THE AMERICAN: King Clooney the magnificent!

With THE AMERICAN George Clooney demonstrates yet again that defying expectation by  choosing parts that interest him rather than guarantee big returns at the box office is anything but film star hubris.
He's played unlikeable characters before but none as unsympathetic or unknowable as Jack,  the American of the title. About the only thing we know about Jack apart from his nationality is that he's an assassin, killing people on behalf of an unnamed and unidentified organisation, and hunted by other unidentified assassins.
His nationality is an issue because the action is set in Italy, among winding roads and isolated villages in the foothills of the Alps, where Jack is very noticeably the only foreigner.
Action may be too strong a word to use in the context of this story. There are some moments of extreme and graphic violence, and even a car chase of sorts, but mostly this is a story about an assassin's life between these brief bursts of lethal activity. Everyday life for Jack consists of exercising, sleeping, and constant vigilance, waiting for an unknown enemy to track him down to the remote village where he's gone into hiding.  His only respites from the solitude are guarded conversations with Father Benedotto, the parish priest, and trips to the local whorehouse where he finds himself increasingly drawn to Clara, one of the prostitutes.
The loneliness of Jack's existence is emphasized by the camerawork. Huge sweeping vistas of valleys and mountains disappearing into the clouds reduce Jack and his car to a small insignificant dot on the landscape. And the convoluted relationships and loyalties of his profession find their echo in the winding roads which fold back on themselves, and the many twisty passageways and alleys of his village hideout. 
Jack navigates them all with apparent ease but there's a nagging sense of imminent danger which neither he nor we can shake. Too often there's a sense of the camera watching him from another, unseen, character's point of view.
THE AMERICAN is a European film not just in its setting but also its sensibility. Events play out at a leisurely pace which belies the tension pushing to burst free from the picture's frame. Viewers hoping for a Jason Bourne-style narrative will be sorely disappointed. This is a character study with the focus as much on the inner workings of Jack as his exterior behaviour, and it's a testament to Clooney's enormous talent that he makes it utterly absorbing. He doesn't quite hit the highs of "Michael Clayton" but he comes mighty close.
THE AMERICAN is a film which rewards the viewer who comes to it with an open mind and an appreciation for an actor who refuses to conform to expectations. And I promise you that, when the end comes, you'll surprise yourself with your reaction.

NEVER TAKE SWEETS FROM A STRANGER: does exactly what it says on the tin

NEVER TAKE SWEETS FROM A STRANGER is an interesting blend of exploitation and drama which genuinely surprised me by the frankness with which it addressed its subject matter.
Set in Canada but very obviously filmed within a stone's throw of the Buckinghamshire studios of Hammer Productions in the UK, the story tackles the issue of pedophilia head-on, but without ever using the p-word.
Granite jawed Patrick Allen moves to an isolated and close-knit town to take up his new job as headmaster of the local high school, bringing with him his awfully prim and proper British wife Gwen Watford and their unfeasibly well-spoken 9 year old daughter Jean. They've barely finished unpacking when Jean comes home and tells them that she and a friend have stripped naked and danced for an old man who gave them sweets as a reward.
Their outrage turns to disbelief when they're advised by the local police chief not to press charges because the accused is patriarch of the wealthy and powerful Oldeberry family which has deep roots in the community.  When the parents insist on taking the case to court they discover just how ruthless the Oldeberrys are prepared to be to protect their reputation.
Director Cyril Frankel takes his cue from the film's no nonsense title and lays out the narrative in a very straightforward style where A leads to B leads to C, but he also resists the temptation to sensationalize the distasteful subject matter. Even Jean's understandably distressed and angry father acknowledges that pedophilia is an illness requiring treatment, and the story never so much as hints at the notion of vigilante style retribution as the solution.
About as close as the film gets to taking a tabloid approach to the issue is in its portrayal of the accused. Old man Oldeberry is presented as a slimmed-down, silent and senile Sydney Greenstreet-like figure, clad in a rumpled white linen suit lurching through the woods clutching a grubby paper bag of candy. His obvious difference makes it somehow easier to accept him as a child molester.
So why exactly was I so surprised by all this? NEVER TAKE SWEETS FROM A STRANGER was first released fifty years ago at a time when the public attitude towards such an issue was far from well-informed or enlightened, and it was made by a studio - Hammer - better known for technicolour horror movies than serious social commentary.
In light of this it's not surprising that the film was not well received by audiences in 1960, but it's worth checking out as an example of mainstream cinema trying something different rather than simply pandering to the lowest common denominator.

