People we Like: Vittoria De Sica

Vittorio De Sica [1901-1974] was of course, along with Roberto Rossellini, one of the greats of Italian cinema, from the neo-realism of the '40s through to the glory days of the '60s and '70s. He was a matinee idol in the '30s and then turned to directing, with THE CHILDREN ARE WATCHING US, showing an extraordinarily sensitive touch with non-actors, especially children. It was also the first film he made with the writer Cesare Zavattini with whom he would subsequently make SHOESHINE (1946) and BICYCLE THIEVES (1948), heartbreaking studies of poverty in postwar Italy which won special Oscars before the foreign film category was officially established. UMBERTO D in '52 is a very downbeat look at old age - proud stubborn Umberto facing poverty and homelessness and his little dog Flick will break your heart, like those closing scenes in BICYCLE THIEVES.

TWO WOMEN is by comparison lighter fare and was a huge international hit in 1960 just as interest in European cinema was taking off, and making Sophia Loren (here at 25 playing the mother of a 14 year old) an even bigger star than she was in her American films. Loren and De Sica could have written their own ticket after that - she got the Best Actress Oscar in 1961, a year of 5 great nominees - but they chose the little seen THE CONDEMNED OF ALTONA from the Sartre play. I finally caught up with that last year!

Then followed those '60s hits with Loren and Mastroianni: YESTERDAY TODAY AND TOMORROW, the Naples section with the endlessly pregnant Loren is the best segment here, and - my favourite - MARRIAGE ITALIAN STYLE from the great Italian play FILUMENA. BOCCACCIO 70 was an amusing quartet of stories in 62, again with Loren, the other episodes were by Fellini and Visconti, the Monicelli segment being cut out from the original release but is now on the dvd. SUNFLOWER made partly in Russia was a misfire, being wildly old fashioned in 1970, as was A PLACE FOR LOVERS with Dunaway and Mastroianni in '69. Vittorio had a last great success (and another Oscar) with THE GARDEN OF THE FINZI CONTINIS from the Bassani novel, in 1971. His last few though went unreleased here in the UK: A BRIEF VACATION with Florinda Bolkan as a working class woman who is sent to a sanitarium for a cure which changes her life, was only shown on BBC television, and we never saw THE VOYAGE a less than successful final film with Loren (and Burton) until its recent dvd release! It comes across now as an old man's farewell to life and the cinema...

Vittorio though was a larger than life character - he gambled incessantly and apparantly had two families. Like the rather similar larger than life John Huston he acted in other director's films (over 100 actually), maybe to finance his gambling - in classics like Ophuls' MADAME DE... in '53, and IL GENERAL DELLA ROVERE in '59, he is fun with Angela Lansbury as impoverished aristocrats in the merry romp THE AMOROUS ADVENTURES OF MOLL FLANDERS in '65, he pops up in Sophia's THE MILLIONAIRESS as the sweatshop factory owner, and he is her lawyer in the delightful IT STARTED IN NAPLES with Gable. He co-stars with Dietrich in the '57 romance THE MONTE CARLO STORY, and with Gloria Swanson and the young Bardot in the '56 NERO's LOST WEEKEND which is an interesting curio to see now, as well as popular movies of the time like SCANDAL IN SORRENTO and those BREAD LOVE AND ... with Lollobrigida and GOLD OF NAPLES . He is terrific with the young Loren and Mastroianni in 1954's TOO BAD SHE'S BAD as the father of the family of criminals - this was a major treat for me to discover last year! His final role was as the father of those daughters in the Warhol BLOOD FOR DRACULA in '74. There is an interesting documentary on him in the recent BICYCLE THIEVES dvd release showing him at his busiest in the early '60s. Its always a pleasure seeing Vittorio (often hamming it up) in any film and I really should catch up with his directing efforts I have missed.

The magical movies of Jacques Demy

French director Jacques Demy [1931-1990] who had some very popular successes during the 60s but, while remaining popular in France, somehow seemed to slip off the radar here in the UK (and maybe elsewhere) as several of his later films never surfaced here at all, while the likes of Truffaut, Malle, Chabrol etc continued to be lionised. (One could say the same for another French director Claude Lelouch). The early films include 2 New Wave classics in glittering monochrome, 2 candy-coloured musicals, 2 fairy tales and a counterculture late 60s classic with great roles for the likes of Aimee, Moreau, Deneuve, Dorleac, Seyrig etc. and of course those sailors in white ...

