Tag Archives: Keir Dullea

Horror Film Review: The Haunting of Julia (dir by Richard Loncraine)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

1977’s The Haunting of Julia (also known as Full Circle) opens with a truly horrifying incident.

Julia (Mia Farrow) is an American housewife who is living in London.  One morning, her young daughter Kate starts to choke on her breakfast.  The panicked Julia attempts to perform a tracheotomy (!) on her daughter.  It should be noted that Julia is not a doctor and her attempts to perform a difficult medical operation on her daughter do not go well.  In fact, Kate dies.  The traumatized Julia demands a divorce from her husband Magnus (Keir Dullea).  While Magnus is reluctant to actually sign the papers, he does agree to a separation.

Julia moves into a new home.  As soon as she moves in, strange things start to happen.  There are odd noises.  Appliances turns on by themselves.  At first, Julia blames Magnus but soon, she spots a girl who looks like Kate in a nearby park.  Julia runs after the girl, just to discover that she’s vanished.

Was the little girl Kate or is Julia seeing something else?  Julia starts to research the history of the house and even consults a psychic who, after conducting a seance, informs Julia that she should leave the house immediately.  The mentally fragile Julia refuses to leave the house, feeling that doing so would mean abandoning the spirit of her daughter.  Meanwhile, Julia’s acquaintances are turning up dead….

Based on a novel by Peter Straub, The Haunting of Julia is an atmospheric ghost story.  (While I haven’t read Straub’s original novel, the film version seems to be owe more than a little bit of a debt to Don’t Look Now.)  I think I was eleven years old when I first came across The Haunting of Julia airing on one of the local stations down in Shreveport.  I didn’t watch the entire film.  In fact, I only caught the final ten minutes and I had to watch the movie with the volume turned down very low because my mom didn’t like me watching horror movies.  In this case, my mom was probably correct because what I did see of The Haunting of Julia left me totally traumatized and scared to go to sleep.  No matter what else one might say about this film, it has an absolutely haunting and terrifying ending.  Trying to get that final image out of your head is not easy.

When I recently rewatched The Haunting of Julia on TCM, I discovered that it was still just as frightening as I remembered it being.  I also discovered that, for the most part, Julia is a remarkably unlikable character.  While Julia is not solely responsible for all of the terrible things that happen over the course of this film, it’s still hard not to wonder just how stupid you would have to be to try to perform a tracheotomy with no medical training.  Afterwards, it’s understandable that Julia’s in denial and one can understand how she convinced herself that Kate’s spirit was trying to contact her.  But it’s still hard not to feel that a lot of people end up dying because she’s essentially an idiot.  Mia Farrow gives a typically eccentric performance as Julia, one that suggests that she wasn’t all there before she accidentally killed her daughter.  The rest of the cast is full of dependable British character actors, all of whom bring the film to frightening life.  This is a film where you have more sympathy for the people around the main character than for the main character herself.

That ending still packs quite a punch.  Don’t watch The Haunting of Julia alone.

The TSL Horror Grindhouse: Blind Date (dir by Nico Mastokaris)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

In 1984’s Blind Date, Joseph Bottoms stars as Jonathon Ratcliff, an American who works in Greece.

Jonathon would appear to have it all.  He has a good job in an exotic land.  He has a nice home.  He has a beautiful girlfriend named Claire (Kirstie Alley).  He has co-workers who love him so much that they insist on throwing him a birthday party and giving him his cake while he’s making love to Claire.  Jonathon enjoys jogging and listening to music and spying on his neighbor, which the film treats as a harmless little thing that all men do.  I mean, I guess we should be happy that Jonathon isn’t disguising himself as a taxi driver and murdering the women that he picks up with a scalpel.  No, someone else is doing that.

Jonathon suddenly loses his eyesight.  Fortunately, Dr. Steiger (James Daughton) has a solution.  He’s created a computer program that turns sound into very primitive, grid-like images.  As long as Jonathon is wearing his headphones, he can see … kind of.  At first, it’s all good fun.  Jonathon beats up the extremely flamboyant muggers who have been harassing him at the subway station.  And he continues to spy on his neighbor whenever she’s getting undressed which is not cool considering that Claire has stayed with him through his entire ordeal.

Meanwhile, the scalpel murders are continuing….

Now, to be honest, I assumed that Jonathon was going to form some sort of mental connection with the killer and start seeing the murder through the killer’s eyes.  Instead, Jonathon just hears the killer walking with one of his victims and he ends up investigating on his own, despite not really being able to see well.  Basically, the whole idea of Jonathon being blind doesn’t have much to do with the thriller aspect of the plot.  I could maybe accept that if the film hadn’t spent a huge amount of time explaining in pain-staking detail how exactly Jonathon’s “eyes” work.  The action literally stopped for a huge chunk of the film’s running time so that the film could make its most ludicrous plot point seem even more ludicrous.

