Zulu

Zulu; war / action / adventure, UK, 1964; D: Cy Endfield, S: Stanley Baker, Michael Caine, James Booth, Jack Hawkins, Ulla Jacobsson, Mangosuthu Buthelezi

The British Army has established a base in Rorke's Drift, serving as its outpost for colonialism and irredentism into Southern Africa. On 22 January 1879, some 150 soldiers assembled into the 24th Regiment on Foot find themselves surrounded by a 4,000 men strong Zulu tribe that wants to attack and destroy their base. Even though greatly outnumbered, Lieutenants John Chard and Gonville Bromhead are determined to stop the attack. The Zulu tribe attacks them from both sides, some of their soldiers manage storm into the base and set the hospital on fire, but the Regiment manages to repel them and survive. The next day, the Zulus retreat.

One of the most popular British movies of the 60s, a real life  depiction of a British army Regiment resisting a siege of an army 20 times their size in 1879, "Zulu" still seems fresh and exciting even today, owing that to a good sense for suspense and action sequences, as well as authentic locations in South Africa, which are aesthetic and offer good shot compositions. Even though some of its themes are rather dated or seem questionable (especially by reversing the event to seem as if the Zulus are the enemy for resisting, and not the British colonialism and imperialism which tried to enslave the peoples of that area), "Zulu" is still a fine film and even established the then unknown actor Michael Caine as the new hope of British cinema. The first half drags, spending too much time on the life of the British army in the base, even though numerous characters are so flat they are barely distinguishable from each other, yet that is overturned an hour into the film when the Zulu siege starts, displayed through exciting images and anticipation of suspense: the camera pan of a thousand Zulu warriors standing at the top of a whole giant hill, overlooking the base, still sends shivers down the spine. Equally as great is the moment when the British soldiers are confronted with Zulu warriors shooting at them from the hills, almost as if they are standing right above them or the long line of hundreds of Zulu warriors stretching across the meadow, to a warrior in a close up. This siege last for the almost the whole second half of the film, and works splendidly. "Zulu" is basically a British 'African western', depicting a stand-off where the weaker ones manages to stop the enemy despite all odds, and despite a slow start, it manages to ignite and keep the viewers attention for the whole second act.

Grade;++

W.R.: Mysteries of the Organism

W.R.: Misterije organizma; documentary / erotic satire, Serbia / Germany / USA, 1971; D: Dušan Makavejev, S: Milena Dravić, Ivica Vidović, Jagoda Kaloper, Tuli Kupferberg, Zoran Radmilović, Jackie Curtis

A film crew is making a documentary about the controversial German scientist Wilhelm Reich who escaped from Europe to the US and developed a theory in which sex is the ultimate means of liberation of people, and that all the dictatorships were just manifestations of repressed sexuality. He died while his books were declared pseudoscience and burned. Numerous people are interviewed... A man with a machine-gun is walking through the streets... Women are sent to sexual therapy... In Belgrade, Milena is a  highly sexualized woman who thinks that Communism should include sexuality. She meets a Soviet artists, Vladimir Ilyich, a highly political communist, and tries to seduce him. He reaches an orgasm - but immediately kills Milena by cutting her head off, not being able to cope with the liberation of his repressed sexuality.

Dusan Makavejev's bizarre satire "W.R.: Mysteries of Organism" became the only film from the whole of Yugoslav cinema that Roger Ebert included into his "Great Movies" list, yet it seems that this is more the result of the critic's lack of knowledge about the cinema from that country than some genuine greatness of the movie in question. Dozens of superior Yugoslav movies were made, yet "W.R." was remembered for its numerous controversies, resulting in a ban from Yugoslav authorities, and even by today's standards the movie can shock the conservative audiences. A part of its disconcerting impression lies in the fact that this is practically five short films glued into one, yielding a narratively confusing picture, since the film starts off as a documentary about Wilhelm Reich (claiming that each person has an average of 4,000 orgasms during their lifetime), then switches to numerous interviews about artists and their sexual art (one scene even has Nancy Godfrey stroking the penis of a lying man, only to then make a cast of his erection), then finally to the main story involving Milena (excellent Milena Dravic) who wants to promote free sexuality.

