321. Laura

Song - She's Not There (Carlos Santana)

Movie: Laura (Otto Preminger, 1944)

A wonderful film, let there be no doubt about that. However, she is there...

Noir at its very best leaves the world unmoored, forcing its heroes to reckon with their moral and rational framework. Even if the murderer is caught, love prevails, or the get-rich-quick scheme somehow works, everyone is still left with a lingering feeling that preconceived notions about what's possible, what's right, and what's true no longer hold water, raising unanswerable questions about what this new reality means. How should we act upon the knowledge that the truths we held to be self-evident are no longer, without being able to fully articulate what has come in their place? Midway through Preminger's film Laura (Gene Tierney) arrives home from her trip to the countryside, finding Detective Mark McPherson (Dana Andrews) asleep underneath her portrait. He's had a long day investigating her murder. 

Laura's return is preceded by one of the few long dialogue-free scenes, following Mark around her apartment looking for clues about what might have happened. He is shown from odd camera angles, with the grand portrait always looming somewhere in the background. The musical score becomes more pronounced highlighting that something's afoot, or about to be, and when he falls asleep Preminger slowly zooms in, and then zooms out, signalling the passage of time, without depicting the experience of it. When Mark wakes up to Laura questioning his presence he is startled, while we rejoice - an already intriguing film just got more interesting! How can a person who was supposed to be dead suddenly be alive? Was someone else murdered, or is it perhaps Laura's appearance that is staged? Is Laura really Laura? Is Laura even really there or is she an apparition of the obsessed detective? The set up suggests the answers to these questions to contain great mysteries, but all of it is ultimately explained by a somewhat disappointingly ordinary combination of mistaken identities and male jealousy that won't turn anyone's world upside down. The road to get there is nonetheless exceptional.

The film is perhaps at its most noirish when it suggests that Mark's obsession with Laura is potentially irrational and self-destructive, but it's self-aware enough to know that it can't really meaningfully pursue that path. Have you seen Gene Tierney, the way she acts, the color of her hair (yes, even in black-and-white!)? The chemistry she has with every potential suitor is off the charts, and portraying Laura as a vulnerable woman who is still able to keep her cool and comfort under pressure only makes her more attractive. Dana Andrews too gives a great performance as a detective who is professional and grounded enough to not let his personal opinions and feelings distract from his job. Watching him think through what he can and can't express is one of the film's greatest pleasures, and undermining that would have been a mistake. Even then, it wouldn't have mattered that much. A screenplay this great, with such wonderfully stylised, flamboyantly witty dialogue can go in all kinds of directions with little harm. Especially when the cast is so at ease with it, and in sync with each other. I had never heard of Clifton Webb before, now I want to see every film he's made.

320. Images

Song - Suzanne (Leonard Cohen)

Movie: Images (Robert Altman, 1972)

'Sounds' would be an equally apt title. The opening scene shows Cathryn (Susannah York) writing her latest children's book "In Search of Unicorns" in her contemporary London apartment. As York narrates snippets from her work, she is suddenly interrupted by another unseen voice, faintly calling out her name. Robert Altman, who has been experimenting with sound design his entire career, then suddenly cuts to a still shot of an antique grail set to a John Williams's score that's more interested in combining various incongruous sounds than in establishing a coherent melody. As the sequence keeps swinging between the abstract and the familiar, we hear once again the disembodied voice calling out Cathryn. The plot is finally set into motion when Cathryn receives a call from a friend going on and on about her unsuccessful love life until mid-conversation the voice on the other end of the line suddenly changes, telling frightening stories about Cathryn's supposedly unfaithful husband Hugh (Rene Auberjonois). Hugh eventually gets home, convincing his wife that nothing unsavory has been going on, but when he leans in to kiss her, we suddenly see him from her point of view looking like Marcel Bozuffi.

'Ghost' would also be an apt title. We eventually learn that three years ago Cathryn had an affair with Rene (Marcel Bozuffi) that abruptly ended when he died in a plane accident. Her memory of a failed pregnancy is far hazier; even if it did occur, she couldn't say whose child she lost. Either way, she still suffers the consequences of whatever happened. Though aware that her mind is playing tricks on her, she is unable to consistently distinguish between reality and imagination. Her husband senses something is off, but doesn't seem to be the most discerning fellow even in the best of times, and his supportive suggestions often have the opposite effect. He is some sort of high-end businessman, but mostly specialises in terrible dad (anti-)jokes: "What's black and white and black and white and black and white? A nun falling down stairs!" is innocuous, but "What is the difference between a rabbit? Nothing, one is both the same!" may well be the closest the film gets to auto-commentary. Notably, the other two main characters are Marcel and his teenage daughter Susannah, portrayed respectively by Hugh Millais and Cathryn Harrison, while "In Search of Unicorns" is a real book, written by Susannah York. 

