April 2013

Only six movies this month! This is owing to a variety of factors, starting with the fact that I had a houseguest for a couple of days. Then I was distracted by the third appropriation of my debit card by identity thieves. Then I had to organize and conduct an out-of-town photo shoot. There were a couple of Randy Newman-related events I attended. Then I housesat for my friend Cindy for a couple of nights. These things add up! But trumping all of those excuses is the fact that I suddenly and quite unexpectedly got an opportunity to move into a new apartment—one farther away from my rude, obnoxious noisy neighbors—and spent the better part of a week moving. But now that I'm settled into my new place, I'm going to try to make a better effort in May.



SAFE HAVEN (2013)—The latest adaptation of a Nicholas Sparks novel (following The Lucky One, The Last Song, Dear John, Nights in Rodanthe and The Notebook, the undisputed best of the lot) is the usual corny, old-fashioned love story scenario (which is just fine with me). This one brings together a heartbroken widower (impossibly hunky Josh Duhamel) and a fresh-faced but aloof woman (impossibly cute Julianne Hough). They fall in love…but there's a conflict, and this one is represented by a mean detective played by David Lyons, who fits into the story in an unexpected and satisfying way. I enjoyed the romance between Duhamel and Hough, as well as the way their lives intersect with Lyons…but the film's resolution contains a twist so incredibly unfitting the rest of the movie that you walk out of the theater with your jaw hanging open in utter bafflement. (8)



42 (2013)—Here's a movie I either didn't know about or didn't care about at the beginning of the year, but it's a big hit now, deservedly so. It's the true story of baseball star Jackie Robinson, the first black athlete to break into Major League Baseball, who endured plenty of racism on and off the diamond. Racial intolerance obviously still exists today, but 42 paints such an ugly picture of it that at times it's cringe-inducing. At times "42" resembles a TV-movie, which is not helped by the fact that so many familiar television actors populate the cast, including John C. McGinley (Scrubs), Max Gail (Barney Miller), Christopher Meloni (Law and Order: Special Victims Unit) and T.R. Knight and James Pickens Jr. (Grey's Anatomy), and those are just the ones from TV series I am personally familiar with. So it's all very black and white with few shades of grey...and yet, you can't deny its power. Acting is uniformly fine throughout, and though Harrison Ford's growly manager character often verges on caricature, it's a fun performance. (9)



OBLIVION (2013)—Great special effects and lots of imaginative set designs notwithstanding, this is a shameless ripoff of 2009's Moon starring Sam Rockwell, which cost about what 1 percent of what Oblivion cost, and yet it's much better movie. Tom Cruise is always dynamic, and his co-stars Andrea Riseborough and drop-dead-gorgeous Olga Kurylenko are superb—they make the movie endurable. But Oblivion just made me want to watch Moon again. And I saw Moon twice! (7)



TRANCE (2013)—Danny Boyle's latest is one of those brain-teasing pictures that keeps you guessing through numerous twists and turns. Although it's a much different kind of movie than Oblivion, there are also several similarities that kept poking at my mind as I sat through it (the day after I saw Oblivion, in fact)—both films, for example, ostensibly kill off characters that we later come to find alive and well, and there's some major memory-altering concepts in both as well. Another huge similarity is that there's an enormously beautiful and sexy star in each movie: this one features Rosario Dawson, one of cinema's most alluring actresses, and she all but stole the movie away from male costars James McAvoy and Vincent Cassel. If you're in the mood for a good mindfuck, you can do worse than Trance, although much of it stretches credulity. (7)



UNFORGIVEN (1992)—I have wanted to see this Clint Eastwood Western since it came out. Only took me 21 years to finally sit down and watch it! The story is simple enough: prostitutes in a Wyoming brothel hire a trio of cowboys to hunt and kill two johns who attacked and disfigured one of their own. Which they do. The end. Clint is very good as the quiet and somber sort-of-rehabilitated killer who says, "I guess" a lot. (He's no longer the Man With No Name, but still a Man of Few Words.) Like Oblivion, Morgan Freeman co-stars. (8)



SMASHED (2012)—I am still catching up on some of last year's critically acclaimed films; this one features Aaron Paul (star of TV's Breaking Bad) as the husband of alcoholic Mary Elizabeth Winstead, who's trying valiantly to get off the sauce, despite major roadblocks. I happen to be the ideal audience for substance-abuse pictures—I can't explain why, but I always dig films about people battling addiction. This film's screenplay falls short of truly extraordinary, and the story is one I've seen before, but I still found myself completely drawn in to the story of Winstead's character; she is terrific in this. (I have apparently enjoyed her in at least two other movies, Grindhouse and Scott Pilgrim Vs. the World, but I have no specific memory of her; I will, however, definitely remember her in Smashed.)  It's a very good effort. (9)

March 2013

For a variety of reasons, I saw only one new release in the theater this month. That's OK—I have about a million movies on my hard drive. Funny how certain stars—Teresa Wright, Joseph Cotten, Robert Mitchum, Gregory Peck—kept cropping up. Here's what I saw in March.



STOKER (2013)—This film's trailer advertises it as a creepy psychological horror story, and certainly that's what it wants to be, or should have been. Indeed, elements of the film are undeniably beguiling. Nicole Kidman's husband has died, and she shares her home with an unsmiling, resentful daughter (Mia Masikowska). Enter Uncle Charlie (Matthew Goode), the dead husband's brother, whom nobody seems to have known about (the first of several implausibilities in this picture). Charlie is a handsome, smooth-talking figure who attracts both women, adding a touch of incestuousness to the proceedings. But is Charlie what he appears to be? Of course not. The movie takes its sweet time revealing the mystery; director Chan-wook Park, in his first English-language movie, is preoccupied with style, style, style, and doesn't bring enough cold-blooded terror to the table. Good performances from the leads, however. (6)



SHADOW OF A DOUBT (1943)—Alfred Hitchcock frequently called this his favorite of all the films he directed, and by and large, it's an expertly crafted thriller, featuring Teresa Wright as a California girl whose mysterious Uncle Charlie—that's right, I saw two creepy Uncle Charlie movies in a row—comes to town. The viewer is tipped at the very beginning that Joseph Cotten is very likely a Boston Strangler-type killer, and the cops are hot on his trail. He tries to blend in with the residents of Santa Rosa and his blood relatives, but his pretty niece slowly starts to piece together the truth. This was a lively, old-fashioned thriller that only lost me at the very end, with its preposterous, though typically Hitchockian, finale, which takes place on a train (where else?). Interesting to see Hume Cronyn in his film debut. (8)



