We can all be grateful to Leslie Howard for warning us against the savage allures of sensuous, primitive peoples, and to value the civilised societies from which we come. Guard against the evils of miscegenation.
Reviews
4 Reviews
Beau Ideal
(1931)
The loyalty of Camelot in an underground Arabian prison.
25 June 2016
It's too bad they don't make films like this anymore. They apparently used the wrong sorts of camels. I think they also used Europeans instead of Arabs, but as none of the Arabs do anything important, except for one or two of the most atrocious and treacherous ones, it doesn't matter.
It could be a film noir, with the grim prison cell in stark contrast to the childhood Camelot at the opening. I think it was too early for the genre, but it's very dark, with the abandoned prisoners starving to death in the underground silo. But there is a happy ending, especially as the hero is freed from his promise to marry the half-caste who hated living among brown people. In fact, I think it's racism is cheerily redemptive, and no one of importance dies in the silo.
It could be a film noir, with the grim prison cell in stark contrast to the childhood Camelot at the opening. I think it was too early for the genre, but it's very dark, with the abandoned prisoners starving to death in the underground silo. But there is a happy ending, especially as the hero is freed from his promise to marry the half-caste who hated living among brown people. In fact, I think it's racism is cheerily redemptive, and no one of importance dies in the silo.
Pirates
(1986)
A waste of Matthau and Polanski
12 December 2015
Warning: Spoilers
I expected more from the 1986 film, Pirates. When I saw Walter Matthau was the main character and that Roman Polanski was the director, I had high expectations that were dispelled the moment Matthau's character Captain Red bit the buttock of his faithful fool, a Frenchman he calls Frog. This stereotypical name is perhaps the high point of humour in the disjointed and aimless film. The officers of the Spanish galleon are all dressed as if they are courtiers at Versailles, while the cabins are furnished as lavishly as any of the Sun King's rooms. In fact, Polanski doesn't seem to be aware that he is making a film centred round a Spanish galleon.
Clichés extend to the overuse of enemas by a ship's physician whose remedies are implicitly responsible for the captain's death; though he expires just after confessing his doubt in God's existence,thus revealing himself to be worthy of redemption. The priest who confesses him is another sanctimonious cliché who is apparently intended to represent the harshness of the Spanish Inquisition, who blithely confesses pirates and criminals to be garroted.
The only notable female in the film is María-Dolores de la Jenya de la Calde, played by Charlotte Lewis. It is easy to understand why she is not well-known and why she hasn't made any films for 13 years, though she was only 19 when she played María-Dolores de la Jenya de la Calde; this character was particularly vacuous and vain insisting that her ransom should be 30,000 doubloons instead of 3,000, and asking her uncle to agree that her honour is worth more than a kingdom, when she is about to be raped; at the same time, he coy smile implies that she hopes Frog does rape her.
There are no heroic characters, nor even interesting villains. Damien Thomas, who plays, Don Alfonso de la Torré, the officer who takes over command of the galleon, the Neptune, after the death of Captain Linares, gives the most competent performance as a would-be ruthless schemer though he proves to be a foiled fop through a series of slapstick accidents that are obstacles to development of any sensible storyline as much as they are to any entertainment value in the film.
All in all, a dreadful experience.
Clichés extend to the overuse of enemas by a ship's physician whose remedies are implicitly responsible for the captain's death; though he expires just after confessing his doubt in God's existence,thus revealing himself to be worthy of redemption. The priest who confesses him is another sanctimonious cliché who is apparently intended to represent the harshness of the Spanish Inquisition, who blithely confesses pirates and criminals to be garroted.
The only notable female in the film is María-Dolores de la Jenya de la Calde, played by Charlotte Lewis. It is easy to understand why she is not well-known and why she hasn't made any films for 13 years, though she was only 19 when she played María-Dolores de la Jenya de la Calde; this character was particularly vacuous and vain insisting that her ransom should be 30,000 doubloons instead of 3,000, and asking her uncle to agree that her honour is worth more than a kingdom, when she is about to be raped; at the same time, he coy smile implies that she hopes Frog does rape her.
There are no heroic characters, nor even interesting villains. Damien Thomas, who plays, Don Alfonso de la Torré, the officer who takes over command of the galleon, the Neptune, after the death of Captain Linares, gives the most competent performance as a would-be ruthless schemer though he proves to be a foiled fop through a series of slapstick accidents that are obstacles to development of any sensible storyline as much as they are to any entertainment value in the film.
All in all, a dreadful experience.
The Timber
(2015)
Pretentious clichés combined with rambling irrelevances
21 June 2015
Warning: Spoilers
Though the two brothers are on their way to kill their father they don't seem to suffer any angst over their task. The banker's reason for wanting them out of the way-to claim the oil on their farm-seems to be an afterthought that provides some sense to the plot. The gunslinger who accompanies them proves both ineffective and pointless. The father could be any of three people and an explosion that provides the brothers an opportunity to escape some uncertain but horrible fate is more serendipity than explicable.
The story seems to be about nature and the wilderness which belittles the conflict between petty humans, though ultimately it seems as if nature is about to reward the morally superior humans, though there doesn't seem to be anything morally superior about them. All they did was mouth platitudes that their antagonists didn't mouth.
I'm glad this film wasn't any longer.
The story seems to be about nature and the wilderness which belittles the conflict between petty humans, though ultimately it seems as if nature is about to reward the morally superior humans, though there doesn't seem to be anything morally superior about them. All they did was mouth platitudes that their antagonists didn't mouth.
I'm glad this film wasn't any longer.
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