November 2023

 

KILLERS OF THE FLOWER MOON (2023)

      For most of our history, at least until the late 1960s and in many cases much longer, most of white America lived in blissful ignorance of the mistreatment and injustice faced daily by millions across the country. And even if they knew, they didn’t care—the inequities faced by African Americans, Latinos, Asians, anyone who dared to admit to being gay or lesbian, non-Christians and, first among those who needed to be pushed aside, Native Americans, weren’t worth worrying about.            

      In the last 30 years, journalism—through newspapers, magazines, books and television—along with the entertainment industry started taking notice of on-going and historic injustices, helping to shake more Americans out of their child-like blindness. Based on David Grann’s riveting chronicle of the inhuman treatment of the Osage Indians after oil production began on the Oklahoma tribe’s land in the early part of the century, Martin Scorsese’s epic movie, set in the 1920s, packs an emotional punch in every scene, every conversation, every closeup as very bad people assimilate into the community to enrich themselves.

      Capturing the world of the Osage and detailing how these events impacted individuals is Scorsese’s greatest accomplishment in this film. Much credit must be given to Jack Fisk, the veteran production designer (he’s just three years younger than the 81-year-old director) who has created a community that feels as authentic as the hard-edged dialogue by Eric Roth and Scorsese.

    As white men flood into the area to “find” their fortune, the town’s boss, William Hale (a commanding Robert De Niro) pushes the young men to woo the unmarried Native women. Once married, the women unexplainably take ill and die, leaving the riches in the hands of their white husbands. This happens over and over again, yet law enforcement, under Hale’s thumb, does nothing. (The Osage can’t even spend their own money without getting a white man’s approval.)

     At the center of the picture is Mollie (Lily Gladstone in a soft-spoken but startling powerful performance), one of the richest of the Osage who seems to have resisted the advances of white men until the inarticulate war veteran Ernest (a miscast Leonardo DiCaprio) arrives in town. He’s the nephew of Hale, but seems to be a sincere, if naïve (and way too old), suitor of Mollie.

     Later, the death of her sister spurs Mollie to seek an outside investigation, but Hale manages to hijack those efforts. Frustratingly, the Native people seem blind to the fact that the beloved Hale is working against them. Not until the FBI takes an interest (Jesse Plemons plays the lead investigator) does there seem to be much hope that justice will be served.

     At three and a half hours, the film is unavoidably episodic, and sometimes feels choppy and repetitive—the picture reminded me of Scorsese’s “Casino” and “The Irishman,” long, rather labyrinth chronicles that, despite numerous brilliant sequences, don’t always hold together as narratives. But it’s not just the length:  I’ve seen plenty of 90- minute films that felt much longer.

      While Gladstone and De Niro have clearly defined roles, and give performances worthy of Oscar nominations, DiCaprio seems a bit misguided in trying to capture the difficult character of Ernest. As he descends from a rather innocent pawn of his uncle and truly in love with Mollie to an active participant in the evil conspiracy against the Natives, he seems unchanged. Not to mention that it makes no sense that a 49-year-old actor is playing the role.

     He clenches his jaw too many times rather than provide some insight into what is going on inside his head. That’s probably a fault of the script and direction, but the result creates a crucial weakness at the center of the film.

     Gladstone, whose ethnic background is Blackfoot, is so good that she almost makes you forget the flaws of DiCaprio’s performance. Her previous best-known roles were in Kelly Reichardt films, “Certain Women” and “First Cow.” “Killers of the Flower Moon” should make her a star.

     With a director of Scorsese’s stature—certainly one of the 10 greatest in American film history—there is always the question of how a new film stacks up with his other works. Despite what many reviewers are proclaiming, this isn’t a great film (a great message, a great story, but not a great motion picture), not ranking with the director’s greatest works, which are among the best American films ever made. Pending a second viewing, I would place it among “The Departed,” “The Age of Innocence” and “The Irishman.”

  

THE HOLDOVERS (2023)

     Alexander Payne, who has directed some of the best films of the past 30 years, had me at the opening credits of his new film, recreating the look of a 1970s release, down to the style of the frame showing the picture’s rating.

      The 70s theme continues as director of photography Eigil Bryld (“In Bruges”) recreates the soft, low-lit cinematography of the era, appropriate for this story set in a New England boys’ prep school in the winter of 1970.

      Paul Giamatti plays the school’s disliked ancient history teacher who gets stuck babysitting a group of students who remain on campus over the Christmas holidays.

     After a few days with the rather cliché group of students, a creaky plot turn leaves just Mr. Hunham, the school kitchen manager Mary (a touching performance by Da’Vine Joy Randolph) and one of the smart-aleck high schoolers, Angus (Dominic Sessa), whose parents decided to vacation on their own.

      These three bring their personal quirks and tragedies to the table that eventually brings them together in the kind of unique family unit that was a product of the era’s crumbling traditional values.

      Payne, like many contemporary filmmakers, has made few films since his feature debut “Citizen Ruth” in 1996, directing only seven features over the next 25 years. (That may speak to the current state of film funding.) But those films have been impressive, including “Election” (1999), “About Schmidt” (2002), “Sideways” (2004), “The Descendants” (2011) and “Nebraska” (2013).

      Randolph, who deserved an Oscar nomination for her performance as an over-the-top nightclub performer in “Dolemite Is My Name” (2019), serves as the truth-teller of the group as she deals with the first holiday after the death of her son, who had been a student at the school before going to Vietnam.

     Giamatti gives his finest film performance, subtly unfolding what begins as a cliched pompous teacher, giving way to a man burdened with his insecurities and unhappy past. The role and the film serve as a reminder that the virtues of 1970s films, so rich in believable characters and with scripts anchored to lived lives, are just as relevant today.

  

NAPOLEON (2023)

      Director Ridley Scott has made a career recreating past and future worlds. From “Gladiator” and “The Kingdom of Heaven” to “Alien” and “Blade Runner,” the filmmaker shines in immersing the audience in the atmosphere of these unfamiliar environs.

     His new film, spanning the adult life of the legendary general, while in many ways playing out like a 1930s MGM spectacular, offers a series of immaculately designed set pieces—from the candle-lit intimacy of Josephine’s boudoir to spectacular reenactments of the dictator’s victories and final loss. Much credit must go to Scott’s regular collaborators, production designer Arthur Max and cinematographer Dariusz Wolski.

    Joaquin Phoenix plays Bonaparte not as the supremely confident, dignified “great man,” but instead as an impulsive, needy egotist whose military smarts and brazen ambition elevate him to the highest ranks. Who knows how true the portrayal is to the real man, but it humanizes him, while offering little to admire. Phoenix does an impressive balancing act and makes great use of that famous bicorne hat, worn sideways.

