent, gory, and gruesome facets of the human experience, I was alright with it). I particularly liked how one bathroom where a large portion of the film takes place in starts off sterile and clean but progressively gets more bloody and disgusting as the film continues. But where Inside falters is its screenplay. While the plot twists about who-kills-who can be surprising (poor Mom!!), every attack and murder is bluntly telegraphed. A friend shows up in the middle of the night. Of course, he has to die. There is a friendly cat who rubs up next to the killer. Of course, it has to die. Cops show up. Of course, they have to die (despite the fact that they are trained to deal with people like the killer). But the film also makes the fatal mistake of making its characters artificially stupid. Let me give you an example. Near the end of the film, a policeman reaches the besieged young woman holed up in her second-story bathroom. The killer turns off the power, plunging them into darkness. The cop then tells this critically injured pregnant woman to stay where she is while he goes into the dimly lit basement to fix the fusebox and turn on the lights. Here's an idea: forget the lights [he has a working flashlight and a gun], get the pregnant woman, get out of the house, and call down an army on that killer. I was so angered by the artificially incompetent characters that I couldn't fully enjoy the film. And was the CGI baby really necessary?

6/10

Amores Perros: Alejandro González Iñárritu

I take issue with anyone who calls Alejandro González Iñárritu's Amores Perros the Mexican Pulp Fiction. Both films may have heightened, aestheticized violence, non-linear narratives, and multiple point-of-view characters that we follow, but they are very different films. First, Amores Perros deals with two genres that Pulp Fiction completely ignored: horror and tragedy. The horror comes into play during the sub-plot about the super-model's dog that gets stuck beneath the floorboards of her apartment. The tragedy comes from the story of the not-quite-retired hit-man. If Pulp Fiction was a wild, stylish, irreverent ode to American pop culture, then Amores Perros is a disturbing glance into the reality of life in Mexico City through the distorted lens of genre conventions. Of course, the stories aren't generic. The super-model story leaves one with the same sense of uncomfortable queasiness and fear that Roman Polanski's earlier films excelled at creating. The story of the two friends who enter the illegal world of dog-fighting is visceral, brutal, and heart-breaking. And the story of the hit-man? Well, that might be the closest Amores Perros gets to being unoriginal. But Emilio Echevarría delivers such an incredible, heart-felt performance that it retroactively makes all other similar stories feel like the imitations instead of the originals. A phone message he leaves to his estranged daughter near the end manages to be the emotional highlight of a film that is apparently made up entirely OF emotional highlights.

10/10

The Desert Archipelago: Katsu Kanai

In my review for Apichatpong Weerasethakul's Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives (2010), I said that if a director uses crappy film stock, crappy actors, makes crappy framing decisions, their film doesn't become ironically good. Their film becomes crappy. I fully believe that Katsu Kanai intended for his film The Desert Archipelago to be provocative and polemical. To this end, he uses inflammatory imagery (a man pregnant with a baby that is born and grows up attached to his back), controversial dialogue, and the most irritating, aggravating soundtrack that I have encountered since Sam Raimi's Crimewave (1985). Seriously, if I hear one more nun laughing I might hurt somebody. But this film is so enigmatic and esoteric that I have difficulty believing that much of it had any point other than to shock and disturb. But to what purpose? To what ends? The film is stark, harsh, and even occasionally beautiful. But it is first and foremost annoying and irritating. Only Kanai's technical competence as a filmmaker keeps me from giving this film a terrible score.

6/10

Utu: Geoff Murphy

For a film intended to tell a particular story, Geoff Murphy's Utu does a poor job transitioning between its various narrative threads. In one shot it will focus on one group of characters and then with a single edit jump to another with barely an establishing shot to tell them apart. It reached a certain point where I couldn't tell the various characters apart and couldn't keep track of their motives. Quite simply, this is a surprisingly difficult film to follow. Even worse, it shoehorns in an unnecessary love story between a young British officer and a Māori woman which makes no thematic sense with regard to the rest of the film. The only part of the film that I truly enjoyed was watching one of the white settlers whose wife had been murdered by the Māori construct an increasingly absurd quadruple-barreled shotgun.

6/10

Dracula Untold: Gary Shore

To read this review, go to: http://www.theyoungfolks.com/film/dracula-untold-review/41590.

