Berserk

Berserk; animated fantasy horror series, Japan, 1997; D: Naohito Takahashi, S: Nobutoshi Hayashi, Toshiyuki Morikawa, Yuko Miyamura, Akiko Yajima, Akira Ishida

The kingdom of Midland is fighting an endless war with another kingdom. Guts, an invincible swordsman, is being assaulted by a member of the mercenary band the Hawks and injured when he in self-defence attacks Caska. The leader of the Hawks, Griffith, wins in a duel with him and convinces him to join his group. As years pass by, Griffith and Guts fight numerous battles for Midland and win every one of them. At the same time, Griffith reveals his dream is to rule the world, and with time he gets the sympathy from the king. The Hawks become the strongest mercenaries and advance to aristocrats, winning in the war. After a peace agreement, Guts decides to leave the Hawks. Griffith is devastated and arrested when he sneaked in to spend the night with princess Charlotte. After a year, Guts hears the Hawks are now outlawed by the king so he returns to help them save Griffith from jail and falls in love with Caska. As they save the mutilated Griffith, his magic Behelit summons the forces of evil that suck in the Hawks. Griffith is chosen to become demon lord and rule the world, offering everyone as sacrifice, even Guts and Caska.

Serious critics were never impressed by splatter/ action/ fight  animes, and rightfully so, since most of them seem like pure trash. Legendary anime „Berserk“ truly starts like one of those trash contributions – with its primitive style it seems more like some Medieval Steven Segal film than something remotely good, and one would not blame people who would simply give up on it after seeing only 2 episodes. But, by some unexplainable reason, „Berserk“ actually starts improving, even putting some emotions into its story, and from episode 7, the first one without any violence at all, it transforms into something good, a real drama about dreams and fate with epic feel that is reminiscent of „Conan the Barbarian“ and „Excalibur“. Even from there on, blood splashes through the screen in almost every episode, but it also has secret dramatic touches – in one episode, Caska is not able to fight right in the middle of a major battle because she has her period, and falls from a cliff. But Guts is able to save her, spots her menstruating and warms her with her body in a cave. Of course, when she wakes up the next day, she is furious, but later on she figures he saved her life. She even reveals her trauma from childhood, in one of the most radical and dramatic things ever to be directly shown in anime: when she was still a 10-year old child, a pedophile count bought her from her parents and tried to rape her in the field. In one scene her ripped clothes are shown, that gave direct view into her underdeveloped breasts, which is highly disturbing, but also uncompromising. Luckily, she was saved by Griffith, another multi-layered character. It is revealed he is ready to sacrifice everything for his dream – in one scene he voluntarily sleeps with a rich, gay, old lord as a semi-prostitute for money, in order to finance his army. But another twist happens in the story that gives this subplot another spark – years later, Griffith is fighting a siege of a castle held by the same old lord, getting in direct confrontation with his old „lover“.

Just because a story is adult and shows violence and blood, it does not mean it is also mature. Actually, some „children’s“ achievements are sometimes more mature than adult animes or mangas. „Berserk“ is sometimes art, but also sometimes trash. Or to be precise, it starts as an ugly duckling, turns into an beautiful swan, only to again turn into an ugly duckling at the end. In one scene Griffith is contemplating after a battle and says: „I want to know who I am“. In another, he spots a dead boy who dreamed about becoming a knight and says: „The thing that killed him might have been my dream“. Not quite a dialogue one can find in ordinary action story, is it? There is a lot of strategy insight but the story has flaws – dry style, unmemorable and sloppy dialogues, the cliche formula about the invincible hero (Guts meets numerous „unbeatable“ warriors who - yes, you guessed it - childishly say he does not stand a chance, but he wins every time). Also, it contains dumbing violence, glorifies hate and presents violence as the only way to solve a problem, which reduces its wisdom. After 25 episodes, „Berserk“ ends on a cliffhanger, with an open ending, which is also disappointing and inconclusive. Still, whether one will love or hate the ending, the finale simply has to be seen – it is indescribable. Just when you thought the story will end this way, it ends in a completely different way. It is one of the most bizarre, unusual things of all time, and one has got to see at least the last 3 episodes simply for the madness of it, which is beyond human mind. On the surface, „Berserk“ is about fighting, but is actually secretly about fate and dreams. The second season will probably never be made, but since the authors needed 8 hours only to get the story started, maybe it is even better that way.

Grade:++

Limelight

Limelight; drama, USA, 1952; D: Charlie Chaplin, S: Charlie Chaplin, Claire Bloom, Nigel Bruce, Sydney Chaplin, Buster Keaton

London, 1 9 1 0s. Calvero is an old entertainer whose glory days have long gone. He drinks in pubs unable to reconcile with the fact that he was once a famous clown, but one day he manages to save a girl, Terry, from committing suicide with gas and places her in his apartment. When she regains her consciousness she admits she didn't want to live anymore when she found out she has rheum, since her job is a dancer. He nurses her and she eventually becomes a successful dancer. She wants to marry him, but he thinks she only has pity with him. On his grand comeback show, Calvero falls in a drum and eventually dies from his injury, but the audience laughs because they think it was all part of the act.

Charlie Chaplin made an unusual move towards melodrama in his second, weaker part of his career, during the sound era: his movie "Limelight" is rather forced since it contains too many one dimensional events and elements (his protagonist Calvero is idealised heavily, being presented as a hero who rejects the love of an attractive girl, Terry, because he thinks she deserves someone better and younger) and shamelessly exploits his personal fears: Calvero disguises himself as a famous clown that looks remarkably like the legendary Tramp, mirroring Chaplin's own fears that his humor and his whole work might have become outdated and forgotten in modern times. Of course, the Tramp will never become outdated, thus Chaplin uses the story as a way to gain his self-esteem once again. Also, for the first time, Chaplin showed himself on film without a moustache and with gray hair, presenting his real, undisguised self. The first half of the film is actually truly good: when Calvero saves Terry from committing suicide and brings her to his apartment, the landlord asks him what he is doing, upon which he replies: "Exactly the opposite of what you think!" When Terry complains that life doesn't have a meaning, he gives her a wonderful, magical, underrated advice: "Why should life have a meaning? Life should just be lived!". The second half is pretentious, but still emotional and heavily autobiographical. In the finale, for a few minutes, Chaplin and Buster Keaton, two legends of old movies, appear together on stage doing a sketch, which is an ontology of classic comedy, despite not being funny enough and underdeveloped.

Grade:++

Monsieur Verdoux

Monsieur Verdoux; Black comedy, USA, 1947; D: Charlie Chaplin, S: Charlie Chaplin, Martha Raye, Marilyn Nash, Mady Correll

One family is wondering where their aunt Thelma disappeared off. But she is already dead - she was killed by Henri Verdoux, a gentleman turned into a serial killer who married older women in order to eliminate them and get their money. After Thelma his next victim is Lydia. But he is only doing that to finance his real wife in a wheelchair and his child since he lost his job. Among his "false" wives is also Annabelle who is constantly talking and refusing to leave her fortune to him. One day Verdoux gives some money to a poor girl and realizes there are also beutiful things in life. But he gets arrested and sentenced to death.

After his last great film, the brilliant "The Great Dictator", Chaplin somehow lost his strength in the sound movie era and started making unnoticed achievements. "Monsieur Verdoux" is for him a untypically cynical and black comedy that ridicules (but secretly also praises) humanism, causing the film to be a commercial failure but also to get nominated for an Oscar for best screenplay. Truly, "Verdoux" starts with elegance and clever humor: in the opening shots Verdoux's grave is shown, but then his voice in form of a narrator starts telling his story. In the next shot the protagonists are members of a average family who are wondering where their aunt Thelma disappeared after she got married for a suspicious husband ("Maybe they are still on the honeymoon!" - "Who could hold out that for 3 months with Thelma?"). Then Verdoux is shown in his garden how he is burning Thelma's corpse in an oven. Chaplin still has style, but the movie is forced and too bizarre at parts, trying to soften his evil role he is playing, an the pathetic can be noticed.