     Josephine, played with a very modern smirk by Vanessa Kirby, holds such a strong power over Napoleon—sexually and psychologically—that you could almost assume that their breakup contributed to Waterloo. Kirby, so memorable as Princess Margaret in “The Crown,” the mother in “Pieces of a Woman” and the White Widow in the recent “Mission: Impossible” films, again dominates every scene she’s in. Scott clearly wanted his Josephine to rule over Napoleon and he found the perfect actress.

      As far as the rest of the cast, they’ve been turned into the scenery—no one stands out.

     Like so many bio-pics and historical drama, the film, written by David Scarpa, too often feels like clips from a longer, more interesting picture. It’s only when Scott takes the film outside to the battle field that the story takes flight. Few combat scenes are equal to this film’s recreation of the Battle of Austerlitz, during which the French lured tens of thousands of Russian troops onto a field of ice. 

     While I hate to even mention the phrase “directors-cut” when writing of Scott (how many versions of “Blade Runner” did we endure?), apparently, he plans to release a four-hour version (the theatrical cut runs 2 hours and 38 minutes) in December on Apple TV+. I suspect the longer film may smooth out the flaws of this version; we shall see.

  

STOP MAKING SENSE (1984)

     It has become accepted judgment that this concert film of a Talking Heads’ performance at Hollywood’s Pantages Theater ranks as the greatest of the genre. Maybe if you are a huge Talking Heads fan it is, but for my taste, I’d lean toward “The Last Waltz” or “Concert for Bangladesh.”

     Not that director Jonathan Demme (“Silence of the Lambs” and numerous music videos and films) doesn’t do a superb job in capturing the energy and quirkiness of the post-punk, New Wave rock band and, most particularly, its off-center lead singer, David Byrne. They emerged as radio favorites in the late 70s and were done by the mid-80s.

    Most distinctively, Demme starts the show with a bare stage—Byrne comes out for a solo sound check—and then slowly fills the space with the instrument set-ups, all as the band bangs out its greatest hits. The film peaks with the incendiary social commentary song “Life During Wartime,” Byrne signature single.

     Re-released to theaters recently (though apparently with no additional footage), it holds up well 39 years later, though the songs, all compelling on their own, sound very similar when performed back-to-back-to-back. The band even turns Al Green’s R&B classic “Take Me to the River” into a Talking Heads song.

     Byrne, who dons his famous oversized suit for a couple of numbers near the end of the show, is more performance artist than rock singer—a combination of David Bowe, Elvis Costello and Laurie Anderson—backed by the funky bass line of Tina Weymouth.

     I enjoyed seeing and hearing the band rip through “Psycho Killer,” “Burning Down the House,” Once in a Lifetime” and its other hits on the big screen (I’d only seen it on VHS previously), but the “greatest”?

  

PRISCILLA (2023) and THE KILLER (2023)

       I can withstand bad acting, bad screenwriting, even incompetent directing, but not the most egregious cinematic sin: being boring. These two movies share nothing except that the characters in both seem to sleepwalk through the performances and the plots are equally dreary.

        Sofia Coppola’s “Priscilla” positions itself as a kind of rebuttal to Baz Luhrmann’s “Elvis” (2022), in which the wife of rock ‘n’ roll’s king spends most of the film in the background. The new movie, based on Priscilla Presley’s 1985 memoir, doesn’t shy away from the clearly inappropriate early relationship between the pair. When they meet, she’s a very-sheltered 9th grader from Texas whose father is stationed in Germany, at the same base where Elvis is doing his required military service (living in luxury few G.I. ever enjoyed).

      Once Presley returns to Memphis, Priscilla visits and, too soon, is living there, all approved by her parents. Yes, it’s 60 years ago, but, even then, this young teen living among the adults at Graceland was a bit strange. Though the film goes to great lengths to show Elvis refusing the girl’s overtures for sex, even as they share a bed, I didn’t believe it for a Memphis second. 

     While Elvis never stops telling her how much he loves her, the soft-spoken Priscilla barely casts a shadow on the Graceland walls, as Presley hangs out with his “Memphis mafia” buddies when not away from home shooting movies and having affairs with his co-stars. (At one point, newspaper stories report that he’s engaged to Ann-Margret.)        

      While every viewer knows from the first frame that this relationship is destined for disaster, I imagined that there must be something interesting about it to make it worthy of a two-hour film. I was wrong.

     Coppola has made a career directing films in which not very much goes on—it’s almost her signature. This one takes the cake: a good portion of the picture depicts Elvis and Priscilla engaging in childish games (remember, no sex) in their bed. It’s all embarrassingly dull.

      As Priscilla, Cailee Spaeny, in her first major role, doesn’t so much give a performance as model for the camera, looking like a lost deer. The script, by Coppola, gives her virtually no personality and nothing of interest to say.

       While I wasn’t impressed with Austin Butler’s Oscar-nominated turn in “Elvis,” at least he brought out Presley’s energy and ambition. Jacob Elordi, a tall, thin actor who bears no resemblance to the singer (distractingly, he’s 5 inches taller than the real Elvis) plays the role as if no one told him he was portraying a rather famous person. Previously, he was a star of the Netflix movie series, “The Kissing Booth.”

      For some reason, Colonel Parker isn’t in the film at all. Odd, considering that most accounts have him making every important decision in Presley’s life. He might have livened up this film (where is Sofia’s old friend Bill Murray?); someone needed to light a fire under this story.

     While I wasn’t surprised at the somnolent manner of Coppola’s picture, I never expected David Fincher to turn “The Killer,” a tale of a failed assassination attempt, into such a slog.

     Michael Fassbinder is the professional hitman who missed and then goes on a vengeance-fueled killing spree knowing that his mistake will likely cost him his life.

    The film seems to be influence by “Point Blank,” but never generates the intensity or outrage that Lee Marvin brought to the violent 1967 classic. It’s just one senseless killing after another, including innocents.

     Without giving away one of the few lighthearted quirks of this mostly repetitive script, the highlights of the film are the names the assassin uses when checking into hotels. Sadly, that minor note is the only memorable aspect of this strangely subdued picture.

        I would have preferred to see a film about the killer’s storage locker, where he keeps an astonishing collection of guns and accoutrements to hide his identity. I can’t imagine how long it took him to accumulate all of this. He even jokes about what the bidders on “Storage Wars” would make of his collection. 

       Late in this slickly directed, but hollow film, the assassin encounters a very rich woman played by Tilda Swinton, which I suspect was the entire reason to make the film. It would have been a very fine 10-minute short.

  

NYAD (2023)

     In the 1970s, Diana Nyad emerged as one of the most famous female athletes after a string of long-distance swims that set records around the globe.