3/10

Trouble Every Day: Claire Denis

I can't say that I've ever seen eroticism and horror combined successfully before. And having seen Claire Denis' Trouble Every Day...I still can't say it. But then again, Trouble Every Day isn't really a "horror film." Mostly it's just a film that uses the aesthetic trappings of the genre to tell a story where terrible and grisly things happen to unfortunate people. But that's the problem: I'm not sure what Denis was trying to accomplish with the film. Is it a film condemning sexual hysteria? Monogamy? Deviancy? Is it trying to scare? Well, Denis' elliptical narrative obscures any chance for the audience to become engaged on the visceral level necessary for truly effective horror. Is it simply an aesthetic exercise? Well, Agnès Godard's cinematography is too damn dark, too damn obscured, and too damn sterile for it to be an appealing piece of film-making from a craftsmanship point of view. The only truly disturbing things in this movie are the soul-shattering screeches of the victims while they are being raped and mutilated. After that, the gore and guts just seems passé.

6/10

The Dam Busters: Michael Anderson

I've seen plenty of whodunits before, but Michael Anderson's The Dam Busters may be one of the first howdoits that I've ever encountered. The film is a fascinating look into the nature of scientific problem-solving, a kind of engineer procedural. The first 3/4 of The Dam Busters is devoted to the creation of the "bouncing bomb," the planning of Operation Chastise, and the training of the pilots who will fly the mission. Cinematographer Erwin Hillier gives the entire film a crisp, clean look with starkly defined shadows that don't swallow or overwhelm the actors or sets. Michael Redgrave's performance as Barnes Wallis is stoic and steady, reliable and oddly endearing considering how restrained it is. The last thirty minutes which feature the actual mission are some of the most kinetic and visually exciting of all 50s British cinema. After watching it, I clearly understood why George Lucas modeled the ending of Star Wars (1977) off it. But I also understood why Lucas was so eager to step up his special effects game. The effects in The Dam Busters vary in quality from convincing models to laughable composite shots, particularly involving the bouncing bomb detonations against the dams.

7/10

Horror of Dracula: Terence Fisher

[Revisit Review]

While I think that Terence Fisher's earlier Hammer Horror film The Curse of Frankenstein (1957) was a better movie, Horror of Dracula is still a solid entertainment. The film has very little exposition, particularly in the first half. But because of this, it relies heavily on the audience already being familiar with the story of Dracula. This, however, allows for fascinating plot twists such as the revelation that Jonathan Harker is a vampire hunter and that he traveled to Dracula's castle at the beginning of the film to kill him. The film even does without the traditional sequence where Harker is unsuccessfully warned away by superstitious villagers. The color scheme is breathtaking, particularly in its use of deep reds and greens juxtaposed with the ancient, washed out buildings that make up most of the sets.

8/10

The Cruel Sea: Charles Frend

They should have taken Captain Benjamin Willard's advice and never got off the boat. Whenever Charles Frend's The Cruel Sea does take its characters ashore, the film grinds to a jolting halt. I suppose I can understand why the off-shore scenes were necessary: they had to establish civilian characters that the protagonists could develop relationships with so that the scenes where they were in danger on the high seas would have extra weight. But neither Wolfgang Petersen's Das Boot (1981) nor Kathryn Bigelow's K-19: The Widowmaker (2002) needed to go ashore to develop their characters' back-stories. But despite these interruptions, The Cruel Sea is a starkly effective film that is concerned with characters first and foremost. There are impressive action sequences such as the sinking of their ship and an attack on a U-boat submerged beneath a group of stranded Allied sailors that forces them to kill their brothers-in-arms with depth charges. But they never overwhelm the human element of the story. One of my favorite parts of the film was Frend's use of non-diegetic sound to highlight the mental anguish and trauma experienced by the sailors, particularly one sequence where the captain is haunted by the sound of dying sailors trapped within a sinking ship.

8/10

The Railway Children: Lionel Jeffries

While I don't think that Lionel Jeffries' The Railway Children is a very good movie, I will admit that it grew on me. It's episodic narrative structure (no doubt adopted from the original novel) makes it feel more like a number of television episodes that had been edited together than a traditional movie, if that makes any sense. But it's difficult to root for the eponymous young child protagonists. Their move to the English countryside was necessitated by the ruination of the father and their family's fortune. There is much talk about them being "poor," but they exist in that strange netherworld of having-just-enough to not be a have-not but not-having-enough to be well-off that only really exists in children’s movies and crappy 90s comedies. So there isn't any true conflict other than the wrongful arrest and imprisonment of their father. So their escapades in helping an escaped Russian prisoner, giving a local townsman a proper birthday party, and saving a train from crashing into a damaged bit of track seems unnecessarily sweet and saccharine. The Railway Children is ever so pleasant. Perfectly, properly pleasant. It's decent fare for children, but I fear that many adults will find it to be a bit much for them. I mentioned that the film did grow on me. That is largely due to Jeffries' sharp eye for human behavior and his tendency to fill the film with adorable little moments like when the aforementioned birthday townsman comes home and sees a brand new pram next to the front door. He glances over at his wife and whispers, "You're, uh, you're not..." And the weary look she gives him is absolutely priceless. Side note: can you believe that Sally Thomsett was TWENTY when she made this film? Now THAT is a great performance!

