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Month: May 2024

Man For All Seasons, A (1966)

Man For All Seasons, A (1966)

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“No; I will not sign.”

Synopsis:
In 16th century England, Sir Thomas More (Paul Scofield) risks his life to uphold his beliefs regarding the divorce and remarriage of King Henry VIII (Richard Shaw).

Genres, Themes, Actors, and Directors:

  • Fred Zinnemann Films
  • Historical Drama
  • John Hurt Films
  • Orson Welles Films
  • Paul Scofield Films
  • Play Adaptations
  • Robert Shaw Films
  • Royalty and Nobility
  • Susannah York Films
  • Wendy Hiller Films

Review:
Peary doesn’t review this Oscar-winning adaptation of Robert Bolt’s Tony-winning 1960 play in his GFTFF, but he does discuss it a bit in his Alternate Oscars, where he refers to the “strained politeness of Zinnemann’s classy but strangely dispassionate work” (I disagree) “about how Sir Thomas More (an Oscar-winning Paul Scofield) chose to give up his life rather than sanction Henry VIII’s divorce from Catherine of Aragon and remarriage to Anne Boleyn.” In comparing A Man For All Seasons with his personal pick for Best Picture that year — Roman Polanski’s Cul-de-Sac — he notes that each film “contains scene after scene of confrontational, power-play conversations”; each is “about a man who loses everything while battling for his integrity”; and each “uses the catalytic appearance of intruders/visitors into a couple’s home to cause them to confront what’s drastically wrong with their marriage.” (That last point is a bit of a stretch for A Man of All Seasons, though More’s marriage — to Wendy Hiller’s Alice — does indeed become seriously strained.)

While Peary doesn’t award Scofield the Best Actor — he gives it instead to Richard Burton for Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? — he does concede that Scofield “gave a disarmingly dignified performance, quite unlike what moviegoers were used to in historical dramas.” He adds, “Until More’s outburst at his trial,” Scofield “delivers almost all of his lines quietly, with patience and restraint” — yet “his every word has both eloquence and force.”

I agree. I went into my viewing of this historical drama intentionally fuzzy on details (hoping to maximize impact), and given that I was unprepared even for well-known final outcomes, I found myself entirely gripped — thanks largely to Scofield’s consistently compelling (and, yes, understated) performance. However, the film itself is wonderfully mounted in its own right, with rich cinematography, opulent sets, colorful costumes, and excellent supporting performances across the board. Among the cast we see an appropriately larger-than-life Robert Shaw as King Henry VIII:

… Orson Welles as an appropriately larger-than-life Cardinal Wolsey:

… John Hurt (in his first significant cinematic role) as the socially aspirational Richard Rich:

… Susannah York as More’s daughter Margaret:

… Leo McKern as Thomas Cromwell:

… and, in a very brief cameo, Vanessa Redgrave as Anne Boleyn.

Note: If you’re curious to know what happened after the film’s infamous final shot, click here.

Notable Performances, Qualities, and Moments:

  • Paul Scofield as Thomas More
  • Fine supporting performances
  • Ted Moore’s cinematography

  • Elizabeth Haffenden and Joan Bridge’s Oscar winning costume design
  • Georges Delerue’s score

Must See?
Yes, for Scofield’s performance and as an overall good show. Listed as a film with Historical Importance in the back of Peary’s book.

Categories

  • Noteworthy Performance(s)
  • Oscar Winner or Nominee

Links:

Good, the Bad, and the Ugly, The (1966)

Good, the Bad, and the Ugly, The (1966)

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“I know the name of the cemetery now — and you know the name of the grave.”

Synopsis:
During the Civil War, a drifter (Clint Eastwood) collaborates with a wanted felon (Eli Wallach) and a sociopath named Angel Eyes (Lee Van Cleef) to find hidden gold.

