WORKINGMAN'S DEATH (2005)

Michael Glawogger’s nail-biting, heartrending, stomach-churning world tour of unrewarding, spiritually grinding, physically demanding work is MANUAL LABOR: EXTREME EDITION. But it’ll never make it as a reality series, it’s much too real. We go from supine coal extraction, in illegally reopened Ukrainian mines, to noxious sulfur gathering and a perilous mountain descent with the heavy load in Indonesia. Off to Nigeria, where it’s best to squint thru an open-air abattoir, an all in one-slaughterhouse/carcass processing carnival of carrion and move on to Pakistan where old oil freighters go to die and get blow torched into pieces for scrap. Finally, a brief stop at a Chinese iron works where the workers show a remarkably sophisticated grasp of the economics that will soon overtake their thriving factory just like the closed German plant, we see brightly lit as a historic industrial artifact for bored teens on an educational outing. Depressing as social document: what is the future for all this outmoded laboring?, but thrilling as film. It all but demands viewing.

THE DEADLY AFFAIR (1966)

George Smiley, the melancholic British desk-jockey spy master from the John Le Carré novels, made his film debut with a brief appearance in Martin Ritt’s film adaptation of THE SPY WHO CAME IN FROM THE COLD/’65. But he became a small screen legend when Alec Guinness took him on in TINKER, TAILOR, SOLDIER, SPY/’79 and SMILEY’S PEOPLE/’82, making such a complete job of it that this fine characterization from James Mason, more fleshly, less daringly chilly & cerebral (with Smiley rechristened Charles Dobbs), has been unjustly forgotten. Adapted with unusual fidelity by Paul Dehn from Le Carré’s debut novel, CALL FOR THE DEAD, it plays out with unexpected clarity for a Spy vs Spy drama; no small feat with a double-helix plot structure that intertwines personal relationships, local police sleuthing, Christopher Marlowe and international conspiracies. Working with Freddy Young on camera, director Sidney Lumet is able to stretch in new directions, though his alarmingly speedy filming manner (how he must have made his British crew hop!) typically leaves his editor missing out on a useful angle or two. (Check out the clumsy set ups in the scenes between Mason and Simon Signoret’s clammy widow.) Lumet also got lucky with his cast on this one with memorable perfs from a smooth Maximilian Schell, a pleasingly plump Lynn Redgrave, and an endearingly narcoleptic turn from old, reliable Harry Andrews. Only Harriet Andersson, as Smiley’s (er . . . Dobbs’) beloved, but errant wife seems miscast. Unless you insist on counting Quincy Jones’s mostly misjudged score.

READ ALL ABOUT IT: Le Carré followed up DEAD with a rather ordinary murder-mystery for Smiley, A MURDER OF QUALITY in 1962. This road-not-taken series novel shows the author moving, somewhat halfheartedly, into Agatha Christie/Dorothy Sayers territory. Happily, he went right back to international sleuthery, though the attempt is not without interest. And it’s short!

THE MIND BENDERS (1963)

After VICTIM/’61, their critically acclaimed homosexual blackmail thriller, was rejected by the film-going hoi polloi, Basil Dearden, Michael Relph & Dirk Bogarde (director, producer & star) did penance, of a sort, with this ludicrous pseudo-scientific thriller on sensory deprivation & mind control. It opens decently, like an episode of Twilight Zone made by Hammer Films, as a zoned-out Oxford Prof steps out of a moving train, dying under suspicion with a briefcase full of cash. But then the inquiry starts up with John Clements' investigator goading Dirk Bogarde into repeating the deceased professor’s dangerous isolation experiment to prove whether the dead man had turned-traitor selling secrets to ‘the enemy’ or had merely turned 'zombie' with a ‘bendable’ mind after treatment. Sounds like it might be nutty enough to play, but the test designed for Dirk plants a seed of jealousy against his pregnant wife, Mary Ure, and all we can do is wait for the inevitable green-eyed monster to show up. (Didn’t Dearden just make a contempo OTHELLO in ALL NIGHT LONG/’62?) It hardly matters, halfway in, you'll know just how the sensory deprivation volunteers felt.

DOUBLE-BILL: Sensory deprivation addicts will need to see Ken Russell’s ALTERED STATES/’80, taken from the Paddy Chayefsky novel. And ‘taken’ is the word since Chayefsky, who also did the original script, loathed the final result and disowned the film.