6/10

Annabelle: John R. Leonetti

To read this review, go to: http://www.theyoungfolks.com/film/annabelle-review/41076.

4/10

Perfect Blue: Satoshi Kon

[Warning: Spoilers Ahead]

Allow me to get my one big criticism of Satoshi Kon's Perfect Blue out of the way first: I think that the ending was too abrupt and too neat. It lacks any hint of irony or self-awareness that might suggest that it was just a hallucination. It's too earnest. But enough about that. Perfect Blue is a brilliant film with one of the most effective rape scenes that I have ever encountered in the cinema. It is effective precisely because it is deliberately simulated: the protagonist has to act out a rape scene for an acting job which forces her to retake certain shots over and over again with her "assaulter" straddled awkwardly on top of her in between takes. The rape might be fake, but that hardly seems to matter as her screeches go on and on and on. In that moment we realize that she is being raped by society; she is forced to debase herself emotionally and physically all in the pursuit of "legitimacy" as an actress. I'd be curious to read an examination of how the film utilizes the technique of doubling: the production the protagonist performs in queerly mimics her real life situation vis-à-vis a murderous stalker and her deteriorating mental state; it is revealed that there are two mentally unstable villains involved in a folie à deux; the protagonist is at war with her true identity and her identity as a former pop idol. There aren't many films that could warrant an entire book's worth of academic evaluation. But Perfect Blue is one of them.

9/10

Waltz with Bashir: Ari Folman

So here's a seemingly impossible question: can a movie act as cultural catharsis? Peter Weir's Gallipoli (1981) was a fiction, Steven Spielberg's Schindler's List (1993) a recreation, but Ari Folman's Waltz with Bashir (2008)? It is neither, both, and more. An animated documentary, the film is a stunning, visceral meditation on the nature of memory, warfare, and the lengths the human mind will go to protect itself from trauma. It contains scenes that would have been impossible (or irresponsible) to recreate in live-action: a pack of undead dogs hunting the soldier that murdered them during a military operation, a man laying on the stomach of an impossible large woman in the middle of a sea, a partially insane soldier literally dancing with his weapon in the middle of a live sniper zone, fireballs of yellow arching slowly 'cross the sky of a war-torn city. Making this documentary animated was a bold choice. And indeed, by animating it the entire film becomes a reconstructive facsimile, much like images and events which emerge and rearrange themselves from the depths of human memory.

10/10

Shaun of the Dead: Edgar Wright

[Revisit Review]

I don't know if Edgar Wright's Shaun of the Dead will ever get the critical admiration or recognition it deserves. Oh sure, it has been hailed as one of the best British comedies of the last few decades. But that's just the point: people think of it as a comedy. Shaun of the Dead demonstrates one of the most remarkable syntheses of genres that I have ever encountered. Here is a film that cloaks itself in the trappings of genre films in order to transcend them. I have long believed that one of the hardest things to accomplish is to successfully blend comedy and tragedy. But Shaun of the Dead doesn't just mix comedy and tragedy; it adds horror as well. How many films can truly say that they are funny, tragic, and scary? The Evil Dead trilogy comes to mind, but its deliberate tongue-and-cheek nature is so overbearing that it never achieves tragedy. Shaun of the Dead might literally be in a league of its own.

10/10

A Fistful of Dollars: Sergio Leone

[Revisit Review]

After a murky and muddled second act and a first that more or less counterfeits Akira Kurosawa's Yojimbo (1961), Sergio Leone's A Fistful of Dollars finally comes together in the third to forge its own identity: bloody, nihilistic, operatic. The massacre of the Baxter family and the final confrontation between the Man With No Name and the Rojos where he secretly dons a steel chest-plate are so brilliant and ingenious that they almost surpass Kurosawa's original. But Yojimbo has the benefit of originality, a superior cinematic storyteller (although Leone would develop into a master himself later in his career), and, perhaps most notably, no day-for-night cinematography!!

