FORTY GUNS (1957)

This Samuel Fuller western opens with a stunning opening shot of three men in a small wagon headed down a desert road in Arizona as a huge party of forty men on horses comes stampeding down the road, parting to go around the wagon. The forty men are the Dragoons, men who work for powerful rancher Jessica Drummond (Barbara Stanwyck). The three men in the wagon are U.S. Marshal Griff Bonnell (Barry Sullivan) and his brothers Wes and Chico, armed with a warrant for the arrest of a man named Swain, who happens to be one of Jessica's Dragoons. In the main storyline, Griff and Jessica begin as antagonists but grow to respect each other, and even fall in love. Getting Swain turns out to be easy, as Jessica insists that she's not the unlawful type. But her vulnerable spot is her reckless brother Brockie (John Ericson) who has just killed the town's blind marshal and gone on a spree of destruction just for kicks. He is temporarily put in his place by Griff but hard feelings remain. In another plotline, Wes is asked to stay in town and take the marshal's place, which he is tempted to do as he has fallen in love with the gunsmith's daughter. Griff's youngest brother, Chico, gets blind drunk and has to be tossed in a trough to sober up, but he soon outgrows his rowdy ways and proves his mettle with his brothers. Brockie continues to cause friction, despite Jessica's attempts to keep him out of trouble, becoming the catalyst for a brutal final shootout.

Between a nice visual style, characters with some depth, and mostly fine acting, this is one of the more interesting westerns of the classic era. Barbara Stanwyck (pictured) had staked a solid claim in the genre in 1950's intense psychological western THE FURIES; here, she is less showy but more realistic, and perfect in the part of the powerful woman whom you expect to be a one-note villain (especially when she is described in a barroom song as "a high-riding woman with a whip") but becomes anything but. John Ericson is believably scary as the out-of-control Brockie. The solid supporting cast includes Dean Jagger as a sheriff mostly under the control of Jessica (at one point she has to remind him, "I'm your boss, not your partner"), Gene Barry as Wes, Robert Dix as Chico, and Eve Brent as the gunsmith's daughter. I was less taken with Barry Sullivan as Griff—he's wooden and uncharismatic, and not worthy of Jessica. But he doesn't really hurt the movie much. The black & white cinematography is beautiful throughout and the climax is genuinely thrilling. Highly recommended. [Criterion Channel]

BACK PAGE (1933)

Ambitious reporter Jerry Hampton (Peggy Shannon) has a scoop, an article about an illicit love nest suicide, but her editor kills it because it involves the rich and influential J.H. Smith. Her boyfriend Brice (Russell Hopton), also a reporter, wants to get married but she's not ready to settle down, so he advises her to get a job on a small-town paper where she can have an impact. Brice's uncle Martin Blake (Edwin Maxwell) is the president of the bank in the small California town of Apex, where the retiring head of the local paper is looking for someone to take over. Sam (Claude Gillingwater) is reluctant to hand over the reins to a woman, and her first act is to antagonize the paper's biggest advertiser Nathan Young (David Callis) by writing about his brother's divorce. When he threatens to pull his ads, she claims that she is about to accept competing ads from mail order companies out of town, and Nathan caves. Sam is won over and Nathan becomes her platonic buddy, running her around town on errands and getting involved in her investigation into a local oil well operation. Blake, the bank president, has encouraged the people of Apex to invest in the well, but Sam smells a rat, and sure enough, the well supervisor comes to Jerry and tells her the well is a bust. Blake has announced he will buy up the townspeople's shares, at a fraction of what they paid (which you may recall was a strategy in old man Potter's bag of tricks in It's a Wonderful Life), and suspicious Jerry, along with Nathan, starts nosing around and soon breaks the news that the well is actually fully functioning. The citizens celebrate and Apex becomes a boom town, but the angry Blake gets his revenge by calling in loan payments that he knows the paper cannot make. He plans to take over the paper, firing Jerry and, to add insult to injury, installing her boyfriend Brice as editor. Can Jerry out-scheme Blake and keep her job and her boyfriend?

This is a rather delightful movie, if you keep your expectations on a low-budget pre-Code level. The plot is complex enough to keep you interested but not so convoluted as to cause confusion. It manages to stymie some expectations one might have about its heroine: she is strong and independent, she sustains a non-romantic friendship with a male, and her boyfriend is not jealous of her commitment to a work life. The movie has a low-budget look but that winds up being almost a plus, as the newspaper office has an authentic small-town feel to it. Generally, the acting is fine. Peggy Shannon eventually became an alcoholic and died less than ten years later, but she fits her role here perfectly. Maxwell does his usual good work in a villainous role; Hopton disappears in the middle of the story, but makes a good impression when he’s around. Sterling Holloway has a comic relief role as a (possibly gay) gossip columnist; many reviewers of this film find him irritating, but I don't mind him. This is the kind of story that lends itself to a typical melodramatic treatment, but the tone is kept fairly light and upbeat. I viewed this on DVD as part of a set from Flicker Alley called In the Shadow of Hollywood: Highlights from Poverty Row, and it's been given a spectacular restoration. The audio commentary, as most are these days, is hit and miss. The commentator misidentifies actor Claude Gillingwater as Gillingworth throughout, and is repetitive with her social context points. I recommended the movie if not the commentary. Pictured are Callis and Shannon. [Blu-ray]

MAN-EATER OF KUMAON (1949)

