Keir Dullea

  • Bunny Lake Is Missing (1965)

    Bunny Lake Is Missing (1965)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, January 2021) You could count on director Otto Preminger for upsetting sensibilities in film after film, and while Bunny Lake is Missing doesn’t have some of the more overt provocation found in his other films, it’s still an unnerving watch. Adapting The Lady Vanishes to feature a four-year-old, it has us questioning the sanity of a young woman claiming that her four-year-old daughter has been abducted despite there being no proof of the child’s existence. Lying or deluded? Have no fear: an inspector (played by Alec Guinness) is on the case, even though he proves an accessory to the protagonist finding out the truth on her own. Shot in detailed black-and-white cinematography and set in London, the film does give a passably unpleasant impression of unhelpful bystanders and dingy locations, everyone aligned against the protagonist. (Although shades of the Swingin’ Sixties occasionally make an appearance, such as unusual rock music from The Zombies as played on background television.) Carol Lynley is fine as the protagonist, but Keir Dullea and Noël Coward and Guinness arguably make more of an impression in easier roles. While the film does feel repetitive at the time, there’s some good tension in the proceedings, and a finale that veers into outright bizarre childhood games. Still, Preminger being Preminger, Bunny Lake is Missing is distinctive enough.

  • Black Christmas (1974)

    Black Christmas (1974)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In French, On Cable TV, July 2018) Perhaps the most noteworthy detail about Black Christmas is the date at which it was produced—1974, four years before Halloween (to which it has a clear kinship) would popularize exactly the kind of film that Black Christmas is both in subject matter, attitude and technique. Some of the filmmaking is limited by its low budget, but most of it reflects almost shot-for-shot the kind of films that slasher horror filmmakers would churn out for years after John Carpenter’s success. A made-in-Canada success story, Black Christmas does feel in advance of its time, although it certainly does not escape from its own subgenre. This being said, there are performances here by Margot Kidder, Keir Dullea and a young Andrea Martin, plus an energetic directing style from Bob Clark. Unusually (and unsatisfyingly) enough, the film does not reveal the identity of the killer nor punish him, reinforcing its futility. Alas, the flip side of anticipating the slasher subgenre is that it can and does feel like more of the same … which doesn’t help if you don’t like the kind of movie that it launched.