Beware !!! (literally stay away from this Fake Fear)
Max Cady is Back ! And this time he is Javier Bardem with a goat-e and Udo Kier type of Blue Eyes -actually Green lenses!)
The new Cape Fear is here...on Apple Tv + (premiered June 5th)
Episodes 1 and 2 were cool and atmospheric, but will it have enough breath to do Ten ?
we'll see...
well, now it's over and what was originally published on June 8th overstayed its welcome -as expected !!! here are the August 1st conclusions of this bloated overbearing season !
Bardem, best thing about him, his Panama hat, does not get even close to his Anton Chigurh from No Country for Old Men or even the blonde eyed psycho Silva from Skyfall. No my faved, his best psycho and most fun is the one from Perdita Durango, Romeo !. Basically Bardem is ripping off De Niro's Max Cady at a nec plus ultra grand guignol style. Effieint but pastiche...
Very little from the original book John D. MacDonald's The Executioners (1957) stays on.
Also not much of the 1962 J. Lee Thompson original adaptation as Cape Fear in glorious Black and White.
cool tittle lettering, cool ideas from the Scorsese 1991 remake and homage (the shots on the negative, camera moves), and most of all the music stays the same. Bernard Herrmann's score, now redone by Jeff Russo. This is the only asset imo, I think I watched it for the score alone, this being one of the best I ever heard, and tops some of Herrmann's work with Hitchcock.
Exec prod by Steven Spielberg, Martin Scorsese and showrunner Nick Antosca.
Wasted Ted Levine and Ron Perlman in the obvious baddie daddy roles.
***
1st episode, 'Fingers and Toes' directed by Norwegian Morten Tyldum (Headhunters, Passengers).
Ep. 2 'Why Would I Want to Hurt You?' directed by S.J. Clarkson (Jessica Jones, Madame Web), features a cameo by screenwiter Wesley Strick (who wrote the 1991 remake of CF).
Ep. no. 3 on June 12th: Phantom Sensations
already feeling the nausea
Ep. 4 Pierced. June 19th.
some lgbtq happens before the two daughters.
ep.5 Faith -June 26.
loss of breath, mambojambo and a sinister Juliette Lewis.
Ep. 6 Possum -July 3rd.
that's when I feel like quiting, don't really wanna see how they're gonna mangle this beyond belief.
Ep. 7: Mongrel -July 10th
by episode seven it's becoming such a grand guignol caricature with storytelling of a bad telenovela, I switched it of. They take a road trip and ouch, and the soundtracks goes from BOC's Don't Fear the Reaper to Alice Cooper's Eighteen.
Ep. 8 ∙ Los tiempos de Dios son Perfectos -July 17. Telenovellas quickens.
Ep. 9- The Scar -July 24. More mambojambo, rednecks and swamps. We don't need a bigger boat ;)
Ep. 10: The Executioners. July 31th. Hurricane arrives. Leaving open season two ? C'mon !!!
After Nae Caranfil completed his second film, Asphalt Tango, in 1996, he received an invitation to make a production in Italy: an ambitious period biopic about a supposed meeting between Stendhal and Rossini. Dolce Far Niente, in 1998. Based on Frédéric Vitoux's novel La Comédie de Terracina, winner of the French Academy Prize, the film is a blend of comedy and drama about the condition of the artist confronted with worldly frivolity and the unconscious enthusiasm of revolution and conspiracy.
The film, which came out at the time with spectacularly bad timing, following Beaumarchais (1996), was not a great success in France or Italy, so it never had a theatrical release in Romania, going straight to pay TV, on HBO, where I had the honour of producing its on-air promotion in 1999. :) In the meantime, I've learned that it has also been broadcast on Cinemaraton TV.
— original poster —
A superb cast: François Cluzet is Stendhal, Isabella Ferrari is Joséphine, Margherita Buy is Countess Gabriella Nencini, Giancarlo Giannini is Count Nencini, Pierfrancesco Favino is Rossini. Caranfil had a lucky hand with the casting; the careers of the film's actors are still shining today.
The cinematography is by another Romanian, Cristian Comeagă, Nae Caranfil's collaborator on his first four films, up to Philanthropy, while the score is wonderful, composed by the renowned Nicola Piovani.
The 4K restored print premiered at TIFF in 2024, when I, too, saw it on the big screen for the first time. Now, however, it is in cinemas, remastered, like a brand-new film. And it has held up even better than it did at the time of its original release!
Do yourselves a favour and see it in the cinema now! It's worth it!
După ce Nae Caranfil a terminat al doilea lui film, Asfalt Tango, în 1996, a urmat o invitaţie, pentru
a face o producție în Italia, un biopic de epocă ambiţios, despre o presupusă întîlnire
între Stendhal şi Rossini.Dolce far
Niente, în 1998. Bazat pe romanul Comedia
de la Terracina de Frédéric Vitoux, premiat de Academia Franceză, filmul
este un melanj de comedie şi dramă, despre condiţia artistului faţă de
frivolitatea mondenă şi entuziasmul inconştient al revoluţiei şi conspiraţiei.
Filmul, care a ieșit în epocă într-un bad timing copios, după Beaumarcahis (1996), nu avut mare succes în Franța și Italia așa că nu a avut premiera în cinama în România ci direct pe pay tv, la HBO, unde am avut onoarea de a-i face promo-ul în 1999 :). Între timp am înțeles că s-a mai dat pe Cinemaraton TV.
- afișul original -
O distribuție superbă, François Cluzet e Stendhal, Isabella Ferrari e Josephine, Margherita Buy e contesa Gabriella Nencini, Giancarlo Giannini Contele Nencini, Pierfrancesco Favino e Rossini, Caranfil a avut mînă bună, carierele actorilor din film stralucesc și azi.
