BANG BANG BABY, THE AMINA PROFILE, VENDETTA - Reviews By Greg Klymkiw - Canucks make cool movies y'all can see this week and I be tellin' you why y'all should see them

3 Canucks Make Cool Movies 2 C now!

BANG BANG BABY

Bang Bang Baby
Dir. Jeffrey St. Jules
Starring: Jane Levy, Justin Chatwin, Peter Stormare, David Reale

Review By Greg Klymkiw

Bang Bang Baby is easily one of the strangest movie musical romantic comedies ever made. Of course, it's Canadian. No surprise here, given that le pays de castor, l'orignal et le sirop d'érable, has already generated filmmakers like John Paizs, Guy Maddin and David Cronenberg.

Set in some perversely accurate 50s-60s studio musical version of rural Canada (basically, anywhere above the 49th that isn't Toronto), this is one lively, imaginatively-directed bonbon of a picture, if you, that is, think of yummy candies as multi-coloured Haribo gummies meeting Monty Python's "Whizzo Quality Assortment" featuring delectable sweet-meat comestibles described by company owner and everyone's favourite sweetie purveyor Mr. Milton (looking not surprisingly like Terry Jones) as "Spring Surprise", in which steel bolts spring out from the chocky to "plunge straight through both cheeks" or "Crunchy Frog, the finest baby frogs, dew picked and flown from Iraq, cleansed in finest quality spring water, lightly killed, and then sealed in a succulent Swiss quintuple smooth treble cream milk chocolate envelope" and, lest we forget the chocky featuring "fresh Cornish Ram's bladder" that's been "emptied, steamed, flavoured with sesame seeds whipped into a fondue and garnished with lark's vomit.

Yes, the bonbon is that tasty.

Indeed Bang Bang Baby, in the parlance of "high concept" (Canuck-style, 'natch), is a kind of cross twixt Mario Lanza-Elvis Preseley-Gidget-Tammy-with-dashes-of-David Byrne's True Stories with a few generous dollops of Orgy of the Blood Parasites (an early title of Cronenberg's Shivers).

Lonely Arms, a magical, mythical town in a Canada we no longer know (but desperately want to) is the sleepy-time Canuck home of high-school senior and car mechanic Steffy (the drop-dead gorgeous Canuckian Kitten-with-a-whip, Jane Levy), who lives with her bitter, alcoholic former musician Dad (Peter Stormare, the man who shoved Steve Buscemi into a wood chipper in Fargo).

Steffy has the voice of an angel (as does actress Levy) and her dream is to enter an American "Ingenue of the Year" Contest. When she's selected as a finalist, Dad fears her virtue will be at stake and he unfairly (but well-meaningly) scuttles her shot at stardom. Our gal resigns herself to a life of provincial Canadian mediocrity, pumping gas for her tender-loving-lying-in-puddles-of-his-own-vomit Dad, grudgingly heading off to a school dance and drunkenly going against her otherwise good judgement and eventually accompanying a creepy rich boy (David Reale, proving again why he's one of Canada's best and funniest character actors) for a late-night drive to his family's forbidding factory on the outskirts of town. A mysterious purple-fogged chemical leak leaves poor Steffy alone on a dark country road.

Out of the mist, appears, the Elvis-like American superstar Bobby Shore (Justin Chatwin) whose car has broken down after missing a turn to Omaha and ending up in Canada. (Our American neighbours are not always too bright.) Not only is she the lad's biggest fan, but she can fix his car.

Once she starts belting out her show-stopping tunes, it doesn't take Bobby too long to realize that she's quite the catch. Crooning and dancing against a plethora of gorgeously fake old-movie-studio-style backdrops, our made-for-each-other couple look like they're going to find happiness and live happily ever after.

However, I hope you haven't forgotten the aforementioned chemical leak from the factory. If you think this movie is weird, I can assure you, in the words of Al Jolson, "You ain't seen nothing yet!"

Without spoiling the rest of the picture for you, I will only say this: icky parasites begin to grown within the bodies of the citizenry of Lonely Arms.

And they are mutating.

Oops, mutants on the way.

Bang Bang Baby won last year's Best Canadian First Feature Film Award at the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF 2014). Clearly the Awards Jury were swept away by director St. Jules's cornucopia of imagination. And yes, said mad vision runs gloriously rampant through the picture.

Still, its period and post-modern details only partially work. Many of the film's oddball touches are stunning, but an equal number of them feel forced and even occasionally anachronistic in many of the wrong ways. The usually reliable Stormare feels like he's sleepwalking through his role (looking aimlessly for the punch-clock and pay cheque) and though Chatwin makes for a decent romantic lead, I was a bit thrown off by his look, especially the Elsa Lanchester Bride of Frankenstein-like hairdo.

The film's inherent silliness is always a treat, though, and wisely, St. Jules never plunges into the kind of over-the-top that might have been swathed in globs of horrendous whimsy. Besides, leading lady Levy delivers a knock 'em dead performance and the genuinely great song-score has the kind of hum-ability to annoy you in all the right ways - as in, you can't get the bloody tunes out of your noggin, especially the title number.

Oh, and there are mutants. As a Canadian, I accept this.

THE FILM CORNER RATING: ***½ 3-and-a-half-stars

Bang Bang Baby is a Search Engine Films release that plays from August 21 at Toronto's Varsity, Vancouver's Fifth Avenue and Montreal's Forum, with expanded release in other Canadian cities to follow.

*NOTE* In an earlier version of this article, I reported how shocked I was that Bang Bang Baby won the Best Canadian Feature Film prize over Albert Shin's In Her Place. This was a huge error as BBB was the recipient of the Best First Feature Film Prize, which makes total sense. (Shin's film is not a first feature.) I had successfully managed to repress all knowledge of the ever-so-slight Felix and Meira which did win the overall best feature prize. Pardon the brain fart, but I do tend to shuttle some films deep into a dark closet - not because they're bad, but because they're so egregiously unmemorable.

THE AMINA PROFILE

The Amina Profile (2015)
Dir. Sophie Deraspe

Review By Greg Klymkiw

Set against the turbulent backdrop of war-and-revolution in contemporary Syria we meet Sandra Bagaria, one hot French-Canadian babe in Montreal and Amina Arraf, one hot Syrian-American babe in Damascus. They meet online. They're young. They're in love. They're lesbians. Okay. That's it. Go see the movie.

READ THE FULL REVIEW of The Amina Profile from Hot Docs 2015 HERE

THE FILM CORNER RATING: **** Four Stars

The Amina Profile is a Les Films du 3 mars presentation opening theatrically August 21, 2015 at the Bloor Hot Docs Cinema. For dates, times and fix, visit the cinema's website HERE

VENDETTA

Vendetta (2015)
Dir. Jen and Sylvia Soska
Scr. Justin Shady
Starring: Dean Cain, Paul "The Big Show" Wight, Michael Eklund, Kyra Zagorsky

Review By Greg Klymkiw

Let's get to the meat of the matter in this kick-ass prison picture by everyone's favourite Beautiful and Talented Hungarian-Canadian twins in Beautiful British Columbia - the action and violence. The Soska Sisters (American Mary) do not disappoint in this regard. Their direction goes far beyond just covering the thwacks, whacks, kicks, testicle-twisting and gore in a perfunctory manner, nor do they resort to the usual wham-bam with no sense of spatiality. I was delighted that they placed a fair degree of faith in actors who could clearly fight, some superb stunt choreography/coordination and a few occasional frissons like the makeshift "brass" knuckles Danvers creates and uses with sweet abandon.

