Strangers on a Train (1951, Alfred Hitchcock)

Strangers on a Train is many things, but it’s principally an action thriller. Director Hitchcock never quite ignores any of its other aspects; he’s just most enthusiastic about the action he and editor William H. Ziegler execute. For example, the third act is entirely action set pieces, one to another, with an occasional bit of light humor thrown in. The light comedy ought to be more complex because the stakes are high; Hitchcock pulls it off thanks to running with light humor throughout, even when it didn’t help a scene; it plays off later.

Train’s best action set piece is the finale, which involves a high-stakes fight scene on a merry-go-round. The film’s incredibly “small,” principally in a handful of locations, moving its cast between them as needed. Plus the train. If it weren’t for the New York to Washington train, there wouldn’t be a movie at all.

The film opens with stars Farley Granger and Robert Walker on such a train. They happen upon each other and become traveling pals for a meal, with wealthy Walker inserting himself into Granger’s day and, soon, affairs. Walker’s awkward but seemingly harmless, and Granger is used to placating the rich and powerful. Granger’s a proto-yuppie (the club tennis pro made good), Walker’s the defective blue blood. Walker knows all about Granger—married to an unfaithful wife (Kasey Rogers), while courting a senator’s daughter, Ruth Roman, on his way into politics. The only problem Walker’s got is dad Jonathan Hale being a pain in his ass. But wouldn’t it be great if both their problems could disappear? Walker’s even got a plan for it: swap murders to confound the police with no motive.

Granger placates Walker’s eccentricity—in for a penny, in for a pound when you’re trying to suck up to the rich—and thinks nothing more about it. Walker, on the other hand, is convinced he’s got all his problems solved. All he’s got to do is get rid of Granger’s problem, and Granger will return the favor.

The film will split its time between Walker, Granger, and Roman, with Roman being the nearest to a protagonist. Walker gets the spotlight, his villain transfixing and often inexplicable. Granger’s the straight man, a little too simple to navigate the resulting troubles on his own, but stoic enough to know he’s got to fix his own problems. Otherwise, he might disgrace Roman and the senator father (Leo G. Carroll); it’s unthinkable since they’re basically his patrons.

He needs patrons to get away from his small city hometown, where his wife Rogers cats around in public view, pregnant with another man’s baby but ready to move to D.C. just to ruin Granger’s life. Train’s got a problem with women, especially if they’re not rich, glamorous, or wear glasses. But thanks to the film’s detached and askew narrative distance, eventually, those characterizations align with the characters’ projections.

Though for a while, it’s just women in glasses—Rogers, for instance—are harpies put on Earth to torment good men trying to be upwardly mobile. The glasses turn out to be a device for set pieces, a fine example of Hitchcock ignoring or oblivious to certain connotations to later deliver on stylized action. It works. But mostly because when the glasses bit comes back, it’s with Patricia Hitchcock as Roman’s precious younger sister. Hitchcock’s a bobbysoxer goth outwardly, really just a cute blue blood, she’s obsessed with murders. One hundred percent, she’d have a true-crime podcast today.

But she also wears glasses, which becomes an issue for Walker, who’s got PTSD from his encounter with Rogers, specifically her glasses.

Hitchcock’s the film’s second most memorable character after Walker—arguably Granger comes in fourth, behind Roman, who’s invaluable in moving the plot forward. At the same time, Granger hems and haws so much it’s a plot point. No one can believe Granger is actually active, so it raises suspicion when he tries it.

Roman’s also more critical because she’s the most sympathetic perspective. The relationship between Granger and Walker is endlessly peculiar, the two men sharing an unspoken bond, but not a simple case of alter egos. They’re both deceptive, and their interactions together are the only times they’re willingly honest. They both will make exceptions, for Roman and Rogers, but not without significant hesitation. Though their respective uncertainties are for very different reasons.

There’s not a bad performance in the film; everyone’s able to find their own space as Walker dominates the screen. Walker’s got as many knockout scenes as the film’s got action set pieces. It’s hard to decide on the best scene; it might be a matter of personal preference—I’m partial to him and Rogers’s disturbing flirtation scene, as he woos her from a distance. It’s the only time Walker ever exhibits lust, and it’s bewitching stuff.

Roman starts as a stock girlfriend part, but it gets better, with her performance doing most of the work. Hitchcock’s great. Granger’s good. It’s his story but not his movie. Carroll’s fun as the senator, but he’s barely in it. He, Hitchcock, and Roman are a fine proto-sitcom family, full of warm and wry banter. Marion Lorne’s delightful as Walker’s confused mother.

Great cameo from John Brown.

Raymond Chandler and Czenzi Ormonde get the screenwriter credits—with Whitfield Cook doing the adaptation from the Patricia Highsmith novel. The writing’s the only place the film ever gets toothsome, but more because Hitchcock’s not interested in the scenes yet doesn’t rush them. Again, it’ll all inform the final payoff.

Robert Burks’s cinematography and Dimitri Tiomkin’s score are both excellent. Tiomkin’s got some great score; Burks has got some great lighting. Thanks to the Hitchcocks, Walker, Roman, Granger, and everyone really… Strangers on a Train is a singular, sensational motion picture.

Blow-Up (1966, Michelangelo Antonioni)

Blow-Up is a day in the life picture. It opens with protagonist David Hemmings on his way out of a flophouse; he’s not a tramp; he’s a wonder kid fashion photographer who’s been undercover all night to snap pics. The film reveals all those details gradually. It takes until about halfway through the picture to find out the photos are for a book he’s putting together with editor Peter Bowles. The book doesn’t seem to include fashion photographs, however. Hemmings seemingly hates his success at photographing models. Unfortunately, he takes out that resentment on his models, who he despises for falling for his Svengali tactics. He’s a right bastard.

The film never shows Hemmings’s perspective. It never asks the audience to identify with him, empathize or sympathize with him. Instead, director Antonioni establishes a close third-person perspective and never strays. There’s usually a brief establishing shot from Hemmings’s point of view—visually—and then the rest of the sequence is looking at Hemmings from the setting. The film takes place over roughly twenty-four hours, with Hemmings moving through a series of time-appropriate vignettes. Most of the vignettes are about him being a jackass, some are about him being an artist, some are about the culture he’s in, both big-scale mid-sixties London and then small scale artist culture.

