Film Noir File: ‘Mildred Pierce’ shows Crawford at her peak

August 15, 2013 by

By Film Noir Blonde and Mike Wilmington

The Noir File is FNB’s guide to classic film noir, neo-noir and  pre-noir from the schedule of Turner Classic Movies (TCM), which broadcasts them uncut and uninterrupted. The times are Eastern Standard and (Pacific Standard). 

PICK OF THE WEEK

“Mildred Pierce” (1945, Michael Curtiz). Friday, Aug. 16, 8 p.m. (5 p.m.). With Joan Crawford, Jack Carson and Ann Blyth.

I saw “Mildred Pierce” for the first time nearly 20 years ago on a Sunday afternoon in my small, studenty London flat – pale gray walls, Venetian blinds, a Victor Skrebneski print opposite the TV. Just before the opening scene unfolded – a shooting in a shadow-drenched California beach house with a sinister vibe – I remember popping a batch of popcorn in oil on the stovetop and making fresh lemonade. Such wholesome snacking for the decadence on the little screen.

Directed by Michael Curtiz, “Mildred Pierce” is based on James M. Cain’s 1941 novel, adapted by Ranald MacDougall with uncredited help from William Faulkner. Joan Crawford plays the title character, a wife and mother, who tries to buy the love of her spoiled and ungrateful teenage daughter Veda (Ann Blyth). Her younger daughter Kay (Jo Ann Marlowe) is easy to love, but Mildred is determined to win Veda over as well.

You can read FNB’s full review here.

Friday, Aug. 16

3 p.m. (12 p.m.): “Brute Force” (1947, Jules Dassin). One of the prototypical prison pictures, with Burt Lancaster as the indomitable convict and Hume Cronyn as the sadistic captain – plus a cast that includes Yvonne De Carlo, Charles Bickford, Ann Blyth and Howard Duff, and a taut script by Richard Brooks.

8 p.m. (5 p.m.): “Mildred Pierce” (See Pick of the Week).

2 a.m. (11 p.m.): “The Helen Morgan Story”  (1957, Michael Curtiz). “Mildred Pierce” co-star Ann Blyth and director Curtiz reunite for this tangy, noirish bio-drama of the tragic popular songstress, with Paul Newman as Helen’s brash gangster lover.

Sunday, Aug. 18

1:45 p.m. (10:45 a.m.): “Rebel Without a Cause”  (1955, Nicholas Ray). With James Dean, Natalie Wood and Sal Mineo.

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Clumsy filmmaking causes ‘Lovelace’ to fall flat

August 14, 2013 by

Lovelace/2013/Millennium Films/93 min.

“Lovelace,” the story of the porn star’s rise and fall, presents a strange creative paradox: the film’s chief virtue is its strong acting, yet the characterizations are also uniformly one-note. In other words, the actors do their very best with what they have and deliver compelling work. But overall, “Lovelace” feels unsatisfying, superficial and obvious.

We first meet Linda Lovelace (Amanda Seyfried) as a jaded star, dragging on a cigarette as she lounges in a marble bathtub. She’s been used and abused. Via flashback, we see that before she became famous as the star of 1972’s “Deep Throat,” the first porn movie to play in mainstream theaters, Linda Boreman was a Bronx-born girl (relocated to Florida) who liked to lie out in the sun with her friend (Juno Temple) and dance at the local roller-skating rink.

When she meets sleazy Chuck Traynor (Peter Sarsgaard) at the rink, her life changes forever. They flirt, fall in love and marry, and through Chuck’s contacts she lands the lead role in the groundbreaking “Deep Throat.” Not only a schmoozer, Chuck appears to have a talent for controlling and abusing Linda as well as borrowing money on her behalf. (According to the filmmakers, “Deep Throat” grossed $600 million; Lovelace received $1,250.)

Meanwhile, Linda aspires to become a mainstream actress but these dreams are never fulfilled and she leaves Chuck. Her parents (Sharon Stone nearly unrecognizable as Linda’s frumpy cold-hearted mother and Robert Patrick as her disapproving Milquetoast dad) don’t offer much sympathy or support. Several years later, Linda remarries, has a kid and writes a book about her experiences called “Ordeal.”

