A Fish Called Wanda (1988, Charles Crichton)

A Fish Called Wanda introduces each of its main characters during the opening titles, cutting from one actor to another, starting with screenwriter John Cleese. He’s a barrister. Then it’s Jamie Lee Curtis; she’s a vivacious American. Then Kevin Kline is a deadly but dim-witted American. Finally, Michael Palin. He loves animals, including his fish (Wanda is named after a fish, but also Curtis’s character, who the fish is presumably named after).

Curtis, Kline, and Palin are pulling a jewel heist. Tom Georgeson is the mastermind. Curtis is the brainy moll, Kline’s the muscle, and Palin’s the utility man. Curtis and Georgeson are shacked up, but she’s really with Kline; to cover in front of Georgeson and Palin, Curtis and Kline pretend to be siblings. It gets some raised eyebrows until Kline—in one of the only intelligent things he does in the movie, but since it’s being shitty, he can figure it out—diverts attention in a very funny subplot.

Kline’s the breakout performance in the film. He’s got a mix of physical and verbal comedy, and he’s always better. It’s an exceptional, singular performance. Though, arguably, that description fits all four leads. But Kline gets the most laughs. He does dangerous and absurd in perfect balance.

When someone turns on the crew after the heist, Georgeson gets arrested. He’s moved the jewels, so when everyone else goes looking, they come up empty-handed. Worse, the prosecutors are offering a deal, provided Georgeson turns over the jewels and maybe his partners.

Curtis gets the idea to cozy up to his new barrister, Cleese, in hopes of getting some privileged information. Curtis flirting with Cleese drives Kline up a further wall, which just gets worse and worse for Cleese (and Curtis).

While Curtis and Kline are working Cleese for their own benefit, Palin’s trying to keep on mission; he just needs to take out a witness against Georgeson. A mean little old lady (a delightful Patricia Hayes) with three mean dogs. Except Palin can’t seem to find a way to kill the old lady without taking out her dogs, causing him quite the moral quandary.

It doesn’t help Kline’s annoying him most of the time. Palin’s character has a stutter, which Kline teases him about (first out of carelessness, then out of malice), and the assassination order just gives him more ammunition. Kline doesn’t think Palin can do it and tries to psych him out.

Meanwhile, Cleese is a successful barrister in a disagreeable marriage to Maria Aitken. His success doesn’t impress her (he married into money, which comes up later), and he doesn’t have any interest in her society goings on. They’ve got a daughter (Cynthia Cleese), who’s often around the house, but doesn’t really play in. She’s funny and good; she’s just very supporting.

Aitken’s awesome as Cleese’s wife, who’s got to be in the “unreasonable spouse” position, so Cleese’s flirtation with Curtis isn’t off-putting. Though Wanda initially plays Cleese as a rube, he ends up the protagonist, and he gets there through his infatuation with Curtis. He thinks she’s just an overeager American legal student who happens to be very sexy; she speaks his language and is interested in what he’s got to say.

Wanda is a heist comedy, not a heist spoof or noir spoof. The film doesn’t play around with twists and reveals in the third act. Instead, it establishes the characters pretty quickly in the first and second acts—with Cleese’s protagonist role being the last bit of establishing—and then the second act is all about Kline screwing up Curtis’s plans, complicating things with Cleese, and consequently his home life. Often hilariously. Maybe always hilariously.

Then Palin’s off mostly on his own, checking in with Curtis and Kline occasionally.

It’s an incredibly well-constructed plot. However, there’s nothing not incredible about Wanda. The dialogue’s not just fast and funny; Cleese’s script ties the character development to it. Curtis gives away insight into the femme behind the fatale as she has to react to unexpected, complicated situations. It’s obvious what all the men see in Curtis and what she sees in most of them, but when she and Cleese’s chemistry starts driving their scenes—mutually—instead of the plot machinations, she’s got to make it believable.

Phenomenal work from Curtis. She’s so good. The script gives her a Basil Fawlty rant at one point, and the way she channels it just informs her and Cleese’s chemistry; he’s almost entirely rant-free. Well, loud rant-free. Cleese isn’t just in an expired marriage; he’s also sick of being British. He’s done it all his life, and it sure looks like Americans have more fun.

Cleese is great. As a writer, he knows how to share. He and Kline have some great scenes together, and then there’s a wonderful one with Palin.

And Palin’s excellent, too, of course. For most of Wanda, he’s just in his own little movie amid the bigger story. When they bring him in it, it’s always great.

The film’s technicals are outstanding too. Crichton’s direction is breezy but never hurried. He knows how to showcase the actors. Excellent photography from Alan Hume and a fun score from John Du Prez.

And Hazel Pethig’s costumes are essential, particularly for Curtis and Kline.

A Fish Called Wanda is a masterpiece of comedy. Peerless comedy acting from Kline, Curtis, Cleese, and Palin, and Cleese’s script is superlative. Wanda’s wonderful.

The Boys (2019) s03e06 – Herogasm

Herogasm might be the best “Boys” episode. I can’t remember the previous seasons well enough, but it’s an exceptional hour of television with a phenomenal script (credit to Jessica Chou). It’s Chou’s first credit on the series, which makes the episode even more impressive as the episode concludes some long outstanding story arcs. It also gives many cast members big monologue scenes, including revealing a momentous new narrative device for Antony Starr.

