Lorenz1060 Reviews

The Zone of Interest (2023)

Just another day in the neighbourhood ... of Auschwitz

[1/10 · 11 March 2024]

I live in a country which was occupied by Hitler for seven years. A concentration/extermination camp was erected in our country, and it remains a mandatory visit for all schoolchildren. I have visited it as well as others. I have visited Jewish cemeteries across Central Europe which are now overgrown and literally falling apart because there is no one left to visit them or provide upkeep. I have been to the Kehlsteinhaus - Hitler's Eagles' Nest - and stood in rooms in which some of the most heinous decisions made by man - to date - were made.

I offer only factual descriptions because if I start writing about my emotional experiences I will never stop.

Jean-Luc Godard famously said that films have a beginning, a middle, and an end, but not necessarily in that order. This ... I don't know what to call it but it certainly is not cinema ... this thing has none of those.

I never though the Holocaust could be so utterly, so meaninglessly trivialised. If that was his goal, Mr Glazer has succeeded.

Just a word about me: I am not Jewish - I am, in fact, an atheist - but I will still wear a yarmulke or somehow cover my head when visiting a Jewish cemetery; I do this out of respect and common decency.

20 Days in Mariupol (2023)

This is still happening in 2024 and our world no longer cares

[10/10 · 26 January 2024]

If you are a human being alive in 2024 and living in a civilised country, this is mandatory viewing. If your government is blocking aide to Ukraine, get on the phone to your representatives every day, make noise, donate what you can to approved organisations (Red Cross, etc), demonstrate (peacefully), wear the colours of Ukraine, and NEVER let anyone forget what is happening there.

For two years I wear a pin with the Ukraine colours every day, and strangers come to me and shake my hand, or share a "Slava Ukraini"! With me.

What is currently happening with funding from the richest countries in the world drying up for internal political reasons is the biggest sin I have witnessed in my lifetime.

Share this film with everyone you know!

Anatomy of a Fall (2023)

There is a difference between not liking a film and wanting to punch someone

[1/10 · 7 January 2024]

I somehow feel that I can't write objectively about "Anatomie d'une chute" as I have rarely encountered a film, an opera staging, a play, that I hated so thoroughly that it so angered me to the point that I wanted to do damage to something.

Please do not let my overall feelings contribute to your decision to see it or not if an opportunity comes your way. I mean, it did win the Palm d'Or and will, I think, land Oscar nominations for Picture, Actress, and Screenplay, and it has a rating of 96% "fresh" at Rotten Tomatoes. And, I must say that Sandra Hüller gives an extraordinary performance. Those, however, are not reasons for me to screen a film or give it a second try, or tell you not to see it. Judge for yourselves.

All that being said: I must warn you that there is, at the two-hour mark (of its excruciatingly slow 150 minutes) an extended scene involving violence to a dog so graphic that I thought I might vomit. I damned near shut it off, but having gotten through 4/5 of it, my hidden inner masochist demanded that I give it a chance to see the denouement (of which there is none).

I am now going to have a long cuddle session with my special-needs cat (three legs and 16 toes) and then go kick something inanimate or break my knuckles as I bang them into a wall.

Just FYI: I confess to being an Art House geek. I screened 402 films in 2023 going back to 1917 (The Golden Age of Scandinavian silent films!) and I doubt seriously if any of them played at cineplexes anywhere, ever.

The Killer (2023)

Not what you think it is

[10/10 · 4 January 2024]

I screened David Fincher's "The Killer" tonight, which is just sublime. It is NOT, however, an "action", "adventure" or "crime" film as labelled by IMDb. While it may have some elements of those genres, it is a deeply moving, sarcastic, soul-probing character study. The score consists almost entirely of songs by The Smiths, played by the title character in a perfectly calibrated performance by Michael Fassbender. There are wildly funny moments. In her 10 minutes onscreen (less?), second-billed Tilda Swinton, who makes a very, very, very, very, very late entrance, is in absolute top form, and tells a joke so funny I had to stop the film to recover from laughter. She also has all-time great Last Words.

This is not a film for action movie fans. Those who like cerebral, deep screenplays which keep you thinking throughout and after, this is a great surprise and gift from Fincher.

