TiVoPlex
TiVoPlex for Tuesday, January 20, 2009 through Monday, January 26, 2009
By John Seal
January 19, 2009
BoxOfficeProphets.com
Tuesday 01/20/09
8:15 AM Turner Classic Movies
Washington Story (1952 USA): Dateline, Washington DC! Congressman Joseph T. Gresham (Van Johnson), renowned for being a tight-lipped ‘human clam', is placed beneath the microscope of ace reporter Alice Kingsley (Patricia Neal). Kingsley is determined to get the big scoop on Gresham and reveal him to be knee deep in Foggy Bottom filth - but, this being the 1950s and all, our public servants are actually squeaky clean paragons of virtue, and there's no story to be had! What's a gal reporter to do? Why, fall in love with her target, of course - only to find her new relationship entangled in the machinations surrounding a controversial bill. Co-starring Sidney Blackmer as a sleazy lobbyist, Washington Story is no All the President's Men, but it's probably as muck-racking as a film could get in 1951. Well, unless that film was digging under the mattress for Commies, which this one determinedly is not.
11:00 AM Starz Edge
City of Men (2007 BRA): A sequel of sorts to Fernando Meirelle's magisterial 2002 study of Rio favela life, City of God, City of Men follows the fraught adventures of residents Ace (Darlan Cunha) and Wallace (Douglas Silva), two 18-year-olds trying to move from the world of juvenile delinquency to adulthood. Ace is coming to terms with fatherhood whilst Wallace is trying to reconnect with his own father, but both of them find old friendships and relationships tugging them back into the gang warfare of their youth. Apparently the film works better if you've seen the TV series it was based upon; I haven't, but still consider it a thoroughly fine, if less then revelatory, follow up to Meirelle's modern classic.
4:00 PM More Max
Control (2007 GB): Do you ever feel so close to the subject of a biopic that you can't bring yourself to actually watch the film? This happened to me at least twice last year: once with What We Do Is Secret, which retold the life of LA punk rock god Darby Crash, and again with this film about Joy Division singer Ian Curtis. When I was a callow youth, the music of Crash's group The Germs and of Joy Division was incredibly important to me, and the fact that both singers killed themselves (Curtis only a month before his group's performance at the Starwood in Hollywood, for which I already had tickets) left raw wounds on my adolescent psyche. The wounds have long since healed, but I'm still not sure I want to live through those times again - hence my initial aversion to Control during its theatrical run. However, there are certainly plenty of reasons to see the film: it was directed by photographer Anton Corbijn, who took some of Joy Division's most iconic publicity shots; features Sam Riley - who bears a startling resemblance to Curtis - in the lead role; and is in black and white, which is almost always a good thing in and of itself. And who knows: maybe this is that special biopic that actually gets everything right. Now wouldn't that be a novelty. Also airs 1/26 on Cinemax at 4:20 AM and 7:20 AM.
Wednesday 01/21/09
1:00 AM More Max
I Confess (1953 USA): One of Alfred Hitchcock's more obscure American productions, I Confess is a nifty little picture about a priest torn between his sacramental vows and his duty to society. Montgomery Clift plays Father Michael Logan, a Canadian clergyman who takes the confession of a killer (O.E. Hasse) who also happens to be employed by the church. That's all well and good, until police suspicions regarding the murder begin to focus on Logan himself. Father Logan can clear his name, of course, but only if he reveals the identity of the man whose confession he took. What to do, what to do? Though lacking much in the way of a McGuffin, I Confess is very satisfying mid-period Hitch, and certainly marks a recovery from its less than overwhelming predecessors, Stage Fright and Under Capricorn. Think of it as The Wrong Man in a cassock.
7:00 PM Sundance
Ghosts (2006 GB): I haven't seen Ghosts yet, but director Nick Broomfield is one of my favorite filmmakers - a younger, cheekier Ken Loach, methinks. This is his take on the 2004 Morecambe Bay tragedy, in which 23 Chinese immigrants were drowned off the coast of Lancashire whilst cockling (fishing for saltwater clams). Shot for British television, Ghosts approaches the story from the perspective of Chinese migrant workers, most of whom are portrayed by...Chinese migrant workers.
