Maybe every year is a great year for celebrity centennials and I’m just noticing, but at my house, 2007 is particularly rich. Example: July 16 is the 100th birthday of Ruby Katherine Stevens, perhaps my favorite actress of Golden Age Hollywood, better known to the world at large as Barbara Stanwyck. Frequently dismissed as nothing more than a good technician or, as a callow film “buff” once described her to me, “not that pretty” (immediately disqualifying his opinions on the craft of acting in perpetuity), Stanwyck was the greatest, most believable seductress of her time, a slim, cool and omniscient stick of dynamite.

She was more than cute enough for anything you had in mind, and game for it, too, but caveat emptor, here was a creature with a core of mystery too deep for mortal travelers, a real woman who was beyond possession — which is, of course, the very quality that keeps ’em coming back for more.

Charles: You’re certainly a funny girl for anybody to meet

who’s just been up the Amazon for a year.

Jean: Good thing you weren’t up there two years.

For most of the 1940s, an upstart screenwriter named Preston Sturges made complete nonsense of the idea that there’s no such thing as an auteur filmmaker, and while he was at it, continually transformed Nonsense itself into Art, just for good measure. As soon as Paramount Pictures gave him a chance to direct his own scripts, after a decade of providing great material for other moviemakers, he unleashed a seemingly impossible flow of creative energy, turning out hit after hit as if he’d found a way to bottle genius. It may be a cliché that the brightest star burns briefest, but in Sturges’ case it was decidedly, woefully true. Not, however, before he’d given us five or six of the funniest movies of all time.

His third film, The Lady Eve, is the best of his best by a hair, which means it’s likely the best comedy of its decade, as well. (more…)

Last Wednesday, June 20th, the American Film Institute announced their updated list of the 100 best movies of all time, an enlightening, schizophrenic document with all the usual victories and disappointments. The list was compiled by polling 1,500 film professionals, critics and historians, all of whom chose from a ballot of 400 English language films released between 1895 and 2006. Each expert voted by listing his/her own 100 best, and picking a personal top ten to break any ties. They were asked to make their judgments based upon a film’s historical and cultural significance, lasting popularity, critical recognition and awards (either received or denied, I assume).

The filmmakers’, critics’ and historians’ new, all-time Top Ten: 10. The Wizard of Oz (1939) … 9. Vertigo (1958) … 8. Schindler’s List (1993) … 7. Lawrence of Arabia (1962) … 6. Gone with the Wind (1939) … 5. Singin’ in the Rain (1952) … 4. Raging Bull (1980) … 3. Casablanca (1942) … 2. The Godfather (1972), and of course, the perennial #1 of our age, Orson Welles’ Citizen Kane (1941).

Let me say right off that many people are tired of Citizen Kane winning the top spot in poll after poll, and I do sympathize with their position, it’s hard, I know, to see the same film at number one all the time, but I’m not tired of it.

I like it that a bold, innovative film, which terrified Hollywood and New York and cities in between, and which was literally buried by several factions of American culture working overtime — successfully, mind you — to destroy its young creator’s chance of ever having a decent filmmaking career, a movie so threatening to the fabric of consensual reality that it was hardly screened anywhere in the world for the first 20 years of its existence, has triumphed over all and is recognized by today’s moviemakers and pundits as a beacon for what movies should aspire to and be.

I like that a lot.  (more…)

(This is an updated, expanded version of a review first posted in the fall of 2001)

“I intended the film to be an intensely subjective experience that reaches the viewer at an inner level of consciousness, just as music does; to ‘explain’ a Beethoven symphony would be to emasculate it by erecting an artificial barrier between conception and appreciation.”

