Old Films Reviewed

If you are a happy bachelor who wakes up married to a hot Italian woman after a drunken evening, what do you do?
1. Divorce her
2. Tell her that you aren't married (she doesn't know English, so it might work)
3. Decide you don't need a life of carefree parties, women and your faithful butler, and enjoy married life.
4. Kill her.

Well, with a title like this, you would think option #4 is the way to go. But don't jump to conclusions.

Stanley Ford (Jack Lemmon) is a successful cartoonist with his own column and a happening bachelor life. Then in a drunken moment of confusion, he offers a diamond ring to the girl popping out of his friend's bachelor party cake. Also present were a judge and notary and plenty of witnesses. Fast forward 8 hours and his hangover includes a spouse.

He immediately wants out, but his lawyer refuses to give him an annulment until he has given the marriage a chance. So he is forced into awkward social situations including spilling a tureen of soup onto himself in front of his boss.

Of course his cartoon strip changes angles and suddenly he has a new audience. Everyone that sees him on the street comments about how their wife/mother/in-law read the strip and thought it was hilarious. Meanwhile his new wife is planning to move her mother in, redecorating, and buying pets. Stanley doesn't know what to do. He misses being a bachelor. His life, his home, and his work have all changed.

Then he comes up with a solution. He can 'kill' his wife. He talks to several experts and makes a plan. Unfortunately after the comic strip is published with him murdering his wife, she disappears. Suddenly, Stanley is facing murder charges.

My Take

I liked this movie. It was comedic, but the jokes were still funny to a 2009 audience. It even has a good message about marriage...and its not that you should try to murder your spouse. This movie will leave you with lots of laughs.

So, this is a movie for people that don't like dialogue. The only spoken 'words' were proper nouns like a name or perhaps title. I can't imagine how this film made Raquel Welch famous. Maybe it was because she spent the entire film wearing a two piece fur bikini. Daniel doesn't think she is even an actress, she is just a body that got lucky. A body with an amazingly tiny waist.

Supposedly its a love story. That's what Daniel says. I admit, I did not watch it at all. It was so stinking boring to me. Anyway, its a love story between Loana of the Shell people and Tumak (an outcast from the savage Rock Tribe).

Tumak gets in a fight with his dad, the leader of the Rock Tribe, and gets kicked out. Loana and some other Shell women (who are all blonde by the way) see him, and Loana nurses him back to health. Unfortunately, Loana was sort of engaged. Anyway, Tumak's presence causes too much drama, so the Shell people send him away and Loana goes with him back to live with the Rock Tribe.

One of the silliest scenes is where Loana and Tumak are with the Rock people and they get to a body of water, so she jumps in. The cave people start enjoying themselves then a giant dinosaur bird thingy (sorry, not an expert) comes and attacks. Clearly, if you ever try to enjoy yourself, you will be attacked by a big monster bird reptile.

Anyway, I suppose the ending was happy enough. There was some sort of initiation of war between the two tribes, and an act of God, i.e. volcano eruption, stops the war and ends up combining the two tribes.

I know, I just ruined the ending for you. I am not really sorry, you don't watch this movie for the story. You watch it to be amazed at the unshaven men, and surprisingly groomed women.

Anyway, if you like watching really fun claymation special effects this is a great film for you.

Holy cow, two posts a week apart. The crazy part is that neither one was scheduled. The whole 'old' rule might be modified since we now have a toddler in the house and its either something that's flashy and has lots of music or after bedtime (which means we don't want to read subtitles). Its too bad though, there are some really good foreign films out there.

Anyway back to the movie...

Plot
This is a movie where Lucille Ball and Bob Hope play young people. Its a stretch. I mean, come on, Lucy was in her late 30s when this film was released in 1950; she was born in 1911. This is also one of the movies she made before she got her own show. Don't ask me how they thought she deserved her own show from this.

Regardless, the story is about the Floud family a neuvo riche family that made it big in the frontier in Butte, Montana in its pre-statehood days. They go to England to find a man for their daughter {though at this point she would have totally been a spinster}. One guy fancies her and decides to invite them to his country home to meet his family. Small problem, he has neither a country home nor family. No worries, his friend has a country home and he knows an acting troop he can hire to play his family for the weekend.

