Eavesdropping At The Movies

No exploration of William Friedkin would be complete without The Exorcist, 1973's iconic horror about a little girl possessed by a demon, and so watch it we do. We watch the theatrical cut, which Mike's excited to see, since the only one he's seen before is "The Version You've Never Seen", the extended cut released in 2000, and he finds this version superior, with better pacing and fewer distractions. José has always had a significant problem with the crucifix scene, and we go into why, and he argues that the film exhibits a desire to shock above all else that is typical of Friedkin. Mike argues for the sympathy we feel for Father Karras and his centrality - Max von Sydow's Father Merrin is in theory the eponymous exorcist, but is that actually the case? And we think over much more besides, including the thrill of the special effects, the disparity between how Mike Oldfield's Tubular Bells is used and its subsequent iconic synonimity with the film, whether the film should be clearer about the boundaries of i

As likeable as it is incoherent, Jade oozes style and steaminess. David Caruso's assistant district attorney, searching for the killer of a businessman, finds himself delving into a world of kink, prostitution and power, in which Linda Fiorentino, his former lover, is embroiled. William Friedkin's attraction to the taboo is at home in the world of the erotic thriller, but as enjoyable as Jade is, it's a film you watch with one eye on its substantial problems. It's a film in which everything is done for effect, and damn the consequences - especially the final twist, which turns the film's sexual liberation and power dynamics on their head, for no good reason. Still, it's a film we were both happy to watch twice, and as superficial as it may be, that surface is highly polished and glossy. Recorded on 23rd July 2020.

To Live and Die in L.A., William Friedkin's 1985 neo-noir, is kinky, colourful, offbeat and as much a Los Angeles film as The French Connection is a New York one. A young and androgynous Willem Dafoe plays a notorious counterfeiter pursued by two Secret Service agents, one by the book, the other corrupted. We discuss the film's style and tone, its subject matter and setting in L.A.'s liminal, casually confrontational criminal underworld, its sensuous cinematography, and how it reflects and contrasts with The French Connection, particularly in the context of the films' morally cloudy protagonists. José has a soft spot for To Live and Die in L.A. despite acknowledging several problematic facets to it; Mike can't say he loves it, finding little satisfying to bite on other than the extraordinarily expressive imagery and Dafoe's captivating presence. Still, it's a bold, evocative work of very, very Eighties noir, and deviant enough to keep you on your toes. Recorded on 19th July 2020.

William Friedkin remakes Henri-Georges Clouzot's The Wages of Fear, telling four strangers' tale of their two-hundred-mile journey through the South American jungle, transporting dangerously explosive cargo for a US oil company. Though a flop upon its release, we find some nice things to say about Sorcerer. It's impressively narrated, largely wordlessly, although we wouldn't have minded some character development, and Friedkin's preference for spectacle over depth is on display: as with The French Connection, the end leaves us asking, "is that all it's about?" The treatment of South America and its people is lazy if not worse, the central characters ending up in this hell as a form of cosmic punishment for their sins. But there's a keen sense of pace to Sorcerer, despite how long it takes for the journey to even begin, some memorable images, and one outstanding, stunning set-piece. Its present-day reappraisal is understandable, and despite its problems, it's worth a look. Recorded on 19th July 2020.

A classic of Hollywood crime, The French Connection paints a bleak picture of life and justice in America, as Gene Hackman's Popeye Doyle demonstrates that no matter how low the drug dealers he pursues, he can sink lower. We ask what its depiction of New York's underbelly and the accuracy of Doyle's hunches despite his revolting behaviour says about the filmmakers, and consider Pauline Kael's assertion that the film is "what we once feared mass entertainment might become". Underneath the iconic style and unforgettable chase, is there anything meaningful to The French Connection? Recorded on 14th July 2020.

