Movies you've seen recently (Part 1)

Cafe Society
1611

I saw the 1943 version of Phantom of the Opera last night. I don’t think I’ve seen this film in 40 years, and that was the only time I’d seen it. It is, in many ways, a very strange film.

In the first place, it’s the only Universal “horror” film made in color. MGM had made a few color horror films in the 1930s – Mystery in the Wax Museum (later remade in 3D as House of Wax, with Vincent Price) and Doctor X – I think in an attempt to compete with Universal’s lock on horror flicks, but it didn’t succeed. Horror looked better in black and white (and was cheaper besides). I think Universal agreed, because they switched back to black and white after this, continuing on that way into the 1950s.
It’s the only Universal horror film to win an Oscar, for Art Design and Cinematography. It deserved it – they did some impressive camera moves. They also lavished effort on writing their own fake operas and having impressive singers. If the “horror” part had lived up to these parts, it would’ve been an impressive film.
It’s the first time since Frankenstein that they so completely rewrote their source material. This is the film that threw out the idea of Erik the Phantom as the deformed-since-birth mostly insane musical genius who haunted the Paris Opera for years and replaced him with the dedicated musician whose musical composition was stolen by unscrupulous producers, and who gets scarred by acid when he tries to reclaim his work/get revenge. That sounds like an extremely weird and contrived explanation, but it was, amazingly, re-used when Hammer did its own remake in 1962 (and Hammer horror films in other cases went far out of their way NOT to resemble the Universal originals) and when Brian de Palma made Phantom of the Paradise in 1974 they just revamped the plot with a modern edge (the Phantom isn’t acid-scarred, but instead gets his face caught in a record press.)

The rewrite really doesn’t do any service to the story. Claude Reins is a likeable actor, but he’s not really threatening or haunting, and his scarring isn’t all that terrible (and not up to the ghoulish standards of Lon Chaney in the 1925 original). At least he looks worse than Gerard Butler in the Andrew Lloyd Webber film, though. At the end of the film, Christine Daeae says that she pitied him, and that’s the problem – the Phantom ought to evoke horror and sympathy, but not pity. You never really feel that Reins’ character was properly motivated to commit horrific acts. He just seems so nice and put-upon. Maybe he just liked skulking around in his cloak and mask while somebody else was committing the murders. In the 1962 remake, that’s exactly what they do have happen – in that version alone the Phantom got an Evil Hunchbacked Assistant (copyright) who did the dirty work, leaving the Phantom largely innocent. It didn’t help – that version was still awful.

It feels as if they had a checklist of Scenes For the Phantom that they went through – Mentor Christine, Disrupt the Opera, Play the Keyboard*, cut down the chandelier, get unmasked by Christine and reveal his face. And when they did all of those, they didn’t know where to go, so they ended the film by having the Phantom’s lair collapse on him as the result of a stray bullet. What should have been the final scene – camera tracks in on he Phantom’s violin and his mask among the rubble, artistically arranged – is marred because they threw in an extra resolution and comic scene at the end.

I’;m not surprised it didn’t succeed. It must have been expensive to film, between the music, the opera staging, and the technicolor. And it’s not good as a romantic comedy or a horror film. I suspect it lost a lot of money. They wanted to make a sequel, but plans fell through. They adapted the sequel as a vehicle for Boris Karloff (although Susanna Foster, the female lead for Phantom, starred in this one, too – The Climax. It flopped.). They went back to more traditional monsters and black and white movies after this.

*The Phantom doesn’t even get a proper horror-move organ to play in this version. He has to be content with a piano.

1612

I thought it was Hollywood Law, that the Phantom has an organ, and plays Toccata and Fugue in D minor.

Although one has to wonder how he got an organ into the sewers. It would make more sense if he played the harmonica.

And I also wondered why (presumably, the fault of the author) Christine got an unpronounceable last name.

1613

You’d think so, but in the 1925 film he plays music from Don Juan Triumphant, his own composition.

He plays Toccata and Fugue in D in lots of sketches and parodies, like “The Phantom of What Opera?” on Night Gallery, but in general, no.

Captain Nemo, though – he seems to play that Bach piece in adaptations of 20,000 Leagues on that organ he ostentatiously stuck in the Nautilus’ drawing room.

I like the idea of the Phantom playing a harmonica. There was a greeting card (which I’ve seen, in a documentary, stuck on the door of Michael Crawford’s dressing room) that has “The Phantom unplugged” playing a guitar.

1614

I just finished watching the Coen Brothers’ film debut “Blood Simple”. It’s a wonderful gritty noir-type movie that’s thick on atmosphere and thin on dialogue, but oozes that particular brand of Coen-ness. I enjoyed it, but am always left with questions. Particularly, how the hell did E. Emmet Walsh’s character fake the photograph?!

1615

Bach’s Toccata and Fugue was also prominently featured in the 1975 James Caan sf action thriller Rollerball.

1616

Yeah, but I don’t think it worked. The use of the “Albinoni Adagio” in Rollerball was good though.

Watched Bombshell and Late Night recently, both of which were about women in television albeit in very different ways. Bombshell was well-done but a little too “Hollywoods-styled” for my taste given the subject matter. I enjoyed Late Night and thought it was well-written as long as you can get past the “Mindy Kaling writing about how great Mindy Kaling is” thing. Emma Thompson was particularly good.

