Month: February 2019

Topaz (1969)

Topaz (1969)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(In French, On Cable TV, February 2019) In the Alfred Hitchcock filmography, Topaz stands out as one of the least liked later-era Hitchcock films. The reason quickly becomes obvious as the film unspools: Despite a few typical Hitchcockian touches—the long shots, the unconventional presentation, a few striking images—, the entire film feels like a perfunctory slog. Adapted from a Leon Uris novel that presented a complex but ultimately boring spying triangle between France, Cuba and the United States, Topaz fails to take off, fly or land. The emphasis on this being a pseudo-realistic take on events that may have happened seems to be an excuse to try nothing interesting and to mute down anything that could have been exciting from a more fictional story. Hitchcock, clearly, was far more at ease in twisted thrillers than the minutia of romantic espionage thrillers. Even the mere two-hour running time feels punishing considering the slow pacing and striking lack of humour in the results. This is mediocre Hitchcock—polished, but long and scattered to the point where it would be more difficult to guess that this is coming from Hitchcock. I did like some of the early-1960s atmosphere, but otherwise I’m joining the popular opinion: Topaz goes straight to the director’s bottom tier.

House on Haunted Hill (1959)

House on Haunted Hill (1959)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On Cable TV, February 2019) By design, I programmed myself a haunted house double bill going immediately from the very respectable The Haunting to the rather far less serious House on Haunted Hill. The contrast was refreshing, and probably worked to both films’ advantage. From the very first moments, we’re clearly not meant to take this William Castle production very seriously: the opening sets the tone of an over-the-top horror film with ponderous narration and overdone characters. There is, for modern viewers, a deliciously comfortable feeling in watching this granddaddy of all “spend a night in a haunted house IF YOU DARE” plots: we think we know where it’s going, and the well-worn mechanics of that kind of story are great good fun. (The real fun of the movie begins when you realize that the stated plot of the film really isn’t its real plot—the other one is hidden and only revealed late after both collide.) Vincent Price has seldom been so deliciously overacting as he is here, and that only adds to the fun of it. The infamous skeleton sequence late in the film doesn’t make a whole lot of sense when everything is revealed and laid bare … but who cares? Some horror films have earned a legacy because they were utterly serious about what they’re doing (The Haunting being one of them) but House on Haunted Hill chose to go another way and improbably ended up being something of a classic in another vein. I know there’s been a remake already, but how about another good remake one of these days? On second thought, never mind: This film is good enough as it is, and no one will ever recapture its delicate campiness.

The Haunting (1963)

The Haunting (1963)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On Cable TV, February 2019) If there’s a single path to longevity for horror movies, I have a sneaking suspicion that it’s atmosphere. The Haunting may be one of the best examples of this: As strangers travel to an isolated mansion to investigate its paranormal nature, the plot is far less important than the sheer oozing oppression of its setting. Taking place in a grand gothic manor, The Haunting never misses an occasion to crank up the eeriness of its location. Director Robert Wise uses a succession of askew angles in order to reinforce the foreboding production design. The Haunting is remarkable for its black-and-white cinematography in that it almost always imposes incredibly dense images, with immensely detailed walls, cluttered decoration and intricate architectural flourishes. By the time the house walls seem to breathe, well, The Haunting has earned its place in the horror pantheon. Richard Johnson is quite good in a familiar kind of role, while Julie Harris has perhaps the most skillful performance as a haunted person. There’s a dash of humour and self-awareness to the proceedings, but The Haunting still feels respectable and highly efficient—taking chances that still feel daring such as giving extensive internal voiceover monologues to the characters. Even the strong hints that the entire thing may be in the character’s heads isn’t quite enough to lessen the supernatural experience. This is one horror film that can still hold its own against more recent entries—in fact, it has now clearly outlasted even its own remake as a still-worthwhile film.

102 Dalmatians (2000)

102 Dalmatians (2000)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(In French, On TV, February 2019) There are times when I’m tempted to keep reviews strictly factual and let readers figure out the rest. In talking about 102 Dalmatians, for instance, is it really useful to say anything but “this is a sequel to the live-action Disney animal comedy film featuring Glenn Close”? There’s a lot packed in that statement. It implies a continuity of tone, and if you know about live-action Disney comedies of the mid-nineties then there’s not a lot more left to say. Glenn Close is remarkable as usual, but clearly slumming in a cartoonish role. (At least she gets a chance to try out-acting Gérard Depardieu.) Nothing in the film, from script to production design, is meant to be even halfway realistic. The dogs will predictably outwit their human opponents. It does without saying that the previous film’s villain, introduced as being reformed, will snap back to form. (If I was of a more analytical disposition at the moment, I’d probably look at 102 Dalmatians’ troubling portrayal of a former villain going back to evil action, reinforcing contemporary society’s prejudices against those who have suffered from mental health issues or narcotic addition, always considered at risk of relapse.) There is, to be fair, a bit of imagination on display in production design terms, but much of the film feels like a straight rethread of the original, and the innovations aren’t much of an improvement. I mean: what’s with “Digga Digga Dog”, the Snoop Doggy Dog inspired theme rap song? At least it’s catchy.