Imaginea e semnată de alt român, Cristian Comeagă, colaboratorul lui Nae Caranfil la primele 4 filme, pînă la Filantropica, iar muzică e minunată, compusă de renumitul Nicola Piovani.
Copia restaurată în 4K , premiera nouă la TIFF în 2024, atunci cînd l-am văzut și eu pentru prima dată pe marele ecran. Acum însă e în săli, remasterat, ca un film nou-nouț. Și se ține mai bine ca la vremea premierei !
Faceți-vă un serviciu și vedeți-l acum în cinema ! Merită !
Sleeping Dogs is Sam Neill's 1st leading part and the first New Zeeland film (!), even though it was directed by an Australian, Roger Donaldson. Both went to Hollywood and had great careers-Donaldson still works. These might be reasons why this film is known today, and it shalll get even more attention because it's maybe more relevant today than it was 39 years ago. It was a huge hit in new Zeeland ehen it came out, thier first film shot on 35 mm. Donaldson also produced and edited, and Ian Mune who plays Bullen also co-wrote it. It's based on the book, Smith's Dream by Karl Stead, a dystopian thriller that mixes 1984 with a sort of First Blood like man on the run.
The finale improves the film much, it has a slow development, weird pace, sheer brutality and violence, constructed not like a regular action drama, with that weird style of all Australian New Wave films.
Sam Neill is great a Smith, a cluless man that just wants to be left alone and it's mistaken for a guerilla leader.
Warren Oates shows up for a brief subplot, playing the American soldier, it his classic Warren Oates way.
The Boys from Brazil was first a book by Ira Levin (The Stepford Wives, Rosemary's Baby), published in 1976. Great page-turner thriller, very risque, mixing real characters with preposterous fiction !
1978, ITC-producer Sir Lew Grade makes the movie adaptation.
The great Franklin J. Schaffner directs. And he gets an 11 Mill. $ budget and a Grade (sic) A cast.
Gregory Peck is Joseph Mengele, playing totally against type, his only Villain in his filmography. His take on Mengele is fierce, mean spirited and dead serious. He man is evil, the Doctor is mad. But Peck plays it straight and dresses sharply, in white suits, with a stilleto moustache. It's definitely one of the top performances of his amazing career.
Peck said afterwards, "I felt, Laurence Olivier felt, friends of mine like Walter Matthau and Jack Lemmon felt, that I was good in this part. Some critics seem unwilling to accept actors when they break what they think is the mold or the image.”
A frail Laurence Olivier (who just had his kidney stones removed!) is Ezra Liberman, the nazi hunter modelled after Simon Wiesenthal. Olivier's physicality helps him tremendously fot the part, you can feel his pain and suffering. Both Peck and Olivier deliver really copious accents. Olivier was nominated for an Oscar for best actor, one of the film's three Oscar nods (editing and music too).
James Mason supports as colonel Seibert, as do a bunch of great actors known from war and spy films,
Walter Gottel (general Gogol in the Moore Bond films), Wolfgang Preiss, Michael Gough, Bruno Ganz, Denholm Elliott, most interesting is young Steve Guttenberg playing a Jewish young journalist who discovers the Praguayan Nazi plot. Lily Palmer, Uta Hagen and Anne Meara have small but important parts and the young boy, Jeremy Black as the uncanny blue-eyed adolescent with multiple incarnations.
The plot itself it's so far out, it's great. And it's played so serious and grave, also it's very avant garde re Cloning, the Macguffin of the film.
Jerry Goldsmith delivers another great score for Schaffner, they colllaborated on seven films. This one is based half on an Austrian waltz, half on Martial menacing music.
Cinematography in 1.85.1 by Henri Decae, legendary & over versatile French DOP (Bob le flammbeur, Les 400 coups, Le Clan des siciliens, Le Cercle Rouge, Day for Night, Le Professionel), in one of the few English language films he ever did (together with The Light at the Edge of the World, Bobby Deerfield, Two People, Operation Daybreak, The Island and Exposed).
Locations are Brazil, Paraguay, London, Austria (Vienna), Germany, Sweden and the US. The production went to Portugal instead and the principal unit never set foot in the USA.
The opening is great, mysterious, after the majestic music turns into menacing sounds, and the opening credits are on black, there is no dialogue for the first 16 minutes.
I must've seen this film every decade of my life, 1st time in 1981-82 on Communist Romanian television when I was in the 6th or &th grade, impromptu and incognito, on a Sunday night, presented as "film artistic", on the the QT. We were so impressed the next day in school, the ones who saw it, by a sheer mistake, as the film was totally smuggled that night, one of those -push it in films-mainly when comrade Ceausescu was visiting abroad. Thanks again whoever put that on that night. A few years later, in high school I got upon the book, in French ! Started to clumsily translate it, I think I got done the 1st chapter, then of course gave up. The book might've been transalted in Romanian after 1990, I don't know.
One big find was the ITC DVD I got in the early 2000's, wasn't a great copy but still...And last time I watched it in 2020, in the pandemic, catching up with Schaffner's Lionheart and Sphynx.
There were many different versions, the film was cut over 20 minutes for TV from the original 2h05 running time and many cuts didn't have the original ending with Jeremy Black in the photo dark room, which adds value to the concept. It also empathies the role of the braclet of animal claws that Mengele brought with him from Brazil, a small detail and metaphor addes to the subtext.
Now they are reamaking the book (and film) into a 5 episodes miniseries for Netflix that will probably stream next year. Peter Morgan is the showrunenr and Jeremy Strong is the nazi hunter. August Diehl plays Mengele but it shall be no longer Mengele, they renamed him, after his exceptional turn of the charcter in thw recent The Dissapaerence of Joseph Mengele, in which the Ira Levin novel and the film are mentioned !
4 out of 5 / 8 out of 10 !
