A SPECIAL DAY - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Italian Kitchen-Sink Love Story now on Criterion

A gay dissident. An overworked housewife.
Can happiness, no matter how brief, be far behind?

A Special Day (1977)
Dir. Ettore Scola
Starring: Sophia Loren, Marcello Mastroianni, John Vernon, Françoise Berd

Review By Greg Klymkiw

Writing about A Special Day is a somewhat bittersweet experience for me. Until watching the gorgeously transferred Criterion Collection Blu-Ray, I hadn't laid eyes upon the picture since 1977 when I saw it first-run on a big screen.

I saw it with my late mother. She loved Sophia Loren and was really looking forward to the movie. It didn't disappoint. It became one of her favourite movies. From time to time she'd mention it agreeably, almost wistfully. I offered, on several occasions, to get it on home video for her, but she always declined. She wasn't one to see movies more than once, even if she loved them. (Her exception to this rule was Gone With The Wind.)

For me, I recall enjoying it well enough in 1977, but I was eventually swayed by Pauline Kael's hilarious pan in The New Yorker. She referred to it as "a strenuous exercise in sensitivity" and described director Ettore Scola's style as "genteel shamelessness". In spite of my Kael-influenced position on the picture, I always maintained a positive stance whenever my mother brought it up. I tried not being a pretentious smart-ass with her.

Seeing it again, I marvelled at what an exquisitely crafted love story it really is. Yes, the picture wears its emotions on its sleeve and the political backdrop now seems somewhat obvious in how it front loads the love story which transpires twixt Sophia Loren and Marcello Mastroianni. But, on this viewing, none of these almost-machine-tooled elements mattered to me. I appreciated Scola's genuine artistry and the film's obvious merits as a first-rate weepy.

All through this screening, though, I couldn't help but think about my Mom.

I think this is a valid critical response to the film. Good movies almost always hit one on a personal level and what I admired, beyond reflecting upon my late Mother's love for it, is what a superb star vehicle it was for its leads and how the film must have resonated with audiences all over the world - especially all those Moms who related to the character Loren played so exquisitely.

The kitchen sink, laundry and Hitler
are powerless against two lonely people
finding happiness, no matter how brief.

Sophia is cast against type as Antonietta, a traditional housewife living in poverty with her brutish husband (John Vernon) and slaving over her six kids (of all ages) whilst living a life of drudgery and servitude - cooking and cleaning ad infinitum. Of course, like star vehicles the world over, Sophia's not really cast against type in the sense that she's the most gorgeous drudge in the history of movies - even without makeup. Why should it be any other way? I imagine my own Mother seeing aspects of herself in the film, but being able to do so with Sophia Loren standing up on the silver screen in her stead.

As the title tells us, the film is set during that very special day in 1938 when Adolph Hitler came to Rome in order to celebrate Totalitarian collaboration with Benito Mussolini. Loudspeakers have been set up in every nook and cranny of the city to broadcast the events of the day, even though virtually every home and business has been drained of humanity to fill the streets for Hitler.

Antonietta is home alone. There's plenty of wifely duties for her to perform - Hitler or no Hitler. When her mynah bird escapes its cage and flies across the courtyard, it lands at the window of Gabriele (Marcello Mastroianni). With his help, the bird is rescued. Alas, all this activity has interrupted Gabriele's plans to commit suicide.

I'd assert that this might be the ultimate meet-cute.

In any event, we discover Gabriele is a former household name - a radio commentator who has been fired for his liberal views and who will, no doubt, be carried off by the Black Shirt Police to rot in prison. Antonietta is charmed off her feet by the dapper intellectual. He treats her with respect and encourages her to find time to exercise her mind with reading books. He's also a homosexual. This doesn't phase Antonietta. She's bound and determined to seduce him.

This is a special day in more ways than one. Two sad, lonely people make a connection. Come what may, for several hours they discover some glimmer of happiness in their momentary closeness. Though director Scola has visually etched a borderline neorealist world, he eventually builds to a fifty-hanky tear gusher. There's no mistaking that A Special Day is anything other than what it is; a touching, sentimental, gorgeously-wrought melodrama.

And yeah, I did shed more than a few tears on this go-round. I acknowledge many of them were probably in memory of my late Mom, but I'd be a liar if I didn't admit that the skillful manner in which the film wrenches emotion also worked its magic upon me. It's the same magic that worked on my Mom, sitting in a movie theatre on a Sunday afternoon with her teenage son some thirty eight years ago.

I suspect the picture will move whole new generations of movie lovers, thanks to the painstaking restoration efforts of Criterion. Like any well crafted love story, Scola did indeed create a picture of lasting value.

THE FILM CORNER RATING: **** 4-Stars

A Special Day is available on the Criterion Collection with to-die-for supplements including: a new, restored 4K digital transfer, supervised by director Ettore Scola, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack on the Blu-ray; Human Voice, a 2014 short film starring Sophia Loren and directed by Edoardo Ponti; new interviews with Scola and Loren; two 1977 episodes of The Dick Cavett Show featuring Loren and actor Marcello Mastroianni (a mega-treat); the trailer; a new English subtitle translation; and an essay by critic Deborah Young.

THE ASCENT and WINGS - Reviewed By Greg Klymkiw - Susan Sontag called Larisa Shepitko's harrowing anti-war film THE ASCENT "the most affecting film about the horror of war I know." Shepitko focused on suffering, slaughter and senseless strife and did so in a stunning allegorical portrait of Christ and Judas during the German occupation of Belarus. The movie was miraculously rendered under Communist oppression in the Soviet Union. With WINGS, Shepitko delivered a powerful, romantic look at Russia's fighting women of the Second World War in a post-war world. Shepitko's eye, like a mad pit bull's jaws, always clenched furiously on its quarry and never, ever let it go.