Grade:++

The Great Dictator

The Great Dictator; satire / tragicomedy, USA, 1940; D: Charlie Chaplin, S: Charlie Chaplin, Paulette Goddard, Reginald Gardiner, Jack Oakie, Billy Gilbert, Maurice Moscovich, Emma Dunn

During the First World War, the Jewish Tramp was fighting for his homeland Tomania, but it lost. After a decade spent in a hospital in coma, the Tramp suddenly wakes up and returns to his job as a barber, but he is shocked to find out that the country is now ruled by the dictator Hynkel who hates Jews. The Tramp makes friends with a girl called Hannah, but is arrested and sent in an concentration camp. Hynkel invades Osterlich, where Hannah has fled to. But the Tramp looks remarkably like Hynkel—one day, the soldiers arrest Hynkel on vacation and mistakenly place the Tramp as their leader. In front of a mass of soldiers, the Tramp makes a speech about peace and humanity.

Unusual satire "The Great Dictator", once declared as the best film of all time by the New York Times, was a brave polygon for Charlie Chaplin's first speaking role in a sound picture, which was nominated for several awards. The film is charming, sharp, funny and touching at the same time, yet also full of dark allegories. The story is an obvious, unprecedented parody of dictator Adolf Hitler and contains a lot of subversive ideas: the Third Reich's minister of propaganda Goebbels is here called Garbitsch. Hynkel is an incompetent clots who always trips unto something. But Chaplin also added a balance with his Tramp who also has a few "universal" gags, not only political ones: the whole story is extremely stylish, Chaplin's gags are meticulously graded and executed, whereas almost every gesture or movement is orchestrated like a good ballet. Just take the scene where the tramp is on the battlefront and gets an order to throw a hand grenade. He wants to throw the grenade, but it falls down his sleeve. The way he gets in panic and quickly removes his clothes is something so hypnotically funny it has to be seen to be believed. 

Another outstanding moment is the scene where stromtroopers paint the word "Jew" on the store, but the Tramp pours paint on their face: when Commander Schultz arrives at the scene of chaos, he calls the 1st in command, but when he spots the man's face is semi-covered with paint, he calls upon the 2nd in command, but the latter has even more paint on his face. The biggest problem of the film are its last half an hour which lost its subtlety and became banal and clumsy (the food fight between Hynkel and Mussolini clone Napaloni), and Chaplin missed out a perfect comical ending (it would have made more sense had the Tramp, a barber, shaved off Hynkel's moustache). As a whole, this is still an underrated masterpiece, a movie and a message with a soul—nothing compares to the brilliant idea that the evil antisemitic Hynkel and the good Jewish Tramp look exactly the same. It is practically a clash between two worldviews of the two most famous people at that time, the Tramp and Hitler, who symbolize a clash of innocence and evil. The implications are obvious—the dictator is persecuting himself, everything can be divided into yin and yang, and—most unsettlingly of all—just a tiny difference in their life experience can make two identical people grow up into complete polar opposites. The Tramp's final speech about humanity ("Only unloved ones hate...") is a metaphysical wonder since it places him as Hynkel's good half, his lost conscience. Full of wisdom, spirit and magic, "The Great Dictator" is Chaplin's only truly great sound movie—and his only one that surpasses all of his silent movies.

Grade:++++

Modern Times

Modern Times; silent tragicomedy, USA, 1936; D: Charlie Chaplin, S: Charlie Chaplin, Paulette Goddard, Henry Bergman, Chester Conklin

The Tramp works on an assembly line in a huge factory, having to curve screws all day long. He becomes mad and ends up in a mental institution, but after he becomes well again, he now doesn't have a job anymore and accidentally ends up in prison. Since he foiled criminals from escape, the warden releases him from jail. On the streets, he meets a girl who lost a father and doesn't have a home. The couple settles down in an old shack and starts working as entertainers, but get fired, thus end up once again on the street.

Charlie Chaplin's last silent film is at the same time his first one where the comedian's problems and 'glitches' started to show up, corroding his previously flawless style, which would later on become even more apparent in his weaker, second phase of his career with sound films, "The Great Dictator" being an exemption. "Modern Times" is a cute, sometimes even a subversive satire on both the Great Depression and the flaws of extreme capitalism in its pursuit of exploitation of overworked employees, Chaplin showing a lot of emotions and sympathy for its characters, but it suffers badly from the clumsy syncretism of sound and silent film, with some parts of the film featuring sound and dialogue, but even that is inconsistent (for instance, the CEO of the steel company is heard talking in one scene, and then in another he is without sound, his text just seen through intertitles, when he is with Chaplin). Another problem is that Chaplin wrote a very vague, almost experimental storyline, thus creating an episodic set of vignettes that meander from one misstep of the hero to another, losing itself slightly in the dark context of the clever critique of the modern industrialisation of the world. 

The exposition is without doubt excellent: from the opening shots, where a herd of sheep switches to a scene of a herd of tired workers; through the CEO appearing on the screen of the restroom to order the Tramp to get back to work; up to the legendary sequence where the Tramp is quickly working on an assembly line, but when he sneezes he loses his pace and thus suffers a nervous breakdown from all the economic pressure, the story shows the inhumane industry system that lost touch with the little man from the urge for hyper-production. Certain jokes remind of Chaplin's heydays: one of them is when a red flag falls down on the street from a driving truck, so the Tramp picks it up and waves to the driver that he dropped something, but just then a crowd of protestors emerges from behind the corner and starts marching behind him, causing the police to arrest the Tramp as the "communist leader". On the other hand, some gags are bizarre (the one where the Tramp ends up in jail and mixes up cocaine (!) with salt), and a fair share of them just doesn't work or feels forced and misguided (the woman having gastritis after drinking tea or Tramp as an apprentice of the factory mechanic, for instance, should have been cut) which thus give the impression that the story is lacking, underdeveloped at times. Paulette Goddard and Chaplin give great performances, nontheless. Despite not being as funny as Chaplin's previous films and too naive at times, "Modern Times" is a good achievement that amusingly paraphrases "Metropolis" and offers a couple of genius scenes. But its story is lost in all the preaching.

Grade:++

The Gold Rush

The Gold Rush; silent comedy, USA, 1925; D: Charlie Chaplin, S: Charlie Chaplin, Mack Swain, Georgia Hale, Tom Murray


Alaska, 19th Century. Numerous adventurers are searching for gold in the mountains, among them even the Tramp who is surprised by a blizzard. He hides in a nearby barn where he meets the bandit Black Larson. There are soon joined by the clumsy Jim, who also searched for a place to rest. As days go by and the blizzard doesn't defer, the men become hungry and are forced to even eat shoes. Larson gets chosen to go get help, but he vanishes. Finally, the blizzard calms down and they manage to escape. The Tramp comes to a city where he falls in love with a girl called Georgia, although she leaves him alone on New Year's eve. Still, she later begs him to forgive her. Jim and the Tramp return to the barn and find gold, thus becoming rich.

