By John Seal
February 17-23, 2003
From the obscure to the obscurest to the merely overlooked or underappreciated - they all have a home in the Tivoplex! All times PST.
Monday 02/17/03
1:15 AM Cinemax
TwentyFourSeven (1997 GB): One of the better low-budget British kitchen sink dramas of recent years, TwentyFourSeven treads some pretty familiar territory - local man tries to save the kids from a life of crime - but has a game cast, including Bob Hoskins as a boxing trainer with a heart of gold. Particularly good is Danny Nussbaum (later the young man absurdly para-dropped into Serbia in 2000's Beautiful People) as an aimless young man who answers the call of the squared circle. Director and co-writer Shane Meadows went on to make the critically acclaimed Room For Romeo Brass and the popular Once Upon A Time in the Midlands, still awaiting a U.S. release. Also airs at 4:15 AM.
1:30 AM Black Starz
Last of the Mississippi Jukes (2002 USA): This original documentary was produced for Black Starz by Robert Mugge, also responsible for Hellhounds on My Trail: The Afterlife of Robert Johnson and Deep Blues. Chronicling the 30-year history of the Subway Lounge in Jackson, Mississippi, this film includes plenty of music by local blues musicians as well as nationally known performers such as Alvin Youngblood Hart and Chris Thomas King. Juke joints were once a ubiquitous part of the Southern landscape, and this film makes a small contribution to keeping their cultural heritage alive. Also airs 2/20 at 10:45 AM and 5:00 PM and 2/21 at 3:00 AM.
5:00 AM More Max
Hit! (1973 USA): Hit! is an ambitious mixture of action and character study. At 134 minutes, one might suspect director Sidney J. Furie of overweening pride, but in fact there's little in the way of flab here. Billy Dee Williams proves that he should have been a major star, and Richard Pryor is brilliant as always. Add a terrific supporting cast (Warren Kemmerling, Paul "They Came From Within" Hampton, Sid Munson), a host of slimy French drug dealers, and a heaping dollop of revenge for a thoroughly satisfying blast of '70s-style crime dramatics. Also airs, curiously, at 7:15 AM: immediately after this showing!
Tuesday 02/18/03
9:00 AM Fox Movies
Pickup On South Street (1953 USA): This tough-as-nails take on communist subversion in Cold War America is one of the few films dealing with that theme, and from that period, that remains watchable. Director Samuel Fuller was always at his best with morally compromised characters, and he has one of the best in this film's Richard Widmark character, a petty criminal who gets sucked into intrigue and espionage. The film's heartbeat belongs, of course, to the wonderful Thelma Ritter, excellent as always as Moe, a stool pigeon who comes to an unfortunate end.
3:00 PM Turner Classic Movies
Dial 'M' For Murder (1981 USA): I'm including this one more out of curiosity than anything else. The fourth (!) made-for-TV remake of Hitchcock's 1954 film was shot in Britain and features a pretty good cast, though Angie Dickinson doesn't seem quite up to the task of stepping into Grace Kelly's pumps. With support from Christopher Plummer in the Ray Milland role, Anthony Quayle as Inspector Hubbard, and Ron Moody as Captain Swan, I can't imagine this being less than entertaining, even if it doesn't measure up to its worthy antecedent.
5:00 PM Turner Classic Movies
Gold Diggers of 1933 (1933 USA): I've never been a big fan of movie musicals, but I make an exception for this one and 42nd Street. Gold Diggers is simply prime Depression-era brilliance, with magnificent production numbers, terrific songs, and a marvelous cast, including Warren William, Aline MacMahon, Dick Powell (whose singing doesn't repulse me for once), Ruby Keeler, Joan Blondell, and character actors Ned Sparks and Guy Kibbee. The scene that always sticks with me is the Pettin' in the Park number, featuring Billy Barty as a baby in a rain slicker!!
Directed with joie de vivre by Mervyn LeRoy, this is one of the great, unheralded delights of the Warners catalogue. It's followed at 7:00 PM by Gold Diggers of 1935, a less successful but still watchable sequel that brought back Powell opposite Gloria Stuart, who's still steaming somewhere about not winning that Academy Award for Titanic.
