RADIO DAYS (1987)

Warmhearted and buoyantly funny (gutbustingly so in the early parts), Woody Allen’s memoir pic is comically precise & believably messy, affectionately charting his extended family over the war years, celebrating their peculiarities as they bump into each other (physically & psychologically) in a modest 2-story house, emotionally steadied by the Golden Age of Radio playing in the background. Underrated (and under-seen) at the time, it’s something of a ‘lost’ Allen film, but a beauty, a great entertainment that’s deepens as it goes along. And what a cast! From a well-preserved Kitty Carlisle Hart at the radio ‘mic’ to the young Seth Green as Woody the kid, there are scores of perfectly spotted performances at home and in some wonderful quick-sketch radio vignettes. (Though a glam cameo from Diane Keaton offers a rhythmically self-indulgently song arrangement that breaks period protocol.) With spiffy recreations that aren’t wallowed in, but handsomely caught on the fly by Carlo Di Palma, shooting the second of twelve Allen films. All wrapped up in a tight 80 minutes.

DOUBLE-BILL: This one resonates not only with auto-bio pics like Fellini’s AMARCORD/’73 and Bergman’s FANNY AND ALEXANDER/’82, but also with touchstone stories invested with personal significance by directors like Minnelli in MEET ME IN ST. LOUIS/’44, Welles on MAGNIFICENT AMBERSONS’42 and Renoir for FRENCH CANCAN/’55.

HARRY IN YOUR POCKET (1973)

An apparent vanity project (there's no other explanation) for tv writer/producer Bruce Geller of MISSION IMPOSSIBLE fame, it was (thankfully) his sole attempt at feature direction. How ultra-competent James Coburn got mixed up in this is a mystery. It’s shockingly bad (LOVE BOAT bad), though just barely worth a look to see the throw-in-the-towel DeadStop of an ending. Coburn plays a seen-it-all master pickpocket, working the streets in what ought to be photogenic cities with failing old-timer Walter Pidgeon; leggy Trish Van Devere, the gal who ‘stalls’ the target; and upstart protégé Michael Sarrazin, ‘the Kid.’ In another film, you might note that Sarrazin & Van De Vere are too old by a decade, but that hardly registers amid the general level of incompetence. Think the poster looks bad? Take a peak at the film.

SCREWY THOUGHT OF THE DAY: Lenser Fred Koenekamp must have been a very accommodating fellow. His next feature was PAPILLON/’73 for the super professional Franklin Schaffner who he’d worked with on PATTON/’70.

WATCH THIS, NOT THAT: Robert Bresson’s PICKPOCKET/’59 is not only the essential existential pickpocket pic, but also an easy way to come by CRIME AND PUNISHMENT!

AVRIL ET LE MONDE TRUQUÉ / APRIL AND THE EXTRAORDINARY WORLD (2015)

If Hollywood’s working model on animated features tends toward homogenized over-development (think DreamWorks with their be-true-to-yourself dicta, larded with winks at Pop Culture for the parental units), here’s a French product that might have benefitted with more corporate think. So wildly unorganized, self-indulgent & individual, it skips logical progression & human emotion, loading on fistfuls of half-baked ideas. An alternate reality fable of a civilization stuck with 19th Century technology, its scientists (and their advances) have all disappeared, grabbed in the maw of lizard conspiracists. (Lizard Conspiracists!!) Now, they're trying to track down a rumored immortality serum that three generations of one family may have, along with their aging, unlikable cat. Toss in a big-nosed spy to fall for our young heroine chemist and you have the semblance of a plot.* Or would if less time were spent on chases past old or re-imagined Paris landmarks. (Two Eiffel Towers?) The animation technique is unable to add much shading to largely incompatible characters, so there’s little to do but admire the handsome draftsmanship on some background layouts and wonder how an animated cat can be so unappealing. Two stellar casts signed on for vocal duties; French-Language cast on the poster, English-Language dub includes Paul Giamatti, Susan Sarandon, Tony Hale & J. K. Simmons, all sounding unconvinced. On the other hand, in his feature debut, composer Valentin Hadjadj sounds entirely convinced in a promising score with a touch of Berlioz to it.

ATTENTION MUST BE PAID: The bulk of the story takes place in alternate-realty Paris 1941; one way of dealing with the real reality of a Vichy government.

SCREWY THOUGHT OF THE DAY: *Taken from Jacques Tardi’s graphic novel; followers may be more enthusiastic . . . or perhaps not.