THE STERILE CUCKOO: more nutty than kookie and definitely dull

I understand that love means never having to say you're sorry. I'm ok with that. But I do have a problem when love means permission to inflict almost two hours of young love cliches and boredom on the unsuspecting reviewer.
From the sappy harmonies of The Sandpipers warbling "Come Saturday Morning" over and over again, to the long shots of the two star-crossed lovers flying a kite, and rolling in each others' arms on a sandy beach, 1969's THE STERILE CUCKOO serves as a case study in everything that's wrong with late 60s - early 70s Hollywood dramas about young love. By the midway point I was pining wistfully for the originality and stiff upper lip of "Love Story."

The problem here is not just director Alan J Pakula's unimaginative handling of the subject matter but also the main characters lack of appeal. In her second big screen role a young Liza Minnelli attacks the part of lonely misfit Pookie Adams with such gusto that she comes off as a mentally ill stalker rather than a kookie young woman we can empathize with. 
The object of her attentions, Jerry Payne, is such an empty vessel that it's difficult to understand how even someone several sandwiches short of a full picnic could become so obsessed with him. In his screen debut Wendell Corey is reasonably successful in portraying his character's nervousness at the prospect of making the beast with two backs with Pookie for the first time, but beyond that he's just dull and nerdy.
Teenagers today watching this film will find it completely unimaginable that first love could be conducted without the aid of cellphones, texting, Facebook and the internet. In that respect THE STERILE CUCKOO serves as a window on a recent past that now seems simpler and gentler. But with the story being so dull and unabsorbing the chances are they won't sit still long enough to find that out.

RED: better dead than red

Thanksgiving has come early this year thanks to this butter-basted over-ready turkey and it's left me with a severe case of indigestion. 
RED is an acronym for Retired Extremely Dangerous but it could equally well stand for Really Extremely Dire because it is. 

Really Excessively Deluded works equally well. Stars Bruce Willis, John Malkovich, Morgan Freeman and director Robert Schwentke labor under the misapprehension that they're making a comedy spy thriller in the mold of "Burn After Reading" rather than a complete mess, which this film also is.
What is intended to be an off-beat quirky, slight left-field romp comes off as a project that was put into production before the script was finished. The entire story feels disjointed, sketchy and, even by the 'suspend your disbelief' standards of comedy thrillers, nonsensical and implausible. 
Other than an oversize paycheck it's very difficult to discern what induced otherwise level headed actors like Brian Cox, Helen Mirren,  Mary-Louise Parker, and 93 year old Ernest Borgnine to get involved in this fiasco. 

THE PROWLER: corrosive corruption of the soul

THE PROWLER is one of the best film noir you've probably never seen.
I first discovered it more than 25 years ago on late night tv in the UK (those were the days when the BBC still screened old movies) and it hooked me right away. The story of illicit passion and murder exuded an incredibly compelling sense of suffocating claustrophobia and barely suppressed tension, and that memory's stuck with me for the ensuing quarter century.