This is a perfect time to take another look at two films about war by the late Ukrainian filmmaker Larisa Shepitko (a protege of Dovzhenko and the wife of acclaimed director Elem Klimov). Ukraine has been at war with Russia since the Maidan revolution in Kyiv just over one year ago which ousted the Putin-backed gangster-President Yanukovitch. Since that time, Russia illegally annexed Crimea and organized an army of terrorists to take control of two provinces in Eastern Ukraine. In recent days, Tatars and Ukrainians in Crimea have suffered massive discrimination and even death, all Tatar and Ukrainian books in a historical Crimean library have been chucked into the streets and publicly burned, Putin is rallying his nation to publicly protest Ukraine's freedom and just yesterday, during peaceful rallies in Ukraine to celebrate freedom from Russia, Moscow-backed terrorists exploded a bomb in Ukraine's second-largest city Kharkiv which killed and wounded many innocent people. The farcical and cowardly EU-backed-and-negotiated truce might only instigate the break out of a large-scale war. Here are my reviews of The Ascent (Christian allegory set in WWII) and Wings (examination of post-war female soldiers) by Larisa Shepitko.

The Ascent (1977) *****
dir. Larisa Shepitko
Starring: Boris Plotnikov, Vladimir Gostyukhin, Sergei Yokovlev, Anatoli Solonitsin

Review By Greg Klymkiw

"Is there an antidote to the perennial seductiveness of war? And is this a question a woman is more likely to pose than a man? (Probably yes.) . . . No photograph, or portfolio of photographs, can unfold, go further, and further still, as does The Ascent (1977), by the Ukrainian director Larisa Shepitko, the most affecting film about the horror of war I know." - Susan Sontag, "Looking at War: Photography’s view of devastation and death", The New Yorker

Survival and sacrifice are at the forefront of Larisa Shepitko’s harrowing World War II drama The Ascent – only fitting since the film, at once simple, at the next complex, is ultimately an allegorical portrait of Christ and Judas in a world turned topsy-turvy by the senseless strife and slaughter during the German invasion and occupation of Belarus. That notion of faith, extracted as it is from the New Testament and applied to such issues as love and betrayal of country are completely at home within the context and backdrop so vividly and evocatively portrayed.

For the Ukrainian-born Shepitko, herself a student of Master Ukrainian filmmaker Olexander Dovzhenko, it is clear why this story resonated with her and why she applied such staggering Dovzhenkian compositions to the picture. Coming from Ukraine, a country and culture that had been under the yoke of occupation and suppression almost from its very beginnings and having been mentored by a brilliant filmmaker who himself had been repressed and censored by Joseph Stalin, the mixture of frank political material coupled with a story and central relationship derived from the opiate of the masses, is illustrative of Shepitko’s artistic bravery at such a relatively early stage of her career in the repressive Soviet regime that frowned upon anything that deviated from the State disavowal of all things based in faith.

The story is a simple one. It is also both tragic and compelling. Ultimately, however, it is the simple narrative backbone that allows Shepitko to inspire an audience’s engagement in the proceedings as well as opportunities for contemplation and reflection both during and after seeing the film.

Following a rag-tag band of partisans through the snowy steppes and forest of Belarus, we are introduced to our pair of mismatched protagonists, the hardened, practical Rybak (Vladimir Gostukhin) and the physically weak, but thoughtful Sotnikov (Boris Plotnikov) as they volunteer to journey through the bitter cold of the dangerous, Nazi-infested region to find food for the tired and starving freedom fighters. The journey begins to take, almost from the beginning, a series of increasingly disastrous and dangerous detours as Sotnikov becomes sicker with bronchitis and a bullet wound while Rybak becomes so intent upon survival that he begins to question all the sacrifices he is enduring. They both find themselves face-to-face with having to make the ultimate sacrifice for each other, those around them and most importantly, home and country.

Given that most of us are more than aware of the relationship between Jesus and Judas, it is also a testament to Shepitko’s cinematic storytelling prowess that we are still gripped by the proceedings in spite of having a good inkling of where the story will go. In fact, it is the inevitability of where things are headed that keeps us glued to the screen – we keep hoping against hope that the inevitable will be circumvented and, of course, Shepitko plays the portent with harrowing assuredness and style.

Interestingly, The Ascent is not dissimilar to another great Soviet war picture, Grigori Chukrai’s Ballad of a Soldier. On the surface, both pictures deal with soldiers who have a specific goal, but on their journey they face a series of obstacles and detours that painfully keep them from reaching their ultimate destination. The difference, however, is that Chukrai’s film (also full of lush, gorgeously composed exteriors in the Dovzhenkian mold) involves detours routed firmly in sacrifice wherein the central character is kept from visiting his destitute mother because he is continually sidetracked by being duty-bound to helping other people with their own challenges. In The Ascent, it is both betrayal and survival that provide the obstacles. This basic difference highlights why one picture feels romantic and the other is overwhelmingly tragic.