As a side note, it is incumbent of me to point out that the one prison movie cliche sadly missing from Vendetta are a few instances of forcible sodomy and blow jobs. Most disappointing. What gives? Even a dull, inexplicably beloved piece of crap like The Shawshank Redemption had a decent anal rape scene.

But, I digress.

READ THE FULL REVIEW of Vendetta HERE

THE FILM CORNER RATING: ***½

Vendetta is now available on BLU-RAY via Lions Gate.

THE FRONT PAGE - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Great Kino-Lorber Blu-Ray of 1931 Classic

The Front Page (1931)
Dir. Lewis Milestone
Starring: Adolphe Menjou, Pat O'Brien, Mary Brian, Mae Clark, Frank McHugh,
Edward Everett Horton, Slim Summerville, Clarence Wilson, George E. Stone,
Frank McHugh, Maurice Black, Clarence H. Wilson, Gustav von Seyffertitz

Review By Greg Klymkiw

Bro-o-o-omance, nothing really gay about it
Not, that there's anything wrong with being gay
Ay-ay-ay!
Bromance ,
Shouldn't be ashamed or hide it
I love you in the most heterosexual way.
- Chester See & Ryan Higa

Everyone knows and loves the Howard Hawks-directed screwball romantic comedy His Girl Friday, a great picture about shady Chicago editor Walter Burns (Cary Grant) and his attempts to keep his best reporter Hildy Johnson (Rosalind Russell) from getting married and leaving the newspaper business, especially when a big story is breaking; the hanging of a convicted murderer who claims innocence, escapes and hides in the courthouse press room. Of course, Walter loves Hildy and deep down she loves him too. If anything, Walter's real modus operandi is to scuttle the marriage of Hildy to her straight-laced fiancé played by Ralph Bellamy.

How many of you are familiar with The Front Page? Based on the hit play by Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur and directed by Lewis (All Quiet on the Western Front) Milestone, it's a great picture about shady Chicago editor Walter Burns (Adolphe Menjou) and his attempts to keep his best reporter Hildy Johnson (Pat O'Brien) from getting married and leaving the newspaper business, especially when a big story is breaking; the hanging of a convicted murderer who claims innocence, escapes and hides in the courthouse press room. Walter loves Hildy and deep down he loves him too. If anything, Walter's real modus operandi is to scuttle the marriage of Hildy to his straight-laced fiancé played by Mary Brian.

Even though The Front Page falls within the relaxed pre-Code days and all manner of not-so-subtle homoeroticism could have crept into the film, this is never the intent (well, not mostly). The Front Page might well be the first BRO-mance in American cinema. Walter and Hildy have no intention of sucking face or slamming their respective schwances up each other's Hershey Highways (though if given half the chance, they might).

They love each other, like men - REAL MEN! And not to disparage homoeroticism at all, but to describe Walter and Hildy's love, allow me to present a few more lyrics from the See/Higa song:

If I loved you more I might be a gay
And when I'm feeling down
You know just what to say
You my homie,
Yeah you know me
And if you ever need a wingman
I'd let any girl blow me off
Cuz you're more important than the rest

Milestone's film, produced by Howard Hughes, fell into public domain and has been duped and duped from dupes from dupes and then from other dupes so many times over the years, that inferior copies have had a clear effect upon making the picture seem creaky and vaguely unwatchable.

Not anymore. With this restoration we can now delight in what really makes this picture tick. And boy, does it tick. Like a time bomb and then some.

In the play, all of the action takes place in the courthouse press room. Director Milestone and screenwriters Bartlett Cormack and Charles Lederer (the latter being the scenarist responsible for His Girl Friday) stay relatively true to the play, but occasionally open things up, but only in the most naturalistic manner. The dialogue blasts a few million miles per second and the milieu is appropriately grungy, replete with plenty of garbage strewn about and clouds of cigarette smoke.

The cast is full of terrific character actor mugs, wrapping their lips around the sharp-edged lines with all the snap, crackle and pop money could by. These men are inveterate bad husbands, gamblers, drunks, lice of the highest order, BUT they are great journalists, laying in wait for the kill like a pack of hyenas.

Milestone's camera brilliantly captures the claustrophobic atmosphere of the setting without choking us on theatrical sawdust. His camera moves deftly and fluidly, but when he needs to, he lets it sit to let the great dialogue do the talking - knowing full well that there's nothing more cinematic than scintillating banter. On stage, the importance of the telephones connected to the reporters' various outlets could not be stressed enough, but with Milestone's direction, it's not only paramount, but his coverage of moments when the men all grab the phones has the rat-a-tat-tat power of a machine gun.

Pat O'Brien, who spent most of his career as a happy go lucky Irishman and/or priest, gets a rare opportunity here to indulge in his manner-than-manly qualities as Hildy. The dapper Adolphe Menjou is easily matched with Cary Grant's eventual shot at the role of the scurrilous newspaper editor Walter Burns. A supporting standout is the persnickety Edward Everett Horton as the fey reporter with a cleanliness fixation. Mary Brian acquits herself beautifully as O'Brien's lady in love and Mae Clark (known as the Baron's wife in James Whale's Frankenstein and as the moll whom Chaney pulverizes in the face with a grapefruit in The Public Enemy delivers one of the film's best performances as Molly Malloy, the hapless hooker with a heart of gold who desperately attempts to protect the innocent killer. She's so moving, it's hard not to get choked up over her selflessness and kindness.

Where The Front Page really crackles is its deeply black humour and satirical jabs at the entire business of both the media and politics. One hilariously nasty scene has reporter Frank McHugh questioning a woman victimized by a Peeping Tom while all the other guys in the press room bellow out catcalls and lewd, rude remarks. Another scene has a boneheaded Austrian psychiatrist (a great little cameo by Gustav von Seyffertitz) ordered to do a final examination of the falsely convicted killer. He wants the killer to recreate his crime and moronically requests the sheriff's gun (who even more moronically gives it up) and then hands the loaded pistol to the condemned man who, partially in fear and partially under hypnosis, fills the court-appointed psychiatrist full of lead. Even more hilarious is when Walter gets his hired thug Diamond Lou (a deliciously sleazy Maurice Black) kidnap Hildy's future mother-in-law to keep her trap shut when she discovers the secret behind the big scoop the boys are onto.

Bitingly funny and oddly prescient is the fact that the poor condemned man is being railroaded by the Mayor and Sheriff to garner the African-American vote since the murder victim was one of Chicago's very few Black police officers. Neither clearly cares about any of this, save for getting re-elected. To see a film 85 years old, a comedy no less, dealing with such charged political material makes one realize just how bad and empty most comedies are today.

Dark political humour aside, The Front Page, like its gender-switching remake His Girl Friday IS about love: love for the newspaper business, love for the company of other men and most of all, love between Walter and Hildy. Don't get me wrong, The Front Page allows us, like the cake we can have and eat it too, male-female romance in addition to the aforementioned manly BRO-mantic hijinx. I have to admit, though, that the machinations of Walter Burns to keep Hildy Johnson in the business, as well as a remarkable scene where the two men begin to reminisce about all their adventures together, IS downright warm, funny AND romantic.

For those who know and love His Girl Friday, The Front Page makes a lovely companion piece. You might even learn to love it just as much. If you don't know either, watch Milestone's film first, then Hawks', then cherish both forever.

