Born to Kill

1947, US, directed by Robert Wise

As brisk and brutal as The Sound of Music is lengthy and overblown (which is not to say I don't like the latter film). Lawrence Tierney gets more screen time than usual even if his role is very similar to his standard tough guy fare and he's given a run for his cold-hearted money by Claire Trevor. They both watch Walter Slezak walk away with the film, though: he's quite brilliant as the self-interested detective quick to sense the chance to maximize his own opportunities. By contrast, as much as I enjoy his weaselly presence in other films, I couldn't quite figure out Elisha Cook, Jr's purpose here: his character seemed more narrative device than actual person and at times he comes across rather awkwardly as one of Tierney's inner voices, surely not the intended effect.

Tangled

2010, US, directed by Nathan Greno & Byron Howard

Adieu poulet

1975, France, directed by Pierre Granier-Deferre

Pretty formulaic stuff that's beset by mismatches: Francis Veber is hardly the best candidate to script a gritty, ripped-from-the-headlines politico-police story, though why director Granier-Deferre didn't simply abandon some of the more slapstick elements is beyond me. Ventura is solid in a role that demands nothing of him -- he's far more interesting in L'Emmerdeur or Garde à vue, from roughly the same period -- but to my mind Dewaere, an actor I generally worship, is miscast. His energy works wonderfully well in other films but on this occasion it makes him seem as though he has breezed in from another picture entirely, one that's more satire and less exposé. The film's most enjoyable quality is the portrait of Rouen as political quagmire: there aren't many films set in the Normandy city, and for all of his conventional qualities Granier-Deferre is almost always strong on atmosphere and location.

Garou-Garou, le passe-muraille

1951, France, directed by Jean Boyer

A routine 1950s Bourvil vehicle, taken from a Marcel Aymé short story that is heavily watered down in this telling -- the Occupation-era story finishes in literal suspense, of a deeply discomfiting nature, whereas this postwar version is a sometimes slapstick romantic comedy despite Bourvil's awkwardness around women. Some of the dialogue is zesty enough, most likely due to the presence of Michel Audiard, and Gérard Oury co-stars, years before he turned to directing.

Crocodile Dundee

1986, Australia, directed by Peter Faiman

A textbook example of making a film for the global market while retaining some local colour, with everything that implies both negative and positive: Paul Hogan's script does a fine job of collecting and repurposing all manner of Australian tropes (the bushman, attitudes to the law, Aboriginals' status) without actually saying much about any of these subjects except lifting an amused eyebrow, while the film gleefully embraces the sexist/racist/homophobic asides so common in Hollywood cinema of the 1980s. The New York nightlife scenes, in particular, are cringeworthy, though the early going does retain a good deal of charm, especially when John Meillon is on screen.

Man in the Shadow

1957, US, directed by Jack Arnold

Jeff Chandler versus Orson Welles hardly seems a fair fight, but Chandler holds his own in this fine example of the politically-minded B picture (though it's a B purely in terms of the lack of top-shelf stars rather than in its ambition). The allegory isn't far beneath the surface, though the politics are still a touch muddled -- even the characters sympathetic to the investigation of a migrant worker's murder aren't quick to use disparaging terminology. The whole thing looks absolutely spectacular: the black and white CinemaScope is used to excellent effect, exploiting both the format's capacity to show the widescreen landscapes and to pack a good deal of information into the frame in sequences on the ranch sets where much of the action occurs.

The French Connection

1971, US, directed by William Friedkin

Interesting as a compare/contrast pairing with Serpico on New York police procedures of the 1970s, as well as the overall attitude to the law by those on the enforcement side. There's more than a little celebration of the vigilante in the film, and it's tough to know whether such tactics were a (legitimate?) response to the New York streets of the era, or very much part of what made them so dangerous in the first place. Hackman catches the eye, but Scheider is the unsung (acting) hero.

Lucy

2014, France, directed by Luc Besson

Hardly surprising that Besson takes the lessons of the Besson school and applies them with considerable force: fast plotting, breathless/kinetic action, a dash of humour, plus an engaging actress. It's everything you'd expect from a production line of considerable talent.

A Most Wanted Man

2014, UK, directed by Anton Corbijn

Absorbing, but all a little too obvious in the end: untrustworthy American spies, espionage agents with troubled personal lives (or no personal lives at all), deep cynicism as to the way of the world, wintry colour schemes are all present and correct. By contrast, the Hamburg location is distinctive and used with great skill -- there's a real sense of the events happening in a very specific place, while the contrast between neighborhoods and social classes is sketched in economically. It's hard to resist the temptation to see Philip Seymour Hoffman in his own final spiral given his character's physical state though I suspect that this says more about Hoffman's qualities as an actor than his actual situation during filming.

