SOUL ON A STRING -- DVD Review by Porfle

 

Originally posted on 9/22/17

 

Beautifully photographed in the Himalayas, the story of Chinese director Yang Zhang's SOUL ON A STRING (2016) is often overwhelmed by the sheer sweep of its sumptuous visuals--the sometimes confusing multi-faceted plot is easy enough to lose as it is. 

But when it focuses on its three or four main characters and their metaphysical journey of enlightenment, the extremely leisurely pace and lack of a conventional storyline ultimately lead the patient viewer to a rather satisfyingly cathartic resolution.

It all starts when Tabei, a reclusive mountain man and inveterate bad boy, kills a deer and discovers a sacred stone in its mouth.  After being killed by a bolt of lightning and then revived by some local monks, Tabei is given the sacred duty of traveling to Palm Print Mountain, the sacred home of the Lotus Master, and delivering the stone to its rightful place.  In doing so, he'll  be given the opportunity to "cleanse his heart" and make amends for his former sins. 

During the long, grueling journey by foot, Tabei acquires two unwanted companions--Chung, a love-starved young woman eager to escape her current circumstances, and Pu, a mute feral boy with apparent psychic abilities.  Though surly and abusive at first, we pretty much know that Tabei will eventually find the two to be a civilizing influence as was the case in THE OUTLAW JOSEY WALES when the title character began to amass a surrogate family and, through them, learn to regain his humanity.

The trouble is, Tabei is being stalked not only by thieves who covet the stone but also by two brothers out for revenge after the long-ago killing of their father by Tabei's own father.  Needless to say, the film will have much to say via these characters about pointless quests for revenge and needless violence in general. 

In the meantime, though, Tabei's run-ins with these dogged pursuers will supply the story with one of its main sources of tension as several scenes seem to be leading up to some kind of gunfight or swordplay (Tabei even makes a stop at a retired swordmaker's house a la KILL BILL).

Surprisingly, no such action ever takes place.  SOUL ON A STRING isn't that kind of adventure--it's story for story's sake, not just as a lead-up to periodic bursts of kinetic violence.
 
After awhile, I actually found myself hoping that such clashes would be avoided in favor of just getting on with the story, which, after a slow first half, starts to get really engaging.  Tabei's journey becomes much more than just getting from one place to another as he begins to discover the true meaning of life and the importance of things he once overlooked.  His slow-burn love story with his surrogate family also becomes quite engaging after awhile.

Yang Zhang spares no effort to make all of this as gorgeous as his incredible locations will allow, as he shoots in places that would make John Ford green with envy (invocations of Monument Valley abound).  He infuses SOUL ON A STRING with a myriad of visual and thematic references to such genres as Italian and American Westerns, samurai films, and fantasy quests (as in the LORD OF THE RINGS series). 

Bringing the Western feel into focus is the presence of a tall, mysterious man in black who looks like a gunfighter out of a Leone film but turn out to have an altogether different motive for tracking down Tabei. It's part of the film's heavily metaphysical underpinning, one which also includes the jarring juxtaposition of the ancient world with the modern in what makes it seem as though the story takes place on the very edge of some strange rift in time.

The DVD from Film Movement is in 2.35:1 widescreen with 5.1 and 2.0 sound (Tibetan with English subtitles).  As a bonus, there's a compelling short film by Oalid Mouaness, a political parable entitled "The Rifle, the Jackal, the Wolf, and the Boy."

Like a candle slowly burning and getting brighter as it reaches the end, SOUL ON A STRING begins as a pretty but flickering diversion and ends with a richly illuminative glow.  It has the breathtaking locations of a conventional epic, yet amidst that splendid backdrop is a human story that I found haunting and effective.

www.filmmovement.com

SOUL ON A STRING -- DVD Review by Porfle

THE GREAT SILENCE -- Blu-ray Review by Porfle

 Originally posted on 5/12/18

 

In 1968, the same year Italian director Sergio Leone unleashed his western masterpiece ONCE UPON A TIME IN THE WEST, his compatriot Sergio Corbucci (DJANGO, NAVAJO JOE) gave us this very different take on the usual "spaghetti western"--THE GREAT SILENCE, aka "Il grande silenzio" (Film Movement Classics).

It's a fascinating change of pace from the usual lurid, bombastic entries in the genre with sweaty men fighting and dying amidst much sound and fury in the blazing heat of the desert.  Corbucci's film takes place in a snowbound setting with dark figures riding their horses over plains of stark white or walking down the streets of a town glazed with frost.