His first movie in 1961 is the beauty that is LOLA, Jacques Demy’s valentine to the movies with Anouk Aimee at her most vibrant and animated in perhaps the most likeable film of the French new wave. Demy’s magical story shows that one person's happy ending is often another's missed possibility of happiness. Raoul Coutard's lovingly shot black and white widescreen photography of the French atlantic port of Nantes is a plus, as Lola sings and dances and waits for her lover to return, in what was a key movie for both Demy and Aimee.



BAY OF ANGELS – this 1963 drama is a perfect companion piece to his LOLA - making two of the most enjoyable, accessible New Wave classics. Here the images of Jean Rabier, Michel Legrand's music, Jeanne Moreau at her most magnetic with silver blonde hair and a Cardin wardrobe (all in black and white), all wrapped up in 79 minutes in the story of compulsive gamblers in Nice and Monte Carlo whom it seems Demy observes for a time. The film ends with them continuing their gambling - will they stay together? we don't know.... Moreau is at her peak here as the woman for whom gambling is everything having lost her husband, child, jewellery etc. Claude Mann is the rather dull bank clerk who gets the gambling urge (Paul Guers as his gambling friend Caron would be more interesting and attractive in this role) and he and Moreau are soon a team as he brings her luck but he is falling in love... There is the astonishing scene where Moreau reveals what gambling means to her and how money means nothing, as they win, lose, win again ... Moreau didn't care for the "French Bette Davis" tag but it rather applies here. I love the look of this one and the previous LOLA: that widescreen black and white and the lovely theme by Legrand. A French classic indeed.


Then in 1964 his biggest commercial success and still often revived today, the candy-coloured musical THE UMBRELLAS OF CHERBOURG, which is entirely sung by the cast, music by Michel Legrand, and it is just sheer perfection. The young Catherine Deneuve and Nino Castelnuovo as the lovers separated by the war, and that marvellous bittersweet climax at the garage in the snow. The colour and backgrounds are now even better than ever on dvd.

There followed his second musical in 1967, THE YOUNG GIRLS OF ROCHEFORT which was bliss to see again recently, to see it in colour and widescreen is magical. It is another all singing musical with great colour and sets – the whole town of Rochefort seems to be dancing at one stage. The sisters Catherine Deneuve and Francoise Dorleac star, with hoofers an older Gene Kelly, George Chakiris and a blonde Jacques Perrin as a lovelorn sailor. It all works perfectly now and I urge anyone who has not seen it to seek it out on dvd, as it is not as well known as the more famous Cherbourg film, it is in fact a perfect 60s film, which I have written about here several times already.

I saw his 1969 film THE MODEL SHOP on release but it had vanished until now and was not appreciated at the time. This made in America film is a love letter to Los Angeles and the lost souls driving the freeways. Anouk Aimee is again Lola here adrift in Los Angeles working as a glamour model to be photographed in a rather seedy studio (it would of course be a sex shop now) and who gets involved with drifter Gary Lockwood waiting to be shipped off to Vietnam. Its a perfect late 60s L A film

The fascinating thing about this film is that Demy and his wife director Agnes Varda had wanted the young Harrison Ford for this role but he was not considered important enough, whereas the rather dull Lockwood had just come off shooting Kubrick’s 2001 A SPACE ODYSSEY.



Next up are two fairy tales, unseen here maybe but big hits in Europe at the time. PEAU D’ANE (DONKEY SKIN) is a perfect 1970 visualisation of the Perrault fairy tale, with Deneuve as the princess who dresses in the donkey skin to escape her father who wants to marry her. Jean Marais is the King, Jacques Perrin the prince and Delphine Seyrig shines as a rather eccentric fairy godmother. It’s a great pleasure to see now.

1972’s THE PIED PIPER is finally on dvd and scenes from it are available in the film THE WORLD OF JACQUES DEMY, a film made by his wife, director Agnes Varda. Pop singer of the time Donovan is the piper and it has a good cast of English regulars including Donald Pleasance and Diana Dors, and it has a nice medieval feel set in Hamelin where rats and plague reign.

His following films do not appear to have been screened in the UK at all and include 1973’s THE SLIGHTLY PREGNANT MAN with Mastroianni and Deneuve (where it is he who is pregnant…), 1979’s LADY OSCAR, UN CHAMBRE EN VILLE (A Room In Town) in 1982 [Dominique Sanda naked under a fur coat!] or 3 PLACES FOR THE 26TH starring Yves Montand in one of his last roles as an older singer/entertainer returning to his home town for a concert.