THE FILM CORNER RATING: ***** 5 Stars

The Front Page is available on a gorgeous Blu-Ray from Kino-Lorber. The picture and sound have never looked this good, however, the source material will eventually require an insanely meticulous, frame-by-frame going-over to remove over 85 years of wear and tear. The extras are simple, but such a thing of beauty, that this is probably one of the outstanding Blu-Ray home entertainment releases of the year. In addition to the inclusion of promo materials, two original radio broadcasts (one starring Walter Winchell) and a great little documentary about the Library of Congress film restoration program, this release features one of the best commentary tracks I've heard in years for any classic motion picture. Filmmaker, historian and home entertainment producer Bret Wood delivers a track that's entirely free of the usual crap on these things: no stupid anecdotal stuff, tons of great info about the film that even I didn't know before (and that takes some doing) and I thoroughly appreciated the variety of sources he uses (including whether they're corroborated or not). Wood's track is not only superbly researched, but his delivery is also terrific: clear, enthusiastic, but without sounding like a fanboy and NOT (thank God) sounding dry and academic. This is a stellar Blu-Ray that's well worth owning. It's a keeper!!!

THE TWILIGHT SAGA: ECLIPSE - Review By Greg Klymkiw - There's so little to bother discussing about this dreadful pile of crap and third in the interminable series, that we're forced to discuss the hunky, mouth-watering pecs and abs of Taylor Lautner and how awful the cinemas are which were first launched with the theatrical release of this "film".

The Twilight Saga: Eclipse (2010) dir. David Slade
Starring: Kristin Stewart, Robert Pattinson, Taylor Lautner, Bryce Dallas Howard

Review By Greg Klymkiw

Wading through this vat of raw sewage, I came to the conclusion that only one of two types of people in this world might enjoy watching it - those who have a good time nailing their titties or testes to the floor and/or completely brain dead vegetables.

There is, however, a third.

I wandered into the living room this weekend to find my sharp, quick-witted daughter watching this movie on Blu-Ray. "Why do you keep watching these Twilight movies over and over again?" I asked. She put the picture on pause. The horrifying image of Taylor Lautner's pectorals greeted me. She looked at me with that typical teenage expression which says, "Why do you think I'm watching this?" She then assured me that the next movie she'd be watching was Pitch Perfect 2. "And don't worry, Dad" she added. "I'll still watch a depressing Italian Neo-Realist movie with you tonight."

Relief.

In any event, I'm compelled to discuss The Twilight Saga: Eclipse because of this event, but I find I have little to say and much bile to expel.

Replete with endless, dull, poorly written conversations punctuated occasionally with uninspired, sloppily directed bursts of violence, I can only shake my head in disgust at how low our civilization is sinking. Call me a curmudgeon, assume I am pathetically uncool, accuse me of sounding like my father - I don't particularly care. Today's youth - those who actually think this crap is good - are pathetic, pure and simple.

When I was a lad, my idea of a vampire movie included great actors like Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee squaring off as vampire hunter and vampire respectively against the backdrop of garish colour schemes. heaving bosoms and atmosphere thicker than Shelley Winters's waistline in the original Poseidon Adventure.

The first instalment of Twilight at least had the virtue of a relatively well-directed and watchable opening 40-or-so minutes. The second helping was a complete mess. Now, due to millions of boneheads watching the previous entries, Hollywood has foisted upon us a third portion of this interminable "saga". I use the word "saga" loosely, if at all, only because the filmmakers have chosen, somewhat erroneously to include it in the title and thus, label it as such.

A saga in the traditional sense would normally have something resembling epic qualities, which this film and its predecessors are sorely lacking. In fact, much of the world created by the movie feels - in spite of being set against the great outdoors backdrop of Washington State - strangely claustrophobic. The soap-operatic ruminations of the three central characters belong on weekday afternoon television, not a big screen.

This is not to say that melodrama is out of place in vampire and werewolf tales, as it is indeed the backbone of such genre items. That said, there's good melodrama and bad melodrama. The legendary Dan Curtis delivered a consistently creepy and sexy horror soap opera on his daily television serial Dark Shadows in the 60s and wowed us with an astounding big-screen version in the 70s called House of Dark Shadows.

Alas, these first three Twilight pictures (a godawful money-grab-of-a-two-parter followed) are rooted in revisionism of the clunkiest kind and are so gently precious and tame that they not only drag the whole genre down, but, as stated earlier, reflect the pathetic state of today's youth for buying into such pap.

Again, we who are possessed of brain cels must suffer through the triangle established in the second instalment New Moon involving Bella (Kristen Stewart), the mixed-up mortal with a desire to become a vampire and her romantic obsessions with the pale, thin bloodsucker Edward (Robert Pattinson) and the buff werewolf Jacob (Taylor Lautner). The details beyond this are meaningless save for the physical attributes of the film's third wheel in the menage of monster-lovin'.

Lautner's pectorals and abs of steel are genuinely impressive and might have even rivalled the milky cleavage content of Hammer Horror pictures if everything else in the movie was as awe-inspiring as his shirtless glory. It's not. In fact, the shirtless man-boy Lautner-pectoral-porn on display is as wasted as John Travolta wearing those delicious form-fitting shorts in the ill-fated Moment By Moment where we were forced to succumb to the vomit-inducing sight of him having to swap saliva with Lily Tomlin.

This episode of Twilight is especially disturbing since it is helmed by a solid director. David Slade, who delivered the tense, creepy Hard Candy and the genuinely malevolent 30 Days of Night, one of the scariest vampire pictures in years, seems largely absent here. The dialogue scenes are covered like a standard dramatic television series, the action sequences are poorly shot and choppily edited and the whole enterprise is so bereft of suspense and style, that one assumes Slade did a paint-by-numbers job in order to secure himself bankability by handing over an unexceptional platter of mediocrity to satiate the boneheads who moronically continue to make this franchise a hit. Either that, or the studio interference was just so ludicrous, that he settled for cashing his cheques and punching the time clock.

About the only thing worth discussing is that I first saw the picture five-years-ago in one of the then-new theatres in Canada that the Cineplex chain branded and expanded (with a healthy price-grab from consumers) as "UltraAVX" - a supposedly new and exciting approach to motion picture exhibition. I'll agree that the digital image is unbeatable - utterly pristine and crystal clear. The sound is also successfully "immersive" as described - in fact, it's so effective that at times, the bass seems to almost make you jiggle in your seat not unlike that of the 70s oddball exhibition feature called "Sensurround ".

The three other major attributes of UltraAVX are less impressive. The wall to wall screen is as advertised, but the top and bottom of the frame's not masked properly. It's a little more than annoying as it takes one out of the supposedly immersive quality of the image. The bigger, supposedly more comfortable rocker chairs in these cinemas are, in fact, extremely uncomfortable - one sinks into them too deeply and the rocking-effect pulls you back too far.

In fact, for all the hype about this new seating, leg-room is still an issue in UltraAVX cinemas. Ironically, when they first burst upon the scene, ushers annoyingly paraded back and forth telling people to take their feet off the chairs in front of them. Now they annoying saunter in every half hour or so with the lowly heads ever-so low and go down to the front of the cinema to flick on a flashlight and annoying scribble something on a sheet of paper affixed to the wall before departing in the manner they arrived.

Finally, the reserved seating feature is just a major pain (and price-grab). If you're stuck anywhere near boneheads blabbing or eating with their mouths open (the latter an especially common and disgusting habit in movie theatres these days) then moving to a different seat becomes problematic. Luckily, I prefer the front row (which is always empty) and I just sit there instead of listening to people eat popcorn and nacho chips more grotesquely than pigs at a trough.