    After a career with ABC Sports (when it was a major player) and other outlets, Nyad decided, at age 64, to again attempt her dream swim: Cuba to Key West, about 100 miles infested with sharks and other dangerous sea critters.

    Annette Bening, looking much like the real Nyad, plays this self-centered, sharp-tongued woman as she trains and then swims the Caribbean Sea.

    Two-time Oscar winner Jodie Foster plays Bonnie, her coach and best friend—both are lesbians but not lovers—showing great patience with the demanding Nyad, who refuses to accept the general opinion that she’s too old to attempt this seemingly impossible feat.

     It’s a great story and these two fine actresses are convincing as they recreate this often-fraught relationship. What left me cold—the film is streaming on Netflix—was the mixing of video of the real Nyad with the performances by the actors. The film, directed by Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin, the husband-and-wife team who made the 2018 Oscar-winning documentary “Free Solo,” starts with five minutes worth of clips from Nyad’s early career (including an appearance on the “Tonight Show with Johnny Carson”) which I could forgive if the filmmakers didn’t keep coming back to clips through the picture.

     They can’t seem to decide if they are making a feature or a documentary.

     The movie touches lightly on the inappropriate actions of Nyad’s youth swim coach but that’s not a major concern as the filmmakers clearly are looking to paint a story of heroism.

     For me, the unpleasant manner of Nyad, which Bening and screenwriter Julia Cox (working from Nyad’s memoir), don’t shy away from, made it hard to root for the woman. But Bening, as usual, is outstanding. She’s recently done well playing real people, including Sen. Dianne Feinstein in “The Report” and actress Gloria Grahame (with whom she bears a strong resemblance) in “Film Stars Don’t Die in Liverpool,” and also delivered memorable work in “The Kids Are All Right” (2010) and “20^th Century Women” (2016). Her post-50 career has defied Hollywood’s agism toward women.   

     Also giving a memorable performance is Rhys Ifans (“Notting Hill”), as a boat owner who becomes a crucial member of Team Nyad. The late-night phone conversation between him and Nyad is the film’s most touching moment.

  

APPOINTMENT WITH A SHADOW (1957)

      One of the most difficult roles to play convincingly is that of a drunk. There’s no right way as every alcoholic acts differently, yet rarely do actors manage to bring drunken authenticity to the screen, instead overacting as if they have seen “Arthur” too many times. Most famously, Ray Milland in “The Lost Weekend” (1945) and Jack Lemmon in “The Days of Wine and Roses” (1962) earned acclaim, if not total success, as heavy drinkers.

      That’s why I was impressed with little-know actor George Nader in this low-budget, 72-minute crime picture. Nader, who spent his entire career in Bs, was most famous for taking the sword to protect Rock Hudson; the magazine Confidential outed him and passed on exposing the bigger star.

     The film opens with Nader’s Paul Baxter passed out at O’Connell’s Bar, his favorite dive. We soon learn that he’s an unemployed reporter whose drinking cost him his job. Meanwhile, his girlfriend (Joanna Moore, who had a long career in serial TV) and her brother (Brian Keith), who is also a police detective, have cooked up a plan to get him back on his feet.

     The detective gives Baxter exclusive access to a police arrest of a notorious mobster. The reporter manages to stay sober and shows up at the scene, witnessing the police shooting a man as he leaves a restaurant. But he also spots the actual criminal watching the scene along with him.

    Of course, no one believes this unreliable drunkard’s story that the cops shot the wrong man, but he pursues the real guy while uncovering the plot that left an imposter dead.

    With a star in the role, this might have been a successful A picture; the script by Alec Coppel and Norman Jolley from a story by Hugh Pentecost (and directed by actor Richard Carlson) has some poignant soliloquies and sharp observations about human fragility.

     I found the film by chance on YouTube when I was searching for the highly regarded noir “Appointment with Danger” (it’s not available). Not sure how good the other “appointment” is, but Nader’s performance made this one memorable. 

PHOTOS:

Leonardo DiCaprio and Lily Gladstone in "Killers of the Flower Moon."  (Apple TV+)

Joaquin Phoenix as "Napoleon."  (Apple TV+)

Cailee Spaeny and Jacob Elordi on the long-awaited wedding day in "Priscilla." (A24)

George Nader plays a drunk in "Appointment with a Shadow." (Universal Pictures)

September 2023

BLONDIE JOHNSON (1933) and BACK IN CIRCULATION (1937)

    Though she never became a major star, few actresses exemplify the 1930s as perfectly as the exuberant Joan Blondell. For Depression era moviegoers, she was ubiquitous, appearing in 55 pictures that decade, typically in support of James Cagney and Dick Powell but also as a headliner in crime and romance programmers.

     Whether she was top of the bill or a supporting player, Blondell brought the same kind of off-handed sarcasm and unstoppable energy as the Warner Bros. male stars.

 

    In “Blondie Johnson,” she turns to crime when she’s denied government assistance despite an ailing mother and being forced to quit her job because of sexual harassment. Blondie partners with a goofy cab driver (Sterling Holloway, later the voice of Winnie the Pooh, among many animated characters) to use a sob story to con men out of a few bucks. Then she pulls the con on a mob lieutenant (the affable Chester Morris), leading to them starting an insurance scam that scores big for the pair and their mob boss. But Blondie refuses to settle for anything less than control of her own fate.

      Not only is the film an entertaining story of rags to riches but it offers sharp commentary on the suffering during the Great Depression and can be viewed as an early tale of female empowerment. It’s probably Blondell’s most charismatic performance.

     A few dozen films later, Blondell is an ethically challenged newspaper reporter “Timmy” Blake (short for Timothea) in “Back in Circulation,” one of many “Front Page” clones Hollywood cranked out in the 1930s and early ‘40s.

      A tip that a wealthy businessman might not have died of natural causes, sends “Timmy” to the funeral, demanding—as only reporters in movies could do—that the ceremonies be stopped and an autopsy performed. The feisty girl reporter is soon demanding interviews with the young widow (Margaret Lindsay, the wife in “Jezebel”) and the attending physician (John Litel), while her demanding editor (Pat O’Brien, this time taking the Walter Burns role)

     In an era where reporters were encouraged to do what it takes to get the scoop, “Timmy” and others at the Morning Express impersonate doctors to get past police barricade, hold a witness at gunpoint, break into the dead man’s home and knock out a witness (“Timmy” delivers the punch).

      The snappy dialogue (Adela Rogers St. Johns, one of the most famous journalists of the 1930s, was among the screenwriters) and the non-stop bickering between editor and reporter make the film seem like a bridge between the original “Front Page” and Howard Hawks’ version “His Girl Friday.”