Agnes Varda, Demy’s wife, is of course a well-regarded director in her own right with films like CLEO FROM 5 TO 7 (reviewed separately here) and LE BONHEUR. I am very pleased to have her 90 minute film THE WORLD OF JACQUES DEMY included in the 2 disk version of UMBRELLAS OF CHERBOURG and what a delight it is, covering all these films which star the cream of French cinema who all appear here discussing their work with Demy and how much they appreciated him, as well as contributions from Varda and their son. It is now fascinating to see their footage of the very young Harrison Ford in the late 60s, he is also interviewed here as the star he later became.

Varda also made a film herself JACQUET DE NANTES about the childhood of Jacques in Nantes in France, including reference to and scenes from his films, which is also available in the box sets on her films. Her documentary on the making of LES DEMOISELLES and its 25th anniversary reunion is included in it's BFI dvd release.

In all, Jacques Demy would appear to be as well regarded and loved as Francois Truffaut or Louis Malle and for anyone with the least interest in international or European cinema his films are not only wonderfully entertaining in themselves but also key works of the last 40 years.

How very '50s: MM at the diner

A Marilyn photo I had not seen before - at the drive-in diner in 1952, by Philippe Halsman, one of those many photographers who specialised in Monroe pictures...

How very '60s: The Swinger & Bus Riley

Back to the zany mid-'60s folks with a double bill of THE SWINGER and BUS RILEY'S BANK IN TOWN. Groovy or what ... THE SWINGER in '66 was "an attempt by old-time Hollywood to cash in on the "youth movement" by making a movie that was "hip" and "relevant" and that the "young people" could "dig." Of course It fails miserably on all counts. This movie was dated while it was being made and is now nothing more than a laughable relic by people who had absolutely no idea of what the '60s were about" [to quote an IMDb review] - like those later Elvis films directed by guys in their 60s or older!

Tony Franciosa plays a Hugh Hefner-type magazine publisher who keeps rejecting stories by writer Ann-Margret about the swinging scene, because he doesn't think she knows enough about it so she sets out to become part of the swinging generation to show him up. The movie is nothing but leering, smarmy double-entendres as she gets her vice squad pals to raid the "orgy" scene she and her equally nice pals set up - which consists of them dancing the frug and painting her (bikini-clad) body with paint. Tony of course and boss Robert Coote are watching and think this is the height of debauchery.

What follows is a Doris Day type plot where the good girl pretends to be a bad girl, then he finds out that she is really a good girl so he pretends to seduce her ... etc etc etc. This is as far from the real mid-60s as one could get, as scanty clad girls lounge around Coote's magazine office as he pinches their bottoms in the elevator and chases them around desks. Did they really think this was funny at the time? George Sidney directed some good musicals in his time, shame to see him reduced to this.

We (or I at any rate) ignored movies like THE SWINGER back in 1966 - the real movies that caught the time were films like MODESTY BLAISE or GEORGY GIRL - not studio-manufactured junk like THE SWINGER or those other mid-60s ones like HARLOW or SYLVIA or THE SINGING NUN as studio chiefs thought Ann-Margret or Carroll Baker were where it was at. One felt sorry for Franciosa (who was a serious actor a decade earlier with Anna Magnani in WILD IS THE WIND) and Coote - once a Pickering in the stage MY FAIR LADY - frantically mugging here. At least the next year 1967 swept dross like this away with the arrival of the new Hollywood with BONNIE AND CLYDE, IN THE HEAT OF THE NIGHT etc.

Ann-Margret is like a barbie doll here, just playing a tease whom all the men cannot resist. She began with such promise in the early 60s, around the same time as Jane Fonda and Julie Christie, but found herself in movies like this and KITTEN WITH A WHIP (which I previously discussed here) - it wasn't until CARNAL KNOWLEDGE in 1971 that she was taken seriously. She has been terrific since in lots of things like Ken Russell's TOMMY (being covered in baked beans) that Aids drama OUR SONS with Julie Andrews (and a young Hugh Grant) or that lush 80s tele-drama THE TWO MRS GRENVILLES where she holds her own with the older Claudette Colbert and was great fun to see recently. Then there is BUS RILEY ...