The jungles of Northern India are inhabited by tigers (so we are told) and typically their prey does not include humans. Collins (Wendell Corey) is an American doctor who is tiger hunting to escape painful memories of his recent divorce. He wounds a tiger which loses a claw but gets away. The natives know that the tiger in its weakened state will have a hard time hunting and will be a threat to people and must be hunted down, but Collins, showing signs of malaria, refuses. When the tiger begins killing villagers, they know that it will never return to its natural prey, and soon in a nearby village, a young pregnant woman named Lali (Joy Page) is attacked and severely injured by the tiger. Her husband Narain (Sabu) fetches Collins to help her; she survives but her unborn child does not. When a tiger print with a missing claw is found in the dirt, Collins eventually decides to stay in the village to hunt the tiger down. Meanwhile, there is some melodrama involving native customs which say that Narain must leave Lali because she can no longer bear children, though he does not want to, and Lali ends up going off to offer herself as bait to catch the tiger. The ending, while satisfying, is remarkably anti-climactic. I watched this because Sabu (The Jungle Book, Cobra Woman) was top billed, but unfortunately Wendell Corey has more screen time. Though he's not exactly a bad actor, Corey must be the most unappealing and uncharismatic actor to become a leading man, and his drab performance sinks the movie. Sabu and Joy Page (the young refugee who Bogart helps in Casablanca) and the tiger all try to get some juice into the proceedings, to no effect. Morris Carnovsky, a respected stage actor whose screen career was eventually hurt by the blacklist, is fine (though made up in what I call 'duskyface') as Ganga Ram, Nairan's father. The print I saw on YouTube was missing roughly ten minutes of footage but it didn't seem to hurt the narrative flow too much, and honestly, anything to make this film shorter is fine by me. Based loosely on the real-life experience of author and hunter Jim Corbett. For Sabu completists only. Pictured are Sabu and Page. [YouTube]

THE ROYAL HUNT OF THE SUN (1969)

Spain, 1528. Explorer Francisco Pizarro goes to the king to get backing for a third trip to Peru to find the hidden gold of the Incas that Spain is certain exists. King Carlos can't afford to bankroll what he assumes will be another futile trip, but he gives Pizarro two priests (to convert the natives) and sends Estete, a royal representative, along. Pizarro raises money and men on his own with help from fellow explorer Fernando De Soto who accompanies Pizarro to Peru. By 1530, Pizarro's men arrive and meet with Incan king Atahualpa, who calls himself Lord of the Earth and Sky and Son of the Sun. Pizarro, claiming also to be a god, demands that Atahualpa hand over all the Incan gold to take back to Spain. After Pizarro's men slaughter most of the king's guards, Atahualpa agrees to be kept captive until his men have filled a room with gold for the Spaniards. Over time, Pizarro finds himself respecting the king. In the end, Atahualpa refuses to guarantee that his men will not harm Pizarro's men as they leave, so Atahualpa is sentenced to die. Putting on the mask of the Sun King, Atahualpa assures everyone that, if he is put to death, he will rise alive the next morning, and Pizarro comes to believe that, if Christ could be resurrected, perhaps Atahualpa can too. 

Like ALFRED THE GREAT which came out the same year, this tries to be both an epic and a philosophical chamber drama at the same time. Admittedly, the deck here is stacked against the epic, as this is based on a play (by Peter Shaffer, author of Equus and Amadeus) and there are few large-scale scenes of conflict or adventure. Robert Shaw (Pizarro) and Christopher Plummer (Atahualpa) give it their all, and at times their conversations, mostly about religion, achieve some actorly grandeur. Interestingly, Shaw outshines Plummer here. Plummer gives a very eccentric performance as Atahualpa, full of strange gestures and hissing and odd verbal squeaks, and though he does make the character seem otherworldly, he also remains cold and unknowable. Shaw lets us see the inner confusion of Pizarro who seems not to be concerned much with the spiritual until he confronts the Incan king. The outdoor scenes, shot in Peru, are splendid looking, and despite the intense focus on the two strong leads, there are some noteworthy supporting performances: Nigel Davenport as De Soto, Leonard Whiting (Zefferelli's Romeo) as Martin, a young associate of Pizzaro's, and Michael Craig as Estete. Not easy to find, but worth seeing, especially as an example of a kind of film (or indeed, play) that isn't made anymore. Pictured, from left, Shaw and Plummer. [DVD]

TEVYA (1939)

It's impossible to experience or discuss this film without making reference to the musical Fiddler on the Roof, an adaptation of stories about Tevye the Milkman written in Yiddish in the 1890s by Sholem Aleichem. Most sources, including the 1971 film of Fiddler and the subtitles on this film, spell the milkman’s name Tevye; this movie's title spells it closer to the Hebrew transliteration. Out of tradition (pun intended, if you know the musical), I will spell it here with the final 'e.' Tevye and his family live in a village in Ukraine, and are one of the few Jewish families in the area. We see Tevye's daughter Chava being admired by the young men of the village, but unknown to all, including her father, she's in love with Khvedka, a gentile scholar who brings her books to read. When a friendly priest drops by to tell Tevye about rumors that a Jewish girl is about to marry a gentile, Tevye says that if that happened to him, either he would die or she would. When Chava hears this, she faints. Sure enough, the very next day, Chava marries Khvedka. Tevye goes to the priest's house in an attempt to stop him from marrying the two, and his wife Goldie warns, "Be careful—if you start in on your quotes, we'll be lost." But his efforts are in vain; Khvedka's parents call Tevye and his wife "disgusting pests." At home, Tevye declares Chava dead, not to be remembered or mentioned, and goes as far as sitting shiva (a funeral ritual) for her. Chava loves her husband, but over the next couple of years, his family starts treating her like a servant. When her mother is on her deathbed, Chava has to watch from outside in the rain. When the Tsar decrees that all Jews must be expelled from their villages, Tevye has no choice (the priest tells him he could convert, but he's not about to do that) so he packs up to leave. When Chava hears the news, she breaks away from Khvedka and his family, and returns to her father, desperately hoping he will take her back.

There is humor here and there—when Tevye's horse refuses to get up and work, he asks it, "How long is your sabbath?"—but this is a darker version of the stories than Fiddler was. In the musical, Tevye had three daughters, all of whom defy his wishes and marry as they please. Here, there is only one other daughter, Tseytl, whose sickly husband (whom we never see) dies and she winds up living with her two children with Tevye and Goldie. The matchmaking business, a big part of Fiddler, is absent here, as are most of Tevye's conversations with God. Because the Tevye of Fiddler is often played as larger-than-life (Zero Mostel, Topol, Harvey Fierstein), it's interesting to see here that Maurice Schwartz, a famous actor of the Yiddish stage (pictured), underplays the character a bit, making him more human and less a blustering force of nature. The other performances are generally fine, though Miriam Riselle as Chava wrings a bit too much melodrama out of her situations. I wasn't sure what to make of the husband, Khvedka (the name in the subtitles though most sources call him Fedye). Leon Liebgold plays him quite sympathetically, right up to the scene where Chava leaves him, but I wondered why he let his family run roughshod over her. The film is in Yiddish and the locations look authentic, but it was actually filmed on Long Island and directed by Schwartz. Fans of Fiddler should try to catch this. [Blu-ray]

