Category: Directors

Jules et Jim (1962)

The film that launched a thousand menages: Jules et Jim

Director: François Truffaut

Cast: Jeanne Moreau (Catherine), Oskar Werner (Jules), Henri Serre (Jim), Vann Urbino (Gilberte), Boris Bassiak (Albert), Marie Dubois (Thérèse), Michel Subor (Narrator)

Of all the films of the French New Wave, Jules et Jim was the one that really captured the global imagination. Its success rode came not only from its embracing of the new French style, but also from the way it captured some of the mood starting to build across the world in the 1960s. Truffaut’s third film, it turned its then 29-year-old director into one of the most renowned directors in the world. Filmed with verve and imagination, it still holds up brilliantly today as well.

In Paris in the years before the First World War, French bohemian Jim (Henri Serre) and shy Austrian writer Jules (Oskar Werner) become best friends. They share everything – the arts, sport and occasionally women – and the bond between them is unshakeable. When both men meet Catherine (Jeanne Moreau), a free-spirited, extremely bohemian young woman, they both fall in love – although the infatuated Jules is the first to admit it. Both men fight for their countries in the Great War and return to civilian life: Jules marries Catherine and they have a daughter. But home life cannot keep Catherine bound down, and a visit to Jim throws the three of them into a curious but warm menage-a-trois. But can such bliss last forever?

Truffaut’s film is playful, vibrant and overflowing with style. While other French New Wave films prior to this had focused on sending the camera out into the streets and capturing the lives of everyday Parisians, Truffaut’s film mixes this with period trappings. Utilising the dynamic camera work of his peers, Truffaut throws in carefully selected newsreel footage and still photography. But all this material is edited with modern forcefulness, Truffaut using a range of freeze frames, wipes, dolly shots and several other editing and camera tricks to make this period story feel astonishingly fresh. The film is fast paced and brilliantly made, and Truffaut’s camera roves like an engaged but playful observer – a feeling added to by the use of a subtly wry narration.

According to legend, Truffaut found a copy of Henri-Pierre Roché’s semi-autobiographical novel in a charity bin and fell hard for the book. It’s a mark of Truffaut’s ability to judge the time he lived in, that he saw how clearly this story of bohemian free love in the 1920s would speak so strongly to the atmosphere of the 1960s. It’s a story that feels more dated today – and at times it’s hard not to feel a little bit annoyedby the very knowing, arty, exhibitionism of its characters, and the way they are very consciously living life as a performance – but it chimed like a bell back then. And the slight air of artificiality about many of the characters throughout gives even more of a jar of real emotion when they respond naturally to tragic and upsetting events.

Truffaut’s film – blessed with a simply sublime score from Georges Delerue, which captures the tone of the film perfectly – becomes a brilliant exploration of the freedom and imprisonment that comes from living your life for every new experience, and never settling. All three of the characters, to various degrees, refuse to settle for convention but are constantly striving for a marvellous new experience. Even the character least affected by these feelings, the more sensitive and weaker Jules, is willing to adapt and change his life constantly just so he can remain part of this circle and keep Catherine (with whom he is besotted) in his life.

Ah yes Catherine. Jeanne Moreau gives the sort of performance here that seems to define an entire generation. Again, today, Catherine’s constant striving for new experiences and addiction to the buzz of infatuation comes across at times as (to be honest) selfish. But she is also an electric figure, overflowing with life and joie-de-vivre. Moreau’s every scene is breathtakingly eye-catching – and Truffaut recognises this with carefully timed freeze-frames where the camera seems to soak in her beauty and dynamism as much as Jules and Jim. Moreau’s performance is truly iconic, like a force of nature, almost impossible to categorise – she is loving, selfish, brave, scared, flirtatious, bashful – and impossible to repeat.

It’s also clear why someone as unpredictable and all-consuming as Catherine gains the ever-lasting devotion of two close friends. Truffaut brilliantly captures both the hopeless devotion of these two men to this woman, and also the slight tinge of unspoken sexual bond between each other. Both men delight early in the film in each other’s permanent company, of this fact being recognised by all, and write each other poetry and stories. The film implies the fascination and longing both men have for Catherine, but also suggests that the strongest, most lasting bond is the one between the two men. Perhaps it is this that makes them so willing to settling into their menage – and certainly why, as Catherine’s interest in first one then the other waxes and wanes, it is each other’s company that they start to long for.

Of course that doesn’t mean that Jules doesn’t stay devoted to Catherine, a woman who gives him days of sunshine mixed with weeks of polite warmth. Oskar Werner is brilliantly sweet, gently naïve and vulnerable as Jules, filled with wit and tenderness but one of life’s passengers. He’s a man who follows rather than leads, or moves between the two other people in his life following the lead of first one or the other. The stronger willed Jim, played with a hardness and worldly realism by Henri Serre, is the one who both has the strength of character to hold Catherine longer and the will to turn away from her (even if for a short time).

The first half of the film is a marvellous explosion of relaxed joy, of pre-war innocence and youthful exuberance. It’s truly a young person’s film – and Truffaut’s dynamic filming, inventive framing and giddy editing really captures this – and the film progresses much as life does into a middle age still clinging to the freedom of youth (like Europe attempting to recapture the innocence before the Great War) before beginning the descent towards the horrors to come of the 1930s. The film’s tragic conclusion has the sadness of a world lost, touched with the ridiculousness that seems inevitable for its exhibitionist characters. It makes for a marvellous and breathtakingly giddy ride, that (even if it looks at time dated in its very 1960s vibe) still carries a great deal of delight, joy and above all fun. Truffaut’s greatest achievement and most famous film still makes for a quite a calling card.

The Spy Who Came In From the Cold (1965)

Richard Burton lands in Cold War trouble in classic Le Carre adaptation The Spy Why Came In From the Cold

Director: Martin Ritt

Cast: Richard Burton (Alec Leamas), Claire Bloom (Nan Perry), Oskar Werner (Fiedler), Sam Wanamaker (Peters), George Voskovec (East German Defence Attorney), Rupert Davies (George Smiley), Cyril Cusack (Control), Peter van Eyck (Hans-Dieter Mundt), Michael Hordern (Ashe), Robert Hardy (Dick Carlton), Bernard Lee (Patmore)

Spy stories fall into two camps. You get the wham-bam blast of James Bond and then you also get the grimy, isn’t-this-a-damn-dirty-trade stories that John Le Carré helped to turn into a major alternative. The book that really kicked off Le Carré’s career was The Spy Who Came in From the Cold, a slim, brilliantly written story of spies working exclusively in shades of grey. The book was a smash, the film was inevitable, and a damn fine film it turned out to be.

Richard Burton plays Alec Leamas, a former head of Berlin Station for the British Secret Service, who is recruited by the services’ leader Control (Cyril Cusack) as part of an elaborate scheme to discredit the cunning and dangerous head of the Stasi office in Berlin, Hans-Dieter Mundt (Peter van Eyck). Leamas will go through a pretence of disgraced dismissal, alcoholism, jail time and half a dozen other indecencies to attract the attention of the East German defector recruiters in the UK. But will the relationship he develops during his disgrace with librarian and idealistic communist Nan Perry (Claire Bloom) endanger the whole mission?