Then again, maybe movies like the Twilight series are perfect for UltraAVX since the cinemas purport to bring back the magic showmanship of movie-going, but are designed to appeal to undiscriminating, mindless, swill-lapping hogs.

THE FILM CORNER RATING: * One-Star

All the Twilight movies, including this one, are available on various and endless special Blu-Ray and DVD editions from that entity of quality, E-One Entertainment.

THUNDERBOLT AND LIGHTFOOT - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Classic 70s Heist/Buddy Picture

Thunderbolt and Lightfoot (1974)
Dir. Michael Cimino
Starring: Clint Eastwood, Jeff Bridges, George Kennedy,
Geoffrey Lewis, Catherine Bach, Gary Busey, Bill McKinney, Dub Taylor

Review By Greg Klymkiw

"I don't think of us as criminals, you know? I feel we accomplished something. A good job. I feel proud of myself, man. I feel like a hero."
- Jeff Bridges as "Lightfoot" in Thunderbolt and Lightfoot

The big sky of Montana has never looked quite as beautiful as it does in Michael (The Deer Hunter) Cimino's directorial debut, Thunderbolt and Lightfoot, but every so often an object, seemingly innocent on the surface, enters the frame and its mere presence takes on a strange kind of malevolence - as if that big sky is bearing witness to potential chaos amidst the natural, peaceful order of the dazzling sun beaming down upon the flat, limitless ocean of prairies.

The opening wide shots of a church should feel at home here, but the structure just doesn't feel right, its spire jutting up aberrantly from the Earth. Hymns of worship waft gently in the wind across the fields; innocent enough until a lone vehicle enters the frame and moves slowly amidst the empty, parked cars of the parishioners within. Whatever natural order exists, we're sure something's seriously amiss.

That big old American sky, the brilliant white church and the rolling fields are little more than a piping hot apple pie cooling in the summer breeze, but its insides are harbouring a pulpy sweet mash laced with arsenic. It's America, don't you know. The preacher seems amiable enough, his parishioners all eyes and ears, but when the front doors burst open and two gents adorned in shades and tacky dark sport coats brandish firearms, America the Beautiful gets just a little less so.

It's a big, old American film, too, so in short order we realize the Preacher is Clint Eastwood, no genuine Man of the Cloth, but a Man in Hiding and the mysterious gents, the bulky, malevolent carrot-topped George Kennedy and his sidekick, none other than Geoffrey Lewis, the short, wiry little man with the bug-eyes are hell-bent on blasting the fake preacher to Kingdom Come.

It's one hell of an opening and it doesn't get less intense as guns blaze and Eastwood hightails across an open prairie with the slavering madmen in pursuit until, as Good Old Fashioned American Luck will have it, a genial car thief, played no less than by the blondy-locked pretty boy Jeff Bridges, barrels along a country road and provides rescue and flight for our preacher, who by now we know, is no preacher.

Bridges assumes as much also as he quips, "You ain't no country preacher, Preacher."

If this were a classic romantic comedy, which it kind of is, since Thunderbolt and Lightfoot is very much in the tradition of 70s American bro-mances like Scarecrow, Midnight Cowboy, California Split and Your Three Minutes Are Up, one might refer to this mad, action-packed first meeting twixt eventual best buddies Eastwood and Bridges as a "meet-cute" (albeit with guns blazing and big American cars roaring across open roads).

And though on the surface, Thunderbolt and Lightfoot is a crime picture with a major bank heist as its central set piece, make no mistake - this is a road movie romantic comedy, a kind of It Happened One Night with lots of snappy one-liners and big, really big, guns.

And lest we forget, all those big, glorious American cars our heroes keep stealing as they make their way across Montana State, are the vehicles of choice as opposed to the Dirty 30s buses and trains of Capra's great classic.

Though Cimino handles the action with the skill he honed and brought to bear years later with The Deer Hunter and Year of the Dragon (as well as the sheer visual majesty of Heaven's Gate), this is first and foremost an ambling, episodic buddy road movie; character-driven and full of all manner of oddball narrative touches.

At the heart of the film are our two title characters - mismatched from the start, but gradually finding the common ground that makes for deep love and friendship. Eastwood's "Thunderbolt" is older, wiser and more cynically realistic than his nutty wisecracking little buddy Lightfoot. He's clearly from the post-Korea-post-Vietnam generation who served loyally and got bupkis for it in the real world. Lightfoot is the "hippie" - all youthful ideals and a sense of humour that keeps cracking the shell of his "old man" best buddy.

Like lovers, they're made for each other, the same way opposites attract. Perhaps overriding it all, though is a combination of big-brother-little-brother and perhaps even father and son. One of the more moving and sadly prophetic moments in the film is when the eager Lightfoot happily and boastfully feels like the two men could be legendary.

"Thunderbolt and Lightfoot," Bridges beams. "You know, that really sounds like something." Then he adds, with jokey pride in Thunderbolt's direction, "Hey, you stick with me kid. You do and you're gonna live forever."

It's a moment that strangely parallels a later scene when Eastwood looks at Bridges and says "You don't look so good, kid." Bridges replies, probably with the line that nabbed him his first Oscar nomination, "I believe you're right."

Eastwood's Thunderbolt has been around Hell's block a few times and back again. He's been to war and he knows enough to realize that "back home" is just another battleground - nobody, lives forever, anywhere, anytime. This is especially true given that are buddies eventually hook up with the crazy-ass criminal cranks from the film's opening. George Kennedy's Red Leary has meanness hard-wired into his DNA and he takes an immediate dislike to Lightfoot - so much so that he reminds the lad that Thunderbolt and he "go back a long way. But you don't mean nothin' to me, understand? Nothin'!" Lightfoot asks him why he tried to kill Thunderbolt if they were so close.

"Because," Red Leary snarls (in George Kennedy's trademark rancourous tone), "Because we were friends."

Nothing in Thunderbolt and Lightfoot ever feels quite right and it's what makes the film so special. Like the natural beauty dappled with occasional intrusions of malevolence, Cimino's screenplay takes numerous strange turns as it moves towards the inevitable big heist and eventual series of bad-guy fallouts. Even then, Cimino's story shocks and surprises and we're eventually left with a big old American movie - as grand and elegiac as the big old skies of Montana.

It's kind of like when Eastwood furrows his brow upon first hearing Bridges' name "Lightfoot" and asks him if it's an "Indian" name.

"Nope," Bridges replies. "Just American."

THE FILM CORNER RATING: **** 4-Stars

Thunderbolt and Lightfoot is available on Kino-Lorber DVD.
In Canada ORDER HERE
In USA ORDER HERE

MR. NOBODY - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Something execrable to blame the French for

Mr. Nobody (2010)
dir. Jaco Van Dormael
Starring: Jared Leto, Diane Kruger, Linh Dan Pham and Sarah Polley

Review By Greg Klymkiw

Oh joy! Just what the world needed! More whimsy in the cinema!

For this, I blame the French.

Though the director of this godawful pastiche of science fiction, magic realism and whimsy Jaco Van Dormael is a Belgian filmmaker, let us not forget that Belgium itself borders on France and half its population, the Walloons, speak French.