7/10

The Equalizer: Antoine Fuqua

To read this review, go to: http://www.theyoungfolks.com/film/the-equalizer-review/40671.

6/10

Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit: Nick Park, Steve Box

Let's be totally, brutally honest for a moment: Wallace & Gromit just aren't meant for feature length films. 30 minute short films are the best format for their adventures. Nick Park and Steve Box's Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit is proof of this. The film has moments of wild invention, unbridled joy, stunning creativity, and an honestly shocking plot twist that legitimately caught me off guard (the true identity of the Were-Rabbit). But the plot is simply stretched too thin. I'll give you an example: a bit where a smarmy British hunter interrupts a public debate or discussion with plans to exterminate the were-rabbit (which is then ignored by the townsfolk and Lady Campanula "Totty" Tottington) is repeated three or four times. Once is fine. Twice is stretching it. Any more than three is simply bad screenwriting. And I do think that a bad screenplay is to blame here. Park and Box's storytelling skills are excellent...when there is a story to tell.

6/10

Ghost in the Shell: Mamoru Oshii

The scenes that impressed me the most in Mamoru Oshii's Ghost in the Shell were the quiet scenes bereft of action where the film meditated on the scenery and the atmosphere that embodied the Japan of the future: Motoko Kusanagi's silent trek through the immigrant sector of Tokyo, Motoko scuba diving in the bay, the glassy eyes of female secretaries who pour through untold amounts of information thanks to cybernetic enhancements like mechanical hands. To me, these echoes of a possible future are the most captivating part of the film. The central story about a brainwashing hacker/A.I. was fascinating. And the frequent philosophical discussions about the nature of reality and what it means to be human were engrossing despite the fact that they would have ruined the pacing of any other film. But in my opinion, Ghost in the Shell is best appreciated and enjoyed as an experience that lulls you into a fantasy equal parts daydream and nightmare.

9/10

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In March 2017 I got to review a new Blu-ray release of the film. I downgraded the film from a 9 to an 8. The storytelling problems really got my goat this time around. Here's my article:

http://www.audienceseverywhere.net/movie-reviews-ghost-in-the-shell-march-14-2017/

The Parson's Widow: Carl Theodor Dreyer

If Jonathan Rosenbaum is right and The Parson's Widow was the "first artistic success among [Carl Theodor Dreyer's] early silent pictures," then it is nevertheless a minor one. There is nothing extraordinary about the cinematography. The performances are capable, but pedestrian. All of the drama in the film comes from the slow, eventual revelations concerning the characters' psychology and motivations: is the eponymous widow a witch or just an old woman, was the new parson bewitched or was he just a lazy bum, does the widow have some ulterior motive in marrying the parson or is she just lonely? However, the first act of the film crawls by at such a glacial pace that it almost put me to sleep. By the time the third act arrived complete with all of the story's major twists and turns, I was damn near emotionally exhausted. Dreyer's later silent films like The Passion of Joan of Arc (1928) would be more evenly balanced from a pacing standpoint.

7/10

Fantastic Planet: René Laloux

[Revisit Review]

Watching René Laloux's Fantastic Planet is like stepping into a head-space both alien and intimately familiar. The designs are creative and original and the world that the characters inhabit exudes that odd feeling of being both crowded and empty that characterizes the work of Jean Giraud. Even though the Draags are essentially blue-skinned humanoids, they are one of the single most alien races ever committed to screen. Here is a film that I am already looking forward to watching again sometime in the future.

9/10

Akira: Katsuhiro Otomo

[Revisit Review]

Akira is a fine movie, but its incredible animation and production values are undermined by an uneven script and unfocused storytelling. The film feels like the first and last hour of a 5-hour television miniseries. Here are my three suggestions for how Akira could have been a better film.

1) Get rid of all of the city politician subplots. Colonel Shikishima can still declare martial law because that's important to the story.

2) Get rid of Kaori. She has no impact on the plot and exists solely to provide man-angst for Tetsuo by getting attacked, sexually assaulted, and killed.

3) Tone down Kaneda's antics at wooing Kei. These scenes feel like they were ghost-written by Rumiko Takahashi. There's nothing wrong with a bit of comedic relief, but these scenes almost ruin the serious and intense atmosphere and tone of the film.

8/10

A Walk Among the Tombstones: Scott Frank

To read this review, go to: http://www.theyoungfolks.com/film/a-walk-among-the-tombstones-review/40249.