Maligned on his opening time, criticised and satirised as the "nazi revival" genre was tiring (The Odessa Filre, Marathon Man, later on The Formula) the film stands tall the test of time, anchored in the two key performances, the clash between two old men, obsessed, a lot of psychology that was brought by Peck and Olivier, happy to work together for one time only, the markings of the a great director, the music and atmosphere.
****
Best review I found about the making of and the motivations of Scahaffner, Peck taking part in it, the choice of the filming format and locations here.
as stated on Sept. 23, 2025 when the trailer premiered.
Movie or at least Curio of next year ?
The Bride, Maggie Gyllenhaal's second film after The Lost Daughter (2021) is a revisonist retelling of Bride of Frankenstein (1935, James Whale), with Jessie Buckley (Fargo sez, IV) as The Bride, Christian Bale as Frankenstein's Monster, and Jake Gyllenhaal, Penelope Cruz, Peter Sarsgaard, Annette Bening.
Just fyi, there was another The Bride, starring Sting, Clancy Brown as the Monster aka Viktor and Jennifer Beals as "Eve", directed by Franc Roddam, in 1985.
-Update-saw the film in cinema March 9th 2026 and posted my "review" on Letterboxed here.
It says:
All over the place big budget mess of a personal (I'd say Vanity) star project (Maggie Gyllenhal's 2nd film) with an incoherent agenda: meta-cinema, pretentious literary references (Mary Shelley, Herman Melville, Shakespeare), grand feminist message, cult genre films homage, from Bonnie and Clyde to Mel Brooks' Young Frankenstein, over-the-top performances -Bale can go for a Razzie, gratuitous violence, #metoo engagement, anachronisms galore, chaotic choregraphy and revisionist musical score. I didn't feel involved at all, Zlatko Buric as Italian capo Lupino ! (another Ida Lupino reference !) is the weirdest casting choice.
Folie a Deux meets (Un) Natural Born Killers, It surely deserves the exclamation sign from the title !!!
Maiorul si moartea (The Major and Death, 1967) is a forgotten gem, and a one of a kind / one-off UFO Romanian thiller written by the great Ion Baiesu (Balanta/The Oak), based on his eponymous 1965 short story. It was made later on into a radio play with Enil Hossu as the major.
Directed by the Documentarian Alexandru Boiangiu in his feature film debut, it's a Black and white black and bleak comedy, film noir -policier, shot by maestro DOP Nicu Stan (Rascoala, Diminetile unui baiat cuminte -see references below, Toate Pinzele sus !). The film made a BO of 1.352.078 in Romanian cinemas in 1967.
It is also Gheorghe Dinica's 1st major leading part. (as the major, sic!) Great part too.
The other jewel of the cast is veteran theatre actor Ion Stanescu as retired safe cracker Solomonica, his only part on the big screen except a bit in O noapte furtunoasa (1943).
Supporting: Vasilica Tastaman, Marin Moraru, Mircea Crisan, Jean Constantin, Stefan Mihailescu-Braila (artist emerit;), Peter Paulhoffer, Constantin Rautchi, Ion Anghel, Florin Scarlatescu, Draga Olteanu (before she was Matei ;) and a very young Carmen Galin in her second film part after Diminetile unui baiat cuminte (see last paragraph).
Atmospheric music by Mircea Istrate (Strainul, Haiducii series), played by the Symphonic Cinema Orchestra (Orchestra simfonica a cinematografie- oh, what dayz, when musicians were employed just to score Romanian films...) and conducted by Silviu Panțiru and a cool and absolutely weird song, sung onscreen by Marina Voica, Criminal Tango, by P. Trombetta (actually Kriminal Tango by Piero Trombetta, originally released in 1959 and the title song of a German film of 1960). Another song sang by Voica, is an uncanyAve Maria Lola in bossanova rhythm (min. 66 in the film, just before Crimanl Tango -a request ;). Maria Voica, a superstar of Romanian Pop music of the Communist age, might be the only one left alive from this film. She is 89 now.
Another gem are the opening credits, Saul Bass 60's funky style. Very cool, have no idea who did them, it's not credited (sic).
They include a caption of the Militia consultant (MAI/Ministerul Afecerilor Interne) of the film, as all films of the time needed one. This one is a Lt. Col. (Lieutenat Colonel) called Alexandru Manuși, meaning Gloves !
The film starts surreally with a pre-credits scene in which an Insurance salesman trying to sell a Life policy to the Major. I won't spoil more about the plot, suffice to say it deals with a hidden treasure, a murder and surreal threats signed Death !
There's a scene where Major Tache plays Checkers with ¬Death¬, it can be interpreted as a Pun to Bergman's chess with death in The Seventh Seal. Or not, one can only fabulise ;)
I's say it's sort of Romanian Ladykillers maybe ? Style-wise and humour. It's a bit of a satire of the system too. Scenes in achurch, at a Religious procession, not likely to be seen in the Regime directory.
Great poster above ! Love also this Czech poster with a nod to Vertigo, saying Major & DEATH / Major A Smrt !
Napinave meaning suspensful !!
It seems M & M travelled a bit in the Socialist haven cinema distribution .)
Deutsche version:
The film can be seen in its entirety in multiple youtube versions, mostly taken from a TVR2HD broadcast.
As a fun note, a 'sopirla' / polticial subversive innunedo, one of the characters (Peter Paulhoffer, a German Romanian actor, nicknamed 'the Romanian Paul Newman', that left for BDR- West Germany-later in the '70's), is reading a newspaper in Gara de Nord/ Bucharest railway station. The paper says: The modern profile of a Director's calification !!! On the left is seen a review of another Romanian film from that year: Diminetile unui baiat cuminte/The mornings of a nice boy, by Andrei Blaier, a sort of New Wave manifesto, not a very socialist film as intended to be. The film can be found on youtube from Cinepub.ro here. I am not sure the newspaper existed or if it waas made up for the film as an inside joke.