Superb monologue-y, spotlighted performances from (in no particular order): Starr, Erin Moriarty, Laz Alonso (probably his best work on the show), Jessie T. Usher (his best work on the show), Colby Minifie (her best work on the show), Claudia Doumit, and Jack Quaid. Karl Urban gets a phenomenal scene, but it’s not monologuing about his soul; it’s doing a super-powered fight. It’s awesome.

Also awesome is Jensen Ackles, who hasn’t gotten a lot of lines before but gets to do his “Ultimate Captain America” in the sensitive modern era culture shock, and it’s excellent. The episode’s not about Urban, Quaid, and Ackles very often, but when it focuses on them, it does a great job exploring the character dynamics of this troubled trio. First, Ackles isn’t just a fascist murderer, he’s one who can’t control it, and then Urban and Quaid are addicted to the temporary superpower drug.

The episode opens with Chace Crawford and Starr discovering Ackles is back from the dead, which causes Starr’s most loyal teammate Black Noir (Nathan Mitchell) to run out because Mitchell knows Ackles is out to get him. But Ackles is going after c-lister twin superheroes Jack Doolan and Kristin Booth first; they’ve retired from the hero game and just get stoned and screw around. The “Herogasm” of the title is an annual superhero orgy (for the c-listers), and multiple people end up there trying to intercept Ackles. Crawford’s going at Starr’s behest, Moriarty and Alonso have teamed up since Urban and Quaid abandoned them, Usher is there trying to find racist Nick Wechsler, and, obviously, Quaid, Urban, and Ackles are also headed there. The orgy’s extreme, gross, and sometimes funny, while acknowledging there’s a lot of not funny about it, and eventually there’s a lot of tragedy. The episode does a fantastic job using it as a framing device.

The one set of cast members not at the orgy is Karen Fukuhara and Tomer Capone; Capone’s ex-boss Katia Winter has kidnapped Capone for not doing her bidding, and Fukuhara doesn’t have her superpowers to save him anymore. There’s a funny recurring bit about Capone being sad he didn’t get to see Herogasm, which also ties into Urban and Alonso’s professional and personal estrangement.

Pretty much every scene is a highlight in one way or another, with Capone and Fukuhara getting some really nice moments. It’s a momentous episode, and it’s a significant success for the series, Chou, and director Nelson Cragg.

I sometimes forget “The Boys” isn’t just good for a comic book adaptation but really good; then Herogasm comes along to remind it’s exceptionally good.

The Boys (2019) s03e05 – The Last Time to Look on This World of Lies

Silly me, when I wondered how things could get worse for everyone on “The Boys,” I didn’t realize it was going to be everyone everyone, including Antony Starr’s psychotic Superman analog. He’s just become to de facto CEO of the superhero pharmaceuticals company (sycophant Colby Minifie gets the title), and he doesn’t, you know, know anything about big business. Starr’s way out of his depth and obviously can’t admit it, which he plays beautifully. He’s actually not in the episode very much, just for some bad-to-worse scenes throughout, but it’s still an excellent episode for him.

The episode opens with a reprieve (or cop-out) for previously mortally wounded Karen Fukuhara. She’s okay now. Like, she’s in the hospital—which raises questions about how they took a superpowered individual to the ER—but she’s okay. She and Tomer Capone get to spend one great day together with him taking care of her. Of course, he’s neglected to tell her his former boss, Katia Winter, blames him for their Russian mission going wrong last episode and is demanding he kill people for her again, but he’s trying to center Fukuhara’s recovery. It’s a lovely arc for Fukuhara and Capone, and of course, their respite will not last.

Laz Alonso starts the episode mad at Karl Urban for superhero serum juicing, but once Jensen Ackles’s reawakened from a Russian lab Captain America gets to New York and starts blowing up city blocks… Alonso decides to put aside his anger. Erin Moriarty’s also recovering from last episode’s tragic twists, but she’s present enough to suggest they deal with Ackles, who everyone thinks is just a super-villain.

Starr’s too busy watching the stock price, though.

It’s a very packed episode. First, there’s relationship stuff for Moriarty and Jack Quaid, again showing why she’s one of the show’s greatest assets, then there’s Urban and Dominique McElligott bonding over the shared trauma of existence in “The Boys” universe. McElligott is another of the show’s best performances. Urban gets the heaviest lifting in their scenes, leaving her the comic relief, which is actually nice since the rest of the time, she just lives in terror of Starr.

Jessie T. Usher then finally gets his arc involving racist superhero Nick Wechsler, which manages to go incredibly wrong even after it’s already going incredibly wrong. “The Boys” isn’t wasting any time getting everyone to the bottom of the well. Except for Chace Crawford, who’s only got one scene, where wife Katy Breier is effectively puppeteering him to success. I was expecting more with them, but the episode leaves a lot of seemingly open threads unfinished. It’s got a particularly frustrating cliffhanger.

One big highlight—not sure executive producer Seth Rogen’s cameo is a highlight; it’s funny, it’s not a highlight–but one unquestionable series highlight is Paul Reiser. He plays “The Legend,” who was sort of Stan Lee in the comics, but in the show, he’s a Robert Evans-type. Reiser’s awesome; no notes.