GENTLEMAN'S AGREEMENT (1946)—The year's Best Picture winner is an agonizingly dated affair, with Gregory Peck as a journalist who pretends to be Jewish in order to write a magazine exposé about anti-Semitism in America. I know this was considered a heavy, controversial film in its time, but it is unbelievably tame now and frankly quite ponderous throughout. (Wouldn't an actual Jew be able to write a much more compelling article?) There's a love story between Peck and Dorothy McGuire that starts off nicely but the two leads end up bickering through most of the film, and Peck becomes massively boring and self-righteous. (At one point, there's a conversation about somebody who told an off-color ethnic joke, and you'd think they were discussing the Holocaust.) There are some nicely written scenes amid all this, but overall, I was way too irritated by the anachronisms and self-righteousness. (5)



SEARCHING FOR SUGAR MAN (2012)—Here's the real-life story of Rodriguez, a very talented folk guitarist-songwriter who failed to sell many copies of his two LPs back in the early '70s, but who gained notoriety in South Africa. Decades after he was rumored to have killed himself onstage, some fans decide to track down the real story of their musical hero, and uncover some startling facts about him. This documentary is constructed as a kind of mystery story, and the light that's shed on it is revelatory—as is the striking music made by the singer at the center of it. Spellbinding, confounding and ultimately moving, this film is a genuine stunner. (9)



THE ADMIRABLE CRICHTON (1957)—I've now seen Kenneth More in several films, including Genevieve (1953), The Thirty-Nine Steps (1959) and The Greengage Summer (1961). He was an extremely popular British performer and the star of dozens of movies, but I've never been able to get used to him onscreen—I don't really like the look of him. Having said that, he's quite good in this remake of J. M. Barrie's 1902 stage comedy. I first became aware of it when John Cleese (as Basil Fawlty) mentioned it on Fawlty Towers, sarcastically referring to his bumbling manservant Manuel. In The Admirable Crichton, a butler finds himself stranded on a deserted island with his high-society overlords, but quickly finds himself in charge when he proves infinitely more resourceful and cunning than his spoiled and elegant employers. It's an entertaining lark with a bit of a romantic subplot thrown in. (8)



THE ABCS OF DEATH (2013)—A horror anthology in 26 parts, one for each letter of the alphabet. It's an extremely mixed bag—there are numerous foreign-language segments (including Spanish, French Japanese); a few are wordless, many are surreal and/or bizarre in nature, and there are occasional stabs at comedy, a couple of animated efforts, and wildly uneven degrees of quality. Not one is truly horrifying or suspenseful; it's more of a gross-out movie than anything else, with lots of gore, blood, vomit, shit, flatulence…even adolescent boys' sweat licked off a gymnasium bench by a perverted janitor. About 11 of the segments I felt were at least worth watching, while the rest were too bizarre, foolish, childish, self-referential or inane for my taste. The highlights involve a slow-motion dogfight ("D is for Dogfight"), a man with an unwanted spider in his apartment ("E is for Exterminate"), a talking bird that doesn't know when to shut up ("N is for Nuptials"), and a Mexican woman forced into prostitution—and worse—in order to feed her kids ("P is for Pressure"). And this may be the first major release to bring the unjustly neglected topic of erotic Japanese lesbian flatulence-sniffing to the screen ("F is for Fart"). (6)



O (2001)—This modern-day retelling of Shakespeare's Othello has been on my radar since it was released. In this version, Mekhi Phifer  is a black high-school basketball player who has a beautiful girlfriend (Julia Stiles), a best-friend teammate (Andrew Keegan) and another very jealous teammate (Josh Hartnett) who conspires to make Phifer go nuts by making him think his squeeze and best pal are doing the mattress mambo. Held back from its initial release because of the Columbine shootings (it was completed in 1999), it's quite dramatic and well acted—I'm glad I finally got around to viewing it. (8)



SCREAM OF FEAR (1961)—An absorbing, very well-plotted Hammer shocker, but the same capsule film review that inspired my viewing of it actually spoiled the twist ending! The paralyzed daughter of a man she hasn't seen in years begins to suspect that foul play is afoot when she comes to visit. Could the disarmingly friendly stepmom actually be behind it? A beautiful girl, some creepy goings-on, an undetermined evil…all the right ingredients, and it would been even better had I not known about the finale. (8)



THE FURIES (1950)—I had never even heard about this Western before I stumbled onto a very positive capsule review of it. I found it online, downloaded and watched it fairly quickly, and…wow! What a perfectly acted, involving drama in the desert! Walter Huston runs his cattle ranch, known as The Furies, with his daughter (Barbara Stanwyck), and as much as they adore each other, there's a big conflict on the horizon. This movie has it all—greed, selfishness, spite, lust, all of the greatest human emotions! I enjoyed it so much that I totally abandoned my "must-see movies" list and turned my attention to movies written by Niven Busch (author of the novel on which this movie is based). (10)



DUEL IN THE SUN (1946)—Amazingly, the second of four Niven Busch-authored films turns out to be another soapy classic! Jennifer Jones is a half-breed orphan who goes to live on a ranch owned by some family "friends," two of which include Gregory Peck, playing an enormous a-hole, and his dad Lionel Barrymore, playing an exact replica of wheelchair-bound Mr. Potter from It's a Wonderful Life (this was released the same year!). Nice-guy Joseph Cotten and mom Lillian Gish represent the kinder part of the family. More lust, more scandal, more greed…and it's even got Walter Huston from The Furies! Director Martin Scorsese claims this was the first movie he ever saw, and it remains one of his very favorites. (10)



PURSUED (1947)—Another excellent Niven Busch Western. Here he contributes an original screenplay rather than the source novel; it features Robert Mitchum as an innocent cowboy targeted for murder by a jerk (Dean Jagger), which puts a damper on Bob's romance with Teresa Wright. Superbly paced drama told largely in flashbacks. (9)



TILL THE END OF TIME (1946)—Fourth and final Niven Busch film (based on his novel They Dreamed of Home) isn't a Western, but a postwar drama about what happens after several soldiers (among them Guy Madison and Robert Mitchum) return home after WWII. But mostly it's about cigarette-smoking war widow Dorothy McGuire and her romance with one the marines. Compared favorably by critics to The Best Years of Our Lives, an extremely similar story and much more popular movie than this, although End of Time came first. I found it a bit draggy and uninteresting, although the ending picks up a bit. I have amassed a few more Busch movies, which I hope to get to in the weeks and months ahead. (6)

February 2013

January was my "movie a day" month, but because of a week-long business/pleasure trip to South Florida, it proved impossible for me to continue that trend. Even so, I was able to work in another theme—February became my "Decades Month," in which I was able to screen at least one movie for every decade beginning with the 1930s onward. That meant an even more varied hodgepodge than usual, but aside from a handful of forgettable flicks, there were a few unexpectedly rewarding classics that I think may go on to become my favorites at the end of the year.



