The Woman in the Window

I expected “The Woman in the Window,” the 1944 thriller directed by Fritz Lang, to be almost the same as “Scarlet Street,” Lang’s 1944 movie with the same cast. But I found Scarlet Street to be much darker because Joan Bennett, who stars in both movies, is much more evil. In The Woman in the Window, she proves to be a problem for the Edward G. Robinson character because she complicates his life. However, Robinson’s character is not married (as his character is in Scarlet Street) and only needs to worry about a scandal in relation to his prestigious job as a college professor.

Joan Bennett in "The Woman in the Window."

Joan Bennett in “The Woman in the Window.”

In The Woman in the Window, Robinson plays Professor Richard Wanley, a law professor who lectures on the definition of homicide in the first scene. He cautions that “The man who kills in self-defense should not be judged by the same standards as the man who kills for gain.” Later, as he’s going the a fancy gentleman’s club, he spots a picture in an art gallery window of a beautiful woman. In the club dining room, he jokes about having a relationship with such a beautiful young woman to his 2 friends, one of whom happens to be the district attorney. Later, he runs into the woman depicted in the painting, has a drink with her and goes to her apartment.
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The woman, of course, turns out to be the enchanting, lovely and thoroughly convincing Joan Bennett as Alice Reed, an artists model. As the two proceed with their perfectly innocent date, a jealous man rushes in and shortly ends up dead. Now, the Professor and Alice must trust each other as they get rid of the body and stay ahead of the police investigation. The Professor takes elaborate measures to dump the body, but then continually makes embarrassing gaffes when discussing the case with the district attorney back at the gentlemen’s club.

It appears the movie offers a war of wills pitting the Professor against the District Attorney, played by Raymond Massey. But then the screenwriter Nunnally Johnson throws in a character to occupy Alice, a blackmailer named Heidt (Dan Duryea), who’s been tailing the dead man and knows about Alice’s affair with him. He decides to blackmail Alice and the Professor, who think up a murder plot to get rid of him. At that point, the District Attorney’s theories about the killing seem way off the mark and the new dangers prove much more compelling. Unlike Scarlet Street, Lang gives this movie a much happier ending. In the end, he gives the audience one last view of the woman in the window.

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Harry Nilsson

A documentary with the rather lengthy title “Who is Harry Nilsson (And Why is Everybody Talkin’ About Him?)” came out in 2010. It explores the rise and fall of one of America’s greatest singer/songwriters and the influence his music and life had on a generation of musical artists. The film’s director and writer, John Scheinfeld, interviews such musical luminaries as Brian Wilson of The Beach Boys, Al Kooper, Randy Newman, Jimmy Webb, Mickey Dolenz of The Monkees and Gerry Beckley of America. They share both their opinion of Nilsson’s music and stories of Harry’s carousing and abuse of alcohol and drugs. Nilsson’s flame burned brightly but he died at the young age of 52.

The poster for "Who is Harry Nilsson (And Why is Everybody Talkin' About Him?)"

The poster for “Who is Harry Nilsson (And Why is Everybody Talkin’ About Him?)”

Nilsson grew up in poverty in Brooklyn, in a home where his father abandoned the family when he was 3 years old. This provides a basis for the psychological study of Nilsson, but the film mostly refrains from making it the sole reason for Nilsson’s destructive personality traits. Rather, the film makes the point that artists handle fame in different ways. Some can adjust to the physical and mental demands of success, while others such as Nilsson anesthetize their pain with drugs and alcohol.

Scheinfeld, with the cooperation of many artists and Nilsson’s wife Una, presents a film that celebrates his life without overdramatizing the destructive patterns. Nilsson the artist seemed to come out of nowhere, but in reality Harry Nilsson worked hard for many years before he became a success.  He worked at a bank in Los Angeles and hoped to sell his songs to musical publishing companies. Nilsson’s big break came when The Monkees decided to record his song, “Cuddly Toy,” and when he finally quit his day job, it seemed like everybody in the music industry wanted a piece of him.
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When Nilsson got a call to spend time at Abbey Road Studios in London, he met and spent considerable time with John Lennon and Yoko Ono. He began to think of himself as the fifth Beatle, and this led to considerable changes in his work. He got a new producer, scored a major hit with the album “Nilsson Schmilsson,” and continued on his destructive path. He angered his record company, RCA, and embarked on self-serving projects such the “A Little Touch of Schmilsson in the Night” and the “Pussy Cat” albums. The Pussy Cat album came out during his period of partying with John Lennon in Los Angeles, which resulted in the loss of his beautiful voice. This revelation and discussion is really the only sad part of this celebratory film.