While my gut feeling is that Chuck Traynor was more than likely a lowlife, he also likely possessed some kind of skulking magnetism or sly charm. By the same token, Linda Lovelace, portrayed here as a victim with a capital V, was probably not as pure as driven snow. I think she must have had a dash of femme fatale.

But Seyfried, while engaging, beams naïve girl-next-door cuteness throughout (wonder what Mila Kunis would have brought to the role?) just as Sarsgaard’s unmitigated dirtball oozes menace from start to finish. Even the scene where Chuck aims to charm Linda’s parents fails to convince. As mentioned, Stone and Patrick are excellent in supporting roles, as are Chris Noth, Bobby Cannavale, Hank Azaria and James Franco (as Hugh Hefner).

Still, Lovelace’s thorny story has been disputed and none of that complexity comes through in this film. The filmmakers Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman and writer Andy Bellin would have done well to take a page from Alfred Hitchcock’s book, remembering the disturbing truth that even full-on psychos often have a charismatic side and that most sane people mask a little darkness when you scratch under the surface.

“Lovelace” opened in limited release Aug. 9.

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Noir writer/director Paul Schrader dishes on ‘The Canyons,’ guerilla filmmaking and Lindsay Lohan

August 9, 2013 by

Is the low-budget neo-noir thriller “The Canyons,” starring Lindsay Lohan and James Deen, a cold, dead movie? Director Paul Schrader certainly hopes so.

“Well what did you expect?” said Schrader at a screening and Q&A Monday night at UCLA’s Billy Wilder Theater in Westwood. “Brett [Easton Ellis] and I have track records. If we can’t make a cold, dead movie, who can?”

The film’s release (VOD and a smattering of theaters) has been preceded by bad publicity, stemming from the crazed production and the erratic Lohan. Schrader said the “cold, dead” epithet came from “the nincompoop that runs the South by Southwest Film Festival,” which rejected the film.

The Sundance festival also took a pass but “The Canyons” has been picked up out-of-competition at the Venice Film Festival. (According to several media sources, the S x SW quote was: “There’s an ugliness and a deadness” to “The Canyons.” Regardless of the exact wording, when a movie is rejected from a festival, staff typically refrain from making any public comment.)

That the film, which novelist Brett Easton Ellis wrote and Alexander Pope produced, was finished at all is a minor miracle. Schrader said the total budget was about $500,000 and was intended from the outset for VOD.

“I’ve always enjoyed pushing people’s buttons. The button I’m trying to push now is the on-demand button on your remote,” said Schrader in response to a comment during the Q&A from Robert Rosen, former dean of UCLA’s School of Theater, Film and TV. Rosen lauded Schrader for “the pride we have in [Schrader] as a trouble-making filmmaker.”

Schrader calls his latest foray into “guerilla” filmmaking “an exhilarating experience.” As he put it: “It’s the mystery of could you do such a thing? Could I pull off such a thing?” Yes and yes. The film is already in profit, Schrader said, thanks to a distribution deal with IFC.

The movie came together through a combination of good luck and false starts, including online auditions via LetItCast, Ellis’ “promiscuous twitter finger” that lured porn star James Deen to the project, writer/novelist Kirsten Smith’s stunning Malibu Canyon home (aka the film’s third star) that fell into Schrader’s lap courtesy of Kickstarter, as well as his “high-maintenance” lead actress, who “lives in a cone of crisis.”

“If a crisis doesn’t exist, she makes one up,” Schrader said. “It’s exhausting. I told her, ‘It must be so exhausting to be you.’”

Schrader sums up the movie as “beautiful people doing bad things in nice rooms.”

A case in point: Schrader said Lohan recently made a last-minute call to Deen (even though they didn’t get along on the set) and asked him to drop what he was doing (in the Valley) to join her on the set while she co-hosted “Chelsea Lately” with Chelsea Handler on the E! channel (taped on the west side, at Olympic and Bundy).

Schrader said: “She has the ability to make you care. She suckered me and I’m a big fan. But there are people who live to hate this girl. There’s an extraordinary predisposition in the media to say something negative about this girl or to satisfy a [need for] media cruelty which we in our culture now thrive on.”

