TiVoPlex
TiVoPlex for Tuesday, November 27, 2007 through Monday, December 3, 2007
By John Seal
November 26, 2007
BoxOfficeProphets.com
Tuesday 11/27/07
8:30 AM Turner Classic Movies
The Case of the Howling Dog (1934 USA): TCM offers a heaping helping of Perry Mason who-dun-its today, starting with the first of six Warner Bros. second features based upon the adventures of Erle Stanley Gardner's then newly created character. The Case of the Howling Dog stars the always terrific Warren William as Mason, an attorney with a penchant for private dicking during his off hours. The titular mutt finds itself involved in a convoluted murder case, and it's naturally up to Perry to unravel the mystery of missing nervous nellie Arthur Cartwright (Gordon Westcott). Co-starring Mary Astor, Allen Jenkins, and a host of other familiar faces from the Warners' stock company, The Case of the Howling Dog provided Perry with an excellent big screen introduction. It's followed at 10:15 AM by The Case of the Curious Bride (1935), a rather mundane murder mystery featuring Errol Flynn as a corpse on a slab; at 11:45 AM by The Case of the Lucky Legs (1935), wherein Perry must bring the killer of a carny con man to justice; at 1:15 PM by The Case of the Velvet Claws (1936), in which secretary and confidante Della Street (Claire Dodd) becomes Mrs. Mason; at 2:30 PM by The Case of the Black Cat (1936), in which Ricardo Cortez replaced William in the lead role; and at 3:30 PM by The Case of the Stuttering Bishop (1936), a last gasp entry featuring the less than satisfactory Donald Woods as Mason, here engaged by an Australian clergyman to defend a woman wrongly convicted of manslaughter. These films are distinctly of their era, resolutely in the murder mystery genre, and characters aside bear next to no resemblance to the later television series starring Raymond Burr.
6:00 PM More Max
Let's Go to Prison (2006 USA): As far as lowbrow comedies go, this is a very good one, and all the more surprising considered it was hatched by the same creative team that gave us the family-friendly Night at the Museum. Dax Shepard (Idiocracy) stars as John Lyshitski, a two-bit hustler who keeps getting sent to jail by the same judge, Nelson Biederman III. Released at the completion of his most recent sentence, Lyshitski is determined to get his revenge on Judge Biederman, but when he learns his nemesis has shuffled off this mortal coil shifts targets to the Judge's son, Nelson IV (Will Arnett), a tyrannical spoiled brat who now runs the foundation named in his father's honor. Lyshitski sets up Nelson fils and gets him sent to jail, where he plans to stage manage the mental and physical destruction of his arch-nemesis' offspring - but things go awry when young Biederman makes a name for himself and finds himself the source of widespread admiration on the prison yard. Not everything about Let's Go to Prison works - not least the unsatisfactory ‘ending' - but there are enough laughs here to entertain, and even a little social commentary regarding the inequities of the American judicial system. It's not nearly as bad as the peremptory reviews implied upon its extremely brief cinema release last November.
Wednesday 11/28/07
8:45 PM Turner Classic Movies
The Wrong Box (1966 GB): It's simply not as good as it should be (or could have been), but this off-kilter black comedy still has much to recommend it. Set in the 1880s, the film features John Mills and Ralph Richardson as Masterman and Joseph Finsbury, the aging would be beneficiaries of the family estate. The terms of the will, however, demand that only the last surviving brother shall receive the inheritance, and the two siblings - with the assistance of their younger relatives - are conniving to make sure they're the last man standing. Also featuring Michael Caine, Peter Cook, Dudley Moore, Nanette Newman, Irene Handl, Thorley Walters, John le Mesurier, and many other familiar British thesps, The Wrong Box is ultimately let down by Larry Gelbart's uneven screenplay, which doesn't go for the jugular often enough and seems a little uneasy with the cultural milieu of Robert Louis Stevenson's original story. With a cast like this and a John Barry score, however, a lot can be forgiven.
Thursday 11/29/07
7:15 PM Turner Classic Movies
A Face In the Crowd (1957 USA): Many movie fans consider 1939 the apex of American filmmaking, but I'd make the argument that 1957 was just as strong a year - if not stronger, thanks to the slow but steady relaxation of the Production Code. 12 Angry Men, A Hatful of Rain, and Paths of Glory are all amazing films - and then there's A Face In the Crowd, as relevant today as it was fifty years ago. Andy Griffith - yes, Matlock himself - should have received an Academy Award nomination for his performance as Lonesome Rhodes, a no-good hobo who hustles his way to the top of the heap with the assistance of Arkansas radio broadcaster Marcia Jeffries (the luminous Patricia Neal, who never looked more beautiful than she does here). Griffith's performance is a true tour de force, his Rhodes a primal force of nature who uses his gift of gab to move from a backwoods jail cell to a nationally broadcast television show, where his faux-homespun, cracker barrel wisdom strikes a chord with the great American public. Perhaps arguably, though rock and roll is never mentioned in the film, I'd submit that A Face in the Crowd IS, secondarily, a film about rock and roll. The narrative arc - hardscrabble country boy with a killer voice sings and talks his way into the hearts of his countrymen—certainly bears some similarities to the life story of one Elvis Aron Presley, and the film's prescient examination of the inevitable intersection of revolution and commodification is fascinating food for thought. This is a great film, keynoted by two great performances by Griffith and Neal, and comes with my strongest recommendation.