Like the setting, everything's muted in this film, including its hero, The Great Silence (French actor Jean-Louis Trintignant, ...AND GOD CREATED WOMAN, Z, IS PARIS BURNING?).  His backstory, seen in familiar flashback form, tells of him having his throat cut as a child by the same bounty hunters who just killed his parents as his father was surrendering to them. 

Silence, with his rapid-fire automatic pistol (the story takes place near the turn of the 20th century), is a hero who's also atypical in that, in addition to having deep feelings, he isn't the stoic, emotionally distant figure we see in Clint Eastwood's self-centered mercenary. In fact, he's a bit of a white knight, avenging women whose men have been murdered by bounty hunters. (Although he's not above charging a fee for his services.)

This time, in another departure from Leone, all of the bounty hunters in the story--namely, sadistic thrill-killer Loco (Klaus Kinski, FOR A FEW DOLLARS MORE) and his motley cohorts--are the bad guys, preying upon a haggard group of outlaws hiding out in the mountains until word of their amnesty comes through from the government. 

Some decide to give themselves up and are picked off, while the rest will eventually be lured to town only to fall into the bounty hunters' ambush.  It's here, with Silence going up against Loco and his crew as they hold their captives hostage in the saloon, that the film's shocking finale will take place.

But before that, Corbucci lingers upon Silence's increasingly fond relationship with the beautiful widow Pauline (Vonetta McGee) after she pleads with him to avenge her husband's murder by Loco.  Their scenes are thoughtful, contemplative--a respite from the bursts of bloody violence that erupt from time to time.

We also follow the tale of seriocomic sheriff Gideon Burnett, played by Frank Wolff (the ill-fated "Brett McBain" in ONCE UPON A TIME IN THE WEST) who is tasked by the governor to solve the bounty hunter problem but finds it quite a handful.  How Loco manages to outwit him as he's being transported in chains to the nearest prison is almost enough for him to earn a smidgeon of our admiration.

More than anyone else, this is Klaus Kinski's film.  In the cheerfully vile Loco he gives us a delightfully low-key villain, and deftly underplays the role.  Loco never heard of "dead or alive"--his pleasure is in luring errant felons into surrendering and then gunning them down with great satisfaction. 

This tendency will reach its peak in the film's final sequence, which suddenly turns into a bloodbath as the story ends on an incredibly nihilistic note.  I was floored by it, and left unsure how I felt about the movie as a whole as the final music of Ennio Morricone's haunting score began to swell.  And I don't know if that's a bad thing or a good thing.

Corbucci filmed two alternate endings (included in the Blu-ray extras), one of which is exactly how I wanted the film to end.  But regardless of all that, THE GREAT SILENCE is a haunting, beautifully-rendered, and very offbeat western that should stay with you for some time after experiencing it. 


Buy it at Film Movement Classics

Tech Specs:
New 2K digital restoration
1.85:1 widescreen
Italian and English soundtracks, English subtitles
Stereo

Extras:
"Cox on Corbucci"--Alex Cox pays tribute to the maestro
"Western, Italian Style"--1968 documentary on the Italian film industry, western style
Two alternate endings
Illustrated booklet with the essay, "Ending the Silence" by Simon Abrams
Original and new trailers

THE GREAT SILENCE -- Blu-ray Review by Porfle

FRITZ LANG'S INDIAN EPIC (THE TIGER OF ESCHNAPUR and THE INDIAN TOMB) -- Blu-ray Review by Porfle

Originally posted on 11/26/2019
 

Sometimes legendary director Fritz Lang wanted his magnificent visuals to convey an important message (METROPOLIS, THE TESTAMENT OF DR. MABUSE, M) and sometimes he just wanted to offer audiences grand escapist entertainment.

The latter goal Lang achieved in spectacular style with the films THE TIGER OF ESCHANAPUR and THE INDIAN TOMB, known collectively as FRITZ LANG'S INDIAN EPIC (Film Movement Classics, 1959).

A forerunner of more recent two-film narratives such as KILL BILL and IT, this double feature tells the sprawling story of a catastrophic love triangle that develops when German engineer Harald Berger (Paul Hubschmid) is summoned to India by Prince Chandra (Walter Reyer) to oversee the construction of several buildings as well as shoring up some of the crumbling infrastructure of the palace itself.

As fate would have it, a beautiful temple dancer named Seetha (Debra Paget, THE TEN COMMANDMENTS) with whom the prince has fallen madly in love is being transported to the palace in the same caravan as Berger, and when the European valiantly saves her life from an attacking tiger during the trip, she becomes hopelessly smitten with him.  This soon develops into an all-consuming passion that will invoke the jealous prince's white-hot, vengeful wrath.

