Movie Reviews - Panic and Shane

Panic (2000) - As the credits roll I'm thinking  "How have I never heard of this movie?"  William H. Macy, Tracy Ullman, John Ritter, Neve Campbell, Donald Sutherland, Barbara Bain.  Miguel Sandoval even has a short little role towards the end.  A classic spot the stars and yet I've never heard of it.  Turns out it was originally an made for HBO movie that was then released to theaters.  It didn't make a lot money there.  Which is too bad really.

Alex (Macy) is a hit man in the family hit man business but it's begun to weigh on his spirit.  So he goes to see a psychologist (Ritter).  In the waiting room he meets a challenging, fascinating 23 year old named Sarah (Campbell) who suddenly gives his life a jolt.  His parents (Sutherland and Bain) are doing their best to run his life which is not a good thing given that they are unpleasant people. Meanwhile his wife (Ullman) is just trying to understand.  When his next hit turns out to be his shrink things begin to spin out of control.

This is exactly the kind of movie I expect Macy to star in and it's why he is on my list of actors I'll go out of my way to watch.  Here he is surrounded with wonderful actors reveling in sharp, fun roles.  Campbell is amazing as the object of Alex's obsession.  She's sexy and self assured while still being vulnerable and fragile.  Ullman offers up an astoundingly subtle and understated performance as his wife.  Sutherland and Bain do what they've done for decades, crank out another perfect little gem of a performance.  Same goes for Ritter. All of them are upstaged by the brief scenes with Alex's son Sammy played by David Dorfman.  He is just beyond cute in his film debut as he runs circles around his father.  It's written and directed by Henry Bromell a man with a long track record in television.

I want to call it a black comedy.  The relationship between father and son grows ever  darker while the one between Alex and Sarah bops along to it's own quirky beat.  The movie loses the thread of it's humor about half way through and morphs into a quiet little drama.  On the whole it's an outstanding little movie.

Rating - **** Recommended 

Shane (1953) - Here's one of the great classic Westerns (#3 on the AFI list).  The story of a world weary gun fighter named Shane (Alan Ladd) who hooks up with a family of Wyoming homesteaders Joe, Marian and Joey Starrett (Van Heflin, Jean Arthur and Brandon De Wilde).  He discovers that there's a range war beginning led by the local cattle baron Ryker (Emile Meyer) and he's drawn into the intrigue when Ryker brings in a hired gun (Jack Palance).  It's a classic confrontation between open range cattle men and the farmers who came behind.

Director George Stevens creates his masterwork with this one.  Visually this is gorgeous.  The Grand Tetons serve as background and the wide open sky of the west frame everything. Cinematographer Loyal Griggs won an Oscar for his work (the movie picked up 5 other nominations including for Director, Picture, Screenplay plus Supporting nods for Palance and De Wilde).  Add in a supporting cast with some great folks (Ellen Corby, Edgar Buchanan, Elisha Cook Jr) and you have all the ingredients of a wonderful movie. Stevens goes one step farther and pays attention to every detail.  The clothes (costumes by Edith Head), the buildings, right down to making sure there was enough weight in a coffin to be realistic.  The final result is something that offers some startling realism combined with typical Hollywood polish.  This was Arthur's last movie (she came out of retirement as a favor to Stevens) and De Wilde does a star turn in the role of the son.  Add in an iconic line ("Shane, Shane, come back!") and an equally iconic Hollywood ending and a wonderful movie movies into the classic field.

If I have a complaint to make it's the silly story line that shows up in so many westerns.  The farmer's wife who falls head over heels for the stranger who rides into their lives.  It inevitably happens the moment, the MOMENT, she first lays on him.  Guess my opinion of the ladies is a little higher than that.

On the list of  classic Westerns I'd take this one over "Rio Bravo" any day.