That said, The Ascent is equally powerful and perhaps even more so since the will to survive – at any cost – becomes so poignant. Sacrifice, which involves principles rather than that of the plight of individuals, takes The Ascent into (ironically) political territory that mirrors the struggles of everyone living within the Soviet system. As an audience we are forced to confront a system of repression (Soviet-ruled Belarus) that is also being occupied and repressed by a foreign aggressor (Germany). The enemy is sadly, from within and outside so that our characters are surrounded – almost in futility. The domestic collaborators with the Nazis are at once evil and altogether human. We understand the need to collaborate while condemning it at the same time.

Living in a system of repression like Belarus and under the yoke of a madman like Stalin, the Nazis provide a way out of the madness – an alternative to Stalin. Two of the supporting characters in this narrative are perfectly emblematic of this. One is a village elder (Sergei Yakovlev) who is a reluctant collaborator while the other is a local Nazi interrogator (Anatoli Solonytsin), a cold, practical bureaucrat. The former is a man who seeks safety in collaboration for his family and friends, while the latter is a pure opportunist – someone who is just as happy serving the dictator du jour (Hitler) as he would be engaging in a Stalinist purge. These dichotomous personalities brilliantly mirror Rybak and Sotnikov – especially since their journeys and the inevitable outcomes are so similar: suggesting, of course, that notions of sacrifice and betrayal, collaboration and resistance, good and evil are almost always grey areas in war, and in particular, within repressive regimes.

What is not a grey area in The Ascent is suffering – represented not only by the physical pain and death of violence, but by the land itself. Here is where Shepitko’s kino-eye is especially evocative. The bitter cold and the endless, bone-chilling whiteness of snow overwhelm all the exterior shots. One of the more intensely powerful moments involves Rybak dragging a sick and wounded Sotnikov through the snow – for what seems like forever – as Nazi bullets fly at them. Shepitko’s camera is like a mad pit bull’s jaws clenching at its quarry – it seems to never let go of these two men as they painstakingly make their way through the snow.

Throughout the film we see the actors enduring literal physical hardships. Seeing The Ascent again, I was reminded of the genius of Werner Herzog’s Fitzcarraldo, a movie that has suffered unnecessarily over the years due to the hype surrounding the mad German (and ethnically Slavic) director’s decision to force his own cast and crew to drag a riverboat through the jungle and over a mountain. When writing at an earlier juncture about Shepitko’s Krylya/Wings I was also reminded of Herzog – in that case, it was the documentary Little Dieter Needs To Fly. Visually, Herzog and Shepitko are very different. Herzog’s visuals in drama and documentary, while stunning, have the immediacy of cinema vérité while Shepitko is rooted in the classical, sumptuously composed imagery her mentor Dovzhenko was known for. What Shepitko and Herzog share, however, is an unflinching search for truth in image, and in particular, the use of truth in image in the telling of stories cinematically.

Speaking of sharing, it is also worth noting that some of the finest war films of all time were made under the Soviet system – many of which put the best American examples of this genre to shame. That said, Ukrainians appear to have directed the very best Soviet war films. Olexander Dovzhenko (Arsenal, Schors and his WWII documentaries), Sergei Bondarchuk (Destiny of a Man, War and Peace), Grigori Chukrai (Ballad of a Soldier, Cold Skies, The 41st) and Shepitko have powerfully and evocatively portrayed the horrors and even glories of war and share Ukrainian ethnicity. Perhaps it is coincidence, or perhaps it is worthy of further study. In any event, it is certainly worth noting. It is also worth reiterating that all the abovementioned filmmakers come from a country that has always been dominated and repressed by other powers. With The Ascent, it is finally survival and sacrifice that drives the picture and makes it a film that is haunting, unforgettable and tragic.

Ukrainians, it seems, and others who have lived under repressive regimes, have always known something about survival, sacrifice and war.

Wings (1966) dir. Larisa Shepitko
Starring: Maya Bulgakova

*****

By Greg Klymkiw

The romance of war has seldom been so heartbreaking than in the hands of the great Ukrainian-born director Larisa Shepitko who made this first feature after a few short films and studying under the watchful eye of fellow countryman and master film artist Oleksander Dovzhenko. What’s especially bittersweet is that Wings is set in a post-war Soviet world where the lead character Nadezhna (Maya Bulgakova) struggles to settle into a life of seeming normalcy and, compared to her career as a fighter pilot, complacency. Now in her fortieth year, she works as a schoolmistress and goes about her daily tasks with professionalism and commitment on the surface, but always yearning and dreaming of the days when she soared above the normal world – touching Heaven, surrounded by the billowy clouds and racing through the air, dipping and swooping like a bird of prey.

Shepitko, part of that breed of Soviet filmmaker that rejected the occasionally overwrought montage-heavy storytelling of the likes of Eisenstein, tells her delicate tale with the same kind of editorial restraint common to her generation. Favouring gorgeously composed tableaus and a stately pace, Shepitko aims her lens at the realism of Nadezhna’s life, but with such a keen eye that the commonplace becomes extraordinary.

And what is it about the “normal” that nags at Shepitko’s central character?

The bottom line is this: The girl just wants to fly high. But alas, it is not to be – Nadezhna’s place in servitude to the Soviet ideal is now in the shaping of minds – youthful minds that live in a peaceful world that cannot even begin to comprehend the horrors of war. Nor are her students (and most others – adults AND children) equipped to fathom the mad, youthful rush accompanying Nadezhna’s idealism which led her into the cockpit of a bomber and into the arms of a fellow high-flyer, a dashing young man who eventually dies in a fireball before her very eyes – an image that haunts her constantly.