During “The Canyons” shoot, Schrader reportedly stripped off his clothes to coax her to do a nude scene. He didn’t mention this Monday night. Nevertheless, it was a bare-bones operation, made without insurance or permits. Actors worked for $100/day (with Lohan getting a bigger cut of profits later on) and provided their own makeup, hair and transportation.

Paul Schrader (Image from Indiewire)

The filmmakers also decided to skip asking the MPAA for a rating because they knew the film would play in a few theaters only. Said Schrader: “The MPAA is just another one of the dinosaurs wandering around La Brea. They’re all going to the swamps.”

Set in Los Angeles, “The Canyons” examines the, um, complicated love lives of Christian (Deen), a sneering twentysomething with a trust-fund, and his trophy girlfriend Tara (Lohan), a once-aspiring actress now looking for men to take care of her in high style. A dilettante moviemaker, Christian casts a sweet and caring corn-fed actor named Ryan (Nolan Funk) in his upcoming sleazy flick.

Ryan is also Tara’s ex-boyfriend and he’s still hot for her, even though he now lives with Gina (Amanda Brooks), who is Christian’s assistant. Christian and Ryan form another lust triangle with Cynthia (Tenille Houston), an actress-turned-yoga-instructor. But Tara is the object of Christian’s obsession. At his whim, he and Tara indulge in threesomes and foursomes with partners culled from apps such as Blendr and Grindr. Christian records these trysts on his phone; later he turns to violence for kicks.

Schrader, who was a film student at UCLA in the late 1960s/early 70s, sums up the movie as “beautiful people doing bad things in nice rooms. … This film is not about Hollywood or making movies, it’s about the hookup generation.”

Lindsay Lohan

To the extent that that generation is made up of grasping, one-note Angelenos, “The Canyons” feels chillingly, depressingly truthful. Your enjoyment of this movie will likely depend on your tolerance for seeing slick, superficial portraits of Hollywood pretty people who, for the most part, are soulless, self-serving and vacuous. “This is an art movie and doesn’t play the empathy card that strong,” Schrader says.

Fair enough. Yet it struck me as short on insight. Images of dilapidated theaters symbolize changes in the way we watch movies. Texting and apps and other tech-savvy ways of derailing human connection are second nature to the hookup generation. Right. And?

On the plus side, the performances are somewhat compelling because they are infused with so much stark reality. By the same token, the roles don’t exactly stretch the actors. Visually, to be sure, the movie delivers. Shot by John DeFazio, “The Canyons” looks pretty amazing, whether capturing Hollywood Boulevard by night or showing off the majestic Malibu hills bathed in white light. Overall, though, the film is at best uneven.

Would Schrader take another gamble on a low-budget project? “I made my money and I should probably leave the casino,” said Schrader. “But I probably won’t.”

“The Canyons” is available on VOD and is showing at select theaters.

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Film Noir File: Deneuve, Buñuel cast spell with ‘Belle de Jour’

August 8, 2013 by

By Film Noir Blonde and Mike Wilmington

The Noir File is FNB’s guide to classic film noir, neo-noir and pre-noir from the schedule of Turner Classic Movies (TCM), which broadcasts them uncut and uninterrupted. The times are Eastern Standard and (Pacific Standard).

PICK OF THE WEEK: Two by Luis Buñuel as part of Catherine Deneuve Day

“Tristana” (1970, Luis Buñuel). Monday, Aug. 12, 10 p.m., (7 p.m.).

“Belle de Jour” (1967, Luis Buñuel ). Monday, Aug. 12, 2:15 a.m. (11:15 p.m.).

Icy, ravishing Catherine Deneuve stars in “Belle de Jour.”

The most beautiful movie actress alive paired with the most brilliantly rebellious filmmaker.

That was the incendiary match-up of star Catherine Deneuve and director Luis Buñuel – who were most famous for their 1967 French erotic drama “Belle de Jour.” In that great film, Deneuve – so lovely and so classically, radiantly, sexily blonde that she took up residence in male dreams forever – played Severine, a Parisian wife, who becomes a prostitute during the day to escape her boring bourgeois life and her handsome but boring husband (Jean Sorel). Severine then falls into a world of crime, hypocrisy, dreamlike perversity and peril. It was the most popular, and the best-remembered, film of Buñuel’s entire career.

