Flick of the Day: The Name Of The Rose

It is often strange how the careers of actors and directors tend to move in cycles. When you’re up, you’re up and studios seem willing to make almost anything your name is attached to no matter how awful (See the early career of Colin Farrell).  The flip side of course is that when you are out of favour, you can’t get a film made for love nor money. While accepting his Oscar earlier this year, Ben Affleck noted how his career had been affected by negative publicity and indeed how he felt like he would never work again.  Of course the cycles come and go and I’d like to think that if somebody is talented they will continue to find work. One such example would be the star of today’s flick, Sean Connery. Now of course Connery is enjoying a well-earned retirement with a hard fought reputation as a screen icon. However, it was not always thus.  In 1986 when Jean-Jacques Annaud was casting his adaptation of Umberto Eco’s surprise bestseller, Connery’s name was one of the last on the list. The studio would have preferred to have cast almost anyone other than him and when he was cast Columbia pulled their financing. This is perhaps not surprising given where his career was at the time.  He was on quite a streak of failures stretching back to 1979’s misbegotten Cuba and including an ill-advised and unofficial return to James Bond in 1983’s Never Say Never Again.  Included in this period is something called Sword of the Valiant: The Legend of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight which I will admit to knowing almost nothing about beyond its thoroughly awful rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

Connery was eventually cast in the role of William of Baskervile, a Franciscan monk and intellectual who strives for knowledge while Europe is in the dark ages. Together with his young disciple Adso, ably played by a very young Christian Slater, William travels to a Benedictine Abbey in the mountains of northern Italy. Upon his arrival, it becomes apparent that all is not well with the monks. One of their number has fallen to his death from a tower above the library which the abbey is famed for. The Abbot, played with characteristic understatement by Michael Lonsdale, asks William to investigate the death. Together with Adso he sets about the desk with a zeal for finding the truth. Along the way he attempts to impart something of his knowledge to the naïve Adso. However as further deaths begin to occur, William realises that he is in a race against time to catch a killer intent on covering his tracks before the arrival of the evil inquisitor Bernardo Gui with whom William has a complicated history. He quickly becomes drawn into a plot involving a lust for knowledge, sexual power and the very nature of religion.

Half the battle in any production such as this is having a good story around which to build your film. In this case Umberto Eco’s superb novel is rich in detail and atmosphere and offers a bounty for any film adaptation. Annaud’s tone is consistently dark throughout which feels to me to be in line with the novel and helps to create an atmosphere of dread as it sweeps through the Abbey. The monks are men of learning and language who live in splendid isolation from the squalor of the peasants who live outside their walls yet they are if anything equally immoral if not more so than the flock they seem to despise. Ultimately nothing is black or white and all of the monks are cast in shades of grey.  The film also deviates from the book in avoiding great detail of the ecclesiastical split between the different orders of monks and how it had affected the Church at the time, something that while interesting would not make for thrilling viewing.

Of course it helps to have a great cast and in this regard the film’s cup overfloweth.  For all the travails around his casting, Connery is nothing less than superb in the role of William bringing wit and charm to the character. Plaudits must also go to the then hilariously young Christian Slater who really makes you wonder how all that talent was pissed away over the years.  Ron Perlman is almost unrecognisable as the brutish grotesque Salvatore and he is joined in the cast by the likes of F. Murray Abraham and the gorgeous Valentina Vargas.

A commercial failure in the US, the film became a runaway success in Europe including being the highest grossing film of the year in France. For Sean Connery it marked the start of a welcome return to form. He would close out the decade with hits like The Untouchables, The Presidio with a young and irritating Meg Ryan and of course Indiana Jones and The Last Crusade and The Hunt for Red October. Such is the nature of career cycles .  

Flick of the Day: Elefante Blanco / White Elephant

Argentine film-maker Pablo Trapero has over the years developed quite a knack for successfully marrying complex social issues in his native Argentina with excellent story telling  and an eye for dramatic flair. Over the years, we have reviewed a number of his films for The Daily Flick including El Bonaerense, an engaging look at police corruption and 2010's  thrilling Carancho. The latter film stars Ricardo Darin, perhaps the best and most definitely the busiest actor in South American cinema. Darin and Trapero are reunited again in today's flick of the day, White Elephant, set in the teeming slums of Buenos Aires.