Amidst a backdrop of splendiferous Indian locations and incredibly opulent sets, photographed in sumptuous color with rich production values, this steamy melodrama is soap opera of the highest order mixed with scintillating political intrigue (the prince's brother and former brother-in-law are plotting against him) and irresistible "boys' adventure"-style action involving swordfights, man-eating tigers, mysterious underground passages, and other fun stuff.

While some have compared these films to RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK, viewers expecting non-stop thrills will be disappointed. Instead, we're allowed to settle in  for a stately paced parade of visual treats (I haven't seen such regal eye-candy since the "Sissi" films with Romy Schneider) charged with constant tension and suspense and punctuated here and there with action sequences that have a Rudyard Kipling flavor.

The tension increases as Prince Chandra's suspicions toward his intended bride Seetha and the European stranger are eventually made evident, bringing out the arrogant, petulant worst in him.  When Berger finds it necessary to escape Chandra's wrath, he finds himself lost in the catacombs beneath the palace where he encounters a colony of lepers banished to the underground.

We're also introduced to Chandra's compound of deadly caged tigers into which, at one point, Berger is tossed with nothing but a spear with which to defend himself. Here, Lang's attention to gilt-edged realism falters a bit when a lunging tiger is noticeably fake (as is a monster-sized cobra in the second film) but I found such shortcomings easily forgivable in view of the scene's entertainment value.

Performances are earnest, with Debra Paget a standout not only for her talent but also thanks to her incredible beauty and sex appeal. Her temple dance in this film is a highlight of sheer sensuality (to be surpassed in the sequel) while her acting adds depth to a very sympathetic character.  Reyer, on the other hand, ably conveys the prince's incredible arrogance, selfishness, and cruelty. (A young Luciana Paluzzi appears all-too-briefly as Seetha's loyal servant.)

Finally, the two forbidden lovers make a desperate escape attempt, with the prince's soldiers doggedly pursuing them from the steamy jungles to the parched, wind-seared desert.  It's there that the dashing European engineer and the beautiful Indian temple dancer meet their apparent doom as part one of Lang's Indian epic, THE TIGER OF ESCHANAPUR, ends in classic cliffhanger style.

The second installment in Fritz Lang's sprawling two-part saga of Indian intrigue and forbidden romance, THE INDIAN TOMB, picks up right where its predecessor THE TIGER OF ESCHANAPUR left off. This time German engineer Harald Berger's sister Irene (Sabine Bethmann) and her husband Walter (Claus Holm), who is also Harald's associate, have come searching for him.

They're told that Harald went missing during a tiger hunt, but become increasingly suspicious of the prince and his motives. This is especially true when Chandra orders Walter to design a tomb for his wife Seetha, in which she is to be imprisoned on their wedding day. When Walter balks at creating what is in essence an execution chamber, Chandra threatens him and his wife.

Political tensions grow to a boiling point as Chandra's brother Prince Ramigani (René Deltgen), passed over for the throne and eager to amend that oversight, plots against him with the help of the prince's former brother-in-law who also despises him. Even the temple priests grow angry toward Chandra when he persists in his desire to marry Seetha (and then execute her) after she is discovered still alive in the desert.

This second film's highlight comes when Seetha performs a cobra dance in the temple which is meant to decide whether the gods wish her to live or die.  In a costume that's the very definition of "less is more" (it makes a string bikini look like a parka) the incredibly gorgeous and physically fit Debra Paget's dance number is, to put it mildly, memorable, despite the very fake-looking cobra which menaces her character throughout.

Suspense builds as Berger's sister and her husband bravely plot to locate where he's being held prisoner beneath the palace and free him.  The story, which has been rather sedately paced up till now, really picks up steam with Irene's encounter with the frenzied band of lepers and Berger's desperate escape from bondage just as he's about to be executed in his cell.

There's swordplay and other violent clashes when Ramigani's armed rebellion against Chandra kicks into gear, and Lang finally shows us why we keep seeing all that dynamite stored in the passages underneath the palace, leading to a flood populated by hungry alligators.

The 2-disc Blu-ray from Film Movement Classics is an exquisite 4K digital restoration of both classic films with an aspect ratio of 1.37:1 and mono sound. Each film features a verbose commentary by film historian David Kalat. Bonuses also include the making-of documentary "The Indian Epic" and the video essay "Debra Paget, For Example" by Mark Rappaport, as well as trailers and an enclosed illustrated booklet with an in-depth essay by film scholar Tom Gunning.

One thing's for sure, when this story finally comes to a head, it pays off in all sorts of fun ways.  Viewers who stick it out through both installments of FRITZ LANG'S INDIAN EPIC not only get to enjoy some of the screen's most dazzling opulence and eye-pleasing production values, but also a romantic, exotic action-adventure ending on a satisfying note that makes it all wonderfully worthwhile.