Psychiatrists, psychoanalysts, therapists. Group therapy or one-on-one. Mentalist, alienist, psychoanalyst, shrink.
Speaking of the original HBO series In Treatment, which itself comes from the Israeli BeTipul, I thought of no better way to wrap up this series of rankings, especially since I had my share of shrinks in my time. :-)
The number one “psychiatric” film would be One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (1975, Milos Forman), but the psychiatrist there is merely window dressing; Nurse Ratched (Louise Fletcher) is the one who embodies the oppressive system. And then there’s virtually any Woody Allen film, especially the Gene Wilder episode from *Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex (But Were Afraid to Ask) (1972), featuring the doctor who falls in love with Daisy the sheep, which I previously discussed in my ranking of performances in Woody Allen films.
K-PAX (2001, Iain Softley), in which Jeff Bridges plays Dr. Mark Powell, treating an alien—or merely a psychotic patient? (Kevin Spacey)—and the Argentine counterpart Hombre mirando al sudeste (1986, Eliseo Subiela), are really about the patients, much like Nash (Russell Crowe) in A Beautiful Mind (2001, Ron Howard).
There’s also Dr. Marc Chabot (Yves Montand) in On a Clear Day You Can See Forever (1970, Vincente Minnelli), who hypnotizes Barbra Streisand and discovers she has lived previous lives. Barbra herself tried being a doctor in The Prince of Tides (1991), attempting to cure Nick Nolte.
But my personal favorite is Klaus Kinski as Dr. Hugo Zuckerbrot in Buddy Buddy (1981), Billy Wilder’s remake (and final film) of L’Emmerdeur (1973, Édouard Molinaro), unfortunately only a supporting role, complete with a fondness for nudist therapy.
And then there’s Dr. Elliot (Michael Caine) from Brian De Palma’s thriller Dressed to Kill (1980), whom I would call the “cross-dressing” variation.
Still, I decided to give the place to the illustrious Dr. Caligari. To paraphrase Siegfried Kracauer’s From Caligari to Hitler, this ranking goes from Caligari to Freud...
10. Dr. Caligari (Werner Krauss) in The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920, Robert Wiene)
Variation: creepy
Dr. Caligari runs an asylum and uses the somnambulist Cesare for various dirty jobs. Similar to Edgar Allan Poe’s The System of Doctor Tarr and Professor Fether and its idea that the inmates have taken over the asylum.
Its descendants include Asylum (1972, Roy Ward Baker), as well as the opening and cover art of In the Mouth of Madness (1995, John Carpenter).
Successors: Fritz Lang’s Dr. Mabuse, Dr. M, the mega-villains of the James Bond franchise beginning with Dr. No, etc.
Caligari controls Cesare, in a scene set to music by Lacrimosa.
(The full film can be found on YouTube.)
9. Dr. Constance Petersen (Ingrid Bergman) in Spellbound (1945, directed by Alfred Hitchcock)
Variation: mysterious
A thriller populated by psychiatrists, fascinated with psychoanalysis—a fairly new concept in Hollywood at the time—partly inspired by producer David O. Selznick’s own experiences in therapy.
Psychiatrist Constance Petersen (Ingrid Bergman) treats the amnesiac John Ballantine (Gregory Peck), accused of murder.
Based on the novel The House of Dr. Edwardes by Francis Beeding, the pseudonym of John Palmer and Hilary St. George Sanders, screenplay by Ben Hecht.
Memorable above all for its dream sequence designed by Salvador Dalí, and for a recurring skiing sequence.
Successor:Gothika (2003, Mathieu Kassovitz), with Halle Berry as an amnesiac psychiatrist committed to an asylum for a murder she cannot remember committing.
Trailer! (The full film can be found on YouTube.)
8. Dr. Buddy Rydell (Jack Nicholson) in Anger Management (2003, directed by Peter Segal)
Variation: out-of-control!
Jack Nicholson, usually the patient :-) (with the exception of “The Specialist” in the musical Tommy (1975), Ken Russell’s adaptation of The Who), plays an anger-management therapist—or whatever the proper term may be; the closest translation I found was “treatment for controlling one’s temper”—in a mediocre film that deserved a much better director.
A vehicle for Adam Sandler, who, when placed face to face with Jack’s explosive personality, is completely eclipsed.
Best scene: Adam, backed up by Jack, singing I Feel Pretty from West Side Story on the bridge!
7. Dr. Sam Loomis (Donald Pleasence) in the Halloween series
Created by John Carpenter for the landmark 1978 film.
The name was borrowed from Psycho, from the character played by John Gavin, Sam Loomis.
Dr. Loomis is Michael Myers’ nemesis. He treated him at the institution from which Myers escaped. He is also the commentator, the voice of reason, and the only character besides Michael Myers himself to appear throughout the series: five films, including Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers, released shortly before Pleasence’s death in 1995.
Played by Malcolm McDowell in Rob Zombie’s remake.
On the nature of evil!
6. Dr. Ben Sobel (Billy Crystal) in Analyze This (1999, directed by Harold Ramis)
Variation: sleeps with the fishes!
Mob boss Vitti (Robert De Niro) has problems and decides to see a psychiatrist. But nobody must find out. Otherwise Vitti might end up sleeping with the fishes too, Luca Brasi style.
Nemesis: Chazz Palminteri, to whom the meaning of the word “closure” has to be explained.
The dramatic TV version:The Sopranos, released the very same year. Which came first? Only they know who inspired whom, but Analyze This is the parody version, a kind of sitcom blown up to feature-film proportions.
Sequel:Analyze That (2002), also directed by Harold Ramis.
Explaining the Oedipus complex! “Fuckin’ Greeks!”
5. Dr. Bill Capa (Bruce Willis) in Color of Night (1994, directed by Richard Rush)
Variation: it’s so bad, it’s good!
The most improbable psychiatrist ever.