BATTLE OF THE CORAL SEA (1959)

In March of 1942, days after the Allied defeat at Corregidor, Lieutenant Commander Jeff Conway (Cliff Robertson, pictured at right) of the USS Dragonfish risks his submarine's safety to pick up a couple of battle survivors on a raft, an act that, though successful, doesn't sit well with his superior officers. His next assignment is to keep track of several Japanese ships which appear to be converging on New Guinea where a naval victory would assure the Japanese of dominance over the Coral Sea and put Australia at risk. He is told that, if need be, he should be prepared to scuttle the sub and sacrifice his men to stop the enemy from getting ahold of his orders. Lt. Len Ross has jerry-rigged a camera so he can take pictures through the ship's periscope and things are going well until they get caught in a minefield and the Japanese attach depth charges to the ship. Conway burns his orders and shoots the photographs out into the sea depths, then he and the crew surrender. They wind up on a POW camp island where the overseer, Commander Mori, is proud of being civilized (even though he overworks Ross, who has pneumonia) and he refuses to use torture to get Conway to spill the beans on his mission. The Americans get friendly with two British POWs (Patricia Cutts and Robin Hughes), and all are a little less friendly to Karen Philips (Gia Scala), a translator working for Mori while claiming to be neutral. Conway figures they can hold out until May 4th, by which time the Allies will already have met to begin an offensive attack, but when Mori admits that his more passive attempts to get information have failed, a new commander is called in who is anxious to use torture and death to get what he wants. Karen finally takes sides with the Allies, and soon they are executing a plan to escape by fashioning bows and arrows, and hijacking a Japanese ship.

The title of this film is misleading in a couple of ways: 1) this is not a war action movie, so don't expect the usual genre scenes of combat; 2) there was a real Coral Sea battle, but we don't see it in the movie until the final few minutes when it is recreated via newsreel footage and miniatures. I enjoyed the movie for what it is, essentially a POW camp escape story (with a slight, if less slapstick, Hogan's Heroes aura). Cliff Robertson is convincingly commanding and stoic while playing down any macho bluster. Gia Scala is quite good as the translator; occasionally she reminded me of Ingrid Bergman, especially around her eyes. Hughes and Cutts are fine, and Gordon Jones (as a beefy torpedoman) and Gene Blakely (as Lt. Ross) provide good support. It's a bit of a slow burn for action fans, but the escape and final battle are fairly satisfying. [TCM]

THE MYSTERIOUS MR. M (1946 serial)

In the latest of a string of murders committed by someone who leaves a note signed "Mr. M," three small-time crooks are found dead in a river, their brains paralyzed by an unknown chemical. Police chief John Blair and detective Kirby Walsh are mystified, but we soon discover that the chemical is a drug called hypnotrine, a truth serum and mind control drug developed by Anthony Waldron, a man who has been assumed dead for years. Waldron, hiding out in his grandmother’s mansion, and being assisted by his brother Derek and sister Marina, is trying to get ahold of Prof. Kittridge's new invention, a super-engine that will allow submarines the size of ocean liners to be built (a fact that is explained in literally every chapter of this serial). Waldron is calling himself Mr. M, but soon, he starts getting phonograph records with whispered instructions from someone else using the Mr. M handle, who is masterminding his own search for the engine plans and blackmailing Waldron into working for him. As the police investigate, Kittridge winds up dead, and one of his assistants, Jim Farrell, is injected with hypnotrine by Waldron to help him—it turns out that Kittridge had farmed out the production of various parts of the engine to a number of people and companies, and the Waldrons have a long road ahead of them. As it happens, Jim's brother Grant is a government agent, and after Jim winds up dead during a confrontation, hypnotrine is found in his blood, and Grant vows to track down Mr. M. Grant and Kirby and insurance investigator Shirley Clinton team up under Chief Blair to find the engine plans first, and to bring Mr. M to justice, not knowing that there is more than one Mr. M.

Most of the above and more happens in the first chapter. It's thick with exposition but still manages to be exciting. More exposition follows, but a nice variety of locales and minor characters keep things moving fairly well over the next 12 chapters. At one point, Kirby is captured, injected with hypnotrine, and has an experimental electronic device implanted in his ear, allowing Waldron to send him orders remotely. Among the cliffhangers: an oil field set ablaze, a building set ablaze, a plane with an unconscious pilot, fisticuffs and car chases, and the apparent fatal shooting of a major character. The script is a notch above the average, though the plot recaps that open each chapter are delivered as exposition from one character to another (often someone reporting developments to the desk-bound Chief Blair) and that gets tedious. Oddly, in the onscreen billing for each chapter, the two bad guys, Edmund McDonald (Anthony) and Danny Morton (Derek), are billed first and third, far above the good guys, Dennis Moore (Grant) and Richard Martin (Kirby), who get seventh and eighth billing (second billing goes to Pamela Blake (Shirley) who gets a big action scene in the disabled plane). I liked the acting throughout, especially Morton and Martin; also Jane Randolph as Marina and Byron Foulger as the mousy lawyer Wetherby.

This serial came late in the serials era, though they were still being released through the early 50s, and this was the last one produced by Universal. The general view is that the later serials were losing steam, but I have not necessarily found that to be the case. I quite enjoyed SECRET AGENT X-9 and MANHUNT OF MYSTERY ISLAND, both from the late 40s. I think a bigger reason for the demise of the serial was television, where if the shows weren't exactly like serials, they were serialized, even if each segment was a stand-alone story. The plot of this serial contained more variety in incident than usual, with some plot strands lasting only a couple of chapters, and some characters came and went throughout—and one of the top-billed characters is surprisingly killed off before the last chapter. There is also a trick involved in the unmasking of the real Mr. M in the last chapter. I did like this, and I can actually imagine watching it again. At top left are good guys Richard Martin and Pamela Blake; at right, bad guys Danny Morton and Edmund MacDonald  [DVD]

DEATH IS NIMBLE, DEATH IS QUICK (1966)