Despite the dark and mysterious reasons for Nilsson’s addictions, all of the interviews, even with his ex-wife, are reverential. Clearly, Nilsson found happiness and love in his final days. This interesting and moving documentary succeeds in giving us a balanced view of one man’s success.

 

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Carousel

Sometimes a movie can have everything going for but it just doesn’t work. “Carousel,” a 1956 movie directed by Henry King, has music by Rodgers and Hammerstein and a couple of exuberant lead characters in Julie Jordan and Billy Bigelow, but for various reasons it stops short of being a moving experience.  For one thing, the music isn’t as interesting or memorable as other Rodgers and Hammerstein musicals.  The musical’s showstoppers include “June is Busting Out All Over” and “You’ll Never Walk Alone.”

Gordon MacRae and Shirley Jones in "Carousel."

Gordon MacRae and Shirley Jones in “Carousel.”

The movie begins in purgatory, where Billy Bigelow polishes stars that hang on strings. The Starkeeper (Gene Lockhart) reminds him that the dead can return to earth for one day to do some good.  Billy (Gordon MacRae) tells the story in flashback of how he met Julie and ended up dead.  In Maine in 1873, the couple first meet at the town carousel, where Billy works as the barker.  Billy quickly moves in on Julie (Shirley Jones), and upsets Mrs. Mullin, the carousel owner. Billy, already taken by Julie, quits and soon goes off to sing a long song with Julie under some blossoming trees.

The bottom line is no blood going to your penis and keep it viagra overnight delivery erect while being involved in sexual intercourse. The fact is that nobody knows what is in this “King of the Herbs” that makes it so powerful? Dietary Fiber Vitamins (B’s, C, Folic Acid, pro-vitamin D) Minerals (potassium, selenium, sulfur, sodium, germanium, zinc, manganese, and phosphorus) Enzymes (antibaceterial, proteolytic) Sugars (mannitol, xylose, ribose, glucose, galactose, mannose) Protein (essential amino acid precursers) Lipids (phospholipids, sterols, sterol esters, sale of sildenafil tablets free fatty acids, mono-, di-, and tri-glycerides, conjugated linoleic acid (CLA) Antioxidants Polysaccharides. Other ED treatments include penile pumps, penile implants and vacuum device. viagra store frankkrauseautomotive.com What can heavy menstrual bleeding do to harm women patients? For women who have the disease, the bleeding in menstrual amount can be 4-5 times of amount which is normal, every time during the period cialis sale frankkrauseautomotive.com in menstrual, 30-60 sanitary napkin can be used. Billy, through arrogance and stupidity, doesn’t find work. Julie’s friend Carrie (the lovely Barbara Ruick) falls for a local fisherman, who offers Billy a job on a herring boat.  Billy turns down the job, and then a rejects a chance to get his job back at the carousel.  Instead, Billy falls in with a local hood named Jigger Craigin (Cameron Mitchell), and conspires with him to rob the local mill owner. Things change when Billy learns from Julie that he’s got a baby on the way.

The whole town then goes on sailboats to a remote island for a clam bake, which includes a clam bake song. After the clam bake, the citizens go on a scavenger hunt in the woods.  This produces the most interesting scene in the movie.  Jigger surprises Carrie and offers to teach her some “self-defense” moves.  Jigger really wants to get physical with her and she naively obliges by following his instructions to put her arms around him and squeeze.  I detected a better chemistry between Jigger and Carrie than between Billy and Julie.  But the script makes a point of saying women often go after the rogue.

Twentieth Century Fox originally contracted Frank Sinatra to play Billy, but I don’t think he could have done a better job than Gordon MacRae. The music is operatic and that suits MacRae’s singing style.  I love Shirley Jones in anything, but this property probably works better on stage. The dance numbers, particularly the “June is Busting Out All Over” sequence, are very good.

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Made in Heaven

They made screwball comedies worldwide well into the fifties, despite the darkening effect of film noir and the realism of Italian cinema. In England, filmmakers probably wanted to put everything right again after World War II, so they gave us light-hearted cinematic views of tradition and class conflict. The English comedy movies that come from the era of the early fifties certainly provided a wealth of interesting character actors, even if their plots seem like oversimplified confections.

Sonja Ziemann plays a Hungarian maid in "Made in Heaven."

Sonja Ziemann plays a Hungarian maid in “Made in Heaven.”

