Reviews

  • Step Up All In (2014)

    Step Up All In (2014)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, April 2020) If I’m an unlikely fan of the Step Up series, it’s because it’s the closest that twenty-first century Hollywood (so far) has come to a series of Classic-Hollywood dance musicals. From a somewhat dull and unpromising first instalment, the series has grown into a modern showcase for dancing and spectacular choreography. Sixth instalment Step Up All In isn’t particularly interesting from a plot perspective (dance contest in Las Vegas, blablabla) but that’s not why we’re watching the film—this is about the dances, the numbers, the choreography, maybe even the recurring characters a little. (Moose definitely levelled up by growing up!) This final instalment wisely chooses to bring back as many characters from previous films as it can, which ends up giving a nice send-off to the series. Vegas makes for an exuberant backdrop to the action, and the money has clearly been spent in the lavish choreography of the dance numbers—and the soundtrack’s pretty good too. While I’m an easy audience for this film, Step Up All In is almost pure fun—and I really should make an effort to see the few instalments of the series I haven’t yet seen.

  • The Narrow Margin (1952)

    The Narrow Margin (1952)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, April 2020) At 71 minutes, film noir The Narrow Margin doesn’t have a whole lot of fat on its muscled thrills. While it takes some of the archetypes of the genre (the widow of a dead criminal making her way across the country to testify at a major trial… also known as just another day in film noir world), it remixes these familiar elements with the romance of cross-country train rides—especially for twenty-first century audiences. While efficient, The Narrow Margin does take its time to build the strands of plot required for its blend of drama, romance, suspense and action. The oppressive claustrophobia of the train setting is used quite well, and there’s a bit of style in the way handheld shots are used to elevate a fight sequence—director Richard Fleischer would go on to direct some far more famous movies. A third-act twist feels surprising and arguably makes some of the late narrative feel hollow. Still, the best part of the film may be Marie Windsor, looking quite attractive in a very unusual, almost Ida Lupino-esque way. But she’s only one of the highlights in a taut, capable thriller that punches far above its weight in twists and turns and good moments.

  • 3 Men and a Little Lady (1990)

    3 Men and a Little Lady (1990)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In French, On Cable TV, April 2020) If you’ve seen 3 Men and a Baby, get ready for the contrived sequel 3 Men and a Little Lady—a big gloppy 1990s-vintage comedy that barely cares about how ludicrous it is. Despite a capable cast, the film suffers from a bad case of sequelitis in which everything is bigger, crazier and yet less interesting than this original. In this case, our three titular men are shocked out of their poly-conjugal arrangement when the mother of the little lady abruptly announces that she’s getting married and moving to England. (Don’t ask why. A sequel is why.) Contrivances piled upon contrivances are this script’s idea of plotting, and there’s no other choice than to ride along until the predictable ending. Nothing in this film feels real, from the absurdly manipulated situations all the way to a marriage that piles clichés on top of another. This is not necessarily a bad thing as long as we know what we’re in for: A script that milks all potential jokes out of a situation before moving on to the next one. While 3 Men and a Little Lady hasn’t necessarily appreciated much in the past thirty years, it does feature some performances from actors whose star power has considerably dimmed since then. Tom Selleck does get a good role, Ted Danson hams it up in a variety of costumes and roles, while Steve Guttenberg doesn’t get much to do… and circa-1990 Fiona Shaw gets insistently coded as unattractive, which is very much up for debate for anyone away from Hollywood. Still, the film is generally watchable, even if it loses a bit of its way in the England-set second half and its madcap wedding comedy antics. But then again—afflicted with such a severe outbreak of sequeltis, where else could it go?

  • Lucky Day (2019)

    Lucky Day (2019)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, April 2020) While it’s far too early to call curtains on writer-director Roger Avary’s career, the first quarter-century of it has shown a filmmaker with interesting ideas that couldn’t quite get them properly expressed… and that’s in addition to a tumultuous personal life that saw him go to prison for vehicular manslaughter under the influence. Somewhat on-the-nose, his first film after his prison sentence is Lucky Day, which begins with the protagonist… getting out of prison. Said to be a belated sequel to Killing Zoe, the film quickly becomes its own thing—an action-comedy very much in the style of the 1990s wave of black criminal comedies that Avary himself pioneered by co-writing Pulp Fiction. The film is directed with some stylish glee, and Crispin Glover’s delightfully unhinged performance as a fake-French assassin can go a long way in sustaining interest in the film. But as much as my fondness for Tarantinoesque (or should that be Avaryesque?) black crime comedies grows stronger now that they’re not making nearly as many of them as they used to, even I felt that Lucky Day quickly became annoying. It certainly does itself no favour through its constant excessive violence against innocent characters, starting with a cute supporting actress shoved aside for the sake of a bad joke. But it gets worse moments later with cheap CGI gore, and again later, as what could have been a good action showcase in an art gallery becomes a repulsively violent sequence. Coupled with the film’s cartoonish humour, it demonstrates an immaturity and an inability to keep a consistent tone. If you’re looking for the ways in which Lucky Day is a clear step down from Pulp Fiction, it’s this kind of juvenile insistence than an R-rating is inherently better than more broadly accessible fare: you can be funny and rough and dark without disgusting audiences. Glover’s performance is pretty good (it had been a while since we’d seen him in this much crazy glory) but the rest of Lucky Day is dull when it’s not actively repulsive. This being a Canada-France co-production may explain the unusually high amount of French dialogue (most of it obviously not spoken by native or fluent speakers).