We are in familiar territory as BUS RILEY'S BACK IN TOWN begins in 1965: a greyhound bus pulls in and a marine in white gets out and looks around his old town - its Bus Riley back after 3 years and trying to settle back into small town life and look for a suitable job. It is familiar William Inge territory but this is William Inge-lite without all the heavy drama of PICNIC, ALL FALL DOWN, SPLENDOUR IN THE GRASS, THE STRIPPER etc - Bus (Michael Parks) is a good-natured chap who does not think too deeply about things and is soon happy back with lovable mother (Jocelyn Brando), adoring younger sister (Kim Darby), sniping older sister (Mimsy Farmer) and local girl Janet Margolin who has to move in with them and who is so obviously the girl for Bus. There is also a very William Inge spinster teacher who gets the vapours at the sight of Bus in his shorts and comes down with a migraine at the thought of a man in the house, so she soon departs. There is also that mortician acquaintance who can fix Bus up with a job - but, as he places his hand firmly on Bus's knee and thigh, tells Bus how lonely he is and wants Bus to move in with him and his mother (Hitchcock's BIRDS expert and BILLY LIAR's grandmother) Ethel Griffies. Bus sighs wearily and instead settles for being a door to door salesman and is soon a hit with those lonely housewives (cue Alice Pearce as a rather dotty one). Then there is Laurel - Ann-Margret of course top-billed here and the posters are all about her, as Bus's old girlfriend who has married money while he was away and drives around town in her swish car looking for him. He resists her at first but she soon has him in her pool as her husband is away a lot and she wants Bus back big time.

Its a pleasant time waster catching the mid-'60s in transition and a rather nice view of small town American life. Laurel gets her just deserts as Bus realises she would never have married him as he was not rich enough and once he is told what a great car mechanic he was by a satisfied client his destiny beckons. Nicely directed by Harvey Hart it is one of Michael Park's better outings; like Christopher Jones he was tagged with the 'new James Dean' label but the mannerisms are kept in check here - he went on to Huston's BIBLE and 67's THE HAPPENING with a young Faye Dunaway, who was obviously going places ...

Best musical evah !

Its THE BANDWAGON natch! - it was on again yesterday afternoon so I cleared the decks and luxuriated in it all over again - enjoying Minnelli's palette of colours - all those yellows and reds - SINGING IN THE RAIN looks drab by comparison! SINGING by the way, which was on the day before just doesn't do it for me, I have enjoyed it all the times I have seen it but it just isn't that special for me, apart from every appearance and utterance of Lina Lamont.
But back to THE BANDWAGON - Fred is wonderful here in 1953, Cyd is at the pinnacle of her career, Fabray and Levant are fine and - maybe best of all - Jack Buchanan is an insane delight as highbrow theatre director Jeffrey Cordova, maybe based on Orson Welles - even the throwaway shot of that poster for his show Oedipus Rex (where we first see him hamming it up) has it billed as presented by, starring, written and directed by him. This Arthur Freed production, with Roger Edens also on board, the witty script satirising show business folk is by Betty Comden and Adolph Green, with Michael Kidd handling the dances and those Howard Dietz songs which all mesh perfectly without a dull moment, starting with that satire on ageing star Tony Hunter and the auction of his top hat and then his arrival in New York - where we have two of Fred's best ever numbers: the wistful "By Myself" as he leaves the train (those journalists were waiting for Ava Gardner!) - Judy makes this song an angry powerhouse statement (which is also perfect in its context) in her I COULD GO ON SINGING, but Fred's version is delightful here; and then we have that dazzling "Put A Shine On Your Shoes" with everything in the amusement arcade thrown in, before Fred meets the Martins (Nanette and Oscar) and their idea for a new show - which leads us to theatre egomaniac Jeffrey Cordova as we go backstage at his Oedipus Rex. Cue seeing ballet dancer Gabrielle Gerard (Cyd) on stage and then we all adjoin to Cordova's town-house and that perfect yellow and white study (pure Minnelli) while Gaby and her partner choreographer Paul Byrd (James Mitchell) are in an adjoining red room. We overhear Cordova wowing the investors as Fred and Cyd size each other up. There is also that delicious scene when Cordova calls Paul over at 3 a.m. and skillfully manoeuvers him into demanding that dancer Gaby is cast in the show! as Hal - Cordova's constantaly on-call assistant (or maybe more?) - wearily rings the papers. Minnelli's THE RELUCTANT DEBUTANTE in '58 also had decor to die for [as per my post on that].

Lots of amusement follows as the show is cast and begins to work and then we get that perfect number "Dancing in the Dark" as Fred and Cyd escape the rehearsals and take a horse and carriage to the park and the number expresses their concerns about dancing together as they effortlessly mesh together rising and falling until spent and exhausted they fall back into the carriage. Its a moment of pure rapture.