As much as I'd prefer to blame the movie on the Walloons, the fact remains that this Belgian-French-German-Canadian patchwork quilt co-production has a much greater French pedigree than mere Walloonery will allow. So again, let's do the math by examining the French content of the co-production entities: half of Belgium speaks French, Belgium borders France, Germany was obsessed with occupying France and one of Canada's official languages is French.

The sum of the above is clear. We can blame the French with no guilt whatsoever.

In fact, by the end of Mr. Nobody, I was reminded of the lyrics penned by Mel Brooks and sung by the inimitable Dom De Luise in Blazing Saddles:

Throw out your hands/Stick out your tush/Hands on your hips/Give 'em a push/You'll be surprised/You're doing the French Mistake/Voila!

Yes, Voila! A French Mistake, indeed!

When this film was first released theatrically, we were inflicted, around the same time with the release of Jeunet's execrable (and French, 'natch) vat of whimsy Micmacs. Mr. Nobody, a dreadfully pretentious movie that purports to be about something, is finally so confusing and tedious, that it's ultimately not about much of anything at all. And unlike Micmacs, which at least tried (pathetically) to be funny, Mr. Nobody is mind-numbingly humourless.

That said, what might have perked things up in Mr. Nobody could have been a few digitally-rendered appearances from the late, great Chief Dan George as Old Lodge Skins from Arthur Penn's film adaptation of Little Big Man. Given the film's reliance on endless, trippy digital effects, this is not such an odd expectation, especially since our title character Mr. Nobody appears in the opening with Jared Leto (the go-to guy when Jake Gyllenhaal isn't available and, of course in Jake's case, vice-versa) in full old-man makeup, not unlike Dustin Hoffman's Jack Crabb. Being interviewed by a dweeby journalist, not unlike the one played by William Hickey in Penn's seminal 70s western, Mr. Nobody, it seems, is the oldest man alive in a dystopian future.

And boy, does he have a whopper to tell, not unlike Jack Crabb in Little Big Man.

Hell, why didn't Jaco Van Dormael go for a digital merging of Chief Dan George, Dustin Hoffman and Jared Leto in these sequences? It might have made the whole affair palatable. (Well, not really, but it would have been good for a few laughs.)

In reality, it seems Mr. Nobody is a man living in a world where everyone has become immortal except for him and he's part of some odd reality-TV death-watch because he has not succumbed to the stem-cell thing-a-muh-bobby that keeps everyone else in the film alive. He eventually begins to tell his story to the reporter and what we get is a story that gives us several versions of his life, most notably three different relationships with three women he loved, or could have loved, or should have loved (Kruger, Pham and Polley).

Or, uh, something like that. Who the fuck knows?

In his dotage and on the verge of death, he contemplates whether he made the right decisions in his life. The tale is told in triplicate and appears to be rooted in two significant moments from his childhood. This is, however, one of the film's many problems. We're shown how his life could have been when he's forced to choose between living with his mother and father when they decide to separate. We see his life with Mom and then with Dad. But as well, the other significant fork-in-the-road moment occurs when he spies three different little girls - all of whom become his wife in the different imaginings of where his life does indeed go.

Well, which is it? The first or the second? Why both? Well, because the director wanted it this way, that's why. He assumed, no doubt, that it would give him more options to deliver a "mind-blowing" series of stories.

Not content with this incongruity, Van Dormael presents the entire thing in a hodge-podge whilst tossing out teasing references to the "butterfly effect" and "quantum theory". Flash forwards, flash backs - here, there and everywhere - are all presented to be significant with a capital "S".

I was reminded, somewhat, of Kurt Vonnegut's great book (and George Roy Hill's terrific film adaptation of it) "Slaughterhouse Five" where we bounce between past, present and future. It made sense there because the central character Vonnegut creates is "unstuck in time" - a joyous and painful predicament since the character must, for an eternity, experience his birth, life and death. This fractured, intricately-etched approach to presenting the narrative was rooted strongly in the science-fiction "logic" of the piece, whereas a similar approach in Mr. Nobody is there, simply because Van Dormael wants it to be there. Even worse is that the fragmented nature of the movie seems to pull a Christopher ("One Idea") Nolan Memento reverse order to the events.

I think.

Whatever, this movie is dreadful enough without conjuring up memories of Nolan's pretentious 2000 pretence-o-rama neo-noir twaddle.

One of the more idiotic touches in Mr. Nobody is the name chosen for Mr. Nobody in his younger years which is... okay, now wait for it...Nemo.

I mean, Good God! NEMO!!!??? Is writer-director Jaco Van Dormael on crack? Does he really expect us all to "ooohhh" and "aaaahhh" over the apparent genius and GREAT SIGNIFICANCE of naming the younger version of Mr. Nobody with a word meaning "no man" or, if you will, "no one" in Latin. This reference also conjures up that of Captain Nemo in Jules Verne's "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea", but I suspect Von Dormael was more inspired by the dark fairytale qualities of the brilliant turn of the century comic strip "Little Nemo in Slumberland". If only Mr. Nobody proved to be as significant and original as that work.

It's not.

Mr. Nobody is one of those boneheaded exercises that pretends to be more intelligent than it is. Von Dormael, no doubt, believes in his "genius" and so do the audiences that smugly believe they're watching great art. They can be dazzled by the striking visuals and non-linear quality in order to feel good that what they're indulging in is not a machine-tooled Hollywood blockbuster from Michael Bay.

Van Dormael has created the greatest aesthetic crime - far greater than anything Michael Bay has foisted upon us - he's machine-tooled an art film for dummies.

There's not much to recommend here. However, poor Leto does what he can with the ludicrous role foisted upon him and the movie does feature a great performance from Sarah Polley as one of Nemo's wives. Playing a bi-polar housewife, Polley takes the kind of chances and delivers the kind of performance that proves once again why she's one of the world's great actresses. She's raw and real, unlike the rest of Van Dormael's candy-floss "complexity". But seeing as Polley also appears in Vincenzo Natali's terrific 2009 Splice, you're better off seeing that. You get a great Sarah Polley performance in a movie that respects its audience and manages to serve up something that's as entertaining as it is intelligent.

All that Mr. Nobody serves up, is the pathetic work of one pretentious, overrated, talentless hack:

Jaco Van Dormael.

He's the real Mr. Nobody.

THE FILM CORNER'S LOWEST RATING:
THE TURD DISCOVERED BEHIND HARRY'S
CHAR-BROIL & DINING LOUNGE
Click HERE for a full explanation of this woeful rating.

Mr. Nobody is available on Magnolia Home Entertainment Blu-Ray and DVD. And get this, it's available separately as an EXTENDED director's cut for all those who might enjoy some cinematic self-flagellation.

TWO DAYS ONE NIGHT - Film Corner Criterion Blu-Ray Review By Thomas Zachary Toles

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about Thomas Zachary Toles

Two Days, One Night (2014)
Dir. Jean-Pierre & Luc Dardenne
Starring: Marion Cotillard, Fabrizio Rongione, Timur Magomedgadzhiev, Pili Groyne, Simon Caudry, Catherine Salée, Baptiste Sornin, Alain Eloy, Myriem Akheddiou, Fabienne Sciascia, Hicham Slaoui

Film Corner Guest Review
By Thomas Zachary Toles

Unembellished Beauty in Two Days, One Night

In Two Days, One Night (Deux jours, une nuit), the Dardenne brothers wield their harsh naturalistic style to position viewers amidst the often humiliating anguish of financially strained working class life. Yet, through the pain, a sensitive humanistic viewpoint emerges. The numerous figures who populate the story are not romantic evocations of poverty nor are there any cane-twirling villains. The film is a gorgeous series of vulnerable conversations in understatedly dire circumstances. The Dardennes create stunning tension by pitting the ordinary there-ness of its characters against the prodigious capitalist forces surrounding and constricting them.