Enter Humphrey (Hope) the hired actor playing the butler. Humphrey is nowhere near conventional, but Ma Floud believes he can fix her husband so he can act like a true gentleman. She sends atelegram announcing that she was bringing home a "gentleman's gentleman." The entire town assumes a Lord or Duke or some such is coming back to marry Agatha (Ball). This is where the real problems begin.

Suddenly Humphrey has to act the Lord to the townpeople, but still be a butler at the manor all while actually being an actor.

My thoughts

Well, I don't feel enriched or even necessarialy entertained by watching the movie. The best part is that Bob Hope looks incredibly like Kelsey Grammer best known for his role as Dr. Fraiser Crane. Aside from that the humor was almost exclusively physical comedy. If you LOVE those funniest home video shows, you will probably enjoy this movie. If you can't stand them you wonder when there will be humor. I mean Bob Hope was known for his jokes. Lucille Ball was known for more physical comedy, but this physical comedy was just not funny.

Also, why didn't Humphrey have an English accent? EVER? He would throw a few horridly pronounced words in something that sort of resembled a British accent, but it was not consistant and it was not good.

Bottom line, it was an ok movie but its not worth your time. The whole "romantic comedy" concept is brief and it made me wonder how in the world Lucy ever got her own TV show. Trust me, this film does no one justice.
If you think of watching this show because you enjoyed I Love Lucy

This 1958 film is an old fashioned romantic comedy. Of course, that's very different from modern romantic comedies, but it wasn't horrible.

Plot:
James Gannon (Clark Gable) is the city newspaper editor. He is rough around the edges, but he knows his job and he is good at it. A request from a local professor teaching a journalism class is folly to him. Why would you go to school to learn how to edit? Its a waste of time. His reply letter of course lets Professor Stone (Doris Day) know what exactly he thinks of college journalism courses.

The only hitch in this is Gannon's boss, the editor-in-chief. Gannon of course had given his boss a copy of the letter he sent to Professor Stone, and the boss was not happy. He tells Gannon he he must go to the class. So Gannon goes to talk with the professor before class starts and tell her that he will do the guest lecture.

Gannon doesn't get to the class early enough and find Professor Stone starting class, and reading his scathing letter. Lets just say, she wasn't happy with direct insults to education.

Gannon, while not classically educated, recognizes a beautiful woman and decides he likes Miss Erica Stone, regardless of her less than satisfactory choice in career. So, James Gallagher is born. Mr. Gallagher is a simple blue collar worker that is taking night school so he can write a company newsletter. Its the perfect cover. Professor Stone is impressed at Ghallagher's raw novice talent and takes him on as a protege.

Ghallagher falls for Stone hard. He tries to steal her away from Dr. Hugo Pine, even though Hugo is not a romantic pursuit and is collaborating on a book with Stone. He discovers that Stone is the daughter of a famous small town newspaper editor (modeled after William Allen White who was actually from my small town hometown). Towards the end Ghallager sees the validity of education and realizes he is in love with Stone. Of course before he can confess that he is Gannon and possibly be with her, Stone finds out his identity in an effort to get Ghallager a job.

My Thoughts:

Well, this story line is similar to others. In fact if you have seen many Doris Day movies, she does several films with Rock Hudson that have a similar plot.

I did like that Stone's father was supposed to be William Allen White, just because I grew up in small town Kansas and actually went to William Allen White Elementary School. Of crouse, that had nothing to do with the film really. Just a personal enjoyment.

I also enjoy Doris Day playing a college professor. Lets face it, in the 50s there weren't that many college professors that were female. She had to have shown that she was at least as good as competing males for the job (though her famous father might have helped her out).

I don't like that Clark Gable is in his late 50s and looks like he is in his late 50s. He makes Doris Day look really young, aside from the old lady hair that was popular in the 50s and probably also used to make her more legitimate as a professor. Afterall, bleach blondes aren't typically thought of as educated women.

I guess overall, I liked the movie. It made me think, "Education is important!" It does a good job showing that having an academic background will make you a better worker on the job. I support that theme for sure.

Sorry we have been less than faithful dear old blog. Lets just say, summer isn't really movie time in our house. Also, Danno is taking a super hard Calculus II class. That means we have to do things not interesting to him so he will study longer. It also means that when he gets a break, a video game is more likely to appear than a movie. Such is life.