The Spy Who Came in From the Cold is shot in a grimy, gloomy black-and-white which is completely appropriate for the morally questionable escapades its characters get up to. Like Le Carré’s novel, the ends justify any means here, and questions of morality and justice are best benched. Characters who can’t let themselves to forget justice are doomed in this film. Genuine shows of real emotion and feeling are generally signs in this film that a person is doomed.

Martin Ritt’s literate script captures the style and tone of Le Carré extremely well – this is still one of the best, truest and most faithful capturing of Le Carré on the screen – and his direction also has a wonderful mixture of shabby kitchen-sink realism and classic Hollywood film noir class that makes for a brilliantly involving package. The pace of the film holds pretty well, beautifully carrying us through a parade of agents recruiting Leamas for the East Germans (each of which are dismissed with a shocking curtness by the next one along), and the final court room trial of Mundt (with its intricate exploration of the complex plotting of the novel) is extremely involving.

The film also has the benefit of a number of terrific performances, led by Richard Burton in the lead. By this stage of his career, Burton was already felt by many to be lost to serious acting in favour of big budget, Liz Taylor-starring pictures and Hollywood entertainment. But he rouses himself here to give one of his best ever performances. Leamas is a shabby, beaten down, little man (despite being played by Burton!) whose chippiness, dissatisfaction and aggression make him perfect as a possible defector. Ritt’s camera often focuses on Burton’s unflinching stares, his eyes seem to bore into the person he’s talking to, little oceans of anger and resentment.

Burton’s Leamas is deep down sick and tired of the world of spying, its betrayals and lies, and sickened with self-disgust at his own involvement in it. Burton skilfully underplays the role throughout, largely ignoring any temptation for grandstanding or big acting moments – instead he is as compromised, grey and lost as the rest of the film, in a superb performance of cynical disaffection. Bunched up, his grand voice dialled down, his eyes flickering with resentment – a great performance.

Claire Bloom is rather affecting as Nan (hilariously, her name was changed from Liz in the book as the producers feared she would be confused with the rather more famous Liz in Burton’s life) and Oskar Werner gives the film a major burst of energy just as it is flagging from one interrogation of Leamas too many, as a chippy, eager, sharp Stasi officer, who is determined to see justice done. The rest of the cast are filled out with some classy Brit character actors, who excel from suave (Robert Hardy) to seedy (Michael Hordern), while Cyril Cusack brings “Control” to cynical life and Rupert Davies gets to the be the first actor to play George Smiley on screen (even if he is only really an extra here).

Spy is a film of atmosphere. Frequently it trusts the viewer to catch up the plot as they go. Leamas actions are not always explained until late on – and we are constantly suspecting that we are only seeing half the story. Its a film that plays its cards close to the chest. This might alienate some, but it’s a true representation of Le Carre – and fits perfectly with the weary sense Leamas has of not being in control of his own life.

But what Ritt does so well is keeping that tonal sense of there always being another shady, compromising twist around the corner. All is never what it seems, and the film ends with an especially bleak series of footnotes as we find out just how ruthless both sides are prepared to be in this soulless chess game of Cold War politics. It’s the moments like this that Spy Who Came in From the Cold really nails. For Le Carré fans the film is a must: for those less interested in the world of espionage, they may find it takes a little too much time.

Shadowlands (1993)

Debra Winger and Anthony Hopkins sublime in the moving Shadowlands

Director: Richard Attenborough

Cast: Anthony Hopkins (CS “Jack” Lewis), Debra Winger (Joy Davidman), Edward Hardwicke (Warnie Lewis), Joseph Mazzello (Douglas Gresham), John Woods (Dr Christopher Riley), Michael Denison (Harry Harrington), James Frain (Peter Whistler), Julian Fellowes (Desmond Arding), Peter Firth (Dr Craig), Roger Ashton-Griffiths (Dr Eddie Monk)

“We can’t have the happiness of yesterday without the pain of today. That’s the deal”. It’s a sentiment that runs through Shadowlands, a beautifully made, deeply heartfelt, incredibly moving tear-jerker based on the (largely) true story of how the man who invented Narnia, CS Lewis (Anthony Hopkins), fell in love very late in life with an American poet Joy Davidman (Debra Winger) only for her to succumb to cancer early in their marriage.

The story had a been a life-long investment from William Nicholson, who had developed the story first into a radio play, a TV drama (with Joss Ackland and a BAFTA winning Claire Bloom) and then a stage play (which won Nigel Hawthorne several awards in the lead role, including a Tony Award) and finally into this film. A wonderfully tender, profound and genuine exploration of the not only grief but the joy and delight that opening yourself up to love can bring you, Nicholson’s Oscar nominated script was brought to the screen by Richard Attenborough.

Looking back over Attenborough’s CV you immediately notice the vast majority of films he directed were massive, all-star, huge scope epics – A Bridge Too Far, Gandhi – which were as much triumphs of logistics and studio managements as they were displays of directing. Shadowlands is one of the smallest scale, most personal films he ever made – and it’s enough to make you wish that Attenborough had allowed himself to make more intimate chamber pieces like this. It’s a wonderful reminder, not only of how skilled he is at pacing and story-telling, but also what a sublime actor’s director he is. Dealing with material that in lesser hands could have become sentimental, Attenborough turns out a film that is realistic, tender, sad but also laced throughout with a warmth and (figurative and literal) Joy.

And of course the involvement of Attenborough also meant the involvement of his regular collaborator Anthony Hopkins. At the start of the 90s Hopkins was in such a run of form he could plausibly claim to be the best actor in the world. In all of this though, Shadowlands might be one of his finest accomplishments. Superbly detailed, perfectly restrained, gentle, tender, hugely vulnerable and intensily scared (under it all) of connecting with the wider world or allowing himself to feel genuine emotions, Hopkins’ CS Lewis is simply exceptional. With all the discipline of a great actor he never once goes for the easy option, but gently allows emotions to play behind his eyes (the eyes by the way that he can hardly bring himself to settle on other people until half way through the film). And those moments where he weeps – three times in the film, and each increasingly more emotional – are simply beautiful in every way from acting to filming.

Lewis is bashful and repressed, so it’s all the moving to see his face start to relax into excitement and joy when he spots Joy in the audience at a lecture he is giving, or him simply enjoying the intelligence and challenge that she brings to her conversation with him. Debra Winger as Joy Davidman matches Hopkins step-for-step, in a sublime performance of prickily New York attitudes at first out of touch in Oxford, but whose humanity shines through. It takes her time perhaps to feel the love Lewis does (but can’t admit too), but when she does start to feel more for Lewis, she has no patience for his repressed unwillingness to acknowledge them. On top of which, Winger is very funny in the role – she has little truck with the sheltered, clubbish snobbiness of some of Lewis’ friends and takes a wicked delight in shocking the stuffy, unchallenged intellectuals.