Color-blind, traumatized by the color red, trapped in a Hitchcockian thriller inspired in part by Vertigo. Someone starts killing off his patients.
The patient roster is practically a compendium of cult actors: Lance Henriksen, Brad Dourif, Lesley Ann Warren, Kevin J. O'Connor.
Steamy sex scenes with the then-young Jane March (The Lover).
Bruce also played a psychiatrist, Dr. Crowe, in The Sixth Sense (1999, M. Night Shyamalan), but I left him off the list for objective reasons: he belongs to the spirit world. :-)
A fan-made video clip for the title song (super-cheesy), performed by Lauren Christy!
4. Dr. Martin Dysart (Richard Burton) in Equus (1977, directed by Sidney Lumet)
Variation: equestrian
A drama written by Peter Shaffer, adapted from his own play, in which Harry Potter himself (a.k.a. Daniel Radcliffe) is currently appearing nude on Broadway.
Burton delivers a magnificent performance as a doctor determined to cure an extremely disturbed young man obsessed with horses (Peter Firth).
Nominated for three Academy Awards (Best Actor, Best Supporting Actor and Best Adapted Screenplay) and winner of two Golden Globes, for Best Dramatic Actor (Burton) and Best Supporting Actor (Firth).
In the original Broadway production (1974–75), Anthony Hopkins played Dysart.
Trailer!
3. Dr. Leo Marvin (Richard Dreyfuss) in What About Bob? (1991, directed by Frank Oz)
Variation: funny
Bill Murray is Bob, the patient who relentlessly torments Dr. Leo Marvin (Richard Dreyfuss).
The Romanian title used on television (since it never received a theatrical release) was The Psychiatrist on Vacation.
Similar: the Burt Reynolds / Dom DeLuise pairing in The End (1978, directed by Burt Reynolds).
The “Gimme Gimme, I Need I Need...” scene. (The full film can be found on YouTube.)
2. Col. Vincent Kane (Stacy Keach) in The Ninth Configuration (1980, directed by William Peter Blatty)
Variation: red herrings!
Based on William Peter Blatty’s novel Twinkle, Twinkle, Killer Kane (The Exorcist).
How Do You Fight A War Called Madness?
A new commander arrives at a castle where he applies shock therapy to former soldiers suffering from mental illness.
An entirely male cast: Jason Miller, Stuart Wilson, Neville Brand, Robert Loggia, Joe Spinell.
A film about post-war trauma—in this case Vietnam—one of the greatest unknown films ever made, although it enjoys a loyal cult following. Now available in its longer director’s cut.
Packed with references to The Exorcist, also written and produced by Blatty.
Filmed in Hungary. The castle is Burg Eltz in Germany.
Successor:Shutter Island (2010, Martin Scorsese).
Part One: the opening sequence set to “St. Antone” by Denny Brooks. (The full film can be found on YouTube.)
1. Dr. Freud (Alan Arkin) in The Seven-Per-Cent Solution (1976, directed by Herbert Ross)
Variation: Freudian :-)
The film in which Dr. Freud (Alan Arkin) treats Sherlock Holmes (Nicol Williamson), brought to him by Dr. Watson (Robert Duvall) for cocaine addiction—hence the film’s title.
Based on the novel by Nicholas Meyer.
Laurence Olivier plays Professor Moriarty and Vanessa Redgrave is the romantic interest, Lola Deveraux.
A special, one-of-a-kind film that clearly influenced Alan Moore’s graphic novel The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.
Predecessor: Freud had appeared on screen before, from John Huston’s 1962 biopic Freud, starring Montgomery Clift, to the less likely incarnation played by Jamie Elman (his co-star from California Dreaming!) in the film where Armand Assante portrays Nietzsche, When Nietzsche Wept (2007, Pinchas Perry).
Project Hail Mary is the Feel Good science fiction film of the year, decade, and more, a hopeful unlikely buddy film well done, with winks to 2001, Intersellar, ET, Close Encounters of 3d kind and of course Rocky ;). Ryan Gosling is at his most charismatic and Rocky is a hoot ! Import Deutch Sandra Hüller (Anatomy of a Fall, Zone of Interest), does a good job, and also karaoke ;) Nice songs on the soundtrack (Kris Kristofferson, The Beatles, Dennis Wilson, Ike and Tina Turner) and effective score by Daniel Pemberton. It does what Mission 2 Mars and The Martian (also based on an Andy Weir book) did not manage to do, meanwhile touching the Grace ;)
See it on IMAX if you can, all the space sequences are shot in the format.
This is Film Noir, dark comedy, thriller, and most of all an homage of Kind Hearts and Coronets (1959), the classic Ealing comedy with Alce Guiness es ;), based on the novel , it says on the credits. "Insiperd by" those two.
Also has an 80's air, it's cynical and politically incorrect, stylish and crisp.
Finally a good part for Glen Powell as Becket Redfellow (cool names in this family !), after the huge misfire of new Running Man-Liked the guy in his SNL episode, I think he has more comedic potential than action chops, definetly romantic too.
Jessica Henwick is the romantic interest, Ruth. Bill Camp has a nice part as Warren Redfellow, also Topher Grace as one of the Redfellows (Steven) and Zach Woods (from Sillicon Valley) another one (Noah). Also Ed Harris' part as the patriarch Whitelaw Redfellow is more like a cameo, but he's effective as ever.
Amazingly enough this was shot in South Africa instead of New York and New Jersey !!!
Great score by Emile Mosserri and effective soundtrack-The Clapping Song (Shirley Ellis) , the Brazilian classic Take Me Back to Piaui by Juca Chaves, No Fear by Inflo, etc.
...when in Rome...just landed and in the taxi I hear the news, celelbrissimo attore Robert Duvall, etc..surely I get it. Gone. I mean he was 95, lived a great and long life and his films are immortal.
But why everytime I go somewhere this kind of news get heavier and harder?