So when I was finally able to get my hands on a VHS copy my concern was that the reality wouldn't live up to the memory, and I'd be left wondering what on earth is was I ever saw in the film.
I watched THE PROWLER again last night all my worries were put to rest. This 1951 film is a five star classic.
Van Heflin stars as Webb Garwood, a police patrolman in an upscale neighborhood in Los Angeles. One night he and his dull as ditchwater partner, Bud Crocker, are called to investigate a prowler at one of the big houses on their beat. They find an attractive young woman, Susan Gilvray, home alone and Webb takes an instant liking to her. Even though she's married and initially resists his advances, Webb determines to seduce her and use her to get what he wants out of life.
Heflin's masterful performance is a major factor in this film's effectiveness. As an actor he often played characters who exuded a certain vulnerability borne of physical or moral weakness, but here he turns it into a strength. Garwood's moral compass has been so eroded by the acidic bitterness of failed dreams that he's no longer restrained by any sense of right and wrong. He targets Susan like a tiger stalking its prey. His cynical and unscrupulous manipulation of her undermines everything that his police uniform represents. 
In the hands of Evelyn Keyes, Susan is a not entirely unwilling victim. Looking and acting like a bargain basement Lana Turner, she comes across as only slightly less untrustworthy than her seducer. Trapped in a loveless and controlling marriage to a much older man, she wants to believe that Webb is the solution to her unhappy existence, and at times it's difficult to determine just who is manipulating who.
On a larger scale THE PROWLER is an unsettling indictment of the corrupting influence of materialism on the American Dream. Webb bitterly resents his inability to get ahead yet he's unwilling to put in the honest toil required to bring even his modest ambition of running a motel within his grasp. Susan has more than Webb can ever aspire to yet she lives the life of a bird trapped in a gilded cage, paid for by her husband's syrupy, insincere shilling for the sponsors of his late-night radio show.  

What is perhaps most depressing is the lack of viable alternatives offered up by the story. A man in Webb's situation, it says, has no choice but to act boldly and disregard accepted norms of behaviour if he's to avoid being crushed by conformity. The best that the American Dream can offer is the life of mind-numbing soul destroying tedium embodied by Webb's middle-aged partner Bud. The biggest kick in Bud's life is showing off his collection of rocks amassed during his annual vacation to the California desert.
Reportedly shot in just 17 days on a budget of $700,000 THE PROWLER offers up more food for thought than any of the bloated, special effects engorged thrillers which pass for cinematic entertainment these days. 
Beg, borrow, buy or steal a copy of this film. It will stay with you for life.

GET HIM TO THE GREEK: let's hear it for the geek!

GET HIM TO THE GREEK is a far better film than I expected. It's certainly not high art or even high brow but it is fun and that's due in large part to Jonah Hill. He was the nerdy roly-poly one in 2007's "Superbad" and he plays a pretty similar role here albeit a few years older and slightly more successful with women.
His Aaron Green is a geeky intern at an LA record label run by the foul-mouthed meglomaniac Sergio Roma (a fine performance from Sean 'P Diddy' Combs). In the opportunity of a lifetime Aaron is sent to London to collect out-of-control British rock star Aldous Snow and escort him to LA in time to perform a money-making comeback concert at the Greek Theater. It sounds like a simple enough assignment except that Snow's not a man given to doing what he's told or following a timetable.  
What ensues are the three most exhilarating, terrifying and challenging days in Aaron's entire life as he attempts to cajole, persuade and drag an increasingly distracted music legend from the UK to the West Coast.
It's Brand who has the showy part in this story and he succeeds in portraying Snow as extravagant, eccentric, willful, unpredictable and mildly self destructive without ever going over the top, but Hill still manages to steal the film from him.His reactions to the excesses and indignities heaped upon him by Snow are priceless and, perhaps most importantly, he's likable where Snow isn't. Snow is what we Brits would call "a bit of a wanker." He's entertaining enough to be around (providing you're not in his firing line) but he'll screw you over in a heartbeat if the mood takes him.

GET HIM TO THE GREEK is not the first film to set itself in the world of rock star excesses but it is perhaps the first to present it in a disapproving light right from the get-go. There is nothing attractive or appealing about Snow or his lifestyle, and it doesn't take more than five minutes for Aaron's illusions about his music idol to be shattered.
Producer Judd Apatow has carved a niche for himself as Hollywood's premier purveyor of overage man-child comedies ("Anchorman", "The 40 Year Old Virgin", "Knocked Up", "Superbad" etc) and while this latest addition doesn't break the mold it does succeed in feeling fresh and funny. 