He helps the Boys find Ackles, who’s on a revenge mission.

Ellie Monahan gets the script credit; very good script. And Nelson Cragg’s direction is outstanding.

It’s a great episode. It’ll marathon superbly. But having to wait a week for any resolution to the… four or five hard cliffhangers? Annoying.

Monster from Green Hell (1957, Kenneth G. Crane)

Monster from Green Hell is impressively boring. Despite running a theoretically spry seventy minutes, the film Hell’s a slog from minute five.

The film opens with unlikely scientist Jim Davis and sidekick Robert Griffin sending rockets into space to test cosmic rays on animals. Their launch site? A very recognizable, very wanting composite still of Monument Valley. One of their test rockets goes off course and crashes in Central Africa. Despite Davis thinking they should worry about that sort of thing, no one cares; not Griffin, not the government, just blandly heroic Davis.

Now, if Hell weren’t just endless long shots of people walking, and the script was talkier, it might achieve some camp value thanks to Davis. He’s profoundly miscast but entirely straight-faced about it. Griffin at least seems like he could be a scientist sidekick. Davis deserves at least a prize for delivering some of the science exposition; incredibly, he’s able to clomp through it, always with his Midwest cowboy drawl.

Unfortunately, Hell isn’t about the talking; it’s about the walking.

The on-location Africa footage is recycled from 1939’s Stanley and Livingstone, which dramatizes events from 1871. In other words, Hell isn’t just colonial; it’s disturbingly colonial. For example, when Davis and Griffin are trekking across Africa, Arab guide Eduardo Ciannelli carries a whip to keep the porters in line. It’s a lot. Especially since the movie’s already established its token credited Black guy, Joel Fluellen, and he’s more modernly presented.

The movie’s first half is Davis and Griffin’s trip across Africa to Fluellen’s village. The audience already knows they’ve run into a monster from the rocket crash; it hangs out in Green Hell and is stampeding the animals, causing turmoil all over the continent. The new apex predator has arrived, and it’s a giant wasp. Or at least it’s head and pincers because they couldn’t afford much more. They certainly couldn’t afford for it to fly.

The special effects on the giant wasp are not great. They’re gross, which helps in effectiveness, I suppose, but Monster’s wasp is a lousy giant fifties sci-fi monster, as it turns out. Primarily because of budget, partially because of writing, nothing is interesting about it. Could a good director have made it work? Probably. Director Crane has a grand total of one decent shot in the entire picture.

Also in Fluellen’s village are Christian missionary doctor Vladimir Sokoloff and his daughter, Barbara Turner. Turner looks miserable the entire time like she agreed to do the movie but didn’t think it’d ever get made. Sokoloff’s terrible and not in a fun way. When they’re around, Monster slogs even more than usual.

The only thing the film’s got going for it is Ray Flin’s surprisingly good black and white photography. In addition, there’s some stop motion animation, which is more creative than the composites the film usually uses for the menacing Monster. But it’s not, you know, good stop motion.

Monster from Green Hell is a bewildering, boring B. However, it’s strange enough you can imagine the behind-the-scenes story is a far better one than the finished product.

Scream 4 (2011, Wes Craven)

Oh, no, Scream 4 is Wes Craven’s last movie. At multiple times throughout, I remember thinking, “at least this isn’t Wes Craven’s last movie.” Not sure what I thought his last movie would have been, but I didn’t really think it would be this mess of a too-late sequel. Though I guess I’m curious if the story is what franchise “creator” and writer Kevin Williamson had in mind for the original Scream 3before he got fired, and they went with something else. Craven, however, returned. But if Scream 4 is what 3 was supposed to be a decade earlier… maybe there wouldn’t have had to be a Scream 4?

The movie’s first act is an object lesson in the dangers of recurring cast horror franchises, before the lumpy second act where the film pretends it might have something to say about itself. The third act reveals it very much does not have anything to say about itself, though if they’d just written for the finish instead of the reveals, they may have had something. Not a movie Craven could’ve directed, or Williamson could’ve written, but someones else maybe. Because even though Scream 4 is ostensibly about franchise stars Neve Campbell, David Arquette, and Courteney Cox getting older and wiser… they’re none of those things. Scream 4 ages worse than the original trilogy because Craven and Williamson haven’t learned anything. They’re ironically referencing tropes, like girls in lingerie and terrible performances from suspicious boyfriends, but it’s not like they’ve also learned how to be funny about it.

For the first half of the movie, it appears Craven is directing now-sheriff Arquette and his obsessive sidekick, Marley Shelton like they’re in a comedy. The music’s not for a comedy, the editing’s not for a comedy, but if Arquette and Shelton aren’t going for absurdist stupid cop comedy…

Because what else can you do with it? The movie opens with multiple false starts to mess with the audience; sadly, none of them improve the main action. The main action keeps churning along until they get to the third act and can do the big killer reveal. Only the movie’s spent the last hour and fifteen minutes reminding why there’s no reason to care about a Scream movie. It’s all about Craven and Williamson being, well, craven.

