Taking Inventory as of October 1

Rialto's Best of British Noir at the Castro
The Third Man starring Joseph Cotten & Orson Welles; directed by Carol Reed; written by Graham Greene; (1949)
Brighton Rock starring Richard Attenborough; written by Graham Greene; (1947)
It Always Rains on Sunday directed Robert Hamer; (1947)
Peeping Tom directed Michael Powell; (1960)
The Fallen Idol directed Carol Reed; (1948)

A bit trivial but I saw It Always Rains on Sunday on Sunday, September 13. It rained that day in San Francisco which is rare for that time of year.

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Tea and Larceny: British Crime Films at PFA
The Snorkel starring Peter van Eyck; (1958)
So Evil My Love starring Ray Milland; (1948)
Noose starring Carole Landis; (1948)
The Long Haul starring Victor Mature & Diana Dors; (1957)
No Orchids for Miss Blandish; (1958)

Even though prior to No Orchids for Miss Blandish, Steve Seid said it was the final film in the Tea & Larceny series, The Krays is schedule for Halloween. It's kind of rump session for the series since the film was made in 1990 and only depicts the gangsters from the postwar period. Indeed, Diana Dors' father was a known associate of the Brothers Kray.

The Snorkel was based on a stroy by Antonio Margheriti, an Italian director and writer (1930-2002). In Inglourious Basterds, Eli Roth's character, Sgt. Donowitz (the Bear Jew), used the alias Antonio Margheriti during the scene at the movie theater in the end.

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Best of Columbia Noir at the Roxie
Blind Spot; (1947)
Johnny O'Clock starring Dick Powell, Lee J. Cobb & Evelyn Keyes; (1947)
The Whistler directed by William Castle; (1944)
The Soul of a Monster starring George Macready; (1944)
Convicted starring Glenn Ford, Broderick Crawford & Dorothy Malone; (1950)
Knock On Any Door starring Humphrey Bogart, John Derek & George Macready; directed by Nicholas Ray; (1949)
Pushover starring Fred MacMurray, Kim Novak & E.G. Marshall; (1954)
Drive a Crooked Road starring Mickey Rooney; written by Blake Edwards; (1954)
My Name is Julia Ross starring Nina Foch & George Macready; (1945)
So Dark the Night; (1946)
Human Desire starring Glenn Ford, Broderick Crawford & Gloria Grahame; directed by Fritz Lang; (1954)
The Sniper starring Adolphe Menjou, Arthur Franz & Marie Windsor; directed by Edward Dmytryk; (1952)
The Lineup starring Eli Wallach; directed by Don Siegel; (1958)
Between Midnight and Dawn starring dmond O’Brien; (1950)
The Killer That Stalked New York starring Evelyn Keyes; (1950)
Screaming Mimi starring Anita Ekberg & Gypsy Rose Lee; (1958)
Murder By Contract starring Vince Edwards; (1958)

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Amongst all the noir, I was able to catch two outstanding Japanese films. Modern Japanese films (at least the one that receive critical acclaim in the US) seem to focus on two themes - family and death. Actually, those themes have been at the forefront of Japanese cinema since at least Ozu.

Still Walking; Japanese with subtitles; (2008) - Official Website
Departures; Japanese with subtitles; (2008) - Official Website

Still Walking's Japanese title is Aruitemo Aruitemo.

Departures' Japanese title is Okuribito. Departures won the 2009 Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film.

Of the two, I preferred Still Walking by a skosh. It dealt with a family that lives with the specter of the oldest son's drowning. The son died 12 years earlier but the parents and surviving children can't or won't let him go. In particular, the parents have elevated their deceased son to saintly heights at emotional expense of their #2 son.

Like many Japanese films, Still Walking takes a quiet and understated approach to the family conflicts. There are no fireworks but rather condemnations and recriminations spoken privately and in hushed tones (or left unspoken). The father & son are barely on speaking terms but are more alike than they realize. The overall effect is one of gentling nudging the viewer along as the plot works itself towards its conclusion.