Her highlight is obviously her comical "political" speech towards people in an apartment complex ("No excitement can ever equal the elemental force of the orgasm. That's why politics attracts those among us whose orgasm is sub-standard, defective, disturbed or premature!... Deprive them of free love, and they'll seize everything else! That led to revolution. It led to fascism and doomsday. The goose-stepping, mass-marching orgasm! The bloodstream orgasm of the alcoholic or junkie! The cerebral orgasm of dogmatics or religious mystics!"). It implies that all the dictatorships are just manifestations of sexual repression, resulting in a black humored, but delicious ending in which a Russian communist reaches an orgasm - only to then kill Milena, unable to cope with the fact that all his loud ideology was just a sexual compensation for his virginity and impotence. This message was so subversive, even implying the Tito-Stalin split as a fight of sexual liberation, that the movie was even banned in the USSR, as well. Makavajev's attempt to blend sexual counter-revolution with communist revolution is not for everyone's taste, especially since numerous archive footage is sometimes garbage and could have been cut, yet there is a deeper meaning in all of this mess, when one thinks about it at the end, which makes its cult reputation somewhat justified.

Grade:++

Rick and Morty (Season 2)

Rick and Morty; science-fiction comedy series, USA, 2015; D: Wes Archer, Bryan Newton, Dominic Polcino, S: Justin Roiland, Chris Parnell, Sarah Chalke, Spencer Grammer

Morty is again doing crazy adventures with his eccentric scientist grandfather Rick, travelling through various dimensions or alien planets: Rick meets his ex-girlfriend again, an alien beehive entity called Unity; an alien instills fake memories in them and disguises as hundreds of absurd cartoon characters, claiming to be part of the family in the house; Rick has to visit a miniature AI world inside his battery, created to generate energy for him; Jerry and Beth undergo an alien marriage counseling; after a wedding goes awfully wrong and the groom, Birdperson, is killed, Rick gives himself in to the Federation so that his family can return safely to Earth.

Even the second season of the highly popular "Rick and Morty" comedy series did not manage to lift itself up from the level of a "mixed bag", since it contains both moments of genius which are then followed by several ill-conceived or misguided ideas, most notably in a couple of disturbing depictions of murder which are treated with an incompatible lightness, as if nothing happened, which is suppose to be funny, but only falls flat as morbid. Two and half great episodes — 2.1, 2.3 and one half of episode 2.5 (the first half involving a satire on religion is brilliant, but the other half involving Rick and Morty trying to sing for the giant heads in the Universe are lackluster and lame) — yet the remaining seven are a lot weaker, whereas this is also a ratio that is weaker than the first season — meaning that in reality its quality is still a notch below all the hype surrounding it. The worst episode is probably 2.7, involving a bizarre marriage alien counselling in which a machine depicts Jerry's vision of Beth as a black Xenomorph while Beth has a vision of Jerry as a slimy, disgusting worm, and their visions then escape and start killing everybody for no good reason justifying this concept, while the worst joke is probably found in episode 2.10, where Rick and his family go to an exile on an Earth-like planet — only for the Sun to rise and "scream" at them, which is just plain stupid. Yet, it deserves to be seen for two highlights: one is episode 2.1 which features a "fractured" time, presenting a split screen in which Rick, Morty and Summer are in two parallel times, with only minimal differences: the viewers will have to pay twice as much attention to notice all the details in it. The second one is 2.3, featuring a surreal metaphor of Rick having a relationship with the "beehive" alien entity Unity whose consciousness spans millions of people on a planet, which offers him the opportunity to sleep with several women wearing Unity's mind at the same time. And it ends with a striking philosophical, even emotional contemplation about how even controlling a million people cannot compensate for the emptiness of life, the nature of free will and Totalitarianism, the question if a character is willing to either change to keep his love or to stay alone to keep his own identity he loves. There are some interesting themes here in several episodes, ranging from artificial intelligence, infinite regress or the unreliability of memory, but it would have been far better if all the garbage surrounding them was edited out.