The movie’s also profoundly unsuccessful with its attempts to modernize, not even leaning into streaming video as well as the Halloween movie with Busta Rhymes, even though it’s years later, the tech’s better, and everyone has iPhones. Though Williamson’s script seems to misunderstand how people use smartphones, which might explain why no one knows how to text except the character with the Sidekick. They also don’t know how to be scared of mass murderers out to get them, as every character who’s in direct danger does absurdly dangerous things just to get some pop scares. Craven tries to do a pop scare every thirty seconds through the first act, seemingly to wear out the trope. So he can use a different but similar trope later. Though is it better when he tries tropes for the suspense sequences, instead of just creating so much empty headspace one can muse whether or not they should’ve hired someone better at suspense for these movies.

Or with actors.

The best performances in Scream 4 are Hayden Panettiere, Adam Brody, and Mary McDonnell. Brody and McDonnell are barely in it, which works to their advantage. They don’t have characters, just bit parts. Getting to the end of your bit part well is a gift in Scream 4. Someone, usually Williamson, not Craven, will ruin it for you. Panettiere’s “reboot” lead Emma Roberts’s cool friend. Panettiere’s not so much good as not bad and more able to guide her performance than Craven. Roberts lets Craven direct her. It doesn’t go well. Roberts’s part is too small given she’s the lead, with the time instead going to Cox, Arquette, and Campbell. The original trio is just in the story because the movie doesn’t trust Roberts, Panettiere, and their friends. More, no one wants to see another Scream movie without some forced nostalgia going on.

There aren’t actually too many terrible performances. They’re usually unsuccessful or pointless. Cox, Arquette, Campbell, they’ve all got pointless performances. They don’t have anything to accomplish, so not doing so doesn’t affect them.

The worst performance is Nico Tortorella, but it’s not his fault. He’s being written as Luke Wilson making fun of Skeet Ulrich but broody. Tortorella didn’t have a chance with the script or the direction.

He’s one of the new teens, along with Roberts, Patteniere, Rory Culkin, Erik Knudsen, and Marielle Jaffe. Hopefully, most of them reconsidered their agents after this movie.

Scream 4 isn’t as bad as it could have been. It might not even be the worst in the series (though it doesn’t encourage a rewatch to find out). The third act has its moments. Unfortunately, it’s also got a lot of bad, cheap, craven (pun intended) moments. But there’s occasional potential. With better direction, with a much better script. It’s an unfortunate but possibly accurate capstone to Craven’s career.

Also, Marco Beltrami’s scoring has managed to get worse. I kept wishing 4 had his overcooked music, and then it turns out it does, and he’s just lost his enthusiasm. Much like everyone else involved. Scream 4: I Mean, You’re the One Watching It, What Are You Going to Watch Next, Die Hard 7?

Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings (2021, Destin Daniel Cretton)

The third act of Shang-Chi makes it real obvious what’s been wrong with the movie the whole time–it doesn’t matter if Simu Liu is onscreen. The third act has a bunch of different characters fighting a bunch of different bad guys, and Liu disappears for a few minutes to do the whole “how’s the hero going to get inspired from the edge of death” bit and… the movie doesn’t need him. Because even though Liu’s Shang-Chi, the star, he’s never the interesting character in a scene.

The film starts with Tony Leung Chiu-wai (who apparently spoke English this whole time, which is devastating because he finally “comes” to America, and it’s this movie). He’s a near-immortal warlord who wants to capture a mythic village so he can see dragons or something. It’s an Alexander wept moment, don’t ask questions. Leung gives a captivating performance in an absolutely crap part. He went nine hundred and seventy-five years without ever doing any character development, and now he’s rushing to get some in.

Anyway. Still the opening. Leung meets Fala Chen in the village, and they have a wuxia fight. Or at least as close as Shang-Chi gets to a wuxia fight. Director Cretton at least tries with this fight. None of the other fight scenes in Shang-Chi have any real… what’s the word. Effort. The other fights don’t have a style goal. Or at least they don’t have a visible style goal. If Cretton was actually going for something, it’d be worse because he, cinematographer Bill Pope, and the three editors (Elísabet Ronaldsdóttir, Nat Sanders, and Harry Yoon) never achieve it. Or even make it clear they’ve got actual ambitions other than getting to the next scene.

Leung and Chen fall in love, and throughout the film—via flashbacks—we learn he gave up a life of international crime bossing for her, settled down, had a couple kids who grow up to be Liu and Meng’er Zhang. Chen dies under mysterious circumstances, but only to the audience; it’s just the flashback doesn’t want to tell us yet. Because Dave Callaham and Cretton’s script is tediously manipulative. There aren’t any surprises in Shang-Chi, which just makes it all the more amazing it’s able to get to so many compelling moments thanks to the cast and, I don’t know, a competent production’s momentum. And it’s a low competent. Like, Disney did not pony up for real effects money on Shang-Chi. The composites are so bad it’s almost a Warner Bros. superhero movie. Almost.

In the present, Liu’s a San Francisco valet parker who spends all his time hanging out with best friend, Awkwafina. They’re just friends. It’s never explained why they’re just friends, possibly because Liu, Awkwafina, and Zhang are weirdly asexual, but they basically lead this amusing sitcom life. Just with fast cars. What’s weird about the Liu and Awkwafina stuff is the actors can obviously do comedy—Awkwafina from this movie and, you know, Liu from “Kim’s”—but Cretton doesn’t know how to do it. Or more, he doesn’t try to do it. It’s the aforementioned lack of effort kicking in again. Instead of it actually being funny, it’s a too-brief nod at funny.