Probably once the class is over, and its either REALLY hot, or it gets cold again, we will be back at em. I will try to finish up the posts that I have started and not completed and schedule them every week or so, just to fill in the gap we are taking. You know, one that is announced unlike most of them.

Many children of the 80s grew up quoting this movie. The fact that people even know the 'truffle shuffle' is proof that this movie was, at least at one time, a major hit. The Goonies is a Steven Spielburg film so even though it was made in the early 80s, the effects are still pretty nice.

Anyway on to the plot and such.

This movie is about a group of loud obnoxious neighborhood kids, whose parents have been hit by the recession and are losing their homes. The icing on the cake is that their homes will be destroyed for a nicer newer country club by the biggest jerk in school's father.

The dreamer of the group Mikey (Sean Astin) has high hopes that they can save their homes by following a treasure map and finding the lost pirate treasure. His cohorts all have fun nicknames: Mouth (Corey Feldman), Data (Jonathan Ke Quan), and Chunk (truffle shuffle extrordinnaire Jeff Cohen). Since they are just kids, Mikey's older brother goes to retrieve them, and ends up joining them on thier adventures. His crush Andy and her friend Stef also join them.

The group follow the treasure map to a "Summer Place" where the Fertelli Gang have a money printing operation and thier hideout. Under the fireplace in a basement room is the entrance to some old caves. The kids, minus Chunk who was distracted by a freezer full of ice cream, go down to the caves and find rooms with pipes going into buildings followed by the bottom of an old wishing well. Chunk is sent to get help but is intercepted by the Fertelli's. After a humerous confession he is tied up with an "it." The it is called Sloth and is the somewhat deformed but really strong younger brother of the Fertelli clan. Chunk and Sloth bond over some chocolate before escaping.

After several close calls with the Fertelli's the kids take a crazy water slide into a large cave with the pirate ship. The ship has lots of treasure, but the Fertelli's are not complete morons and catch up to them making the kids walk the plank and hand over all the gold in thier pockets.

Never fear, 'justice' and Sloth prevail saving the kids, and no one even dies. This is a family film you know.

As a kid I loved the movie, once I got married I was surprised that it was two hours of screaming children. Of course, now that I have a screaming kid of my own the screaming is more tolerable. But, be prepared for lots of screaming.

Overall I rate it four stars, with a special bonus star for the preteen and young teen group. Just be aware, PG ratings in the 80s meant you will hear the occasional 4 letter word (we are talking the s word, and the h word, but not the f bomb).

This is a movie that inspired many remakes; the most recent remake was You've Got Mail. If you liked that movie, I recommend watching the film that inspired many.

The Shop Around the Corner is a film centering around a little store that sells leather goods. Alfred (James Stewart) is the long time employee of a little shop, and he has a correspondence "friend." He met her via a classified ad that was looking for someone to write to and asked that all letters be addressed "Dear Friend."

Meanwhile a girl Klara comes asking for a job, impresses the boss and is hired. Alfred and Klara don't get along very well and almost every interaction is full of sass. Time passes in the shop and Alfred who had been with the shop for nine years starts losing favor with Mr. Matuschek (played by Frank Morgen, I recognized him as the Wizard of Oz). Alfred also keeps writing his "Dear Friend" and gets to the point where he plans on meeting her, and probably getting engaged. Unfortunately, to do that he needs to make more money. He sort of implied to Dear Friend that he is more important (read wealthy) than a shop clerk.

He goes in to ask Mr. Matuschek about a raise, and get fired! He is stunned, and everyone else in the shop is sad. Alfred is now jobless in a poor economy (like today). He hasn't the heart to show up. He goes with one of the other shop clerks to the restaurant where they were to meet, and asks the other clerk to give a note to his Dear Friend. The other clerk recognized Klara immediately and starts trying to warm Alfred up to the idea that Klara will be a good match.

The ending is really good. In fact, its just a feel good movie. I won't share it, since it is different, and for some reason I tend to only give spoilers for movies I dislike. SO go, rent it or check it out from your local library and enjoy this feel good movie.

Four Stars for feel good romance.

This 1961 film seemed to have everything going for it. Doris Day, Rock Hudson, and Tony Randel. Its gotta be great right?

Wrong.

Its a lesser known film because its just dumb. Please note I will have a spoiler alert, cause I hated the movie, so I don't care if you see it or not, but in case you want to, be warned.

