fenrisfil, Author at Screen Wolf

The Spiral Staircase (1946)

Posted on February 10, 2022October 11, 2024 by fenrisfil

From director Robert Siodmak, whose work includes the excellent Film Noir’s “The Killers” and “Phantom Lady” this is 1946’s “The Spiral Staircase”, a serial killer movie, where the killer stalks and kills women with various afflictions, though most of it takes place in an old house on a stormy night so multiple tick boxes here.

The movie technically stars Dorothy McGuire as the Mute Helen, but despite being the protagonist, because she is mute the dialogue is all taken by other actors. Helen became a mute after witnessing her parents die in a fire when she was younger and has not spoken a word since. The supporting cast includes Kent Smith as Dr. Parry, George Brent as Professor Warren, Gordon Oliver as Steve Warren and Ethel Barrymore as the bed ridden Mrs. Warren.

The Twisted Path.

In the hands of a less capable director and with a less capable lead this would have been a very mediocre movie. The plot is unremarkable and most of the actors are likewise. However, Siodmak with his heavy influence from German Expressionism brings a fantastic eye to the camera and provides some beautiful imagery, mostly involving the use of shadows, rain and of course the Spiral Staircase itself along with some great glimpses of the killers eye (an eye provided by Siodmak himself) and an interesting daydream sequence.

Also raising the quality of the movie is McGuire and given she isn’t allowed to speak any dialogue has to convey to the audience all her emotions purely through her movements and expressions. Of course this movie is only 17 years after the end of the silent film era so perhaps this was less impressive in the day, but none the less she played her role perfectly. The killer however, once revealed wasn’t particularly imposing, which is a real shame because I know Siodmak can give us a great killer as the one in his “Phantom Lady” was actually very intimidating and had some great dialogue.

The Ever Decreasing Circles.

The music is typical of what you’d hear in the period in a Film Noir, but this is blended with a nice bit of Theremin. It works well enough but doesn’t really add anything. The problem with this film is simply that as a horror it’s not really scary or unsettling. I feel sympathy for Helen’s plight as a mute but that’s it really. The killer isn’t revealed until quite late on and while we see glimpses it doesn’t really build any terror. Really this plays more like a Film Noir, which also makes the visuals seem less unique as those techniques are all over that genre. Ultimately this isn’t Siodmak’s best work but it has it’s moments none the less.

Happy New Year

Posted on January 1, 2022January 1, 2022 by fenrisfil

Just wanted to wish you all a Happy New Year. I hope 2022 is a better year for us all and I also hope Hollywood learns the right lessons for 2021’s movies. We can but hope. I’ve got a lot more reviews coming for you in the new year and will try and get other parts of the site working. The plan is to do some Youtube content in the new year, so it is time to up my game.

2021 Year in Review – Part 3 : The Top Ten

Posted on December 31, 2021January 1, 2022 by fenrisfil

So as 2021 draws to a close I want to leave the year on a positive note by listing off my ten favourite films of the year. These are all personal favourites and as such this is an entirely subjective list. So let’s kick it off from ten to one:

10. Willy’s Wonderland

So let’s start with my favourite cult movie of the year. This is a fun, low budget horror staring Nicholas Cage in a roll that you would probably never think he would be right for… but the thing with Nick Cage is those often turn out to be his best roles. This is no exception as he brings a sort of overly calm autism to the silent, deadly protagonist. Not a word passes his lips for the entire movie as he turns the tables on his wood be executors, the possessed animatronic monstrosities at “Willy’s Wonderland”, a family entertainment centre. That base concept is not in itself original, basically being a “Five Nights at Freddy’s” movie and also similar to the “Banana Splits” movie that came out 2019 that fused the Five Nights concept onto a previously non-horror franchise. What makes this movie unique though is Nicholas Cages character, who proves more dangerous than the evil that has possessed the place. I would love to see more of this mute drifter in a sequel. No need to bring back the animatronics though.

On a side note apparently a Five Nights at Freddy’s film is in the works. One wonders how many more rip offs it will have before they actually get the movie out.

9. Venom: Let There Be Carnage

If you have read my review this one you will know I consider it a long way from perfect and yet in it’s simplicity it does manage to entertain. Eddie Brock returns in this film and he and Venom are struggling to find equilibrium in their relationship. But they must learn to get on in a hurry to deal with the threat of the Carnage Symbiote that spawned from Venom and has bonded with serial killer Cletus Cassidy. The final conflict is a solid action spectacle, while the rest of the movie is effectively a buddy cop comedy. It is short and does little different to the original movie but the fact is if you enjoyed that one, you will likely enjoy this.

8. Wrath of Man

While this is very much as Jason Statham film, it is one of his better ones. It’s also classic Guy Ritchie, but it has to be said it isn’t the best for either star or director. It’s just a solid action/thriller that delivers pretty much everything you would expect from the pair. Statham plays “H”, a cold mysterious character that clearly has some kind of hidden agenda working at armoured cash truck company responsible for delivering hundreds of millions of dollars around Los Angeles each week. In classic Guy Ritchie fashion the story intertwines criminal masterminds with each other to see who comes out on top. One of the things I always appreciate with Ritchie is his villains usually aren’t incompetent and so the protagonists need to be either very smart or very lucky to get the upper hand.

7. Pig

Yes it turns out Nicholas Cage made two of my favourite movies this yeah, who could guess? This is a really interesting story that never really goes where you would expect it. This is a story of one man’s attempt to find his prize truffle hunting pig after it is stolen by a pair of drug addicts on behalf of a mysterious third party. On it’s surface it looks like this will be a John Wick type story only with a Pig replacing John’s Dog. That’s not the case, or at least if it is it’s only true if John instead of being a highly skilled master assassin was instead a highly skilled master chef. While the movie presents a bit of action it is really a much more personal story and once again Cage presents one of the more interesting characters of the year. This is one of those films where an mysterious eccentric ends up teaching others life lessons, but it’s more than that as the eccentric himself has his own journey to go on. I highly recommend this unusual movie.

6. Free Guy

This was a movie that from the first trailer I could tell two things: It would be incredibly stupid and; It would be incredibly fun. The final product delivered exactly what the trailer promised. Not much in this movie makes sense when you think about it for more than five minutes, but it really doesn’t matter because the movie packs in so much pure unadulterated fun that you can forgive pretty much any other failing. Ryan Reynolds of course is someone that plays variations of the same character (himself) in every movie, but this is him at the maximum level of Ryan Reynolds you are likely to find him outside of a Deadpool movie. On top of that the movie itself provides a lot of fun for anyone that has ever played Grand Theft Auto or it’s sequels/rip-offs and a good number of other references in between, including some that clearly must have been added after a certain studio purchased another studio as those rights wouldn’t have been available before. Ultimately it great time for anyone that doesn’t exclusively watch Oscar nominated dramas.

5. The Suicide Squad

James Gunn provided one of the most heart felt and fun movies of the year. Yes the plot is complete nonsense, yes Harley Quinn was the weak link this time around, but the other characters were on point both in personality and interaction. Indeed this movie had some of the best character work of the entire year, which is pretty impressive for one of the silliest movies of the year. Then again that is exactly what Gunn does. Say what you like about the man personally, but as a director of comic book movies he is perhaps the perfect director combining the kind of character interaction and banter that Joss Whedon is known for with the knowledge, love and dedication to the source material of someone like Sam Raimi.