7/10

8 Million Ways to Die: Hal Ashby

Wait, wait, wait...this movie has a 0% rating on Rotten Tomatoes? That doesn't make any sense. Hal Ashby's 8 Million Ways to Die isn't just a good crime thriller, it's a smart one. More and more I've begun to believe that the American crime films of the 1980s emulated the crass materialism of the decade as a means of cultural exorcism. And much like Scarface (1983), 8 Million Ways to Die is a film obsessed with appearances and extreme displays of conspicuous consumption. This hardly comes as a surprise considering that both films were written by Oliver Stone. But whereas Brian De Palma and Al Pacino swung for the fences with over-the-top violence and performances in Scarface, Ashby's film is more constrained and interested in the psychology of its main character, alcoholic ex-Los Angeles Sheriff's Deputy Matt Scudder. There are still a number of intense action scenes, including an excellent yet brief car chase where Scudder drives a car with busted tires. But the best scene is a tense stand-off near the end of the film where Scudder starts to destroy a stockpile of drugs he stole from a drug dealer when said drug dealer refuses to cooperate while exchanging them for a hooker he has hostage. A gunfight ensues, but it is overshadowed by the chorus of screaming, hollering, and threatening that proceeds it as Scudder almost nonchalantly starts to burn the packages of cocaine while one of the drug dealer's thugs (who has his hand duct-taped to a shotgun duct-taped to the hooker's neck) struggles to decide what to do. Andy Garcia is absolutely mesmerizing as the drug dealer Angel Moldonado. We get the sense that he may never have been as wealthy as Scarface, but he would have had the good sense (i.e. sanity) to survive longer than he did...if he had been smart enough not to kill one of his subordinates right in front of Scudder.

8/10

Kiki’s Delivery Service: Hayao Miyazaki

Hayao Miyazaki's Kiki's Delivery Service is a film that I earnestly wish every little girl could see. Here is a film about growing up and the need that every young woman feels to get out on her own, start her own life, and carve out a place for herself in the world. It alternatively funny and tragic, exciting and paced. It grapples with such devastating problems as depression, the inevitable loss that everyone feels when they finally start to grow up and have to say goodbye to the world (and friends) of their childhood, and personal independence. There are times when Kiki is lost and doesn't know what to do, occasionally spurning the attentions of genuinely well-intentioned peers for seemingly arbitrary reasons. But therein lies the beauty and truth of Kiki's Delivery Service: growing up doesn't make much sense in the first place. My only problem with the film is that the ending sequence with Kiki saving her friend from falling from the blimp seemed like a cheap cop-out ending intended to solve all of her complex problems in one fell swoop (pun maybe intended). Little girls won't be given a similar magical opportunity to hand-wave all of their emotional problem away. So why should Kiki? And yes, I know...I know...the ending is symbolic and argues that love and the friendship of others is the key to finding one's way in life. But did we really need a gigantic action scene to drive that point home? Oh well...at the very least it didn't hurt the film.

8/10

Porco Rosso: Hayao Miyazaki

I have never felt that any of Hayao Miyazaki's films were bad, but Porco Rosso may be his only film that underwhelmed me. Miyazaki's themes and imagery surrounding flight and the futility of armed struggle are on full display. But not much of the film felt like a Miyazaki movie. There are three exceptions. The first is an early scene where the eponymous bounty hunter rescues a class of schoolgirls from a group of sky pirates. The juxtaposition of the dangerous action, the schoolgirls' gleeful refusal to take their kidnapping seriously, and the seemingly unspoken shared knowledge between the schoolgirls, the pirates, and Porco Rosso that no matter what happens the children will not be harmed was something that could have only come from Miyazaki's mind. The second exception was a sequence where a group of women of all ages come together to build an airplane in the absence of their male family members. It's charming, but it would ultimately be out-done by a similar scene involving the denizens of Irontown in Princess Mononoke (1997). Finally, a scene where Porco Rosso witnesses his slain pilot friends from World War One ascend into the sky to join an endless contrail of dead planes was one of the most fantastic pieces of visual imagery that Miyazaki has ever committed to celluloid. Howard Hawks once said, "A good movie is three good scenes and no bad scenes." And Porco Rosso is just that: a good movie. But it isn't a great one. It lacks a certain je ne sais quoi that keeps it from reaching the same heights as Miyazaki's other films. I hope one day I can figure out what it is.