Hunted

1952, UK, directed by Charles Crichton

A fine postwar thriller, with Crichton showing himself at least as adept at atmospheric material -- the nighttime scenes in and around Bogarde's flat are especially good -- as he was with comedy. The narrative moves along very briskly, with the central section a kind of proto-road/buddy movie. Bogarde moved with extraordinary ease between genres in the 1950s, equally convincing as a former sailor, doctor, colonial farmer or war hero.

Serpico

1973, US, directed by Sidney Lumet

Watched as a companion piece/complete contrast to The Parallax View: visually and performatively the films are worlds apart even if they share a strong sense of place (New York here, the Pacific Northwest there). I've never been the world's greatest Pacino fan as his tendency to go big always seems to be present just under the surface, though this is a performance of considerable commitment and conviction with no attempt to smooth out Serpico's contradictions and confusions.

Duck Soup

1933, US, directed by Leo McCarey

A nice way to start the New Year, but a better way to start a life at the movies: this was Shay's first full film at the cinema and he loved it. Of course, when you're not-quite-four it's hard to figure out whether it's the popcorn, the funny seats, the evening out, the soda, the film itself or a bit of everything that is most important but for the most part Shay was an attentive audience member and had plenty of questions afterwards about the onscreen action. He thought the ending was completely crazy -- well, it was -- but his favourite scene was the wonderful "mirror" sequence, clearly a hit with the rest of the crowd too based on the laughter I heard behind me.

Silver Linings Playbook

2012, US, directed by David O. Russell

A film antic enough that we could almost believe we had a wild New Year's Eve instead of packing the kids off to bed so we could watch a rare full-length film without getting up exhausted; wonderful chemistry between the leads, though, of that real movie-star wattage.

The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies

2014, US/New Zealand, directed by Peter Jackson

A fairly satisfying conclusion -- although the title pretty much describes what happens, even if we had a hard time keeping track of the exact number of armies involved -- to a somewhat unsatisfying trilogy. Still, it's hard to imagine going back to the well to watch this set of films again.

The Parallax View

1974, US, directed by Alan J. Pakula

Impossible to imagine this being made in anything like the same fashion forty years on -- there's no way the combination of downbeat tone, paranoia, and astonishing visuals would emerge from the studio system these days. Still one of the most unsettling films of the 1970s, even if much-imitated.

Love Affair

1939, US, directed by Leo McCarey

Most of the films I watched over the past few months are getting short shrift, though I feel a bit more guilty about not giving my full attention to this one: I can't figure out if that's the reason why the film didn't sing for me nearly as much as other McCarey films from the same time period. The stars are charming and the plot complexities quite satisfying but the downbeat tone was a little wearing at times in comparison to the lightness of touch on offer in other films, even those with a poignant overall message.

Mission: Impossible

1996, US, directed by Brian De Palma

Seen again for the first time since the cinema release, as a follow-up to reading David Bordwell's excellent blog post on visual storytelling. I'm not a big De Palma fan but for the most part the film remains quite fresh nearly twenty years on, unlike many of that year's other big hits (Independence Day, Twister, Jerry Maguire, The Rock, all of which seem more and more obviously formulaic); the set-piece above is especially good, though the TGV-set finale shows its age a good deal more.

The Desert of the Tartars

1976, Italy/France/Germany, directed by Valerio Zurlini

A viewing inspired by Judy Dean's excellent consideration of the film as part of David Cairns' 2014 Late Films Blogathon. It has mythical-colonials aspects that pair it very well with the near-contemporaneous Le Crabe-tambour, also featuring Jacques Perrin, though few films can compete with the astonishing locations of Zurlini's film. The picture is imbued with a profound sense of the absurd, with the protagonist discovering that his longer-for escape from the stifling life of the provincial nobility is, if anything, even more constricted with rules. It's also an exceptionally subtle work, with the days becoming months and perhaps even years through a very careful, discreet use of elision; the same discretion marks the film's attitude to death, generally turning away and allowing the characters to their own fates. The cast is quite remarkable, and Vittorio Gassman looks more than ever like something hewn from a Roman coin.

The Awful Truth

1937, US, directed by Leo McCarey

Just as perfect as on many previous viewings, with the exception of the very final shot, which comes in sharp contrast to the resolutely non-mechanical interactions of the rest of the film.

The Babadook

2014, Australia, directed by Jennifer Hart

I spent the three months from December 2014-March 2015 making a final push to finish my PhD. In had little time to watch films and even less time to blog about them -- and I suspect that for want of brain space, many of the films I saw during that period will be too quickly forgotten, though director Jennifer Hart's supreme control over her material, and her film's extraordinary soundscape, will linger for quite some time.