I think it always says something about a movie when a character you didn’t think you would like ends up your favourite and that is absolutely the case for me with The Suicide Squad and “Ratcatcher 2”. But she’s not alone, Idris Elba proved his “Bloodsport” to be far superior to Will Smith’s “Deadshot” while John Cena’s deadpan comedic delivery proved perfect for such a ludicrous character as Peacemaker and it seems was so impressive in the role he now has a spin off in the works. The humour won’t land for everyone but as I said it is also a movie full of heart and I think most people will appreciate the character work.

4. Ghostbusters: Afterlife

Of course if we are talking heart, there was no movie this year that displayed more of it than Ghostbusters: Afterlife and having already shared my full review I won’t go into too much detail here. This was a resurrection of a franchise that many people thought dead, a love letter to the original movie and perhaps most importantly an apology to all the fans that were insulted and belittled after the disastrous 2016 movie by the shill media, actors on that film and even the director himself. It made that apology though while not compromising their mission to make Ghostbusters as accessible a franchise as possible, providing a diverse cast and a female lead that everyone (except those still making excuses for “Answer the Call”) can actually get behind.

The story keeps itself simple and on the surface appears merely a rehash of the original movie, but underneath that it is actually a very personal story where the main character is Egon Spengler. Quite a feat considering that character dies early in the movie and Harold Ramis, his actor died years ago before this movie even began production. Eventually the movie provides the reunion of the original team that everyone was waiting for and gives them a final moment to shine and remind the fans why the original was so good in the first place. If you feel nothing after the end of this movie, I worry for you.

3. Dune

I had a lot of doubts going in as to whether Denis Villeneuve and 2021 could deliver a good Dune movie. I knew it would look fantastic, but after seeing “Blade Runner 2049” I had my doubts on the rest o fit. That movie failed to do justice to the characters, story or themes of the original movie, though it did certainly look the part. I did recognise however that unlike with 2049, Villeneuve would be grounded here by the quality and extent of the source material. Fans of Frank Herbert’s classic science fiction series have been waiting a long time for someone to do justice to that series on screen, The first attempt was David Lynch’s 1984 movie that proved heavily divisive amongst Dune fans and the audience in general. For my part I quite liked it, though it was also my first introduction to the franchise having not read the novels. This was followed in the 90’s by a couple of low budget TV shows on Sci-Fi that were actually pretty good too, but suffered from bad 90’s CGI and have dated horrendously.

This new take on the story finds itself in a approach that takes the best from the previous two. Like the TV series, it doesn’t rush to tell the story and of course this is why the movie barely covers a third of that first book, but like the previous movie the acting is top notch and the movie looks and sounds great. I will provide a full review of this in the new year but for now the important thing to note is the movie is epic and compelling, despite the slow pace and long running time. It doesn’t feel like a movie that has taken two and a half hours to tell a third of a story, and while the movies sudden end (and cheesy closing line) leave you fully aware of how little of the story has been told, it also leaves you eagerly anticipating the stories continuation. Definitely a job well done.

2. Spider-Man: No Way Home

If you’ve read my review of “Spider-Man: No Way Home” probably the only thing that shocks you here is that it is not at number one. Yes I absolutely loved this movie, but it’s not perfect and it is ultimately yet another franchise movie, indeed it is two franchise movies the MCU and Spider-Man, the two biggest franchises in the superhero business. It’s success was always guaranteed, though few predicted it would be as successful as it has been. It’s also not a movie free from flaws, but let’s not focus on the negatives here. The truth is this is another redemption story and not just the story of one redemption but multiple ones. It redeems villains, it redeems heroes and redeems entire sub-franchises. By the end of the movie Tom Holland’s Peter Parker is closer to the comic book version than he has ever been and through this I came to realise that this entire trilogy of movies has actually been an origin story. I’m still not sure if that is good or bad, but it certainly leaves a sense of satisfaction.

Like the Infinity Saga before it, this is more than just a movie, it is a huge cinematic event and the culmination of 8 movies and three separate franchises. It does something that has never been done before in the history of cinema and it does it in a way that will leave most people very happy indeed. The only problem is this is something that only really works once. It may have breathed life into a flagging MCU but now they need to course correct with the rest of the franchise.

1. Nobody

What do you get if you take the writers of the best current action franchise, “John Wick”, pair him with the director of breakout cult classic and first person action movie “Hardcore Henry” and ask them to provide an action movie debut to Bob Odenkirk (Of Breaking Bad fame)? Well, what you get is my movie of the year and one of the best action movies I’ve seen for years. Throw in a touch of RZA and Christopher Lloyd as a bonus and you have a real classic on your hands. This is a masterpiece of an action movie, hiding it’s explosive nature under the surface much as it’s protagonist hides his own past and capabilities under the guise of a family man with a boring job. The action sets off from a chain of events beginning with a badly planned home invasion of Odenkirk’s house, which leads to a confrontation with strangers on the subway and the wrath of a local mob boss.

The movie achieves a rare thing and works both on the level of a tense thriller and when it fully ramps up the action outperforms some of the most outrageous over the top action films of recent years. The pacing of the story is perfect easing you in to the gradual increases in intensity and unlike many modern action films you can actually follow every bit of action clearly. It is like the best 80’s action hero meets the best 90’s action stunts and applies the polish of the best 2000’s action CGI fest. If you’ve not seen this one yet you owe it to yourself to check it out and unlike most of the top picks this year, this is an original movie and not part of any pre-established franchise. Top marks all round.

So that is my top movies of this year. I hope you enjoyed my choices, feel free to agree, disagree or share your own in the comments. Happy New Year to you all and see you in 2022.

2021 Year in Review – Part 2 : The Big Breakdown

Posted on December 30, 2021December 30, 2021 by fenrisfil

2021 has been an erratic year in the theatres with a number of movies bombing hard, delayed releases having too much ground to make up to break even and a few movies completely bucking the trend and making us all wonder if the box office failures were due to Covid at all. After all movies have bombed in the past, maybe there were marketing failures, maybe the trailers were bad, maybe there just wasn’t any demand for what was being put out, maybe the movies were just not very good! Let’s take a look!

Dramatic Failure.

It seems one of the biggest hit movie genres of the year is the Drama. These movies tend to have lower budgets (hovering around the 20-30 million dollars), but this year they have struggled to draw much at the box office. Many of these movies have been sent simultaneously to streaming, others attempted stay exclusive to theatres. Neither approach really turned out a winner. For example Clint Eastwood’s Neo-Western Drama “Cry Macho” released to streaming and in theatres and only pulled in $14.7m in global gross against it’s $33m production budget. That already looks bad but when you take into account P&A (Prints and Advertising) costs and the fact that they only get a portion of that gross the movie ends up as quite a bomb, at least on paper.

Another release, the long anticipated Soprano’s prequel “The Many Saints of Newark” went simultaneously to HBO Max and theatres and clawed in a mere $12.7m global gross against it’s hefty $50m budget. It seems the movie wasn’t as anticipated as perhaps the studios thought. Reaction to the movie has been mixed too between Soprano fans, but this hasn’t stopped rumour of a spin off series set between this movie and the original show.

Theatrical Exclusivity.

It is hard to determine how much of that is offset by benefit of the movie being on streaming. What we can do is make a comparison to other drama movies that did not hit streaming simultaneously. For example Ben Affleck’s crime drama “Stillwater” was exclusive to theatres and drew in $17.3m against it’s $20m budget. On the surface that looks better, but it is still a bomb and one with no benefit to streaming partners. Similarly, historical drama “Spencer” also had an exclusive theatrical release and that drew only $12.2m global gross against its $18m budget making for yet another flop.