Duvall was one of the Greatest, like Hackman. As as kid I knew him first by name, my father showed me, he was in the Guinness Book of World Records as the most versatile actor of the '70's. Opposed to Hackman he was the quintesential Character Actor. Capital A.
He was in over 100 films and television series.
He got an Academy Award (for the forgotten Tender Mercies-1983), a BAFTA Award, four Golden Globe Awards, two Primetime Emmy Awards, and a Screen Actors Guild Award.
His film debut was as Boo Radley in the book adaptation of To Kill a Mockingbird (1962).
His shot at Movie Mythology came with Consigliere Tom Hagen in The Godfather and more for Coppola, a bit part in The Conversation-uncredited-where I saw him last-last year, as a Gene Hackman homage series of films), lt. Kilgore "love Napalm in the morning" in Apocalypse Now. He refused to reprise his part in The Hodfather III doe to a salary quarrel.
Loved his parts in Lucas' debut THX 1138, Jesse James in The Great Northfield Minnesota Raid, the gangster in The Outfit, based on the Donald E. Westlake book, the German colonel in The Eagle has Landed, the baddie in Sam Peckinpah's Killer Elite, a TV producer in Sidney Lumet's Network, Dr. Watson in The Seven-Per-Cent Solution, the cop in True Confessions, another cop in Dennis Hopper's Colors, then later on Tony Scott's Days of Thunder, written by Robert Towne, Joel Schumacher's Falling Down, Kevin Costner's Open Range. Also Sling Blade, Get Low, the part of the Old man in the adpatation of Cormac McCarthy's The Road, The Judge in 2014, last bit in 2022 Scott Cooper's Netflix flick The Pale Blue Eye.
He directed five films films, most notably The Apostle in 1997 and in 2002 in Argentina, Assassination Tango. I gotta catch-up with that last one, never saw it.
He lived in his ranch in Virginia, surrounded by his family. Never will be gone, just left this stage and sets...
"Somebody once said that the best life in the world is the life of a second leading man. You travel, you get a per diem, and you’ve probably got a better part anyway. And you don’t have the weight of the entire movie on your shoulders.”
1st film I saw on 2026 it's one of the best of 2025 and one of Park Chan-wook's best. No Other Choice aka Eojjeolsuga eobsda. It's also the offical Korean Submission for Best International film at the Oscars and it's nominated for 3 Golden Globes Awards. No Other Choice premiered in the 2025 Venice Film Fest Competition. It won Best Director in Sitges FF.
It's limited in Romanian Cinemas now, so try to see it on the big screen, it's worthy. Just peropeare for slower development, the film has 2h19 mins.
I follow the Korean director for 25 years, ever since he came to Bucharest with his 1st feature, JSA (Joint Security Area) at the 1st Festasia fest edition. That was before Oldboy, Mr. and Mrs. Vengeance, Thirst, Handmaiden and Stoker. Saw most of his oeuvre, also the HBO series The Sympathiser, so I can say that this one it's one of his best.
Lee Byung-hun who is South Korean leading man is here a Paper Man, formerly "Pulp Man of the Year 2019." He was also in PCWook's JSA, in A Bittersweet Life, Squid Game series, even in G.I. Joe. He gets back at working with PCW after 25 years. Here he is a plain family man, with a desperate will to get back to his job that was downsized. Son Ye-jin is great too as his wife Miri, and so is the son Si-one and the daughter Ri-One- playing cello. And the two dogs (Si-Two and Ri-Two). And all the supporting characters. Great supporting characters !
It's a Korean Le Coupert / The Axe, based on Donald E.Westlake 1997 novel. It was made before by Costa-Gavras in 2005 as The Ax, a great black comedy, merciless, starring José Garcia. But Wook-Chan goes even further in absurdity and satire. He co-wrote this with Don McKellar, they worked together before on The Sympathiser. The film is produced by Costa-Gavras family and it's dedicated to the Greek director, who kept the rights of the novel and gave them to Park Chan. The film was supposed to be in English first (starting 2009) but kept developing.
Via IMDB: During a live discussion with Costa-Gavras at the 2019 Busan International Film Festival, Park told audiences that he was still working on his adaptation of Westlake's novel. The film was described by Park as a "lifetime project" and that while he hadn't begun filming it yet, he wished "to make this film as my masterpiece." Gavras, who still held the rights to the book, had helped Park to develop the project. The film was set to be an English-language picture, with Don McKellar co-writing the script alongside Park.
The design is fabulous too, from the bonsai and the greenhouse to the seasons change, going from summer to winter (it was shot in a period of five months, from August 2024 to January 2025). The colors are very important for the transitions and the story. Impeccable widescreen (2.35 : 1) cinematography (by Kim Woo-hyung who worked before with the director on The Little Drummer Girl series) and editing (Kim Sang-bum, Park's editor since JSA), adding to the plot points and directing.
Great score too, and great idea of a cello subplot, by Chan-wook Park's collaborator, Cho Young-Wuk. The score includes incidental classical music, Mozart piano concerto (no. 23!), Marin Marais and pop hits, Korean and American (Hold On I'm Coming by Sam and Dave -1966), edited and directed on camera (one set-piece might as well be the best Cinema scene of 2025!-and the funniest -with subtitles too ;).
4 out of 5 / 8 out of 10 !!!
“I've always been trying to follow the footsteps of the great masters of cinema, most of whom have passed away today. I've tried very hard to reach their level. And I think in certain scenes or certain films, I might have reached a similar level, but there's still a very long way to go. So, when I think about how many more films I can make for the rest of my life, I feel very rushed.”
Tom Stoppard was one of the greatest playwrights of the last century, screenwiter and script doctor and author of the play Rosenkrantz and Guilderstern are Dead (1966). In 1990 he directed also a film based on his play, the film won the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival as well as the Fantasporto Directors' Week Award. He co-wrote Brazil with Terry Gilliam and Charles McKeown, for which he was nominated for an Oscar. He won the Oscar (and Golden Globe) for a lesser film, Shakespeare in Love, in 1998. His forte were the adpatations.
