CAT PEOPLE (1942) - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Visionary Val Lewton on Criterion Collection!

Stalker (left), Prey (right). Two of the scariest, creepiest
scenes in movie history. And there are more. Plenty more.

Cat People (1942)
Dir. Jacques Tourneur
Prd. Val Lewton
Scr. DeWitt Bodeen
Starring: Simone Simon, Kent Smith, Jane Randolph, Tom Conway, Jack Holt

Review By Greg Klymkiw

"Mоја сестра." ("My Sister.") - greeting from a woman afflicted with the old Serbian curse of turning into a cat when she gets horny to another woman similarly afflicted in Val Lewton's Cat People.

There aren't too many stories as sexy, haunting and downright terrifying as this one. Based on Val Lewton's short story "The Bagheeta", Irena Dubrovna (Simone Simon) an émigré from Serbia in modern day Manhattan refuses to have sex with the handsomely hunky square-jawed husband she loves (the somewhat presciently monikered "Oliver Reed", played by Kent Smith) because she's terrified she'll turn into a ravenously deadly black panther. When the frustrated hubby turns his amorous attentions to Alice Reed (Jane Randolph), his beautiful co-worker at the engineering firm he's employed by, it's quite possible that claws will sprout and fangs will be bared.

As a genre, the horror movie came of age with the visionary Val Lewton's 1942 RKO shocker Cat People and there is not a single scary picture that followed that doesn't owe it a huge debt of gratitude.

For example, how many times have you watched a horror film and jumped out of your seat, clutching your heart, grasping your breath, (and possibly) unloading a stream of urine and/or a glob (or three) of faecal matter in your drawers when a wham-bam shock-cut batters you senseless? Chances are, in good movies or bad, the jump-scare has knocked you on your tailbone (or preferably your cushy derriere) more times than you'd care to admit to yourself, much less anyone else.

Well, you saw it here first, folks - Cat People invented the jump-scare.

The scene in which it occurs here was so shocking, so stunning and so memorable that for decades afterwards, when film crews were setting up for shots involving a jump-scare, they'd refer to it as setting up for "The Bus". Yes, they were referring to the "bus" in Cat People. There's no need to spoil it for you.

When the bus arrives, you'll know it!

"The Bus" is important for more than introducing the jump-scare (as we now know it) to the world; it's everything that precedes the shock (in both the sequence and the film itself) and everything that follows.

Prior to Cat People, the horror film was primarily rooted in the "past" - historical narrative rumination upon long-ago-far-away worlds of Bürgermeisters, torch-carrying villagers and monsters created via alchemy. Not that there is, or was anything wrong with this, but when the highly regarded writer and story editor Val Lewton was hired by the ailing RKO studios to set-up a horror movie division, he had his work cut out for him. The studio was, at this point, almost bankrupted by the WWII (and post-war) economy, but also by Orson Welles via the disappointing box-office of Citizen Kane and the wild cost-overruns of The Magnificent Ambersons. They wanted horror movies! They needed to be made fast and cheap!

Lewton was the right man for the job. Long associated with madman creative genius David O. Selznick, he learned well from the best in the business, but he also had his own ideas about things. One time Selznick so infuriated Lewton that the young man wrote, uncredited of course, a scene in Gone With The Wind that was so insanely over-the-top that he assumed Selznick would never consider including it in the movie.

Remember Scarlett O'Hara stumbling onto the Main Street of Atlanta, the dirty roads cluttered with the hundreds upon hundreds of wounded soldiers, the camera pulling away from her and craning up to a God's-eye view as a tattered Confederate flag flapped in the wind? Lewton wrote this. Selznick shot it. The scene might be one of the most famous in movie history. Well, when Selznick, in a shockingly magnanimous gesture, recommended Lewton to RKO, movie history was not only made again, but cinematic storytelling took a decidedly welcome turn.

The Ukrainian-born Lewton (his Aunt was Alla Nazimova) was steeped in a tradition of literature and folklore. He also brought a lonely childhood to bear upon his subsequent work which fuelled his imagination.

Lewton believed that what was scary - REALLY scary - was everything in the real and CONTEMPORARY world that "normal" people had to face. Blending this with his love for fairy tales and folklore, Lewton was the first person to bring horror to the "modern" world.

With Cat People, here was a story about a stranger in (to her) a strange new land - a woman from an "old" world in a "new" world, carrying the baggage and sins of her ancestors into an America which valued prosperity and forward-thinking. It's a story about marital strife, sexual frustration, loneliness, suicidal despair, psychoanalysis, the complex relationships between men and women and most of all, the scariest thing of all - the dark.

Yes, darkness. What we can't see is what scares all of us.

Lewton understood this and decided to exploit it for all its worth. Though rival Universal Pictures made a fortune from horror movies, they already had long-standing franchises (Frankenstein, The Wolf Man, The Mummy and Dracula) to keep the bucks rolling in for a modest cost. All RKO had was the King Kong franchise, but they really couldn't be made fast and cheap. The studio's marketing geniuses handed Lewton a whole whack of titles. Yes, titles only. These titles were "proven" potential for box office gold as exhibitors had been polled and gave big collective approval ratings to them.

Lurid promises - A movies that delivers the goods.

So, for his first production, Lewton was handed the title Cat People. Oh, he did not disappoint. Working from Lewton's original short story, screenwriter DeWitt Bodeen, director Jacques Tourneur, cinematographer Nicholas Musaraca and editor Mark Robson not only delivered one of the most dazzlingly original horror pictures ever made up to that point (and let's not forget that the likes of James Whale and Tod Browning were no previous slouches in this department), but generated a film that went through the roof at the box office. (Lewton also brilliantly presided over all the studio's lurid marketing materials.)

The horror set-pieces are still unparalleled in terms of their influence upon cinema. Lewton and his team used darkness to their clear advantage - deep shadows and off-screen horror-potential keep us shivering (and practically, they don't cost money). Add to this, though, the astonishing use of sound design. Who will ever forget the creepy water sounds and echoes in the film's empty swimming pool at night sequence? Or how about the two sets of click-clicks of high heels upon the sidewalk pavement in Central Park as a woman senses being stalked?

And then, there's "The Bus".

Goddamn, it's scary. As is the whole movie.

THE FILM CORNER RATING: ***** Five Stars

The Cat People is now on Criterion Blu-Ray and (if you must) DVD. The sumptuous package includes a new 2K digital restoration, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack on the Blu-ray, a 2005 audio commentary with film historian Gregory Mank and excerpts from an audio interview with Simone Simon, a 2008 feature-length documentary: "Val Lewton: The Man in the Shadows", a 1979 interview with Jacques Tourneur, a trailer and an essay by critic Geoffrey O’Brien.

THE CHILDREN ARE WATCHING US - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Haunting Vittorio De Sica Classic screened on rare 35mm print at TIFF Bell Lightbox Cinematheque series "MORE THAN LIFE ITSELF: REDISCOVERING THE FILMS OF VITTORIO DE SICA", programmed by the inimitable James Quandt (also available on a lovely Criterion Collection DVD).

