Reviews

The 1955 film is an abstract expressionist take on a dark and disturbing subject. Not for all tastes, but I find it entrancing. A masterpiece. The original sound track is brilliant, with music that was composed by George Antheil, an American avant-garde composer who lived from 1900 to 1959.

Then some knuckleheads bought the rights to the film and decided it needed some histrionic narration thrown in here and there. The narration is a distracting annoyance and detracts seriously from the film. Many people on archive.org complained about this and despaired over what could be done. Several people claimed the narrator is Ed McMahon, the intro man for the old Johnny Carson show. I don't know how they came to this conclusion. One enterprising person created his own electronic musical soundtrack, but that eliminated all the original audio. So how can you watch it with the original soundtrack but without that imbecilic narration? I found a way.

I ported the video file to an audio WAV file (using freeware tools) and opened it in Audacity, a wonderful tool for audio editing, also available as freeware. Whenever that annoying voice appeared, I selected that portion of the audio stream and set it to silent. Then I copied a nearby portion of sound from the original sound track equivalent in time and pasted it over the silent portion. I used VirtualDub (more freeware) to apply the modified sound track to the video. The resulting sound track is narration free! We have the original Dementia back! Find it at archive.org.

A mysterious island, a mysterious doctor living in a mysterious old house with mysterious people. Three men in a plane crash land on this island and the mystery thickens. Dark, forbidding and ominous. And everyone in the cast of this dark tale plays it straight, except for Mantan Moreland.

Often classified as a horror film, Mantan Moreland puts on a bravura performance, turning this dark and forbidding tale into pure satire. Yes, he is relegated to the scared of everything role just like Stepin Fetchit. This is 1941, after all. And this a low budget, cheesy production. But his comedic talents are brilliant and make this film worth watching which, if he were not in the film, would be a forgotten throwaway.

I tend to like very old films, and this is a real antique. But age alone does not make it good. There was a good deal of trash produced in the old days, just like today. But when you have a gem like this, it is worth preserving and watching repeatedly after a suitable time. And I believe you can download this from the Internet Archive since it appears to have fallen into the public domain. Very funny and great fun. I give it an 8.

I don't need to repeat anything about the plot line since you have already read it, or should have. In any event I found this film to be a wonderful diversion. What we soon learn is that the two hit men are completely unsuited to the job. They are complex, morally conflicted and emotional, while their employer is a cynical psychopath. Having some time off with these two in the Belgian city of Bruges during Christmas allows us to move about the old city on a sight seeing tour, punctuated with serendipitous or chaotic encounters with other people and interactions between the two leads. Along with the Christmas lights there is some violence, but it is integral to the black comedy aspect of the film. Some of the violence is quite comical.

The addition of a film in production within this film adds another level. Two of the supporting characters come out of that inner film, in a certain way providing a connection between waking and dreaming. Bit parts played by people in fantastic costumes add to the magic of what might otherwise be a purely dark scene.

All the characters are very carefully crafted. As another review stated this is (in part) a character study. It is also designed to be very entertaining, which it is. I enjoyed it immensely. A bit slow moving at times, but this is a European film which holds the value of the stage very high, yet it does not appear staged. It puts you right there. The direction, the camera work and the acting all work together to give a real experience.

I wanted to like this. It seemed to have potential. The haunted mirror is a good start, a mechanism used very effectively in much earlier films, such as one of the stories in "Dead of Night" from 1945. Unfortunately this film is like virtually all modern horror films. It does not follow up well on promising details offered at the beginning. It goes on too long. It pulls in unnecessary and distracting supernatural characters. It gets confused. Worst of all, it is NOT SCARY. When it got to the point of seeming way too familiar, I knew. Why movie producers are so utterly helpless with horror films I do not understand. I won't suggest that all old horror films are good, but there some real gems from yesteryear whereas these days it seems nothing since "The Exorcist" shows any real skill in making something truly creepy.

One thing that I noticed about this film was the similarity to House of Voices. Young woman goes to huge old mansion in the country that is being used as a boys' school, discovers bizarre goings on while her personal history comes into play. Nothing wrong with this, indeed it could be made into something truly frightening. And both films benefit from high production values with effective lighting and photography and a very good cast.

Then there is the script and the overall story board. Subtle revealing of a supernatural presence initially works well, but then, at least for me, things start to fall apart. The protagonist becomes less convincing as time goes on, seeming to be a different person than the one first introduced. Certain scenes are thrown in that contribute nothing to the story and indeed just muck it up, other scenes seem like outtakes where they were just experimenting with camera angles, even some characters and their actions are superfluous, and the revelation at the end really annoyed me - I have seen this same revelation many times before in other films and it is tiresome in the extreme. And it reminded me of House of Voices which I also rated a 2. And it could have been so much better.