Hemmings lives in his studio, where he’s got various people working. One of the first scenes has him giving rolls of film to an assistant for developing. After a few more scenes, the assistant delivers the photos. Blow-Up never forgets the linear structure. As fantastic as Hemmings’s day will get, it’s just a day, and he’s just one person amongst a million. He’s a solitary egotist, with his painter friend John Castle living on the same property. The living situation is a little unclear. Though Hemmings’s real estate pursuits are an essential but unexplored bit of the ground situation. Similarly important but mostly unexplored is Hemmings’s relationship with Castle’s wife, Sarah Miles. They have an intense flirtation. Miles is only in a few scenes, but Antonioni gives her the close third-person treatment as well. If Blow-Up were a bigger story, she’d obviously be part of it.

But it’s not a big story. It’s a tiny one.

In the course of his day, Hemmings finds himself with time to kill in near a park and, being a photographer, wanders while taking pictures. He comes upon a couple in the park—Ronan O’Casey and Vanessa Redgrave—and follows them. At least a third of the way through the film, this sequence is the first time Antonioni lets Hemmings just be. Every other moment he’s either conning or controlling someone, but at the park, he’s childish. It starts with him running and jumping for fun, enjoying tiring himself, then when photographing O’Casey and Redgrave, he turns it into an espionage adventure. He hops fences, hides behind trees, clearly entertaining himself because O’Casey and Redgrave aren’t fooled, and she comes over to confront him.

Their first encounter provides insight into how Hemmings responds when challenged. He’s used to people either fawning over him or at least being obedient to his whims. Later, when Redgrave tracks him down at the studio, she’s going to be more susceptible to the Svengali techniques. That sequence is the most character development Hemmings does onscreen, with him either lying at length to Redgrave (who may be lying at length right back at him) or being startlingly honest with a stranger. It’ll be an outside the everyday experience for Hemmings, whose entire life seems to be—but isn’t—a series of abnormal experiences.

Redgrave’s at the studio trying to get the pictures he took, which presents him with a problem. He’s got to magnanimously acquiesce to a beautiful damsel in distress, but not really because he wants the pictures for his book. Adding to the dilemma is Redgrave appears willing to go to extreme lengths to get them back, giving some more rare insight into Hemmings’s actual character. He’ll sort of roll it back soon after once he’s gotten the high of being not just a great photographer but an unintentionally great detective.

The film only shows a handful of Hemmings’s photographs and quickly. We never get to see his fashion photography. We know they’re good because he’s successful, whereas the photographs of Redgrave and O’Casey are good, but also Antonioni has baked regard into them. We saw Hemmings take the photographs, we briefly saw what he was photographing, and then there’s the pay-off. Antonioni’s got a whole approach to Hemmings as photographer, where Hemmings is often developing a photograph in real-time, but the audience doesn’t see that process. Blow-Up is full of photographic gadgetry and process, just without any fetishization. It’s about seeing what Hemmings is doing, not what Hemmings is doing. There’s never any voyeuristic aspect to it either, thanks to Antonioni’s constantly close third-person narrative distance.

It’s exceptional work.

The third act has Hemmings trying to work through the consequences of his discoveries and finding himself unable to control much of anything. It’s a phenomenal character study, especially since he’s gradually revealed to be far less narcissistic than initially implied. The finish, with Hemmings haggard from another sleepless day, stirs in all the themes for a fascinating vignette. So good.

Excellent direction from Antonioni, photography from Carlo Di Palma, editing by Frank Clarke. Clark’s cutting is stunning. The script—from Antonioni, Torino Guerra, and Edward Bond—is sharp while subtle. There’s a superb meta-bit where Hemmings comments on the unimportance of names, something few of the characters have spoken onscreen.

Excellent score from Herbie Hancock.

Blow-Up’s a remarkable success.

The Element of Crime (1984, Lars von Trier)

During The Element of Crime, it never seems like the mystery will be particularly compelling. The film and the detective’s investigation are compelling, but the mystery itself seems rather pat. A serial killer has been targeting young girls selling lotto tickets, earning the moniker the “Lotto Murderer,” and the police are stumped. So they bring in Michael Elphick to take over. Elphick has been living in Cairo for over a dozen years, exiled from Europe. The film starts back in Cairo with a therapist, Ahmed El Shenawi, hypnotizing Elphick to get him to remember what happened.

Only El Shenawi isn’t hypnotizing Elphick exactly; he’s hypnotizing the audience. After a handful of murky shots of Cairo, director von Trier starts the film proper with a second-person point-of-view. It’s mesmerizing. Element of Crime will mesmerize often, but the second-person stuff is von Trier’s most significant swing, if only because everything else has some foundation when he does it.

It takes a few more minutes to meet Elphick—he starts narrating before he appears on screen. Elphick’s narration and diegetic dialogue are sometimes indistinguishable, creating incredible, sometimes startling effects—and we get to see some of future Europe. It’s flooded, and everyone just lives sometimes in three feet of standing water. It’s all nonpotable, so everyone’s a bit of a drunk. von Trier doesn’t have many establishing shots in the film. Sometimes he’ll focus on one aspect of the scenery, but there aren’t any skylines. The film takes place entirely at night and is all in a yellow or greenish tint. Occasionally, there are other color breakthroughs, usually blue, but it’s primarily high contrast yellow or green action surrounded by infinite darkness. In that darkness is the rest of civilization, struggling to continue, left up to the audience’s imagination. It’s incredibly ambitious and a formidable accomplishment.

Elphick’s first stop is his old mentor, Esmond Knight, who taught Elphick everything there is to know about criminal investigations. He taught many detectives, though, even wrote a book called The Element of Crime. It’s a reasonably thick book—we see a couple copies in the film—but the central concept is physically occupying the space of the villain to experience what they experienced and potentially find clues through one’s impersonated reactions. But before Elphick starts retracing the killer’s footsteps, he’s got to get yelled at by the asshole police chief. Jerold Wells plays the chief, who knew Elphick in the old days and was his subordinate. But now Wells is the boss, and there’s no time for that hippy-dippy Element of Crime stuff.

The first act is Elphick getting situated back in Europe and getting some sense of the case from Knight, who had some kind of breakdown as a result of the investigation; Elphick’s only there a few hours before the next victim turns up, which gives the film a sense of immediate danger. Especially since someone is lurking around Knight’s house and then following Elphick.