– Stanley Kubrick, (1968)

2001: A Space Odyssey (1968, US-UK)

running time: 2 hr., 19 m. / original studio: MGM / original MPAA rating: G

directed & produced by Stanley Kubrick; screenplay by Stanley Kubrick & Arthur C. Clarke; director of photography, Geoffrey Unsworth; edited by Ray Lovejoy

with: Keir Dullea (Dave Bowman), Gary Lockwood (Frank Poole), William Sylvester (Dr. Heywood Floyd), Douglas Rain (voice of HAL 9000)

Stanley Kubrick’s greatest achievement (Dr. Strangelove notwithstanding), 2001: A Space Odyssey comes closer to “pure cinema” than any other feature film I know. An ideal (and idealized) approach to film storytelling, using abstract imagery to provoke ideas and emotion in the viewer, pure cinema had been discussed prior to 2001 by moviemakers everywhere, and it still is, but this time Stanley Kubrick stopped talking and actually did it. It’s not his most entertaining film, arguably, nor his most beautiful, but it is his most beautifully made, his most ambitious, difficult and fully realized, an epic tone poem of imagery and music with a minimum of dialogue, and a gloriously entertaining film for people who want more from their movies than the usual canned answers to life’s Big Questions.

2001 is the rarest of American rarities, a movie that dares to shadowbox with the Great Nameless Unanswerable, the mother of all elephants in the room, the eternal problem of humankind’s place in the universe. Of course, it’s true that the film’s philosophical content is light as a feather, as its detractors still monotonously insist, but so what? Simplicity is vastly underrated by people who seek and demand the Big Answers (I know, I’ve done my share of seeking and demanding). (more…)

Saturday May 26 is the 100th anniversary of John Wayne’s birth. We can be sure that many pundits on the Duke Centennial, having consulted their handbooks on politically correct sound bytes about dead conservative movie stars, will repeat the accepted wisdom that his disturbing (and uneven) performance in John Ford’s The Searchers is his greatest moment, precisely because it is so out-of-character with his usual persona.

Well, I say nuts to that. The John Wayne persona loved by millions was a virile, dependable action hero who was hard on the bad guy and kind to abandoned women, kidnapped children, gimpy old men and stray dogs. And take all that hype about John Ford in small amounts, too: Raoul Walsh gave John Wayne his first break, ten years before Ford deigned to cast him in a movie, while no one did more to bring out his best side than the great Howard Hawks:

Rio Bravo (1959)

running time: 2 hr., 21 m. / original studio: Warner Brothers

directed & produced by Howard Hawks; screenplay by Jules Furthman and Leigh Brackett, from story by B.H. McCampbell; director of photography, Russell Harlan; edited by Folmar Blangsted; music by Dimitri Tiomkin

with: John Wayne (John T. Chance), Dean Martin (Dude), Ricky Nelson (Colorado), Angie Dickinson (Feathers), Walter Brennan (Stumpy)

Like many films that are now regarded as masterworks by critics and film buffs, Rio Bravo was once considered no big deal, written off for decades as just another entertaining Howard Hawks Western. But in the last ten years or so, the stakes have gone down sufficiently for opinion-mongers to see past their own biases — against the star system, and films that are “only” meant to entertain, and particularly against Westerns — and declare Rio Bravo one of the best American films ever made. An agreeable character study with a finely tuned funny bone, it’s the quintessential Hawks movie, an ensemble piece that closely follows the director’s favorite adventure formula, and the culminating panel in a triptych on the subject of grace under pressure.

Beginning with the brilliant Only Angels Have Wings (1939), a movie about barnstorming aviators defying death and love (!) in a remote South American outpost, Hawks discovered a way to romanticize the trait that he valued most in other people, professional competence, and to turn its obstacles (any personal relationship) and problems (staying alive) into an intoxicating mixture of thrills and camaraderie. He turned around and did it again with To Have and Have Not (1944), changing the setting to the Caribbean, switching out movie stars, and adjusting the emphasis he placed on certain subplots. Though its wartime intrigue was packed with stirring human emotions, most of those emotions fell under the category of Major Fun; the ultimate effect of To Have and Have Not was that of a party attended by some of your favorite people, which you don’t really want to leave. This is not unlike the agenda of most Hollywood movies, even yet. (more…)

A moment of silence, please…

 Kurt Vonegut, Jr.

