Poe has been avenged!

 THE RAVEN (1935)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

I've read some Edgar Allan Poe in my time and nothing about "The Raven," a 1935 chamber-horror-flick-of-sorts from the Universal Pictures venue, bears any resemblance except in the author's namesake. Sure, you've got the iconic torture device known as the swinging, razor-sharp Pendulum and there is a room involving walls coming together to crush someone to death. Still, what about the bedroom that is an actually an elevator? Or those steel shutters at every window? Or how about any actual ravens in this movie, other than a statue of one?

I used to watch "The Raven" religiously in my pre-teen years every Halloween on PBS (they used to have an all-night marathon showing of just about every Universal Horror picture from the 1930's through the 1940's). There is nothing grander than seeing Bela Lugosi as the insanely mad doctor, Dr. Vollin, who relishes the opportunity to torture people to death - his rationalization is that it gives him power. It sure does and you can feel every moment of Lugosi's crazed, maniacal laugh and his unruly obsession (this also means that the author Poe has been avenged! Say what? Well, the mad doctor is insane after all). 

Vollin's cryptic duties in his secret dungeon is interrupted by an escaped killer named Bateman (Boris Karloff), who consults the doctor and wishes to have his facial features surgically changed. This, of course, comes at a price - the doctor changes Bateman's face and makes him look hideously ugly with an immobile eye and scar tissue on one side of his face. Meanwhile, Dr. Vollin wants the concerned Judge Thatcher (Samuel S. Hinds) killed because Thatcher will not permit the doctor to have his daughter in marriage (Irene Ware). The girl is already spoken for - a dancer whose life was saved by Vollin after a horrible car accident is promised to her beau (a cheerless Lester Matthews) whom Vollin wishes to murder as well. Thus, Vollin pretends to not be interested in her and settles his differences with the judge by inviting him and everyone else to a dinner party to talk about mostly about Poe, of course. Bateman has to commit the dirty deeds and pretends to be the house servant, but will he or not? The plot gets sillier and melodramatic, especially towards the end when most of the dinner guests are already in the secret quarters of the underground dungeon where the torture devices are on full display.  

Most chilling is Bela Lugosi who hams it up with unsubtly expressive eyes yet there is also a curious elegance to his mannerisms and his diction - Lugosi was one of the few in horror films who dominated the screen front and center (his final moment in a room where the walls close in is creepy beyond belief). Your eye is always drawn to him, his slicked back hair, his laughter, his poised renditions of Poe's poetry. A class act in every way.

Imaginary Crimes

 THE CRIMINAL LIFE OF ARCHIBALDO DE LA CRUZ (1955)
Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

Imagine a scenario of a serial killer who is not really a killer - he fantasizes killing women. These are women he's obsessed with, feels a certain passion with that is never quite consummated. The truth is that he plans to kill these women but the plan falters, fate intervenes and they are killed but by other perpetrators. Seems like fertile ground for Spanish director Luis Bunuel who approaches this material with a slight comedic bent, though there are singularly outrageous moments that will leave you either convulsing with laughter or in absolute shock.

Archibaldo de la Cruz is our main protagonist whom we see as an abrasive, non-attentive 5-year-old child during the Mexican Revolution days. He wishes for his governess to be killed after he opens his new gift, a musical box. Sure enough, the governess is shot through the window presumably by the rebels. What does little Archibaldo do? He observes her leg stockings - this kid doesn't cry but reacts with some derision.

Segue to an older Archibaldo (Ernesto Alonso), a now wealthy man who makes pottery vases, and he is telling this story to a nun. She finds the story unpleasant and is quite shocked to see that he is ready to cut her throat with a razor. The nun runs and somehow falls down an elevator shaft! The irony is that Archibaldo wished to kill her and she ran, but he did not chase her. As he recounts his story to the chief of police, we learn of Archibaldo's attempts to kill an alluring female model and tour guide (Miroslava) who plans to marry a rich, older man; a vivacious woman named Patricia (Rita Macedo) who recognizes Cruz from his gambling days at a casino, and there's the demure Carlota (Ariadne Welter) whom he hopes to marry though she's been secretly courting another man. Some of these elongated episodes have unsurprising outcomes yet we are still on the edge of our seat. Will Archibaldo ever actually murder someone or will they die by providence? The real question at the center of the film is whether anyone would live at all had Archibaldo not fantasized it first. One potential victim survives which brings up more perplexing questions. Usually the music box plays and it is like a calling for our potential murderer.