Then we have the giant egg with appropriate sounds as the opening peformance is a colossal flop - and Fred takes over and the show is re-done and we get one marvellous number after another: Cyd in that yellow dress with the splash of red, "Triplets", "Louisiana Hayride" and Fred and Jack in that delightful "I Guess I'll Have to Change My Plan". I really only know Buchanan from this movie, its a shame there were no later great musicals for him. Then we get the iconic "Girl Hunt" ballet where Fred and Cyd dazzle - when Cyd displays that red dress and those legs ... and finally that last reprise of the anthem "That's Entertainment" as Cyd tells Fred the show will run forever. Its all bliss, pure bliss. For me, the best MGM musical then, followed by KISS ME KATE - and Gene's later ones ITS ALWAYS FAIR WEATHER and LES GIRLS. Time now to dig out the dvd and those extra features and making-of documentaries... Fred of course went on to those other favorites of mine FUNNY FACE and SILK STOCKINGS (sorry, not DADDY LONG LEGS). Perfect end comment: "This was THE smart and sophisticated musical comedy of the '50s, an era when New York adults still set pop trends and before American culture became corrupted and dumbed down by television. It's not just nostalgia to say they don't make them like they used to."

Mother Gin Sling

THE SHANGHAI GESTURE - the last great film of Josef Von Sternberg "luxuriates in a corruption and degradation that rivals BLUE VELVET in its suggestiveness" according to VARIETY. The nightmarish, stylised environment that Von Sternberg creates in this 1941 classic set the standard for the film noir vision. It is as important to me as those other 1941 classics: CITIZEN KANE, THE MALTESE FALCON, THE LADY EVE, SULLIVAN'S TRAVELS, BALL OF FIRE or THE GREAT LIE.

In Shanghai's slimy underworld, English financier Sir Guy Charteris (Walter Huston) tries to close down a gambling den owned by the devious Mother Gin Sling (Ona Munson). However, Gin Sling learns that Sir Guy's daughter, the wilful Poppy (Gene Tierney) is a regular at her establishment and with the help of the seductive decadent Dr Omar (Victor Mature) she lures Poppy into gambling debts and drug addiction. Gin Sling blackmails Charteris and he reveals a shocking secret plunging them into another level of hell. Based on a racy 1925 Broadway play (where Gin Sling was called 'Mother Goddam') THE SHANGHAI GESTURE received 32 rejections from the Hays censorship office before it was finally released. The Chinese government objected to the film's depiction of China and attempted to suppress it. THE SHANGHAI GESTURE brilliantly evokes the foreboding, poisonous noir underworld and stands out among Von Sternberg's best work.
Ona Munson (she was Belle Watling in GONE WITH THE WIND) is simply astonishing as Gin Sling with those different hair creations, as she presides over that dinner party of people dependent on her to which she invites Sir Charles; also in the cast are Eric Blore, Maria Ouspenskaya in a silent role and Mike Mazurski as a very strange coolie. The young Gene Tierney is stunningly beautiful here (3 years before LAURA or her South Sea beauty the next year in SON OF FURY) and the set for the gambling den is merely stupendous. When the icy Mother Gin Sling tells us how she became who she is and discovers that the worthless Poppy is in fact her daughter she exacts a terrible revenge... its all lit and set as fascinating as any of the Von Sternberg-Dietrich pictures and is a worthy companion to them. It was in fact the last film the despotic director had total control of - Nicholas Ray completed MACAO (which like SHANGHAI EXPRESS also saw the Orient as a decadent mysterious place) and Howard Hughes tinkered with JET PILOT for years. It makes one wish that Von Sternberg's vision of I CLAUDIUS for Korda had been completed in 1937 but the fragments that remain will have to do.

Don't mess with Missy Stanwyck !

Barbara was one tough dame. Here she is in full throttle '50s mode .... I first discovered her in those westerns like CATTLE QUEEN OF MONTANA, THE MAVERICK QUEEN, 40 GUNS, THE FURIES, TROOPER HOOK and dramas like CLASH BY NIGHT and BLOWING WILD, then there was her blazing turn in WALK ON THE WILD SIDE when she (understandably) wants Capucine for herself.

