New Goodfellas trailer

Personally approved by Scorsese, for its re-release, as we await the arrival of his lauded new film SILENCE. 

ANOTHER Bigger Spash !

Now that the Oscar-bait movies are all released and on show, its good to see some interesting new international movies appearing here in London. I am very intrigued by the new A BIGGER SPLASH - no, not another Hockney - but Luca Guadagnino's new film which - intriguing for me - seems a remake of Jacque Deray's stylish French thriller LA PISCINE from 1969 which re-teamed Alain Delon and Romy Schneider with Maurice Ronet whose daughter was played by Jane Birkin - a very stylish murder story around that swimming pool.

This time around its Ralph Fiennes in it seems towering form (as he has been since Wes Anderson's THE GRAND BUDAPEST HOTEL), with Tilda Swinton as a Bowie-esque rock star on holiday, who it seems stays silent after throat surgery, and with hunk de jour Matthias Schoenaerts as her lover. The daughter is Dakota Johnson (the daughter of Don Johnson and Melanie Griffiths, and granddaughter of Tippi Hedren). I loved Guadargnino's operatic melodrama I AM LOVE in 2009 - a modern Italian classic, where Tilda was amazing again (see Tilda label), so we are looking forward to this one -  Fiennes and Swinton are never less than compelling and both seem on top form here; we will be rushing to it when it opens here on Feb 12.
Guadagnino came out as gay in a recent interview, and one can definitely see a 'gay sensibility' in his work ... 

Another modern Italian classic I loved was Paolo Sorrentino's THE GREAT BEAUTY in 2013, so his new one, in English, YOUTH also has to be a must-see. I don't rush to Michael Caine films but will have to make an exception here, it also has a good role for Harvey Kietel and it should at least be interesting to see Caine and Jane Fonda (if they have scenes together) 50 years after their teaming in Otto's HURRY SUNDOWN back in 1966 ... what a lulu that was (Fonda label). This poster is not the one being used here in the UK.

Hilarious reading the reviews on DIRTY GRANDPA - maybe the worst film Robert De Niro has churned out in recent years? He is entitled to do as he pleases of course in his 70s, but hard to picture Travis Bickle of TAXI DRIVER or Jimmy Doyle of NEW YORK NEW YORK or his RAGING BULL or GOODFELLAS appearing in drivel like this ... surely he could have said no this time ? I suppose we will be laughing at it in due course ...... 

Favourite movie stills .... an occasional series.

1950s: EAST OF EDEN: More on Dean, Richard Davalos and Julie Harris at labels ..... 

1960s: BLOW-UP - David and Vanessa and that perfectly 1960s studio space ...

1970s: NEW YORK NEW YORK, De Niro and Liza in Scorsese's powerhouse musical drama, a new A STAR IS BORN ...

1980s: BODY HEAT: Kathleen Turner's sizzling walk past dumb William Hurt in Lawrence Kasdan's sizzling modern noir.

Different choices, next time. 

The taxi driver scores an ace in the hole

Or The Chuck Tatum /Travis Bickle show ...

Watching two searing dramas one after the other left one limp on the sofa. I had not seen Billy Wilder's 1951 ACE IN THE HOLE for years (its before my time obviously, I only started going to the movies in 1954 when I was 8) and maybe only ever saw it once so it was rather unfamiliar to me, whereas we over-dosed on Scorsese's TAXI DRIVER back in 1976, and in that pre-video age, went to it several times and even got the soundtrack album, but again I had not seen it for a long time ...

Chuck Tatum (Kirk Douglas), a ruthless former New York newspaper reporter now trapped in a dead-end job at a New Mexico newspaper, sees his way out by covering the story of a man trapped inside a mine. He sees this as his way back to the big time and New York. When Tatum's first story appears, crowds begin arriving at the mine site to watch the unfolding rescue. Although the man, Leo Minosa, can be rescued in about a day, Tatutm gets the local corrupt sheriff and the mining engineer to prolong the rescue by using a drilling process that will take about a week, thus ensuring that Tatum can milk the story for all its worth, as crowds gather to see what happens. It becomes a carnival as everyone is out to make a fast buck. 

This Wilder film is a dark allegory and he outdid himself in cynicism and savage wit with this assault on the trashy press which was a colossal flop at the time, even changing the title to THE BIG CARNIVAL did not help - Wilder stuck to proven hits and successful plays for most of the 50s after that. Kirk Douglas plays another heel (THE BAD AND THE BEAUTIFUL) and is the man you love to hate. 

Jan Sterling too plays another sneering, trashy blonde, a real hard-boiled number who won't kneel to pray, as it "bags her nylons". She is the trapped man's wife and runs that forlorn diner which does not make any money - soon, though the cash register is ringing as she caters to the crowds arriving - she too wants to get away, as Chuck slaps her around and gets her to act the part of the concerned wife, only he goes too far ... 

