The Quiet Man

The Quiet Man (John Ford, 1952)

A retired American boxer returns to the village where he was born in Ireland, where he finds love.

The most celebrated director of all time, John Ford, had to find a studio ready to finance the project he cherished the most: The Quiet Man. Having to direct a box office sure shot in 1950, Rio Grande for Republic Pictures, Ford brought his casts of regulars (John Wayne, Maureen O’Hara, Ward Bond, Victor McLaglen, Francis Ford) in Ireland the land of his ancestors. Shot in a sheer Technicolor giving to O’Hara’s red hairs a beautiful look and letting the wonderful sceneries of Ireland execute its charm on the screen.

Coming from America, Sean Thornton (Wayne) is an ex-Boxer with a secret wants to buy back the house where he was born. It doesn’t take much time for him to fall in love with soon enemy Red Danaher’s(McLaglen) sister Mary Kate (O’Hara), his neighbours. Since, he left America to turn his back on boxing he decided to be a passive man and let the violence away from his life. However, his marriage with Mary Kate will suffer from this way of thinking.

Ford realizes his dream film filled with many personal elements, the tone set between the visual comedy, the melodrama, and the Fordian film isn’t always very clear. Ford is an Irishman and being able to go back his roots in a film like he did with How Green Was My Valley was in some level his way to attain heaven just like Thornton says in the first half of the film. His vision of a small community, Catholicism, fighting Irishmen, drunk men, and many other elements already omnipresent in his films are fully exposed as the epicentre of the movie. And the theme of the man who must understand and pass over his own pride to be able to fully achieve himself just like Wayne’s character in The Searchers is pretty obvious too.

A surprise is the aesthetic flashback of boxing that probably inspired Martin Scorsese for his Raging Bull. Even if there are moments of pure bliss in The Quiet Man, it is an uneven movie that entertains and also still connect with Irish people but that lacks the lustre of the aforementioned The Searchers. A final comment would be to paraphrase Martin Scorsese and Richard Schickel on the fact that there is too much Irishmen drinking and fighting in this film that cannot be considered a comedy or a melodrama completely. Recommended but not a must see even if it a film that has been praised for sixty years.

You Only Live Once

You Only Live Once (Fritz Lang, 1937)

The public defender's secretary and an ex-convict get married and try to make a life together, but a series of disasters sends their lives spiraling out of control.

Fritz Lang’s second American feature, the first being Fury, continues on building the themes that will become the cornerstone of Film noir and Melodrama. Starring Sylvia Sidney and Henry Fonda as the Taylors, Eddie and Joan form a young couple of an ex-prisoner and the secretary of the public defender. This unique union of “good and bad” is linked by the fact that Lang exploits the Rousseau principle on the beliefs of Joan that she believes that every man is born good and that society brings him to do bad things. In fact, the plot of the film slowly evolves into proving that it is quite right.

Wrongly accused and judged of robbing a bank and killing six persons, Eddie goes back to prison to wait for his eventual execution. But before these things happen a strong depiction of how a person is marked for life and that forgiveness isn’t always a given when someone has sinned. Lang’s themes in You Only Live Once revolve around the Catholic themes of guilt, innocence, forgiveness, and unconditional love. The criminal life of Eddie follows him all along the film even if he did not commit a crime to get inside. However, Joan knows that he is good and knows that is feelings for her are pure. For that, she will get into deep trouble as a showing of her love and dedication. Even if someone is not acquainted to Catholic values, the moral dilemmas and observations exposed enriched the keen qualities of the script.

Shot in a crisp black and white, You Only Live Once marks the fact that Lang is establishing himself as one of the most talented storyteller of his time. His mise en scène is methodical and nothing is useless or superfluous. It is easy to take this Fonda movie and to compare it with Alfred Hitchcock’s The Wrong Man, also starring Fonda and based on a crime that he may or may not have done. While Hitchcock’s film was a pale attempt to direct a Neorealist film. On the other hand, Lang directs a genuine film that will reverberate itself for decades. There are many similarities between both directors but at some point, Lang is a better storyteller and he is more apt to direct actors and infuse believable characters.

Finally, since Fritz Lang was more of a hard tempered director he had some troubles to get the recognition amongst Hollywood and since he was German this never helped him to fully get the respect he deserved. In the upcoming weeks many Lang movies will be reviewed and have a full spot on them.

Life of Brian

Life of Brian (Terry Jones, 1979)

Brian is born on the original Christmas, in the stable next door. He spends his life being mistaken for a messiah.

Often regarded as the best feature film of the Monty Python troupe, Life of Brian has been condemned for blasphemy in many countries. Mistakenly represented as a parody of the life of Jesus Christ, Life of Brian is set during the same time and location but it is more or less a depiction of the time and the absurd logic of Monty Python in developing simple situations and indulging them with a twist that makes the whole simply hilarious.

Some of the sets and decors of Franco Zeffirelli’s Jesus of Nazareth were reused, since it was shot one year earlier and the producers of both films were brothers. Many technical aspects of Life of Brian are excellent when we think that Terry Jones directed alone and Terry Gilliam let his co-direction (they both directed The Holy Grail) to work on the artistic aspects of the film.

The regular gang of Monty Python is present and Graham Chapman, Michael Palin, John Cleese, Eric Idle, Terry Jones, Terry Gilliam, and many others were part of the cast. As usual, the cast does multiple parts and even if some aren’t that much equal in quality, while others are pretty efficient.

