Friday, June 26, 2009
LANG IN HOLLYWOOD
Today's NYTimes Best 1176 Film was Fritz Lang's
There are a lot of nice touches in this blatant propaganda film. A lot of it doesn't add up but still, the parts are very good.
Lang had left Germany and had a new artistic and life home in America. So he made a British war film!
Walter Pidgeon, Joan Bennett star with a gaggle of German character actors including the very non-German George Sanders with a monocle.
An interesting aspect of this film is that the Germans talk German to one another. There are no sub titles. You don't need them. Even Sanders is talking kraut to his komrads.
It has John Carradine cast in a perfectly ambiguous role. But he plays it for all it is worth. I bet they cut a lot of it out or it would make more sense.
There are great sets and lighting. The plot is preposterous but, what the hell, it is war time.
I wouldn't want to see it again but once was OK.
I will give it a 3 out of Netflix5.
Labels: best films