Adapted from Tracy Letts' 1996 play of the same name, 2006's Bug, directed by William Friedkin, sees two lonely people with traumatic histories connect and share a descent into madness. It's a bit of an experiment, its theatrical roots obvious, some questions left unsatisfyingly unanswered, and it's not until the final act that it takes off. But it's interesting, features strong performances from Michael Shannon (who also played the role on stage) and Ashley Judd, and is essential viewing for anyone interested in Friedkin, Shannon, Judd or Letts. Recorded on 5th July 2020.

Spike Lee's latest joint sees four US Army veterans, the Bloods, return to their former battlefields in Vietnam in search of two things: the body of their fallen comrade and leader, Stormin' Norman, and a cache of gold bars, intended during the war to pay the Lahu people for their help fighting the Viet Cong, but taken and buried by the Bloods for themselves. Set in the modern day, exploring the history of black oppression and racism in the USA, and released on Netflix among a backdrop of Black Lives Matter protests around the world, Da 5 Bloods could hardly be more relevant. But is it successful? No, argues José. Spike Lee is in full-on propagandist, pamphleteer mode here, delivering lessons about racism and class, warfare and imperialism, black martyrs and heroes, but inartfully and clunkily. Although his direct address is striking and powerful, the Rambo-esque action adventure story to which it's married lacks imagination and intelligence, and really functions only as a frame from which to hang the film's

A slow, careful drama, Vitalina Varela - named for the non-professional actor at the centre, who plays a version of herself - tells a story of grief, anger, and discovery. Vitalina, abandoned by her husband in the 1980s, travels to Portugal from Cape Verde to confront him, but finds that he has passed away just days ago. She is left to explore the house he has left empty and the life he led without her for some forty years, and the film gives ample time to the feelings and questions that arise within her. We discuss the economic situation depicted - this is a slum in Lisbon, built into the ground, feeling a world away from the vibrant, wealthy capital nearby - and Varela's visual power, her performance one of presence as much as acting, as she moves slowly through the town like a ghost. Leonardo Simões' cinematography is extraordinarily beautiful, thoughtfully composed and intricately lit, and Mike remarks upon how the edges of the 4:3 frame blend into the blackness of a widescreen television, giving a feeli

A film dear to Mike's heart since childhood, and a large blot on Steven Spielberg's career despite its financial success, Hook imagines a world in which Peter Pan, J. M. Barrie's flying boy who never grows up... grows up and forgets how to fly. When the adult Peter, a workaholic corporate lawyer unaware of his origins, travels to London with his family, his children are kidnapped, forcing him to return to Neverland, confronting his past, his attitude, and his erstwhile adversary, Captain Hook. Hook is a chunky, colourful family film with flaws all over the place. Its action is unexciting, its plot composed of several disparate strands and themes that never cohere elegantly. José takes issue with Dustin Hoffman's accent and John Williams' score, finding the former pointless and unsuccessful, the latter prescriptive and overbearing. But Mike defends them, finding charm in them, and appreciating as an adult what never stuck in his mind as a child, in particular the central emotional conceit: that for all the co

From a central focus on two aspiring young basketball hopefuls from Chicago, Hoop Dreams weaves an incredible tapestry of race and class in America, without once explaining itself to the audience, without once winking and imploring us to notice something. William Gates and Arthur Agee, two black boys of about 14 or 15 years old, are plucked from their neighbourhoods by a scout for St. Joseph's High School in Westchester, a white suburban private school that dips into the inner city looking for talent to boost its basketball team, chucking back any kid that doesn't show enough promise. Over the course of several years, we follow William and Arthur's development. William and Arthur don't start in the same place - William is touted as the next Isiah Thomas, a former St. Joseph's alumnus who reached the NBA, and receives as an individual gift a personally guaranteed scholarship to St. Joseph's from a wealthy benefactor. Arthur is labelled with no particular expectation beyond that he shows the potential to go pr

A somewhat elliptical family drama from Pablo Larraín, Ema tells the story of a young woman who returned a child she adopted, feels the loss deeply, and wants to get him back. We discuss the central performances from Mariana Di Girolamo and Gael García Bernal, how their characters throw the most painful insults at each other but remain so obviously in love, Ema's sexual fluidity and willingness to use sex as a tool, the poetic opening movement to the film including the astonishing on-stage, colour-shifting Sun, and whether Ema's pain is as apparent as we'd like. Recorded on 21st May 2020.

