Movie review - "After the Ball" (1957) **

 Biopic about Vesta Tilley who I've never heard of and starring Pat Kirkwood who I've never heard of but both were big deals in England. It's very stock biopic, with bald exposition and musical numbers.  Tilley's life lacked drama -a lot of shows, a bit of World War One drama. She retires.

Romulus wanted to made it because it was a vehicle for Kirkwood and also Laurence Harvey who seems hamstrung in a hamstrung part as the husband/manager. No death, no reversal, no illness (they pump up an allergic reaction).

Some colour and. songs. Peter Rogers produced and it feels thrifty.  I mean it's period, and in colour but there's a lot of tight shots.

Movie review - "Fresh Air" (1999) ***

 Not much of a story, but interesting visuals, a bright cast, likeable characters. I enjoyed the scenes with the guy and his sick dad (Tony Barry) and it was authenticity. The director likes women.

Opportunities for drama thrown away like  Bridie Carter seemingly interested in the guy - why not have her flirt with him? Or Nadine Garner?

Still, hard to dislike.

Movie review - "The Custodian" (1993) **1/2

 John Dingwall may have written a great script for Sunday Too Far Away but he wasn't flawness and he's not the best argument for writer-directors. This is an intense, florid, corruption tale with Anthony La Paglia as a cop who decides to dob in mates including Hugo Weaving to journo Kelly Dingwall.

Famel characters consistently bland - Essie Davis' perfect coffee girl who just wants to be there for La Paglia and invites him home and is basically nothing, Naomi Watts also nothing to play as Dingwall's girlfriend, and there's also La Paglia's trashy wife Joy Smithers, and Barry Otto's nothing wife who is murdered (the only kick of this piece), Weaving's got a wife who's just there too. Nothing wrong with actors, just nothing to play.

La Paglia is meant to be a top cop but we don't see him do anything except dob. It's actually not that much of a role. Weaving goes full scenery chewing. Barry Otto is the best in the cast.

I don't think there's been a film with so many female characters that are nothing - you could cut all out of the movie except Otto's wife and she only makes it because she gets murdered.

Just put a dead body in it and have an investigation.

Movie review - "Flesh and Blood" (1985) **1/2

 The original idea was meant to be about two old comrades, Rutger Hauer and Jack Thompson, clashing. Orion pushed for more of a lovestory. Because it's Paul Verhoeven that means rape. 

Hauer is ideally cast although he and Verhoeven clashed on the film. Jennifer Jason Leigh has a perm, a sexual curiosity, gets gang raped, then is into Hauer.

The other casting is a real grab bag. Hauer's team include Bruno Kirby (!), Susan Tyrell (terrific), Brion James. Tom Burlinson is fresh faced as the prince betrothed to Leigh. Jack Thompson is a mercenary. 

The baddies are diverse - include several women, a kid, a gay couple.

Solid story. But no emotional links between characters. We forget Thompson and Hauer fought together. Burlinson is a stranger basically to Leigh and Hauer. Leigh and Hauer knew her.

Better if Leigh was Thompson's daughter and knew Hauer/Burlinson a long time.

Leigh goes naked a lot.  To a point where it's like "is this really necessary for the script?"

Movie review - "Mad Dog Morgan" (1976) *** (re-watching)

 I want to like it more than I do. I love the photography, sets, period detail, cast, Dennis Hopper, violence, madness, boldness.

Not a great script - a series of encounters. No core relationships other than Hopper and Gulpilil which seems like two odd bods. Frank Thring is evil. Jack Thompson is a pursuing cop but his role is small - he's undermined in a way too by Michael Pate's pursuing cop.

Great visuals. Consistently interesting. Phillipe Mora can't quite hook in the viewer via narrative. But he had a go.

Movie review - "The Journalist" (1979) *

 This got made because Michael Thornhill was on the board of the NSWFC and so had an "in", Roadshow made money on Petersen and so loved Jack Thompson, I think funding bodies thought "it's time we made a light comedy and here's one" and it sounded fun - "Jack Thompson as a rapscallion".

It's terrible.

This feels like a first draft, a vomit draft. The sort of thing entered in the Monte Millers.

Why didn't they get David Williamson to give it a pass?

You sense it'll be bad from the opening credits -played over scenes of Sydney Harbour, but the water isn't blue and the credits go on and on. They can't even get the credits right. I mean, just have pretty pictures of Sydney and keep it short. But all these people get their own card eg Stewart Wagstaff.

The story is dumb and confusing. 

Thompson is bad.  

Okay what I liked

- Elizabeth Alexander is beautiful and tries

- I like Candy Raymond who pops in at the end

- Don McAlpine is a good cinematographer

- Sam Neill does well

- there is camp in seeing Jack Thompson at the disco

- it shows the sexual desires of elder women eg Carol Raye, Margot Lee

What doesn't work

- the film keeps changing what it's about - he goes to Hong Kong,  then he's a journalist, then he's doing a government job then he's a journalist

- he's a bad journalist writes lousy copy can't type and doesn't investigate

- it's unclear what his relationship is like with Liz Alexander - they're together, she's pregnant, but she never seems that intohim

- the references to other movies and films eg Shampoo, Annie Hall - just make me angry at Thornhill's ineptness

- no sense of theme, of character

- no sexy, no nudity, no jokes, Thompson can't even get it up for two women (why include this)

- it was a scandal this was made

Movie review -"Spank!" (1999) *1/2

 Shot in Adelaide which is a point of difference - there are lots of scenes of Rundle Mall and some nice houses. Robert Mammone nicely underplays the lead who got out of a monastery which is interesting.

The story is about some Italian Australians who want to open a cafe. There's a lot of broad playing - a lot. Some guy who I kept thinking was Sal Coco mugs ruthlessly, gyrating and talking about woman. Vince from Heartbreak High mugs relentlessly, There's lots of mugging. It's exhausting. Maybe this would've worked on stage. I wondered why Mammone kept hanging out with them.

Many of the characters wear black and and have black hair and I had trouble telling them apart.  Especially has everyone acted like a maniac.

There was potential here - the story of young people opening up a cafe, colourful characters, a man out of a monastery having his first romantic relationship. That last subplot could have propped up the whole film if just played relatively straight with a bit of colour. (Even if there's some very unconvincing kissing - there's a great final shot of a conga line and everyone partying but 

 Rolf de Heer was executive producer.

Movie review - "Sex is a Four Letter Word" (1995) **1/2

 Some people sit around and talk about sex. A film of its time - this sort of raunchiness could not be seen on television.

It's surprising Joy Smithers organised a truth telling session when she's had an abortion and isn't sleeping with her partner (Rhett Walton). Did she not thing that was going to come out?

There's some twists - Walton is sleeping with uptight friend Tessa Humphries. Tony Waltton is bi and on with Miranda Otto and Mark Lee.  This part of the story is still fresh because we don't see many bi guys on screen even now.

It might've used being a movie more - ducking off to corner rooms works well.

Structurally the movie has flaws - characters will make revelations and then act as if the revelations haven't been made. Also the "my parents are bad" as get out of gaol is oversued, and Miranda Otto's character (while performed with plenty of energy) is a little Williamson/Bob Ellis (young, dim, horny, has great memories of rooting her music teacher at school).

Still there is a lot of energy, it's well acted, and it's impossible not to have admiratino for Fahey's spirit.

Movie review - "Star Portal".(1997) *

 One of the cheapies made in Ireland by Roger Corman, this has a strong source material, Not of This Earth but is just ineptly done. I like Athena Massey and it's cute to see her blending in to the world learning about sex and taking her clothes off, and Steven Bauer was sweet as a doctor with glasses who pursues her rather like Ryan O'Neal in What's Up Doc? but there's no suspense or horror and the film gets dumber and more incompetent as it goes on.

Movie review - "Undercover Heat" (1995) **1/2

 An utterly competent, perfectly designed late night cable erotic thriller, not with a huge budget, but a skilled, likeable, attractive cast. Athena Massey is very engaging as the cop investigating the murder of a hooker so she goes undercove as a high class call girl in a brothel run by Meg Foster with her offsider Jeffrey Dean Morgan. So there's some star power here.

It's cute (yes also and exploitative) how Massey discovers she quite enjoys doing increasingly sexual acts and tells her superiors to get lost.

The mystery isn't bad. Some promising subplots not developed like Massey and Morgan, and the romance between Meg Foster and Massey's boss. Nice friendship between Massey and the girl from Showgirls.

A movie that absolutely knows what it is.

Top unmade Margaret Lockwood films

 1) Rob Roy - announced before WW2, cancelled because of it... a great shame, would've been great, Gainsborough, Ted Black, Will Fyffe, Lockwood..

2) The Blue Lagoon - another Gainsborough project cancelled by WW2 it was good this was made in colour but young Lockwood would've been perfect 

3) Vanity Fair - announced in the late 1940s, presumably cancelled due to the financial crisis. Could have been fun. Maybe. I have limited confidence of Rank.

4) Ann Veronica - adaptation of the novel by HG Wells. Hmm... maybe director dependent. She did do it for TV and no one cared.

5) The Wicked Lady's Daughter - this should have been made. Arliss and company were still around. 

6) Mary Magdalene - Rank wanted to do this. She refused. Hmm.... I like the idea but Rank couldn't have pulled it off. The Americans could have.

