1940s Movie Reviews

To Be or Not to Be (1942) Review

September 30, 2016 by JD Hansel

Many consider this to be one of the greatest comedy films of all time, and I am happy to say that I have joined the many in that opinion. I’m afraid I have very little to add here that hasn’t been said, so I will keep my comments brief and simply urge all readers to watch this film. While it may not be my favorite comedy, it is one that I greatly appreciate, and one that I intend to emulate. It perfectly established so many great tricks to make a film extra-funny, and these are techniques that can still be employed today without losing much strength. Much of its brilliance and beauty come from the fact that it’s a comedy about World War II that was made and released during World War II, and yet the really great thing about it is how well it plays with an audience of young people today (as I had the good fortune of witnessing myself). Because I saw the Brooks film some years before seeing the Lubitsch original, there were some parts of the movie that annoyed me simply because I was hoping this film would offer more of the great moments I was used to seeing in the way I was used to seeing them. That being said, this film takes everything a different direction – its own unique direction – that I think is worth a little analysis.

After reading an analysis of the film from a few decades ago by cultural theorist Mladen Dolar, and reading Ebert’s review of the Brooks/Johnson remake, I am fascinated by two elements of this film’s humor. The first is the way it manages to be over-the-top without being over-the-top. While watching this film, I was a little let down during the soliloquy sequences, because the remake made me expect Jack Benny to totally lose his cool on stage and follow the man in the audience to the edge of the stage. This film doesn’t do that, instead focusing on understatement of big problems. This is tied to my second note, which is how petty everyone is. I think films are can be found on a rectangular spectrum-like chart with a particular type of fictional world in each corner:

Type A: The audience and the protagonist are sane, normal, and relatively smart people, but some people are inhuman, evil monsters.
Type B: All humans are inhuman, evil monsters.
Type C: The audience and the protagonist are sane, normal, and relatively smart people, but some people are short-sighted, ignorant, silly fools.
Type D: All humans are short-sighted, ignorant, silly fools.

I sorted them in order of popularity, and maybe I’ll make up a graphic representation later, but for now we can call our imaginary chart “The Fictional Cynicism Diagram.” This film is noteworthy for being an early example (if not one of the only really good examples) of a film that belongs right in the last corner, Type D. Most stories are somewhere in the middle, but this sets a tone that wouldn’t become more common until mockumentary shows and Tina Fey productions became popular. For a film made during the second world war to have this approach to even the Nazis, refusing to let them be anything but flawed, foolish humans, just like our heroes, is amazing. That’s what makes this a landmark film, and why its one of my favorites.

Stranger on the Third Floor Review

September 29, 2016 by JD Hansel

This surely must be one of the most fascinating and strange films I have ever seen.

Stranger on the Third Floor is generally considered to be the first movie in the film noir genre, and yet it is very different from the standard conceptions that come to mind when most people think of noir (based on films like Out of the Past, Double Indemnity, or the Bogart films). The lead in this story is no stone-faced, stoic Bogart type – he’s an emotional basket-case – and the relative normalcy of the characters makes the film feel very different from how I’d come to think of noir based on what I saw in Out of the Past. It starts off like a simple enough old-timey Classical Hollywood story about two young lovebirds, but the second act takes a turn when it becomes an experiment in expressionism, before finally returning to reality for a third act that breaks Hollywood in the strangest way.

The second act features an elaborate and creative nightmare sequence, composed almost entirely of elements that were shown (or at least discussed) earlier in the film, now warped into something entirely unreal. This sequence is expressionism gone wild, blatantly stealing from German, French, and Russian artistic styles, but clearly forming a new style of its own at the same time that would be very influential in future film noirs (not to mention Tim Burton films – even if indirectly – and other dark dramas). Simply put, it all looks gorgeous, and its exaggerated theatrical style makes the whole nightmare scene explode with all the wild emotion that burns in the protagonist’s shredded heart. I’m not sure I can think of any other film that manages to be so vibrant without having color, so over-the-top without getting silly, or so animated without being . . . well, literally animated. Then comes the ending.

The final act is incredibly bizarre seeing as how the protagonist vanishes from the movie, leaving his girlfriend to take over the role of being a hero (of sorts). This is not so much a feminist move as a clumsy one, because this was not done to make any sort of statement about gender equality, from what I saw/heard in my repeated viewings and careful reading, but I’m not sure what exactly it really is supposed to be. This move seems to serve little purpose and just make the narrative awkward. Even more awkward is the conversation the leading lady has with the insane antagonist, which had so little logic to it that there were multiple moments of laughter in the screening room when I saw it. Then, at the end, the antagonist is randomly hit by a car and presumed dead, only for the police to look at him and start talking to him as his body lies in the street, revealing he is alive. This is finished off with one of the most forced “tag endings” in movie history, making for an overly cheery, cheesy conclusion that just doesn’t feel human.

On the whole, however, the film is very strong. The expressionist visuals are used not just for show, but to saturate the conflict, making the emotions of the protagonist that much stronger and the drama of the story that much more powerful. Its commentary on how flawed the American justice system may very well be is truly chilling. The performances by some of the actors, particularly the great Peter Lorre, served the film very well, making for a very special mood to the work overall. I recommend this film not only because it was inspirational for filmmakers historically, but because it is inspirational to me. It’s weaknesses may be absurd, but its strengths win me over, and I cannot help but have a massive crush on this gorgeous, gorgeous film.