Shepitko expertly juxtaposes the romance and tragedy of Nadezhna’s life during the war with a series of poetic flashbacks that always help move the story forward when the drabness of her current existence reaches its nadir. One of the more moving sequences has our protagonist watching as a group of schoolchildren in the local museum are shown a display devoted to her heroism during the war. With the love of her life long dead and a schlubish museum director vying for her attentions – Nadezhna’s own life has become a literal and figurative museum piece.

Her daughter Tanya, a ravishing beauty, has married a much older man and Nadezhna can only think of her long-lost lover and how this prissy egghead who cohabits with her progeny can only pale in comparison. While Tanya has married for love, Nadezhna’s lover died for love – not necessarily for romantic love, but for the romantic ideals and love of flying that he shared with her.

With such a pedigree, can anyone ever be good enough for Nadezhna’s daughter?

While Wings shares much in common with Dovzhenko and Grigori Chukrai (Ballad of a Soldier), this is, unlike the work of her male colleagues, a relatively contemporary film by a woman and about a woman, which builds towards a conclusion as soaring and heartbreaking as the one that ends Nadezhna’s story. Werner Herzog’s astounding 1997 documentary Little Dieter Needs To Fly still can evoke tears when one recalls the final images as the title subject has a dream come true. A similar and extraordinary sequence occurs at the end of Wings and delivers the kind of impact that only movies can bring when a dream comes true.

In both cases the wish fulfillment is endowed with both elation and heartache.

Shepitko firmly roots her character in a past that seems so far away and yet, truth and redemption are found in the reclamation of that past – albeit a reclamation that embraces the present and includes an acceptance of the future.

Shepitko only made three features following this debut. Her life was tragically cut short in a car accident while on a location scout for what would have been her fifth feature.

Like Nadezhna’s dashing flyboy lover, Shepitko died while doing what she knew and loved best.

Great art and life are never that far apart, are they?

Wings and The Ascent are available in one set on Criterion's Eclipse DVD label

In Canada - BUY LARISA SHEPITKO movies HERE!

In USA and the rest of the WORLD - BUY LARISA SHEPITKO movies HERE!

SORCERER (New Digital Restoration of the 1977 Classic, Supervised By Director William Friedkin) - Reviewed By Greg Klymkiw in his Colonial Report on Cinema from the Dominion of Canada in the super-cool movie mag in the UK, "Electric Sheep - a deviant view of cinema".

SORCERER
*****

(1977)

Dir. William Friedkin

Starring

Roy Scheider

Francisco Rabal

Bruno Cremer

Amidou

Reviewed By Greg Klymkiw

In 1977, my virginal plunge into the sweaty, nerve-wracking maw of this insane jungle thriller about four desperate men transporting nitroglycerine across the most treacherous topography imaginable, was, for me, an epiphany. During a myriad of subsequent viewings, and now, with this brand new digital restoration overseen by director William Friedkin, Sorcerer was always, still remains and always will be a movie that repeatedly whacks you with a two-by-four across the teeth.

My review of this new restoration can be found in my column "The Colonial Report on Cinema from the Dominion of Canada" in the ever-so-cool UK-based movie mag "Electric Sheep - a deviant view of cinema".

My full review of SORCERER can be read HERE.

The Toronto International Film Festival’s TIFF Bell Lightbox will be screening the all-new digital restoration (supervised by director William Friedkin) of the 1977 remake of The Wages of Fear, Sorcerer on 12, 15 and 18 April 2014 as a TIFF Cinematheque Special Screening. This is part of a grand spring series that includes a new 35mm restoration of Joseph Losey’s The Servant, new 35mm prints of Robert Bresson’s A Man Escaped, Nagisa Ôshima’s Boy, Alain Resnais’s Je t’aime, je t’aime, Michelangelo Antonioni’s L’Avventura, a new digital restoration of the 248 minute ‘roadshow’ version of Joseph L. Mankiewicz’s Cleopatra, new 4K digital restorations of Roberto Rossellini’s Voyage to Italy, Nobuhiko Obayashi’s House/Hausu, John Sturges’s The Great Escape, Elio Petri’s Investigation of a Citizen above Suspicion, and 35mm Archival prints of Humberto Solas’s Lucia and most excitingly, H.G. Clouzot’s The Wages of Fear.

Anyone planning to be in Toronto for these screenings is well advised to order seats in advance. For dates, tickets and further information, please visit the TIFF website HERE.

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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CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE THIRD KIND - Review By Greg Klymkiw - It's been 36 Years Since I First Saw.....IT?

Aside from being a great science fiction picture, “Close Encounters of the Third Kind” is one of the most evocative tales of obsession ever to be etched on celluloid and as such, this is as much a review of the film as it is a reflection on my personal obsession with the picture that has not abated since I first saw it 36 years ago.

Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977) *****
dir. Steven Spielberg
Starring: Richard Dreyfuss, Francois Truffaut, Melinda Dillon, Teri Garr, Roberts Blossom

Review By Greg Klymkiw

On a crisp Winnipeg winter night in December of 1977, I floated in a daze from within the warm confines of an old 2000-seat downtown picture palace and my eyes looked immediately to the Heavens.

IMMEDIATELY.

A typically clear mid-western prairie sky presented a dazzling display of the cosmos – stars danced and twinkled above me and it was near impossible to shift my gaze from the limitless expanse of the universe and beyond. I kept watching the sky for some time in total bliss and ignorance of the sub-zero temperature that, as per usual, threatened to freeze exposed skin in less than a minute or two.

