Last Seen Movie - The Latest Movie You Have Seen; ratings

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Air Force One (Wolfgang Peterson, 1997) 8/10

This is one prepostrous action film and an incredible guilty pleasure. Air Force One is hijacked by a Russian radical (Gary Oldman) and his goons who hold hostage the U.S. President (Harrison Ford), his wife, daughter and members of his staff who are all on board. The hijackers demand the release of a political prisoner (Jürgen Prochnow) who is held in Moscow. While the Vice President (Glenn Close), the Defence Secretary (Dean Stockwell) and the Attorney General (Phillip Baker Hall) attempt to negotiate with the hijackers the President acts with the dexterity of James Bond (he got his skills while in Vietnam) and proves to be a wily foe on board. The Americans are all incredulous that such a thing could happen to their President and someone says with great arrogance, "No one does this to the United States". Clearly the screenplay or that thought did not anticipate 9/11 which was just a few years on. Ford makes a perfect action hero as he tussles both verbally and physically with Oldman and even flies the plane â la Karen Black (who did it just as well in "Airport '75"). The film's various action set pieces are completely over-the-top as the giant 747 dodges missiles, a mid-air refueling takes place, hostages jump out of the plane with parachutes, the President hangs out of the plane's hatch held only by his hand and the final escape using a wire between two airborne planes. It's amusing to see Gary Oldman playing the vicious hijacker here especially with his recent Oscar winning performance still fresh in one's mind - I prefer this vicious goon to his portrayal of Churchill. The film's erratic effects and all the holes in the screenplay can be ignored as the non-stop action and suspense hold you by the neck and take you on this roller coaster ride of thrills. Great fun.
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Lady on a Train (Charles David, 1945) 4/10

Rather silly whodunnit with perky and annoying Deanna Durbin witnessing a murder through a train window. When nobody believes her she turns amateur sleuth and gets involved with a mystery writer (David Bruce) and in an inheritance plot involving an old woman (Elizabeth Patterson) and her two nephews (Ralph Bellamy & Dan Duryea). Both actors play against type while Durbin sings "Silent Night", "Night and Day" and "Give Me a Little Kiss" in this boring screwball comedy-mystery. The star is dressed-up to look older in order to help her graduate to more adult roles but she still looks like a child playing a game of dress-up.
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God's Own Country (Francis Lee, 2017) 9/10

The film's title refers to Yorkshire being the Lord's very own. A love story set against a backdrop of the seemingly idyllic, but often harsh, realities of a farming community. The visual beauty of the countryside with its rolling moors masks what is often a harsh life full of day-to-day squalor - a lonely young man (Josh O'Connor) lives on a farm with his invalid father (Ian Hart) and old grandmother (Gemma Jones). A Romanian migrant worker (Alec Secareanu) is hired as an extra help and the two men bond and find a common ground. The film owes a debt to "Brokeback Mountain" but goes off in a different direction. It is more an amalgamation of the themes found in the novels of E. M. Forster, Emily Brontë, Thomas Hardy and D. H. Lawrence. The film also advances a pro-immigration subtext in what is the closing borders of Brexit-era Britain. The film's raw passion echos the harsh realities of the countryside. Delicately acted film hinges on the chemistry of the two leads who give superb performances with quiet support by both Hart and Jones all of whom easily slip into their rural milieu.
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The Miracle of the Bells (Irving Pichel, 1948) 7/10

A saccharine premise surprisingly works as most of the screenplay revolves around the life of a struggling actress (Alida Valli) who gets her break in a famous director's (Lee J. Cobb) film version of "Joan of Arc". When she suddenly dies a day after the film finishes shooting the director decides to shelve it. The studio's sly press agent (Fred MacMurray), a close friend of the actress, tries to get the director to release the film. While in a small town to bury her he cooks up a ruse by getting all the churches in the region to ring their bells for her. The ensuing publicity - a result of a "miracle" inside a church - gets the money mad Hollywood executives to finally see reason. The film rests on the shoulders of its charming leading lady who is incandescent throughout. She has great chemistry with MacMurray. A miscast Frank Sinatra is the priest who refutes the "miracle". The film not only propagates hope but celebrates goodness, kindness and understanding in human beings. Forgotten little gem of a film.
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Night Unto Night (Don Siegel, 1949) 7/10

