Quick Takes, May, 2022

Paul Henreid and Rex Harrison in Night Train to Munich

Carol Reed's Night Train to Munich is a slight, but enjoyable spy thriller from 1940. Screenwriters Sidney Gilliat and Frank Launder recycle many of the elements of their work on The Lady Vanishes for this picture: kidnappings, intrigue on a train, choice parts for the comedy duo of Basil Radford and Naunton Wayne, and Margaret Lockwood. Hitchcock had decamped to Hollywood and a comparison of The Lady Vanishes and Night Train to Munich show the differences between the touch of a master and that of a very good director. Rex Harrison is shown to good advantage in a role that shows off his chief attributes, suave urbanity and an endearingly poor singing ability. I wonder if this is the first English language film to depict a Nazi concentration camp. 

Mike Mills' C'mon C'mon is deadly earnest social realism with postmodern touches. Robbie Ryan's black and white cinematography is splendid to behold, but the narrative, in which Joaquin Phoenix has to squire his irritating nine year old nephew around the country, is paper thin.

After the treacle of C'mon C'mon, I felt in the need of some cinematic vinegar, So I watched Fritz Lang's House by the River, from 1950. A Gaslight type thriller done on the cheap for Republic pictures with serviceable B stars (Louis Hayward, Jane Wyatt). The flick is minor Lang, but still a tight and effective picture. 

Brian Duffield's Spontaneous, from 2020, is a predictable black comic horror film in which a class of high school seniors spontaneously combust. Bereft of wit or feeling.

Joe Swanberg's Digging for Fire, from 2015, is an ensemble drama set in Los Angeles. Boasting a stellar cast (Brie Larson, Sam Rockwell, Rosemarie DeWitt, Anna Kendrick, Orlando Bloom), it is akin to Short Cuts, Two Days in the Valley or Pulp Fiction in that it offers a labyrinthine narrative of intersecting characters. Unfortunately, the film is an amoebic blob that evinces little of the flavor of SoCal.

Katherine Dieckmann's Diggers, from 2006, is also an ensemble drama, but it provides a believable portrait of working class Long Islanders in 1976. Sarah Paulson and screenwriter Ken Marino give especially affecting performances. 

James Curtis' new book Buster Keaton: A Filmmaker's Life is a definitive work, the product of impressive archival research. It is exhaustive and exhausting. The casual reader may well weary of its endless litany of negative costs and box office receipts. Curtis provides little insight into Keaton's psyche or taste. As a personality, Keaton remains a sphinx. Like Howard Hawks, another product of the Midwest, he is a prime example of 20th century American utilitarianism. Curtis' book contains memorable portraits of Fatty Arbuckle, Joseph Schenck, Natalie Talmadge, and Raymond Rohauer and is recommended for the hardcore film buff.