The mystery figure will continue into the second act as Elphick starts retracing the killer’s steps and soon takes on a sidekick in prostitute Me Me Lai. She’s part of his first stop, then she tags along for a change of scenery and ends up being an invaluable asset in the investigation.

Everything will be revealed in the third act, but only answers to the questions Elphick asks. The mystery he’s investigating is one thread, the mystery the film’s creating through the investigation is another. The film probably has the answers—at least some of them—if you wanted to go through it and pick it apart, but it wouldn’t change the effect because the conclusion is the same. Evil is commonplace, whether it’s the Lotto Murderer or Wells. Especially in this crumbling, sunken world, fecund with violence and death. It’s a helpless, hopeless world. Elphick’s very interesting in how he works against hopelessness. He’s undeniably mired in it, but he really wants to be above it.

It’s a very, very full hour and forty minutes, with exceptional use of narration combined with an excellent performance from Elphick. Knight, Wells, and Lai are all fantastic too. There are a dozen or so other characters, but most are just stops along the way in Elphick’s investigation. Despite the darkness and narration, Element of Crime isn’t a noir or even a riff on one. Instead, the thorough investigation makes it feel a lot more classical, down to the undiscovered urban environment surrounding the narrative.

von Trier’s direction is superlative. He and his crew—cinematographer Tom Elling, editor Tómas Gislason, production designer Peter Høimark, composer Bo Holten—do remarkable work. The film’s even more impressive taking the multiple languages at play in its creation—von Trier and co-writer Niels Vørsel lucked out with translators William Quarshie and Stephen Wakelam. The script’s superb.

Crime’s a singular motion picture, both as a mystery-thriller and as a piece of work.

Cabaret (1972, Bob Fosse)

The first act of Cabaret is about introducing British guy Michael York to Weimar-era Berlin and to the life and times of his neighbor Liza Minnelli. Minnelli’s an American ex-pat; she’s landed in a cabaret and is trying to sing, dance, and sleep her way into movies. York’s there to teach English and get some experience before he becomes a boring Cambridge professor.

The second act is about the rise of Nazism in the early thirties and how much effect it can have on ex-pats. Or it would be if York and Minnelli were paying attention; instead, they’re letting rich German guy Helmut Griem play with them. Griem is in need of affordable diversions, and York and Minnelli are broke.

The third act is about the tragedy of York and Minnelli and how the problems of little people don’t amount to a hill of beans in the crazy world. Director Fosse’s got an inspired narrative distance to York and Minnelli—he has it throughout the film, but in the third act, it’s even better because first, it pays off. Everyone shows their hand, both the characters and then Fosse revealing how the film’s actually been working, and the third act works through the repercussions. It’s sort of like the third act is an extended epilogue to the epical arc the film only barely spotlights.

Because while York and Minnelli are drinking champagne and playing with Griem, their friends Fritz Wepper and Marisa Berenson are experiencing the realities of Nazism. Wepper’s a wannabe gigolo; Berenson is the perfect mark. She’s rich and beautiful but Jewish. It’s not a problem for Wepper; it’s a problem for Berenson. Over the course of their courtship, in addition to Wepper falling hard for her, the local brownshirts start targeting her family.

Cabaret’s most salient arc is for Wepper and Berenson, who occasionally visit York and Minnelli to fill them in on the main plot. But the film’s not really about its arcs; it’s about the disquieting nightmare world everyone finds themselves in, the world of the cabaret.

Joel Grey plays the emcee at the club where Minnelli dances, but Fosse uses him throughout, an almost devil overseeing tragedies big and small. There are only a couple scenes where Grey and Minnelli interact—they have a remarkable musical number together, but Cabaret’s musical numbers are integrated into the narrative and compartmentalized from it—the scenes where Grey and Minnelli engage each other, however, are profoundly disturbing. Just like Fosse uses Grey to imply the macro changes to Germany, Grey’s also there to make some implications about Minnelli’s personal changes. Cabaret is about dreams never coming true while the nightmares instead do. Grey’s the master of ceremonies and nightmares.

Fosse shoots much of the film in close-ups, especially when York and Minnelli are becoming friends. The focus is on the characters, not their setting. Fosse zooms out for some other sequences, the ones contextualizing the characters in the changing Germany. The changing Germans then get the close-ups, Fosse emphasizing the humanity of their inhumanity. There’s a devastating beer garden Nazi youth singing sequence (the master race has such bad teeth and skin) where Fosse malevolently reveals the extent of Nazism among the populace. York’s ostensibly the one watching the revelation unfold, but it’s the viewer. York’s going to get to put his head in the sand while the audience presumably knows what’s coming.

It’s unclear how much the growing Nazi movement impacts York and Minnelli’s arc. It definitely has some effect, but a lot is going on; the film never reveals anywhere near all of it. Actually, the film doesn’t even show most of it. The audience is not privy to York and Minnelli’s thoughts or secrets, just what they’re going to share with the world or one another. And if they’re keeping secrets from each other, it passes over to the audience.

Minnelli and York are tragic characters without being tragic figures. Fosse always finds a way to show the character through the caricature, which is quite the trick given the importance of caricature in the cabaret performances—the most terrifying implication, of course, is Grey’s emcee isn’t a horrifying sight gag but is an active participant. It’s never more impressive than with Minnelli, however. It’s a sensational part, with Fosse and Minnelli able to do all sorts of minor character developments and reveals along the way. York’s got the epical arc—young English man abroad—and Minnelli gets the character study. Even with the film presenting Minnelli almost entirely through York’s observation in the second act. When Minnelli does a musical number, and York’s not there, it takes a second to remember it’s her movie. Well, it’s the cabaret’s movie, and she’s in the cabaret.

Fosse leans heavily into making the Life is a Cabaret song metaphor work for the whole picture. Fosse and cinematographer Geoffrey Unsworth don’t exactly soft-focus the non-cabaret scenes, but there’s always more reality to the musical numbers. The camera captures the performers waiting and watching from backstage, for example. Or whatever magic Unsworth does to make the stage’s lights visually sear without changing the lighting mood. Cabaret is one hell of a gorgeous film. As impressive as Unsworth’s photography gets, David Bretherton’s editing is even better. He and Fosse cut the musical numbers precisely, seemingly on the actors’ rhythm, but the rest is just as well-edited. Every cut in Cabaret is divine.