The new Running Man, is not a remake pre se of the Ahnuld 1987 vehicle, but a more faithful adaptation of Stephen King as Richard Bachman novel, written in 1973, published in 1982. That novel happened in the year 2025 and actually today it happens, with the Squid Game series and a Korean Reality show named exactly Running Man. So Ben Richards is in a banal world, becoming more real every day. I mean, it's like Y-day news after the Hunger Games series and all the Tv/straming fare of this kind.
Running man is of course influenced by Rollerball, which still stands up as one of the best film of its era (not the shitty unnecesaary reamke) it's even worse tha n its remake.
Everyone's commenting, oh, it's an Edgar Wright film. Ok, that is like a certified value for a big budget blockbuster Sf action (110 mill. $). surely not. I was also very dispointed by Lst Night in Soho, his take in gialllos, very pretentios and shallow. The most action Wright directed was in Baby Driver, which I enjoyed most of his all films, and he's better in making quirky, funny, heartfelt little films, not Hollywood fodder.
Also Glen Powell, which I've just seen in the lastest SNL edition, can't carry the film., at all. Not a problem with the guy and he tries hard but neh.
This would've worked as a Snake Plissken adventure, like Escape fromn the Dome. I guess Wright gave a few nods to John Carpenter.
There's also a problem with the duration which is overlong, 2h13 min, oi, the film doesn't start until we get to the show and no matter how good Josh Brolin and Colman Domingo are, they can't help much.
Also this world, used and dirty, used to cost less to produce on the screen. Here they went to Bulgaria for exteriors and day shots. Somehow doesn't look like America. The rest of it was hot at Warner Bros' studios in England.
Now for the music, unimpressive loud score by Steven Price. And as Edgar Wright ia great fan of songs to use on the soundtrack (yeah, great in Baby Driver), here most of them are wasted. Rolling Stones' Doo Doo Doo Doo Doo (Heartbreaker), Sly and the Family Stone (Underdog)-on the main credits, Iggy and the Stooges (Search and Destroy), The Allman Brothers (Revival) , Miles Davis (Red China Blues) and Tom Jones (Keep on Running) on the end credits. Including a riff of The Revolution Will Not Be Televised (last heard appropiately in One Battle After Another). And Jamie XX, far from my desk ;)
It's been Stephen King's year all over, from Life of Chuck to Welcome to Derry, the IT prequel that runs now on HBO MAX, MGM's The Institute series, passing through The Monkey and another Bachman opus, The Long Walk (which I liked best of these all, my review here).
Wright's film is full of King references /Easter eggs for the eyes of King's fans and King himself, credited as an executive producer. Of course King was happy with the film, as I know his tastes in film (ex: how much he hated Kubrick's The Shining and managed to to a sequel just to get rid of that Kubrick hangover, I don't care so much about what he likes or does not cinematically...hey, what about that Maximum Overdrive?
2 1/2 out of 5
*I opened recently a Letterboxed account in order to write down the films I see which I hardly can here, and my "reARviews" will be isssued there. Same ratings apply.
Diane Keaton was 79. Except Woody Allen's muse, friend (and girlfriend) and confidante (eight films together, from 1972's Play It Again Sam, ending with Manhattan Murder Mystery in 1993), she was Al Pacino's Michael Corleone's wife Kay in the three Godfathers, from fiancee to divorcee (also his girlfriend in real life), and exceptionally radicalist Louise Bryant in Warren Beatty's 1981's Reds. A very smart, intellectual. witty woman, personified best in Annie Hall (1977), character that used Keaton's manierisms, also her true family name is Hall, film that brought her an Oscar for best actress. She was also a feminist and an avant garde personality. And a great protograper (book Reservations). She never married and had two adopted kids.
I think the last time I saw her was in Something's Gotta Give, the 2003 Nicholson weaker comedy... She was in a lot of romantic comedies (Father of the Bride), heartfelt films (The First Wives Club), dramas (Marvin's Room). But for me she will always be The Little Drummer Girl, in the excellent George Roy Hill film from 1984, based on the John le Carré book (not the 2018 series), where she plays a wannabe groupie terrorist, ideologically brainwashed and used, in a film that is more actualt today than Woody Allen's NY fantasies or the politics of Reds.
She as also great in Richard Brooks’ audacious drama with a sex twist, Looking for Mr. Goodbar (1977).
Diane Hall / Keaton was also a director, most famously for Be Unstrung Heroes (1995), she also directed Belinda Carlisle's hit video Heaven is a Place on Earth. She also produced Gus Van Sant's Elephant. She wrote memoirs thrice: “Then Again” (2011), “Let’s Just Say It Wasn’t Pretty” (2015) and “Brother and Sister” (2020).
2017 Lifetime Achievement Award from the AFI/ American Film Institute.
`There are two kinds of people in this world, those who know who Shane Black is, and those who don't!. Those can dig ;)
NALD
Well Shane Black is back as a writer/director, this time on Amazon Prime & theirs MGM 100 mill. $ streaming extravaganza.
It's a Parker film named Play Dirty (not to be confused with the 1969 André De TothWW2 actioner, the title comes from Black's unfilmed script for Lethal Weapon 2, unseen til today -Black's most proud and gritty work, or so they say ;).
It's based on the Richard Stark (aka Donald E. Westlake) iconic novels started in the 60's. Not one novel but `novels`. I guess they're trying to build a franchise but this won't happen I guess cos' the film is the weakest of Black's career as a director (and that includes the reshot troubled 2018's The Predator).