I missed Departures during its ~2 month run at the Landmark Theaters due to procrastination. I was lucky that Departures screened at the PFA on September 27. The screening was not a PFA sponsored event. Rather, it was part of the Tracing the Study of Japanese Buddhism conference which was hosted by the Center for Japanese Studies which is under the aegis of Institute of East Asian Studies at Cal. The cost as free but the suggested donation was $5 to $10. I guess I'm not as cheap as I like to portray because I had just gone to the ATM as I didn't know in advance that it was free admission. I only had $20 bills and I actually asked for change so that I could donate $10.

Departures had more drama as in melodrama. It deals with Kobayashi, a cellist that loses his job at the orchestra. He finds works (initially distasteful) as a undertaker's subcontractor. Specifically, he ritually prepares the corpse for cremation. This involves cleaning the body and dressing it in burial robes and accessories. By repeating this process and seeing the effect it has on the families of the departed, Kobayashi finds his true calling, infuses his cello playing with a previously missing passion and achieves inner peace. That's good because the rest of society looks down upon his profession. His wife leaves him because of it and his childhood friend refuses to be seen in public with him. Despite this, Kobayashi chooses the job over all else. One demon he can't shake is the pain and resentment directed at his father who abandoned he and his mother when he was a child.

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I also watched The Baader Meinhof Complex (German with subtitles; 2008). It was very entertaining - suspenseful, funny, tragic and the adjectives could keep going. Slightly familiar with the Red Army Faction in West Germany, I was not aware of the specific events in the rise and fall of the first generation of the RAF. Johanna Wokalek as Gudrun Ensslin delivers a tremendous performance - frightening, pathetic and sexy. I could wonder if the real Gudrun Ensslin was as charismatic as Wokalek's portrayal. The only nit I could pick is that the motivation of these people was difficult to ascertain. Ensslin and Baader seemed to verge on sociopathic. Meinhof's actions were even more puzzling. The mother of twin girls and respected (albeit left-leaning) journalist, Meinhof seemed become a terrorist and go underground because she was bored, goaded by Ensslin and perhaps to spite her husband.

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I was able to see one William Klein film at the PFA.

Muhamamd Ali, the Greatest; documentary; (1974)

It would be difficult to make an uninteresting documentary about Muhammad Ali so I wasn't overly impressed but Klein did a good job of highlighting Ali's dichotomies. I heard the phrase "Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee" but that wasn't the entire mantra. "Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee, rumble young man rumble, aaaahhhhh!!" Also, it was recited in unison with his assistant trainer Drew Bundini Brown. They yelled it at the top of their lungs and the effect was to make Ali look like a teenager in need of Ritalin. Also, I learned that Ali had originally been given a draft deferment because he couldn't spell. I found that surprising for a man who was principled enough to refuse induction into the Army and convert to Islam. Not versed in Ali's life, apparently Ali was an uneducated man who was backed by a Memphis syndicate at the beginning of his career. It was clear how he broke free although he eventually aligned himself with Don King. It only adds to Ali's amazing life story as depicted in the film - upset win of champion Sonny Liston, the "phantom" punch in the rematch, his conversion to Islam, being stripped of his title and regaining the title from George Foreman in Zaire. That doesn't even include the Thrilla in Manila fight with Joe Frazier which took place after the film was released.

Muhamamd Ali, the Greatest was a solid documentary although I prefer When We Were King. There was a great scene in the Klein film where Mobutu staged an audience with Ali & Foreman (separately) while a phalanx of news photographers snapped photos. Also, I found a scene with Foreman after he lost the fight (with a mouse under his eye) to show a lot of class. Foreman spoke with reporters and children and was quite humble. Big Bad George didn't sneak out of the country, make excuses or react with a surly disposition; instead he took the loss with more dignity than most could have summoned.

