I've seen a number of films over the last few days and couldn't decide which to review. Among them were "The Spoilers" (1942), a movie that has been filmed at least five times, in which John Wayne has his best brawl outside "The Quiet Man". Then there was R-Point (2004) a Korean variant on a fairly frequent modern theme: a platoon of soldiers are haunted by the ghosts of the dead -- a wee bit on the confusing side and, as you know, I distrust war films. So I decided to celebrate the first showing on UK television of the above film -- mind you it was on BBC4 and therefore probably had a wee audience. I had seen it once previously, but it was good to welcome it again. Directed by Federico Fellini immediately after "La Strada" it was not a success in Italy and didn't get a US release for another nine years. It was probably something of a failure in that it did not much embrace the quirky side of life like his most memorable films and was very definitely ultimately downbeat. In a role conceived for Humprhey Bogart (now that would have been something to see), the lead was taken by Broderick Crawford, supported by another American actor, Richard Basehart (who was so very good in "La Strada"); of course they were both dubbed into Italian -- not too professionally I should add. Broderick's scam was to dress as a bishop and to con poor peasants out of their hard-gained savings by pretending to find "treasure" on their land -- a fairly elaborate con for relatively small returns. As his original gang falls apart, Crawford joins up with less savoury crooks and when he finds his own epiphany, he also finds unforgiving tragedy. I kept trying to picture how Bogie would have handled it and think he was probably wise to turn down the role. In short, a movie well worth seeking out, but not one to restore your faith in humanity.
I'm off to Newcastle for a few days, so probably no new entries before Saturday. See you then....
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