THE INNER EYE, SIKKIM, BALA, TWO: FOUR SHORTS BY SATYAJIT RAY - Review By Greg Klymkiw #TiffBellLightbox

Don't miss a single one of these great films on display at TIFF Bell Lightbox in the TIFF Cinematheque series "The Sun and the Moon: The Films of Satyajit Ray". From visionary programmer James Quandt, this is one of the most important retrospectives ever presented in Canada. If you care about cinema, you can't afford to miss even one. Heed the warning below!!! The Film Corner & Mr. Neeson mean business!!!

Few directors looked as cool as Satyajit Ray
when he had a cigarette dangling from his lips.

Sikkim (1972) Dir. Satyajit Ray 52mins. *****
Review By Greg Klymkiw

This exquisite portrait of life in the Himalayan kingdom of Sikkim was banned for many years in India and only recently has been revived and lovingly restored in 35mm. If all geographic documentaries were as intelligent, tasteful and compelling as this I'd be glued to whatever specialty channel was broadcasting them for hours, days, weeks, months, if not years on end. Thank God, for my life and general well being, that only Sikkim exists and towers well above the best of this genre of film. It has a simple, but effective structure - we're introduced to the kingdom, delivered a punchy informative history, follow the activities of its inhabitants, get to meet the royal family and finally follow a massive cultural festival in its glory. Ray, in his great dramas surely rivalled Ingmar Bergman in terms of capturing the indelible landscapes of the human face. Here, in this documentary, he continues the tradition. The film's gorgeously shot, beautifully written and expertly narrated by Ray himself. This is not only filmmaking at its finest, but an important slice of a time and place that now remains etched upon celluloid forever.

The Inner Eye (1972)
Dir. Satyajit Ray 20mins. ****

Review By Greg Klymkiw

This is probably one of the best, if not the best documentary portrait of a visual artist I've ever seen.

Ray focuses on the great Indian visual artist Binod Behari Mukherjee (with whom Ray studied). Ray again writes gorgeous narration, delivers it beautifully and captures the essence of this astounding treasure of Indian art by ultimately letting the man and the work speak for itself.

Ray delivers a deft series of biographical details, captures the artist's philosophies on art and life and maybe inadvertently opens a window upon Ray's great visual work as a filmmaker by the manner in which he presents Mukherjee's art.

Of course, the most extraordinary aspect of this tale is that the Master himself eventually went blind, but tapped into his "inner eye" to keep creating stunning work in spite of his handicap.

A truly beautiful and inspirational experience and Ray captures it in only 20 minutes. It's 20 minutes wherein life seems to stand still and we get a glimpse into one of fine art's great geniuses.

Bala (1976) Dir. Satyajit Ray 29mins. ***1/2
Review By Greg Klymkiw

Balasaraswati (known by her more popular diminutive stage name Bala) was already in her 60s when this documentary portrait of her was made. This prima ballerina who specialized in the art of the Bharatanatyam dance had continued to practice her art. Using a wealth of archival materials, Ray delivers the fascinating biographical details of her life, renders aspects of her contemporary life and frames everything within the context of two full dances. Ray captures her dancing simply and beautifully - once in the studio, and again out against a stunning natural backdrop. He keeps a mostly fixed position and only moves his camera with her movement. The dances themselves are so spectacular that one interview subject talks about how Bala's dance had the legendary Martha Graham shuddering and weeping with astonishment. Ray's indelible portrait is such that we do not doubt this for a second.

Two (1964) Dir. Satyajit Ray 15mins. ****
Review By Greg Klymkiw

This simple, beautifully shot (in gorgeous black and white) fable of haves and have-nots is as delightfully entertaining as it is deeply and profoundly moving. Ray tells his tale with no dialogue whatsoever. A little rich boy on the second floor of his family's home plays alone with his huge collection of expensive toys. At one point, he looks outside the window and sees a poverty-stricken youth also playing by himself. The two lads make a connection, but soon the rich boy is demonstrating all his wonderful toys in a gloatingly uncharitable manner. The film turns into a rivalry between two children on the extreme opposites of social strata. Where it ends up, finally, is a heartbreaker. Such is the art of Maestro Satyajit Ray.

