Birth of an Unknown Woman

If I were to be the owner of a grand repertory cinema with the ability to curate and put on double features of my choice, I think I found a perfect evening for my patrons. It would be a double feature dedicated to the greatest of all niche genres, "women who lie to themselves", and would feature Max Ophuls' 1948 tragic romance Letter from an Unknown Woman and Jonathan Glazer's reincarnatory love story Birth. The two films really, truly feel as if they couldn't be more dissimilar to one another, and yet as I sat in the Museum of Modern Art watching a 35mm print of Ophuls' seemingly overlooked drama I couldn't help but think the two films, separated by some 56 years of history, were peas in a pod.

It's a beautiful film, for sure, on a visual and dramatic level. The story of a famous pianist who receives a mysterious letter from a woman who claims to have loved him for her entire life only to have been turned away because he was too blind to see who she was. Of course, the tragedy becomes twofold for reasons that seem rather obvious from the opening scene, but that's neither here nor there. For somebody who is notoriously fickle with the tears they shed, I did get quite a bit misty-eyed of Unknown Woman with its delicately fragile lead performance by Joan Fontaine (we were just have a laugh with her last week!) and her tale of operatic woe. The cinematography of Franz Planer is gorgeous with its beautiful rendering of snow and shadow. My particular favourite shot it that overhead shot of Fontaine's "unknown woman" walking away her body casts a shadow as long as her gloom. Just divine.

But where the connection to Birth comes in is remarkable. The films share so much and yet it was something that I only noticed when Unknown Woman, which I had obviously never seen before, utilised the scene of an opera in a very similar way to Glazer's. As Fontaine's Lisa takes her seat to watch Mozart's The Magic Flute, she has just been confronted with the realisation that her one true love has returned. Whilst not quite in the same mysterious fashion as the situation that confronts Nicole Kidman's character in Birth, but the two characters wrestle with their feelings as the power of the music wash over them. It's remarkable how similar the scenes and the character motivations behind them are. Sadly, we are not treated to a masterful three-minute sequence of beguiling close-up in Letter from the Unknown Woman like we are in Birth - I suppose this very mainstream-leaning romance film wasn't quite the place for such a visual move in 1940s Hollywood - but the effect is one and the same. It works.

Image source, FIPRESCI

From there, the two films felt like nothing less than sisters. The stories of Fontaine's Lisa and Kidman's Anne seemingly etched together as they each emerge out of the intimidating shadow of the men who took their former flame's place and decide to persue something that seems foolhardy and destined for failure, but which neither women can truly come to terms with until it's staring them blankly in the face. Both women go to personally tragic places in order to be with the love of their life, only to have it suggested by the man himself that it wasn't that all along. They mourn very obviously on the inside, harbouring long-gestating pain within them, while putting on an external face of strength. And even though the man at the centre of Unknown Woman is obviously a very dashing, handsome man, and the boy at the centre of Birth is, well, a boy, both stories tell a very salient point on what the idea of an all-encompassing love can do to us in the long term if it is interrupted by the natural order of things. Funnily enough, in Unknown Woman the love is interrupted by a birth, and in Birth it is interrupted by death. Make of that as you wish.

That they also share the aforementioned stunning cinematography, plus great musical scores (Desplat's work on Birth remains one of the greatest things my ears have ever heard), and bona fide immaculate performances by the respective lead actors are just cherries on top. Birth has been said to have been influenced by Kubrick, which I think is definitely on point to a degree, but having now see Ophuls' film I can't separate the two. Nor do I want to, even if my mind is just playing tricks. I now covet both of these films separately and together. I want to soak in their opulence and live in a world where I get to yearn for somebody with the strength and dedication as them. Although, hopefully, my yearning would have a happier ending.

Note:
I was thankfully able to view Letter from an Unknown Woman in 35mm print form, which was a wonderful relief. MoMA are screening it again on Monday at 5pm so hopefully I have maybe inspired you to jump on the subway to 53rd street. Coincidentally, Birth will also be screening on 5 June and 12 June at MoMA in a tribute season to cinematographer Harris Savides. I have been told by the MoMA people that it too is screening in 35mm. If somebody would put them together, side-by-side, I think you'd have one hell of devastating double.

31 Horrors: The Howling (#4)

Wherein I attempt to watch 31 horror films over the course of October. 31 horror films that I have never seen before, from obscure to acclaimed classics. We'll see how well I go in actually finding the time to watch and then write about them in some way.