It was a revelation to go back and see the early Stanwyck of THE LADY EVE, BALL OF FIRE (Sugarpuss O'Shea!) and as Phyllis Dietrichson, that "Medusa of the suburbs", biding her time in '40s California in Billy Wilder's classic DOUBLE INDEMNITY. When I was growing up that great star quartet comprised Davis, Hepburn, Crawford and Stanwyck. Barbara played it straight down the line... That recent biography by Jane Ellen Wayne was a brisk canter through her early years on Broadway and Hollywood, those gay rumours that swirled around her for decades, her long marriage to Robert Taylor, and that purported romance with a young Robert Wagner!

Showpeople (2): When heart-throbs meet...

Italy 1957: Dirk and Rock meet at Cortina D'Ampezzo where the jet set ski. Dirk was making that Canadian adventure CAMPBELL'S KINDGOM while Rock was filming A FAREWELL TO ARMS, both in the Italian dolomites. Wonder what the boys had to talk about, probably about the price of fame and keeping their fanbase happy.

There is another picture of them looking at their respective pinups but I cannot find it. Dirk went on to shake off that matinee "Idol of the Odeons" tag, but Rock played it to the end.

Right: Christmas 1956: best pals Dirk and Kay Kendall with Kay's new beau Rex Harrison, and Margaret Leighton. [Kay was with Rex in New York during his 'My Fair Lady' run, they married in 1957]. At least Kay had a few more good years until 1959 and left us those imperishable movies LES GIRLS, THE RELUCTANT DEBUTANTE and ONCE MORE WITH FEELING.

What to write about next ?

... that is the question.


4 new movies? Tilda in I AM LOVE, Polanski's THE GHOST (WRITER), Ewan (again) and overcoming my aversion to Jim Carrey to watch I LOVE YOU PHILIP MORRIS, and that recent version of Margurite Duras' THE SEA WALL with Isabelle Huppert - after having finally re-seen the 1958 original...

a Vitti double bill: BLONDE IN BLACK LEATHER (with Cardinale!) + THE SCARLET LADY

more on Romy Schneider, Anouk Aimee, Claudia Cardinale, and that 60s classic DANGER DIABOLIK

Clement's all-star IS PARIS BURNING?

People we like: Jeffrey Hunter, Michael Craig, Clifton Webb, George Sanders, Claire Bloom, Glynis Johns, Flora Robson, Belinda Lee, Anita Ekberg ...

Jeanne Eagels: Kim Novak in 1957 -v- the real Eagels in the 1929 THE LETTER

Theatre programmes since the '60s: Vanessa in DESIGN FOR LIVING, Glenda and Marianne in 3 SISTERS, Maggie in Ingmar's HEDDA GABLER, Barbra's FUNNY GIRL, 3 A LITTLE NIGHT MUSICs, 6 HAMLETs and so on ...

Jacques Demy's magical movies: LOLA, BAY OF ANGELS, UMBRELLAS OF CHERBOURG, LES DEMOISELLES DE ROCHEFORT, THE MODEL SHOP, DONKEY SKIN, THE PIED PIPER...

Francois Ozon's French movies - and now that he has died aged 80, Claude Chabrol's .... so many favourites here!

Sheer Exploitation: NIGHT OF THE QUARTER MOON, GIRL OF THE NIGHT, THE SWINGER, BUS RILEY'S BACK IN TOWN, THE DETECTIVE, THE UNHOLY WIFE, 3 IN THE ATTIC

Von Sternberg's THE SHANGHAI GESTURE - where has Mother GinSling been all my life?

'40s delirium in DESERT FURY, a delicious noir in blazing colour

1950's "Picture Show" star portraits

let's join Tony Hunter (Astaire) and Gaby Gerard (Charisse) on THE BANDWAGON - my very favourite musical - Jeffrey Cordova (Jack Buchanan) is an insane delight too, plus Levant, Fabares and Ava Gardner! Cinema doesn't get much better than this...

return visits to BONJOUR TRISTESSE and I WAS HAPPY HERE on the big screen

Those forgotten cinemas - the art houses and revival cinemas of London in the 60s and 70s

the new London Film Festival programme for 2010 - those interesting new ones for next year: THE KING'S SPEECH (Colin Firth on the Oscar trail again, maybe winning this time), THE KIDS ARE ALRIGHT (ditto Annette Bening and Julianne Moore), the highly regarded Thai UNCLE BOONMEE WHO CAN RECALL HIS PAST LIVES, a new Mike Leigh ANOTHER YEAR, an intriguing Italian comedy LOOSE CANONS (MINE VAGANTI) and Franco and Hamm in the Allen Ginsberg film HOWL etc. and a restored new print of Kazan's WILD RIVER!

.... "decisions, decisions"!