American Interpol agent Tom Rowland (Brad Harris) and his buddy, detective Joe Walker (Tony Kendall), are back in another Eurospy movie, the second in the Kommissar X series after KISS KISS, KILL KILL. In Ceylon (now Sri Lanka), three men attempt to kidnap Babs Lincoln, daughter of a wealthy American businessman, resulting in the death of Rogers, an American diplomat, by a fatal karate chop administered by a big bald bruiser named King (Dan Vadis). As it happens, Rowland gives a public demonstration of his impressive karate skills in Singapore and he is tapped to investigate the kidnapping attempt, apparently being masterminded by a mysterious criminal organization called the Golden Cats. When Walker is hired by Babs' father to keep an eye on her, the two wind up working together on the case. As Walker prepares to take a shower in his hotel room, the water comes streaming out blood red, and it turns out to be infected with man-made bacteria that can eat human flesh. As is often the case with these 60s spy films, the plot becomes labyrinthine and hard to follow, but turning off your narrative logic senses will help you enjoy the proceedings which include the following: a beachside chase between a jeep and a train, a thrilling rooftop chase between Tom and King, a cab that is used to gas backseat passengers to death, an assassination attempt foiled by a flashing mirror, more karate attacks, a bizarre amphibious tank that patrols a creepy swamp filled with dead trees, and eventually a climactic sequence of elephants versus a plane.

I'm finding these Kommissar X movies quite fun, almost as much fun as the classic James Bond films, taking into account their lower budgets and less creative screenwriters. Harris and Kendall have a nice 'antagonistic buddies' chemistry, and though in theory, it's Kendall whose character is Kommissar X—though that name is never used in the film—it's Brad Harris (pictured to the left of Kendall) who gets the lion's share of the action and attention here. Vadis makes an effective and imposing bad guy, and Siegfried Rauch is nicely repellent as the secondary villain Nitro, though of course, neither one of them is the chief bad guy whose identity is kept secret until near the end. The finale takes place in another supervillain secret island lair, though it feels oddly truncated. The German title, Drei gelbe Katzen, means Three Yellow Cats, but the English dub always refers the group, definitely more than three people, as the Golden Cats—the 'three' may refer to a ceramic bauble of three cats which is sometimes left at the scene of a crime. Enjoyable. [YouTube]

THE BITTER TEA OF GENERAL YEN (1932)

During the Chinese civil war of the 1920s, Shanghai is in chaos. Bob, a missionary, is about to marry Megan, his childhood sweetheart whom he hasn't seen in three years. On her arrival in Shanghai, her rickshaw driver is hit and killed by the car of the warlord General Yen. Megan is upset that Yen seems unconcerned that he has caused a death (as in Casablanca, human life is apparently cheap) but for good or ill, they have made a brief connection. As the missionaries spout cruel comments about their charges, Bob decides to postpone the wedding briefly to go off and save some orphans. He goes to Yen to get a safe passage document, but Yen gives him a note which mocks him for leaving his bride-to-be. Bob and Megan get to the orphanage, but street battles separate them and an injured Megan is saved from further harm when she is taken onto the private train of General Yen. While recovering at his home, she sees a brutal mass execution carried out from her window even as she sees scenes of luxury in his palatial house. Megan has been reported dead so Yen decides to keep her around. She tries to sneak letters out to Bob, but Yen's mistress Mah-Li gives them to Yen instead. Yen says he will send her back to Shanghai once things have calmed down in the streets, but he engages in a slow burn seduction with Megan, and soon she is having erotic dreams of a suave and loving Yen saving her from a demonic Yen. But even as she begins to fall for him, she cannot convince him to show mercy to Mah-Li when it is discovered that she is the lover of one of Yen's henchmen, and has been feeding information to Yen's enemies. In the end, Megan agrees to stay with the isolated warlord and she dresses as a courtesan to serve him tea, but he has poisoned the tea, and after he dies, she says she will never leave him, and will see him again in the afterlife.

This early Frank Capra film is a footnote in movie history as the first film to play at Radio City Music Hall, but it still holds interest as an example of fine pre-Code moviemaking. The shimmering black & white photography is gorgeous, and though the sets may not be as elaborate as those at MGM (this was shot at Columbia, at the time not quite a grade-A studio), they are effective. Romance between races would soon be banned by the Production Code, and some critics believe that the portrayal of love between an Anglo woman and a Chinese man doomed the movie at the box office. Barbara Stanwyck is as fine as ever as Megan; the Danish actor Nils Asther dons what we would call "yellowface" to play Yen, but he plays his role with some subtlety and I don't think his performance is as jarring to modern viewers as those in the Charlie Chan or Mr. Moto movies. There are Asian actors in a handful of roles, including Toshia Mori as the complicated mistress. Walter Connelly plays an American money man who has raised a good deal of cash to finance Yen's ambitions, and Gavin Gordon is the unlikable Bob. Given how interracial romance was treated through most of Hollywood’s classic era, the ending here in which Megan still pines for Yen after his death is almost shocking. [DVD] 

KWAIDAN (1964)

We popped this award-winning Japanese anthology film in the DVD player as a Friday night Chiller Theatre pick. Not a good choice. Despite its reputation, this is not a horror film in any meaningful way. We gave up after the slow first half-hour. But the next night, with genre expectations gone, we enjoyed it for what it is: a beautifully shot, deliberately paced rendition of four ghost stories (more or less) with a tone of unease rather than horror. The film dramatizes four supernatural stories of Japanese folklore, originally collected and retold by Lafcadio Hearn. In "The Black Hair," a samurai reduced to poverty leaves his wife to make a more financially beneficial marriage with a woman from a high-class family. But after several years, he soon realizes that his new wife is selfish and a life lived just for material satisfaction is not fulfilling, so he leaves to go back to his first wife. She welcomes him home, though oddly, she seems not to have aged, and their home is just as it was. As he learns, appearances can be deceiving. The second story, "Woman of the Snow," has a beautiful, if patently artificial, setting, with a winter skyscape of clouds that look like eyes. During a snowstorm, a woodsman and his apprentice take shelter in what seems to be an abandoned hut. The next morning, a woman with long black hair appears and breathes frost onto the older man's face, killing him. She spares the younger man but tells him he must never tell anyone about the incident. Of course, in folklore, we all know what eventually happens when someone is told not to do something: they do it. Consequences follow. 