The Children Are Watching Us - I bambini ci guardano (1942)
dir. Vittorio De Sica
Starring: Emilio Cigoli,
Luciano De Ambrosis, Isa Pola,
Adriano Rimoldi, Giovanna Cigoli

Review By Greg Klymkiw

On a narrative level, the cruelty and selfishness of a young mother is what lies at the heart of Vittorio De Sica's The Children Are Watching Us and as such, seems an especially appropriate element for the rich and consistent mise en scène to present the entire story from the perspective of a 5 year old child. There are many powerful aspects to this classic motion picture, but the fact that director De Sica wisely places his camera eye-level to the child in question is almost gruelling in terms of the pain he wrenches from the story and the emotion he extracts from the audience.

Though the film slightly pre-dates the period of Italian neorealism which began with Luchino Visconti's Ossessione in 1943 and Roberto Rossellini's Rome, Open City in 1946, De Sica is already playing with a stark element of realism in the storytelling. We might crave a happy ending, but it would be false, not unlike so many pictures generated in pre-War and wartime Italy.

The Children Are Watching Us was filmed during wartime in 1942, but its politically and socially restful qualities come from the fact that the bombing and shelling did not shock the country into fear and despair until the fall of that year. In addition to utilizing many real locations in tandem with realistically dressed/designed Cinecittà studio work, De Sica cast his central player, Luciano De Ambrosis as the sensitive child Pricò from a non-traditional background. De Sica used the child's already heightened sadness over his mother's recent death to astounding effect in this tragic tale of maternal betrayal.

The film is neatly and boldly divided into 2 parts quite literally as De Sica provides "Part One" and "Part Two" titles to signal the film's two key movements. In the first part, we learn that Pricò's mother Nina (Isa Pola) is engaged in a love affair. When she leaves her husband Andrea (Emilio Cigoli) and essentially abandons her child for the handsome smarmy lover Roberto (Adriano Rimoldi), both father and son are devastated.

Though the loyal housekeeper Agnese (Giovanna Cigoli) is a bedrock, Andrea feels Pricò might be better off with female relatives, but neither of these arrangements come to happy endings and the child is reunited with his father. After a few days of carnal abandon with Roberto, Nina sheepishly returns after ending the affair. Andrea grudgingly allows her to stay for the sake of son needing a Mother. Though he's curt towards her, Andrea allows his bitterness to subside and decides a family vacation at a seaside resort away from Rome is in order.

The second movement is marked by a gradually touching reconciliation between husband and wife. When Andrea confidently returns to work in Rome, he allows Nina and Pricò to remain for a few days in the idyllic hotel with its lush sun-dappled beaches. The happy Hubby feels like some quality time between Mother and Son will be a positive thing and he also secretly decides he'll replace the old curtains (which Nina always detested) with lush new drapes in their flat's boudoir.

Alas, a male dog will always come sniffing around and a bitch in heat will respond in kind. Roberto shows up at the resort and Pricò is left alone whilst Mom willingly receives her lover's prodigious root.

Hell breaks loose in two ways. One is expected, the other is not. Both are unbearably shattering.

De Sica more than superbly handles the performances and scene blocking with the skill of a fine craftsman, but as an artist, he excels with the kind of visual touches that only a filmmaker infused with celluloid in his DNA can do.

We never forget the title for a moment. Our eyes are ultimately drawn to Pricò in virtually every scene as the actions of the adults allow us to naturally shift our focus to the child's gaze. The child, it seems, is not only watching, but always watching, so much so that when Pricò stops training his gaze upon his mother, lulled into a kind of happy complacency during a magic act in the hotel ballroom, we're initially unaware that his eyes are not where they've been for the whole film. Once we realize this, our hearts do indeed sink, and the narrative does not "disappoint" us in this respect when Pricò's eyes shift back to his mother's activity.

It's a heartbreaker of monumental proportions.

De Sica also never lets us forget the eyes of the child with the intelligently placed camera, always at Pricò's eye level, whether we're with him in a specific shot/scene or not. This allows us to always view the dramatic action as if we are indeed the child and that what we see is both what he sees and how he sees it. Again, we are Pricò, and though it's an intermittently joyous perspective, it is, more often than not, a devastatingly sad point of view.

This mise en scène is never oppressive nor heavy-handed. De Sica's touch is pure gossamer in this respect. However, at one point, De Sica uses Pricò's point of view to deliver one of the most haunting nightmare sequences ever committed to film, brilliantly framed in the reflections of a train's window as it speeds along a pitch-black night. The images here are as utterly devastating to us as they would be to a child like Pricò.

As if that isn't powerful enough, De Sica maintains this position during a scene where Andrea begs and finally begins to order Pricò to reveal the truth about Nina's indiscretions - closeups of eyes at a child's eye-level have never been more emotionally calamitous.

Eventually, when De Sica presents the final moments of Nina begging for forgiveness, the camera's position remains fixed as it always has been, only this time we experience how physically tiny, yet infused with strength this child is.

And in spite of this strength, De Sica forces us to experience the child being swallowed up by a world he knows he must face alone. It's a knockout, just as the picture itself ultimately is. The children are indeed watching us and De Sica has crafted one of the most devastating reminders of that fact, one that none of us should ever forget.

THE FILM CORNER RATING: *****

The Children Are Watching Us plays this summer at the TIFF Bell Lightbox on 35MM. For dates, times and tickets, visit the TIFF website HERE. If you aren't in Toronto for this wonderful experience, the Criterion Collection DVD presents a fine transfer of the film along with two superb added value features, an interview with an Italian critic, but most astoundingly, a great interview with the actor who played Pricò.

Feel free to order the Criterion DVD directly from the following links. You'll be supporting the ongoing maintenance of The Film Corner if you do so.

In Canada, order HERE
in the USA order HERE
and in the UK order HERE

THE PALM BEACH STORY - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Screwball Sturges Hijinx via Criterion

KLYMKIW PREAMBLE:
WHAT IT WAS, WHAT IT IS NOW1

Imagine if you will, watching a battered film print of The Palm Beach Story in the 1980s, projected with a Kodak Pageant 16mm projector on the apartment wall belonging to old pal Professor Wm. Steve Snyder of the University of Manitoba film programme, stopping every 30 minutes or so in order to changeover from one reel of film to the next. Fair enough. But soon the print will return to wherever it came from. As this is a film that bears repeat viewing, whatever will be done?

Imagine if you will, Prof. Snyder recording the film off his wall with a Panasonic PK300, but needing to cut all three reels together, he must copy the tape to an old 3/4" deck and dub the separate reels into one seamless recording to another 3/4" deck and THEN copy it back to a VHS tape which, like psychopaths, we watch again and again because it's such a great movie and because a select few of us, including future filmmaker Guy Maddin and his roommate and future producer (ME), are huge fans of fruity tenor Rudy Vallee, who is not only in the picture, but, with a full orchestra, croons the immortal love ditty "Goodnight Sweetheart" under Claudette Colbert's window.