      Ray Enright, who had been directing second-features for Warner Bros. since the late 1920s, was behind the camera for both of these. The sure-handed pro keeps the action moving while giving time for supporting players to shine; Allen Jenkins, Claire Dodd, Toshia Mori and Holloway in “Blondie Johnson” and Regis Toomey, George E. Stone and Spencer Charters in “Back in Circulation.”

     Blondell’s torrid pace during the 1930s—including six with Cagney and 10 with Powell—slowed in the 1940s, but she gave three high-profile performances during the decade: as a hospital volunteer in the war film “Cry ‘Havoc’” (1943), repeating her stage role as Aunt Sissy in “A Tree Grows in Brooklyn” (1945) and as the spurned clairvoyant in “Nightmare Alley” (1947). She scored an Oscar nomination near the end of her film career for her role in the Jane Wyman weeper, “The Blue Veil” (1951)

    From the 1950s through the ‘70s, she made appearances on dozens of TV series, occasionally working in features, memorably in “The Cincinnati Kid” (1963), “Support Your Local Gunfighter” (1971) and “Grease” (1978).

     The actress, whose career began in vaudeville at age three in support of her parents, died in 1979, working right to the end.

  

DUMB MONEY (2023)

     The Reddit-Robinhood-GameStop stock market phenomenon of 2021, more than any recent event, played out like a script from one of Frank Capra’s “common man vs. the powers that be” pictures. Yet this film, despite its efforts to paint the retail investors as working-class heroes and the Wall Street hedge fund bosses as arrogant blowhards, is an unpleasant experience featuring characters that never inspire cheering.   

        Paul Dano captures the nerdy, headband wearing Keith Gill, whose postings on the social media website Reddit inspired nonprofessional stock market dabblers to put money in GameStop stock even though the video game store was thought to be on the brink of bankruptcy. As the number of Gill’s followers investing in GameStop multiplies, the stock price skyrockets, making them rich overnight and creating financial disaster for the hedge fund firms that bet the stock would sink.

     While the movie, directed by Craig Gillespie (“I, Tonya” and “Lars and the Real Girl,” both first-rate films), makes its case about how easily the market can be manipulated, it’s hard to root for those portrayed as investing money they couldn’t afford to lose. It also doesn’t help that the Reddit community is portrayed as filled with profane and sexist commentary, accepted matter-of-factly. In addition, everyone in the film swears like they’re a character in a popular streaming series. (I’m convinced that the proliferation of profanity in settings once considered family friendly stems from the constant swearing in TV scripts.)  

      Seth Rogen, Vincent D’Onofrio and Nick Offerman are unrelentingly Machiavellian as Wall Street CEOs, while Shailene Woodley is underused as Gill’s supportive wife. The most interesting character in the film, who ironically doesn’t do any investing, is Gill’s slacker brother, well played by Pete Davidson.

     The film doesn’t emphasize the recent downside of GameStop investing: while at the height of the craze the stock hit $500 a share, in the past year it’s hovered around $17.

 

THE EQUALIZER 3 (2023)

    Few actors have ever been able to move so comfortably between films based on classic theater (“Fences,” “The Tragedy of Macbeth”) and violent action pictures as Denzel Washington does. In this third installment of this adaptation of the 1990s TV series, Washington’s Robert McCall ventures to Sicily to deliver his unapologetic vigilante justice on a mob family.

     Badly injured, he ends up recuperating in a quaint, coastal Italian town in the Amalfi Coast region. About the same time, another mob family thinks they can bully the town folks into handing over the city for development of casinos and hotels. But they didn’t count on the one-man wrecking crew in the form of this limping American stranger, who has quickly become part of the community.

     McCall gets the CIA involved, anonymously contacting agent Collins (Dakota Fanning, who co-starred with Washington in “Man on Fire” when she was 10), but she and her team mostly arrive in time for the cleanup.

    Director Antoine Fuqua, who’s directed all films of the franchise and also “Training Day,” which earned Washington his best actor Oscar, keeps the killing to a minimum, instead focusing on the way McCall and these small-town Italians bond in ways that aren’t possible most places in America.

   It’d be easy to dismiss this as just another star-vehicle actioner, which it is, but “Equalizer 3” also features a thoughtful, naturalistic performance from the best in the business.

 

 OUR HOSPITALITY (1923)

      Celebrating its 100^th anniversary, this Buster Keaton comedy is often ranked as one of the actor-director’s greatest works, alongside “The General” (1927) and “Sherlock Jr.” (1924). To me, it stands up better than much of Keaton’s pictures as it mostly focuses on an actual plot and character development rather than jumping from one acrobatic stunt to the next.

     While Keaton’s critical stature has grown as his silent rival Charlie Chaplin’s has declined, I still find Chaplin, even when he’s milking the sentimentality of the Little Tramp, the greater artist. I’ve never warmed up to Keaton’s stone-faced, rather infantile character who never tired of getting pushed around.  

     “Our Hospitality” satirizes the infamous Hatfield and McCoy post-Civil War feud (renamed Canfield-McKay), as the silent’s prologue shows Willie McKay’s father dying in a shootout in the Blue Ridge Mountains with one of the Canfields. The young widow quickly leaves for New York City with young Willie and raises him there.

     Fast forward 20 years and Willie is a young, clueless dandy who receives notice that he is now the owner of the family’s “estate” back in the hills. Imaging a palatial estate, he boards one of the strangest transportation contraptions ever imagined. 

          Keaton, who directed along with John G. Blystone, is clearly proud of his oddball invention—a combination of a primitive train and a stage coach—as he spends about 15 minutes of the 75-minute film on the journey. The “train” looks like something you’d encounter at an amusement park, with its moveable tracks and bumpy ride. (His dog beats the train to the destination.) Importantly, Willie meets a young lady (Natalie Talmadge) who is returning home after a visit to the big city.

     It’s obvious from the start, though not to Willie, that this woman must be a Canfield. Once they arrive in the rural community, her father and brothers immediate start plotting to shoot the young McKay. Their plans are complicated by the tradition of “hospitality” they must show to this courting young man while he’s in their home. It becomes a game of cat-and-mouse that ends, as Keaton adventure inevitably do, with a harrowing escape, this time on the side of a rocky cliff and over a waterfall.

      Keaton, to his credit, uses intertitles sparingly, allowing the visuals carry the humor and drama, even in the casting, as all the other men in the film are at least a foot taller than the star.  If you’ve never seen a Buster Keaton film, this might be the perfect starting point (and is available on YouTube for free).

      Among the other acclaimed movies marking a century of existence include Harold Lloyd’s most famous work “Safety Last!” Chapin’s “A Woman of Paris,” “The Hunchback of Notre Dame,” featuring Lon Chaney’s heartbreaking performance, and Cecil B. DeMille’s first version of “The Ten Commandments.”