(THE LITTLE WORLD OF) DON CAMILLO (1952)

Broad and warmly comic, novelist Giovanni Guareschi found satirical-humanistic gold charting the post-WWII political foibles & changes of an Italian town in the Po Valley where a newly elected Communist Mayor collides with his own best ‘frenemy,’ a tradition-bound, reactionary priest.* Director Julien Duvivier wisely lets the material speak for itself, in the manner of French rural specialist Marcel Pagnol (of FANNY fame), and the episodic structure of the story gathers strength & believability as you grow familiar with the pragmatic quirks behind the characters’ stubborn facades. With every township decision a Right-Wing/Left-Wing standoff, the story only finds its footing midway in, when a work stoppage between the landowners and the field workers leaves the town’s livestock untended and suffering. A tragedy in the making, it forces Gino Cervi’s mayor and Fernandel’s priest to break into the communal barn and work together. Naturally, there’s also a Romeo & Juliet (or rather Pyramus & Thisbe) affair of the heart to bring everyone together, with Franco Interlenghi, one of De Sica’s SHOESHINE boys involved. But the film truly belongs to French character-star Fernandel, physically & comedically commanding whether he’s talking with Jesus (naturally, its a two-way conversation) or taking on a truckload of Reds brought in from the city. Filmed in both French and Italian, a restored version of the Italian-language version from KOCH-Lorber is the easiest to get a hold of. A double set with THE RETURN OF DON CAMILLO/’53, first of many sequels; not without its moments, but what was once broad is now forced, missing the first film’s distinctive earth-flavored charm.)

DOUBLE-BILL/SCREWY THOUGHT OF THE DAY: *The Don Camillo films may lean a bit to the Left, but Guareschi himself pulled sharply Right, as can be seen in LA RABBIA/’63, a piece of crap essay-challenge film for Guareschi and film auteur manqué Paolo Pasolini.

DEKIGOKORO / PASSING FANCY (1933)

Well observed, if modest silent dramedy from a young, yet already experienced Yasujirô Ozu hangs a classic no-fool-like-an-old fool romance on a series of neighborhood relationship stories to excellent effect. Not yet old, but no longer young, brewery worker Kihachi is a single dad with a hard to handle ten-yr-old son (Tomio) and a best pal/drinking bud in Jiro, his handsome co-worker. Trouble strikes two ways when they rescue a pretty homeless girl (Harue) with a job at their local hangout and once more when the boy becomes sick. Girl trouble because Kihachi falls for the pretty waif, but she only has eyes for Jiro. Kid trouble when Tomio eats so many sweets he winds up in hospital. Naturally, all this works itself out in the end, but the script keeps things lively & intelligent while Ozu does wonders bringing up details that help the old tropes ring true. Starting right from the opening, when a storyteller recital finds the camera lowering its gaze to focus on a dropped empty pocketbook, stolen again & again by hopeful members of the audience. And note that eye patch on the boy. In any other film, it would foreshadow blindness or a brain tumor. But for Ozu, it’s just an eye patch; any presumed infection disappears without comment between scenes. (The kid's tummy troubles are self-inflicted via candy-buying spree.) Or later in the film when Jiro, who’s long refused to admit any feelings toward Harue, finally owns up to the obvious. Ozu, covering the exchange in a series of reverse angles between Harue & Jiro, purposefully places Jiro on the ‘wrong’ side of the frame, but only when he finally blurts out the truth. Ozu: filmmaker nonpareil.

DOUBLE-BILL: Of twenty previous films from Ozu, most are either hard to see or lost. But there’s already a masterpiece to his credit in I WAS BORN, BUT . . . /’32.

ERCOLE SFIDA SANSONE / HERCULES, SAMSON AND ULYSSES (1963)

Having gained a Stateside fan base for Italian ‘Sword & Sandal’ pics in 1958 with Steve Reeves as HERCULES, director Pietro Francisci wound up the cycle with this relentlessly silly, unexpectedly fun triple-threat Greco-Judaic nonsense. A tasty storyline has Hercules & Co. shipwrecked by a sea monster, then washing ashore in Judea. The beefcake boys just want to sail home, but when Hercules bests a lion with only his bare hands, the evil occupying Philistines mistake him for their shadowy archenemy Samson. Now, Hercules’ only hope to prove his innocence and get back to Ithaca is to catch the real Samson for the King. Tough going, especially since the real Samson thinks this oddly dressed hunk o’ flesh is a Philistine spy hiding in Greek clothing! So much more becoming than his Hebraic loin rags! All this, plus the fleshly temptation of a deceitful, bathing Delilah!! The action is cleanly handled; effects (pasteboard rocks for throwing, scale model temples awaiting destruction) amusing if not exactly convincing, the musclemen yeasty; narrative structure remarkably assured; dubbing no worse than expected. As Hercules, Kirk Morris, though beardless, has the physique & expression of the Greek God of Lightning in Disney’s FANTASIA/’40; Iloosh Khoshabe (going by the name Richard Lloyd) makes Samson something of a lug, while Enzo Cerusico’s Ulysses is delicate & a little fey compared to the rest of the crew. Hey, it’s a long voyage.

