TCM TiVo Alert for January 15-22

TCM TiVo ALERT

For

January 15–January 22

DAVID’S BEST BETS:

SHAFT (January 15, 2:00 am): "Who's the cat who won't cop out when there's danger all about? Shaft. Right on." It's not just the great theme song and a super funky soundtrack, this is the absolute best blaxploitation film ever made. It was so popular that it's considered the film that saved the then-struggling MGM studio from going out of business in 1971. Richard Roundtree is Shaft, John Shaft, a private dick who is asked by the Mafia to rescue the daughter of the crime boss. Shaft is as cool as they come, bedding a number of women, and always a step or two ahead of the police, the mob and the gang that kidnapped the girl. It's an incredibly enjoyable movie, filled with action and humor. 

THE MAGNIFICENT AMBERSONS (January 16, 12:45 am): This is Orson Welles' follow to Citizen Kane starring Joseph Cotten (one of cinema's most underrated actors in just his second film) as Eugene Morgan, a charming and successful automobile manufacturer around the turn of the 20th century. Twenty years after he returns to town, Eugene falls in love again – though he's been in love with her for most of his life – with Isabel Amberson Minafer (Dolores Costello), a former flame who is later widowed. But Isabel's son, George (Tim Holt), steeped in the Amberson tradition and name, interferes in the love affair between his mother and Eugene, who want to marry. The film is beautifully shot with incredible acting and a compelling storyline about those who go to unbelievable lengths to keep their pride at the expense of their own personal happiness and of their families.

ED’S BEST BETS:

THE EARRINGS OF MADAME DE (January 18, 10:00 pm): The films of Max Ophuls are noted for their subtlety, and this film is a prime example. Taking a simple premise, that of a French woman whose series of white lies does her in, Ophuls raises it to the level of high tragedy. although it opened in the U.S. to mild praise, the film is viewed today as one of the greatest gems of movie history, and perhaps the acme of Ophuls’ career. Of course, a good cast helps, and Ophuls has a terrific one with Charles Boyer, Danielle Darrieux and Vittorio De Sica as his leads. Ophuls is in his element here, painstakingly designing mies-en-scenes that frame and define his characters, and combining that with close-ups that allow us some psychological insight into the characters. The plot is beautifully staged, opening and closing on the consideration of the eponymous piece of jewelry that passes from owner to owner until returning to Darrieux. This is a film of charm and beauty with a marvelous subtext of the pain that goes hand in hand with vanity and which no amount of lies can cover or explain.

DAY FOR NIGHT (Jan. 22, 12:45 am): This is one of Truffaut’s wittiest and most subtle films – a film about the making of a film. While on the set of Je vous presente Pamela (Introducing Pamela), the story of an English wife running off with her French father-in-law, we also get to know the cast and crew shooting the film, each with his or her own set of problems. Hence the title: a technical cinematographic term for simulating a night scene while shooting during the day. Special filters and optical processors are employed to create the illusion. While Nathalie Baye and Jean-Pierre Leaud are wonderful in their roles, Valentia Cortese steals the picture as the fading actress Severine. For those new to Truffaut, this is the perfect introduction and one not to miss.

WE DISAGREE ON ... WINGS OF DESIRE (January 22, 10:15 pm)

ED: B. There have been quite a few films that featured angels in their plots, but nothing like Wim Wenders features angels. Only Wenders can envision them as gloomy men in overcoats moving stealthily through Berlin looking to comfort those unfortunates in need of their assistance. Being an angel is a tough lot in Wenders’ existential fantasy. Being powerless is part and parcel of their job, since they cannot change fate but can only bear witness to what it does to an individual. It’s this feeling of powerlessness that motivates an angel named Damiel (Bruno Ganz) to give up his celestial otherworldliness for the sensation of corporeal existence. The film gets off to a great start, as we share the details and responsibilities of Damiel and a fellow angel named Cassiel (Otto Sander). We see them riding the subway, listening in on each commuter's thought process, or in traffic listening to a woman talk to the dog in her car. They offer comfort to a pregnant woman on her way to the hospital, or solace to a wife who just lost her husband. They do all this while remaining invisible (except to children) to those they help. And we witness the growing feeling of longing in Damiel for the joy that a corporeal existence can bring. He becomes inspired by watching an American actor (Peter Falk) as he prepares for a role, or a beautiful trapeze artist (Solveig Dommartin), with whom he becomes infatuated. So far, so good. But while the basic idea of the film is enchanting, it gets away from Wenders and ends up quite overripe. Take the case of Falk, in town to star in a film about World War II. We hear him worrying about whether he understands the role, and while sketching another actor on the set he is given to some of the ripest dialogue this side of Coleman Francis in The Beast of Yucca Flats (“Flag on the moon. Where did it come from?”). While looking at an actor in costume, he is led to muse, "Yellow star means death. Why did they pick yellow? Sunflowers. Van Gogh killed himself.” And it gets worse with Dommartin’s musings. Such pithy pronouncements as ‘"Where did time begin, and where does space begin?” make us feel more that we’ve wandered into a lecture on existential philosophy than watching a trapeze artist at work. In the end, both she and Falk lead us to a musing of our own along the lines of “Who cares, anyway?” Her remarks not only serve to trivialize the film, they go on and on, and in the end their final effect is to break up the monotony of endlessly lingering camera shots on her high-wire acrobatics. For a film that grabs us at the beginning with its novelty, Wings of Desire breaks down in the second half, weighted down by excessive dialogue and camera movements and its unyieldingly heavy sense of whimsy. It ultimately wears us down and gives us only a sense of relief that the film, artsy-fartsy to the extreme, has ended. Day for Night is coming on immediately after this. Watch that instead. 

DAVID: A. If you love film, you will love Wings of Desire, an ingenious and moving picture from 1987. The visually-stunning film focuses on Damiel (Bruno Ganz), an angel in Berlin around the end of the Cold War. He stands on top of tall buildings, in a crowd or nearly anywhere, watching people and listening to their thoughts, many of them quite depressing. Damiel and Cassiel (Otto Sander), an another angel featured in the film, can't really do anything to directly comfort people except touch someone's shoulder to give a little hope to those with troubled existences. Its beauty is in its subtlety. The acting is brilliant, particularly Ganz and Peter Falk, who plays himself. Falk is in Berlin to film a movie, and it turns out, he was an angel who chose to give up his immortality to become a person. Falk's ability to play himself with an unexpected twist is one of the most compelling aspects of this most compelling film. Damiel is growing tired of being an angel and yearns to be a human. He tells Cassiel: "It would be rather nice, coming home after a long day to feed the cat, like Philip Marlowe; to have a fever, and blackened fingers from the newspaper; at last to guess, instead of always knowing.” Damiel falls in love with Marion (Solveig Dommartin), a beautiful trapeze artist who fears she will fall. For Damiel, it's love at first sight. He longs for the simple things humans experience, but often don't notice, such as touching someone or having a conversation. Damiel risks his immortality to have an opportunity at love. Is the film's tempo slow? Perhaps, but that allows the viewer to better understand Damiel's existence as an angel and the quandary he faces in choosing mortality and love. Rather than a deep meaning, the film provides a simple lesson: It is the small things in life that make it worth living.

For the complete list of films on the TCM TiVo Alert, click here.