Things didn’t go so well for Ridley Scott this year either with two movies released exclusively to theatres. His second, “House of Gucci” actually did well drawing in $111.5m but with a production budget of $75m it is still currently sitting at a loss. Scott’s first movie of the year however “The Last Duel” only brought in $30m worldwide on a whopping $100m production budget making it one of the bigger bombs of the year. That one I largely blame on poor marketing, but it is also worth noting that putting a blockbuster size budget on what was effectively a modern day version of experimental Japanese movie “Rashomon” (1950) was probably not that wise in the first place. Not that most people even knew this is what the movie was going in thanks to that marketing.

The Horror! The Horror!

One of the genres that seems perfectly suited to 2021 is the Horror movie, after all when the audience is afraid just going to the cinema, the horror movies job is done before the projector even starts. Which may explain why so many mediocre to bad horrors managed to make themselves some cash at the box office this year. Even the dreadful “Candyman” remake managed to claw itself into marginal profit. Not all horrors made a killing this year though.

One notable exception is “Resident Evil: Welcome to Racoon City”. This new reboot to the Resident Evil franchise attempted to tell the story of the first two games in compressed forms but hasn’t impressed most fans with comments complaining about changes to the characters and CGI that is little better than the graphics of those original games. The movie achieved a mere $31m global gross against it’s $25m budget. Those numbers seem pretty close but when you factor in P&A, the movie likely needed to reach $60m to draw even, leaving this another of 2021’s bombs.

Another of this years box office failures in the horror field is Edgar Wrights “Last Night in Soho”, which was one of my personal disappointments of this years cinema. The movie landed $23m worldwide gross against $43m budget marking it down as a real clanger. It’s worth noting that while “The Last Duel” was effectively (and confusingly) marketed as “Me Too – The Movie”, that would have been a fairer assessment of this movie. Both films failed, so perhaps cinemagoers are just tired of these kinds of themes in their movies. Like Racoon City though this was not a traditional horror film. So how well have they faired?

Fear Markets Itself.

The big winner of the horror box office this year was “The Quiet Place: Part II”, sequel to the breakout hit of 2018. After the success of the low budget original the sequel was guaranteed a larger budget and ended up around the $55m mark. The movie was also likely to have a lower box office than it’s predecessor, further reducing the profit. However, despite that the movie drew in $296.7m globally meaning this movie is well in profit and unsurprisingly a third movie has already been announced.

Also well into profit is the long awaited third part of the Conjuring Franchise. Many fans, including myself wondered if they would ever get back to the main series after making so many spin offs, but they did and the result was… mediocre. However the box office was not, landing $200m globally against it’s modest $39m budget. Another very healthy profit and it seems even though the Conjuring shared universe has more misses than hits as far as quality is concerned, as a franchise it is as strong as ever.

The last big winner was also one of the most disappointing movies of the year and that is “Halloween: Kills”. Where the movie did not disappoint was it’s box office scoring $130m against a $40m production budget. With a heavy sway towards domestic over international that has allowed for around about $40-50m in net profit. That is pretty healthy but it should be noted it is significantly short of the heavily hyped franchises return in 2018 which landed about double. Perhaps that is due to covid, perhaps it is because the previous instalment proved divisive amongst the fanbase or it could be because word of mouth on this one was frankly dreadful. Still, with about $70m net profit I doubt the producers are crying themselves to sleep. Halloween Ends is out next year and we will see if they can stick the landing on this trilogy.

But what about the Blockbusters?

Ultimately outside of “The Last Duel” none of the movies we’ve mentioned so far were that big of a gamble. Even the flops may yet justify their existence through streaming, physical media release and studio prestige. The Blockbusters however are a different matter. These movies often cost over $300m (including P&A) and can have break even points well above $500m. The most extreme example of this in 2021 being “No Time to Die” which had a reported break even point of $900m. It’s impossible to say if it was truly that high, but with multiple aborted releases wasting advertising money, the need to reshoot due to outdated product placement and the interest charges on the funds borrowed to make the movie those costs just kept going up, until we reached the point where the movie was looking like it may actually bankrupt Eon Productions.

That didn’t happen though because by a minor miracle the movie managed to score 770.9m global box office. Turns out despite the long delay, people still really like James Bond (Which makes the movies ending somewhat unfortunate). Perhaps unsurprisingly, $128m of that box office was from the UK. It’s worth noting though that if the report was true, the movie is still losing $130m. That’s bad, but Eon Productions lives to fight another day. Distribution company MGM however did end up selling to Amazon. We will have to see how this impacts Bond in the future. Word is though that Eon and Amazon are already at loggerheads.

A Woman Scorned.

For many blockbusters this year the story wasn’t about disaster but just underperformance and the various excuses for that disappointing box office. Many of these films found their way on to streaming alongside their theatrical release and much like with the drama’s it is difficult to judge just how much of an impact this had on the box office.

Black Widow was out early in the year and brought in $375m. For a lot of movies that would be a win, but for a $200m Marvel Cinematic Universe movie that was only two movies removed from the two billion box office of “Avengers: End Game”. It’s also worth noting that this is another movie that had aborted release dates rapidly raising the break even point. Measured on theatrical performances alone this movie is a bomb, losing Disney about $100-150m. However Disney claim the movie also made $125m on Disney+ through it’s premium access (meaning subscribers had to pay an additional fee to watch). That drags the movie to around it’s break even point, most likely still making a loss. We may never know the real story, but what we do know is that Scarlett Johansen was unhappy enough to sue Disney over the result. The case was settled out of court and ScarJo is down to work with Disney again for their movie adaptation of their “Tower of Terror” ride (Yes, that is a thing that is happening), so it seems there were no hard feelings.

The Grey Area.

Also released early in the year Ryan Reynolds vehicle “Free Guy”, was predicted to be a bomb but actually proved to have incredibly strong legs through word of mouth and just about managed to draw even. Bringing in $323.6m global against $100-125m budget. The movie was sent to streaming 45 days after it’s theatrical release, which proved to be a winning tactic (and something Warner Brothers are implementing for all movies next year). As an early release the movie was likely more impacted by Covid and it seems the IP’s new owners at Disney (The movie started production prior to the Fox deal) are very happy with it. Expect a sequel.

Another big budget question mark this year is “Godzilla Vs Kong”, which released simultaneously to streaming and managed to bring in $467.7m in worldwide gross. The budget is estimated at between $155m and $200m which means the movie likely made money, but it’s worth noting if that budget is at the maximum of that range then it probably has a small loss instead. However I’d still call this a win considering it was also on streaming and came in ahead of three MCU movies (Two of which were theatrical exclusives). Meanwhile Disney’s villain turned anti-hero movie “Cruella” landed a $228.6m box office against it’s $100m production budget. Not a bomb, but definitely a disappointment for Disney.

The Triumph Of Mediocracy.

Perhaps the most hotly debated win or loss of the year was “Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings” which clocked up 417.9m globally against it’s $150m-$200m budget. That left it’s end result somewhere from a $5m loss to a $70m profit and without the excuse of being on streaming simultaneously. On the domestic side it landed in between “Ant Man and the Wasp” and “Doctor Strange” with not much in it (Though Shang Chi opened in more theatres than either), but globally it fell quite a way short of either of those landing even below the original “Ant Man” movie’s draw of $518.9m. Reaction to the movie has at least been mostly positive from the public, the media proclaimed it as a triumph and Disney have already greenlit a sequel, but it is clear that Shang-Chi is not going to be a major draw for the MCU moving forward.

