Duck, You Sucker, Sergio Leone's Forgotten Film 

Most people know Sergio Leone for his "Dollars Trilogy", three films that starred Clint Eastwood, A Fistful of Dollars, For A Few Dollars More, and The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly. Fewer people are familiar with his "Once Upon A Time Trilogy": Once Upon a Time in the West, Once Upon a Time... Revolution, and Once Upon a Time in America.

Of all his films, the middle film of the Once Upon a Time series, Once Upon a Time... Revolution, released in the U.S. as A Fistful of Dynamite, before being given the title Leone preferred, Duck, You Sucker. Is perhaps the most overlooked Leone film. Set in 1913 Mexico, it tells the story of I.R.A. terrorist John Mallory and Mexican Bandito Juan Miranda, who team up to pull a bank job and become unlikely players in the Mexican Revolution.

While the narrative is far murkier than previous and subsequent Leone films, that's part of the film's charm. Whereas Leone films (and Spaghetti Westerns in general) tend to have characters whose motivations are somewhat concealed, Duck, You Sucker takes things a step further as the John and Juan's paths cross, diverge, and recross through a story where not everything is explained, making it feel much more like real history than mere popcorn theater.

If you really want to sink your teeth into a prime Spaghetti Western that doesn't star Clint Eastwood, this would be a good film to check out.

Mississippi Burning - *****

If you look at any film guide from the period, Mississippi Burning usually rates about 3 out of 5 stars. I'm not sure why this film, which was nominated for a number of Academy Awards (including a win for best cinematography), was generally though of as just a bit above average by most critics.

Whether it was the controversy over liberties with history (as the director often points out, it's a dramatization based on real events with fictitious characters, not a documentary), or it just got lost in the crowd in a year that also gave us Bull Durham, Die Hard, Rain Man, Who Framed Roger Rabbit, and the even bigger Willem Dafoe film, The Last Temptation of Christ, but whatever the case, it was clearly an oversight as Mississippi Burning is now, justifiably considered a classic.

There are many strong performances here, including Brad Dourif as a racist deputy, and Frances McDormand as his wife, but the film hangs on the two key leads played by Willem Dafoe and Gene Hackman, two actors who can almost always be counted on to deliver electrifying performances.

The film deftly weaves almost every emotion in the book together in a tale about the FBI's investigation of the murder of Civil Rights activists in 1964 Mississippi. It is a detective story a little reminiscent of the 60s film In the Heat of the Night, with a northern detective paired with a (in this case former) Southern Sheriff, but in this case the tale is rooted in truth. Where it takes liberties with the facts, it does so in the interest of conveying the emotions of the time, and thus remains a relevant and powerful piece of film making.

Madhouse - ***

Madhouse is like every other Vincent Price horror film, which is to say it has a mediocre script buoyed by Price's performance, meaning on a scale of 1-10 it would rank about a five or six.

But, Madhouse has a couple extras going for it that make it just a tiny bit more enjoyable. First, Price's co-star is the one and only Peter Cushing, and the scenes they share are excellent, even when they aren't talking about anything consequential.

Second is the gimmick that Price and Cushing are playing aging horror movie actors, in other words, characters like unto themselves. This not only adds believability, but allows the producers to throw in a bunch of clips from old Vincent Price films as if they were showing clips from his character Paul's past work. For the horror movie buff, that means the chance to pick out actor and movie references throughout.

If you've seen no other Vincent Price horror films, I wouldn't recommend starting with this one - not just because it's not one of his best, but also because the funnest part of this movie are its references to all his other movies. In other words, watch this after you've seen the best of his 50s and 60s work.

The Royal Tenenbaums - *****

Before The Royal Tenenbaums was even made, I knew that Wes Anderson was a unique voice on the cinematic landscape, even if I wasn't quite sold on the cult popularity of Bottle Rocket and Rushmore. To me it seemed that Anderson was mixing a certain amount of populist storytelling with an obvious use of kitschy retro styling in a calculated-to-appeal to Generation Y approach that I found simultaneously entertaining and eye-rolling.