LES MISERABLES (2012)—The only musical I have seen three times on Broadway, Les Miserables finally arrived on the silver screen over Christmas as a 158-minute extravaganza. (Joan and I patiently waited for the free screening at Paramount.) It's big, it's lavish, it's got big-name movie stars, and a couple of them can actually sing! Unfortunately, the movie's villain, Javert, is played by Russell Crowe, who is a serious liability in the vocal department. It's tempting to imagine what a perfect movie musical this would have been had they cast somebody with the requisite pipes in the role...but Hollywood being Hollywood, they're more interested in putting asses in seats. Regrettably, those asses were being laughed off as Crowe struggled hopelessly with what is generally considered to be a very demanding singing chore. On the upside, Anne Hathaway put every talented molecule in her body into the role of Fantine, and deservedly walked away with a Best Supporting Actress statue. (Her rendition of "I Dreamed a Dream" is already legendary.) Admittedly the film drags on and on—we really needed an intermission—but it does look wonderful and scores on many levels, especially with the costumes, makeup, cinematography, etc. It's a movie for fans; others (you know who you are) should stay far, far away. (8)



THE LONG KISS GOODNIGHT (1996)—The first of two films to fulfill my '90s obligation, Long Kiss is a movie Jay Steele has always recommended, so during my weekend trip to see a stage production of Promises, Promises that he produced, I allowed him to pick a movie one night; this was it. I can't say I enjoyed it as much as he does, but it's always a treat to watch Samuel L. Jackson work. This is a crime drama about a amnesiac (Geena Davis) whose memories as a CIA operative come flooding back, shattering her new life as a schoolteacher. There are lots of guns, evil henchmen, double-crosses, exploding tankers and enough clichés and preposterous plot twists for five action movies; it's all watchable enough, but ultimately forgettable. (6)



BABY MAMA (2008)—The movie I picked for me and Jay is this comedy starring Tina Fey, whom we both enjoy enough to have sat for six hours straight watching the final season of 30 Rock together. Fey and her former Saturday Night Live co-star Amy Poehler team up as a single businesswoman (Fey) who hires Poehler to be a surrogate mother for her; Greg Kinnear and Dax Shepard are their respective love interests. There are laughs here and there, but the lightweight material is way beneath these talented comedians. (6)



THE MAN IN THE WHITE SUIT (1951)—After enjoying the 1952 Alec Guinness movie The Card back in 2010, I made a mental note to take on as many Ealing classics as possible, especially the ones featuring Guinness (best known to modern audiences as Obi-Wan Kenobi from the original Star Wars). Here's the first of three such classics I selected for this month, about a scientist who creates a fabric that can't get soiled or ever wear out. Sounds pretty nifty, right? Except…what about all of those textile workers who will be out of a job when the miracle fabric goes on the market and nobody needs to buy new clothes? That's the basic setup, and the conflicts and resolution are all cleverly handled. As usual, Guinness is a master. One memorable aspect of this comedy is the rhythmic sound that the young scientist's simmering test tubes produce. (9)



BETSY'S WEDDING (1990)—The last film to have been written, directed and starring Alan Alda is forgettable, lightweight fluff about the wedding of one daughter (Molly Ringwald) and the romance of another (Ally Sheedy) to an underworld type (Anthony LaPaglia, in the movie's best performance). It tries hard to be charming, but misses the mark, demonstrating why Alda never made another movie after it. (7)



SALMON FISHING IN THE YEMEN (2011)—This romcom was officially released to theaters in the U.S. last year. When a mega-wealthy sheik expresses interest in bringing the sport of salmon fishing to a salmon-free desert, it's up to a laconic scientist (Ewan McGregor) and the sheik's Western representative (Emily Blunt) to study the feasibility of turning it into a reality. Naturally, sparks fly, and maybe (just maybe!) a romance will develop! A mild but watchable entertainment, mostly due to the charm of the film's stars…and I approve of the theme about no dream being too wild to pursue. (8)



KIND HEARTS AND CORONETS (1949)—February's second Alec Guinness movie is my only entry from the Forties. This one stars Dennis Price as a shunned relative of a wealthy family who decides to go for an inheritance by bumping off everybody else in the family…all of whom (both men and women) are played by Alec Guinness! It's a tour-de-force that went a long way toward making him a star. It's a very dark but also very funny comedy. Actress Joan Greenwood astonished me by having the voice, looks and mannerisms of Felicity Kendal, another British comic actress I've always enjoyed. (10)



SIDE EFFECTS (2013)—Weirdly, this was one of only two current-release films I saw all month. Director Steven Soderbergh, whose work I have admired (Erin Brockovich, Haywire, Contagion), turns his attention to a mystery about prescription medication that's full of unexpected surprises. It stars Jude Law as a doctor whose life spins out of control as a result of a patient (an excellent Rooney Mara) and her unusual medical circumstances. To say much more would be giving away the nature of the story, which requires a healthy suspension of disbelief, but if you can do that, it's a movie well worth seeing. (9)



THE SECRET LIFE OF ZOEY (2002)—It's funny how certain things lead me to others. I was compelled to seek out this made-for-Lifetime-TV effort after listening to actress Julia Whelan (so perfect in the TV series Once and Again) perform the audio-CD version of last summer's bestselling novel Gone Girl. Mia Farrow is a single mom bringing up smart, beautiful daughter Whelan, who just happens to have gotten into illegal drugs. The movie strives to remind parents to always keep a watchful eye on their kids, because this kind of thing can happen to anyone. Except…Farrow plays such a great parent and Whelan is such a good girl that it's totally mystifying how she fell into the wrong crowd or how Farrow could have missed any of the clues. It's a well-meaning film, but fails to connect all of the dots. Decent performances by all, however. (7)



WARM BODIES (2013)—Connie's unexpectedly non-horrible review of this "zombie romcom" inspired Joan and I to take a look, and we agreed with her that it was a decent time-killer, enjoyable without being particularly memorable. I found the special effects in this futuristic adventure to be quite impressive, and the love story is performed with goofy affection. Female star Teresa Palmer is easy on the eyes, but even her great beauty is eclipsed by that of Damsels in Distress star Analeigh Tipton, whom I will henceforth strive to see in anything she appears in—including the forthcoming Two Night Stand. (8)