Excellent silent comedy "The Gold Rush" is one of the most respected in Chaplin's opus, who once again proves that he can, besides gags, also create a very clever movie maker style even for feature length films, unlike his colleagues Laurel and Hardy whose films over 20 minutes become used out and run out of steam. The jokes served somewhere around the middle of the film, which play out in the city, are unfunny and slightly forced, but the ones in the barn are hilarious: the timeless genius of the "old" films can be best sensed in the classic scene where the Tramp eats his shoe or does the "dance" with two bread rolls. Another great, but more "unknown" gag involves the scene where Larson tries to throw the Tramp out of the barn, but the blizzard wind is so powerful that he can't even come close to the opened doors, and in another the barn gets dragged all the way to the edge of the cliff, thus tipping for 90 degrees while the men are still in it, whose perspective gets distorted, so the Tramp and Jim are forced to slowly crawl on the floor towards the exit before it crashes. The emotions are rather underplayed in the story this time around, but even the "colder" romantic subplot ends up being very good, making "The Gold Rush" a simple classic gold.

Grade:+++

A Woman of Paris

A Woman of Paris; Silent drama, USA, 1923; D: Charlie Chaplin, S: Edna Purviance, Carl Miller, Adolphe Menjou

A French village. Jean, a young painter, and Marie are in love with each other, but their parents are strictly against their relationship. The young couple decides to flee to Paris and marry there, but Jean postpones the trip when his father suddenly dies. Marie interprets his delay as a resignation so she goes to Paris alone and becomes a mistress of the rich Pierre. After a long time, Marie again meet Jean and their love blossoms again. But Jean's mother is still against the relationship so Marie goes back to Pierre. Jean, deeply disappointed, commits suicide. Marie and the mother reconcile and open a home for orphans.

Silent Melodrama "A Woman of Paris" is the first serious film from the comedian Charlie Chaplin, but a one he didn't star in (except for a small cameo) thus the commercial and critical success stayed out. Still, although a "fiasco" at it's time, the movie is today rehabilitated, holds on pretty well and has a solid number of admirers. Admitted, "A Woman of Paris" is a step behind Chaplin's classic comedies and it's simple story about a love between the rich Marie and the poor Jean is slightly unmemorable and dangerously close to an soap opera, but for it's time unusually bitter and mature. For instance, in one scene a woman covered with sheets like a mummy disrobes on a party completely nude (although nothing much is shown) while in another Pierre announces to Marie that she will stay his mistress even after he marries another woman. Rarely cheerful, stripped of any kind of humor (except for a few exceptions, like the scene where a woman is throwing her cigarette-stub in a trumpet), this film has flaws, but it bravely displays a brave story of it's author.

Grade:+++

Total Recall

Total Recall; science-fiction action, USA, 1990; D: Paul Verhoeven, S: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Rachel Ticotin, Ronny Cox, Michael Ironside, Sharon Stone, Marshall Bell, Michael Champion, Dean Norris, Lycia Naff

The year is 2084. Douglas Quaid is a normal construction worker married to Lori and obsessed with travelling to Mars. Since he doesn't have enough money to afford a trip, he decides to go to a company called Rekall where he would get an implanted, false memory of a travel to Mars. He decides to get a memory of a secret agent, but it goes wrong, he escapes and starts wondering if he really is a secret agent from Mars whose memory has been erased and replaced with a false one. As he gets persecuted by Richter, Quaid travels to Mars and meets prostitute Melina with whom he apparently had a relationship. He also meets a psychic-mutant, Kuato, leader of the resistance, who advises him to start a secret Martian reactor built by Aliens long time ago. Cohaagen, Mars' administrator, reveals that Quaid is actually Hauser, his employee, who voluntarily had his memory replaced in order to infiltrate and find Kuato. Still, Quaid manages to escape and start the reactor, which creates oxygen and turns the whole Mars into an inhabitable planet.

"Total Recall" starts brilliantly: it shows an extravagant, utopian world of the future full of interesting details and high-tech ideas (the "TV-windows" that can show pictures of nature by a click of a button; a woman changes her fingernail color from green to blue just by touching them; robot taxi...). The main tangle, based on a short story by the brilliant Philip K. Dick, unravels rather quickly: the main hero Quaid cannot afford a journey to Mars, so he decides to implant a false memory of his journey to that planet as a secret agent, but the thing goes wrong and he soon doesn't know if he really is a secret agent or if it just a virtual 3D simulation of his memory implant. There are a few thought provoking issues raised in that plot, especially the one about how one's whole memory can be replaced with another one, leaving someone wondering what is real and what not. "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind" had a similar concept, except that there someone's memory was erased, while here it was added. Unfortunately, when the main hero comes to Mars, some 43 minutes into the film, the story collapses and loses its philosophical-intelligent charge and quickly degenerates into an average, vile action flick. It still has a few interesting ideas here and there, and the visual effects are fascinating (especially the exteriors of buildings or a train on Mars), but the story too often falls into trash (the mutants, like the woman with three breasts or a "conjoined twin" mutant on the stomach of a man, are simply at time too bizarre and disgusting), whereas dumb violence and Verhoeven's uninspired, excessive exploitation of gore and campy style debase it, where not even the trick if the whole story is just Quaid's imagination or not cannot save the thing. "Total Recall" is a good film, but it still stinks.

Grade:++

The Man Who Knew Too Much

The Man Who Knew Too Much; Thriller, USA, 1956; D: Alfred Hitchcock, S: James Stewart, Doris Day, Christopher Olsen, Daniel Gelin, Brenda De Banzie

Doctor Ben is together with his wife and son Hank traveling in a bus through Morocco as a tourist. Hank gets scorned by an Arab for taking the veil of a woman, but the situation gets de-escalated by the French Bernard. In a hotel they become friends but the next morning Bernard, masked as an Arab, dies in front of Ben due to an assassination and manages to mention a planned assassination in London and Ambros Chapel. Ben wants to say that information to the police, but an anonymous callers warns him to keep quiet because his son has been kidnapped. In London Ben finds a certain man called Ambros Chapel but he soon realizes Bernard meant a real chapel. He there discovers criminals disguised as priests who kidnapped his son and who plan to kill a minister inside an opera. During the opera, the minister gets only wounded, while Ben manages to free his son and push the priest down the stairs.

With "The Man Who Knew Too Much" Alfred Hitchcock made a remake of his very own film with the same title from 1934 and proved to be his own match. The exposition is manifesting itself like almost every Hitchcock film: with calm mood. There the master by the way portrays a few interesting details from Morocco, like the meat that is traditionally eaten with the right hand and with only three fingers, causing the main hero Ben a lot of problems. Of course, with the murder of the French charter Bernard the mood suddenly transforms into a thriller and slowly raises the tension - in one scene the police chief is interrogating Ben if he knows the victim and immediately adds: "Of course you knew him!", which causes Ben to reply with: "You're not only asking the questions, you're also responding to them at the same time!" Hitchcock also added a few satirical stabs (Ben's son is kidnapped by a criminal disguised as a priest) and the 9 minute long sequence in the finale, that plays out in the opera where the killer is waiting to shoot the minister at the end of the act, created suspense by simply showing and following the music notes. A rather skillful thriller-drama about abduction, full of rhythm, the famous song "Que Sera, Sera" won an Oscar while the movie itself was even nominated for a Golden Palm in Cannes.

Grade:+++

Mr. Smith Goes to Washington

Mr. Smith Goes to Washington; drama / satire, USA, 1939; D: Frank Capra, S: James Stewart, Jean Arthur, Claude Rains, Edward Arnold, Guy Kibbee, Thomas Mitchell, Eugene Pallette, Beulah Bondi, Harry Carey

A Senator of an unnamed state dies, so his boss, Jim Taylor, a tycoon of suspicious moral, decides to find a quick replacement to fulfill his illegal plan to build a dam nobody needs in order to get even richer by funding it with the tax money. His people choose the new replacement - the naive, moral Jefferson Smith, the head of the Boy Rangers. But when arriving to Washington, Smith is shocked to find out Taylor controls numerous corrupted Senators, among them even his idol Paine, so he announces that publicly in the Senate floor. Taylor organizes a dirty campaign against Smith, even ironically accusing him of trying to become rich by building the dam. Smith launches a filibuster, but Paine in the end admits the truth an Smith is declared free of charges.