Grade;++

Victor and Victoria

Viktor und Viktoria; musical comedy, Germany, 1933; D: Reinhold Schünzel, S: Renate Müller, Hermann Thimig, Anton Walbrook, Hilde Hildebrand

Viktor is a struggling actor, but cannot find a job because his dramatic interpretations are often comical. During an audition, he meets actress Susanne who also cannot find a job. Viktor informs her that he sometimes plays a woman, Viktoria, in a Cabaret, but since he has a flu, he persuaded Susanne to jump in to save the show. Susanne thus pretends she is a man playing a woman, and finds great success among the audience. An agent approaches Susanne and she signs a contract to continue performing. In London, she meets Robert, who falls in love with her, insisting that she is a woman, even though Susanne tries to pretend she is a man. Even more problems arrive when a woman, Ellinor, falls in love with Susanne, thinking she is Viktor, a man. Finally, Susanne and Robert kiss, while Viktor takes over the role of Viktoria as a comedy act.

Even though it was met with overwhelming enthusiasm by German film critics during its premiere, and subsequently gained the status of a classic in its country of origin, Reinhold Schunzel's transvestite comedy "Victor and Victoria" feels dated by today's standards due to its stiff narrative and dry-overlong musical sequences, some of which are even used in ordinary dialogue that rhyme. It is axiomatic that Edwards' film "Victor/Victoria", filmed 49 years later, is easily superior, displaying a rare situation where an American remake towers over an original. While the two main actors, Herman Thimig and Renate Muller, are very good, they are not convincing at playing the opposite gender, which is especially aggravating for Muller who is suppose to carry the film as a woman pretending to be a man playing a woman on stage, since her high, feminine voice leaves little ambiguity. Worse still is that all the rich potentials of the tantalizing premise were scarcely exploited, leaving many situations underused. Some of the best jokes still arise from the man-woman confusion  — for instance, Viktor releases four geese from a cage so that the two performers have to chase them and leave the male locker room, giving Susanne a chance to change clothes without anyone noticing that she is not a man. In another good scene, Robert jokingly informs Viktor that he is challenged to a pistol duel due to a bar fight, so Viktor shockingly leaves the room, only to accidentally stumble into some sound stage where a performer wearing Cowboy clothes is randomly practicing shooting. While good is exploring the men-women relationships and identities, "Victor and Victoria" still seems like a 'rump' version of these themes, too timid to truly give them justice, most noticeably in the abrupt ending, though it has charm.

Grade;++

Rick and Morty (Season 1)

Rick and Morty; animated science-fiction comedy series, USA, 2013; D: John Rice, Bryan Newton, Stephen Sandoval, S: Justin Roiland, Chris Parnell, Sarah Chalke, Spencer Grammer

The 14-year old Morty is annoyed by his eccentric grandpa Rick, a scientist who often brings him along on his misadventures, ranging from trips to another dimensions through aliens to problems involving Rick's inventions going out of control. Morty's sister Summer and their parents, Jerry and Beth, whose marriage is on thin ice, also unwillingly get involved into Rick's misadventures.

Justin Roiland's and Mark Harmon's surprise hit animated show is the ultimate example of a mixed bag: episodes 1.3, 1.4 and 1.10 are excellent, but the quality of the rest of the first season is highly uneven, since some are solid, some OK and some outright bad. Aggravating all of this is the fact that even in some bad episodes the authors can still conjure up some incredible examples of wisdom about life, using the most surreal and bizarre grotesque as a metaphor for something in our society. It is almost like 'Sophocles meets "Family Guy"': rarely has there been a show that offers a whole spectrum of quality, ranging from genius to garbage. Episode 1.3 is one of the best, turning into the most black humored Christmas episode in TV history: in it, Rick brings a man dressed as Santa Claus home, but the latter falls into a coma, so Rick shrinks Morty to a size of a microorganism and sends him into the man's body. At the end, Rick simply loses his patience since he cannot find a microscopic Morty, so he takes the naked dead body of the Santa Claus, flies off into space and instead enlarges the man's body ten thousand times, thereby inevitably returning Morty back to his normal size. This results in a Zenith of absurdist humor, rarely seen anywhere, with the expressionistic sight of a giant naked Santa Claus floating in orbit over the whole of America, his toes being spotted in L.A. and his head in New York. Episode 1.10 also rises to the occasion, involving a situation in which Rick is confronted with hundreds of Ricks from hundreds of parallel Universes, which gave a wealth of potentials, ending in a remarkable "hidden" compliment Rick makes to his Morty: "I am the Rick-est of them all, which means you are the Morty-est of all Mortys". Throughout these wacky stories, "Rick and Morty" displays a secret philosophy on life and the Universe, yet it is not always presented in an intelligent way. Episode 1.4 is a sly satire on the 'brain in a vat' argument, but episode 1.7, on the other hand, is a rather lackluster take on sexism: the concept of an alien civilization in which women rule while men are kept as an inferior race does not offer anything new that hasn't already been explored in "He-Man" episode "Trouble in Arcadia", for instance.