  • The Fuzzy Pink Nightgown (1957)

    The Fuzzy Pink Nightgown (1957)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, April 2020) No matter what you think about the rest of the film, The Fuzzy Pink Nightgown at a title, is wonderful. The premise (a movie star is kidnapped—except everyone thinks it’s a publicity stunt for her next movie in which she plays a kidnapped woman; she falls for the kidnapper) is fine. Jane Russell is more than fine. But the film itself isn’t. Oh, it’s still relatively amusing, and I suspect that time had been kind to it by sheer virtue or encapsulating a late-Golden-age snapshot of Hollywood. Leaden, even at less than 90 minutes, this comedy runs out of steam early on and the dialogue isn’t strong enough to sustain the repetitiveness of the premise. Despite a few funny scenes and moments (the opening is particularly strong and makes the rest of the picture look poorer in comparison), the entire thing feels more laborious than it should – it’s clearly a misfire for director Norman Taurog, otherwise known for much better pictures. Russell has the panache of a movie star, but her co-star Ralph Meeker is not always up to the role as a lovable rogue. (Lovable, fine; rogue, not. ) It doesn’t help that, by being in black-and-white by the late 1950s, The Fuzzy Pink Nightgown sends mixed signals: It’s not the kind of serious drama that was shot in black-and-white at the time, and it doesn’t feel like the kind of 1940s movies it looks like. Still, I had a decent-enough time watching it—although I’m a good game for any film in which Hollywood looks at itself. Despite the dubiousness of a captive falling for her captor, this is the kind of less-than-successful film that could use a remake—I can just imagine studio executives deciding not to pay a star’s ransom based on social media feedback.

  • The Curse of the Cat People (1944)

    The Curse of the Cat People (1944)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, April 2020) You’re more than free to hail Val Lewton for his work on the still-superb Cat People, but there’s a very good argument to be made that The Curse of the Cat People is equally interesting as a showcase of his unusually sophisticated sensibilities. Billed and marketed as a follow-up to the first film, this film doesn’t settle for mere sequel rehash—it becomes an unusually heartfelt mediation on a young girl’s loneliness, executed as an ethereal ghost story. While the end result isn’t perfect (much of it due to studio meddling, this not being what they expected), it’s considerably more impressive than most of the run-of-the-mill horror movies of that time. Horror as seen from the perspective of a child is a special mixture—and one carried even today by filmmakers such as Guillermo de Toro. The Curse of the Cat People is an early example of what is possible with the horror genre as soon as you don’t focus on the scares at the expense of having something to say. Surprisingly sophisticated… unless you’re a Lewton fan, in which case it’s exactly as expected.

  • Double Harness (1933)

    Double Harness (1933)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, April 2020) Wait, wait, wait—you’re telling me that a Pre-Code William Powell film was considered lost for decades until it was brought back from obscurity by TCM? Strange but true—Loaned to RKO by Warners, Powell played in Double Harness and that film (along with five others) ended up excluded from RKO’s film library when its rights were sold back to the producer in 1946, who then did nothing with them. TCM managed to get those films back in circulation in 2007 and the result is yet another treat for Powell fans. The actor doesn’t step away from his persona too much in Double Harness—he plays a playboy manipulated into marriage, and then courted-for-real by his own wife. It’s a sophisticated romance well in-line with other Powell films, and having Ann Harding as his romantic sparring partner is a welcome change of pace. At 69 minutes, Double Harness is short but steadily amusing, and clearly Pre-Code in its faux-cynical consideration of the relationship between love and marriage. It would have been cruel to deprive the world of this Powell film—admittedly minor, but still a Powell film.

