sarlja Reviews

45 Years (2015)

Lost Love is Never Lost

[10/10 · 11 April 2024]

Charlotte Rampling loves Tom Courtenay until the body of her husband's first love is uncovered when ice melts the crevice that kept her frozen for 50 years. He would have married her he says. He retrieves her photo. He never took photos of Charlotte. He has many photos of Kata in the attic. Charlotte discovers the photos and projects them. We see both women look alike. Identical! Two shots show Kata is holding her hands on her stomach. Is she pregnant? Tom didn't want children wirh Charlotte. Their anniversary is in a few days. Charlotte realizes in the few days before their anniversary that her entire 45 years has been a sham. She was not loved. She still plans the event choosing Smoke Gets in a Your Eyes as a first dance tune to be played. The song choice means she was blinded by emotion when she married. He never told her the truth. He and Kata were next of kin. Katya wore a wedding ring. Tom Courtenay telling of his Kata and he in the Alpes is cruel since it shows he felt alive with Kata.

Tom and Charlotte dance at the anniversary and the Charlotte expression reveals she is through with him. The love he felt for Kata was not ever dormant; Kata was a ghostly presence for the entire 45 years.

Oppenheimer (I) (2023)

Questions Arise from this fil

[10/10 · 8 April 2024]

Oppenheimer created the atomic bomb but lost his security clearance. This loss ruined his reputation. Was there something bad in his background? Would he give his formulas to Russia?

Did Oppenheimer feel ashamed? Is Harry Truman to blame for the atomic bombs being dropped on Nagasaki and Hiroshima? Is this a shameful thing? Is America shamed forever by its bombs then and after? Germans didn't create the atomic bomb. Russia created the atomic bomb. The Belgian Congo supplied the Uranium which ended up in a warehouse in NYC.

The bombs could have been made but not used. Truman could have used them as leverage against the Japanese

Germany had surrendered. Truman failed in his decision to drop two atomic bombs. His poor decision is a black mark forever. He created the age of anxiety.

War is a matter of which country has the fastest missile. Russia had the fastest missiles.

This film is great because it asks questions.

An American Tragedy (1931)

Sylvia Sydney at her best

[10/10 · 17 March 2024]

Phillip Holmes is a product of poverty working as a bell boy at a hotel. He leaves town and meets up with his rich uncle in Lycurgis, New York. He becomes manager of a collar stamping dept at his uncle's factory. His cousins don't accept him. He starts dating Sylvia Sydney who is a stamper. She is a sweet girl from a farm. When Sylvia gets pregnant, Holmes, Clyde Griffiths, has already fallen for rich Frances Dee.

Shelly Winters plays the Sydney part in A Place in the Sun. Both Sydney and Winters are in the boat pregnant with the guy who made them pregnant. To me this is an absurd scene because if I were pregnant and could not swim, getting in a boat with my impregnator who didn't want to marry me would be the last thing I would do. Shelly Winters makes her character unsympathetic whereas Sydney gets my sympathy. Steven's' version is a duh for Elizabeth Taylor over Winters. Von Sternberg's slow long look at drowning Sydney with Holmes swimming away shows he could have saved her.

Another absurdity is he could have gotten away with it. He should have reported it immediately and that would have exonerated him.

I love the courtroom scenes. Both sides start a fist fight. I love the prosecution's case that clearly shows premeditation.

The main theme is money rules. Dreiser's novel has the tragedy placed in a society that values money above all else. Griffiths wanted the rich girl not the poor girl.

The Departed (2006)

Boston gangsters

[10/10 · 29 December 2023]

Matt Damon is a cop working for gangster Jack Nicholson. Leonardo di Caprio is an undercover cop working with Nicholson. Mark Wahlberg is a cop in charge of DiCaprio. Alec Baldwin is a cop in charge of a special unit. They are mostly Irish. And Italian. The Catholic church and cops are related. Damon rises to special unit. DiCaprio infiltrates the gangsters.

Vera Farmiga is the psychologist listening to DeCaprio. She moves in wirh Damon. DiCaprio writes Citzens on an envelope which he finds on Damon's desk. Damon deletes DiCaprio. Farmiga finds out the truth. Damon is alone but more happens. The screenplay is all action with never a dull moment.