Images is mostly an exercise in style, highlighting that when you are as formally accomplished as Robert Altman you can basically make an entertaining film out of very little. Not much happens here beyond Susannah York hearing sounds and entering rooms, usually shown from her perspective as supposedly familiar spaces of slippery, consistently shifting composition. Altman has a lot of fun putting us halfway in the shoes of Cathryn. We are always aware that we have a better grasp of reality than her, without ever getting the full picture to be able to confidently assess the consequences of her actions. I enjoyed it a lot, but once it ends you do feel a bit like you've been pointlessly yanked around. I have yet to see Altman's other 70's movies, but would not be surprised if this turns out to be the weakest of the bunch.

319. Ghost

Song - Unchained Melody (The Righteous Brothers)

Movie: Ghost (Jerry Zucker, 1990)

Every once in a while a guy mostly known for making silly comedies with his brother will suddenly find himself directing a Best Picture contender. Green Book is one of those films that's become a victim of Oscar success. It's nowhere near one of the best films of any year, but I found its central relationship appealing and liked that it always looked at the world through Tony Lip's eyes, rarely letting modern, more enlightened sensibilities seep through. An unsophisticated oaf discovering the absurdities of racial segregation is not able to intellectualise them away, emphasising how plainly obvious it is that black Americans being discriminated is both a fact and an abomination. Even if it doesn't always work, the film highlights why excuses about the past being a different time don't really cut it. I have however never liked the Farrelly's tendencies to sentimentalise their crude and vulgar characters, reaching for ill-fitting pathos. That touch of insincerity that's always there in their comedies is unsurprisingly more pronounced in a serious-minded film and it's easy to see why many didn't buy Tony's anti-racist turn as 'inspirational'.

When looking for a funny comedy, Zucker-Abrahams-Zucker will always be a better bet than the Farrelly Brothers. To my surprise and delight, Ghost shares the "anything goes" spirit of Airplane! and The Naked Gun. It presents the dead as ghosts roaming around in the physical world, unseen by the living, but doesn't bother with any form of tedious world building. Any seemingly established rules are thrown out of the window if there is potential for a cool or fun moment. Late in the movie one of the villains dies and is immediately taken away by shadowy figures making horrifying sounds. It's a surprising, creepy scene that works because the film trusts the audience enough to introduce unexpected elements without feeling the need to set them up in advance or justify any in-universe logic. In addition, the movie also constantly changes its POV, allowing itself even more freedom to switch genres on the fly. It can be a slapstick comedy (Whoopi Goldberg playing a grifting medium who becomes terrified when she realises she can actually communicate with the dead is an inspired choice) in one scene, and an action-thriller in the next, and then swerve into fantasy, horror and romance without ever feeling tonally off. Zucker does make the boring choice during the film's emotional climax when Sam (Patrick Swayze) and Molly (Demi Moore) have one last opportunity to experience each other in the flesh. We see the entire scene from Sam's point of view, when Molly's would have been funnier and more mischievous.

Ghost is at its most romantic in the famous pottery scene, set to Unchained Melody, and performed by Demi Moore and Patrick Swayze with unabashed sensuality, emphasising how much they enjoy turning each other on. The two shots of a jukebox switching records (an almost literal mic-drop) bookending the scene suggest that Zucker and co. are very much aware of what they have created and basically give the audience permission to feel a certain way about it too. I loved the choice to show the jukebox in extreme close up, without any sense of the space surrounding it. It's a seemingly inconsequential shot that opens up many possibilities. The jukebox could theoretically be in the loving couple's home, adding a bit of colorful detail to what kind of people they are, but it's equally likely that Zucker is cheekily breaking the fourth wall, showing the viewers something non-diegetic. A third option is of course that the jukebox does belong to the film's world, without Moore and Swayze knowing. Later on, when Swayze becomes a ghost after getting shot, he will find that supernatural entities are constantly intruding in our lives, through barely perceptible actions that may well have major consequences. 