Really quickly, Liu has to fight some bad guys on a bus, which ends up forecasting Cretton’s inability to do action sequences, and then he and Awkwafina are off to Macau to meet up with previously unrevealed sister Zhang.

They then meet up with dad Leung, who reveals he’s going to go get all the dinosaurs from Isla Sorna. Sorry, wait, I’m thinking Lost World: Jurassic Park but Cretton cribs a scene from there, so I got confused. Leung wants to invade the village and rescue the soul of dead wife Chen from the shitty villagers who wouldn’t let them live there because he’s a warlord.

Even though Awkwafina’s already the comic relief, they need more, so Ben Kingsley comes back from Iron Man 3 (more specifically, the superior Marvel short, All Hail the King), and occasional smiles occur during the subsequent action. Up until they get to the secret village, where Michelle Yeoh enters the movie, and all of a sudden, it’s interesting. Because even though Leung’s mesmerizing, it’s a lousy part. Yeoh’s part isn’t good, but it’s not a terribly underwritten villain part. She’s the cool aunt. She’s basically the hero of the last third of the runtime.

Eventually, Liu will be critical in saving the world from dragons or whatever, but he doesn’t have to act while doing it. Most of the time, he’s just a part-CGI model in extreme long shot.

There’s no one who doesn’t take over the scenes with Liu. Awkwafina from go, then Zhang, then Leung, then Yeoh, but also the supporting actors in scenes, like bit player Ronny Chieng. There’s an astounding lack of direction from Cretton when it comes to his actors. All of them muscle through—I mean, relatively, like Zhang’s likable but not particularly good and Awkwafina is one-note—just not Liu. He’s so unimportant in his own movie it can lose him, and it doesn’t matter, which makes the hero’s quest finale all the more lackluster.

Shang-Chi’s never bad—it’s incredibly safe—but it feels like it’s never bad because Cretton and company figured out a way to produce the film without any stakes. Certainly not for Cretton. Or Liu.

For a specific viewer, Leung will more than make it worth it. Even when he becomes CGI. Or more, he doesn’t become CGI for long enough for it to hurt him. Ditto Yeoh, actually, whose big action sequence ends up being as a too-small CGI model. Then there’s Kingsley; his return is fun but underwritten because Cretton and Callaham are dreadful at comedy.

Also, since the flashbacks to Chen’s story go on for so long—it’s third act before we get the whole story and the movie completely, and very intentionally wimps out on the implications—even though Chen’s okay, she just reminds if they’d gotten Maggie Cheung for the part… I mean, then you’d have a movie worth Tony Leung Chiu-wai. But no. Because it’s a rote and joyless outing, albeit an aridly competent one.

Of Human Bondage (1934, John Cromwell)

The best performance in Of Human Bondage is Frances Dee; despite doing a lot of close-up one-shots with the actors staring directly into the camera, the only time director Cromwell ever gives one anything to do is Dee. She’s mooning over Leslie Howard, which just draws attention to how little Howard mooned over anyone in his previous close-up one-shots. And since Bondage is all about how Howard’s “bound” to Bette Davis, it’d have helped if he’d done some mooning. Instead, at best, he seethes in his close-ups, jealous Davis is giving all the other fellows the attention he apparently craves.

“Apparently” because his attraction to Davis never makes any sense, other than wanting to force her into social situations where she’s subservient to him. The film opens with Howard in Paris, having studied for years to be a painter only to turn out to not be a great one, just a mediocre one. So instead he goes to medical school. Presumably even as a mediocre painter he’s got the fine motor required for surgery.

Other than his professor making Howard exhibit his club-foot for the class, he seems to be doing all right until he meets Davis. “Seems” because there’s nothing the film avoids like providing any character development for Howard outside his pursuing Davis’s affections.

Howard’s got two pals in medical school—Reginald Denny, the class Casanova, and Reginald Sheffield, the filler first act sidekick. Sheffield’s got a crush on Davis and brings Howard along to tell her jokes. All of Howard’s jokes are at Davis’s expense, which shockingly doesn’t endear the two men to her. She’s far more comfortable with flirtatious businessman Alan Hale.

The film soon establishes a pattern, which it’ll keep going through the entire (quite lengthy) eighty minute runtime. Howard will be jealous of Davis and some other dude, Howard will go on a date with Davis, Davis will throw him over for the other dude, Howard will vow never to see her again, Davis will return to Howard once the other dude throws her over. The movie goes out of its way to call it “human bondage,” this relationship between the two, but since Howard’s so stone-faced and the script’s so muted, we never get much insight into his actual feelings. In the salad days we do get some misguided dream sequences, which also reveal Howard wishes he didn’t have the club-foot.