Too many episodes focus only on degenerate monster aliens (the above mentioned episode 1.7 has these women having extra hands on their ears (!?)) or shock, and attempt to seize the attention of the viewers more through bizarreness than through some genuine inspiration. Aren't the praying-mantis-human mutants in episode 1.6 pure trash, for instance? Isn't the alternate Universe TV commercial in episode 1.8 of two people eating Leprechaun's intestine pure junk? And yet, just when the viewers dismiss such stuff, the authors suddenly redeem themselves thanks to an unexpected example of genius. Episode 1.6, for instance, is terrible, but has a fantastic beginning and an ending, by presenting Rick who explains to Morty his unrequited love:"Listen Morty, I hate to break it to you, but what people call "love" is just a chemical reaction that compels animals to breed. It hits hard, Morty, then it slowly fades, leaving you stranded in a failing marriage!" Episode 1.8 is also just a random collection of inconceivable, surreal and disturbing TV channels from alternate Universes, but it ends in one of the most inexplicable, genuine, miraculous, virtuoso and beautifully touching endings ever seen, a small gem: throughout the episode, it has been established that Morty's and Summer's dad, Jerry, has never married in an alternate Universe and became a major movie star. At the same time, Beth finds out that without being married to Jerry and not having kids, she could have pursued a great career as a real surgeon in that world. This leads to a crisis of their marriage. But at one point, Jerry observes his alternate Jerry driving in underwear on the street on alternate TV. At the same time, Beth is watching her alternate ego through special goggles, living alone in a house with birds. Suddenly, these two realities become one when alternate Jerry stops and knocks on the door of alternate Beth, to announce: "Beth Sanchez, I have been in love with you since high school. I hate acting, I hate fame... I wish you hadn't had that abortion and I never stopped thinking what might have been." Jerry and Beth, back in the real world, then realize that they are living precisely in that 'what if?' Universe, drop everything, reconcile and kiss in the living room. This is a highlight that, although unable to fully compensate for all the questionable content before, is still going to be remembered for a long time.

Grade;++

The Jazz Singer

The Jazz Singer; silent drama / musical, USA, 1927; D: Alan Crosland, S: Al Jolson, Mary Dale, Eugenie Besserer, Warner Oland

Jackie Rabinowitz wants become a jazz singer, but when he is caught singing in a pub, his strict, orthodox Jewish father forbids him to continue and beats him up, because he wants Jackie to succeed him and become a cantor in a Synagogue. Jackie flees from home and makes great progress as a singer in New York, falling in love with Mary, a stage dancer. Now renamed, Jack returns to his home to see his mother, but is again chased away by hist father. On the premiere of a career defining performance on stage, Jack decides to not show up and instead sing as a cantor in a Synagogue because this was the last wish of his dying father. However, he gets another chance and performs as a singer in a theater.