In the Villa Virgin shanty-town of Buenos Aires lies a long incomplete hospital, an icon of broken government promises around which a vast slum has built up. In this melting pot of humanity toils the good priest, Julian, played by Ricardo Darin, Julian strives to complete a new social housing project to free the people from poverty while working with crusading social worker Luciana, played by the incomparable Martina Gusman, to help the local young people escape drug abuse. At the film's open, we are introduced to Julian looking ominously at a brain scan and before long he welcomes a new priest to his staff, the idealistic and conflicted Nicolas, played by Jeremie Renier. Nicolas has recently survived a vicious attack on the jungle mission where he was working. Together the three fight to try and make the lives of the slums residents a little bit better while interacting with a clerical hierarchy who wish to keep the area at arms length and an organised crime element involved in bloody internecine conflicts between the narrow streets of the favela.

At times this is bravura film-making from Trapero, we are immediately drawn into the life at the heart of this neighbourhood, the living and the dying. The film has an epic feel from the beginning as the excellent cinematography by Guillermo Nieto manages to both highlight the scale of the slum and its conflicts while also accentuating the narrow claustrophobic streets that criss cross it. While the work of Julian and his team is worthy, it would not make for enthralling cinema were it not for the fact that as the tensions mount in the favela over the lack of construction progress and a bitter bloody feud between two rival gangs, the faith and belief of Julian, Luciana and Nicolas is shaken if not shattered.    

How this conflict and testing of the character's beliefs plays out is the emotional heart of the film. Ultimately the question asked by Trapero is what is the cost for people who give everything to help people with less than them? This is an often dark film but it is never less than compelling. If the film has a flaw it is that its ending doesn't live up to what has come before. Yet despite this, there is much to enjoy here not least another fine turn from Ricardo Darin. There is enough talent evident in Trapero's work to make me want to see where he goes next because it will surely be something special.

Flick of the Day: Cross of Iron

There is no doubt that certain film-makers and their work are so adored by their fans that even the biggest turkey in their filmography will find its defenders. There are still people who will vigorously claim that Stanley Kubrick’s Eyes Wide Shut is a masterpiece. Who knows, perhaps they’re right and it’s the rest of the world that’s wrong. We all have our blind spots but the point is that the overall quality of the work of such auteurs is such that it engenders deep support from viewers. Sam Peckinpah was such a film-maker and when on form and when his work was allowed to speak for itself (something that was rarely the case during his career), he was a prodigious talent. Perhaps his most well-known and celebrated film is the slice of revisionist western that is The Wild Bunch and it is an enjoyable, if violent, epic. However in my humble opinion, his best and indeed one of the greatest war movies ever made, is 1977’s Cross of Iron.

Cross of Iron is one of those rare things in a Hollywood film, a WW2 story from the side of the German army.  There are many historical reasons why this is the case, not least the crimes of national socialism and the holocaust, however Peckinpah manages to side step this by focusing on the lives of the average German soldier on the Eastern front. These enlisted men have nothing but scorn for Hitler, the party and their officers.

It is 1943 and the German campaign in Russia is rapidly beginning to reach its nadir. We are introduced to the hard bitten Sergeant Steiner, played with grim determination by an excellent James Coburn. Steiner is a decorated hero and winner of the Iron Cross who is beloved by his men. While he is difficult and often insubordinate, he is tolerated by his superiors Colonel Brandt, a weary James Mason and the resigned (to defeat if not death) Captain Kiesel, played with a rakish charm by David Warner. Into this steps the patrician form of Captain Stransky, a wonderfully malicious Maximilian Schell. Stransky is an officer of the Prussian aristocracy and has arranged his transfer to the front in order to obtain an Iron Cross. His brusque and often brutal leadership immediately puts him into conflict with Steiner. After Steiner and his men lead a bloody and victorious counterattack against the oncoming Russian forces, the cowardly Stransky who had hidden from battle, attempts to claim credit for the assault. He requires two men to corroborate, one he obtains by blackmailing a closeted homosexual and for the other he enlists Steiner. Steiner refuses to corroborate his tale even when urged by Colonel Brandt with the knowledge that it will rid them of Stransky. An enraged Stransky enacts a brutal revenge however. As the Russian army threatens to overrun their position he fails to pass on the order to retreat to Steiner and his men, leaving them trapped behind enemy lines with the only option of fighting their way out.