Book review - "Helga's Web" by Jon Cleary

 The second Scobie Malone, revolves around the Opera House. We meet Scobie's miserable whiny working class parents - dad works on the Opera House and helps give them access which is good - and they clash with Scobie's girlfriend, Lisa, who moved here following The High Commissioner. 

Cleary had sex on the brain with this one. Interesting structure, it cuts back and forth between Scobie's investigation into Helga's murder and Helga's last few days. The identiy of the killer isn't that shocking.

The characters are types really - aspiring politician, his ambitious wife - although I liked the commercials producer, I wonder if that was inspired by Brian Chirlian. Cleary is strong on a sense of place and narrative, not so great on characters.

Movie review - "The Woman for Joe" (1955) **1/2 (warning: spoilers)

 Obscure Rank feature from the 1950s despite being in colour and Vista Vision - it got a decent release but wasn't a TV perennial. Perhaps due to the story. George Baker runs a circus and becomes best friends with little person Jimmy Karoubi. Then Karoubi falls for Hungarian barmaid Diane Cilento.

Having a little person as protagonist is so unsual the film has a fascination.  Karoubi isn't really up for the part - he's got a charisma, I just wish he was a better actor. George Baker isn't that good either - he wrote in his memoirs that Peter Finch should've played the role and he was right.

The film is too nice. Baker and Karoubi like each other. Cilento is a decent person. They still are selfish. Karoubi loves Cilento. She's hot for Baker. Baker goes for her even though he would (arguably) have other options and she would have other options. She's got to go for Karoubi's best friend and he's got to go for her. Sorry, they're selfish. They don't even struggle against their attraction. Then Karoubi dies in an accident (I think it's a hinted suicide because she set him up with a dwaf he rejected earlier in the film after Baker tried to set him up with her?) They go off together feeling a little bad. Sorry for bad language, but fuck them. In playing everyone as "nice" they still come across as insensitive pricks because at the end of the day Karoubi is a dwarf and he isn't.

It might've been more fun using the plot of Freaks. Cilento is  tramp out for Karoubi's mother and hot for Baker. Or if they wanted to make Baker nice have some sexy dude she humps. Throw in a murder.

The writer has done for a more sensitive portrayal. Which is fine. But those need really skilled handling. Everyone tries. No one is outstanding.  It needed a better director. Cilento comes off best despite a Hungarian accent - which again is fine just another layer of artificiality.

I read a review which said the film seems to go on forever. I get that and think I know why. It lacks pace, it puts everything out in a linear manner. We meet Baker. Establish his problems. We meet Karoubi. Things get better. We don't meet Cilento until 30 minutes in. The film could've stared five minutes before hand.

The glimpses of circus life are fun. This is a negative review but there are many good things about the movie. The fact it's about a dwarf is inherently interesting. It totally gets points for that.

Book review - " Cimino:The Deer Hunter, Heaven’s Gate, and the Price of a Vision" (2022) by Charles Elton

 I'm surprised it took someone so long to do a book on Cimino, I thought he'd be a natural, but I guess he was uncommunicative and lived a long time (thus better able to sue). Elton tackled the job with admirable enthusiasm, with his best "get" being he contacted Joan Corelli but also a close friend when Cimino was transitioning and Steven Bach's exec partner at UA (who slags off Bach a lot, not unexpectedly - but it doesn't discount Bach's version).

Elton makes a lot of minor errors, mostly about the history of Hollywood - he's prone to saying things were "unprecedented" when they weren't, and stuff like Something's Got to Give was completely shut down when Fox filmed it as Move Over Darling. I think he's also a little too forgiving of going over budget - the "well David Lean did it" argument.  

It's not definitive but it's really good and Cimino is such a fascinating character.

Movie review - "The Undead" (1957) **** (re-watch)

 Oh the rating is too high but I love this film. It's ambitious, its spookiness, the quality of its script, the dialogue - Griffith said Corman cut out the iambic pentameter but there's a bit in there. Acting quality varies - Richard Garland slightly OTT, Pamela Duncan is okay but Alison Hayes is wonderful and Val Dufour a great slimy shrink plus Mel Welles has the time of his life as a gravedigger.

It throws in dancing girls, Satan, a little person (Billy Barty), witches.  The ending has emotional power with Duncan giving up her life.

Movie review - "The Flying Fontaines" (1959) **

 Michael Callan given a lead role in this trapeze drama which references the Burt Lancaster Trapeze  a few times. There's a love triangle, talk of a triple. Callan is the only one of the young Columbia contract players to have much individuality. Bright colour. George Sherman directed. Bigger budget than a "B" it feels - "A minus" maybe. Not much of a story. Lacks a murder or something. Nice production values. Callan dances at a night club.

Gene Hackman top ten

 

Okay enough time has passed (arguably) to do a Gene Hackman top ten. Everyone knows the actual good movies so I thought I'd do my top ten weird Gene Hackman movies.

1) Lucky Lady (1975) - Gene has a threesome with Burt Reynolds and Liza Minelli. That is not made up. Burt gives Gene's arm a fondle the morning after. You gentleman, Burt!

2) Two of a Kind (1982) - reteaming of Olivia Newton John and john Travolta that no one remembers except uber fans - Gene Hackman provides the voice of God and does very well

3) March or Die (1977) - Hackman made a few films for Lew Grade's company ITC in the late 70s- I enjoyed this french foreign legion tale where he is, as always, good

4) Bat21 (1988) for some reason this movie was on like every few months on Channel Ten on Friday/Saturday nights in the nineties - there was probably a bigger market for pudgy men in war movies than people realised - this film isn't that weird actually it was more weird how it was always on Channel ten

5) Zandy's Bride (1974) - when people talk about how great cinema was in the 70s it's always good to say "what like Zandy's Bride?" in the conversation to be annoying - Hackman is good as always

6) Superman 4: The Quest for Peace - everyone took the money on this one - read Daniel Kremer's Sidney Furie bio for the inside scoop on what went down

7) First to Fight/ Covenant with Death (mid 60s) - when Hackman was working his way up through the ranks he had to support actors like Chad Everett and George Maharis in films like these because they were what people thought film stars looked like and Hackman wasn't - he graduated to "supporting peopole who looked like film stars and actually were" like Warren Beatty, Robert Redford, Jim Brown and Gregory Peck - but i guess you've got to get through Chad Everett first to get to Redford

8 ) Lilith (1964) forgotten film in which Jean Seaberg, who often sleepwalked through her roles, is terrific - so too is peter Fonda

9) Doctor's Wives (1971) - sleazy material with a director who had a class rep on TV and. a first rate cast - they manage to still make it sleazy material

10) Misunderstood (1984) - a male weepie with Hackman and Henry Thomas, coming off ET - i remember it made my cry as an eleven year old but I sense it may be terrible so am afraid to see it again

Movie review - "Return of the Secaucus Seven" (1980) ****

 Rough, of course, with some erratic acting and staging. But I love the film for its ambition. Being an ensemble piece, trying to break up chat with basketbell games, ordering drinks, nude swimming. You do get to know the characters - I think maybe a few different haircuts would've helped.

The tensions, humour and acting are well staged. There's "future star" spotting with Gordon Clapp and David Strathairn.

It's more sexual than other Sayles films except maybe Lianna. The scene where two characters, Adam leFevre and Karent Trott, whisper about wanting to do it and do it is very hot - Sayles didn't often write that, but he could do it well (eg Battle Beyond the Stars).

I loved the scene where they were arrested and these flakes, or people who seemed flakey (Mark Arnott as the druggie), started reeling off their arrests for political events. 

I would've liked to have seen Lacey, the actress again.

But I love the feeling of friendship, the indie vibe. I's an important movie.

Documentary review - "The Self-Preservation Society" (2009) ***

 Solid doco about making The Italian Job  with some great talking heads: Michael Deeley, Michael Caine, Robert Evans, Peter Bart (who never passes up a chance to self  promote), Peter Collinson's widow and kids. The Collinson story is inevitably moving.  Lots of details about cars. Fun clips. Good natured.

Ronald Lewis Top Ten

 I always called him "Roland Lewis". Anyway

1) The Square Ring - effective character work - I think he was a character actor in a leading man's body

2) Robbery Under Arms - the fault of the films are not his

3) The Wind Cannot Read - like many pushed as a leading man, made a better villain

4) Scream of Fear - excellent work

5) The Full Treatment - ditto

6) Conspiracy of Hearts - decent work in a good Ralph Thomas film 

7) Mr Sardonic - some William Castle fun

8) The Secret Place - solid noir

9) Storm Over the Nile - he doesn't have much to do but I like the movie

10) Siege of Saxons - cheerful kids film, Lewis has a bad blonde wig but is fine

Movie review - "Shiva Baby" (2020) ***1/2

 Bright comedy-drama with a star making turn from Rachel Sennott and well written and directed by Emma Seligman. Kind of like a play in that it basically is set in one place over a restricted period of time but the handling is cinematic as Sennott kind of loses it with a particularly strong music score.

Diana Argon plays a blonde shiska.