The Inner Eye: Four Shorts (THE INNER EYE, SIKKIM, BALA, TWO) By Satyajit Ray is presented at TIFF Bell Lightbox on Tuesday, July 15, 2014 at 8:45 p.m. as part of the TIFF Cinematheque series "The Sun and the Moon: The Films of Satyajit Ray". NOTE: Sikkim IS A RESTORED 35MM FILM PRINT & Two IS A RESTORED 16MM FILM PRINT. This might be your only chance to see this masterpiece the way it was meant to be seen, so get your tickets NOW and GO. Visit the TIFF website for further details by clicking HERE.

DON'T FORGET TO BUY YOUR SATYAJIT RAY MOVIES FROM THE LINKS TO AMAZON.CA, AMAZON.COM and AMAZON.UK, BELOW. DOING SO WILL ASSIST WITH THE ONGOING MAINTENANCE OF THE FILM CORNER.

*BUYERS PLEASE NOTE* Amazon.ca (Canadian Amazon) has a relatively cruddy collection of Satyajit Ray product and generally shitty prices. Amazon.com has a huge selection of materials (including music and books) and decent prices. Amazon.UK has a GREAT selection of Satyajit Ray movies from a very cool company called Artificial Eye (second these days only to the Criterion Collection). Any decent Chinatown sells region-free Blu-Ray and DVD players for peanuts. Just get one (or several - they can be that cheap) and don't be afraid of ordering from foreign regions. The fucking film companies should just merge the formats into one acceptable delivery method worldwide. Besides, you can order anything you want from any country anyway.

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PARAMOUNT GAME NIGHT COLLECTION - Baseball Films Reviewed By Greg Klymkiw: FEAR STRIKES OUT & Original BAD NEWS BEARS Homeruns, BANG THE DRUM SLOWLY & MAJOR LEAGUE Ball Fours, HARD BALL, BAD NEWS BEARS sequels & remake all Strikeout.

It's the middle of a cold, dark winter.

Hockey is in full swing.

Baseball is a dim memory.

It seems as good an excuse as any to haul out the old Paramount Home Video nine-movie DVD box set entitled the Game Night Collection as a cinematic post-coital cigarette and pillow talk to the main event which occurred, it seems, so long ago.

Rating of Collection: **1/2
Ratings of Individual Films:
Fear Strikes Out (1957) dir. Robert Mulligan ****
Major League (1989) dir. David S. Ward **1/2
Hardball (2001) dir. Brian Robbins *
Bang the Drum Slowly (1973) dir. John D. Hancock **
Bad News Bears (1976) dir. Michael Ritchie ***1/2
Bad News Bears (2005) dir. Richard Linklater *1/2
Bad News Bears in Breaking Training (1977) dir. Michael Pressman *
Bad News Bears Go to Japan (1978) dir. John Berry *1/2

Review by Greg Klymkiw

As someone who has virtually no interest in sports I'm still a sucker for great American sports pictures since the addition of story, character, mise en scene and on occasion, pure big-screen hokum become a perfect substitute for watching the thing itself. It's a genre that can delve into that one area of sports I actually find fascinating - the WORLD of sports – that is, everything about and around the sport rather than the sport itself.

American cinema is, of course, overflowing with sporting activities as a backdrop, but it's probably safe to say that baseball and football are – by far – the most popular activities to Uncle Sam's worshippers. In the movies, if football is analogous to war as it so often is (think Oliver Stone’s Any Given Sunday as a great example), baseball occupies a somewhat loftier, though gentler metaphorical position than football – that of LIFE itself. Winning is nice, but how you play the game is just as, if not MORE important.

When this box set presented itself to me a few years ago, I was pretty excited since I had seen many of these films when I was a child and had fond memories of them. I was also looking forward to catching up with a few of the newer titles I had heretofore missed and to take a new look at a couple of the more recent offerings. Ploughing through the whole box, my initial hopes weren’t necessarily dashed, but the collection turned out to be a pretty mixed bag.

Happily, in all such sets, there’s usually one Crown Jewel in the mix and this box is no exception.

While I’ve always had happy halcyonic thoughts about Fear Strikes Out, this most recent viewing yielded one of those rare experiences wherein the benefits of age (mine and the film’s) allowed for a whole new appreciation of this masterpiece of the 1950s. The inspiring true story of Jimmy Piersall (Anthony Perkins), a star hitter, shortstop and outfielder for the Boston Red Sox who made it to the top with his insanely demanding, driven father (Karl Malden) goading him on, resulted in a highly public nervous breakdown. It's the stuff movies are made of and Fear Strikes Out delivers big-time.