After Sandra (Marion Cotillard) suffers a nervous breakdown, her not-so-sunny coworkers at the solar panel factory learn that they will each receive a €1000 bonus if she is made redundant. The whole affair is put to a depraved vote, leaving Sandra with two days and one night to beg each of her colleagues to put her above themselves. Sandra methodically approaches as many of her coworkers as she can reach, finding some understanding, some fearful, others furious. She, and the filmmakers, are keenly aware of the emotional power of a face, up close and personal. Sandra’s goal is not so much to make a complex argument as to bare her pathetic humanity to those who have plenty to gain by ignoring it.

I typically expect to like Cotillard more than I do. In James Gray’s The Immigrant, I found her unable to rise above the sanctimonious suffering of the character as written. With the Dardennes, however, Cotillard seems unflinchingly exposed, internalizing her character’s intermittent ugliness. Her strength is impressive without revelling in the glory of “I-am-victim-hear-me-roar.” The rest of the actors all pull their weight to fill the drab, industrial landscape with a careworn community.

Sandra’s biggest obstacle, larger than her depressive anxiety and medication dependence, is shame. And while the filmmakers are sympathetic to her desperate mission, they are equally careful to imbue each of her targets with their fair share of desperate humanity. With each rejection Sandra faces, she and the viewer are painfully reminded of the costs of her victory. Even the true hard asses, as Renoir put it, have their reasons—no relationship in the film is shallow.

Even the seemingly inexhaustible support of Manu (Fabrizio Rongione), Sandra’s husband, is undercut by Sandra’s suggestion that he no longer loves her. The film leaves it ambiguous whether Sandra’s assessment is a purely deluded symptom of her misery or if Manu’s efforts are fuelled more by pity than affection. His uncompromising aid keeps her going but it is possible that Manu, on some level, views her employment as a guilt-cleansing prerequisite for their future separation.

In many ways, the film is a hate letter to the capitalist system that makes its premise possible. The situation will be settled by twisted democracy, a practice that seems far more barbaric than it is typically regarded. To maintain the mediocre status quo at work, more than half of the employees must choose to vote against their own self-interest on a piece of paper marked either “Sandra” or “Bonus.” It is no surprise that many have trouble empathizing. Even if Sandra wins, those who saw their bonuses as essential may not soon forget what she took from them. In the end, Sandra is presented with a prototypical paradox of capitalist reasoning.

Yet, despite the bleak scenario, the film is not bereft of hope. It insists upon the importance of fellowship in impossible circumstances. When Sandra’s pleas meet an understanding ear, the faint burst of buoyancy is palpable. In one scene, after she has interrupted Timur’s (Timur Magomedgadzhiev) soccer to wearily recite her petition, his apologetic collapse restores some bewildered life to Sandra’s features.

The monumental emotional payoff of the film’s final scenes is made possible by the Dardennes’ patient pacing. We are forced to fully experience the arduousness and excess of Sandra’s journey, rendering the seemingly brief period described in the film’s title as both fleeting and endless.

Over the course of that weekend, the filmmakers present numerous characters honestly and delicately. One by one, we are gently acquainted with different voices, postures, mannerisms. Each figure independently may not leave an immediate impression. But at the end of the film, when Sandra sees the now familiar faces who voted for her gathered together in a single room, the sheer humanity on display is overwhelming. The frame is simply saturated with personhood, bursting at the seams with prosaic beauty.

My chest tightened; I could hardly bear to look.

Therein, in the unembellished revelation of people as they are, lies one of cinema’s greatest gifts.

THE FILM CORNER RATING: *****

Two Days, One Night will be released 8/25/15 on Blu-Ray and DVD via the Criterion Collection with a new 2K digital master, supervised by director of photography Alain Marcoen and approved by directors Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne, with 5.1 surround DTS-HD Master Audio soundtrack on the Blu-ray. Added value supplements include new interviews with the Dardennes and actors Marion Cotillard and Fabrizio Rongione, When Léon M.’s Boat Went Down the Meuse for the First Time (1979), a forty-minute documentary by the Dardennes, featuring a new introduction by the directors, a new tour of the film’s key locations with the directors, To Be an I, a new video essay by critic Kent Jones, the trailer, an essay by critic Girish Shambu and new cover design by Eric Skillman.

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THE KILLERS (1964) - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Don ("Invasion of the Body Snatchers") Siegel. Gene ("Star Trek") Coons. Ronald Reagan. Lee Marvin. John Cassavetes. Angie Dickinson. Clu Gulager. Criterion Collection. Blu-Ray. 'Nuff Said.

The Killers (1964)
Dir. Don Siegel
Scr. Gene L. Coon
Starring: Lee Marvin, John Cassavetes,
Angie Dickinson, Ronald Reagan, Clu Gulager, Claude Akins, Norman Fell

Review By Greg Klymkiw

"It's not only the money. Maybe we get that and maybe we don't. But I gotta find out what makes a man decide not to run... why, all of a sudden, he'd rather die." - Charlie Storm (Lee Marvin) in Don Siegel's The Killers

Two hit men, the steely Charlie Storm (Lee Marvin) and his young, wisecracking partner Lee (Clu Gulager), pay a visit to their quarry Johnny North (John Cassavetes). He knows they're coming. He waits for the inevitable, and it's brutal beyond belief. His body jerks, flinches and arches in agony with every bullet hit as the killers empty their guns in as many painful and deadly spots imaginable.

The aforementioned represents the opening minutes of the first American film ever made exclusively for television. The picture doesn't get any gentler. Broadcaster NBC was so appalled they refused delivery. It's not surprising. I also neglected to mention that the opening scene is set in an educational rehabilitation centre for the blind and the killers terrorize a sight-challenged secretary to get the location of their quarry, then summarily pistol whip her into unconsciousness. Luckily for Universal Pictures, the movie was released theatrically instead and was a huge hit at the box-office.

Nineteen sixty-four was just on the cusp of the new permissiveness in American cinema - Arthur Penn's Bonnie and Clyde, for example, was just round the corner and helmsman Don Siegel was already no stranger to tough-minded thrills with such genre classics under his belt as Riot in Cell Block 11, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, Baby Face Nelson, The Lineup and among many others, Hell is for Heroes. That Siegel would eventually give us Dirty Harry, Charley Varrick, Two Mules for Sister Sara, The Black Windmill, Coogan's Bluff and Escape From Alcatraz should come as no surprise to anyone watching The Killers for the first time.

Like Robert Siodmak's 1946 film noir version of Ernest Hemingway's great short story, Siegel's film builds up a story around the central idea of two hit men and a victim who has no desire to run. Siegel, however, wished to eschew all obvious references to Hemingway and hoped the film would be entitled Johnny North (after the washed-up race car driver turned criminal played by Cassavetes).

Siegel was also interested in telling the entire tale through the perspective of the killers; a wise choice which veteran writer Gene L. Coon handled magnificently. Coon was a prolific TV scribe, and in fact, was the actual creative brains behind so much of what made the original Star Trek series so immortal - in particular the clever banter, humour and his creative input on some of the most immortal episodes like "Space Seed", "The City of the Edge of Forever" and "The Doomsday Machine".