"The Criminal Life of Archibaldo de la Cruz" is not one of Bunuel's towering achievements but it is entertainingly devious all the same with a couple of surrealist touches (blood dripping on the frame, the cremation of a mannequin who in certain shots seems to be a living, breathing human being). The ending suggests a lark for Bunuel, a director known for pursuing dark subject matter, and he merely toys with us and our expectations. Liveliness is not synonymous with Bunuel but it is a welcome change of pace. 

Thrilling propaganda and intertwining love stories

 O.S.S. (1946)
Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

"O.S.S." is the first official film made about the Office of Strategic Services, a department bent on patriotic loyalty and luring spies into Nazi-occupied territory (its formation eventually led to the creation of the CIA). You know it is official because right at the start of the film, title cards indicate this department's declaration to the making of this film and its accuracy. Despite its sealed stamped approval and how it was rushed into theaters, "O.S.S." could be see as another run-of-the-mill WWII action film but it has some decent performances and some remarkable tension sprinkled throughout. 

We are introduced to Alan Ladd as John Martin, who has a dry practice run of pretending to be a Baltimore electronics official who steals some plans - the ruse doesn't pan out but it shows John has some capability as an agent. A team is arranged by Naval Commander Brady (Patric Knowles) and they are commissioned to run the "Operation Applejack" mission to Nazi-Occupied France. John has reservations about a woman spy, Ellen aka Elaine Dupree (Geraldine Fitzgerald), because she is, pardon the expression, a woman. It turns out that she is more than capable herself, more so than the leader, Gates (Don Beddoe) who is killed by the Gestapo for the subtle mistake of using a fork on his right hand rather than the left!  

"O.S.S." has a truly charming and evil Nazi Colonel (John Hoyt in his debut performance), Nazis who cooperate with the American spies, typical flying missions where soldiers parachute onto hostile territory, igniting bombs inside of sculptures and a radio operator, Bernay (Richard Benedict), who falls for the female military radio contact he send messages to! (This burgeoning love is between two people who have never met). The Bernay section is quite stirring particularly in scenes where he is transmitting codes that make the lamplight and apartment hallway lights flicker. Not every American agent makes it out alive and some are assumed to be meeting their maker. "O.S.S." is sheer propaganda yet it is fast-paced and often intense enough in its endless confrontations with Nazis. Scenes with Hoyt's Nazi who falls for Fitzgerald's Elaine are crackling, enthralling moments because we never know if he is onto her or not. Ladd shows strength and subdued romantic feelings for Elaine without ever showing his emotions. It is that kind of war picture.

Clickety-clickety-click

 THE DESPERATE HOURS (1955)
Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

Bogart was always more intrinsically watchable as a non-hero, non-chivalrous, scheming and distrustful man. Look no further than "In a Lonely Place" or "Treasure of the Sierra Madre" for such darker characters, though one should not dismiss his more heroic pictures either. Either way, Bogart steals the show in William Wyler's "The Desperate Hours."

The plot is simple enough. A random family home is invaded by three escaped prisoners from an Indiana prison. The prisoners need to stay out of sight and they need cold hard cash, and the leader of this trio is the tough, often brutal Griffin (Humphrey Bogart). A package of money is supposed to be delivered to this home address by Griffin's Ohio-based girlfriend. Of course, nothing goes as planned. Griffin's girlfriend is stopped for a traffic violation and so now, she will have to mail the money. Griffin goes head-to-head with the patriarch of this household, Mr. Dan Hilliard (Fredric March), who will not so easily bow down to Griffin's every request. The other family members in this hostage situation are Dan's wife, Eleanor (Martha Scott), who is close to getting a nervous breakdown though she's ever the dutiful wife; teenage Cindy (Mary Murphy) who is considering getting married, and the little brother, Ralphie (Richard Eyer), who insists on being called Ralph and will not kiss his father before going off to school - a simple firm handshake will do.     