Movie review - "Stanley: Every Home Should Have One" (1984) *

 Oz attempt at Arthur has Peter Bensley as the titular man child who goes to live with an ordinary family - Graeme Kennedy (who would've been idea for the lead when younger), Susan Walker, Joy Smithers and David Argue (who would've been better if more aggro). He reomances Nell Campbell and the two don't have chemistry.

The film cost $4 million - there are some pretty shots of Sydney Harbour but I'm not sure where it all went. 

The plot might've been okay for a half hour kids thing. There is adult stuff with Kennedy being busted at a gay bar with Harold Hopkins, Walker having an affair, Smithers being pregnant to an Aboriginal and Argue being a drug dealer... actually isn't this the plot of Bliss?

Over time the film's lack of comedy, endless cut aways of Max Cullen stalking Bensley and lack of chemistry between Bensley and Campbell got on my nerves and I started to hate the movie.

Movie review - "My Old Ass" (2022) ****

 Swee fantasy comedy where Maisy Stella meets her older self, Audrey Plaza, who gives some advice on her last summer. Stella is outstanding - everyone is good too.

I wasn't sure it was okay to have a woman who sleeps with women then realising she prefers dudes, nbut maybe that's how it swings in Canada. The film is very Canadian - there's comments about climate change, open attitudes to sexuality, it's all set by a lake, there's a Justin Bieber sequence.

Movie review - "The Sunchaser" (1996) ** (warning: spoilers)

 Michael Cimino's last feature film as director is one no one remembers, not really. It escaped with a whimper, not a bang, doesn't even have a decent controversy associated with it. Woody Harelsen, who shows a likable tendency to work with all sorts of directors, plays the lead - a cancer doctor. He's kidnapped by teen gangster Jon Seda who wants Native American meidcal treatment which is interesting. Seda's performance gets on the nerves after a while - lots of yelling.

Alexandra Tydings is a generic leggy type as Harrelson's wife, perhaps put in the film as Harrelson's beard since the film has Harrelson essentially fall in love with Seda. This is raised in the film and feriously refuted.

This movie is reminiscent of Thunderbolt and Lightfoot - two men on the lam - although it's different in that Harrelson is kidnapped so could escape, there's no stakes if the cops get him.

I like taking Navajos seriously and we meet some hot Navajos (one played by Talisa Soto!) and the ending is satisfying. But there is something missing in the movie. An extra twist. Or someone dying at the end. Really Harrelson should die at the end - I think that would've worked if they'd gotten rid of his family. His family being in the film doesn't work, there's no point to it.

But, you know, interesting.

John Milius in Film Comment 1976

 

Movie review - "Michael Cimino: God Bless America" (2022) ***1/2

 Doco about the director with taped interviews though not recent pictures. Great talking heads of others though like Quentin Tarantino and Oliver Stone. Visits scenes where various movies shot notably The Deer Hunter. I like that it book ends The Sunchaser with Thunderbolt and Lightfoot.

Movie review - "Desperate Hours" (1990) **

 I think the theory was good - take a well worn story, which almost always works (siege/home invasion), and add a hot star like Mickey Rourke, some great actors like Mimi Rogers and Anthony Hopkins, and give it to Michael Cimino.

It's got 90s bloat which we saw in a lot of remakes around this time (eg The Getaway). I think Cimino struggles with cramped, indoor stories. His famous films - all of them until here - were basically oudoor stories. Even the indoor sequences felt spectacular eg Russian Roulette in Deer Hunter, the restaurant in Year of the Dragon.  The scenes set outdoors here - Kelly Lynch on the opening, for instance, or when David Morse escapes - has a life the indoor stuff doesn't.

Cimino struggles with character interactions. Desperate Hours should be full of them - we keep waiting to see humanity in Rourke towards Hopkins/Rogers/Smith... but don't. Sexual attraction/repulsion, an understanding, people realising stuff about themselves, interesting gang dynamics... none of that is really there. I kept waiting for a psycho convict to do something... no. There's a nice moment where a convict recognises a video game played by Hopkins' son and waited to see that relationship developed... No. Smith is a bratty teen and I waited to see a convict fall for her (or Rogers) - or threaten them. No. Yes, cliches, or tropes, but at least drama. Hopkins acts all tough, which is foolish when people have your family. He has a younger lover he left Rogers for who would be a great person to turn up... instead there's a real estate agent who is killed. Also Smith's boyfriend appears but they don't move there.

It's one of those films where maybe they were too afraid of cliches.  So they didn't do the cliches but they didn't replace them with anything.

The movie needed to be directed by, I don't know, John Badham or someone. That's no diss on Badham - I think that director was better with characterisation and more conventional material.

Movie review - "The Sicilian" (1987) **1/2

 Heaven's Gate hurt Cimino's career but it didn't kill it - he made Year of the Dragon which underperformed in North American but did well enough for finance to be raised for this movia, a biopic of Sicilian bandit/politician Salvatore Giuliano.

There's very little American interest in the story but it was based on a novel by Mario Puzo. Christopher Lambert is not ideally cast in the lead. John Turturro is his best friend,  Giulia Boschi is his girlfriend and  Barbara Sukowa a horny countess. Joss Ackland is a mafia don and Terence Stamp is a prince.

The novel was part of The Godfather series and included the Corleones. They are removed here - presumably due to legal issues. It's a shame - I get the reasons, but maybe some American characters added could have helped the movie connect with American audiences. Or any non-Sicilian audiences. There's a lot of chat about Sicilian politics, elections and communists, that I felt a little behind the eight ball with.

Lambert looks good but is terrible. There's an awful "If you don't rape me I'll rape you" scene between Lambert and a countess and they listen to music and have sex  (Many Cimino's film have rape in them.) I think once they cast Lambert they just needed to reduce all his dialogue and give it to Turturro and Ackland and Stamp. Or just cast Terence Stamp. Or someone who can act. Sorry, I don't mean to be rude. The women in the cast aren't great either.

The tremendous period  detail of his earlier films is present in the outdoor scenes but indoor scenes with big bands feels fake.

The spectacle, sweep and subject matter could've made this really good. There was a cut version and Cimino version - I saw the latter. It has stature but has a lead who can't act and some dreadful scenes as well as some amazing ones.

 Gore Vidal did a pass of the script. Most of the key actors are English but Aldo Ray has a small role.

Movie review - "Year of the Dragon" (1985) ***1/2 (re-watching)

 Mickey Rourke was born in 1952 so he could've served in Vietnam - I like his performance but his silly hair makes him seem old. And Ariane, I have affection for, but the fact is a really good actress in that part would've make it sing. John Lone is superb.

It looks gorgeous. Sweeping vistas. Extras.Burmese jungle. Hong Kong. Restaurants.  The action sequences are incredible - assassinations, shootouts in restaurants, people being shot on the road, beatings in nightclubs. So many great touches like the nuns translating bugged criminals and the mafia guy with a throat box.

They didn't have to make Rourke's character such an arsehole. When Ariane says she's been raped he grabs her and throws her in the chair and yells at her. When his wife is angry he took off at dinner he goes and sleeps with Ariane. He constantly makes racist slurs. This didn't have to be in the film. Neither did the rape scene - I wonder if that was Stone or Cimino both were partial to rape.

I like the bloke who played Rourke's old mate. The wife character is the standard Oliver Stone nag, but the actress does the best she can. Dennis Dun is moving as the undercover cop - at least he gets some time in the sun as does Ariane.

Really, Rourke's character should have died at the end - it feels wrong that Dun and his wife were killed and Ariane was raped and he got to live. 

Still, a really thought provoking movie. Not cookie cutter.

Movie review - "Heaven's Gate" (1980) *** (warning: spoilers)

 Looks gorgeous. Cimino spent a lot of money but it's up there on screeen. Every shot is like a painting.

Opening scene with John Hurt making speeches at Harvard doesn't really make sense.  There's pretty dances and bands and it looks tremendous - it doesn't have the universality of people getting married.

A key problem of the movie is Cimino is so in love with set pieces and sets. A train arriving. A horse drawn carriage. Rollerskating. Landscapes. It lacks the personal touch. It is pretty funny in that one scene where there's a juggler in the background. Some over the top action sequences like little battles. The immigrants have no personality.

And yet... 

There is greatness. In bits. Isabelle Huppert is captivating. The love triangle between Chris Walken, her and Kris Kristofferson works a treat. Walken's part is terrific. Kristofferson less strong - he looks wonderful and I think Cimino was in love with filming him in poses. 

The acting is fine. Sam Waterson as baddy.  Jeff Bridges as Kristofferson's mate. Walken - who steals the show.

No one enjoys sex here. I'm noticing that in Cimino films. Kristofferson and Huppert frolic nude but don't often do it. The other hookers look poorly. Huppert is raped.

The plot is actually simple. The bankers/land barons do up a death list. Execute. The people push back. Chaos. 

Easy to see the bits that needed to be fixed - give John Hurt some point, some genuine tie with Kristofferson. Cut all the stuff that has no story point. Trim it down. Really the story should've been properly told from the POV of immigrants - rather, the lead. I think Cimino had a man crush on Kristofferson.  His stakes don't compare. I mean, make Kristofferson an immigrant... the story comes alive a lot more.

The ending is moving with Kristofferson old, rich and sad. But wow what a downer - the government helps the richies, most of the immigrants die, then Bridges and Huppert are killed just to make us feel especially bad. 

