Film
Reviews
DRAMA PASSENGER (PASAZERKA)
(15) 105min
(Second Run DVD retail) O...
‘~-assenger it A film by
Andrzej Munk
951$
Passenger is one of the great. overlooked films to deal with the Holocaust. Andrzej Munk's film stands alongside Night and Fog and Shoah as a seminal examination of this crater in 20th century life and thought. Unlike those films. however. this is not a documentary. and a kind of conditional incomplete work. Munk died during the making of Passenger. and a colleague cobbled together the footage. photographs and voice- over narration. thus giving the film both a rough-hewn quality of a film in the making: while at the same time suggesting that the best approach to such an event is subtly avoiding over-dramatisation. Resernbling in some ways Chris Marker's La Jetee. made around the same time. this disc also contains 47 minutes of extras that include The Last Pictures — a rare documentary about Munk featuring Andrei Wajda and Roman Polanski. A masterpiece.
(Tony McKibbin)
FANTASY DRAMA ANGEL-A (15) 88min (Optimum DVD retail/rental) .00
For Berlin. read Paris. For Wings of Desire. transpose Angel-A. But while Wim Wenders' 803 classic still sparkles. this occasionally charming Luc Besson effort instantly pales by comparison. The
problems are several fold. but the jovial knockabout fun between the titchy. ramshackle loser (Jamel Debbouze) and the Amazonian. messed-up blonde (Rie Rasmussen) fails to ignite. their on- screen passion doused by the suicidal plunge into the Seine.
Nothing is all that it seems here (although the title helps give the ‘mystery' away within about five seconds) as he seemingly saves her from drowning while her celestial powers let him sneak from the grip of the hoods he owes big money to. Only a fool would make Paris look bad on film. so it’s barely a compliment to quuriate in the cinematograpl'iy. while the matey banter between the leads and their clapperboard- wielding boss make the DVD extras equally as irritating.
(Brian Donaldson)
DOCUMENTARY AVENGE BUT ONE OF MY TWO EYES
(E) 100min
(Second Run DVD retail) 0...
Avenge but one of my two eyes (Nekam achat mishtey eynay) A fllm by
Avi Mograbi
Avi Mograbi's tough— minded documentary on the horrors of today's Israeli—Palestine conflict looks at events not from the point of view of Palestinian fanaticism and Israeli brutality. but chiefly from the long
established fanaticism present in Jewish culture that makes a mockery of Israeli reasonableness in the face of Palestinian extremism. Tracing Jewish myths of political suicides through Samson and the hilltop auto-fenestrations at Masada. through to present day Israeli terror groups. Mograbi also. insistently. puts himself into the picture. As a Jewish filmmaker he can‘t always stay objective behind the camera. and there is a great moment of ‘unprofessionalism' where he tears into young Israeli soldiers insisting they should be ashamed of themselves for their bullying actions and lazy power tripping. Extras include a useful essay by Mark Cousins. (Tony McKibbin)
WAR
LA GRANDE ILLUSION
(U) 110min (Optimum DVD retail/rental) 0.00.
After La Grande ///usion won a prize at the Venice Film Festival in 1937. the Nazis declared it 'cinematic enemy number one'. and when Germany invaded France a couple of years later Goebbels had prints of the film deshoyed.Jean Renoir's masterpiece survived. of course. and went on to become one of the rare non-English language films to be nominated for a Best Picture Oscar.
What got the Nazis all fired up was not only the film's deeply affecting indictment of the nature of war. but also Renoir’s dramatisation of the death of the old European order. Set during World War I, the
film focuses on the relationship between three French POWs. an aristocratic captain (played by Jean Gabin). an army mechanic and
DVD ROUNDUP
Valley of the Dolls
Shy, prone to stage sickness, deep depression and melancholia the British comedian Frankie Howerd was still the funniest man ever tp have been born in the city of York, England. A brilliant, stammering pontificate of a stand-up comedian, Howerd’s talent transferred badly to cinema as the woefully underfed double bill Comic Icons: Frankie Howerd (Optimum COO ) testifies. The two films featured here. Up Pompeii and Up the Chastity Belt are cheap relics from a time when Variety was breathing its last breath (the 19703). Howerd deserves so much more. At the time of going to press. however. it was undecided whether Peter Sykes’ fine 1973 comedy horror film The House in Nightmare Park, in which Howerd really showcases his considerable scope was to be included in the set. If so this is probably worth invesfingin.
By comparison Leslie Philips was a man born for cinema. Comic Icons: Leslie Phillips (Optimum 000 ) contains the hodge podge of cheapo comedies which featured Phillips at his best — Please Turn Over (1959), Watch Your Stern (1960), No Kidding (1960) and Crooks Anonymous (1962) are of their time but sweetly amiable in their own caddish way.
Still looking back so I can bear to look forward — HC Potter's breathless and quite wonderful 1941 musical farce Hellzapoppin (Second Sight COO. ), featuring the deranged madcap talents of US vaudeville legends Chic Johnson and Ole Olsen, is worth purchasing. If some of the gags here seem familiar that’s because Monty Python raided this duo’s larder 30 years later without anyone noticing.
More serious chinstrokers out include Dogme doll Jan Dunn’s subtle examination of racism in Ramsgate. Gypo (Fox a... ). starring the brilliant Paul McGann and Jorge Ramirez-Suarez's flawed but occasionally thrilling Mexican thriller Rabbit on the Moon (Guerilla 000 ).
So it’s come to this. Russ Meyer in the red corner and Jacques Tourneur in the blue. Meyer’s Beyond the Valley of the Dolls (Fox .000 ) gets released both as a standalone and alongside the less glorious Valley of the Dolls. It’s got sex. drugs, rock'n’roll and sleaze by the D-cup; they really don’t make them like this anymore. Out of the Past (Universal 0000.), on the other hand, is a deeply vital noir starring Robert Mitchum as a private dick, hired to follow a gambler's demented girlfriend to Mexico. I’m betting on a draw.
Next issue we'll be sitting down with short films. female convicts and Jewish gangsters. Kol Tov! (Paul Dale)
Von Stroheim).
Digitally restored and uncut. this special edition also features two short films by Renoir. (Miles Fielder)
a Jewish banker. but also — controversially — between the captain and his likewise aristocratic German jailer/commandant (Eric
ALL DVDS WERE REVIEWED ON A SYSTEM SUPPLIED AND INSTALLED BY LOUD 8: CLEAR
46 THE LIST 1» 1:3 Feb 2007