West of Zanzibar (1928)
“For all the suffering he brought her, he’s going to pay!”
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Review: Redeeming Qualities and Moments:
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Ilsa, Harem Keeper of the Oil Sheiks (1976)
“You have the instincts of an Arab, Ilsa.”
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Man They Could Not Hang, The (1939)
“To operate on a living body is like trying to repair a motor when it’s still running.”
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Craig’s Wife (1936)
“Nobody can know another human being enough to trust him.”
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Review: Watching Harriet Craig a few years ago was my personal introduction to Kelly’s play; viewing it once again (albeit in a truncated fashion; this film runs just 73 minutes, 21 minutes less than Harriet Craig), I had a renewed appreciation for the important themes he’s attempting to address, and I found myself doubly thankful that this earlier version was directed by Dorothy Arzner, whose feminist sensibilities shine through clearly. Indeed, Russell’s Harriet comes across as nothing less than a deeply self-preserving woman who recognizes that her only chance at security in life is wooing a well-off man who will give her whatever she wants; her mistake, of course, lies in failing to recognize that longevity requires more than just this initial conquest. To that end, I remain troubled in both adaptations by the unrealistic character arc of Craig’s husband, who shifts from adoring puppy (how can he be so clueless?) to wounded cynic far too quickly — but this time around, I found myself better able to understand the need for dramatic compression (this is an adaptation of a play, after all). Ultimately, both Craig’s Wife and Harriet Craig remains worth a look by those interested in engaging with the play’s challenging yet provocative premise. Redeeming Qualities and Moments:
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Walking Dead, The (1936)
“What effect did the experience of death have on his subconscious mind?”
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Given the enormous popularity of Frankenstein (and Universal Studios’ eagerness to bank upon its successes), these thematic connections are not all that surprising — nor, sadly, is the fact that The Walking Dead pales in comparison. The film’s primary problem lies in its underdeveloped narrative and characters. There’s a weak attempt at a romantic subplot between Gwenn’s over-worked assistants (played by Marguerite Churchill and Warren Hull), but this goes absolutely nowhere:
… and speaking of Gwenn, his “mad doctor” is frustratingly opaque.
It’s difficult to think of Gwenn as anything other than a jolly do-gooder, yet here he blithely fools around with a man’s existence to fulfill his own curiosities about death — all the same, we’re left unsatisfied in terms of knowing how exactly we’re meant to react to him and his motivations. Karloff, however, is fine from beginning to end — as with his Monster, he injects his troubled protagonist here with extraordinary pathos throughout.
Meanwhile, director Michael Curtiz and DP Hal Mohr do a fine job playing up the atmospheric nature of the screenplay, which cleverly incorporates gangster elements into its storyline; Ricardo Cortez as the lead gangster responsible for boldly sending Karloff to the electric chair is particularly well cast.
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Finishing School (1934)
“The aim of our school — and we like to believe the achievement — is to prepare young ladies to meet graciously all social demands.”
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Review: (sorry for mild spoilers) … isn’t necessarily made to pay for her “sins”. What’s most fascinating about Finishing School is the way it daringly portrays the utter hypocrisy behind upper-class mores, which hold that as long as one isn’t “caught”, one can get away with just about anything; the goal is to avoid detection and public shame. One particularly well-handled scene shows Bondi glimpsing Dee arriving home after an outing with Mac, and hesitating as she clearly wishes she could pretend not to have seen what she just saw.
Dee’s sin isn’t carousing; it’s falling in love with a lower-class man and daring to present it openly. Dee does a fine, sensitive job in the leading role:
… and Cabot stands out as refreshingly natural in what appears at first to be a nominal supporting role (he’s first glimpsed wandering around a hotel room picking up after the partying socialites), but turns into a major romantic lead; one can easily see why Dee would fall for someone like him.
