Jason's Blog, page 116

Virginia Frances Sterrett 2

Pulp Octopus

Pulp illustration

based on a Phantom Lady cover

Billy Wilder

Top 5 Billy Wilder films:
1. The Apartment
2. Some Like It Hot
3. Double Indemnity
4. Sabrina
5. Sunset Boulevard

Adèle Palm Beach

The Extraordinary Adventures of Adèle Blanc-Sec

What happened to Luc Besson? He made a couple of good films back in the days. I was hoping for something in the line of Judex or Irma Vep, but the film is more like a stupid comedy a clueless American Hollywood director would make. And Besson is French, goddammit! It has almost nothing to do with the Tardi comics, it's more like Indiana Jones meets The Mummy 3. Adèle is given a backstory, about a dead sister, to give her motivation. She's Adèle Blanc-Sec! She's supposed to be kind of a mystery! She doesn't need no stinkin' motivation! So, first Adéle, then Tintin, what's next?

The Palm Beach Story

Okay, it's a classic, it's screwball comedy, Preston Sturges, Claudette Colbert and everything, but I found it a bit hard to get into this film. It's far from It Happened One Night. What do we learn in the film?
Rich people sure are silly.
Foreigners sure are funny.
Black people (servants and porters) sure are stupid.
Maybe I was in the wrong mood... The film almost redeems itself in the ending, that actually is pretty funny, referring back to the crazy, unexplained opening credits.

Maltese Falcon / Broken Ear

Louis Moe

Corto Maltese

drawn by Charles Berberian 
http://barbiermathon.com/dotclear/ind...

The Hit

John Hurt and Tim Roth are sent to kill Terence Stamp, hiding in Spain. Also starring Fernando Rey, directed by Stephen Frears.

A good film, part road movie, part philosophical drama. Frears is more of a meat and potatoes director, less stylish than other Brits, like Ridley Scott and Alan Parker, but he gets the job done, the images never getting in the way of the story. A story that is quite hard to guess where it will end up. Only at the end does it stumble a bit. It reminded me of In Bruges; I wonder if it was an inspiration for Martin McDonagh.

If someone should send a hitman after me one day, I would like for it to be someone like John Hurt in this film, glum looking, with sunglasses and a cigarette dangling in the side of his mouth. I think that would be okay, a proper way to go. I'd put up less of a fight than if it was some prettyboy a la Clive Owen or someone. When Hurt takes off his glasses, there are worse things that will be the final thing you see. Looking into his haunted, tired eyes, it will, somehow, make sense.

Harold Lloyd sketch