The Glass Cell (1978)

Academy Awards, USA 1979

Nominated Oscar

Best Foreign Language Film West Germany.

Filmverlag der Autoren (Germany)
Directed by Hans W. Geissendörfer
My rating: 2.5 stars out of 4
IMDb Wikipedia
(YouTube)

An architect is framed by his employer and sent to prison for five years. Upon his release, he finds out his wife had an affair with his lawyer. Although she claims it is long over, he begins to suspect otherwise when presented with tapes of their conversation from the same employer who framed him. One night when going to confront the lawyer, he impulsively murders him. He is then blackmailed by the same employer who secretly taped the murder. The police suspect he is involved but have no proof, until another body shows up. Cold, calculated thriller is as unemotional as its aloof, amoral characters. Intricately plotted, but also oddly predictable, but helped by a dark, moody electronic soundtrack by Niels Janette Walen, cinematography by Robby Muller and a good performance by Brigitte Fossey as the wife.

Midnight Express (1978)

Midnight Express [Blu-ray]

Academy Awards, USA 1979

Won Oscar	Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material from Another Medium Oliver Stone
	Best Music, Original Score Giorgio Moroder
Nominated Oscar	Best Picture Alan Marshall David Puttnam
	Best Actor in a Supporting Role John Hurt
	Best Director Alan Parker
	Best Film Editing Gerry Hambling

Columbia Pictures
Directed by Alan Parker
My rating: 4 stars out of 4
IMDb Wikipedia
(Blu-ray, Sony)

American Brad Davis is caught trying to smuggle hashish out of Turkey and sentenced to prison. He serves out three painful years, learning how to survive in the brutal day to day prison life. However, just before his release date his sentence is revoked and his is given life instead. This sends him spiraling into anger and eventually madness, landing him in an asylum for the criminally insane. Medicated and barely human, he plans one last desperate attempt at escape. Oliver Stone's screenplay takes liberties with the actual events and occasionally goes too far, but always in service to the plot or characters. It's probably cinema's most intense prison drama, helped immensely by Giorgio Moroder's throbbing synth soundtrack and a bevy of excellent performance by supporting actors, including John Hurt as an English drug addict.

Portia on Trial (1937)

Academy Awards, USA 1938

Nominated Oscar

Best Music, Score Alberto Colombo (head of department) Score by Alberto Colombo.

Republic Pictures
Directed by George Nichols Jr.
My rating: 2 stars out of 4
IMDb Wikipedia
(YouTube)

A female lawyer takes the case of a woman accused of shooting her fiance. However, she also has personal motives, since the fiance was also the father of her child years ago. He shows up not knowing that fact, but after a dance at a party she let's him know. Anyway, this all comes out at the trial that concludes the film. Some crisp dialogue and early feminism might elevate this slightly, but the melodrama is first and foremost.

Under Western Stars (1938)

Academy Awards, USA 1939

Nominated Oscar

Best Music, Original Song Johnny Marvin For the song "Dust".

Republic Pictures
Directed by Joe Kane
My rating: 2 stars out of 4
IMDb Wikipedia
(YouTube)

Roy Rogers, in his first starring role, plays a cowboy who becomes a congressman to get federal aid for the drought in his home state. He fights a greedy water company and corrupt politicians along the way, sings plenty of songs and flirts with pretty Carol Hughes. More or less set the template for the hundred or so movies that would bring him unparalleled success for the next several decades.

Way Out West (1937)

Academy Awards, USA 1938

Nominated Oscar

Best Music, Score Marvin Hatley (head of department) Score by Marvin Hatley.

MGM
Directed by James W. Horne
My rating: 2.5 stars out of 4
IMDb Wikipedia
(YouTube)

Stan and Ollie travel by mule to a typical old west town. The promised to deliver a deed to a gold mine to the daughter of an old prospector friend. She works in the town saloon, where the owner overhears their plans and schemes to get the deed from them. Entertaining if low-brow humor from the famous comedy duo, filled with their brand of cartoon-ish slapstick, spoofing the western genre.