THE MASTER RACE (1944)

Father & son producers Edward & Robert Golden, after a hit debut with HITLER’S CHILDREN/’43, followed up with a second Nazi-themed thriller set at the end of the war that orders a gaggle of German commanders to go incognito into newly liberated towns to start dividing & conquering all over again. Hitler is Finished! Long Live National Socialism! The plan’s mastermind is George Coulouris, a high ranking Nazi who begins to surreptitiously sabotage all the good will & good deeds the American, British & Soviet soldiers bring to a small Belgium town as its war-weary soldiers start drifting home. The basic idea of winning the peace was unusual for the time (the war was still raging), and this indie pic offers a technically impressive package with dark, moody lensing from Russell Metty and a believable war-torn town. No stars, but a good mix of fresh & seasoned featured players, look for a young Lloyd Nolan and little Gigi Perreau at the start of her cute-kid days. But whereas HITLER’S CHILDREN became something of a breakthrough for its director, Edward Dymtryk, this one comes out stillborn under the barely competent, often corny hand (and script) of Herbert Biberman. Best known now as one of the Hollywood Ten*, it does offer a rare example of a Hollywood pic that really does shoehorn some Rah-Rah-Russia, Soviet-style propaganda into the narrative mix, sticking a happy-go-lucky Red Army Doctor right in the middle of Belgium. How’d he get there?

SCREWY THOUGHT OF THE DAY: *Ironically, after both served a 6 month jail term, Biberman was one of the ‘Card Carrying Communists’ Dmytryk ‘named’ to clear himself in Hollywood.

MAHANAGAR / THE BIG CITY (1963)

Perfectly poised, deceptively simple, deeply felt film from Satyajit Ray about family fissures in an over-crowded tenement apartment in Calcutta. The husband (Anil Chatterje), a bank clerk, is sole supporter for wife, child, parents & sister. A grim financial picture until his wife (Madhabi Mukherjee) decides to go job hunting. Landing the job, a tough door-to-door gig selling an automated knitting machine, turns out to be easy compared to keeping the peace at home with her new schedule & priorities. But real trouble only begins when she comes to realize that she’s good at her job, enjoys the experiences and feels quietly empowered by it. Ray keeps all the family members in motion with dramas of their own, showing how they impact on each other. The continual adjustments to changing situations keeps things from feeling either dated or dogmatic. The ending, which involves a confrontation & a reconciliation between the almost painfully reticent Mukherjee, her not quite unflappable boss and her husband's wounded pride is simply extraordinary. Calmly transcendent, and very Bengali.

KABE ATSUKI HEYA / THE THICK-WALLED ROOM (1953;'56)

This early work from Japanese director Masaki Kobayashi plays on issues of wartime guilt & responsibility he’d return to in his HUMAN CONDITION Trilogy/’59-‘61. Controversial in its day (its release was held up three years), the film looks like apprentice work and isn’t helped by poorly preserved elements. But it shares many of the shortcomings of his more fully achieved work, with too many dramatic pointers marking the path. The story follows a group of convicted war criminals stuck in the Japanese prison system years after the end of the war. But just how culpable are they? Kobayashi sticks to men below officer class, and in a series of flashbacks shows them ‘just following orders.’ No doubt, true for many, even most, but his choices end up obscuring rather than revealing cause & character. In the most interesting flashback sequence, outraged locals on some tropical isle revolt against the burial on their land of three executed Japanese soldiers, and for a brief moment, the move toward moral complexity denies easy closure. But then it’s back to prison for more pickled drama, an 'honor code' story as one of the men gets a 24-hr pass for his mother’s funeral which leads to a face-to-face meeting with the exonerated officer whose original order & courtroom lies put him behind bars.

TWENTY FEET FROM STARDOM (2013)

Morgan Neville’s popular, award-winning, but shallow documentary about a handful of wildly talented backup singers (mostly black female artists active in the Pop and R&B world of the ‘70s & ‘80s) never gets past a by-the-numbers PBS American Masters vibe. Hosts of famous music industry types (frontmen & session guys) are so busy with blanket encomiums, telling us how great, decent, wonderful everyone is, the motivating idea of the film (where’d these gals go?; why didn’t they strike out/strike sparks on their own?) gets lost. The film doesn’t seem to pick up on one obvious answer: half the musical acts we know & love were led by shits. Maybe that’s what these gifted singers lack, the self-regard & calculated cool that can make the music all but irrelevant to commercial  success. Of the profiled singers, Darlene Love is the obvious exception. But her missed opportunity was more likely the result of deceit & mismanagement after signing on the dotted line with legendary producer (and real life Mephistopheles) Phil Spector.* The film is slickly made, with beautifully sourced, sharply restored archival footage; it's bound to make a lot of viewers happy. But it's also something of a wasted opportunity.