But then came The Royal Tenenbaums, and everything just clicked. Despite all the accolades for later efforts (like the recent Grand Budapest Hotel), The Royal Tenenbaums, to my mind is Anderson's greatest film creation to date.

A lot of the credit goes to the ensemble cast. In Luke Wilson, Gwyneth Paltrow, Ben Stiller, Angelica Huston, Bill Murray, Owen Wilson, Danny Glover, Alec Baldwin, and especially lynchpin Gene Hackman (who is always outstanding in every role he plays); Anderson has assembled a cast of some of the most underrated dramatic actors in Hollywood around the turn of the millennium - either because they were still up-and-coming, or in the case of the more seasoned veterans, largely overlooked actors whose greatest successes were from the 70s and 80s. In both cases, the talent was eager to prove themselves, steal scenes and chew the scenery, which works well with Anderson's everybody's-quirky-and-nobody-is-the-straight-man type storytelling.

But The Royal Tenenbaums hits what Bottle Rocket and Rushmore were aiming for. By acknowledging from the start that the titular Tenenbaum family is not normal, the lack of a straight man in a major role as a point of reference does not hinder this film the way it does with those prior films.

Like all Wes Anderson films, The Royal Tenenbaums demands that the audience sit tight, give up control, and observe events as they are spoon fed, the story by a narrator (in this case the affable Alec Baldwin). But if you are prepared to accept that, it can be quite engrossing for all its contrived glory.

Captain America: The Winter Soldier ****
Captain America: The Winter Soldier may not be the perfect Marvel movie, but it is the best of this year's crop, and possibly the best solo Marvel superhero (non-team) movie so far.

Why? Because Captain America: The Winter Soldier has learned what all superhero films should learn - that the superhero doesn't make the movie, it should first be a good story - science fiction, mystery, thriller, whatever - and then the superhero should be placed in that story. Too often superhero movies are simply 'origin' stories for the superhero and they fight a supervillain - the end. Captain America: The Winter Soldier is actually a thriller, specifically, a spy thriller (ala James Bond), where the protagonist happens to be Captain America. That's the difference, and what a difference it makes.

Could it be better? Yes, there's still a lot of room for improvement here. Robert Redford appears as a member of a covert organization (SHIELD) that is compromised from within (hmmm... where have we seen this before *cough* Three Days of the Condor... *cough* Spy Game), and from the get-go, you just know he's going to turn out to be the bad guy, but O.K.

Also the 'comic book physics' get pushed a little too far at times. Captain America should be able to do superhuman things to a point, but he really isn't Superman, just an augmented human. Not only are some of the things a little too physics defying, but by making him such an uber-badass all the time it tends to paint him into a corner. For example, at one point he surrenders when he's surrounded by a group of armed men pointing guns at him. That makes sense. But what doesn't make sense is why he's surrendering to a group of armed men pointing guns at him this time, when all throughout the film he's taken on groups of them, including an aircraft shooting at him - with him just dodging the bullets, and now suddenly he thinks he can't do it again, despite having done it just an hour ago?

But those things can be overlooked given the smooth forward momentum of the entire story. Large parts for Nick Fury, Black Widow, and Falcon also really enhance the feeling that is a story about a world of super spies (Hell, even Batroc 'zee leeper' makes an appearance as a terrorist), and not just a Captain America saves the world type 'superhero' film.

That does mean sacrificing a little of the patriotic American-centric nature of the character (hey, you knew they were going to do that anyway, given the reliance of the studio on foreign market success), but at least it does include some commentary on the state of the U.S., with a subtext hinting at the NSA bulk data collection, and the controversial drone program downplayed but evident.

Captain America: The Winter Soldier has raised the bar a little for superhero movies going forward, let's see if its successors are up to the challenge.