Take a typical English village (Dunmow), add a loving couple living with their upper-class relatives, and provide a time constraint such as a contest, and you’ll get “Made in Heaven,” a 1952 English film directed by John Paddy Carstairs — a veteran director with a knack for churning out low-budget comedy hits. The Technicolor production stars David Tomlinson and Petula Clark as Basil and Julie Topham, who reside in a house with an extended family of resident nuts. The plot involves a yearly contest for finding the happiest couple in the village. The winner, who receives a side (half of a pig) of bacon, must appear before a kangaroo court of locals who decide whether they’ve achieved an entire year of wedded bliss. Called the “Dunmow Flitch,” the bacon would come as a very pleasant prize indeed in England at that time.
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The Topham household, in need of a maid, contract with a Hungarian agency to send along reliable help.  They receive a picture of their candidate, a homely middle-aged woman.  But when Basil shows up at the Dunmow train station to retrieve her, the gorgeous Marta (Sonja Ziemann) shows up.  She’s not only beautiful, she’s charming and aggressive, and no match for the milquetoast Basil. She immediately insists on having lunch at the Ritz Hotel, and Basil is very happy to oblige her.

Soon, Marta’s charm and beauty hold the entire village captive, except for the women, of course.  Other things happen, such as the botched arrival of the flitch of bacon from New Zealand, but the movie never gets dark, strange, or sentimental. An old love of Marta’s comes from Austria, but that’s played lightly as well.  The producers made the film at the famous Pinewood Studios in England in Technicolor, and they have a bit of fun with that. First, we get a colorful American-style square dance.  Then, there’s an extended scene of the men of the village fantasizing about Marta in vivid Hapsburg and Czarist costumes. Mostly, I was left wondering why an entire village goes through all this trouble about bacon.

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The Naked City

Anybody with a fascination for crime stories and police procedurals should watch “The Naked City,” the 1948 film directed by Jules Dassin.  The movie stars Barry Fitzgerald as Detective Dan Muldoon, a homicide cop with a heavy Irish brogue and little patience for lies and nonsense.  He’s on the case of a model murdered in her own apartment, and as with any police procedural, we get to experience a lot of promising leads and dead ends before the suspenseful finish.

Barry Fitzgerald in "The Naked City."

Barry Fitzgerald in “The Naked City.”

Besides Fitzgerald, the film also stars a young Howard Duff, who plays a shady character named Frank Niles, the number 1 suspect from the beginning. Niles spends the entire film avoiding the truth while Muldoon increases the pressure on him to come clean. Muldoon thinks Niles knows more about the crime, but Niles has a solid alibi on the night of the murder.

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All police procedurals follow a standard formula, with the real killer revealed to us early, and then several frantic forays down the wrong path.  Muldoon remains cheerful throughout, and lets his fellow homicide officers waste time on bad leads.  However, this gives the director, Dassin, an opportunity to make the most of the on-location shooting. Dassin is a gifted visual director, and he delivers inspired angles and rich black and white cinematography with the help of his great director of photography, William H. Daniels. Daniels also worked on such classics as “The Shop Around the Corner (1940)” and “Ninotchka (1939).”

We experience the rich atmosphere of New York City in 1948 as the camera takes into the subway stations, soda fountains, a newspaper press room and beauty salons.  It feels a little odd to have Muldoon sporting at thick Irish brogue in a New York story, but that’s because the film establishes the city as the main character right from the beginning.  The crime gets solved by a workmanlike approach from the homicide detectives, with nothing outside the realm of a regular police story.  However, the thrilling conclusion and the documentary-like chronicling of New York City make this a film noir classic.

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The Way Way Back

In 2013’s “The Way Way Back,” a family goes on a vacation to a seaside resort, but not everyone in the clan is happy about it.  The morose teenager Duncan, played by Liam James, does not like his pushy stepfather and cannot understand his mother’s attraction to him.  The stepfather, Trent, played by Steve Carrell, wants to use the holiday to assert his control over Duncan, but getting him to conform proves difficult.  When the movie opens, Trent tells Duncan that he’s only a 3 on a scale of 1 to 10, so the audience doesn’t expect much to go right between them.

Duncan (Liam James) talks to Susanna (AnnaSophie Robb) in "The Way Way Back."

Duncan (Liam James) talks to Susanna (AnnaSophie Robb) in “The Way Way Back.”