As surprising as it sounds, I had never seen "that werewolf movie with ET's mom in it", before last night. Oh, of course, I'd seen Philippe Mora's The Howling III: The Marsupials before, but not the original? Have you heard about that third Howling movie? It's the one that features Dame Edna presenting the Best Actress Oscar and the winner turning into a werewolf live on stage. Not to mention all of that werewolf ballet that goes on.


Wikipedia informs us that "Nicole Kidman was originally slated" for the lead role and we can only help she filmed a screen test and that one day it emerges online. One suspects a zealous producer updated that information with a porky, but we'll let it slide because the imagery of it is so deliciously absurd. Not quite as absurd as the critic quotes at the end of that trailer there, but absurd nonetheless. Anyway. ET's mom being chased by werewolves? Yes!

I had no idea upon pressing play on the Blu-ray that The Howling was about what it was about. I guess I'd figured it was another standard stalk-and-slash werewolf movie, but instead I found myself getting quite wrapped up in the story of a television news reporter and her attempts to cope with a profane stalker. The initial scenes set in a scuzzball Times Square pornography shop were surprising. Even more so was that extended shots of rape porn being played! They earned that R rating pretty early on, yes. It was certainly nice watching The Howling, which is about some smart people trying to solve a mystery - albeit, a mystery that some seem all too willing to believe rather quickly - rather than the more simplistic werewolf movie I assumed it was. Of course, thinking back on it, I've probably had that assumption about every singe werewolf movie I've ever watched.

The biggest mystery of all, of course, is how on Earth you Americans sleep at night? According to the movies and TV that I've grown up watching, y'all leave your bedroom curtains open all night so that perfectly angled light (moonlight? street lights?) can filter in and illuminate the room just so for filming. It's a wonder you can get any shut eye with such bright lights stretching across the bedroom in the middle of the night!

(I jest, of course, but it's always made me laugh so silly it is.)

I don't really have anything particularly observant to say. It's fun, Dee Wallace is Dee Wallace, there's some fun scary scenes, the ending is a hoot, and it looks great. I would have preferred more of the mystery solving angle, but that's just me and I always enjoy that type of stuff. It's Joe Dante, man, what else is there to really say other than, sure, it's not quite Ginger Snaps, but not many werewolf movies are. Hey! I never said I'd have anything good to say about these movies I'm watching.

Curious to note that, completely by accident, I've watched two films this October that deal with transformation from human to animal. First it was Cat People and now this. Actually, it's not really curious at all since so much of horror is about transformation, it's just that some films utilise it in a very literal fashion whereas others do not. Even The Signal and The Stone Tape were about transformation, but less so of the purely physical world and more sensory (memories into visions, sanity into madness). Hmmm...

Hit Me With Your Best Shot: Moulin Rouge!

Lift your skirt up for Moulin Rouge! It turned ten years old last week (it was released in Australia on 24 May) and that means it's been ten whole years of deep affection for Baz Luhrmann's extravagant, revolutionist movie musical. I saw it eight times at the cinema and would happily see it again if it, like other classic musicals, was rereleased at anniversary intervals (hello Astor Theatre). To say I was "obsessed" would be putting it mildly. I hailed it the no. 2 film of the decade and it would have been an east no. 1 if David Lynch hadn't thrown his hat into the ring in the same year with Mulholland Drive.

When the mission came to choose a "best shot" for Nathaniel Rogers' Hit Me With Your Best Shot project at The Film Experience I quite obviously found it a daunting task indeed. Visually, Moulin Rouge! is one of the grandest films you'll ever come across. A large amount of the film's enjoyment hangs on Catherine Martin's art direction and costume design (Oscar winners, each) and the cinematography, editing, make-up, visual effects, etc, and how they all connect via Luhrmann's astonishing directorial vision. The film is obviously much, much more than the visuals, but this is a feature dedicated primarily to what we perceive as aesthetically pleasing so we'll stick to that path.

The first shot that I considered was the moment Kylie Minogue enters the picture as "The Green Fairy", a hyper hallucinatory after effect of drinking Absinthe. Minogue's appearance at nine minutes into the run time is like a eyebrow raising dare to the audience - "Can you handle this? Here's Kylie fuckin' Minogue!"


And then but mere seconds later - "Oh, I'm sorry. You're not a fan of Kylie Minogue? HERE ARE TEN MORE!"


It's as if Baz Luhrmann dared himself to out-camp Strictly Ballroom and Romeo + Juliet combined and commits himself to it like it's going out of fashion.