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Tonight, I watched Dario Argento's Suspiria (1977) at the YBCA. The film's most striking feature was the use of vibrant colors. Set in a ballet academy, the red painted walls would make the most wanton bordello madam blush. Argento shines light off the walls to give a disquieting red glow to the proceedings. The plot was forgettable; some of the performances was painfully stitled and the film looked dated; I can't believe this is one of the the all-time great horror films. Perhaps it was trailblazing - what was new and unique in 1977 is cliche in 2009. Frankly, as I was watching the film, I kept wondering if I had seen it on an episode of Elvira's Movie Macabre in the 80's.

Earlier in the month, I saw Bigger Than Life (1956) with James Mason & Walter Matthau and directed by Nicholas Ray. This film was also dated but interesting in a kitschy sort of way. Mason's mousy schoolteacher overdoses on cortisone and the result is a psychotic episode where he thunders "God was wrong!" as he prepares to sacrifice his son...literal sacrifice as in the Old Testament of the Bible. Generally thought to be an indictment of conformist American society in the 1950s and the miracles of modern science; I thought it was an allegory for postwar US foreign policy. Bulked up on nuclear weaponry, the formerly isolationist US engages in muscular and interventionist foreign policy like our protagonist behaves under the influence of cortisone. Cortisone?

Mostly Noir but German Terrorists, Chilean Fascists, Japanese Porn, Italian Witches and Alfred Hitchcock Have Their Moments Too

As I mentioned, the Castro Theater is presenting “Rialto's Best of British Noir.” This series of five films is co-presented by the Film Noir Foundation. The Film Noir Foundation was founded by Eddie Muller and presents the wildly successful Noir City Film Festival each January. Speaking of which, the dates and venue for Noir City 8 have been announced. The festival will run January 22 to 31, 2010 at the Castro.

I posted the synopses of Brighton Rock and It Always Rains on Sunday from the PFA program for Tea and Larceny.

The other three films in the program are:

The Third Man (1949) - Pulp novelist Holly Martins travels to shadowy, postwar Vienna, only to find himself investigating the mysterious death of an old friend, black-market opportunist Harry Lime — and thus begins this legendary tale of love, deception, and murder. Thanks to brilliant performances by Joseph Cotten, Alida Valli, and Orson Welles; Anton Karas’s evocative zither score; Graham Greene’s razor-sharp dialogue; and Robert Krasker’s Oscar-winning photography, The Third Man, directed by the inimitable Carol Reed, only grows in stature as the years pass.

Peeping Tom (1960) - A frank exploration of voyeurism and violence, Michael Powell’s extraordinary film is the story of a psychopathic cameraman — his childhood traumas, sexual crises, and murderous revenge as an adult. Reviled by critics upon its initial release for its deeply unsettling subject matter, the film has since been hailed as a masterpiece. With Carl Boehm, Moira Shearer, Anna Massey and Maxine Audley.

The Fallen Idol (1948) - The first of three masterpieces to result from the legendary meeting of director Carol Reed and writer Graham Greene, who together would also create The Third Man and Our Man in Havana. Elegantly balancing suspense and farce, this tale of the fraught relationship between a boy and the beloved butler he suspects of murder is a delightfully macabre thriller of the first order and a visually and verbally dazzling knockout. With Ralph Richardson, Bobby Henrey, Michèle Morgan and Sonia Dresdel.

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The Roxie's Best of Columbia Noir program has been rescheduled for September 17 to 30. The films are the same as I previously reported. The Roxie is currently seling passes for the program priced at $85. The double feature price will be $11.

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The Red Vic is screening a film that looks interesting on September 17. It will be the San Francisco premiere of Stingray Sam (Official Website). A dangerous mission reunites Stingray Sam with his long lost accomplice, The Quasar Kid. These two space convicts must earn their freedom by rescuing a young girl who is being held captive by the genetically designed figurehead of a very wealthy planet. Science fiction, musical and miniseries collide in this anticipated work. Director Cory McAbee will be in attendance. Stingray Sam screened at this year's Sundance. The film was well reviewed on Variety whose opinions I have found to be generally consistent with mine - The overall effect is hilariously digressive, campy yet deadpan. And awfully catchy: McAbee's songs range from a "Rawhide"-like theme tune to swinging '60s acid rock, cowpunk and an acoustic "Pretty Little Lullaby." There's even room on the soundtrack for brief traditional Indian and Chinese instrumentation. The freewheeling pic accommodates everything from physical humor (notably an incredible "secret handshake" running gag) and delightfully staged wiseass musical numbers (opener "Welcome to Mars" wins goodwill enough for multiple features) to the genuinely sweet interactions between senior and junior McAbees.