On a very special Eavesdropping at the Movies requested by our listeners, José takes us through the career of Burt Lancaster, every one of whose films he has been watching during the lockdown. Lancaster is a star through whose career a whole history of movements and evolutions in Hollywood can be tracked, from the studio noirs of the 1940s right through to the anti-war allegories of the 1970s, taking in all of the social, political, stylistic, industrial and aesthetic shifts that would take place in a constantly changing America. On screen, Lancaster was capable of moving fluidly between genres and styles, including noir, action-adventure and Westerns, won the 1960 Oscar for Best Actor for Elmer Gantry, was regularly amongst the top box-office stars from 1950-1965, and worked with some of the great screenwriters and playwrights, including Tennessee Williams and Arthur Miller. Off screen, he was one of the foremost independent producers of his day. He fought against McCarthyism during the height of the Red Sc

Federico Fellini invites us to hang out with a group of unemployed, lazy twentysomethings in 1953's I vitelloni, one of his earliest films and an interesting portrait of life in a sleepy Italian town. For José, comparisons to his youth in a sleepy Spanish town abound; Mike finds links to British films that evoke similar feelings. I vitelloni is both culturally specific and universally relatable - every society has some version of the gang one grows up with, and the middle-class youngsters who think they rule the place. We consider the motif of homosexuality - evoked in different ways by different characters, sometimes explicitly and sometimes only if we want to see it, but present throughout - and the theme of patriarchy, considering particularly the roles of women in the film, be they wives, mothers, or playthings, and ask what their agency is, if any - do they even believe they have any? Life in I vitelloni's seaside town is unconducive to personal progress, development, opportunity, and freedom, but where

Stardom, beauty, the machinery of Hollywood, madness, age - 1978's Fedora sees Billy Wilder occupying much of the same thematic territory of his 1950 classic, Sunset Boulevard. William Holden's has-been film producer attends the funeral of Fedora, a reclusive former film star, and thinks back on the recent trip he took to Corfu, attempting to track her down and coax her out of retirement. What unravels is a mystery, a conspiracy, a twisted mother-daughter relationship, and another in Mubi's strand of "perfect failures". Wilder's struggle to finance Fedora is apparent, José suggesting that in every part one can imagine a superior actor. Though that's perhaps scant defence of the tedious visual design - Dutch angles don't cost money, and the film is crying out for more visual expression than it offers. Mike explains his problem with the plot structure and particularly his dislike of "two weeks earlier" hooks, and we consider the way in which we're asked to believe in Fedora's incredible stardom while not reall

Carole Lombard and Jack Benny lead chaos in 1942's To Be or Not to Be, Ernst Lubitsch's classic black comedy set amongst a group of actors turned resistors in occupied Poland. Considered to be in bad taste at the time, it was, to say the least, a bold film to make, one that mocked the very real and active threat of the Nazis to their faces. It's also endlessly witty and truly hilarious, generous and kind. It's a treat. We think about it in comparison to other satire, in particular that of Mel Brooks, who José argues has an aggression and contempt that Lubitsch avoids, while Mike suggests that their work shares an absolute unambiguity as to the targets they set and the messages they convey. But there's unquestionably a remarkable sensitivity of tone to To Be or Not to Be, as well as an effortlessly executed intelligence in plotting, with the love triangle of the opening leading cleverly, smoothly, and unpredictably, into the unmasking of a Gestapo spy. José can't speak highly enough of Lubitsch, above whom t