Maestro (2023)

Keep looking for Lenny because you won't find him here

[1/10 · 30 December 2023]

I kept looking for the man who I saw on TV, in his legendary shows to introduce kids to classical music, and who I saw conduct at Lincoln Center's new Philharmonic Hall (which had horrid acoustics and since has been gutted and rebuilt twice and renamed twice), and at the Metropolitan Opera. My dad still has the first-ever complete recordings of the Mahler symphonies: Lenny and the NY Philharmonic (from the 1960s; not his horrid 1980s Mahler recordings with the Vienna Philharmonic used in the movie), which has about 12 LPs packaged in a binder with sleeves each holding one disc, tucked into a black monolithic sleeve decorated with a faux bronze medallion of Mahler - I grew up with this! I read an early bio and did an oral book report on him in fifth grade. I even saw Felicia in a mime role in an opera at the Met.

Late in his life, I met Lenny several times through a mutual friend, a young conductor. If anything, the constant cloud of cigarette smoke was underplayed in the movie.

This could have been any "lavender wedding" story. In fact, there was just a TV/streaming series about one called "Fellow Travelers" which ALSO had Matt Bomer, who I guess will now be the de facto face of the LGBTIQ+ community in film, as anything from a secret boyfriend to an ego-maniacal man who destroys everyone in sight.

But where was Lenny? I kept looking for him, but all I could see was the massive, egregiously overextended ego of Bradley Cooper, who sounded like he had lifetime massive nasal congestion.

If you are looking for a film about Bernstein, the great conductor of great music, or his true life as a politically active gay man (he was highly condemned for hosting a party for the Black Panthers in 1970), this ain't it.

Bradley: if ya gotta make another movie, please ration the unrelenting close-ups!

Passages (2023)

Too bad the title "Repulsion" has already been taken

[1/10 · 30 December 2023]

As a gay man who, more than 50 years ago, was marching in the streets of New York City for Gay Liberation (it was called that before it became commercialised as Pride), it sickens me to think that I did all that to pave the way for this kind of film. The script is appalling, the acting even worse, particularly from Rogowski. I hated everything about this mess, from the meaningless, vapid sex scenes down to the costumes on the extras. What an eyesore!

It's a 90-minute battle of an overblown ego versus mindless sycophants, all of them repulsive.

I enjoyed Rogowski in "Großer Freiheit" and thought his lisp was part of his character, which fit. But it seems to be a true speech impediment. While he has proven that he is an excellent character actor, why would anyone cast an unattractive man with a lisp as a leading man/sexual magnet to both men and women?

Ben Wishaw, an openly gay actor, has proven his skill and versatility in many other roles. This marks what I can only assume to be a bad move on the part of his agent. Or maybe America's answer to how to cast a gay role in a film, Matt Bomer, wasn't available.

Smiley: Cinco minutos antes de la cuenta atrás (2022) Season 1, Episode 7

A 10-star show marred by two big mistakes

[8/10 · 15 December 2023]

I would really like to give this episode a 10, as it contains the best moments in the series.

However: Àlex continues to be a one-dimensional, vapid, egomaniacal, repulsive meat puppet; Bruno still harbours some feelings for him, but I fail to understand how someone of his intelligence and good looks falls for this air-headed twink. Must be great in bed. Yawn.

Along the way, they are oblivious to family, friends and other lovers whose lives are impacted, harmed, or even ruined by this hapless fling. Among other things, Àlex leaves his temporary replacement boyfriend, Ibra, stranded alone on a flight to Africa, which was a vacation gift from Ibra to Àlex.

Do you see Bruno and Àlex building a life together? I give it about two weeks.

The most appealing characters for me throughout the entire series are Ramon (watch Ramon Pujol in the queer film "Fin de siglo") and Albert, whose big scene in this episode is the single best moment in the series.

There are superb, emotional scenes for Vero and Patricia, and Javier and Ramiro, and throughout the ensemble.

But the two lead characters are such jerks it shows how their pathetic bedroom adventure should be relegated to lesser import in the overall scheme of things.