The chemistry between these two actors is sublime, and the slightly autumnal relationship between the two of them that builds feels wonderfully genuine. Nicholson’s script makes an astute examination of Lewis’ personality and Christianity. Throughout the film, we are brought back again and again to a lecture Lewis gives – with increasingly less and less disconnection – on why God allows suffering and pain in the world. Pleasingly Lewis’ faith in the film isn’t challenged – only his rather pleased-with-itself lack of doubt and his complacent lack of experience. Experiencing love and loss himself, makes him question the views he has held – and leads him to develop a richer, more genuine understanding of the world.

Which all makes the film sound very heavy, and it’s not. It’s a delightfully light done story that never once leans too hard on the tragedy. Instead it punctures several moments with touches of humour (much of it from Joy’s American clashes with high-table Britishness) and moments of sweet affection. The film gains a lot of balance from Edward Hardwicke’s delightful performance as Lewis’ Dr Watson-ish brother Warnie, a bluff ex-army officer turned academic who reveals himself over the course of a film to have a great deal of hidden love, affection and empathy. It also has a delightful performance from Joseph Mazzello as Douglas Gresham, a child performance that brilliantly avoids all cloying sweetness and feels very real as a shy, nervous boy dealing with his mother dying.

But then, Lewis is also a shy nervous boy (both he and Warnie never really got over the death of their mother as boys – a moment that both wordlessly acknowledge while observing Joy with her son at the hospital), and the film follows him becoming something more than that, a man wh has loved and lost and can deal with it. A neat subplot around James Frain’s difficult working-class student demonstrates his growing ability to relate and empathise with others. A large chunk of the film builds towards Lewis’ tearful outpouring of grief (a scene impossible to watch dry eyed), a reaction that seemed impossible in the opening moments.

But then that’s what the film is saying: We have to accept that the joy of loving people, the wonder and warmth that they bring to our life, will inevitably one day lead to us losing them. Allowing us to experience love and joy is counter balanced by the pain we will feel when they go. It’s a deal – and if it is a deal, it’s the price we pay for having our life enriched. Attenborough’s simply beautiful, romantic film covers all this gently and brilliantly: it’s a film to treasure and hold tight.

Erin Brockovich (2000)

Albert Finney and Julia Roberts battle for justice in the caperish Erin Brockovich

Director: Steven Soderbergh

Cast: Julia Roberts (Erin Brockovich), Albert Finney (Edward L Masry), Aaron Eckhart (George), Marg Helgenberger (Donna Jensen), Tracey Walter (Charles Embry), Peter Coyote (Kurt Potter), Cherry Jones (Pamela Duncan), Scarlett Pomers (Shanna Jensen), Conchata Ferrell (Brenda), Michael Harney (Pete Jensen)

When Steven Soderbergh was being celebrated as the Great White Hope of arty American movie making back in the late 80s, it would probably have amazed his fans if you’d told them that 10 years later he would be directing a Julia Roberts star vehicle. But that’s what he pulled off to great effect in Erin Brockovich.

Telling the true story of Erin Brockovich (Julia Roberts), the film follows her life from 1993 when she is struggling to make ends meet while bringing up three small children. After losing a court case – largely due to her brassy foul-mouthedness – she pressures her lawyer Ed Masry (Albert Finney) to give her a clerical job at his law firm. There she finds herself engaged with a simple real estate case involving PG&E, a major gas and electric company. Discovering the company has been polluting the water of the town of Hinkley in California – and left many residents with crippling health problems – Brockovich works to uncover the truth and to gets Masry to agree to build a legal case. She also finds her mouthy down-to-earthness allows her to connect with the people of Hinkley, and she soon becomes determined to get them justice.

The big thing that Erin Brockovich was about when it was released was Julia Roberts. In 2000, it was hard for heads not to be turned by seeing America’s Sweetheart wearing clothing so revealing and provocative it made her Pretty Woman character look reserved. And she swears! Frequently! The film was a triumph for Roberts, turning her from a romantic comedy queen into a serious actress. Roberts won every single Best Actress award going, up to and including the Oscar. And Roberts is very good indeed in the role. Few films have used her effervescence and warmth as a performer so well. You can’t help but side with Julia Roberts when she is firing on all cylinders, no matter what the situation – whether she is a brassy, chippy working mother, a Hollywood actress or a New York City prostitute, you find yourself on her side.

But, looking back at the film now, this role essentially plays to all of Robert’s strengths. While it looks on the surface like a radical departure for Roberts, the film is basically very much in her wheelhouse. In fact, the whole film is almost a writ-large version of that shop scene in Pretty Woman (still one of the best scenes of modern cinema) stretched over the course of a whole movie. Julia Roberts is treated badly by snobby people, she doesn’t let it get her down, and then she returns with a triumphant flourish that puts the snobs in their place.

That’s the whole game from Roberts: this is very much the type of performance she gave in Pretty Woman, Notting Hill and My Best Friend’s Wedding repackaged and given a novel appearance by being placed in a drama rather than a comedy. But all the little acting touches that would be familiar to you from those movies are there. There is nothing wrong with any of this, but the film in fact reinforces rather than refutes the idea that Julia Roberts (like Cary Grant) is largely a personality actor. She has a very skilful and impressive collection of acting touches, but they are pretty consistently the same across films. She performs with brilliant, luminous presence here – and commits fully to the part – but it’s more like the ultimate expression of the roles she played in the 1990s. It’s not a surprise looking back that she’s not had a hit like it since.

The rest of the film is an enjoyable mix of comedy and touches of tragic sadness. Soderbergh packages the film as a very safe entertainment, and its’ entertaining. The real Erin Brockovich claims the film is 98% accurate to what happened to her – which perhaps just makes you think that the clichés of film hew closer to real life than you might expect. Soderbergh doesn’t really have much to say here beyond big corporations and snobbery being bad and to never judge books by their cover. But it doesn’t really matter as the whole thing is presented with a confident, brassy buzz as if it is channelling Brockovich straight into celluloid.

It works all the time because you care about Erin, and you enjoy her company. It touches on some issues around sexism in the work place – although Erin is looked down as much for her working class roots as her sex – but there are elements there showing she is clearly judged by her appearance, and even the big firm lawyer brought in help fund the case can’t resist saying when he sees her “I see what you mean about a secret weapon”. Not that Erin herself isn’t ashamed to use her assets – when Ed asks how she can get people to allow her access to such confidential papers, she deadpans “they’re called boobs, Ed”.

That gives you an idea of the general comedic tone of the movie. It’s matched with a fairly predictable domestic plot-line. I suspect Soderbergh was probably making a bit of a point by turning Aaron Eckhart’s (very good in a nothing role) gentle biker, next-door neighbour, childcare provider and boyfriend into the sort of pleading “Honey please come home for dinner” non-entity that the woman often plays in films like this while her husband crusades. The film does manage to mine a bit of quiet sexual agenda from its otherwise fairly bubbly surface. It also draws attention to the way the film basically sets up Erin’s primary romantic relationship being not with a boyfriend, but with herself as she discovers the sort of person she has the potential to be.