Great costumes from Charlotte Fleming, production design from Rolf Zehetbauer, and sound from David Hildyard. The music—Ralph Burns arranging—is excellent. Ditto Jay Presson Allen’s script. Obviously, Fosse is the superstar, but he’s got a great crew and cast.

Minnelli and Grey give the best performances, then York. York never gets to be flashy—he is British, after all—and does an excellent job radiating nervous energy. Wepper and Berenson are outstanding. Griem’s fine. He’s just a shallow blue blood, de facto glamorous, and Cabaret’s about what’s behind the glamour. Both real and imagined.

It’s a devastating and devastatingly good motion picture.

MASH (1970, Robert Altman)

MASH is timelessly white liberal. There’s even a lovable Southerner (Tom Skerritt) who knows in that science way Black folks are just folks, but he still wants to be a dick about it. And his white male Northeastern elitist friends, Donald Sutherland and Elliot Gould, are totally fine with that bigotry because, you know, it’s not hurting anything, really.

But then there is something going on actually hurting people, and it’s evangelical Christian Robert Duvall. In what initially seems like a pronounced case of bullying, it turns out director Altman, actor Duvall, and screenwriter Ring Lardner Jr. (whose actual dialogue infamously got edited out for the final product) do a great story arc about Duvall’s Christian Nationalism hurting tangibly hurting and maybe even killing people. When it’s not about Sutherland, Gould, Skerritt, and every other guy in the movie sexual harassing their female colleagues, it’s an exceptionally subtle look at life in this Army M*A*S*H unit.

Altman is doing an anti-Vietnam picture from a pro-war Korean War novel, and the studio is interfering; MASH is a film made in the editing room to some degree. The chaos of the film and the chaos of the content are in perfect sync. When you get to the saddest moment in the picture, you don’t even know why it’s sad; the actors knew why it was sad, but it’s out of sequence and haunts differently. MASH has these occasionally bewitching moments, sometimes even the problematic romance arcs, so Altman and editor Danford B. Greene have sort of set the tone for it to continue. MASH intentionally overloads the audience with information—conversations over one another, basic transition scenes ignored, actual voiceover contrasting a different scene—they work at it from the opening. MASH’s story begins when Sutherland walks into frame, and some quotes roll. But the opening titles are scenes of the unit bringing in the wounded from the helicopters. The film starts with a kick in the gut, one Altman never really brings up again—the gory death surrounding the characters. There are a scant handful of medical cases—MASH is anti-procedural—but their drama’s never tied to them. It’s incredible the film Altman made with the performers not knowing where the film was going. It’s organized chaos.

Just like the war.

Okay, so there’s the white colonial savior shit, which I’ll group with the permissive white liberal racism, and then the classism. Though the classism is more about the misogyny, which is a sort of post-sexual revolutionist excuse for predatory and grooming and gaslighting behavior. Then there’s Duvall’s puritanical shit, which is actually very harmful, and Duvall’s playing a gross, evangelical shit. It’s depressing how secular MASH was allowed to play in 1970.

And then Sally Kellerman’s regular army, but professionally skilled, but performatively puritanical. She’s actually the film’s most realized character, and her purpose is to suffer sexist assaults and hijinks from Sutherland, Gould, and Skerritt. MASH goes out of its way to expertly convince Duvall is actually bad enough of a guy to deserve it, but with Kellerman… the film batters her, and she preservers through it. It’s an excellent performance from Kellerman. Especially since she’s playing a generic harpy in most of her foreground scenes for the first half of the picture. The character development’s in the background.

And when there isn’t character development, it’s about why there isn’t character development. Sutherland, Gould, and Skerritt are the Marx Brothers as drafted, drunken, horny, disaffected brilliant narcissist surgeons. Skerritt’s simultaneously the most and least sympathetic since he’s the unapologetic bigot. Oh, the homophobia. I forgot about the homophobic story arc. MASH is a series of interrelated story arcs; they’re not really vignettes just because they’re all sort of happening at once. At least until the third act and the zany football finale.

Yeah, there are a lot of things going on in MASH. The homophobia arc basically then turns into a patriarchal, classist toxic masculinity objectifying thing for the resolution. Like it’s fucked up. And it does say a lot about the characters creating manipulating those situations. Altman’s got a peculiar narrative distance with the protagonists. Skerritt’s going to get demoted in the third act because he’s gone soft for a girl—everyone’s got a wife back home, but it’s okay because maybe the nurses have husbands. There’s an ever-present but never directly explored romance between base commander Roger Bowen and nurse Indus Arthur. In addition to being married, Bowen’s helplessly aloof; his corporal, Gary Burghoff, basically runs the base. So Arthur’s always doting on Bowen, and it’s kind of icky, but also maybe it’s sweet. But then there’s this added layer where Arthur’s aware Bowen’s a doofus and laughs at it with her friends, including Burghoff. MASH is basically able to get through all of its… well, from Sutherland calling a Black guy a “racist” for giving him shit, MASH is white liberal edge-lord. While also being great.

It’s able to get away with it by never going too far in any one direction—the homophobia is literally genially presented, the racism levels are fine with Fred Williamson, so it’s got to be okay, something something something with the sexually predatory behavior (the nurses are all enthusiastically consenting because the men Altman cast to be normal-looking are all love stallions). It’s a movie, after all, a Hollywood movie, and it’s a comedy. And a war movie. So a Hollywood war comedy. MASH requires a very delicate touch, and Altman’s got it.

Acting: Kellerman’s the winner, then Duvall. Then it starts getting difficult to list it out. Not Skerritt. Kind of not Gould. Kind of not Sutherland either. In terms of irreplaceability, it’s Burghoff. He’s not in the movie as much as he’s in the TV show; he’s definitely a D-tier character (he’s got no subplots to himself). But he’s holding it all together. But also, everyone’s great. Williamson’s great—he ends up commanding the majority of the third act—Rene Auberjonois is great, David Arkin is great, Bud Cort is great; no one’s not standout. Even the objectified nurses. Actually, the treatment of the nurses is kind of where the Marx Brothers comparison comes in.