Stalker (1979)

Endless allegory about human consciousness (Yawn)

[1/10 · 3 December 2023]

It has been posited that Tarkovsky and some of his cast and crew members likely met untimely deaths due to exposure to hazardous and poisonous elements in the water and air of the areas in which most of "Stalker" was filmed.

Pity. They could have gotten it over much quicker by simply allowing themselves to be bored to death by this film.

I have been occasionally attracted to Tarkovsky's work, but this makes Béla Tarr's harshly gorgeous "Sátántang" (7 hours 19 minutes; a total of around 150 cuts) seem like a Marvel Universe epic.

At least Tarr gives us characters to care about, just enough plot to make it intriguing and hold one's interest, and stunning cinematography.

While there is an occasion visual treat in "Stalker", it lacks in all other departments. It's like being repeatedly beaten over the head with philosophical clichés spattered among silence and industrial noise with a nice image as a reward every now and then.

Instead of testing your patience and concentration (my mind often wandered off during "Stalker" as there is nothing onto which to grasp), go attend a production of "Waiting for Godot", even by an amateur theatre group: you will be far more entertained and enlightened, and still have time for a cocktail after the show.

Locke (2013)

I am at a loss pf words for all the 10-star reviews

[1/10 · 2 December 2023]

Just more proof that western civilisation has, indeed, lost all ability for critical thought, and that most of the commentators have never actually seen a truly genre-bending film, or one with a decent script and (gasp!) a plot.

"Locke" is like the plot lines of three seasons of a mediocre soap opera crammed into 84 excruciating minutes, with one character on screen the whole time, and others merely voices on a car phone.

It's about concrete, you see. Pouring it, preparing it, triple-checking it, getting people out of Indian restaurants to check on it again, yada, yada, yada. Mix in a a loveless one-night-stand with a stranger who pops us, seven months later, calling from the maternity ward (Surprise!), and a family at its wit's end because Da isn't at home to watch the footies and mom bought sausages and is even wearing "the shirt" - about which we hear at least a dozen times.

The one character we see is beyond a total jerk, putting at risk not only his reputation and entire professional life, but the lives of his wife and teenage sons, all for an attempt to be present (which he isn't) at the birth of the bastard he sired from a seemingly pathetic, lonely, older woman who he admits to not knowing.

While there may be something to be said about the technology of the entire film being a one-shot, driving from somewhere in the UK to London in, roughly, real time, it quickly becomes meaningless as there is no there there, except for endless repetition of syrupy lines to the loser's family, barking to work colleagues, and blabbering to the woman he knocked-up, apparently when drunk at a party after completing a job out-of-town.

This can't even legitimately be considered cinema; more like an ill-conceived audio book. Go watch some Goddard (Nouvelle vague) or Jean-Jacques Beineix (Cinéma du look).

Peeping Tom (1960)

To hell with all those who told me I was "missing an underrated classic"

[1/10 · 30 November 2023]

Irredeemably awful and, for what is supposed to be a legendary cinematic groundbreaker, more boring than sitting in the dentist's waiting room and as entertaining as cleaning the cat litter box.

Powell: yes, the legend who brought us "The Thief of Baghdad" and "The Red Shoes" (which, as a former ballet dancer and later a balletmaster, remains a personal favourite). But ... a decade or two later and the trademarks have not matured: retina-burning oversaturated colours, over-staged illogical blocking (he's what'cha call an auteur, ain't he?), and mindboggling, dreadful acting down the line (OK - I liked the brief dance/murder sequence with Moira Shearer, but the choreography looked like something Mary Tyler Moore did on "The Dick Van Dyke Show" in the same era). Even the music is excrement in the ears.

Karlheinz Böhm (whose main attribute is that he is a son of Karl Böhm, one of the greatest conductors of the 20th century and a Nazi collaborator; he did his post-war time and went on to conduct until he could barely lift the baton) seems to be aping Peter Lorre and has all the charisma of a public lavatory floor.

And he is just one among a sea of zombies.

I am extremely disappointed: I was led on for decades about what a masterpiece it was, and now that I finally catch up with it (thank you, Criterion; can I please get my money back?), I am hugely disappointed on every possible level.