The Razor's Edge (1946)

The Razor's Edge (Blu-ray)

Academy Awards, USA 1947

Won Oscar	Best Actress in a Supporting Role Anne Baxter
Nominated Oscar	Best Picture
	Best Actor in a Supporting Role Clifton Webb
	Best Art Direction-Interior Decoration, Black-and-White Richard Day Nathan Juran Thomas Little Paul S. Fox

Twentieth Century-Fox Film
Directed by Edmund Goulding
My rating: 2 stars out of 4
IMDb Wikipedia
(Blu-ray, Fox)

Soldier Tyrone Power, traumatized by the death of a comrade, is left questioning his existence and decides to travel the world. He declines an offer of employment by a wealthy friend, stunning his socialite fiance Gene Tierney. Instead, he goes to Paris to experience the bohemian lifestyle. He takes a menial job in a coal mine where he hears about a mystic in India. He takes a pilgrimage to the mountain top retreat where he becomes enlightened. He returns to the real world where he falls in love with alcoholic Anne Baxter. They eventually marry, but rival Tierney tricks her back into addiction and she leaves him. Power eventually finds her in an opium den but cannot persuade her to return. He blames Tierney but because of his enlightenment forgives her, traveling once again to comfort another dying friend on his deathbed. Essentially a melodrama that strives to be something more, but ruined by stereotypes of eastern mysticism. His ascension of the mountain and glimpse of God in the clouds is laughable. Power's stone-faced performance doesn't help much either.

Prelude to War (1942)

Academy Awards, USA 1943

Won Oscar

Best Documentary

Office of War Information
Directed by Frank Capra
My rating: 2.5 stars out of 4
IMDb Wikipedia
(YouTube)

First in a series of "training" films for US troops entering WWII. It contains the expected propaganda, but also some illuminating perspectives as the country prepares for war and the outcome is far from certain. I viewed this just a day after the inauguration of Trump, whose "America first" policy bears a striking similarity to the country's mood after WWI. The documentary makes it clear that this policy contributed to the rise of Hitler, Mussolini and Yamamoto, as the US looked the other way. The failure of the League of Nations also resulted from US isolationism, eerily similar to Trump's criticism of the United Nations. Only time will tell as of the writing of this review, but this long forgotten documentary should be required viewing for all Americans.

Last Days in Vietnam (2014)

American Experience: Last Days in Vietnam [Blu-ray]

Academy Awards, USA 2015

Nominated Oscar

Best Documentary, Feature Rory Kennedy Keven McAlester

American Experience Films
Directed by Rory Kennedy
My rating: 3 stars out of 4
IMDb Wikipedia
(Netflix)

As the north Vietnamese invade the country after the withdrawal of American troops, the last few remaining in Saigon converge on the American embassy hoping to evacuate. Tens of thousands south Vietnamese also arrive, climbing the walls or using vague personal connections. The American ambassador refuses to recognize the dire situation until it is almost too late. Once the airport is bombed out, the only option left is evacuation by helicopter, and they have only one day to do it. The ending of the Vietnam War is no different than the rest of it: poorly planned and morally bankrupt, with the south Vietnamese bearing the brunt of the suffering.

Storm Over Bengal (1938)

Academy Awards, USA 1939

Nominated Oscar

Best Music, Scoring Cy Feuer

Republic Pictures
Directed by Sidney Salkow
My rating: 2 stars out of 4
IMDb Wikipedia
(YouTube)

Fast paced story is essentially a western relocated to India. British soldiers tangle with the local insurgents, hoping to make a last minute treaty with a dying Maharishi to prevent a war. There is a romantic subplot involving two brothers and the girl they both love. Filmed on location at Lone Pine, California, the same site as many old Republic Pictures westerns.

Navajo (1952)

Academy Awards, USA 1953

Nominated Oscar	Best Cinematography, Black-and-White Virgil Miller
	Best Documentary, Features Hall Bartlett

Lippert Pictures
Directed by Norman Foster
My rating: 2.5 stars out of 4
IMDb Wikipedia
(YouTube)

A young boy and his family move to a remote canyon in the hopes of a better life. His adopted "grandfather", really just a friend of the family, teaches him about the history of the Navajo. After his grandfather dies, the boy goes to town to get help with the body, but instead is put into a local school against his will. The boy grows to resent everyone around him and runs off at the first opportunity. He hides in the same canyon where his family once lived, pursued by a couple of good-intentioned teachers. The melodramatics don't always click, and neither does the forced narration by the boy, but it is beautifully photographed on spectacular Arizona locations.