There’s that Pretty Woman parallel again. The film is basically a dreamy re-invention saga, presented with a cool flourish. Roberts is excellent in a role that has become a calling card. She’s also got quite the double act with Albert Finney, who is brilliant as the put-upon, slightly haggard, slightly twinkly Masry who finds his own passion for justice reignited. Finney tends to get overlooked in this film, but he is superb and gives the best pure performance in the film. Soderbergh directs with a professional glossiness, and supplies plenty of heart-tugging victims (Helgenberger is very good as the main victim we see) mixed with punch-in-the-air, she’s proving herself better than them moments from Julia Roberts. It’s a very fun film, and genuinely entertaining. But like Roberts’ performance, it’s presenting old tricks in a new way, not reinventing the show.

The Motorcycle Diaries (2004)

Gael Garcia Bernal and Rodrigo de le Serna go on a road trip in Che Guevera biopic The Motorcycle Diaries

Director: Walter Salles

Cast: Gael Garcia Bernal (Che Guevera), Rodrigo de le Serna (Alberto Granado), Mia Maestro (Chichina), Mercedes Moran (Celia de la Serna), Jean Pierre Noher (Ernesto Guevara Lynch), Facunda Espinosa (Tomas Granado), Lucas Oro (Roberto Guevera), Marina Glezer (Celita Guevara)

In 1952, Che Guevara – posters of whose face are as synonymous with students as baked beans and debt – is a young man in his early 20s, heading out for one final adventure with his friend Alberto Granado. They intend to motorbike the entire length of South America, from Buenos Aires to a leper colony in Peru. The journey will solidify Che’s views on socialism and help to shape him into the legendary idealist socialist revolutionary he will become. That’s the story of Salles’ film, the sort of film that will have a never-ending appeal to anyone who ever had a romantic interest in revolution history.

Sadly I don’t have that sort of passion, so I found it hard to be swept up in the romance of Guevara’s views, and Salles’ ambling, largely plotless film struggles to give you a real reason to care if you haven’t got a pre-existing admiration for its subject. Which isn’t to say this is a bad film – it’s certainly not – but it’s the sort of film that requires the viewer to have an investment from the start. It’s certainly a lot better – and gives a much better sense of Guevara’s character – than Steven Soderbergh’s thuddingly average Che double bill, but it’s still a rather drifting road movie.

The nature of all road movies is of course that they go from location to location, with each one throwing up a different collection of characters. I’ve got to be honest, none of these characters are particularly engaging or interesting, falling as they do into three categories: duped middle classes, attractive women who are duped or charmed by our two heroes, or sickly, poor or dying working classes whose suffering helps shape Che. It’s decent enough, but once you’ve seen it repeated a couple of times you don’t really engage in it much further.

It doesn’t help that the two leads don’t really change that much themselves over the course of the movie. I suppose that is at least a reflection of real life – and it does avoid the film cliché of “one life-changing journey”, but it also has a tendency to suck drama from the film. The real changes you see are that both characters’ pre-existing political views are both solidified – the difference being that for Guevara this will become his life’s work, whereas for Granado it will become a driver for his decision about where to take his work.

All this is no comment on the twin lead performances by Bernal and de la Serna, both of which are excellent. Bernal is wrapped in charisma and youthful idealism, humane concern and empathy in every pore of his character, mixed with a genuine warmth and enthusiasm as well as an excellent sense of humour. You can see why the latter attributes have drawn Granado to Che – and de la Serna is equally wonderful as a charming bon vivant with a heart and conscience.

Salles’ film is told with sweep and beauty, crammed with excellent camerawork. The road trip looks beautiful, and the film is extremely well cut and paced. While Salles does not quite extend the journey into a real interior exploration of his lead character, it does really capture the romantic poetry both of idealistic socialism and this On the Road type journey. Salles also mixes the tone extremely well of a film that turns from moment to moment from a social issue drama to a near knock-around comedy.

What he does slightly less well is to open the drama up to the unconverted. The moments used to demonstrate the poor and downtrodden essentially boil down to sad scenes where the sick and dying talk through their pain with Che. At several moments, the actors portraying the poor gather in monochrome line-ups to stare soulfully down the lens of the camera. It’s hardly a real search for the reasons or causes of poverty in South America, or an insight into the reasons for the differences between the working classes and the middle classes. It’s not a film that is trying to develop a political understanding, which is ironic considering it explores (or claims to) the life of one of the most political figures of the twentieth century.

Saying that, The Motorcycle Diaries has many, many strengths – even if I didn’t bond with it as much as I imagine many others will do. It’s an extremely well-made, dressed up, road movie that is full of events and a certain level of character insights – but doesn’t scratch down far below the surface to help you really understand the man or the times. It’s beautifully made and wonderfully performed – and it has real moments of youthful joy – but I just didn’t feel as strongly about it as I felt I should.

The Favourite (2018)

Olivia Colman is at the centre of a complex rivalry in The Favourite

Director: Yorgos Lanthimos

Cast: Olivia Colman (Queen Anne), Emma Stone (Abigail Hill), Rachel Weisz (Sarah Churchill, Duchess of Marlborough), Nicholas Hoult (Lord Robert Harley), Joe Alwyn (Colonel Lord Masham), Mark Gatiss (Lord Marlborough), James Smith (Lord Godolphin)

Looking around the cinema, I couldn’t help but wonder how many of the audience were expecting The Favourite to be a Sunday night-style costume drama about Queen Anne. Goodness only knows what they made of this skittishly filmed, acidic, sharp-tongued, very rude drama about squabbles in the court of Queen Anne. The Crown it ain’t.

In 1708, the court of Queen Anne (Olivia Colman) is dominated completely by her head of household, chief advisor, secret lover and domineering best friend Sarah Churchill, Duchess of Marlborough (Rachel Weisz). But Sarah’s control over Queen Anne is set to be challenged by the arrival in court of seemingly charming, but in fact ruthlessly ambitious, cousin Abigail Hill (Emma Stone), a former aristocrat who has fallen on hard times. Soon Sarah and Abigail find themselves in the middle of a bitter, ruthless clash for control over Anne – who, seemingly weak-willed and disinterested in government, in fact takes an eager pleasure from the rivalry of the two women.

The Favourite is a brilliant, acerbic, very dark comedy that treats its period setting with a hilarious lack of reverence. It’s a frequently laugh-out loud comedy, with its often foul-mouthed dialogue just on the edge of being anachronistic (a trait that also comes into the hilarious non-period dancing). It takes a moment to tune up, but leans just enough on the fourth wall to work. Lanthimos’ film doubles down on the insane pressure bowl of Anne’s courts, turning the court of the 1700s into a bizarre, semi-surreal state where you have no idea what insanity you might see around the corner – from racing ducks, to rabbits roaming free, to a naked man being pelted with oranges.