But they made another film that Buñuel preferred and is one of his most personal: “Tristana” (1970). Shot in Spain, based on a novella by famed author Benito Perez Galdos (adapted by Buñuel and Julio Alejandro), this not underrated but definitely underseen film starred Deneuve in a role just as alluring and frightening as the wayward Severine: Tristana, the young orphan seduced, exploited and virtually imprisoned by her guardian Don Lope (Fernando Rey). Don Lope, worldly and egocentric, is an aristocrat of radical political beliefs, whose desire for his ward undermines his ethics – even as Tristana, a seeming victim, turns exploiter herself and exacts a terrible revenge.

“Tristana” earned the admiration of Alfred Hitchcock.

“Tristana” is a masterpiece, but it’s also a grimmer, sadder, more psychologically disturbing picture than “Belle de Jour.” Buñuel, notorious for his audacity, has directed some of the cruelest scenes in cinema, in films like “Un Chien Andalou,” “Los Olvidados” and “Viridiana.“ But he never filmed a more wounding scene than Tristana on the balcony: a sequence that delighted no less an epicure of sadism than Alfred Hitchcock. “Tristana! That leg! That leg!” Hitch exclaimed when the two directors met at a party. Buñuel probably only smiled.

Other Deneuve Day highlights include: “Repulsion” (1965, Roman Polanski), “Mississippi Mermaid” (1969, François Truffaut) and “Un Flic” (1972, Jean-Pierre Melville). See TCM for the full list. Films are in French (“Tristana” in Spanish) with English subtitles. [Read more…]

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Film Noir File: ‘Paths of Glory’ seduces you with its beauty, shatters you with its horror

July 26, 2013 by

By Film Noir Blonde and Mike Wilmington

The Noir File is FNB’s guide to classic film noir, neo-noir and pre-noir from the schedule of Turner Classic Movies (TCM), which broadcasts them uncut and uninterrupted. The times are Eastern Standard and (Pacific Standard).

PICK OF THE WEEK

“Paths of Glory” (1957, Stanley Kubrick). Saturday, July 27: 1:30 p.m. (10:30 a.m.)

In 1957, Stanley Kubrick, still in his 20s – with “Dr. Strangelove,” and “2001: A Space Odyssey” still in his future – made one of the greatest of all anti-war movies: his grim, stylish and incredibly moving adaptation of Humphrey Cobb’s World War I novel, “Paths of Glory.”

Kubrick may not have known war first hand. But, in that film, he created an indelible image of war’s inhumanity and horror. “Paths of Glory” is a compelling, wrenching nightmare of a movie with a brilliant (and very noir) cast including Kirk Douglas, Ralph Meeker, George Macready and (at his best, or worst) Timothy Carey.

Based on a real-life episode, the movie was made on location in Bavaria and is set in the French trenches, where the infantry soldiers eat and sleep in the cold, dirt, and mud – and from which they charge forth to fight and die. It’s also set in an elegant chateau, far from the battlefield, where rich, ambitious generals plot the sometimes-insane strategies that will get their men killed.

Michael Douglas plays Dax, the regiment’s idealistic commanding officer.

When one ill-advised attack against the Germans fails, Macready, as the vainglorious Gen. Mireau, flies into a murderous rage and demands that his own men be executed for cowardice. His superior, the wily Gen. Broulard (Adolphe Menjou), argues the number of the condemned down to three soldiers: Meeker, Carey and Joe Turkel. Defending them is Colonel Dax, the regiment’s courageous and idealistic commanding officer (played by Douglas, one of the leading Hollywood liberals of the ’50s and ’60s). Outraged by the mad injustice of the trumped-up court-martial , Dax – a famous criminal lawyer in civilian life – argues eloquently and fearlessly for the lives of those three guiltless men.

What a great movie this is! “Paths of Glory” is a film to see when you’re young and more innocent, like the three soldiers. And to see again when you’re stronger, more mature and full of fiery ideals, like Dax. And finally to watch yet again when you’re even older and have witnessed a lifetime of the awful compromises and vile injustices that “Paths of Glory” paints with such absolute lucidity, such deadly, inexorable narrative force.

Timothy Carey had worked with Kubrick in 1956’s “The Killing.”

