Recommendations: Sam (SJMJ91)

"All right, Mr. DeMille, I'm ready for my close-up."

SUNSET BLVD. (1950)

Director: Billy Wilder
Country: United States of America
Genre: Drama / Film-Noir
Length: 110 minutes



Billy Wilder had always been a very prolific director. From tense thrillers to romantic comedies, the main characteristic of his filmic style was that it gloriously portrayed, in a joyous way, the American lifestyle. Such elements would be irremediably exalted through plots regarding deception, malice, crime and the exquisite cinematic film-noir genre. With Sunset Blvd. he managed not only to create one of the best and most glorious American classic masterpieces with some of the most memorable, dramatic and stylish one-liners, but also to reveal what had been by then a possible myth of the obscurity of Hollywood. As scandalous and possibly offensive this timeless and dark masterpiece may have been for some people in particular, especially those belonging to Hollywood stardom and eternal egoism, Sunset Blvd. is arguably the best American film-noir ever made as well as an unforgettably compelling drama based on the typical behavior of the characters popularized by the media.

In the unparalleled tradition of Citizen Kane (1941) without equaling it, the film opens with a floating corpse in a pool with his eyes wide open, staring at the deepness of the water. Resorting to a voiceover narrative structure that relies on a predominant flashback as dark as the streets of Sunset Boulevard during the night, the main character, movie screenwriter Joseph C. Gillis, slowly and wisely narrates his romance with an exceedingly egomaniac and undeniably gigantic bitch silent-movie star named Norma Desmond, who asks him to write a screenplay for her new film under the incredibly blind conviction that life, unexpectedly, is about to reward her with a big screen-comeback. Being selected as one of the twenty-five landmark films of all time by the National Film Registry of the Library of Congress in 1989, as the 12th greatest film of the 100 Greatest American Movies of All Time by the American Film Institute in 1998 and as the 16th Greatest Movie of All Time by the American Film Institute in 2007, the movie was nominated for 11 Academy Awards, which are Best Art Direction-Set Decoration, Black-and-White, Best Music, Scoring of a Dramatic or Comedy Picture, Best Writing, Story and Screenplay, Best Actor in a Leading Role, Best Actor in a Supporting Role, two for Best Actress in a Leading Role, Best Actress in a Supporting Role, Best Cinematography, Black-and-White, Best Film Editing, Best Director and Best Picture. As beautiful and brilliant as the old classic Hollywood times may have been for cinema, it is clearly that a peaceful audience was not yet ready for this kind of dark meta-Hollywood film-noir, since the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences ended up mistakenly choosing All About Eve (1950) as the best motion picture of the year with Joseph L. Mankiewicz as the best director, and Judy Holliday as the better actress for her fairly decent performance in Born Yesterday (1950), directed by George Cukor. All of these awards, including the one for best cinematography, were obviously stolen from the film.

The screenplay elaborated by Billy Wilder, Charles Brackett and D.M. Marshman Jr. demanded a great complexity and constant strokes of genius. Creating an obscure Hollywood story and merging it with reality may seem as a fun challenge and an entertaining game for the screenwriters to show their knowledge about cinema, but it is ultimately a difficult task. Counting with several outstanding cameos such as of the prolific composers of the film Ray Evans and Jay Livingston (Rear Window [1954]), The Godfather [1972]), actresses Anna Q. Nilson (Adam's Rib [1949], An American in Paris [1951]) and Hedda Hopper (Wings [1927], The Women [1939]), actor H.B. Warner (Mr. Smith Goes to Washington [1939], It's a Wonderful Life [1946]), actor, director, screenwriter, producer and editor Buster Keaton (Sherlock Jr. [1924], The General [1926]), and director Cecil B. DeMille (King of Kings [1927], The Ten Commandments [1956]), who actually plays a rather relevant role within the film, Sunset Blvd. has daringly ventured into a desperate downward spiral of psychological doom and soul abomination through the famous world of Hollywood, creating a believable atmosphere. What the cinematography accomplished to create is a darker and more vertiginous atmosphere where arising emotions culminate in tragedy and total madness, thanks to its dusty giant scenarios and its perfectly captured frames.

I'll dedicate an exclusive paragraph for the acting. William Holden offered a brilliant personification of the typical American and romantic detective of predominant stylish, with one minor detail: he's not a detective, but a credited screenwriter. His perfect love complement is interpreted by Nancy Olson, another romantically confused screenwriter named Betty Schaefer, who would only be the drop that would overflow the glass and unleash chaos. Erich von Stroheim (Intolerance: Love's Struggle Throughout the Ages [1916], La Grande Illusion [1937]) portrays a rather macabre character that, at first glance, seems to be hiding an extraordinary amount of secrets, and a psychological disorder and a dependent weakness. The whole show is, naturally, stolen by Gloria Swanson, who ironically was also an acclaimed silent-film actress. She is the ultimate reincarnation of the (unfortunately) typical film star who has already faded into the empire of goods abundance, an increased feeling of ownership of the world as being the reason of the creation and existence of cinema, and the creation of a powerful and greedy empire by an irremediably lost-in-life upper class. Her exceeding sensation of false despotism can be deliciously contrasted with the artistically awesome mansion scenario with an organ that constantly plays thanks to light wind gusts, like a human's soul harmonically tossing desperate screams of impossible freedom, concluding with hundreds of photos of an army of Norma Desmonds and a big movie screen where she can contemplate her own films, showing the real-life feature film Queen Kelly (1929), starring the real Gloria Swanson and directed by the real Erich von Stroheim.

Is this Hollywood's most audacious classic? Perhaps it is, but it is undeniably the best and most ambitious and visionary masterwork of Billy Wilder. Poetically speaking, the film is absolutely grandiose, from the literarily inspired script to the hypnotic black-and-white photography and an unforgettable and unequalled female leading performance. Myths and truths behind the scenes revealed, Sunset Blvd. is an American masterpiece released at the exact time, a period where American films reached a beauty that rarely is accomplished nowadays, but that it is not supposed to be remade for any reasons, not even for financial ones, but to be worshipped and admired as a source of true cinema landmarks.

98/100

"The hills are alive with the sound of music / With songs they have sung for a thousand years. / The hills fill my heart with the sound of music. / My heart wants to sing every song it hears."

The Sound of Music (1965)

Director: Robert Wise
Country: United States of America
Genre: Biography / Drama / Musical
Length: 174 minutes



What is it that makes The Sound of Music one of the greatest and most inspirational musicals ever made in motion picture history? More than attributing the credit to the delicate and magical approach of Robert Wise to such an enchanting tale and the overall cathartic empathy its worldwide audience acquired through this exceptional tale, the magic of this musical comes from the beautiful lyrics written by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein. However, there is still an abundant number of reasons, most of them universally accepted.

The Sound of Music is based on the book written by Howard Lindsey and Russel Crouse and on Maria von Trapp's book "The Story of the Trapp Family Singers", and tells the beloved story of Maria, a former nun who leaves a covenant under the orders of Mother Abbess so she can become the new governess of a wealthy Austrian widower whose rules have erased all signs of fun and music in his family of seven children: the von Trapp children. The film received 10 Academy Award nominations for Best Actress in a Leading Role, Best Actress in a Supporting Role, Best Art Direction-Set Decoration, Color, Best Cinematography, Color, Best Costume Design, Color, Best Music, Scoring of Music, Adaptation or Treatment, Best Film Editing, Best Sound, Best Director and Best Picture, winning the last five awards.

When this musical is seen, its spectator can't do anthing else but to literally love this film to pieces. It is one of those rare, magical films that completely erase its 3-hour running time and transforms it into a wonderful visual concert full of songs that evoke happiness and the simplicity of life itself. It is plagued with vast and wonderful scenarios depicting the hills and mountains of Salzburg, Austria while the lyrics of the film elevate their rhythm and charm over the clouds so they can finally reach the people's hearts. Consequently, the cinematography is spectacular, with an unxpectedly astonishing opening sequence.

The performances throughout were extremely talented, and Julie Andrews acting seemed so natural that she instantly became in an inspirational cinematic icon. When the title The Sound of Music is spoken, the biggest probability is that one may think on Maria's character spinning around the grassy hills of Salzburg. A religious perspective is shown throughout the film which is used as a motor for dividing the film into two main parts: the von Trapp family and the depiction of the difficulties World War II had prepared for the aforementioned family. However, the ending sequence portrays a new beginning, a message of life itself, whispering to the soul that the human attitude should always be grateful towards the gift of life itself and the blessings resulting from submitting our existence to the merciful will of God.

A The Sound of Music review cannot leave the songs unnoticed. Seeing Julie Andrews singing is a visual delight and magic for the ears. Seeing her perform songs with the von Trapp children makes you wish to have a mother like her, a wife like her, a family like them. The "Do-Re-Mi" song, along with the opening sequence and song of the film, must be the most famous scenes among the history of American adaptations of musicals to the big screen. You just feel in the right place at the right time before suddenly realizing you've been singing with the characters all along.