The Wicker Man (2006) **
(and also ****)
I've given this film both a two star rating (and that's being generous) for overall quality, and also four stars for kitschy fun, because this attempt at remaking the 1973 cult classic of the same name goes so badly off-track that it becomes one of the most unintentionally hilarious bad films of the past decade.

Hollywood remakes in general tend to go poorly, especially remakes of classics, but there are so many missteps here it boggles the mind. The original was an English film and contrasted a believable stiff-upper-lip modern Brit encountering a pagan cult still practicing ancient Celtic rites in the remote islands off the coast of Scotland. As such, it was completely believable. This version however decided to relocate the cult to the U.S. of course, which automatically stretches the credibility. But not somewhere in, say, New England, oh no, it was set in the islands of the Pacific Northwest, a place Hollywood loves to shoot for budgetary reasons.

But taking the ancient Celtic cult about as far away from the British Isles as possible in the U.S., save maybe Alaska, was just the beginning. The lead role was given to none other than Nic Cage, whose (ahem) limited acting range have helped make bombs out of a lot of other genre pictures. Here Cage does not disappoint, turning in a performance so wooden that you might think the title refers to his character.

Cage plays police officer Edward Malus, who goes to the island to investigate the disappearance of a girl who looks identical to a girl who he failed to save in a car crash a few months earlier. Despite near constant flashbacks, to that scene, it's never explained, with even such details as who was driving either vehicle left completely unresolved.

These annoying, persistent flashbacks aren't the only intrusive and unexplained scenes though. Soon Malus starts having flashbacks to things that never actually happened in what is obviously a desperate attempt by the filmmakers to inject some sort of visual shock value into the otherwise lifeless film. In one particularly funny sequence, Malus rescues a drowned girl only to flashback to not having rescued the drowned girl, before flashing back to having rescued the drowned girl, before showing in the present that he hasn't in fact rescued anyone - all through a series of jump cuts. Despite this and other attempts at shock value, this PG-13 film is actually tamer, with nothing to rival the pagan debauchery of its predecessor of more than 30 years!

Eventually Malus actually has to don a bear costume (that is funnier than the 'pagan' outfits Dan Akroyd and Tom Hanks wear in the comedy remake of Dragnet) in order to infiltrate one of the cult's sacred rites.

There's so much more I could go into, but I'm going to leave it at that and say grab some beers and some buds and check this out (the theatrical version is preferred over the 'unrated' version for maximum lulz), you will be rolling on the floor with laughter before the first ten minutes are up!

The Artist *****

It's kind of ironic that a tale of the Golden Age of Hollywood like this could only be made outside of Hollywood today - by the French no less.

But it kind of makes sense, when you think about it. It's a day and age where Hollywood is only interested in producing enormous budget tent pole films; and Hollywood doesn't seem to have a lot of respect for its own history, judging by all the sequels and reboots that care more about CGI than story.

The French however have a long history of appreciation for the art form of cinema (they can after all make a strong case for having originated the medium). And that appreciation shines through in spades in the film The Artist.

The Artist tells the story of two actors, one seasoned leading man 'George Valentin', and the other rising starlet 'Peppy Miller', in the early days of motion pictures. The two have a rocky romance complicated by the fact that the man's career is thrown into a tailspin with the advent of 'talkies' just as the woman's begins blossoming. No doubt inspired by similar events in the lives of real stars of the silver screen.

But, The Artist, does more than tell a story set in that time period, it actually adopts the style of the period, being entirely black and white and with musical accompaniment replacing dialogue. More than that, though, the film actually emulates the storytelling form of the period, there is a human-ness in Jean Dujardin's George Valentin that is reminiscent of the kind of character Charlie Chaplin or Buster Keaton might play, a good-natured fellow buffeted by fate.

The Artist is one of the best films about the Golden Age of film ever produced, and is highly recommended.