By the time he directed and co-wrote “Paths of Glory,” Kubrick, 29, had three features already under his belt (including the classic 1956 film noir, “The Killing”). His partner on “The Killing,” James B. Harris, produced “Paths of Glory.” Douglas – then at the height of his Hollywood stardom and power – made it happen.

Two great American novelists collaborated with Kubrick on the screenplay: Oklahoma-born noir ace Jim Thompson (author of the crime classics “The Killer Inside Me,” “The Grifters” and “The Getaway”) and the acidly funny Southern novelist Calder Willingham (“End as a Man,” “Eternal Fire”) Probably thanks to those two, “Paths of Glory” has one of the darkest visions, some of the richest characters and some of the most pungent dialogue of any American movie of that era.

Kubrick’s masterpiece of war’s injustice seduces you with its beauty, shatters you with its horror. The battle scenes are shot with a black and white grit and shock reminiscent of Lewis Milestone’s “All Quiet on the Western Front,” but also with the Max Ophuls-like grace and romanticism that Kubrick loved and that ironically permeates his film.

War is hell. It’s also noir.

“Paths of Glory” is available in DVD on Criterion. [Read more…]

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Can Ryan Gosling save ‘Only God Forgives’?

July 23, 2013 by

“Only God Forgives,” starring Ryan Gosling and Kristin Scott Thomas, opened on Friday to mixed (mostly negative) reviews. This art house/crime thriller film, written and directed by Nicolas Winding Refn, was nominated for the Palme d’Or at this year’s Cannes Film Festival.

In 2011, Refn, Gosling and Carey Mulligan teamed up for the eloquent and extremely violent “Drive.” You can read Stephanie Zacharek’s review of “Only God Forgives” here.

And on the small screen: The success of political-intrigue TV dramas such as “Scandal,” “House of Cards” and “Homeland” means the Beltway has displaced Manhattan and Los Angeles as the capital of noir, says James Wolcott in next month’s Vanity Fair. You can read the full story here.

 

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‘The Last Seduction’ is smart, funny and unforgettable

July 16, 2013 by

The Last Seduction/1994/ITC/ 110 min.

Years ago, I wrote a weekly column for the Chicago Tribune. I interviewed experts on ways women could work smart and climb the corporate ladder. Most of the time, no matter what the obstacle or dilemma was – job hunting, negotiating a raise, getting a promotion – the bottom line was: do your homework, highlight your achievements and ask for what you want.

In 1994’s “The Last Seduction” by director John Dahl and writer Steve Barancik, Linda Fiorentino as Bridget Gregory takes this advice to dazzling new heights. As the story unfolds, this career maven excels in not just one job, but several. In the opening scene, she’s a supervisor at a telemarketing sales firm in New York City, where she doesn’t ask, she demands. Then she needles her hapless sales guys mercilessly, calling them “maggots, eunuchs and bastards.”

At least they know where they stand. That pat-on-the-back stuff is way overrated.

Later she becomes Director of Lead Generation at an insurance company in a small town in New York state. Under her own steam (at night, of course, this being a noir) she researches prospects for a telemarketing murder business. Hey, it’s not like there isn’t a market.

And she launches an entrepreneurial venture in which she steals a boatload of cash from her husband, malleable Clay (Bill Pullman) and taps loyal-to-a-fault Mike, her lover/investment partner (Peter Berg), to help her. Neither of these dudes is much of a match for her – their chief virtue (besides being good looking) is that they are good at following orders, which is especially true in Mike’s case.

Bill Pullman and Linda Fiorentino play husband and wife.

When one of Mike’s friends asks him: “whadd’ya see in her?” he replies: “a new set of balls.” Her résumé also includes legs that never stop, bedroom eyes and a ready laugh, especially at the expense of doofuses or dumpy small-town mores. Just when you think an interfering man is going to impede her climb to the top, she flicks him away like a speck of lint from her sleek pinstripe suit.

Having done her due diligence, she’s hoping to close the deal in such a way that neither Clay nor Mike can claim a penny of the profit. Talk about multi-tasking. It’s understandable that so much juggling might make Bridget a little irritable from time to time.

Luckily, Mike is nothing if not supportive and just turns the other (butt) cheek when she calls him a rural Neanderthal. When he suggests they go on a date and chat sometime; she asks: “What for?”