Bitter and subversive political satire, one of the best movies of all time, "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington" even today clearly demonstrates the underrated talent of the director Frank Capra, who once again gave an ode to humanity and morality, without ever turning explicitly preachy. The clever story about an evil tycoon, Taylor, who "buys" Senators in order to model and change the laws by his own will to secure himself financial profit is truly unbelievably visionary for its time and even relevant today, causing some critics to say that "Mr. Smith should visit Washington again". Some have attacked the film for being "unpatriotic" in showing the corrupt politicians, completely missing the point since it is simply a warning of what can happen if corruption, selfishness or even plutocracy prevail in politics. The whole story becomes a clash between idealism and corruption; nobleness and selfishness; democracy and autocracy, embodied in Smith who is the young, unspoiled version of the old Paine who lost all those beliefs a long time ago. As always, Capra has emotions and sympathy for his characters and offers a moral message: from the sequence in which the naive Smith is walking through Washington and admires its monuments and what they stand for, up until the bitter, electrifying finale where Taylor is controlling the newspapers and uses that control to spread lies and put the reputation of the good hero through the mud (even preventing the other newspapers that claim the opposite!) while at the same time elevating the evil Senators, the movie raises an interesting point and proves to be excellent all the way through, whereas James Stewart plays his role with bravura, especially in the unforgettable sequence where he holds a long speech in the Senate.

Grade:+++

The Shop Around the Corner

The Shop Around the Corner; romantic comedy, USA, 1940; D: Ernst Lubitsch, S: James Stewart, Margaret Sullivan, Frank Morgan, Sara Haden

Budapest. The old Matuschek heads a small shopping store that's getting through a hard time. He employs 6 people, among them the young Alfred Kralik who was reading a newspaper and stumbled upon an ad of an anonymous woman who is searching for a man of her life and started writing to her through the letters. But he doesn't know that the woman he is writing to is actually the new employee in his store, Klara Novak, who is going on his nerves. After Matuschek almost commits suicide when he discovers that his wife has been cheating on him with the employee Vadas, Kralik temporarily takes charge of the store and discovers that his pen-pal girl is actually Novak. When he reveals that to her they make up and become a couple.

After Ephron's hit film "You've Got Mail", many moviegoers became curious and wanted to find out more about the original film "The Shop Around the Corner", but some of them were left slightly puzzled. Namely, after the excellent comedy "Ninotschka", Ernst Lubitsch did not manage too well to repeat the same enchanting formula in the story about a man and a woman who hate each other, but do not know that they are actually anonymously writing love letters to each other. The iteration of humor does not work flawlessly and many actors are irritatingly hamming their roles. Only at moments does the story truly live up to her expectations and become inventive, like when Kralik discovered that Novak is actually his anonymous pen-pal girl: instead of revealing Novak the secret, he "accidentally" enters the restaurant where they were suppose to meet on a blind date and starts mischievously talking with her, much to her dismay since she is still expecting her "man of dreams". The next day he even writes her a letter saying: "I didn't want to meet with you because I saw you with a very handsome guy". There is an interesting point made in the story, the one about how people could learn to love each other only if they dropped their facade and get to know each other better, and have an open mind, but it is a pity that the film is taking too little time to handle the "invisible" couple, concentrating more on the supporting characters, like when Matuschek discovered his wife is cheating on him with Vadas. That special spark is missing, but still, there are enough of quirky dialogues: in one scene, Kralik starts dictating a letter to Flora in front of Vadas: "To whom it may concern. Mr. Vadas has been in the employ of Matuschek & Company for the last two years, during which he has been very efficient as a stool pigeon, a troublemaker, and a rat". Vadas of course demonstrates: "Now look here!", but Kralik continues to dictate: "And if he doesn't clear out of here he's going to get a punch in the nose! Yours very truly, Alfred Kralik, Manager, Matuschek & Company."

Grade:++

Kukuli

Kukuli; Drama, Peru, 1961; D: Luis Figueroa, Eulogio Nishiyama, César Villanueva, S: Victor Chambi, Judith Figueroa, Emilio Galli, Martina Mamani

In the rousing landscapes of South America live the people of Inca. Kukuli, a young woman, is a member of these people, playing with her lama while traveling across the mountains. During one of her voyages she meets Alaka and falls in love with him. The young couple arranges for a witch to predict their future, but she gets scared and chases them away sensing they are going to die soon. In a nearby town a carnival is underway and Alaka is tolling the bells in a church. Suddenly a bizarre creature shows up dressed in a black costume and pushes Alaka from the tower and kidnaps Kukuli. The villagers and a priest kill the creature, but when they take their mask off they discover it has a head of a bear. But too late, since Kukuli is already dead.

As the first movie filmed in the traditional language of Inca, "Kukuli" is considered a milestone in contributing to the authentic old cultures of South America and Peru's cinematography, although it's only a good film. Except for the fact that it's at parts boring, monotone and has a slow rhythm, and that the three directors Figueroa- Nishiyama- Villanueva don't extract something extraordinary out of it, the most bizarre and unusual element of the film is that it's presented in form of a documentary (for instance, the narrator explains how Incas are making necklaces or conducting rituals), although in the exposition it is stated quite the opposite. The main heroine Kukuli is described rather raw, sparse, like the whole mythical tone of the minimalistic story, and her romance with Alaka is unforgivably clumsy (they are never shown touching or even talking to each other) but exactly that hermetic and unusual departure from the western culture give it slight charm. "Kukuli" is a rare kind of black and white film, a naive fairytale with ethnic Inca iconography that can't fit into any kind of model - the supporting characters have much more space than the main characters - but the fact that the film turns into a fantasy in the last 10 minutes, where a bizarre human-like creature dressed in a black costume kidnapped Kukuli and when the people killed it and took it's mask discovered it had a bears head, gave the film an interesting touch of esoteric folk tale.

Grade:++

Where Is the Friend's Home?

Khane-ye doust kodjast?; drama, Iran, 1987; D: Abbas Kiarostami, S: Babek Ahmed Poor, Ahmed Ahmed Poor, Keda Barech Defai, Ait Ansari, Iran Outari

The teacher is late for 5 minutes in his class inside a elementary school. He checks the homework of every child pupil and eventually notices that one of them, Nematzadeh, again wrote his assignment on a piece of paper instead in his notebook. Since he didn't obey him before, the teacher gives him one final warning: either he writes his next homework in his notebook or he will be expelled from school. Outside the school, Nematzadeh fell and his colleague Ahmed helped him up, accidentally taking his notebook. Back at home, Ahmed realized Nematzedah's notebook is at him, so he decided to find his home and return it to him, knowing it will be his blame if he gets expelled from school. He doesn't manage to find his home, but he writes the homework for him and brings his notebook back in school the next day.

"Where Is the Friend's Home?" is another minimalistic film from Abbas Kiarostami that once again shows that every event in life can be interesting and appropriate for a film, no matter how small or insignificant it seems. In this case, a 8-year old boy goes to find the home of his colleague to return his notebook, which isn't something western moviegoers would consider a high concept. Quiet poetry, humanity, long shots, simple events and a plot, fascinating rural landscapes and realism are all the ingredients that can be found even in this film from Kiarostami, but also all of his flaws, like the overstretched feeling and at parts boring moments. Also, some of the moments seem slightly forced, like the constant tendency of actors to repeat their lines four or five times: for instance, a man asks the boy Ahmed to give him a piece of paper from his notebook, but the boy refuses since it's not his. The man asks him again for a piece of paper, and the boy refuses again. So the man asks him again for a piece of paper from his notebook, and the boy refuses again. Sometime later, the boy asks him if he is the father of Nematzadeh, but the man doesn't notice him and keeps talking with his customers whom he wants to sell a door. The boy asks him again and again, and so a couple of times. Still, at its core, this is a story about loyalty and moral values and even the simplest scenes, like the one where the teacher is examining the homework of the pupils in the class seem intriguing and authentic, while the charming end underlies the message that there are more than one way to solve a problem. Like most of introverted films, this one also relaxes the soul and demands enormous patience, but it doesn't pay out to the fullest.