There are some pseudo-character developing romantic misadventures with other women for Howard. Kay Johnson gets a crap part as his first rebound and then Dee. There’s very little development with Dee, who’s mostly in the film as at home waitress to father Reginald Owen. Owen’s one of the patients on Howard’s rounds and they take a liking to one another; Owen’s an old fashioned, fallen on hard times blue blood, who lives in squalor with his family—nine children and counting. Owen’s old fashioned values extend to keeping women barefoot and pregnant, promising Howard that kind of service if he’ll marry Dee away. Only Dee’s too young for Howard. Presumably. There’s a line about it, but given Howard’s got no chemistry with Dee past their flirtatious first scene, it seems like a throwaway not a major plot thread running through the montage heavy third act. The third act takes place over years, with maybe four full scenes and everything else in montage. Director Cromwell’s got some great techniques, which don’t accomplish very much, but he and editor William Morgan’s montage work is not one of those great techniques. They’re tiresome admissions the film has become too tiresome to sustain actual scenes.

It’s a surrender.

Davis is all right. It’s a crappy part, with her character intentionally portrayed in the worst possible light—she’s full caricature in Lester Cohen’s screenplay, every time, even in Howard’s dreams. Howard is barely middling. He’s more vapid than bland—at one point Davis asks him for medical advice and it seems unlikely anyone should trust his doctoring. Dee’s fine. She also doesn’t get a good part. Denny’s good, Hale’s good, Johnson’s fine (and deserves better from the film); Owen’s blah, so it’s good he’s barely in the thing.

For the first third of the film, it seems like Cromwell’s directing might carry the thing, but Bondage never adds up. The messy third act failure seems more inevitable the longer it plays.

Westworld (1973, Michael Crichton)

Westworld is a regrettably bad film. It doesn’t start off with a lot of potential. Leads Richard Benjamin and James Brolin are wanting. But then writer-director Crichton starts doing these montages introducing the behind-the-scenes of the park.

Oh. Right. Westworld is about an amusement resort with humanoid robots. Benjamin and Brolin are guests. Benjamin’s not over his divorce, so he’s got to man up. Brolin’s a man of few words, less facial expression, and no mystery. Crichton’s direction of the actors in the first act should’ve been a clue for problems later on.

The behind-the-scenes procedural about the maintenance of the robots has a lot of potential. It eventually fails because the set is so poorly designed and Crichton and his cinematographer, Gene Polito, often shoot through walls. Everything looks like a set. Even when it shouldn’t, because Polito’s photography is so bad. And someone needed to explain head room to Crichton because he really doesn’t understand it.

Alan Oppenheimer plays the park supervisor. He’s okay. Okay is pretty good in Westworld. Benjamin is occasionally likable, but he’s never good. Crichton avoids him too much to ever give him the chance to be good or bad. When there’s the big chase scene–robot gunslinger Yul Brynner is out to kill Benjamin–Crichton sticks with Brynner for the first half. There’s a changeover to Benjamin after an atrociously executed ambush sequence where the footage between Benjamin and Brynner doesn’t match. It’s not just lighted differently, it’s obviously different locations because Polito and Crichton also don’t understand how depth works.

Westworld has a bunch of Western genre standards; Crichton executes them all poorly. And tediously. Every set piece in Westworld gets tedious. Crichton and editor David Bretherton can’t do the “action” sequences. They can almost do the mood sequences, when they’re showing the uncanny behind-the-scenes stuff. Then Fred Karlin’s music takes a turn for the worse and Crichton holds a shot too long and Polito’s lighting mistakes kill the verisimilitude. Westworld is a failing movie about something failing. Crichton has some great ideas. Not just for the story, but for set pieces. He just can’t execute them. He tries though. And it’s painful.

Karlin’s music is terrible. Set against Western tropes, it’s belligerently terrible. Crichton’s direction of the Western tropes is awful. It’s like he’s never seen a Western before. It’s singular, I suppose. It’s a singular way of directing action on an Old West set. It’s terrible too. Singular and terrible.

Around the halfway point, Crichton starts focusing more on Norman Bartold’s story. He doesn’t even get a name. But he’s guest in Medieval World, not Western World (Division Thirteen alert). It’s not like Bartold’s interesting–he’s trying to seduce multiple robot women without success–but Crichton still finds him more interesting than Brolin and Benjamin. And Crichton’s not wrong. They’re tiresome.

There’s a lot of future technology and Crichton does manage to showcase those effects well. He really does. It’s like forty-five good seconds of eighty-five minutes. But some of its dumb. Like when Brynner gets a visual upgrade and can see in super-pixelated vision. He can’t make out detail because the pixels are so big. Crichton does point of view with the computer visual stuff. It too kills the moment.

If there are any moments with Brynner. Crichton’s bad direction becomes clear when Brynner shows up. Along with Polito’s inability to match lighting between shots. But it’s kind of fun to pretend when Brynner’s smiling, it’s because his robot is evil. It doesn’t matter.

Because Westworld, even with killer robots and defenseless guests, has no stakes. Who cares if the guests are danger? Benjamin is divorced and no one cares. Brolin is so thin he doesn’t even have that story. Bartold maybe had an implied wife in the setup in the first act but not once Crichton decides he’s more amusing than Benjamin and Brolin. He doesn’t have a name. Oppenheimer doesn’t have a name. Dick Van Patten’s got a recurring cameo. But no name.

Westworld is like a disaster movie’s set pieces strung together. More should make it better but the film’s so terribly made, more would just be worse.

Worst of all, Westworld gets worse as it goes. It disappoints, continuously. And it’s not the story disappointing, it’s how badly Crichton directs the scenes.