When Mike (Peter Berg) suggests going on an actual date, Bridget (Linda Fiorentino) asks, “What for?”

To say that Fiorentino, a Philly native with a fiery intensity, nails the part is an understatement. She is one of the fiercest femmes fatales in all of neo-noir moviemaking. If I were a guy, I think seeing this performance would surely give me an uneasy night’s sleep. I would have loved to see Fiorentino work with Quentin Tarantino, but her career short-circuited fairly early. I have heard she was a tad hard to work with – shocker! Pullman, Berg and the rest of the cast more than hold their own, underplaying their parts and letting Fiorentino hold bitchy court.

Director Dahl is a neo-noir specialist (he also directed “Red Rock West,” “Kill Me Again” and “Rounders”) and the sharp, funny script is peppered with references to noir classics. For instance, Dahl tips his hat to “Double Indemnity” by having Bridget and Mike both work at an insurance company and, when Bridget calls the police to falsely accuse a guy of exposing himself (so she can make a getaway), she gives her name as “Mrs. Neff.”

I suppose that could be evidence of her truly tender heart – in her imagination, the doomed lovers Walter Neff and Phyllis Dietrichson get married and live happily ever after. Yeah, right. But, if Bridget said it, you’d believe her.

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The Noir File: A toast to Truffaut’s elegant, edgy dark side

July 11, 2013 by

By Film Noir Blonde and Mike Wilmington

The Noir File is FNB’s guide to classic film noir, neo-noir and pre-noir from the schedule of Turner Classic Movies (TCM), which broadcasts them uncut and uninterrupted. The times are Eastern Standard and (Pacific Standard).

PICK OF THE WEEK: François Truffaut Film Noir on Fridays

As a movie loving juvenile delinquent – the life that he later fictionalized in “The Four Hundred Blows” – the young François Truffaut was an aficionado of all kinds of movies.

But his favorite genre was film noir. Truffaut, the “most feared” French film reviewer of the ‘50s, star critic of the famed film magazine Cahiers du Cinema and an international directorial sensation after he premiered “Four Hundred Blows” at the Cannes Film Festival, was a noir devotee. He especially liked films made by director-auteurs like Alfred Hitchcock, Fritz Lang, Orson Welles, Max Ophuls and Nicholas Ray.

Truffaut was also partial to the genre as a moviemaker. He made all kinds of movies himself, mostly romances in various keys, but he was obviously very inspired by the dark side of cinema.

He adapted two noir novels by Cornell Woolrich, one by Charles Williams and one by David Goodis (“Shoot the Piano Player”), giving each of them his special romantic spin. Tonight on TCM’s Friday Night Spotlight, David Edelstein looks at the work of this influential filmmaker.

“The Bride Wore Black” (1968, François Truffaut). Friday, July 12: 8 p.m. (5 p.m.). One of Truffaut’s favorite actresses, Jeanne Moreau (“Jules and Jim”) is at her most sullenly sexy and mercurial here. Moreau plays Julie, a bereaved bride in black whose husband was unintentionally killed by five men, all of whom she intends to track down and murder. The men include those splendid French film actors Jean-Claude Brialy, Claude Rich, Charles Denner, Michel Lonsdale and Michel Bouquet. The music is by Hitchcock’s maestro of terror Bernard Herrmann. The source is one of Cornell Woolrich’s best known novels.

Jean-Paul Belmondo and Catherine Deneuve star in “Mississippi Mermaid.”

“Confidentially Yours” (1983, François Truffaut), Friday July 12: 10 p.m. (7 p.m.). Jean-Louis Trintignant is a businessman suspected of murder, hiding from the flics. Fanny Ardant (Truffaut‘s last lover) is his smart, love-bitten secretary, who is trying to find the real murderer. The plot may sound like Woolrich’s “Phantom Lady,” but the treatment is light and comic, like a “Thin Man” movie. Based on Charles Williams’ novel “The Long Saturday Night.”

“Mississippi Mermaid” (1969, François Truffaut). Friday, July 12, 12 a.m. (9 p.m.). Jean-Paul Belmondo and Catherine Deneuve are a plantation owner and his mail order bride, who get involved in murder and become lovers-on-the-run. Strange casting for two of the sexiest French stars, but the movie grows on you. It’s adapted from a first-rate Cornell Woolrich novel, “Waltz into Darkness,” which would have been a much better title for the movie.