But then this is the sort of bizarreness that stems from the top, and Olivia Colman’s Queen Anne is a domineering eccentric. In a film-career-making performance from Colman, her Queen Anne is part infantalised puppet, part needy insecure lover, part bitter control freak. Anne will change from scene to scene from a furious, knee-jerk rage to a weeping vulnerability. Her interest in actually ruling the kingdom has been largely beaten out of her, but she still needs to feel that she holds the power. With her body raddled with gout, Anne alternates between demanding independence and being wheeled from place to place. Colman’s performance bravely skits between temper tantrums and a desperate, panicked loneliness and sadness – it’s a terrific performance.

A woman as uncertain and unhappy in herself as Anne is basically pretty ripe for control and manipulation. History has not been kind to Sarah Churchill, who is often seen as a ruthless, power-hungry manipulator only out for what she can get, obsessed with the power her role brings her. This film takes a different, more interesting slant, thanks in part to Rachel Weisz’s superb performance. Weisz plays Churchill as a strong-minded, hard to like woman, who has a genuine bond with Anne, but honestly believes she is better suited to execute the powers of royalty than her lover. But that doesn’t stop her having feelings for her – or priding herself on refusing to lie to Anne about anything (from her appearance to her behaviour). But this doesn’t stop Sarah from ruthlessly bullying Anne or threatening her – though she’s equally happy to climb into bed with her when required.

But Sarah Churchill here is doing the things she is doing because she honestly believes that it is what is best for the kingdom and (by extension) Anne, and the moments of shared remembrance between Anne and Sarah have a genuine warmth and feeling to them. Which makes her totally different from the ruthless Abigail, played with a stunning brilliance by Emma Stone. Abigail doesn’t give a damn about anything or anyone but herself: something the rest of the servants in the household seem to recognise instinctively as soon as she arrives, but a danger Sarah doesn’t detect until too late. Abigail’s every action is to promote her own wealth and prestige, and she’ll do whatever it takes to do that, from crawling through the mud for herbs to crawling between the sheets to pleasure Anne at night. Stone’s Abigail is ruthless, self-obsessed, uncaring and on the make in another terrific performance.

The film focuses in large part on the see-sawing fortunes of these two rivals for the role of favourite – with Anne as the fulcrum in the middle. The film is split into eight chapters, each of which is opened by a quirky quote from the chapter itself. It neatly structures the film, and also gives it a slight off-the-wall quality. The film is packed with electric scenes, as the women wear the trousers in the court (often literally, in Sarah Churchill’s case), riding and shooting in their spare time and slapping down the assorted politicians and lords desperately trying to promote their interests on the edge of the court. This battle of wits and wills is a fabulous, increasingly no-holds barred, rivalry that motors the film brilliantly.

Lanthimos loves every moment of scheming and double crossing the film supplies. He shoots the film with a selection of low-angle and fisheye lenses, which make the palace settings seem as imposing, large and domineering as possible – and also distorts the world just as the feud between the two women is doing. The film looks fabulous, with its intricate design and it’s candle lit lighting. Lanthimos’ court always looks gloomy and secretive, with only a few spots of orange warmth.

Lanthimos also understands that there is very little room for sentiment or feeling here, and the flashes of it we get are never allowed time to really grow. That’s not a negative of course, as this sharp comic drama is also an arch commentary on some of the selfishness and distortion of events that lies under politics (sound familiar?), with the interests of the ordinary people of the realm raising very little interest from any side on the political divide. And Anne is such a bizarre character, so pulled between pillar and post, so desperately unhappy so much of the time, so utterly spoilt the rest, that you understand how she has become such a chew toy for court faction, and why she is happy to tacitly encourage this world where her every whim is played to for advantage.

I laughed out loud several times during The Favourite. It’s obvious to say that it feels like a film for the #metoo era – but it certainly has three fabulous, brilliant, hilarious and strangely heartfelt performances from its three female leads, three of the best actresses in the business. Wonderfully directed, beautifully written and fabulously designed, this is properly fantastic cinema.

The Hurt Locker (2009)

Danger awaits round every corner in the shocking The Hurt Locker

Director: Kathryn Bigelow

Cast: Jeremy Renner (Sgt William James), Anthony Mackie (Sgt JT Sanborn), Brian Geraghty (Specialist Owen Eldridge), Guy Pearce (Staff Sgt Matthew Thompson), Christian Camargo (Lt Colonel John Cambridge), David Morse (Colonel Reed), Ralph Fiennes (British Mercenary), Evangeline Lilly (Connie James), Sam Spruell (Contractor Charlie)

There have been few wars in history as controversial as the Iraq war. Despite this, it’s hard to think of a film that really has nailed the complex social, political and military causes behind the war – or managed to engage with the deep unease much of the Western world feels for the campaign. While there have been great films about Vietnam, that other opinion-dividing conflict of the last 50 years, there hasn’t been one about Iraq yet – perhaps because the wound is still so fresh. The Hurt Locker gets closest by far – largely because it is a film that makes war its subject, not Iraq; it could just as easily be set in the fields of France as the streets of Baghdad.

After the death of their Staff Sergeant (Guy Pearce) while defusing an IED in Baghdad, Explosive Ordnance Disposal (EOD) unit members Sgt Sanborn (Anthony Mackie) and Specialist Eldridge (Brian Geraghty) are joined by a new team leader Sgt William James (Jeremy Renner). However, they both – particularly the by-the-book Sanborn – grow increasingly concerned about James’ maverick methods and willingness to take personal risks to defuse bombs. Slowly, tensions rise in the team.

The Hurt Locker makes no comment whatsoever on the controversy behind the decision to intervene in Iraq. Instead, its focus is entirely on the psychology of those who go to war, and the sorts of personalities it can attract, from those with a keen desire to do their duty to others who get a certain “buzz” from risk and conflict that they cannot find elsewhere in their lives. As the film’s opening words say, “War is a Drug”. And there are few characters more afflicted by an addiction to that drug than Sgt William James.

Not that James is a villain. One of the film’s many strengths is that he is far from a lunatic. Played with a career-defining charisma and intensity by a then almost-unknown Jeremy Renner, James takes personal risks (defusing bombs without the huge rubber safety suits, turning off his comms to concentrate, returning to bombsites to collect trophies or lost items) but he also shows concern and empathy for his fellow soldiers and (largely) avoids putting them in danger. With the team pinned down by snipers in the desert, he calmly reassures Eldridge and talks Sanborn quietly through taking down the snipers. He develops bonds with people and later in the film shows great compassion and willingness to put himself in danger to save a man unwillingly attached to a suicide vest.