Speaking of worse, it is time to mention “The Eternals”. Undoubtedly the most ill advised movie the MCU has put out so far. Taking a team of drama writers with no genre experience, pairing them with an indie movie director obsessed with scenery and giving them $200m to turn a virtually unknown Jack Kirby creation into a blockbuster superhero movie may have seemed like a good idea in a boardroom at one point, probably only if a large quantity of white powder was involved or possibly some LSD. To make matters worse they marketed the movie by simultaneously calling it a “Love letter to Kirby” while also celebrating the many, many changes they made to the characters and general look of the film. Kirby was of course an artist, so taking his work and totally changing the look of it is more like hate mail than a love letter. Of course most MCU fans don’t even know who Jack Kirby was, so this isn’t the reason for the movies failure.

Epic Fail!

It’s worth noting that “Eternals” was put into production just after Warner/DC announced “The New Gods”, which was basically the better known DC version of the same thing. This led to many to speculate that the movie only existed as a counter to the moves by DC. It is perhaps amusing to note then that Warner eventually scrapped “The New Gods”. The Eternals ended up with just under $400m domestic against it’s huge $200m budget and hefty marketing costs and is looking to be the MCU’s first confirmed bomb. There is still a possibility of it drawing even but with fans and critics both turning their nose up at this one it seems unlikely and we’ll probably not see much more of this team in the future.

This was far from Disney’s worst performing movie of the year though. Competing for that title are the theme park ride turned movie “Jungle Cruise” and animated feature “Encanto”. The latter drew in $194.3m against a $120m-150m production budget and looks to lose the studio from $50m-100m. Jungle Cruise though wins the prize as the Dwayne Johnson vehicle crawled to a $210.4m global against it’s $200m budget and looking set to lose the studio a whopping $150m. You would be forgiven for thinking that was the biggest bomb of the year, but from the looks of things, that prize is instead going to go to the Matrix 4, a sequel no one asked for by a director/writer that it seems didn’t want to make it (At least going by the self referential lines in the movie). That is currently sitting at a $66m box office against it’s $175m production budget and looks like it may lose the studio around $200m. Of course the movie may have legs and surprise people but as it is available on streaming and generally considered a terrible movie that seems unlikely.

Actual Triumph!

By this point you may be starting to wonder if the age of the blockbuster is over and if studios can rake in the kind of profits that they have in the past. Well wonder no more because here comes Sony with what may be their most successful year in decades, even in the face of pandemic. It’s worth noting that Sony do not have a streaming service and so did not send any of their movies simultaneously to streaming. First up for Sony was Venom sequel “Venom: Let There Be Carnage”, which not only did well in a period where people were making constant excuses for underperformance but actually matched the domestic take of the previous non-pandemic era movie in the franchise. Racking up $501m against it’s $110m production budget it is looking set to make a net profit of around $200m for Sony. The movie itself was entertaining but not spectacular, but clearly Venom is still a popular character and frankly anything that is a part of the Spider-Brand is a safe bet these days.

A closer run thing for Sony was their attempt to repair the Ghostbusters franchise from the damaged done by the disastrous “Ghostbusters; Answer the Call” film of 2016. Keeping things simple, returning to it’s roots and offering up very well done fan service turned out to be a winning formula but fans would need a lot of convincing to give the movie a chance. Sadly every franchise movie is deeply impacted by the one before it, which mean this movie was always really going to be about fixing things than profit, so a win here is basically not losing money and getting a positive reception and the movie achieved both. Bringing in $177.5m may not sound that great but with $121.2m of that domestic and a production budget of only $75m that is enough to push the movie in to the black and make around $18m in profit. Whether the next movie in the franchise can draw serious money now that the fans are happy again remains to be seen, but overall I’d mark this down as a win.

The Other Half Of The Story

A similar win comes in the form of “Dune”, a movie that was always a big question mark. While Frank Herbert’s epic series of novels are well known to hardcore science fiction fans, to the general audience it probably seemed like a drier, less exciting rip off of Star Wars (Ironically the Star Wars was heavily inspired by Dune, but most theatre goers don’t know this). To make things more challenging the movie is only part of the story of the first book and the studio were not willing to commit to filming part two simultaneously, which meant they had to convince the audience to go and watch half a movie, without an guarantee to ever complete the story. On top of this, the movie was pushed out to streaming simultaneously with the theatrical release. Odds were against the movie and many people, including myself felt the production was doomed. It doesn’t help that director Denis Villeneuve is pretty divisive as a director with as many people hating his previous movie, “Blade Runner 2049” as loving it and that movie failing to draw even at the box office.

However despite all that, positive word of mouth and some solid trailers stirred up the audience and the movie ended up bringing in a respectable $394.6m globally against it’s $165m production budget. That pushed the movie over the finishing line and fortunately it has now been greenlit for the second part. It’s hard to say at this stage whether the franchise will expand as much as was originally intended (With multiple movies and TV shows pencilled in) but at the very least we should see the completion of the first novel and I will be eagerly looking forward to it’s 2023 release date.

Another success story of the year was “F9: The Fast Saga”, despite being openly mocked for how ridiculous the movie was it did draw in a very strong box office of $721.3m and though most of that was international (meaning a smaller cut for the studio) it still generated a healthy profit against the movies $200m-$225m budget. The overall negative reaction though may leave the next movie in a difficult situation. Not that there are really any more sharks for this franchise to jump, but maybe they’ll introduce time travel and have the team race dinosaurs or something.

And the Winner Is…

While Sony did well with Venom and Ghostbusters this year, we can’t really talk about the company without mentioning the complete obliteration of the box office this year that happened at the hands of our friendly neighbourhood web crawler. “Spider-Man: No Way Home” delivered on all it promised and more and absolutely smashed the box office with a run that may yet see it hit the $2 billion mark or at least fall not too short of it. Currently sitting at $1.2b globally after only two weeks and with many global markets still to open the sky is the limit for Peter Parker and Sony. Disney get a big chunk of this profit too thanks to their deal with Sony (and more importantly for them they get 100% of the merchandise sales), but both companies have no doubt noted that this movie has outperformed the previous three MCU movies combined box office and done it just as the new Covid variant is tearing through the world. Indeed some global markets are completely shut down right now and yet this movie is making “End Game” numbers.

While financially that is great for Sony and Disney it must leave Marvel questioning just why the rest of this years output performed so weakly by comparison. The truth to that is most likely just that Black Widow was too little too late, finally giving a movie to one of the original Avengers after that character has been killed on screen. That Shang-Chi, despite the film itself is a D List character that people that don’t read the comics likely never heard of before and the Eternals are obscure characters even for those that do regularly read comics and simply had the wrong people writing and directing it. With characters that obscure you really need someone like James Gunn that can bring out the personalities and make the relatable. It’s pretty clear moving forward that Marvel needs to get some big guns out to make up for the loss of so many of the original team. That means getting The Fantastic Four out and figuring out what to do with the X-Men. They also need to cling on to Spidey like their lives depend on it! Sony meanwhile are laughing all the way to the bank.

2021 Year in Review – Part I : Fan Service

Posted on December 27, 2021August 24, 2023 by fenrisfil

2021 has been another difficult year both for people and for the movie industry. Studios weren’t really confident in their own movie’s ability to pull in an audience and many chose to send movies simultaneously to streaming. In this environment no one was really sure how to judge a movies success or failure. However by the end of the year we have had a clear indication thanks to Spider-Man that people will brave new Covid variants to see something that they are excited for. The trouble is there was a lot out this year that people clearly were not excited for. So what lessons have we learned this year? I think one of the big ones is the benefit of doing fan service in the right way. As we saw last year with “Sonic The Hedgehog” (2020), listening to fan criticism can result in a big win. This time around we have two big examples of doing things the right way.

Note, minor spoilers ahead for things you probably already know by now.

