Toshiro Mifune made an auspicious film debut in this superb crime/adventure thriller written by Akira Kurosawa and directed, in only his second outing, by Senkichi Taniguchi. Despite the exciting performance by Mifune, though, it is the endlessly versatile Takashi Shimura who walks away with the film. His role as the leader of a trio of bank robbers progresses through a hugely dramatic arc, and Shimura effortlessly reveals every facet of the man's humanity. Mifune plays the youngest of the three,…
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One Wonderful Sunday 1947
This is a film of small, subtle charms, ever so simple in its execution, yet profoundly beautiful for all its naivete. A young couple, only able to see one another on Sundays and both dreadfully poor, try to make a happy day of it on their one weekly day together. Despite the title, much of what happens is disappointing, even despairing. Yet the almost irrepressible optimism of the girl Masako leads the couple to a strange and tender joy, realized…
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The Banshees of Inisherin 2022
This remarkable tale of loneliness, purpose, and what we now call "unfriending" is another in the stunning emotional explorations by writer-director Martin McDonagh. In a performance that tops anything of his I've ever seen, Colin Farrell is heartbreaking as a provincial Irish lad who cannot understand and will not grasp that his closest friend no longer wants his friendship. As the former friend, Brendan Gleeson is also superb, but the picture really belongs to Farrell, who plays exquisitely the balancing…
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Dune 2021
It took many years, but I finally found a science-fiction movie I hated worse than Star Wars. This pseudo-mythic melange of Islamic-Gaelic-Hebrew-Christian nomenclature and ponderous Sir Gawainish “dialog” has virtually no intelligible story beyond the barest framework of presumably good guys in conflict with assortments of monosyllabic bad guys. No effort is evident in making the characters identifiable humans one could connect with emotionally (although Jason Momoa, through force of personality, comes close). It’s all sci-fi fanboy wanking, with all…