Buy it at Film Movement.com


THE TIGER OF ESCHNAPUR
NEW 4K DIGITAL RESTORATION
Film Movement Classics
1959
101 Minutes
Country: Germany, France, Italy
Language: German w/ English subtitles
Classics, Romance, Thriller
Not Rated
Blu-ray
Aspect Ratio: 1.37:1   
Sound: Mono   

THE INDIAN TOMB
NEW 4K DIGITAL RESTORATION
Film Movement Classics
1959
102 Minutes
Country: Germany, France, Italy
Language: German w/ English subtitles
Romance, Thriller, Classics
Not Rated
Blu-ray
Aspect Ratio: 1.37:1   
Sound: Mono

Here's the poster of the American theatrical release in which the two films were edited into one:

 

FRITZ LANG'S INDIAN EPIC (THE TIGER OF ESCHNAPUR and THE INDIAN TOMB) -- Blu-ray Review by Porfle

THE ARDENNES -- DVD Review by Porfle

 

Originally posted on 3/4/17

 

Belgian director Robin Pront credits Martin Scorcese and David Fincher among his artistic influences, and after watching his feature writing/directing debut THE ARDENNES (2015), it's easy to see why. 

I see mostly the Fincher of SE7EN in Pront's dark, gritty visual style and in the visceral, hard-hitting effect he achieves.  By the time it was over, I felt as though I'd been beaten and dragged through the mud in the stinging cold rain just like the two main characters, brothers Dave (Jeroen Perceval, BULLHEAD) and Kenny (Kevin Janssens).

Both are involved in a botched home robbery at the beginning, and while Dave gets away, Kenny goes to prison for four years.  In that time, Kenny's girlfriend Sylvie (Veerle Baetens) realizes that he's the cause of all her miseries and ends up falling in love with Dave.

Four years later, Dave and Sylvie are expecting a child and dreading the effect this potentially incendiary news will have on a newly-released Kenny.  Their fears, we discover, are well-founded, as the volatile Kenny's incarceration has only made him more jealous, more wildly unpredictable, and, worst of all, more prone to sudden, irrational violence.

Pront has an economical style and an artist's eye as director--as well as a terrific cast to work with--establishing a bleak world in which there seems no way out through either honest labor or, in Sylvie's case, well-intentioned group therapy (Kenny attends a session unannounced and, unsurprisingly, disrupts and intimidates). 

The first half of the movie slowly, methodically builds tension and dread, with Dave and Sylvie's secret hanging like the sword of Damocles over every scene (Kenny gets a clue to their relationship early on which we're invited to pick up on ourselves).
 

We also fear a variety of other conflicts Kenny stokes with everyone from Dave's abrasive boss, who reluctantly hires him at Dave's urging and quickly regrets it, to the Moroccan club owner where Sylvie works (when Kenny sees him touching her from across the crowded dance floor, we know there will be hell to pay).

Then, after Pront and co-writer Perceval are done slowly lulling us into a very valid sense of dread, the dam breaks and suddenly we, along with Kenny and Dave and a dead body that's in Dave's trunk for some reason, are swept away into the dark heart of the Ardennes forest where dead bodies go to disappear and sometimes the people who bring them there do too.

Pront's Scorcese influence gets a workout here when Kenny's way-creepy former cellmate Stef (Jan Bijvoet) and Stef's hulking transvestite boyfriend Joyce (Sam Louwyck) show up just to make things scarier and more violent in all sorts of ways.

I'm loathe to reveal any more, except to say that from here on in, "sudden death" isn't just a sports term.  The film saves a wicked little twist to pull on us just when we least expect it, paving the way for a mud-and-blood-splattered finale in which not everyone lives happily ever after.

The DVD from Film Movement is in 2.40:1 widescreen with both 5.1 and 2.0 stereo sound.  Language is Flemish and French with English subtitles.  In addition to a commentary track with director Proust and actor Kevin Janssens ("Kenny"), extras consist of a making-of featurette, a gritty and violent 15-minute short by Proust entitled "Injury Time", an interview with Proust and Janssens, and trailers for this and other Film Movement releases.

THE ARDENNES isn't the ideal film to watch if you're trying to cultivate a happy mood.  Not that it's as downbeat and depressing as, say, EDEN LAKE--nowhere near it--because as disheartening as it might be, it's still just so keenly clever and mischievously malicious that I actually felt strangely elated at the end, and, compared to these poor slobs, a little happier with my own lot in life. 

