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In a Lonely Place (1950)
Not that great Bogart as they say...
In a Lonely Place is one of the two successful movies produced by Santana Productions, company owned by Bogart himself and named after his yacht. Humphrey appears in a role of down-on-luck screenwriter Dixon Steele who struggles to write a good script.
Without saying anything else that might be considered a spoiler, his acting was highly praised by back-then movie critics and is considered as one of his best movies ever made. I personally don't agree with these critics and found his acting a bit .. weird, maybe because he was visibly getting old and his wild lifestyle started to take its toll on him.
What is also important to mention is how did Gloria Grahame get the main role (which later become one of her finest ever)? Well, Laurel Gray was initially supposed to be portrayed by Humphrey's wife (and fine actress indeed) Lauren Bacall but she was contracted to Warner Bros and they decided to not release her of their contract for the movie produced by independent Santana Productions in a fear of becoming a threat to their monopoly. The second option was casting Ginger Rogers (the big star of 30's and 40's) but director Nicholas Ray stepped in and decided to cast his own wife - Gloria Grahame. That later turned out to be one of the few good decisions he has made in regard to this movie. Despite the Gloria's fine acting, her marriage with Ray was deteriorating, ending up with Ray catching Gloria in bed with his 13 year old son.. well, she sure was a man- eater, lol.
At last but not least, we have to compare the final version with its novel predecessor by Dorothy Hughes. In a novel, Dixon Steele is only pretending to be a screenwriter, in fact he is just living lavish lifestyle thanks to money from his rich uncle. He is also helping his friend Det. Stg. Brub track a serial killer and is later exposed that the serial killer is no one else but Steele himself. All this that happened in a novel did not happen in a movie itself so if you haven't watch the movie yet, don't worry - the story is a bit different. Writer Hughes describes Steele as a violent psycho and misogynist (back then wide known American social issue) and who knows, maybe Humphrey didn't have to play this part much ;) The ending itself was also changed (thank you Ray!) and in my personal opinion that affected the movie in not exactly favorable way. I won't describe the different but let's say that tragic ending would suit the whole movie better.
To sum this up, movie is definitely worth watching. Besides Gloria Grahame, I'd like to point out fine acting of Frank Lovejoy and Martha Stewart whose presence I enjoyed a lot. Altogether 85%.
Grand Theft Auto III (2001)
GTA3 is rightfully considered a classic, revolution in PC games.
As someone, who has been actively playing PC/console games since mid 90's, I dare to say I've seen a lot. Times are passing by and trends are changing too with my favorite genres as RTS , adventures being on decline while FPS , visual novels are on the verge of its popularity now.
My apologies to all for the first sentimental paragraph but I felt like I want to mention that due to the fact that GTA3 is more than 15 years old game now. The question is - is Grand Theft Auto 3 the best game (within franchise) made so far? I dare to say "NO", as every single time a new GTA comes out, gaming community is stunned with graphics, options etc.. but I can say that no game is going to be as revolutionary as GTA3 was back in the time.
Having played GTA2 for tens, maybe hundreds of playtime, seeing and hearing news of GTA3 was something unimaginable. EVERYONE was talking about it.. people were reading printed magazines and early reading every preview / news / reviews available and every game picture was like idol, no matter if it was gameplay or not. When we finally got our hands on the game, the feeling was just .. hard to describe. From isometric view of GTA2, Rockstar threw us into open world fully in 3D graphics and that was the main factor of its legacy. It was first (or one of) fully open world game in 3D - no more square boxes watched from the sky, you saw 3D models of people walking on the street, you could steal any car you want and of course - the legendary teenage approach back then was "you can get a hooker, have sex with her and then kill her with a baseball bat to get your money back"!!! I know it might sound lame nowadays but back then, all kids in school were talking about things like this. Some people played arcades, some played strategies, others preferred adventures - but everyone was playing GTA3.
Nowadays, graphics and options might not be appealing anymore but me and all my friends will never forget Asuka whipping her peons, Toni Cipriani and his mother (we never saw), mechanic 8 Ball, Diablos - the lamest gang with the best car, Jamaican gang with their shitty lowriders and Columbians with jungle-like hats and boots in pick up trucks. And of course, at last but not least, Italian gang with their Sentinels always tunes up to classical music. Nothing can beat those memories, ever.
Gilda (1946)
Godlike Rita Hayworth at her best
Gilda is a story of one femme fatale (a damn good one), German/nazi Argentinian cartel and one good guy (Gilda's ex). Honestly said, the plot around German cartel was weak and almost annoyance in otherwise magnificent movie surrounding Rita Hayworth and Glenn Ford.
