The Towering Inferno (1974)

USA
directed by: John Guillermin, Irwin Allen
written by: Stirling Silliphant
starring: Steve McQueen, Paul Newman, William Holden, Faye Dunaway, Fred Astaire, Richard Chamberlain, Jennifer Jones
seen: 25th August, 2015

I've a seen better films about human pride. But it does give you the feeling of fatal monumentality, it does. The thing is that a film like this with this many characters doesn't have the time to persuade me to emotionally invest into any of them and therefore it's more like watching laboratory mices run around in a maze. I keep thinking to myself: "Faye Dunaway won't die, she's too famous for that, but I don't know this lady, well good luck getting out random doomed lady." And presenting an objectively terrible thing simplified like this does not make me feel so good. The cynicism of this approach is scarier than all the flames and heights combined.

The closing statements of the three main male characters then seem forced and ineffective. The prize for the most impressive, modest and truthful conclusion of a character/story arc goes to Fred Astaire - and it's worth noticing that he gives his "message" without saying a single world and while holding an animal in his arms.

When it comes to suspense, I was knitting a scarf while watching the film and I missed three loops and had to re-do a lot of the work later. So I admit that from this point of view it really was thrilling. But after taking all notions into account, the average feeling I felt was average.

Wuthering Heights (1939)

USA
directed by: William Wyler
written by: Charles MacArthur, Ben Hecht, John Huston + Emily Brontë (book)
starring: Merle Oberon, Laurence Olivier, Flora Robson, Geraldine Fitzgerald
seen: 19th August, 2015

I liked the ever-present wind. In the never-ending fight between differrent adaptations about who is going to be the biggest monster in their version of the story, I see that the film-makers here decided it should be Cathy, who really is as insufferable, shallow, and overbearing as possible.

From my present-day point of view (knowing that actors are almost always more attractive than an "average" person and in the past it was double the truth) it is still unfathomable why would anyone keep telling the aristocratic-and-upright-looking Laurence Olivier that he is a filthy and crooked creature. I thing he represents the thing I would call a total miscast.

I have recently seen a modern adaptation (by Andrea Arnold) where they made the effort to show the life, the house and the surroundings realistically and plausibly, so it makes me smirk a little to see this idealized vision of life on a godforsaken heath - but that's a mistake (?) made by many literary adaptations.

In the space she got to play with I was most impressed by Geraldine Fitzgerald. I mean, Isabella was always my favourite character, but the more important thing is that her performance is the one that is the most time-resistant, I would say.

And I must confess that I would very much like to see a film one day where everything shown here would be just an exposition culminating with a jilted lover forbiding the ghost of his dying loved one to leave in peace, and than the body of the film would describe decades of getting old on the moor with the ghost and always seeing or sensing the never-closed gate to the afterlife in the barren land surrounding the house.

If... (1968)

United Kingdom
directed by: Lindsay Anderson
written by: David Sherwin, John Howlett
starring: Malcolm McDowell, David Wood, Richard Warwick, Christine Noonan, Rupert Webster
seen: 16th August, 2015

-"Aries. That's Mick. No matter how strong the urge, resist any temptation to go into battle this month. Otherwise, you run the risk of not only being on the wrong side but possibly in the wrong war."

Oh my, it's so beautiful. (I have recently stared to use the word "beautiful" instead of "perfect", and in this case it also means ironic and absurd. I might even dare say bizarre, but the joke gets lost once I translate it from my native language into English.) All the details in those individual scenes. And the ways they court each other! (I like tigers. And trapeze seductions.) I also have a soft spot in my heart for films split into named chapters and the way they do it here, all distant-and-practical-like, is very inspiring.

It is a flawless film when it comes to making a statement, but it's also a film that I can enjoy using my brain only, it does not work well with my heart. Jean Vigo would be proud, I think. (A bonus compliment: When the school principal urges the boys to listen to reason, a girl is the one to take out the revolver.) And I also want to say that I don't like it when they force this film into context with the (american) school shootings of the 21. century, because the origins and implications of both phenomenons are not the same thing at all.

Sleeper (1973)

USA
written and directed by: Woody Allen
starring: Woody Allen, Diane Keaton, John Beck
comment: 14th August, 2015

-"You must understand that everyone you knew in the past has been dead nearly two hundred years." -"But they all ate organic rice!"

It is a rather frenzied tornado of uncoordinated ideas, or at least that's my impression. Allusions of silent slapstick comedy, and especially Chaplin's "Modern Times", are strong and omnipresent. I've always wanted to use the word "allusion" in a sentence, so I hope I've done it properly. But it's hard for me to take this film "seriously" because Woody's been squeezing out his works so rapidly they sort of all blend into one vague shape and although some ideas may be interesting, eventually it all just seems as a make-believe play between some friends in a park on a Saturday afternoon. You can sense a creative mind behind it, but it's like only a required minimal amount of thoroughness was put into shaping the result. It does not feel like the makers put their heart into it, and that's hard for me to process, especially since it's a film about fighting for freedom. Maybe that's the point and Woody doesn't believe in fighting or freedom, but that would still be a no from me. But I do have to add that the thing I appreciated about "Sleeper" the most was the immitation of Marlon and Vivien.