To suggest this was "groundbreaking" and "ahead of its time" is pure heresy. Kindly have a look at what a true auteur was doing in 1960: watch some Goddard (up to 1967) and Truffaut and anybody from the nouvelle vague, some Visconti and Bertolucci, some Kurosawa and Teshigahara, some Buñuel, some Kubrick, some ... OK. You get the idea.

If you have any desire to see this overrated, over-hyped snoozer, just go do something that is at least relatively fulfilling.

Dust (2018 TV Movie)

A "Coming of Age" story you don't need to see (again)

[1/10 · 11 April 2023]

Rural teenagers (about age 16) working on a dreary, isolated farm (if you don't know, that's white asparagus they're digging up and processing; an annual springtime treat in the EU). Constant consumption of alcohol. No adults present anywhere. A boy with Down syndrome, used/abused as a source of fun from the opening shot, becomes the sex toy of both a girl and a boy. Toxic masculinity. Sex-obsessed teenage girls, one of whom sits in an abandoned caravan keeping count of the number of boys she kisses by scratching lines into the wall with a shard of broken glass.

What could possibly go wrong?

Actually, I am rather ashamed that my neighbouring country het Nederlands is making stuff like this for television in 2018. I am not sure of the point of this (homophobia? Rape? Lack of education? Kids without adult supervision? All of the above?), but I would suggest you could find a better way to spend 41 minutes.

There's nothing here you haven't seen before, treated in a much better light, probably decades ago.

Unprecedented (II) (2022)

I'd rather watch a National Geographic documentary on dung beetles

[1/10 · 18 July 2022]

I am sick to death of all the attention these creatures receive. Echoing other comments here: unless you've been living under a rock since 2016 there is nothing new to be learned. I cannot hide my disgust for this "family" and to paraphrase a book title: everything they touch they kill. And that includes my homeland.

Somewhat ironically, I could not in all good conscience live in a country in which SCOTUS handed the presidency to Bush II, and I left in 2001. I had considered returning at some point, but I will never set foot there again (it's already 19 years since my final visit).

Please Americans: vote very carefully and very blue in a new weeks if you want to retain even a modicum of democracy.

Firebird (I) (2021)

What- exactly - happens to Roman?

[10/10 · 3 July 2022]

I want to clarify two aspects of the plot - one minor, one major - which need to be taken into consideration.

Roman's and Luisa's son is called "Serjozha" throughout the film. Serjozha is the diminutive form of Sergey: the boy is named after his father's lover.

The final events pass rather quickly and are somewhat broken-up so the full narrative is far from clearly spelled-out. Let's revisit the events in the order in which they are presented in the film:

The morning after after the New Year celebration, Roman reads Sergei's letter in which he explains that he has left him: he states that he will not take Roman away from his wife and son.

As Roman is reading the letter, it is revealed that Luisa has discovered the relationship (from also reading the letter?) and verbally and physically assaults Roman.

Sergey is seen sitting on a train and his voiceover of the end of the letter continues "Please, don't come looking for me".

Roman is sitting alone on the bed in the guest-bedroom of the Moscow flat, to which he relegated Sergey when Luisa came to visit. (Shall we assume Luisa has left him?). He receives a phone call from Colonel Kuznetsov. We don't yet know the content of the call.

We abruptly cut to "One month later" as Sergey is unpacking back at drama school in Moscow. He learns that Roman came to visit him when he wasn't there, and left a letter for him.

Roman begins to read the letter, jumps up, goes to a public phone, and calls Kuznetsov.

Sergey asks how he might reach Roman. Kuznetsov informs him that he left for Afghanistan shortly after the New Year, and says "Last Monday ... Sergey, we lost him".

Sergey is seen reading the letter alone in the darkened auditorium at the drama school. Roman's voiceover continues:

"To speak and to do, to think and to live: they are not the same thing, Sergey. By the time you receive this letter, I will have left for Afghanistan. The three days that Kuznetsov gave me to consider are coming to an end. But what is there to consider? I can't choose for fear of hurting those I love. I can't divide myself any longer and belong to everyone at the same time".

Sergey is next seen at Luisa's flat in Estonia.

