European Cinema, 1953-1977:
Running the gamut from downbeat to despairing
Sawdust and Tinsel (Ingmar Bergman, 1953): 3/5
Love and misery at the traveling circus. Some powerful sequences, naturally.
Il Bidone (Federico Fellini, 1955): 2.5/5
A group of swindlers con money out of the very, very poor. But who is really being swindled? Just kidding. It’s the poor people.
Any Number Can Win (Henri Verneuil, 1963): 3.5/5
Rififi meets The Treasure of Sierra Madre. Alain Delon looks cool as hell, expertly playing a bit of dim bulb.
The Executioner (Luis Garcia Berlanga, 1963): 3.5/5
This one is bleak but at least it was pretty funny too. A man is very, very slowly—and with great protest and denial—pushed into having to execute a man for the state.
Memories from Underdevelopment (Tomás Gutiérrez Alea, 1968): 2/5
An aimless man wanders around Havana after the revolution. Spoiler: it ends with the rope tightening.
(NOTE: I realize that Cuba is not Europe, but I wrote the review already, and it certainly fits in with this group of films).
Investigation of a Citizen Above Suspicion (Elio Petri, 1970): 3.5/5
Kafka in reverse. A guy who is guilty of a crime descends into madness because he’s stuck in a system that just won’t find him guilty. Spoiler: it ends with the rope just refusing to tighten.
The Virgin and the Whore (Jean Eustache, 1973): 2.5/5
An aimless young man wanders around post-68 Paris. These extremely blabby characters have some amusing ideas, but at three hours and forty minutes, to say that they wear out their welcome is a stunning understatement. I must be a boob, though, because Richard Brody found it “emotionally shattering.” Did you know that the woman “the Mother” was modeled after in real life killed herself after the movie’s first screening. Talk about bad reviews!!
Mr. Klein (Joseph Losey, 1976): 3.5/5
An aimless man wanders around Vichy Paris. There’s another Mr. Klein (an elusive doppelganger, but Jewish) or is there? Alain Delon looks like hell. Spoiler: it ends with the rope tightening, in absolutely stunning fashion.
A Special Day (Ettore Scola, 1977): 4.5/5
Two outsiders share a fleeting connection on the day Hitler visits Rome in 1938. An emotional look at how the personal and political can’t be separated. Spoiler: it ends with the rope tightening.
1) In the cinema of Francoist Spain, Berlanga rivals Bunuel in terms of subversive dark humor. One theory why Berlanga is relatively unknown in the U.S. is that his frequent use of overlapping dialogue (a decade before Altman) couldn't be accurately translated with subtitles. Digital subtitling might improve his standing.
ReplyDelete2) Freudian slip alert: La Maman et La Putain is usually translated as The Mother and the Whore.
3) Richard Brody is an ass. The reputation of Eustache's film certainly precedes Brody, but his whole routine consists of promoting offbeat, excruciatingly boring movies as "undiscovered gems."