9:30 PM Turner Classic Movies
Juliet of the Spirits (1965 ITA-FRA): This is a film that deserves multiple viewings, scene-by-scene (and sometimes frame-by-frame) analysis, and a hearty appreciation for surrealism. Giulietta Masina is perfect as the middle-aged woman on the verge of a nervous breakdown, trying to decide if husband Mario Pisu is cheating on her. Director Federico Fellini's camera flatters Masina (his real life wife) at every turn, in sharp contrast to the outrageously costumed and made-up likes of Sylva Koscina and Valentina Cortese. Hints of the macabre are laced throughout, in anticipation of Fellini's own Satyricon (1969) and countless Italian horror films of the '70s. I pose two questions: what is the symbolic importance of the very frequent facial shots of characters that are shrouded in shadow? And is the split-second shot of a David Hemmings look-alike, complete with camera, some sort of psychic forecast of what Michelangelo Antonioni would be filming in Blowup (1966)? Watch the film, and submit your answers to the usual address!
10:30 PM IFC
Street Mobster (1972 JAP): If you enjoyed last year's IFC airings of Kinji Fukasaku's five-film Yakuza Papers series, here's another of the director's nikkatsu (gangster) offerings. Street Mobster features good old Bunta Sagawara as Isamu, a particularly loathsome hoodlum who has a penchant for rape when he isn't knocking heads with the local competition. Isamu is a loose cannon, but he's also got big time aspirations, and is determined to set up his own powerhouse gang with compatriot Kizaki. Unsurprisingly, the incumbent Yato gang doesn't take kindly to this sort of thing, setting in motion the incredibly bloody proceedings that follow. Unlike some of Fukasaku's oeuvre, there's no attempt here to graft social commentary onto the story, which is either a good or a bad thing, depending on your perspective.
Friday 11/30/07
3:15 AM Sundance
The Fearless Freaks (2005 USA): Either they changed or I did. I remember seeing The Flaming Lips open for Nick Cave back in the ‘80s, and I was not impressed. They looked and sounded like a metal band, and I especially didn't like that song about how she didn't like the jelly. Twenty years on, I consider them amongst the finest contemporary exponents of psychedelic music. Go figure. This rockumentary does a pretty good job of explaining The Lips' evolution from hairy rock gods to purveyors of perfect, though slightly perverse, pop. There's lots of concert footage, home movies, and interviews, and this is absolutely essential viewing for anyone interested in Oklahoma's finest export since Will Rogers.
Sunday 12/02/07
3:00 AM Fox Movie Channel
Champagne Charlie (1936 USA): Genuinely rare movie alert! This hour-long Fox murder mystery has been unseen for decades, and according to IMDb, survives only on a single nitrate print at UCLA. Whether that's the print being utilized for this airing, or if Fox discovered another print in their archives, remains a mystery, as the folks at FMC don't do a very good job of tooting their own horn when it comes to preservation work. Their Web site doesn't even feature a single sentence synopsis for Champagne Charlie, and I've never seen it, so you're on our own with this one - but it probably won't air again real soon, so don't miss the opportunity.
Monday 12/03/07
12:45 PM Sundance
Deadline (2004 USA): Ready for some cognitive dissonance? This documentary examines the recently imprisoned former governor of Illinois, George Ryan, who suspended his state death penalty for all the right reasons in the year 2000 and followed it up with a blanket amnesty three years later. Ryan comes across as one of the most thoughtful, moral politicians you could imagine - but is currently serving a 6½ year sentence in a Wisconsin prison camp on federal corruption charges.
10:00 PM Sundance
Last Jews of Libya (2007 USA): Once upon a time, over 30,000 Sephardic Jews lived in the North African desert kingdom of Libya. Today, not a single one remains. Tracing the history of the Roumani family, who lived in the city of Benghazi for hundreds of years, The Last Jews of Libya takes a fascinating look at a diaspora most of us have never heard about. Narrated by Isabella Rossellini and directed by Vivienne Roumani-Denn (yes, she's related, and moved from Benghazi to Boston when she was 12), this is an absolutely fascinating look at this historical footnote, which saw the Jews of Libya survive the World War II depredations of their fascist Italian colonial master only to run adrift on the rocks of Arab nationalism and the perverse decision-making of Colonel Muammar Kaddafy, once an American bogeyman but now a staunch War on Terror ally.