Coon's dialogue in The Killers is exceptional. Though the film has even less to do with Hemingway than Siodmak's version, the words Coon has spitting out of the mouths of all the characters are clearly inspired by Papa's terse word smithing. As well, the sense of doom which pervades Siegel's film is directly linked to Coon's obvious love for the original short story. The entire backdrop of the car racing circuit was an especially brilliant touch as it adds the sense of daredevil bravado to the character of the doomed Johnny, but also provides a perfect world to attract the film's femme fatale Sheila Farr (Angie "Hubba Hubba" Dickinson) to the hapless hero.

Siegel handles the entire film with his trademark economy and viciously hilarious aplomb. He even makes grand use of the rapid TV shooting schedule to create a tremendous look to both the interior and exterior locations. Veteran TV cinematographer Richard L. Rawlings (Sea Hunt, Gilligan's Island) flooded most of the interiors with light to capture the garish colours of 60s decor and for the exteriors, he superbly harnessed the dazzling California sunshine (doubling as Miami) to wash the film in a strangely harsh glow. Even the dank basements and grungy chop-shops where the criminals plan their heist, are only occasionally pooled with high contrast and, more often than not, are imbued with a flat, even lighting to accentuate the grunge of the settings. The compositions are full of Siegel's sparing, but effective use of canted angles.

The cast, personally selected and approved by Siegel, deliver immortal performances - everyone from the "romantic" leads down to the scuzzy supporting lowlife. One of the more astounding performance comes from eventual Governor of California and President of the United States of America, Ronald Reagan. As the scumbag criminal mastermind-turned-property-developer, Reagan played the only villain of his entire movie career. (This was also his last feature film as an actor.) He oozes evil, but not in any Snidely Whiplash moustache-twirling manner, but rather in his coolness. It's impossible to forget his chilly delivery of the line "I approve of larceny; homicide is against my principles" (knowing he doesn't really mean the latter) and it's inconceivable one could ever clear one's memory banks of Reagan's creepy smile right before he belts Angie Dickinson in the face for "disobeying" him.

The other standouts, of course, are the two hit men; Clu Gulager (whom most will remember as Burt the sleazy warehouse proprietor in Return of the Living Dead) comes across like a handsome Dan Duryea with an oddball "Der Bingle" tone to his deliveries of the acidic lines he's given and Lee Marvin as the laconic, but obsessed hit man gives as great a performance as he's ever given. Marvin's meanness mounts steadily as the film progresses and he's got one of the great moments in movie history when a potential victim attempts a bit of sweet talk to avoid being hit and Marvin half-growls-half-whines, "Lady, I don't have the time.".

And so he does not. If there's one thing which ultimately drives The Killers it's the overwhelmingly haunting sense that time is running out for everyone in the world of the film. The sands keep trickling and only stop once every conceivable body lies dead - as a doornail, of course.

THE FILM CORNER RATING: *****

The Killers (1964) is available on a great Criterion Collection Blu-Ray. In addition to including Robert Siodmak's 1946 classic film noir adaptation with Burt Lancaster and Ava Gardner. The Blu-Ray is loaded with great stuff including a new high-definition digital restoration, with uncompressed monaural soundtracks, a wonderful 2002 on-camera interview with Clu Gulager reminiscing about the 64 version, readings from Don Siegel's autobiography, Tarkovsky’s short 1956 student-film adaptation of Hemingway’s story, a terrific 2002 interview with Stuart Kaminsky, the Screen Directors’ Playhouse radio adaptation from 1949 starring Burt Lancaster and Shelley Winters plus, ever-so delectably, a 2002 audio recording of actor Stacy Keach reading Hemingway’s "The Killers".

Order directly from the links below and contribute to the ongoing maintenance of The Film Corner.

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SANDRA (Vaghe stelle dell'orsa…) - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Electra Myth Sizzles as magnificent melodrama under Luchino Visconti's masterful rendering, screened on ALL-NEW 4K restoration at TIFF Bell Lightbox Cinematheque series "SUMMER IN ITALY", programmed by the inimitable James Quandt.

Sandra - Vaghe stelle dell'orsa… (1965)
Dir. Luchino Visconti
Starring: Claudia Cardinale, Jean Sorel,
Michael Craig, Fred Williams, Marie Bell, Renzo Ricci

Review By Greg Klymkiw

I can think of few juicier morsels of grand melodrama than Luchino Visconti's Sandra (Vaghe stelle dell'orsa…), a modern re-imagining of the Greek myth involving Electra, the Princess of Argos, who, in cahoots with brother Orestes, spins a mad plot to avenge the death of their father King Agamemnon at the hands of Queen Clytemnestra and their stepfather Aegisthus.

Visconti, however, never content to merely ape his inspirations, takes the aforementioned narrative base and careens wildly into the territory of an opera plunged into the deepest depths of genuinely perverse sexual obsession. (A layer of wartime collaboration, Auschwitz and a reclamation of Jewish Heritage is stirred in for good measure along with attempted rape and suicide for those so inclined.)

With the astoundingly baroque black and white cinematography of Armando Nannuzzi, Visconti spins a (seemingly) measured yarn which mounts ever-so broodingly to a shocking, over-the-top climax and a denouement which is as fraught with irony as it is deeply moving.

Beginning at a swank cocktail party in Paris and winding up amongst petty bourgeoisie squabbling within an ancient, crumbling, family estate in the provincial Italian enclave of Volterra, Sandra is a grandly entertaining belly flop into a pool of madness and incest. It makes the sordid spectacles of Giuseppe Verdi at his most floridly, bombastically romantic seem quaint and subtle.

Where Sandra deviates from the Elektra myth is in substituting the sexuality of Daddy worship (and competing with Mommy for Daddy's love) to a deep sexual spark between the sister (ravishing Claudia Cardinale as the title character) and brother Gianni (dreamy Jean Sorel) as a reaction to the siblings' joint belief that their long-dead Jewish scientist father was betrayed to the Nazis and Fascists by their Antisemitic concert pianist mother (Marie Bell) who has now gone completely insane and the mad matriarch's blusteringly petty lover and eventual second husband (Renzo Ricci).

Add to this mix Sandra's loving, but clueless American husband (Michael Craig) and the hunky town doctor (Fred Williams) who still carries a torch for her and we've got ourselves a heady brew, indeed.

Much of the action is centred within the family estate. Sandra and her hubby are visiting to convene at a special ceremony honouring her late father who died at Auschwitz. It's a nice enough tribute, but its reason for being is that the family fortunes are dwindling and the once massive grounds can no longer be cared for. They've been taken over by the town as a Memorial Park dedicated to Sandra's Dad.

There is much in the manner of slinking and skulking about the corridors, corners and shadows of the once grand old house, along with all manner of hushed whispers, most of them related to the unholy relations twixt Sandra and Orestes. The only time vocal timbres gush out full throttle are when we meet Mad Momma who screeches out her various hatreds and regrets with considerable bile and lung power.

The centrepiece of the entire picture is the voluptuous, pouty-lipped, big-ole-dark-eyed Claudia Cardinale, who manages to acquit herself as both a fine actress and ravishing camera-loves-her sexpot.

As is his wont, Visconti allows us to wallow in the majestic mire of the melodrama to our hearts' content, but for those seeking added noggin stimuli (the noggin that thinks, of course), Visconti handily invests the movie with moments of sheer visual poetry and much in the way of historical, social and class-related ruminations. Happily, one can take one's pick or go for the fully loaded big banana split of sex, sin, art and politics.