James’ struggles are to deal with the modern world and its shallow obsessions compared to the thrill of putting your life on the line (as the film brilliantly illustrates with a final vignette of James back home at the end of rotation, staring blankly at a wall of cereal boxes in a supermarket). On campaign, he talks dismissively of his child and claims to not know or understand his relationship with his wife. But this is a front – it’s clear his family life is far more settled than he suggests – and is actually more connected to his guilt at enjoying his time on military posting more than he does the neutered warmth of family life. Renner excels at all this complex psychology, crafting a man who is aware of his addiction, can’t combat it but feels a deep guilt for it.

The Hurt Locker is about how this rush of war can be more compelling and life-affirming than hearth and home. It’s also perhaps a commentary on how we ourselves get a rush from watching action and war films – that it’s only a few steps from enjoying watching the excitement of conflict, to enjoying being in the middle of that kind of action. Is James really that bad? Defusing bombs is a difficult and demanding job – and James knows (rightly) that he is one of the best at doing it. And shouldn’t a man enjoy his job? Renner’s glee at a job well done is balanced by guilty awareness that he shouldn’t be enjoying himself as much as this.

Kathryn Bigelow is in her element directing this burst of male testosterone, assembling a film that is gripping, tense and hugely exciting. It’s essentially constructed around a series of set-pieces, each of them more unsettling than the one before. Bigelow’s direction is impeccable, as each of these sequences is both unique in tone and utterly compelling. Bigelow became the first woman to win Best Director at the Oscars – and her acute understanding of men enamoured with the buzz of adrenalin is what gives the film much of its narrative force.

It also helps that the film she has assembled here is a technical marvel, brilliantly shot by Barry Ackroyd with a scintillating display of hand-held cameras, cleverly focused details and immersive story telling. The Hurt Locker is a film both drenched in sun and darkness, with burning yellows and oppressive greys. It’s a film that captures the incredibly alien, heat-stoked insanity of Iraq, and the journalistic style and camerawork make everything we watch feel even more immediate.

In the middle of this, the psychological drama between the maverick James and the cautious, procedure-led Sanborn (played by an equally impressive Anthony Mackie, whose every moment buzzes with frustration and anger at the dangers he sees James inflict on them) plays out wonderfully. Bigelow has an immediate understanding of how the adrenalin and testosterone of combat quickly bubble up into violence and aggression off the battlefield, with these two men often becoming like rutting stags, struggling to place their own supremacy on the team – with Brian Geraghty’s weaker Eldridge the pawn between the two.

The Hurt Locker does what it does so well that it’s easy to overlook its flaws. Its narrative is so pure that you regret it gives barely a second to addressing the issues in Iraq or how the behaviour and attitude of the soldiers there (mostly angry and abusive towards the local population) may be contributing to the problems. It also struggles to add much narrative originality to the story, beyond its set-pieces – in particular James’ friendship with a young Iraqi boy seems like the forced stuff of movie convention in a film that prides itself on reality. When dialogue takes over from action, many of the psychological points it raises have been seen in countless films past. You could argue that the film is largely at its weakest when it tackles any questions of plot at all, and that what Bigelow has really done here is make one of the finest boots-on-the-ground immersions you are going to see.

And if The Hurt Locker is just that then, you know what, that’s fine too. Because when it does this it’s one of the best in the game. Brilliantly assembled, shot and edited (those many Oscars were well deserved) it’s a gripping war film that relies a little too much on some of the conventions of war and combat films, while also focusing very intently on how war affects the psychology of the men at the sharp end. It gives a truly unique perspective of the dangers (in every sense) and is brought to life by a series of fine performances, with Renner and Mackie outstanding. Wonderfully directed, and smashingly tense, it’s a worthy contender in the upper echelons of any list made of great war films.

My Fair Lady (1964)

Audrey Hepburn and Rex Harrison cover how to speak proper in My Fair Lady

Director: George Cukor

Cast: Audrey Hepburn (Eliza Doolittle), Rex Harrison (Professor Henry Higgins), Stanley Holloway (Alfred P Doolittle), Wilfrid Hyde-White (Colonel Hugh Pickering), Gladys Cooper (Mrs Higgins), Jeremy Brett (Freddy Eynsford-Hill), Theodore Bikel (Zoltan Karpathy), Mona Washbourne (Mrs Pearce), Isobel Elsom (Mrs Eynsford-Hill), Henry Daniell (British Ambassador)

My Fair Lady is possibly one of the most popular musicals of all time. A singing-and-dancing adaptation of George Bernard Shaw’s most popular play, a satire on self-improvement and sexual politics, the original Broadway production ran for over six years and 2,717 performances, while the original cast-recording album was a smash hit bestseller. It was a question of when rather than if a film version would be made. When it finally happened, the film was garlanded with Oscars aplenty, not least Best Picture, Best Director and Best Actor.

The musical follows the story of Eliza Doolittle (Audrey Hepburn), a cockney flower girl in Victorian London, whose life is changed after a chance encounter with linguistics genius Professor Henry Higgins (Rex Harrison). Higgins has a bet with his colleague Colonel Pickering (Wilfrid Hyde-White) – he can change Eliza’s accent and manners so much that the shrill cockney girl will pass for a society belle. The bet will not only change their lives, but also those of Eliza’s father, sage-like binman Alfred (Stanley Holloway), and lovestruck romantic young gentleman Freddy Eynsford-Hill (Jeremy Brett).

From the start, producer Jack L Warner wanted to develop a new verison of the film, fresh and different from the stage production. George Cukor, the esteemed director from Hollywood’s Golden Years, was brought on board as a safe pair of hands – but it was clear Warner was calling the shots. How to put your own stamp on a massive hit musical? Well you start by getting a fresh cast in. Julie Andrews had made the role her own in the original production, so Hollywood was stunned when she was overlooked for the part. Instead Audrey Hepburn was hired – while Julie Andrews got the consolation price of being able to accept Disney’s offer of the role of Mary Poppins. Warner knew who he wanted for Higgins – and Cary Grant was swiftly courted for the role. But Grant refused, allegedly responding that he wouldn’t even see the film unless Rex Harrison was retained in his signature role.

So Harrison owes him a drink or two, because the film allowed him to leave a permanent record of a stage role he had played over 1,000 times on Broadway and in the West End. Harrison had taken a revolutionary approach to musicals, by basically not singing. Instead he sort of spoke the songs rhythmically – an approach that every other performer of the role has stuck to. The film is a brilliant capture of this unique and authoritative performance, and while Harrison is not exactly fresh he’s certainly charismatic, delivering every scene with confidence and well-rehearsed bombast.

Harrison’s steely lack of willingness to compromise also lead indirectly to a revolution in sound recording in the movies. Harrison refused to obey the custom at the time to lip-sync on set to a pre-recorded soundtrack. Harrison insisted that his performance was subtly different every time so he could never lip-sync accurately. Instead the technicians were forced to invent a sort of wireless microphone that could be disguised in the over-sized neck ties Harrison wears. This also means that at least one musical number has the bizarre situation of Harrison singing live, Hyde-White lip-syncing and Audrey Hepburn being dubbed.