This is my favorite Scorsese film. William Monahan wrote the screenplay. The departed are dead people.

Saint Laurent (2014)

Film is a fashionable dress

[10/10 · 11 December 2023]

Like a fashionable dress this film needs the viewer to sew the pieces together in order to embrace the complexities of Saint Laurent. The addictions, the drawings, the lovers, the friends, his manager have to be incorporated in order to put Saint Laurent together. That multitude of people surrounding Saint Laurent are integral to understanding the person. The cutters and the people who sewed the pieces together are like Donnello who gives us the work of deciding who he was. And who was Saint Laurent? Like Warhol he was a man of his times. Women were ready to wear his clothes. The movement of his creations gave women the power to advance. His life was long and productive. Gaspard Ulliel plays Saint Laurent and captures his playful sexuality is the famous kissing scene.

There is a light touch of Donnello in all of this He is able to give the viewer much to enjoy and ponder.

Americano (2011)

Something occurred

[4/10 · 9 December 2023]

Salma Hayek and Mathieu Demy meet in Mexico because he wants to give her his mother's paintings. His mother left them to her. Were the mother and Hayak friends or more than that? Remy has a girlfriend he is having sex with at the opening. Something happens to him With Hayek. I do not know what. His car is stolen. Hayek has a son. That is the theme that mothers love their sons even Though they can't care for them. The strip club where Hayek works is also a brothel. Hayek is now 57 married to a French billionaire. She gets paid for sex. The owner of the club cuts Demy's ear. At the end Hayek gets the something from his mother. I have no clue what this film is about. Good luck.

Two Days, One Night (2014)

Unwatchable

[2/10 · 5 December 2023]

Dardenne Brothers wrote and directed this not fun film with too much realism. If you like financial work related stress, then watch this. Why make 16 employees choose between firing a fellow employee or getting a 1000 euro bonus. She is the poorly cast great Dame of cinema Marion Cotillard. Why would she choose to play this dreary plot? There is no good scenery. No music. I lived in a slum once with more music. The pill popping. The stress is palatable. We all know money and job problems. Although the film runs short it felt like two days and one night. She should have just looked for another job! Why would she stay there? Bad casting but worse plot. Bad production. Cotillard should have refused this one.

Angels with Dirty Faces (1938)

The System becomes the Gangster

[10/10 · 6 November 2023]

James Cagney is a charismatic gangster who has influence over young boys in New York's Hell's Kitchen. Pat O'Brian is a priest trying to influence the angels with dirty faces. The lawyer Humphry Bogart is corrupt. The media manipulates the people with its headlines of violence. Violence becomes seductive in this 1938 film about manipulation. Telephones are used to make quick calls to influence events. Money can manipulate people.

The film is about the system becoming more corrupt than an individual. Corruption is contagious. The infantile thrill of a shootout outweighs the choir voices. Father Pat O'Brian has little appeal against the physicality and money of Cagney. He lies to the boys. The boys dress differently. They wear hats and jackets like Cagney. Cagney has a terrible end and the system that arrested him as a boy is to blame. O'Brian ran faster and escaped reform school.

Succession (2018–2023)

Brilliant

[10/10 · 27 September 2023]

Nothing compares to this master work script in series that I have seen. The dialogue is a fascinating group language.

This isn't about the father alone but in a group. Logan Roy exists in the context of a company and in a family group. His identity is communal in that what he does or doesn't do is always public. He is a social entity. He has no internal life. Because he is nothing but the social he is a sociopath. His children are sociopaths. His brother is right. He is so meager because he lacks an interior self.

When Logan describes his father at his funeral, he says he was a life force who created money that employed people. That is a definition of a capitalist. This series explains capitalism If you want to succeed and make money, you need to be a socioparh.

Margaret (I) (2011)

A Perfect Film

[10/10 · 10 September 2023]

Margaret will be on a list of top films of all time. Kenneth Lonergan's screenplay gives Anna Paquin, J. Smith Cameron, Jeannie Berlin, Matt Damon, Mark, Ruffalo, and Matthew Broderick the foundation from which they were able to do their best work in a fountain of words.