Genres, Themes, Actors, and Directors:

  • Civil War
  • Clint Eastwood Films
  • Eli Wallach Films
  • Gold Seekers
  • Lee Van Cleef Films
  • Sergio Leone Films
  • Westerns

Response to Peary’s Review:
As Peary writes, Sergio Leone’s “exceptional, extremely exciting, extravagant, and funny epic western” — “released in the U.S. in 1968, a year after A Fistful of Dollars and For a Few Dollars More” — is another “episode in the life of Clint Eastwood’s deadly, nameless superwarrior (a myth figure riding through America’s West)” who “is, ironically, ‘the good’ — so designated because he kills only bad guys.”

Eastwood’s ‘Blondie’ “forms an unholy alliance with Eli Wallach’s Tuco, a ruthless (although humorous) murderer who, besides killing people, has ‘robbed countless post offices’ and taken almost everybody over the border for immoral purposes” — and is thus “the ‘ugly’ — a flawed superwarrior” (I wouldn’t use this term for him) “who has emotions, talks a lot, is religious and feels guilt”:

… “and is more human than either Eastwood or Lee Van Cleef’s ‘Angel Eyes,’ Leone’s ‘bad’ — a fallen angel/superwarrior who kills anyone who gets in his way.”

As Peary synopsizes the storyline: “All three men are after a cache of gold and they won’t let even the Civil War get in their way.” (!!! True.)

Peary points out that the film features “an imaginative storyline, elaborate set pieces (some employing hundreds of extras)”:

… “several terrific shootouts” — including “the film’s sensational climax” in which “the three invincible characters face each other in a graveyard, with the gold going to the victor”:

… “much humor (built around the Eastwood-Wallach relationship)”:

… “striking cinematography by Tonino Delli Colli, and Ennio Morricone’s best score.” He notes that the “film has [a] vague anti-war theme and, like all Leone’s works, points out that America was civilized by men who killed for profit.”

He asserts that “the three leads make lasting impressions,” and notes that “even the ugly bit actors Leone puts in close-up have remarkable screen presence.”


Peary’s review nicely sums up the strengths of this iconic western, which isn’t a personal favorite but has clearly been hugely influential, with Quentin Tarantino naming it the best directed film of all time. It should be seen at least once by all film fanatics.

Notable Performances, Qualities, and Moments:

  • Eli Wallach as Tuco
  • Lee Van Cleef as Angel Eyes
  • Tonino Delli Colli’s cinematography
  • Fine use of location shooting across Spain
  • The creative opening sequence
  • Ennio Morricone’s truly iconic score

Must See?
Yes, as the third in a classic western trilogy.

Categories

  • Genuine Classic

(Listed in 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die)

Links:

Guerre Est Finie, La (1966)

Guerre Est Finie, La (1966)

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“Spain is no longer the dream of 1936 but the truth of 1965.”

Synopsis:
A middle-aged revolutionary (Yves Montand) fighting against Fascism in Spain tries to decide whether to retire with his lover (Ingrid Thulin) or continue supporting the cause — a choice made even more difficult when the beautiful young daughter (Geneviève Bujold) of a compatriot makes herself available to him.

Genres, Themes, Actors, and Directors:

  • Alain Resnais Films
  • French Films
  • Genevieve Bujold Films
  • Mistaken and Hidden Identities
  • Revolutionaries
  • Yves Montand Films

Review:
Alain Resnais followed up his first three art-crowd favorites — Hiroshima Mon Amour (1959), Last Year at Marienbad (1961) and Muriel (1963) — with this more accessible but still heady film about an aging revolutionary confronting the potentially interminable nature of his work. In my write-up, I’ll cite DVD Savant’s review, in which he explains his own appreciation for the film:

Although its style is definitely that of Alain Resnais, La guerre est finie‘s subject is not an abstraction, but a real man’s revolutionary politics. Although some people will be frustrated, it has a compelling story, big stars, romance and intrigue that seems far more ‘real’ than similar mainstream movies.

He adds:

La guerre est finie is a remarkable film, beautifully photographed and acted, and probably a lot more accessible to American audiences now that storytelling styles have caught up with the avante garde of 1966. Resnais uses flash-forwards and stream-of-consciousness associative editing that can become quite confusing. But unlike some of his earlier successes that seemed to exist on a mental plane outside of time, Guerre is for the most part quite linear.