FOLLOW THE BOYS: it's not what you think

What was his agent thinking?! 
Movie tough guy George Raft starring in a film called FOLLOW THE BOYS? 
What's that going to do to his image as a snarling, cold blooded gangster? 
Chances are Raft believed that signing on for the film would do his image nothing but good. 

Despite the rather misleading title FOLLOW THE BOYS is actually a red, white and blue flagwaving all-star tribute to the boys in uniform who were fighting and dying to defend democracy from the fascist regimes of Nazi Germany and imperial Japan.
The film would also have appealed to Raft because it only required him to play a fictionalised version of himself. He wouldn't have to travel very far to get into character which was a blessing because Raft had what is politely described as "a limited range" as an actor. Whether he was emoting crazy mad with anger or crazy mad in love.he tended to employ the same expression and tone of voice. 
He plays hoofer Tony West who dances his way from vaudeville to Hollywood and marriage to musical star Gloria Vance (Vera Zorina). They're the Fred and Ginger of emotionless dancing until the Japs bomb Pearl Harbor and Tony's turned down by the Army because of a bum knee (seems it's ok to dance on but not march on). So he pours all his energy into drafting his fellow showbiz stars to entertain the troops, traveling the world to put on shows just behind the front-line. But all this war work leaves him no time for Gloria and a series of misunderstandings on both sides tears them apart. 
The marriage split is a less than subtle effort to convince the audience that big stars understood and shared in the real life misery of separation from loved ones being experienced by millions of couples because of the war. It's a persuasive argument if you ignore the fact that Tony and Vera's separation is caused by both of them failing to take five minutes to listen to one another, rather than by Uncle Sam sending the husband off to war and possible death in a distant corner of the planet.
But, coded messages apart, the primary aim of FOLLOW THE BOYS is to show the stars doing their bit to support the men in uniform. Orson Welles saws Marlene Dietrich in half, WC Fields performs a billiards routine using a trick table, Dinah Shore and The Andrews Sisters sing, Jeanette McDonald trills, Sophie Tucker talk-sings, Artur Rubenstein adds gravitas with a piece on the piano, and there's tricks from a  bunch of trained dogs in costume.
Compared to Warner Brothers two star studded morale boosters "Thank Your Lucky Stars" (1943) and 1944's "Hollywood Canteen", and MGM's "Thousands Cheer" also from 1944, this contribution from Universal is bargain basement stuff. It's not just Raft's monotone performance and Zorina's lack of charisma, it's the sense of disconnection between the various star turns, it's the shoddy editing between long shots of actual performances at army camps and studio based recreations in close-up, and it's the dearth of real stars. With the exception of Welles and Dietrich the wattage is determinedly B-list.
As a curio piece - and for the opportunity to see Raft hoofing on a flatbed truck in a rainstorm - FOLLOW THE BOYS is definitely worth seeing, but as a morale booster it's decidedly depressing.

CADDYSHACK: one big yawn

My god is CADDYSHACK a huge waste of space!

For a film touted as one of the 1980s more memorable comedies it's unbelievably devoid of laughs.
Bill Murray's slack-jawed grounds keeper, locked in a life or death feud with a pesky gopher,  is self indulgently stupid, Rodney Dangerfield over-acts appallingly, while Chevy Chase sleepwalks through the film offering not a shred of evidence to justify his reputation as one of America's top funny men of the period.All three stars are comprehensively outperformed by the gopher and he's nothing more than a mechanically operated prop.
CADDYSHACK is just the kind of film we Brits offer in evidence when making the case that Americans have a weird sense of humour, and by weird we mean a propensity to laugh at material that's just not funny.
Nothing that's actually funny happens in CADDYSHACK. There's plenty of scenes and characters with comic potential if only someone had remembered to write some genuine humour into the script rather than settle for a ragbag of half-finished routines and one dimensional characters. There are too many set-ups which simply peter out before they reach the punchline. Even the grand climax - the thing the whole story's been building up to - falls flat.
I've got nothing against American comedy - I'm a big fan of Woody Allen, Groucho Marx, Laurel and Hardy, David Letterman, Larry Sanders, and Jack Benny  among others - nor do I dislike low brow humour. It can be the funniest comedy in the world if it's done right, But I do object to a bunch of over-rated 'comedians' who've so bought into their own inflated reputation that they believe absolutely anything they do must be funny simply because they're doing it. Today we call it 'Will Ferrell syndrome' and there's really only one cure for it. Make these people earn the title of 'funnyman' instead of just bestowing it on them because they tell us they're funny.