THE ARDENNES -- DVD Review by Porfle

HEIDI (2015) -- DVD Review by Porfle

 

Originally posted on 3/25/17

 

Before, whenever I heard the name "Heidi", I thought of Shirley Temple being cute, or a children's book that I never read, or, most infamously, an American Football League game between the Oakland Raiders and the New York Jets on November 17, 1968 which, during an intensely suspenseful fourth quarter, was suddenly interrupted by NBC for the premiere of a brand new "Heidi" TV-movie, causing frenzied football fans all along the East Coast to tear their hair out in utter, gibbering consternation.

But that was before.  Now, having just seen the latest Swedish film adaptation of Johanna Spyri's 1881 children's book HEIDI (2015), not only has my perception of the story gone up considerably, but you might even call me a fan.  At least, a fan of this wonderfully rendered and exquisitely produced version.

Anuk Steffen is disarmingly endearing in the title role as a young orphan girl pawned off on her gruff grandfather by an uncaring aunt. Grandfather is played by Bruno Ganz, known mainly these days as Adolf Hitler in DOWNFALL (2004) thanks to all those "Hitler Reacts" video memes on the internet.

 

Here, he convincingly plays an old hermit living on a mountaintop in the Swiss Alps who rejects the child at first but eventually warms up to and then learns to love her.

The mountain sequences are dazzling with their beautiful locations and photography, whether during the lush green spring and summer or the frosty snow of winter.  Heidi frolics almost as a feral child, accompanying her young friend Peter during his daily goatherding duties or just hanging out with and gradually humanizing the once misanthropic old man. 

Her happiness is short-lived, however, when mercenary Aunt Dete (Anna Schinz) returns and takes her away to the city to live with a wealthy widower--and mostly absentee father--as a companion to his wheelchair-bound daughter, Klara (Isabelle Ottmann), an arrangment from which the unscrupulous aunt makes a tidy profit.

 

Although Heidi and Klara become fast friends, Heidi's life is made miserable by the stiflingly formal regimen of upper-class life (where she is addressed by her real name, Adelheid) personified by stiff, sadistic governess Miss Rottenmeier (Katharina Schüttler), who more than lives up to her name.

Thus, Heidi's dilemma is that she yearns to escape back to Grandfather and her beautiful mountaintop home but also dreads leaving poor Klara alone in her dreary, joyless existence. 

Director Alain Gsponer (LIFE ACTUALLY) has a very nimble and imaginative style that adapts well to the various settings.  The cinematography is consistently fine, as is the film's musical score. 

While the Swiss Alps provide some incredible eye-candy, even the believably gritty city and village settings are impeccably rendered and totally convincing.  The mansion scenes are suitably oppressive, sort of like a children's story as written by one of the Brontë sisters. I also sense something of a GREYSTOKE vibe at times, so jarring is Heidi's forced transition into so-called civilized life, with a bit of A LITTLE PRINCESS thrown in as well.

The cast are so good at their roles and the script so well-written that Heidi's story is effortlessly engaging from beginning to end.  Her eventual reunion with Grandfather and her precious mountains delivers a well-earned emotional catharsis. 

One of the film's main strengths is that it takes its story seriously--the drama and pathos are realistically handled, and lighthearted moments spring naturally from the situations without seeming forced or artificially cute.

The DVD from Omnibus Entertainment and Film Movement is in 2.40:1 widescreen with 5.1 and 2.0 Dolby surround sound.  Dubbed English or original German with English subtitles are available.  No extras.

I feel now as though I've been missing out on this story all these years, although I can't imagine it being presented in such a realistic and satisfying fashion as it is here.  There's so much more to this version of HEIDI than its innocuous-sounding title might suggest, and it should please both children and the adults who watch it with them to an equal degree. 

HEIDI (2015) -- DVD Review by Porfle

FARINELLI -- Blu-ray Review by Porfle

 

Originally posted on 4/18/19

 

The very notion of the "castrato" has always been utterly grotesque to me, so I didn't know what I was getting into with FARINELLI (1994), the biography of real-life 18th-century Italian castrato Carlo "Farinelli" Broschi.  And the last thing I expected was for it to be so moving, so engaging, so lavishly produced, and, ultimately, so much fun.

Not a comedic sort of fun--there are few actual lighthearted moments--but the fun of delving into something purely enjoyable and being dazzled by it. The story is a richly dramatic one that's well-acted and impeccably rendered, with fine costumes and locations including some of the grandest opera houses in Europe.

But the main appeal here is the journey of our main character, Carlo (Stefano Dionisi), who becomes a castrato (thus preserving his exquisite pre-pubescent singing voice) against his will having already witnessed another boy's suicide after suffering the same fate.