“Such a Gorgeous Kid Like Me” (1972, François Truffaut). Friday, July 12, 2:15 a.m. (11:15 p.m.). A saucy, dark little comedy about the romance of an unrepentant murderess named Camille Bliss (played by Bernadette Lafont, who’s wonderful) and a smitten sociology student named Stanislas (Andre Dussollier), who wants to figure her out. (Fat chance.) The men Camille entices are Charles Denner, Philippe Leotard, Claude Brasseur and Guy Marchand.

“Shoot the Piano Player” (1960, François Truffaut). Saturday, July 13, 4 a.m. (1 a.m.). With Charles Aznavour, Marie Dubois and Nicole Berger. Reviewed on FNB June 13, 2013.

Saturday, July 13

7:30 a.m. (4:30 a.m.): “No Orchids for Miss Blandish” (1948, St. John Legh Clowes). With Jack La Rue and Linden Travers. Reviewed on FNB October 6, 2012. [Read more…]

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The Noir File: ‘The Big Heat’ tells a searing story

July 5, 2013 by

By Film Noir Blonde and Mike Wilmington

The Noir File is FNB’s guide to classic film noir, neo-noir and pre-noir on Turner Classic Movies (TCM), which broadcasts them uncut and uninterrupted. The times are Eastern Standard and (Pacific Standard).

PICK OF THE WEEK

Gloria Grahame and Glenn Ford star in “The Big Heat.”

“The Big Heat” (1953: Fritz Lang). Tuesday, July 9: 9:15 a.m. (6:15 a.m.).

“When a barfly gets killed, it could be for any one of a dozen crummy reasons,” says Police Lt. Ted Wilks (Willis Bouchey) in “The Big Heat.” Fritz Lang’s grim but gratifying crime drama from 1953 is laced with violence that’s still a bit shocking even by today’s standards.

Lee Marvin plays Gloria Grahame’s gangster boyfriend.

Easy on the eyes Glenn Ford, the incomparable Gloria Grahame and ever-glowering Lee Marvin star in this unforgettable noir.

You can read the full FNB review here.

Friday, July 5

2:30 p.m. (11:30 a.m.): “Hangmen Also Die!” (1943, Fritz Lang). With Brian Donlevy, Walter Brennan and Anna Lee. Reviewed on FNB Feb. 27, 2012.

8 p.m. (5 p.m.): “The Four Hundred Blows” (1959, François Truffaut). Noir-lover Truffaut’s astonishing Cannes prize-winning feature film debut: the semi-autobiographical tale of the write-director’s boyhood life of parental neglect, explorations of Paris, street play, movie-going and petty crime, with Jean-Pierre Léaud as the young Truffaut character, Antoine Doinel. Truffaut and Doinel made four more Doinel films, and they might be making them still, but for the great French filmmaker’s untimely death in 1984. (In French, with English subtitles.)

The beginning of a month-long Friday night Truffaut retrospective, hosted by New York Magazine movie critic David Edelstein.

Saturday, July 6

8 p.m. (5 p.m.): “Key Largo” (1958, John Huston). With Humphrey Bogart, Lauren Bacall, Edward G. Robinson and Claire Trevor. Reviewed on FNB August 10, 2012.

Sunday, July 7

4 p.m. (1 p.m.): “Rebel Without a Cause” (1955, Nicholas Ray). With James Dean, Natalie Wood and Sal Mineo. Reviewed on FNB April 18, 2013.

4:30 a.m. (1:30 a.m.): “The Fugitive” (1947, John Ford). With Henry Fonda, Dolores Del Rio and Ward Bond. Reviewed on FNB July 28, 2012. [Read more…]

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‘Sea of Love’ is a neglected neo-noir with hidden depth

July 2, 2013 by

Sea of Love/1989/Universal Pictures/113 min.

“Sea of Love” is what you might call a neurotic and erotic thriller, dealing as it does with one of the most terrifying settings imaginable: the New York City singles scene.

Deftly directed by Harold Becker, with a magnificent script by Richard Price, “Sea of Love” is a deeply satisfying neo-noir, which has been oddly neglected since its 1989 release.