I don't like it when a film is incoherent. I don't like it when a film drags. I don't like waiting for something to happen in the film and nothing happens. I do have to give some credit for atmosphere and photography, and in spite of what some other reviewers have said the acting is fairly good. Unfortunately the script runs out of interesting material very fast, and as the film dragged on I started to detect some extremely tiresome and derivative plot elements that are simply annoying. i suspect in an attempt to be mysterious with a bizarre back story and a surprise ending, the screenwriter was smoking something and could not avoid going completely off the rails. Sadly, what could have been good, wasn't.

This is an effective chiller with a disparate group of characters temporarily confined to an old house because of pandemic plague affecting the area. The air is still and sickly. Claustrophobia sets in. People start to die. Fears are aroused. Superstitions and accusations start. An uneasy feeling is pervasive which quickly turns into alarm as further tragic events appear to unfold and turn into something unexpected. Another dark night must pass before the wind can pick up again.

I particularly like this film for its exquisitely wretched atmosphere. Karloff is excellent in a tortured role, where he tries to keep order amidst a collapsing sense of control. The rest of the cast also holds up well, when they don't die and even when they do. It turns out there is more than one way to die.

This is an engaging whodunit with a particularly charming back and forth between Warner Oland and Keye Luke. A good bit of action as well, with some some fisticuffs and bang bang. I was intrigued by several occasions where Chinese is spoken, although it appears none of it was critical to the plot. Certainly it is appropriate considering the locale in Shanghai. Some good little surprises here and there, with Charlie always ahead of everyone else in spite of a couple of perilous encounters.

If you like this series in general, you should be quite pleased with this entry. Warner Oland is, at least I think, the best Chan, showing warmth and wit and a playfulness his antecedents seem to lack.

Dana Andrews plans to debunk this supernatural claptrap. He doesn't believe any of it and aims to prove it. But those of us watching the film who can suspend disbelief so we can enjoy the film are convinced right away. So we start to worry about Dana as he goes about with no sense of danger. But at one point he decides to get inside the house to search for clues and there in the office is a house cat lounging in a chair. Nice kitty. It becomes a race against time for Dana to turn the tables.

I find this film very effective. Dark corridors, unexplained events, and that sense of menace hanging over everything. There is a demon out there, and it knows where you are. 9 out of 10.

The theme of the woman as a hunter goes way back to before the common era. And here we have the woman tangled up with the image of the ever mystical cat. The story is truly ancient, picked up and dropped down into 1942 America. Love, crisis, jealousy, betrayal, weakness of character, tragedy.

This film is set substantially in the dark and in the shadows. But you know there is something lurking in those shadows, something evil and dangerous. Something motivated perhaps by human emotions, but also perhaps powered by an extra-human force? The characters have flaws which set things in motion. Less than noble motivations, less than noble actions, and less than noble outcomes. It is like a Greek tragedy. Betrayal is a strong theme here, a bit like Medea. Strong and frightening stuff.

The Uninvited gets to me. It convinces me right off the bat that we are dealing with a malevolent entity. Something is wrong with that house. Something is in that house that is a palpable form of menace.

This is an old film with a style of cinematic story-telling from a previous age. In black and white the house seems much older than color stock would tell me. And the noir effect is exceedingly effective. The heavy darkness dominates the film and deepens the sense of dread.

This is the sort of tale which done this way on the screen takes me from my own time and place and puts me in that house, hearing things, seeing things, unsure of but aware of the danger that is from a separate reality but has stepped into my reality and threatens me as it threatens the characters in the story.

I was impressed with the relative originality of the first part of the film. Relative in that it is stylistically way over the top. It is pretty outrageous in a way I had not seen before. However, the plot quickly bifurcated. Maybe I missed something, but I could not relate those first scenes with what followed. And what followed just seemed to roll inexorably downhill as the film went on. It does seem to maintain a dark and blood soaked atmosphere throughout, but at times it drags and toward the end it started to get a little silly. So I give it a 5, points added for stylistic excess and points subtracted for being dramatically insipid.

I would suggest that before you see this film, watch the original version. Then don't watch this one. The original Haunting is one of the very best of the genre, with a cast that effectively fits the story. This version ends up being an incompetent parody, neither scary nor funny. This remake dumbs down the story seemingly to target 8 year-olds. It relies on artificial special effects rather than good acting. The cast does not fit the story, indeed the cast seems like a random selection of mostly comedic stage personalities, not chosen for their acting ability, Liam Neeson notwithstanding. With all due respect to people who like this version, I was offended by it.