Overwrought but very atmospheric psychological melodrama with gothic overtones. It's rather unusual to see an early film by this director who decades later gained prominence with his films for Clint Eastwood. Two people - a scientist (Ronald Reagan) who is suffering from the beginnings of epilepsy and a woman (Viveca Lindfors) haunted by the ghostly presence of her dead husband - find each other as soul mates. He has rented her gothic mansion on a beach in Florida and coming in between them is her oversexed bitchy sister (Osa Massen) and a hurricane brewing over the nearby ocean. This brooding love story is beautifully shot with the camera snaking through the eerie house along its dark corridoors, up and down the huge staircase and over glistening sea water to the music of Franz Waxman. Well acted film has Broderick Crawford in a strong supporting role just before he became a huge star. Reagan got a bum rap all his life for being a bad actor although he was not bad at all as he proves here.
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Scandal Sheet (Phil Karlson, 1952) 8/10

Stylish noir based on a novel by Samuel Fuller and beautifully shot in black and white by Burnett Guffey. The managing editor (Broderick Crawford) of a scandal sheet newspaper commits a murder and squirms in growing horror as two of his staff reporters (John Derek & Donna Reed - both very good) get closer and closer to solving the crime. Gripping film is superbly paced and acted with Crawford a standout as the tough boss whose relentless pursuit of stories has inspired his star reporter to do just that and which could end up turning the tables on him. The tough dialogue throughout makes this film a very exciting watch.
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The Pyx (Harvey Hart, 1973) 4/10

Low budget Canadian feature is a mash-up of Polanski's "Rosemary's Baby" (and its satanic cult) and Pakulla's "Klute" and built around a police procedural. A heroin addicted hooker (Karen Black) is found dead after a fall from the roof of a building. Via flashbacks we get to see how the hooker reaches her terrible end as a detective (Christopher Plummer) investigates if it was suicide or murder. The mystery is not that compelling but Black is fascinating to watch as the tough, high-class call girl battling her addictions. The film's darkly lit cinematography and a leaden pace are also major detriments.
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Loving Vincent (Dorota Kobiela & Hugh Welchman, 2017) 7/10

Visually stunning animated film - with each frame painted in oils - recalls the last few days in the life of tormented Dutch painter Vincent Van Gogh. The screenplay presents the events in the form of a mystery with a young man who arrives to deliver a letter to Van Gogh's brother who he finds has also died a few weeks after Vincent's death. His interest is piqued when it is suggested that the gun shot that killed the painter was maybe not suicide but murder. Various people who were around Van Gogh during his last days are interviewed and come up with their own theories. The scenes set in the present are full of dramatic colour like Van Gogh's paintings while the flasback sequences depicting the artist are in black and white like charcoal sketches. It was filmed in live action with actors and then each frame was painted (like an oil painting on canvas using the same technique as Van Gogh) and then animated. The film is a visual feast for the eyes. Oscar nominated for best animated film.
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Red Sparrow (Francis Lawrence, 2018) 2/10

Nasty spy thriller with full-throttle lashings of nudity, rape, veiled incest, beatings, torture and coldly brutal seduction. In the same vein as "Atomic Blonde" this film creates a cold-blooded killing machine enmeshed in a hairpin plot of twists. A prima ballerina (Jennifer Lawrence) with the Bolshoi ballet cracks her leg in an accident on stage and is forced to take help from her uncle (Matthias Schoenaerts) who is a high ranking member of the Russian intelligence. She is inducted into "Sparrow School" ("Uncle you put me in whore school") - a training place for spies run by the cruel and emotionless matron (Charlotte Rampling) - which includes the art of becoming a perfect whore by coldly becoming adept at every form of sexual act - she also learns how to pick locks and manipulate people. Her first assignment is to get close to a CIA agent (Joel Edgerton) in order to find out the identity of the mole who is the American's contact inside Russian intelligence. It's a fantastic set up with a number of twists but unfortunately blandly directed with no energy in any of the scenes. A deadpan Lawrence, wearing a hideous blonde wig, has no chemistry with Edgerton but is surrounded by a great cast also including Joely Richardson as her ailing mother and Jeremy Irons and Ciarín Hinds as high ranking members of the Russian intelligence. Lifeless film goes on and on with no end in sight. Stick to "Atomic Blonde" with kick-ass Charlize Theron and avoid this film like the plague.
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London After Midnight (Todd Browning, 1927) 6/10