318. Citizen Kane

Song - The Best (Tina Turner)

Movie: Citzen Kane (Orson Welles, 1941)

I've always loved the story of Orson Welles directing a radio adaptation of War of the Worlds so convincingly some listeners thought an alien invasion was imminent, and have been equally intrigued by F for Fake, his documentary about an art forger that's supposedly somewhat of a forgery itself. I should have perhaps expected Citizen Kane to similarly straddle the boundaries between fiction and reality. I knew that it was supposed to be a thinly veiled biopic of media tycoon William Randoplh Hearst, but was surprised by its fascinating autobiographic layers. Welles was 25 years old and had no experience with film before directing, writing and acting in it, in the process establishing entirely new filmmaking rules and techniques that helped move the art form forward. Welles' genius was only matched by his bluster and bravado, and his willingness to speak his mind on all subjects, especially if he could rattle sacred cows. He presented himself as a larger than life self-consciously stylised slippery figure, with even his most seemingly innocuous statements adding to the mystery. Suggesting he could only make Citizen Kane after seeing Stagecoach over 40 times can be read both as genuine humility and gratitude and as a self-aggrandising expression of passionate obsession. 

As the inexperienced publisher of the Inquirer, Charles Foster Kane treats newspaper journalism as entertainment. He will say and write whatever sells and his main objective in the newsroom is to always be the centre of attention, dismissing any criticism with a quick quip. He is a great orator expressing a political interest in fighting fot the working man, but will sell out his principles whenever convenient. He will build an opera house for his wife to perform, knowing she is a terrible singer with enough integrity to feel humiliated by the false praise from his newspapers. His last words, 'Rosebud', are a mystery to every journalist in the country and attempts to piece the puzzle together mostly reveal that nobody, not even his closest companions, knows who Charles Foster Kane really was. What does become evident is that he was a self-consciously stylised figure of great bluster and bravado who would speak his mind on all subjects, creating an entirely new form of journalism in the process. 

Welles and cinematographer Gregg Toland revolutionised the use of deep focus cinematography, allowing everything in the frame to be seen sharply. That allows for some great shots showing how the action in the foreground affects what's happening in the background or vice versa, in line with the film's broader point that no man 's life can be explained through a single word. The deep focus cinematography allows Welles to reveal the broader context behind key events, even when the characters on screen are not explicity aware of what's happening on the otther side of the frame. There is also some spectacular use of dissolves making elegant and sometimes surprising spatial and temporal connections. The highlight is a zoom into a still photo of successful journalists at a rival newspaper turning into a moving image of the same journalists being photographed six years later as they are about to start working at the Inquirer. I also loved how the story of Kane's first marriage is entirely told through a montage of a series of breakfasts through the years. It lasts maybe less than 5 minutes but communicates more than some entire films on the subject. Citizen Kane contains many more narrative and technical interventions of major importance to film history; none are as great as Welles' lead performance. 

Welles may go big here, but he performs with no vanity, unafraid to highlight the hollowness and cruelty behind Kane's bluster and grandeur. When Kane, leading in a political campaign against an objectively ratty politican, is confronted by his rival over his adultery he is given the choice to either quietly withdraw or be publicly shamed, affecting his entire family. Kane chooses the second option, framing it as an act of personal integrity. Theoretically that's true - besides you don't win elections (or make Citizen Kane!) by choosing the first option, but the film shows that his choice gives the ratty politician the moral high ground, understanding that sometimes choosing a better outcome for others over your personal integrity is the right thing to do. There are many scenes, especially in the latter half of the film where Welles shows a similar critical self-awareness, one that can be quite rare to find in such auteur projects. This characterisation of Kane is however also connected to my only real gripe. I will always appreciate movies that counteract the stories nations like to tell about themselves, but an epic about how American society is shaped by men with completely vapid inner lives can't help but risk narrative inertia. I've had similar issues recently with The Irishman; Welles handles the challenge better than Scorsese, but still almost every scene ultimately leads to the same conclusion.

317. O Lucky Man!

Song - The Logical Song (Supertramp)

Movie: O Lucky Man! (Lindsay Anderson, 1973)

When Mick Travis (Malcolm McDowell) walks past graffiti exclaiming "Revolution is the opium of the intellectuals", O Lucky Man! suddenly clicks as a socialist feature-length version of "the goy's teeth" scene - basically a short moral parable set to Jimi Hendrix - in A Serious Man. The Coens tell of a Jewish dentist who finds potentially religious symbols  inscripted on the back of one of his secular patient's teeth. "Help me, save me" they supposedly read, leading the good doctor to many sleepless nights, digging through Jewish tomes trying to find out whether God communicates to him, and if so how. In his despairing quest for answers he eventually seeks out Rabbi Nachtner, hoping he might know if "Hashem" speaks to him through the "Torah or the Caballah". The Rabbi's answer is simple: "The teeth, we don't know. A sigh from Hashem? Don't know. Helping others? Couldn't hurt."  There is a subset of leftists who seem to treat socialism as a theoretical exercise whose main aim is the expression of Marx and Lenin's thoughts, rather than as a practical framework for materially improving people's lives. Unsurprisingly that often comes with an irony-poisoned worldview requiring to see every single aspect of mainstream society as a fundamentally stupid sham that only a select few comrades can see through.