GEORGY GIRL: it's the heart not the looks that really count

It's got the catchiest theme song ever to adorn the opening titles of a 60s movie. "Hey there Georgy Girl" by The Seekers will stick in your head for days afterwards. 
But not only is it infectious it also sets out in plain unambiguous English the premise for the story about to unfold. And just in case you are having trouble understanding the lyrics director Silvio Narizzano helpful matches up the words with images of Georgy "swinging down the (high) street (in London) so fancy free."
"You're always window shopping but never stopping to buy" warble The Seekers at the exact moment that Georgy pauses to look at the clothes in a shop window. 
GEORGY GIRL is not a subtle film. There's nothing here to interpret or decode. What you see is what you get. 

And what you get is a fascinating time capsule - a window on the working class end of the swinging 60s as they probably never existed but were purveyed by British movies of the time. Lynn Redgrave is Georgy, overweight, fat faced and ugly (her words) and longing for a boyfriend, a love life and a future not spent on her own. James Mason plays Mr Leamington,  a wealthy dirty old man who lusts after Georgy, and Alan Bates is Jos, the hedonistic, immature and dashingly handsome boyfriend of Georgy's beautiful flatmate Meredith, played by Charlotte Rampling.
Georgy is out of place not only because of her appearance but also because she doesn't subscribe to the live for today ethos which has infected everyone around her. She's an old fashioned girl with a heart of gold  looking for someone worthy of sharing her love with. 
GEORGY GIRL is not quite the story of the ugly duckling who blossoms into a gorgeous swan; it's more of a voyage of self-discovery filled with bittersweet moments on the way to a surprising conclusion.
Redgrave is magnificent as Georgy. Self deprecating and brutally honest about her shortcomings, there's not a trace of ego in her performance. Mason is superb as her oily benefactor while Bates is just about bearable in his hyper-exuberant interpretation of the swinging 60s made flesh.
Had Bates dialed down his performance a couple of notches and  events unfolded at a slightly less frantic pace it's possible that a more serious and meaningful film would have emerged. As it is the moral of the story gets buried under the film's brash, slick exterior and its focus on playing almost everything for laughs.

MIAMI VICE: what a crock(ett)!

Director Michael Mann's 2006 big screen version of the 80s smash hit tv show is a bloated empty hulk devoid of interest or entertainment.

No amount of snappy editing and flashy camerawork can conceal the fact that there's absolutely nothing worth watching going on here. The action is framed with all the style and grace of a fidgety kid with way too much energy, presumably in the mistaken belief that a multitude of movement will somehow distract from the lack of meaningful story.
Colin Farrell as Sonny Crockett and Jamie Foxx as Ricardo Tubbs are little more than ciphers - one dimensional characters going through the motions of being cardboard cops chasing a bunch of stereotyped, foreign accented drug dealers back and forth across the Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico. 
But MIAMI VICE isn't just boring, it's also largely unintelligible. When Tubbs and Crockett aren't muttering to each other they're mumbling, and Farrell's dreadful attempt at an American accent doesn't help matters. Quite why Mann felt an Irish actor was the only man capable of taking on the part made famous by Don Johnson is a mystery. Beyond a droopy moustache and appallingly awful haircut Farrell brings nothing memorable to the part.
Foxx's greatest achievement, meanwhile, is in making his interpretation of Ricardo Tubbs even less memorable than that of Philip Michael Thomas.
This is a surprisingly misstep for Mann who's work on "Heat", "Collateral" and "The Insider" has earned him a reputation as one of the most distinctive and stylish directors currently working. MIAMI VICE shares many of his trademark touches but in this case they just don't add up to anything worth investing 2 and a quarter hours of your life in.