Its charming simplicity and predominant delight are unpecedented. This musical was released at the right time, reminding Hollywood that the Golden Age of both cinema and musicals were not dead yet since it held (and still holds) a heartwarming and nostalgic resemblance to older iconic musicals, such as The Wizard of Oz (1939) and Singin' in the Rain, among dozens others. Differing significantly from his previous musical film West Side Story (1961), this is the last great musical that deeply moved masses and invited them to perceive life differently, just before Bob Fosse (Cabaret [1972], All That Jazz [1979]) conquered the big screen with a whole new meaning of the gene. Magic has been revived.

93/100

"I haven't seen Berlin yet, from the ground or from the air, and I plan on doing both before the war is over."

The Great Escape (1963)

Director: John Sturges
Country: United States of America
Genre: Action / Adventure / Drama / Thriller / War
Length: 172 minutes



World War II has been subject to multiple cinematic interpretations around the world and the one applied by John Sturges in The Great Escape is truly one of a kind. With the right amount of the brutality that WWII films have always portrayed, either graphically or psychologically, and stylish humor, The Great Escape is a classic adventure masterpiece rich in character, not to mention the director's best achievement. Moreover, it is the vivid and epic representation of the glory that adventure films had back in the 60's, effectively becoming an action film with exciting moments that guarantee three hours of massive and unparalleled entertainment disguised with cinematic brilliance.

The film is based on a true account of one of the most ambitious and complicated escape attempts from a German POW camp during the Second World War, equally focusing on both the constant and non-stop escape efforts by the Allied prisoners through the building of a long, underground tunnel and the exhaustive search by the German Gestapo of the ones that actually managed to escape from Stalag Luft North. The film received an Amademy Award nomination for Best Film Editing, losing it against How the West Was Won (1962).

John Sturges' approach to the Second World War is effectively enough to provide to the audience what the cast and the premise promised since the beginning. Being basically divided into two episodes, The Great Escape may be one of the greatest fictionalized war stories ever put to the big screen for several reasons. The technical aspects of the film cannot be left unnoticed. Its pace allows to provide a vast amount of different characters with various respective backgrounds and psychological characteristics, thus leaving room for enough character development for making the spectator to care for each and every one of them. That is the way the film opens and firstly develops. Consequently, The Great Escape proceeds with the controversial and daring discussion of the nearly-impossible and extremely ambitious escape attempt of 250 men, including the construction of the tunnel.

The escape attempt is easily one of the most thrilling and memorable sequences ever created. From this moment on, the film's length is no longer felt and the editing and the sound are the obvious highlights, besides a remarkable camera work. The glorious days of old Hollywood never lacked an entertainment factor, so one of the greatest motorcycle chases of cinema history was a rather important scene not to be ommited where a well-shot cinematography can be fully appreciated, a motorcycle ridden by Steve McQueen. His character may not be so different from the male-centered characters he usually portrays, appearing this time as a hilarious mix of the kid that never learns to stop trying to escape from the POW camp and a man whose commitment and so-ridiculous-that-they-may-actually-work ideas encouraged the rest of the Allied prisoners to become involved in the overall escape process.

An inevitable, yet necessary war realism is a present characteristic in the film, which is exactly the reason that justifies the movie's conclusion. However, thanks to the empathy of the wide cast and the development of the events, one as a viewer is decently forced to accept the upcoming consequences, sequences that slowly start to construct a brutal ending. Inspirational scenes and one-liners make up for the aforementioned details, making of The Great Escape the best US feature film of 1963, undoubtedly.

As a mixed bag of genres, it is a unique film to watch. As a real-life account put into film, it is a masterpiece. As an action/adventure film, it is an exciting and brilliant experience. A rare film that is success from wherever one may see it, The Great Escape is a film of noticeable power and predominant hope and inspiration, and a daring and somewhat patriotic, yet realistic version of the German POWs during World War II, being arguably the second best prison-escape film ever directed and an American homage to Jean Renoir's La Grande Illusion (1937).

93/100

"I remember I led a peaceful, uneventful life as a little girl. I loved fries with ketchup, Bruce Lee was my hero, I wore Adidas sneakers and had two obsessions: Shaving my legs one day and being the last prophet of the galaxy."