Campy would help Westworld. Not much else would help, given Polito and Crichton’s risible composition choices, but camp might help.

Oh, and Majel Barrett’s good. She’s good. Ninety-nine percent of the rest isn’t.

0/4 ⓏⒺⓇⓄ

CREDITS

Written and directed by Michael Crichton; director of photography, Gene Polito; edited by David Bretherton; music by Fred Karlin; produced by Paul N. Lazarus III; released by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.

Starring Richard Benjamin (Peter Martin), James Brolin (John Blane), Norman Bartold (Medieval Knight), Alan Oppenheimer (Chief Supervisor), Dick Van Patten (Banker), Linda Gaye Scott (Arlette), Majel Barrett (Miss Carrie), Anne Randall (Daphne), and Yul Brynner (Gunslinger).


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Quartet (1948, Ralph Smart, Harold French, Arthur Crabtree, and Ken Annakin)

Quartet opens with what turns out to be a questionable introduction from source story author W. Somerset Maugham. In the rather stodgy introduction to the film–featuring adaptations of four personal favorites from Maugham’s extensive bibliography–Maugham indentifies adjectives critics have given his work over the years.

Those adjectives prove useful during some of the film’s more labored sections.

While there are four different stories with four different directors and four different casts, screenwriter R.C. Sherriff handles the whole adaptation. The script doesn’t really affect the segments, since Sherriff sticks way too close to the source material for each of them. The cast and the directors make and break the segments, though the detached narratives–flashbacks in flashbacks in flashbacks–which might work fine in prose, clunk repeatedly on film.

The first story, boringly directed by Ralph Smart, has gentleman Basil Radford complaining to some of his chums about his son’s misbehaviors abroad. The flashback starts with Radford but then switches over to the son, the amiable if not particularly effective Jack Watling. The first segment gets the least effort in terms of production values–it’s set in Monte Carlo, where everything is inside save one hotel exterior (at night)–and it doesn’t help things.

Watling, ignoring Radford’s advice, tries his hands at gambling and womanizing. The woman in question is Mai Zetterling, who’s got a little more energy than Watling, but not much. The segment does move pretty, mostly because of their amiability, but it doesn’t amount to anything. It doesn’t amount to anything for Watling or for Radford.

The presupplied adjectives start coming into use as it winds down, though not the complimentary ones. Smart’s lack of direction doesn’t help at all.

The second story, featuring Dirk Bogarde as an heir to a country estate who just wants to be a professional pianist, has similarly unimpressive direction from Harold French. Quartet never takes the time to be stagy, though that approach might actually help given the reliance on interiors.

Bogarde’s parents, Raymond Lovell and Irene Browne, don’t approve of his career choices. Meanwhile cousin (Honor Blackman) ostensibly supports him, but really just wants to marry him.

The script and Bogarde’s performance get this one through, along with Blackman’s uneven performance being a lot better in the first half than the second. She doesn’t get any help from French, who ruins her best possible moment during Bogarde’s big piano recital by superimposing previous dramatic events on the frame. A few minutes later, Bogarde gets a similar opportunity and French (and editor Ray Elton) use medium shots instead of close-ups, sapping his expressions.

A clunky epilogue doesn’t help either. It’s back to those adjectives Maugham supplied in the opening bookend.

The third segment, directed by Arthur Crabtree, is a flashback in a flashback in a flashback. A narrator, who seems like it should be Maugham but doesn’t sound like him (and is uncredited), explains it’s a story his friend Bernard Lee told him. Lee is a prison visitor, someone who helps out incarcerted chaps and provides an ear or shoulder as needed. Lee meets prisoner George Cole, who’s in jail for a peculiar reason. Crabtree, Sherriff, and Maugham drag out the revelation of why way too long before getting into Cole’s story. Oh, wait, there’s actually a flashback in a flashback in a flashback in a flashback at one point.

Anyway, Cole’s in jail because he doesn’t want to support his wife (Susan Shaw) because she broke his kite. Why does Cole care about kites? Why would Shaw want to break one? A lot of it has to do with Cole’s overbearing, protective mother Hermione Baddeley, who thinks Shaw is a harpy. And Shaw is a harpy. And Baddeley is awful. It’s a story without any sympathetic characters, much less any one would want to identify with; it drags on and on, easily the lowpoint of Quartet, even if it’s better directed than the first two segments. It’s just grating. Intentionally so.

And its conclusion, presumambly straight from the source story, is downright asinine, which wasn’t one of Maugham’s supplied adjectives, but definitely should have been. None of the performances are bad, they’re all as good as the poorly drawn caricatures deserve.

However, Quartet doesn’t just save the best for last, it saves the good one for last. Not only is Ken Annakin’s direction immediately superior, there’s no silly frame for the fourth segment and it’s got the pacing, plotting, and production values appropriate for a film.

Cecil Parker is an obnoxious, anti-intellectual upper-middle classman with various responsibilities around country and in London, though he mostly just likes London because mistress Linden Travers is there. Unbeknownst to him, wife Nora Swinburne has literary ambitions. She publishes a steamy book of verse and it becomes a huge hit. Parker doesn’t have any interest in reading it until he finds out it’s about a middle-aged woman and her love affair with a younger man.