The relationship between father and son often provides highly-charged drama, but as portrayed in this extraordinary movie, it chills to the bone with its portrait of a father pushing his son out of both love and selfishness to dizzying heights of fame on the surface, while deep-down, shoving his son into a deep, dark closet mired in fear and intimidation.

Karl Malden as Dad and Anthony Perkins as Jimmy electrify the screen with their searing, staggering performances. As horrendous as Dad is, Malden still infuses the character with a warmth and humanity that makes the character all the more recognizable to anyone who has experienced that special love-hate tug with their own father. Perkins, in a role pre-dating his turn as the nut-job in Hitchcock’s Psycho is equally extraordinary – careening wildly from the shy romantic young man with a dream to the psychologically battered and drained vegetable in a straight-jacket.

Fear Strikes Out is also noteworthy as one of seven terrific pictures from one of the great producer-director relationships in American cinema. As a team, Producer Alan J. Pakula and director Robert Mulligan always dared to take us on journeys few mainstream pictures were willing to take in the late 1950s to early 1960s. They tackled a wide variety of important social issues with taste, intelligence and most importantly, a fabulous sense of showmanship. The pictures they made together were as supremely entertaining as they were thought-provoking. If the team had only made Fear Strikes Out and their timeless adaptation of Harper Lee’s To Kill A Mockingbird, that would surely have been enough to secure them a place in motion picture history, but they kept on delivering.

It’s also interesting to mention how this creative relationship really points to the importance of producers with vision. Once this team split up, Mulligan kept directing pictures, but they were all a pale imitation of his collaborations with Pakula. Pakula, on the other hand began directing his own pictures during Mulligan’s decline. Pakula kept delivering and continued the legacy of creating masterworks (Klute, The Parallax View and All The President’s Men to name just a few) while Mulligan barfed up such celluloid chunks as Summer of ‘42, The Other, Same Time Next Year and sadly, those pieces of crap were his “watchable” pictures – try sitting through Mulligan's coat-hanger abortion upon Jason Miller's The Nickel Ride sometime. Sadly, the Fear Strikes Out DVD has absolutely no extra features, but it’s a solid transfer of a gorgeous-looking black and white picture and happily enhanced anamorphically. It's a movie worth owning and within the context of this box set, it shares (thankfully on a separate disc) a slim-line case with Bang The Drum Slowly.

The latter title, directed by the painfully bland John Hancock, is rendered TV-movie-style (visually) and the muted drama pretty much makes mincemeat out of Mark Harris’s lovely novel and screenplay. A young Robert DeNiro as a doomed simpleton ball player works hard to charm and touch us whilst Michael Moriarty as the pal who takes pity on him is equally moving.

Both actors make the film worth seeing, but the picture moves lugubriously, looks ugly, has little feel for capturing the joy of the ball fields, dugouts and dressing rooms and is saddled with a grating musical score.

There are no extras with Bang The Drum Slowly, but none are really required. As a point of comparison though, this set might have benefitted from including the live television adaptation from the 50s wherein scriptwriter Arnold (Tucker: The Man and His Dream) Schulman and director Daniel (A Raisin in the Sun, Fort Apache – The Bronx) Petrie blended the techniques of radio drama with live theatre and cinema (along with those of live television itself), thus rendering a perfect example of cusp-period artistic expression during the dawn of television as a medium that was worth extending far longer than it lived. Their challenge was to translate a tale that spanned two baseball seasons, numerous locations (including dugout action) and a huge cast during one live hour of drama. Ultimately, it’s handled with the kind of originality and efficiency that Hancock's 70s film version can't even begin to hold a candle to.