SCREWY THOUGHT OF THE DAY: If Hercules really needed to prove he wasn’t Samson, a quick peek ‘below deck’ would reveal the uncircumcised evidence, no?

BLOW OUT (1981)

Fiercely admired, fiercely reviled, Brian De Palma’s first mature work has dated alarmingly, disappointing on all fronts. Commercially snubbed on its release (it began a 13-yr career purgatory for star John Travolta), the film is self-indulgently over-stuffed, with an inappropriately snarky tone in story, character, design & technique. Writing & directing, De Palma laces this paranoid political conspiracy thriller with echoes of BLOW UP/’66 and its offspring THE CONVERSATION/’74; Ted Kennedy’s Chappaquiddick incident and the Zapruder JFK assassination film; a soft-core slasher opening that’s parody De Palma and more parody De Palma in the film proper. Withal the technical finesse, those long swooping shots & split screen angles, more onanistic than purposeful, he still needs to force-feed a wobbly plot. And so many unplayable character types! Travolta (as a sound effects man who accidentally records a hush-hush murder) and lead villain John Lithgow sound like amateurs. Still, better than Nancy Allen (Mrs. De Palma at the time) as a tart who gets in over her head, a role so insipid it rates as spousal abuse. And that’s not even counting the sick-joke tag-ending that must have sent De Palma home with a chuckle. At least, Vilmos Zsigmond’s lensing still glitters even as regular De Palma composer Pino Donaggio comes apart at the seams. This one’s best left to memory.

WATCH THIS, NOT THAT: Early De Palma remains well served by PHANTOM OF THE PARADISE/’74 while the mature filmmaker he might have become is occasionally glimpsed in CARLITO’S WAY/’93.

AFTER THE THIN MAN (1936)

Though it inevitably lacks the element of surprise found in the original THIN MAN/’34 (a bantering, debonair married couple casually mixing drinks & detective chores was something new on the screen), and runs an extra two reels, the second of five sequels to the sleeper hit is easily the best of the follow ups; and may have the best murder mystery of the lot. Pet pooch Asta loses dignity in a few forced comic bits, but everything else is neatly trimmed thanks to a smart/funny script from married writers Frances Goodrich & Albert Hackett, along with W. S. ‘Woody’ Van Dyke’s straight-ahead megging. And such an excellent cast of character actors for suspects when a wayward husband gets bumped off. Special fun from a young James Stewart & George Zucco sporting a pair of coke-bottle lenses. (Though Jessie Ralph, fine enough as soul-weary servants & loyal nannies, never convinces in her grand dowager roles.) Good as Myrna Loy & William Powell are at juggling Nick & Nora’s marital partnership (Loy a wonderful sport about everything, very modern), Powell’s the key in hiking these little films into something out of the ordinary. With the most precise technique in the biz, apt for comedy or drama, he never puts a foot wrong, consistently doubling results using half the effort of anyone else in town.

DOUBLE-BILL: In addition to the six THIN MAN pics, Powell & Loy co-starred in six more films. Try LIBELED LADY/’36 from the same year as AFTER, with Powell’s real-life romantic interest (Jean Harlow) paired with Spencer Tracy.

TERRORE NELLA SPAZIO / PLANET OF THE VAMPIRES (1965)

In a break from his horror speciality, Italian cult director Mario Bava slips into lowball Sci-Fi with this atmospheric thriller. Loaded with visual & story elements that would later be seen in STAR TREK and ALIEN, then closing on a meta-twist ‘reveal’ Rod Serling might have used in a TWILIGHT ZONE, Bava easily overcomes his starvation budget with imaginative color zones and some suspiciously spacious space modules. (In Space No One Can See You Wax The Floor!) With a nifty (dubbed) multi-national cast and an American ‘ringer’ in Barry Sullivan to assure Stateside financing. The set-up finds two spaceships answering a distress call on a dying planet. But soon the crews are also going south, only to find themselves reanimated as ‘host bodies’ for what’s left of the local population. (More like PLANET OF THE ZOMBIES!) Darn effective in its way, with Bava in very good form.

DOUBLE-BILL: Ridley Scott swears he never saw or heard of this film. But see ALIEN/’79 yourself to compare. (The prologue still tremendous stuff.)