Yogi's Movie Consumption Blog

Professor Rankin, a teacher in a small town in Connecticut marries the daughter of a Supreme Court Justice. She has no idea that the man she loves has a very sinister past. There is something comically surreal about the whole plot. Although the film shows some signs of a typical film-noir, it is more a political satire on post-war America. Undercover war crime agents hunting Nazi sleepers is a rather blunt set-up and many of the actions in the film verge on the ridiculous. When the 'bad guy' is finally uncovered, Welles' character goes through an inconsistent zigzag of confiding the truth to his wife, and at the same time lying to her. On the other hand he is a amateurish murderer with very weak planning ahead for such an allegedly super-smart war crime architect. His escape attempts towards are lame and stupid - packing a bag or hiding in his favorite spot in the church tower when the whole town is searching for him. I can understand why Welles didn't like th...

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...

When an ex-lieutenant visits the father of one of his fallen soldiers he finds their home taken hostage by ruthless gangsters. The diversity of the characters in this story is breathtaking. All the actors manage to render their part with amazing depth and conflict. Robinson is a great villain, and the stubborness of the father is quite amazing to watch. The party being locked in the small space of the hotel lets everybody clash with everybody. The ending felt a bit propped on to me and a complete change of tone. When I read that Huston "borrowed" that ending from Hawks "To Have or Have Not" it came as no big surprise. The social commentary with the Indians treated as low lifes was quite amazing and the old Indian woman looked great on screen. Maybe in a more modern version more people would snap in that situation and the ending would have definitively more graphic violence. It would make way more sense to flood the hotel and let the people have it out on the ...