It's the Visconti way, God Bless Him.

THE FILM CORNER RATING: *****

Sandra is playing in Toronto at the TIFF BELL LIGHTBOX. For dates, times and tickets, visit their website HERE. For those who cannot make it to Toronto, a gorgeous import DVD from Italy is available through Amazon. One hopes it's merely a matter of time before the 4K restoration will be available for sell-through on Blu-Ray.

The Region 2 Italian Import of Sandra can be ordered directly via the links below (and as such, contribute to the ongoing maintenance of The Film Corner).

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LIMELIGHT - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Classic Chaplin Melodrama on Criterion Blu-Ray

Limelight (1952)
Dir. Charles Chaplin
Starring: Charles Chaplin, Claire Bloom,
Nigel Bruce, Sydney Earl Chaplin, Norman Lloyd, Buster Keaton

Review By Greg Klymkiw

It's 1914 and Great Britain will soon enter World War I. The great clown Calvero (Charles Chaplin), once the toast of the entertainment business, is now an unreliable alcoholic whose agent must beg even the most ramshackle music halls to book his client on the bottom-feeding end of the billings and under vague pseudonyms so that no theatre booking agent or the lowliest of audiences will think they're getting an unfunny stumblebum.

One fateful evening, Calvero enters his modest rooming house and though two sheets to the wind, he is still able to make out the overwhelming smell of gas emanating from a first-floor suite, its door locked and the landlady with the pass key nowhere to be found. The pie-eyed codger manages to break the door down in the nick of time to find its beautiful tenant Terry (Claire Bloom) on the verge of death by her own hand, the open gas oven blasting its deadly fumes into the air.

Calvero revives the destitute out-of-work dancer, then discretely summons a doctor from round the corner and moves the addled missy upstairs to his own room to recuperate. When she realizes she's been saved, her sorrow seems even greater. Calvero, however, is full of understanding and seems to know exactly how to gently admonish the young miss and set her straight. When she questions the meaning of life and indeed the very notion that there is any meaning at all, Calvero supplies just the right verbal balm. "What do you want meaning for?" he chides ever-so gently. "Life is a desire, not a meaning. Desire is the theme of all life!"

And so it is.

And so begins one of the greatest movies of all time - written, produced, directed, scored and starring the Little Tramp himself. Deep into the latter stages of middle age and exiled to Switzerland after being refused entry to the United States on spurious grounds by the House of Un-American Activities, Charles Spencer Chaplin (Charlie, to the world) gave us one of his sweetest gifts. Limelight began its life as a novella, however, it read so much like a movie script that it seemed inevitable Chaplin would go ahead and make the picture.

This is also a movie that should have been one of Chaplin's greatest box-office triumphs. Alas, theatre owners in the United States were vigorously lobbied by Senator Joseph McCarthy and the FBI's J. Edgar Hoover to not exhibit this "propaganda" by the suspected communist. Most acquiesced to the desires of the House of UnAmerican Activities. Though the film played in a mere handful of American theatres, mostly in liberal enclaves, it still managed to gross over a million dollars in the USA. In European territories, Chaplin's film did fine business and grossed in the neighbourhood of eight million dollars.

Its appeal made sense. Chaplin fashioned a work that was as sophisticated and mature as it was simple and sentimental - appealing to both highbrow and general audiences. (That the film was essentially suppressed for two decades in America, the aforementioned numbers in 1952 currency are pretty astounding.)

And it's such a great and compelling story. Chaplin juggles a few threads of plot here, but the main one involves his unconditional support to Terry and how he provides her with the inspiration and drive she needs to make it to the top. As he optimistically tells her, "Think of the power that's in the universe! And that's the same power within you. If you'd only have courage and the will to use it."

Of course, their relationship is more than a trifle complicated. There's deep love that grows between both of them. The father-daughter and teacher-student love makes the most sense given their huge age difference, but Terry (even though she's attracted to a young composer played by Chaplin's real-life son Sydney), feels conflicted about her feelings for Calvero and thinks she loves him the way a potential wife would love her husband. She even proposes marriage to him.

As Calvero keeps plummeting to the bottom, Terry rises to the top - a familiar enough A Star is Born-like trajectory, but Chaplin is wise enough to throw a few wrinkles and surprises in the mix so that we're more often than not, fed a few morsels which twist and turn the narrative handily. One of them involves the great Nigel Bruce (Dr. Watson to Basil Rathbone's Sherlock Holmes) as a theatrical impresario whose respectful acknowledgement and belief in "the old days" allows for a joyous fork in the road to open up for all concerned.

Initially via Calvero's dreams and reminiscences, the film also allows us to see both the character and Chaplin himself, performing a number of classic comedy routines. Seeing this great master go through his creative paces is infused with considerable two-for-the-price-of-one delights. In particular is one major highlight of comedic genius. Chaplin had always been obsessed with nailing an idea he had for a sketch involving trained fleas and he finally delivers the goods here with considerable gusto.

Eventually, the tale allows Calvero/Chaplin the opportunity for a full-blown vaudeville show before a huge, appreciative audience. This sequence is not only hilarious, but induces the kind of happy gooseflesh one can only get when bearing witness to sheer virtuosity. Astonishingly, we're also treated to a classic comedy routine between Chaplin and Buster Keaton (the only time the two of them ever shared screen-time). To say the entire routine is a joy would be an understatement of the most egregious kind.

The film's exquisite humour induces plenty tears of laughter, but it wouldn't be Chaplin if the picture also didn't wrench our hearts with the kind of emotion that forces us to completely lose it emotionally. Luckily, this happens on several occasions.

As the greatest have always proven, there's nothing sadder than a clown.

And there's nothing sadder and greater than Chaplin as a clown in his twilight years, a character still so vibrant, yet also driven by the kind of self-sacrifice, that he inspires the cycle of life and death to come full circle.

At one point Calvero says, "I believe I'm dying, doctor. Then, I don't know. I've died so many times." It's a beautiful moment that fills us with joy. We know Calvero will never really die, just as Sir Charles Spencer Chaplin through the great gift of cinema, lives forever.

THE FILM CORNER RATING: ***** 5-Stars

Limelight is available on a gorgeous Criterion Collection Blu-Ray which is overflowing with hours worth of materials which provide added insight as well as sheer entertainment value. Amongst the myriad of interviews, all of them worthwhile, I was especially delighted with those involving the wonderful actress Claire Bloom who offers plenty of greats stories and insights which are far too modest with respect to herself, but also give us a unique window upon Chaplin's genius. This is one of the best Criterion efforts of the year (though it seems one can say this with each new release from this visionary company). The new 4K digital restoration, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack on the Blu-ray is of the highest quality and in addition to outtakes, trailers, a booklet with a Peter von Bagh essay as well as an actual on-set piece by Henry Gris, there's a lovely video essay by Chaplin biographer David Robinson which places the whole film within Chaplin's personal and artistic process. It's extremely informative and moving. There are new interviews with the aforementioned Claire Bloom as well as Norman Lloyd, a 2002 documentary on Limelight, a delightful audio recording with Chaplin reading excerpts from his novella "Footlights" (wherein the film blossomed out of) and most magnificently, two silent shorts by Chaplin, one of which is an unfinished piece which first introduces the brilliant and funny trained flea act. The case is gorgeously illustrated with a beautiful new cover by Bill Nelson. All in all, a must-own Blu-Ray.