The third story is the longest and has the slowest pace, and its title, "Hoichi the Earless," is a bit of a spoiler, but it's worth sitting through. We first see two clans in a sea battle, and the losing clan dies out when all the women kill themselves in disgrace. The shoreline is said to be haunted by ghosts of the clan. A blind servant named Hoichi is known for singing a ballad of the battle, and one night, a samurai arrives and takes Hoichi to the shoreline where what appears to be a mighty court of people listen to him play his song. He does this night after night until two of his friends realize he is playing to the ghosts of the losing clan, and they fear that he will be taken by the dead as one of them. The set and effects make this a very effective sequence. The last story, "In a Cup of Tea," is the least. Its tale of a writer whose creativity is stymied when he sees a vision of a face in his tea is both predictable and muddled. Overall, the film, directed by Masaki Kobayashi, is too long—the version I saw on a Criterion DVD is 161 minutes, and a 3 hour cut is available elsewhere—but its slow pace is part of what makes it evocative. Kobayashi's use of vivid color and studio sets bring to mind the films of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburgerer, like Black Narcissus or Tales of Hoffmann. Well worth watching for its look and atmosphere. [DVD]

AND NOW TOMORROW (1944)

At her engagement party, socialite Emily Blair (Loretta Young) falls ill with meningitis; when she recovers, she has lost her hearing. The doctors don't know how long it will last, so she puts off marriage to Jeff Stoddard (Barry Sullivan). She spends months visiting doctors all over the world but gets nowhere (though she kicks ass at lip-reading). On her return train trip to her hometown, she is pulled out of the way of a runaway luggage cart by Dr. Merek Vance (Alan Ladd), who has a practice at a free clinic in Pittsburgh. He's a hometown boy visiting his mentor, Dr. Weeks (Cecil Kellaway), who has, coincidentally, asked him to work on Emily's case. At first, she assumes that this free clinic physician couldn't possibly help her, and on Merek's part, he resents her family because years ago, Emily's father laid off Merek's father just before Christmas. But she agrees to try his treatment and he agrees to stay in town for a few weeks to see if it works. Their relationship remains a bit prickly, but eventually they warm a bit to each other. Soon, Merek stumbles on an unpleasant fact: Emily's fiancé Jeff is having an affair with Emily's sister Janice (Susan Hayward).

This small town soap opera is, refreshingly, short on showy melodramatics, and allows the relationship between Emily and Merek to develop at a leisurely pace, perhaps a bit too leisurely as, at just 90 minutes, things bog down a bit in the final third. But if thwarted romances and medical dramas are in your wheelhouse, you'll like this. I like Young better in her 1930s movies where she seems bright and energetic. Here, she seems artificial at times, and she doesn’t really inhabit her character. But she's OK, and better are Ladd and Kellaway. Sullivan and Hayward are fine, even though, for the most part, they remain cardboard characters—though you can feel Hayward trying to make something meatier of her role. Grant Mitchell and Beulah Bondi provide solid support. Good line, early in the film: at a diner, Ladd asks for coffee, "hot, strong, and made this year." The cook replies, "You won’t like ours." Pictured are Ladd and Young. [DVD]

THE CARPET OF HORROR (1962)

A man seated at a desk near a statue of Kali is killed when a gloved person tosses a large round tablet on the carpet near the desk. The tablet dissolves into gobs of hissing gas, choking the man to death. Scotland Yard doesn't know what to make of it, except that the gas causes facial scarring and seems to be a poison found in India. Meanwhile, in another house, John Milner, a minor member of a large crime gang run by a mysterious, never-seen boss, has a list of all the gang's members that Scotland Yard would like to get ahold of. Detective Harry Raffold (Joachim Fuchsberger) is on the grounds when another gas tablet attack occurs, killing John. Ann (Karin Dor), the victim's daughter and now an heiress, sees Harry try unsuccessfully to stop the killer, and soon he has appointed himself Ann's protector (and suitor) and delves into the poison gas case as well. The gang's hideout is a basement beneath a car repair shop where they gather to see instructions from the mysterious boss which appear typed out on a large TV screen. Ann moves into a boarding house run by Mabel (Eleonora Rossi Drago), who may or may not be interested in a fling with Harry. The Colonel (Carl Lange) is a possibly sinister fellow boarder. After a series of increasingly outlandish events—and more gassings, although one character is racing against the clock to develop an antidote—the boss is finally exposed and defeated, and Harry and Ann, who get engaged in the back of a taxi, can live happily ever after.

This German krimi film has the usual genre markings including an unknown but all-knowing villain, a crime gang, a trap door, and a convoluted plot. Nevertheless, I found this to be quite fun. I've become quite a fan of Fuchsberger (pictured) and he's in good form here. Harry Raffold seems like the kind of character who might have been brought back for more adventures, though essentially, he is very much like all the other heroes that Fuchsberger plays in these krimi films. Dor is a notch above the usual krimi heroine and the rest of the cast is fine, especially Drago who keeps you guessing about what her role in all this might be. The ridiculous title might give you pause (though the German title is almost as silly: Der Teppich des Graunens = Carpet of Dread), but I recommend this. The print I saw is dubbed in English but the German text on the screen is untranslated. [YouTube]

THR TRUTH ABOUT SPRING (1965)