Ah yes Hepburn. If there is one thing everyone remembers about Hepburn’s performance in this film, it is that she doesn’t sing a single note of the final film. Her actual singing was quickly considered by Warner to be not up to snuff, and so she is replaced by voice-double-to-the-stars Marnie Nixon. It’s always a mark against Hepburn, whose performance is often rather shrill, stagy and (whisper it) even a little bit irritating. In fact, she’s pretty much miscast as the cockney flower girl, never convincing as a bit of rough from the streets, and is so horrendously misstyled throughout that she also jarringly looks like a 1960s fashion icon floated into a period film.

Having hired the male star of the Broadway production – not to mention Stanley Holloway also being retained from the original cast after James Cagney refused to be drawn out from retirement – the film quickly settles down into being a straight Broadway musical captured as faithfully as possible on the big-screen. My Fair Lady is a film crushed under the pressure of its design, and watching it today it looks unbearably studio-bound and flat. In every scene you can never forget you are watching the action take place on enormous sets, with the camera pulled back to try and get as much of the expensive soundstage work in frame as possible.

As a dance musical, it’s pretty flat – Holloway’s numbers in particular are strikingly lifeless in their dancing, which makes you regret even more that Cagney couldn’t be lured to star in it – and much of the singing feels forced or over-performed. Even Harrison’s numbers feel pretty by-the-numbers from Harrison’s constant repetition of them. Even the more impressive scenes – such as the race track sequence – feel artificial and over-designed, the money chucked at the careful period detail and over-elaborate costumes and set (designs courtesy of Cecil Beaton, who allegedly drew the designs and then disappeared to leave them to be interpreted by others) seeming more and more dated as the years pass by.

But then this was a film that probably felt dated at the time it was made – it beat Dr Strangelove for best picture, and in five years’ time Midnight Cowboy was lifting the Oscar – never more so than in Cukor’s direction. One wonders at times what Cukor really did: Warner cast the film and led on the design and staging. Harrison and Holloway had played their roles literally thousands of times already. The camera work is as conservative and unimaginative as you can expect, with the film dryly set up to give you the perfect view from the stalls. Several touches – such as the staging (complete with blurry focus edges) of Eliza’s fantasies of the domineering Higgins being punished by firing squad – are clumsy and obvious. It’s a film made with no real independent personality whatsoever.

Not to mention the fact that it completely fails to draw any chemistry from the Higgins/Doolittle relationship whatsoever. It’s an odd one, as the musical takes on a romantic ending of the two characters together – an ending, by the way, that Shaw famously hated when a suggestion of it was added to the original Pygmalion production. Here, this comes from nowhere, and feels unbelievably forced and artificial as Harrison has demonstrated no interest at all (other than irritation) for Hepburn, and she in turn offers little back. When they come back together it’s hard to care.

But they cared back then as this was a huge box office smash. It’s very odd to imagine it now – because this isn’t a great film, it’s a decently done one that carries some charm but never finds an identity for itself as film away from its musical roots and never brings anything unique and imaginative to the table. It’s extraordinarily flat as a piece of film-making and seems increasingly more and more dated in its performances, its atmosphere and its staging. It’s got some charm, but I’m not sure if it’s got enough.

Mary Poppins Returns (2018)

Emily Blunt is practically perfect in every way in Mary Poppins Returns

Director: Rob Marshall

Cast: Emily Blunt (Mary Poppins), Lin-Manuel Miranda (Jack), Ben Whishaw (Michael Banks), Emily Mortimer (Jane Banks), Pixie Davies (Annabel Banks), Nathanael Saleh (John Banks), Joel Dawson (Georgie Banks), Julie Walters (Ellen), Colin Firth (William Weatherall Wilkins), Meryl Streep (Topsy), Dick van Dyke (Mr Dawes Jnr), David Warner (Admiral Boom), Jim Norton (Mr Binnacle), Jeremy Swift (Hamilton Gooding), Kobna Holdbrook-Smith (Templeton Frye), Noma Dumezweni (Miss Penny Farthing)

Some sequels go into production even before the first film hits the cinemas. Others give you a good long wait – and Mary Poppins has had you waiting 54 years. Of course, part of that was down to her creator, PL Travers. Travers so hated the Disney original (I mean, she really hated it) she outright banned all other adaptations of her work – but her estate were far more open to the prospect (and let’s be honest, probably also to the money) that Disney could finally go ahead with a sequel.

And thank goodness for that, since this delightful film is practically perfect in every way. It’s 25 years since the events of the first film, and Michael Banks (Ben Whishaw) is now a widower with three children, whose home is about to be repossessed by the bank for non-payment of loans. His sister Jane (Emily Mortimer) is trying to help, but the pressure and sadness are showing on Michael and are forcing his children Annabel, John and Georgie (Pixie Davies, Nathanael Saleh and Joel Dawson) to grow up fast. The Banks family is in trouble – so it’s the perfect time for the arrival of Mary Poppins (Emily Blunt) to save the day – with a little bit of help from gas-lighter Jack (Lin-Manuel Miranda).

Mary Poppins Returns is a triumphant mix of nostalgia and originality, that walks a very difficult tightrope between being a loving pastiche and tribute to the original film while also managing to bring its own original charm and magic touch. That’s a difficult trick to pull off – but it basically takes a slight remix of the original film’s story and adds a heft of emotional impact to create something that feels modern and fresh while also being very close tonally to the original.

This is never clearer than in Emily Blunt’s sublime performance as Mary Poppins. If there is anyone who had a more difficult job in this film than Blunt I can’t think of them. She had to take on the most iconic character of an iconic actress – and does so brilliantly, but creates a character who feels an equal mix of both Andrews and Blunt. This is clearly the same character as before, but Blunt mixes in a wonderful heart-warming care and concern under the pristine English exterior that melts the heart. She has a glowing twinkle to her, an almost bottomless charm with an endearing delight for the wonder and silliness that is part of Poppins world. And boy can she sing and dance? She carries the film with effortless grace – to such endearing effect that, just like with Julie Andrews, you miss her as she becomes less prominent in the final act.

And of course she is matched by a superb company of actors. Lin-Manuel Miranda makes the transition to the big-screen like a duck to water, hugely loveable, wonderfully charming and superb (as you would expect) at the musical sequences. The three children give exemplary performances, with never a hint of sickly sentimentalism. Emily Mortimer is radiantly giddy as Jane, while Ben Whishaw will bring a lump to the throat as a Michael who is struggling under a huge amount of grief. That’s not the mention wonderful turns from the whole of the cast, especially from Holdbrook-Smith as a kindly lawyer.

All these actors are “marshalled” brilliantly by director Rob Marshall. With his experience of musicals – both on screen and stage – Marshall knows his stuff and brings all his experience to bear here to create a sequel that will be seen (I’m sure) as a worthy companion to the original. Marshall’s direction of the musical sequences is faultless. He knows exactly how and where to place the camera for maximum effect, and gets just the right tone and mood from these scenes. He’s also, let’s not forget, a brilliant choreographer and has put together some exquisite sequences, not least the lamplighter song Trip the Light Fantastic, a whirligig showstopper of a number that if you saw it in the West End would have the whole crowd on their feet.