Rogers, meanwhile, is perfectly cast as Dee’s wisecracking roomie, and other young starlets — including Anne Shirley — do a fine job portraying young heiresses of various stripes. Interestingly, Finishing School was co-directed by a woman (Wanda Tuchock) — something so unusual at the time that it most definitely stands out when watching the opening credits. (Unfortunately, it seems she only directed one other short film; the rest of her Hollywood career was spent on screenwriting.) Redeeming Qualities and Moments:
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Ilsa, She Wolf of the SS (1975)
“Once a prisoner has slept with me, he will never sleep with a woman again. If he lives, he will remember only the pain of the knife.”
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Response to Peary’s Review:
In his review of this first entry in the series, Peary notes that “at least the torture/violence is not as convincing as one might fear”, and points out that “the brutality looks staged”; yet the “poor acting, pedestrian direction, and a repelling overdose of bondage and violence” still “put the film at [the] bottom of the women-in-prison genre”. Indeed, it’s genuinely distressing to know that this film has a cult of diehard followers who find nothing wrong with what they refer to as its “campy” sex and violence; why in the world would people choose to sit through something this distasteful? (Clearly I’m not the target audience.) Unfortunately, I’ll eventually have to subject myself to a bit more, given that Peary lists one of the sequels — Ilsa, Harem Keeper for the Oil Sheiks (1976) — in the back of his book, despite openly referring to it as “worse”. Why, oh why, Peary? Redeeming Qualities and Moments: Must See? Links: |
Who Slew Auntie Roo? (1972)
“You children don’t want to leave here! You have a home here — forever!”
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Meanwhile, other plot elements — such as the presence of Winters’ manipulative butler (Michael Gothard) working in cahoots with a sham medium (Ralph Richardson) to convince Winters her daughter is communicating with her — are poorly resolved.
Winters tries hard with the material she’s given, but this one is only must-see for her diehard fans. Redeeming Qualities and Moments:
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Testament (1983)
“Tell it to stop.”
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Genres, Themes, Actors, and Directors: Response to Peary’s Review: What’s most impressive (and effective) about Testament is its quiet authenticity. As the film opens, rather than presenting an idyllic, pastoral representation of life in small-town America, we see a typically hectic morning in the Wetherly household, with Alexander frantically trying to get her kids ready to leave for school, and Harris feeling slightly put-upon by his over-eager dad, who insists on challenging him to a rigorous, semi-competitive bike ride early each morning; meanwhile, Alexander and Devane quibble (she pours dry cereal over his head in frustration when he refuses to take time for breakfast), but they make up with one another later that night in a way that demonstrates the ultimate solidity of their marriage. The time Littman takes to show us all of these seemingly mundane details results in an even more powerful sense of shock and loss when “there is a flash in the sky from [a] bomb” — a moment that “should give every viewer a sick feeling in the stomach”, given that “a nuclear explosion cannot be reversed”. Community relations are quickly strained, and we see the effect on more than just Alexander’s family. Kevin Costner and Rebecca De Mornay, for instance, play a young couple whose newborn quickly becomes a casualty of the blast; meanwhile, a Japanese-American gas station owner (Mako) with a mentally retarded son (Gerry Murillo) suddenly finds himself in an unexpected position of power, given his access to valuable fuel. Other than a few such contextualizing scenes, however (including the casual arrival of a neighborhood boy whose parents have disappeared, and who comes to live with Alexander’s family), the story remains heavily focused on Alexander’s attempts to help her own family survive. To that end, viewers have debated the ultimate wisdom of her character’s choice to simply stay put in her house, waiting for what seems like the inevitable, painful death of herself and her loved ones; many wonder why she doesn’t attempt to flee with her family to a different, less exposed location (which is what Costner and De Mornay’s characters do). Yet I find her decision eminently logical and realistic; in the face of ultimate powerlessness, it makes sense to stay in a comfortable and “known” location, and the film is no less potent or revealing because of this pivotal narrative choice. Redeeming Qualities and Moments:
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Living Desert, The (1953)
“In her desert drama, nature knows neither hero nor villain; she’s impartial, and plans for the survival of all.”
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Review: Note: You may or many not enjoy one of the film’s most discussed segments, in which scorpions “square dance” with one another — helped by the clever cinematic technique of running the film reel backwards… It’s done for comedic effect, but does it sully the supposed veracity of the documentary? Redeeming Qualities and Moments:
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