After this extended confrontation, Sergey visits the frozen-over lake where he and Roman swam and made love much earlier in the film, as Roman's voiceover of the letter concludes:

"Sergey, I have to choose the only place where I still feel free. The sky. Please, don't wait for me. Forget me. I shall always think of you, Sergey. Mo matter what life may bring, I will always be there with you".

These are the last words of the film.

It seems pretty clear to me that Roman committed suicide, as did Sergey's childhood friend after his sexuality was discovered and he was beaten by his father on his 13th birthday. "By the time you receive this letter" is language commonly associated with suicide notes.

If you didn't stick through the four-minute 30-second end credits, there is a final, silent scene lasting 15 seconds: the hateful Major Zverev, the first character to threaten Roman with charges of forbidden homosexual affairs punishable by five years of hard labour, is seen in the dark backseat of a car; as his face is illuminated by a match lighting his cigarette, he is smiling.

Is it possible Luisa informed on Roman, cementing what Zverev suspected for years (it also came close to discovery at Roman's and Luisa's wedding when Zverev walked in on them to tell Roman "Your wife is looking for you").

This brings up the possibility that Sergey was given two options by the Russian military:

Go to Afghanistan and commit suicide - you will be regarded as a hero, your wife will receive your pension, no one will ever know you were a homosexual. Or ...

Stay and be tried and punished for homosexual relations, found guilty, serve your time, and live out your days a pariah and your family will live in shame.

You have three days to decide.

Let's read that farewell letter again:

"The three days that Kuznetsov gave me to consider (consider what?) are coming to an end. But what is there to consider? I can't choose for fear of hurting those I love (choose death or degradation?). I can't divide myself any longer and belong to everyone at the same time".

I think it's clearly forced suicide, probably ordered by Zverev.

Oddly, Tchaikovsky seems to be Roman's favourite composer.

Tchaikovsky was rather flagrantly open about his homosexuality in Tsarist Russia. It has been theorised that Tchaikovsky was forced to commit suicide after his affair with the nephew of a nobleman, a duke, got too close to the royal family.

The duke prepared a letter to be delivered to Tsar Alexander III accusing Tchaikovsky of sexual perversion; it was first shown to Tchaikovsky's fellow alumni of the Imperial School of Jurisprudence. Eight members met in a "court of honour" lasting five hours, ending in a recommendation that Tchaikovsky commit suicide.

Tchaikovsky was dead six days later at the age of 53. One possibility is that he purposely and publicly drank a glass of unboiled water while a cholera epidemic was raging in St Petersburg, infecting himself. Theories about ingesting arsenic also exist.

This still-controversial theory caused the Russian government to remove and deny access to Tchaikovsky's letters and diaries for the past several decades, and to remove all references to the great composer's sexuality.

Better Call Saul: Plan and Execution (2022) Season 6, Episode 7

"Listen to me, I'm a philosopher. Listen to me, I'm a philosopher"

[10/10 · 24 May 2022]

Right now - 17:07 on 24 May 2022 (in my time zone: CET) - there are 143 10-star reviews for this episode, and while I haven't read all of them, I certainly don't disagree with any, but I also doubt if I can add anything substantial.

I will go out on a limb here and echo something I've occasionally seen in these reviews: "Better Call Saul" is every bit as good as "Breaking Bad" and perhaps even better!

I have in the last weeks been going through "BB" again, sometimes an entire season in one day. Of course it is brilliant beyond belief. But when it goes dark - when it breaks, one could say - the inexorable downward spiral is blinding. Gloriously so, but it is not an easy "watch".

One of the countless things I love about "BCC" is its balance: who would ever have thought that the mid-season cliff-hanger would also be one of the funniest episodes in TV history, down to the colour of Jimmy's socks in his running sequence? I came expecting blood and guts and instead was roaring with laughter! Well ... for a great deal of the episode. Not since a certain bathtub made a surprise entrance - and exit - in Season One of "BB". And in a later season, there was that fly ...

Yes: one of the greatest of all-time. No, this doesn't give me any tenure or weighted importance, but I grew up "in front of the tube" watching things like "Father Knows Best" and "Leave it to Beaver" so perhaps my seniority adds some validity (and I know now that when the time comes for my wheelchair, it better be equipped with a bell).