Plot Summary
Carol Templeton (Doris Day) is the worker bee of the advertising world, working with integrity and doing rather well at the same time. Still, she just keeps barely losing accounts to Jerry Webster (Rock Hudson) at the rival agency . After hearing about losing yet another account to the sly Jerry Webster, Carol puts him on trial by Advertising Agency. Mr Webster sends his go to sex kitten with an entire speech rehearsed about the amazing and upstanding Jerry Webster. Rebel (said kitten) also shows the board a was medal Jerry gave her to wear around her neck. After the 'trophies' work, Doris has to think of a new way to win.

She may seem antiquated to a modern woman of 2009, but she is no fool. She is afterall the lead advertiser in her agency. She hears that Jerry has this new account he is working on lining up called Vip. VIP is a sham, but no one knows that except Jerry. Unfortunately Pete Ramset (Tony Randal) sends Jerry on vacation, finds out about the commercial footage and starts the advertising campaign for a product that doesn't exsist. When he gets back Pete and Kerry decide to hire a chemist to make them anything that can be passed as Vip. Vip changed my life. It made my who I am. I owe everything to Vip.

Carol meanwhile hires a private detective and finds out about the chemist, and goes to try and get an advertising contract. Naturally, she had never met Jerry Webster (he didn't show up to the trial) so when she finds a man at the chemist's lab she assumes its Dr. Tyler and not her nemesis.

The courtship of company and product begins. Errr, well its sort of just a series of strange dating things where Jerry gets her to buy him a new wardrobe, teach him gulf and swimming as well as how to kiss. Yeah thats right, this woman suddenly becomes typical and sucked into this infatuation based on LIES.

Eventually she finds out Linus is actually Jerry Webster, and VIP doesn't exsist. Trial #2 with the ad council and some rather odd turn of events. As well as the end(spoiled ending in The Bad)


The Good
Doris Day plays a professional. Not a secretary or a nurse, but an advertising agent.
Rock Hudson is good looking.
Doris' character won't sleep around. (I admit it was strange to see this pride in virginity, its very different than today's movies)

The Bad
Doris Day's character is a total blockhead.
The ending sucks. SPOILER ALERT! Doris and Rock in a case of drunken lust get married. She gets the marriage annulled, but surprise, that one night of drunken passion = honeymoon baby. So Rock finds out and she just married him so the baby has a father? Ummm, ok. Also, she was like totally only 5 months pregnant going into the hospital. So not true to life. END SPOILER

The Random
There are totally some good random quotes from the movie. Also, Doris Day sings the opening song as well as an internal monologue song. Random!

Overall?
It was fine. Definately not exactly a strong sexy woman. In fact Daniel's reaction to Doris Day was that she seemed really old. It was that horrible early 60s hair. Poor gal. She looked like a wrinkless 50 year old.

There are some laughs, but the ending is horrid, makes no sense to me, and enough to make me dislike the film.

Three starsm because the 3 main people are famous. (It was a mediocre film.)

An environmentally friendly movie for Earth Day!

I gotta love me some Hayao Miyazaki even if his films aren't all that old. Nausicaa Valley of the Wind is one of Miyazaki's earliest works, and was released in 1984 before the formation of Studio Ghibli. Its a sci-fi, environmental film.

Nausicaa is the Princess of the Valley of the Wind, a remote agricultural village located on the sea. The valley is surrounded by desert and beyond that is the jungle where giant insects (including the Ohmu) live. The time is 100 years after the 7 Days of Fire. At that time, a huge war/battle obliterated the ecosystem leaving most of civilization in ruins. The land was covered by plants that release spores toxic to humans, but the Valley is safe due to the wind blowing in from the sea.

One night a large air ship crashes into the valley. Nausicaa tries to steer them clear of the mountain, but it was too late. In the ship is a young princess who warns Nausicaa that the cargo must be destroyed. The cargo turns out to be the heart/fetus thingy of a Giant Warrior. The Giant Warriors were used during the 7 Days of Fire battle, and if you have one, you are the king of the world.