 

SHE’S FUNNY THAT WAY (2015)

    This final feature of Peter Bogdanovich, who died in 2022, might have come off as an amusing screwball comedy—with a few alterations—if it was made in 1937 and starred Cary Grant and Carole Lombard. This modernized, less subtle version of a mistaken-identity comedy quickly grows irritating and tiresome.

     Owen Wilson, at 54 still sporting his floppy mop of blonde hair more suited to a frat boy, plays a famous film director who regularly cheats on his wife with call girls when in New York. When Arnold’s most recent paramour (Imogen Poots) auditions for his upcoming play, which stars his wife (Kathryn Hahn), the stuttering, frenetic confusion begins.

     Also connected to the young actress-call girl Izzy is a doddering judge (played with stupendous idiocy by Austin Pendleton), a distracted, angry therapist (Jennifer Aniston), and the play’s leading man (Rhys Ifans). The sex-mad characters fly in and out of the film as if it’s a Jerry Lewis telethon and are more grating than comical. But I did want to see more of Izzy’s parents, played by Bogdanovich’s long ago muse, Cybill Shepherd, and the great comedian Richard Lewis.

     The story is told in flashback, which adds nothing to the film, during an interview (Illeana Douglas plays the reporter) with Izzy, now a success in Hollywood. The script was written by the director and his ex-wife, Louise Stratten, whose older sister Dorothy was Bogdanovich’s lover when she was murdered in 1980.

    The film has gained some recent traction, under the title “Squirrels to the Nuts” (a line from an Ernst Lubitsch film), a somewhat altered version re-cut by the director shortly before his death. But I doubt it could be refined enough to be anything more than an unsatisfactory meshing of Woody Allen and ‘30s screwballs.

 

CAUSEWAY (2022)

     In recent years, it has been rare that Academy Award voters take notice of good performances in minor, little-seen movies. But in honoring last year’s film work, they looked beyond “Everything Everywhere All at Once” and “The Banshees of Inisherin” to nominate Brian Tyree Henry for his role as James, a small-town auto mechanic who befriends a depressed Afghan war vet (Jennifer Lawrence).

      While Lawence gives her usual fine performance—her Lynsey is back home recovering from a brain injury suffered while serving—Henry steals the picture. While the film is weighed down with too many tragic characters, the script comes to life in the conversations between Lynsey and James, mostly while she works cleaning pools.

     I’m sure Lawrence was in the running for best actress, delivering a low-ley, but intense performance, a change of pace from her wide-eyed, frantic scientist in the end of the world comedy, “Don’t Look Up” (2021).

    Making her feature film debut, director Lila Neugebauer keeps the temperature low through the story even as characters dig deep into their emotional scars. She clearly knows how to get the most out of her actors.

    The film is far from Henry’s first success: the 41-year-old was in the original cast of “The Book of Mormon” on Broadway, scored a Tony nomination for his performance in the play “Lobby Hero” and, on television, is among the stars of the hit series “Atlanta.”  Unfortunately, if your name isn’t Denzel Washington, mainstream cinema doesn’t offer many good roles for African-American actors, certainly not compared to the theater or streaming world. Here’s hoping some filmmakers are paying attention.    

 

SEVEN DAYS TO NOON (1951) and THE QUEEN OF SPADES (1949)

     After four decades of watching way too many movies, it has become a rare treat to discover a first-rate, vintage film. I streamed both of these mid-century gems in the same week on Kanopy (through the LA County Library) after they languished on my need-to-see list for years.

    “Seven Days” won an Oscar in 1951 for best motion picture story (a category eliminated a few years later), honoring the original idea by Paul Dehn and James Bernard, which Roy Boulting and Frank Harvey turned into a terse, no-nonsense script about the development of the atomic bomb.

      Nothing could be timelier at the beginning of the Cold War than a cautionary tale about weapon research; the Boulting-led team (Roy and brother John direct) avoid the histrionics and preaching that the subject can lend itself to.        

       Central London is under threat after a scientist demands that Britain announce the end of A-bomb development or he will detonate a powerful bomb in a week’s time. The picture follows the manhunt by Scotland Yard detectives with the help of the scientist’s daughter and his research assistant.

     Even with the urgency always in the forefront—large titles announce the beginning of each day as the deadline gets closer—the officials remain calm and levelheaded, as is the British way.

      With a few stars in lead roles, this film might be better remembered, but instead British character actors Barry Jones (“Prince Valiant,” “Alexander the Great”), as the disgruntled scientist and Andre Morell (“The Bridge on the River Kwai,” “Ben-Hur”), as the stoic police investigator, head the cast.  Both are fine, but I can just imagine Ralph Richardson and Trevor Howard in the roles.

     The Boultings were among the leaders of post-war British cinema as both producers and directors. John was the more successful director, receiving solo credit for “Brighton Rock” (1947), “The Magic Box” (1951) and the comedy classic “I’m All Right, Jack” (1959). 

       Even more impressive is “The Queen of Spades,” a dark, gothic rendering of an Alexander Pushkin short story about a military officers obsessed with gaining his fortune through gambling.

     Set in early 19^th Century Russia, the story opens with a gathering of young officers wagering large sums on the card game faro. Though the scene plays like an atmospheric way of introducing Herman, a Russian officer played with sweaty urgency by Austrian actor Anton Walbrook (“Gaslight,” “The Red Shoes”), it turns out to be the crucial moment of the story.

      Soon after the game, Herman reads about a countess who regained her fortune a half century earlier by learning a magical way to win this game. He immediately becomes obsessed with discovering the secret.

    He heartlessly courts the countess’ naïve ward, Lizaveta (Yvonne Mitchell), to gain access to the elderly woman (Edith Evans in a haunting performance). Dame Edith—in her first film in over 30 years after decades of Shakespearean roles on the British stage—creates an almost spectral figure, hovering between life and death and holding on to her faro secret.

    After her return to movies, Evans became a regular supporting player in Britain and Hollywood in such films as “The Nun’s Story,” “Look Back in Anger,” “Tom Jones” and “The Chalk Garden,” earning supporting acting Oscar nominations for the last two. She scored a best actress nod for her role in “The Whisperers” (1967), playing a lonely, fragile woman struggling to survive in her senior years in the slums of Manchester.

    Director Thorold Dickinson (the original “Gaslight”) and cinematographer Otto Heller (“The Ladykillers,” “Alfie”) utilize the look of film noir and Warner Bros. horror pictures to frame “Queen of Spades” as both a powerful study of unbridled greed and a creepy ghost story.

 

PHOTOS:

Joan Blondell as "Blondie Johnson." (Warner Bros.)