Reviews were hysterically negative. I understand why but they shouldn't have been. It's not a masterpiece - Cimino needed a co writer - but it's a work that deserves appreciation.

Book review - "The Director Should've Shot You" by Alan Dean Foster

 Memoir of a novelist - but someone better known for novelisations. Most film buffs had a Foster on their shelves back in the day - I'm glad he's still at it. Lively account of his life and times. A lot of hours spent in front of the typewriter so not a huge amount for a personal life, at least according to this. 

Some interesting experiences - the challenges of John Carpenter's Dark Star, the generosity of George Lucas giving a percentage on Star Wars, disliking Alien 3 and changing the story (letting Newt live) and being scolded by Walter Hill, getting involved in a actor-director fight on Chronicles of Riddick, working for JJ Abrams (no goss he sounds decent). Too much whining over lack of science in sci fi. But the talk of craft is interesting. Made money from Star Trek log books in the seventies.

Book review - Hardy#3 - "The Marvellous Boy" by Peter Corris

 Corris rips off The Big Sleep  as a rich old crone asks Hardy to look for a missing relatives. He still smokes here. Gets knocked out. There's well described violence. An abortonist. Some weirdos.

Movie review - "The Deer Hunter" (1978) ****

 A big deal in its day and the fame has lingered in part because of the notoreity of Michael Cimino. It's long - over three hours - so is probably best appreciated in the cinema. It looks gorgeous - the Pennsylvania steel towns, Vietnam and stuff.

There's New York actors pretending to be working class types and they mostly pull it off because they're excellent actors. The Russian Roulette stuff works brilliantly as a dramatic device. It's so homoerotic - the homophobia dialogue is accurate for the milieu but Chris Walken and de Niro seem to be in love and John Cazale accuses de Niro of not being interested in women and de Niro doesn't do anything in bed with Meryl Streep for a while. 

We see a deer actually be killed. There is Hollywood shenanigans in de Niro is in Nam, then runs into Walken and Savage, then they are all captured, then de Niro escapes by being super heroic then de Niro gets back and does a silly but highly effective final Russian Roulette.

John Cazale's part isn't much and I sense the roles of George Dzunda and Chuck Aspegren could be combined and Streep is the Girl and Savage's wife could've done something more but...

You know what? This is still a really good movie. It's gorgeous. The money is on screen. De Niro is superb. It's moving. Russian Roulete words a treat. The cuts are terrific. It tackles PTSD very well. It does like it's characters.

Movie review - "Thunderbolt and Lightfoot" (1974) ***1/2 (warning: spoilers)

 Michael Cimino got his directing career going with this buddy comedy, a genre much in vogue at the time. Cimino's commercials background means he knows how to fill a frame and compose an image. It ambles a bit in that Malpaso way. I was surprised how low fi it was (essentially a two hander which morphs into a four hander with a big heist sequence in act two). Also how homoerotic it was - Jeff Bridges is clearly in love with Clint Eastwood who is into Bridges; there is talk of women and they pick some up (including Catherine Bach) but it feels forced.

Interesting to see Bridges in drag after reading what came out about Cimino but that just may be accidental. Neat touches and twists like how George Kennedy dies. I'm guessing Midnight Cowboy was an influence.

Book review - "Junior Bonner: The Making of a Classic with Steve McQueen and Sam Peckinpah in the Summer of 1971" by Jeb Rosebrook

 Memoir by Rosebrook who wrote the script fo Junior Bonner. The story of the making of this film actually isn't super interesting despite the involvement of drama magnets Steve McQueen and Sam Peckinpah - there was no recutting, no massive bust ups, it was so Major Dundee or coke riddled Convoy. McQueen liked the script, Peckinpah liked doing something non violent. Peckinpah did some mild (by his stands) bullying, firing people who didn't deserve it, McQueen was basically the boss, but people generally behaved.

Still it is an interesting book because of the director and star and also characters like Ida Lupino (whose role was intended for Susan Hayward who wanted to do it but they all got drunk and forgot to offer it to her and she got annoyed), Robert Preston (who as usual everyone loved), Barbara Leigh (an engaging unpretentious model who just had affairs with everyone from Elvis to McQueen to James Aubrey) and rodeo riders. Also the book acts as a memoir for Rosebrook's career which wasn't amazing but was entirely decent. He wrote a script for James Coburn, who sounds like a gentleman, and did a lot of TV. Rosebrook was a producer so has an engaging appreciation of below the line workers which a lot of writers don't.

Jack Thompson interview from 1975 Cinema Papers

 

Old Cinema Papers interview with Bryan Brown

 

Movie review - "Early Frost" (1982) *

Notorious as a film with no director credit - it was Brian McDuffie - and with the novelty of being set and shot in Blacktown and featuring a young Jon Blake. There's also Guy Doleman, Kit Taylor, Danny Adockc and some vaguely familiar female leads who I think did a lot of TV.

Various women are turning up dead but there's no suspense, no style, no gore, no nudity.

Movie review - "Night Tide" (1961) *** (re-watching)

 Haunting mood piece which owes more than a little to Cat People but is effective. Although low budget it benefits from location work at a sea fair. Dennis Hopper is excellent as a lonely, lecherous sailor who falls for a woman who may be a serpent.

Movie review - "Blue Velvet" (1986) ****

 Gorgeous, gripping, very accessible - everyone should be able to follow this story, it's a who dunnit (who owns the ear). Kyle McLachlan literally spells out the solution in his phoe calls. The sense of mood is captivating.

McLachlan is a solid Lynch surrogate, Laura Dern does wonders as the blonde (there's something ticking behind her brain), Isabella Rossellini is a standout as a traumatised, sexy, grieving, glamorous, severely mentally ill woman, Dennis Hopper is amazing as the yelling and terrifying Frank, Dean Stockwell impresses as the camp drug dealer.

The film just works with its combination of Americana, mystery, weirdness, underbelly, etc.

Book review - " The 007 Diaries: Filming Live and Let Die" by Roger Moore (1973)

 I don't know if Moore actually wrote this or if it was ghosted but it definitely feels like him, the wry humour, the self deprecation. He lived a glamorous life, lots of lunches and dinners, and exotic locations. Did plenty of charity work, especially for a "spastic" association as it was called then. I do think that generation had a greater public service aspect, at least in Britiain. His wife Luisa is often mentioned as a figure of fear especially when doing love scenes.

Antics with Jane Seymour and Gloria Henry, a good relationship with Guy Hamilton, hints at an unhappy Yaphet Kotto (who clashed with Hamilton and Moore says he played a joke on Kotto listing a black entertainer that Kotto criticised on the call sheet). Refers to a film that he hoped to direct, written by Bryan Forbes based on Moore's own story. 

The references to other incidents in Moore's life are interesting such as a one night appearance on Broadway, acting with Lana Turner. Filming the Bond movie has some accidents but is pretty smooth. 

Moore would have been pleasant to deal with after Sean Connery. He praises Connery, makes jokes about Harry Salztman beating him at cards. His behaviour may have been boorish if you weren't in the mood, but most people have nice things to say about Moore.

Entertaining.

Movie review - Bond#8 - "Live and Let Die" (1973) ***1/2 (re-watching)

 Random notes 

- I did an earlier review and my opinion hasn't changed much I think this is a solid entry

- superb galaxy of villains, all are strong: Kanaga, Tee Hee, Whisper, the cab driver, the singer - they are scary opponents

- Bond being a white man in an unfamiliar world helps add a lot of tension (though he can always draw on Felix Leiter for help)

- two annoying bits - the baddies constanly try to kill Bond as they should but then they later do it by putting him in an alligator farm and dangling over sharks instead of killing him - I mean, his escaping is fun but it's just a little silly

- Jane Seymour a little young but achingly pretty and a good actor - Roger Moore just young enough to not make it too icky (he gets her into bed by lying) 

- Yaphet Kotto a superb actor and David Hedison was the best Felix Leiter until Jeffrey Wright

- fairly witty script full of memorable bits

- Roger Moore very confident from the get-go.

Book review - Hardy#30 - "The Dunbar Case" by Peter Corris (2013)

 I think Corris got jazzed researching the wreck of the Dunbar - turned into a silent film. The action in the present day involves someone who may have inherited money from the wreck. Then it's ex cons, crims and cops with the setting in Newcastle giving it some variety. Perfectly fine.

Movie review - "The Big Doll House" (1971) *** (re-watching)

 Fun. Ticks all the boxes for the genre. Vicious lesbian guard. Showers. Mud wrestling. Escape. Revolutionaries. Third world setting. All the characters are different. It's made with energy. Star turns from Pam Grier, Roberta Collins. Sid Haig fun. The movie works.  Stephanie Rothman had the film rewritten by Don Spencer - I wonder what her contribution was.

It's a shame she and Jack Hill seem to clash.

TV series - "The Buccaneers - Ep 1 Blackbeard" (1958) **1/2

 I watched this because it was on Tubi. Robert Shaw is credited as the star but he's not in it. The hero is Alec Cunes as Woodes Rogers, offering a pardon to pirates including Blackbeard. Ralph Smart directed.

It's fun. Low budget but big enough to have a pirate ship and taverns and costumes.