It's thirty years later.

Imagine, if you will that we no longer need a battered 3rd or 4th generation 16mm print, shot off a wall on VHS, duped to 3/4", then duped back to another 3/4", then duped down to VHS. This is because the Criterion Collection has released a gorgeous Blu-Ray with a full 4K digital restoration.

"Goodnight Sweetheart", indeed!

The Palm Beach Story (1942)
Dir. Preston Sturges
Starring: Claudette Colbert, Joel McCrea,
Mary Astor, Rudy Vallee, Robert Dudley, Sig Arno, Franklin Pangborn

Review By Greg Klymkiw

"I did all my directing when I wrote the screenplay. It was probably harder for a regular director. He probably had to read the script the night before shooting started." - Writer/Director Preston Sturges

Preston Sturges, arguably one of the greatest writer-directors in the history of cinema, wasn't always in the movie business. In fact, he didn't start writing until he was 30. Prior to a glorious career as the first writing-directing auteur of Hollywood's "talkie" period, Sturges lived in the lap of privilege and luxury.

Born into a hugely wealthy American family, he was bitten by the show business bug in childhood as a valued assistant to his Mom's best friend, the famed Isadora Duncan, for whom he helped mount numerous productions for the stage. His early adult life was spent serving his country in the signal corps during World War I and upon his return to civilian life, he joined his mother's posh design firm Maison Desti. It was the company's line of scarves which Isadora accidentally choked upon (I find this incredibly hilarious for some perverse reason) and where his first great success as - yes, an inventor - was a shade of lipstick that didn't leave whopping scarlet kiss marks on the flesh.

Sturges might well have had a charmed life, but he brought to his writing a wealth of life experience and once he started writing and directing his own pictures, he created a legacy that is all his own and uniquely American. He was neither above nor below mixing manic hijinx, pratfalls, ludicrous narratives and brilliant rapid-paced dialogue and delivery, but all the while, he generated material that was as rooted in humanity as it was designed to offer huge, knee-slapping laughs.

There was no one like him, nor will there ever be anyone as dazzlingly original.

The Palm Beach Story is one of his greatest achievements. Joel McCrea plays Tom Jeffers, a hardworking visionary inventor who just can't seem to get a break. He's madly in love with his beautiful wife Gerry (Claudette Colbert at her funniest and sexiest) and she with him.

Unfortunately, their financial situation is dire - so dire that Gerry, thinking that marriage is dragging hubby down, runs into a prospective new tenant for their Manhattan digs, played by the delightfully cantankerous Robert Dudley and Sturges-monickered as the Wienie King (I'm not kidding).

She gratefully accepts his charity after spilling her sob story, abandons her beloved, hops on a train to Florida (hoping to eventually meet herself a rich husband in Palm Beach), loses all her luggage upon plunging into the insane antics of the Ale and Quail hunting club (an irrepressibly jovial, albeit benevolent group of gloriously drunk old reprobates) and finally, as luck would have it, meets the filthy rich John D. Hackensacker III (Rudy Vallee) during the long chug-a-lugging north-south steam engine ride from NYC to FLA.

Phew!

Tom, also the recipient of Wienie King charity (double I kid you not), follows Gerry. Not wanting to scuttle her plans of marrying the rich Hackensacker, our heroine has introduced Tom as her brother, whom she preposterously names as "Captain McGlue". Hubby becomes the prospective romantic interest of Hackensacker's sister, Maud (Mary Astor), AKA the Princess Centimillia, who makes a play for Tom whilst her whining lap-dog lover Toto (Sig Arno) crazily continues to follow her around.

Tom has a great idea to invent an airport in the sky. Hackensacker and the Wienie King are both thrilled by the investment prospects. Is it possible for things to turn around? Given the nonsensically harebrained proceedings, anything is possible.

Have I, for instance, mentioned there are identical twins in the mix? No? Good. Suffice to say it has something to do with a ludicrous wedding scene scored to the William Tell Overture and the copious melange of nuttiness in this tin of comedic comestibles which, is so infectious, you'll be desperately longing for the world, invented by the inadvertent strangler of Isadora Duncan to exist - for real.

Nobody made movies like Sturges. Thank God. There could only, really and truly be just one. And I steadfastly guarantee that your jaw will be agape from beginning to end - either in utter incredulousness and/or because howls of laughter will be spewing forth. Make sure you're not chewing on nuts.

You might choke on them.

THE FILM CORNER RATING: ***** 5 Stars

The Palm Beach Story is available on a gorgeously transferred 4K Blu-Ray disc with wonderful uncompressed mono from The Criterion Collection and includes a solid array of extra features including an all new interview with film historian James Harvey who focuses on Preston Sturges, a terrific interview with the great comic actor Bill Hader about Sturges's influence, a delightfully ridiculous 1941 World War II propaganda short written by Sturges, a magnificent Screen Guild Theater radio adaptation, an essay by critic Stephanie Zacharek and delicious new colourful caricatured cover illustration by Maurice Vellekoop.

I MARRIED A WITCH - Review By Greg Klymkiw - René Clair Classic with Veronica Lake on Criterion Blu-Ray

Burned at the stake, a witch casts a curse upon the family responsible that all the males will suffer horrendous marriages. Hundreds of years later, the witch returns to wreak some personal havoc, but instead falls in love with the man she's sworn to destroy.

I Married a Witch (1942) *****
Dir. René Clair
Starring: Veronica Lake, Cecil Kellaway,
Fredric March, Robert Benchley, Susan Hayward, Robert Warwick

Review By Greg Klymkiw

There is no stronger aphrodisiac than the tresses of Veronica Lake spilling from her shapely cranium, cascading naturally like a waterfall of the sweetest dew over one eye, her other ocular orb working overtime to so intensely draw every man, woman and yes, even child, into her inescapable aura of libidinous magnetism, to be entrapped like a fly upon the golden honey caressing her supple flesh, to weave and bobble like a grape surrounded by gelatine and devoured by her insatiable need to ingest all who are tantalized by her almost supernatural charm.

Like a witch, Veronica Lake had powers that exceeded every movie star before, during or after her reign and there are none - NONE, I TELL YOU!!! - who can even approach from several country miles the magnificence of her womanhood, the utter perfection of her screen persona. Miss Lake truly defined the MGM notion of stars in Heaven, though she was no Louis B. Mayer gal, but a concubine of Zukor's domain at Paramount where she dazzled the likes of Joel McCrea in the great Preston Sturges comedy Sullivan's Travels and was so perfectly paired over four pictures with Alan Ladd.

There might, however, have only been two directors in Hollywood who knew precisely how to make the most of her ample gift of allure.