The film undoubtedly exaggerates not only the greed of the reporter and of local traders but also ghoulishness of the public. In the end, though, it all backfires on him as the trapped man dies, thus making him effectively guilty of manslaughter, as the public and the media circus leave.  Presumably back then, the heel has to pay for his callousness, it might be a different ending today, as we are used to television cashing in on tragedies ... Co-written by Wilder and Lesser Samuels and Walter Newman, not his usual collaborators. 

TAXI DRIVER. The plot of Scorsese's classic is too well known to go into again, but here it is anyway:

Travis Bickle is an ex-Marine and Vietnam War veteran living in New York City. As he suffers from insomnia, he spends his time working as a taxi driver at night, watching porn movies at seedy cinemas during the day, He is a loner who sees New York as a cesspool. His one bright spot in New York humanity is Betsy, a worker on the presidential nomination campaign of Senator Charles Palantine. He becomes obsessed with her, but takes her to the porn cinema when she agrees to a date with him..He then wants to save Iris, a twelve-year-old runaway and prostitute who he believes wants out of the profession and under the thumb of her pimp, and he may also want to shoot the senator. so the scene is set for a showdown of savage intensity. 

After years of seeing De Niro in lesser movies or movies one does not need to see at all, one forgot how stunning he was in TAXI DRIVER, and of course MEAN STREETS. I particularly like NEW YORK NEW YORK and then there was RAGING BULL and GOODFELLAS, among others (1900, THE DEER HUNTER). 
But Travis Bickle is his iconic role, "God's loney man" the classic loner going out of his mind, whether alone in his room ("You talking to me?"), or his eyes in close-up as he drives that big yellow taxi as the brilliant Bernard Herrmann score plays - and then that final shoot-out. Everyone is excellent here: Jodie Foster, Harvey Kietel, Cybill Shepherd, Peter Boyle, even Scorsese himself in that cameo as the client spying on his wife, and of course Paul Schrader's script. It was the film of 1976 for most of us.  

Francine Evans & Jimmy Doyle go head to head again

Summer re-runs: as my Facebook friend Martin is having a mini-Scorsese season, here's another look at NEW YORK NEW YORK, one of my favourite Marty's, up there with TAXI DRIVER .... its perhaps his flawed masterpiece, his A STAR IS BORN !

Our "Sunday Times" recently ran a new interview with Robert De Niro in their 'Culture' magazine, the usual fawning stuff - as usual De Niro had nothing much to say (like when he was on tv last week on our Graham Norton Show, where he was just there to plug a silly new movie), the magazine interview by Bryan Appleyard name-checked those great Scorsese-De Niro collaborations MEAN STREETS, TAXI DRIVER, RAGING BULL, THE KING OF COMEDY, GOODFELLAS, CAPE FEAR, CASINO - but did not mention their 1977 NEW YORK NEW YORK which seems to be considered something of a flop these days.

I though loved it at the time, and went to its first run and saw it several times and also got the double vinyl gatefold soundtrack album - it was just before the home video explosion when a soundtrack album was the best souvenir available.

An egotistical saxophone player and a young singer meet on V-J Day and embark upon a strained and rocky romance, even as their careers begin a long uphill climb - he becomes a great jazz musician while she becomes a famous vocalist and movie star, can they rekindle their romance?

After the huge success of TAXI DRIVER, not just a cult movie but popular too, Scorsese was riding high, and was able to mount his follow-up on a big scale. Just as the story and situation mimic those of old musicals, NEW YORK NEW YORK's production design aims to recreate those movies' stylized, artificial sets and visuals. I understand it was a troubled (cocaine-fuelled apparantly) shoot which over-ran - the big "Happy Endings" number with Larry Kert (Liza's "Born in a Trunk"?) was removed, but everything about it worked for me. The colour and music, that great long opening sequence when we realise how obnoxious Jimmy Doyle is (for me his jazzman is as good as his Travis Bickle), those scenes of their doomed romance - the artificial trees in that scene in the snow, when he attacks Francine for getting pregnant.  The songs are great too, some in the '40s style of Peggy Lee, and Diahnne Abbot as the Harlem club singer whose  "Honeysuckle Rose" is in  the style of Billie Holiday. The title song by Liza, with that marvellous staging, is the definitive version (sorry, Frank). It and CABARET are Liza's defining moments, and it is certainly a great De Niro performance. It is really a movie buff's musical as Scorsese recreates '40s and '50s musicals - perhaps his A STAR IS BORN ?  Scorsese's opus too was cut from 163 minutes to about 130 for various releases. Its certainly though, as those French cinebuffs say, a film maudit ...
 