Condemned! (1929)

Academy Awards, USA 1930

Nominated Oscar

Best Actor in a Leading Role Ronald Colman

United Artists
Directed by Wesley Ruggles
My rating: 2.5 stars out of 4
IMDb Wikipedia
(YouTube)

Ronald Colman is sent to a sweltering South American prison run by a sadistic warden. His debonair manner and non-violent record get him selected to be the warden's house servant. He treats his wife Ann Harding as badly as the prisoners, and it doesn't take long for her to fall in love with Colman. He is sent to solitary confinement but manages to escape, plotting to meet up with Harding on an ocean liner. Stilted acting leftover from the silents is compensated by vivid atmosphere from art director William Cameron Menzies and cinematographer Gregg Toland.

Winged Migration (2001)

Winged Migration [Blu-ray]

Academy Awards, USA 2003

Nominated Oscar

Best Documentary, Features Jacques Perrin

Sony Pictures Classics
Directed by Jacques Perrin, Jacques Cluzaud and Michel Debats
My rating: 3 stars out of 4
IMDb Wikipedia
(Blu-ray, Sony)

Run-of-the-mill documentary about bird migration is brought to another level by stunning aerial photography against spectacular backdrops around the world. The droll narration is still present, and largely unnecessary, but easy to ignore as you take in one stunning landscape after another. The real highlight, though, is the in-flight photography mere feet from the birds. Just don't watch the making-of special feature to avoid knowing how it was done, somewhat controversially.

Wild (2014)

Wild Blu-ray

Academy Awards, USA 2015

Nominated Oscar	Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role Reese Witherspoon
	Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role Laura Dern

Fox Searchlight Pictures
Directed by Jean-Marc Vallée
My rating: 2.5 stars out of 4
IMDb Wikipedia
(Blu-ray, Fox)

Bereaving from the recent death of her mother, college student Reese Witherspoon decides to walk the Pacific Crest Trail in California and Oregon despite having no hiking experience. She struggles with her tent, her fuel, food and water, but especially with the threatening men who seem to turn up at every bend. She also deals with vivid flashbacks about her mother, her heroin addiction, high risk sex life and a persistent fox (poorly CGI'd). At the end of the month's-long ordeal she has a vision of her future, thankfully much happier. Unconvincing portrayal of a real-life event, but you can't fault Witherspoon, who gives it her all.

Hugo (2011)

Hugo (Blu-ray 3D + Blu-ray + DVD + Digital Copy)

Academy Awards, USA 2012

Won Oscar	Best Achievement in Cinematography Robert Richardson
	Best Achievement in Sound Mixing Tom Fleischman John Midgley
	Best Achievement in Sound Editing Philip Stockton Eugene Gearty
	Best Achievement in Visual Effects Robert Legato Joss Williams Ben Grossmann Alex Henning
	Best Achievement in Art Direction Dante Ferretti (production designer) Francesca Lo Schiavo (set decorator)
Nominated Oscar	Best Motion Picture of the Year Graham King Martin Scorsese
	Best Achievement in Directing Martin Scorsese
	Best Writing, Adapted Screenplay John Logan
	Best Achievement in Film Editing Thelma Schoonmaker
	Best Achievement in Costume Design Sandy Powell
	Best Achievement in Music Written for Motion Pictures, Original Score Howard Shore

Paramount Pictures
Directed by Martin Scorsese
My rating: 3 stars out of 4
IMDb Wikipedia
(Blu-ray, Paramount)

An orphaned boy is sent to live with his drunken uncle repairing clocks in a vast Paris train station. He spends his spare time trying to repair an automaton he believes carries a message from his father. He is caught stealing by the owner of a toy shop in the station and agrees to work for him as payback. He befriends the owner's young daughter, who happens to wear a necklace containing a key he needs for the automaton. They get it working, but its message is not from his father but of a mysterious drawing and signature which belong to a pioneer in early cinema long thought dead. Scorsese's paean to the films of Georges Melies threatens to become lost in its vast 3D sets, the first hour is terribly slow, but picks up considerably in the second half, especially for lovers of Melies and early film.

Dirty Wars (2013)

Dirty Wars DVD

Academy Awards, USA 2014

Nominated Oscar

Best Documentary, Features Rick Rowley Jeremy Scahill

IFC Films
Directed by Rick Rowley
My rating: 3 stars out of 4
IMDb Wikipedia
(Netflix)

Journalist Jeremy Scahill investigates claims that innocent women and children were killed in a night time raid in Afghanistan by American special forces, who then attempted to cover it up. He suspects that a special operations force under the direct command of the White House is involved, not just in Afghanistan but in terror hot spots around the globe. A rare glimpse of some of the most dangerous places in the world, in addition to Afghanistan he visits Yemen and Somalia. Some of the images are quite disturbing, particularly of children, but it is a story that must be told, and much of it has been subsequently verified.