Gruff small-time fisherman John Mills lives on his small boat with his tomboyish teenage daughter (Spring, played by Hayley Mills, John's real daughter). The pair can be con artists when they need to, as when we see the two pretend to be starving in order to get food and supplies from a bigger boat. While in dock in the Florida keys, they get a visit from a nearby yacht from young handsome James MacArthur who is looking to buy some fish for his uncle and the uncle's young female guests. A recent law school graduate, James decides he's bored on the yacht (and intrigued by Hayley) and when Mills invites him to stay a while, he does. Mills' ulterior motive is to get James to help him (in legal matters and otherwise) find a lost treasure marked on a map in his possession that two other groups of men (which include Lionel Jeffries, Harry Andrews and Niall MacGinnis) also want to find. Ultimately, as sparks fly between James and Hayley, everyone winds up on an island beach, digging up an old wreck that may or may not have anything valuable in it. The most surprising thing about this movie is that it's not a Disney production. It is family-friendly, it has Hayley Mills (from the Disney films Pollyanna, The Parent Trap, and In Search of the Castaways), and it has a fairly strong supporting cast, but it's from Universal via the British company Rank. Though certainly watchable, that hard-to-define Disney magic is missing. Hayley Mills was almost 20 and James MacArthur (pictured with Hayley Mills) was closing in on 30, but her maturity and his youthful looks help make them seem more evenly matched. She seems to be having fun, though MacArthur (who had his own batch of Disney films in his past) feels a little less into the proceedings. John Mills is good as always, and the other stalwart British supporting players are fine. At times, it verges on a Home Alone-ish feel, with villains who never seem very threatening, and I suppose that's what makes this ideal viewing for children—there is a little bit of innocent romance and a little bit of danger and a little bit of adventure. Adults may feel differently, especially since it feels rather long at around 100 minutes, and though it's harmless, you might prefer to rewatch Mills in The Moon-Spinners or MacArthur in Swiss Family Robinson. [Blu-Ray]

THE ADVENTURES OF DUSTY BATES (1947 serial)

It's a foggy night in London as the ship Tilbury Pride heads for a dock along the Thames. Young Dusty Bates (Anthony Newley), an orphan who has run away from his abusive adoptive parents, has stowed away on the ship following his Uncle Hank. Dusty, in hiding, sees a couple of sailors, Tod and Walrus (nicknamed for his mustache) conniving to hide some smuggled jewels in a crate to be taken off the ship and put into a warehouse where they can retrieve them when they're not being watched by dock police. When Dusty is found, he asks to stay with his uncle Hank, but Hank suggests that Captain Ford and his wife, who have two children of their own, take Dusty in until more permanent arrangements can be made. At first, Ford's son David resents having to share his room with the newcomer, but soon, David and his sister Gill initiate Dusty into their "secret" club which involves minor adventures, the details of which must all be kept secret. However, Dusty sets them off on a major adventure when he finds out that Uncle Hank is implicated in the smuggling—he was the unwitting carrier of the jewels onto the boat—and he and the Secret Three try to find the jewels before Tod and Walrus. What they don't know: 1) the head of the shipping company is also after the jewels, and 2) Captain Ford, though completely innocent, is being set up to take a fall if the smuggling effort is exposed. Can the Secret Three get the jewels and avoid getting caught by the villainous forces after them?

As a fan of classic-era Hollywood serials, I was surprised to discover that the British were apparently making their own serials, or at least this one—I couldn’t find much information about other such serials. It follows the American pattern of a serialized narrative in chapters of 15-25 minutes each, with cliffhangers at the end of each chapter to bring audiences back the next week. But there are differences. This one is explicitly aimed at children, or as the opening credits before each chapter put it, "An adventure story for children of all ages." With only five chapters, the total serial runs just two hours instead of the three- or four-hour running times that American serials typically had. The cliffhangers are not quite as exciting as the Hollywood ones, but they also don't cheat the viewers by showing our heroes being blown up, only to cheat an escape in the next chapter. The longer serials fell into repetitive patterns with the story stalling around chapter 3 in order to fill out the long running time (rather like streaming television shows today); this narrative went along at a brisk pace with little repetition. Though one might be tempted to dismiss this as kiddie matinee stuff (which, of course, is what the Hollywood serials basically were except with adults in the leads), the children are put in real danger; the primary villainous pair of Tod and Walrus might seem a bit like comic relief, but they're never slapstick bad guys as in the Home Alone movies. The kids mostly go through their adventures on their own, though Uncle Hank gets drafted into the secret society near the end. Anthony Newley went on to a strong showbiz career as an actor in movies and on the stage, and also found fame as a composer (songs for WILLY WONKA and the lyrics to the theme from GOLDFINGER). Bernard Lee, M in the early James Bond movies, has the relatively small role of the captain. I quite liked John Longden (Tod), Tony Arpino (Walrus), and Ronald Shiner (Squeaky, Hank's comic relief buddy. Recommended for serial fans. Pictured are Arpino and Longden. [DVD]

THE CRIME OF DR. CRESPI (1935)

At the Taft Clinic, the senior surgeon, Dr. Crespi (Erich von Stroheim), gets a call from Estelle Ross, wife of Stephen Ross, another renowned surgeon. He has been gravely injured in a car accident and she asks Crespi to operate on him. At first, Crespi turns her down because of their past love triangle; Crespi had been in love with Estelle, and he remains bitter that she married Stephen, Crespi's assistant at the time. Soon he relents, and the operation seems successful, but we find out that Crespi was actually using Stephen as a test subject for an experimental drug. After injection, Stephen becomes paralyzed and appears to be dead but is still aware of everything around him. By the time the drug wears off, Stephen will be buried alive. Crespi manages to stop an autopsy before the doctor would notice that the body was still alive, but cringing underling Dr. Thomas (Dwight Frye) notices that Crespi had filled out a death certificate while Stephen was still alive. Will Thomas have the wherewithal to report Crespi, and if so, will Stephen be rescued from his premature burial? The best thing about this Poverty Row melodrama is the stark set; necessitated by the low budget, it gives the movie an interesting and eerie feeling which, for the most part, the acting and writing can't do (and neither can the music because there is essentially no background score). Stroheim is playing Stroheim, as he usually did, and his one-note performance robs the film of a strong central figure. However, supporting players Dwight Frye, Paul Guilfoyle, Jean Brooks, and Geraldine Kay bring their characters to life enough to keep the viewer's interest. There is a subplot involving a romance between a doctor and a nurse that is mostly played for comic relief, and with a running time of barely more than an hour, this ends up feeling a little long. But it remains watchable for its almost expressionistic visual style, and for giving Frye a fairly normal and sympathetic role. Pictured are Stroheim and Harriet Russell (as Estelle Ross). [Blu-ray]

WILD GIRL (1932)