DOUBLE-BILL: You can see what’s missing in here by checking out STANDING IN THE SHADOWS OF MOTOWN/’02 which has less happy talk, but plumbs deeper looking at Motown’s default backup recording band, the Funk Brothers.

LINK: *Or possibly not. Check out some fascinating comments @ IMDb on some debatable facts behind the official Darlene Love story. 

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2396566/reviews?ref_=tt_urv

THE MASK OF DIMITRIOS (1944)

Warner Bros. followed up THE MALTESE FALCON/’41 by pairing its two unlikely Mutt & Jeff character stars (Peter Lorre & Sydney Greenstreet) in a series of inexpensive, but slick looking mysteries. This one, an early credit for director Jean Negulesco after a series of well received short subjects, is probably the best of the bunch, a tidy thriller about Dimitrios Makropoulos (debuting Zachary Scott), a dangerously unscrupulous confidence man with a killer smile . . . make that a killer’s smile. Someone’s finally caught up with this fast-moving villain, but his backstory (along with a viewing of the corpse) intrigue crime author Peter Lorre. Maybe there’s a book in there.  Or maybe there’s cash to be had just from selling the info he’s already picked up. That’s what Sydney Greenstreet thinks, if only Lorre would share what he knew. But first, Lorre needs to fill himself in on this peripatetic scoundrel, picking up pieces of the puzzle from past victims. There’s more circling than action in the story, but the cast, dialogue & atmosphere are terrific. Negulesco, with his background in the fine arts, gets a lot of European flavor on screen, ably assisted by a heavily accented supporting cast, and by retaining FALCON’s D.P. (Arthur Edeson) & composer (Adolph Deutsch). The climax is a bit of a mess, but it doesn’t do much damage. Beautiful print from Warners Archive, too.

SCREWY THOUGHT OF THE DAY/DOUBLE-BILL: The story structure -- writer visits a few of his subject’s past acquaintances and gets a handle on the dead man’s life thru their differing POVs (all told in flashback) -- is a bit like CITIZEN KANE/’41. Coincidence? Maybe not. It’s taken from an Eric Ambler novel,  whose JOURNEY INTO FEAR was filmed the previous year by Orson Welles’ Mercury Players. It’s only available in Region 2, but a Stateside compatible DVD can’t be too far off.

CITTA VIOLENTA / VIOLENT CITY (aka THE FAMILY) (1970)

Spaghetti Westerns & action fare from the ‘60s & ‘70s built a following for Italian director Sergio Sollima (a box set is out from KOCH), but this one came with Hollywood players in the leads and earned a belated Stateside release in ‘73 as THE FAMILY. (It also had classy tech credits with Aldo Tonti lensing and an Ennio Morricone score.  Now, Blue Underground DVD has restored about ten minutes of missing footage from its initial cut using the original Italian track & English subtitles as needed.) The opening and closing scenes are striking action fare: two all but silent set pieces, a sharply organized car chase thru the narrow streets, alleys & stairways of St. Thomas (it’s BULLITT GOES TO THE TROPICS), and a stealth sniper attack on an exposed elevator for a climax. The problem is everything in-between.  Charles Bronson, in ridiculously fit shape, is the hitman on vacation with slinky lover Jill Ireland (his real life wife and a perfectly lousy actress), but once ashore, they wind up chased on those winding island roads. Turns out, it’s Bronson’s own guys who are targeting him.  The rest of film sees Bronson tracking everyone down and coming up with Telly Savalas, his own lawyer and even the lovely (and frequently naked) Ms. Ireland either on his tail or out to double-cross him. This should play reasonably well, but neither Sollima nor co-scripter Lina Wertmüller bother to play by any rules of narrative continuity. Nothing adds up.  Worse, the distinctive Wertmüller thud of sexual violence and general misogyny gets dealt once too often. (At one ludicrous point, forced sexual violence between the Bronsons gets interrupted by a live-action illustrated lecture from Charles B. on . . . forced physical violence.) Still, those opening & closing action scenes are intriguing enough to recommend more Sollima.