Movie review - "Three Hats for Lisa" (1965) ***

 British musical which I don't think made much of a splash but is quite elaborate with large production values and elaborate dance numbers. Leslie Bricusse did the score which is fine - nothing memorable but pleasant enogh.

The star is Joe Brown who I'm not that familiar with. He's got a boy next door face and spiky blonde hair.

The plot has him as a fan of a French actoress (Sophie Hardy) who is in town looking for a hat. Like that's the story. It's got a dash of Roman Holiday and Hardy is far too attractive for Brown. Stubbs is the girl who loves Brown, I think. But more of a conneciton between lead boy and girl would've worked wonders.

Still Sid James offers from dependable support and the film's determination to be fun is endearing. They threw a lot at it. Sidney Hayers directs his little backside off.

Movie review - "Circus of Fear" (1966) **1/2

 Stars off as a heisty movie then becomes about a serial killer at the circus. One of many films round this time based on an Edgar Wallace story.

The last is heaps of fun - Klaus Kinski, Victor Maddern as crooks, Leo Genn as a cop, Suzy Kendall and Christopher Lee as circus folk.  Never quite as much fun as I want it to be. Attractive women and circus stuff great like the mean little person just not enough of it. I got bored.

Movie review - "Kinda Pregnant" (2025) **

 Starts off fantastically then sort of gets bogged down, doesn't seem to really dig into its concept or go spinning off in interesting directions and too much time is spent with Amy Schumer and her random attractive new friend. The best bits are those when the characters are bonkers and/or seem to be ad libbing.

Movie review - "Kangaroo" (1952) **1/2 (re-watching)

 Random thoughts:

- looks gorgeous

- Lewis Milestone doesn't understand story

- Maureen O'Hara was right how the original script was wrecked - does this mean her other claims in her memoir were right? That John Ford made out with a guy? That her husband was murdered? That Peter Lawford and Richard Boone were busted in a male brothel?

- Lawford and Boone are dressed the same but Boone makes all the decisions

- why set this in 1900?

- opening scenes may has well have been shot in Hollywood because they take place at night

- fascinating mess.

Movie review - "The Living Daylights" (1987) **** (re-watching)

 The rhythm is a little bit off in spots - I couldn't quite put my finger on it. Like Dalton's performance. And like that when it gets in the groove it's extremely entertaining. Myram d'Abo's character is sweeter than usual but it works for the story - an innocent in the world of killers - but they give her a world class skill (cello) and she's European. 

Consistently strong action and a superb array of suppor characters - Jerome Krabbe's buoyant defector, Joe Don Baker's military enthusiast arms dealer, the blonde assassin, John Rhys' tough Russian, Art Malik's Afghanistan fighter.

Love John Barry's music score, the exotic settings, defending Gibraltar.

Book review - "True Indie" By Don Coscarelli

 I don't know that much about Coscarelli despite him making some cult faves - Phantasm, Beastmaster, Bubba-Ho Tep. He had an amazing career, his first DIY feature picked up by a major studio as was his second. And Phantasm was a huge success. I wonder why he didn't do more. He was going to do Silver Bullet but it didn't work out he turned down Conan the Destroyer and Nightmare on Elm Street 2.

Interesting book. Perhaps overlong (could've done with less on screenings and the later films.)

Book review - Hardy#4 - "The Empty Beach" (1983) by Peter Corris (warning: spoilers)

 Better than the movie. Makes more sense. Love letter to Bondi. More believable. Looking for Singer, like the final twist (he's causing trouble from beyond the grave to help his widow). The Anne character is kind of thrown away.

Book review - Hardy#1 - "The Dying Trade" (1980) by Peter Corris

 First Cliff Hardy novel. The plotting is a little dodgy but the feel is spot on - the humour, toughness, violence, darkness, sex, commentary on society. Hardy gets knocked out a lot, looking after a sister of a rich man - it feels like cobbled Chandler but that's okay.

Movie review - "The Fall Guy" (2024) ***

 Fun, irreverent, a good time. Maybe too much up its arse with film injokes and 80s power ballads. Also Emily Blunt's character is passive until the last 30 minutes. I'm just throwing theories here.

Movie review - "Wombling Free" (1977) **

 I wasn't a bad idea to make a Wombles movie even though the TV show only went for 5 minutes - there would be songs, it had IP, the film had a point of difference. But this isn't that good. It's hard to tell the Wombles apart there's not much of a story, the main girl is annoying.Fun to see David Tomlinson though.

The movie feels a little racially dodgy with how it depicts its Japanese character. There is no real life sparking off the screen. The clean up Britain message is not exactly sublte.

However if I saw it as a kid I would love it.

Movie review - "The Empty Beach" (1985) ** (re-watching)

 Bryan Brown is very good. So too is John Wood. Nice to see faces like Ray Barrett, Nick Tate (Coolangatta Gold connection with Joss McWilliam). Kerry Mack's Hilde is a pleasing nod to series continuity for the Cliff Hardy books.

But the  story is hard to follow and doesn't seem to make sense. The final shoot out is fine as a shoot out but the character's actions aren't logical.

Movie review - "Innocence" (2000) ***1/2 (warning: spoilers)

 Many of Paul Cox's films were up his own backside but he had a very endearing affection for older people as demonstrated in A Woman's Tale and this which is about two former loves who find love later in life. Charles Tingwell and Julia Blake get a lead role in a feature which must have tickeled them pink.

The kids are played by Marta Dussledrop (his) and Robert Menzies (hers). The show is stolen by Terry Norris who plays Blake's cuckolded husband. Cox had a soft spot for cuckolds - they pop up in My First Wife and Golden Braid. 

I love the nding where it builds to Tingwell dying of cancer... and then Blake dies. That was very smart.

This gave Cox a late period hit and helped him going for another decade or so. A quite lovely movie.

There's 8mm flashbacks of course and appearances from Chris Haywood and Norman Kaye. And smoe nudity from the Julia Blake film in flashback.

Movie review - "I've Gotta Horse" (1965) ***

 A surprise - obscue British musical from the mid sixties, with Bill Fury who I don't know much about. This had a decent amount of coin pumped into it, presumably after the success of A Hard Days' Night. It's packed with rock numbers - but also musical ones too.

I couldn't follow the story, not really, but there's a love for animals that's very endearing. (Fury owned horses IRL). Fury doesn't have the charm of Cliff Richard or the compulsive presence of Tommy Steele but he's amiable. Amanda Barrie is really sweet as the love interst.

Production values are high. Colour is gorgeous. Maybe three stars is too much but I liked it.

Movie review - Carry On#10 - "Carry On Cleo" (1964) ***1/2

 Super fun Carry On, one of the best in the series. The Roman setting acts as a massive energy boost, it looks splendid in colour, the sets and costumes impress, the cast have fun. Amanda Barrie is the title role, not given as much screen time as I'd thought. Kenneth Williams is a hilariously camp Caesar and Sid James a raucous Antony with Charles Hawtree as Seneca.

Movie review - "Molokai The Story of Father Damien" (1999) **

 I don't know why the hell the Belgian producers thought they'd have an easy time with Paul Cox, the man was always his own box and had a long tradition of whingeing. I'm sure the producers were annoying too.

David Wenham tries his best but the sing song accent gets on the nerves. Location filming in Moloka helps marvellously. The stuff with the lepers is very effective and it's clear that this probably should've been done a lot cheaper just with Wenham and lepers.

Various names in the cast - Kate Cebrano (very charismatic), Peter O'Toole, Leo McKern. Aden Young plays a doctor probably wishing he had the lead. There's a scene where a doe eyed native girl is hot for Cox that feels old school Oz movie Cox. 

I found it boring. None of the reationships Damien had were interesting. I kept waiting for the subplot of the leprosy local who inspired him. I guess there was Peter O'Toole and Chris Haywood.

But it doesn't touch. At least not me. Catholics might like it. They love Damien because he was such an admirable figure.

But personally I couldn't wait until this film was over. It's two hours.

Movie review - "Far from the Madding Crowd" (1967) ***

 Darling made so much money that MGM pulled out the cheque book for Joseph Janni, John Schlesinger, Fred Raphael and Julie Christie and went "take our money". So they did Thomas Hardy, presumably to give Christie a big fat lead role.

The film looks gorgeous - Nic Roeg shot it and it's full of his wonderful colour. It's made with taste and skill. Everyone can act. Peter Finch is superb.

But it's almost three hours, a Roadshow, and I didn't care about anyone. Julie Christie is beautiful and a fine actress but I just didn't care. Terence Stamp livens things up as a love rat but this could've been told in 90 minutes. Peter FInch is a drip for hanging around and so is Alan Bates. Schlesinger didn't connect with the material.

Honestly I would've prepared a sexed up Gainsborough melodrama version of this with Stewart Granger and James Mason.

Prunella Ransome has a showy role as Fanny.

Movie review - "The Man Who Had Power Over Women" (1970) **

 An attempt by Rod Taylor to make something different, a mid life crisis story about a man whose wife won't put out but the wife (Carol White) of his best friend will. Phew. Not a good movie at any stage. I did like the stuff between Rod and his dad. Absurd ending with person being killed by toilets. Carol White, who needed special handling, doesn't work. Rod over-acts.