As a home invasion thriller, Wyler's direction allows for much introspection of the characters and their motives, some which surprise us. One rudimentary brute is more cold-blooded than the rest (watch out for the scene with the garbage pickup man). Bogart allows a little touch of humanity when his younger brother, Hal (Dewey Martin), decides he wants to cut loose, afraid he will be jailed again. Griffin will not stop from killing but only as a last resort and Dan especially comes close to upsetting the whole situation. The tension builds and the danger of getting killed slowly becomes a realization. We side with the good-natured family of course but they are not hapless victims, and that is the strength of Joseph Hayes' script. Hilliard will vainly protect his family and switches from vulnerable to a man of potential violence when holding a gun. Cindy is no vulnerable teenager, faking an illness by collapsing on the floor with a brave attempt to take one of their guns. Ralph himself doesn't like any of the thugs and lets them know it, also bravely trying to escape through his bedroom window at one point. The wife shows courage as well when she smacks Griffin in the face. 

Bogart and March really bring the audience to their knees with their endless confrontations and verbal attacks. We also get Ray Collins appear as a Sheriff, if only for a few minutes, and there is Deputy Sheriff Jesse Bard (Arthur Kennedy) who has dealt with Griffin in the past. This deftly handled noir thriller shows that Wyler knew had to engage us with an unbearable suspense yarn in the ways Hitchcock did. It truly packs a wallop.

The children of today, that they may be better citizens of tomorrow

DEAD END (1937)
Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

There is a stunning opening shot in William Wyler's "Dead End" where we see the poor tenements below the skyline of massive buildings in the background and, as the camera pans to ground level, there is a street filled with garbage and local folks trying to make a living (a milkman is spotted) living in crowded quarters. The camera then tracks to the left to see part of the East River and an opulent looking building where the wealthy live. That dividing line is crucial to understanding William Wyler's film, part melodrama, part reality and part mob movie. 

There is a group of kids called the Dead End Kids who do nothing but stir trouble (they roast potatoes over a drum fire). They harass the wealthy people in that tall ornate building left and right, in the most harmless ways imaginable (and with the deepest New York accents you can imagine). One incident unfortunately involves the stabbing of a judge's brother, right in the man's hand. Then there is that rich kid who gets robbed by the hooligans of his watch and clothes.The Dead End Kid involved in the stabbing, Tommy (Billy Halop), lives with his big sister, Drina (Sylvia Sidney), who wants to move out to a better neighborhood. She has her eye on her childhood friend, a struggling architect, Dave (Joel McCrea), who has his eye on a glamorous looking blonde, Kay (Wendy Barrie). She lives in the expensive high-rise and when she comes to visit Dave at his apartment, she sees cockroach-infested garbage cans. Yuck!  

Meanwhile, a high-end mobster who had a little plastic surgery done, Hugh "Baby Face" Martin (Humphrey Bogart), has returned to the neighborhood with his partner Hunk and hopes to see the girl he almost married two decades earlier. Baby Face wears silk suits so he hardly has an issue with the wealthy moving in close to the picaresque East River. He also has no issue with the rowdy street urchins because he used to be one himself. 

"Dead End" is suffused with imagery of only one corner of that dead end street next to the East River (the origins of this screenplay are stagebound). Still, during the sequence of Kay going up the tenement stairs or a chase that involves relentless shootouts, we see dark, confined spaces such as fire escapes and rooftops that give this film a special noir look (this is where you can see cinematographer Greg Toland, pre-"Citizen Kane," really at work). Interestingly, there is no visual comparison with the marble-looking high rise apartments and we never see how swanky those accommodations are.

"Dead End" is well-crafted by director Wyler (along with Toland's help) and there are some strong, emotional moments that can pierce and cut through the facade of its singular location. Bogart's mobster has a scene with his mother whom he has not seen in years - her feelings of betrayal of having raised a murderer echo deeply and it hurts Baby Face to his core. I also love Drina's insistence to the police that her brother be released in her care, or how she pines for Dave and such moments feel honest and earned. "Dead End" evokes the world of the poor and the rich and how they will never coalesce. There will always be a dividing line.

If war comes, it's goodbye roses

 MRS. MINIVER (1942)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

If you watch William Wyler's "Mrs. Miniver" in principally the first half hour, you might not see anything here other than a domestic drama where not much happens. Sure, you got Mrs. Miniver (Oscar winner Greer Garson), the matron of a British household with two kids and her architect husband (Walter Pidgeon). They are spendthrifts - she goes into town to buy fashionable hats and he is ready to buy a new car rather than fixing the tire of his old car. Their eldest son, Vin (Richard Ney), has just returned from studies at Oxford and pontificates about Britain becoming a feudal system. This is all very simply presented without much fuss or troubling issues. Oh, yes, and there is the girl (Oscar-winning performance by Teresa Wright) that Vin likes whom he dances with and proposes marriage. 

Before you know it, air raid sirens are heard and the fictional town of Belham is struck by bombs from war planes overhead. This is the time of World War II where Vin enlists in the Royal Air Force and Mrs. Miniver is less than pleased though she never voices her concerns other than to her husband (who in turn is part of a riverboat mission to Dunkirk). The rest of "Mrs. Miniver" functions as sentimental war melodrama yet it works - I never felt that the film was thick in sentimental inclinations. We expect certain cliches for this kind of picture yet Wyler instead relies on irony and some unexpected lives are taken during these endless bombing campaigns. One sequence stands out with Mrs. Miniver - a wounded German soldier infiltrates her home and demands milk and food. It is a titillating sequence because we are unsure of the outcome - will he kill her or will she be able to disarm him?

"Mrs. Miniver" is often a stirring drama of the people caught in the middle of a war who are not soldiers  - "it's the people's war." The movie has been pegged as propaganda by Wyler and even President Roosevelt who, at the time, declared the picture needed to be in theaters fast to rally the troops and provide morale. Regardless of how it was pegged and trotted about, "Mrs. Miniver" benefits from a most elegant performance by Greer Garson. She is the soul of the movie - the voice who does not speak about war yet her silence speaks volumes.

Bourgeois threatened by affair

 THE UNFAITHFUL WIFE (1969)
Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

Some of the critics at the time felt Hitchcockian tones present in Claude Chabrol's "The Unfaithful Wife" yet the writer-director denied such claims. He is right since his infidelity-in-a middle-class family picture is more about a slow progression of unrelenting tension felt in almost every frame without the benefits of heightened suspense by way of 120 volts of Bernard Herrmann's music. "The Unfaithful Wife" is leisurely-paced yet within its portrait of the artifice of a unified domestic family, something wicked this way will come.

Charles Desvallees (Michel Bouquet), working in the insurance business, is in a presumably happy marriage with an attractive wife, Hélène (Stéphane Audran). What's not to love; they have a son and live in a desolate French countryside manor so this all points to a beguiling bourgeois existence. From the start of the film, something is askew when Charles' mother visits, complaining to Hélène that he needs to lose weight. When we are introduced to Charles, he seems fit and jolly enough for a Frenchman who loves to drink and eat. When he is away from his heavy workload at the office, he realizes Helene needs to enjoy life a tad - sometimes they frequent a nightclub or have dinner at a fine elegant restaurant. Still, right from the start, I had the sneaky suspicion that Charles was well aware his wife was committing adultery. When she makes a phone call, we know she is calling her lover and Charles catches her without admission from either one - she claims it was a wrong number.

Charles eventually hires a private detective to check where Hélène goes when she frequents Paris. Eventually we get an address and the identity of the lover and it leads to a confrontation delivered with tension and suspense. The odd thing about Chabrol is that he refuses to indulge in heightening any moment - it is all deadpan delivery. Charles appears to be a bland individual and Helene shows a spark of sexiness that he may or may not find troubling - their bedroom scenes are nothing more than slight pecks. He knows she has desires but he has erred in thinking their domesticity is enough for their existence as a family (I suppose a sex life went out the window long before they had their son). She clearly needs passion yet the irony is that her lover (Maurice Ronet) is only a tad more animated than Charles. 

"The Unfaithful Wife" is not easy to digest or like, plainly due to the emotional disconnect to these self-absorbed characters. That is precisely the point, that a marriage has to entail something more grounded than just having a child and a pleasant home. For Charles, there is nothing else and that is his own tragedy - a man with no passion and no joy other than devotion and commitment to his family. No matter what.