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At the Castro, from September 23 to 27, is The Metropolitan Hallucinations
of Marin Scorsese, a program of ten Scorsese classics including Taxi Driver, Goodfellas, Casino and Raging Bull. The two films I would like to see on the Castro screen are After Hours on September 23 and Mean Streets on September 25.

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For 31 days starting on September 1, the Stanford Theater is screening Hitchcock films including my favorite, Strangers on a Train. At the end of the film, there is a scene involving a "runaway" merry-go-round. There is an old man that is a carnival worker in charge of the carousel. He has to crawl under the floorplates to get to the center of the merry-go-round to stop it. All the while, Farley Granger and Robert Walker are fighting each other and the centripetal forces. The slow movement and labored but relentless expression on his face are both funny and suspenseful. Hitchcock claims the scene was filmed without trick photography and the most dangerous he ever filmed.

They are screening two early Hitchcock films I would like to see. Both were filmed in England before Hitchcock emigrated to Hollywood. The 39 Steps (1935) and Secret Agent (1936) are a double feature from September 8 to 10. The latter stars John Gielgud and Peter Lorre.

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The Baader Meinhof Complex opens at Landmark Theaters (maybe others) on September 4. Highly reviewed, the film dramatizes the real-life actions of the Red Army Faction, a terrorist group operating in West Germany in the 1970's. Visit the official website.

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I don't know if it's been released yet but if not, it will be released on September 4. I am referring to Still Walking, a Japanese film about "modest joys and gentle sorrows that accompany the realization that life must inevitably move on." Visit the official website.

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Tony Manero opens on September 11 at the Sundance Kabuki. Technically, it's playing on the San Francisco Film Society Screen at the Kabuki.

In Santiago de Chile, 1978, Pinochet’s dictatorship has Chilean citizens coping with a nightly curfew, constant military patrols and the omnipresent threat of violence. In the midst of it, a middle-aged man named Raúl (Alfredo Castro) is obsessed with the idea of impersonating Tony Manero, John Travolta’s character from Saturday Night Fever. On the outskirts of the city, he leads a small group of devoted dancers who have set their sights on an upcoming “Tony look-alike” television competition. Raúl’s immoderate desire to win, coupled with an obsessive need to recreate the glass dance floor from the movie, leads him to commit a series of crimes and thefts and to act increasingly autocratic and cruel with his fellow hoofers. “Shot on 16mm, Tony Manero has a purposefully murky look and a frantic feel. The ultra-Dardenne camera follows Raúl as he darts through Santiago’s empty alleys and vacant lots, only pausing when he raptly watches Saturday Night Fever or attempts to imitate Tony's stomp-and-point rhythmic flailing. Feasting on this bizarre fascist posturing, director Pablo Larraín suggests that, with his sordid charisma, Raúl is a miniature Pinochet—reproducing the brutality of the state in his willingness to steal, exploit, betray and kill in the service of a fantasy.” —J. Hoberman, The Village Voice

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On September 10, 12 & 13, the YBCA is screening Bigger Than Life (1956). Starring James Mason & directed by Nicholas Ray, the film is ostensibly about a man that takes experimental cortisone pills to control his "inflamed arteries." Subversively a critique of conformism in 1950's America, Bigger Than Life has gained an appreciative audience since its original release.

The YBCA is screening Dario Argento's Three Mothers Trilogy on October 1, 3 & 4.