ANIMAL CRACKERS (1930)—As much as I idolize the Marx Brothers, I've not seen every one of their films—at least from beginning to end. It was high time I got this one out of the way. Following The Coconuts, it's their second film, and based on their stage success. It's the usual Marx Brothers lunacy; this one features the famous song "Hooray for Captain Spaulding" and involves a stolen painting. Attractive co-star Lillian Roth would be worth tracking down in other films from the same time period. (8)



THE DEAD GIRL (2006)—This was one of the months' most welcome surprises, a multiple-story film linked by the title character. There are five interconnected tales in this unique drama, written and directed by Karen Moncrieff and starring Toni Collette, Mary Beth Hurt, Marcia Gay Harden, Kerry Washington and Brittany Murphy. It is troubling, surprising, confounding, thought-provoking and superbly constructed. (10)



LÉON: THE PROFESSIONAL (1994)—As a fan of Natalie Portman, I've been curious to see her screen debut for several years. There are at least three different versions of the movie; the one I saw is the most complete and inclusive version, which is more than 20 minutes longer than the U.S. release. Jean Reno plays a hit man who is at first compelled to provide protection to a 12-year-old (Portman), then gradually starts to make her a part of his professional. Gary Oldman appears as an unrelentingly slimy DEA investigator, an over-the-top villain who's a little bit too maniacal to be believed…but this is more of a fantasy movie than anything else, and somehow it all works…even the bizarro idea of Portman falling in love with a man decades her senior. Completely absorbing and entertaining; makes me want to catch up on every movie of Portman's that I have missed (not counting those later Star Wars sequels). (9)



THE LAVENDER HILL MOB (1951)—Third in the trilogy of Alec Guinness movies I enjoyed in February, this one is about a bank employee who connives to pull off an armored-car heist with some buddies. Funny, suspenseful and imaginative—you'll be rooting for the "bad" guys all the way to the end. Gotta watch more Guinness soon! (9)



THE WATCHER IN THE WOODS (1980)—Jamie-Alice mentioned how frightening this Disney chiller was when she was a kid, so I threw it into the mix, as I have dozens of unseen Disney movies in my archives and would like to continue chipping away at them. Bette Davis rents a large British mansion to an American family (including 22-year-old blonde beauty Lynn-Holly Johnson of Ice Castles), then supernatural forces in the woods nearby start to menace everybody. Do these ghostly goings-on have to do with Davis's own daughter, who went missing decades before? Well, duh! The movie is designed to creep out the small fry, but anybody over the age of 20 is bound to find themselves chuckling at the now-primitive special effects and especially the hilariously bad acting of Johnson—the worst acting I have ever seen in a major film release. (5)



LADY SINGS THE BLUES (1972)—Alas, my eardrums have always been allergic to Billie Holliday's voice; she sings too high and sounds like a cartoon character. I do, however, enjoy listening to Diana Ross, so the idea of her starring in a biopic about Holliday interested me—especially because I've never really seen Ross act before. The movie is trashy fun from a soap-opera lover's point of view but is essentially a washout as a biography—to say they take "poetic license" is an outrageous understatement, since virtually all Billie does in the movie is sing and take drugs. It's a film that's loaded with movie-biography clichés, including the one where a character walks along with a moving train just to continue waving goodbye to a departing spouse. Still, Ross does turn in an acceptable performance, while Billy Dee Williams looks handsome and Richard Pryor sounds unintelligible most of the time. Also, you have to laugh at the idea of stunning Diana Ross portraying significantly less-than-stunning Holliday—it's as if they'd cast Zoe Saldana to play Nina Simone. Oh, wait—that one is already in production! (6)

THE SERVANT (1963)—Joseph Losey directed Harold Pinter's script that was based on a novella by Robin Maugham (a nephew of Somerset). In it, James Fox (sort of a cross between David Bowie and Bruce Davison) plays a rich upper-class twit who hires a manservant (dependable Dirk Bogarde) to run his house, cook, etc. Fox's girlfriend (Wendy Craig) takes an instant dislike to the vaguely sinister butler, then Sarah Miles enters the picture as a housekeeper and the real fun begins. For three-quarters of the movie, I was absolutely mesmerized by the tension between these four characters. But the intriguing premise—exploring how the master of the house and the hired help gradually swap places in a kind of power play—totally ceased to interest me when Fox became a mopey, boozy sycophant and Bogarde became a loud-mouthed bully. I just couldn't swallow it. Critics heaped praise on this film, but the last reel suffers greatly from a lack of realism. The movie vaguely reminded me of Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf. (6)

January 2013

I did not deliberately set out to try my Movie-a-Day experiment again, but I was able to fit so many in, it kind of worked out that way. Even if I'm not able to close out the year with 365 films under my belt, I've successfully completed 1/12th of the task!

The 31 movies I screened in January are an interesting mix of:

(A) movies I've always wanted to see (or have been curious about for a long time);

(B) newly released or recent films;

(C) impulsive, oddball selections;

(D) movies inspired by a recently seen title.

A typical example of this last category: My viewing of Unbreakable and Jackie Brown whetted my appetite for more Samuel L. Jackson; likewise, I have moved Betsy's Wedding, Inside Daisy Clover and Apollo 13 higher on my Movie Bucket List because of films I saw this month that featured Alan Alda, Natalie Wood and Tom Hanks, respectively. Unfortunately, it appears I awarded only three movies a "9" (outstanding) rating, and nothing was deserving of a 10.

I need more 10s in my life, damn it!

Here's my report card for January.



THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE: THE BEGINNING (2006)—A Chainsaw virgin, I decided to prepare for the first major film release of 2013 (Texas Chainsaw 3D) by acquainting myself with the franchise. It all began with the low-budget Tobe Hooper original in 1974, followed by a sequel in 1986, a Next Generation sequel in 1994, a remake in 2003, a prequel to the remake in 2006, and finally this year's sequel. I opted to get my feet wet with this 2006 prequel to the remake, then watch the 2003 remake (bypassing the Tobe Hooper original altogether). It turns out to a pretty darn good slasher film, recounting the backstory of young Thomas "Leatherface" Hewitt and his cannibalistic family. The story really starts when a group of teenagers run afoul of R. Lee Ermey, the scarifying boot-camp drill instructor in Full Metal Jacket, here playing an even scarier version of his bellowing, short-tempered authority figure character, perfected as far back as 1978's The Boys in Company C. I have not seen more than a few slasher films in my life, but this is definitely the best of the bunch. (8)



SLEEPWALK WITH ME (2012)—I am still trying to get caught up on some of the 2012 releases I missed. I had high expectations for this one, because I love standup comedy and it's about a fictional stand-up comedian (inspired and performed by real-life comic Mike Birbiglia). Also, the movie won a lot of great reviews. While it has a couple of interesting ideas and the occasional laugh, I never completely warmed to his brand of funny…but it was nice to see Six Feet Under star Lauren Ambrose as his cuckolded girlfriend. (6)



THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE (2003)—Back to the Chainsaw franchise. Ermey and Leatherface are back, terrorizing more teenagers (including hot-as-a-piston Jessica Biel). It's a standard slasher shocker; a decent production that is well (you should pardon the expression) executed. I think the prequel is slightly better. (8)



TEXAS CHAINSAW 3D (2013)—To my surprise, the big-budget sequel turns out to be a direct follow-up to the 1974 original, ignoring all other sequels, reboots and prequels. (I had not bothered to watch the original, but had skimmed through it and learned enough for this one to make perfect sense.) First of all, the 3-D process was pointless; I noticed only a couple of brief scenes that took advantage of the effect, so it might as well have been viewed in 2D. Second, it's a rather predictable and preposterous story, with a young woman inheriting an estate, only to learn she's Leatherface's cousin. Nothing special here, although it was a huge box-office success, so I presume more will be on their way. (6)



BLADE RUNNER (1982)—One of my ongoing New Year's Resolutions is to catch up on some of the iconic films I've missed over the years. This is one of the last of the "biggies." I don't know how this one slipped through the cracks, but now I can say I've finally seen the film Harrison Ford made between the second and third original Star Wars installments. It's a dark, bleak and violent look at Los Angeles during the year (HA!) 2019, when we've not only been to other planets, but have created "replicants" (biological robots) to work on them, effectively enslaving them. Some of these ultra-strong humanoids have come back to Earth to cause us harm, and Harrison Ford has been conscripted to stop them. But who's the real villain here—the slaves or those who have enslaved them in the first place? It's a theme that was re-used in last year's Cloud Atlas in one of that film's many stories. Blade Runner is more noir than I usually care for, but it's worth watching through all the steam and smoke and rain. No doubt it played much better 30 years ago—hilariously, so much of the so-called "futuristic" design and props on display already been rendered obsolete by today's standards, such as all the monochromatic computer screens that just make you roll your eyes. (Nobody carries any smartphones or Mini iPads because they hadn't been conceived in 1982.) This film exists in at least seven different versions; I watched "The Final Cut," which has forsaken the original voice-over narration and clarified some plot points that were apparently muddled originally. One of the film's major liabilities is the musical soundtrack by Vangelis, whose career was hot after Chariots of Fire, but it sounds embarrassingly dated and out of place now. (7)



A KISS BEFORE DYING (1956)—Digging even further into the archives is this movie based on a book by Ira Levin. Based on his 1953 debut novel (written 14 years before Rosemary's Baby), the film is a pared-down version of the book about a guy who murders his girlfriend after she gets pregnant, then woos his sister in order to get to their daddy's fortune and frames other people for the killing. (In the book, there was a third sister). It's an old-fashioned yarn, rather shopworn by today's standards, but interesting to see a rail-thin Robert Wagner as the villain, as well as Joanne Woodward as the girlfriend who gets bumped off. (6)



ARBITRAGE (2012)—Another movie from last year that got a bit of buzz for Richard Gere's performance. Here he's a financial wizard, the president of a hedge-fund company that's basically bankrupt. He cooks the books and is frantically trying to sell the company that his beautiful daughter is active in when a car accident causes his world to spin out of control. The main problem with the movie is that Gere is way too arrogant to be even a little likable, so it's hard to root for him as he uses his slippery nature to weasel his way out of a truly horrific situation he's caused for himself and his family. (5)



THE TORTURED (2010)—I liked the setup: After a couple's young son is kidnapped, tortured and killed by a psychopath, they decide to kidnap the killer and get revenge by torturing him. But it turns out there's very little satisfaction in watching a psycho get tortured, and even the dimmest viewer will figure out the twist ending long before the film's conclusion. How disappointing that I chose to watch this over so many more worthwhile selections on my must-see list. (4)



NOT FADE AWAY (2013)—A pointless, meandering mess. In the late '60s, a group of young musicians form a band, explore romance and smoke cigarettes, not necessarily in that order. The film wants to capture the love of rock and roll (the soundtrack is wall-to-wall oldies), so director David Chase dresses up his cast in period clothes, litters the streets with authentic automobiles, and drops references to Vonnegut, Martin Luther King and, of course Mick Jagger. There's precious little story and a laughable non-ending ending that caps the main character's boring 10-minute meander around the streets of Los Angeles. I was paralyzed with boredom from beginning to end; film's one saving grace is easy-on-the-eyes Bella Heathcote, an Australian doing a perfect American accent. Otherwise, exceptionally boring. (2)



DON'T DRINK THE WATER (1994)—Woody Allen's farcical 1966 debut play (filmed in 1969 with Jackie Gleason) became a TV movie in '94, this time with Woody directing and starring—I suspect he was "slumming" in order to finance more ambitious big-screen efforts from this timeframe, such as Mighty Aphrodite and Deconstructing Harry. Not surprisingly, Woody and his cast of TV sitcom actors (Julie Kavner, Michael J. Fox, Mayim Bialik) fit their characters like gloves in this zany tale of a family trapped in a U.S. embassy behind the Iron Curtain, accused of being spies. It's just the kind of nutty, slapdash, gag-filled movie Woody used to make, and it's fun to see him in full schlemiel mode again. (8)



EXPERIMENT IN TERROR (1962)—Director Blake Edwards is best known for comedies like The Great Race and the Pink Panther series. But before his career took that direction, he actually made some serious dramas, such as 1962's Days of Wine and Roses. That same year, he made this psychological thriller, with Ross Martin as a ruthless killer who tries to force innocent teller Lee Remick to rob her own bank for him. Glenn Ford heads up the FBI team to hunt him down and stop him. What once undoubtedly played as an edge-of-your-seat thriller seems hopelessly dated today, with loads of bumbling mistakes made by the G-men; it's also way overlong at over 120 minutes. Although it mostly plays like a B&W episode of Dragnet, there are a few tense scenes that made somewhat of an impact. My favorite subplot had to do with a Chinese woman (Anita Loo), whose hospitalized son has a surprising connection to the bad guy. Overall, though, this was a bit of a slog. (6)