There are whole lot of micro shots within this opening "Welcome to the Moulin Rouge" montage sequence that would be worthy contenders for the title of "best shot". One of my favourites is the following of Lara Mulcahy's Môme Fromage swinging around with her bosom, only partially housed within the hot pink polka dot cancan dress, sticking out like it's on a platter and her face giving of the expression of unbridled sexy frivolity.



The next shot I considered was this one of just romanticism - and yet, it's one of the very sort of shots that the movie's "haters" would point to as a reason why it's awful. As the lights pop up all over Paris to the tune of Ewan McGregor's voice, it's a gorgeous moment that continues Luhrmann's determination to throw as much at the audience as possible. It's followed mere seconds later, however, by a far more personal and simple shot of Nicole Kidman reacting that is sublime.



There's something about this shot of six bald-headed men in tails sitting around a piano during the "Come What May" number that I really like. I used it in my Black & White Friday entry for Moulin Rouge! and it looked better in black and white so I'm not using it as my "best shot". Still, I do like it for reasons I can't quite put my finger on. Perhaps its just the pure oddity of the scenario that does it for me?


"The Show Must Go On" is perhaps the film's most underrated number. It's exclusion from the soundtrack certainly didn't help, but I think it's Kidman's finest vocal work and is filled with amazing shots like the ones below.




And, really, who can't love this shot from the "Come What May" climax?


The "El Tango de Roxanne" sequence is filled with potential best shots. How about these two, which I absolutely adore (Caroline O'Connor... I wish you'd return to the silver screen!)



But the "Roxanne" shot that I very nearly went with was this one. In fact, I had decided upon it until I revisited an earlier scene just to make sure and in fact found one I'd realised I was silly for not chosen before. Just look at this shot and you'll surely understand why I was so close to hailing it as the best. That deep rich navy blue surrounded by a pool of black, Nicole Kidman's face bathed in light, but silhouetted by a lacy curtain that's accentuated further towards the bottom, adding a lovely visual flair. It's a truly astonishing image and it reminds me of this wonderful poster for The Barefoot Contessa, but upon further thought I'm glad I went with the shot I eventually used because, if anything, this one shot is too dark for a film like Moulin Rouge!


A film like Moulin Rouge! needs to be represented by something brash, bold and bright. Something that's as in your face as the film itself. While the following shot, of an unknown actress' undergarments, would perhaps be seen as a crude and throwaway shot - nothing more than one out of a thousand shots that Luhrmann and his editor Jill Billcock throw at the audience amidst the Moulin Rouge introductory sequence that is such a sensory overload - but I think it represents so much about Luhrmann's movie. It is brash, it is cold, it is bright. It's colours leap out of the screen, the sex oozes from the frame and its imagery is shoved in the audience's face. Hit me with your best shot? Here it is:

Review: Rabbit Hole

Rabbit Hole

Dir. John Cameron Mitchell

Year: 2010

Aus Rating: M

Running Time: 90mins

Grief is given a hefty workout in Rabbit Hole, a searing drama that charts the parallel paths a married couple take after the death of their only child. It’s an unfair tragedy when a parent outlives their child, exemplified by the film being set nine months after four-year-old Danny’s death; you only get nine months to be excited about the imminent birth of a child, and yet the grieving never ends. Becca (Nicole Kidman) and Howie (Aaron Eckhart) know they’ll never experience another day of their lives that isn’t impacted by memories of Danny’s death, but they do what they can in such a pressing situation.

Read the rest at Trespass Magazine
And given how much I've spoken about this movie over the past year, you probably should read it just so we can draw a line under it. I found it interesting that on one side of me at the screening earlier this week, one of my esteemed colleagues was crying and an emotional wreck once the credits rolled, and on the other side of me, yet another colleague, say laughing and doodling in her notebook. Maybe you should go and find out for yourself?

Review: Greenberg

Greenberg
Dir. Noah Baumbach
Year: 2010
Aus Rating: M
Running Time: 107mins

Writer and director Noah Baumbach has become more and more esoteric with each passing film. Where his Oscar-nominated breakthrough with The Squid and the Whale was an accessible take on Woody Allen, Margot at the Wedding proved to be a bitter pill for many to swallow with its focus on Nicole Kidman’s sarcastic sister routine. With Greenberg, Baumbach turns to Ben Stiller’s Roger Greenberg, a selfish, privileged and aimless soul whose only purpose in life is to take anti-depression medications and make everyone around him feel worthless. Fresh out of the hospital, Roger housesits for his brother and must navigate the world he hasn’t experienced in a long time.