Getting the Band Back Together

The first is “Ghostbusters: Afterlife”, a cautious but heartfelt attempt to correct the many mistakes made by the 2016 franchise reboot and introduce a new generation to the concept of busting ghosts. The movie was made relatively cheaply which likely is why the setting is a small remote town instead of New York and the plot was kept simple, essentially being a rehash of the first movie. But what the movie did right was being a continuation of the classic movies, treating the original with respect (and a lot of love) and giving the surviving OG crew a meaningful reunion. But while doing that it also introduced new characters, provided diversity in the right way (naturally, balanced and without virtue signalling) and set up for the franchises future.

The movie wasn’t perfect, but it managed to leave fans of the original happy and win over new young fans. Despite this the damage done to the franchise by the previous movie meant the opening weekend wasn’t fantastic. However, the strong legs generated by word of mouth saw this film make a healthy profit in the end. One of the things to note here is the difference between how this movie referenced the originals and how the 2016 movie did that. here these elements are all worked directly into the plot and even the clunkiest of references (Stay Puffed) feels like it is actually part of the story. Meanwhile 2016 would pretty much stop the movie to show us an Easter egg and then throw it aside and move on.

Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner

But following on from that success was the biggest winner of the year: “Spider-Man: No Way Home”. A movie that delivered on many levels, not just in providing fan service but also in providing a great deal of redemption for all three branches of this franchise (past and present). The biggest success though is the phenomenal box office. At the time of writing this, in the movies second week it has crossed the billion dollar mark at the box office. Something many people thought was impossible in a pandemic year and it did it in the winter, with a new variant out and with many theatres having to cope with additional restrictions (or complete lock downs). The movie also currently doesn’t have a China release making it’s global haul even more impressive.

But the danger with this movie is that Hollywood learns the wrong lessons. It wasn’t simply having cameos that made it a success but in the way they were used. The old favourites were treated respectfully and had personalities consistent with their past appearances and their on screen character development in those movies. But at the same time they did not overshadow the movies actual star. That’s not to say the movie did all the cameos perfectly. Doctor Strange definitely got the short straw here, but this wasn’t a Doctor Strange movie and perhaps his own sequel due out next year will provide him some redemption.

The Right Way and the Wrong Way

There is a right and a wrong way to do cameos. Both these movies make for an obvious comparison with Disney’s Star Wars sequels. Those movies deliberately kept Han Solo, Luke Skywalker and Princess Leia apart and minimised their roles so as to not get in the way of the new characters. The movie gave them characters inconsistent with their previous appearances, whereas No Way Home presented past characters consistent with their own character development and provided them further development and redemption for past mistakes. But most importantly it brought them all together and this was a meeting we never even knew we wanted.

Meanwhile Afterlife brought together all the original team, gave them off screen character progression consistent with their established personalities and gave the fans the moment they’ve been looking forward to for decades. Neither of these movies overshadowed the new characters with the old, indeed Afterlife kept the original crew out of the majority of the movie. See you can give the audience want they want, be respectful and consistent with the original and still have your focus on the future.

A good example of a movie that didn’t get the right way to do fan service from 2021 would be Halloween Kills. The movie featured almost a who’s who of characters from the first movie and made endless references to both that movie and Halloween 2, which the previous movie had retconned out of existence. The trouble is none of these characters or references were really meaningful, they were just there and most of them got in the way of the story they were trying to tell. This reminded me a bit of the 2016 Ghostbusters reboot that really felt like they wrote their movie and then went through it and dropped cameos and references in randomly. Both movies felt detached the originals and insincere.

Final Thoughts

Two final thoughts about fan service: It is important to know the difference between what the majority of fans want and what is just a handful of people on social media. When you are talking about respecting the previous instalments and/or source material it is likely the majority. When you are looking at “Shipping” (i.e. romantic relationships between two characters that aren’t currently romantically involved or even hinted at having that kind of connection) or other demands for radical change away from the source material it is probably just a handful of people being very vocal and should be ignored. The Sonic complaints for instant were all about making the character looking more like he did in the games instead of the creepy looking thing that was first put forward. It was safe to assume that the majority of fans agreed.

Finally, you can still create something new while respecting the past, just look at Cobra Kai, that series has been running for a few years now, is radically different to the Karate Kid movies and yet has respectful and consistent portrayals of both the characters and the past events of the movies. They introduce new characters and they let everything evolve on screen. The key thing here is “Show, don’t tell”. Even though a long time had past between seeing Daniel and Johnny in the movies and seeing them in the show their off screen progression was entirely logical and linear from where they left off, but once on screen they were able to take things in new directions. The same is true of Spiderman: No Way Home and to a lesser extent Ghostbusters: Afterlife, but where major events had happened (the team splitting up, it formed really the core of the entire story and really they did the best they could considering they had to explain why no one had been busting ghosts for 30+ years.]

So that’s the end of part one. I hope you enjoyed reading. See you with part two when I look at more of the years hits and misses.

Venom: Let There Be Carnage (2021)

Posted on December 22, 2021April 29, 2022 by fenrisfil

The sequel to 2018’s “Venom”, starring Tom Hardy as Eddie Brock, a down and out journalist Eddie Brock that stumbles upon an alien Symbiote and together they become Marvel Comics anti-hero “Venom”. This instalment introduces Venom’s arch Nemesis (Well, other than Spider-Man) Cletus Kassady/Carnage, played here by Woody Harrelson. The movie also sees Hardy gain a writing credit and has a change in the directors seat with Andy Serkis replacing Ruben Fleischer.

Despite the changes the movie isn’t that different to the last one and much like that the plot and pacing is reminiscent of 90’s Superhero movies. The action mostly takes place in the final act and the plot is kept very simple. The comedy however is very much keeping with the MCU style (Very character based on focused around the hero) and of course humour is always very subjective so those jokes may not land for everyone. For me it was about 50/50. The other element that dates this as a modern movie instead of something from the 90’s is the dominant focus on themes over plot or characterisations. Everything here is driven by the themes of personal relationships but the focus on specific relationships actually undermines a number of the characters and elements of the plot.

Eddie are you okay?

The main relationship focus of course is Eddie and Venom, (which also provides the vast majority of the comedic elements) and this is really just an expansion of the first movie. A lot of this plays out like a buddy cop movie where two mismatched personalities have to learn to get on to bring in a serial killer. Venom is the loose canon, while Eddie is the by the book guy (Well, compared to Venom anyway). There are basically two issues on the surface for the pair. The first is that Venom basically wants to be a Superhero and as part of this wants to eat a few heads. Eddie on the other hand isn’t interested in that and doesn’t want Venom going around killing people.

This isn’t especially dissimilar to their conflict in the previous movie. What is new though is their relationship with Anne (Michelle Williams), or rather the lack of it since they have gone their separate ways since the previous movie. If you recall at the end of that movie Eddie decided to keep Venom’s survival a secret from her, but it seems sharing a body with an alien symbiote may have been too much of a distraction for him. Venom, having previously bonded with her for a while too is naturally fond of her and sees Eddie as a failure for letting her go. It’s worth noting Eddies relationship with Anne is quite underplayed in favour of focusing on his one with the symbiote.

Out of the Black into the… Red?

Then there is Cletus’ relationships with his Carnage symbiote, with Brock and his love interest Shriek. These relationships sadly feel a lot more superficial. But then as a psychopath it’s not a surprise that most of his relationships are based on what others can do for him. He first sees Eddie as a means to enhance his notoriety, but when that backfires he sees him as a rival and a target for vengeance. When he bonds with the Carnage symbiote it’s pretty obvious what he is getting out of it and while on the surface the pair seem on the same page they never really have any affection for each other. Both are intent on using the other.