Perhaps the bittersweet ending where they both walk away from a proposed meeting did not work for audiences? and De Niro does not play for sympathy as Jimmy Doyle is certainly an abusive husband. 1977 was the era of SATURDAY NIGHT FEVER and STAR WARS and CLOSE ENCOUNTERS, but surely the ANNIE HALL crowd would have embraced NEW YORK, NEW YORK?  Scorsese's later films with Leonardo DiCaprio do not work for me in the same way as his with De Niro. Now for THE WOLF OF WALL STREET, I just wasn't particularly interested in seeing SHUTTER ISLAND. We also loved his documentary on George Harrison and his documentary on Italian cinema ... (Scorsese label). 

Actors: Hoffman x 2, Finney, De Niro

A double bill featuring that fascinating actor Philip Seymour Hoffman - I have not liked all of his films, but sometimes he blew one away, ever since his early roles in BOOGIE NIGHTS, MAGNOLIA and THE TALENTED MR RIPLEY.  Here teamed with Albert Finney and Robert De Niro as equally magnetic co-stars, he delivers the goods ...

BEFORE THE DEVIL KNOWS YOU’RE DEAD. Sidney Lumet’s last film in 2007 (see below & Lumet label for other reviews) is also – yes, fascinating – to catch now, since its star Philip Seymour Hoffman’s death recently. This is a family drama that veers into Greek tragedy territory. Lumet at 83 lays on a powerhouse cast as we watch brothers Andy (Hoffman) – desperately needing money to finance his drug habit and cover money he has embezzled, and weak younger brother Hank (Ethan Hawke), who needs money for his family and who gets lured into big brother’s plan to rob a jewelry shore – not just any old jewel shop, but the one belonging to their parents, Albert Finney and Rosemary Harris. 

This is meant to be a victimless crime with the insurance paying out. But younger brother gets someone else involved in the robbery and the mother, who was not meant to be at the shop, fights back, resulting in two deaths: hers, and the robber. Both brothers go into meltdown, and the father – Finney at his most intense, in a good late role for him, decides to investigate further. This leads to a stunning climax between Hoffman and Finney ... Marisa Tomei has a good role too. Now for another I had been putting off: Hoffman with De Niro in FEARLESS, which I did not want to see at all at the time.

 

FLAWLESS from 1999 is a real oddity, sometimes one wants to turn it off or speed it up, as we watch homophobic ex-cop Robert De Niro, who suffers a stroke during a run in with some drug dealers, and tries to recover. His doctor tells him the best way to improve his speech is to start singing lessons. He plucks up courage to ask his neigbour to teach him to sing - this is Hoffman as the flamboyant transvestite and drag queen, who has problems of his own, as he finally admits he is lonely and ugly and unloved. This film is about how the relationship grows between these two very different people and how they both work together to overcome their very different problems, while some vicious hoods are also looking for that money. 
It is good to see De Niro back to his best after some very average movies, a lot of which one didn't want to or need to see (he is almost an older Travis Bickle here, down on his luck in a very seedy sleazy gritty New York) and Phillip Seymour Hoffman is just outstanding and mesmerising again, he was certainly an actor who took risks - and will be as sorely missed as Heath Ledger. Its a Joel Schumacher film, a lot of it though looks too dark, one can barely see what is going on. 

Soon: Finney in Huston's 1984 UNDER THE VOLCANO, and with Tom Courtenay in THE DRESSER, plus Tom in Noel Coward's ME AND THE GIRLS.

No love for NEW YORK NEW YORK ?

A love story is like a song. It's beautiful while it lasts (as the movie's tagline said).

Our "Sunday Times" ran a new interview with Robert De Niro in their Culture magazine, the usual fawning stuff - as usual De Niro had nothing much to say (like when he was on tv last week on our Graham Norton Show, where he was just there to plug a silly new movie), the magazine interview by Bryan Appleyard name-checked those great Scorsese-De Niro collaborations MEAN STREETS, TAXI DRIVER, RAGING BULL, THE KING OF COMEDY, GOODFELLAS, CAPE FEAR, CASINO - but did not mention their 1977 NEW YORK NEW YORK which seems to be considered something of a flop these days.

I though loved it at the time, and went to its first run and saw it several times and also got the double vinyl gatefold soundtrack album - it was just before the home video explosion when a soundtrack album was the best souvenir available.

An egotistical saxophone player and a young singer meet on V-J Day and embark upon a strained and rocky romance, even as their careers begin a long uphill climb - he becomes a great jazz musician while she becomes a famous vocalist and movie star, can they rekindle their romance?

