Episode 38: Giving the Devil Benefit of Law

We talk about one of my all-time favorite films: A Man for All Seasons, the imminent end of PJTV's Trifecta (one of our favorite things), gay weddings, religious freedom, the need for belief, and Taken.

Best of May/June 2014

Movies:
While I enjoyed two non-fiction thrillers in Captain Phillips and Valkyrie, it was a third (dubiously historical) film, A Man for All Seasons, that swept me away. Robert Bolt's witty, emotional play is an amazing political fable delivered via fiery, powerful dialogue from a stellar cast of Shakespeareans. I probably just used way too many adjectives, but what the heck, it's great. My review.

For June it's a narrow win for Babette's Feast over 12 Years a Slave. A lovely, meandering Danish film, Babette is one of the purest representations of joy that I've seen in a long time. There's also a lot about art, generosity, God, love, and food. Mostly food. This movie really enjoys food. Set in a gorgeous, barren landscape, Babette shows us those little tinges of grace - purple clouds, elegant cliffs, music, feasting, friendship, artistry. (For those who have seen Ordet, it reunites two cast-members 33 years later.) My review.

TV:
While Band of Brothers didn't affect me in the way it should have - emotionally - it's impossible not to respect the immensity of it. An enormous cast, impeccable production values, and gorgeous cinematography allow it to easily rival any big-budget Hollywood WWII flick. The few actors I kept track of among the chaos were superb, and it's fun to spot cameos from future stars (Andrew Scott, Tom Hardy, James McAvoy, Jimmy Fallon...) The neatest thing is that it's all true; the men really existed. My cousin even knew one of them. My review.

Michael Gambon always adds an aura of class to a film, and these atmospheric, charming adaptations of Georges Simenon's Maigret novels are no exception. Shipping English actors overseas to play foreign characters only works sometimes, but this series pulls it off flawlessly, as it also does with the 1950s noir style. Gambon plays Inspector Jules Maigret, a burly, vague, quirky, intelligent sleuth. Like the Maigret of the novels, Gambon doesn't go for the more sleek, sexy attraction of a genius like Holmes, but a quietly endearing Everyman, empathizing with the beleaguered Parisian working classes, seeking justice in a morally gray world.

Hannah Long

Henry V (1989) - Movie Review

When Henry V debuted in 1989, 28-year-old director and star Kenneth Branagh was hailed as the new Olivier. It was something of a premature announcement, but not unwarranted. Twenty-five years later, it’s still Branagh’s best movie, even if he did improve in subsequent films. For instance, Henry V’s beginning is weighed down by dull politics and difficult language (though Derek Jacobi’s opening monologue is inspired,) and Much Ado About Nothing, by contrast, improves in clarity. But Branagh proved to suffer from Peter Jackson Syndrome: his judgment clouded by fame and large budgets.

As a Shakespeare fan, I’m nowhere near expert. Henry V is my favorite movie adaptation of The Bard, and my inexperience may partly be the reason—for it is both accessible in its raw, visceral emotion and complex in its treatment of the subject material. Still, I'd definitely recommend this one to those who have read the play, for it often opts for emotion over simplicity.

A plot summary really ought to be superfluous, but Henry V isn’t actually as familiar on a cultural level as Julius Caesar or Romeo and Juliet. In brief, it’s the tale of a young medieval king who led his country to war against France, narrated by a snazzily-dressed Derek Jacobi, and featuring the best pre-battle pep talk of all time.

“We few, we happy few, we band of brothers.” That one.

A Man for All Seasons (1966) - Movie Review

"More is a man of an angel's wit and singular learning; I know not his fellow. For where is the man of that gentleness, lowliness and affability? And, as time requireth, a man of marvelous mirth and pastimes, and sometime of as sad gravity: a man for all seasons."
~Robert Whittington, 1520

This film took me by storm. I expected a dry, rather cheap-looking medieval period piece, with a few quirky British thesps to spice up an otherwise dull historical biopic. Given the age and source, it seemed like an archetype of respectable, old-fashioned film-making. In a way it was. It wouldn’t be made today—it was far, far from the cutting edge of cinema, even in its own time. But it’s just these things that allow it to be the best film I’ve seen this year. 

A riveting political fable, A Man for All Seasons is jam-packed with superb performers and spearheaded by the most interesting protagonist I’ve encountered in a long time. It uses many standard conventions—long scenes, big-budget visuals, everything a little bit stagey, but given these play-like customs, it is allowed a slow, insistent growth of suspense and complexity of character. There are moments when you could cut the tension with a knife, mostly due to clash of personality between these expertly drawn characters.