Pete Davidson and Paul Dano in "Dumb Money." (Columbia Pictures)

Buster Keaton and Natalie Talmadge in "Our Hospitality."  (Kino Video)

Anton Walbrook and Yvonne Mitchell admire the grand countess, Edith Evans,

in "The Queen of Spades."  (Kino Lorber Studio)

July 2023

OPPENHEIMER (2023)

       Christopher Nolan, even with “Memento,” the “Batman” trilogy, “Inception” and “Interstellar” on his resume, scales new heights as a filmmaker with this fast-paced, succinctly written and brilliantly edited psychological profile of the man most responsible for creating the atomic bomb.

       While the three-hour picture touches on the important events of physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer’s life and, plot-wise, spends most of its time on his work during the Manhattan Project, which resulted in the bombs that ended World War II when dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the film is most interested in the volatile relationship between science and politics and the way hysteria over communism altered lives.

     Irish actor Cillian Murphy, best known as Scarecrow in the “Dark Knight” series, seems an unlikely choice to anchor a very expensive, high-profile picture, but he nails this conflicted, prickly man, making good use of his hypnotic eyes and quiet manner.

      Adeptly chronicling Oppenheimer’s rise from a precocious college student to a famed astronomy and nuclear physics professor at Berkeley, the movie manages to capture the clubby, gossipy community of pre-war scientists with dialogue that is both telling and realistic. And it moves at a lightning pace, jumping from the classroom to cocktail parties to the bedroom. To me, it works beautifully (based on a biography by Kai Bird and Martin Sherwin), but I can’t imagine a viewer getting much out of the film without at least a passing knowledge of the dynamics of World War II and America’s uneasy alliance with the Soviet Union.

     Like most of the director’s pictures, “Oppenheimer” is a technical marvel, with world-class work by editor Jennifer Lame (“Tenet,” “Manchester by the Sea”) and cinematographer Hoyte Van Hoytema (“Dunkirk,” “Interstellar”).

      The centerpiece of the film—and Oppenheimer’s life—begins when Gen. Groves (a no-nonsense Matt Damon) convinces him to take charge of the bomb-making aspect of the Manhattan Project. Using the tension created by the time-sensitive nature of an existential world war and the gradual process of science, Nolan creates what seems like a believable tale of how the atomic bomb came to be, culminating in the first test in Los Alamos, New Mexico on July 16, 1945, just weeks before the bombs were used to expedite Japan’s surrender.

      Beyond Murphy’s superb portrayal of this low-key, but egoistical man of science, the film overflows with small, memorable performances, including Damon; Emily Blunt, as Oppenheimer’s long-suffering but loyal wife; Tom Conti as Albert Einstein; Josh Harnett as fellow Cal prof, Nobel Prize-winning physicist Ernest Lawrence; Benny Safdie as hydrogen bomb inventor Edward Teller and Florence Pugh as Oppenheimer’s longtime mistress.

      In the second half of this epic, Robert Downey Jr. as Lewis Strauss, a key member of the Atomic Energy Commission, dominates as he maneuvers to cancel Oppenheimer’s influence over post-war nuclear policy. Behind the scenes, he uses the era’s suspicions of even the slightest connection to communism and, underlying everything, Oppenheimer’s Jewishness to tarnish his reputation. It’s one of Downey’s finest performances.

    In addition to the questions of loyalty to the U.S., the film examines the moral questions faced by scientists working on the bomb (it’s terrible, but better us than the Germans, right?) and the even more destructive hydrogen bomb that was developed after the war. Oppenheimer’s idea that an international board should control weapons is seen as more proof that he was being swayed by Soviet influence.

      I’m sure the film doesn’t perfectly align with all the facts of these mid-Century events, but it’s not meant to be a documentary. “Oppenheimer” is an exceptionally crafted feature that manages to be both a grand work of entertainment and an insightful look at a crucial event in American history. Not only is this Nolan’s greatest achievement, but it ranks as one of the best films of this century.  

  

MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE---DEAD RECKONING, PART ONE (2023)

     Is there no end to the existential threats to mankind Hollywood screenwriters can invent that require heroes to save us?

       In the latest chapter of the Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) story, he and his IMF unit (Ving Rhames and Simon Pegg are back along with Rebecca Ferguson) are tasked with obtaining a key that manages the all-powerful, but poorly explained “Entity.”

     Though all the nations in the world are after it, the rogue players, as always, seem to beat them at every turn, requiring Hunt and team to once again, this is film No. 7, stand as the only hope to avert the apocalypse.

      Two women are the picture’s most interesting characters. From 2018’s “Fallout,” Vanessa Kirby’s White Widow returns, bringing an amoral Eurotrash duplicitousness, playing off Hunt’s unimpeachable righteousness. Meanwhile, Grace (Hayley Atwell), a slick pickpocket, injects some street-level crookedness into this battle of genius operatives, becoming both foil and friend to Hunt’s efforts.

      Atwell, Peggy in various Marvel adventures, finally has a role worthy of her skills as she matches Ethan’s spy-craft despite her character being an amateur. Previously, she gave impressive performances in British TV miniseries, as Julia in “Brideshead Revisited” (2008) and as Margaret in “Howards End” (2017).

     Returning to the series is the memorable Henry Czerny as Kittridge, Hunt’s distrusting controller from the first, and best film of the franchise. He’s the perfect government go-between, playing both sides but never completely committing to either. You never knew what he was thinking in the 1996 actioner, which hewed closer to the TV original than any of the sequels. But images of Hunt pulling off a mask, dangling in the middle of a Langley computer room and dodging a helicopter chasing a train in a tunnel are essential in development of the modern action picture.

      Of course, the new film features some incredible chases, including a dizzying and very funny race through the narrow streets of Rome with Hunt and Grace handcuffed to each other, squeezed into a mini-Fiat and, of course, the epic motorcycle jump off a cliff that’s thrilling even though I’d seen part of it in the trailer about 20 times.

    This film, coming just a year after “Top Gun Maverick,” cements Cruise’s status as the most important movie star in Hollywood, a seemingly ageless icon (he’s 61) who is equally believable doing an impossible stunt and mourning a colleague’s death. His continuingly evolving Hunt grows more human, more fragile and more introspective about his place in the world with every film (I’m hoping for a final film showing him enjoying retirement, coaching Little League and battling with irritating neighbors.) He’s 100 times a better actor than he was when the series began 27 years ago.  

      Though the film is “Part One,” I didn’t feel cheated at the end; writer-director Christopher McQuarrie, working on his third “Mission: Impossible” (he’s also written four other Cruise pictures), gives viewers a real ending while keeping the mystery of The Entity unfinished business that will require more impossibilities from Hunt next year.