After the low-budget success of TAXI DRIVER, Scorsese was riding high, and he was given the chance to mount his follow-up on a big scale. Just as the story and situation mimic those of old musicals, NEW YORK NEW YORK's production design aims to recreate those movies' stylized, artificial sets and visuals. I can see it was a troubled (cocaine-fuelled apparantly) shoot which over-ran - the big "Happy Endings" number with Larry Kert (Liza's "Born in a Trunk"?) was removed, but everything about it worked for me. The colour and music, that great long opening sequence when we realise how obnoxious Jimmy Doyle is (for me his jazzman is as good as his Travis Bickle), those scenes of their doomed romance - the artificial trees in that scene in the snow, when he attacks Francine for getting pregnant.  The songs are great too, some in the '40s style of Peggy Lee, and Diahnne Abbot as the Harlem club singer whose  "Honeysuckle Rose" is in  the style of Billie Holiday. The title song by Liza, with that marvellous staging, is the definitive version (sorry, Frank). It and CABARET are Liza's defining moments, and it is certainly a great De Niro performance. It is really a movie buff's musical as Scorsese recreates '40s and '50s musicals - perhaps his A STAR IS BORN ?  Scorsese's opus too was cut from 163 minutes to about 130 for various releases. 
 

Perhaps the bittersweet ending where they both walk away from a proposed meeting did not work for audiences? and De Niro does not play for sympathy as Jimmy Doyle is certainly an abusive husband. 1977 was the era of SATURDAY NIGHT FEVER and STAR WARS and CLOSE ENCOUNTERS, but surely the ANNIE HALL crowd would have embraced NEW YORK, NEW YORK?  Scorsese's later films with Leonardo DiCaprio do not work for me in the same way as his with De Niro. In the interview he says there may be another De Niro-Scorsese film ...

More offbeats soon: FELLINI SATYRICON, Herzog's NOSFERATU, Bunuel's PHANTOM OF LIBERTY, Powell's PEEPING TOM, THE PLACE BEYOND THE PINES, ONLY GOD FORGIVES, Ingrid as HEDDA GABLER, LOVE IS THE DEVIL, that Liberace biopic, more Deneuve and Schneider reviews, and Brush up your Shakespeare: all those HAMLETs, MERCHANT OF VENICE and Orson's OTHELLO ... 

Actors 2

A lovely still from Antonioni's L'ECLISSE, 1962, with Alain Delon. The link below, if you copy to your browser, features a terrific page of animated stills of this and other movies like TAXI DRIVER, BLADE RUNNER, 2001, LOLITA etc with brilliant animation of the stills. Enjoy!

http://blogs.suntimes.com/scanners/2011/09/cinematographs_living_breathin.html

10 great male performances: (or my favourites at any rate)

Robert De Niro - TAXI DRIVER & RAGING BULL (and his sax player in NEW YORK NEW YORK!)
Dirk Bogarde - THE SERVANT / MODESTY BLAISE / DEATH IN VENICE
James Mason - A STAR IS BORN 
Maurice Ronet - LE FEU FOLLET
Peter Finch - SUNDAY BLOODY SUNDAY / THE TRIALS OF OSCAR WILDE
Anton Walbrook - THE RED SHOES 
Ralph Richardson - THE HEIRESS
Montgomery Clift - WILD RIVER
David Hemmings - BLOW-UP
Cary Grant - NOTORIOUS
Gary Cooper - FRIENDLY PERSUASION
James Dean - EAST OF EDEN
and sneaking in Jack Lemmon as Daphne in SOME LIKE IT HOT - Tony ain't bad either!

Taxi Driver

It's back! A new re-issue of TAXI DRIVER for its 35th anniversary ... it would be good to see it properly again - it was probably one of the most viewed of the early video cassettes back in the 80s and 90s.

An essential 1976 movie - how we were gripped and enthralled by it, it is certainly a vividly expressionistic depiction of big city breakdown and one of the true masterpieces of American cinema. One had to read the extensive coverage on it in "Film Comment" as Scorsese, Paul Schrader and De Niro were the heroes of the hour. I had that album too with that pounding Herrmann score - and then those images: the taxi emerging from the steam, the reds and neon colours. Perfect, simply perfect. I also loved NEW YORK NEW YORK and in fact that is one to re-visit too now.

The other movie that excited me as much in 1976 was De Palma's brilliant OBSESSION where one fell totally in love with Genevieve Bujold, and it too had stunning images and another final Bernard Herrmann score. They were the top movies of the year for me, along with Visconti's last L'INNOCENTE (maybe the greatest costume period film ever) and Lester's ROBIN AND MARIAN. Some year ... (like 1975 was the year of Antonioni's THE PASSENGER and Kubrick's BARRY LYNDON