The songs make for easy criticism (reviewers seem duty-bound to say they are not as good as the original) – but to these ears Marc Shaiman and Scott Whitman’s songs and scores are both catchy and engaging. Give them time and I’m sure you’ll find them as replete with impact as the Sherman brothers’ tunes from 1964. Saying that, there might be one musical number too many – but that’s a very minor criticism.

Because this is a film that gets so much else right. The storyline is certain to leave a lump in the throat, with its delicate handling of grief and the sadness both of growing up and also children being forced to leave their childhoods behind in impossible circumstances. These are universal themes – and they certainly impacted on me, and on a cinema packed with families all of whom were engrossed. That’s part of the magic of what Marshall has achieved here – heck, even the final Big Ben set-piece starts pushing you towards the edge of your seat in tension. I also loved the bravery of the colour-blind casting. It’s a film that stands on its own feet so well, it almost takes you out of the film when Dick van Dyke appears at the end – it doesn’t need the cameo, this film is its own beast.

Mary Poppins Returns will leave a smile on your face and a glow in your heart. It’s totally lovely from start to finish. Emily Blunt is superb (with wonderful support from all) and Rob Marshall triumphs as director and choreographer in this, surely his finest movie ever. It’s got something for all ages, and a truly heart-warming story. It takes everything that works so well in the first film and builds on it. It’s a wonderful mixture of homage and originality, that you will enjoy time and time and again. Practically perfect!

Bunny Lake is Missing (1965)

Carol Lynley’s daughter ‘Bunny’ goes missing – but is the girl real or not? Classic noir mystery Bunny Lake is Missing

Director: Otto Preminger

Cast: Laurence Olivier (Superintendent Newhouse), Carol Lynley (Ann Lake), Kier Dullea (Steven Lake), Martita Hunt (Ada Ford), Anna Massey (Elvira Smollett), Clive Revill (Sergeant Andrews), Finlay Currie (The Doll Maker), Lucia Mannheim (The Cook), Noël Coward (Horatio Wilson)

Otto Preminger’s career was an interesting mixture of high-brow, noirish thrillers and pulpish adaptations. Bunny Lake Is Missing is a mixture of these, a restructuring of a hit novel. Transplanting the novel from New York to London, the film covers a single day and the investigation into a missing child ‘Bunny’ Lake. Her American mother Ann Lake (Carol Lynley) drops her at her new school, and returns at the end of the day to find no one has seen her daughter or any record of her existence. While her protective brother Steven (Kier Dullea) rants and rages, Superintendent Newhouse (Laurence Olivier) leads the investigation. As Newhouse fails to find any evidence for the child’s existence at all, the question is asked: is she a figment of Ann’s fragile imagination?

Preminger plays this delicate game of “guess who” with the audience for a skilled and enjoyable 90 minutes before giving us any form of answer. The film throws us straight into the mystery of whether Bunny is real or not from the off, as our first shot of Ann is her alone in the school after dropping her daughter off. We see as little evidence of Bunny’s existence as the cast does. From there it’s a careful balance between giving us enough reasons to both trust Ann’s conviction her daughter is real and also give us enough reasons to suspect that Ann may be as unbalanced as Newhouse is concerned she might be.

It’s quite the game the film plays, and Preminger does it very well, the film never tipping the hand too much one way or the other. Shot in luscious black and white, it’s a film of noirish shadows and imposing blackness where everything feels a little bit out of kilter and untrustworthy. Preminger throws us into Ann’s perspective by using a number of clever tracking shots that allow us to follow her through the events of each scenes. These shots are sustained, subtle and also give us a further subconscious reason to trust her – we are effectively seeing the events of the film side-by-side with her. It makes for a rather empathetic film, and one you find yourself investing into.

Not least because it completely understands the twin horrors of both losing a child and not being believed by anyone no matter how desperate you plead that you are telling the truth (no matter how generous people are while doing so). Preminger acutely understands we all deep down worry that we are going to be let down by those we need to believe in – and this feeling of concern, mixed with frustration and pity for Ann is what draws us to her. Even while we think there is more behind Bunny’s existence than meets the eye.

The screenplay by John and Penelope Mortimer also throws plenty of potential suspects at us. These are largely a series of delicious cameos for vintage British actors. These extreme odd-balls also make the two Americans in London (Ann in particular) seem even more like fishes out of water. Martita Hunt is excellent value as a retired school headmistress, seemingly confined to a bedroom in the attic of the school (!) whose hobby is recording children talking about their nightmares. Anna Massey is equally good as a harassed matron more concerned about the negative impact on the school’s reputation than child’s safety. Pick of the bunch of this rogues gallery is Noël Coward (having a whale of a time) as Ann’s drunken landlord, a faded actor and sexually ambiguous seductress who in one priceless scene gleefully shows a group of police detectives some of his favourite whips (“I find the sensation [of being whipped] rather titillating…[this was] reputed to belong to the great one himself. The Marquis de Sade”) from his collection of bizarre sex toys.

These perverts, oddballs and weirdos are all investigated with a cool professionalism by Laurence Olivier’s Superintendent Newhouse. Olivier gives possibly one of his most humane, restrained and engaging performances: he’s the epitome of caring, dedicated professionalism and a superbly humane detective. Carrying much of the burden of conveying the films narrative, Olivier is superb here – and he manages to make Newhouse exactly the sort of man you would long to investigate your child’s disappearance, even as he starts to doubt the child even exists. Olivier is in fact so strong, that the parts of the film where he disappears suffer noticeably from his absence – no one else among the principles can match him for presence.

Saying that, Carol Lynley does an excellent job as a character we invest in and sympathise with, but can never quite bring ourselves to be sure is reliable. It’s a difficult line she walks between being believably distraught and simultaneously slightly off kilter, enough to make you worry that she be (knowingly or not) making the whole thing up. The feeling may be more than helped by the exceptionally weird relationship between herself and her brother, one of an incestuously unsettling intensity (their relationship as brother and sister isn’t divulged until almost 15 minutes into the film and it’s as much a surprise to the audience as it is to the characters).

Kier Dullea as her brother gives a decent, if rather strained performance, as Steven. Dullea’s slight emptiness in the role can perhaps be partly attributed to his terrible relationship with Preminger, later claiming making the film was the worst experience of his life. (Olivier was also unimpressed calling Preminger a bully).

It’s a shame as Dullea is crucial to the final sections of the film. I won’t give away the reveal and solution, but Preminger overplays his hand here, stretching the final sequence of the film out to a full 15 minutes which rather overstays its welcome. Maybe the sort of psychological complexity it’s aiming for is a bit more familiar to use today, than it was in 1965, but it certainly feels like a scene overstretched. But that’s a blemish on a very solid mystery before then that brings more than enough pulpish pleasure, fine performances and interesting film making to reward rewatching.