Legendary classic lost silent film - all prints are deemed lost with the last known print destroyed by fire in an MGM vault in 1967 - is recreated via stills, intertitles, dramatic organ music and the camera moving snake-like across the film's production stills. An aristocrat is found dead of a gunshot wound along with a suicide note. The inspector (Lon Chaney) suspects murder but has no proof. Five years later the dead man's house is leased by a ghoul-like man (also played by Lon Chaney with fake teeth and death-like mask) who has the aristocrat's name and who the neighbor's think is a vampire. When the aristocrat's body goes missing from his tomb the inspector returns and questions the deceased's butler, nephew, friend and daughter and proves murder had been committed. Chaney plays two roles - the straight role of the cop and the over-the-top ghoul which allowed him his fascination for grotesque makeup.
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Good Sam (Leo McCarey, 1948) 6/10

McCarey is here in Frank Capra mode. Cooper is the do-gooder who goes beyond the call of duty in his neighborhood much to the consternation of his hapless family. He just doesn't know when to stop with his good deeds. Brittle Ann Sheridan, as his sensible wife, is superb and the two stars play well off each other. Cooper's usual slow-burn style of acting, which is usually always pretty annoying, works well for the character here. There are vivid bits scattered throughout as he interacts with a great supporting cast of character actors.
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Bad Words (Jason Bateman, 2013) 7/10

Jason Bateman is so much better than the material he directed in which he also plays the leading role. The thrill for him must have been to play against type - here he is an unrepentant 40-year old asshole who is angry at everyone around him, a far cry from the usual mild mannered losers he is wont to play in films. Using a loophole in the rule book he competes with kids in a National spelling bee contest where he has absolutely no qualms about berating and undermining his fellow competitors all of whom are pre-teen kids. He is similarly obnoxious towards a reporter covering his story and who also happens to be his fuck-buddy. The F-bomb is in continuous motion throughout the screenplay and eventually wears thin - there are so many laughs you can milk by using that word. This is an extremely foul-mouthed and mean-spirited comedy (with quite a few laughs along the way) with rude ethnic zingers about Indian and Chinese kids. The movie comes to life in the scenes between Bateman and a precocious but lonely and neglected 9-year old Indian-American kid who is desperate to befriend him - the montage of them going for a whirl around town in a fast car, visiting bars and hookers is quite far-fetched but is in line with most current American smut comedies so in vogue today. Their relationship holds the key to the angry man's past and the film's end, which in it's predictability, is a bit of a cop-out. The screenplay should have ended on as much of a savage note as the rest of the verbal duels. Bateman is very good and the young child actor (Rohan Chand) is very appealing. With all the misogynistic and racist jokes on display this film must have been a chore to sit through by many anal and self righteous people in the "land of plenty".
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The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society (2018) Mike Newell 5/10
Good News: Newspaper Salesman, Dead Dogs and Other People from Vienna (1990) Ulrich Seidl 5/10

Repeat viewings

The Old Maid (1939) Edmund Goulding 7/10
House Calls (1978) Howard Zieff 6/10
Carol (2015) Todd Haynes 9/10
The Night of the Following Day (1969) Hubert Cornfield & Richard Boone 6/10
One, Two, Three (1961) Billy Wilder 6/10
One From the Heart (1981) Francis Ford Coppola 4/10
Call Me By Your Name (2017) Luca Guadagnino 9/10
The Naked City (1948) Jules Dassin 6/10
Sebastiane (1976) Paul Humfress & Derek Jarman 7/10
Anatomy of a Murder (1959) Otto Preminger 9/10
"I want cement covering every blade of grass in this nation! Don't we taxpayers have a voice anymore?" Peggy Gravel (Mink Stole) in John Waters' Desperate Living (1977)
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The Great Man's Lady (William A. Wellman, 1942) 5/10

Rambling pioneer drama related to a reporter in flashback by an old lady at age 109 years. An uppercrust girl (Barbara Stanwyck) from Philadelphia gets married to an ambitious man (Joel McCrea) and they set out for California to find fame and fortune. Along the way to the top there is tragedy, floods and the death of their kids. Thinking she is dead he gets married and becomes a bigamist and rises up the political ladder while she has an affair with a gambler (Brian Donlevy). The film covers over 70 years of history in 90 minutes making the plot seem rushed and disjointed. Stanwyck has all the best scenes playing the spirited woman who sacrifices her marriage for her husband's new life with another family.
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The Death of Stalin (Armando Iannucci, 2017) 7/10

Very funny black comedy that lampoons Stalinist Russia. It's almost as if the Monty Python team have been resurrected. The Russian leader dies suddenly and his Inner Circle - Khrushchev (Steve Buscemi), Malenkov (Jeffrey Tambor), the sadistic secret police chief (Simon Russell Beale) among others - flail about in rambunctious fashion trying to plot against each other and seize power. The entire cast is superb - trading wicked barbs - playing bumbling and weak-minded buffoons. Political satire at its slapstick best.
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