November 11, 1922 - April 11, 2007

 ” ‘A was a man, take him for all in all:

I shall not look upon his like again.”

(In the spirit of the Shotgun relaunch, and while I’m busy with movie polls and such, I’ve decided to recycle some of my earliest home video reviews into the new format. Since most of what I was reviewing back then were classic or nearly classic films anyway, I thought they deserved a new airing.

This first recycled offering was originally posted in August of 2001. I’ve updated some of the information and added, uhm, one or two notes, as is my wont.)

The Silence of the Lambs (1991)

1 hr., 58 m. / original studio: Orion Pictures / rated R

directed by Jonathan Demme; screenplay by Ted Tally, from novel by Thomas Harris; director of photography, Tak Fujimoto; edited by Craig McKay; music by Howard Shore

with: Jodie Foster (Clarice Starling), Anthony Hopkins (Hannibal Lecter), Scott Glenn (Jack Crawford), Ted Levine (Buffalo Bill)

As part of the FBI’s attempt to profile a serial killer who skins his victims, a female trainee is assigned to gain the trust of a psychotic genius being held in ultra-maximum security.

A riveting thriller-cum-horror tale, The Silence of the Lambs is one of the all-time great box-office sleepers, rivaling Hitchcock’s Psycho (1960) as a media phenomenon in its initial release and establishing the character of Dr. Hannibal Lecter as a contemporary icon of dread to rank with the likes of Dracula. Sixteen years later The Silence of the Lambs has lost none of its power as one of the most disturbing movies ever made, a superior, modern gothic entertainment which gazes fearlessly into the darkest labyrinth of human psychosis and leaves us deeply unsettled, but safe, when it ends. At least, safe for the moment. (more…)

“Working with Marty is…quite something. It’s tumultuous, passionate, funny, and it’s like being in the best film school in the world.” — film editor Thelma Schoonmaker picking up her third Oscar for editing a Martin Scorsese film.

“I just want to say…that so many people over the years have been wishing this for me. Strangers, you know, I go out walking in the street, people would say something to me, I go in a doctors’ office, I go in a…whatever. Elevators! People say, ’You should win you should win,’ I go for an X-ray: ‘You should win one.’ ” — Martin Scorsese holding his first Oscar, after six previous nominations

Finally, finally, finally: the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences gave its Little Gold Man to Martin Scorsese Sunday night, in a show that was otherwise remarkably dull, even for an Oscar show. This was especially ironic when they also awarded Best Picture to his brash and brutal, wickedly entertaining film, The Departed (see my review from October). All in all, not a bad night for movie lovers; believe me, there have been worse.

(more…)

Greetings and welcome to the new ShotgunReviews.com. Since 1999, we’ve done our best to give you worthwhile (and often funny) reviews and columns, and it’s time to shake off the rust and do it a little differently. We’ve kicked around a few ideas regarding how we’d do this new thing, and we hope you like what you see.

The new design comes to us from Barb Hallock, a student of mine with the appropriate attitude for this place (that is, bad). The more bloggish format puts us more on par with the current landscape. After all, we’ve been doing this almost eight full years. It was time for a big change. I think that you’ll agree that the new format, with a huge list of categories and easy searching, is a good one.

As part of that big change, we’ve brought in an influx of new talent from a variety of places. The entirety of our Best Shots team, responsible for the Best Shots column that runs every Monday at Newsarama.com, is now operating here in several capacities. You’ll also meet several talented young writers, including Barb herself, who will be tackling a variety of topics.

However, if you’re one of the rare folks that has read us since 1999, don’t get too worried. Shawn Delaney will still grace us with terrific music reviews, as will Jonathan Birdsong and the Lyrical Lounge crew. The Russ is back on wrestling coverage in full force. L.I. Rapkin’s already kicking in some culture. Eric Barker’s already opened the film vaults. And they aren’t the only familiar faces lurking around.