Suspiria (1977) - Considered one of the great horror films, Suspiria tells the tale of Suzy, a young American ballet student who travels to Italy to attend a prestigious dance academy, only to arrive at an institution terrorized by gruesome murders. After putting together clues, Suzy uncovers a coven of witches who use the reanimated corpse of her friend in an attempt to murder her...And don’t forget the soundtrack

Inferno (1980) - Arguably Argento’s masterpiece, in Inferno a young woman stumbles upon a mysterious diary that reveals the secrets of "The Three Mothers" and unleashes a nightmare world of demonic evil. As the unstoppable horror spreads from Rome to New York City, this unholy trinity must be stopped before the world is submerged in the blood of the innocent. Features a pulse-pounding original score by Keith Emerson of Emerson, Lake & Palmer.

The Mother of Tears (2007) - The bizarre finale to the trilogy. In the heart of modern Rome, an urn is found and brought to a young archeologist, Sarah Mandy. But what Sarah doesn’t know is that the urn belongs to the world’s most powerful witch, the Mother of Tears. She unwittingly unleashes a demonic power intent on destroying the city and everything in its path. Starring Asia Argento and Udo Kier.

Starting on October 8, the YBCA screens eight pinku eiga films by Koji Wakamatsu.

More than any other Japanese films, those made by Koji Wakamatsu in the '60s and '70s are deeply rooted in the political and social upheavals of the era. One of the leaders of 'pink cinema,' Wakamatsu has always been obsessed with the history of student protest movements. 'Pink cinema' or pinku eiga—Japanese sexploitation—were independent film productions that from the mid '60s to early '70s experimented with a new form of filmmaking that blended sex and violence.

Tea and Larceny in Berkeley

The PFA has announced the lineup for their Tea and Larceny: Classic British Crime Films series. They have pointedly avoided the word "noir" since the Castro is screening its own British Crime Film Series titled Rialto's Best of British Noir from September 11 to 16.

Brighton Rock and It Always Rains on Sunday screen at both the PFA and the Castro so I'll probably save a trip to Berkeley and catch the Castro screening of both films.

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Steve Seid's program description takes a swipe at the Castro series which is screening The Third Man or The Fallen Idol.

Here at home, we may have our “mean streets,” as Raymond Chandler called them, but England has its own bleak equivalent, a cobbled stretch paved in battery and betrayal. Tea and Larceny is no parlor game for the well-behaved teetotaler, but a boisterous gathering of gin-soaked malcontents bent on mayhem, malarkey, and murder most foul. Not necessarily noir, each film does set its sights on misdeeds of lurid ambition, corrupted love, or poorly pent pathology. We’ve avoided the usual suspects such as Carol Reed’s The Third Man or The Fallen Idol, instead digging up cold cases like I Met a Murderer, So Evil My Love, The October Man, and the foul-scented No Orchids for Miss Blandish, as well as the recently exhumed Brighton Rock and It Always Rains on Sunday. Beyond the dank country manors and fog-draped alleyways, beyond the prim sitting rooms and cliff-edged highways, lies a scheming sensibility that is England’s own. Though a few films, like Obsession and Night and the City, have ties to the tough mugs of American movies, most give up the goods as only the Brits could do it—it’s all menace hiding behind the manners.

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Brighton Rock (1947)
The brilliant author Graham Greene (The Third Man; Our Man in Havana) provides the source novel and screenplay for this Dickensian glimpse into the underbelly of a typical British seaside resort, where sun, sand, and carnivals camouflage another town entirely. In run-down Brighton, the boardwalk is lined with pasty day-trippers and incompetent singing acts, but it’s also patrolled by teenage Napoleon Pinkie Brown (Richard Attenborough). Pinkie is looking to make his mark in any way possible, whether literally, with that knife he’s constantly twirling, or through murder or, even worse, love, by seducing a naïve teenage girl. With a choirboy’s looks and a killer’s cold stare, as alien to his fellow gangsters as he is to “civilians,” Attenborough embodies a psychosis matched only by James Cagney in White Heat. “Brighton Rock shows, as clearly as anything ever did, Greene’s preoccupation with the allure of sin,” writes Terrence Rafferty; “virtue is uninteresting, and moral weakness, grubby and persistent, is the main attraction.”