Read the rest at Trespass Mag
Writing this review just made me remember, most of all, how good Nicole Kidman is in Margot at the Wedding. For all of that film's faults, it was always fascinating to watch Nicole Kidman walk that delicate tightrope walk of a performance, which is something that Ben Stiller lacks here. He's always Ben Stiller Acting Depressed and never really much more. Greta Gerwig, however, continues the Noah Baumbach train of fantastic female actor performances in his films. Note, I have not seen Kicking and Screaming, but I should try and get to that at some point.

Black + White Friday: Moulin Rouge!

Sorry for the lateness, but as I originally wrote, yesterday was a very long day and so here I am doing this now. Voila!


It's is probably not at all surprisingly to learn that I spend a lot of my day thinking about Baz Luhrmann's Australia and then yesterday I had a hankering to rewatch (for the millionth time) Moulin Rouge!, the film that gave birth to what will likely be an entire lifetime of devotion to the man and anticipation of every single project he will ever embark on. However, upon rewatching it last night, I decided to take a different tact with Moulin Rouge! in this "Black+White Friday" series. Most of the other movies I have screencapped for you guys have had me trying to turn the original into something else, something classical that I think the originally was going for (see, for example, The Others and The Texas Chain Saw Massacre), but while it would be easy to do this for any musical and say "let's see what it would look like if it were made in the heyday of the Astaire and Rogers!" it is impossible to do that with Moulin Rouge! It could never have been made in any other time, by any other person or in any other way, which is why it's such a case of bravura filmmaking.

So, instead, I merely found a bunch of moments that I thought would look nice in black and white - there are plenty - because to try and drain this or this of colour is both silly and a crime against humanity/cinema/life/etc, don't you think?


Upskirt shot! How rude. But seriously, what an incredibly shot.


Proof positive that Nicole Kidman would've been a star in any generation. Not every actor can look so classic in both colour and black and white, but she does it. But, then again, we already knew this, didn't we?


This shot has always made me chuckle. Something about it makes me think it should be in a horror movie about a brood of bald men who come together on Halloween to steal the souls of children (or something to that effect).


One of the (many) film posters I have saved onto my computer is one for the 1954 film The Barefoot Contessa (here is an alternate version of the one I have, I can't remember where I found it unfortunately) and it wasn't until I took this grab that I realised how similar the two shots are. Hmmm.


This moment reminds me of Guy Maddin's Dracula: Pages from a Virgin's Diary. Strange, but true.


Oh Kerry Walker, bless you. And as an aside, I actually think this scene is Kidman's best in the entire movie and perhaps one of the purest in the film. A lot of people think the musical scenes only work in this movie because of the production Luhrmann puts behind it, but this tiny moment shows there's true power in it and that Kidman actually does have a good voice. I am indeed quite interested to see how she handles her next musical, Nine.


"The Show Must Go On" is routinely one of my favourite unappreciated moments from the film and I remain adamant that it is Kidman's strongest moment vocally. I do have a random question for all you Oscar-philes out there. How long was it between nominations for a musical performance? Surely Kidman's Best Actress nod in 2002 was the first for quite some time, right? Anybody know? I could try and research it myself but, ugh, effort!


How cool and retro-horror is this shot? Answer: Very.


Funny story: I once received an e-mail from somebody claiming to be Lionel Haft (who plays The Duke's manservant "Warner") - and who would fake that, honestly? - who was angry at me for ripping apart his performance in the terrible schlocky Aussie crapfest Solo. I mean, it doesn't top receiving an e-mail from Rena Riffel (another true story), but it still amuses me.


Similar much

Black + White Friday: Birth

Apologies for not being around last week to do this feature, but by the time I got home at 11.45pm (and having left the house at 6am, too!) I had been having a bad day and didn't feel like screencapping if you know what I mean!


My affections for Jonathan Glazer's elegiacal 2004 film Birth are quite well documented. Best film of 2004! Best performance by Nicole Kidman! Best score in modern cinema! etc! Well, I found it odd that I have never even considered using the film for "Black+White Friday", especially since the film is beautiful and I think Harris Savides' dreamy cinematography will prove equally as intoxicating in black and white as it does in those near-sepia candlelight hues that it is bathed it to perfection.