Wednesday 02/19/03
5:15 AM Black Starz
Public Enemy (1999 USA-FRA-BEL-GER): No, it's neither a remake of the 1931 crime classic nor a documentary about the popular rap group, though it's closer to the latter than the former. This documentary about the Black Panther Party includes interviews with many of the usual suspects - including Bobby Seale (I once received a phone call asking me if I was Bobby's brother!), Kathleen Cleaver, Nile Rodgers, and Noam Chomsky - and serves nicely as a European complement to the excellent American-made All Power to the People! (2001). Also airs at 8:30 PM.
10:30 AM Turner Classic Movies
Five Star Final (1931 USA): Another terrific Mervyn Leroy Warner's film, Five Star Final finds the director back in more familiar hard-boiled territory. Starring Edward G. Robinson as a ruthless newspaper editor out to get the big scoop regardless of the pain inflicted on the subjects of the story, this is an indictment of journalism's tendency for sensationalism - still, unsurprisingly, a problem seventy years later. His costars include 18-year-old Marian Marsh, still with us today, as well as H. B. Warner, Aline MacMahon (again!), and Boris Karloff (pre-Frankenstein) as Robinson's hatchet man.
5:00 PM Fox Movies
Violent Saturday (1955 USA): Thanks to Fox Movies we can now see the widescreen version of Violent Saturday. It's a terrific, tense crime drama that must have been somewhat controversial in 1955. Certainly the onscreen violence is stronger than anything else I've seen from the period, except possibly Richard Widmark shoving the wheelchair down the stairs in Kiss of Death (1947 USA). There are definitely some hints of the future Hollywood of Sam Peckinpah - the sadistic Lee Marvin grinding a little boy's hand into the ground, and a bearded Ernest Borgnine using a pitchfork on Lee towards the end of the film - which is surprising from a director generally as non-controversial as Richard Fleischer. Screenwriter Sydney Boehm was responsible for gritty films like The Big Heat (1953 USA) and Rogue Cop (1954 USA), so I expect we must blame him for coarsening the cultural atmosphere and poisoning the artistic well. Do William Bennett and Lynne Cheney know about this guy?
Thursday 02/20/03
12:45 AM Flix
Joyride (1977 USA): This road movie is an under-appreciated example of the genre and stars a 20-year-old Melanie Griffith before she became incredibly annoying. Griffith plays a young woman who heads off on a road trip to Alaska with her good buddies Desi Arnaz, Jr. and Robert Carradine (always the least appreciated and most talented brother, in my opinion). They hit some speed bumps on the way and turn to a life of crime. Complications ensue.
1:00 AM Turner Classic Movies
The Bad and the Beautiful(1952 USA): From 1933's Death Kiss to Robert Altman's The Player, there's always been a small niche in cinema for movies about movies - and how everyone in the movie business is a corrupt louse. In this one Kirk Douglas plays a movie producer (supposedly based on David O. Selznick) who gets to the top on the backs of his actors and screenwriters, played here by Lana Turner, Walter Pidgeon, and Dick Powell (hello again, Dick!). Gloria Grahame won the Best Supporting Actress Academy Award for her performance as Powell's wife and the film also took home gongs for Black and White Cinematography (Oklahoma Crude's Robert Surtees) and Screenplay (Charles Schnee). It's not quite in the same league as Sunset Boulevard and hasn't aged as well, but for those who get a kick out of swimming with the Hollywood sharks, this is a must-see.
Friday 02/21/03
1:00 AM Turner Classic Movies
The Wilby Conspiracy (1975 RSA-USA): I really love this all but forgotten caper film, shot in South Africa during Apartheid's heyday. It's basically an Afrikaaner version of The Defiant Ones, with Michael Caine and Sidney Poitier filling the buddy roles as an engineer and a political activist on the run (for different reasons) from the South African police. If you want to see a textbook example of film villainy, you need look no further than Nicol Williamson's sadistic Major Horn, who is guaranteed to get you hissing the TV set with each appearance. The film also features Saeed Jaffrey and Persis Khambata (looking very beautiful) as an Indian couple caught up in the escape attempt (an unusual bit of recognition for South Africa's frequently silent Asian minority) and Rutger Hauer as another Boer baddie. Nicely filmed in Panavision, intelligently written, and marvelously scored by the great Stanley Myers, The Wilby Conspiracy deserves a larger audience and a better reputation.
4:00 PM Encore Mystery
Pushover (1954 USA): Fred MacMurray stars in this Columbia noir about a policeman sucked into corruption by a fallen woman (Kim Novak, in her first credited film role). Atypically directed by Richard Quine - usually behind the camera for comedies or musicals - this is a low budget delight for fans of the genre.