MASH is awesome. It’s also very privileged, elitist, sexist, and generally misanthropic. But, again, white liberal edge-lord and still gets away with it. When Altman’s great, Altman is great.

Lone Star (1996, John Sayles)

Lone Star is Texas Gothic. There’s nowhere else the story plays the same way except a border town, at no time other than when it does; it’s all about the sins of the mothers and fathers playing out. Actual sins, imagined sins, hidden sins. It’s about heroes and villains and how they’re the same thing. It’s very much about love and loss and anger and sadness. It’s about fear. And it’s about joy and goodness. There’s never any kindness in Lone Star without goodness backing it up. It’s hopeful without being aspirational. Because bad things happen all the time and good people suffer.

The film opens with the C tier–Lone Star has got an A plot, a B plot, and many C plots running between the two and around them. But all the actors who are in C plots have business in the A and B plots. Like how Miriam Colon’s story arc about her relationship with one of her employees, Richard Coca, is more complicated than she realized is a C plot, Colon has a lot to do with A plot actor Elizabeth Peña because Colon’s playing her mother. So when the film opens with Stephen Mendillo and Stephen J. Lang finding a body out next to an army base, Mendillo and Lang are sidekicks to the mystery. Because Lone Star’s a mystery. It’s more a drama, but it’s a mystery too. It’s about what happens when you turn drama into mystery. Or vice versa.

The body discovery introduces sheriff Chris Cooper, who we soon learn is the son of a famous 20th-century sheriff, played in flashback by Matthew McConaughey. The body’s got a sheriff’s badge next to it, so Cooper goes and talks to the mayor, Clifton James, who used to be deputy. Jeff Monahan plays the young version of James. They work for corrupt thug of a sheriff Kris Kristofferson back in the fifties, and Kristofferson disappeared. So Cooper starts thinking it’s Kristofferson’s body they found and investigates his now-dead father’s past. Meanwhile, Joe Morton has taken command of the nearby army base—the body found on property adjoining—and he’s dreading running into his own father, the only Black bar’s owner, played by Ron Canada. Lone Star’s town is a mix of Mexican, white, and Black. We find out that mix is vital to the film early on, when Morton’s wife, Oni Faida Lampley, talks to Peña about it before we even find out how their characters figure in.

Peña and Cooper used to be in love in high school before their parents broke it up. They moved on, married other people, left or were left by other people, and now they’re running into each other again. The film’s got so many timing coincidences the characters can’t help but comment on it—McConaughey’s on Cooper’s mind already because they’re dedicating a courthouse to him and the naming decision was contentious because the Hispanic population dramatically outnumbers the white now; the city’s changing. The mystery angle drives Cooper’s investigation, but how the people he interviews talk to him about the past. Lone Star takes place in a world where it’s time to start telling the truth and not the white American fairytales. Because in Texas, there are lots of bodies still buried.

Another C plot involves army grunt Chandra Wilson, who finds herself in trouble in Canada’s bar and then, incidentally, in Morton’s crosshairs too. Because of how writer and director Sayles lays out the B plot—Sayles follows Eddie Robinson, as Morton’s son and Canada’s grandson, into the bar one fateful evening, and it connects to a bunch of other plot threads as Morton goes through a self-discovery. Juxtaposed against Cooper’s, but Cooper and Morton never have a scene together. They’re just two guys from the same town who have a lot of similar trauma caused by men who never figured out how to stop causing it. It’s an achingly quiet film. Every line, every gesture is precise. Sayles edited as well, and his cuts are frankly seductive; there’s never a cut where you don’t wish the scene had held on for another moment, good or bad. Lone Star makes several promises about its characters and their dramatic potential, then it realizes them one after the other in the third act. It’s one accomplishment after another—there are four plot resolutions: the B plot for Morton, the A plot for the mystery, the A plot for the romance, the C plot for Colon. Morton’s B plot is separate, other than sharing some characters, but the other three all echo and ruminate through each other. For the mystery’s sake, Lone Star has to sacrifice the Colon and Peña plot. There’s work on it, indicators, promises; the future’s unknowable and often sad.

It’s breathtaking stuff. Sayles nails it, ably shifting between drama, mystery, and romance. Cooper and Peña are a fantastic couple. Their romance is appropriately cute, apprehensive, passionate, and tragic. Morton probably gives the best performance. He’s got the best acting in a scene. Just utterly destroys. Canada’s great. Colon’s outstanding; she’s got the most challenging part. Gabriel Casseus is great as young Canada. Tony Amendola, Gordon Tootoosis, and Frances McDormand are all stops along the way in the investigation; all are great; Amendola in particular.

Kristofferson. Kristofferson is the best supporting performance. He’s an exceptional weasel hero, up against a younger, actually heroic replacement. McConaughey’s excellent in that role.

Awesome technicals—Mason Daring’s music, Stuart Dryburgh’s photography, Dan Bishop’s production design, the sound effects crew (Eugene Gearty and Lewis Goldstein are the credited editors). Lone Star’s always gorgeous, always sounds amazing, there’s nothing else quite like it.

Lone Star’s magnificent work from all involved.

Passing Strange (2009, Annie Dorsen and Spike Lee)

From the start, Passing Strange is a spectacular filming and presentation of a stage production. Lee’s direction, Barry Alexander Brown’s editing, Matthew Libatique’s photography, they’re all great from go. Lee and Libatique have highlights throughout—and Brown’s cutting excels during the busiest sections—but it’s clear Strange will look great no matter the content. Of course, Lee directs for the actors’ performances, which I’ll get to in a bit, so again, he still gets occasional peaks thanks to them.

