Lima

An interesting Fulci. There' s no Giallo slashing, no perversion, as the title might suggest. Just an interesting, almost Vertigo-like story and a lot of tasteful eroticism, which was a sought-after commodity and a trend in the cinema at the height of the sexual revolution, and Fulci pulled it off. As for the plot, hirnlego would probably say that "woman is the greatest evil on earth"; anyway, it's a bit naive, the villain's premature confession a too willing, but the ending, though a little too trite, was a delight. The colors were beautiful, many, many shots were really cool, and Mr. Director did his traditional crime lab cameo.

After this movie, my mom, a big movie fan, proclaimed, "That was even better than Hitchcock!" I don't know, I wouldn't go that far. However, to the local detractors, if you dispense with the meaningless comparisons, you have to admit that William Castle did a good job. The twist at the end really surprised me, and I consider myself a fairly astute viewer (and I didn't research anything about this film beforehand, so that's why), and some of the visual gimmicks, like the 50-second pause to leave the cinema before a tense scene, really amused me. I wish I could have been at the premiere at the time and heard the audience's look of amazement at the reveal :o) The year it was released, the prestigious Time magazine listed Homicide as one of the 10 best films of the year, congratulations.

The film, even according to the poster, wants to present itself as a kind of parody of Grant Wood's famous 1930 painting “American Gothic”. It tries, through Rod Steiger's goofy overgrown "kids", to play on a lighter note, but the kids are played so badly, and the whole thing is so absurd that it's impossible to take it seriously. Starting with the attack on Jeff, about half an hour before the end, it completely falls apart dramaturgically, and all that's left is an obscure scene of crazy people, with a hard-to-accept transformation of a main character, and horribly, downright scary bad acting. The theatrical performance of the great Rod Steiger seems to belong in a completely different film. An utter cinematic disaster.

A very interesting film, with the fantastic atmosphere of a remote village in the middle of snowy mountains. The unexpectedly calm, emotionally unstressed scene of the meeting between the captain and the killer is excellent, I enjoyed every second. But that’s where the good things end. I really don’t like it, I actually hate it when live animals are killed for the sake of a film, as is the case here; not artificial mannequins, but real living beings. I could still stomach the wolf and the thrush, it wasn't so obvious there, but the severed head of the goose at the end, with the body still shaking in death convulsions, dripping blood, was too much for me. I experienced something this shocking a long time ago, in Deodato's Cannibal Holocaust, where a poor turtle is slaughtered on camera, and it was the same here. No movie justifies killing a living being just to make a scene look spectacular. No a single one! Without rating.

The film is very strong in the details and the particulars, but not so convincing on the whole. There are some really excellent, creepy scenes that send chills down your spine, but I get the feeling that what the whole film is leading up to isn't as emotionally crushing as the previous course might have made it out to be. The ending arrives and, well, that’s it? Otherwise, it’s alright. The plus side is clearly Deborah Kerr's neurotic performance, I ate up that bundle of nerves; the two children are also good, and note how their faces are subtly backlit in close-up to make them seem distinctly sinister. Freddie Francis, later the famous Hammer director, did a great job here, along with the shadow play in the darkened rooms. I give it a strong 4* for the occasional shivers (a game of hide and seek!) and the disturbing atmosphere.

I certainly wouldn't call it a horror film, but rather a thriller that, except for two scenes, noticeably lacks suffocating tension. But that wouldn't matter, if it wasn’t for one problem: an unexpected plot twist, which, though impressively orchestrated, turns all previous events on their head and lacks any logic. As with that twist, unfortunately the actions of the main character follow the same silliness to the weakly built-up conclusion. It's really a shame, in the first half this film had the potential to be really Hitchcockian, but it ended up being a complete bust.

One of the first horror films (I even read somewhere that it was the very first) that introduced the theme of reincarnated witches who sacrifice an innocent girl on the Sabbath to prolong their eternal life. In Italy, Mario Bava responded directly to this film with Black Sabbath and started a popular wave of gothic horror. The story is not flawless, though. The villain and the victim are clear right from the start (as the period poster for the film unhappily reveals), but the atmosphere is priceless. Beautiful scenery of dilapidated houses of a city obsessed with Satanism, thick fog rolling low over the ground, a sinister underground dungeon and a beautiful gloomy cemetery with giant crosses. The music interestingly alternates jazz passages with horror symphonic ones, supported by choral singing. It's interesting how the scenes are repeated in both visits to the cursed city – the same looks from the citizens, the same ritual elements, all pointing towards the inevitable. The ending is really great, it builds up perfectly, with flames shooting out of the cross and the ominous singing of the choir. Christopher Lee is god (as usual), although he plays more of a second fiddle. The clear trump card is Patricia Jessel, you'd be hard pressed to find a more demonic witch.

Criterion blu-ray screening. Tarantino's source of inspiration. An incredibly austere, emotionally cold film. Yates always made films like this, even the famous Bullitt was like this, but there he at least pushed some emotion through McQueen and had some memorable scenes. There are two bank robberies, one of which lasts about a minute, the other at the beginning of the film is chillingly cold, executed with stoic calm, really well done, but that's where the positives end. Everything here is done with such a calm face, even the actors declaim in a static manner, Mitchum is literally just a number here, his "both sides" game is actually quite meaningless, as are the woes of the young arms dealer. The 100 minutes of runtime dissolve like steam over a pot, without involving the viewer in the plot, and that's quite disappointing given the cult status the film has overseas.

From the film that is Nicolas Winding Refn's favourite and biggest source of inspiration, I was expecting more than a murky gangster movie about Tokyo gang rivalry and status honour. For the first 40 minutes or so (which is about half of the runtime) not much really happens, apart from the fact that there are two gangs vying for influence; all stuff we've seen in many other films. Quite often, incomprehensibly for me, a scene is suddenly cut off in the middle of the action and another one comes in, as if the editor was confused, but in any case the viewer is confused. What I have to praise, though, is the visual aspect. As long as the action takes place in Tokyo, the director chooses interesting austere compositions with gorgeous colours, a joy to look at, the sets are not bad either (the ending!), but the passage from the snow-covered mountains is not very interesting and overall, the film doesn't bring much of interest apart from the cinematography. PS: Bluntman is babbling something about running away from a train as a phallic symbol. Come on! That scene lasts about 4 seconds and you can barely see the train at all. Those film theorists really are crazy sometimes :)

Beautiful scenery, a charismatic girl, Simon and Garfunkel, a meaningful story and emotions. If I were to recall something similar in type and genre, the last time I enjoyed a film like this was Penn's Into the Wild eleven years ago. The protagonist of that one had different motivations, but both have something in common: they are searching for themselves in a beautiful, purifying landscape. At the beginning I wasn't really hooked, the sudden cuts were a bit confusing, but as time went on I got incredibly engaged. I understood the main character, I envied her determination to do something with herself, and I'm so glad that Vallée didn't slip into cheap tropes, that some scenes that could have slid into a fatal ending were resolved in a different way and the clichés were avoided. And the way Vallée works with flashbacks is a masterpiece, too. And especially Reese – she put everything into the role, she even produced it herself; girl I admire you! Reese is just a God-given talent, like Vallée, I have yet to see a bad or even just mediocre film from him.