Filmed in Yugoslavia behind the then iron curtain, Peckinpah’s film has a real veneer of authenticity to it. War is brutal and the stark conditions of the front lines are continuously exposed to the viewer. In James Coburn’s Steiner, we are presented with an almost legendary example of soldiery. He is abrasive yet fair and not open to the kind of corruption which Stransky wallows in. Throughout the film Steiner defies death to lead his men to safety. It is a bravura performance form Coburn. Yet Schell deserves equal plaudits for his portrayal of the slimy but driven Stransky. He is the kind of patrician who looks down on all other men yet has a grudging respect for the abilities of Steiner who has achieved the one thing he could not, the iron cross. This leads him to dishonour himself in an attempt to enact revenge on Steiner, something he would not need to stoop to for other lesser men.

Like much of Peckinpah’s work, this contains sexual politics which can seem out of touch with modern times. At one point Steiner and his men come across a farmhouse full of female Soviet soldiers with consequences that can be expected. Now I’m aware the Russian had a lot of female participation, certainly far more than the other Allies, and a lot of it was concentrated at the front lines but the scene as it plays out feels bizarre at such a remove.

Even upon release the ending of the film stood out for its abrupt nature and over the years a legend has grown up that the production ran out of money and was forced to throw together an ending on the last day of shooting that wasn't to Peckinpah’s liking. While the ending was not as outlined in the original script, it was something that Peckinpah had Coburn improvise on the day. Regardless, it doesn't detract from the film and contains one of the best lines in the film:

“Then I will show you where the Iron Crosses grow”

The film’s production is almost as legendary as its story. It was financed by a West-German pornography producer and filmed in Yugoslavia using mainly extras from the local army. Peckinpah was at this stage of his career a full blown alcoholic with reports that he drank four bottles of whiskey or vodka during every day of filming, sleeping only 2 to 4 hours a night as he struggled to complete his only WW2 film.

Overall, this is a film which just has to be seen. It is brutal and epic in a way that few films are these days. It showcases a director at his best and a fine cast of actors giving career best performances. Is it of its time? Absolutely but it doesn't detract from what is a great story.

Flick of the Day: Good Vibrations

 It can often be the case that history on screen can feel somewhat remote and detached from modern life, sometimes the frame of reference can be so different that it is difficult to take in the historical events playing out on screen. This is not always the case; the events depicted in Schindler’s List are as harrowing today as they no doubt were at the time.  For me, the events and happenings in Belfast during the Troubles of the 1970’s and 80’s can feel somewhat remote when played out on screen  given the long period of peace the people of Northern Ireland have enjoyed since the signing of the Good Friday Agreement in 1998. Today’s flick of the day however, Good Vibrations, manages to bring to life the difficult and often harrowing events of those times while also immersing us in the Belfast punk music scene through this fine tale of the life and times of Terri Hooley.

At the opening of the film we are introduced to a young Terri playing in his front garden where all is right with the world until after an exchange of words with some local children he gets a toy arrow to the face and requires a glass eye. At this point, I was slightly worried that the film might turn out to be a tad too grim to be enjoyable but it isn't the case. We fast forward in a bravura sequence of carefully edited news footage to Belfast in the 1970’s. Terri is a music fan and he saw all the greats come to Belfast in the 1960’s : Dylan, the Stones, Jimi Hendrix, the list goes on until of course they stopped coming because nobody went out at night anymore.

We find Terri, played by the excellent Richard Dormer, scratching out a living in Dylan Moran’s dive bar where he acts a DJ to an empty room.  There he meets Ruth played by an equally excellent Jodie Whittaker; he explains that once upon a time he had lots of friends, both Protestant and Catholic and that once the troubles started, they fell into opposing groups with Terri alone in the middle. We see how his former friends now despise him for not siding with either side. After marrying Ruth, they try and form a life together despite the maelstrom which is erupting around them.  However after Terri is the subject of an attempted kidnapping at gunpoint while walking home one night, he decides that he had to do something to foster peace and hits on the idea of a record shop. With the help of Ruth’s idealistic group of friends and a mortgage on his house, Terri sets up Good Vibrations. The story would have ended there but for the fact that Terri becomes drawn into, almost by accident, the emerging punk scene in Belfast. Despite being older than the young people that are the focus of this movement, Terri finds himself drawn to the energy of the music and a scene which is truly cross-cultural and without the infection of sectarianism. He sets out to try and bring as much press and airplay to the burgeoning scene and its various bands including most famously The Undertones and their anthem “Teenage Kicks”.