A bigger, and more ruthless kingdom Tolmekia comes for the Giant Warrior fetus, and to kill Nausicaa's father, the King. They leave with several hostages, including Nausicaa. Nausicaa tells Yupa (some random old guy that is her father's friend and her mentor) that the plants in the toxic jungle are not toxic, its the soil. She also reveals a secret lab where she has the plants growing and they are thriving.

While the Tolmekians are returning to thier kingdom, a Pejite airship attacks them. They land to do some repairs, and Nausicaa finds out from the Ohmu that the pilot is still alive. The pilot ends up being the twin brother of the young princess. Nausicaa is taken to Pejite and finds the place destroyed. The people lured the Ohmu there to destryo the land and chase out the Tolmekians, they also plan to do the same to the Valley of the Wind so they can get the Giant Warrior back.

Of course Nausicaa has to save the valley.

Overall the film is exciting and intriguing at the same time. The plot implies that weapons of mass destructions will screw us some day, and it also shows that as a whole the Earth wants to right things. I was also surprised when I looked up some things for the film and found out who the voice actors were. They include: Alison Lohman, Patrick Stewart, Uma Thurman and Shia Lebeuf.

It may not be for the youngest audience, as there aren't any musical numbers or flashy scenes like Disney, but it is a great film and one that I have a copy of and enjoy.

Take one loser who needs a new washing machine, and a second hand washer.

Mix in lots of background machine noise.

What men at supermarkets clearly not knowing how to shop... they stalk women and buy what they buy. They follow each other and pick out items the same way.

That washing machine is beautiful, but it doesn't wash clothes. It stops every time, unless the repair guy is watching. Until the faithful day that you become such good friends with your washing machine that you watch television with it, make it dinner and say goodnight.

Introducing woman who is the washing machine's soul. She'll scrub your floors, she'll clean in any way you please. She is obedient and follows commands! She is worth more than 100 monetary unit when you ask a guy "want a woman"? But look out... she isn't very faithful. If she winds up with some strange old man who watches questionable videos while wearing a power ranger mask, she will stay.

All of these things up until know are pros for the movie.

HUGE con: The people who made the movie seem to think that the most important part of the movie was the completely unnecessary probably rape scene (we skipped the chapter). All the bonus feature seem to feature this scene more than any other. Is that really important?

Eventually the washing machine gets in the weird old man's families way, so they have to kill her. Bring on the stabby. Now the poor old man will drink away his sorrow.

I give this movie a 5 out of 5 for general oddness, a 1.5 out of 5 for plot, a 1 out of 5 or scenes to focus on, and a 5 out of 5 for old men wearing masks. This leads to an overall score of I would discourage you from watching this.


This poorly organized review is brought to you by Alice Bell Cook. Alice Bell Cook will chew on things just for you! Watch Alice Bell Cook and win chewed up items!

This is a story about a down on thier luck and moralless family the Carltons. The Sahib (Roland Young) has touted himself as the famous Colonel Carlton a famous stage persona in order to get the family into parties of the rich and famous to cheat at cards and in an attempt for thier gchildren to marry up and have carefree lives. At the very beginning the French Police kick them out of France for cheating at cards and scamming on the rich, so the exiled Carltons begin a long train ride in second class to England.

On the train there is a run in between daughter George-Anne Carlton (Janet Gaynor) and her former fiance Duncan McCrae (a breakout role for Richard Carlson) who turned out to not be wealthy at all. Once his poverty was discovered George-Anne broke it off. She also runs into a old lady Miss Fortune (Minnie Dupree). After an over the top tale of disaster and illness plighting her family, Miss Fortune invites George-Anne and the family to ride in her private room. The train wrecks and the Carlton family saves Miss Fortune from the wreckage. Miss Fortune invites the family to stay with her until they are back on thier feet in her huge mansion.

The idea becomes that the family will get in the old lady's good graces so they can get inthe will, and be set for life. The only problem is that they need to make the appearance of getting back on thier feet.

Long story short, after being forced into getting jobs, the Carlton men discover they both enjoy working. The son starts falling for his boss, who isn't rich but does own the company. They also begin caring for Miss Fortune. On Miss Fortune's birthday they have a big party and she collapses. They wait all day and night hoping that she will be fine, not because they want the money but because they hope she will be ok.

In traditional American style there is a cheesy happy ending. It made me feel good, and sometimes you want to watch a movie that just makes you feel good. I think this is a family film, though it might be less exciting for younger kids as the Carlton children are probably in thier 30s. The film does have a moral, and the moral is if you act kind, you will become kind.