Lonergan's vision gives us the streets of New York, the Opera, the theater, and the liberal classrooms. He shows us the danger in a simple street crossing.

Each character could be the sole focus of other films. He unites them in his opera found on a poem.

The poem is read by Broderick in his class. The title is Spring and Fall. Lonergan's vision for Margaret the film is to give the viewer a rich tapestry of life. He kept to his vision and would not be rushed and the result is a magnificent experience for me.

Secrets & Lies (1996)

Marianne Jean Baptiste

[10/10 · 3 September 2023]

Marianne Jean Baptiste is at her mother's funeral as the film opens. She loved her mother and is grief stricken. But she decides to search for her birth mother Lynda Blethyn who has another daughter and no husband. Timothy Spall is the family conciliatory who is married and childless. He has a successful photography business. His wife can't have children. The meeting of Jean Baptiste with Blethyn is astounding in that emotions are visibly created. That is the genius of this film that is capable of creating scenes that feel so real and deeply felt. The most compelling is the barbecue at the end where the truth comes out. This scene is cathartic in its ability to affect the viewer as if the viewer were present at the party. Every scene in the movie moves toward the explosive ending. And the ending is the beginning where all involved are evolved and free of their secrets.

Carnage (2011)

Masterpiece

[10/10 · 31 August 2023]

The writing is the foundation upon which the characters grow and become fully formed despicables. The humor is exceptional because it evolves naturally as the four- way conversation evolves from the violent strike of one boy with a stick on another boy. The parents of the two boys are filmed in one location by Roman Polanski. The choreography is like a ballet with the words spoken in harmony like a brilliant dance a Quatro. Christoph Waltz is a lawyer on his cell trying to quell a press article that condemns his clients' drug amtrel. Jodie Foster tells John C Reilly "How can you be so utterly despicable." They all emerge as despicable. Their sons are the victim and the criminal yet like their parents both are at fault. The drinking brings out Kate Winslet's fury. Jodie Foster is my favorite.

The funniest lines are about a hampster whom Reilly has set free. The apartment is completely destroyed by the end. This a is master work by a great writer.

The Intouchables (2011)

So Good

[10/10 · 29 August 2023]

The score is brilliant The pace is electric. The Masarati flies. Omar Sy is magnificent as caretaker of millionaire Francois Cluzet who is quadriplegic from an accident in a glider. The scenes gliding are wondrous. My favorite scene is Sy dancing to Earrh Wind And Fire.

Most of all this film escapes it's plot. The characters's chemistry does it. The subplots do it. The other characters are all charming. There is humor throughout. The writing is quick and clever. The biggest surprise is the film is never dull but a multi faceted tale of a great friendship between two extremely different men whose main connection occurs because each treats the other as an equal. Great writing and great acting abound.

A Summer Place (1959)

Great Summer Flick

[10/10 · 16 August 2023]

Beware of this total fantasy about everything fun. A boat crashes and a doctor is called to examine the young girl Sandra Dee who spent that night on the beach with Troy Donahue. "I want my fadder. I want my fadder." Screams Dee. She and her fadder have a connection where Dee confides that she lets a neighbor see her through her window. She tells Troy Donhue she learned how to kiss on her school roof. She kisses him on their first encounter. And when they really make love the mother was right; pregnancy ensues; disaster for every young girl. The Constance Ford character is totally right about not giving in to a boy's lust. She is wrong about bigotry and right about sex. This point is lost. Ken Jorgansen is the evil husband who encourages his daughter to go for it. Later with the wife he stole from Arthur Kennedy in his Frank Lloyd Wright house, he seems the victor instead of the villain. It is there the wicked deed is done by the water at night. Ford should be furious. Donahue wants to marry her. What if he didn't want to? Now he has to. The story is wrong. Pregnancy is always a catastrophe at a young age. Babies need money and marriage. Young girls beware.