While Rita was already well established in 1946 as Goddess (citing Uncle Pio here), Glenn Ford was still quite unknown actor and this was rightfully his breakthrough role. The story is similar to one of Notorious, difference being only magnificent Rita Hayworth (sorry Ingrid) and really tacky ending.
Fun fact 1: Movie's notorious song "Put the blame on Mame" during Rita's famous striptease scene (she won't drop much guys, sorry) is sung by unknown Canadian singer Anita Ellis BUT movie contains also second version of the song, slower guitar version which is original sung by Rita Hayworth. How sweet!
Fun fact 2: Original black dress by Jean Louise Rita was wearing in this movie was sold on eBay just few years ago. I was unable to find out who is the lucky collector / what is the price of this dress nowadays though :)
Nightmare Alley (1947)
Tyrone Powell in quite different position
When I was about to watch this movie, I have read / heard few unfavorable reviews and so I have been expecting 2 hours of not very convincing acting and circus, which is not my favorite setting either. Oh I couldn't be more wrong here! 110 minutes passed smoothly and my heartbeat was increased for a while after final credits ended already - and it worked without deaths too.
But let's start from the beginning... Nightmare Alley is based on the same name novel written by William Lindsay Gresham (and in retrospective this is obviously his best book) and it was not a success after its release, despite several favorable back-then reviews on Powell's behalf. The reason was probably political, as movie extensively deals with blasphemy(?). Movie never hit international scene and ended up as a flop. Nowadays, the movie is classical noir flick and earned some favorable reviews in 2005 upon its re-release on DVDs.
Story itself is quite interesting; It tells a story of carnival help-hand, who schemes and earns himself a fame as a mentalist and someone, who is able to communicate with dead. But as they say - eat to live and not live to eat, Stan Carlisle eagerly pushes his luck over and over again as he ends up worse than he was before. The movie ends up differently than novel does though - Stan is reunited with his wife Molly and she nurses him back to health, doomed to work as a "geek", eating live chicken and doing sideshow flicks. In novel though, Stan plays a geek but goes crazy and drunks himself to death, fulfilling the prophecy of Mademoiselle Zeena.
Whichever way story ended, the message was clear and ending was strong enough to remember. I would also compare grim ending to similar movie Brute Force, ending similarly with a wise quote "How can a guy get so low? - He reached too high.."
Brute Force (1947)
Film-Noir without femme fatale
One of several great noirs directed by Jules Dassin, a man who's views gained him exclusive place on (in)famous Hollywood blacklist (which later met the representative of Dr. Walters as well). The film was shocking in its time for violent scenes and the depiction of the chief of the prison as a sadistic bastard (which is normal phenomenon nowadays).
I personally enjoyed flashbacks of prisoners from cell R17, because it was nice and quick overview of their "destinies" and it was also some room for femininity in the movie - bringing the beauty of Ann Blyth, Yvonne de Carlo, Ella Raines and Anita Colby.
Burt Lancaster really fit in the role of Joe and Hume Cronyn really reminded me Percy from Green Mile - the only difference was that Munsey was not so cocky...
Notorious (1946)
First Noir produced by Hitchcock
Post-war blockbuster Notorious is about love triangle against the background of investigation of former Nazis plotting in Rio de Janeiro.
Notorious has ostensibly slower start in comparison to other Noirs but this is characteristic of Hitchcock's early work. What was quite new within his early work was plot focused on love triangle. Alicia, daughter of former Nazi spy sentenced to death penalty, is "hired" by US Secret Service (or something like that) and sent to Brazil to spy on Nazis secret ring. During briefing and awaiting further orders Alicia and American agent Devlin fall in love but US government has a different opinion on what to do with Alicia - and so they force her to seduce Nazi ringleader Alexander Sebastian and move into his palatial residence. Devlin cannot reveal his true feelings at this time and so Alicia agrees with the plan and love triangle is created. I won't describe the plot in detail anymore, I'll just mention that Alicia's role is discovered and fight for her life occurs between Devlin and Alexander (assissted by his mother). The movie is 100 minutes long and last 30 minutes are really thrilling until the very end of the film.
I have to admit that Cary Grant did not gain much sympathy in his role. On the other hand, Ingrid puts a lot of effort to evolve her initially unsympathetic character into victim of political schemes and you can't wish anything else than her rescue. I must also highlight main villains (played by Claude Reins and Leopoldine Konstantin) who were really convincing opposition.