Sturges played up her gamine, waif-like powers - so tremblingly vulnerable on her milky skin, whilst resting just beneath the protective cover of inspiring manly protection was the rip-roaring, madly funny and unquestionably brilliant modern woman who understood the ways of the world with far more insight that the rigid pretend-dominance of the men around her. Ah, and while we will always have a special place for Lake alongside Sullivan in Sturges' Travels, it was the magical René Clair, the Frenchman who excelled in blending comedy and fantasy before conquering the world with his groundbreaking use of sound in À nous la liberté, Le Million and Under the Roofs of Paris who understood her real appeal.

Clair knew that Lake was a witch: at once alluring with hints of malevolence that could lead to only naughtiness of the most utter sexual abandon. As the vengeance-seeking witch who sinks her hooks into the society magnate rendered by Fredric March, Lake beguiles every mortal character with the magic that is, well, Veronica Lake. So pouty, so naughty, so sexy, so unrepentantly ribald and gee-whillikers-knee-slappingly hilarious AND demanding of love, attention, worship, kisses and caresses. And as we await the havoc we know she can wreak, we are equally delighted when she is madly smitten, due at first to magic gone wrong, with the man she means to destroy.

There are few rivals to the joy Clair yields from the material and this is a romantic comedy to end all romantic comedies. Though not a musical, it might as well have been. Clair uses his camera and actors as if they were alternately sprightly notes on sheet music and dancers of unparalleled deftness and lightness. With a supporting cast of perfection and generous injections of love, romance, trickery, sex appeal and laughs galore, Clair delivers a movie that's always funny and never lets us down. The picture holds up on one viewing after another, always yielding ever-new moments to send us into fits of laughter and to allow us the pleasure of experiencing lines and gags that never pale, and indeed, keeps us laughing and smiling every time we see them.

It's a great picture and, I daresay, quite perfect in every respect. I can also guarantee that for the rest of your life, you'll never hear "I Love You Truly" again without thinking and laughing to the song's perfect use during one of the funniest wedding sequences in motion picture history.

"I Married a Witch" is stunningly transferred onto beautiful Blu-Ray in this all-new gorgeous Criterion Collection release. It comes with a lovely audio interview with Clair, a deliciously uncompressed monaural soundtrack and the added value of a most delightful essay by the inimitable Guy Maddin. This one's a keeper, folks.

TO BE OR NOT TO BE (1942) - Review By Greg Klymkiw - "So, they call me Concentration Camp Ehrhardt?" Lubitsch's great black, screwball, romantic comedy gets the Criterion Collection treatment on BLU-RAY.

To Be Or Not To Be (1942) *****
Dir. Ernst Lubitsch
Starring: Carole Lombard, Jack Benny, Robert Stack, Felix Bressart,
Lionel Atwill, Stanley Ridges, Sig Ruman, Tom Dugan

Review By Greg Klymkiw

An actor's worst nightmare: He is playing Hamlet before a packed opening night house. He finds his light onstage and looks soulfully into the depths of his character's spirit and launches into one of the greatest of Shakespeare's soliloquies. "To be or not to be..." he intones before catching sight of an audience member standing up in the middle of the second row then clumsily stepping over and onto the feet of those seated next to him. The show must go on, but never could any actor ever imagine being faced with the ultimate slap-in-the-face, the utter horror of an audience member walking out on: "to be or not to be." That such an indignity should occur but once in an actor's life is enough to sadly accept "the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune", but when it begins to happen every night, surely any sane person would agree that "now is the winter of our discontent."

The actor in question is none other than Joseph Tura (Jack Benny), the male half of an acclaimed husband and wife thespian team in Poland just prior to Hitler's occupation. The seemingly dissatisfied patron of the arts, clutching a bouquet of flowers every evening is the young Polish Air Force officer Lt. Stanislav Sobinski (Robert Stack) who is smitten with Joseph's beautiful wife Marie Tura (Carole Lombard) and upon her instructions, "To Be Or Not To Be" is the code for handsome Sobinski to safely go backstage to pay homage to her.

Ah, the slings and arrows... of Cupid and eventually, Hitler. If there was (or is) a comedy that touches upon Anti-Semitism and the Holocaust that blends with the kind of "what if?" scenario eventually employed by Quentin Tarantino's Inglourious Basterds, but was actually made during World War II, then you need not look too hard to find it. With 1942's To Be Or Not To Be, director Ernst Lubitsch and his screenwriter Edwin Justus Mayer (journalist, noted playwright and writer of close to 50 screenplays from the silent era and beyond) crafted one of the funniest and most daring comedies of its time. That the film remains as one of the funniest and most daring comedies of ALL TIME, is no fluke.

The world was at war, anti-Semitism became the key driving force of Germany and while the role of the Allied Force always took centre stage, many brave artists risked and/or gave up their lives for the war effort. Carole Lombard, for example, never saw the finished product. Two months before the film's release in 1942, she perished in a plane crash. She was on her way to preside over a War Bonds drive. She was 33 years old.

To Be Or Not To Be is an important film in more ways than one. At its foremost, the movie is an astonishing example of everything that can make a motion picture as great and enduring a work of art as anything by virtue of every single detail being completely and utterly perfect. The film uses all the basic rules of film language developed to its stage in movie history, then proceeds to expand each and every one of those boundaries in ways that have defined and refined cinema in its lofty shadow and in homage to its quintessential place as a truly modern classic.

Take the film's opening - a stirring montage detailing the rise of Anti-Semitism in Poland in 1939. At first, it's a kind of News on the March celebration of Polish-Jewish culture and morphs into a powerful documentary-styled portrait of Nazi subjugation of Poland, and in particular, the Jewish people. The sequence essentially presents a chilling, darkly funny tale of Hitler arriving in the Jewish district of Warsaw to peruse the wares in one of the delis (utterly absurd given Hitler's vegetarianism and hatred of Jews). It then culminates in revealing how and why Hitler came to Warsaw using what is still one of the great pieces of screenwriting in movie history.

It's a brilliant and almost shocking turn that not only provides an answer to the question it poses, but leads us into the narrative's chief backdrop.

So, first and foremost - the film within its opening minutes signals that we'll be seeing an incredibly unique story and that the film will not at all shy away from the political realities in Europe the way almost every other film did during WWII. We take such politics for granted in our popular storytelling now. Lubitsch shot his film on the cusp of America entering the war effort officially and, unable to secure backing by the studios, turned to the far more daring British film industry to pick up the tab. To say the picture would have shocked audiences is an understatement. However, those who saw it, were also delighted and during subsequent decades, the film has stood the test of time and blows pretty much every movie of a similar nature right off the map. (And, there is, by the way, absolutely no need to see Mel Brooks' remake which, while not awful, is resoundingly ordinary.)

The storytelling is also quite unique in that Lubitsch gives us a film that blends several different strands of the comedy genre. The film is as much a biting satire (still on a par with Kubrick's Dr. Strangelove from many years later), as it is a madcap screwball comedy (replete with rapid-fire one-liners, pratfalls and humour lodged deeply in mistaken identity) and finally, it's a romantic comedy - a love story involving a triangle that serves to (no kidding) fight the Nazis, but also explore the differences between mere infatuation and deeply-seeded mature love and respect.