Grade:++

Violence Jack: Evil Town

Violence Jack bangaihen: Harlem bomber hen; Animated horror/ action, Japan, 1986; D: Ichiro Itano, S: Kiyoshi Kobayashi, Hiromi Tsuru, Maya Okamoto, Kappei Yamaguchi

Since a powerful earthquake hit Tokyo and placed it under the ground it's citizens that managed to survive are fighting to stay alive. Food and water supplies are diminishing so the underground people divided into groups A, B and C. By accident, while digging a tunnel in order to find a way back to surface, group B releases a 20 foot tall man called Jack who was captured in the rock. Jack helps them fight against the group A that is ruled by the evil giant Inuma, but he soon leaves them when he discovers they raped women from group C. Jack eventually decides to protect the women in the group C who manage to find an exit to the surface. When the evil groups attack them, Jack kills them. Inuma transforms into a monster so Jack also kills him. On the surface, the nature is still preserved.

When the viewers read the title of this first part of the OVA anime trilogy called "Violence Jack" they will probably laugh at it's inadvertently comical banality and campy mood that stays until the end. Somewhat funny is also the presentation of the in hero, Violence Jack, a 20 foot tall (!) man that gets released from a underground cave by "normal" people - the contrast of their size at first has it's trashy charm, but pretty much even the most undemanding fans of anime will likely be disappointed: "Violence Jack" is simply unwatchable. Dumbing violence, pretentiousness, low qualities of splatter genre and gore exploited without any redeeming feature and bad animation ruined this part and it's sequels. The scenes are truly awful, from kids who find a living cockroach and eat it up to the evil giant Inuma who finds the head of his girlfriend chopped up, takes it into his arms and kisses it, and by the time the final fight starts where Inuma transforms into a monster (?) every logic is dropped and nothing is important anymore anyway, but the black and white characterization is also problematic - except for Jack, every man is portrayed as a rapist or a murderer, which is simply an insult to the male gender. Obviously, the authors wanted to make a simple action flick full of battles where the viewer can simply relax and leaves her/his brain somewhere else, but it makes one wonder what they were thinking because this is simply a chaotic mess and a stupid nonsense that doesn't even touch far superior, even intelligent achievements from the same genre, like let's say "Conan the Barbarian". It's hard to imagine that the writer of this manga and anime is Go Nagai, the same guy who wrote "Cutey Honey". Human mind can sometimes express the unimaginable highs and lows of art - this is one of the unimaginable lows of art.

Grade:-

Woman of the Year

Woman of the Year; Comedy, USA, 1942; D: George Stevens, S: Spencer Tracy, Katharine Hepburn, Fay Bainter, Reginald Owen

Sam Craig is a sports reporter writing for a local newspaper and is annoyed by feminist comments of the popular Tess Harding. To his surprise, she gets a new job as a columnist in his newspaper. At first, he is a little bit resentful having to work with her in the same building, but they eventually fall in love and get married. But their marriage soon starts getting shaky: Tess is always preoccupied with her work, holding speeches at different ceremonies and even being pronounced "Woman of the Year", much to Sam's discomfort. When Tess adopts a small boy, a Greek refugee, but doesn't have the time to take care for him, Sam looses his patience. He returns the boy to the orphanage and decides to separate from his wife. Eventually, they make up and she decides to become a better wife.

"Woman of the Year", the first Spencer Tracy/Katharine Hepburn film, is a nice, gentle, at times burlesque essay about the problems of marriage that won the Oscar for best screenplay. The movie starts as a very dynamic comedy showing the old paradox about a couple that at first can't stand each other only to fall in love later on - in one of the most amusing sequences, Sam takes Tess to a basketball game but since she never went there he eventually has to explain every single rule of the game to her, much to the dismay of the people sitting in front of him - but in the second part it looses it's orientation and transforms into a rather mild, tame, overstretched story that will probably have a few problematic moments with the feminist part of the audience sine it places all the blame for the failed marriage on the wife, Tess (who was by the way too busy being a feminist activist to do her "wife's duties"). Still, in one of the best situations in the whole film, played somewhere near the end, Tess decides to become a real wife in order to save her marriage and sneaks in at her husband's home early in the morning to surprise him with a good breakfast - but since she never cooked in her life, she does everything wrong: when she was about to make him pancakes she accidentally slammed the door of the refrigerator that flipped the page of the cooking book, but she didn't noticed that and went on to put yeast in the bowl, eventually getting a giant mass of pastry. The small subplot about an adopted boy, a Greek refugee, seems slightly out of place but at the same time it also gives amusing parallels to modern celebrities, especially when Tess doesn't have time to take care for him like a real mother, while George Stevens' direction has a nice visual style. "Woman of the Year" is a charming comedy, only missing a real punchline.

Grade:++

Adam's Rib

Adam's Rib; Comedy, USA, 1949; D: George Cukor, S: Spencer Tracy, Katharine Hepburn, Judy Holliday, Tom Ewell, Jean Hagen

Doris found her husband in arms with another woman so, in a moment of jealousy, she shot him with a pistol. But her husband survived and sued her for attempted murder - while the lawyer Adam unwillingly got the case and isn't pleased about it since he read about it in the newspaper. When she heard that, Adam's emancipated wife Amanda, also a lawyer, immediately decided to defend Doris on the trial. As the trial becomes more and more vicious, it starts moving from the court to Adam and Amanda's private life, who even start thinking about a divorce. The jury pronounces Doris innocent while Adam and Amanda make up.

"Adam's Rib" is an amusing and intelligent comedy that speaks about the issue of the battle between men and women and the everlasting tendency of women for a equal role in the society, while the actress Judy Holiday was nominated for an Golden Globe and the screenplay for an Oscar. The ambitious (and highly allegoric) story about the fight between two married lawyers who defend their male/female opposite clients in order to mirror their perspectives was used for a quality portray of male-female relationships, but the whole isn't as funny or stimulative as it could have been, coming across as slightly forced, and it also made the mistake to too aggressively escalate the antagonism between the genders. At the same time the movie can commend with a few first-rate dialogues ("Lawyers shouldn't fall in love among themselves. That's incest. Then they get idiotic children and even more lawyers") and situations of absurd (during the trial a strong woman from the circus lifts Adam in the air by holding his legs, what even shows up as a caricature in a newspaper), thus creating solid messages and points that are in the function of the story, and the actors are excellent.

Grade:++

Tootsie

Tootsie; romantic comedy, USA, 1982; D: Sydney Pollack, S: Dustin Hoffman, Jessica Lange, Teri Garr, Dabney Coleman, Bill Murray, Charles Durning, Doris Belack, Sydney Pollack, George Gaynes, Geena Davis

New York. Michael Dorsey is an unemployed actor who had "creative differences" with almost everyone in the entertainment industry. He escorts his friend Sandy to an audition for a TV soap opera about a hospital, but when she doesn't get the role he takes desperate measures and cross-dresses as a woman, Dorothy Michaels—and gets the role himself! In order to gain enough money for a play for his friend Jeff, Michael plays the role of a woman very well, observing the chauvinistic director Ron and eventually falling in love with the actress Julie. When things get to complicated, Michael de-masks himself in front of everyone on a live broadcast.

