2015 #61
Samuel Fuller | 76 mins | TV | 2.35:1 | USA / English | PG
Samuel Fuller | 76 mins | TV | 2.35:1 | USA / English | PG
Western with Barbara Stanwyck as a powerful landowner, and commander of the titular posse, whose bullying brother, Brockie, is consequently allowed to run riot over the town. Enter lawman Griff (Barry Sullivan) and his two brothers, whose moves to bring Brockie in line kickstart a chain of ruinous events.
Writer-director Samuel Fuller tells his brilliantly constructed tale in brisk and never dull fashion, finding time to sketch interesting characters and, alongside cinematographer Joseph Biroc and editor Gene Fowler Jr., craft much memorable imagery.
(For a more insightful and informative analysis, be sure to read this at Films on the Box.)
Forty Guns is released on Blu-ray by Masters of Cinema tomorrow.
Roaming the outback of a gasoline-desperate post-apocalyptic Australia, “Mad” Max Rockatansky (Mel Gibson) comes across a commune-like oil refinery, whose inhabitants are under siege by a brutally violent gang. Max strikes a bargain: he’ll help them escape with their oil, in exchange for a tank full for himself.
The most memorable part, however, is the climax. They escape the oil refinery, Max driving the tanker — fitted out with weaponry and defences — and the gang give chase. An almighty action sequence follows, a speeding battle through the outback. It feels wrong to just call it “an action sequence”, like that’s selling it short. You get the sense that this is why the movie exists; that co-writer/director George Miller’s goal with the entire rest of the film has been to get us to this point. It’s not just “the climax”, it’s “the third act”, and it’s stunning — the choreography of it, the editing, the stunts, as dozens of vehicles chase each other, people run around on top of them, jump between them… I don’t think it’s hyperbolic to say it must be one of the greatest action sequences ever committed to film. One of the reasons 
The second feature from 
and two other men’s hats, briefly has a funny bit in the middle when he tries to acquire the second hat. The film also uses swearing as a comedic crutch too often. I’m not one of those people who’s only tolerant of swearing if they feel each and every use is absolutely justifiable, and I don’t object to it as just part of dialogue, but too often the film leans on someone saying “oh shit” (or whatever) as if that’s a serviceable punchline.
The movie’s best running gag is its titular one. At first it just seems like the concept is going to be limited to Albert sitting in a saloon and listing ways to die, which isn’t funny; but then it keeps cropping back up, sometimes unexpectedly, which really works. The whole fair thing — a running gag within a running gag — is particularly effective. If the film had traded more on this, less on farting and other bodily functions, it would’ve been much improved.
I dread to think what the 
Westerns don’t come more renowned than this Ford-Wayne collaboration about the years-long hunt for a girl kidnapped by Native Americans.
With each passing entry, the Falcon films become less reminiscent of their Saint forebears and more akin to the Poirots and Marples of this world: a gently comical murder mystery, with a finite location and a finite number of suspects, where the ‘game’ of solving the plot is the point.
Jackie Chan and Owen Wilson are back as… um… whatever their characters were called, in this follow-up to 
Knights as a whole feels like it moves better than its predecessor — it gets going quicker, without the need to establish these characters and force them together; there’s a greater reliance on those quality action sequences. The guest cast feels a bit bargain basement, though the villains — Aiden Gillen and the aforementioned Yen — are of a higher calibre. This means we’re treated to a pair of great climaxes, with Chan first having that punch-up with Yen, followed by a three-sword duel with Gillen (or possibly a stuntman).
In the end, I’m not sure if I like it more or less than the first film. The Western setting was a smoother fit in many ways, but here there’s a less stodgy plot, a general reduction in the overlong comedy sequences, and even better action sequences. All things considered, I think Knights may actually have the edge.
Hong Kong martial arts legend Jackie Chan and Hollywood funnyman also-ran Owen Wilson team up for a film that I don’t think anyone involved could reasonably deny is just “
Things that could have (should have) been fixed way back at the writing stage leer out at the viewer. The plot is treated almost perfunctorily, as if it’s not interesting enough to bother explaining or expounding upon. It’s hardly highly original or complex, but it feels as if important beats or character motivations have just been skipped over. For instance, the character/story impact of the final fight would be so easy to build up a bit, but they haven’t and so it falls a bit limp. Not to mention the bit when two characters who are essentially on the same side have a duel when they have more pressing things to worry about — save the Princess first, fight amongst yourselves later! Then there’s all the time given to Wilson’s rivalry with the local sheriff/martial/whatever, which we’re told exists, isn’t really built from anything, and suddenly is half the focus of the climax.
Shanghai Noon should be a lot of fun. It should be Jackie Chan and Owen Wilson engaging in a bit of comedy between skilfully choreographed, occasionally amusing, balletically staged fight sequences. But it isn’t. It’s laden with an underwritten plot, bulked up by clichés, stereotypes, overplayed character scenes, humour that doesn’t work, and a shortage of judicious editing. It is still kinda fun, but it could so easily have been more.