His musician father makes him vow to never deny his voice to his older brother Riccardo (Enrico Lo Verso), an aspiring composer who uses Carlo as a vocal instrument to increase the appeal of his own pedestrian music. Later, when Carlo's fame elevates him to rock-star status, this brotherly partnership will extend to Carlo's sexual conquests, which Riccardo also shares in tag-team fashion.

The early part of the film reminded me a bit of Ken Russell's LISZTOMANIA--sans the over-the-top ridiculousness--with women, nobility included, throwing themselves at Carlo and sometimes even reaching sexual climax during some of his more impressive vocal gymnastics. 

Riccardo seems to enjoy this aspect of his brother's fame the most, though, as Carlo is clearly unfulfilled and searching for something more. That something, we discover, is to sing music with genuine passion, as opposed to the ornate but empty passages penned by his brother.

At one point, the great composer Handel (Jeroen Krabbé, THE LIVING DAYLIGHTS), who previously rejected the brothers and ridiculed Carlo as a freak, has a change of heart after Carlo's rise to fame and wishes for him to perform his music.  This will create a rift between Carlo and the increasingly jealous Riccardo that will grow wider with time, especially when a terrible secret from the past is revealed. 

Meanwhile, Carlo's sensitive side emerges when he meets Margareth Hunter (Caroline Cellier) and her disabled young son Benedict, with whom he forms a deep mutual affection.  He also falls in love with Benedict's nurse Alexandra (Elsa Zylberstein) and they form a close relationship that will, as usual, include Riccardo.

Most of this, as I found after a bit of online research, is made up of whole cloth and bears little resemblance to the life of the real Farinelli (Carlo Brochi's stage name).  But I didn't mind, because it's such a gorgeous, sumptuous fiction that I found myself captivated by it from tumultuous start to emotional finish.

Not the least of its charms are its performance scenes, during which Farinelli's incredibly rich and nimble soprano voice is simulated by the painstaking combination of real-life male and female opera singers after much experimentation. 

Stefano Dionisi himself underwent extensive training to learn how to convincingly lip-synch the songs amidst all the pomp and splendor the production designers could muster.

Director Gérard Corbiau brings it all together with a surehanded, straighforward style and a keenly artistic eye.  FARINELLI is both a visual and aural confection and a dramatic delight that one can indulge in like a rich dessert.  And like any sumptuous treat, I didn't want it to end.


Buy it at Film Movement 

BONUS FEATURES:
Making-Of Featurette
Behind-The-Scenes Interviews
Illustrated Booklet With Essay
Trailer

TECH SPECS:
Format: NTSC, Subtitled
Number of discs: 1
Studio: Film Movement Classics
New 2K Digital Restoration
1.85:1 Widescreen, 2.0 Stereo
Language: French and Italian, English Subtitles
DVD Release Date: April 23, 2019
Run Time: 111 minutes

FARINELLI -- Blu-ray Review by Porfle

MARQUISE -- Blu-ray Review by Porfle

Originally posted on 5/11/19

 

The 17-century French comedy-drama MARQUISE (Film Movement Classics, 1997) looks like it's going to be one of those daunting costume affairs that bore us and then make us feel stupid and unsophisticated for being bored.

But then the first thing it does is to set such concerns at ease by engaging in about ten minutes of crude, delightfully unsophisticated humor--including bathroom humor--in which a group of actresses passing through a bustling French town set off looking for a place to "go" and the playwright Molière (Bernard Giraudeau) and his partner Gros-Rene (Patrick Timsit) meet a gorgeous peasant girl named Marquise (Sophie Marceau) who is both a dancer and a whore. 

Gros-Rene, smitten by love at first sight, barges into her hovel while she's servicing an elderly client and invites her to come to Paris to dance before their plays, and she, an aspiring actress, accepts.  (Later she will accept his proposal of marriage and remain a loving wife to him even despite a succession of affairs.)

Thus beginning as sort of an upper-crust "Porky's", the story reveals other facets as well when we're immersed in a superbly-rendered world of old French theater attended by upper-class sophisticates who are in reality just as crude and lowbrow as the risque' sex farces Molière writes for them.

But while stricken at first by crippling stage fright, it isn't long before the beautiful Marquise becomes the toast of the theater world and sought after by such royal figures as an oddly-eccentric King Louis XIV (Thierry Lhermitte) while captivating the lower classes as well.

All of which is brought to the screen with the most sumptuous of production values (costumes, cinematography, and Italian locations are all stunningly lavish) and a directorial style by Véra Belmont (MALENA, RED KISS, PRISONERS OF MAO) that's effortlessly inviting. 

Performances are uniformly fine and well-suited to the time period. Lambert Wilson (The "Merovingian" from the MATRIX sequels) enters the picture as playwright Racine, who competes with Molière for the King's attentions artistically while ardently pursuing Marquise's affections.