1617

Watched Unfit on Amazon Prime last night. A very sobering film about the rise of autocracy in today’s world and how, psychologically, Trump fits right into that mold as a certifiable malignant narcissist. Scary stuff.

1618

I can’t really speak to any specific piece of classical music, but I do know that the use of a classical score in Rollerball was to not date it; it is set in the proverbial future. If they would have used a contemporary score, or some space-aged attempt, it would have screamed “THIS MOVIE WAS MADE IN THE 70’S!”.

Same thing with 2001: A Space Odyssey.

1619

As I understand it, Kubrick didn’t go with classical music to make the film “timeless”. He was using pieces of classical music as placeholders while Alex North (who composed the score for Kubrick’s Spartacus) composed the score. Kubrick ended up liking the classical music better than North’s music, so he went with it. North’s score was eventually performed and recorded. More than once, in fact. I have a copy, but I have to admit (much as I like the score for Spartacus) I like the classical music better. Kubrick liked the idea of classical music so much that he continued to use it in his next three films (A Clockwork Orange, Barry Lyndon, and The Shining), although in two of those he used some music that was played by Walter/Wendy Carlos on the synthesizer.

For what it’s worth, I don’t think either of the North scores for Spartacus or 2001 are really “dated” now.

A lot of people have a problem with the pop/rock score by Andrew Powell for Ladyhawke, though…

1620

Watched Enola Holmes on Netflix the other night. It was entertaining, but kind of oddly paced. The narration was fine, but I was annoyed by the need to break the 4th wall and talk to the camera while doing it. I think if they would have just had the normal voice-over narration, it would have been better. The movie seemed more geared for a younger audience, and not really for “everyone”.

A different role for “11”, but she did really well with it (also with her native accent). The sets and costumes were great. And it was a fun take on the Holmes family (living in the shadow of the well-known older brother).

1621

I had the same impression of it. A piece of fluff, but entertaining.

1622

Watched the John Cusack film Identity last night.

Was quite predictable from the start that the psychiatrist probing the convict led to the bulk of the film scenes which were really going on the convict’s head. But I got it wrong thinking he was reliving murders he committed as opposed to be in a state of killing off his multiple personalities just to kill off that one murderous personality behind his crimes.

Quite inventive ending.

1623

Watched The Riddle of the Sands from 1979 with Michael York & Jenny Agutter appearing together again for the first time since Logan’s Run. Thoroughly enjoyed it. I got the book on order. According to the trivia at IMDB, this was the first spy novel.

1624

Watched recently:

The Trial of the Chicago Seven - Aaron Sorkin makes some unsubtle parallels with current events regarding protestors up against a morally questionable police force and judicial system, but on the whole it’s a pretty good film and, to be fair, the original trial was pretty fucked up in all sorts of ways. I couldn’t help but wonder how much of the material was true to life, especially the court transcripts. Definitely worth a watch if you’re not allergic to Sorkinism.

Onward - A nice little Pixar film about two suburban elf brothers on a literal quest. Enjoyable but forgettable.

1625

In Search of the Wilder People on Netflix. Starring Sam O’Neill- this was a funny and touching story about a foster kid that found a family…eventually and through many adventures . It did not go the direction I thought it would and was surprisingly original and fun. Plus…Murray from Flight of the Conchords sneaks in at one point.

1626

This weekend, I watched the Coens’ Hail Caesar! and the recent Birds of Prey, so I now finally have a film on my 2020 Oscars spreadsheet. And given the way 2020 is going, it may even stay there when the nominees are announced. :smiley:

1627

I tried to watch “In A Valley of Violence”, an oater starring Ethan Hawke and John Travolta. I didn’t get very far, as it’s truly dreadful. I’m not sure what the creators were aiming for, but their shots went wide of the target by a fair margin. Hawke is a decent actor, but the characters are cardboard cutouts.

1628

The Bingo Long Traveling All-Stars and Motor Kings (1976)

Hard to believe I let a baseball movie go unwatched for 44 years, but I finally got around to it. Billy Dee Williams and James Earl Jones star, with Richard Pryor in a supporting role. This was also the feature film directing debut of John Badham.

Entertaining, but with much unrealized potential. It’s as if the filmmakers couldn’t really decide whether this was a comedic romp or a serious take on racial and intra-racial power dynamics, so they aimed squarely in the middle. What could have been either a great comedy or a poignant drama turned out to be neither. And then there was the weird alternate-history ending where one of the black players gets signed by the Brooklyn Dodgers - in 1939.

Still, some good performances by a talented cast, and it did nevertheless have something to say. In a way, I’m kind of glad I waited to watch it. It wasn’t exactly subtle, but I don’t think 13-year-old me would have really gotten what it was about when it was first released.

1629

I watched a bunch of oldie-but-goodies yesterday, though I’d seen them before: House of Wax, The Haunting, etc. However, I was surprised by The Bad Seed. I didn’t remember it being so poorly done, to the point of wondering if there were two differently edited versions of it. It’s a shame, since the source material was quite good.

1630

Yesterday, I finally got around to watching The Untouchables to memorialize Sir Sean Connery’s passing. Meh.

By pure coincidence, we noticed that Time Bandits and Hunt for Red October were on the schedule yesterday.