Rating - **** Recommended

Movie Reviews - Taken, The Searchers, High Noon

Taken (2008) This is an action thriller about a retired CIA operative whose daughter is kidnapped in Paris by a gang of human slavers.  The girls are sold into prostitution and he's going to get his daughter back.  You now know pretty much everything you need to about this movie.  Given that information you should know that lots of people are going to be shot, stabbed and beaten in this movie.  The tempo is fast, the villains are evil and goodness wins out in the end.  The script is so cheesy that Liam Neeson, who plays the dad, thought it was a straight to DVD movie.  In fact it re-launched his career as an action hero and made well over 200 million dollars worldwide.  The best thing about this movie is Neeson, pretty much everyone and everything else isn't worth remembering.  The good news is that he makes the movie fun to watch just as long as you don't spend too much time with your brain engaged.

Rating - *** Worth A Look

The Searchers (1956) - This movie presents a bit of a challenge to me.  The American Film Institute (AFI) named this film the Greatest Western of All Time in 2008 and the #12 Greatest Movie of All Time in 2007.  There's critical reviews that would stack 3 feet high that agree.

I'm just not sure I get it.

Here's what argues in the movie's favor.  John Ford's direction.  Do I need to say any more?  Visually this film is stunning as per usual with John Ford working Monument Valley.  It's big and it's epic and it's just gorgeous.  Put a more than competent cast into that backdrop (John Wayne in what he always claimed as his favorite role, Jeffrey Hunter, Vera Miles, Ward Bond plus the young Natalie Wood and even younger Lana Wood playing the same character at different ages) and you would think that you're home free.  And yet somehow you never get there.

The story follows the family of brothers Ethan and Aaron Edwards.  Ethan (Wayne) went off to fight for the Confederacy while Aaron stayed behind and got the girl.  There's an obvious subtext here that is never spoken that once upon a time there had been a big something between Ethan and his now sister-in-law.  There's an Indian raid that draws the local men off.  While they're gone the Indians raid the Edwards homestead and kill everyone except young Debbie (Woods) who is carried off.  The rest of the movie is the story of Ethan and Martin Pawley (Hunter), the young half breed adopted by the Edwards family as a boy and raised as one of the family, to find Debbie.

The movie is, as many movies of the day were, overtly racist.  But it goes beyond the usual "savage redskin" stuff and moves on to justifying genocide.  This is well into "the only good injun is a dead injun" territory.  Beyond that is a strong streak of misogyny with the repeated "wisdom" that Debbie is better off dead after having "been with a Comanche buck".

Even allowing for the context of the time period of the production this story is just nauseating.  That's what really gets me about the "Greatest Western of All Time" label.  Is this really what we want representing the entire genre as the very best?

Rating - *** Worth A Look

High Noon (1952) - Now here's a western that appeals to me much more as the greatest of all time.  (It's interesting to note that John Wayne did not like this movie at all especially the ending.  He and director Howard Hawks would make "Rio Bravo" as a response to High Noon).  It's the story of Marshall Will Kane (Gary Cooper) who has just married Amy a Quaker (Grace Kelly) and promised her that he will hang up his guns for good.  Unfortunately an outlaw that Kane had sent to prison is coming back on the noon train with revenge on his mind.  Kane feels it's his duty to protect the town one last time.  The problem for him is that no one agrees.  His new wife prepares to leave him for picking up his guns and the towns people refuse to back in against the outlaws.  In the end he will face all of his troubles alone.

This movie is a great western and the inspiration for the spaghetti westerns of Clint Eastwood that would follow some two decades later.  It's amazing in that it's told almost in real time.  Each ticking clock shown carries through the actual elapsed as we watch.  The visuals are tilted away from the traditional mythology and towards a much more realistic.  Cooper's spare acting style is perfect. It is a modern western long before the modern western took center stage.  The story did not involve chases, action and other western standards.  Nominated for 7 Academy Awards it took 4 home including Cooper for Best Actor.

AFI listed this as the #2 Greatest Western of All Time.  I'd easily bump it to the top of the list.

Rating - **** Recommended (and if you're into Westerns this is a definite ***** Own It)