I also totally loved the blatant nod to Hitchcock - did anyone else catch that? An iconic image first seen in 1958 is rather faithfully recreated, just for a second or two.

And with all due respect to Mrs. Landry, you do NOT want to add garlic to your potato and leek soup! Fresh snipped chives are all the zing you need.

Oh - and for you remaining 1-star reviewers, I suggest you direct your ire toward your cable provider and/or AMC. As a seasoned user of IMDb, I know for a fact that they will not enable this website to receive ratings and reviews for anything in any medium until it has been released and is available. No one is cheating here: some people pay for AMC+ and they get advance availability. I thought that would by now be common knowledge.

MA 2412 (1998–2022)

Great parody of governmental excess

[10/10 · 14 April 2022]

This hysterically funny German-language comedy series skewers Austrian bureaucracy.

Vienna's governmental departments are called "Magistratsabteilungen" (municipal departments), abbreviated as "MA", followed by a number. They cover everything from citizenship to garbage collection.

"MA 2412" is a fictitious department which gets its number from the date of Christmas - 24 December - and is in charge of overseeing Christmas decorations.

Happy Endings Sleepover (2019)

Sets a new low for American LGBTQ+ movies

[1/10 · 19 March 2022]

It takes about 90 seconds to realise that, despite being set in Kobenhavn, the cast and makers of this trash probably never travelled farther than Pasadena.

I am from an EU country. I collect queer films from around the world - over 150, from places like Hungary, Iceland, Israel, Argentina, Georgia (the country, not the state), Portugal, and even Libya - and the USA consistently ranks last as far as quality of script, acting, and direction.

This is insulting and vapid beyond belief. Try something with subtitles.

Real Time with Bill Maher: Ira Glasser/Fiona Hill/Matt Welch (2022) Season 20, Episode 2

What happened to him?

[1/10 · 31 January 2022]

How did he go from a bastion of liberalism to a disgusting racist pig? Yeah - let's all laugh at Muslims because of the way they dress. Next he'll be justifying 1/6.

Come from Away (2021)

7 Tony Award Nominations / 1 Win

[3/10 · 22 November 2021]

This film consists of portions of several live performances of "Come From Away" seamlessly edited together.

The direction is dazzling, the extremely talented and versatile ensemble cast of 12 is magnificent, the band (onstage) is great, but unfortunately the music - which is pretty much through-composed (no breaks between numbers, like an opera) - is totally unmemorable and often grating and repetitive. The book is predictable (the woman whose son is a NYC fire-fighter) and has its cringe-worthy moments (such as the rite for becoming an honorary Newfoundlander).

In all it comes across like a Hallmark Card to send to people who lost loved ones on 9/11. It makes "The Sound of Music" seem experimental and dangerous.

It's very easy to see why, of its seven Tony Award nominations (losing in all but one category to "Dear Evan Hansen" - which, despite being a flawed movie is a far, far better show). It won only one, for Best Direction of a Musical.

Still, it's worth watching. Once. But keep the fast-forward control nearby.

Interesting fact: Canadian actor Tony LePage - who memorably plays Garth, half of the gay couple comprised of two Kevins, and other roles (all12 actors play multiple roles) - is an understudy! He has never been an actual scheduled member of the cast according to IBDB, the Broadway sister of IMDb.

Wonder Bar (1934)

Hi-de Hi-de Hi-de NO!

[1/10 · 18 October 2021]

First - please understand that I was lucky enough to have grown-up in NYC in the early 1970s when Theater 80 St. Mark's in the East Village screened a different double-bill of movies from the 1930s/1940s every day of the week! They were usually thematically related, even if somewhat tenuously: "Dinner at Eight" and "The Women"; "Dark Victory" and "All About Eve". And, of course, the unforgettable Busby Berkeley musicals, but "Wonder Bar" was never on the programme.

Unlike the Berkeley greats (all of which I own on DVD), there is not one memorable song (one need only think of "Shuffle Off to Buffalo", "Shanghai Lil", "We're in the Money" memorably sung in Pig-Latin by Ginger Rogers, and so many others).