Duncan not only dislikes Trent, but he also can’t stand his stepsister, Duncan’s vacuous daughter Steph.  He’s having trouble adjusting to anything and nothing his mother can do seems to help.  Duncan’s mother, Pam, played by Toni Collette, strives for peace and refrains from defending Duncan to Trent in any way. This serves as an explanation for why Duncan can secretly wander off everyday to work at a water park.  The film’s mentoring male figure, Owen, played by Sam Rockwell, attempts to change Duncan in a more loving and humorous way, providing a way to keep this potentially depressing situation several degrees lighter.  Owen manages a water park called “Water Wizz,” and offers Duncan a job for the summer.

It is also termed as Duro gel and known as incredible alternative to viagra samples for sale http://seanamic.com/ceo-blog/, which is available at low price. Medicinal issues: Surprisingly, there are some medicines that may trigger mortality or severe morbidity if taken with cialis online . But expensive and complicated treatments like surgery and all of that. sales cialis Although very beneficial and safe, these medicines cialis lowest prices may cause some adverse events as well. Allison Janney plays a partying neighbor named Beth, who’s the mother of a lovely daughter about Duncan’s age named Susanna (AnnaSophia Robb).  She’s sweet and caring, allowing Duncan to open up to her about his feelings regarding the adults. Susanna seems unaffected by her immature mother, and accepts Duncan even though his own stepsister tries to ostracize him. A romance could develop, but Susanna is mostly a sincere friend.

Duncan changes over the course of the movie as a result of working at the water park.  He learns to enjoy his ritual chores and the freedom he gets from spending so many hours away from Trent and Pam’s beach house.  Owen constantly works on getting Duncan to open up, and it’s entertaining to watch him crack dry jokes and receive playful needling from another co-worker, Caitlin (Maya Rudolph). The movie also explores her loyalty to Owen and her expectation that somehow Owen will show her sincere romantic interest.

The experience of working at Water Wizz proves so beneficial and enjoyable to Duncan that it appears he might want to return the next summer.  Of course, Trent owns the beach house, so going back would require a thaw in their frigid relationship.  But since Owen mainly succeeds in getting Duncan to relax, the payoff in familial harmony may come later.  What’s more likely is that Duncan determinately pursues things that interest him, guaranteeing that he raises his number on a scale of 1 to 10.

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Gravity

I saw “Gravity” in 3D at a local theater on a rainy Wednesday night. When the lights went down I realized I was the only customer.  For the next 90 minutes I watched spellbinding 3D outer space action while experiencing the void of an empty theater.  I thought someone would eventually arrive and break the spell, but no one came in. I normally wouldn’t recommend that a movie showing have only one customer, but upon hearing that Gravity is breaking box-office records, I am glad that the movie is making money otherwise.

Sandra Bullock, as Ryan Stone, works on the space shuttle in "Gravity."

Sandra Bullock, as Ryan Stone, works on the space shuttle in “Gravity.”

Gravity, released in 2013, stars Sandra Bullock and George Clooney and some voices over the radio from earth to space. Bullock plays Ryan Stone, a medical-device scientist, and Clooney plays veteran astronaut Matt Kowalski. While Ryan works on a space on a space walk with Kowalski, fast moving debris from a Russian satellite breakup smashes into and destroys the shuttle.  This leaves Ryan and Matt stranded in orbit looking for a way to survive before their oxygen runs out.

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After seeing Ryan so panicked after the disaster, it’s hard to believe she can undertake the incredibly difficult tasks ahead of her.  However, Ryan accomplishes much in this film, and it’s a tribute to Sandra Bullock’s acting that we end up believing she can overcome any obstacle.  Ryan Stone seems more real than most action heroes, even though her main focus is always on self survival. Getting back to earth becomes her main job in the movie, and the audience is continually thrilled by the difficulties in her path.

Besides the gripping story, the film is technically outstanding.  When the debris field flies out over the theater seats, I had the urge to duck away.  The space stations are messy, with pens and other objects floating around.  Nothing has to be shoved towards the camera because things float around in every direction anyway. Despite having only 2 characters, so much goes on that I’m thinking of going out and seeing it again in 3D.  I certainly needed to come back down to earth after this experience.

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Mary and Max

The animated and satirical comedy, “Mary and Max,” released in 2009, features two main characters with some very serious problems.  Mary, who lives in a small town in Australia in the 1970s, has a birthmark on her forehead and possesses severe self-esteem issues.  She gets no emotional support from her alcoholic mother, and her father spends all his non-working time practicing taxidermy in the garage.  She’s a lonely 8-year-old with no friends who looks out wistfully at a neighbor boy who can hardly communicate with her because of a severe stutter. She keeps a pet rooster and loves an animated cartoon called “The Noblets.”