My Man Godfrey (1936)

My Man Godfrey (1936)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On Cable TV, February 2019) There’s a good reason why My Man Godfrey comes up again and again on lists of classic 1930s comedies—it impeccably charming, and still oozes class and cool even eighty years later. The star of the show, of course, is William Powell, who’s unflappable as a homeless man plucked out of the scrap heap by a rich family on a dare, and who eventually becomes an all-knowing, all-capable butler to a quirky dysfunctional family. It’s a kind of suave character that he’d play many times later on, and you can see why. Carole Lombard is just as good in her own way as a flighty socialite, and they play off each other beautifully: neither would be as funny without the dynamic created by the other. While incredibly accessible to modern audiences, My Man Godfrey does remain a clear product of the mid-1930s—there’s an oblique reference to the Dionne quintuplets, for instance, and the film does start by taking for granted a social situation that would only exist in Depression-era America. Surprisingly enough for Depression-era Hollywood, there is a fair amount of class critique here (after all, the film does begin with a treasure hunt in which one of the collectibles in a homeless man), with the deck clearly stacked against the rich characters. (It can’t quite reconcile its populist intent with its escapism.) Interestingly enough, though, much of the humour in My Man Godfrey isn’t in the one-liners or crazy situation as much as it’s found in the coolness and eccentricity of the characters, with a little bit of physical comedy thrown in. The script is a bit rough around the edges—the beginning is a bit much to take, and the ending has pieces falling together so quickly that it becomes unconvincing—but the result is one great film, one that has aged gracefully as a terrific product of its era.

Rio Bravo (1959)

Rio Bravo (1959)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On Cable TV, February 2019) As the story goes, Rio Bravo was director Howard Hawks and star John Wayne’s response to High Noon’s deconstruction of western heroism. Unable to tolerate even the slightest amount of criticism (you should read Wayne’s hyperbolic commentary), they teamed up like fearful clucking hens to reconstruct the Western archetype. (They clearly had no idea of what was in store in later years.) Despite my lack of sympathy for their intentions, even I have to admit that Rio Bravo is rather well done in the end. It’s a straight-up formula with a sadistic macho streak of bloodthirstiness as confused with American values (and I’m being charitable in drawing a distinction between the two), but Howard handles it with his usual energy, and Wayne delivers exactly what his creepy robotic persona was designed to do. Rather than look in vain for help from an apathetic population as in High Noon, here we have a sheriff with an overabundance of help as they wait for the enemy attack on their small western town. (Wayne being Wayne, it goes without saying that his character is proven right at every turn of the story.) The overindulgence of the film’s intentions most clearly shows in the film’s inflated run-time at two hours and twenty minutes—there’s no good reason for the film to run this long, but it does. (It doesn’t help that, with two of his actors being also singers, the film pauses for songs. Yes, really.) Fortunately for everyone, most of the film’s interminable lengths come early in the film, leaving the concluding act far better and involving than the rest of the film once the laborious scene-setting ends and we go to the main event promised all along. “Go out of a high note” is the usual tip for filmmakers, and Hawks was too much of a veteran by that point in his career to do otherwise. Despite an overstuffed script, Rio Bravo eventually pulls off a success … but don’t stop watching after the first hour or you’ll never get there.