One of the best comedies of all time, "Tootsie" is a small masterpiece where every potentially questionable or problematic ingredient turned out to be just right in the end. Only true masters could take such an uncertain concept as a man disguising himself as a woman and turn it into a story that seems like the best idea ever: the movie is as hilarious as one light "guilty pleasure" comedy, but as intelligent as an art film—at the same time it is never stiff as an art film, but always elegant and touching as a drama—and at the same time it is never preachy or sappy when becoming deeply, beautifully emotional (the sequence where Dorothy spends the night in Julie's bed, and Julie reflects how she grew up with the wallpaper in this room, always waiting for the flowers on the paper to finally bloom, is a moment of romantic perfection). Nominated for numerous awards, of which it won many, this charmingly brilliant classic operates on a high comic level and belongs in the anthology of the comedy genre: despite numerous gags the story is still dominated by humanity of its characters, whereas Dustin Hoffman as a woman turned out to be a perfect being.

In one scene when Michael, dressed up as Dorothy, auditions for the role in the TV series and makes a fuss when "she" gets refused by the director, a woman producer asks Dorothy if "she" was just acting when "she" said that or if it was natural, upon which Dorothy responds with: "Which answer will get me the job?" The sequence of the final live broadcasting of the TV soap opera, where Dorothy starts completely improvising random lines is absolutely unbelievable and has to be seen to be believed: Hoffman simply brings down the house with this role, while at the same time giving a self-referential portrait of the limits of acting, the dimensions of transforming yourself into a different role. The screenplay is so meticulously crafted, filled with endlessly quotable lines, that it almost seems as if it was written by B. Wilder ("I can act circles around that guy!", shouts Michael to his agent after he heard that someone else got to play "The Iceman Cometh"; Dorothy's improvised audition: "You don't have a man, so you want to act like one." - "All right, just shut your mouth right now! When you talk to me, you talk to me professionally! You don't get personal!")—whereas numerous other comic talents all give great little supporting roles, from Bill Murray ("Mrs. Right! Oh, Mrs. Right!", Jeff whispers as Michael observes his dream woman leaving the birthday party) up to the energetic Teri Garr. The observations about the differences between women and men were never so gentle, poignant and psychologically deep, whereas the whole storyline is crafted with a remarkable finesse and ingenuity that gives it a timeless feel. Even if you hate everyone from the crew on this film, you just have to give them credit for "Tootsie": almost every of their dialogues are a classic. In spite all odds against them, the authors delivered a shining achievement.

Grade:++++

White Chicks

White Chicks; comedy, USA, 2004; D: Keenen Ivory Wayans, S: Shawn Wayans, Marlon Wayans, Jamie King, Rochelle Aytes, Busy Philipps, Jessica Cauffiel, John Heard

Two FBI African American agents, Kevin and Marcus, masters of disguise, get a new assignment: they have to pick up Brittany and Tiffany Wilson, the blond daughters of a rich tycoon, at the airport in order to protect them from being kidnapped. When the two sisters get a small scar after a car accident and refuse to leave the hotel, Kevin and Marcus disguise themselves as the Wilson sisters. No even Tori, Karen and Lisa, their best friends, or their worst enemies, the Vandergeld sisters, notice any difference. Kevin and Marcus manage to stop the kidnapping and discover the father of the Vandergeld sisters was planing to eliminate them.

It wasn't hard to guess that "White Chicks", another Wayans brothers comedy, would be another populist comedy, a stupid, thin, shallow and forced crowd pleaser aimed only to quickly satisfy the norms of light entertainment, but the film was still nontheless funny at parts and managed to stay in borders of vulgarity and bad taste. For instance, in the opening act Shawn and Marlon Wayans are masked as two Mexican clerks who are expecting a drug delivery in order to arrest smugglers at their store: the way those masks of baldy Mexicans with heavy moustaches look like, and the way they are delivering their lines looks almost as a Cheech and Chong parody and is hilarious. Sadly, the rest of the film is rather forced and predictable: it's never convincing that they look like white blond girls, from the weak make up Shawn and Marlon wear up to the fact that they always wear long sleeves to hide their strong arms. Maybe it was a part of the joke to let them look unrealistic, but it didn't come across very well. The story manages to nail a few true female cliches, like the maniacal obsession with their own looks, and explore a few male-female relationships, but they were all already handled years ago in much better comedies like "Tootsie" and "Victor/Victoria". If anything, the average plot is sufficient for a very good dance choreography sequence somewhere near the end and a few cynical jokes, like the one where a Vandergeld sister is shown in a TV commercial for vaginal herpes while a jealous Karen comments: "How did she get that role? She doesn't even have herpes!", but 4 out of 5 jokes fail to work and only emphasize how good those jewels of transgender comedies like "Tootsie" really were.

Grade:+

The Party

La Boum, comedy, France, 1980; D: Claude Pinoteau, S: Sophie Marceau, Claude Brasseur, Brigitte Fossey, Denise Grey, Alexandre Sterling

The 13-year old girl Vic moves with her dad Francois, a dentist, and mother Francoise, a comic drawer, to Paris. Although an outsider at school, she manages to become friends with Penelope. When two boys invite them to a party, they accept. There she meets a nice boy Mathieu and falls in love with him. At the same time, her dad admits to her mom that he had an affair, so they decide to separate for a month. Out of revenge, her mom starts an affair with Mr Lehman, but eventually reconciles with her husband. When Vic finds out Mathieu is also meeting with another girl, she makes him jealous by kissing her father as if he is her lover. Eventually, she also reconciles with him and arranges a party for her 14th birthday.

Teenage comedy "La Boum" looks like some sort of a looser, faster and clumsier female French version of Allen's typical outsider comedies, a simple coming of age film whose charm is still fresh and quirky today. The film is poor with directing skills, somewhat clumsy and almost cheap at moments in realization, but in the end it doesn't matter since it's rich with wonderful characters, emotions, humor and energy, while Sophie Marceau, then only 13 years old, is absolutely brilliant in her movie debut, perfectly embodying the cute Vic. At least two of the film's humorous situations became classic and have been copied a thousand times in other films and TV shows: in one, outsiders Penelope and Vic are walking on the street, contemplating how to make friends, when two boys show up on their bikes and invite them to their party since they have too few girls. Penelope and Vic look at them in a cool, uninterested way and reply that they will "maybe" make it. When the boys leave the two girls turn into the total opposite: they drop their disguise and start cheering from joy, being lucky to have been invited to a party. In another, Vic spots Mathieu approaching so she becomes nervous and quickly asks Penelope to pretend as if they are talking about something cheerful. Penelope says: "What should I say?" upon which Vic responds: "So that's what he said! Ha, ha...", but Mathieu passes by her without greeting her. The story avoids turning into kitsch, sharply observing the problems of teenagers and even presenting some daring jokes (the penis in a popcorn box idea first appears in this film). The song "Dreams are My Reality" is pure nostalgia, even for those who were not even born during that time, and despite a rather bizarre, confusing and inconclusive end the film has so much life that it's hard not to stand up and cheer at it's characters.

Grade:++

Southern Comfort

Southern Comfort; Action/ Drama, USA, 1981; D: Walter Hill, S: Keith Carradine, Powers Boothe, Alan Auntry, Les Lannom, T. K. Carter, Fred Ward, Peter Coyote

Louisiana. A National Guard patrol of 9 people go to a routine military excersise during the weekend on the south. In order to cross a swamp, they take canoes of local Cajun's. When Cajun's show up on the shore, soldier Stunkey mischivosly shoots at them with blanks, on which they return fire and kill Seargent Poole. The patrol is in chaos and Seargent Casper takes over the leadership. They find a local Cajun hunter and arrest them although they are not sure if he shot at them, while Bowden blows up his house. That makes the Cajun anrgy and they start hunting and killing patrol soldiers one after another. In the end, only Hardin and Spencer manage to escape from the forest and come to a local village. There the hunters find them and attack them, but they manage to kill them while the US military finds them.