Strange is the story of a young Black man (Daniel Breaker) who moves from Los Angeles to Europe in his late teens, searching for a place where he can be himself. Narrating the story is Stew; Stew and his band have songs throughout; it’s a narrated memoir rock musical, with Stew, Lee, and stage director Annie Dorsen all taking big swings with the medium. Stew isn’t just the narrator; he’s also the critical viewer; we’re watching him watch his remembered past unfold to music, a Technicolor dream. Dorsen’s staging—which has the musical cast interact with the band—is incredible. Then Lee’s direction just adds another layer. Passing Strange is so good at making the experience feel like watching a live performance, it’s weird not to stand and applaud at the end, especially as Stew—in terms of performance (he’s got the narrator and musician hats on especially for the third act, as he interrogates himself)—keeps upping the dramatic ante. Passing Strange is about a lot, being a Black man in the United States, being a Black man raised in Christianity, being a son, being a parent, being a friend, being an artist, being a white European girl, being a gay, closeted preacher’s son, the list goes on and on because almost everyone ends up getting a spotlight. There are only six cast members, and only Breaker and Eisa Davis (as his mother) play one part; the other four create multiple distinct characters throughout, which turns Strange into a showcase for the exceptionally talented cast. For the first act, it seems like the performances are going to be the best part. It changes once Stew—as writer—takes more significant swings, but the performances are always singular.

The first act takes place in L.A., with teenage Breaker arguing with Davis about going to church. However, he changes his mind once he sees pastor Chad Goodridge do a rockabilly sermon. Breaker’s enthusiasm for the music lands him in the youth choir, which seems terrible until he finds out preacher’s son Colman Domingo, who runs it, starts every choir practice with a good smoke out. Domingo and Breaker bond over unrealized dreams. But while Domingo is resigned to his private trap, Breaker’s able to get out of his—he saves up and moves away to Europe, abandoning mom Davis and the punk rock band he made out of the church choir.

His first stop is Amsterdam, in search of public weed-smoking, espresso, and European freedom. There he immediately finds a community who simultaneously sees the color of his skin but assigns no fear to it. The piece about new friend De’Adre Aziza letting him crash at her place is the first singular song, play, and film combination. Aziza’s first part in Strange is as a fellow (Black) teen at the church, but she’s now a Dutch girl. Goodridge, Domingo, and Rebecca Naomi Jones all play Dutch or at least European roles now. They’re all going to do fantastic work, with both Aziza and Jones showing off until Domingo turns in the most eighties German rock performance ever.

But first, it’s time for Aziza to show off. Everyone’s going to get their chance, though Goodridge’s best sequence is the rockabilly church performance; his acting’s good, his characters are never integral to the plot. Aziza and Jones both play love interests, with Jones as a West German girl. Breaker’s a bad artist boyfriend to both of them, which gives them lots of acting and singing material. Aziza’s so good it seems unimaginable Jones is going to be able to compare, but then she’s phenomenal as well. There’s always good interaction between the actors—particularly during the musical numbers—so there’s never any one-upping quality about it.

Though the third act belongs to Breaker, Davis, and Stew. At the beginning of the film, when Lee’s establishing the camera’s narrative distance, Davis sets the bar for acting in close-up. She acts the hell out of it when, since it’s a stage production, she really doesn’t have to act the hell out of it. But everyone’s going to do it. It makes the performances all the more impressive when you see the supporting cast still working even though no one, not even the camera really, can see them.

Wonderful acting. Wonderful music. Wonderful everything.

The third act has some exceptional emotional heft, which the play heaps on, starting with Davis, then adding it to Breaker, while revealing Stew’s got the sum total of it all. Then once he confronts “himself,” there’s a whole other level. And Stew’s not done. After the first set bows, when it feels like there should be an encore—any encore—he goes with one to add yet another layer onto Passing Strange.

It’s superlative work from all involved.

BlacKkKlansman (2018, Spike Lee)

I’m late on BlacKkKlansman. It plays a little differently in 2021 versus 2018 (or even 2019), because now there’s no difference in the rhetoric of the seventies racist garbage and today’s Republicans. The film opens with Alec Baldwin playing the host of a KKK newsreel and doing multiple takes as to take the racism up a notch. The prologue does a couple things. First, it establishes the language of the film. It’s set in the early 1970s in Colorado. White people resent not being able to say the N word so they have all sorts of euphemisms. Baldwin’s opening draws attention to the word replacements and how intent changes content. Second, director Lee does a bunch with historical pop culture imagery—Gone with the Wind, Birth of a Nation—throughout the film and the prologue sets it up. It’s a jarring, grotesque, transfixing opening.

The film proper kicks off with lead John David Washington interviewing for a job at the Colorado Springs police department. They’re trying to get with the times and the times say they need at least one Black police officer. Washington interviews with unidentified Black man Isiah Whitlock Jr. (somehow the film gets away with a meta-“Wire” reference for Whitlock) and very white police chief Robert John Burke before getting sent off to the records room for a bit.

Washington’s ambitious but Burke doesn’t care, not until Kwame Ture comes to town for a speaking gig and Burke wants someone to see how much the local Black people is getting riled up and ready for armed revolt.

The film’s got a very methodical first act, with Lee taking the time to establish Washington so when Ture’s speech hits him, the result is visible. Washington’s there undercover, spying on Black college students—and flirting with Black Student Union president Laura Harrier—and when he hears Corey Hawkins (as Ture) speak, something changes. It’s not even clear what changes because Washington is affably inscrutable. Based on his interactions with his fellow cops—Burke in particular—he conveys there being a definite limit to how much nonsense about Black people he’ll tolerate without comment, but he’s very intentionally deceiving Harrier.

So BlacKkKlansman is about some bad guys and some problematic guys. The only heroes are the students, which kind of spoils the ending but I won’t go any further into it. Lee makes a very big swing with the ending—eschewing an epilogue—and instead offers a capstone about the danger of trying to capstone “history.”

Anyway.

On a whim, Washington calls the KKK (they advertise in the Colorado Springs newspaper; maybe don’t Google to see if they still do, why upset yourself) and pretends to be a white guy. But not a stupid, overly violent racist white guy, just a regular calm reasonable white guy. So he’s a hot prospect. Only problem is Washington can’t go in person. Oh, and he uses his own name.

The former is more immediately important and so they get Adam Driver to play Washington in person with the Klan guys.

The movie’s then a fairly straightforward procedural about cops Washington, Driver, and Michael Buscemi investigating the local Klan, led by Ryan Eggold, who’s got a loose cannon sidekick, Jasper Pääkkönen, and a drunk and dumb enough to be dangerous Paul Walter Hauser. Eggold’s the pseudo-intellectual white supremacist, so Washington and Driver are able to play to his vanity. Washington will also be really good at manipulating Klan national leader David Duke (Topher Grace) when they become phone buddies. Because racist white men just want other racist white men to validate them. Ashlie Atkinson, as Pääkkönen’s true believer wife, also plays a big part in the Klan stuff. The action mostly sticks close to events Washington and Driver participate in or witness, but then all of a sudden Pääkkönen becomes a second tier protagonist and the film becomes a whole lot more dangerous. Because more than anything else BlacKkKlansman is about taking racist white people seriously (and what happens when you don’t).