Sophie Marceau, to whom I've always been rather indifferent, soon proves herself an irresistible presence as Marquise as she conveys the character's naivete, ambition, determination, insecurities, desperate desires, and equal amounts of loyalty and duplicity in her dealings with both men and women.    

The story grows deeper and more dramatic as Marquise's social and romantic entanglements become ever more complicated and lead to tragedy.  Deftly combining sophisticated story with an ever-present wry humor (which, as mentioned before, isn't afraid to revel in the lowbrow) and ample opportunities for Sophie Marceau to charm us with her beauty and mystique, MARQUISE is like a rum-soaked confection that's both sweet and intoxicating.


Buy the Blu-ray or DVD from Film Movement Classics

Also available on Fandango, iTunes

New 2K Digital Restoration
1.85:1 Widescreen
2.0 Stereo
French w/ English Subtitles
Bonus: Interview with director Véra Belmont, trailer,
       illustrated booklet with essay by Laurence Marie

MARQUISE -- Blu-ray Review by Porfle

GREGORY'S GIRL -- Blu-ray Review by Porfle

 

Originally posted on 1/15/20

 

I remember seeing the promo for GREGORY'S GIRL (1980) back in the early 80s when it was on Cinemax, and although it looked harmless enough, I had no desire to actually watch it except maybe for the novelty of seeing Altered Images lead singer Clare Grogan in an acting role.

Now, however, I'm no longer trudging through the 80s but looking back on them through a haze of nostalgia, so the idea of watching this endearingly easygoing teen comedy appeals to me.

Oddly, it opens with what appears to be a sop to the PORKY'S crowd, with Gregory (Gordon John Sinclair, BRITANNIA HOSPITAL, LOCAL HERO, WORLD WAR Z) and his mates excitedly watching a young nurse disrobe in front of her window.

But they're not actually pressing their noses against the glass or peering into a hole drilled in a shower wall. In fact, they appear to be watching this apparent act of exhibitionism from behind a tree across the street.  Not exactly a gang of lechers, these lads. (One of them even faints.) I would've stopped to look too.

The nice thing we discover about Gregory is that he's really just a normal high school kid who's well-meaning enough despite the usual faults. He's a tad irresponsible, doesn't take life all that seriously, and tends to be a stranger to his parents (the latter point is played for gentle laughs in a nice scene between Gregory and his driving-instructor dad, who we never see again).

He doesn't even get upset when his football coach tells him he's moving him from lead kicker to goalie and trying out new talent for their perpetually-losing team.  This sets up the story's main plotline when a beautiful, athletic girl named Dorothy (Dee Hepburn, "The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie") tries out and blows everyone else away with her skills, while stealing the lovesick Gregory's heart at the same time.

What follows is one of the most low-key and pleasantly realistic coming-of-age comedies that one could while away some time with.  Gregory's attempts to overcome his shyness and make progress with the seemingly unattainable Dorothy are easily relatable and never played for cheap laughs.

And when his little sister Madeline (Allison Forster) tries to give him first-hand advice about girls even though she's years away from any actual romantic experience herself, it's heartwarming. Through it all, Gregory is so lighthearted and happy-go-lucky that even the agonies of teenage love can't keep him from strolling through life with a smile on his face.

Writer-director Bill Forsyth (LOCAL HERO) captures the flavor of smalltown Scotland with this pleasant diversion in which the teachers are barely out of school themselves (Gregory's mousey football coach is proud that his moustache is growing in) and his pals are interested in such things as photography, baking black market goodies in Home Ec to sell after school, and, of course, girls.

Or, in the case of his likably timid friend Andy (Robert Buchanan), standing on an overpass watching trucks go by because he read that so many tons of corn flakes pass beneath it every day.

All of this culminates in a delightful sequence in which Gregory's date with Dorothy goes from a non-event (she doesn't show up) to a lovely scheme by his other female friends to set him up with the girl who really has feelings for him.

This is where Altered Images lead singer Clare Grogan ("Red Dwarf") comes to the fore as classmate Susan, who joins Gregory for an evening of simply passing the time together.

That's what watching GREGORY'S GIRL is like, and what gives it such an unassuming charm.  It's not often that I enjoy a movie so much simply because it's such an effortlessly placid and comforting look at everyday life and the modest pleasures that can be derived from living it.