FUN FACTS:
1) Scene in hotel room (where Cary and Ingrid kiss passionately) had to be remade due to censorship by following rules --> Kissing in films could not last longer than 3 seconds so we had to watch 2 minute scene dramatized with various smooches, talking and simply cuddling instead of passionate kissing we are used nowadays. How cute!
2) The key to the vault (skillfully stolen by Alicia) became famous movie prop which Cary Grant himself kept after the casting was done. He later gave the key to Ingrid, claiming that key brings luck. She kept the key until 1979 when Hitchcock received award for life's work and Ingrid gave the key to him in big ceremony to bring him some luck as well. If her intention worked or not is dubious; nearly year after that Alfred Hitchcock died of kidney failure and two years later Ingrid Bergman died of breast cancer. Wasn't fun fact at all but still worth mentioning.
The Big Sleep (1946)
Movie adaptation with significant changes to plot, still great movie to watch!
The Big Sleep was formally the first Noir I've ever seen and I really fell in love with this genre. The Big Sleep by Howard Hawks is highly successful adaptation (as opposed to the later remake with Mitchum) of a novel by Raymond Chandler written in 1939, though its ending is overly positive in comparison to other Noirs - I'd call it more like a good and deft detective story.
There are several significant changes in plot when you compare this film with novel and I will mention two biggest features so watch out if you're reading this and don't know the book / movie and want to. Identity of killer is first major change - Carmen was a real killer in book but in this movie there's a character of Eddie Mars, the man who was a killer but managed to persuade others that Carmen was responsible of his wrongdoing. The second major change worth noting are scenes with naked Carmen. While book presents us with naked Carmen in Marlowe's bed (same for Geiger), censorship in 40s strictly forbid any kind of nudity and so we had to live without Martha Vickers flashy moments. I've got to add I am sorry about it because Martha was a true gem!
The film was entertaining in overall, main parts were convincing acting of both Humphrey and Bacall (who were also still freshly married) and plot itself. Every single woman cast in the film was really attractive and you just gotta love Hollywood of 40s!
The Letter (1940)
Bette Davis' one woman show
"With all my heart, I still love the man I killed!" - that is a quote from one of my favorite Noir movies I've seen so far. This movie is one of the earlier Noirs that were slowly getting on top and which culminated nearly 10 years later, yet Bette Davis' Letter remained on top.
The film was based on a very successful stage play from 1927, which was based on real events from 1911. During the course of this development it was merely inevitable to divert / manipulate facts and these changes were reflected in the film itself. In 1911, a woman XY (cannot remember name) really killed another man in her home while her husband was out. However, in trial that followed she was fully acquitted and got away from Malaysia unharmed (she died sometime in 70s in US, her ex- husband somewhere in Argentina much earlier). During writing the stage game, its author decided to dramatize the whole story by creating a letter proving her infidelity and that's what an entire film (and the game) are about. Beechnuts from Warner Bros. could not let the villainous woman get away with it though so they have decided to punish her adultery (then still a crime) with death sentence for which they were rightfully criticized.
Still, the film became a legend and that's not only because of shrewy Davis. Except for Davis, I really enjoyed acting performances of James Stephenson in the role of a lawyer Howard Joyce (which was pretty much the only proper role he ever made and at the time was practically unknown), his assistant Sen Yung and at last but not least, Gale Sondergaard who was really terrifying. All those scenes with Sondergaard were pretty neat even now. All in all, we've got a great movie (except for bunked ending) and all credit goes to director Wyler.
The Last Samurai (2003)
One of my top 10 favorite movie
This Hollywood epic historical war film was surprisingly more financially successful / critically appraised in conservative Japan than USA. Sure, the term "Hollywood blockbuster" usually means stellar cast, epic music, a lot of clichés, monumental battles and lots of beautiful scenery along with highly expensive tricks and effects that cost some heavy dough. I always question myself about its position within my personal TOP10 movies but whenever I get the chance to watch it - I'm clear.
I really love historical movies, especially based on some real events. Tom Cruise is probably the best pick from all those Pitts and Depps around (and not only because he's looking like lumberjack here) and when it comes to Asian actors - I didn't honestly know them but they're all cool. I enjoy their conversations led in that gibberish with everything that's part of it (gestures, shouts and whatever). The message of the film and its inevitable (and useless) sad ending is quite showy from the beginning yet it always works and I'm quite soft when it's over.
Well, in the end I have to highlight presence of Koyuki who would be a good wife to me - unfortunately I was not quick enough to reach her so her beauty fell to some Asian guy. It's a shame - my shame. RIP heavenly marriage.