SuperGrid (2018)

SuperGrid (2018)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On Cable TV, February 2019) One of the perks of being Canadian is a glut of nationally produced content on Cable TV channels. OK, that’s not quite a perk considering the somewhat variable quality of Canadian productions, but at least it gives our media landscape something slightly different from south-of-the-border cinephiles. Anyone with a camera, a pickup, ominous news stock footage and a desolate landscape (plentiful up north) can make a postapocalyptic film and have it qualify for CanCon regulations. I was probably expecting a bit too much from SuperGrid considering that it shares many filmmakers (including director Lowell Dean) with the surprisingly enjoyable Wolfcop movies. Unfortunately, the result far too often hews closely to the clichés of the genre. It’s not bad, but it certainly feels dull most of the time: the idea of environmental collapse, post-apocalyptic road movie through a forbidden zone to find a cure (à la Desolation Alley) all blend into a beige morass of deja vu even when we want to be indulgent about a Canadian Prairie Science Fiction film. This is an age of cheap CGI, so the film’s few successes in that area don’t leave much of a distinction. To be fair, SuperGrid does improve in its second half: When doing familiar material, the best way to distinguish oneself in through small detail and atmosphere, and so when the film does make it to its destination, the highlight on indigenous characters is worth a cheer, although by that time the film’s bleak and humourless approach is likely to have ground down any sharp emotional reactions. Even the more ambitious action set pieces are the very end of the film feel like too little too late, wrapped in too many clichés to be effective. Despite approaching SuperGrid with the most indulgent attitude, I’m left once again disappointed at the homegrown result.

The Good Earth (1937)

The Good Earth (1937)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On Cable TV, February 2019) In looking for adjectives to describe The Good Earth, “grotesque” is one of the best I can find. It certainly wasn’t made to deserve such a description, nor was it received as such at the time … but time moves on. Today, an American writer would think twice about writing a novel entirely set in rural China, but Pearl S. Buck (writing from Nanking) was up to the challenge—and had the empathy to pull it off all the way to a Nobel Prize for Literature. The result was even a best-seller. Today, no Hollywood studio would dare shooting a China-set film with all-Chinese character using largely California-built sets and all-Caucasian main actors. But here we are: In the 1930s, I have a feeling that The Good Earth was perceived as daring, world-aware, perhaps even progressive in depicting an entirely different reality from the average American moviegoer. Today, though… The entire film seems like a gleeful act of extreme cultural appropriation, with such white-bread actors as Paul Muni and Luise Rainer playing Chinese farmers in obvious makeup. It doesn’t help that this long and epic depiction of Chinese peasant life will tax anyone unwilling to have a long sit. While the plot does have its highlights (locust swarm, civil war, etc.), it does remain a very mannered take on a long story and it takes a fair amount of fortitude to pay attention throughout. Still, for today’s audience it’s the brazenness of having a (nearly) all-Caucasian cast play Chinese characters that gets the most attention. At least we can fall back on the idea that the film does portray its characters with a fair amount of sympathy and well-researched details: for all of the weirdness of the casting and setting, the stereotypes are kept at bay and the film seldom turns to cheap Orientalist clichés along the way. Still, grotesque isn’t a bad adjective. It may best be applied to Katharine Hepburn in the not-dissimilar Dragon Seed, but it’s certain appropriate for The Good Earth as well.

Curly Sue (1991)

Curly Sue (1991)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On TV, February 2019) As much as John Hughes dominated the 1980s comedy landscape, his decline in the 1990s was rapid and definitive. Curly Sue earns a special spot in his filmography by being the last movie he ever directed, after which he focused on producing and screenwriting before gradually retiring from Hollywood. It’s not exactly a high note on which to stop, but you don’t have to squint to find the Hughes touch even in the middle of a strictly formulaic product. From the moment we understand the dynamic between the main characters (a middle-aged man and a young girl as a con-artist team) and meet the missing part of the triangle, there’s not a whole lot left for the script but to go through the motions of mawkish sentimentalism. But Curly Sue’s workable premise is hampered with execution issues. The film aims much younger than it should, and the caricatures in lieu of characters are fit to frustrate adult watchers. (Family films aren’t particularly good if the whole family doesn’t enjoy them.) The needlessly violent slapstick doesn’t help in grounding the weak result. In terms of actors, the result is a mixed bag. Much depends on the young Alisan Porter in the title role and she is fortunately up to the task. The same can be said of Kelly Lynch as a wealthy divorce lawyer. Alas, the film does depend a lot on the inexplicable confidence that 1990ish Hollywood had in James Belushi as a leading man—the film would have been significantly different with another actor in his role. There is some skill in the way the plot pieces are moves around, but Curly Sue is disappointing even for Hughes completists.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Secret of the Ooze (1991)