I think it's quite obvious to everyone and sundry that Jonathan Glazer was fixated by Nicole Kidman while making this movie (understandable, really). And she looks stunning here. If she were around during the early days of cinema she would have been worshiped with the greats.


We're all aware how gorgeous Nicole looks bathed in candlelight, right? RIGHT?!


Aah, like the family dramas of yore.


Because she's just so gosh darn beautiful, don't you think? I know a lot of people don't like her anymore because they're "distracted" by whatever surgery she has had done, but I say her acting is just as captivating as anything else about her.


Following on from the above point, any actor who can keep an audience's attention during a silent three-minute sequence with nothing more but a closeup of their face is clearly doing something right. I highly doubt Phillip Seymour Hoffman could do that.


I may not care for Cameron Bright in anything I've seen him in - he's the weakest part of Birth for what it's worth - but, damn, was that not perfect casting? Talk about creepy! If I was to believe anybody was a reincarnation of somebody else I guess I'd believe him.


Doesn't this shot feel like it should be taken right out of Rosemary's Baby? With scary Danny Huston and Lauren Bacall in the backgrounds with their black eyes and the scary Ruth Gordon-esque Zoe Caldwell in the front. Or a zombie movie.



This shot here feels like it's from some 1950s French movie, no?


Fact, Anne Heche looks scarier in black and white. Fact, Anne Heche is amazing. Shame that her career is, basically, over. She is so good in this movie too! Also, doesn't she remind you of Sissy Spacek a little bit here, with that straight hair and plain face?


What have I said before about not letting Nicole near water! It's a recipe for disaster.

Such an amazing, beautiful, powerful movie. I light up a little bit whenever somebody says something kind about it because, for a while there, I felt I was entirely alone.

Black + White Friday: The Others

Alejandro Amenábar's 2001 suspense tale The Others is already pretty monochromatic, so I thought for this week's edition for Black+White Friday I'd take it one step further and turn it into a two shade flick, the movie that I have a sneaking suspicion that Amenábar wanted to make, but didn't have the chance (thanks Harvey Weinstein!)


Already it has the authentic feel of a black and white film. A time when blacks weren't exactly always "BLACK", but a murky grey. Also, why does Kidman seem more convincing in this one screenshot as Samantha from Bewitched than she did in the entire film version of that series? Bizarre...


I love the look of these moors, clouded in mist. No matter what the film - think Hitchcock's The 39 Steps or Frankenstein - they always look superb on camera. Don't you agree?


I'm not sure how many times I paused my VLC player on moments like these of Nicole Kidman looking frightened, but I did it a lot because there are a lot of them and she always looks so good in them. I can't help but be transfixed.


I always found it slightly weird, but intriguing, that Alakina Mann who was cast as Kidman's daughter looks, at times, eerily similar to Linda Blair from The Exorcist. Seriously. Next time you watch The Others keep an eye out for it.


This was a stunning little scene wasn't it? From the music cues, to the red herrings, to the voice, to this moment where a previously closed door appears to be closing again by itself. I love this movie.


I feel traumatised Nicole - something she has gotten down to a fine art - is scarily fascinating to watch. No wonder Lars Von Trier wanted to torture her and make her suffer in Dogville, huh?


I think that Javier Aguirresarobe's photography is, perhaps, the best framing of Nicole Kidman... ever? Even moreso than Birth or Moulin Rouge!, there are moments in The Others - like this scene, which feels like a lost outtake from Jacques Tourneur's Cat People - that are so beautiful and you can't do anything but stare are Nicole. Gorgeous.


Sorry, but you can clearly tell that I got a bit obsessed while collating this entry. How could I not? I love that this screenshot feels like 'Merchant Ivory Does Hitchcock'!


Remember earlier up there I mentioned Frankenstein?


I chose to include this moment because it's probably the film's biggest jump moment. Even seeing it in pictures though you may not be able to fully remember how much your bones jumped out of their skin with this appeared as if from nowhere. Those eyeballs are creep no matter what colour scale they're in!

I think we can all agree that The Others looks sublime in black and white. It reminds me of a mix between Robert Wise's The Haunting, Bryan Forbes' Seance on a Wet Afternoon and the Val Lewton RKO horror films of the 1940s, which I think is a mighty fine combination. But, if nothing else, it's an absolutely gorgeous reminder of how amazing Nicole Kidman is. This film, and Kidman's performance, is actually far far better than I remember (and I liked it immensely before now), which is more than I can ask for, really.