And yes, it is about the commitment of artists in wartime - a dazzling, rich and even moving portrait of how members of a theatre company must deliver their most astounding performances in their entire careers. One bad performance could lead to death for one if not all the actors and threaten the Polish underground's war effort. Ultimately, though, To Be Or Not To Be is a comedy about Nazis set against the backdrop of the Jewish ghetto in Warsaw - a comedy that portrays Nazis as dangerous as they are mind-numbingly moronic.

This portrayal of Nazis certainly pre-dates Billy Wilder's Stalag 17) and frankly, it's a lot more viciously funny. The endless barking cries of "Heil Hitler!" that accompany any mere mention of Der Führer are continuously hilarious and no more so than when Der Führer himself walks into a room amidst the boot clicking and hands outstretched and in complete deadpan utters: "Heil Myself."

There isn't a single cast member who doesn't give it their all. Carole Lombard, once again proved why there were no actresses who could touch her with a ten foot pole. She's mad, sexy, passionate, sharp as a tack, funny as hell and good goddamn, the woman knew no boundaries - under Lubitsch's extraordinary direction, she displayed an unparalleled freewheeling, rip-roaring, cartwheeling, insanely, whirlingly, nutty dervish. The great Jack Benny, for whom Lubitsch conceived the role for, knocks it right out of the park as "that great, great Polish actor, Joseph Tura" a self-proclamation that gets hilariously shot down by a blustering, blundering Nazi commander who quips that what Tura "did to Shakespeare, Germany is doing to Poland." What Benny does as he infiltrates Gestapo headquarters is pure comic genius - but also, just pure great screen acting. He's acting as an actor who's acting as a Nazi.

Suffice it to say, after seeing To Be Or Not To Be, it will be impossible for you to ever get this line of dialogue out of your head. It's horrifying and audaciously hilarious as Lubitsch and Mayer milk it for all it's worth:

"So," says the Nazi commandant upon receiving a compliment from Benny as Tura in Nazi disguise, "So, they call me Concentration Cape Ehrhardt, eh?"

Concentration Camp Ehrhardt, indeed! Comedies about the Holocaust just don't get funnier than this.

And as Tura in Nazi get-up quips: "We Germans do the concentrating and the Poles do the camping."

"To Be Or Not To Be" is yet another must-own Blue-Ray from the Criterion Collection. Boasting a new, restored 2K digital film transfer, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack on the Blu-ray edition, a fine new audio commentary with ace film historian David Kalat, "Pinkus’s Shoe Palace", a 1916 German silent short directed by and starring Ernst Lubitsch (a GREAT silent shiort by the way and an extremely revelatory look at a very popular series of comedies which celebrated and never tried to hide the Jewish-ness of the main hero), "Lubitsch le patron", an excellent 2010 French documentary on the director’s career which presents a thorough analysis of his work with detailed and knowledgable interviews with virtually every important French cinema egg-head, a lovely booklet featuring an essay by critic Geoffrey O’Brien and a 1942 New York Times op-ed by Lubitsch himself and one of the real treats are two - count 'em - TWO episodes of The Screen Guild Theater, a radio anthology series: "Variety" (1940), starring Jack Benny, Claudette Colbert and Lubitsch, and "To Be or Not to Be" (1942), an adaptation of the film, starring William Powell, Diana Lewis, and Sig Ruman. Another must-own title for any lover and/or student of cinema.

Greg Klymkiw's 10 Best Blu-Ray and DVD Releases of 2012 - There will be one new ALPHABETICAL posting everyday until we hit the magic number. Today's Klymkiw Blu-Ray/DVD Accolade for 2012 is: Alfred Hitchcock - The Masterpiece Collection from Universal Studios Home Entertainment

The Best Blu-Ray and DVD Releases
of 2012 as decreed by Greg Klymkiw

This was a stellar year for Blu-Ray and DVD collectors that it's been difficult to whittle my personal favourites down to a mere 10 releases. So hang on to your hats as I'll be presenting a personal favourite release from 2012 EACH and EVERY single day that will comprise my Top 10. At the end of all the daily postings, I'll combine the whole kit and kaboodle into one mega-post.

My criteria for inclusion is/was thus:

1. The movie (or movies). How much do I love it/them?
2. How much do I love owning this product?
3. How many times will I re-watch it?
4. Is the overall physical packaging to my liking?
5. Do I like the picture and sound?

There was one more item I used to assess the material. For me it was the last and LEAST area of consideration - one that probably surprise most, but frankly, has seldom been something I care that much about. For me, unless supplements really knock me on my butt, their inclusion is not that big of a deal. That said, I always go though supplements with a fine tooth comb and beyond any personal pleasure they deliver (or lack thereof), I do consider the educational value of such supplements for those studying film and/or those who might benefit from them in some fashion (film students or not).

So, without further ado, here goes.

Greg Klymkiw's 10 Best Blu-Ray & DVD Releases of 2012 (in alphabetical order) Today's Title (more to follow on subsequent days) is none other than: 

Alfred Hitchcock - The Masterpiece Collection (Limited Edition) Universal Studios Home Entertainment
15 (!!!!!) BLU-RAY Discs

This is the Blu-Ray release we've all been waiting for and it pretty much lives up to all the anticipatory slobber from movie geeks the world over. The 15 films that comprise this mega-box-set, presented on 15 individual Blu-Ray discs in the order of their original theatrical release dates are, for the most part, a stellar assortment. Here are brief capsule reviews of all the movies within this absolute must-own set.

SABOTEUR

"Totalitarian nations . . . get things done." 

Saboteur
(1942) ****
A solid hero in the dependable form of Robert Cummings, the delectable Priscilla Lane and vile villains of the juiciest order in this exciting espionage-tinged chase thriller inspired by Hitch's own 1934 The Man Who Knew Too Much. Noted for its bizarre expressionistic climax atop the Statue of Liberty. As the following clip from Saboteur demonstrates, the film was, politically ahead of its time, only now, in contemporary terms, the tables have turned and the totalitarian regime Hitch's hero might be fighting would be America itself:

SHADOW OF A DOUBT

"Horrible, faded, fat, greedy women."

Shadow of a Doubt 
(1946) ***** 
Utter perfection. One of the most chilling, disturbing & harrowing thrillers of all time with dollops of mordant wit plus an indelible sense of time & place - a seemingly pure, sun-dappled mid-western America. Best of all is Joseph Cotten as "The Merry Widow Killer", one of the creepiest serial killers in movie history - he's truly, utterly horrendous (and, for a time, quite charming). Written by Thornton (Our Town) Wilder, Sally Benson & Alma Reville (Mrs. Hitchcock herself as ludicrously rendered in the recent theatrical film Hitchcock & brilliantly played by Imelda Staunton in the HBO feature The Girl). It has, however, been said that Hitch himself wrote Joseph Cotten's famous dinner table speech. Take a gander at it here and . . . ENJOY!

ROPE

"I never strangled a chicken in my life!"