Greek director Nico Mastokaris is obviously trying to do an Argento-style giallo with Blind Date and, indeed, Argento himself has a noted habit of including intriguing but ultimately pointless red herrings in his films.  Just as Asia Argento having the Stendhal Syndrome proved to be a bit inconsequential to The Stendhal Syndrome, Joseph Bottoms being blind is inconsequential to Blind Date.  That said, Argento can get away with that sort of thing because, even in his weaker films, he’s clever stylist and he usually maintain a solid narrative pace.  Blind Date, on the other hand, is rather draggy and Joseph Bottoms is not a particularly likeable hero.

On the positive side, James Daughton (he was the head of the evil frat in Animal House) gives a genuinely interesting performance and Kirstie Alley is likable as the neurotic Claire.  For the most part, though, one can see why the sequel promised in the closing credits never came to be.

Film Review: Fahrenheit 451 (dir by Ramin Bahrani)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

(Before reading this review, make sure that you’ve read my review of Ray Bradbury’s novel!)

(And then make you sure that you’ve read my review of the 1966 Truffaut film!)

The latest HBO original film, Fahrenheit 451, is bad.

For all the talent involved, for all the hype, and for all the hope that many of us had for it, it is extremely bad.  It sets up its targets and then fires at them with all the aim and success of a myopic archer.  By almost any standard, it’s a misfire of almost Vinyl proportions.

The film, of course, is based on Ray Bradbury’s novel about a future dystopia where the population is kept in line through pharmaceuticals and mind-numbing television and where firemen burn books.  Michael B. Jordan plays Montag, the fireman who develops doubts.  Michael Shannon plays Beatty, Montag’s boss. Sofia Boutella is Clarisse, who inspires Montag to question why.  And no one plays Montag’s wife because that character was apparently cut from the film.

From the minute this version starts, it’s obvious that this film was inspired less by Bradbury and more by Black Mirror, Blade Runner, and the Purge franchise.  The entire world is defined by neon and dark shadows.  Gone is Bradbury’s suggestion that a world without books would be a bland one.  Instead, a world without books is now one that looks like every single recent sci-fi film.  People may have stopped reading but apparently, they’re still watching old Ridley Scott movies.

Gone too is the idea of Montag as a middle-aged man struggling with an existential crisis.  Now, he’s Michael B. Jordan, who comes across as if he’s never had a moment of doubt in his entire life.  He’s less Montag and more Creed in an authoritarian future.  Also gone is the weary relationship with Captain Beatty.  Now, Beatty is almost a father figure to Montag.  Of course, Montag’s real father died mysteriously years ago.  Nothing indicates a lazy screenwriter quicker than a character with daddy issues.

As I mentioned earlier, in this version, Montag is not married.  Instead, he lives a bachelor lifestyle in a glitzy apartment and he spends most of his time asking questions to the future’s version of Alexa, Yuxie.  (“Yuxie, was Benjamin Franklin the first fireman?”)  Of course, in the novel, Montag’s wife stood in for every citizen who never questioned why books were being burned.  It was Montag’s dissatisfaction with his bland home life that led to him getting to know Clarisse and eventually questioning his job as a fireman.  Now, Montag starts to doubt after a random rebel says that Benjamin Franklin didn’t support burning books.  But why, if Montag has spent a lifetime refusing to question anything, would some rando rebel suddenly make him reconsider?

The Book People are still around but now they’re kind of a pain.  I love books but I wouldn’t want to hang out with any of them.  They’re a humorless group of people who live in a farm and apparently being a book person means you can’t wash your hair or something because seriously, everyone looked a bit grimy.  I mean, it’s important to rebel again authoritarianism but that doesn’t meant you can’t look good while doing it.  Each Book Person has memorized a book and you have to wonder how they decide who gets to memorize which book.  We’re told that one Book Person has memorized Chairman Mao but if you’re battling censorship, would you really want to hang out with a person who has devoted her life to the guy behind the Cultural Revolution?  Another Book Person claims to have memorized all of Proust but I think he’s a damn liar.  I mean, how is anyone going to check that?  I’m guessing he probably only memorized the first 20 pages or so of Swann’s Way.  What I want to know is who got to memorize the Twilight books?