The other piece of bad news in this box set is a double-trouble double-header. Two separate discs sharing another slim line case are a pair of what might be the worst baseball pictures ever made: Hardball, a bile-inducing story of loser Keanu Reeves finding his inner-self while coaching a ragtag group of deprived inner-city kids to little league victory and Talent for the Dame, a dull-as-dishwater picture directed by the once talented (Alambrista, Short Eyes) Robert M. Young, who turned-into-no-talent-sell-out-hack. Starring an earnest ('nuff said) Edward James Olmos (‘nuff said) as a baseball scout who turns a small town simpleton ('nuff said) into a major leaguer ('nuff said), it's virtually unwatchable. Lorraine Bracco ('nuff said) is in it too. Christ, she has an annoying voice. Watching her in this picture, I’m absolutely stumped how Scorsese turned her into the beyond-palatable Henry Hill moll in Goodfellas. Here, she sounds like a frog with a firecracker going off in its butt. Talent For The Game, as it should be, has no extra features, but Hardball is inexplicably jam-packed with extra features including a pretty useless commentary track with the purported writer-director and a mess of glorified EPK junk.

Getting its own slimline case, the single disc of writer-director David S. Ward’s Major League, dubbed the “Wild Thing Edition”, is loaded with a variety of extra features including an okay commentary with Ward. If you liked George Roy Hill’s Slap Shot (and I most certainly do), you’ll probably manage to enjoy this raucous baseball version sans Hill’s directorial panache and Nancy Dowd’s brilliant dialogue. That said, Major League made me laugh quite a bit when I first saw it and coming back to the picture was like putting on a comfy old pair of slippers, managing quite ably to deliver the well-worn goods.

Rounding out the set are four different titles with the Bad News Bears. Sharing one slim-line case are two separate discs of the original Michael Ritchie comedy classic and the recent Richard Linklater remake. Ritchie’s picture from Bill Lancaster’s terrific script holds up so marvelously that one wonders why the remake was necessary – especially since it really doesn’t try to move into new territory like some good remakes actually can. (I like citing the first three versions of Invasion of the Body Snatchers as an example of how this can work beautifully.) Ritchie’s original, stars the inimitable hang-dog schlub Walter Matthau as the drunken foul-mouthed lout who manages to coach an equally foul-mouthed group of kids to ball-diamond glory with the help of a foul-mouthed tweener, pitcher Tatum O’Neal and foul-mouthed little criminal on a motorcycle, a very young Jackie Earle Haley. It’s a wonderful picture – both funny and moving. Linklater’s remake is not only necessary, but thanks to Lancaster’s script (which remains largely intact) and Billy Bob Thornton who is surprisingly good in Matthau’s role, it’s kind of watchable, but why bother when the original rocks big time and in its own way, hasn't really dated. Sadly, Ritchie’s classic has zero extras and Linklater’s ho-hum remake is jam-packed with extras.

The final offerings in this box are the 70s sequels to Ritchie’s original. On two separate discs in the same slim-line plastic case, you'll first find Bad News Bears in Breaking Training, a horrendously unfunny followup with few of the original cast on board and an utterly unappetizing William Devane making a poor replacement for Matthau. The other sequel, Bad News Bears Go To Japan, has a few laughs as the misfits find themselves in the land of the rising sun. Paramount wisely secured Bill Lancaster to write the script and they cast a very entertaining Tony Curtis in the coach role. Is it good? Not exactly, but it’s an okay time-waster and has a good number of ludicrous American-styled Japanophobic gags.

If you don’t own Fear Strikes Out, Major League and the original Bad News Bears and want to own all three of them, then it’s probably your best bet economically to pick up the box set. That said, I do hope Paramount Home Video gets its act together and issues some extras-loaded Blu-Rays of Fear Strikes Out and Ritchie’s Bad News Bears. That would be manna from Heaven.

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NICKELODEON - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Bogdanovich love song to early movie biz a delight in spite of itself.

Nickelodeon (1976) ***
dir. Peter Bogdanovich
Starring: Ryan O’Neal, Burt Reynolds, John Ritter, Stella Stevens, Jane Hitchcock, Tatum O’Neal, Brian Keith, Don Calfa.

Review By Greg Klymkiw

Nickelodeon is a mess, but WHAT a mess!

This notorious Peter Bogdanovich boxoffice and critical failure from the 70s is a big budget, star-studded love song to the pre-D.W. Griffith pioneers of the motion picture industry. Reviled in its day as a clumsy attempt to cram early movie history into a pastiche of early film techniques, it’s a picture that not only managed to keep audiences away in droves, but (at least for me) inexplicably alienated Bogdanovich’s biggest supporters – the critical elite of both the popular mainstream and alternative press. To dump truckloads of manure onto a picture for excess is one thing, but when the excess seems somewhat justified and not without entertainment value, it’s incumbent upon some of us to refute the elitism of the predatory gaggle of scribes who were clearly looking for any excuse to take Bogdanovich, the critic-turned-filmmaker, down a few notches.

