Last week’s run of films from 1953 got me thinking about a couple of things. Firstly, about coincidence — out of a pile of 20 unposted reviews, it happened to be those that were among the first few I had ready to post. But, more pertinently, it was the last two, and the scores I gave them — 
four for The Big Heat, five for Roman Holiday — that gave me the most to mull over.
To put it simply, I wondered “why?” Why is The Big Heat only worthy of four stars and Roman Holiday worthy of five? They weren’t scored relative to each other — I watched them almost a month apart, and while I take forever to post my reviews I usually rate the films straight away — so this contrast hadn’t been thrown up before, and probably would never have been had I not happened to post them side by side.
The thing is, when considered against each other, The Big Heat is more my kind of film than Roman Holiday; if asked to pick a favourite, I’d probably choose the noir; I’d be more likely to buy it on DVD; I’d be more likely to watch it again. That’s nothing against Roman Holiday — it’s a great film — but, in direct comparison between just these two films, The Big Heat is more my kind of thing.
And yet, for all that, and having considered changing both scores, The Big Heat still has four stars and Roman Holiday still has five.
Putting The Big Heat up to five didn’t sit wholly easy, especially when I compared it to the scores I’ve given other noirs. This led me to wonder if I’m harsher on film noir because it’s a genre which, though I’m unquestionably still discovering it (most of those I’ve ever seen are reviewed here), 
I have a good deal of affection for — and, therefore, expectation for its films. The same could be said of other favourite genres — action, thriller, etc.
Dropping Roman Holiday to four seemed wrong too, as if underrating it. This made me wonder if I was influenced by expectations — Roman Holiday is simply the kind of film one gives five stars too, thanks to Oscar wins and making a star of Audrey Hepburn and all that. I don’t think this is always an influence on me — I’m happy to give a respected film a slating if I disliked it, and vice versa — but when something sits borderline, I can be swayed by reputation.
Are star ratings just inherently rubbish? There’s a reason why reviewing publications from Sight & Sound to Doctor Who Magazine choose not to use them — and that’s in part because they invite instant, arguably invalid comparisons (such as the one I’m discussing). “Is W a whole star better than X?” “Are Y and Z actually worth the same score?” On many occasions the answer to such questions is “no”; that’s the inherent imprecision of having five possible scores and thousands of things that need scoring. By rating things with five stars the reviewer is placing them in broadly defined groups, and some will always be better than others within their group, and some will always be on the borderline — and some will get placed on the wrong side of it.
Many games magazines and websites using a percentage system (or they did in my day — several now seem to use an out-of-10 score… but merrily use decimal points, so it’s the same damn thing). I guess it’s an inbuilt cultural thing, because (other than an aggregate site like Rotten Tomatoes) 
I’ve never seen films reviewed with a percentage. Theoretically, this method allows for 100 different scores — much more precise. In practice, of course, the lower ones are rarely used and the tippity-top ones are seldom (if ever) reached. Partly this is because you find your ‘average’ review score sitting less at 50% and more at 70% or higher. I believe this is because (like almost any reviewed art form) the bulk of what one encounters has been polished enough to earn a higher score — the average quality of work is of above-average quality, if you will. It also makes the system more liable to awkward questions: give one thing 95% and another 96% and you provoke “is the second definitely superior” arguments you wouldn’t get if they both just had 5 out of 5. Arguments aren’t necessarily a bad thing, of course, but it does require one to be frighteningly precise when scoring.
I’m not convinced the answer is to ditch all forms of rating. Perhaps a skilled reviewer could always present a perfect balance between their pro and anti thoughts on a review subject, 
but I don’t think there are many of them about. Giving something a score stamps your opinion nice and clearly: there have been a good few reviews where I’ve mainly discussed the negative points of a film I’ve primarily liked, for whatever reason, and without the score at the end readers might get the wrong impression; I may even have penned a review or two where I’ve tried to draw out the positives from something I was giving a low score to. I’d wager this is true of most reviewers — it’s always possible for your text to be misinterpreted; for a reader to see a positive (or negative) bias, however balanced or actually-the-other you thought you were being.
That all said, a definitive summary sentence or paragraph would serve just as well — better, maybe — than a little line of stars. Hm.
I’m not going to ditch my star ratings, but this has caused me to have a good think about them. It’s clear the way I apply them is not always accurate (as if the fact I often include four-star films on my top tens while excluding numerous five-starers hadn’t made that clear), but — if only for my own satisfaction — I like the way they separate the bad from the good, the good from the great… however broadly.
Roman Holiday is the kind of film where its list of achievements don’t quite precede it — Best Picture nominee (it lost to 
the Princess as they take her on a day messing about in Rome.
If, instead, you remember that he’s Fundamentally Kind, it might be less troubling that he has a secret plan most of the time.