For over two hours O Lucky Man! presents itself as an intellectualised satire of capitalism and contemporary British society, following Mick, a young coffee salesman whose simple charms and singleminded dedication to proftt fuel his career in the company, and eventually open doors into the even greater riches of the military-industrial complex. The many signifiers of high-minded artistry and postmodern sensibilities (references to Kubrick and A Clockwork Orange, a rock band let by The Animals' Alan Price serving as a Greek chorus commenting on the action until it suddenly finds itself part of the plot, silent film interludes, actors playing multiple roles, surrealist ambigous imagery) can't conceal that many off its potshots are incoherent and off-target. The 'surprising' promiscuity of a plain looking hotel hostess does not represent the dark underbelly of British commonality, no matter how hard you try. The use of blackface does not need to be inherently racist (see Assa, and Tropic Thunder), but it definitely is when used to present a white English actor as the president of a fictional African country, voluntarily and enthusiastically selling off his land to the British government. A scene early in the movie of the company manager rambling in front of a major poster of a stereotypical African farm lady joyously carrying coffee beans over her head makes a similar point much better and funnier. Detours to a military site and a hospital have some similarly effective and funny moments, but overstay their welcome without really making explicit what they are actually criticising, turning O Lucky Man! into a social satire that disdains instutions that save and kill lives equally, because it's mainly offended by the supposedly bourgeois attittudes governing them. 

In one of the sharper scenes, Mick becomes a patsy. He is arrested for the corrupt dealings between a British industrialist and the aforementioned African dictator, but while "justice" is served the deal still gets through. After five years in jail, he gets out a reformed man and the film suddenly becomes much more interesting, making an aesthetic turn for social realism. We now see the world as it is, rather than as a stylised intellectual concept. The film looks unflinchingly at the poverty in London's East End where the better off try to make ends meet in crammed one-room apartments, while the truly miserable live on the street hoping that the kind food truck lady will have enough for all. Mick gets accidentally recruited to stop a single mom from killing herself and starts quoting Shakespeare, Thomas Payne and other great Britsh writers of renown,  finding that their inspirational eloquence doesn't bring any food to the table. "Revolution is the opium of the intellectuals" appears in the next scene, indicating that the film might be self-aware. Even so, it still takes three hours to achieve what "The goy's teeth" managed in seven minutes, but it eventually leads to a rather moving ending that works much better in practice than you'd expect on paper. Ultimately, we are all just simple people trying to do our best. 

316. All Is Lost

Song - Sailing (Rod Stewart)

Movie: All Is Lost (J:C. Chandor, 2013)

I like All Is Lost for the same reasons I've become a fan of Powell & Pressburger, and Truly Madly Deeply. It is a great portrayal of dignity under duress. Chandor doesn't provide any background to Robert Redford - we don't get to learn his name, and he barely utters a word aside from a few swears, but when he wakes up to a waterlogged cabin in the middle of the Indian Ocean it becomes immediately clear what kind of man this is. Concerned, but unperturbed he finds that a loose freight container has struck his ship and goes to work, one step at a time. First the container has to be dislodged, then the water has to be removed and finally the hole in the hull should be closed. Every action "Our Man" takes is measured and performed with maximum commitment and awareness. There is no hint of rush, and the most urgent thing is always the task at hand, not to be abandoned until either a solution has been found or all hope is gone. 

I have no sailing experience, but get the sense that even in these opening scenes the situation is far more hopeless than the film or Redford lets on. That's certainly the case midway through when the sailboat is about to sink. Needing to bring some last minute necessities, including conserved food, flares and cutlery, to his emergency life raft, he holds his breath in the submerged ship, rummaging under water for the correct drawers. Chandor takes the time to show every dive back in, filming in calm long takes, mirroring Redford's deliberate composure. There is more to this than just presenting him as a seasoned sailor. Undoubtedly, Redford's attitude is practical, connected to his experience and will increase his chances of survival more than blind panic, but it's also about living, and surviving, the right way. Death may come anyway, facing it on your own terms is the best you can do, and the film consistently seeks to heighten our awareness of what it means to act on those terms in this context. When Redford is navigating a storm forcing him to put on his rain jacket. Chandor shows the entire process of him deciding he needs it, finding the box where it's kept, taking the jacket out, putting the box back in its place, and going back outside with his jacket on to continue the fight against the storm. Most disaster movies would cut most of the middle part to focus on the exciting action, but if all may be lost anyway, the meaningfulness of the process takes precedence over the results.