The two big Berkeley numbers are short on his usual extravagances (which reached their psychedelic height in "The Gang's All Here") - while there is one brief trademark overhead kaleidoscopic moment, the use of mirrors and special effects dominate more than the choreography or those mind-boggling Art Deco sets or some visual gimmick like dozens of chorines built into harps. And a morose Dolores del Rio is no Ruby Keeler!

There is not one even vaguely likeable character, except perhaps for an underused Dick Powell. The pathetic, middle-aged stereotypical American couples used for comic relief are disgusting and unwatchable. Every character is involved with infidelity, grand theft, murder, abetting criminals, mental and physical cruelty (the whip-cracking in the "Gaucho Dance" is pure sadomasochism), or some other major character flaw which has no place in a Depression Era escapist musical. It is simply devoid of humour.

And then we have Jolson, perhaps the most annoying presence to ever be put on celluloid. Bug-eyed and flapping his arms like a diseased bird, cracking bad jokes at everyone, it is impossible to think he was such a big star. His very personal style of crooning is literally unlistenable.

What passes for plot includes Jolson abetting a murderess (after whom he lusts) by disposing of the body of her lover who's jilter her by placing the corpse in the back seat of the car of a financially-ruined investor who clearly states he intends to commit suicide from his first moment onscreen. Initially, there is concern over his condition until it becomes all too easy to let him drive off a cliff with a body in the back seat to hide the crime. Jolson doesn't even get the girl; he goes home alone.

Now it's time for the elephant in the nightclub: "Goin' to Heaven on a Mule".

This is obviously the reason Warner Bros. Deleted this title from its Warner Classics DVD-R series, and makes a case for destroying all existing prints of this abomination.

No, it doesn't even stand as an "historical curiosity" and no amount of advance commentary (i.e. Making excuses for the depiction of slavery added to broadcasts and DVDs of "Gone with the Wind") can justify Jolson's hideously grotesque make-up, performance, or the song itself, ALL of which are filled with the most heinous racial stereotypes. When he gets to "heaven" he is treated to fried chicken and watermelon, and gets to roll some dice.

I can't believe I am writing this sentence, but a giant watermelon splits into sections (redolent of the bananas in "The Lady in the Tutti-Frutti Hat" in "The Gang's All Here") revealing a jiggling tap-dancer.

Did I mention he's in blackface? Did I mention that the entire cast of dancers and extras (including small children) are in shoe-polish blackface with clown-like white lips?

How can anyone watch this in the 21st century?

With nothing to balance the unrelenting crudeness of this movie - not one memorable or entertaining moment to offset its myriad flaws - there is simply no reason for it to exist.

It needs to be, in the very least, locked-up in a vault and shown strictly for historical purposes, or simply destroyed.

No Time to Die (2021)

21st Century Bond

[10/10 · 30 September 2021]

I had the immense pleasure of seeing "No Time to Die" in its first Austrian screening, this morning at 00:07.

The first thing that hit me as I walked home was that it would be skewered by American critics (professional and amateur) as being too "woke". Rotten Tomatoes, IMDb, and the New York Times review from its least dependable critic (A. O. Scott) back me up.

I loved experiencing Bond's human side. I loved the performances by the women down the line, especially Ana de Armas. I loved Ben Whishaw's openly-gay "Q". While their contributions are limited, I loved the evilness of Rami Malek and our hometown boy Christoph Waltz. I loved the cinematography. I loved Hans Zimmer's score, one of his best. The direction moved at a pace that never had me checking my watch (I still wear one!).

I think enough "warnings" will have been posted by the time the film comes to American screens so that it will not offend those who find the Bond of 2021 too weepy. I can only say that waiting to see it on a small screen would substantially cut-down the reason why franchises like this exist.

Showing my proof of vaccination and collecting my reserved ticket took no time, and I loved being in a cinema for the first time in more than a year with a crowd who wanted the same thing as I: a little escapism (albeit masked) and a visit with an old friend.

By the way, the first Bond of my lifetime was Connery, and I have enjoyed watching his successors change with the times. It was also heartening to see the arrival of an entire row of young gentlemen who donned their tuxedos for the event. Sadly, Martinis were not available at the snack bar.