Fritz Lang is probably best remembered for the films he made in Germany; medium-defining classics like 
but it does manage what might be described as twists in how far it’s willing to go — mainly, who gets killed and how.
The further behind one gets on reviews, the easier it becomes to forget a film. Or not so much forget the film itself, but when one watched it. Or, to put it another way, I was a little surprised when I looked back over the 20 films I had left to review and saw Genevieve still there. At least I had a hundred or so words of notes for this one.
heightened by an evening of irritations and revelations, tipping the second half’s journey-back into an out-and-out race. It’s the second half that contains the more overt comedy as the rivals compete to scupper each other’s chances. That’s not to do down the more gentle style of the opening half, which has its moments. That said, depending on one’s perspective, the realistic sparring of the married couple during the opening scenes might be seen to give the film a bit of an edge of reality, making it not just the staged, (relatively) high-concept comedy it could have been.
Director Henry Cornelius was vetoed on most of his first [casting] choices… and he was forced to make it at studios he didn’t want to work at. Cornelius’ displeasure was acutely felt by cast and crew as he didn’t hide how unhappy he was. He was also seemingly highly lecherous. Consequently both Dinah Sheridan and Kay Kendall carried whistles on them at all times… Olive Dodds, Rank’s head of contract artists, later testified that every leading cast member came to her at one point and said they wanted off the film.”
The most recent example of this speedy-remake phenomenon is Swedish vampire drama 
in fact, the director is keen to point out (in a surprisingly unpretentious fashion) that he doesn’t aim his work to slot into any particular genre — while Reeves set out to make a horror movie first and a young-love drama second. Though don’t go expecting out-and-out vampire thrills and gore from Let Me In, because it retains enough of the original’s DNA to make it still a pleasantly unusual genre entry.
Owen is a 12-year-old loner in New Mexico in 1983, spending his days at school being bullied and filling his evenings spying on his neighbours. Then a girl, Abby, and her father move in next door and it looks like he might finally make a friend.
The nighttime scenes are bathed in the orange glow of street-lighting, a nice choice of colour scheme as it’s evocative of the real world, especially as it’s not unnaturally overdone: the colour is abundant where there is such lighting, but more natural tones are used in forests, etc. It also provides a very different feel to the original, where a more white, snow-emphasising light was adopted throughout. Despite its realism, though, such a solidly orange palette does make the US one feel more visually stylised. Ironic.
Despite it being easier to spot omissions than additions, Reeves’ film runs the same length as the original and feels faster moving. This may just be because I knew the story well, watching both versions just 24 hours apart, but some things are quantifiable: as well as far fewer scenes with the neighbours — in the original, characters; here, victim-extras — there’s also fewer arty shots of scenery, which helped give the original its sedate arthouse tone. What’s taken the place of all these things? Scenes from the novel, you might think, but from what I’ve read it’s faithful to the film more than novel — stuff I’ve read about being in the novel but not the Swedish film hasn’t been reinstated here either.
It seems he isn’t innocent in the same way Oskar was, that Reeves is building up his awareness of sexuality… but then he asks Abby to go steady and he still considers it to mean you don’t “do anything special”. What? Also, if she says “I’m not a girl”, surely the logical response is “you’re a boy?!”, not “what are you?” — especially if the only answer she’ll give is “I’m nothing”. But she’s not a boy — probably. It’s not explicit, but she seems much girlier, and of course it would remove any dangerous homosexual element. Or possibly they just wanted to make damn sure they didn’t need to include The Crotch Shot. Considering they’ve changed the bully’s teasing of Owen from “piggy” to “little girl”, it seems even more obvious a shame to have stripped Abby of her androgyny. Unless that’s the point? They tease Owen about being a little girl, before getting their asses kicked — or, rather, bodies ripped apart — by one.
Similarly, the CGI is overdone throughout. It’s not bad per se, just used too overtly. Whereas the original remained grounded and (perhaps surprisingly) plausible, Reeves occasionally indulges in more stereotypical horror movie excess — take Abby’s first attack in the underpass, for instance: superficially similar, but in this version a computer-aided Abby flies all over the place. It draws attention to its has-to-be-fakery and is therefore a less effective sequence.
It’s probably unfair to judge Let Me In by watching it so close to the Swedish version. I expect it benefits from a bit of distance. It’s still a well-made film, still an unusual take on a familiar genre. But it is — obviously — not as original or innovative. It’s also not as well acted, not as nuanced, not as beautifully made — the images Reeves conjures up do not burn themselves into your mind in the way so many from the original do.
Oskar is a 12-year-old loner in Sweden in 1982, spending his days at school being bullied and filling his evenings with fantasies of revenge. Then a girl, Eli, and her father move in next door and it looks like he might finally make a friend.