7/10

Ceddo: Ousmane Sembène

Ousmane Sembène's Ceddo is a film of rhetoric and debate, of decorum and pageantry. The film is about the religious struggles that take place when an African king orders the persecution of the pagan "ceddo," or "common people," after converting to Islam. The ceddo abduct the king's daughter in protest, sparking a conflict that will leave many dead and wipe away an entire culture. The bulk of the movie is comprised of lengthy debates where representatives of the king, the local Muslim imam, and the ceddo argue either for their freedom or for their supremacy. There isn't anything inherently cinematic about prolonged conversations, but the viewer must keep in mind that this is an African film by an African filmmaker utilizing African sensibilities. If Western audiences can patiently sit through all 7+ hours of Béla Tarr's Sátántangó (1994), then they can engage Ceddo on its own terms despite the inevitable fatigue most viewers will feel watching it. The film is also a curious examination of the impact of the Western world in African society. Two of the most memorable characters are a white Christian missionary who dreams of filling his empty pews with converts and a slave trader who happily trades guns and ammunition to whoever brings him fresh slaves. One of the most striking elements of the film is the use of modern African-American spirituals during scenes where new slaves are bound and branded, seemingly predicting the future of the African diaspora.

8/10

The Wind Rises: Hayao Miyazaki

Perhaps the story of Jiro Horikoshi and his creation of the Mitsubishi A6M Zero fighter can never be divorced from the controversy surrounding its use during World War Two and the use of slave labor to produce them. But I believe that Hayao Miyazaki was fully aware of this when he made The Wind Rises, a stirring, melancholy film that is easily the great master's best film since Spirited Away (2001). The central theme, if one can be picked out, would be the need of the individual to follow their bliss despite the world around them. Whether or not the historical Horikoshi really only wanted to create "beautiful airplanes" is irrelevant. Miyazaki's Horikoshi was a dreamer who lived to see his creation be turned into an instrument of warfare and destruction like Alfred Nobel and Mikhail Kalashnikov. Thinking back on this film, I realize that perhaps it may have been just as much about Miyazaki as it was Horikoshi. Considering how flight plays such a central role in Miyazaki's films and how uneasy his fame as one of the world's greatest animators makes him, it isn't difficult to equate the airplane industry with the animation industry.

9/10

Loulou: Maurice Pialat

I'm not entirely sure what I think about Maurice Pialat's Loulou. On the one hand, the central performances courtesy of Isabelle Huppert and Gérard Depardieu are excellent and the two share a remarkable on-screen chemistry. But the characters are one-dimensional and flat. I also didn't feel that Pialat effectively addressed his central story element: a bourgeois woman who abandons her marriage and prosperity for an intensely sexual relationship with an unemployed slacker. If Pialat was trying to make a statement about sexual need, then he shouldn’t have used strawman characters like the woman’s husband who was obsessive and abusive. That gives her a REASON to cheat. A more proper statement against the bourgeoisie would be if he was the PERFECT husband. Any woman, regardless of class, would try to escape an abusive spouse. So his indictment of the upper-class lifestyle falls flat. Still, for what it's worth, the acting was great.

6/10

The Puppetmaster: Hou Hsiao-Hsien

Unlike his earlier film A City of Sadness (1989) which I felt diluted its message concerning the White Terror through its oblique narrative methods, Hou Hsiao-Hsien's The Puppetmaster successfully examines the trials and tribulations of the Taiwanese people in the early 20th century by primarily focusing on a linear biographical narrative. The eponymous puppetmaster on whom the film is based, Li Tian-lu, even makes occasional documentary appearances to recount experiences in his life. As hypnotic and beautiful as Hsien's cinematography and mise-en-scène are, they can be challenging to watch for extended periods of time. So these touches of documentary filmmaking help keep The Puppetmaster fresh and engaging during its 2 1/2 hour run-time. But truthfully, I can't see myself running to revisit this film any time soon in the future. It is a wonderful work of art and I am genuinely glad to have watched it. But I found its slow pacing exhausting both physically and mentally.

9/10

Four Weddings and a Funeral: Mike Newell

[Revisit Review]

My favorite part of Mike Newell's Four Weddings and a Funeral was the eponymous funeral. Sounds strange, doesn't it? The film is a brilliant comedy that helped launch Hugh Grant's career.  It is jam packed with brilliant situational gags and sharp dialogue. But the funeral is still my favorite scene. See, I've always believed in something called "dramatic relief," the opposite of "comedic relief" where serious dramas are occasionally interrupted by comedy to help lighten the mood. I find that comedies that successfully utilize dramatic relief take on a more bittersweet tone that makes the laughter more joyful and the overall experience more memorable. And the aforementioned funeral is one of the single greatest pieces of dramatic relief that I have ever encountered.

8/10