Live from Lincoln Center: American Ballet Theatre: Giselle (1977) Season 2, Episode 1

Complete Cast/Credits

[10/10 · 25 August 2021]

Giselle - Natalia Makarova Count Albrecht - Mikhail Baryshnikov Wilfred - Frank Smith Berthe, Giselle's Mother - Ruth Mayer Hilarion, the Gamekeeper - George de le Peña The Prince of Courtland - Alexander Minz The Squire - Richard Schafer Bathilde, the Prince's Daughter - Berthica Prieto Pas de deux - Marianna Tcherkassky, Kirk Peterson Myrta - Martine van Hamel Moyna - Nanette Glushak Zulma - Jolinda Menendez.

The Twilight of the Golds (1996)

Did Showtime demand the drastic changes to the plot?

[5/10 · 4 July 2021]

I attended opening night of the play on Broadway in October 1993, and there was one moment late in the show when the entire audience gasped.

In the (flawed-but-still-excellent) play, Suzanne and Rob decide that she should abort their likely gay son and have another try at having a "normal" child. The gasp came with the news that there was a complication in the operating room and Suzanne can no longer have children.

This obviously opens up the whole question of which would be better: raising a gay child, or having no children at all?

But in this wildly-uneven film adaptation, Suzanne has the baby, gay brother David is reconciled with the Gold family (along with his partner, Steven), and Rob leaves Suzanne, although it is mentioned in the all-too-rosy epilogue that he becomes a devoted weekend dad.

In the play, Suzanne and Rob remain together, but childless, and David breaks his tenuous ties with his family. Hence: "The Twilight of the Golds."

The basic core thought - that of the far-reaching implications of pre-natal genetic testing - remains in the film, but all the misguided added material to "open-up" a stage-play for the screen (especially the whole opera subplot) really drags it down.

The acting is generally very good, with a surprisingly multi-layered performance from Jennifer Beals (who is doomed to be forever remembered only for "Flashdance"). Brendon Frasier (David), Jon Tenney (Rob), and Sean O'Bryan (Steven) are excellent. The two sets of annoyingly-stereotypical Jewish parents also shift the tone of the story and there were some poor choices in casting here.

I am amazed that playwright Jonathan Tolins (credited as co-writer of the screenplay and co-producer) permitted the outcome of his play to be so altered that I can only wonder if Showtime demanded the ridiculous "happy end" which basically erases the entire point of his play, so much that it makes even its title irrelevant.

Last Week Tonight with John Oliver: PACE (2021) Season 8, Episode 16

"To Be Condom"

[10/10 · 21 June 2021]

I must agree: that is simply the ugliest dog in the world.

Siberia (2020)

The five Siberian huskies are astonishingly beautiful

[1/10 · 21 June 2021]

And so are stretches of the cinematography.

But that's not enough to drag out to 90 mintes.

Utter, incoherent, flamboyantly-self-important hogwash. Dear, dear Mr Dafoe needs to learn to say "No" sometimes.

Also: there is a comment here somewhere which credits the truly magnificent, thinking man's horror movie "The Lighthouse" to the egregiously overrated Abel Ferrara.

Nope! "The Lighthouse" was directed by Robert Eggers.

Hokusai (1953)

Unwatchable filler from Criterion at its worst

[1/10 · 28 April 2021]

The Criterion Collection sinks to a new low with its totally unnecessary second disc of supplements for its release of Hiroshi Teshigahara's "Woman in the Dunes".

The half-hour piece on the collaboration between Teshigahara and author Kôbô Abe is somewhat interesting, but the three short films, "Hokusai", "Ikebana", and "Tokyo 1958", are unwatchable. A first-year film student could have produced more coherent films on an iPhone with actual content; these are just empty, meaningless wastes of time.

You can listen to someone dryly read facts about Tokyo while the imagery bears no correspondence (we are shown a bike race while given the statistics on suicides), or watch close-up tracking shots of woodcuts. I actually was frightened to learn that there are over 200 different schools of flower arranging in Japan.

A commentary track accompanying "Woman in the Dunes" would have been far ... FAR ... more interesting and informative. This second disc accomplishes nothing but show that Teshigahara was a really poor, unimaginative filmmaker before his big hit in 1964.