PERSEPOLIS (2007)

Director: Vincent Paronnaud & Marjane Satrapi
Country: France / United States of America
Genre: Animation / Biography / Drama / War
Length: 96 minutes



Any person claiming Persepolis to be one of the best animated films of the new century is completely correct. Persepolis is a revolutionary, provocative and poignant animated masterpiece abundant in style and creativity throughout. To make such an enchanting and wonderful biopic in an unusual way is a direct demonstration of vision and talent. Aimed at several masses regardless of their specific political ideologies, Persepolis is a multiphacetic tale with a specific moral message for every viewer, making a direct invitation to personal reflection and not deviating from a powerful, cathartic moment.

This gorgeous piece of animation is set during the days prior to the Iranian Revolution of 1979 and its aftermath, a shattering and catastrophic landmark event seen through the eyes of Marjane Statrapi, an Iranian girl who witnesses the resuting fundamentalist regime of her country devastated by the Shah. Events are recalled from her mind while we explore the vast and mixed beliefs of her idealistic family and the hardships that bring sadness and disappointment throughout her life. The film received an Academy Award nomination for Best Animated Feature Film of the Year, losing against the masterful, yet inferior film Ratatouille (2007). However, it won the Jury Prize at the Cannes Film Festival and was nominated fo a Golden Palm which lost against Cristian Mungiu's 4 Luni, 3 Saptamâni si 2 Zile (2007) after a very strong competition.

The animation itself is a spellbinding achievement, like if the audience were witnessing a comic book gaining cinematic life with an unstoppable rhythm. Once again, the language is not a distracting characteristic. It adds a poetical tone to the film with enough sympathy to be kept entertained. Adapting several political ideologies, the Iranian Revolution is ultimately used as the principal environmental motive to develop a character that is so complete and so submissve towards the influence of a surrounding society that it instantly becomes an interesting icon. Thanks to the talent of a brilliant French dubbing, the overall efectiveness is as striking as a lightning.

Persepolis interprets the act of revolution as a necessary transitional period for the successful reign of the proletariat and a benign outcome of nationalism. Capitalism is reported as a complete destroyer and the film does not deviate from the typical concept of the refusal of the society's ideologies, so totalitarian control is still a present factor in Eastern cinema. With an extraordinary use of animation that nostalgically homages the black and the white of the legendary film-noir genre so the overall emotions present in each frame can be dramatically enlightened, Persepolis falls in love with expressionistic art forms, such as the German Expressionism, for adding the biggest amount of visual magic possible, making so much transitions that the brilliance is overabundant.

The concepts of the hatred towards national heroes, ripping their faces from text books, and that of decaying anarchy are essential and relevant terms that mold the personality of Marjane, thus limiting the freedom of speech and expression. However, the plot is told and narrated with such joy and hyperactivity that the final result is a unique experience of its kind, referencing pop culture that have defined the last three decades. It also uses a brilliant mix of the hardships that human relationships imply with an intelligent sense of humor, including the usual stupidity of unfaithful men and the vanity and intuition of a woman.

"Inventiveness", "revolution", "humor" and "creativity" are arguably the key terms for describing this film. Its vision has surpassed those of the biggest and most successful animation studios regarding most of their films. It decided to resort to a classic style of animation and allowed the story to unfold at an undeterminate rhythm and acquire a genius style of its own. The film provides a moving and heartwarming sensation when the credits start to roll, but this coming-of-age manifesto has declared war to the lack of quality of modern cinema, including the fully-CGI animated mainstream gargabe that govern the big screens nowadays. Persepolis is a complete masterpiece.

98/100

In Bruges had a drastically different atmosphere overall and even the fans of the genre could not perceive it. Those who could are complaining about the whole film except for Farrell's exceptional performance and the climax. The city of Belgium is used as an environmentally gothic background for unleashing a sensational brief dose of dark humor, a not-so-common screenplay and a powerful punch in the stomach right in the moment when we least expect it. It is different and somewhat audacious; the pace was perfect and the movie itself makes a spoof about the gangster honor code!

74/100

Sam Raimi drags us to his roots! Drag Me To Hell is a highly enjoyable and typically stylish supernatural horror film by one of the masters of horrific mindless lunacy: Sam Raimi. It clearly does not make a desperate attempt to retake the unparalleled brilliance and dementia of the original Evil Dead trilogy, but unbelievable elements put randomly and a high capacity for constructing undeniable dark humor are still present throughout. Finally, an adequate ending I loved...

61/100