I had, of course, just seen an advance preview screening of Steven Spielberg’s Close Encounters of the Third Kind, a motion picture of such staggering power that it seemed perfectly fitting that my first helping of its magnificence be within the cavernous expanse of this classic theatre built in 1907, its screen enveloped by a mighty proscenium, sitting in plush seats surrounded by an interior rich in ornate white Italian marble (it not only had a huge balcony, it had fucking LOGES) and bathed in a flickering light of utter magic that was, at this early stage of my life, a picture unlike anything I had ever seen before.

This one screening proved to be so epiphanous that once the picture officially opened two weeks later, I saw it on a big screen – in this same cinema – well over forty times.

I could not get enough of the picture. I needed to see it as one needs nourishment. A week could not go by that I did not feel the mysterious pull of this extraordinary movie. I was a man possessed - barely one, at that, being a mere 18-years-old.

By now, everyone knows that this classic motion picture charts the journey of everyman Roy Neary (Richard Dreyfuss) who experiences the unexplained appearance of something other-worldly and abandons his life, his job, his family – everything he holds dear – to obsessively track down the meaning behind this occurrence. In a tale steeped in Judeo-Christian resonance – from Moses to Christ – Roy makes a perilous journey, climbs Devil’s Tower and comes face-to-face with the answer to his visions until he, along with twelve apostolic “pilgrims” ascends to the Heavens, arms outstretched in what is surely the most benign crucifixion-image imaginable.

It’s quite perfect, really. Aside from the obsessive quality of the central character, the picture itself is relentless in its adherence to the basic principles of UFO-ology and a system of extraterrestrial classification as posited by the late astronomer Dr. Josef Allen Hynek – the close encounter. According to Hynek, a close encounter of the first kind is seeing unexplained phenomena, while the second kind involves hard proof of some sort of physical manifestation from what was originally witnessed and, finally, the close encounter of the third kind, contact.

Using this classification system as the basis for his screenplay, Spielberg fills in his story with a sound and compelling three-act structure – one that is so exquisitely classical and presented with such flair, that the experience of seeing the film is not only entertaining, but frankly, borders on the spiritual. This sense of spirituality is almost divine in nature and makes perfect sense considering Hynek’s own belief in the notion that a technology must exist which blends both the physical and psychic. Furthermore, it's important to note that Paul Schrader wrote the first pass of the film and though he didn't take a story credit (something he regretted almost as quickly as he agreed to it and more so in the years to follow), it feels, deep-down like a Schrader narrative - especially the combination of obsession and spirituality.

Spielberg clearly believed in both Hynek and Schrader's concerns, but his approach was, as it always is and always must be, that of a master showman imbued with the innocence and wonder of a child. This, finally, is what makes Close Encounters such a supreme entertainment – we’re engaged and dazzled, finally, by the sheer physical beauty of what Neary sees, but also, we feel and perhaps even understand what this character feels (and by extension, Spielberg).

I really don't think Richard Dreyfuss has ever been better. He's the ultimate man-child here - a kind of hulking working class version of what Kubrick's "Star Child" in 2001 might have become. Teri Garr and Melinda Dillon acquit themselves nicely, but if any performances match Dreyfuss' here, it's legendary French filmmaker Francois Truffaut as the UFO expert who seems as much an obsessive man-child as Dreyfuss and, of course, lest we forget the late, great character actor Roberts Blossom as the crazed old man who opines on the aliens' prowess at manning their spaceships:

"They can fly rings around the moon, but we're years ahead of them on the highway."

The movie contains several great set-pieces of wonder, but nothing in the film, and frankly nothing in MOST films can compare to the pure joy of the final third of the picture - the close encounter of the third kind. For me, perhaps the most moving element is how the universal language that binds mankind with the aliens is light and music. Can their ever be a more universal duo? Thank God for John Williams' score, the simple, melodious, almost-Satie-like dissonance that brilliantly riffs on "When You Wish Upon A Star" from Disney's Pinocchio.

It's pathetic. Just THINKING about moments from the final third of the film in tandem with Williams' score STILL makes me tear up like, in the words of Brando in Apocalypse Now, "some old grandmother".

As for the special effects - they are GORGEOUS OPTICALS courtesy of Douglas Trumbull, an astounding hand-built set in an airplane hangar and animatronics courtesy of Carlo Rambaldi. There isn't a single digital effect that can hold a candle to any of these.

Over the years, Spielberg has tinkered with various cuts of the film. After the initial theatrical release, he issued a “special edition” in 1980, which trimmed a few bits he felt needed trimming, but moronically dumped several key moments that contributed to Neary’s humanity and his relationship with his family - as well as the physical manifestation of Neary's obsession in the form of the most insane act of tossing mud, plants and trees into his family's suburban dream home in order to sculpt the image lodged in his brain, the message that he and a few other special people receive from the aliens.

This was, frankly, a mistake, but an even more egregious error in this decidedly UN-special Edition, was taking us beyond Neary’s walk onto the Mother Ship, but inside as well. This version comes close to destroying what was almost perfect. Years later, Spielberg rectified the situation by restoring the film closer to the original release, dumping most of the new footage (and thankfully, ALL of the interior Mother Ship footage). All three versions are presented on Sony’s exquisite Blu-Ray and watching them back-to-back provides an extremely rewarding look at a great artist’s process at trying to “get it” right.

Whatever you do, though, watch the 1977 version on the disc first. It offers the purest state of grace.

You see, on one level, the third version from 1998, is probably the best version of the film, but for me, it’s hard to separate myself from the slight raggedness of the 1977 version. It’s the version that first obsessed me and I feel that ultimately, even its minor flaws weirdly contribute to the picture’s enduring, obsessive quality.

Steven Spielberg is unquestionably a born filmmaker. He’s delivered some of the finest entertainments we’ll ever see in this bigger-than-life medium, but ultimately, it’s Close Encounters of the Third Kind that will probably resonate with the greatest power and longevity in the decades to follow.

After all, it comes from a special place.

It comes from the heart – that mysterious, delicate muscle that pumps lifeblood and seems, more so than the mind itself, to harbor the soul. It’s what makes great pictures and Close Encounters of the Third Kind is nothing if not great.

“Close Encounters of the Third Kind” is currently available on Blu-Ray from Sony Pictures Home Entertainment. If you are seeing it for the first time in years and/or if you are showing to kids who've never seen it properly on FILM, on a BIG screen before - do this: Turn all phones off, make sure all the curtains are drawn so nothing from the outside seeps in, make sure ALL the lights are off, make sure nobody has anything to eat or drink before or during the film, make sure your kids have unloaded every drop of urine and every ounce of heavier materials, make it clear that there will be no breaks and that nobody will be allowed to leave the room for ANY reason and then, CRANK THE SOUND. It's the only way to fly.

THE MESSAGE - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Inspirational Epic of Islam now on Anchor Bay Ent. Canada Blu-Ray

ZORBA the ARAB
It ain't all Greek to
His Holy Swarthiness!

Mohammed, the Prophet, receives a Holy Message from God via the angel Gabriel and begins a struggle to take back the city of Mecca - now a den of inequity and represented by over 300 pagan gods. With such formidable foes as a rich, greedy and powerful merchant class led by Abu Sofyan (Michael Ansara) and his wife Hind (Irene Papas), converting the people to Islam is going to be an uphill battle. Luckily, playing Mohammed's Uncle Hamza is Anthony Quinn (AKA "The Life Force" - as crowned, with tongue firmly in cheek, by the late, great Pauline Kael). He's just the man among men to kick all the Pagan-butt necessary on behalf of the Great Prophet. Eventually God is forevermore able to win the hearts and minds of all the people - thanks, of course, to Anthony Quinn (and yes, Mohammed, the All Holy Messenger of the One True God).

________________________________________________________________________________

Anthony Quinn: The Ideal Butt-Kicker for Islam!

THE MESSAGE (1977) ***1/2
Dir. Moustapha Akkad
Starring: Michael Ansara, Irene Pappas, Anthony Quinn
Review By Greg Klymkiw

Short of reading a good translation of the Koran and/or taking an introductory undergraduate Religious Studies course, Moustapha Akkad's straightforward epic narrative rendering of the story of the Prophet Mohammed, provides a solid, entertaining Coles/Cliff's Notes version of the origins of a religion that has otherwise been horrendously stereotyped by the West and equally (and even surprisingly) perverted by extremist Middle Eastern sects.

The Message was long overdue and cinematic reparations were, indeed, in order. Like any decent Cecil B. DeMille sword-and-sandal sprawler like The Greatest Story Ever Told (including the ludicrous George Stevens remake) and The Ten Commandments, it's a relatively straightforward tale told with a great deal of sweep. Director Moustapha Akkad isn't, however, as proficient a filmmaker as DeMille. Not that Akkad's direction is bad, but due to the international nature and flavour of the production (it was seven years in the making, shot in several languages and in some cases with alternate cast members for different markets), there are more than a few clunky moments. However, the film strikes a generally good balance between history lesson and rip-snorting entertainment and is, in general, thoughtful, literate and respectful of its subject matter.

Given that the subject matter is Mohammed, the Holy Prophet of Islam, it's a darn good thing Akkad was respectful. Ultimately, God only knows, he might well have had a Fatwah imposed upon him. This wasn't going to happen to Akkad, though, since the canny director developed the property and shot it in such a way that he was able to maintain the strict Holy Doctrine of never literally depicting Mohammed. His solution to the problem of telling the story of someone who was not allowed, in any way, shape or form to be seen onscreen, was so brilliantly simple that after the initial shock of having to get used to it, you do.

Seriously, this must be reiterated: Mohammed is the main character, but he is never seen onscreen, nor are we allowed to hear his voice. His actions and words are described by others and when characters need to speak with Mohammed, Akkad has them speaking directly into the camera. I really loved this touch - not only for adhering to the strict Muslim laws on such matters, but frankly, this kind of reverence towards the "Character" adds considerably to the mystique and holiness of Mohammed and his very important story within the context of the world's faith-based history.

This is one big movie. As the cliched saying goes: "They don't make 'em like this anymore." The vistas are vast, the sets and costumes sumptuous and the whole film is pleasingly photographed. Akkad assembled an amazing team of artists including gorgeous cinematography by the legendary Jack Hildyard (The Bridge on the River Kwai) and a stirring score by composer Maurice Jarre (Dr. Zhivago). This is a movie that, by rights, should have been seen far more widely in the West - especially in North America.

In contemporary terms, The Message might be even more important than ever since it presents a far more accurate portrait of the Islamic faith, its roots and history - effectively shooting down all the truly hateful American propaganda foisted upon audiences since 9/11. Akkad emphasizes so many of the progressive values of this religion - including equality between men and women as well as issues of peace, love and forgiveness. Though the movie might have been tarred and feathered by Muslim audiences even before it was released (rumours circulated that Charlton Heston would be seen - on camera - playing Mohammed), Akkad had wisely brought numerous Islamic clerics and academics on board as active historical and religious watchdogs. Rather than compromising the film, it did, I believe, make the film far more sympathetic, informative and entertaining.

In America, the film was viewed in an anti-Judeo-Christian light which, was especially moronic since the film even refers positively to any number of Judeo-Christian prophets and deities including Abraham, Moses and the Big Fella' Himself, Jesus H. Christ. The real reason The Message was virtually censored and condemned via poor exhibition and distribution (under the title Mohammed: Messenger of God), along with Akkad's tremendous followup Lion of the Desert (to be reviewed on this website soon) had way more to do with the fact that his films had been financed to the hilt by Libyan ruler Muammar Gaddafi (Rompin' Ronnie Reagan's nemesis throughout the 80s). In spite of America's hatred for Gaddafi, he offered, provided and maintained a strictly hands-off approach to financing both films and exercised no censorship whatsoever. This, of course, is a far cry from the overt and/or subtle censorship of American cinema via the government, New World Order and/or the studios.

Sadly, Akkad never got to make his dream project Saladin, an epic that was to star Sean Connery as the great Muslim leader who fought against the injustices of the Crusades. During pre-production in 2005, Akkad and his daughter were killed in the bombings that took place in Amman, Jordan. Luckily, we have Akkad to thank for making two huge motion pictures in an attempt to bridge the divide between Islam and the Western World.

Curiously, and for better or worse, he can also be thanked for financing, as Executive Producer, the first eight Halloween films - movies that reached audiences in the most universal manner one could imagine.

"The Message" is available on Blu-Ray in a gorgeous new edition from Anchor Bay Entertainment Canada which includes the Arabic version of the film and an excellent making-of documentary.

TWILIGHT'S LAST GLEAMING by the great Robert Aldrich joins Greg Klymkiw's 10 Best List of Blu-Ray/DVD Releases of 2012 - Today's Accolade is none other than one of the most criminally forgotten political action thrillers of the 70s - gorgeously restored and made available on Blu-Ray from the visionary Olive Films (and in Canada, via the equally visionary Mongrel Media).

APOCALYPSE THEN, NOW AND THE FUTURE - through the eyes of Robert Aldrich and a great all-star cast.

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 with all titles listed ALPHABETICALLY. 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 WILL BE COMPILED IN ALPHABETICAL ORDER IN ONE FINAL MEGA-POST. TODAY'S TITLE IS NONE OTHER THAN:

Twilight's Last Gleaming (1977) ****
dir. Robert Aldrich
Starring: Burt Lancaster, Charles Durning, Paul Winfield, Burt Young, Richard Widmark, Joseph Cotten, Melvyn Douglas, Richard Jaeckel, William Marshall, Roscoe Lee Browne, Gerald S. O'Loughlin, William Smith

Review By Greg Klymkiw

Director Robert Aldrich at his best, always seemed to be ahead of the curve - so much so that even now the "curve" hasn't always quite caught up to him. A case in point is his phenomenal film adaptation of Mickey Spillane's Kiss Me Deadly which is still the only major picture to adequately capture the famed private dick Mike Hammer in a manner than best typifies the hard-as-nails gumshoe whose almost neanderthal exterior masks his inherent, basic and decent sense of humanity. Not even the prevailing critical assessment of Spillane's books ignores this dichotomy. While this has almost become trope-like in detective novels, Spillane took these two sides to such extremes that the pleasure and depth of reading his work was never matched by any movie before or since Aldrich's 1955 noir classic.

If this had been Aldrich's only film, it would have been worthy of extolling his virtues, but this is a director who churned out one great picture after another and displayed considerable longevity. His filmography is a virtual litany of tremendous movies; The Big Knife (the classic vicious Clifford Odets show business melodrama), Autumn Leaves (hardboiled melodrama resembling Douglas Sirk doing full-on film noir), What Ever Happened To Baby Jane (Bette Davis and Joan Crawford slugging it out), The Flight of the Phoenix (one of the best airplane crash survival pictures of all time), The Dirty Dozen (THE archetypal Granddaddy of WWII pictures), The Killing of Sister George (lesbian harridans sniping at each other), Ulzana's Raid (Ulzana's FUCKING Raid - see it or DIE!), Emperor of the North (Lee Marvin and Ernest Borgnine pummelling each other on a moving train), Hustle (the strangest cop picture of the 70s), The Choirboys (a nasty black comic episodic portrait of LAPD foretelling the Daryl Gates years) and his last picture All The Marbles (with Peter Falk as a manager/coach of FEMALE WRESTLERS).

Twilight's Last Gleaming was released to little fanfare in 1977 - no box office to speak of and indifferent to devastating reviews (with a handful of exceptions). I remember as a teen being quite dazzled by Aldrich's stylistic choice to make use of cinemascope so that not an inch of the screen was wasted. (Seeing it now, my feelings are even more intense.) His use of split screen is especially masterful, as are his gorgeous, crackling compositions that are always replete with story information, providing a myriad of perspectives.

With Twilight's Last Gleaming, Aldrich is always adept at maintaining the sort of clarity and spatial details that put far too many directors (admired by those who should know better) to absolute shame - in particular the spate of horrendous contemporary directors of the Christopher Nolan, Marc Forster, Sam Mendes and JJ Abrams ilk - all of whom seem to subscribe (due to their inherent incompetence and pseudo-arty pretence) to the miserable ADHD fashion of tossing endless handfuls of shit at the screen to see what'll stick.

