10 films: Invasion of the Body Snatchers to Walk the Line
Invasion of the Body Snatchers (Don Siegel, 1956). People are replaced by alien copies grown from vegetable pods. Surprisingly good, with the genuine eerie paranoid atmosphere of certain nightmares. [8/10]
The Day the Earth Stood Still (Robert Wise, 1951). An alien lands and tries to stop the violence and wars of Earth. The film is a brilliant plea for pacifism, and one of the few non-corny 1950s science-fiction films. It was fun to learn where Army of Darkness (Sam Raimi, 1992) got the famous phrase “Klaatu barada nikto”. [9/10]
Hearts in Atlantis (Scott Hicks, 2001). A young boy is befriended by an old man, who says he has secret powers and is chased by government agents. The original story is by Stephen King, and for some reason a lot of his works don’t translate well to cinema. This film is boring and predictable. [6/10]
The Thing from Another World (Christian Nyby and Howard Hawks, 1951). A spaceship crash lands in the Arctic and a team of scientists and soldiers fight it out with one of the surviving monsters. Nice mood, great tension between curious scientists and order-following soldiers, and special effects that still hold up good. Another good 1950s sci-fi. [9/10]
Hard Times (Walter Hill, 1975). During the Great Depression a tramp fights street boxing fights for money. A very simple film with few surprises, but interesting if you want to see a tough guy acting, well, tough, and beat people up for 93 minutes. [7/10]
Ā bout de souffle (English title: Breathless) (Jean-Luc Godard, 1960). A man kills a police officer in cold blood, runs from the scene and hooks up with a girl he wants to escape with. High tempo, unsympathetic characters, and a film that tries so hard to be cool it’s entertaining. [8/10]
Tempo di massacro (English title: Massacre Time) (Lucio Fulci, 1960). In the Italian wild west a man learns his home ranch has been taken over by a greedy, evil guy, so he returns home to fight them off. A violent western with the kind of one-dimensional characters you expect, but done with a sense of self distance that makes it highly enjoyable. [8/10]
Deliverance (John Boorman, 1972). Four men go on a canoe trip where nothing turns out the way they want to. I’ve heard a lot about this film, about the famous male rape scene where a character threatens he’s going to make his victim “squeal like a pig”, how the script is used in classes as an example of a perfection, and how Quentin Tarantino watched it age 8 without flinching, but cried when Bambi’s mother died. My expectations were high, and yes, the film is very good and a classic for good reasons, but parts of it felt contrived and over the top. [8/10]
Jade Warrior (original title: Jadesoturi) (Antti-Jussi Annila, 2006). A modern-day Finnish man learns he has mystical sword-fighting powers, and has to battle an ancient evil. The idea of a Finnish Kung fu film is cool, but the execution is less interesting. The fight scenes are OK, but the story has been told too many times to be fun anymore. [6/10]
Walk the Line (James Mangold, 2005). Singer Johnny Cash’s rise to fame, his drug addiction and broken marriage, and his determination to keep singing. You don’t need to like Cash’s music to enjoy the film, but it doesn’t hurt. My dad has the LP record At San Quentin, live from the prison, and I used to listen to it as a kid, so I’m familiar enough with Johnny Cash. Joaquin Phoenix and Reese Witherspoon performed all music themselves without dubbing, and even learned their instruments from scratch, which is most impressive. A good film, especially if you’re interested in the artists. [8/10]
The Day the Earth Stood still is one of those movies I want to see only because it’s mentioned in The Rocky Horror Picture Show.
“The original story is by Stephen King, and for some reason a lot of his works don’t translate well to cinema. This film is boring and predictable.”
On the other hand, one did.
I haven’t seen a single one of the movies. But a few seem interesting. I will check Deliverence out. And Hard Times.
Deliverance is a lot more important than Hard Times if you have to choose between them. I hope you know it’s Samuel from the dormitory I reference with the pig-squealing line?
With Stephen King, do you mean The Shining? King apparently hated Kubrick’s film (The Shining (Stanley Kubrick, 1980)) and much preferred the mini series (The Shining (Mick Garris, 1997)). In the mini series garden bushes shaped as dinosaurs come alive in a computer animated attack, the family is chased by bees and, well, it totally lacks the psychological horror of Nicholson going bad. I haven’t read the book, but I get the impression the film is good more thanks to Kubrick.
You shouldn’t miss the Shining bunny re-enactment (or any other re-enactment, dairy (sic!) or pigeon cam from Angry Alien Productions).
Me and Helena have been working our way through 1950s science fiction lately, so expect more reviews as I write them. Many of them are double features and meant to be seen with another film, so they’re just over an hour long, which is usually enough to get the plot across. We fell asleep to Cat-Women of the Moon (Arthur Hilton, 1953) as the astronauts were attacked in a cave on the moon by a giant spider controlled by ropes (I’m not sure they were supposed to be visible), but I’ll give it another try. It’s got a 2.4 of 10 rating on IMDb, but the part I watched was so bad it was good.
The intro to Rocky Horror is shock-full of references, and I really would like to watch all the films mentioned:
Michael Rennie was ill
The Day the Earth Stood Still
But he told us where we stand.
And Flash Gordon was there
In silver underwear,
Claude Rains was the Invisible Man.
Then something went wrong
For Fay Wray and King Kong.
They got caught in a celluloid jam.
Then at a deadly pace
It Came From…Outer Space.
And this is how the message ran:
Chorus:
Science fiction, double feature
Doctor X will build a creature.
See androids fighting Brad and Janet
Anne Francis stars in Forbidden Planet
Wuh uh uh oh o-o-oh
At the late night, double feature, picture show.
Usherette:
I knew Leo G. Carrol
Was over a barrel
When Tarantula took to the hills.
And I really got hot
When I saw Jeanette Scott
Fight a triffid that spits poison and kills.
Dana Andrews said Prunes
Gave him the runes
And passing them used lots of skills.
But When Worlds Collide,
Said George Pal to his bride,
“I’m gonna give you some terrible thrills,”
Like a…
Chorus:
Science fiction, double feature
Doctor X will build a creature.
See androids fighting Brad and Janet
Anne Francis stars in Forbidden Planet
Wuh uh uh oh o-o-oh
At the late night, double feature, picture show.
I wanna go
Wuh oh o-o-oh
To the late night, double feature, picture show.
By RKO,
Wuh oh o-o-oh
To the late night, double feature, picture show.
In the back row,
Oh oh o-o-oh
To the late night, double feature, picture show!
Yes, I referred to The Shining and I also know that he preferred the mini series. Which is amazing, since what I saw of the series was incredibly lousy. But it is supposed to be closer to the book.
Forbidden Planet is nice. And, I haven’t seen The Day of the Triffids, but I recently read the novel. It is a rather flat sf novel of the old, bad sf style. But at least the early parts of the book is quite good. As you know I love Zombie movies and this one has the best part of those: almost everyone dies in the beginning.
I really have to watch Rocky Horror again. I remember the good (?) old days when I watched parts of it almost every night. Herregud.
Sven said:
Also, The Shawshank Redemption.