  • Rafter Romance (1933)

    Rafter Romance (1933)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, April 2020) Even by the multi-decade standards of Hollywood romantic comedies, Rafter Romance’s premise remains built on an impressive contrivance: Due to financial problems, two strangers (Ginger Rogers and Norman Foster) agree to share an attic apartment sight unseen, one by day and the other by night. Despite never meeting, the two end up in an antagonistic relationship by playing pranks on each other. But as these things happen, the two eventually meet and fall in love, while not knowing that they’re sharing space with each other. It’s all quite amusing, if not revolutionary—and at 72 minutes, quite short as well. Part of the film’s charm is that it dates from the Pre-Code era, what with a man and a woman sharing an apartment, some bare legs, good-luck swastika (yes, yes), suggestive language and other things that would not be out of place in a far more modern film. Rafter Romance was, for decades, a lost film—its rights having been ceded to their producer and not kept in the RKO library. It took TCM’s efforts to find, restore and show the film again. While it’s not a great film, it is definitely the kind of romantic comedy that’s well worth having again in the collective film library of the world.

  • Places in the Heart (1984)

    Places in the Heart (1984)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, April 2020) It’s not that Places in the Heart is a bad film; it’s just that I can probably dissuade you from seeing it simply by listing facts. 1930s rural Texas. Cinematography in shades of brown and yellow. A widow with two children. Classic Hollywood melodrama. A farm at jeopardy of being repossessed. Episodic structure. A blind boarder. A black handyman and the KKK. A final sequence that’s pure fantasy. Oscar-winning screenplay and best actress for Sally Fields. If that sounds like your kind of movie, then go ahead. If anyone else needs coaxing, know that despite the above elements, Places in the Heart comes together nicely. It’s old-time rural drama and very low-key, but it does go off running in several directions, some of them more interesting than others. The blind boarder is an intelligent man played by John Markovich. Ed Harris shows up. There’s a tornado special-effects sequence. It all amounts to something that’s more than the sum of its parts, good or bad. I liked it, slightly, and that’s more than I could have said running down the list of ingredients that make Places in the Heart.

  • Chain Reaction (1996)

    Chain Reaction (1996)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (Second Viewing, On TV, April 2020) There is something almost overwhelmingly 1990s about watching Chain Reaction again, nearly 25 years later. We’ve got young avatars of Keanu Reeves, Morgan Freeman and Rachel Weisz (plus Fred Ward) running around, unaware that their careers would blossom for another quarter-century. We’ve got the usual conspiracy theory nonsense about alternate energy. We have overblown action sequences, the best and most ludicrous of those being Reeves outrunning a nuclear-grade explosion on a motorcycle. (Alas, it only happens fifteen minutes in, not leaving much for the rest.) Director Andrew Davis’ execution is strictly by the books of 1980s–1990s thrillers and has not unpleasantly aged in the interim. The mid-1990s do feel much nicer now from the vantage point of a global pandemic, although much of this comfort is undercut by the decision to set this film in wintry Chicago and Washington, DC—the visuals are considerably grayer and duller than if the film had been set in a sunnier environment. With a quarter-century’s hindsight, I believe that this is still the only major movie to ever feature the word “sonoluminescence.” Otherwise, this is a familiar thriller-type kind of plot—scientists on the run, evil conspiracy to shut down their project, helicopters and chases and big holes in the ground. The plot makes little sense, as it mixes scientific research with shadowy well-financed research projects, but hey—we’re not here for a treatise on the military-scientific complex as much as guns and explosions. I remember seeing Chain Reaction in the late 1990s and not being overly impressed, and a second viewing now doesn’t change my mind much… although I have to admit that its period details are now settling into a nice little patina.

  • Gentlemen Marry Brunettes (1955)

    Gentlemen Marry Brunettes (1955)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, April 2020) From the get-go, Gentlemen Marry Brunettes start with significant handicaps compared to its predecessor Gentlemen Prefer Blondes: Howard Hawks is not directing, Marilyn Monroe is not featured, and even the characters of the original film can’t return due to rights issues. At least Jane Russell is back, at least. What follows is a competent attempt at recreating the atmosphere and basic elements that ensured the success of the first film. It sort-of works, but we’re clearly more in a comfortable recreation than an attempt to build anything more ambitious. (Also: blackface.) The core conceit of having two girls gallivanting around Paris is there, as do musical numbers. Jane Russell does well here in a dual role as both the sister and niece of her own character in the first film, but it’s Jeanne Crain who impresses more in another dual role. The musical numbers are fun but rather forgettable, and the comedy is very light. Gentlemen Marry Brunettes is not terrible, but it’s clearly not up to the stratospheric level of the first film, and feels second-rate when measured against the kinds of musicals they were producing in the 1950s. And if you want to compare it to the first film, well — as a gentleman who usually prefers brunettes, in this case I vexingly have to give my vote to the blondes.