"The Jazz Singer" signalled a new era of cinema, an era of sound film, yet even though it was a smash hit and the highest grossing movie for almost a decade, it was kind of a cheat: the movie is 20% a sound film and 80% a silent film. It was still an incomplete, semi-sound film where the audio was used only for the singing of the hero and one sequence when he talks with his mother while playing the piano for her, yet the majority of the story is still a silent film, even using intertitles for dialogues of the characters for most of the time. Despite this technical innovation, "The Jazz Singer" remained only a footnote in film lexicons since it feels very dated by today's standards. It is basically a simplistic story of a man torn between following his dream and the tradition of his family, yet it never rises to the occasion, neither in writing nor in execution. This storyline is a dime a dozen, basically almost a soap opera with banal narrative flow, whereas it simply lacks highlights. There is very little to see, stylistically or story-wise, and the long sequences of singing tend to become tiresome and dry. That is why "The Jazz Singer" is today only valuable formally for the cineasts, yet does not hold a special place in the heart of many movie goers.

Grade;+

Jigoku

Jigoku; fantasy / drama / horror, Japan, 1960; D: Nobuo Nakagawa, S: Shigeru Amachi, Yoichi Numata, Utako Mitsuya, Akiko Ono

Shiro is a young student who is engaged to Yukiko, the daughter of his University professor, Mr. Yajima. One night, he was together with the classmate Tamura who drives a car and accidentally hits and kills a yakuza member on the street. Shiro is plagued by guilt, but Tamura tries to whitewash any wrongdoing from them. Shiro's life just goes downhill from there: while trying to report everything to the police, the taxi he was in has a crash from which Yukiko dies; Shiro returns to his home where his mother dies from a disease, while his father is cheating on her with a mistress; the yakuza's girlfriend, Yoko, tries to kill Shiro, but dies by falling from a bridge... Finally, all the inmates in the house die from poisoned fish and find themselves in hell. Shiro observes how all the people he knew had dark secrets one way or another, and how they are punished for these in hell. He is stuck trying to save his and Yukiko's unborn baby who is rotating on a giant wheel.

"Jigoku" is a dark and depressive fantasy-horror drama in which director Nobuo Nakagawa displays a grim perspective on life that is doomed to end in all kinds of tragedy and despair: for him, there is no escape from this "doomed if they do, doomed if they don't" cicyle, depicting how his characters are plagued while they were alive, only to be plagued once again in hell. However, it seems Nakagawa lost context from the film, almost as if he himself is unsure what this has to do with the overall theme of the storyline. The "normal", first part of the film, could have worked much better if it was changed just a little bit: the protagonist, Shiro, is plagued by guilt of a man who was killed in a car he was in, and the hell could have been just a symbolic representation of his bad conscience. If Shiro drove the car himself, this would have worked, but since the car driven by his friend, all of this guilt is not quite fitting. Unfortunately, Nakagawa somehow lost this simple perspective and included numerous other characters who also landed in hell, even those who had no fault, which seems uneven and pointless, unless it is a sardonic commentary on life that crudely punishes everyone, from those who are guilty to those who are innocent. The film drew attention thanks to its bizarre hell sequences which comprise the last 38 minutes, which stand out thanks to their outstanding special effects for that time (the "dune" valley with a river underneath it; demons sawing a man in half or taking the skin away from another man, leaving him only with a skeleton and organs underneath; the row of skeletons on a dark valley...). It is also interesting that the movie demolishes all the institutions in this segment by including all the characters in hell, from the police (an inspector who framed an innocent man), journalism (a false news article ruined the life of a man) up to medicine (a doctor erred with false diagnosis, but was too proud to admit his mistake). Still, all this could have been presented in a better way, since the ending is rather abrupt and pointless.

Grade;++

Dr. Mabuse the Gambler

Dr. Mabuse der Spieler; silent crime drama, Germany, 1922; D: Fritz Lang, S: Rudolf Klein-Rogge, Bernhard Goetzke, Aud Egede-Nissen, Getrude Welcker, Paul Richter

Berlin. Dr. Mabuse is a seemingly respectful doctor of psychology, but in reality he is secretly a criminal boss who wants to rule the underground. His henchmen steal a secret Swiss-Dutch contract from a train, which Mabuse uses to gain a fortune on the stock market. He also uses hypnosis to persuade a rich man, Hull, to lose a poker game and give him a lot of money. State prosecutor von Wenk suspects that all these crimes can be tracked down to one criminal, but he doesn't even know his name. Mabuse orders dances Carozza to seduce Hull in order to spy on the rich man. When Hull is killed in a casino, Carozza is arrested, but poisoned by Mabuse who fears she might reveal his name. Von Wenk manages to capture a henchman, Pesch, who placed a bomb in his office, but Pesch is killed by a sniper. Mabuse falls in love and kidnaps Countess Told, but she rejects him. Finally, the police starts a raid of Mabuse's mansion. They finally arrest him when he loses his mind from visions of the people he killed.