Also, for all you WIzard of Oz fans, Marmy is played by Billie Burke who played Glenda the Good Witch. Billie Burke had quite a long film career, so I look forward to seeing more of her movies.

Four really good stars!

The nice thing about this break in blogging, is that I at least started posts for several movies making it easy to complete them with perhaps a bit of help from imdb or wikipedia to get names of actors/directors or award info.

The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (Les Parapluies de Cherbourg) is a 1964 happy happy musical. At least initially. Its very Sesame Street in its bright colors, young love, sing-along way.

Boy meets girl, boy falls for girl, boy gets shipped overseas in the name of his country.

Basically, Genevive i.e. girl in the previous scenario is the daughter of a broke umbrella shop owner Madame Emery. Mom's only hope at not being broke or almost broke is to marry Genevive off to a wealthy man. Genevive meanwhile falls for Guy a young man working as a mechanic in someone else's shop. Guy's parents are dead and he lives with his aunt who is cripple or sick or something.

Young love ensues while Madame Emery sets up dinner and meetings with a wealthy jeweler (who actually keeps the umbrella shop from going under by buying Madame Emery's jewels).

Then Guy is drafted. The two love birds are of course sad, and want to spend their last moments together. They go to Guy's room after his Aunt is in bed.

In a rather foolish moment Genevive and Guy sleep together his last night in France. Genevive soon discovers that tryst led to a little guy on the way. She wrote to Guy with the idea that when he returns they will be wed, but after many months and no replies to her letters she unhappily agrees to marry the jeweler that her mother picked out at the beginning of the story.

Of course, Guy didn't die or forget her during the war. he returns home with an injury and finds the Umbrella Shop gone, Genevive gone, and his heart broken. Guy gets depressed. His girl went off and got married, he hates his job, he drinks. He drinks a LOT. He also quits his job and starts picking up women.

He hits rock bottom when he sleeps with a prostitute and learns her name is Genevive. Oh tragedy! He goes back home and finds out his aunt died, and the only person left is Madeline (the aunt's nurse/helper).

Fast forward, and Guy owns a gas station and mechanic shop and him and Madeline have a son. Genevive is driving through town and stops for gas.

I will let the end be a surprise.

Ok, usually French bothers me (ironic that I don't care for many foreign films just because of their language, yet I watch lots of them) but French singing? Génial! Its probably the fact that this is literally an opera. Every line is sung. So its got the gaiety of a 60's musical, and still dramatic and obviously not American.

I give this film 4 stars because its got star crossed lovers, and reality mixed in. It would have 5 stars, but all the singing voices are dubbed (yes in a movie where all the lines are sung).

This film was about as good as late 60's suspense goes. You have two old broads out to get each other, and a pesky dog that knows the truth. Oh man, good times.

Lets see if I can sum this up...Mrs. Marrable finds herself widowed and left with a pile of bills, and the contents of her husband's briefcase. The briefcase sounds like it belongs to Mr. Boddy (i.e. Clue the board game) as it contains 1 Rusty Dagger, a Stamp collection, and some framed bugs of some sort (that reminded me of Grissom on CSI: Crime Scene Investigation). Anywho, cut scene to someplace notable different with a sort of Southwestern Old lady feel.

There Mrs. Marrable gets up the courage to do her first killing. In goes the housekeeper, and in goes a pine tree. Time passes and the pine trees grow more numerous and in stair step formation. It reminds me of the birth a kid every 2 years sort of thing some people do. Don't know how they would do that, but who am I to judge. Back to the story...or at least the overview.

Anyway, the housekeeper that gets the most screen time is of course, the one that has a fabulous red wig, and a fiery conniving temper. Lets just say, a bit of faking a possible poison in pheasant is hilarious, and probably gutsy.

I thought this movie was great, from the somewhat random side characters to the conniving and truly insane main characters. Aunt Alice is the fiery red wigged housekeeper that comes to discover the truth about her friend that just disappeared. They do a great job keeping you guessing if Mrs. Marrable will do Alice in or not. And then when you think you figured it out, you expect to be wrong.

I give it 4 stars, for being suspenseful but not gory.