Rope ***** (1948)
Shot to approximate real time with no cuts (save for reel breaks). Based on the notorious Leopold/Loeb killings with Hume Cronyn's treatment, a script by Arthur Laurents (writer of, I kid you not, the Redford-Streisand weeper from the 70s: The Way We Were), memorably sickening John Dall & Farley Granger performances, first-rate thesping from James Stewart, expert Hitchcock blocking & his trademark expressionism in extremis. Here's a delectable taste of Rope's foul killers:

REAR WINDOW

"He likes the way his wife welcomes him home."

Rear Window
(1954) ****
For my first three decades on Earth, THIS was my all-time favourite Hitchcock movie. Eventually overtaken by Vertigo, it still delivers big time in the suspense department with fetishistic peeping tom qualities running rampant as invalided James Stewart spies on his neighbours and witnesses a murder. Raymond Burr plays one of Hitchcock's scariest villains.

THE TROUBLE WITH HARRY

"Mom! Wally's picking on me."

The Trouble with Harry (1955) ***
A mildly entertaining trifle of a black comedy that's not quite as dark as it wants to be. Buoyed by a tremendously sexy, funny, engaging and very young Shirley MacLaine, Jerry Mathers (Leave it to Beaver) and some stalwart character actors to make the whole affair a pleasure.

THE MAN WHO KNEW TOO MUCH

Que Sera, Sera 
WHATEVER
WILL BE
WILL BE

The Man Who Knew Too Much
(1956) ***1/2

Odd remake of Hitch's 1934 original with great suspense set pieces, a weirdly brilliant James Stewart and, in spite of occasional longeurs, can one ever go wrong with Doris Day a singin' ever-so sweetly? In a Hitchcock picture, no less.

VERTIGO

"I don't care anymore about me."

Vertigo (1958) *****
These days when people ask me what my favourite movie of all time is, I have no problem citing this one - but always with the added history of how it is a film I have grown with over the years. The more years, the more life experience, the more I related to the psychological intricacies, layers of character, its obsessive romanticism and the fetishistic qualities of moulding someone into precisely what you want. As creepy, chilling and suspenseful as Vertigo is, it's also deeply and profoundly moving. No surprise it's moved up in so many polls as the best movie of all time. It might well be. What I know for sure is this: Kim Novak's entrance in Vertigo is without a doubt the greatest entrance of any star, of any character, in any movie known to man - now and forever.

NORTH BY NORTHWEST

"That wasn't very sporting. . ."

North by Northwest
(1959) *****
The greatest mistaken identity espionage thriller of them all. Classy Cary Grant, suavely sinister James Mason and that ever-so deadly crop duster diving and aiming on a flat, bald prairie with no cover of escape.

PSYCHO

"I'll lick the stamps."

Psycho (1960) *****
Foul, vile and still astounding psycho-thriller that jangles the nerves with all manner of perversities and horror. The isolated motel. The blonde. The nervous young man. The screeching harridan mother. The taxidermy. The sandwich. The peep hole. The bathroom. The psycho. The blood. It seldom gets scarier than this. And the shower? The jets of refreshing water. The shower curtain. The malevolent shadow on the other side of the curtain. Scared the crap out of me the first time I saw the picture as a kid and still creeps me out.

THE BIRDS

The Birds (1963) *****
Gorgeous blonde.
Stalwart hunk.
Yummy Brunette.
Schoolhouse.
Children.
Thousands of birds that kill.
'Nuff said.

MARNIE

Marnie (1964) ***** Hitchcock's final genuine masterpiece of obsessive love with a great Tippi Hedren performance and a gloriously expressionistic mise-en-scene. Oh God, and that score, that score that sticks to one's brain forever.

TORN CURTAIN

Torn Curtain (1966) **** This espionage thriller is a mess and full of longeurs of the worst kind, but its flaws are overshadowed by several set pieces of suspense and violence that are up there with Hitchcock's best. There's a "kitchen" scene that seems to be a strange reversal, yet extension of the "shower" scene from Psycho that still shocks and horrifies even the most jaded contemporary viewers.

TOPAZ

"Flores para los muertos."

Topaz (1969) ** Bloated, dull spy thriller that's almost uwatchable save for a handful of decent set pieces.

FRENZY

A SACK O' POTATOES

Frenzy (1972) **** I love this sick, hilarious, shocking, brutal and terrifying thriller to death. There's a killer loose in London and he's into rape and necktie strangulation. The detective in charge is more sickened by his wife's grotesque gourmet cooking than the crime scenes he must pore over with a fine tooth comb. Even more perverse is the hero of the film who is so reprehensible that we almost find the necktie killer charming. And then, we have the potato truck scene.

FAMILY PLOT

Family Plot (1976) **1/2 Slight, mildly amusing thriller with a clutch of decent performances - especially from Karen Black and William Devane. It's not quite the last film one would have hoped for Hitch, but it's not without some merit.

Alfred Hitchcock - The Masterpiece Collection on Blu-Ray is ESSENTIAL to own. This gorgeously produced box set is not without some mild flaws, but overall it's a winner and a keeper. The sound and picture transfers range from okay at worst to mind bogglingly spectacular at best, The packaging is attractively designed, though a tad cumbersome in terms of the basic practicality of removing discs for play. And the extra features - the thing I usually care least about - are rendered here with such magnificent detail and considerable educational value that it's an element of the package worth touting.

PLEASE FEEL FREE TO ORDER THIS GREAT BOX SET DIRECTLY FROM THE LINKS BELOW (& GENEROUSLY SUPPORTING THE MAINTENANCE OF THIS SITE):

Les visiteurs du soir - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Criterion Collection Blu-Ray of Classic Marcel Carné Masterpiece about love amongst the minions of the Devil is a perfect gift to honour and celebrate the birth of Baby of Jesus H. Christ - KLYMKIW CHRISTMAS GIFT IDEA 2012 #7

Can someone explain to me

why movies today can't have great posters like this.

In this continuing series devoted to reviewing motion pictures ideal for this season of celebration and gift giving, here is KLYMKIW CHRISTMAS GIFT IDEA 2012 #7: The Criterion Collection Blu-Ray of the Marcel Carné Masterpiece "Les visiteurs du soir" about love amongst the minions of the Devil and those they must convert to Satan worship and/or spread ill-will amongst. A perfect gift for the celebration of Baby Jesus H. Christ.

ARLETTY

Les visiteurs du soir (1942) *****
dir. Marcel Carné
Starring: Arletty, Alain Cuny, Marie Déa, Fernand Ledoux, Marcel Herrand, Jules Berry

Review By Greg Klymkiw

Those who've come back to us from Near Death Experiences (NDE), often describe one salient common detail, which is, being enveloped by the sensation of overwhelming love. It's as if the true power of the universe, of existence, of spirit and science can be called God, but is, whatever it is, that which is borne from rapture - a love that is as pure and intense as life itself.