In the next few days and weeks, you’ll see the roster expand a little more and you’ll see some new recurring columns and features that we hope will become favorites. If you want to check out the old stuff, the old site currently still exists in its full glory under the archive button. If you want to talk about any of the stuff, old or new, visit our newly established forums.

So there’s my big speech. Enjoy yourselves, express yourselves, and invite friends. ShotgunReviews.com never went away, but we are most certainly back. Thanks for your time.

 Sometimes family and friends call me “Mr. Obscure,” because my movie-watching habits, besides being obsessive and near total, tend fanatically toward films that aren’t exactly on the New Release wall at Blockbuster. This holds true whether I’m bringing home some damned foreign language thing without stars that all the PC critics have recommended, or trying to tape half a day’s programming off of TCM (you know, Turner Classic Movies) to watch later, after I’ve consumed the latest Netflix arrivals.

In this way, I can avoid getting a life while staying busier than a one-legged man in an ass-kicking contest. It’s not possible to see everything, but I go through long spells of giving it a good try, interrupted just every now and then by a quasi-Zen determination to be happy with what I’ve seen so far in my life.

But I’m not to that point right now, not with TCM doing their “31 Days of Oscar” marathon (a holdover name from the century when the Academy Awards were in March). Lots of films I haven’t deigned to see yet from the vast Classic Hollywood period, and some of them pretty satisfyingly obscure, too, like Wednesday’s T-Men (1947), which is an early Anthony Mann noir about treasury agents going undercover in the mob to root out counterfeiters.

(more…)

“For those two jobs I was awarded a Double O number in the Service. Felt pretty clever and got a reputation for being good and tough…Now…that’s all very fine. The hero kills two villains, but when the hero Le Chiffre starts to kill the villain Bond and the villain Bond knows he isn’t a villain at all, you see the other side of the medal. The villains and heroes get all mixed up.” — James Bond, thinking out loud in Ian Fleming’s Casino Royale (1953)

“A superb gambling scene, a torture scene which still haunts me, and, of course, a beautiful girl.” -- Raymond Chandler, reviewing the book

While standing in line to see Casino Royale, the twenty-first James Bond film made by the Broccoli family’s Eon Productions, I was drawn into a conversation about the cinema of 007 with the man standing behind me. It was the film’s opening night, Friday evening at a giant suburban multiplex jammed with middleclass Midwesterners, good atmosphere for an event movie, and the man and I soon established that we’d been Bond fans since the advent of the franchise in the sixties. (more…)

“When you can assume that your audience holds the same beliefs as you do, you can relax a little and use more normal ways of talking to it; when you have to assume that it does not, then you have to make your vision apparent by shock — to the hard of hearing you shout, and for the almost blind you draw large and startling figures.” — Flannery O’Connor, “The Fiction Writer and His Country”

Any time Martin Scorsese unveils a new film, it should be a cause for celebration among cineastes everywhere, although the most frequent reaction is mild-interest-to-indifference. Scorsese is a favorite of critics, who generally (though not always) want to be challenged and provoked, to be jolted out of the comfort provided by the average, cliché-ridden action fest, often at the expense of noting and praising the occasional well-made entertainment. Most audiences don’t want these things from a movie, especially as movie-going becomes more expensive: they want good guys and bad guys, plenty of familiar plot developments, funny dialogue whether it’s motivated or not, and an ending that leaves them feeling good about themselves and the world. 

But Marty don’t play that game, never has, so it’s a bit of a shock that The Departed, his latest masterpiece of twisted loyalties and brutal psychology in the underworld, had the biggest opening weekend of any Scorsese Picture since he started making features thirty-four years ago. In one sense this is good news, because it means Marty will get to make another big ticket movie, but the reason the film opened well was not the Scorsese name in the promos. For the core audience of young people who buy most of the tickets, it was the promise of seeing Leonardo DiCaprio and Matt Damon, two major movie stars just now entering full maturity for all the right reasons, paired together in a knock-down-drag-out action film, and for everyone else it was the promise of seeing Jack Nicholson, wild-eyed grand master of all scenery gluttons, once more enveloping an entire movie in his warm, psychotic embrace and making Over the Top seem like the highest of performance arts.