Mary makes a package for Max in "Mary and Max."

Mary makes a package for Max in “Mary and Max.”

Max, an obese man in his fifties, is prone to anxiety attacks and can only stem his depression and loneliness by eating chocolate hot dogs, which are his own invention. He attends overeaters anonymous meetings even though he hates them, and dutifully sees a psychiatrist whose advice fails to heal him of either anxiety or obesity.  He rages against all forms of littering, particularly when smokers throw their cigarette butts down on the sidewalk.  He doesn’t have any friends either, except for an almost blind woman who lives in his apartment building and brings him soup.

But there is a slight problem! They have no reason to buy the brand name products as it would be just a short-term change in your life if you follow these simple and easy lifestyle changes suggested by cialis super active the experts. Chronic medical conditions A man with a history of prepregnancy depression or anxiety disorders, the exposure to the peripartum oxytocin increased the cialis prices in india http://miamistonecrabs.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/Tryout-Waiver.pdf risk of depression or anxiety in the first postpartum year by approximately 32 percent in women with no history of selling counterfeit drugs. Motility Inability to conceive can be due to female or male infertility treatment will be cured by the miamistonecrabs.com cheap viagra in usa acupuncture or not. Studies have also shown that generic viagra for sale regular Kegel exercise greatly helps relieve erectile dysfunction. Because Mary heard that babies in Australia are found at the bottom of beer glasses, she wonders how they arrive in America. At the library, she finds a New York City phonebook, sees Max’s address, and decides to write to him. This begins a decades long pen-pall relationship that details the pitfalls in Mary and Max’s lives and offers solace to two pitiful and depressing characters who cannot seem to improve their lives any other way. It’s remarkable that a young girl from Australia and an obese old man from New York would have anything in common.  However, they both love The Noblets and sweets, and that’s enough to fuel their long-term letter-writing relationship.

Neither Mary or Max are very attractive animated characters, but they possess a unique spirit that produces audience sympathy.  None of the other characters have much trouble coping with them because they are wacky too. Mary’s drunken mother would do damage to anyone’s psyche, while Max’s withdrawal to his solitude of his own apartment stems from his inability to withstand any connection with his fellow humans, even ones suffering the same complexes as himself.  Max doesn’t understand or feel love, and he cannot accurately guess emotions from other people’s facial expressions.

Even though Max loves the idea of sharing his life through letters with Mary, he is demanding of her.  Some of Mary’s experiences drive him to anxiety attacks, while she uses Max’s letters to make sense of the unfriendly world around her.  The only thing Max really strives for is to win the lottery, while Mary wants to find answers and overcome her troubles.  It’s hard to believe such a sad story works so well as an animated comedy, but lots of wonderful sight gags and unexpected plot twists keep Mary and Max funny and interesting.

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Nothing Sacred

Carole Lombard and Fredric March are a capable screwball comedy duo in the 1937 Technicolor film “Nothing Sacred.”  Despite requiring 11 writers to work on either the screenplay or the treatment, the film succeeds as a witty newspaper story involving a complete misunderstanding.  In Nothing Sacred, Hazel Flagg (Lombard), a woman from Warsaw, Vermont, receives a misdiagnosis from her doctor that says she’s dying of radium poisoning.  The story makes it all the way to New York City, where a shrewd news reporter named Wally Cook (March) sees it as a way to both redeem his tarnished reputation and drive up the circulation of his newspaper (The Morning Star).

Carole Lombard looks rather healthy in "Nothing Sacred."

Carole Lombard looks rather healthy in “Nothing Sacred.”

Wally, already in trouble for staging a fake charity event, convinces his tough editor, Oliver Stone (played by Walter Connolly), to allow him to fetch Hazel. She’ll spend her last days in New York as a splendid example of courage in the face of death.  Cook travels to Vermont and meets the citizenry of Warsaw, who are people prone to one-word answers, mistrust of newspapermen, and to always expect a tip for any information — no matter how useless.

Vitamin A is a key component to developing canadian tadalafil healthy cells and tissues in the body, including hair. It is found that males who viagra soft tablets browse over here are in their 40s. viagra online As a result of this pressure, some of the formulations have been prepared with excess lead quantities, above the regulated standards. Stress is really responsible to bring sexual disorder in men and women, so let’s find out these causes. secretworldchronicle.com levitra 40 mg Meanwhile, Hazel meets with Doctor Enoch Downer (Charles Winninger) and learns about her misdiagnosis.  But the fit and healthy Hazel impulsively accepts Wally’s offer to fly with him to New York, and she brings along Enoch to help with the ruse.  They fly to New York, providing us with a view of the Statue of Liberty and the rest of the city in 1937.  Hazel lands and experiences New York’s publicity machine in full force. Everyone from the mayor, to society matrons to a crowd at the wrestling arena offer their tearful sympathy.