This pre-code melodrama is framed as if we're flipping through a photo album, with scene transitions done by page turns instead of wipes or fadeouts. The credits feature the actors introducing themselves in character. In the small mountain town of Redwood City, young tomboyish wild child Salomy Jane (Joan Bennett) is well liked by the townsfolk, and is being pursued by several men—though in the film's intro, she tells us that she likes trees better than men. Rufe, a scruffy sort, is feuding with Jack, a slick gambler, over Salomy. Phineas Baldwin, a mayoral candidate and supposed member of the Purity League, is planning on driving the saloon's ladies of leisure out of town, even as he eventually aggressively nuzzles Salomy though she adamantly refuses his advances. While Salomy engages in some innocent skinny dipping in the woods, she meets a handsome and gallant stranger (Charles Farrell) who is looking for Baldwin, whom he blames for driving his sister to suicide. When Baldwin assaults Salomy, the stage is set for revenge, murder, robbery, and a lynching. The biggest reason a classic movie buff might have for wanting to see this is that the young Joan Bennett is blonde (pictured with Farrell); the first sight of her this way is a bit of a shock to anyone who knows her from her later work (especially as the matriarch in Dark Shadows). Only 22 when she made this film, Bennett is surprisingly light and fizzy and quite good as the title character. Her wildness, as we discover quickly, is much more about energy and innocence and has nothing to do with sexual behavior. Charles Farrell, who could be a bit dull in romantic lead roles, is very good as the Stranger, maintaining the character's mysterious aura throughout. A youngish Ralph Bellamy is Jack and Morgan Wallace is appropriately slimy as Baldwin—his final comeuppance scene is a standout. Eugene Pallette has fun as Yuba Bill, the stagecoach driver. He is partly comic relief, though his character is important to the story. The visual style gives the whole thing a kind of fairy tale or folklore feel, and some location shooting was done in the Sequoia National Park in California. The director is Raoul Walsh, best known for a string of 1940s movies (WHITE HEAT, HIGH SIERRA, THEY DRIVE BY NIGHT) and he gives the film a light touch even as it deals in sordid melodrama. [TCM]

KISS, KISS, KILL, KILL (1966)

As a woman sings a catchy bit of jazzy pop called "I Love You, Joe Walker," we see a long car chase that ends in violent fisticuffs between two men. But it turns out the two are American cop Joe Walker (Tony Kendell) and his beefy Interpol buddy Tom Rowland (Brad Harris), and we've just witnessed an elaborate training exercise. The two are friends but competitive and occasionally antagonistic, and both are in Yugoslavia for different reasons: Rowland is on vacation and Walker is helping a sexy purple-haired woman named Bobo hunt for her missing brother, a physicist. Soon, however, Rowland is assigned a case involving prominent businessmen who are getting blown up, and eventually the two cases meet with both men tracking down a mysterious villain named Goldfinger…er, I mean, Oberon, who has a hidden cache of radioactive gold, obtained through illegal arms deals, on a secret island hideaway. Both the disappearance of the physicist (to aid with handling the gold) and the businessman assassinations (getting rid of the men who are entitled to a cut of the gold) are the work of Oberon. He also has a small army of hypnotized blonde-wigged women—like Austin Powers' fembots—guarding his outpost. I took notes like mad while watching as I tried to keep up with the action, but after 30 minutes, I just gave up, relaxed, and enjoyed the wild antics.

This German-made film is part of the Eurospy genre of movies influenced by the international success of the James Bond movies. From what I can piece together, this is the first in a series of Kommissar X (that would be Joe Walker) movies, based loosely on books credited to a Paul F. Island (think Franklin W. Dixon, supposed author of the original Hardy Boys books which were actually written by a staff). At times, it feels like the filmmakers just shot a bunch of action scenes and fashioned a semi-coherent narrative later. But it is generally fun to watch. The two leads are handsome and confidently masculine, by which I mean they don't have to exaggerate or play down their butch qualities. Brad Harris is an American actor who found his niche in Europe, first in a couple of sword-and-sandal films (like GOLIATH AGAINST THE GIANTS) and then in spy films, crime films and westerns. Tony Kendall is an Italian actor (born Luciano Stella) who had a similar career trajectory to Harris's. Kendall is suave, Harris is hunky, and they have good team chemistry. They're almost like James Bond split in two: Joe is the unflappable ladies man, Tom is the brawny man of action, though in a nice comic twist at the end, it's a buff and shirtless Tom who is surrounded by non-fembot bikinied women. At least two of the female characters have fabulous purple hair. The film's budget is considerably lower than that of the Bond films, but they still manage to have some effective fight scenes and action stunts, especially one in which Harris leaps onto a moving boat. Certainly one of the better Bond rip-offs from the era. Pictured are Kendall and Harris. [YouTube]

COCKTAIL HOUR (1933)

Cynthia Warren (Bebe Daniels) is a well-liked and well-paid illustrator who lives in a Manhattan penthouse and throws cocktail parties galore. We learn early on that she is dating Prince Philippe (Phil to his friends) but not exclusively, despite what he thinks. Phil, assuming Cynthia will marry him, has brought his mother, the Princess, to Cynthia's latest afternoon shindig to meet her, and Mom seems to realize what her son doesn't—that Cynthia will never marry him. After the party, Cynthia is on her way to the passenger liner that will take her to Europe for a vacation when she stops to chat with magazine editor Randy Morgan (Randolph Scott), with whom she shares a past. They have a discussion about the "rules of sex." He wants to marry her and have her revert back to the sweet Midwest girl she was when she came to the city, but she's not ready to settle down. He prankishly locks her in a closet to stop her from leaving, but she gets out and makes it to the ship to find that Phil and his mother have booked passage on the same ship. On the trip, Cynthia becomes great friends with the seemingly exotic Olga, who is actually Tessie from Topeka, and gets cozy with Bill Lawton (Sidney Blackmer). When the ship docks in London, Lawton admits that he's married, that his wife will be meeting him, and asks her not to make a fuss. Cynthia decides to cut things off with him. In Paris, Cynthia has to deal with Phil still hanging around, and running into Bill and his wife socially, when Randy pays a surprise visit. Things come to a head at a party where booze and hurt feelings lead to someone getting pushed out of a window.