Friday 01/23/09
12:15 AM Encore
Dead Heat (1988 USA): An all-star cast elevates this amusing horror-comedy-thriller above the seething mass of crummy '80s action pics. Treat Williams and Joe Piscopo (remember him?) play Roger Mortis (ho ho) and Doug Bigelow, two cops stymied by a crime wave caused by living dead thugs. Yep, zombies are robbing neighborhood stores and rolling old ladies, and it's up to our heroes to put an end to the reanimated recidivism. The clues lead them to Dante Pharmaceuticals, where Roger has an unfortunate encounter with a ‘resurrection machine' and finds himself with only 12 hours to live - and, consequently, 12 hours to solve the case. It's good, bloody fun, and the cast features such luminaries as Vincent Price, Keye Luke, Linnea Quigley, Dick Miller, and Darren McGavin. Oh, and MTV's Martha Quinn - but don't let that put you off.
9:30 AM Turner Classic Movies
Sealed Cargo (1951 USA): This obscure RKO actioner isn't going to win any prizes for originality, but it does offer some good old-fashioned anti-Nazi fun. The film stars Dana Andrews as Pat Bannon, a Nova Scotia whaler who encounters a Danish cargo ship adrift off the coast of Canada. Shot to pieces and abandoned by its crew, the ship has one remaining inhabitant: Captain Skalder (Claude Rains). Assuming the schooner has been torpedoed by a U-boat, Bannon tows it to shore - but soon begins to suspect that the vessel and its commander may have a more sinister provenance. Co-starring Whit Bissell, Onslow Stevens, and my new favorite actor Skip Homeier (deliciously malevolent in the Alfred Hitchcock Presents episode The Motive!), Sealed Cargo is best served with a mug of hot cocoa and a modicum of suspended disbelief.
Saturday 01/24/09
2:00 AM Turner Classic Movies
Hollywood Without Makeup (1963 USA): Did you enjoy Hollywood My Home Town when it played on TCM a few months back? If so, prepare yourself for a second dose of Ken Murray-style nostalgia, wherein our avuncular host unveils another assortment of home movie footage of Golden Age Hollywood. The format is simple: Ken shows a clip of a famous actor or actress, relates an amusing anecdote about same, and then moves on the next clip. You'll be left with a warm, fuzzy glow, even if you haven't been drinking anything stronger than hot cocoa.
7:15 PM Turner Classic Movies
The Man Between (1953 USA): James Mason stars as a sinister blackmailer in this Cold War thriller from director Carol Reed. Mason plays Ivo Kern, a Berliner with some damning information about Bettina (Alraune's Hildegarde Knef), the German wife of Briton Martin Mallison (Geoffrey Toone). The secret: she's actually married to Kern, himself the victim of a blackmail attempt and a co-conspirator in a smuggling racket involving East German refugees. Understandably but unfavorably compared to Reed's Vienna-set thriller The Third Man, The Man Between is an above average feature when considered on its own merits, featuring excellent location photography by Desmond Dickinson and a distinctive John Addison score.
Sunday 01/25/09
7:00 PM Sundance
Manda Bala (Send a Bullet) (2007 BRA): If City of Men didn't sate your appetite for knowledge about economic inequality in Brazil, here's a documentary to fill in the gaps. Director Jason Kohn examines the strange relationship between rich and poor in the Amazon basin, where the rich and corrupt few exploit the economically vulnerable masses whilst the poor rely on kidnapping and ransoms to balance the scales of justice. If you've ever wondered what frogs have to do with money laundering, this is the film for you: likewise, if you enjoy onscreen ear lobe removals, don't miss it under any circumstances. On a more mundane note, Manda Bala won two awards at Sundance 2007, including the Grand Jury Prize.
Monday 01/26/09
5:15 AM IFC
Closely Watched Trains (1965 CZE): This wry black comedy, produced in Czechoslovakia in the run-up to 1968's Prague Spring, stars Vaclav Neckar as a lovelorn and suicide-prone railway worker during World War II. When he's unable to consummate his relationship with an attractive conductress, he turns for advice to a friendly doctor (director Jiri Menzel), who provides him with some confidence-building pointers that enable him to successfully woo a resistance fighter and blow up a German ammunition train to boot. Obscuring its political opinions with a coating of anti-Nazi commentary (much in the way Iranian cinema has relied on stories of childhood to take not-so-subtle digs at the mullahcracy), Closely Watched Trains was a belated hit with American art-house-goers and took home the Best Foreign Film Academy Award in 1968. Also airs at 11:45 PM.
7:00 PM Sundance
Joe Strummer: The Future is Unwritten (2007 GB): Or as I prefer to call him, Saint Joe. The punk rock man of the people, already beatified in 2004's Let's Rock Again!, gets another dollop of hero worship in this Julien Temple rockumentary. How could one man be so good, and do so much good for all the peoples of the world? Tune in to see the truth behind the snark behind the snarling man with the mohawk.