It’s great. Washington is a fantastic lead, likable even when he shouldn’t be, and his gentle romance with Harrier is an outstanding subplot. Also good but less important is his relationship with Driver, who’s doing his best to hide his Jewish heritage around his racist fellow cops. BlacKkKlansman isn’t a buddy cop movie or a juxtaposition piece, it’s the story of this case, with Washington’s experience as a Black man being a cop in Colorado Springs in 1972 riding the momentum. Only Lee’s going to make it about the way they’re telling that story, working a fantastic narrative distance and perspective sort of over Washington’s shoulder but also much broader, maybe even documentarian (BlacKkKlansman observes its way too real villains almost entirely without comment, cut it differently and Driver, Pääkkönen, Eggold, even Atkinson, could easily be the protagonist). And there’s a big finish to the procedural, there’s a big crowd pleaser for the more comedic elements (Washington does get to be buddies with fellow cops Driver, Buscemi, and Ken Garito, who know other cops are racist murderers but blue lives matter more or whatever), but then it’s time to look at what we’ve learned and what the characters have learned and what it all means. And it’s a great ending. It’s nauseating. But it’s great. Lee never lets up on the pressure either. He gives the film one release and then he sits down to get serious. He even rightfully retracts the second, bigger release.

The best performance is probably Pääkkönen, who’s never not terrifying, never not real. Everyone’s great though. Harrier, Eggold, Driver, Grace, Hauser, Atkinson, Burke, Garito, Buscemi. Plus a fantastic character actor background cast. And then Hawkins. He’s phenomenal. Harry Belafonte has an excellent cameo, so does Nicholas Turturro, on completely different ends of multiple spectrums.

It’s a phenomenal film; always haunting, sometimes hilarious, it’s particularly outstanding streamlined (read: mainstream) work from Lee. And then so much good acting. Great soundtrack, music by Terence Blanchard, photography by Chayse Irvin, edited by Barry Alexander Brown—Curt Beech’s production design and Marci Rodgers’s costumes are great too—BlacKkKlansman is superlative filmmaking start to finish.

Psycho (1960, Alfred Hitchcock)

Psycho is a masterpiece of color. After forty joyfully plodding minutes of Janet Leigh going from fetching spinster in a torrid lunch hour romance to grand larcenist in precise black and white (and then another few minute as she moves to close that character arc), director Hitchcock and Psycho put Leigh in the color of an all-white motel bathroom. And all of a sudden the black and white film (gorgeous photography from John L. Russell) is just as colorful as the imagination, albeit in a stark, sterile white bathroom. The mundane soon becomes a nightmare, even as Hitchcock allows for some ogle on Leigh—who’s partially in her current predicament thanks to every man she’s encountered in the film objectifying her in one way or another. The first arc—not act—of Psycho is Hitchcock humanizing Leigh from the opening, which has her dissatisfied with beau John Gavin. He’s a hunk and he’s worth matinees on work days, but he’s unavailable—he’s too broke to marry Leigh—and Leigh’s getting exhausted with her life.

The film’s an entire flex from Hitchcock. There’s not a scene where he’s not showing off. The drab backgrounds of Leigh’s office are going to contrast the white in the bathroom but also the clutter of the eventual locations. Leigh’s office is as flat and bland as the motel where she and Gavin meet. Psycho’s all about motel living for Leigh; she starts in one, she ends in one. In the first she has urban—even if it’s small city Arizona—anonymity, in the second she has none. In the first she’s on an arc to cause (or inflict, but it’s hard to sympathize with the guys she’s ripping off) suffering, in the second she’s brought the situation around and is directing herself now, actively toward gladness. But Psycho is not about the moral tragedy of Leigh’s character, though along the way Hitchcock does sort of decimate the film noir trappings and examine the resulting dust; Psycho is about the unknown and the terror hiding in it.

Because the second motel is where Leigh meets Anthony Perkins and once Perkins arrives, even a nude shower scene isn’t enough to keep the focus on Leigh. It’s all about Perkins. He’s a shy, somewhat awkward, but very charming, handsome young man who manages the roadside motel for his elderly, infirm mother. They live up in a big house behind the motel. Hitchcock’s going to be very, very careful about how he shows that big house. For most of the film there’s only one way to get there; Perkins’s slim figure, always in mostly dark, going up to the house, coming down from the house, is going to become on the film’s most haunting images as the audience learns more and more about him. Psycho’s a mystery. Hitchcock tells the story of that mystery with the film, with his shots—there are always well-placed inserts to make the world tactile to the viewer—with the photography, with George Tomasini’s editing, and obviously Bernard Herrmann’s awesome music. Whoever did the sound design—Tomasini, Hitchcock, some sound recorder—works in such magnificent unison with Herrmann, who’ll go very loud then silent, the silence ratcheting up the terror. Because everyone’s in some kind of danger in Psycho. Always.

The film establishes very early on women are not safe in Psycho. Sure, she’s in the process of committing a felony, but Leigh is in danger every guy she meets and always because she’s a woman. So when her sister, Vera Miles, starts looking for her, not just retracing her journey but continuing on—Leigh’s plan was to steal the money and go rescue Gavin and then disappear (was disappearing on twenty grand possible in 1960)—with Miles making the trip to Gavin and enlisting his help. Miles only puts herself in actual danger in the finale, but until then it’s clear she’s not safe.

Miles and Gavin get a Third Musketeer in Martin Balsam, a private detective out to get the money back before Leigh’s boss, Vaughn Taylor , has to call the cops. Balsam validates a bunch of imagined offscreen events from Leigh’s rationalizing scene—a phenomenal sequence with Leigh in close-up, driving through a thunderstorm, imagining various conversations about her going on, the conversations playing as voiceovers. Again, Hitchcock flexes everywhere he can in Psycho, showing off a variety of distinct devices, only slowing down once the film’s got Perkins established.