A key element of the story is compatibility and how first impressions don’t determine who is compatible and who is not. So while Venom and Eddie seem at odds, they actually care about each other and underneath are actually compatible while the Cletus and Carnage are basically the opposite. The problem here is this feels artificial. It is an arc that fit better in the first film and which really wasn’t the case in the comics, so here they had to find a way to artificially drive the two agents of chaos apart and this wedge is Shriek, the aforementioned love interest and easily the weakest character in the movie.

Make some noise!

Now in the comics Shriek does become an ally of Carnage, but the love story is new for this movie and significantly changes Cletus’ personality making him significantly less scary and more human, which wouldn’t be so bad except this isn’t really reflected in the actors performances and Shriek especially has very little to do in practice other drive the plot forward. It’s worth noting that this is a character with literally nothing to her outside of story elements directly related to events in this film. Outside of her relationship with Cassidy the only thing that drives her is the need for vengeance against a completely random cop that happened to shoot her after she tried to kill him, of course this cop happens to be Detective Mulligan, the one cop that is also investigate Brock and Cassidy. Outside of this she has no past, no drive and no personality. Ironically as they randomly decided to race swap the character, that meant taking away her pale goth girl look, which while not a substitute for personality would have at least made her more memorable. They did a similar thing with Domino in Deadpool 2 but that character had enough on screen personality to make her interesting without her iconic look.

Ask Not For Whom The Bell Tolls.

The action when it finally happens is solid too and though I know some have said the CGI wasn’t good, it looked perfectly fine for me. The church location for the finale leads to a number of cool visuals and set pieces and the two symbiotes certainly go at it! There’s also a number of cool visuals prior to the confrontation. There is a mid and post credits scene as is the tradition for Marvel movies these days. One lays the groundwork for Venom 3, while the other will no doubt get viewers excited… until they find out it basically leads nowhere. This one is basically a Marvel One Shot in two parts split between mid-credits scenes in two movies. In itself it is fun, but it teases a lot more than it delivers. One last thing about the credits… damn that music is awful. Really awful. Made it hard to stick through the credits for those scenes.

Anyway, key thing I think in all regards here is that if you liked the first movie you will probably like this. The movie is definitely entertaining, but given the importance of Carnage to the Venom story in the comics and the excellent casting of Harrelson in that role, this does feel a bit of a waste.

Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021)

Posted on December 17, 2021April 29, 2022 by fenrisfil

This is a tricky movie to review without any kind of spoiler so I have decided that this review will avoid plot spoilers only, but WILL reveal who is actually in the movie because I don’t think this can be properly reviewed without this and I feel like the surprise (or disappointment) is something people would want to know about in advance and does not ruin the film. Plus it is easiest to do a review here that avoids plot spoilers by focusing on the characters as this is very much a character movie.

You have been warned! I won’t be revealing this off the bat however and I’ll give you plenty of warning before I make the reveal.

So first up let’s go over the basics. This is the third MCU Spider-Man movie, the sixth MCU movie with Spider-Man in, the Eighth live action Spider-Man movie in general and the eleventh live action superhero movie with the character. For those keeping track, Batman has only nine, ten if you include his cameo in Suicide Squad and Eleven if you also include the 60’s TV movie. Suffice to say Spider-Man has quite the on screen legacy and unlike Batman all those movies are within the last 20 years.

Say No Go.

All incarnations of Peter Parker have been successful on screen and have had their own uniqueness to them. Tom Holland’s version of the character is no exception and his movies tend to hit the billion dollar mark. Not a huge shock given that Spider-Man is the most popular hero globally (WIthin the US Batman probably still takes that honour, but not by much and the only other hero near either of them is Superman). He is also my favourite hero and probably the one I have read the most of in the comics. MCU Spider-Man does attract a lot of well deserved criticism however due to how different he has become from the comics. It doesn’t help that his supporting cast is almost unrecognisable, but probably the biggest issue is his origin and I don’t mean the spider bite, I mean Uncle Ben.

See the MCU’s Parker doesn’t have an Uncle Ben, or at least if he did the man died before Peter gained his powers. He also has a considerably younger and well protected Aunt May that he doesn’t have to spend time worrying about too much. Instead of this as motivation he was given an attachment to Tony Stark as a mentor and felt that loss strongly. It was good character advancement but it made this Peter considerably different. I bring this up because it is probably the number one criticism that MCU Spider-Man gets and it does get somewhat addressed in this movie. There is definitely an element of course correction here.

Can U Keep a Secret?

Jon Watts is at the reins again with this instalment showing that Marvel is clearly happy with what he brings to the table and I think most fans are too. It’s worth noting he is attached for the MCU’s Fantastic Four movie so maybe there is reason to be hopeful. Chris McKenna and Erik Sommers also return as writers. Tom Holland of course returns as does his regular supporting cast including the not-so-popular Flash Thompson interpretation played by Tony Revolori who is basically just there to be the butt of a few jokes and Angourie Rice’s Betty Brant that does actually get a nice nod to her comic book counterpart in her brief cameo. Jon Favreau has a cameo but is less involved than in “Far from Home”. Zendaya, Jacob Batalon and Marisa Tomei however all play major parts in the story.

Joining the regulars is Benedict Cumberbatch’s Doctor Strange who plays a pivotal role (as seen in the trailer, Peter wants him to make people forget his secret identity), but actually isn’t in that much of the movie. First thing to bring up here is that he is not as irresponsible about the whole thing as he appeared in the trailer. Which is good because the Sorcerer Supreme shouldn’t be a reckless fool. If he is indeed the Sorcerer Supreme, which is something that seems to be up for debate. At the end of this movie they show a trailer for Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness and I have to say I wasn’t sold on that. However he is treated fairly respectfully here and his interactions with Peter are actually really cool.

Ghetto Thang.

His interaction with Michelle Jones is not so good thanks to that annoying “Please” line from the trailer. But as I usually find with with these movies Zendaya was far better in the movie itself than the trailer. For some reason they always seem to pick her smuggest, snarkiest lines in the trailers instead of any of her human moments which is something that doesn’t help to sell the character to people (and given the whole “MJ” bit, they do need to sell her). On a side note here, they did awkwardly force into dialogue randomly that her full name is Michelle Jones-Watson… yeah they totally didn’t need to do that and it had no bearing on anything (so I don’t regard it a spoiler) but I guess someone, somewhere is celebrating. She is actually fine though.

Ned Leeds is a trickier one to judge since he is part of an annoying plot contrivance. But to be fair that contrivance allowed him to do something other than just comic relief (Which lets face it is totally redundant in an MCU Spider-Man film. However they even turn that into comic relief so it’s not great and they missed a chance to give Ned a not to his comic book counterpart. He’s not terrible though so it’s fine.

Me Myself and I.

So the most important thing here is Peter Parker. As I mentioned above there is a very clear course correction going on in this film. It’s not perfect, but you couldn’t do this correction perfectly in Peter’s sixth MCU appearance. He’s got too much history. But I feel like they did this as well as they possibly could and I don’t say that lightly. It feels like the writers and director and maybe Marvel/Sony producers took on board the criticism and tried to adjust for this and I have to say I am impressed by Marvel actually listening to fans for a change.

The way the course adjustment is done is entirely through the story and Peter’s character development in the story. Sam Raimi once said his approach to the Spider-Man films was “What can Peter learn in this movie” and this really felt like it was the approach to this. By the end of the film Peter has changed from being “Iron Boy Junior” to genuinely feeling like Spider-Man and I could not be happier about that. Of course they can still mess this up later but we will see.