It Always Rains on Sunday (1947)
“Almost the definitive British postwar film” is how historian William K. Everson described this Ealing Studios noir, shot through with a despairing realism that prefigures the next decade’s kitchen-sink tendencies. It’s another rainy Sunday in London’s East End, its row houses, street markets, and narrow rooms populated by tea sippers and thugs, wide boys and spivs, temperance groups and coppers. Luckless cons work to offload the fruits of a botched raid (roller skates), a band leader aims his lechery towards a naïve young beauty, and, in one particularly cramped home, a fugitive hides in the upstairs bedroom, protected by a housewife who was once his lover. All dreams are dead ends; all trains return to the East End. Director Robert Hamer (Kind Hearts and Coronets; Dead of Night) ably juggles multiple story lines and flashbacks, while a final chase scene through the steam and shadows of a London rail yard adds an Anthony Mann-like noir flourish to its poetic fatalism. Bertrand Tavernier called it “a masterpiece...a brilliantly written choral work.”

The Snorkel (1958)
A debonair and diabolical villain turns a piece of scuba-diving equipment into an unusual instrument of murder in this clever chiller from the Hammer studios. Before the opening credits, we witness Peter van Eyck perpetrate what ought to be a perfect crime, rigging a room in his Italian villa into a death chamber for his wife. Her demise is ruled a suicide, but the killer’s stepdaughter is the suspicious type; while she tries to unravel what really happened to her mother—and to her real father, who also died under dubious circumstances—a menacing relationship develops between sinister stepdad and troublesome teen. Formerly a cinematographer for David Lean and others, director Guy Green brings an inventive eye to the proceedings, which dive to a sardonic denouement.

Noose (1948)
“We don’t have any gangsters here,” claims a London newspaper editor to his hot-to-trot reporter from Chicago at the beginning of this energetic programmer, a fascinating combination of American noir aesthetics with British slang, style, and location. Yankee fashion hound Linda Medbury (Carole Landis, who died tragically after the film was made) quickly proves her boss wrong, uncovering a ruthless London crime ring led by the fast-talking Bar Gorman and the slick Sugiani, neither of whom will stop at killing women to keep their empire going. Fortunately Linda’s got her British hubby on her side, an ex-commando who’s organized a gang of his own (complete with Chelsea jerseys) to help smash the syndicate. A John Alton–esque sense of light and shadow, as well as director Edmond Greville’s impressive visual flourishes, provide a flair that’s pure Hollywood noir, but the zippy insults, class concerns, and seedy postwar settings are as British as they come.

So Evil My Love (1948)
Ray Milland is both repellent and compelling in this Victorian thriller, directed with bleak panache by Lewis Allen (The Uninvited). Milland plays a charming thief, forger, and all-around blackguard who spots a prime mark in Ann Todd, a missionary’s widow and proprietor of a boarding house where Milland takes up residence. Under the influence of Milland’s advances, the straitlaced Todd abandons her inhibitions, eventually becoming complicit in larceny and blackmail—but her seducer will learn that a woman’s passion, once unleashed, can be difficult for even the most calculating con artist to control. A carefully drawn backdrop of British respectability heightens the drama of Todd’s decline: as so many English mysteries have proven, crime can be all the more thrilling when draped in crinoline.

The October Man (1947)
“I couldn’t have done it...could I?” In a twist on the wrong-man theme, this hybrid of playful murder mystery and psychological melodrama stars John Mills as an innocent man whose own self-doubt makes him a suspect. After a bus accident kills a child in his care and leaves him with a fractured skull and troubled mind, Mills seeks refuge in a small hotel whose very proper residents greet him with a mixture of curiosity and condescension. When an attractive lodger goes out to post a letter and doesn’t return, the neighbors, the police, and Mills himself all begin to wonder whether he might be responsible. Erwin Hillier’s cinematography shrouds the action in an atmosphere of misty, pervasive melancholia, and Mills brings an otherworldly, fretful presence to Eric Ambler’s alternately sardonic and empathetic scenario, which hints at the struggles of men shattered not by accident but by the recent war.