  

711 OCEAN DRIVE (1950)

     This B-movie, released amidst the wave of mid-century film noirs, has more connection with the rise-and-fall gangster tales from the early 1930s. If Edward G. Robinson, James Cagney or Humphrey Bogart starred instead of Edmond O’Brien, this would be a highly admired picture airing regularly on TCM. (Instead, I found it on YouTube.)

    O’Brien, who followed his years as a solid supporting player with a series of hard-nose cops and criminals in postwar crime movies, plays Mal Granger, a discontent telephone company tech. After being introduced to the illegal off-track-betting operation run by tough guy Vince Walter (Barry Kelley), Mal quits his legit gig and begins updating the technology used by the gambling house. (At the time, it was illegal to place horse racing bets outside the track.)

     Mal quickly falls for the lifestyle, seeing the boss’ girl (Dorothy Patrick) and pining for more power. Then, right on cue, Walter is killed and Mal takes over the business. But trouble is brewing behind the scenes as a special police crime unit starts probing Los Angeles gambling and a powerful mobster from the Midwest (the deceptively grandfather-like Otto Kruger) wants a piece of Mal’s action.

     What makes this film stand out from a hundred others from the era is a smartly written, multilayered plot along with the care director Joseph M. Newman takes with even the briefest of scenes. A sequence in which Mal talks to a restaurant owner who knows a tailor (the underrate character actor Robert Osterloh) who could do a job involving a killing could have fit nicely into “The Godfather.”

       Joanne Dru, coming off three great films, “Red River” (1948), “She Wore a Yellow Ribbon” (1949) and “All the King’s Men” (1949), plays a key role as Gail, the wife of Kruger’s righthand man (played by Don Porter), whose striking looks and roving eye are used to control Mal.

    Adding to its believability, the picture places the characters in numerous classic Southern California locations, including Hollywood Park racetrack; Gilmore Field, the old minor league baseball field; the Sunset Strip; one-time LA nightclub the Doll House and Palm Springs. (Oddly, the title address is Mal’s Malibu house but it doesn’t play much of a role in the film.)

    Like too many crime films, the ending falls short of the first 90 minutes. Here, it’s a complicated chase through the insides of Nevada’s Hoover Dam. Then, to make matters worse, the picture concludes with a short propaganda lecture on the evils of gambling.

    Director Newman, who spent many years as an assistant director (earning two nominations when that was an Oscar category) and part of MGM’s short film division, spent the 1950s and early ‘60s working in every genre, but mostly crime pictures. His best-known films are “The Gunfight at Dodge City” (1959) with Joel McCrea, the sci-fi adventure “This Island Earth” (1955), “The Big Circus” (1959) with Victor Mature and the Hollywood tale, “The George Raft Story” (1961). But “711 Ocean Drive” stands out, a low-budget gem worth seeking out.

  

BARBIE (2023)

     In a shrewd piece of marketing, filmmaker Greta Gerwig has combined the enduring popularity of Mattel’s young adult doll with a heavy-handed message of female empowerment in a world run by dunderheaded males. After two Oscar-nominated films both grounded in the very real lives of young women—“Lady Bird” (2017) and “Little Women” (2019)—her new film seems an odd turn toward the fantasy, computerized constructs of 21^st Century blockbusters. Then again, maybe that’s the point. 

      Without much explanation, the film introduces Barbieland, a cartoonish, mostly pink community—imagine Palm Springs meets Newport Beach—run by the full gamut of Barbies (apparently, the dolls come in all shapes and sizes and career aspirations) with the Kens standing around trying to look good for the gals. How and why this world exists, with talking and walking, human-sized Barbies and Kens (yet without the need for food or drink and lacking genitalia) is never addressed. Like a Marvel film, you either accept the ridiculousness of the premise or move on.

     But even if you buy into it, the inane dialogue is hard to endure. Each day in Barbieland begins with stereotypical (original?) Barbie (the shiny, exuberance Margot Robbie) repeating “Hi, Barbie” to dozens of her friends before more childish conversations take place. While I understand the cleverness of the dialogue, as Gerwig and Noah Baumbach are writing for inanimate objects, it doesn’t make it any easier on the ears.

      It turns out that all these dolls are still somehow connected to a real human whose thoughts influence the dolls. Strangely, no other Barbie has experienced this except the one played by Robbie. Anyway, she’s off to find an answer to various mental and physical changes by taking a long journey, with Ken (Ryan Gosling) onboard, to the real world.

      The film’s big dramatic irony, of course, comes when Barbie discovers our world that hasn’t been forever changed by the feminist power of the Barbie doll. In fact, it’s Ken who is empowered when he witnesses a society primarily run by men. (How that translates back in Barbieland is the film’s most problematic plot turn.)

      While the film makes legitimate points about identity and sexual politics, the script alternates between mini-lectures and sophomoric sarcasm, making the message difficult to take seriously. There is just about enough material here to sustain an episode of “Stranger Things.” 

      This film offers too many obstacles for someone who sees Barbie as an outdated, borderline harmful (like the overly realistic guns boys play with) influence on children; a far cry from the heroine of a feminist-themed movie.

  

FREEBIE AND THE BEAN (1974)

     Alan Arkin, who died in June at age 89, was both the most underrated and underused actor of the 1970s and ‘80s, following his hilarious and heartbreaking performance in “Catch-22.”

     In Mike Nichols’ adaptation of Joseph Heller’s acclaimed World War II satire (scripted by Buck Henry), Arkin plays Yossarian, a U.S. Army Air Force pilot based in the Mediterranean who serves as the calm amid a comically dysfunctional military unit. His dream of being grounded because he’s crazy is thwarted by the so-called “Catch-22,” which stipulates (at least according to the brass) that anyone who asks to be grounded can’t be crazy and thus should keep flying.

     Up to that point, it looked like Arkin was destined for major stardom, having earned two best actor Oscar nominations in the 1960s, with his comic turn as a Soviet sub commander in “The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming” (1966) and a thoughtful turn as an empathic deaf-mute in “The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter” (1968).  He was also memorable as a drug dealer terrorizing a blind Audrey Hepburn in “Wait Until Dark” (1967).

      After “Catch-22,” he continued his quirky characterizations: As a trucker experiencing America in “Deadhead Miles” (1972), a lonely restaurateur in Neil Simon’s “Last of the Red Hot Lovers” (1972) and as another loner on the road in “Rafferty and the Gold Dust Twins” (1975). Those films all failed at the box office.

      His two successes in the 1970s were “The In-Laws” (1979), a cult comedy in which he plays the innocent in-law of a mobster on the run and “Freebie and the Bean” (1974), a very dated police buddy movie co-starring James Caan.