While Leigh’s story is Psycho’s more obvious MacGuffin, certain aspects of Perkins’s character and performance are similarly airy as far as the actual narrative’s concerned. Everything’s relevant, but thanks to Russell’s lighting, Hitchcock obscures that relevancy. Psycho always presents Perkins as a sort of sympathetic, even after it’s clear he doesn’t get it by default. He’s less a hen-pecked doting son and more an active participant in his mother’s outbursts, which place terrible burdens on him. The scene where Perkins has got to clean up the bathroom, restoring the pristine whiteness, has all these tactile touchstones so Hitchcock can force the audience into a sympathetic response (we’ve all grabbed a towel, haven’t we), only for Hitchcock to reveal the dangers of such sympathies. You’ve got to be on guard at all times in Psycho.

Of course, there’s an explanation for all the goings on, and it’s a….

It’s a lot. The film weaponizes the inaccurate, bigoted psychology of the era to create a new category of screen villain (or at least new in A tier movies) for an easy reveal, all patriarchally lectured (quite ably from Simon Oakland). It’s sexist, transphobic, ableist; even for the era the film should’ve come with a disclaimer. Psycho is, no doubt, a singular masterpiece; it changed mainstream film thanks to Hitchcock and company’s techniques. And also because of its garbage reveal. That reveal has had a lot of bad consequences. Solely bad consequences, in fact; fruit of a poisonous tree branch. Psycho’s deus ex machina hasn’t so much as aged badly as always been rotten.

It’s also an expertly executed deus ex machina. Hitchcock knows how to present the reveals, then pulls all the threads together for the last few shots; he brings in Perkins for part of the pay-off too, after building big up to his return to the screen even though he’s only been gone a few minutes. It’s incredibly well-done, also bringing back the noir feels.

Psycho’s one of a kind.

All About Eve (1950, Joseph L. Mankiewicz)

All About Eve is incredibly ambitious work from writer and director Mankiewicz. From the first scene, from the epic Alfred Newman score over the opening titles (which are just the standard late forties, early fifties Fox title cards), it’s clear All About Eve is going for something. But it takes over an hour to even reveal where it’s going, instead concentrating on entirely different aspects of the relatively simple plot. The film doesn’t have a tangled narrative—it’s mostly in flashback, with occasional narration (Mankiewicz’s success at toggling flashback narrators without having to break the flashback is an early stunning feat)—but it’s an extremely rare case of a twist (and directing through misdirecting regarding that twist) works out perfectly.

Most of All About Eve is a character study of top-billed Bette Davis. She’s an aging Broadway diva (forty-two playing forty), who’s in a career renaissance thanks to boyfriend director Gary Merrill and their good friends, playwright Hugh Marlowe and his wife, Celeste Holm. In some ways, Holm’s always the protagonist of the film. Mankiewicz’s centering on her—and using her to center or stabilize the film—is another of Eve’s great accomplishments. She provides a touchstone for everyone—audience included—involved.

Everything changes when Holm brings Anne Baxter into their world (specifically into Davis’s dressing room for a meet and greet). Baxter’s a devoted fan, having seen every performance of the play. She’s got a tragic backstory and a love of the theater (and, possibly, a desire for applause) and everyone feels empathy for her situation, especially Davis. Baxter’s too good for the theatrical world, so Davis gives her a job and a place to live, which encroaches on Thelma Ritter’s position. Ritter’s still unmarried Davis’s live-in best friend, who also happens to do light maid tasks and so on. Ritter’s great; she’s hilarious but able to pivot immediately to sincere. It’s too bad she doesn’t get more to do; she and Davis are wonderful together.

And Ritter’s not going to like Baxter after a little while working together, something Mankiewicz and editor Barbara McLean do a fantastic job conveying in montages. But when Ritter complains to Davis about Baxter maybe being strange, Davis doesn’t see it. Until she then does see it and she can’t stop unseeing it. Especially not after boyfriend Merrill returns from shooting a picture in Hollywood—for a film so adamant in the inhumanity of theater folk, Eve’s got an even lesser opinion of Hollywood—Davis has even more reasons to worry. Turns out Baxter’s been writing him while he’s away.

The film’s never soapy, even as various characters work out various schemes to injure or benefit other characters. There are secrets abound (and a few where it’s unclear if they’re ever revealed), but Mankiewicz keeps them appropriately compartmentalized. Davis gets her secrets, Holm gets her secrets, and so on. Baxter doesn’t get any secrets yet because Baxter’s barely in the film at this point. Once Baxter joins Davis’s entourage, it’s Davis’s picture and everyone else is just lucky enough to be in it. From scene one, in the present day bookend, it’s clear from how she picks up a glass, Davis is going to be giving an incredible performance. It eventually works out to Mankiewicz spotlighting Davis, Baxter, and Holm’s incredible performances, but he takes his time, showcasing George Sanders’s excellent turn as a theater critic.

Acting-wise, it’s not hard to do the list in order—Davis is best, then Baxter, then Holm, then Sanders, then Merrill and Ritter sharing fifth. But the gulf between Holm and Sanders is a big one. Davis, Baxter, Holm, they all get big issues to tackle, big realities, sometimes ones they don’t even get to talk about, just ones they have to experience offscreen while the other characters gossip or plot. Merrill even gets a whopper moment to handle, even though it’s someone else’s scene. And actually then someone else’s—All About Eve has a wonderful flow to its not infrequent protagonist hops. But Sanders never really gets a big scene. Not to himself. He’s a force in the film, but not an active participant, not exactly.

He’s great. But he’s not in the same tier as the female leads.

Most of Eve has Davis in the protagonist seat; it doesn’t seem possible Mankiewicz is going to be able to shift things over mid-film to Baxter. He pulls it off using Holm, leveraging her being in the seat in the first place. It’s an awesome move. Especially when he then lengths the narrative distance out in the third act, as the flashbacks end and the bookend comes back.

It’s a magnificent film. From very early on. It very quickly reaches a point it could go incredibly wrong but so long as Davis’s performance holds, it’ll be great. But then it just keeps going well and Davis just gets better and better… and then you realize you’ve still got like ninety minutes left (Eve runs two hours and twenty minutes); you sit with bated breath, waiting for Mankiewicz and company to impress.

All About Eve is awesome. Start to finish. Davis, Baxter, Holm, Mankiewicz, et al. Just awesome.