She Played With Fire a.k.a. Fortune Is a Woman (1957)
As we all know from Double Indemnity, insurance and romance can be a dangerous combination; this little-seen mystery by Frank Launder and Sidney Gilliat (Green for Danger) adds to the formula a touch of British Gothic. Sent to investigate a Christmas Eve fire at one of those country manors that always seem to harbor dark secrets, insurance adjuster Jack Hawkins encounters an enigmatic family, including an imposing matriarch and a young wife (Arlene Dahl) with connections to Hawkins’s own past. “We’re all escaping from something, aren’t we,” says Mother; her son sagely advises, “Be careful in this dark corner.” As Hawkins tracks a trail of fraud, forgery, and worse, schemes and suspicions proliferate—as do classic Launder-Gilliat supporting characters—and nightmares overlap with reality and art.

The Long Haul (1957)
Racketeering is the principal cargo in this well-tuned tale about a trucker in trouble. Victor Mature (in a role intended for Marlon Brando) plays Harry Miller, a deactivated G.I. stranded in England with his Liverpudlian wife. Harry signs on as a driver for a lorry combine only to find that mobsters rule the road. Joe Easy (Patrick Allen), the ruthless thug who runs Easy Hauling, plays it fast and loose with his freight, but not as loose as his curvaceous cohort Lynn (Diana Dors, the British Monroe). Once Harry catches sight of her, Dors becomes the soft shoulder on a road to nowhere. Though Hell Drivers (September 6) emphasizes rivalry among the drivers themselves, both of these big wheelers saw the hauling biz as a shiftless world of lowballers and hijackers. Caught up in the momentum, Harry must choose between a pedestrian life with wife and child and the felonious fast lane. The Long Haul offers no rest stop for the wicked.

No Orchids for Miss Blandish (1948)
“It has all the morals of an alley cat and the sweetness of a sewer!” blared a contemporary review of this controversial 1948 noir. No Orchids bubbled forth from the depths of British Poverty Row studio Renown to shock the English nation with its casual brutality (multiple murders in cold blood in the opening reel, another killing involving a grandfatherly innocent bystander) and leering perversion (“I don’t have ta drink ta want you,” opines one ruthless Romeo). The film concerns a hard-partying society dame who falls for her vicious kidnapper, a crime syndicate overlord. Simultaneously revolting and revolutionary, its Z-grade budget, inexpressive cast, and total disregard for bourgeois sensibility make No Orchids play like some unholy alliance of Ed Wood and Georges Bataille, a Poverty Row Grand Guignol. Monthly Film Bulletin declared it “the most sickening exhibition of brutality, perversion, sex and sadism ever to be shown on a cinema screen”—in other words, unmissable.

The Krays (1990)
This brutal neo-noir depicts twin brothers who became two of Britain’s most notorious criminals. Hailing from London’s tough East End, the Kray brothers learn early to claw their way up. They take their mother’s advice—“Don’t fight each other; fight them out there”—to extreme lengths, building a London club empire atop a pile of mutilated bodies. As they gain power, the Krays’ idiosyncrasies deepen. Ronald, the more violent of the two, grows increasingly unpredictable and paranoid. Reggie takes a desire to care for his wife to smothering extremes. As played by real-life brothers Gary and Martin Kemp, of British New Romantic pop group Spandau Ballet, the Krays are cool, suave charmers who cling to each other and their beloved mother. The film is particularly attuned to the plight of women in postwar Britain: they must grow up, while men “stay kids all their lives, and they wind up heroes or monsters.” The creepy Krays don’t break this vicious cycle.

The PFA series screens a few a more films (most notably Night and the City with Richard Widmark) but Labor Day Weekend plans will not allow me to see all the films in the series.