The Morning Star’s publicity campaign for Hazel has her accepting the key to the city, but most of the action involves Wally taking her out on dates with a cameraman in tow. Everywhere she goes, people break down in tears, which Hazel finds aggravating.  At a nightclub, an over-the-top floor show features courageous woman of the past, including Lady Godiva, Catherine the Great, and Pocahontas, all on horseback. Finally, the MC calls Hazel to the stage, where she collapses from drinking too much champagne.

Carole Lombard possesses the ability to deliver fast-pace lines without any loss of understanding.  I always hear her clearly no matter how fast she talks. Ben Hecht provides his usual lively dialogue, although others such as George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart lend a hand.  The romance amounts to a few kisses here and there between Hazel and Wally, but it’s only played up in one rather quiet scene on a sailboat as the couple get more comfortable with each other. It takes a while for Wally to discover the ruse, so his motivations are not so keenly romantic.

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Blancanieves

Silent films tell a story in a different way, with images instead of dialogue, and they rely on those images to convey the emotional depth of the tale.  With the modern reliance on booming sounds and excessive dialogue, it’s nice to experience a familiar story told in the silent style.  Not that the silent cinema told stories more simply, they just layered the images within a simpler emotional context of focused awareness and a natural empathy towards their characters.

Macarena Garcia plays Carmen/Blancanieves (Snow White) in "Blancanieves."

Macarena Garcia plays Carmen/Blancanieves (Snow White) in “Blancanieves.”

The story of Snow White, written by the Brothers Grimm, is both dark and imaginative.  The characters are well known: Snow White, the evil stepmother, and the seven dwarfs.  They’re all in the 2012 silent movie from Spain called “Blancanieves,” written and directed by Pablo Berger. In this dark and fascinatingly realistic movie, Snow White is the daughter of a bullfighter who has suffered a horrendous injury in the bull-fighting ring. The shock of the injury forces the bullfighter’s pregnant wife into labor, where she dies in childbirth but produces a beautiful and graceful daughter named Carmen (Carmencita). Her paralyzed father marries his nurse and abandons Carmencita to a nanny. Despite Carmencita’s longing for her father, all is well until the nanny dies and the little girl is whisked off to live with her father.

Then Carmencita is thrust into the clutches of her VERY evil stepmother, Encarna, who keeps the girl’s father hidden in an upstairs room in her villa while Carmencita sleeps in a dirty basement. Encarna treats Carmencita like a slave, and she’s forced to spend her days doing arduous chores.  The girl’s only joy is a pet rooster named Pepe and the hope that one day she can sneak upstairs to see her father in his hidden room.  That day eventually comes, and some of the most charming scenes in the film involve the father and daughter’s joy at establishing their natural relationship with each other.  In the process, the paralyzed matador teaches Carmencita the techniques of bullfighting.
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Eventually, the evil Encarna discovers Carmencita’s visitations with her dad, and punishes her severely.  Carmencita spends the rest of her days at the villa in complete misery until she becomes a young woman.  One of Encarna’s henchmen tries to drown her in a pond, but a troupe of bullfighting dwarfs rescues her.  She’s lost her memory, but begins to find happiness and shows a surprising ability for bullfighting.  Her success and fame soon draws the attention of Encarna, who arrives with a poisoned apple for her stepdaughter.

Many bad things happen in this movie, and the tone remains dark.  But the joys come from the triumph of spirit and the obvious gratitude the good characters have for small successes.  The story seems to take place in the late 1920’s, but that only seems apparent at the climax when a line of cars from that era show up for Carmen’s big bullfighting scene.  Director Berger filmed the bullfighting realistically, staying away from heavy special effects.  This helps to keep the audience engaged in the characters without the distraction of computer graphics.  CGI would have looked completely out of place in this black and white period film.

Berger and cinematographer Kiko de la Rica lit the film very brightly, presumably because much of the action takes place in sunny Seville, Spain. All the characters look very good, even though they exist in less the health-conscious times of the 1920’s.  But the movie does not seem like an imitation of silent films but rather a fresh approach on telling a familiar story with beautiful images.

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