The power of love is, for me, what ultimately rests at the core of Marcel Carné's masterpiece Les visiteurs du soir, a deliriously enchanting medieval fairytale. With sumptuous production design, a perfect cast, and a screenplay that always tantalizes and surprises, Carné pulled off a film that was France's hugest box office hit during the 40s, continued to delight post-war audiences abroad and miraculously withstood the ravages of time and continued to be of universal importance in terms of both its entertainment value and its submerged, though vital, political and social subtext.

Set against the lavish backdrop of French nobleman Baron Hugues's (Fernand Ledoux) castle, preparations are underway to marry off his beautiful daughter Anne (Marie Déa) to the vulgar, loutish Baron Renaud (Marcel Herrand). One suspects Hugues would normally see through the wrong-headedness of this arranged marriage, but alas, he wanders about in a cloud of despair having been widowed from the woman he loved so dearly and faithfully.

Under these dire circumstances, happiness for the beleaguered Anne is not to be.

In fact, the potential for even more dire consequences multiplies exponentially with the arrival of two new visitors to the castle, a pair of wandering minstrels. Gilles (Alain Cluny) is a mouth-wateringly gorgeous young man with a sad face and sadder eyes that betray much pain and heartache. A fey, young fellow with a hard, icy beauty accompanies him. If it were not for the male garb, we might suspect that he is a she. And so it is, that she, is not a he, but is indeed, a she. Adorned in drag, this is the former lover of Gilles, Dominique (the gorgeous, radiant French star Arletty). Though they travel together, their love has faded. As minstrels, they make beautiful music together, but no similar beauty exists between them as a pair.

They enter the castle, ostensibly to perform at the various wedding festivities. Sure enough, they indeed perform and when they do, they do so rapturously. Gilles and Dominique have other aims. They've sold their souls to the Devil and wander the Earth to surreptitiously spread ill will. Seeing as this household is already burdened with the despair of a husband missing his late wife and the despair of his daughter being forced to marry an odious fop, one wonders how much more wretched gloom these Satanic emissaries will imbue the proceedings with.

Things, however, take a few unimagined turns when the power of true love threatens to rear its sweet head, but this is no typical fairy tale - there are no guarantees that love will conquer evil. A truly formidable force joins the proceedings when it seems that his minions might be blowing it - a crazed madman who appears to embody all in the world that is truly abominable.

He is none other than The Devil himself.

Nothing in this tale will come easily, if it comes at all. This is, after all, a film by the estimable Marcel Carné and produced in the midst of the Nazi Occupation of France. There are many laughs, much that is delightful and plenty of romance, but there is, amidst the surface enchantment, a roiling cauldron of darkness.

The elegance, intelligence and sophistication of this great picture stand on their own, but frankly, it is impossible - with the hindsight of history - to avoid the fact that all in the film's plot that is duplicitous, double-crossing and evil is rooted in the reality of a country living under the cloud of a turncoat collaborationist government, the Vichy, and its conquerors, the Nazis.

Even more powerful is the fact that the film was made before the Liberation and within that context; there might well have been little hope in France that the forces of right would quash all that was wrong.

At a critical point in the film's proceedings, it becomes clear that the central protagonist is Satan himself and as brilliantly, eye-roilingly and viciously portrayed by the great Jules Berry, the devil bears a mighty strong resemblance to Adolph Hitler.

Three years later, and in secret no less, Marcel Carné would go on to direct one of the great films under the Occupation of France, Les enfants du paradis and as tremendous as that film is, Les visiteurs du soir might well be his masterpiece.

See it! Les visiteurs du soir, The Envoys of the Devil, threaten to drag the world of the film down, but in so doing, you, the audience, will soar!

"Les visiteurs du soir" is a must-own Blu-Ray, or if you must, DVD and as such (and given the film's subject matter, prove to be an excellent gift for someone special this Christmas Season. The Criterion Disc is replete with lovely extra feature including an all-new digital restoration, an uncompressed monaural soundtrack (as always, MY favourite feature), a tremendous 2009 documentary on the making of the picture, "L’aventure des Visiteurs du soir” and new English subtitles with a fresh translation.

THE GOLD RUSH - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Two versions of Chaplin's classic are lovingly restored on the great new Criterion Collection Blu-Ray

The Gold Rush (1925/1942)
Dir. Charles Chaplin

Starring: Charles Chaplin, Georgia Hale, Tom Murray, Mack Swain, Malcolm Waite.

***** (1925)
**** (1942)

Review By Greg Klymkiw

By his admirers, Charles Chaplin is embraced for the abundance of sentimentality in his work and by those who dare posit themselves as detractors, he is admonished for it. The fact remains that Chaplin would hardly be Chaplin if his work was not sentimental. I, for one, so often find myself in an absolute rage when the word "sentimental" (like "melodrama") is, in a contemporary context, used pejoratively and often with no context. Most critics and artsy-fartsies unfairly (and myopically) jerk their knobby knees oh-so reductively. This simplistic, dismissive categorization of sentimentality in art, displays both laziness and a holier-than-thou intellectual snobbery. Using one word like a cudgel to pound away at a dramatic technique that enhances an audience's emotional connection to theme, action and style is an easy way out for these cretinous curs.

Yes, if executed badly, sentimentality is intolerable. However, when functioning from the highest plane of artistic endeavour, sentimentality is - in form and feeling - one of the most effective ways for an artist to elicit visceral and intellectual responses to their material. No matter how excessively it's employed, if it's right for the material, the period it reflects, the period from whence it came and hewn into the style of the work, there's not a damn thing wrong with it. When worked by expert hands - sentimentality can be effectively used consciously and/or unconsciously (the latter a natural product of period, material and/or style).

In spite of the considerable virtues of sentiment as a legitimate storytelling tool, critical volleys of the word almost always imply that any work with any sentiment is inferior to any work that avoids all sentiment.

Brian Wilkie's great 1967 essay entitled "What is Sentimentality?" notes that the word "sentiment" as defined by both critics and academics in this simplistic fashion is, finally, "unhelpful" and most of all, "misleading." It asserts that this one word is enough and that adequate elucidation beyond using the word is unnecessary.

When Wilkie examined twelve literary style handbooks he discovered that two of them discuss sentimentality at length without explaining or bothering to define the word and that ten of them "define the term in essentially the same way, with some, but surprisingly little variation in wording, emphasis, and illustrative detail." Wilkie goes on to note that "sentimentality, according to the current definitions, violates decorum in a special way: the violation is a quantitative one, an 'excess' [of manufactured feeling]."

Over the course of cinema's history some of the greatest filmmakers have been charged with stylistic overuse of sentimentality - a criticism grounded rather easily and unimaginatively in the realm of Wilkie's aforementioned discovery. To name a few film directors so charged (and the list of literary figures is astronomical - Dickens and Saroyan to name a couple of my favourites) are: D.W. Griffith, Frank Capra, John Ford, George Stevens and Steven Spielberg.

No slouches in the great filmmakers of all time sweepstakes.

And lest we forget, the Little Tramp, Charlie Chaplin.