Widely considered to be Fritz Lang's breakthrough film as a director, silent crime movie "Dr. Mabuse the Gambler" is still a notch below all the hype that surrounds it: for a running time of over 4 hours, it is decisively too long, and the 'cat-and-mouse' story doesn't pick up until the third hour. It is without doubt a fine, quality film with an elegant narration and clear storytelling, yet the longer a film gets, the more ingenuity it needs to invest for the viewers not to quit the screening—for such extra long time it demands, a movie needs to grow exponentially in quality to cover for it, and "Dr. Mabuse" somehow lacks highlights for such a megalomaniac task. Lang's visual style is not quite as grand or innovative as it was in his finest classics, including "M" or "Nibelungen: Siegfried", yet the story flows smoothly, with remarkable elegance, despite the pacing issues. Two sequences are truly excellent and show Lang in his true glory as a filmmaker: one is when state prosecutor Wenk and criminal Dr. Mabuse meet for the first time, both in disguise, both unaware of each other's identity, in a secret casino where they engage in a poker game. Mabuse again tries out his regular trick of hypnosis in order to find a victim from whom he can extract large amounts of money. This is conveyed through an effective scene in which the whole background becomes black and only Mabuse's face is left visible, whereas it is slowly magnified on the screen as it tries to command to Wenk.

The other moment is their third encounter, in which Mabuse is disguised as a magician and calls up Wenk on the stage. Wenk finally recognizes his nemesis behind the mask, yet is unable to resist the hypnosis. Mabuse then orders him to drive with a car off the cliff into the Melior quarry. The sequence of Wenk driving the car through the forest is remarkable, displaying the subtitle "Melior" on his windshield, and then the word "Melior" is repeated four times as it slides from right to left side of a whole row of trees along the road, in a fantastic mise-en-scene. With a better editor, who would have cut out many of the unecessary subplots, this would have been a far more compact film. Still, it is an interesting essay on the chaotic time in Germany of that era, focusing on all sorts of underground thugs who have arisen from thee, noticeable in Lang's commentary on contemporary existentialiast and nihilist tendencies in a highly intriguing moment in which Countess Told admits: "I am afraid there is nothing on this world that I can be interested in for a long time... Everything I can see from my car, from my window is partially revolting, partially uninteresting." This causes Mabuse to reply that the only interesting thing is "to play with people and their destinies", revealing that money was not his interest at all, but sheer exploration of how psychology can be misused to exploit people.

Grade;++

The Mircale of Morgan Creek

The Miracle of Morgan Creek; comedy, USA, 1944; D: Preston Sturges, S: Betty Hutton, Eddie Bracken, Diana Lynn, William Demarest, Brian Donlevy

Governor McGinty receives a phone call from a distressed man, informing him about a bizarre story that is unfolding in Morgan Creek: teenager Trudy Kockenlocker participated in a farewell-party for American soldiers leaving for war, but the next morning she woke up and realized that she was so drunk she got married to one of them, but forgot his name or how he looks like. Worse still, she is pregnant. Trudy tells this to her 14-year old sister Emmy, but hides it from her father. Trudy thus asks the guy who was in love with her all these years, Norval, to marry her to conceal the scandal. She dresses Norval as a soldier and tries to marry him under a fake name so that she can get divorced through the marriage certificate, but Norval is arrested for impersonating a soldier. When he tries to escape from jail, things get even worse for him. On Christmas, Trudy gives birth to six boys, while McGinty arranges for Norval to get released so that the two can be a good couple.