POT O' GOLD (1942)—I had started and rejected at least three movies before popping in this old Jimmy Stewart offering (released the year after The Philadelphia Story and five years before It's a Wonderful Life). The film was inspired by a 1939 radio show—the first big-money giveaway program. This comedy-romance starts off a lot like It's a Wonderful Life, with Stewart playing an aw-shucks dreamer following in the shoes of his not-very-successful father, who was in business for love, not money. Along comes his golden opportunity to make big bucks…but it's not really in his nature to go in that direction. (Sound familiar?) But where It's a Wonderful Life went off in an often more serious (and supernatural) direction, this one is really a musical, with lots of people playing in a band and singing in shows—even Jimmy's character sings one song, although it is obviously not his voice. Paulette Goddard is the love interest; it's all very broad and silly, almost like an episode of I Love Lucy. I wasn't really expecting this to be a musical—I had abandoned In Search of the Castaways immediately before watching this exactly because there were all of these unexpected songs in the way of the story. Pot o' Gold would have been considerably more effective as a straight comedy: there are enough farcical elements and wisecracks for it to have worked as such. Stewart called this his worst movie, but it's probably worth at least a (7).



THE CHILDREN (2008)—How do you battle a seven-year-old girl with a bloody knife in her hand—especially when she's your own daughter? That's the most interesting aspect of The Children, a British horror movie presents two families (joined by two grown sisters) with a bunch of adorable moppets spending the holidays together in a remote cabin…and then, inexplicably, the kids fall victim to a mysterious illness that turns them all into homicidal maniacs. Because Village of the Damned (1960) is my favorite movie, I am naturally curious about all movies about evil kids. This one is a twist on the usual slasher film, where your own brood is suddenly the enemy. Intriguing premise, and there are some suspenseful scenes, but the movie lets us down with a lot of violent payoff scenes that are shown in a blink of an eye, leaving you to wonder, "Hmmm, what just happened?" Aside from the sometimes clumsy direction, I am always hyper-sensitive about snowbound scenes that are betrayed as obviously man-made because the actors don't have any "fog breath"; in this one, you see fog about a quarter of the time, which for me only magnifies the problem. (6)



UNBREAKABLE (2000)—After the international success of The Sixth Sense, director M. Night Shyamalan re-teamed with star Bruce Willis for this supernatural tale that's sort of The Dead Zone meets Superman. Bruce plays a dude with some kind of superpower—and exactly what it that is proves to be the focus of almost the entire movie. Shyamalan tries hard to recapture the magic of his recent success: as in The Sixth Sense, Bruce is finding it difficult to reconnect with his wife; there's a small boy who looks up to him, a scene where Bruce plays a big part in resolving a terrible crime, and a surprising twist ending. Unfortunately, the ending rubbed a lot of people the wrong way—it's rather preposterous and yet at the same time perfunctory. The movie never seems to know if it wants to be a drama, a mystery, a sci-fi story or a thriller, and ultimately ends up as a superhero origin story for a franchise that never got off the ground. I wasn't as enthralled by this picture as much as The Sixth Sense; it's an adequate time killer but might have been better titled Unremarkable. First of several Samuel L. Jackson films I selected this month.(6)



THE QUATERMASS XPERIMENT (1955)—Quatermass was a recurring British sci-fi serial (i.e., miniseries) beginning in the 1950s. After the first six-part serial was broadcast in 1953, the story was condensed and filmed as a movie in 1955. The pattern was duplicated for two additional series in the 1950s and one more in the '70s. I decided to get my feet wet with the first movie, in which a scientist, Prof. Bernard Quatermass (Brian Donlevy), investigates creepy goings-on after a three-man rocket crew returns to Earth with only one of the original astronauts. It is, of course, outrageously dated by today's standards, and it's much more of a monster movie than what you could call science-fiction. Even boiled down to 90 minutes from what originally aired in six parts, it still drags a bit. There are a couple of tense moments, but today the film is more of a curio than anything else; American Donlevy seems out of place among his British co-stars, and he's weirdly unlikeable. Still, I might check out the second film in order to bridge my way toward the much-beloved third movie in the series, generally acknowledged to be a sci-fi classic. (6)



THE D.I. (1957)—Jack Webb was best known as Sgt. Joe Friday, the cop character he debuted on the radio in 1949 before launching a tremendously successful TV series. He steps out of his famous monotoned character's shoes to inhabit a much louder one: Sgt. Jim Moore, a drill instructor who must whip his maggots into Marines in eight weeks of boot-camp hell. He is about as terrifying as the best movie D.I.s, including Lou Gossett Jr. in An Officer and a Gentleman, Darren McGavin in Tribes, and R. Lee Ermy in Full Metal Jacket. As in all of these films, there's one problem soldier that the D.I. has an especially tough time transforming into a true soldier; here it's Private Owens (Don Dubbins), who's burdened by a few personal problems. Based on a 1956 episode of the TV anthology show Kraft Theatre, the story has been slightly expanded to include a little love story for Jack, presumably to make him a bit less hard-edged. (Jackie Loughery, his real-life wife at the time, plays his girlfriend.) For some reason, I have always found these boot camp movies particularly compelling. This one's in black and white, and produced and directed by Webb. (8)



A NEW LIFE (1988)—I was passionate about TV's M*A*S*H and of star (and sometimes writer-director) Alan Alda, so when the series neared the end of its run and Alda started to do movie work, I was delighted. He started out as a wonderful comic actor in other people's films (Same Time, Next Year), then as a writer-star (The Seduction of Joe Tynan) before the triple-hyphenate credits started rolling in, beginning with the fabulous The Four Seasons in 1981. With that film, I was convinced we had a new Woody Allen on our hands, and I remember daydreaming about all of the great Alan Alda films that would come. But it was not to be. His next film (the mediocre Sweet Liberty) wasn't until five years later, and he only made two films after that: A New Life (1988) and Betsy's Wedding (1990), which effectively ended writing and directing career. Alda would become a great character actor on TV (The West Wing) and film (Tower Heist, Wanderlust and, ironically, various Woody Allen films), and it's great to see him onscreen in anything—I've even enjoyed both books he's published. The completist in me felt I should see even his final box-office bombs, beginning with A New Life. Unlike his previous films, A New Life has the feel of a TV-movie, and although it breaks no new ground and doesn't sparkle with the usual Alda wit, it's enjoyable enough as a romcom. Alda and wife Ann-Margret split up and find new romances, navigating the unfamiliar late-'80s dating scene somewhat precariously. (Their respective new loves are the very attractive Veronica Hamel and John Shea, respectively.) Seeing "Hawkeye" with head full of bushy grey hair, a greying beard and puffing on cigars takes some getting used to. Certainly worth a look for Alda fans. (8)