Out of the Past Review

March 31, 2016 by JD Hansel

In contrast to the western, film noir is more like my cup of tea. I’ll take the visual style of noir over the visual style of the western any day of the week. It’s so dark, smokey, dramatic, theatrical, and mysterious. How could a saloon girl compare to a deadly, spunky femme fatale? How could a singing cowboy compare to an eerie saxophone? Film noir has a special charm about it that I appreciate, but I haven’t actually watched many films in the genre (if any) all the way through, until I finally saw Jacques Tourneur’s Out of the Past. This picture is a good example of what film noir has to offer to the history of cinema, but what it presents is both the good and bad aspects of the genre.

This is, in its own way, a very interesting movie. It still strikes me as “tederesting” more than captivating, but it is very easy to get lost in the world of the film. The structure is surprisingly pleasant, because the first act or two is/are done almost entirely within a flashback. The plot does take surprising twists and turns, and it handles the twists and turns well . . . for the most part. Eventually, as can happen with noir, the plot becomes unintelligible. It gets too difficult to tell who’s who and why each of them is doing what he/she is doing. As it turns out, the characters are also unsure of what’s going on, and they are surprisingly struggling to know why they are doing what they are doing.

I wish to elaborate on the subject of motivation, because it is an important subject in art and philosophy that I have yet to address in a movie review, and this is the ideal motion picture for beginning this discussion. In fiction, deterministic fatalism is generally treated as a pleasant view of life – the good side is predestined to beat the bad side, and the chosen one simply must save the day because the prophecy says so. While I am not a fatalist, I am a determinist, which is to say that I stand by the evidence that our thoughts and actions are determined by subconscious brain activity we cannot control, which leaves us without freedom of will (in that we are not the source of our own intentions and desires). That being said, I would obviously much rather live in a world in which we do have free will, and the fact that this cannot be is troubling. This movie exemplifies how the genre of film noir uses this troubling predicament to make good drama.

Kathie is the femme fatale with a lot of bad habits, from shooting people without sufficient reason to being a compulsive liar. When challenged for her actions, she persistently claims that she didn’t want to do what she did – she had to, and she couldn’t explain why. In my film history class, the professor explained why. Noir is fascinating because it shows the consequences of living in a world with not only determinism, but fatalism, in that the characters have certain actions that they must commit regardless of their intentions, and they have no control over whether these actions will be good or bad. This is, when pondered, a rather terrifying concept, which brings all the fiction that celebrates “destiny” under serious scrutiny. As annoying as it was to repeatedly hear Kathie’s rejection of responsibility for her actions, this did make me realize that there is a certain kind of conflict that I want to see far more of in cinema: the struggle for freedom in a world that cannot have free will. This subject may very well be the most captivating concept that any work of art could discuss, at least in my opinion, and I wouldn’t have even thought of it if not for Out of the Past.

Overall, this movie is fine. It’s true that I couldn’t fully appreciate the characters, and it’s true that I found the ending a little unsatisfactory. I found it rather slow at many times, particularly in the last act, and I could not keep track of the chaotic plot-line (which was more of a plot-scribble) if I were well paid to do so. However, it does provide a bit of entertainment, and can even be surprisingly thought-provoking, so I give it a pass.

Casablanca Review

September 23, 2015 by JD Hansel

There’s not much I can say about this one – I can’t critique perfection, but I must confess that, initially, I was not a fan of the film. I started watching Casablanca back when I was about eleven years old, and I didn’t get anything that was going on: I didn’t know the history or context, I didn’t care about the characters, I wasn’t into the music, I couldn’t appreciate the technical aspects, I didn’t get the jokes, and I wasn’t sucked into the drama. I couldn’t even finish the movie. I eventually decided that it would be best to watch the film again, and finally finish it after having completed a high school-level history course some time ago – not to mention a history of film class.

Even still, I found myself doing a little bit of research online within the first few minutes of the movie to make sure I understood the historical and political context correctly. With that out of the way, I was able to fully appreciate the film, and I got wrapped up in every detail. The first thing that stuck out to me was the visual presence, and while the visual style I tend to prefer is quite colorful, the lighting of this picture is so theatrical and dramatic that I all but drool at half the sights the film offers. This was followed by an appreciation of the music, since I could not have asked for a much better soundtrack for this particular story. I quickly came to love the marvelous cast of colorful, distinct, and memorable characters that are found at every turn, all of whom are performed to perfection, and casting the lovely and charming Ingrid Bergman as the leading lady was the best decision anyone has ever made since the repeal of the Eighteenth Amendment (at least I remembered something from history class). Lastly – and this is what made me fall in love with the picture – while I was expecting a totally serious drama, I was enthralled to find that the superb dialogue adorning the screenplay is filled with the Epsteins’ witty and hilarious lines, all of which are right up my alley. While I do not consider this picture to be my favorite, and I refuse to let its critical acclaim alone determine my rating, I simply must give this film the highest praise simply for making me want to be a much better writer.