Though not part of my 
The thing with the wife, for instance, is mainly down to a few looks, or the way a line of dialogue is played. I was once taught that if a writer doesn’t put any subtext into a scene the actors will add it themselves — perhaps that’s even what happened here. I was wondering if it was going somewhere, if we were going to learn that Shane and wifey actually knew each other, or if they were going to have A Thing now (this being a ’50s American movie, “almost have a thing but then not quite” is probably nearer the mark). But, without meaning to spoil things, it doesn’t play out like that. At all.
September 1881: after admiring their leader for years through cheap magazine stories, 19-year-old Robert Ford manages to hook up with the James Gang. Little does he suspect that, just seven months later, he will be responsible for the murder of his idol, Jesse James. (That’s not a spoiler, it’s in the title.)
Let’s be clear, though: this is not a film for everyone. This is not an action movie set in the Wild West, which might be what’s expected from a Hollywood studio movie starring Brad Pitt. Apparently director Andrew Dominik intended to make a film with a Terence Malick vibe, so I read after viewing, which chimed with me because “Malick-esque” was one of my foremost thoughts during viewing. This is a slowly-paced two-hours-and-forty-minutes, with more shots of crops blowing gently in the breeze or riders approaching gradually over distant hills as there are flashes of violence. Despite what the studio wanted, this is not a fast-paced action Western, it’s a considered, sometimes meditative, exploration of character and theme.
Jesse’s mood swings are more obvious than Ford’s, but Pitt makes them no less unlikely. At times charming and a clear leader, at others he is a genuinely tense, frightening presence, without ever needing to resort to the grandstanding horror-movie grotesques offered by (Oscar winners) Daniel Day-Lewis and Javier Bardem in There Will Be Blood and No Country respectively.
This must also be thanks in part to director Andrew Dominik. Every last shot feels precisely chosen and paced. Of course, every shot in every film has been chosen and placed where it is, but the amount of thought that’s gone into that might vary. Jesse James somehow carries extra weight in this department, with no frame in its not-inconsiderable running time wasted on an unnecessary angle or take that’s allowed to run even a second too long. Somewhat famously, there was a lot of wrangling over the film’s final cut (delaying its release by a year or more), with the aforementioned debate between something faster and something even slower: a four-hour version screened at the Venice Film Festival, to a strong reception. Sadly, the intervening years haven’t seen that cut, or any of its parts, resurface (to my knowledge). That’s an hour and twenty minutes of material and I’d love to know what’s in them.
because he’s obsessed with the notoriety of Jesse. Later, once the titular deed is done, he becomes an actor (not without talent, as the narration informs us) and re-performs the act that made him famous hundreds of times. It’s his legacy, however, to not be as well-remembered as his victim; to not be as well-liked, even; not even close. There’s something there about the pursuit of fame for its own sake, if nothing else.
Quentin Tarantino made his name in the ’90s with a series of dialogue-heavy gangster thrillers that provoked a storm of imitators. Since the turn of the millennium, however, he’s contented himself with a series of extravagant hyper-cinephilic genre homage/parodies. After tackling Japanese action movies in 
It’s fair to say Django Unchained sprawls. But, unlike the chapterised character-flitting antics of Kill Bill and Inglourious Basterds, it has a straight throughline it follows from beginning to end, with only a few asides. In terms of length and scope, it’s perhaps not too much of a reach to evoke 
Or how about those action sequences? Months of work training real horses to do things never before seen pays off (and Tarantino proudly displays the “no animals were harmed” notice right at the top of the credits), while the blood-drenched Candyland shoot-out is arguably one of the best pure action scenes in years. Those are amongst myriad other sequences, from the small and transitory to the epic and vital.
Still, best served — and, perhaps, more deserving of the Supporting Actor nod — are villainous duo Leonardo DiCaprio and Samuel L. Jackson. For starters, has Leo ever played a villain before? He’s on stonking form here as Southern gent Monsieur Candie (who can’t speak French), a sinisterly welcoming fellow with a dark side that’s on constant display. He’s all smiles and all lingering threat and menace. Indeed, scenes are often at their most tense when he’s at his nicest. I think there’s an argument for him to go down as one of the great screen villains — he even has the obligatory cool dispatch. “I couldn’t resist” indeed.
It does make you wonder if some of these people had bigger roles that got cut… or maybe there are just 
Tosh and piffle, I say. One of the best ways to skewer many an evil institution is to make them a laughing-stock, to take the piss out of them, and that’s exactly what Tarantino is doing. These aren’t likeable, funny people who are Klan members; they’re incompetent fools because they’re Klan members. The resulting scene is hilarious and deservedly one of the movie’s most memorable moments.
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