QUATERMASS II (1957)—Like the first Quatermass movie, this is about some gunk originating from outer space that threatens all of mankind by snatching our bodies and other creepy stuff. Standard B&W sci-fi horror nonsense, barely distinguishable from the first movie, and Donlevy isn't getting any more likable. (Fortunately, he gets replaced in #3.) (6)



MESSAGE IN A BOTTLE (1999)—There's that unmistakable prickle on the back of your neck when you realize that what you're watching is the millionth Big Lie movie. This romantic adaptation of Nicolas Sparks' novel is, confoundingly, yet another in the seemingly endless permutations of the "You lied to me!" plotline, featuring Robin Wright Penn as a researcher who tracks down Kevin Costner as the author of the titular bottle messages because she thinks it'll make a good story in her newspaper (which it does). Predictably, she falls in love with him, and he finally starts to come out of his shell after suffering the loss of his first wife. Will their love survive his finding out about her fabrication? Contrived, cliched and preposterous as it all is, it's well put-together and totally worth watching if you're in the mood for slumming, which I find I often am. Paul Newman plays Costner's dad, and he's terrific as always. Penn and Costner are both a tad ineffectual and less than totally charming, but do well enough. (8)



QUATERMASS AND THE PIT (1967)—For some reason, Hammer Films took nearly a decade to adapt the third Quatermass TV miniseries into a film (it was retitled Five Million Years to Earth in the U.S.). Fortunately, American actor Brian Donlevy has been replaced as the good professor; unfortunately, they've replaced him with Scottish actor Andrew Keir, who isn't much of an improvement. I remember being interested in this movie because of co-star Barbara Shelley, so lovely in my favorite movie, 1960's Village of the Damned. This is the first time I've seen her in color (she's a redhead!); it's also the first color Quatermass film. As usual, mankind is threatened by weird forces from outer space…the twist this time around is that it's from alien forces that have been buried underground for millions of years. The impact of the creepiness factor has weakened over the past 40+ years, and lots of the special effects are appallingly bad by today's standards (particularly the papier-mâché aliens). There a few tense scenes and a some interesting ideas, for sure, but this is only marginally an improvement over the earlier Quatermass movies. It might be interesting to try to watch the original 1958 serial. (7)



JACKIE BROWN (1997)—I recently realized that I had seen every feature film directed by Quentin Tarantino except for this one. As it was the follow-up to his blockbuster Pulp Fiction, I'm not exactly sure what kept me away from it 15 years ago; it appears to have won considerable acclaim and was a box-office hit, and re-teamed QT with his Pulp star Samuel L. Jackson. It could be that I felt I wouldn't have appreciated its homage to star Pam Grier's "blaxploitation" movies like Coffy and Foxy Brown, none of which I have seen. But I've been curious about it for some time, and especially after seeing Django Unchained last month (co-starring Jackson, natch!), it was finally time to put this on at the top of my must-see list. It turns out to be a serviceable crime drama with an exceptional cast that includes Robert DeNiro, Michael Keaton and Bridget Fonda, who has been greatly missed onscreen since she retired a decade ago. These performers, along with the deliciously evil Jackson, help lift the movie to above-average status, but while some of the trademark QT touches (i.e., unexpected violence, morbid humor) are in place, the movie is simply too long. That's a rare complaint from me for Tarantino, whose movies are generally long, but deservedly so—Kill Bill was so lengthy that it had to be split into two films! Jackie Brown in a two-hour movie that goes an extra half-hour too long, with too many belabored scenes where nothing happens. (The interminable opening credits, apparently a tribute to The Graduate, show Grier at an airport being whisked along a standing conveyor belt, Dustin Hoffman style.) I liked much of the movie, but grew tireless during some of the draggy scenes. Now that I'm up to date with Tarantino, I feel like checking out more Samuel L. Jackson movies I missed, such as True Romance and Freedomland…maybe even Snakes on a Plane! Note: I think what I'm going to remember about this movie in years to come is DeNiro's final confrontation with Fonda, which is horrifying and hilarious at the same time! I miss Fonda...it's a shame she left the business. I've already started to collect some of her other movies after enjoying her in this. (7)



UNTHINKABLE (2010)—Here's a direct-to-DVD thriller starring Samuel L. Jackson, the epitome of a movie I watched because of a previous one—my "domino" viewing habit at work. Jackson was so good in Jackie Brown, I wanted to see him at work again. In Unthinkable, he's a professional torturer called in by the U.S. government when an American Muslim terrorist hides nukes in three U.S. cities. The criminal is in custody…now what? The film explores the effectiveness of torture, balancing Jackson's no-holds-barred techniques with soft-hearted FBI agent Carrie-Anne Moss's rants that torture is not effective. Both sides make their point in what is ultimately a fairly gripping picture; the answer to the eternal question, "Does the end justify the means?" may not be answered definitively, but it does a good job of illustrating the question. Much of Unthinkable teeters on the unbelievable and hokey, but I was never bored. (8)



AGAINST THE WALL (1994)—Another Samuel L. Jackson movie from the archives! Airing on HBO only seven months before Pulp Fiction hit theaters, Sam is featured in the true-life story of the Attica prison riots of 1971. Kyle McLachlan, in his post-Twin Peaks years, is a young and naive guard at the prison where conditions and morale were deplorable, leading to the takeover of the institution by the convicts, while Jackson and Clarence Williams III play radical black Muslims who lead the revolt. The movie is more educational than entertaining; it's a real downer but did paint a chilling portrait of what went down at the correctional facility in New York. Interestingly, the movie was directed by the once critically praised John Frankenheimer, famous for having helmed Manchurian Candidate, Seven Days in May, Seconds and other famous films from the 1960s; sadly, Against the Wall never truly rises above TV-movie quality. (7)