Yes — refreshingly so! Having fairly recently watched Resnais’ first three films, this one is remarkably easy to follow and relate to — a good thing, given the intense subject matter. We are watching a man who has literally given his life to a cause yet must still live on edge (he could be detained at any moment), is unable to settle down without feeling a sense of resignation, and has to track numerous running threads of false personal narratives at any given point.

On the aftermath of revisiting The Battle of Algiers, seeing what the long-game might look like for someone this committed to revolution was especially poignant; as DVD Savant writes, “Montand, playing a Spaniard who passes for French, is a soulful soldier whose war was lost long before he began to fight. The tension of being an outlaw to the state shows on his tired face.”

Film fanatics will likely enjoying seeing an impossibly young, faux-cherubic Geneviève Bujold in her very first cinematic role:

… and Ingrid Bergman-favorite Ingrid Thulin in a non-Scandinavian film.

Notable Performances, Qualities, and Moments:

  • Yves Montand as “Diego Mora”
  • Sacha Vierny’s cinematography

Must See?
No, but it’s worth a look. Listed as a Personal Recommendation in the back of Peary’s book.

Links:

Battle of Algiers, The (1966)

Battle of Algiers, The (1966)

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“It’s hard to start a revolution — even harder to continue it. And hardest of all to win it.”

Synopsis:
A petty criminal (Brahim Hadjadj) is recruited by a revolutionary leader (Saadi Yacef) to fight with the FLN (National Liberation Front) in the Algerian War of Independence, and is soon among a handful of individuals sought out by French paratroop commander Colonel Mathieu (Jean Martin) and his men.

Genres, Themes, Actors, and Directors:

  • Flashback Films
  • Historical Drama
  • Revolutionaries

Response to Peary’s Review:
As Peary writes, this “extraordinary revolutionary film by Gillo Pontecorvo” — who “directed and wrote the script with Franco Solinas” — covers “the pivotal years, 1954 to 1957, in the Algerian struggle for independence from France.” While the “entire film looks like a cinéma vérité documentary” — especially given cinematographer Marcello Gatti’s use of “grainy stock,” and the intentional hiring of non-actors for all but one key role — this is actually “a fictionalized account of real and representative events that took place during the National Liberation Front’s guerrilla war against the French.”


It “not only shows how to conduct an urban guerrilla war (the reason it was studied by America’s Black Panthers) but also the necessity of violence in revolution” — and “equally important, it shows how oppressors — the French, in this case — conduct a counterrevolution.” As Peary argues, “you won’t believe that the shots of women planting bombs”:

… “and those of innocent people being killed aren’t real,” and “you’ll also feel you’re watching history when the French close in on some holed-up Algerian leaders.”


I should point out that Peary’s analysis of this “fascinating, thrilling” film is just one of many that have emerged since its highly contested release (it wasn’t shown in France for five years), with Criterion’s DVD release including numerous extras for those who would like to dive even deeper. Just part of this movie’s own storied history is that it was screened by the Pentagon in 2003 “for officers and civilian experts who were discussing the challenges faced by the US military forces in Iraq” (and as of the exact day I’m writing this, it remains enormously relevant for different but related reasons).

Indeed, as “fascinating” and “thrilling” as this film may be (and it is expertly crafted), it’s also deeply disturbing and hard to watch, precisely because of its authenticity. To that end, the filmmakers don’t shy away from depicting horrors and challenges on both sides — including, for instance, children mercilessly harassing a drunk man on the street after the FLN prohibited “the sale and use of all drugs and alcoholic drink.”

(We also see explicit scenes of torture, which were excluded from earlier versions of the film). Regardless of its challenging content, however, this remains a masterful depiction of revolutionary (and counter-revolutionary) tactics, and holds a deserved role in global cinematic history.

Note: For those seeking more precise historical context on the era, I recommend this video on The Cold War channel.

Notable Performances, Qualities, and Moments:

  • Marcello Gatti’s cinematography

  • Ennio Morricone’s score

Must See?
Yes, as an enduring cinematic classic.

Categories

  • Foreign Gem
  • Genuine Classic

(Listed in 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die)

Links: