Month: June 2022

When tailor Maurice Chevalier travels to Vicomte Charles Ruggles’s castle to collect on past due payments, he finds himself faking an aristocratic identity and falling in love with Ruggles’s niece Jeanette MacDonald. While I liked both Chevalier and MacDonald much more than other films I’ve seen them in, the other characters outshine the leads, particularly a trio of Macbethian aunts and a delightfully sex-crazed Myrna Loy. The film does display a number of surprisingly well-crafted musical numbers that would be more expected during the golden age of musicals versus in a pre-Code, relatively early talkie.   

After a shooting in one Nigerian district leaves a number of election officials dead, the voting results in that district are nullified. A popular candidate who has thus lost the election declares herself the legitimate winner and sues her opponent. My interest in Nollywood films grew with how tight this violent political thriller is. The stench of political corruption blanketed the entire election and until the last moments, it’s impossible to know who is telling the truth and who is in the right, if anyone is.

Placed in an open prison program that provides prisoners with various types of skill training, convict Clive Owen discovers he has a knack for gardening. Loosely based on a true story, it’s a fairly charming, light hearted little British film. While there’s nothing terribly complex about the story, the acting meets the challenge with Owen receiving a patron in Helen Mirren, a love interest in Natasha Little, and a mentor in fellow inmate David Kelly.

The American localized version of Godzilla has Raymond Burr forced into the story as a reporter whose Tokyo layover forces him to stay in the city right at the time of Godzilla’s rampage. Even without having seen the original Japanese film, it is quite obvious that Burr’s storyline is all added-on. Every one of his scenes come across in the same way as Jack Black’s appearance in the Investigative Journalism episode of Community where previous incidents are all shown from this stranger’s perspective. Instead of getting to experience the relationships and actions of other characters, they are all filtered and narrated through Burr’s knowledge and experiences. It’s rather tedious as a narrative and distracts from any message being portrayed.    

Scientist Martin Donovan, who has created a device that allows for the recording and playback of memories, dies under mysterious circumstances. Peter Dinklage, whose brother died in a car accident a year previously, attempts to use the device to solve the murder. I watched this in my attempt to see more of Dinklage’s major roles and he’s strong here, but sadly the film muddily concentrates more on the theoretical concepts of the device over the murder mystery.