THE LIFE AND DEATH OF COLONEL BLIMP (1943)—A deservedly long (2 hrs., 36 mins.) comedy/drama/war film that spans four decades in the life of Major General Clive Wynne-Candy (Roger Livesey, whom I enjoyed last year in I Know Where I'm Going). The ultimate Englishman, he participates in three major wars, falls in love a couple of times, and makes a lifelong friend in German soldier (Anton Walbrook). Deborah Kerr gets to play three different roles in three different decades! It's a grand old movie, in dazzling Technicolor, and often has the feel of another British film—This Happy Breed (1944), which also spans many years during wartime in Britain. Livesey gives a bravura performance, aging before our eyes very convincingly. This is one I'll want to see again in future years. (9)



THE TERMINAL (2004)—I have adored so many films starring Tom Hanks (The Green Mile, Toy Story, Forrest Gump) and so many directed by Steven Spielberg (E.T., Close Encounters, Jurassic Park) that you may well wonder how I could have missed this nine-year-old comedy-drama. My excuse: I probably dislike—or at least find mediocre—more of their work than I enjoy. Hanks in particular seems to be clueless sometimes about choosing parts (hello, Larry Crowne!). But despite mixed reviews, I decided to take a chance on this film, in which Hanks plays a European tourist with poor English skills and a huge problem: an uprising in his (fictional) country has made in impossible to either fly back home or enter the USA. So he becomes stranded at the airport and somehow manages to make a life there, even somehow gaining employment and snaring a romantic prospect (Catherine Zeta-Jones). The movie's obnoxious villain, a U.S. Customs official, is wonderfully played by Stanley Tucci, while Zoë Saldana, Chi McBride and other great character actors round out the excellent cast. This is an inspirational and moving film, another home run for Hanks and one of Spielberg's most satisfying efforts. (9)



AMOUR (2012)—This is 2012's big, acclaimed foreign film, the major Oscar contender and winner of London Critics Circle Film and Golden Globe awards. Written and directed by the Austrian filmmaker Michael Haneke, but starring French actors, the movie focuses on the longtime marriage of two retired music instructors, now in their 80s. Georges and Anna are having breakfast one morning when she briefly appears catatonic, the result of a blockage in her carotid artery. Surgery is unsuccessful and she experiences a stroke, and progressively loses more and more functionality while her husband struggles to take care of her. So no, it's not a comedy. It's a painful, depressing and often agonizingly slow-moving picture, with several scenes deliberately directed at a snail's pace, the camera lingering interminably on a character for a full minute with no action (for example). There really is really only the smallest scrap of a story here, but the elderly couple are heartbreakingly by Jean-Louis Trintignant and Emmanuelle Riva, the latter of whom withers convincingly into her woeful state. It's a sad movie, for sure, but not one that particularly moved me. (7)



MAMA (2013)—It's truly incredible how many different variations of a ghost story have been fashioned. This version starts off with a truly riveting event that leaves two small girls alone in an isolated cabin…with seemingly no one to take care of them until they are discovered in near-feral state—two Nells for the price of one! This creepy and suspenseful horror film was co-produced by Guillermo del Toro, who brings his unique touch to director Andres Muschietti's remake of his own Spanish-language short. Jessica Chastain—virtually unrecognizable as the same actress in Zero Dark Thirty—plays a punkish musician who must care for the girls after their discovery, and that's a mighty tall order considering the supernatural forces at work here. The movie maintains a brisk pace until the final ghostly confrontation, which goes on about five minutes too long. But that's a slight quibble; this is an entertaining, well-conceived, perfectly constructed chiller that contains images bound to haunt me for years to come. (9)



PARKER (2013)—A den of thieves headed up by Jason Statham conducts an elaborate robbery of a county fair. When Statham declines to contribute his share of the bounty to fund their next big swindle, he is shot and left for dead off the side of a road. He survives, and the film becomes his revenge against his would-be killers. Jennifer Lopez somehow gets conscripted into helping him. This is a lively but extremely violent crime caper with lots of shooting and more than the usual amount of gore; Statham is shot, knived and beaten but somehow never bleeds out. (One of the fights shows a knife going all the way through his hand…OUCH!) A fun and fitfully suspenseful time-killer. (8)



SPLENDOR IN THE GRASS (1961)—Back in the 1920s, handsome Warren Beatty and gorgeous Natalie Wood are high-school kids in love. What could possibly go wrong? How about agonizing sexual repression and mental illness to kick things off? Beatty, a basketball hero, wants desperately to screw Wood, but although their lust is mutual, she's been raised as a "nice girl." So, when Beatty's apparently uncontrollable urges lead him into the arms of another woman, Wood goes on a manic-depressive rampage, nearly gets raped, attempts suicide and at one point lies in a hospital nearing catatonia. The movie also demonstrates how both teens' parents are involved in this star-crossed romance. Beatty and Wood, both in their early 20s and passing themselves off as teenagers, are very good in their roles, but more entertaining are the film's cornucopia of hilarious euphemisms ("Maybe you need to find…another kind of girl," i.e., loose; "She had to have one of those awful surgeries," i.e., abortion). Splendor in the Grass is soapy and competently directed by Elia Kazan, but it contains a less-than-satisfying conclusion and left me with way too many unanswered questions. (You wonder: Has Beatty never heard of masturbation?) Still, it's worth watching for the sheer, perfect beauty and dynamic acting talents of Natalie Wood, whose West Side Story was released the same year, and for Pat Hingle's portrayal as Beatty's dad, Ace. It's also cool to see Sandy Dennis and Phyllis Diller making their silver-screen debuts. (7)



LADY FOR A DAY (1933)—Apple Annie, an aging Times Square street peddler (May Robson), is about to meet the daughter she hasn't seen in years, but there's a complication: in her letters, Annie has fibbed, telling her daughter that she's rich. Enter Dave the Dude (Warren William), a tough-talking gangster who thinks Annie brings him good luck when he gambles, so he tries to help by dressing her up as a Baroness in order to pass her off as the genuine article. Will it work? This is a Frank Capra movie, so you know there's bound to be some farce and sentimentality in the script. Indeed, there are some laughs in this pleasant comedy, but it isn't exactly top-tier Capra. (The following year brought him numerous awards with It Happened One Night). (7)



THE LOST PATROL (1934)—I close out the month with John Ford's World War I saga about British soldiers lost in the Mesopotamian desert and getting shot at by Arabs who are always behind a sand dune but never actually seen. The film starts with a dozen soldiers; one gets shot and killed at the very beginning, and after that, they go down, one after another. (This is one of those old movies where lots of people get shot, but they just fall down, with no visible wounds.) It's a pretty grim affair, but paints a gritty picture of what fighting this war was like overseas. Boris Karloff has a nice non-horror showcase role as a soldier who's a religious fanatic and slowly becoming unglued. (7)