Mark Wahlberg is Parker, an obnoxious choice. He can't handle the character dark charisma and dry wit, a dangerous man with a code of its own. Stark's Parker is an Anti Hero, Steve Mc Queen would have done him justice. Or Kris Kristofferson. Even today's Brad Pitt cos' Russell Crowe's too overweight...
Robert Downey Jr. was supposed to play him but he backed off, remaining on board as a producer. Not sure even about Downey but definetly a better choice, Parker's before were Lee Marvin (Point Blank-1967- the most menacing), Jim Brown (The Split-1978, the black one), Robert Duvall (The Outfit-1973, the most aloof), Peter Coyote (Slayground-1983, the most unlikely), Mel Gibson (Payback-1999, the coolest, but meanest to his director-check out only the Director's Cut), Jason Statham (Parker-2013, bleh..). I'm not adding two these the two Frenchie freejazzin', Made in USA (Jean Luc Godard, 1966) and Mise à Sac (Alan Cavalier, 1967).
Back to Play Dirty. Would've been better to play it cool tho. The film itself is a self indulgent mess, combo of action scenes, comedy and VFX gone awry.
Too many characters, too much useless plot, not a lot of chemistry between the actors. Rapper LaKeith Stanfield shines as Grofield, Stark's character that has his own novels. Would've liked more of the Thomas Jane character, and someone else for Tony Shaloub, the guy plays a caricature of the mob boss of a ridiculous corny and cartoonish Outfit. Think a James Coburn, even in Hudson Hawk or Kris Kristofferson (he was the boss of The Outfit in Payback, but not in the Director's Cut !!!). Also for the Latin country (unanamed but it's Peru), some finer actors, plus Rosa Salazar as Zen is kinda unmemobrable and not at all a Femme Fatale type.
The running time (2h03) is overlong and the film loses steam in midstream.
+++The Plus:
Great score by Alan Silvestri, reminionscent of those he did for Predator and The Long Kiss Goodnight (based on Shane's script), jazzy and funk, dramatic and menacing where it needs to be. For me Silvestri's score is a great comeback to form. A bit of 007 Bond-sist swagger, Lalo Schifrin and The Taking of Pelham 123 by David Shire, the percussion points.
Also the opening credits are very cool, 60's like. They were made by Daniel Kleinman who did all the title sequences for James Bond starting with GoldenEye back in 1995. Amazingly he is not credited with imdb and Anca found this for me, thanx ! Her piece on the art of the opening credits is here.
And here's the whole title sequence.
Production values-high -especially the first action scene at the racing track.
The cinematography (superb 2.39:) by legendary Phillipe Rousselot (he's 80 now!), a lot of shades, shadows, reflections, in a NYC shot this time in Sydney, Australia !!!! Rousselot and Black worked together before in 2026's The Nice Guys.
Some of the wisecracks work better than the plotholes and the action. Also there are many references to Black's scripts and films, from the Christmas setting (Duh !) Lethal Weapon (the fall from the rooftop), The Long Kiss Goodnight (the House of Gretchen Mol, the chase in the snow, the scene by the water), Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, The Nice Guys, etc. Liked the Mark Cuban pun ;)
Shane Black's influences on this one are great films, from Bullit to Dirty Harry, Marathon Man to the obscure Hickey & Boggs (1972), you can check the interview here on Letterboxed.
French 75 resurges for one last call...Do you remeber the code ? "What time is it?" / It's Time for REVOlution (again ?)
One Battle After Another is Paul Thomas Anderson's biggest film to date (you dpon't wanna know the budget, out of which a quarter is Leo's salary..). Most expected and already lauded as film of the year. Sean Penn is in for an Oscar nod surely-best supposting. Di Caprio does a OUIH bit imo. He's like Rick Dalton playing the fried brains revolutionary recluse Bob Ferguson aka Ghetto" Pat. Benicio Del Toro is also superfunny as the Sensei, shades of him in Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas...but Sean Penn's performance as Col. Steven J. Lockjaw is surreal. One for the books !
Chase Infiniti's big screen debut as Bob and Perfidia's daughter Willa is intense. Special mention to Eric Schweig as Avanti.
Plus the Christmas Adventurers Club, man, kudos for this one off ;)
I'd call this No Country For Any One...
It's a relentless ride, shot beautifully on 35 mm film in VistaVision (second film in this format in this century, after The Brutlalist), by Michael Bauman (his second film with PTA after Licorice Pizza), his first feature credit !
The film should be read through his soundtrack -I mean the overall score, again by Jonny Greenwood, his faithfull composer, this time a psychotronic overpulsating paroxistic one. I expect his Oscar next March.
The soundtrack includes great songs, from Steely Dan (Dirty Work), to Jackson Five (Ready Or Not Here I Come), Tom Petty's American Girl on the end credits (you will know why, "she was raised with Promises"), Ella Fitzgerald and The Revolution Will Not Be Televised, thge classic and still subversive Gil Scott-Heron proto-rap from 1970, which plays a role also in the plot.
Thomas Pynchon's book Vineland (1990) was the inspiration of PTA, who did a crazy looney tones political bonanza. Reminde me a lot of Eddington. It's somehow PTA's funniest film to date. Some bits reminiscent of the weed haze of Inherent Vice, his adaptation of Pynchon's other counterculture book.
There is also a big connection (and inspiration) with Gillo Pontecorvo's revolutionary classic Batle of Algiers (1966).
Epic duration, 2h41, but it goes fast, on this one I would've liked to be even longer, more Christmas Adventureres, Billy Goat, Beegee, Comrade Josh and Talleyrand.
The film is dedicated to Adam Somner, the legendary second unit director (Gladiator, Phantom Thread) and producer of 5 of PTA's films from There Will Be Blood, The Master, Inherent Vice, Licorice Piza to this last, OBATA. Somner died last year in November after completing this film...
4 out of 5, 8 out of 10 !!!
*Defintely it's a film that you can revisit, plus very TODAY in the actual political climate.
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