Little White Lies (2010)

Deliberately despicable bunch

[10/10 · 3 August 2023]

Guillaume Canat wrote this film about a group of deliberately dislikeables. They leave their friend seriously ill for the beach. At the beach they are loud. They can't operate a boat. Their exercising is laughable. They scream at their children. They cheat. They clap for a singer who they mocked before his arrival. He leaves his guitar. Teach yourself to play, he says. One married man tells another married man he loves him. They hug and hug. The house becomes a pigsty. The people are not attractive. The sick man is phoned. The phone is held to his ear. A lesbian wants to reconnect and is rebuffed. The music is American; loud and intrusive. These are Americans who have companies in Paris. They are not French or English. The French and Englishe loved this film.

The crying about Ludo is the big chill. The bag of sand on his coffin is the final act of a tasteless goon. This film is anti American. The singer is an obvious Arab or Muslim. The length of the film is also sending the point again and again that this group although successful in business is utterly despicable.

Olive Kitteridge (2014)

Olive Kitteridge is a mean person

[10/10 · 26 July 2023]

Frances McDormand plays Olive a math teacher who is not liked. Her husband is a likeable pharmacist. Their only child Chris is smart and good looking.

The key scene is Olive visits her son with his new pregnant wife and her two children. Olive is rude and slaps the boy. She still has a torch for O'Casey. She still acts like a paranoid. She talks on the phone to her brain dead husband. She doesn't hold the baby. She doesn't let the boy call her grandma. Olive is a completej jerk.

Then the dog dies and Olive is about to shoot herself, but is stopped by children. She gives an anguished look.

She has met Bill Murray before by chance. Now we see her bringing him flowers and hugging him on his bed. This ending does not work because it is not the person we have seen for the entire series. No one magically becomes loving after a lifetime of pure negativity. Therefore the ending is false and pure Hollywood.

Olive Kitteridge is a well acted series with a flawed ending unless you believe in miracles.

Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1966)

Who is afraid of this ..

[2/10 · 24 July 2023]

I had to grow up looking at Elizabeth Taylor on every magazine cover. Who was she?? She couldn't act. She was short legged and top heavy with a bushel of hair. Her neck was short. She dances lewdly in this her supposed greatest acting piece. She is loud and obnoxious. Sandy Dennis her foil is weak and mousy. Richard Burton tries to withstand the constant onslaught until he is locked out. He then delivers the news that crushes all delusions and the play ends. The play by Edward Allbee is so deliberately anti women that its popularity can only have grown from curious contempt. Women trap men through pregnancy and money. Women want husband's who earn money. Women cheat on husbands. The point of this play is men want children and only women can give them children. If you don't want children, don't marry.

One Fine Day (1996)

Screen chemistry is palpable

[10/10 · 22 July 2023]

Michelle Pfeiffer anf George Cloony have electric chemistry in this light romance. Cloony had dated Dede Pfeiffer and met Michelle back in the 80's. He was ER super star when this was filmed and is his first film break through. Cloony is from Kentucky and brings that come as you are persona on screen. He is Irish and just plain handsome. Rosemary Cloony is his aunt. His father was a TV commentator. Usually I am bored with him but here he is sizzling because he has a real connection with Pfeiffer. He couldn't really date her so he knew this was as good as it gets. The kids are very good not annoying as usual. Cloony is a reporter trying to substantiate a story that would get the Mayor. She is an architect with a big presentation that falls on the floor. Both face career challenges on one fine day. The song is an original and won prizes. The best thing is there is no sex. It is light and fun. Excellent.

Letter from an Unknown Woman (1948)

Unrequited is so wonderful

[4/10 · 22 July 2023]

Unrequited is what every girl wants. They really don't want the real thing. No. That would not be fun. But to take certain lessons and study music because he is a concert pianist is girlish. He is too good looking to have to please all the tome. Love is a delusion. She,Joan Fontaine, hasn't a clue who he really is. She wouldn't like him if she knew him daily. Yuck. She hasn't a father so she has no real knowledge of how boring most men are. She fantasized. She has his son and doesn't tell him! What a mouse. The trouble is Joan Fontaine never grew up. Her acting stops at 17 or so. Something stopped her development. Because she is a perenial teen. She is so dull. Louis Jourdan is a robot. I studied this film for the high regard some have given it. With music and style you still have a very dull film.