The segment is a delight and about the only time Quartet approaches its promised insight into the human condition. Parker is fantastic as the bewildered, stogdy boob thrown into arty conversations and–dreadfully–book stores. No one addresses the obvious contradiction–he’s complaining to mistress Travers about Swinburne’s possible adultery–but it still comes through.

Annakin’s direction, focusing on Parker’s subdued but increasing outrage, is great. Travers is good, if underutilized. There’s a fun Ernest Thesiger cameo. And Swinburne, while she has the tale more worth telling, is good.

It almost saves Quartet, at least, as much as it could be saved after three lackluster–though reasonably well-paced–segments. But then there’s Maugham again, offering a parting thought or two to the viewer. Maybe if he had any insight into the film and its adaptations, but it doesn’t even seem like he’s seen them.

Maybe he got bored during the Crabtree directed one and gave up.

1.5/4 ★½

CREDITS

Directed by Ralph Smart, Harold French, Arthur Crabtree, and Ken Annakin; screenplay by R.C. Sherriff, based on stories by W. Somerset Maugham; directors of photography, Reginald H. Wyer and Ray Elton; edited by Jean Barker and A. Charles Knott; music by John Greenwood; produced by Antony Darnborough; released by General Film Distributors.

Starring Jack Watling (Nicky), Mai Zetterling (Jeanne), Basil Radford (Henry Garnet), Dirk Bogarde (George Bland), Honor Blackman (Paula), Raymond Lovell (Sir Frederick Bland), Irene Browne (Lady Bland), Françoise Rosay (Lea Makart), George Cole (Herbert Sunbury), Hermione Baddeley (Beatrice Sunbury), Mervyn Johns (Samuel Sunbury), Susan Shaw (Betty Baker), Bernard Lee (Prison Visitor), Cecil Parker (Colonel Peregrine), Nora Swinburne (Mrs. Peregrine), Linden Travers (Daphne), and Ernest Thesiger (Henry Dashwood).


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Scanners (1981, David Cronenberg)

About a half hour into Scanners, the film starts to run out of its initial steam. Director Cronenberg (who also scripted) opens the film with some dynamic set pieces–lead Stephen Lack mind frying a mean woman, Lack on the run from goons, Patrick McGoohan chaining Lack down and torturing him (apparently), and Michael Ironside blowing up some guy’s head with his mind. Scanners is a lot right off. Oh, and then a car chase action sequence after the head explosion. Again, it’s a lot.

And then it’s time for the first exposition dump. McGoohan is trying to find “good” Scanners, who are telepaths, like Lack. Ironside is trying to find bad ones. Both want them as biological weapons, McGoohan just wants to sell them to humans. Ironside wants to subjugate the humans. Not all that information comes out at the first info dump, mostly just McGoohan bickering with security chief Lawrence Dane. Dane doesn’t trust McGoohan, but Cronenberg wants the viewer to side against Dane. It’s a confusing turn of events at the end, just because McGoohan’s not a sympathetic character and Dane seems square but level-headed.

Then Lack comes in and goes on a secret mission around Canada as a double agent to join Ironside’s group. Previous to this point in his life story, Lack’s character had been homeless. Now he’s a well-dressed Canadian, kind of a maple syrup James Bond. Only he’s not particularly good at the secret agent stuff. Eventually he meets a girl Scanner–Jennifer O’Neill–who he actually treats terribly and roughly, which is a little disconcerting at times because apparently Lack is supposed to be sympathetic and likable. He’s not, of course, because his performance has all the life of a once damp towel. Same for O’Neill. Same for McGoohan. Dane gives the film’s best performance almost by default.

Well, except for Ironside. I mean, Cronenberg front loads the film with action. He saves some effects work for the grand finale, but there’s no action to it. There’s exposition, there’s pointless contrivance. Cronenberg keeps throwing out big revelations to try to get some emotional connection to the characters, but they’re impervious–Ironside should be intellectually sympathetic but Cronenberg can’t swing it. He really does rely on Lack instead and Lack crumbles, time and again.

But until the late second act, Ironside’s a perfectly good thuggish villain. Sure, he’s also a millionaire war profiteer but it’s Canada, it’s just how Canadian millionaire war profiteering Scanners who operate out of desolate office parks operate.

Nice photography from Mark Irwin, some occasionally strong editing from Ronald Sanders. Once O’Neill and Lack have teamed up in their chemistry-free quest for… it’s unclear. Cronenberg has at least two jumbo red herrings in the script just to keep things moving, which might work at ninety minutes but at over a hundred it’s a slog.

Howard Shore’s music is competent, occasionally Hitchcockian, but most often too much. Cronenberg never really gets a sense of the locations in the film and Shore’s music defaults to filling in mood. But it’s not good at filling in mood.

Really, until O’Neill shows up and becomes Lack’s Eva Marie Saint, Scanners can almost get through. Cronenberg’s got Dane, he’s got Ironside. Sure, Lack’s vacant but maybe he’s supposed to be vacant in that poorly acted way. The strange part about the film is how the first act’s well-plotted. Shame the rest of it is either aimless or misguided.

This post is part of the O Canada Blogathon hosted by Ruth of Silver Screenings and Kristina of Speakeasy.