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Secret of the Ooze (1991)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(In French, On Cable TV, February 2019) Nobody expected a classic from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Secret of the Ooze, but the result is such that it will confound even those who thought they knew what to expect. Maximizing the jokey aspects of the first film and toning down much of whatever possible seriousness one could imagine from its silly premise, this entry in the series is dull until it gets silly enough to get a reaction. Whether this reaction is amusement or mockery is up to the viewer. Plotwise, the titular oozy premise of the film works as both backstory and pretext to introduce new villains. If it does feel partly more interesting than its prequel, it’s that we’re finally done with the origins story and on to something else. (Even if that “something else” is not that new either from the TV series or the later movie reboot.) Alas, there’s a long way from premise to execution: once you accept the idea of skilled martial artists fighting in bulky turtle suits, the film’s numerous fight scenes will be meaningless for anyone over twelve. The core of the series does remain the turtles, however, and the efforts required to suspend disbelief in the pre-digital era. There’s a heroic quality to portraying kung fu fighting turtles in live action, and the special effects for the entire film are both impressive and silly throughout. This sequel’s overall jokey tone reinforces the unreality of the film. Even if you somehow manage to suspend your disbelief and get over the film’s insistent absurdity, you will inevitably come to the moment where the turtles ham it up on a nightclub scene with none other than Vanilla Ice (“T-U-R-T-L-E Power!”) Maybe your brain will survive the experience. If it does, maybe it will be because of the inherent time-capsule aspect of a film self-consciously designed to appeal to early-1990s teenagers.

Deadpool 2 (2018)

Deadpool 2 (2018)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On Cable TV, February 2019) One of my reactions to the first Deadpool film was a vague foreboding that this was the kind of movie you could only do once—that the joke would quickly overplay itself in a sequel. Now that Deadpool 2 is here, well, it does manage to avoid most of the problems that it could have had. It doesn’t take things easy—although with a bigger budget to play with, the bigger scope shouldn’t come as a surprise. Obviously, it does acknowledge its own status as a sequel and visibly tries to do what it can to avoid common sequels pitfalls. There’s a real emotional scaffolding built to support the crass jokes, and it does lead to a surprisingly involving conclusion that plays both with emotions and laughs. Surprisingly enough, the result does not overstay its welcome. The commentary on a few more years’ worth of superhero movies is something only a Deadpool film could get away with, and the script once again finds a sweet spot between parody and doing its own thing. Thanks to director David Leitch, of John Wick fame, the film has some spectacular action/CGI sequences—perhaps the best being a mad truck sequence through a city. Ryan Reynolds is up to his usual mix of charm and good-natured profanity, and he gets two good assists from the fantastic Zazie Beetz and a growling Josh Brolin—who manages to create as a credible antagonist in a comedy film. While I’m still not entirely comfortable with the amount of gore and language in Deadpool 2, it’s true that Deadpool would not be Deadpool without them. Considering the results, I’m surprisingly more upbeat than I thought I’d be at the prospect of an inevitable Deadpool 3.

Love in the Afternoon (1957)

Love in the Afternoon (1957)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On Cable TV, February 2019) From a twenty-first-century perspective, looking at the totality of an actor’s filmography at once certainly has a different impact that chronologically living through it one movie at a time. As much as I like Audrey Hepburn, for instance (and I do!), it’s hard not to notice that in between 1954 and 1967, she made no less than seven movies at least partially set in Paris, and at least four of them with significantly older men. While Sabrina was partially set in Paris but obviously not filmed there, Funny Face and Love in the Afternoon (both 1957, shot a month apart) get the subgenre properly started. In the latter film, Gary Cooper plays an aging playboy who sets his sights on an inexperienced young daughter of a detective. The remarkable difference between the two characters (in age, in social status, in understanding the world) is enough to make any viewer uneasy, and it’s a measure of writer/director Billy Wilder’s skill and both stars’ charm that the film (barely) holds together. Hepburn is up to her usual self here, although if you want another Paris movie in which she calls her father an ebullient “Papa!”, you’ll be better served by How to Steal a Million Dollars. Cooper is a bit less bland than usual here, with a character that does service to his stature in the industry at the time. Maurice Chevalier rounds up the marquee names with an on-target role as a wise, compassionate and knowing private investigator to the stars. There’s no avoiding that the material here is tricky, and that Wilder steers his movie through material that would instantly doom other directors. (Although much of the same can be said about Funny Face and Charade.) There are, fortunately, quite a few laughs along the way, my favourite being the gypsy band following Cooper’s character around, mixing diegetic and non-diegetic musical cues. But while the film does have its strengths (seeing Hepburn, Cooper, Chevalier and Wilder working together being the best of them), its place in a well-defined sub-sub-genre of “Hepburn with older men in Paris” also invites unfavourable comparisons. Funny Face has Astaire dancing and Hepburn keeping up, while Charade plays far more smoothly with the romance with the far more charismatic Cary Grant. If Love in the Afternoon makes you queasy despite its old-school Hollywood charm, you’re not alone.