I had previously seen this film in 2013 in the cinema, amongst friends. We all liked it very much, but I was somewhat disappointed by the ambiguous ending, especially because I was the only one in my group who thought he survived. If we take the final shot at face value, Redford dying would force a spiritual/religious reading on the film that I felt was disconnected from the rationalism that came before. However, seeing it now, Redford surviving feels like it would be an even bigger betrayal of the film's existentialism, which veers into the irrational as the end comes closer. It's unlikely that a freighter passing that close to a life raft wouldn't notice the fireworks emanating from its flares, and its conspicuously unlucky to become surrounded by sharks just when your effort to catch a small fish is finally rewarded, but sometimes no matter how much you do the right thing, the mysterious forces of nature will simply turn against you.  

315. Mira

Song - Mijn Vlakke Land (Jacques Brel)

Movie: Mira (Fons Rademakers, 1971)

The village bar is celebrating. The men have just returned from seasonal work in France, bringing food and money for a few extra beers, but rumors of the upcoming construction of a bridge over the Scheldt quickly turn the mood sour. Some folks have spotted professional looking "civilised" engineers doing measurements along the bank, endangering the old way of life. Sure, the bridge might create economic opportunities, but is that a good price to pay for living under the yoke of Big City? Presumably not, but it's hard to get a good sense of everyone's opinion. Fons Rademakers puts us right in the middle of this Flemish rural community, letting everyone yell over each other. We get a vague sense of how certain people are connected, but it doesn't matter much anyway as the identity of the village takes precedence over the individual. Lander (Jan Decleir), who is on leave from the Army, and Mira (Willeke van Ammelrooy), who has just returned mysteriously from Paris, are among the few able and willing to separate themselves from the rigid conformity. Their reunion suggests a past attraction that's almost immediately consummated without any discomfort or hesitation. Rademakers presents it as a steamy easygoing romance between two attractive carefree young lovers indulging each other in full view of the village, knowing that they will probably soon be separated again. Also, Lander is Mira's uncle. 

Lander and Mira are forced to break off their romance much sooner than expected, though for non- incestuous reasons; Lander and two fellow villagers kill the manager overseeing the construction of the bridge, and his main assistants. On a foggy day, they follow them through the reeds and drown them in the river. During the pursuit, the camera stays close to the killers as they weed through the vegetation and mud, barely able to see beyond what's right in front of them. Eventually we see someone has died, but it takes a while before we get a full picture of what's happened. The deliberately disorienting approach makes the riverside feel much more savage and exotic than it really is, and Rademakers' intents become even more obvious in the ensuing scenes of mounted police chasing Lander through the forest. All non-diegetic sounds disappear as we see and hear the law closing in on an out of breath Lander as he drags through uneven terrain, escapes beartraps and jumps of 'cliffs' (the right camera angle can make even the smallest elevation look like an imposing canyon!). Alas, nothing can help him, not even the trigger happy gun nut offering emergency gruel in his wooden shack on the outskirts of the village.

Mira has especially in its second half some strange plotting issues. It sometimes feels as if too much material was shot and attempts to make sense of it all couldn't find the forest for the trees, with scenes that are seemingly missing or at the wrong place. However, it's always compelling and probably as close as you can get to a Belgian 'frontier' western. Rademakers has cast himself in a brief role as the public notary giving an exasperated speech to the villagers outlining the benefits of the bridge. The film certainly shares his view that industrialisation is an inevitable good, but it does lament what gets lost in its wake, and it does romanticise its 'Wild West', not necessarily in the most tasteful way. Following the arrest of Lander, Mira begins a romance with the bridge's chief engineer. It's far less passionate than the illicit one with Decleir, and the engineer can't catch a break in other ways either. The open plains of the village are contrasted wtth his stuffy family home where his mother controls, and knows of, all his decisions. He eventually marries Mira, but their wedding night evokes the famous final scene from The Graduate. Soon after, she leaves him; the now completed bridge makes her departure much easier.