A few reviews . . (film or TV) — Page 175

The Keeper Of Lost Causes - 2013 - 7/10
AKA - Kvinden i buret (The woman in the cage)

Mørck doesn’t wait for backup, and he and crew are ambushed.
He survives and is demoted to the basement, sorting and marking cold cases as closed.
Department Q is a dead end, although Mørck is assigned a motivated assistant, Assad.
One case surfaces, a young politico who supposedly committed suicide on a ferry.
Very much a hard core procedural, as the men interview, dig, unearth and irritate.
Taut thriller, followed by two films and a copy-cat TV series.

Ward - 1973 - 6/10
AKA - Štićenik

Young man Mihael, on the run in a bleak countryside, seeks refuge in an asylum.
Steadily pursuing is a man in a black cape.
Mihael begs for, and is granted, shelter, where his paranoia and violence escalates.
The mysterious hunter could be a guardian, could be Death.
Yugoslavian film mixes supernatural hints in obscured mystery.
English subtitles = https://sub-scene.com/subscene/155246

Your Past Is Showing - 1957 - 6/10

He publishes a monthly tabloid, you see?
Nothing but dirt and the juicy stuff.
Unless the “profiles” pay £10,000 to quash the issue.
Oh, please, don’t call it blackmail. That’s so … squalid.
Terry Thomas, Peter Sellers, Peggy Mount, Shirley Eaton.
Broad comedy gathers momentum until it bores full throttle into screwball,
English subtitles = https://sub-scene.com/subtitle/3359854

Sinners - 2025 - 7/10

Brothers Smoke and Stack return from Chicago with loads of ill-gotten money.
They buy an old mill, intending to transform it into a juke joint.
Cousin Sammie, a budding bluesmith, is enlisted to help with musical entertainment.
Sammie’s playing is a siren call, however, for wild revelry, and for evil.
Setting, time and place are wonderfully done. 1930’s Mississippi, flatlands of cotton, scorching heat.
The joint is a success. Rowdy, seething, sweaty, until it attracts another element.
A hard turn enters. Bloodletting along with a shared hive sensibility.

Cave Of The Living Dead - 1964 - 5/10
AKA - Der Fluch der Grünen Augen

After death number six, Interpol sends agent Dorin to a small village.
While all the slain women show neck punctures, the local doctor marks heart failure.
Villagers disdain strangers, yet live in fear of the grotto area, as well as the castle.
And – the titled professor who has taken it over.

Superstition be damned, Dorin soon finds a cross more effective than a pistol.
Not to mention the local gypsy fortune teller, more attuned than the doctor.

Routine storyline from Yugoslavia, with assorted character types, easy to differentiate.
The photography, sharp black and white, deep shadows, cutting and angles, is first rate.
Locations from cave corridors to castle interiors are sheer Gothic, and look authentic.
English subtitles = https://sub-scene.com/subtitle/3359933

Great Expectations - 2013 - 7/10

Young boy Pip, barely more than an urchin, aids an escaped convict.
The man does not forget, even after the wiles of Miss Havisham torture the lad.
Pip has aspirations, expectations, far above his social level.
Heady condensation of Dickens’ novel, and stylized to boot.
Saturated in Gothic, most this unrolls like a walking nightmare.
Characters from the deep past resemble cadavers, while cobwebs are everywhere.
Although we read this in grade school, this is not a children’s story.
Adult Pip, reliving his youth, the stuff of nightmares.
English subtitles = https://sub-scene.com/subtitle/3359934

When Worlds Collide - 1951 - 6/10

Rogue star is heading Earth’s way. Destruction imminent.
Yet, the star has an orbiting planet, perhaps humanity can hop there.
Governments of the world ignore the looming disaster.
Luckily, ka-zillionaire types subsidize rocket building … just like today!
Who gets to go? Who decides? And how will the teeming hordes react?
Old school SciFi (based on a 1930’s Pulp novel) has moments here and there.
Drama and melodrama retard the pace and thrust, however.

Affliction - 1997 - 7/10

Wade, small town sheriff, senses a fatal hunting accident might not be so accidental.
Investigating, however cautiously, is nigh impossible in such a hamlet.
Add that Wade’s mother has been found dead (freezing) in her own home.
Next room, Dad sits drunk. At least he won’t beat her any longer.
Although there are the two boys, Wade and his brother, both abused since childhood.
Less a mystery than a harrowing character study or tortured lives.
Difficult and painful cinema.
I once listened to a Q&A with director Paul Schrader: Casting Coburn was a coup, as they needed someone who would seem physically imposing to Nolte.

Reilly, Ace Of Spies - 1983 - 7/10

Before Ian Fleming envisioned 007, there was the actual, British agent extraordinaire.
Sam Neill shot to fame as the womanizing, double-dealing, articulate agent.
Most of the timeline runs from 1904–1924. Arms deals, wars, espionage, sabotage.
Adversaries include Basil Zaharoff (the Merchant of Death), Felix Dzerzhinsky and Stalin,
Excellent production values, especially for television of this period.
At 12 episodes, this also breathes a bit.
Based on a real individual, exploits dodgy, yet stands with the finest spy films.

The World’s Greatest Sinner - 1962 - 6/10

Insurance salesman Clarence, bored and disillusioned, gets himself fired.
High on the vast potential of life, Clarence decides to write a book - and - enter politics.
The book is more a pamphlet on ultimate self-improvement.
From ordinary folk to super-humans to being gods.
Swelling followers are soon chanting, “We are gods, we are gods” while destroying things.
Clarence, by the way, has renamed himself to simply – God.
And, being a god, proceeds to violate taboos, especially sexual.
Bizarre film best viewed as inspired Outsider Art.
English subtitles = https://sub-scene.com/subtitle/3359935