This slight romantic melodrama is interesting, even if the somewhat rushed ending is not terribly satisfying. Cynthia begins as an independent woman who likes men and who engages in affairs but is in no rush to get married. Bebe Daniels plays her with a light touch and she remains sympathetic throughout. The situation with Prince Phil (Barry Norton) is mostly played for laughs until it's not. Jessie Ralph, as Phil's mom, is quite likable; she loves her son but knows full well that he's not likely to wind up with Cynthia, and it doesn't sour her on Cynthia. Muriel Kirkland is fizzy fun as Olga, and Sidney Blackmer is surprisingly charming as the caddish Bill—his character is portrayed mostly as misreading the "rules" of his affair with Cynthia. That leaves second-billed Randolph Scott in a throwaway role as Cynthia's "rescuer," confined mostly to the beginning and end. Despite being a pre-Code film, Cynthia winds up learning her lesson and seemingly ready to settle for conventionality with Randy. More than watchable if perhaps a little less than memorable. Pictured are Norton, Daniels, and Blackmer. [TCM]

CLASH OF THE WOLVES (1925)

Rin Tin Tin was a canine superstar for much of the first half of the twentieth century, as big a star as Lassie became in the second half of the century. The original dog was a German shepherd who was rescued in World War I by an American soldier who brought him to the States where he became an unlikely silent movie star. He was featured in nearly thirty movies, mostly westerns and adventures, between 1922 and 1931, and is often considered something of a savior for Warner Bros. studios when they hit bad times. I remember seeing Rin Tin Tin adventures on television when I was young (in the early 1960s), but that was a different dog than the first one, who died in 1932. In fact, there were at least four dogs by that name who were featured in films, TV and publicity campaigns. This was Rinty's tenth outing so he was an old hand at acting by then. The title of this movie is a bit misleading as there is no clash whatsoever between wolves, though there is some culture clash, so to speak, between wolves and humans, and even the wolves are actually half-wolf, half-dog. 

A forest fire in the High Sierras forces a band of wolves down into the desert valley where they begin killing ranch animals, and their brave leader, Lobo (Rin Tin Tin), is targeted by the ranchers. New to town is self-described "lonely tenderfoot" Dave (Charles Farrell) who is prospecting for borax. May (June Marlowe), the daughter of a ranch owner, falls for Dave to the dismay of her father. Alkali Bill (Mack Sennett comic Charlie Conkln, credited here as Heinie Conklin) becomes a good buddy to Dave, but William Horton (Pat Hartigan), a borax appraiser, is actually a claim jumper, and when Dave brings a borax sample to Horton, he's determined to go out and find Dave's strike and take credit for it. Meanwhile, poor Lobo is injured and gets a thorn in his paw that hobbles him, and afraid of being a drag on the pack, goes off to die. Dave finds him and manages to extract the thorn, and Lobo instantly becomes domesticated. Alkali Bill uses a rubber band to put a fake bit of beard fuzz on Lobo's face so the ranchers won't get wise to his real identity, and Dave can take Lobo with him into town. The real clash in the movie is between Dave and Horton, who eventually does steal Dave's claim, and tries to steal May. But when Horton does his worst, loyal Lobo shows up and, in an effective climax, gets the wolf pack to hunt Horton down.

I'm not an expert on wolves (or dogs, for that matter), but I couldn’t believe that Lobo’s fake 'beard' could fool anyone, though it does here. But aside from that bit of silliness, the rest of the movie is enjoyable enough. The actors are all fine—Farrell does a nice job of coming off as sweet and a bit naïve but still manly and smart—but let's face it, this is Rinty’s movie all the way, and he's a damn fine animal actor (and you can plainly tell he's a he). When he's injured, he limps; when he's pissed off, he attacks; when he reunites with his mate, he's happy. His most impressive stunt occurs when he tries to climb up a slippery incline to save Dave from a sneak attack. Dave had put little lace-up boots on his paws so he wouldn't get any more thorns (see the above picture of Rinty with Farrell), but the boots make him slide down the incline, so he unlaces and shakes off his boots to effect the rescue. The story is nothing special, which I assume is the case for most of the Rin Tin Tin movies, but animal fans who don’t mind watching silent films will like this. [TCM]

ALFRED THE GREAT (1969)

In 9th century Wessex, Prince Alfred (David Hemmngs, pictured) has a vision of a united England, under one ruler and one law, written down for the first time, but wants nothing to do with governing. While Alfred is preparing to enter the priesthood, his weak brother, King Ethelred, is wounded while fighting the invading Danish Vikings and calls on Alfred for his assistance. Reluctantly, as he is against the act of killing, Alfred leads the battle and is victorious. He is pressured into a politically favorable marriage to Aelhswith (Prunella Ransome), daughter of the king of Mercia, but he refuses to sleep with her, assuming that sometime, he'll get back to the priesthood. But after Ethelred dies and Alfred is acclaimed the new king, he changes his mind and takes her by force. However, he remains opposed to killing on religious grounds, though he's not opposed to sending others into bloody battle to keep fighting the Danes. When the Danes, led by Guthrum (Michael York), get the upper hand, Alfred agrees to a truce with the Danes getting Mercia but agreeing to stay out of Wessex. They also trade hostages, and Guthrum asks for Aelhswith, who somewhat surprisingly puts up no fight. What she hasn't told Alfred is that she is pregnant, which means his heir will be brought up with the Danes. Eventually, Guthrum returns to fight in Wessex, and Alfred, who is living in the woods in a community of thieves, must decide if he will break his vow about killing in order to try and unify the lands.

This movie tries to be an epic along the lines of Lawrence of Arabia and a more intimate examination of politics, philosophy, and personal relationships, along the lines of The Lion in Winter, and though there are fine moments here and there, it doesn't come together as a satisfying whole. Ultimately, there was neither the budget nor the imagination to make the epic half come to life (though the final battle is well staged), so perhaps more focus on character and relationships would have worked to the movie's advantage. Hemmings gives a slightly eccentric performance in the title role; some critics call it campy, but it seems to me to be an exaggerated attempt to externalize Alfred's internal conflicts. I got used to him, but he's rarely presented as truly heroic or even particularly sympathetic. Michael York would seem miscast as the ruthless king of the Vikings but he is surprisingly effective. Prunella Ransome doesn't make much of an impression as Aelhswith; much better are supporting players Ian McKellen, Colin Blakely and Peter Vaughan. Ok for a one-time view, but not something I'd revisit. [YouTube]