Sorry for the long break in blogging...school started for Danno and we stopped watching movies. What can I say, not enough time. We have watched a few movies since last July (you would think so in 8 months) but having all the details might be hard, so I pulled a 'classic' off our shelf.

The Snowman is a musical illustration of a children's picture book. We watched this movie often enough to wear out the VHS tape as kids. The basic gist is that there is an amazing snowfall one winter and this boy builds a snowman outside. The snowman comes to life using Christmas Eve magic (as that's the only way to explain it) and gets to see some of the sites in the boys house including his toys, dress up in the parent's clothing, and a thrilling motorcycle ride.

After a while, the Snowman has to join the rest of the snow people on their way to the North Pole to party with Santa Claus.

I obviously love this movie, so this is an unashamedly biased review. The movie starts out with an intro by (ok can't remember his name...and the case doesn't say, so its some mildly famous British dude). Then it gets to the good stuff. This is an animation in a strictly sketch style. The music by Howard Blake is awesome. (As it should be considering there is no spoken word, and only a short clip with singing.)

I have to say, I checked my copy and I don't have the British dude on it. This short was first put out as a made for TV.

The Snowman was nominated for the 1982 Academy Award for best animated short film, but lost out to Crac by Frederic Back. Its a short that has music and sound effects, instead of just a musical score that rules the video.

Its nice how you can find these things on places like Google Video. And since, I can't leave a movie review with a different clip and not include the piece that's reviewed here it is:

If you haven't seen the book, check it out. It is a GREAT picture book (as in no words), and the movie is just as great. A nice 27 minute Holiday film. And lets face it, the music is what makes this movie. Without the music you may as well read (or rather look at) the book.

Are we giving ratings? Its been too long to remember, I would give this 5 stars or popcorn's, or small children. Its fascinating and beautiful.

Image was taken from ShopMTV where you can buy this for under $10.

This is a quality independant film...and its from China. Yet another subtitled masterpeice. Well, mostly a masterpiece. The thing is, if you love half naken old Asian men, you will LOVE this film.

The opening scene has really nothing to do with most of the movie, but its really fun. You know how they have sleeping pods in Japan, I could believe they have showers that are similar in China. Pretty much, you purchase how long you would like your shower to be. Your clothes are steamed while you shower, and just like the classic car wash machines, you stand there and are cleaned in the shower. looks like it cold be a comedy right?

Then the movie actually begins. A son returns home (a traditional bathhouse) to visit his father and younger brother. This scene cracked me up so hard. I told Daniel that he must watch it, memorize it, and do the same thing to his brother when we see them in Florida. It consists of the younger brother walking up to the older, caressing his face, leaning against his shoulder, then running away. Beautiful. Hilarious. So ackward. Its in the imdb trailer here.

A few minutes later I realized the younger brother is handicapped. Instant guilt for laughing at him. Then I remebered, its a movie. There is no way the actor is really handicapped. Sweet, freedom to laugh.

In a conversation between the two brothers we discover the real reason why the older son came home. He got a post card. And not just any post card. On the post card was a drawing of a sad person sitting on the edge of a bed with another person in it. Older brother asks, "Why did you send this?" "Its me and dad. He is sleeping." Just when you think your father has died.

Ah another quality moment.

There is a time when a patron comes in because his wife has beaten him up. That character has a nice subplot, an intriguing story as to why him and his wife have so many issues, and a heartwarming "awwwww" moment with a happy ending.

Aside from the the silly parts, the film is clearly a drama. The bath is in an old section of Bejing, and there has been talk of the whole district getting torn down for a new shopping mall. *SPOILER ALERT, SKIP TO NEXT Paragraph* There is also family drama: First the older son loses the younger one in the city, then the funny foreshadowing post card comes true. I know, its a lot less funny when its true.

Overall, a good film. I would watch it again. Daniel didn't really get into it, and wanted to skip forward a few chapters, and then didn't watch the end. He missed out. Its even a short film, just over an hour and a half.

Its really is a good film, especially if you have gotten close to any developmentally disabled people. It takes on the idea of institutionalization, and acceptance. And hey, there is even some great Italian Opera singing, afterall its a shower. There has to be singing.