Buy it from Film Movement Classics

Tech Specs
Film Movement Classics
1980
91 Minutes
United Kingdom
English
Comedy, Romance, Drama, Coming of Age
PG

Bonus Features
Audio Commentary with Bill Forsyth and Mark Kermode
Bill Forsyth on Gregory's Girl interview
Bill Forsyth - The Early Years interview
Gregory's Girl Memories interview with Clare Grogan
New essay by film scholar Jonathan Murray
Alternative U.S. and French dub versions
Sound: Stereo
Discs: 1

GREGORY'S GIRL -- Blu-ray Review by Porfle

TIME TO DIE -- Blu-ray Review by Porfle

 

Originally posted on 11/23/17

 

Sometimes I'm in the mood for a simple, matter-of-fact story told in a deliberate style that allows the viewer to contemplate what's happening rather than just passively observing flashes of action and drama. 

If, like TIME TO DIE, aka Tiempo de morir (1966, Film Movement Classics), this story happens to be a vintage Mexican western in exquisite black-and-white, then all the better.

There's a lot to contemplate in the story of Juan Sayago (Jorge Martínez de Hoyos, THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN, THE PROFESSIONALS), who, after serving 18 years in prison for killing a man, is released and walks all the way through the lonely desert to return to his hometown where the dead man's two sons, now grown, wait patiently for their revenge. 

Juan doesn't want trouble, but only to rebuild his life just as he tries to reassemble the shambles of a home left when his mother died years ago.  But the hatred of proud, hot-tempered young Pedro Trueba (Enrique Rocha) is too strong, and his insistent provocations to violence unavoidable even as the man's younger brother Julian (Alfredo Leal), the less volatile of the two, has a conflicting sense of what he sees as a potentially honorable man.

The story seems almost reverse-inspired by HIGH NOON--this time it's the protagonist coming into town while his killers await him there, and the townspeople, rather than staying out of it, do everything they can to come between the opposing forces to avoid bloodshed. 

This is especially true of Juan's former love Maria (top-billed Marga López), now a rich, respected widow, and Julian's girlfriend Sonia (Blanca Sánchez), who fears the needless death or imprisonment of her future husband--strong women but unable, in their time, to affect the course of men doing men's business with harsh fate as their final arbiter.

There's also HIGH NOON's brand of crisp black-and-white photography and quiet, deliberate pacing as well as a preoccupation with time and timepieces.  In addition to brief snatches of its minimalist score, the film's soundtrack consists mainly of stark practical sound effects often backed by the constant rush of hot desert winds. 

A long moment in which Maria quietly dreads the inevitable future is accentuated by the loud ticking of a clock.  When the vengeful Pedro dons his father's old clothes and paces within his empty study, the dead man's spurs echo hollowly on the wooden floor as Pedro follows in his ghostly footsteps.

In 1962's THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN, Jorge Martínez de Hoyos played a humble farmer seeking the aid of expert gunmen to help protect his village from marauders.  Here, he himself is such a gunman, but a tired, much older one who now wants only peace and a chance at redemption. 

It's a restrained, subtle performance that reflects Juan's wasted years behind bars and his weary regret for once killing a man while now facing the prospect of engaging his two sons in pointless conflict.

The main tragedy is that in this revenge western there are no bad guys and no clear-cut morality--only a relatively good man who was once forced to kill, and two brash young men honor-bound to avenge what they perceive to be the cowardly murder of their father. 

Director Arturo Ripstein, who began his career as Luis Buñuel's assistant director in 1962 and would become one of Mexico's leading filmmakers, handles his first feature film with a restrained confidence and an artistic eye.  He favors long, unhurried takes with fluid handheld camerawork (a rarity in those days before Steadicam) that tells the story unobtrusively and economically. 

Part of the novelty of this Mexican western comes from the setting, taking place not in the rough border town of Sergio Leone's A FISTFUL OF DOLLARS, but in a picturesque village with narrow cobblestone streets and whitewashed buildings of adobe and brick.  There's an almost turn-of-the-century modernity and sense of progress which the more civic-minded inhabitants are striving to keep untainted by the kind of violence threatened by Juan's return. 

The physical and emotional release of gunplay is held back from us until the very end, where neither we nor the surviving character(s) derive much satisfaction from it save for a curdled sense of relief.  In TIME TO DIE, the only real victor is Death itself.


BONUS FEATURES
Video Introduction by director Alex Cox (Repo Man)
Commentary by director Arturo Ripstein and actor Enrique Rocha
New essay by Carlos A. Gutiérrez, co-founder of Cinema Tropical
Booklet insert

PROGRAM INFORMATION
Type:  Blu-ray/DVD
Running Time: 89 mins. + extras
Rating:  N/A
Genre:  Western
Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
Audio:  Stereo
Language: Spanish with English Subtitles

Buy it at Film Movement Classics

WATCH THE TRAILER

TIME TO DIE -- Blu-ray Review by Porfle