One of the movie’s many strengths is a knock-out lead performance by Al Pacino as veteran NYC police detective Frank Keller. Frank is feisty, hard-working and intense, but he’s got weaknesses aplenty: he drinks too much, as does his elderly father (William Hickey), he’s sick of his job, and his ex-wife left him to hook up with his fellow cop, Gruber (Richard Jenkins).

Meanwhile, Frank’s got a crime to solve: Two men have been shot in the head in their bedrooms. Lipstick-smeared cigarette butts point to a female killer. Said killer apparently finds her victims by answering singles’ ads in a magazine.

Frank figures: why not place an ad and see if the murderess shows up for a get-to-know-you drink? So, aided by jovial chubster Det. Sherman Touhey (John Goodman), they meet a procession of available women, including one who quips, lest you forget you’re watching a neo-noir: “Fate sucks, I swear!”

The most intriguing candidate, though, is a slim, flinty blonde in a red-leather jacket named Helen Cruger (Ellen Barkin). Finding that he’s attracted to her, Frank puts her name at the bottom of the suspect list, and the two begin an uneasy love affair. We learn that Helen runs a shoe store on 57th Street and that she’s divorced with a young daughter.

The passion grows and the police work proceeds, but neither are smooth sailing especially when another man (this one married, with a family) turns up dead, with the same MO. No one likes to put pressure on a relationship in those early, heady days, but at the same time it’s best to know asap if firearms are tucked inside a gal’s baggage.

It’s a tense wait to see how Frank rates as a judge of character. But I didn’t mind the wait one bit; in fact, I didn’t want this flick to end. Even though the plot is fairly straightforward, there are many layers of subtext to the central narrative and there’s an earthy realness in every scene. For example, the opening is a police bust that has nothing to do with the imminent murders – don’t blink and you’ll see young Samuel L. Jackson.

All in a day’s work: Sherman (John Goodman) and Frank (Al Pacino) go on fake dates to catch a killer who targets victims through the singles pages.

In the DVD commentary, director Becker, a New York native, calls these slightly off-track parts “moments that build the rich texture of New York life.” To that end, Becker took particular care casting the many smaller roles, choosing “New York actors who would give authenticity and richness to the scene.”

Pacino’s wonderful in this part, his first screen role after a several-year hiatus during which he worked in theater, his first love. Though it’s not much of a stretch for him, the always-engaging Goodman makes the ideal partner for Pacino. Barkin effortlessly inhabits Helen – a tough working girl who gives as good as she gets, as Becker puts it. (Becker further describes Barkin as being beautiful with a boxer’s nose, which might not exactly endear him to her.)

Of course, Gotham City itself also serves as a major character, with brash, bold attitude and cheeky swagger, that has lent an air of mystery to many a noir. Becker says he tapped cinematographer Ronnie Taylor to help him tell a story with light and shadow.

Harold Jones’ sax-drenched score helps conjure the mood of a New York nightscape: thrilling and sad; transient and eternally alluring. (The soundtrack also includes a Tom Waits cover of “Sea of Love.” The original was a 1959 Phil Phillips song.)

Helen (Ellen Barkin) and Frank (Pacino) deal with each other’s baggage.

Another key ingredient: “Sea of Love’s” first-rate script by Richard Price, a precise and accurate rendering of police work and their lingo as well as a sympathetic take on singles seeking other singles.

And it’s funny. There are many LOL moments – for instance, when Frank and Sherman are assessing their lonely-heart suspects, Sherman asks Frank: “Think you could go for a babe with a dick?” to which Frank replies: “Depends on her personality, really.”

I suspect that “Sea of Love” served as inspiration for 1992’s “Basic Instinct,” written by Joe Eszterhas, who reportedly snagged a $3 million paycheck for the story of police detective Michael Douglas falling in love with murder suspect Sharon Stone. I’d bet $3 million that Price didn’t get nearly as much Eszterhas. “Basic Instinct” can boast high gloss, inventive cinematography and a famous shot of Stone without underwear, but “Sea of Love” is a smarter, far more human, and funnier movie.

Does anyone know what Richard Price is doing these days? In this era of online dating, maybe we need a Sea-quel.

“Sea of Love” is available on DVD and Blu-ray from Universal on Amazon.

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