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ƒilm ¢ourt «« culturecourt |
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§ Remember the late great British author Colin Wilson [1931-2013]? Director Pablo Behrens has just made a film of CW's early "Beat" novel Adrift In Soho. Poet Paul Green -- himself an early apprentice and graduate of London's bohemian sub-culture -- gives us the run-down on what this version delivers and what it misses of the mid-fifties Soho zeitgeist. |
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¦¦¦ Who is the Queen of the South? In the 2002 Arturo Pérez-Reverte novel it's La Mexicana, Teresa Mendoza, a fugitive from the narcomafia in Sinaloa, Mexico... but in the 2016 TV series it's the bad ass Camila Vargas until fate decides otherwise. Check out LR's take on this unusual neo-noir Netflix TV series where bitches and bullets decide the game. ¦¦¦ Starring Veronica Falcón and Alice Braga in The Queen of the South >>> *Since writing this piece on Seasons 1 & 2, Seasons 3 & 4 have appeared on Netflix. What a disappointment! The further the writers got from Pérez-Reverte's novel, the more the action collapsed into torture, gunfights, chases and caricature. Skip 3 and 4. Watch Kate del Castillo as the Queen in the Spanish language version instead. LR |
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¦¦¦¦ Behzat Ç is an excellent Turkish TV series now available on Netflix. Broadcast 2010 to 13, this raw and subversive cop drama rattled a few cages domestically and became a cult. Profane, violent and socially relevant, this drama takes no prisoners, leaves no graves unmarked. ¦¦¦¦ Starring Erdal Besikçioglu as Behzat >>> |
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§§ A sunny day sometime in 1944. A powerful Mercedes Cabriolet -- top down -- is surging along a country road on Guernsey driven by a German soldier in uniform. In the back are two civilians, a handsome blond Swedish journalist in a immaculately tailored silver-gray suit; beside him, a beautiful brunette who could be a German UFA film star but who is in fact a monitor from the Nazi Propaganda Ministry in Berlin, a hand-picked escort by Dr. Joseph Goebbels himself. As the car slows for a corner, the woman -- Fraulein Trudi Engle -- becomes excited when she spots a roadside sign outside a cottage garden, exclaims, "Oh look... 'Afternoon Tea'... we're in a little part of England!" Read more about the classic series Enemy At The Door »» |
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§ Ever wonder what fascism was all about, how it got a hold of Italy? Like to see it another way, rather than by textbook? Try Antonio Frazzi's 4 part mini-series Detective De Luca (2008). Based on the crime novels of Carlo Lucarelli, this drama delivers a reasonably objective view of Mussolini's Italy and its aftermath, 1938-48, through the eyes of a young homicide detective. Film noir as it can be: beautiful dames, crazy men, fabulous locales, great costumes, true crime, true love, and history as it happens. Read LR's take on Detective De Luca »» |
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Danger Man/Secret Agent: TV Noir. The chiaroscuro cine is superb. A lot of TV drama was shot in Super 16, but for Danger Man/Secret Agent it was all 35 mm. Like a well-dressed truant looking for someplace to kip, Drake (Patrick McGoohan) cases the joint, moving stealthily through the noir geometrics. An unattended pot of soup simmers... an empty gun holster hangs from a peg... the stairs ascend into darkness... a dimly lit corridor, a sinister door... the house hangs in the void like a monument to cubism. |
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Pandora & the Flying Dutchman (1951)... one of the greatest art films ever to come out of Hollywood. Shot in sweet 35 mm Technicolor, Albert Lewin's mystical film takes inspiration from surrealism and futurism. Star Ava Gardner and James Mason. |
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Man Hunt: early Hollywood Fritz Lang version of Geoffrey Household's influential 1938 novel Rogue Male »» |
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Across the Bridge
(1957)) Annakin Crash (1996)
Cronenberg The Damned 1963
Losey Dog Days (2002)
Seidl Easy Rider
(1969) Hopper The Garden of the
Finzi-Continis (1971) de Sica The Garden of the
Finzi-Continis (1971) de Sica Man Facing South-East
(1986) Subiela The Rapture
(1991) Tolkin Talk to Her (Hable
Con Elle) (2002) Almodovar Ulzana's Raid
(1972) Aldrich Vertigo (1958) Hitchcock Waking Life
(2001) Linklater |
the de Sica files Umberto D the Fellini Files La Strada the noir files The Letter
neo noir Vertigo the Lancaster files Criss
Cross
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