7:00 PM Sundance
Take Care of My Cat (1998 ROK): The speculative pick of the week. How can I possibly ignore a film with the title Take Care of My Cat? Detailing the lives and coming-of-age experiences of five South Korean teenage girls, the "cat" actually only appears on text-messages, getting traded back and forth between the characters. Not sure what to expect here, but this is definitely one for the adventurous moviegoer.
7:30 PM IFC
Cube (1997 CAN): It can't really supply a satisfactory conclusion, but until it gets to the final reel, Cube is a thoroughly satisfying existential exercise masquerading as science fiction. A group of strangers stranded in a maze of interconnecting cubes try to fathom a way out whilst coming to terms with why they're in the maze in the first place. No Exit, anyone?
Saturday 02/22/03
3:00 AM Encore Mystery
Escape In the Fog (1945 USA): Another low-budget Columbia programmer, this 62 minute bill-filler was helmed by cult western director Budd Boetticher and stars Nina Foch as a nurse recovering from a nervous breakdown. As she emerges from the fog of her despair, her dreams of murder start to become distressingly real. Watch for Shelley Winters in an uncredited role as a taxi driver.
3:30 PM Fox Movies
Celebration At Big Sur (1971 USA): The music isn't exactly my bag, but the film is so darn rare I had to include it! A documentary filmed at the 1969 Big Sur music festival, the emphasis is on folk music, but there are enough popular names here to warrant a look-see: Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young; Mimi Farina, Joni Mitchell, Edwin Hawkins (a bit out of place!), John Sebastian, and Joan Baez (ack!). For fans of the music, this is a terrific opportunity to see a film that has never been released on video. For me, I'm hoping to see as little Joan Baez and as much Neil Young as possible. Also airs 2/23 at 5:30 AM.
Sunday 02/23/03
Sweet Smell of Success (1957 USA): If Five Star Final and The Bad and the Beautiful didn't sate your appetite for films exploring the sordid underbelly of success and celebrity, here's the best of the bunch: Alexander Mackendrick's bitter satire of making it in the Big Apple. In my opinion, this is Burt Lancaster's best role, an opportunity for him to play against type as the cold-blooded columnist J. J. Hunsecker. Tony Curtis is also outstanding as the sycophantic Sidney Falco, the mother of all yes men. The two of them own this film, playing off each other to vicious perfection. New York City is a luminous presence in the film, filmed to black and white perfection by James Wong Howe, and there's a terrific jazzy score by Elmer Bernstein. It's hard to imagine how this film garnered zero Academy Award nominations.
9:00 PM Turner Classic Movies
Old San Francisco (1927 USA): Things have come to a pretty pass when this film appears on the schedule and my only reaction is "they're showing that again?" Yes, TCM has spoiled us all, but just because this silent is making its third appearance on the network in the last five years is no reason to sink into a state of despondency. After all, this is one of the least racially sensitive and most politically incorrect films you can imagine, guaranteed to get your jaw dropping and your blood boiling. Starring Warner Oland as a treacherous 'half-breed' out to corrupt the flower of American womanhood, Old San Francisco remains an eye-opener, reminding viewers of the way things were not so long ago in the bad old days.
10:45 PM Encore Mystery
Olivier Olivier (1991 FRA): I recommended this one last week, took my own advice, and came away impressed. Taking place in the languid reaches of the French countryside, the film stars Faye Gatteau and Emmanuel Morozof as a rather unpleasant and constantly feuding couple whose two children escape from the parental sparring by living a fantasy life amongst the bucolic greenery. All is well until the younger child disappears in the course of running an errand, at which point the father relocates to Chad (apparently there's a veterinary shortage there). Bereft of their men-folk, the mother and daughter grudgingly carry on together, until one day the prodigal son turns up on the doorstep, discovered by a Parisian policeman during a crime sweep. The family takes him in and the father returns from his sojourn in Africa, but even with the apparent normalcy back in place things aren't quite as simple as they seem, and doubts about the now teenaged son's identity begin to emerge. The story occasionally gets sidetracked unnecessarily (I didn't understand the levitation subplot myself) and the conclusion is a disappointment, ending the film on a decidedly un-metaphysical note, but overall this is a very fine piece of work by Polish émigré Angnieszka Holland.