Even for Preston Sturges, this is one of the most insane and audacious comedies from the Hays Code era, a satire that dances on thin ice of the allowed themes at that time, yet manages to still pull it off. The joke premise of a girl who was so drunk she forgot whom she married the previous night was so influential that it was copied a thousand times in movies or TV shows (a similar concept was even used again is Sturges own later film "The Sin of Harold Diddlebock") and offered huge potentials for a screwball comedy, with jokes ranging from witty dialogues ("I don't believe it!" - "Well, nobody asked you!") up to pure physical sight gags (one of the most howlingly funny scenes is the wacky stunt in which the 14-year old Emmy scorns her father that he should be "more rafined" and then turns around to walk away, but her dad is so angry at that remark that he swings his foot to kick her butt, but slips and falls down, loosing his shoe). Sturges rises to the occasion in this story, poking fun at everything and everyone, from conservative institutions up to small town mentality, and in a sheer stroke of genius even has his old Governor McGinty back from his film "The Great McGinty" as the framework of the story. The range of burlesque jokes is simply astounding, some of which are just plain crazy and batty, yet one has to give him credit for at least having the courage for trying them out: near the end, in a weird clip, the film makes fun of the scandal of Morgan Creek getting so out of hand that it even switches to a military camp where Hitler gets informed about the birth of the sextuplet babies, only for the newspaper to announce the headline: "Hitler demands a recount!" The best joke in the entire film is probably the sequence in which the clumsy Norval is trying to hint to Trudy's father (brilliant William Demarest) that he wants to propose his daughter, but dad is cleaning his gun and accidentally fires pass him. Norval then quietly walks through the glass door (!) and towards Trudy, exchanging a dialogue which is comedy gold ("What was that gunshot about?" - "It was just your father. He was practicing"). The ending seems slightly too chaotic and sloppy, ruining somewhat the impression, yet "The Miracle of Morgan Creek" is still a fine screwball comedy that works thanks to its anarchic humor.

Grade;+++

Candyman

Candyman; horror / psychological drama, USA, 1992; D: Bernard Rose, S: Virginia Madsen, Tony Todd, Xander Berkley, Vanessa A. Williams

Chicago. Helen, a graduate student, intends to write a thesis on modern myths and is intrigued when she hears about the urban legend of the Candyman. He was once an African-American painter in 19th century, but when he impregnated a white woman, the mob hacked his hand off and killed him by tossing thousands of bees onto his body covered with honey. According to a source, Candyman can be summoned if his name is told five times in front of a mirror, and allegedly someone was murdered by him in the Cabrini-Green housing project. Helen investigates the murder, but suddenly gets hallucinations. She wakes up in the apartment of Anne-Marie, whose dog has been killed and her baby kidnapped. The police send Helen to a mental asylum, but she escapes when she summons Candyman who kills the psychiatrist. Candyman wants Helen to continue his legacy, but she manages to kill him and herself in fire, but saves the baby. Helen's boyfriend, Trevor, summons Helen's name five times in the mirror - and is subsequently killed by her, who succeeded Candyman.

A surprisingly refined psychological horror, this is a quality made independent film that managed to lift itself up above the typical cheap-trash slasher films from that era, thanks among others because it dedicates a lot of time to its main heroine, Helen, played very well by Virginia Madsen, and an elegant visual style. "Candyman" still missed a golden opportunity, however: its title antagonist, an African-American, was a victim of racial violence in the 19th century, and the story could have benefitted a lot if it followed that lead and turned into an allegory of a dark past that haunts the modern US. Unfortunately, almost nothing in the film itself seems to consider this potential: Candyman could have very well been white, or any other race, since it makes no difference in the narrative. The theme of racial relations is utterly ignored for the rest of the film. Likewise, the film lacks highlights: the second half is just one long hallucionation after hallucionation that Helen endures, while she lands in the mental asylum, yet potentials for more suspense could have been exploited. There is one great scary moment: the flashback of a couple who jokingly dare each other and tell Candyman's name five times in front of the mirror. At first, nothing happens, and they dismiss it as a myth. The guy leaves the bathroom, while she stays and then turns off the lights—only for Candyman to suddenly appear in the dark. This scene is a sophisticated example of horror, and the film could have used some more of it. Still, it is an all-around clever and patient little film that manages to deliver a horror film with a difference.

Grade;++