As a teen I also remember reacting strongly to Aldrich's extremist political stance which was definitely not on the right, nor even especially on the left, but as a plea for humanity amidst a militarized state exercising heinous acts of violence in the name of freedom (yet ultimately in the name of maintaining economic and political power). To say this had even MORE resonance for me now, would be an understatement.

At the time of its release, many reviews cynically remarked that the revelatory shocker in the film was "old hat", but seeing the film again after so many years, it's another example where Aldrich was indeed ahead of his time - visionary, if you will, for the picture speaks so directly to the tumult the world has been embroiled in over the past decade that it's safe to say he generated a picture that is thematically infused with the sort of universal qualities that many of the best movies possess. In fact, the revelatory shocker might, actually, have more resonance now than when it was first unveiled and frankly, Aldrich is wise to use it more as a dramatic tool to enhance both the stirring narrative and the film's deeper thematic concerns.

Twilight's Last Gleaming is based on a book called "Viper Three" by Walter Wager and I will admit to having read it as a teen in addition to Wager's "Telefon" which Don Siegel adapted as a Charles Bronson picture the same year. Siegel's movie was a crisply directed spy thriller and relatively faithful to Wager's compulsively readable pulp. Aldrich, on the other hand, added the substantive and controversial political subtext, while remaining faithful to the basic premise (rogue retired military men take over a nuclear missile site and threaten to launch wide-scale nuclear annihilation unless their demands are met). In the book, the motive is money. For Aldrich, the motive has everything to do with the release of devastating top secret information about America's involvement in Vietnam.

Almost from the film's opening it's obvious that the old rogue soldier played by Burt Lancaster has zero interest in money. His cohorts do. To pull off his mad plan, he needs the best of the best and in such cases, money goes a long way. This of course adds an extra layer of tension - especially in the character brilliantly portrayed by William Smith as a bloodthirsty psychotic ex-Green-Beret.

To say Aldrich has assembled one hell of a great cast is yet another understatement. Lancaster's performance as Dell, the former Air Force General (turned terrorist) is especially touching. He plays a man who was once dedicated to the principles of America and the military, but when faced with access to extremely damning information and potentially turning into a whistle blower, he's railroaded into prison. He wants payback, though for Dell, payback is exposing the truth.

Seeing Lancaster react with pride and sentiment when he watches military men engaging in the process of solid soldiering that they've been trained to and then, the familiar and almost collegial manner in which he addresses other military men are in stark contrast to when he dons the steely face of a truth-exposing terrorist. Furthermore, Lancaster even allows us occasions to see the weight of sadness he feels at how he's been betrayed by his country, but worst of all, how his country has betrayed its citizens and the rest of the world. (God, this all sounds familiar in light of the spurious War on Terror.)

The slovenly Burt Young and cool, collected Paul Winfield are along for the ride with Lancaster. On the "other side" of the equation, Aldrich fills up the movie with the best of the best as politicians, military officials and rival soldiers - Melvyn Douglas, Richard Widmark, Joseph Cotten, Richard Jaeckel, William Marshall, Roscoe Lee Browne and Gerald S. O'Laughlin acquit themselves handily and form a Who's Who of testosterone in suits and uniforms.

The revelation amongst this clutch of great actors is just how great Charles Durning is as the American President. Yes, Durning was a fabulous character actor, but his performance here is so moving that one hopes the new life the film is getting will also cast light on this forgotten work by Durning. In any other world or context, Durning would have at least received an Oscar nomination, but the movie was so much a non-starter in 1977 that his performance was sadly overlooked. It's also a bit sad to think that his only Oscar nominations were for Mel Brooks' misfire of a remake To Be Or Not To Be and, God Help Us, The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas (with Durning's performance in the latter being genuinely fine, but the only thing in it worth watching).

Curiously, Twilight's Last Gleaming was produced in Germany with mostly German money. Given that Germany was so grotesquely occupied by America for so many decades, it makes some sense that Aldrich's decidedly critical take on American foreign policy would have been popular to German financiers, but that also, it could well be the reason the movie was buried alive in America. Now, I can only think that the film had been unfairly repressed and targeted by New World Order and other political forces, resulting in its poor performance at the box office. Even as a teen, I remember being flummoxed that the film opened and closed after only a week (or two at most) - this was, after all, a gripping, suspenseful, violent, kick-ass action thriller (with an all-star cast) that had me on the edge of my seat and was so much better than most films of its ilk.

Aldrich is, quite simply, at the top of his game here and Twilight's Last Gleaming is one of the 70s best pictures. As such, kudos to Olive Films for releasing this terrific picture in a gorgeously re-mastered HD transfer packaged with an excellent newly-produced one-hour documentary on the making of the film. Olive Films has one of the most exciting home entertainment catalogues out there. The past year has seen exquisite Blu-Rays (aggressively marketed in Canada by Mongrel Media) of such terrific pictures as Andre De Toth's Ramrod, John Ford's The Quiet Man, a great Otto Preminger Collection that includes the incomparably insane Skidoo, Don Siegel's Invasion of the Body Snatchers, Edward Dmutryk's Where Love Has Gone, Fritz Lang's Secret Beyond The Door, Fred Zinnemann's High Noon, Abraham Polonsky's Force of Evil, Sidney Lumet's Long Day's Journey Into Night, Bernardo Bertolucci's 1900, Cy Endfield's Sands of the Kalahari, Robert Rossen's Body and Soul, George Cukor's A Double Life,George W. Koch's Badge 373 and the list goes on and on and on.

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