"Southern Comfort" is a very interesting film from the unknown, straight-forward director Walter Hill that comes as some sort of an allegory to the Vietnam War. In the opening shots of the military gathering, the movie is chaotic, disjointed and the dialogues monotone, but once the tangle starts, where the Cajun are provoked and start hunting the 9 soldiers in the swampy forest, it transforms into an intriguing and suspenseful thriller about misunderstanding, arrogance and the ever lasting human resort to violence. The story borrows from Boorman's "Deliverance" but also offers a lot of original details: when one of the soldiers finds a dead deer, shot by the Cajun hunters, he says: "Somebody shot Rudolph!" When the enemies start hunting the soldiers, their faces are never shown (until the very end), giving the film ambiguity and paranoia, especially when sometimes those soldiers become their own biggest enemy. They let their dogs attack the soldiers, or even cut off trees and let them fall on them! It's a quality action drama, but a one-note story that was a little bit overstretched and chaotic, and it's not obvious that Hardin and Spencer are the main protagonists until the very end when they end up being the only characters alive. Still, it's a realistic, grim achievement with elegant direction and fluid rhythm.

Grade:++

Volver

Volver; Drama/ Comedy, Spain, 2006; D: Pedro Almodóvar, S: Penélope Cruz, Lola Dueñas, Yohana Cobo, Carmen Maura, Blanca Portillo, Chus Lampreave

Raimunda and her sister Sole go to visit their old aunt Paula, who lives alone in a huge house. When Raimunda's husband tries to rape her daughter Paula, she kills him in self defense and Raimunda decides to dispose of his body, at the same time putting efforts to take over the charge of a restaurant. Soon, she also gets informed that aunt Paula has died. After the funeral, Sole's dead mother Irene appears to her, claiming she hasn't died at all, but that she actually found her husband sleeping with another woman and put them on fire, making everyone wrongly assuming for years that she has died with him. Sole hides her in her apartment. When Raimunda discovers she is alive, she is angry at first, bu eventually decides to forgive her. Irene admits she is guilty since she never noticed Raimunda was raped by her father and had a daughter with him.

"Volver" is an sympathetic film from Pedro Almodovar that seems more like an experiment then a film that can be pinned down under any genre, elegantly playing with such dark themes as incest and death, but strangely sustained and tame for his taste. From the opening shots in which a bunch of women are cleaning graves on the cemetery, the movie establishes a very feminist touch - almost every protagonist is a woman, while men show up only here and there is small supporting roles or get killed - which gives the relaxed story a refreshing tone, and Penelope Cruz (nominated for a Golden Globe and an Oscar) is absolutely unbelievable in her role: she is fresh, unusual and has a tight, sharp role reminiscent of Loren's "La Ciociara", and apparently she wore some sort of a prosthesis for her butt. Almodovar directs the film very calmly, even adding fantastic elements in the second part that turn out to not be fantastic at all (the "dead" mother returns to her daughter and explains that she never died in the first place). Some scenes are very bizarrely cute, like the one where Raimunda was sitting on the toilet until she sensed a "familiar" smell, a fart from her mother, then going to Sole's room where her mother was hiding and where they all started to laugh, and the story is very fluid but thin and it seems the director's classic sense for extravagant was reduced to it's minimum and rather watered down. "Volver", a cheerful movie some have characterized as Almodovar returning to his roots, is a soap opera for intellectuals.

Grade:++

Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade

Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade; adventure, USA / Jordan, 1989; D: Steven Spielberg, S: Harrison Ford, Sean Connery, Alison Doody, Denholm Elliott, John Rhys-Davies, Julian Glover, River Phoenix

Late 1 9 3 0s. Indiana Jones is informed that his father, Henry Jones, vanished while searching for clues to locate the Holy Grail. He and Marcus go to Venice and meet Dr. Elsa Schneider to retrace his father's footsteps. After surviving an assassination attempt by the Grail sect, Indiana finds his father in a castle near the Austrian-German border, captured by the Nazis, and is betrayed by Elsa. Still, Indiana and his father manage to escape and come to Hatay, a political entity in the Middle East, and find the cave with the Holy Grail. The Nazis also want the Grail and send Indiana to get it. A earthquake splits the ground and swallows the Grail, killing the Nazis, while Indiana and his father escape.

Great "Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade" is the third and the only sequel that this a worthy continuation in the series to the original "Indiana Jones" seriefilm, full of humor, style, freshness and clever ideas. This time the story was focused on the most holy object for Christians, the Holy Grail, while the "guest" appearance of Sean Connery as Indiana Jones' father Henry is extremely charming and adds a dose of demystification to the macho protagonist archaeologist. The whole film is a wild fun handling the Nazi's obsession with Biblical mythology, and the action sequences are brilliantly executed. In one funny scene, Indiana Jones disguises himself as a Nazi and manages to get his father's diary back in Berlin. Just as he is about to leave he is sucked in by the crowd and eventually ends up right in front of Adolf Hitler. Jones is scared stiff, assuming he is doomed, but as Hitler takes his diary, he signs it with his autograph, gives it back and leaves, not knowing what he just missed. In one ontological action sequence, Indiana and Henry are being persecuted by Nazis in fighter planes - Henry shoots at them with a machine gun, but as he swings the gun, he accidentally hits his own tail of the plane, so they crash. At the beach, Henry uses his umbrella to frighten off seagulls who massively fly at the Nazi fighter plane that loses control and crashes. Other action sequences are equally as inventive and comical (for instance, one "economic" bullet going through several Nazis standing in a row on a tank). The only bad thing is the overstretched, weak ending - the actual discovery of the Holy Grail is handled clumsily and was not resolved in a satisfying manner - but because of Spielberg's strong directing skills, scene after scene, the potentially trashy adventure is turned into a clever, tight and fluid film that not even the biggest Indiana Jones haters could resist.

Grade:+++

The Color Purple

The Color Purple; drama, USA, 1985; D: Steven Spielberg, S: Whoopi Goldberg, Danny Glover, Margaret Avery, Oprah Winfrey, Willard E. Pugh, Rae Dawn Chong

USA from 1909 to 1949: young African American girl Celie was raped by her father and gave birth to two children, who were taken away from her. She loves her sister Nettie very much, but then she gets forced to marry a brutal farmer called "Mister" and take care of his children. A jazz singer girl, Shug, becomes friends with Celie, while her other friend Sofia marries Mister's son Harpo and ends up for 8 years in jail because of a rude remark to the mayor's wife. After she found out he has been hiding her letters from Nettie, Celie leaves Mister and opens a haberdashery, uniting together with her children.

Gentle epic melodrama "The Color Purple" has a lot of wonderful emphasized emotions and thoughtful demanding moments, but it's still a step away from being totally right. Although many complained that Spielberg, a Jewish millionaire, didn't have the appropriate background for a portray of (self)repressed African Americans in the South, he did a very good job and consistently proved to find orientation even in themes out of his league. Although the story is too long, the biggest complaint can be attributed to it's mild, conventional realization of the intriguing script that cherishes it's figures and addresses such issues as incest and forced marriage. Academy nominated the film for 11 Oscars, including best picture and best actresses (very good, understated debuts from Whoopi Goldberg and Oprah Winfrey), but it didn't win none, while Goldberg managed to win a Golden Globe. It's a film that gains it's sympathies from the suffering of the characters, but doesn't exploit them, while Spielberg cleverly placed purple subtitles in the opening credits, and didn't portray Celia's abusive husband called "Mister" as a one dimensional character, but even gave him some positive features.