The real strength of this film is how it perfectly captures the raw energy and emotion of the punk movement and how influential it would prove despite its short initial lifespan.  Yet the film does not ignore the fact that punk was not the only game in town. In a poignant scene, Terri notes how talented musicians from the oft-maligned show band circuit kept the Belfast music scene alive.

The film displays a light touch with a period of Northern Ireland’s history which was grim to say the least and is to be commended for this. The casting of some of the young bands feels spot on, in particular Fergal Sharky of The Undertones. Ultimately the rise and fall of punk in Belfast did not bring about a sea change in relations between the two factions and it can’t be ignored that the Troubles thundered on for another 15 years with perhaps the darkest days in the 1980’s. Yet this film feels like a celebration of a time and place when change felt possible and one can’t help but be caught up in Terri Hooley’s story. As the man himself puts in the end: “When it comes to punk, New York may have the haircuts, London may have the trousers but Belfast has the reason”.

Flick of the Day: Nine Queens / Nueve Reinas

Since I first started writing this blog, I have always made an effort to label the leading actors as a way of tracking old posts and films. It was a surprise then and perhaps a testament to the talent of the man when I noticed that today's flick of the day would be the third to contain the talents of Argentine actor Ricardo Darin, the previous films being the excellent The Secret in Their Eyes and the equally compelling Vulture. One of the biggest names in Argentine cinema, he is a superb talent has only begun to be appreciated over the last decade outside of his own country.

Nine Queens is the tale of two con artists who meet in a supposedly random fashion on the streets of modern day Buenos Aires. Marcos, played by Darin, is the older wiser head of the two with an eye for a quick buck wherever it can be had regardless of the effect on his relationships with friends and family. He is quick, sharp and charming when he needs to be. Juan, played by Gaston Pauls, is the earnest and naive younger man who needs to raise money to get his father out of prison. The pair meet in a petrol station one night when Juan is caught attempting a scam and Marcos manages to talk him out of it. He offers Juan the chance to work with him foe one day as his partner has split town. Juan is hesitant at first but eventually agrees. They set off into the busy streets of the city to hatch money making schemes as and when they present themselves. Their focus soon turns to a wealthy Spanish businessman who is staying at a nearby hotel and has a passion for collecting stamps. They plot to sell him fake copies of a rare German stamp much to the annoyance of Marcos's sister who as well as being an employee of the hotel has also fallen out with her brother when he attempted to rob her inheritance. A tense and entertaining crime drama, one begins to feel early on that the protagonists are attempting to con each other and that all is not as it seems but who is the true master con artists and who is the mark?

Ricardo Darin is excellent as the sleazy yet likeable Marcos, a man who survives and thrives on the strength of his own wits. He is the focus of the movie and carries it at times. His fellow compatriot Gaston Pauls also gives an entertaining as the supposedly naive young thief Juan. He is the perfect foil to Marcos, helping the old hand out of a few tight scrapes as the film heats up. 

Director Fabian Bielinsky makes the most of his tightly written script and allows the actors performances to flow. The story such as it is could not be accused of being too original and if you are the kind of movie goer with a penchant for seeing twist endings before they announce themselves then you will probably see this one coming a mile off. That said, the film moves along at a breezy base and there is enough humour to keep you entertained. While none of the characters involved are nice people, let us not forget they are all some form of con artist or scam artist, they are entertaining portrayals and it makes for an enjoyable ride.

Ricardo Darin's career has gone from strength to strength over the past decade and though the number of Argentine films which make it to release in European cinemas, even art house cinemas, is still low with talent like this on show the future is bright.

Flick of the Day: Robot and Frank

Ageing is only very rarely dealt with in cinema and even rarer still is for it to be looked at in any kind of positive light. To lose one's faculties is to lose ones grip on reality or the ability to lead any kind of reasonable life or so the movies would have you believe. Today's flick of the day, Robot and Frank, is that rare event and while not detaching itself entirely from reality manages to be funny, charming and sad. 

In the near future, Frank Langella is an ageing cat burglar who is beginning to lose track of his thoughts on a regular basis. He finds himself wandering through his remote up-state New York home not quite sure of where he is. His house is a mess and he has begun to miss meals and misplace his children's names. He spends his days wandering into town to visit the library to pick up books to read and flirt with the librarian Jennifer, played by  an excellent Susan Sarandon. His son Hunter, played by James Marsden, comes up with the ingenious idea of an expensive next generation robot who has been programmed to look after Frank and keep his memory from deteriorating further much to Frank's irritation. Alone in his rambling old house with his new robot nurse, Frank initially rails against this electronic interloper. However gradually as he gets used to the rhythm of life, he becomes attached to the robot. He soon realises that his new friend can be used for more nefarious means and the possibility of one last big score presents itself. He trains Robot to pick locks and case potential robberies. Frank is determined that together they will pull off another job despite the best efforts of his free spirited daughter Madison, played by Liv Tyler, who attempts to remove Robot and move in with Frank in an attempt to assuage her own guilt.