This version of Fahrenheit 451 is a bit of a mess.  I’m not one to demand that literary adaptations stick exactly to their source material.  (For instance, the film version of The Godfather was greatly improved by ignoring 60% of what happened in Mario Puzo’s novel.  For that matter, we can all be thankful that It didn’t end with the Losers Club solidifying their bond by having group sex with Beverly.)  But, in this case, the changes don’t improve on the original.  Instead, they just turn Fahrenheit 451 into yet another shadowy dystopian film.

When it comes to Fahrenheit 451, my advice is just to read the book.

Cleaning Out The DVR: The Hoodlum Priest (dir by Irvin Kershner)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

(I recorded The Hoodlum Priest off of TCM on January 6th of this year.)

“I’m not trying to change the world.  I’m just trying to keep the world from changing me.”

— Anti-Death Penalty Activist in The Hoodlum Priest (1961)

The Hoodlum Priest tells the story of two men who have far more in common than may first seem apparent.

Billy Lee Jackson (Keir Dullea) has spent the last few months in prison and seems to be destined to return as soon as possible.  Though he was convicted of armed robbery, the truth was that Billy was little more than a mugger and a petty thief.  It only takes one look at him to see that his tough exterior is largely an act.  Billy is angry, bitter, and often scared but tough he definitely isn’t.  As soon as Billy’s released back onto the streets of St. Louis, he teams up with his friend, Pico (Don Joslyn), and the two of them plot to crack a safe.

Father Charles Dismas Clark (Don Murray) is a Jesuit who has dedicated his life to trying to rehabilitate ex-cons like Billy.  As Father Clark explains it, he is the son of coal miners, a descendant of the original Molly Maguires.  He knows what it means to be on the fringes of society.  As opposed to his colleagues, Father Clark speaks the language of the streets.  (Of course, we’re talking about the streets of 1961 here, which means that Father Clark spends a lot of time saying stuff, “Hey, I ain’t no square!”)  Father Clark’s dream is to open up a halfway house, a place where those released from prison can stay as they try to reintegrate into society.   Helping Father Clark is a famed attorney named Louis Rosen (Larry Gates).  Opposing him and suggesting that Clark is as much a hoodlum as those he claims to be helping is a supercilious journalist named George Hale (Logan Ramsey).

At first, it appears that Billy could be one of Father Clark’s greatest success stories.  After convincing Billy and Pico to abandon their criminal plans, Father Clark arranges for Billy to get a job.  Billy even begins a rather unlikely romance with a wealthy socialite named Ellen (Cindi Wood).  However, no matter how hard Billy tries to resist, the temptation to return to his old ways remains.  While Father Clark struggles to convince people to support his halfway house, Billy finds himself drawn back into a life of crime…

The Hoodlum Priest was based on a true story.  The real Father Clark personally approached Don Murray and told him the story behind the founding of Dismas House.  Murray felt so strongly about Clark’s story that he not only starred in and produced The Hoodlum Priest but also wrote the screenplay.  (The script was credited to Don Deer, which was Murray’s nickname when he was a high school track star.)

That this film was a passion project for Murray is obvious in the intensity of his performance.  As played by Murray, Father Clark is hardly an intellectual.  Instead, he’s frequently as emotional and, at times, as angry as the people that he’s trying to help.  When Billy fails to show proper gratitude after Father Clark rescues him from being sent back to jail, Clark refuses to excuse the snub.  Clark may be sincere but he’s not going to let anyone push him around.  Director Irvin Kershner and cinematography Haskell Wexler bring a gritty realism to the film’s visuals, which keeps the film from getting overwhelmed by its own sincerity.

The Hoodlum Priest is a well-done piece of social commentary, one that features a still relevant message about the struggle of ex-cons to reintegrate into society.  Don Murray brings the same righteous authority to this film that he would later bring to Twin Peaks: The Return.  This is a good one to keep an eye out for on TCM.

Horror on the Lens: Full Circle (dir by Richard Loncraine)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

For today’s horror on the lens,we have a film from 1977.  I recently watched this film very late at night and — OH MY GOD!  Seriously, I had nightmares for two nights straight!

Full Circle opens with the horrifying death of Kate (Sophie Ward), the daughter of Julia (Mia Farrow) and Magnus (Keir Dullea).  After Kate’s death, Julia and Magnus divorce and Julia moves into a new house.  However, she is haunted by visions of a little girl who looks just like Kate.  As well, the house is full of odd noises, creepy toys, and appliances that turn on by themselves.  Is Julia seeing the ghost of her daughter or something far more dangerous?

Full Circle is a truly haunting and disturbing haunted house film.  Mia Farrow gives a great performance as Julia and the entire film is dominated by a palpable atmosphere of dread.  And that final scene — AGCK!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WQVrglbsjfQ