Movie review - "Poor Cow" (1967) ****

 Ken Loach was unhappy with this film even though it was a hit. I really like it. I like the compromises. It's in colour, has a new star (Carol White), a more established star (Terence Stamp), a pop soundtrack (Donovan), it's in colour, has lots of sex. White has a healthy sex drive, a lot of charm.

White was bland in her later films but here she's relaxed and vulnerable and very winning. Stamp is excellent, charismatic and relaxed. Other actors very good. 

I loved the little touches like White talking to camera and the chapter headings.

Movie review - "Cactus" (1986) **

 Paul Cox's run of art house successes enabled him to get $1.5 million and an imported star (Isabelle Huppert) for this but response wasn't that strong. It's not one of his better films although there's plenty of good things - it looks gorgeous, has a pleasant mood, Robert Menzies makes an impressive star debut.

I agree with co writer Bob Ellis that the basic set up is silly - Huppert is visiting friend Norman Kaye when she has her accident and sticks around in Australia to get better. If she was having lots of operations or had a job out in Australia, signed a contract or something , I'd get it, but she doesn't seem to work.. It's the sort of irritating, easy to fix script problem that marked many Cox movies.

Huppert has star factor but she's a debit to the movie, I feel - she doesn't seem engaged, whether it's being friends with Normal Kaye (why are they friends?), or going blind, or falling for Robert Menzies. I kept thinking "Wendy Hughes would've been better in this". I understand the useful ness of having an imported star, I just wish they'd gotten one whose presence made more sense and who was more connected to the story. French movie stars don't have a great track record in Australian films.

Other Cox movies have intriguing subplots that are typically under exploited. Not this one. Norman Kaye and his wide are dully. There's an extended scene where they watch some old ducks including Maurie Fields sing songs. I did like the satire of the community meeting. That felt very real and funny. 

I liked the scene where Menzies revealed Huppert was his first girlfriend. That was touching. Really the film should've been about him - a blind man falling in love for the first time. That has stakes. Huppert doesn't seem to care. She's required to go nude of course just a little.

 

Movie review - "A Woman's Tale" (1991) **** (warning: spoilers)

 Paul Cox in selfless mode, a tribute to Sheila Florance. This is a litte mean but I could take or leave her acting but it's just so wonderful she's got this starring vehicle and she was dying and is making a film about a woman dying. I can't resist that showmanship!

There's a lot of love - for Florance, for the old, for life, Gosia Dobrowolska as a kind nurse who is using Florance's flat to root her married lover (this plot feels as though it's undercooked - Cox routinely under-services his subplots), Chris Haywood as her daggy but loving son, Norma Kaye as a dementia riddled neighbour (Kaye later had dementia), the shifty landlord. 

Occasionally it lacks focus but it holds because of the reality and the ending where the nurse kills Florance in her bed which is so logical and true.

Movie review - "Gonks Go Beat" (1965) **

 Much mocked but also much to admire - gorgeous colour, energetic direction from Robert Hartford Davies, plenty of talented acts. It's a  juke box musical featuring an array of talent including Lulu.

The main issue is the story. It's a sci fi one, set in space about two warring nations united via love. But everyone sings Earth music. The story lacks any sort of reality. It just needed to be set on Earth in the real world. Add aliens if you want but it needs to have some solid basis.

Movie review - "Golden Braid" (1991) **

 David Stratton loved this movie, possibly in part because Gosia Dobrowolska takes her kit off and hooks up a lot with Chris Haywood. He runs an antiques store, gets a lot of sex according to him, has a deadbeat brother (Robert Menzies) and is having an affair with married Salvo, Dobrowolska. He finds some old golden hair and gets turned on by it.

Dobrowolska is married to Paul Chubb who is so amiable and lonely I didn't really like her for cheating - marriages don't work out, fine, but she's dragging the poor dude along.

Like many Cox films he has characters whisper thoughts on the soundtrack - the recording of Dobrowolska doing it was really irritating the volume was too high or something. He once more has fascinating support characters (Menzies, Jo Kennedy, Chubb) who could have used more screen time instead of the leads. He's also got all these women serving the needs of the male lead.

I just didn't care about the leads.

Looks gorgeous, like the ambition, can't fault the actors. Just disliked it.

Movie review - "Force of Destiny" (2015) **1/2 (warning: spoilers)

 Paul Cox's last feature. It starts off powerfully with sculptor David Wenham discovering he's got terminal cancer. This all feels real like you'd expect it would from a director who went through the same thing - a series of casual appointments, doctors being reassuring and not making eye contact, trying to be positive. Jacqueline McKenzie is excellent as the ex wife looking to re-insert herself in Wenham's life.

Like so many Cox films he lets himself down as a writer by not servicing his set up well enough. Wenham has a daughter but she is bright and lovely and that's it. They don't do anything with her, or his friend Kym Gyngell, or the other patients in his ward, or most damagingly McKenzie, who has terrific potential.

Instead he spends most of his time with Wenham and his dream love interest, Shahana Goswami: a gorgeous, calm, loving marine biologist - the Perfect Person. Oh and she's spiritiual too. And she cares him, loves him, gets along with daughter... then he gets a transplant. Yay!

Really, Wenham should have died and McKenzie should've caused more trouble. A Woman's Tale works because Sheila Florance dies. Wenham gets a happy ending. I'm sympathetic to Cox wanting to do that but it lessens the film's impact.

Yet the piece has power. It's well directed, the actors are solid, it has this incredible personal connection.

Movie review - "Scobie Malone" (1975) ** (rewatching)

 I minded this less the second time. The sex comedy stuff feels shoe horned in but at least it's lively. And there's something endearing about how nakedly the film tries to be commercial. 

The odd structure comes from the book. Normally we stick with a detective the whole way and find out what he or she finds out. But here Malone's only in half the movie. The rest is flashbacks.

There's a little bit of a connection between Malone and Helga. I think it should have been a proper relationship - they dated. There's no Lisa, Malone is a stud.

The characters aren't that memorable - Helga is a minx, a Minister is stuffy, his wife is a dragon, a killer is sleazy. 

There are some visual flourishes - an intercut sex scene a la Don't Look Now, the murder of Morris in the bowels of the opera house. I think the piece needed more. Some of the sets are ugly though the Sydney Harbour locations are pleasing.

I've read Cleary's script - it had Lisa in it but not his parents. Malone was more active. I think it needed really classy direction to work - or stars in support parts. The acting isn't good. I think I blame director Terry Ohlsson. Imagine what say Bruce Beresford could have done with this.

Movie review - "The Nun and the Bandit" (1992) **1/2 (warning: spoilers)

 I think Paul Cox ran out of personal stories in the 80s so he turned to novels, which was an ideal step. This involves some brothers, led by Chris Haywood, who kidnap the granddaughter of a rich relative (Norman Kaye) but also pick up a nun (Gosia Dobrowolska).

Most of the film is Haywood being horny for Dobrowolska who is clearly not into it - Haywood is pudgy and sweaty basically trying to coerce Dobrowlska into sex. Cox plays the reality of it so we don't get trashy fun of the nun really wanting to be rammed by this hot criminal.

The film tackles interesting themes - class, sex, money. The character of the kidnapped girl isn't much - she's a kidnapped girl (played by Haywood's daughter). Haywood and Dobrowolska really commit.

Cox sets up a galaxy of potentially terrific support characters - black brother, mentally handicapped brother, slimy rich Kaye - but doesn't do anything with them.  It's at least 40 minutes of Haywood coercing Dobrowlska into sex, she seems to do it and is clearly traumatised. Then he's shot dead. The end.

What's done is done well I just wished once again Cox had used a co writer because the script is so easily to edit - reduce the core couple, cut away to others.

Still, worth watching. I'm surprised how much I'm enjoying these Cox movies.

Oh and for all his endless complaining about mortgaging his house he spent almost $2 million on this film. The Australian taxpayer gave him a lot of money. I'm sympathetic, truly, but his films didn't have a great rate of return.

Movie review - "It Shouldn't Happen to a Vet" (1976) **1/2

 John Alderton is someone who should've been a movie star - he was going to play Flashman in Richard Lester's film of that novel but it was postponed, and when the project was reactivated in 1974 (a different novel Royal Flash ) Malcolm McDowell got the gig.

Alderton had a warm boy next door persona, amiable but not sleazy. I'm watching a bunch of EMI Films and the male casting never seems right - it was Alderton who should've been in Percy's Progress, All Creatures Great and Small, Journey's End.

He got his chance when Simon Ward didn't return for this. He's better than Ward but the film isn't as good because there's no real reason to make it. The first had this strong emotional core with Ward arriving in Yorkshire and trying to establish himself and falling in love with Lisa Harrow. That's all done and dusted here.

Anthony Hopkins isn't back and while Colin Blakely is a perfectly fine substitute it  doesn't help the sense of continuity. Neither does the fact there's no Tristram.

I think this just should've focused on the war and done war nostalgia - having a baby, dealing with war stuff. That would've been a point of difference.

Don't get me wrong the film is done with taste, skill and all that - it's just this feels like an episode of a TV show whereas the first movie, because it had Herriot's arrival and the romance, felt more like a film.