A film many have heard of and few have seen, Southland Tales is writer-director Richard Kelly's infamous difficult second album. Six years after his eventual cult hit Donnie Darko, this sprawling, confusing mess of an end-of-days parable was released to thunderous bafflement and almost no box office. We dive in and find that perhaps all we needed was to give it thirteen years to breathe. There's no defending much of the film's execution. Kelly's visuals are functional at best, almost never expressive, and rather obvious, there's an abundance of plot that feels at once over- and under-developed, and there's no emotional way in to significantly connect with any character. But Southland Tales is chock full of ideas and ambition, and there's much to respond positively to. José considers how its critique of American culture continues to resonate today; Mike suggests that alongside M. Night Shyamalan's The Village, it captures the state of mind of post 9/11, pre-financial crash, perpetually warring, deeply conserv

A prototypical screwball comedy, 1934's Twentieth Century sees John Barrymore delightfully chewing the scenery as a pompous theatre impresario who discovers and makes a star of Carole Lombard's lingerie model. Having separated after several successful years, the former power couple meet by chance on the luxury Twentieth Century train, and it all kicks off as schemes are put into action, conflict erupts, and some religious bloke keeps putting stickers that say "REPENT" on everything he sees. Barrymore is sensational, sending theatrical types up and orating floridly and dramatically, while Lombard clashes with him spikily. We consider how well Twentieth Century fits into the screwball genre - the dialogue is snappy and witty, the situations farcical, the relationships barbed, although it's less of an even two-hander than you might expect, the focus heavily on Barrymore. Mike argues that the chemistry between the couple doesn't play as enjoyably as intended, and that the bits of business on the fringes, and the

A 62-minute-long, 1940 B-movie whose director you haven't heard of and whose top-billed star has barely ten minutes of screen time, you'd be forgiven for thinking that Stranger on the Third Floor is nothing remarkable, but its reputation precedes it: Here we behold, if the legends are true, the first film noir. José, a lover of noir, both likes and dislikes this line. On the one hand, it enjoyably disrupts what is already a fairly shaky narrative of noir beginning practically overnight in 1941; on the other, noir is a term that encompasses many visual styles, stories, character types, associated genres and influences, and artistic movements like this develop gradually, not immediately. But this taxonomic discussion says nothing of Stranger on the Third Floor's quality. And for a good fifteen minutes or so, that quality is not promising, but the film explodes into life upon the protagonist's descent into a hallucinatory nightmare brought on by guilt and fear. It's José's first time seeing the film, and immed

We conclude our dalliance with Jean-Pierre Melville with 1970's Le Cercle rouge, a heist film with an impressive cast of Alain Delon, Gian Maria Volonté, and Yves Montand. We discuss how genre conventions operate in the film - the shortcuts an understanding of genre provides allow details to make the difference, Mike suggesting that it all comes out through character relationships and quirks. In discussing Le Cercle rouge, we think back on what we've learned about Melville's style, themes and interests. For Melville, emotional attachment is dangerous and makes one vulnerable; it's a rather bleak outlook, but José argues that his films aren't without their romantic aspects. Mike remarks upon the way in which Melville's style has been interpreted and appropriated by the filmmakers he influenced, noting that the vivacity with which, for instance, Quentin Tarantino effuses about Melville is not reflective of Melville's films themselves, which are slower and more pensive than you might be led to expect. To José,

Jean-Pierre Melville draws upon his experiences in the French Resistance for 1969's Army of Shadows, which depicts an ensemble including Lino Ventura, Simone Signoret and Paul Meurisse working to disrupt the Nazi occupation of France, rescuing Resistance members from captivity, operating safehouses... and killing informants. Army of Shadows' view of the Resistance is far from romantic, showing the ordinary people who comprise it being driven to extreme measures in the cause of remaining hidden and evading capture, and the threat of capture and death hanging over them at all times. We compare it to The Great Escape, a caper in which prisoners of war work towards a big victory - there's nothing of the sort in Army of Shadows, the Resistance only ever staying one step ahead of the Nazis pursuing them. Resistance itself is the victory, and it comes with costs. We think about continuities between this film and Melville's other work. The isolation felt in Un flic and Le Doulos comes through here, the Resistance