  • Grey Gardens (2009)

    Grey Gardens (2009)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, April 2020) Mere hours after I watched the 1973 documentary Grey Gardens on TCM, its more modern fictional adaptation played on HBO—an ideal occasion to do some comparative analysis. Both films are about two old women (mother and daughter, respectively aunt and cousin to Jaqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onasis) living together in a vast but decrepit house in the Hamptons. Rather than the unfiltered cinema-vérité of the original, this adaptation provides a scripted narrative for the actresses, hopping between the glory days of the pair and the aftermath of their downfall. While it may not be as striking a cinematic artifact as its predecessor, nor capture the story as nakedly, it’s a great deal more interesting to 2020 viewers than the original thanks to material attempting to explain what is happening. (This is true all the way to repeated CGI fly-bys showing the differences between the house in 1936 and 1973.) Having seen both movies practically back-to-back, I can testify that this reconstitution nails the visuals of the original film with an uncanny fidelity, especially when it recreates the shooting of the documentary. The hand of fiction is comforting here, allowing the insertion of additional material to heighten the dramatic impact and ensure that it all makes sense. Jessica Langue and Drew Barrymore star (with Jeanne Tripplehorn playing Jacqueline Kennedey) and even I have to admit that Barrymore has a great role here. Also of interest: the film’s insistence on providing a happy ending… of sorts.

  • Grey Gardens (1975)

    Grey Gardens (1975)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, March 2020) It’s not because Grey Gardens is a striking documentary than it’s a pleasant one. While its subject matter of older women with mental issues living together in a large unkempt house is not unique, the reason why the film attracted a fair bit of attention over the years is because those two women are relatives of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, somewhat discarded and left behind by the rest of their family. The women come from old money, are articulate, and yet not quite there—their living conditions are deplorable, the house is falling apart and their recluse nature is off-putting. The first half of the film is tediously cinema-verité, with minimal intervention from the director or the crew, simply showing the terrible living conditions of the pair. The crew does show up later in the documentary to interact with the women, which only highlights their social issues. I suspect that Grey Gardens hasn’t aged particularly well, in large part because of the higher prevalence of material today about reclusive hoarders (including a considerable amount of reality TV) but in larger part due to the fading mystique of the Kennedy-Bouvier family. For twenty-first century viewers, Grey Gardens is liable to lead to a singular impression—this is miserable, so when do we get out of here?

  • Floyd Norman: An Animated Life (2016)

    Floyd Norman: An Animated Life (2016)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, March 2020) Chances are that you don’t know Floyd Norman, but chances are also that you’ll think of him very fondly after watching the great documentary biopic Floyd Norman: An Animated Life. While Norman worked his entire life in the field of animation, he is not someone who’s easily identifiable—he was never credited as a director, bounced between studios (but is better known for the animation work he did at Disney) and was known as a strong personality within his field, even if it took time before he was given due credit as a veteran of the artform. While one of his claims to fame is having become the “first Disney African-American animator” in 1956, Norman talks about his Southern California upbringing as one relatively free of racial tensions. It’s when you put together these strands of personal history, and combine it with his grander-than-life personality, that Norman emerges as a fascinating subject for a biography. Generously illustrated through animated segments, it showcases a very funny, very witty guy at age 79. His troublemaker moments at Disney are covered in gleeful detail, along with more troubling matters of agism. The intersection of what he’s known for—the art of animation, the reality of life within Disney, advancing black rights—are what makes An Animated Life interesting. Directors Michael Fiore and Erik Sharkey don’t pull punches in discussing his divorce, remarriage (to someone as funny and interesting as he is) and anger issues. Talking heads asked to contribute to the documentary include some major animation figures such as Paul Dini and Dean DeBlois. Anyone eager to learn more about the nitty-gritty of animation work will be even more pleased with the result. The question “why a documentary about Floyd Norman?” gets obvious answers the longer the film goes on—and his obscurity at the top of the producer-director totem pole becomes an asset when the film avoids mythologizing the influence of those positions and focuses instead on the realities of the craft of animation. Terrific subject, great documentary—don’t miss An Animated Life if you have even the slightest interest in the past few decades of American animation.

  • The Citadel (1938)

    The Citadel (1938)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, March 2020) King Vidor was one of the major directors of the silent age but while his star dimmed significantly when the movies started talking, he still managed to create a few great sound movies. One of them is The Citadel, an adaptation of a then-red-hot novel railing against the medical establishment (plus ça change…). Here, a very likable Robert Donat takes on the role of a medical student who enters the workforce and finds out that the profession isn’t quite as idealistically satisfying as what he’d expected. Part drama, part coming-of-age, part medical thriller, part romance, part courtroom theatrics, The Citadel is a rather enjoyable blend of different subgenres in its story of a heroic doctor in a small mining town who diagnoses tuberculosis at a very inconvenient time for the mine. The plot clearly doesn’t stop there, but that’s the fun of it—Vidor’s surprising instincts leading him naturally to a novel-length story with twists, turns and significant changes for its protagonist. It’s hardly perfect (notably too long in its second half before reality comes back) but Rosalind Russel is there and Vidor demonstrates his touch for character-based drama. For classic cinephiles, The Citadel does fit right in with the other medical dramas of the 1930s.