Movie review - "You're Cordially Invited" (2025) ***

 Funny comedy with Will Ferrell and Reese Witherspoon battling over a wedding reservation - a decent idea, well developed. Ferrell and Witherspoon have different comedic styles - he's more up in the air she's more grounded. I didn't want to see them together - that doesn't become an issue for the last ten minutes or so. Maybe it would've been a better film with more obviously romantic co starring leads.I mean, he's ten years older which isn't that much by Hollywood standards but he seems older. I think mahybe Vince Vaughan or Ashton Kutcher would've worked more.

Movie review - "My First Wife" (1984) ***1/2

 There's a genre of films called "here is my penis" movies made by auteurs who stand naked in from the camera going "here is my penis". This is one of them. That's not to say the films aren't good - this is very good, exquisitely acted, done with honesty, it's just Paul Cox standing nude in front of the camera. John Hargreaves even has a Cox style beard.

He goes balls to the wall as does Hughes. The behavious is unsettling - Hargreaves is self centered, violent, sulky, a lousy husband and father. It's no mystery why Hughes cheats on him and leaves him.

The lack of concern by the police when Hargreaves abducts his daughter is all too believable as is Hargreaves' focus on Hughes' infidelity rather than her problems.

Hughes goes naked as she seemed to be legally required to do so. But it's a very good performance even though Hargreaves is the one who carries on.

I'd be inclined to go with four stars but the dude really should have had more of a comeuppance.

Movie review - "All Creatures Great and Small" (1975) ***1/2

 Completely charming dramatisation of the books which ha been overlooked by the success of the TV show. The stories suit television better, really, but it has been done with taste and affection - and it has a "spine" in the romance between Simon Ward and Lisa Harrow (even though there's some weird editing... we don't see them kiss, they date, then he proposes to her father then they get married then we see them kiss over the credits).

Anthony Hopkins is wonderful as Siegfried. Simon Ward isn't much as Herriot - you can see why he didn't become a star, in this and Ace's High. Lisa Harrow is charming.

Production design a delight. Some sure fire scenes like Ward telling a crusty old farmer he needs to put his dog down, and some shifty Yorkshire farmers. Ward's character is very keen to recommend euthenasia!

Movie review - "Exile" (1994) ***

 Liked this more than I thought I would. Slow, but gorgeously shot, great locations. Aden Young in exile, Beth Champion visits, Claudia Karvan is his ex. Prob needed more of a bang - role of Karvans's guy was mis used and Karvan is missed in the last thirty minutes. But i liked it.

Movie review - "Kostas" (1979) ***

 Early Paul Cox film benefits from simplicity - a romance between a Greek immigrant cab driver (Takis Emmanuel) and an Anglo (Wendy Hughes). It helps that Emmanuel and Hughes can carry the screen - Hughes is so gorgeous and Emmanuel a solid performer.

His character's backstory is interesting, as we see him being beaten up by Greece for his politics (he was a journalist). So the film has an edge.

Appearances from what would be Cox's stock company - Norman Kaye (a BBC expat), Chris Haywood (annoying man at dinner party), Graeme Blundell. Kris McQuade is in it too.

A bit rough but I liked it. Cox doesn't over-reach, the Greek milieu is well depicted, he knows what he's making a movie about.

Movie review - "Baxter!" (1973) **

 Lionel Jeffries second feature wasn't released until after this third, I think because EMI weren't that into it, and to be honest I don't blame them. Maybe I saw this in a bad mood but I didn't care about the kid, his speech impediment didn't seem so bad, the mother felt like a caricatured bitch that it was easy to dump everything on, it was odd this American was in England, this random couple befriends them (Jean Pierre Cassel and Britt Ekland) and sing show tunes, dad pops in to be an arsehole, kid seems to have a breakdown.

Maybe it needs another viewing.

Movie review - "Take Me High" (1973) **

 Cliff Richard's last proper movie, it came and went fairly quickly, but it could have worked. I think it was just too cheap.

He plays a merchant banker dude who wants to go to New York but is sent to Birmingham to close some deal. He fals in love with a local girl and a local restaurant.

It's a musical - Richard sings some songs on screen - but also at times it isn't, the songs play on the soundtrack. There's a weird number where he and Anthony Andrews are in a car and a duet between them plays on the soundtrack and they are clearly thinking the song but not singing it. That happens a few times. Lik when Deborah Watling visits him on the boat and he thinks the song, doesn't sing it - why not have him sing it? Was this an artistic decision or to save money?

Deborah Watling is fine I guess. George Cole is terrific as is Hugh Griffith.

I don't mean to be rude but Birmingham isn't that visually pretty. This really needed to be set in say Scotland or Ireland or Brighton or somewhere there were prettier pictures.

I did really like Cliff staying in a funky boat on the canal, that was cool. And the street march.

Not well directed. Works as an ad for a hamburger. Needlessly confusing plot.

Movie review - "Made" (1972) **1/2

 Kind of like imitation Ken Loach - producer Joseph Janni and star Carol White had previously made Poor Cow with Loach, which made money for Nat Cohen so he backed this. The director John Mackenzie had worked on Loach TV plays and the script is down beat - working class heroine who has a rough life, mum with MS who dies, a kid who is killed when knocked over by soccer hooligans, men let her down. There's an immigrant who love bombs her, a priest who seems a little keen on her, and a rocks star who uses her and exploits her trauma as a song.

The casting isn't quite right. Carol White seems disinterested - bored, not engaged. Roy Harper was a rock star (if not a famous one) so at least is believable as that. Castle doens't feel quite right as a the priest.

It's interesting - Howard Barker wrote it from a play based on John Lennon ripping off Eleanor Rigby. There are different views as to what makes life worth living - religion versus pop music. 

The film doesn't get there but I love its ambition. White's character is very passive. (Like, why not have her there when the baby dies? Early 1970s films had a lot of dead baby's - Portnoy's Complaint, Cinderella Liberty).

Book review - "Zeppo the Reluctant Marx Brother" by Robert Bader

 Fascinating, exhaustively researched biography of a famous punch line name. Zeppo didn't want to be in the group but was forced after Gummo (who also didn't want to be in it) left to join the army. A straight man who was not hot enough to be a romantic lead (or a strong enough singer) he kind of hang around though his presence is part of the film's fun.

He was very smart, ruthless, hung out with gangsters his whole life, was a successful gambler, great card player, could charm, ran a successful agency (Barbara Stanwyck was a client and good friend of his wife), then bizarrely a successful factory plant in World War Two, and made profits from Safeway. Always had plenty of money but was skilled at stashing it so sometimes Groucho thought he was poor. Compulsive womaniser, he would occasionally beat women. His wife adopted two children and he was a terrible father (basically shipped them off and ignored them). He was also step dad to his second wife's kid and wasn't that great with him. Cuckoled by Frank Sinatra.

A genuinely unpleasant person. Fascinating book.

Movie review - "Some Will Some Won't" (1970) ** (warning spoilers)

 I'm confused why they did this. Was Laughter in Paradise such a big hit? Or did Nat Cohen just have the rights and want to make a cheap Peter Rogers style comedy?

Cast includes names like Ronnie Corbett, Leslie Phillips, Michael Hordern.

Talented actors. It was as if they went "well we'll 'cast' our way out of this."

Not terrible. Just feels pointless. Especially the end where ha ha there's no money ha ha.

Opening shot as a crazy white haired man climbing a clock tower in a storm and seems like it's from Back to the Future. That's novel.

Oh and nice for Corbett to get a lead role. I think he could've been a movie star in the right vehicle.

Movie review - "Lust and Revenge" (1996) ***

 Paul Cox goes back to the Man of Flowers well only instead of Alyson Best posing nude it's Nicholas Hope (which is maybe why he film didn't do as well, sorry Nicholas) and instead of cultured Norman Kaye watching he's a model for a sculptor (Victoria Eagger who was Chris Haywood's lover in Flowers) who is gay. She's working for Claudia Karvan the nepo daughter of pharmaceutical dude Chris Haywood (very funny) who is doing it for a tax deduction. Gosia Dobrowlska is Hope's wife and is into a new age guru Norman Kaye.

Some nice comedy courtesy of John Clarke, with easy yet funny jabs at the art world. Lovely odd touches like Wendy Hughes in drag and John Hargreaves as a sleeze in a gallery. Karvan is very sexy and disrobes as does Dobrowlska. The plot were basically women are made horny by being roofied (Karvan, Dobrowlska, Haywood's secretary) hasn't aged well.

I didn't like this as much as I once did back in the 90s but it has charm and a lovely musical score.

Movie review - "The Body" (1970) ***1/2

 Hypnotic. Beautiful music. Trippy but also social realism. Some social commentary. Two people actually having sex. There's a birth in there too.

No narrative. Tony Garnett produced. Roy Battersby directed. The lack of narrative does tell after a while.