The film is pretty well loved in all the independant film leagues as well. It was the World Cinema Selection at Sundance in 2000, as well as getting awards in Toronto Film Festival, Seattle International Film Festival, Rotterdam Film FEstival, the San Sebastian Film festical, and being moted as an official selection by the museum of modern art. Don't ask me why the cover art says its a comedy. Its not really. There are comedic moments, but its really not a comedy.

Oh and its reated PG-13. Mostly for the nudity. There is a point when there are two young boys (under 10) frolicking naked in the bathhouse. Supposedly there is also some language, but I don't remember it. Maybe its for the cricket fights? Those are pretty intense. ;-D

Crazy like a Fox? Pfft More like crazy like "The Cow".
The Cow is brought to us by the home-made black and white syling movie-makers of Iran. Smuggled out in the 70s it's considered to likely be the best Iranian film made to date. That isn't saying much. The entire movie spanning 100 minutes has so little plot that it's amazing how much time it takes to tell the tale. Don't worry though the movie still has bandits (that sometimes look like ninjas), random great characters (like the man who always talks through his window and never leaves his house), and a love story, well actually two.
Hassan is the one man in town that is lucky enough to have a cow. He loves his cow; he plays with the cow. He walks around with the cow and picks food for it. He shoos away local children who want to touch or feed the cow. He seems in all accounts to regard the cow more than he regards his wife. Yet, for some unknown reason he goes on a day trip and doesn't bring the cow. The cow almost immediately dies, presumably from separation anxiety. The townsfolk are so concerned about what will happen to Hassan when he finds out, they decide to hide the cow and tell Hassan it ran away, so he won't get upset.
Madness ensues as Hassan is unwilling to accept the idea that HIS cow would leave. In fact, he's certain his cow never left because it's still there. He quickly degrades from believing he knows the cow is there to taking the cow's place. To even calling for himself to protect him when he feels threatened. The movie progresses a little more simply to show us what happens to a man who both thinks and insists he's a cow.

Overall the movie is odd. The best parts of it are the mad cow moments. Anytime you see a man-cow throw himself into a support beam, then break it off and attack his/his master's friends you know its a good film. This alone must be the one support for all the awards that were given the film. Hassan (Ezatolah Entezami) received the Golden Hugo in Chicago International Film Festival in 1971. He also went on to make many more random movies, that might or might not be great. Who knows??

Three Stars for Absurdity

So in our, we have library cards and live close enough to walk, and we need something to do together, we rented library movies. Our library has a HUGE foreign film section (especially compared to some of the other sections) so we ended up with two 1960s Italian foreign films and James Bond Die Another Day. Good mix right? Well after watching the films Daniel said we should consider reviewing these in a blog. So the creation started.
This little gem is about a man that has been married for a dozen or so years, has no kids, is wealthy, and a bit of an incestuous pedophile. Yes thats right, a pervy old man. Well, thats not how he is portrayed, but in America, thats how he would have been.

Ferdinando (played by Marcello Mastroianni) is married to a smothering woman who tends to his every need. Lets just say, this woman needs a kid, a pet, or a hobby to distract her attention, but since they have none of those, she dotes constantly over her husband. Also note that the wife (Daniela Rocca) was actually a beauty queen and her big break was putting on the ugly in this little diddy. Thats right, the woman had a matronly hairstyle, unibrow, and mustasche. Nothing says home like a hairy wife.

Nothing, but a first cousin who lives in the other wing of the mansion. She also sleeps in a -scandalous for its time - negligee with her windows open. That means Ferdinando AND his father can both get their peeping Tom on. Needless to say, Ferdinando is blinded by the childlike beauty of his cousin and wishes he were married to her. Alas, divorce is illegal. What to do?

The newspaper solves that with a story of a woman that killed her husband when she caught him in bed with a lover. The law books say if the courts deem it a "honor" killing, you only get 4-7 years. Lets see 7 years plus 15...eek the cousin would be 23 and far too old to still be desirable, but 4 is doable. And Ferdianand sets out on a mission. A mission to find a man that will attract his wife so she can cheat and he can kill her and get the girl.

This movie is so messed up, and hilarious. You may think foreign comedies aren't all that funny, but this one has some great situational comedy, as well as random absurdity. We recommend it to everyone that doesn't mind subtitles, and wants a look at what a man will do in order to get that hot young 15 year old that lives down the hall. Yeah its like that. We like it so much, we have considered planning a little movie night, just to make others watch it. Good clean Italian fun.