Okay, minor character spoilers ahead for the villains (these are all in the trailer, so no surprises).

Potholes in My Lawn.

All the villains you see in the trailer are the actual villains from their respective Spider-Man universes. This is important because they all manage to retain consistent characterisations from those movies. They really feel like direct continuations of the same characters. Even more impressively most of them actually get character development! So perhaps unsurprisingly Alfred Molina’s Doc Ock and Willem Dafoe’s Green Goblin/Norman Osborn are the stand outs and as perhaps the two favourite villains from past movies they do justice to their previous appearances and characters and add to those movies instead of detract from them which was always the danger.

Jamie Foxx’s electro gets some redemption here too. Sadly Amazing Spider-Man 2 will probably go down in history as the worst Spider-Man movie, but here he is improved and he gets almost as much focus as the other two. Sandman (Thomas Haden Church) too gets some redemption though his part in Spider-Man 3 was generally considered the best bit anyway. Sadly though while he starts off consistent to his personality from that movie they seem to forget about that a bit in the middle. He and Lizard were always going to be the minor players in this but he did okay. Lizard on the other hand gets very little screen time and doesn’t add that much to the movie. He doesn’t detract from it either so there is that at least

So before we hit the reveal there is one other major cameo I’m not going to reveal because it is just one scene early in the film and you can probably guess it anyway. Suffice to say it was satisfying. I will tell you one cameo you will almost certainly miss though: Nicholas Hammond, the original live action Spider-Man from the 70’s TV series is in this movie. I’m not going to tell you where though!

CHARACTER SPOILER TIME!!!!!!!

The magic number.

The music for the films end credits is itself a spoiler for those characters. It is “The Magic Number” by De La Soul (At least I think it was the De La Soul track, it may have been another version of it or the original material used for the samples). Yep, the rumours were true Tobey and Andrew are both in this movie.

So I’m not going to talk too much about how they are involved but I will say they are key parts of the entire third act and all get both character and action moments. Each one is consistent to their past characters, but developed past the end of their final movies. Andrew-Spidey was of course deeply impacted by the death of Gwen Stacy and went somewhat to a dark place after that. He’s still got the wisecracking though that made many people call him the best Spider-Man (though they usually pair that with “Worst Peter Parker”).

Tobey-Spidey however seems to have found a good element of balance and happiness to his life and though he doesn’t talk about it (so it’s not a spoiler) they really seem to hint that he may well be happily married to Mary Jane much like he was in the comics before the dreaded “One More Day” storyline messed that up. Tobey as the older Spider-Man is getting a little worn physically but he can still get the job done.

Buddy!

One of the best things here is the interaction between the three Peter’s. It’s respectful of each, though also acknowledges basically all the fan criticism. That in one place felt a bit like they were dumping on the AMS films but they restrained the mocking to things most people mocked and remained respectful of Andrew’s Spider-Man. They also talked about Tobey not needing web shooters, which turned into a fun moment. As far as Tom-Spidey goes they were careful not to diminish him too much by throwing in the other two (Especially with Tobey being such a fan favourite). They acknowledged Tom’s strengths and how his experience working with the Avengers makes him unique (Who have only worked solo, or briefly with one other)..

Perhaps the best bit though is that Tobey and Andrew both get on screen character development too and in ways that reference their own past and things that would have weighed on their consciences. This is the strength of this movie in general. All the main characters (The three Peters and three main villains) all get character arcs that really work for them. I also have to give Andrew dues for putting in a really good performance, giving him a lot of vindication for having to suffer through the bad writing on his solo outings.

3 Feet High and Rising.

Okay so while this movie is strong for character development, it actually isn’t especially outstanding on the action front. It’s not bad as such, but there isn’t really anything outstanding or ground breaking here, just lots of what you’ve seen before and in actual fact less impressive action than a lot of previous films. There are some great spectacles that no doubt make great screen shots (such as the one above), but it definitely suffers from the messy style of a lot of modern action where things are fast and hard to follow. To me though this didn’t really impact the film, this is a character movie with action and that is fine. What I will say is when you have all three Spider-Men involved in the action it can get a little confusing at times as to which is which.

Rating this movie is a tricky one. I don’t want to get too drawn in to nostalgia here, but as of right now I feel this is a solid 7.5. If you are a Spider-Man fan of ANY of the previous instalments, you will likely enjoy this movie. One final thought though: As I mentioned this movie has a lot of course corrections for the character, but I would just like to point out that if they hadn’t chosen to skip Peter’s origin story and the character development he has from that origin they wouldn’t have needed to spend three solo movies and three team movies to get Peter to a position he would have been in his first movie, had they shown that origin. So in future, maybe don’t be so fast to applaud skipping superhero origins. Remember it’s not important what made someone powerful, but it is important what made them a hero.

The Changeling (1980)

Posted on December 5, 2021December 5, 2021 by fenrisfil

Another review from my October Horrorthon, this time “The Changeling” from 1980. The movie is directed by Peter Medak (“The Krays”) and stars George C. Scott (“Dr. Strangelove”, “Patton”) as John Russel with support from Melvyn Douglas and Trish Van Devere.

John Russel, is a music professor, grieving the loss of his wife and daughter in a traffic accident. To get a clean start he moves to Seattle where he rents out a Victorian Mansion from an agent of the local history society, Claire Norman (Van Devere). It turns out the property has been vacant for twelve years and it appears to be haunted. After a number of unexplained events within the house John brings in some specialist in hauntings to try and communicate with the spectral presence that turns out to be the ghost of a young boy.

The first act is a pretty solid haunted house affair, with a nice steady build up to the discovery of a hidden attic bedroom and a music box that plays the same tune which John had previously “composed” earlier in the movie (under the influence of the house). Things change drastically though for the middle act which is more of a mystery thriller as John delves into the story of the child and the house and uncovers the dark secret of the Mansions former owner. The vengeful spirit gets back involved though in the final act where things are ramped up in a suitable fashion (and we get a few deaths to boot). As a horror the middle act breaks the tension a little too much, but it does allow for a far more interesting ghost story.

John is an interesting character with a very personal motivation for investigating ghosts and it gets even more personal when a séance (involving some ghost writing and EVP) reveals that the ghost is that of a murdered child. The problem though is that John as a little too calm about the whole thing while the vengeful spirit, despite the odd temper tantrum is focused solely on finding justice for what was done to him. For most of the film they are on the same page so once the mystery is in motion I never really felt John was in any danger in the house. The mystery surrounding the house and ghost however is very compelling and it is refreshing to see a haunting with a more complicated and nuanced story behind it.

This is a different kind of ghost story with the focus on the mystery instead of the horror and while the haunting elements do have their moments (Especially the child’s wheelchair moving itself around the house and a few things in the final act that I won’t spoil for you) it’s not especially scary or unsettling. The central mystery is directly linked to the name of the film and certainly provides a dramatic George C. Scott does a solid job in the lead role (especially as this is a movie very focused on it’s lead), but I would have liked to have seen a bit more made out of loss and how that relates to the plot of the film on an emotional and introspectional level. Overall though, this was an enjoyable movie.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xTzgXVosQOU

Sweet Smell of Success (1957)

Posted on November 30, 2021December 5, 2021 by fenrisfil

My final November Noir is a big one that I am long overdue for watching. This is “Sweet Smell of Success” from 1957. Adapted from Ernest Lehman’s novelette of the same name, this is a Noir Drama and one of those that may not be obvious as a Noir just from the synopsis but themes and style are very much in the genre.