Set at a time when Thomas Edison and his cronies maintained the position that they held exclusive patents to the motion picture camera, we follow the adventures of a ragtag band of moviemakers who refuse to shell out royalties to the inventor-thug who stopped at nothing to shut down all the independent businessmen who sought to grab their fare share of the profits from the new magic called movies. Edison hired gun-toting strong men to seek out these upstarts and rough them up and destroy their labs and equipment.

In Nickelodeon, one such upstart is the blustery showman H.H. Cobb, insanely portrayed by a crazed Brian Keith. Failed lawyer and Harold Lloyd look-alike, the bespectacled Leo Harrigan (Ryan O’Neal) literally pratfalls into this independent company and is quickly nominated to the position of screenwriter.

Dispatched to a sleepy, one-horse California waterhole to take over the filmmaking operations, Harrigan discovers that a teenage girl, Alice Forsyte (O’Neal’s daughter Tatum) is an even better screenwriter than he is and when he furthermore discovers that the director has gone on a drunken bender, absconding the unit’s working capital, he is further nominated to the position of director.

The group includes a sexy leading lady (Stella Stevens), a near-sighted ingénue (Jane Hitchcock), an amiable sad sack cameraman (John Ritter) and best of all, a two-fisted galumphing galoot from Texas played with good humour and cheer by a thoroughly delightful Burt Reynolds.

All of this probably sounds terrific. It’s not, but it should have been. Where Bogdanovich errs is when he spends far too much time on meticulously recreating slapstick farce from the period. While technically proficient, it’s seldom funny – not so much out of familiarity with the style of humour, but that many of the set-ups are so meticulous that instead of seeming freewheeling and fresh, the laughs – what few we actually get – are utterly predictable. They’re also at odds with what should/could have been a thoroughly compelling story – taking us out of the action to grind everything to a standstill in order to watch one set piece after another.

When the humour works, it works not because it is mannered, meticulous and stylized, but when it’s rooted in the story, characters and backdrop. These moments work so beautifully that they come close to canceling out all the moments that don’t. Many of these well-wrought sequences happen when Bogdanovich doesn’t play over-the-top moments… well, over-the-top. When he plays them straight or relatively straight, they’re as fresh and funny and downright exhilarating as any great comic moments should be.

It's no surprise the best stuff involves Burt Reynolds. In one great scene, Burt's recruited to mount a house for the first time in his life. In full KKK garb he holds a burning cross aloft as the steed stumbles. Another great moment involves Reynolds, who is terrified of heights, and gets bamboozled by Ryan O’Neal to get into an air balloon which, instead of rising only to the height of a horse, is released and set on a wild course into the Heavens. As well, Tatum O’Neal unleashes her trademark Paper Moon precociousness and gives us one fine display of cutthroat negotiation after another.

This IS the stuff great comic set pieces are made of.

When the movie sticks to moviemaking and does so in an understated fashion, it IS terrific. One only wishes Bogdanovich hadn’t indulged his slapstick muse so often. The best thing about the movie, though, is a truly exciting and moving recreation of the world premiere of D.W. Griffith’s Birth of a Nation. This astounding sequence is so elegiac, that one is inclined to forgive the movie any and all of its flaws.

One of the main reasons to give this picture a whirl on DVD is the fact that Bogdanovich has been given an opportunity to present the film in black and white. When it was first made, the studio balked at such an expensive picture being unleashed in shades of grey rather than all-out colour. Bogdanovich and his cinematographer, the late great Lazlo (Easy Rider) Kovacs acquiesced, but with new digital technologies, the film has been transformed into gorgeous black and white with a lovely range of tones and a mouth-watering grain that looks especially stunning when one plays the regular DVD on a Blu-Ray machine with an HD television monitor. In spite of its flaws, Nickelodeon was always a picture I liked, but I have to admit that in black and white, I do believe I like it a whole lot more.

“Nickelodeon” is available on DVD from Sony Pictures Home Entertainment in a two-disc set with Bogdanovich’s masterpiece “The Last Picture Show”

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):