As with too many other films such as Cat People and Diabolique, the modern remake is a feeble imitation that distills and dilutes the story down to fetid bilge water.

I had hopes that this film would offer some creative thrills. Unfortunately, it started off badly. Nicole Kidman, although playing the role well, played the role of an annoying neurotic. Sorry, hard to have much sympathy with her character. And as it went on, things often did not make sense. Some plot elements contributed nothing to the story and seemed to be no more than distractions. I just did not like the way it played out, waiting for the tension to build but it never really did. And worst of all, when the surprise ending arrived, I felt cheated. Of course, I can't explain why without revealing the whole plot. Pity.

This film I think would be best watched in its entirety if split into three or perhaps four sessions as part of a weekly college class on the nature of random events and how such events can affect outcomes. But for me, all at once just as entertainment it doesn't do very well.

The plot is very simple, giving the film maker an opportunity to play around much more with cinematic techniques. And the techniques used here are well done and entertaining. So the story is pegged at 20 minutes, and allowing for some overhead with parallel scenes and scenes from another slot of time, the film is over in about 30 minutes. Except it isn't. After the story is told, it is told again but the outcome is different. Then the story is told a third time, but with yet a third outcome. By the end of the second telling it started to pall. By the time it was all over it felt like a bit of an ordeal.

However, I very much liked various aspects of the film. For one, I found the lead character, Lola, very appealing. I like her. So I propose some changes. I would edit out the first two versions of the story and turn it from a fair to poor feature length film into a good short film. Why remove the first two versions? Because I liked the third version and I did not like the first two. I thought the third fit the general mood of this film much better.

This was just broadcast in one go, the original episodic partitions merged into one showing as part of the Masterpiece series on PBS. I didn't actually get to see the whole thing, coming upon it as I did part way through. At first I did not know what it was about, but something quickly seemed compelling and it wasn't long before the story became evident to me. Then I stayed up much too late, unable to turn away.

If you don't know the story, read the book first. If you do then you don't need me to tell you what it is about. But concerning this production, it blew me away. It is beautifully crafted and sensitively acted. The character of Anne and her interaction with those around her during a truly bizarre time is disarming and haunting. My big plasma screen may have helped, but it was the nature of the production and the intensity of the story that really pulled me in, making me feel I was in the same space with them, as a silent observer to the ups and the downs, the warmth and the tension, the joy and the anger, the hope and the fear.

The ending was a nice touch. Everyone was accounted for. I could feel a sense of grief and a sense of closure, knowing the aftermath of what Anne was able to record.

The protagonist is called to a castle somewhere to do some work as a land surveyor. A small village is outside the castle, which is where he stays while attempting to make contact with various officials attached to the castle in some way, so he might know just what he is supposed to do.

It is winter. The landscape is snow covered. The castle, massive and forbidding, dominates the top of the hill. The seat of government is supposedly in the castle. Various officials and government workers of varying descriptions are around and about. The land surveyor asks questions, official procedures are described, leading to more questions...

This 1968 effort by Maximilian Schell to put Franz Kafka's novel on film is for me one of the pinnacles of cinematic achievement. This is a film where I think it would be impossible to write spoilers into a review. This is very far away from most films in style, narrative and delivery. It is not perhaps accessible to everyone, hence the decidedly negative reviews also found here. But it blows me away not for being so different, but for being so so true, so prescient.

Perhaps you have seen "Divorce Italian Style", a classic example of delightful farce. With this Ruski gem, the laughs come even faster. It is set in the Caucasian mountains, and the spectacular scenery is a bonus. A trio of buffoons who often appeared together star in this film along with the "hero". A very beautiful young woman figures into the silly plot, and she becomes the kidnap victim. Complete nonsense ensues, and it is priceless. At times it looks like potential source material for Benny Hill. One of the buffoons stars as the "hero" in other excellent comedies and was a gifted circus clown (I forget his name, drat!). In this film the non-stop antics and gags, although clearly done on a very low budget, nonetheless work very well with a cast that is obviously having a jolly good time. Available with subtitles.

This is not really a proper review since I did not see most of the film. I stopped watching it. The film is very violent, with nasty drug dealers and street punks, but that is not why I stopped watching.

Here was the problem: I watched just enough to be introduced to several characters, all of whom were not interesting. Everyone was a tedious, despicable psychopath, with no engaging personalities, giving me nothing to look forward to. I found myself not the least bit curious about what they would do next or what might happen to them.

If there had been even one person of interest, and I don't mean good or nice person, I mean an interesting person, I could have stayed with it. Watch "State of Grace" to see what I mean. In that film the Gary Oldman character is a complete lunatic, but he is *very* interesting. Al Pacino perhaps did a good job in Scarface, but his character just did not engage me.