Overall, Life of Brian holds well together and even if some scenes lack in laughs the ratio is excellent. Some viewers might find its humor too old school and the most common issue is the fact that the humor is too British to be fully enjoyed. As a good public for absurd jokes, I found myself laughing very hard at many moments during the projection. It is probably one of the greatest comedies and definitely Monty Python’s better offering.

Last but not least, a cinephile like me should not underestimate the fact that the picture is part of the very select Criterion Collection. The quintessence of movie addicted junkies, it is a title that is worth acquiring considering being only the third comedy added to the collection when it was released. Recommended.

The Descendants

The Descendants (Alexander Payne, 2011)

A land baron tries to re-connect with his two daughters after his wife is seriously injured in a boating accident.

Back in 2011, the first movie of Alexander Payne in seven years received mixed reviews and was more or less appreciated by movie goers. Starring the Cary Grant of our time, film star George Clooney as the descendant of the last Hawaiian princess with a bunch of cousins owns a huge chunk of land on Kauai Island. They want to sell to a group who wants to put Hotels and condos on this piece of paradise and make a big profit in the transaction. But at the same time, Matt (Clooney) must deal with his wife in a coma from a boat accident. Learning that she’ll be unhooked from the machines that keep her alive, Matt learns from his eldest daughter Alexandra (Shailene Woodley) that his wife had an affair and wanted to leave him for another man. Since, he was too busy with his job it was Elisabeth (Patricia Hastie), his wife, that raised the children and kept the house going. Matt must face his responsibility of taking care of his daughters, arranging the final moments of Elisabeth, and deciding what to do with the land.

With the voiceover, we are share Matt’s thoughts and we understand his mixed feelings towards the man with whom Elisabeth cheated on him, his desperation in his facing of the situation, and his dilemma for the sale. Having been in Hawaii for my honey moon in August 2011 I feel that the essence of these people has been very well assimilated by the script and I can sense that the original material was true to the protection of the land that the natives cherish. The narrated opening of the film with Clooney telling how the perception of paradise of Hawaii from the people of the continent might be not as picture perfect as many would think. It’s just that it has its own culture and way of living.

The indie feeling of this comedy meets drama might get on some people’s nerves since the line isn’t always very clear; some situations might even be funny when they weren’t really supposed to. However, this is a very good script and I think that without an actor like George Clooney the character of Matt King would have felt a little flat. And as Jeffrey M. Anderson mentioned it, the film has its moments of bliss while other parts are unequal. I liked the pace and the very simple but beautiful photography. It’s not very difficult to take a breathtaking image of Hawaii, but the use of colors and textures captures the essence of the land.

Alexander Payne’s fifth picture isn’t a great film neither a bad film and once again he puts the accent on a middle aged man having to face a crisis that will bring him to be a better man, model, and human being. Payne’s ability to present believable human characters under a multitude of angles is giving them more than just a simple color. He gives them many shades and colors just like the rainbows that represent the state of Hawaii. This is a sensibility that few talented directors have in their craft. 

I Walked with a Zombie

I Walked with a Zombie (Jacques Tourneur, 1943)

A young Canadian nurse (Betsy) comes to the West Indies to care for Jessica, the wife of a plantation manager (Paul Holland). Jessica seems to be suffering from a kind of mental paralysis as a result of fever. When she falls in love with Paul, Betsy determines to cure Jessica even if she needs to use a voodoo ceremony, to give Paul what she thinks he wants.

When producer Val Lewton was hired for RKO Pictures, the studio decided to start a line of Horror films. Beginning with the mysterious Cat People starring Simone Simon brilliantly directed by Jacques Tourneur, its success encouraged Lewton to reemploy the director for two other films. The second movie is I Walked with a Zombie, titled in a very weird way, the producer-director team almost surpassed its first collaboration.

Betsy (Frances Dee), a young nurse, is hired to take care of the wife (Christine Gordon) of a sugar plantation owner (Tom Conway) on the island of San Sebastian. In fact, she is brought into a particular family where many secrets are hidden by Wesley (James Ellison) the brother of Paul and their mother Mrs. Rand (Edith Barrett). Vaguely explained by the singing of famous calypso singer Sir Lancelot, the mystery around the permanent sleep of the wife Jessica is never really said or shown.

The strength of the film resides in the atmosphere of the superb contrasts of lighting and shadows. The constant blow of the wind that becomes almost a presence in every scene and the eerie looks of the settings. Jacques Tourneur’s mise en scène gets to its best part when Betsy takes Jessica in the night to use voodoo to try to get her out of her almost coma-like state. This trek in the sugar plantation is done without a word and filled with many voodoo elements like human skulls and the omnipresence of the drums.

In an interview Tourneur once said that he never turned down a script, one of the main reasons why he touched to many genres and managed to make a lot of films. With his entries in the Film Noir, it is easy to advance that he had the right touch to make moody Horror films. I Walked with a Zombie has superb aesthetics and the camera movements around Betsy are very engulfing.

So in this film got in my viewing list because of my October Horror event and the main reason was that it was on the TSPDT 1000 greatest films. It wouldn’t have been something I would have reached for if it wasn’t on the list. I’m very glad I did watch it because it’s not a Top 100 film but at least a Top 500.

Movie Watching Goals For 2012 - November Update

Since I put my hand on Andrew Sarris’ The American Cinema : Directors and Directions 1929-1968, my interest for completing a list I’ve been rambling about over and over here at the good old LMdC (short for Le Mot du Cinephiliaque), is TheyShoot Pictures Don’t They? 1000 Greatest Films of All Time is became my priority. To me and many others, Kevyn Knox for instance @The Most BeautifulFraud In The World, this is the ultimate cinephile’s reference.