For instance, when the usual skills do crop up, they’re presented in a very grounded way — any CGI required is used subtly and incredibly effectively — or kept off screen. They’re at the best when used to slightly emphasise Eli’s weirdness — the way she drops ever so slightly slower than is natural from the climbing frame when she first meets Oskar, or to shape and manipulate her face almost imperceptibly at times.
The story’s central relationships — mainly, Eli/Oskar and Eli/Håkan, he being the ‘dad’ figure who helps Eli survive — can be read various ways. The author/screenwriter, John Ajvide Lindqvist, has one interpretation — indeed, based on what I’ve read, the novel is quite clear on these points — but the film leaves many facts ambiguous. Is Håkan related to Eli? Does he love her? In what way? Does she love him? Does she even like him? Is he just a facilitator? Was he once in Oskar’s position? If he was, is she just manipulating Oskar? Or is it really love? Or is it just friendship? The joy of such well-placed ambiguities in a story is that each viewer can bring their own interpretation, without anyone being clearly right or wrong and without undermining the quality of the story being told. I think I know what I think; but, just as much, I enjoy the fact there are numerous possibilities. (Of course, equally valid is the argument that there are no ambiguities because most if not all have been cleared up Lindqvist and/or Alfredson in interviews. But where’s the fun in that?)
Though most of Let the Right One In’s irregular take on vampires seems genuinely unique, one of those unusual elements — a 12-year-old girl being a vampire — immediately draws comparison to 
if they’d filmed some of the stuff in the novel, the filmmakers would’ve gone to prison — but also about refocussing the story to be a two-hour film instead of a novel. I’m not sure, therefore, how faithful the climax is, but it’s a sequence that seems made for the screen. I shan’t say much more on this point, just in case you’ve not seen the film and still read this far (tsk tsk), but it seems having a vampire for a best friend is a great way to deal with bullies.
Despite the city being as associated with him as jam is with donuts, Melinda and Melinda was Woody Allen’s last New York-set film before he began his current European phase with London-set thriller 
If it wasn’t for the framing device that clearly tells us not only the thematic point of the film but also which bit is the comedy and which the tragedy, I don’t think it would be immediately possible to tell which was which. Indeed, one might think that was Allen’s point: life is neither tragedy nor comedy, but both at the same time, so of course you can’t tell the difference. But as it goes on the comedy does introduce a couple more laughs, but even more so a general niceness that leads to the predictable rom-com ending. Concurrently, the tragedy introduces darker elements and refuses to provide a neat, conclusive or satisfying ending, which is both thematically sound (I suppose) and also dramatically frustrating.
and then they’ve crafted them completely independently. So that is to say, for instance, that the same restaurant may appear in both tellings, but at different points and with a different scene taking place; or in one storyline the director-character is an outsider who holds the husband’s future in his hands, while in the other the director-character is the wife and a different outsider holds her future in his hands. If that makes sense.
Richard Lester’s Four Musketeers was shot at the same time as the previous year’s 
the murder of Constance; the cold-blooded execution of Milady; and ending up with Richelieu still in power too — none of it sits well with the jolly swashbuckling tone that still dominates. There are some good action sequences nonetheless — for instance, the ice-covered lake; breakfast/siege in the ruined fort; and the burning-building finale — which go some way to make up for the shortcomings.
I like a good swashbuckler. I don’t know exactly what it is about sword fights, but they’re probably my most favourite kind of action sequence. The 1973 Three Musketeers, then, is a film I’m slightly amazed I’ve not seen before. Especially as I absolutely loved it.
Thanks to this most of the fights aren’t strictly sword fights, I suppose. Indeed, Oliver Reed seems to dispense with his blade at the earliest opportunity and turn instead to sticks, wet towels, whatever else happens to be at hand. It lends a certain kind of organised chaos to proceedings; the kind that elevates a technically proficient duel into a funny, exciting, memorable segment of cinema. I would list standouts, but instead may I recommend you watch the film and, every time an action sequence starts, count it as one I mentioned. But particularly the one in the laundry and d’Artagnan and Rochefort’s lightbox-lit nighttime duel. And also— Now, this is why I said I wasn’t going to list any.
Constance and Faye Dunaway as the conniving Milady de Winter. York earns his place as the lead amongst such company, though, making a d’Artagnan who is by turns athletic, clumsy, hot-headed, loyal, and funny. As I said, everyone pitches the lightness just right, but York perhaps most of all — he doesn’t send up the youngest musketeer, doesn’t make him a pun-dispensing action hero, but finds all the humour in his actions and dialogue.
It also means the film ends with a sort of “Next Time” trailer, which feels very bizarre indeed, but is also a tantalising glimpse of what’s still to come.
