POMO

Saboteur is a spectacular thriller with a high-octane screenplay and excellent directing. However, I see a problem both in the actor playing the main character, who, though he does a believable job of it, is not a likable Hitchcockian hero, and in his chemistry with Priscilla Lane. The lady puts her head on his shoulder before there is even the slightest spark between them...

Though I’m a fan of the period and the genre, I can’t give this more than three stars. George Waggner’s The Wolf Man lazily moves in safe clichés. It’s predictable and there is nothing surprising about it, the Roma actress doesn’t know how to act and the foggy setting of a 20-square-metre forest doesn’t add to the film’s charm. Furthermore, the father/son drama doesn’t lend it a deeper dimension either. Perhaps only Lon Chaney’s performance makes this film a classic. If nothing else, at least Werewolf of London, made six years earlier, offers a screenplay written with more imagination.

Wordy but fast-paced entertainment trying to look like a serious espionage drama. To truly enjoy this, you need to like the atmosphere of image and sound of black-and-white classics, be able to watch it from a detached perspective, savor Boris Karloff’s acting skills and above all pay attention, because the film is based on being overly contrived.

Rather than in the story itself, the joy of watching this movie lies chiefly in savouring the beautiful, elegant filmmaking of early Hollywood, with spectacular scenes and with excellently selected and stylized actors. The story is rather dated, unable to engage as it once did, and it becomes exciting only in the final revelation. Moreover, the anxious position of the main character in the story is more relatable to the female rather than to the male audience. For me, Rebecca is all about Laurence Olivier’s star power and charisma, the design and atmosphere of the gloomy Manderley Mansion, and the black silhouette of a mysterious housekeeper in the interiors with long curtains. These are the elements that Hitchock revisited in his later and, in my opinion, more significant works.

A BEAUTIFUL adaptation of Bronte’s novel. Its atmosphere and the poetics of the black-and-white imagery have no equal today. Wuthering Heights is one of those cinematic classics that are a heart-warming celebration of moving pictures.

The Lady Vanishes is endearing, entertaining, suspenseful and intelligent. The characters are thoroughly developed, the plot is well thought out and the screenwriting techniques form the foundation on which thrillers are still built today. In other words, this is a classic crime film that can captivate you as much as any contemporary blockbuster can. After all, timelessness has always been one of the hallmarks of Alfred Hitchcock’s genius. I also recommend The 39 Steps, which is very similar with respect to its subject matter, but even more dramatic and cinematic.

Bride of Frankenstein is the most complete merger of dramatic, horror and fantasy motifs on the big screen. It’s the classic of classics, a vitally important event for a movie fan that conveyed to me the euphoria of viewer happiness, enrichment and fulfilment.

The subject matter itself with the flowers blooming under moonlight and the whole exotic exposition at the beginning of the film hold a lot of promise, but everything is weakened by the excessive dialogue of unnecessary supporting characters (particularly the two old alcoholic women) later in the film and the complete absence of a nighttime London backdrop, which could have been beautifully built upon. Werewolf of London is more of an interior chamber play, which wouldn’t matter if its dramatic depth hadn’t been diminished by both the aforementioned extraneous dialogue and the equally incomprehensible presence of humor.

One would expect that the protagonist would spend the first hour coming up with an invisibility serum and that the drama would come after he drinks it in the last half hour. However, the screenplay by R.C. Sherriff draws us into the drama of the scientist’s efforts to rid himself of invisibility in the initial seconds of the film and it is so packed with ideas and exciting scenes that it could fit in with contemporary genre productions. With great actors and incredibly good effects for its time, The Invisible Man is a treat for connoisseurs.

Tod Browning excels as a storyteller. With a precise psychological brush, he presents to us handicapped beings as people who can love, desire, dream and feel envy. And he triumphs narratively by putting them in conflict with able-bodied people, who are the real “freaks”. However, these are only pieces of a puzzle that, as a whole, does not make a complete cinematic impact on the viewer, who longs for something more than merely seeing something that hasn’t been seen before (e.g. an armless, legless man lighting a cigarette). The plot is rather banal, with a lightweight conclusion. And other than the necessary acknowledgement of Browning’s courage to make something like this in the 1930s, what’s left is only an unusual experience and a subject for a brief discussion. For that reason, I’m not giving Freaks my highest rating.