    The nonstop comic dialogue between Caan’s Freebie and Arkin’s Bean (he plays a Latino, which gives you an idea of the script’s racism) as they keep tabs on a mobster is the only aspect of the film that saves it from being a complete disaster. Much of the film, set on Super Bowl weekend in San Francisco, is unwatchable, especially a long, pointless rant by Bean when he thinks his wife (Valerie Harper) has cheated on him. Director Richard Rush (“Psych Out,” “The Stunt Man”), seems to thrive on chaos and improvisation, giving the frenetic Arkin plenty of room to rift.

    In the 1980s, Arkin worked in television and on low budget pictures seen by few before he found his niche as a supporting player, starting with “Edward Scissorhands” (1990), “Glengarry Glen Ross” (1992) and “Grosse Point Blank” (1997), eventually earning that long-deserved comeback Oscar playing the blunt speaking grandfather of a very wacky family in “Little Miss Sunshine” (2006). He was even better as the B-movie producer enthusiastically aiding the scheme to free the American hostages in Iran in “Argo” (2012), earning another Oscar nomination.

     He capped off his career with a sarcastic yet touching performance as a successful Hollywood agent, Norman Newlander, best friend to actor turned acting teacher, Sandy Kominsky (Michael Douglas) in the Netflix series “The Kominsky Method.” Their leisurely lunches at Musso and Frank, Hollywood’s most legendary restaurant, where they ruminated on life’s tragedies and the importance of carrying on, were a virtually Acting 101 class.

    Arkin, who reportedly could be prickly on the set, was, as an actor, probably a bit too human—a mumbler with a few too many nervous tics—to become a movie star.  Yet he inevitably brought something original to any film he was cast, even in recent dogs like “Stand Up Guys” and “Going in Style,” mirroring those who fight doubts and inadequacies to get along in an unforgiving world.

 

INDIANA JONES AND THE DIAL OF DESTINY (2023)

     Hollywood’s ultimate power duo—Steven Spielberg and George Lucas—have created some of the most memorable motion pictures of the past 40 years, but they seemingly can never leave well-enough alone.

     “Jaws,” “Star Wars,” “Indiana Jones” and “Jurassic Park,” landmark films of varying degrees have all been tainted by the pursuit of more money through lesser and lesser sequels.

      “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull,” released 15 years ago, pretty much left the beloved character in the dust, without a modicum of relevance. In fact, all indications were that Shia LeBeouf, who plays Indy’s son in the 2008 film, would take over the franchise. For various reasons, that wasn’t to be.

    So here we are again: Harrison Ford, made to appear sprightly at age 81, flies all over the world (travelling looks so painless in movies) in pursuit of an invention of Greek mathematician Archimedes.

    The picture opens with a flashback to Indy’s younger days—the digital de-aging works well here---in the midst of the retreat of the Nazis and his encounter with Jurgen Voller (the great Danish actor Mads Mikkelsen), who wants the ancient device for the Fuhrer.

     A fantastic pursuit inside and on-top-of a train filled with stolen artifacts offers the promise of a thrilling movie. But it’s all downhill from there as the chase for the mysterious dial moves ahead to 1969 and eventually sinks to Marvel-like fantasy.

     Jones has given up his archeological adventures as he looks like he can barely climb out of bed—until Helena (Phoebe Waller-Bridge), the daughter of an old colleague, comes looking for the Greek antique.  

     Their love-hate relationship is about all the film offers in the way of character development. Instead, we are left to be amazed by one ridiculous vehicle chase after another, during which no one seems to get injured despite how many walls they end up being hurled against.

     The bad guys, Dr. Voller (now a NASA scientist!) and his henchmen, always are right behind Indy and Helena as they race around the world, defying logic in an era before tracking devices and GPS.

     Ford grimaces with his usual aplomb, while Waller-Bridge comes off as an amateur, lacking much in the way of screen presence. (Though, much to my surprise, she’s an accomplished TV actress and writer in the series “Fleabag” and “Killing Eve”) But here, essentially, her character is an inconsistent moveable piece used to create tension when there is none. To connect with veteran fans—the original movie is 42-years old—Karen Allen and John Rhys-Davies make appearances.

       For those looking for mindless action, director James Mangold doesn’t disappoint but the set-pieces grow less believable as they pile up on one another. Unfortunately, there is nothing here that matches the combination of intense action and intelligence the director brough to previous films, “3:10 to Yuma” (2007) and “Ford v Ferrari” (2019). 

    “Indiana Jones” Part V isn’t a complete waste of time, but I would have thought that a more inventive script could have been cobbled together if the Spielberg-Lucas entertainment cabal were going to bring this famous character back for this encore.

  

CHESS STORY (2023)

       Despite the title, this story of Nazi cruelty has less to do with rooks and pawns than the psychological games the mind plays on prisoners.

      As a sport, or even as a metaphor, chess isn’t the most cinematic contest; even for viewers who understand the strategy, until someone calls checkmate, it’s hard to tell who’s winning. The best-known American movie about chess is the surprise 1993 box-office hit “Searching for Bobby Fischer,” about a young chess prodigy.

      Chess is at the center of the popular Netflix series “The Queen’s Gambit,” an adaption of Walter Tevis’ novel. At least two pictures have used chess matches to explore the intensity of the Cold War, “Dangerous Moves,” the 1984 foreign film Oscar winner, and the more recent “The Coldest Game” (2019) with Bill Pullman.

      “Chess Story,” a German film based on a 1941 novel by Stefan Zweig, finds yet another study of Third Reich oppression. Josef Bartok (Oliver Masucci) ignores the warnings about a Nazi crackdown and remains in Vienna one day too long. Before he knows it, he’s been arrested, becoming a focus of the Gestapo because he serves as an investor for rich Austrians and knows the bank numbers of foreign accounts.

     He’s held in a hotel room for months, given bread and water and little else in the way of human comfort. He does sneak a book into the room—a collection of chess matches and from that his imagination runs wild.

      The centerpiece of the picture is an impromptu chess match between Bartok and a European champ (Albrecht Schuch, who also plays a Nazi interrogator, and was one of the stars of “All Quite on the Western Front”), while both are aboard an ocean liner headed to American and freedom, at least in Bartok’s mind.

      Director Philipp Stölzl might have done a better job of delineating fantasy from reality, but he guides Masucci to an emotionally draining performance as his character fights day by day to remain sane.

PHOTOS:

Cillian Murphy in "Oppenheimer"  (Universal Pictures)

Edmond O'Brien and Barry Kelley in "711 Ocean Drive" (Frank Seltzer Productions)

Alan Arkin with James Caan in "Freebie and the Bean"   (Warner Bros.)