A day's viewing

I didn't post any reviews yesterday, not so much because I didn't feel like it, but because the unreviewed films from the previous days left me somewhat unmoved and not exactly eager to revisit them.  Yesterday's selection made up for such unforgivable apathy to some extent:

"Animal Farm" (1954):  Sometimes looking back on landmark movies works.  This was the first feature-length British animation based on the well-known George Orwell fable about the dangers of totalitarianism.  Yes, to the modern eye the animation techniques are a little basic and lack the verve of traditional Disney skill; however there is a darkness to the drawing which serves the tale well and illustrates the moral that all animals are equal, but that some animals are more equal than others.  Unlike the book which did not predict a better tomorrow, the film-makers did allow for the hope that the real workers might overturn the decadence of their masters (pigs), which is sort of what history has provided (if you look at politics in the same simplistic terms.)

"Warriors of Heaven and Hell" (2003):  This is a visibly high-budget Chinese epic set in the 9th Century and more dependent on character development, gorgeous photography, and traditional swordplay (some of it quite violent) to tell its tale than the mind-boggling wirework of Hong Kong movies.  Its the story of a Japanese enforcer in the service of the Tang Dynasty who longs to go home, but first must kill an army renegade (his crime: he refused to kill innocent women and children).  The latter is guarding a camel train carrying a young monk and an important religious relic; the enforcer agrees to help him reach his destination before dispatching him, and together with old army colleagues and a warrior maiden, they hold off what seems like endless hordes of bandits.  Not all of them survive but their precious cargo does.  I think my general reaction was that it was very impressive, if not exactly much fun .

"The Freshman" (1925):  Now this Harold Lloyd classic IS a lot of fun.  Nerdy lad is so eager to be liked at college that he practices quirky mannerisms and wastes his hard-earned cash in the pursuit of popularity, while the other students are having a laugh at his expense.  Only the landlady's daughter sees him for the good man that he really is. Standouts among the set pieces are the dance that he hosts in a tuxedo that it only basted together and the final football game where he saves the day for his college -- he might only have been the waterboy, but determination will out.  Put that in your pipe and smoke it, Adam Sandler!