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Reviews
Armadingen (2011)
a farmer becomes a caring husband as the world ends
Set in a tiny farm in Northern Germany, a stodgy German farmer becomes a belatedly caring husband as he hides the fact that the world is ending in two days from his wife who putters about noting his behavior is unusual. When the electricity is cut off they attempt to grill a pork-loin outdoors, only to be drenched by an increasing rainfall. The fiery destruction of his model train layout symbolizes the devastation they will soon undergo. Or will they? He resignedly makes two cups of valerian-laced tea to put himself to sleep & lies down beside her, only to awake to a sunny morning. Was it only a nightmare? I watched it before dawn on KQED (S.F. PBS) on Columbus Day & was terrified from beginning to end.
Santa Fe Trail (1940)
Massey's politics
Massey's older brother was Vincent Massey, the first Canadian-born Governor General of Canada. Raymond served in the Canadian Army in both WW1&2 (wounded in both); determined to portray Lincoln as well as John Brown as often as he could, once he was an American citizen he only dabbled once in (civilian) politics, appearing in a television endorsement in 1964 in support of conservative Republican presidential nominee Sen. Barry Goldwater (R-AZ.) In it, Massey denounced the Vietnam War, saying Goldwater also opposed it, ending by quoting the famous Goldwater campaign slogan: "You know he's right!" It can be seen on YouTube.
The Water Horse (2007)
Listen to the voices
(I'm watching it on broadcast digital-TV as I write this.) My father emigrated to Boston from Glasgow as a boy early in WW1. I crave Scottish voices & this film supplies them subtly. I could listen to it for hours, so for me it's altogether too short. The magical water-horse domesticates Scottish lore/legend without being unduly hokey. The extended action sequence of Angus (as a boy) riding Crusoe (the mature Water-Horse) on the lake joyously should delight any child & the child within us. The contrast of the accepting Scottish family vs the strutting British Army artillery unit billeted on them illustrates their profound cultural difference: the Scots' beloved pet is the Water-Horse Crusoe, the army's are Churchill, a scruffy bulldog & Victoria, their long-distance cannon. Nothing more need be said, other than: Up Alba! (Think of this as a child's LOCAL HERO.)
Cuba (1979)
Brit mercenary arrives in Havana on the eve of the Cuban Revolution of 1959.
British mercenary Sean Connery arrives in Havana on the eve of the Revolution of 1959, hired by the Batista regime to defeat it. How he assesses the Batista regime is done largely by facial cues to his military guide, but we are (somehow) given to believe he sees the Batista regime is about to collapse. He finds a former teenage lover of his there (Brooke Adams)who is now married to the son of cigar-factory wealth (Chris Sarandon) Does she escape the revolution? Do we really want her to? I liked its brightly-lit brittle realist Havana hotel scenes, but I liked them in HAVANA with Robert Redford even more. In the simplest old-Hollywood terms, winners are winners, losers, losers. Castro obviously wins. You don't have a major star like Connery walk away from the people we ourselves are supposed to sympathize with, but do we really expect him to join the Revolution? Has Lester ever been interviewed about this film anomaly? I wonder where Connery stood/stands on the Cuban Revolution, & Cuba now, likewise Redford.
The Lake House (2006)
loved it
In the last year (01/26/2013) my Chicagoan 1st-wife Joan Helen Budyk died; our last communication consisted of my sending her a used paperback copy of THE TIME-TRAVELLER & HIS WIFE soon followed by a DVD of the film. Seeing THE LAKE HOUSE re-addresses my need to be re-united with her again by any means. Likewise, my younger 2nd-wife Carolin(a)Jayne Combs who died in 2007. Men don't often admit to this need to rejoin a lost spouse, but that may well be changing (I hope) in this new century. Such loving admissions As this are not just overdue, they're badly needed admissions of the continuities of close relationships (like love) that end profoundly unfinished.