Zero For Conduct (1933)

Zéro de conduite: Jeunes diables au collège
France
written and directed by: Jean Vigo
starring: Jean Dasté, Robert le Flon, Du Verron
seen: 14th August, 2015

I am of that opinion that children are the only way to change the world (for better I might add) because it is in their little heads where all the ideologies that can do that are stored. This film pushes this point through, as well as pointing out the fact that the teachers, the beings that put these ideologies in those heads, are as equally important. I'm not sure if it was Jean Vigo's intention but "Zero For Conduct" today mainly works as an initiation experience making you want to rebel and create and not necessarily as a fully-fledged work of film.

The Lady Vanishes (1938)

United Kingdom
directed by: Alfred Hitchcock
written by: Sidney Gilliat, Frank Launder + Ethel Lina White (book)
starring: Margaret Lockwood, Michael Redgrave, Naunton Wayne, Basil Radford
seen: 12th August, 2015

Why on Earth is Hitchcock dubbed the master of suspence and not the master of humour? I've been under the attack by some very cheeky ideas about how this film would turn out if some members of "Monty Python" could help out a bit. I can't imagine anything else than pure gold. After all, it does have, even now, a scene of rabbits from the hat stoicly watching a magician fight a wanna-be detective! And then there's a scene of a man trying to save himself with the use of a white cloth that is just as impressive, but straight away from a different genre, indeed. Maybe Hitch was the master of it all.

I've seen Michael Redgrave for the first time last year (in "Secret Beyond The Door") and for some time I only thought of him as of a handsome mannequin, so I am as surprised as anybody that I've developed a taste for his talents after all. I also need to label those two sport-obsessed gentlemen as divine (I saw them first in "Dead of Night", but here they are "the originals"), divine in their own stiff and reserved way, oh, I want to meet them for afternoon tea every Thursday.

Blancanieves (2012)

Spain
written and directed by: Pablo Berger
starring: Macarena García, Inma Cuesta, Maribel Verdú, Daniel Giménez Cacho, Sergio Dorado
seen: 8th August, 2015

My heart is moved. ♥♥♥ This is both so uplifting and depressing that it right away deserves a spot on a list of my most favourite fairy tales, nevermind if modern or classic. Berger is doing a marvelous job utilizing mythical themes and aplying them onto his chosen time period, as well as getting the most out of the specific nature of silent film form.

I've only seen Maribel Verdú in three films so far and she manages to play such a different character in each one and be so good at it that I'm having trouble realising it really is her. On a similar note, it's very refreshing to see a film equipped with all kinds of unique female characters, complete with observant and lifelike details about them. This film's representation of a relationship between a father and his daughter also deserves an honorable mentioning.

So although I was a bit sceptical/unaware at the very beginning, the first few minutes made me speechless and I spent rest of the film in a state of unconditional admiration all the way to the end. (See the first sentence of this comment.)

The Age Of Gold (1930)

L'Âge d'or
France
directed by: Luis Buñuel
written by: Salvador Dalí, Luis Buñuel + Marquis de Sade (book)
starring: Gaston Modot, Luis Buñuel, Max Ernst, Paul Éluard
comment: 2nd August, 2015

If a magical golden fish ever gave me three wishes, one of them would be for Luis Buñuel to rise from his grave, familiarize himself with the current state of cinema (and the world) and make one more film. I have completely forgotten how sharp this is.

An American In Paris (1951)

USA
directed by: Vincente Minnelli
written by: Alan Jay Lerner
starring: Gene Kelly, Leslie Caron, Georges Guétary, Nina Foch, Oscar Levant
comment: 1st August, 2015

It seems so unnatural for this many people to be so optimistic. But a passionate mental orchestra of a frowning pianist, that's more like it. Lise seems like and interesting human being, and so does Milo. All the female population was quite delightful. And I don't know if it's my current mood or what, but despite this being not my favourite genre at all, I'm finding the result quite impressive. It strongly radiates all the effort that was put into making it.

What I fully don't understand is the way this film rejects reality. I unconsciously kept imagining him fighting the war, killing people, living through hell, and then he comes to Paris and paints street still life? But maybe that's the thing that justifies the whole charade? All those artificial smiles. Oh my, I did not expect this kind of existential deliberation because of a film like this.

 -"And I'm not trying to rob you of your precious male initiative."