David Lynch - top ten people he launched as stars

David Lynch had very successful track record as the launcher or relauncher of "semi stars" i.e. people not quite A-list but who had really really good careers after breakthrough performances in Lynch films. Here's a top ten:
1) Kyle McLachlan - plucked from nowhere to be in Dune, then saved from blacklash obscurity via Blue Velvet and Twin Peaks
2) Isabella Rossellini - had been the "girl" in White Nights and of course had famous mum but Blue Velvet made her an icon
3) Laura Dern - had a Lynch double whammy with Blue Velvet then Wild at Heart which made people look at her in, ahem, a different way
4) Dennis Hopper - am trying to remember this right but from memory Hopper was considered toxic goods in the early 80s but then in the mid 80s, I think 1986 to be specific, he became Mr Hollywood via a part in Blue Velvet as well as Hoosiers and then also directing Colors - it was a big comeback and of course Blue Velvet made him a go to villain for the next fifteen years or so which kept him in oil paintings  and health treatments
5) Lara Flynn Boyle - in the 90s she was on a magazine cover every second week it seemed (weight battles, dating Jack Nicholson, being in The Practice) but she was launched in Twin Peaks
6) Madchen Amick - okay yes she kind of never hit the hugest heights but for a section of us she will always be a star  (see also James Marshall, Lara Flynn Boyle, Sheryl Lee, Sherilyn Ann Fenn, Michael Ontkean, Joan Chen, Kyle McLachlan - there was much discussion on Tuesday night viewings of Twin Peaks about who your favourite eye candy was, there was a lot on display)
7)  Naomi Watts - seemed to be around forever (I remember her arc on Homers where she played a girl in a wheelchair who fell for Dieter Brummer’s brother) - then got Mulholland and it all changed
8) Robert Blake - acted since he was a child - became a TV star... then got Lost Highway which opened him up to a whole legion of fans and he might’ve had a Hopper like renaissance but then he, uh... shot his wife...
9) Sherilyn Ann Fenn - look, technically Two Moon Junction made her a star but Twin Peaks turned her into a 90s It girl, dating Johnny Depp and the rest... she never quite became what she could have but look back on her performances and they were actually legit terrific
10) Chris Isaak - cheating a little but not really, Lynch was an early supporter of Isaak, put his songs in his films and directed video for Wicked Game.

Movie review - "Man of Flowers" (1983) ****

 Paul Cox's biggest hit perhaps - a film made with his own money, or at least so he said, about things he was interested in set in a world he knew, with his friends. Norman Kaye has the role of a lifetime as a cultured man who enjoys watching Alyson Best be naked.

The film has a strong support cast - Barry Dickins as a lively postman, Ellis as a whining shrink, Chris Haywood superb as Best's egotistical artist boyfriend, Sarah Walker as Bests' friend who falls in love with her.

The film became an arthouse hit, in part because of all the nudity - Best, Walker, Victoria Eagger, even Norman Kaye. Werner Herzog makes a cameo. 

I mean it's made by dirty pervs. You can sense that. But it's got a solid story and pay off.

Movie review - "Island" (1989) **

 Paul Cox can't write. Good setup - three women on a Greek island. Man arrives turns ex druggie Eva Sitta into drugs. Deaf mute friend Chris Haywood kills guy. They cover it up. Nothing done with it. No betrayal, or other baddie coming. Lots of hanging around a pretty island. Sri Lankan character who is noble and wails. Irene Papas as Greek woman full of fire. Norman Kaye is in it and Takis Emmanuel. It just sort of ending. 

Good on Cox for making his movies. He made a lot. I think he struggled outside his comfort zone, i.e. urban Melbourne. There's a difference between hanging out in a place and living there.

Seven AFI nominations. Seven!

Movie review - "Entertaining Mr Sloane" (1970) **

 Am sure this worked a treat on stage. Cheap film - four actors and one set basically. Very homoerotic with Pete McEnery loungoing around on bed in underpants and being lusted after by two middle aged siblings - Beryl Reid and Harry Andrews. Good they filmed it. Not sure I cared. Sorry, Orton fans.

Movie review - "Spring and Port Wine" (1969) **

 The play ran for years so obviously worked for an audience who presumably related to its northern schtick. I didn't buy the film version. Maybe too foreign. But I've bought British tales of the north before. Ths feels like it should be shot in black and white or something. Everyone feels like an actor rather than a person, James Mason in actor mode, Susan George in actor mode, that mum from Bless This House the other hot daughter and her boyfriend. It feels unsatisfactory not the meet the dad of George's kid or find out what happened. I quite liked the ending with them all trying to get along - that felt real.

I sense this was made a few years' too late.

Movie review - "Jenny Kissed Me" (1985) *

 A fascinating melodrama, key in the career of Brian Trenchard Smith because it was a departure in one way, being a melodrama, but in another way being a stock Trenchard Smith movie, full of action and incident. It also shows what held back his career - a lack of understanding about story and character.

Jenny Kissed Me is full of pace and character but is just too... off. Ivar Kants is such a perfect person, hard working, devoted to the child (his partner hints at incestuous feelings but this isn't developed), upstanding, muscular, handsome. And when he abducts the kid she's all for it.

Deborrah Lee Furness' mother is hot but lazy, she can't find a job, bored, best friends with a hooker, has an affair with Steven Grieves, neglects her daughter, yells at her daughter, leaves with Kants.

Trenchard Smith seems terrified someone will get bored so something's always happening - there's nudity (from Furness and others), sex scenes, a scene in a brothel pool, drugs (Nicholas Eadie is Paula Duncan's sleazy boss), drug busts, Wilbur Wilde as a handyman, fights, slaps. One hour in Kants is revealed to have a terminal brain tumour, he gets arrested, out on bail, brings a gun to abduct Jenny, a car chase ensues.

The film is so unsympathetic to Furness and so sympathetic to Kants it's unfair. Well, that's fine if it's the story you want to tell, it's just uncomfortable to watch. Kants never takes any blame for the breakdown with Furness because none of it is shown to be his fault. Kants' behaviour at the end is fairly reprehensible - having him kidnap a kid and engage in a car chase that almost kills her in a crash and take her on the lam in the bush. But at the end Furness asks for his forgiveness and teaches her how to parent.

This has been pitched at as a melodrama in the Douglas Sirk tradition but those films were aimed at women, women aren't going to like this, the woman is the villain. This film's natural target audience is divorced dads. Especially with its mean female magistrates and social workers.

The acting is pretty good. Tamsin West is terrific.

The film could've worked. Give Furness a troubled background. Like a drug habit. Make Jenny's dad a character - a real piece of shit. He gets Furness back on drugs, he gets her ito the brothel. The film needs a real baddie.

Movie review - "All Neat in Black Stockings" (1969) **

 I thought the title indicted a thriller. Actually it's more a drama - the producer called it a cross between Alfie and A Kind of Loving and that's not inaccurate. He also called it a sex comedy. There's sex but not a lot of laughs. It's moe social realism.

The star is Victor Henry who was a big stage actor, an angry young man, who was knocked over by a bus in 1972 and went into a coma until he died in 1985. I don't think he's much of a leading man. I'm sure he was a good actor but the role needs charm.

He's a womanising window cleaner - years before Confessions of a Window Cleaner - who kind of falls for Susan George, and she likes him but then at a party she shags his mate. I think he kind of rapes her, yes? Did I understand that?

She gets pregnant and he marries her and she has a mum who hates him so that's the A Kind of Loving About it.

The film looks ugly at least the print I show. Not a comedy really. A drama. 

Just not that interesting. Well worn material. George is cute just young.

Movie review - "A Kind of Loving" (1962) ***1/2

 I appreciate the artistry. Extremely well done. Empathetic to working class. Likes them. Young hot Alan Bates. June Ritchie fine if lacks charisma. Bitchy mother in law. Beautifully shot.

Most of plot has him trying to root her and she loves him but he's not really in to her. But in the end he guts it out. Conformity.

Genuine atmopshere. Sex content made it a hit. And the fact it's a romance with a happy ending ish.

Great debut for John Schlesinger.

Movie review - "Catch Us if You Can" (1965) ***

 Anglo-Amalgamated tried to do a Hard Day's Night with the Dave Clark Dive. It's not really a musical though more a sort of gloomy road movie/satire of British society with a Dave Clark Five soundtrack.

 Stunt man Dave Clark runs off with model Barbara Ferris and they have adventures - meeting beatniks, an upper class couple, going to a fancy dress party, going horse riding, encountering army maneuvres.

Look it's interesting.Songs play on the soundtrack but no one sings.

Clark is good looking but doesn't have much life. Ferris is okay but struggles a little against him.  None of the others get much of a look in.

Michael Blakemore was Boorman's assistant, Alex Jacobs was producer David Deutsch's assistant, peter Nichols wrote the script. So a lot of talent. Interesting visuals.

The film stuck with me after.

Movie review - "Nothing But the Best" (1964) ***

 Made with care, turned Clive Donner into a hot director, smart arse script from Frederic Raphael which. has some funny lines ("how did you know my size" says Mary Millicent as they drive up to a castle).

Maybe didn't have enough sex to be a hit. Or needed a murder.

Denholm Elliot is fun as a rich prat, Alan Bates is amiable. Nice Nic Roeg photographe.

Movie review - "This is My Street" (1964) ***

 Kitchen sink drama with sex, which earned Nat Cohen money via A Kind of Loving but not this one despite also starring June Ritchie.

I think that was about young people falling in love which everyone can relate to. In this one she's married to an idito and has an affair with Ian Hendry who then falls for her sister Annette Andre (very good).

It's well acted. It's a little hard to care for a married woman having an affair with an idiot. 

Sidney Hayers directed. Peter Rogers, the Carry On guy, producer.

Moving ending. John Hurt is in it.