(more…)

Stuck at home on a Saturday night in the middle of winter? Well, melt some butter, pop some corn, turn out the lights and press “play”on…

Casablanca (1942)

running time: 1hr., 42m. / original studio: Warner Brothers

produced by Hal B. Wallis; directed by Michael Curtiz; screenplay by Julius J. and Philip G. Epstein, and Howard Koch, from the play Everybody Comes to Rick’s by Murray Burnett and Joan Alison

director of photography, Arthur Edeson; edited by Owen Marks; music by Max Steiner

with: Humphrey Bogart (Rick), Ingrid Bergman (Ilsa), Paul Henreid (Victor), Claude Rains (Louis), Conrad Veidt (Maj. Strasser), Peter Lorre (Ugarte)

French Morocco, just before America’s entry into WWII: a mysterious Yankee is drawn into political intrigue when the only woman he ever loved shows up, escorted by a famous Czech resistance leader.

Currently the most beloved film from Classic Hollywood (circa 1930 to 1960), Casablanca is also one of the most talked about and written about movies of all time. Everyone has an opinion on why it works, everyone who contributed to the script or the production claimed credit for its diverse charms, and both sides of the Art/Commerce debate point to it as the exception to a rule. (more…)

Remakes of classic movies are almost always a bad idea. Unlike the theatre, where everything depends on what is happening in the moment and new productions can sometimes offer a fresh perspective on familiar work, a truly classic film becomes burned in the cultural memory and much of its potency is derived from that very permanence. Come to think of it, a frequent characteristic of classic films is their unchanging freshness, the way in which they not only stand out in their own era, but in all eras.

But Peter Jackson’s King Kong isn’t just any remake; it’s one of the best films of 2005, a work of unrestrained showmanship and imagination, and an epic labor of love by one of the world’s finest moviemakers. That it’s also a flawed masterpiece should not deter anyone from seeing it; a flawed masterpiece is better than no masterpiece at all, and rare enough on its own. (more…)

Had to take a month off while I moved across country, but I’m back extolling the true classics with a still-controversial favorite:

“Some day they’ll go down together; / They’ll bury them side-by-side; /

To few it’ll be grief - / To the law a relief -

But it’s death for Bonnie and Clyde.”

– Bonnie Parker, 1934

Bonnie and Clyde (1967)

running time: 1 hr., 51 m. / original studio: Warner Brothers / original rating: M

produced by Warren Beatty; directed by Arthur Penn; screenplay by David Newman & Robert Benton; director of photography, Burnett Guffey; edited by Dede Allen; music by Charles Strouse

with: Warren Beatty (Clyde Barrow), Faye Dunaway (Bonnie Parker), Michael J. Pollard (C.W. Moss), Gene Hackman (Buck Barrow), Estelle Parsons (Blanche)

One of the most important and influential films ever made, Bonnie and Clyde forms a locus in modern film history: it was intimately tied to the mid-sixties zeitgeist, by both caprice and design, and it was the decade’s most significant harbinger of a new era in American filmmaking, launching numerous great careers on both sides of the camera and transforming the visual language of Hollywood cinema. (more…)

 (click thumbnails for larger view)

“Criminals are a superstitious, cowardly lot. So, my disguise must be able to strike terror into their hearts.” — Bruce Wayne, “Origin,” Detective Comics #33, November 1939

There is a beautiful moment during the climax of Christopher Nolan’s Batman Begins when a small boy, just saved from doom by our spectacularly revised and revivified superhero, turns to his companion and says, “I told you he would come.”

Defiantly corny and old fashioned in the midst of a smart, hip movie, the moment resonates with the whole world of superhero codes and conventions, with all previous incarnations of Batman, and with his successors throughout the 20th century. This is a movie made by people who care about movies, and who care more about Bob Kane’s original Batman creation than they do about how previous films have portrayed him — in some cases, betrayed him. Long before the moment occurred, I knew I was watching an authentic rarity,  (more…)