This film is very funny at times, finding humour in many of the little foibles of Frank's life without ever seeming to laugh at him. His self involved children are perfectly drawn characters and the story is relevant to us all given the way we all try to hive off ageing and the aged into a particular corner of society. However, the real joy and pathos of the film is the relationship between Frank and Robot, voiced by the talented Peter Sarsgaard, while Robot continues to remind Frank that he is not human, Frank begins to develop a friendship with him and as they spend more time together, he becomes increasingly protectful as he begins to rely on Robot and by the end of the film does not wish to part from him regardless of the cost.

Langella gives a wonderful performance as Frank, a man unwilling to comes to terms with effects of getting older. He is nuanced in how he handles the ups and downs of the script and displays perfect comic timing. It is at times a master class in how to act a part with subtlety, wit and a sly charm. Kudos also to Sarsgaard whose voice of Robot brings the character to life and gives him a presence on the screen. 

The film is full of laughs but yet is possessed of a great heart and can only leave you feeling wistful at the end for Frank and Robot. A genuinely unexpected triumph, I urge you to see it if you get a chance. It shines a light on ageing and memory loss without being trite or overly sentimental yet gives you two characters whose company you will delight in.

Flick of the Day: Witness for the Prosecution

Charles Laughton is one of the greatest actors ever to grace the silver screen and yet he is not anything like the kind of household name of a Brando or DeNiro or in receipt of the same plaudits as Olivier or Gielgud. A versatile talent he worked until his premature death in 1962 from liver cancer with starring roles in classics such as Mutiny on the Bounty and Hobson's Choice. A fine entry in his later career work is today's flick of the day, Witness for the Prosecution, an adaptation of an Agatha Christie play of the same name from writer and director Billy Wilder.

Laughton fills the role, in every sense of the word, the role of Sir Wilfrid Robarts, an eminent barrister and legal scholar who at the films open is recovering from a recent heart attack despite his own best efforts to the contrary. He is determined to return to his legal practice despite the opposition of his nurse Miss Plimsoll played by Laughton's own wife Elsa Lanchester. However a most interesting case soon falls into his lap, that of a down at heel inventor named Leonard Vole, played by Tyrone Power as an Englishman with an inexplicable American accent, who has been accused of the murder of a wealthy widow. His only defence is the alibi of his wife, an immigrant whom he rescued from the ravages of post war Germany played by the excellent Marlene Dietrich. Sir Wilfrid is immediately suspicious of Vole's wife and of her willingness to appear in his defence though there is no doubt in his mind that Vole is an innocent man. He launches himself into a new trial putting his health in danger to defend an innocent man whilst investigating the machinations of Vole's supposedly loving wife.

Billy Wilder could easily lay claim to being one of the great director's of Hollywood's golden age with a filmography to rival anyone including highlights such as Double Indemnity, The Lost Weekend, Sabrina, Sunset Boulevard, Some Like it Hot and The Apartment. He is on top form here, carefully weaving the various strands of the tale into a suspenseful legal thriller. Of course it helps when the cast is as strong as that on offer here. Laughton dominates the screen both with his immense bulk and his deep booming diction, a performance perfectly suited to that of a barrister. Dietrich and Power are equally strong with Power giving one of his final performances before his untimely death while filming Solomon and Sheba in Spain.

Wilder was always a director who could turn his hand to any kind of film and in this case, he manages to transcend the genre of courtroom thriller to make a film that is enjoyable and thrilling in equal measure. It doesn't really have any weak elements and would have surely swept the board at the 1958 Oscars were it for the stiff upper lip juggernaut that was The Bridge on the River Kwai. He deviates from Christie's play by inserting humour into the script where it can bare it such as the verbal back and forth between Laughton and his put upon nurse. 

While the ending might stretch the believability stakes in an attempt to keep the film from falling foul of the Production Code which stated that crime must not go unpunished, it is an entertaining drama all the same. If for no other reason then to admire Laughton at somewhere not even near his best, this is a film worth seeing.