Grade:++

Twilight Zone: The Movie

Twilight Zone: The Movie; horror / fantasy, USA, 1983; D: John Landis, Steven Spielberg, Joe Dante, George Miller, S: Vic Morrow, Scatman Crothers, Kathleen Quinlan, Kevin McCarthy, Nancy Cartwright, John Lithgow, Albert Brooks, Dan Aykroyd 

Two men are driving in a car at night. Suddenly, one of them decides to show the other something scary by transforming into a Zombie and killing him, while the narrator says that we are entering the "Twilight Zone": William, a man who lost a promotion because of a Jew and whose neighbors are Black, starts making racist comments. Just as he is about to leave the pub, he is suddenly caught by Nazis who claim he is a Jew and send him into a concentration camp...In a retirement home a mysterious Mr Bloom transforms old people into children. But they all become old again because they want it that way...Helen meets a boy and gives him a ride home. He shows her his house, where people are imprisoned since he has special telekinetic powers and can do whatever he wants to. She takes him with his car...John spots a gremlin on the plane's wing, but nobody believes him. When the plane lands, he is sent to a mental institution.

Since the four popular directors - Landis, Spielberg, Dante, Miller - put their signature on the "Twilight Zone: The Movie", an adaptation of the also popular horror TV show that aired in the '50s and the '60s, the expectations were big, but except for a solid commercial success the movie is rather disappointing. It's a lethargic omnibus consisting of 4 stories, from which the first two are not even suspenseful, or even good. In the bizarre, almost inadvertently comical prologue, Albert Brooks is driving Dan Aykroyd who suddenly asks him: "Do you want to see something really scary?", before he turns his head away only to transform into a Zombie, after which the narrator announces that we are entering the "Twilight Zone". The first part of the film, in which an antisemitic man is by some strange twist of fate found persecuted by the Nazis is in theory an inventive take of "tasting your own medicine", but the realization is inert and weak, and a lot of things have been left underdeveloped. Spielberg's second story is actually a sappy drama in which old people become young again: instead of at least putting some skill and wit into the plot, he decided to simply direct it in a tame way and the result is a thin soap opera with only one interesting detail - the scene where old people are being instructed how they can have a healthy sexual life even after they have passed their 70s.

After the first two disappointing segments, Dante managed to bring some sharpness into the film with his 3rd story about a boy who can do anything with his mental super powers, offering a creative horror scenario (in one scene, he creates a giant monster rabbit that comes out of the hat) and a poetic end (the boy and Helen are leaving in the car while the desert is transforming into a meadow behind them), but the thing is a tiny bit too crazy, chopped up and tame in this version, stopping just at being only good. The forth and final segment, directed by Miller, is by far the best: John Lithgow spots a gremlin on the wing of the plane, but nobody believes him. The story is a real nightmare and directed with taste and delicacy, slowly bringing the paranoia of the character to the extreme: it's an excellent segment, but he can't bring that quality to the rest of the three that didn't adapt to the tone of the show.
 
Grade:+

E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial

E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial; science-fiction drama, USA, 1982; D: Steven Spielberg; S: Henry Thomas, Dee Wallace, Robert MacNaughton, Drew Barrymore, C. Thomas Howell, Peter Coyote

California. A UFO leaves the forest after a group of people arrive, leaving one alien stranded on Earth. The alien hides at home of a boy, Elliott, who becomes his friend. Elliott's sister Gertie and older brother Michael are frightened at first, but decide to keep it a secret from their mother. Elliott and E. T. gain a psychic connection, but government agents suddenly invade their home. E. T. becomes sick and dies, but resurrects while Elliott and Michael manage to bring him back to the forest, where he is picked up by his people in a spaceship.

Winner of several awards, the 4th highest grossing film of the 20th century by selling 142,000,000 tickets at the American box office, "E. T." is a slightly overrated, stiff and inert, but still good achievement that managed to be a family film that's equally as interesting for grown ups, full of innocence. "E. T." seems like a sequel to Steven Spielberg's own (and superior) UFO film "Close Encounters of the Third Kind" and a paraphrase of the embodiment of an imaginary children's friend, a touching story about friendship without limits - curiously enough, if Elliott's first and last letter would have been added, it would create the initials ET - and children's desire to find some strong shoulder during a time of crisis, in this case when their parents divorced.

The dialogue and scenes are actually pretty clever and elevate the quality of the tame story - the "Ur-anus" line is there, and in one scene Elliott unwittingly jokingly says: "How do you explain school to a higher intelligence?" When E. T. gets to know Elliott more, the boy shows him his "Star Wars" figures. They also gain a psychic connection: when E. T. gets drunk by drinking beer at home, Elliott also suddenly starts acting like drunk in school, and when E. T. watches the movie "The Quiet Man" where a man and a woman kiss, Elliott in the same manner kisses a girl in school. Somewhere near the beginning, the mother is leaning forward while a kid mischievously points with his finger as if he is going to touch her butt. The film is full of realistic details and everyday observations, but the most interesting thing in it is the hidden religious subtext: from the film's poster, which paraphrases Michelangelo's "Creation of Adam", up to the fact that E. T. can heal people and even dies and resurrects at the end of the film, but the Jesus parallels still seem a little overstretched. However, compared to the highly intelligent aliens in "Close Encounters", which showed up only near the end, E.T. is, perplexingly, only an inarticulate pet, without much insight or wisdom expected for such a technologically superior being. Would a conversation between E.T. and Elliot have worked better than just non-verbal interaction? "E. T." is a nice, gentle, simple fairy tale about friendship and innocence that's still relevant today, but it feels simply too lukewarm.

Grade:++

1941

1941; comedy, USA, 1979; D: Steven Spielberg, S: Robert Stack, John Belushi, Toshiro Mifune, Dan Aykroyd, John Candy, Ned Beatty, Lorraine Gary, Waren Oates, Christopher Lee, Nancy Allen

Los Angeles, 1941. A Japanese submarine surfaces off the coast of California in order to attack Hollywood and demoralize Americans, but first they kidnap a local timber merchant. At the same time, Wally intends to take Betty to a dance contest, while captain Wild Bill uses his plane to attack the submarine, joined by Sgt Tree and Private Foley. Chaos ensues, and not even General Stilwell manages to keep things under control. The Japanese destroy a Ferris Wheel and return home.

Earlier achievement from Steven Spielberg, burlesque comedy "1941" is probably his most primitive and senseless film, but that doesn't mean that's it is entirely bad. In "1941" Spielberg curiously degenerated into (a weaker) Mel Brooks, thus the movie doesn't even seem like a Spielberg film; it's emotionless, wacky, grotesque, unorganized and a bizarre mess, coping simply with more characters than it can handle - the episodic story could have easily disposed of half of the characters in order to gain some cohesive structure. Curiously, in the exposition, Spielberg is parodying his own film "Jaws" when a naked girl is swimming in the sea at night when she is suddenly elevated in the air by a Japanese submarine that surfaces in front of Californian coast, but the thing is rather more silly than it is funny. The film was a commercial failure, but it contains an interesting visual style, the budget of 40 million $ guaranteed an excellent technical look and some jokes are good, like when John Belushi lands with his plane at a gas station in order to fill it up or the finale where Ward goes to hang a Christmas wreath on his door as a symbol of peace and unity, only to accidentally spectacularly push his damaged home into the Pacific Ocean. Sadly, the rest seems forced, never elegant. While Spielberg was serious in his other World War II films, here he tried a different, comic approach, but he doesn't have a sense or rhythm for comedy: brilliant comedians like Dan Aykroyd and John Candy are left underused, the aggressive wild humor seems annoying, the bizarreness doesn't fit (the sequence where General Stilwell watches "Dumbo" in cinemas while a fight rages around him) and the running time is overstretched. "1941" is a sufficient film, but it contains too much caricature and chaos and too little control and sense for measure for such a comedy.

Grade:+