Directed by Alexander Mackendrick (of Ealing Studios fame, having directed such movies as The Man in the White Suit (1951) and The Ladykillers (1955)), with double Oscar winning cinematographer James Wong Howe seeing to the visuals the legendary Elmer Bernstein providing the score. Add to that Tony Curtis and Burt Lancaster and this was always going to be a good one.

Curtis takes the lead as morally bankrupt press agent Sidney Falco, with Lancaster as the overbearing columnist J.J. Hunsecker, support is given by the beautiful Susan Harrison as Hunsecker’s sister Susan and Martin Milner as her love interest, Jazz guitarist Steve Dallas.

Sweet Sound of Success

The first thing that hits you right out of the gate is soundtrack that manages to be both explosive and sleazy at once with an instantly recognisable hook. This is a Bernstein soundtrack more along the line of “The Man with the Golden Arm” (1955) than his later work and it fits perfectly for this movie.

It’s worth noting the music for this movie isn’t entirely Bernstein as the film also featured music by the Chico Hamilton Quintet, itself quite a ground-breaking group as it featured Cello as a lead instrument. Though here much of the focus is the guitar due to it being the instrument of choice for key character Steve Dallas. This was the first movie to have two separate soundtrack releases one for Bernstein’s score and the other for the Quintets (Something that is commonplace today).

Sweet Look of Success

Accompanying the soundtrack in the intro are some fantastic bits of cinematography which lets the viewer know they are in for a treat as we briefly follow a newspaper run straight off the print, into trucks and to it’s final destination to the hands of Sidney Falco (Curtis).

This is a late period Noir and has a lot more polish than a lot of the genre, but it doesn’t move away from the classic shadow play. James Wong Howe’s style is certainly smoother and less claustrophobic than a lot of the genre but it works beautifully for this movie. Of particular note are the wide cityscapes that really capture Manhattan in the late 50’s.

Sweet Plot of Success

The premise is pretty straight forward on the surface. Falco has been asked by columnist J.J. Hunsecker to derail the romance of his younger sister that he is over protective of. Having failed to do so by the start of the movie Hunsecker has frozen him out of his column, which has cost him one of his clients. Hunsecker gives him a second chance, which allows Falco to come up with a scheme to manipulate the couple into ending their romance. The plan involves smearing the guitar player and forcing a confrontation between him and J.J. that paints Hunsecker as the injured party and forces his sister to stop seeing him. Of course things are never that straight forward.

What follows is a web of manipulation where morality and integrity become both a weakness to exploit and an obstacle to overcome. Falco stoops ever lower to achieve the bullying Hunsecker’s demands and eventually his ability to read and manipulate people fails him causing the whole web to unravel.

Sweet Themes of Success

This is a story about morality and how far people are willing to go to achieve their goals. But it’s also about denial and how people delude themselves that they aren’t being immoral. As Falco’s morality becomes more and more flexible he also becomes more and more defensive of his own motivations, most notably when he whores out a “friend” as a form of bribe and seems to be justifying it to himself more than her that it is for her good.

His plan to break up the couple hinges on using Dallas’ morality against him, but while he reads the guitarist like a book he fails to read either of the Hunsecker’s reaction to situation and between them his fate is sealed. By the movies conclusion he is well aware of how far he has fallen but yet doesn’t seem willing to accept any of the blame himself. Rest assured though this is the 50’s so naturally he won’t escape punishment.

While Falco is still descending in his morality, Lancaster’s Hunsecker has already reached the point where he can no longer tell how far he has fallen. Indeed after having achieved his goals he is so insulted by being called out for what he really is by Dallas that he pushes his luck just a little too far. Indeed he sees the attack on his moral fibre to be an attack on his readers. He has bought into his own hype, he sees his view as moral and Steve’s as immoral. Really, this is a very accurate portrayal of Journalist. On one side willing to stoop to any depth to achieve his ends but on the other seeing himself as a true pillar of the community.

All told this is a superb movie. Curtis and Lancaster nail their roles, the dialogue is superb, the plot appears simple on the surface but sees it’s share of twists and turns, the themes are strong throughout, the characters believable and compelling and the movie looks and sounds great. Definitely well worth seeing.

The Crooked Way (1949)

Posted on November 24, 2021November 24, 2021 by fenrisfil

Tonight’s November Noir is 1949’s “The Crooked Way”, directed by Robert Florey and staring John Payne (Kansas City Confidential) as Eddie Rice a WW2 Veteran with a piece of shrapnel in his brain that has caused him permanent amnesia. Support comes from Sonny Tufts as crime boss Vince Alexander, Ellie Drew as Nina Martin, Eddies ex-wife and Rhys Williams as Police Lt. Joe “You’ll hear from me later” Williams. The movie is based on the radio play “No Blade Too Sharp”.

Our story begins as Eddie heads back to Los Angeles with the hope of bumping into someone that knows him. That seems quite hopeful but he is recognised the moment he exits the train station by local law enforcement. He soon discovers he was previously known as Eddie Riccardi, a key figure in organised crime in the area. Through a series of additional encounter he comes to realise he turned states evidence on the local crime boss Vince Alexander to avoid jail time himself. Suffice to say Vince is not happy to hear about Eddies return, neither is his ex wife.

The Amnesiac’s Way

Interestingly this is not the only Film Noir to feature an amnesia plot for a war veteran with 1946’s Somewhere in the Night having a similar start but going in a very different direction. Sadly I’ve not seen that movie yet so a direct comparison will have to wait. What I can say is this movie had a lower budget and was considered brutal by comparison. Indeed critics of the day took issue with the violence, though of course by todays standards that violence is pretty tame.

The idea of memory loss as a plot device is always pretty compelling. To not know ones own past instantly creates a mystery and makes the protagonist sympathetic as he learns everything the same time as the viewer and when that protagonist’s past is dark it creates interesting moral questions such as are there some things it is better not to know and how much guilt should one have for misdeeds you don’t even remember doing? Despite the set up this film is a bit more direct in how Eddie copes with these things but to be fair as a Soldier (and a war hero) he is not the kind of person to run from his responsibilities. Instead he tackles them head on. This leads to being framed for murder and on the run with both the police and the local crime boss gunning for him.

The Noir Way

This is a fast paced noir with a lot of action for the genre, making it seem more like a 30’s gangster movie in places, but the themes (specifically being unable to escape a dark past or a terrible future), the camera work and lighting are very much of the Noir genre. The cinematography is creative, with lots of unusual angles, close ups and wide shots (All very common in the genre, but used heavily here). Perhaps because of the low budget the lighting is played very much on the dark side with a lot of emphasis on shadows, in some cases getting more of the screen than the actors that are casting them. I have to say, I loved the visuals in this movie it was a really highlight and as far as the use of darkness goes it reminds me just how much better they were in the 40’s and 50’s at using it in artist ways while still allowing the viewer to actually see what was going on. These days, it’s basically the opposite.

The restrained use of music in The Crooked Way is interesting too. It is used sparingly to ramp up tension when anticipating a major event, but completely absent in a lot of the movie including for most of the final shoot out. Again this was probably for budgetary reasons but what is there works well and this is actually an excellent example of how creative directors in the 40’s and 50’s could be with limited resources. The story is pretty simple really effectively just leading Eddie from one violent encounter to the next as he tries to make sense of things. The actors for their part do a fine job but not really stood out as anything special to me. The ending was a little disappointing in it’s convenience and largely coming out of nowhere. Really this is a film made on the back of it’s strong visuals and rapid pacing rather than the story itself or the actors performances. Overall it’s a solid Noir.

There’s no trailer for this movie (that I can find) so here is a random scene. You can also watch the whole movie via archive.org.