Though Chaplin's comic masterpiece The Gold Rush might be less infused with overt sentimentality than many of his other pictures, it is worth considering the contemporary knee-jerk use of the word in the context of what's present on the Criterion Collection's magnificent new Blu-Ray release of this truly great picture.

Chaplin was a groundbreaker in many areas associated with the development of cinematic storytelling language, but perhaps most notably in his belief that silent cinema and the art of pantomime, could live happily in a world of talking pictures (notably City Lights and Modern Times which in 1931 and 1936 respectively were made after the invention, release and acceptance of "talkies"). That said, Chaplin, erred when he transformed his 1925 version of The Gold Rush into a new form wherein he replaced title cards with his own off-screen narration while additionally rendering cuts and modifications that repressed the film's sentimentality.

I'd like to think that EVERYONE knows what The Gold Rush is about, but what I wish for and what actually is are two different things. It's a simple tale involving The Little Tramp (Chaplin) and his adventures during the title time period in the Klondike. The Tramp happens upon two men in the icy, snow-packed mountains of the Yukon Gold Rush during a massive snowstorm. One is prospector Big Jim McKay (Mack Swain) who has discovered a motherlode and the other, Black Larsen (Tom Murray), a dastardly wanted criminal looking for an easy score.

Eventually, The Tramp meets and falls in love with Georgia (Georgia Hale), a beautiful dancehall girl who is attached to the brutish, abusive Jack (Malcolm Waite). Embroiled in a rivalry between Black Larsen and Big Jim, our moustachioed hero with the baggy pants and funny waddle is torn between doing the right thing and making his unrequited desires for Georgia requited.

The movie is chockfull of magnificent Chaplin comedy set pieces: A wind storm that keeps bouncing him in and out of a rickety snowbound cabin; hunger pangs forcing Big Jim to imagine The Tramp as a chicken ready to be gutted, cleaned and cooked; the Tramp staving off starvation and unwanted cannibalism by turning his shoe into a meal; and performing a dance with dinner rolls during one of the most magical dream sequences ever committed to film.

The movie also has a dark side - exploring greed and avarice in American culture (albeit from a historical perspective) and examining the lives of the rich in contrast to the desperation of the poor. Especially poignant is Chaplin's depiction of the "outsider" society of those who have traversed great distances to toil amidst the hardships of the north - desperately clinging to the hope that they'll strike it rich, but more often than not, spending what little gold dust they scrounge up to drown their sorrows in cheap booze at the dancehall.

Georgia Hale's performance is, in particular, quite an extraordinary portrait of an impoverished young woman seeking to make a living in this frigid domain of broken dreams. She is, on the surface, happy-go-lucky, but beneath her spunky smile and somewhat garish dolled-up appearance (that doesn't hide her beauty, but makes you realize what's beneath the visage, both on a physical and spiritual level), we ultimately see a woman who recognizes the sad truth of her station in life - including what will, no doubt, become of her - especially if she sticks with the exploitative misogynistic Jack.

Chaplin in his familiar Tramp role displays a similar duality. He is, of course, Chaplin, the bewildered and seeming naif reacting to every conflict with a plucky determination. Sadly (and alternately funny) is the fact that he's an even bigger outsider in this world of outsiders. Chaplin is nothing short of brilliant here - rivalling the sublime qualities he brought to his Tramp role in City Lights. Moments when his character has no choice but to remove the mask of resilience are, in a word, heartbreaking.

Everyone, in the world of the Klondike seems to wear a mask. Even Big Jim, brilliantly played by the legendary Mack Swain, is at first surly, eventually acquiescent and during a bout of amnesia, desperately befuddled. And deep, deep down he possesses a heart (pun intended) of gold.

The only characters who don't have much in the way of masks (in the tradition of both melodrama and in many instances, life itself) are the villainous (vaguely concealed pimp) Jack and the utterly reprehensible Black Larsen. As played by Tom Murray, Larson's bad to the bone and his only convincing mask of benevolence (if one can call the fake visage even remotely "benevolent") is when he seeks to get something utilizing a strategy that's slightly beyond his usual bludgeon-happy manner.

These performances are great in either version of the film, but in the 1942 recut, they lose quite a bit of their impact (as do the film's stunning visuals) with the annoyingly cloying Chaplin voiceover. While Chaplin clearly laboured upon the recut prodigiously to make a better movie - extending and shortening scenes with alternate takes, his narration quashes the beauty of the pantomime and hence dilutes the story's inherent power.

Worse yet, the love story in Chaplin's preferred 1942 re-release cut is what suffers immeasurably - especially in the final reel where the mad, passionate and yes, sentimental conclusion to the romance between the tramp and Georgia is muted. The movie from 1942 feels like it ends far too abruptly and I defy anyone who chooses to watch the 1925 version first to feel likewise.

For those, like me, whose first helpings were the 1925 cut, the disappointment in the 1942 reworking is extremely palpable. The laughs are still there, but not as funny with the narration and the pure sublime sentimental dollops throughout the film and at the end are either lessened or completely eradicated. I can say quite honestly that even in blasted out 16mm dupes of dupes of dupes of the tattered, abused and forlorn 1925 version, I found myself weeping as hard as I was laughing. The 1942 cut evoked some laughter, but nary a tear was shed.

Still, what's extremely valuable are the complete restorations of BOTH versions and frankly, audiences have the most perfect opportunity to experience both of Chaplin's versions - diluted and undiluted.

Oh, and the glorious sentimentality of The Gold Rush (1925) - so simple, so pure and so lasting. Whether intentional or not, Chaplin muted sentiment in the latter version and I fear that contemporary audiences might prefer 1942's rendering since, as Brian Wilkie asserts, the narrow common definition of the word causes people "to equate sentimentality with all expressions of deep feeling . . . so that, out of an instinct for safety and a fear of ridicule", many will allow themselves "to enjoy only that . . . which is tight-lipped or ironic or in other ways hard-surfaced." In these dark days, when sentiment is embraced on emotional and intellectual levels, it's so easy for individuals to "be hurt and often alienated" when told, in effect, that their "values are meretricious."

Bring it on, I say. Embrace your meretriciousness, load up with a box of kleenex, sit back and let Chaplin's sweet, beautiful and delicate magic devour you whole.

Besides, you're only going to be considered truly meretricious by eggheads and pseuds.

The Criterion Collection Blu-Ray of "The Gold Rush" is a must for all cineastes and certainly all Chaplin completists. Both versions are worthy of in-depth study and the cornucopia of phenomenal extra features provide considerable critical, production and restoration background. This is easily one of the best Blu-Ray discs in the format's history. As per usual, I do provide the following advice. Watch the 1925 version first (it includes a brand new recording of Chaplin's original score) and then watch the 1942 Chaplin-preferred cut. (Many great directors have fiddled with their masterpieces - Charlie's forgiven, though not for the cavalier dismissal of the original prints and elements that were, thankfully pieced together in the best possible presentation here.) After watching both versions, THEN dive into the depths of astounding extra features which will provide considerable illumination.