Yogi's Movie Consumption Blog

A writer marries a beautiful woman, who turns out to be a controlling sociopath. I really liked the story idea, and how the layers of "acceptable" behaviour are peeled one by one from the beautiful wife. Maybe if I had a harder time accepting that she really is that kind of self-indulging, egocentric and jealous woman, she turns out to be might have made the film way more exciting. The film uses flashback technique to brace the actual story, but that didn't work quite well for me. Also, I think that the murder of the little boy in the lake could have been more haunting. Maybe Hitchcock should have treated this script - it would have made great sense within his own oeuvre. Still there remain myriads of things in this film that I love. Foremost, the absolutely stunning photography, the colors, the nature, the sea. Everything looks really beautiful and the colors are breathtaking. Tierney is a must see, possibly one of the most authentic 40s beauty ideal  I can think...

A hitchhiker is picked up by death and then picks up his personal tormenting devil. The plot looked fairly straightforward, but the magic of this gem is that the story strand convolutes until it tightens into a strangling gordic knot - which is pretty much exactly what happens towards the end. The flashback structure are very noir-ish, so was the plot - everything straight down, right from the beginning. I really rooted for the guy to get out of this situation, but every time he takes a decision it actually gets worse - so in the end I was just hoping he might die and get relieved. Most striking was the jaw-dropping performance of Ann Savage. She pops out about a mile and her character is rendered so immensely unlikeable that I wondered that she has not been called the godmother of a new type of acting school (maybe she was?) This is definitively a film worth studying again. Its shortness does nothing to diminish the impact and it is rich on details.

An unhappily married cashier and hobby painter is led to support a would-be mistress and her secret lover and resorts to stealing. This movie still lingers on with many memorable scenes. The awkward rencontre in the cafe with his would-be mistress, the bizarre naivete of Robinson's characters which transcends beautifully to the pictures and the harrowing ending where the poor painter is haunted by a remorseless guilt. I 'm surprised that the 40s would give a director leeway to simply steer pass the obvious happy end into such deep waters as Lang does here pretty effortlessly. Things that caught my eye were the interesting set-up of the apartment. The "drawing room" is elevated in one part of the flat, where as the bedroom is "way down somewhere" on the other side. Lang went into great lengths to explain the architecture and geography (it is quite important for some of the film's most important scenes) Robinson is wonderful, but so are all the oth...

A soldier from the countryside falls in love with a city girl on his short leave and they try to marry against all odds. The film is set up as a love-at-plus-minus-first-sight romance with some semi-satirical caveats thrown in. No matter how hard they try, the poor couple just can't get wedded. There are many obstacles, the biggest of them being the various laws of the state of New York. Although I felt that the story dragged on a bit (the film has a lot to offer from an analytical standpoint), there were some easily enjoyable bits here and there. The drunk in the bar was funny, the actual bizarre wedding ceremony was quite good and the milkman and his wife were quite cute in itself.  I've read somewhere else that the city and especially its soundscapes are the main character in this film, so maybe this could be something to go back to and approach this film again.

A frustrated Parisian lady - Helene - decides to hook up her ex-lover with a "dancer". This film completely took me in, the simplicity of the set-up was a bit discouraging at first. But when the very resourceful Helene is slowly stripped of her social defenses and comes to display her true, evil personality I was already siding with Agnes. The young dancer represents life, a very interesting version of rebelliousness, and a definitive disregard of the upper social class - which is an obvious consequence of her lifestyle. That the film still manages to come to a fairy-tale like and beautiful ending is testimony to Bresson's genius. Although the story becomes less and less "realistic", I couldn't care less. After the viewing, I was just happy that everything came out as it should (in a way). And not too many films leave such a warm and satisfying aftertaste. Worth for studying the character development, "peeling" of the motives.

A guest in a country house has an overwhelming sense of deja vu in a circular nightmare with a voice-over psychologization nonstop. The premise of the movie is quite good, unfortunately it descended into on-the-nose analysis by the annoying psychiatrist in the film, they should have gotten rid of him immediately. There seems to be a certain trend in 40s movies to speak out (highly inaccurate) descriptions of "psychological disturbances" and "Freudian analysis". Other examples like the egregious "Snake Pit" come to mind. Maybe in future years people will scratch their head, when they hear the pseudo-scientific nonsense babble in sci-fi/superhero movies of today. And I hope that this day will come soon. I think films were still trying to tiptoe their way in new cinematic narrative forms with a mass appeal and this is the biggest credit I can give to this film: Ealing, not a small studio being sort of experimental.  Times are still/only more than a de...

A mute housekeeper is under the threat of a murder in the house where she lives. There are a couple of great moments in this film: First of all, there is the weather. Similar to Key Largo the weather is menacing, shutting off communication though not completely. The telephone is still working, but of what use is that to a mute woman who tries to get help. Although I liked the movie, I had the feeling that the "psychologisation" of the lead character - a trauma resulting in muteness - was too obvious. This also lead to some heavy handed script decisions, e.g. her trying to make a call and then realizing she was mute.  (?) But there are some other great scenes. The showdown on the staircase was quite amazing, and I really loved the the idea of the "threatening eyes" and the strong sense of POV throughout the film. A lot of times the camera watches out from the killer's head.

A young family struggles to make the wish of the daughter for better schooling come true. There is a weird similarity to the "I Remember Mama" which is more upbeat and more rewarding to watch I think. But this one has extremely strong acting, and although I thought the interpretation of the mother let on too much variability which made her emotional development a bit harder to follow. I felt a bit strange about how the very charmingly played father of the family disappears out of the picture exactly at his personal turning point. If his turn-around had been a bit more troubled than the rather kitschy Christmas situation I would have been more convinced. Overall, the movie had an extremely theatry feel to it, something that significantly changed with later films of Kazan.

A middle-aged woman meets falls passionately in love with a man she briefly meets. The film has a strong ending, but I had trouble getting into it in the beginning. This might also have to do with the lead role - she was too much a victim I thought. After a long while I could start to understand her struggle with her "real" life. What I really liked was how the back and forth transitions between her memories and her present situation worked. It seemed there weren't too much and not too few. And the ending with her husband welcoming her "home" was quite impressive. There are some really amazing shots of trains arriving in the station, especially at the beginning and just before the end.

An alcoholic, struggling writer goes on a long drinking binge ending up at the lowest point of his life. A very powerful and gripping story, the flashback structure of the story is not revealed until the end, as it serves the cold, analytical way that the "hero" looks at his own life and his continuous string of failings, deceits and misdemeanors. His struggle is not so much with the drug but with his failed expectations in his own persona. Ray Milland's performance is astounding, and holds up totally realistic even 60 years later. There is a lot of bitter humor in the picture which serves it very well and some great directorial ideas on how to convey ideas in simple pictures. My favorite was the little rings that shots of rye leave on the bar and how they multiply over time. Definitively worth a re-watch and in-depth analysis.

With all means a single mother tries to win the love of her daughter, giving up everything. A very well constructed films with a long flashback bracing the actual story, that Joan Crawford tells at the police station. I deeply hated the Veda character, in my opinion one of the top evil baddies I have seen in a long time. (Maybe the boy in Au hasard, balthasar was even worse?) It didn't appear to be a "film noir" to me, because the character I rooted most for (the mother) might finally get what she deserves: peace. Joan Crawfords acting is amazing and I could really feel her love for her daughter coming out of the screen. In her all-giving love she might be a doomed soul, so there is no hope for her anyway. Also the rest of the cast was extremely well placed and worked perfectly - I believed every one of them. I just realized that Crawford wears a huge bunch of different costumes through that film.