The Muppets Take Manhattan (1984)

The Muppets Take Manhattan (1984)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On Cable TV, February 2019) A classical let’s-put-on-a-show musical … with Muppets. That’s the whole review right there: The Muppets Take Manhattan is a playful take on a hackneyed genre, except that the charm of the Muppets takes makes any plotting refinement completely useless. It starts with a step back from the original, as the Muppets disband and a few characters end up in Manhattan trying to survive after college. Inevitably, the plot converges on putting the group back together and throwing a show. The way to get there is slightly more complex, but this is really about classic tropes being played with by the Muppets and their charm carrying the day. It generally works, although many of the numerous pop-celebrity cameos will be completely alien to viewers thirty-five years later. There’s nothing outlandish here, but playing exactly as expected in a Muppets core value. The music is fine and so are the jokes, which is all we’re asking from The Muppets Take Manhattan. Fans will be very pleased.

Bird Box (2018)

Bird Box (2018)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(Netflix Streaming, February 2019) You can be out of touch and yet still feel that the cultural conversation is being manipulated, and that would cover my reaction and finding out that, out of nowhere, everyone in January 2019 was talking about the Netflix exclusive horror movie Bird Box. Much of the chatter had something to do with stupid people behaving stupidly—To promote a movie in which characters had to do things while blindfolded, Netflix sponsored influencers to do the same and then idiots ran with the idea to do even more dangerous things such as driving while blindfolded. One well-publicized car crash later, we were left to ponder where viral marketing ends. All of this, unfortunately, makes for a poor introduction to Bird Box—which is a kind of film best discovered out of nowhere rather than heavily marketed. It is, at best, an effectively realized horror thriller with an intriguing premise. But even then, it’s not able to sustain the scrutiny that a hype campaign creates. Simply put, the premise has to do with something invading earth and making sighted people go crazy suicidal. Screens or mirrors won’t protect you: the only way to go outside is to do it blind. (And ignore those who tell you to take off the blindfold, because they’re just trying to trick you.) Fast-forward a few years after the global catastrophe, and the story picks up with a mother (Sandra Bullock, effective) having to leave the confines of a comfortable secured home to undertake a dangerous journey to a possible sanctuary … with two kids in tow. In a way, Bird Box finds a niche in the spate of recent horror movies revolving in one way or another around sensorial deprivation, whether it’s sight (Lights Out) or sound (Hush, Don’t Breathe). It’s not badly executed on a technical level, although the less you think about the premise the better it’s going to be. The film does feel longer than it should thanks to a framing device that takes a long time to go through the inevitable plot points that it announces in the first few minutes of “now” time. The opening sequence is rather good, though—as there’s a catastrophic pandemic of suicides affecting our protagonist, it’s hard not to think that this is how The Happening’s first half should have felt like. Still, the story eventually settles down to a bunch of survivors in a house learning about the rules of the film’s horror and figuring out the essential facets of life under this new environment, followed by the protagonist and her kids making their way in a dangerous journey. While not particularly good, Bird Box remains an adequate film, and I think it may actually appreciate the longer it’s away from its initial hype.

The Taking of Pelham One Two Three (1974)

The Taking of Pelham One Two Three (1974)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On Cable TV, February 2019) Knowing that it was coming from the middle of the bleak 1970s, a time when “urban” was always followed by “decay”, I was frankly expecting the worst from The Taking of Pelham One Two Three. How could a movie depicting a hostage taking in the NYC subway be anything but bleak and depressing? Fortunately, this isn’t quite the case: While the film is a slow-burn thriller, it’s not entirely bleak and can even be surprisingly engaging at times. Walter Matthau stars as the city official trying to piece together the elements of a criminal plan before they come to fruition, and the choice of giving this heroic role to an actor like him is indicative of a playful oddball sensitivity that runs through the movie: the characters have colds, are interrupted by visiting Japanese visitors, and one of the hostages stays asleep through much of the excitement. Thanks to director Joseph Sargent, 1970s New York City in this film is grimy but not always bleak and after a relatively tepid first half, The Taking of Pelham One Two Three gets going toward the end with a few good sequences. The musical theme is interesting and complements the interesting period piece atmosphere. I’m always fond of techno-thrillers, and the detail through which the film explains the minutiae of the NYC subway system is absolutely fascinating. In a few words, I had a great time with The Taking of Pelham One Two Three, and it’s definitely worth watching today even if you’re familiar with its vastly less remarkable remake.