Casbah (1948)

Academy Awards, USA 1949

Nominated Oscar

Best Music, Original Song Harold Arlen (music) Leo Robin (lyrics) For the song "For Every Man There's a Woman"

Universal International
Directed by John Berry
My rating: 2.5 stars out of 4
IMDb Wikipedia
(YouTube)

Untouchable criminal Pepe Le Moko thrives in the vast Casbah section of Algiers. If the police try to arrest him, such as the one played by Peter Lorre, the residents strong arm the police and get him free. Pepe sets his sights on the diamonds of a visiting French woman, played by the exotic Swedish beauty Marta Toren, but soon becomes interested in more than her diamonds. She becomes his femme fatale leading to his eventual downfall. Unnecessary second remake of the original French classic unwisely adds songs by leading man Tony Martin. However, the ecclectic casting still makes it worth a look.

Career (1959)

Academy Awards, USA 1960

Nominated Oscar	Best Cinematography, Black-and-White Joseph LaShelle
	Best Art Direction-Set Decoration, Black-and-White Hal Pereira Walter H. Tyler Sam Comer Arthur Krams
	Best Costume Design, Black-and-White Edith Head

Paramount Pictures
Directed by Joseph Anthony
My rating: 2.5 stars out of 4
IMDb Wikipedia
(YouTube)

A young actor moves to NYC with hopes of becoming a star. He soon finds himself living in a cold apartment with barely enough to eat. He meets director Dean Martin who is just as broke. They become roommates while producing off Broadway plays. His old girlfriend shows up unexpectedly one day and they are soon married. However, she becomes disillusioned when he fails to find success as an actor. They break up and he starts a relationship with the daughter of an influential producer, leading to another short-lived marriage. When he finally finds the success he craves, he can't admit that the cost was too high. While the story (co-written by Dalton Trumbo) addresses the addictive narcissism of fame, it too often resorts to melodrama to advance the plot. 

You're a Sweetheart (1937)

Academy Awards, USA 1938

Nominated Oscar

Best Art Direction Jack Otterson

Universal Pictures
Directed by David Butler
My rating: 2 stars out of 4
IMDb Wikipedia
(YouTube)

A Broadway producer comes up with a gimmick to help promote his new show: a millionaire from Oklahoma buys out the house for the entire first week's run because he is in love with leading lady Alice Faye. A waiter stands in for the millionaire, but the impersonation soon gets out of hand and they must come up with money for the production. Familiar plot device is interspersed with elaborate dance numbers and comic relief from Andy Devine, who performs the 13x7=28 routine that Abbott and Costello made famous a few years later.

Going Places (1938)

Academy Awards, USA 1939

Nominated Oscar

Best Music, Original Song Harry Warren (music) Johnny Mercer (lyrics) For the song "Jeepers Creepers".

Warner Bros.
Directed by Ray Enright
My rating: 2 stars out of 4
IMDb Wikipedia
(YouTube)

Department store salesman Dick Powell poses as a horse jockey at a prestigious race as an advertising stunt. He promises to ride the horse of a pretty debutante to impress her, but instead is coerced into riding a wild horse named Jeepers Creepers by a couple of gamblers. Louis Armstrong and his band save the day, since the horse favorably responds to his trumpet playing. Silly story with outdated racial stereotypes, poor Louis Armstrong is forced to sing to a horse.

The Girl Said No (1937)

Academy Awards, USA 1938

Nominated Oscar

Best Sound, Recording A.E. Kaye (Grand National SSD)

Grand National Pictures
Directed by Andrew L. Stone
My rating: 2.5 stars out of 4
IMDb Wikipedia
(YouTube)

Bookie Robert Armstrong falls in love with pretty dance hall girl Irene Hervey. Despite spending lavishly on her, she keeps her distance. He decides to get revenge by posing as a Broadway producer and getting her to invest large sums of money in his ruse. He gets help from a kooky family of actors who want to revive Gilbert and Sullivan operettas. When she unexpectedly falls in love with him, he comes clean in the middle of a performance. Just enough sincerity from Hervey, and laughs from the acting troupe, to keep it interesting.

Thunderbolt (1929)

Academy Awards, USA 1930

Nominated Oscar

Best Actor in a Leading Role George Bancroft No official nominees had been announced this year.

Paramount Pictures
Directed by Josef von Sternberg
My rating: 2 stars out of 4
IMDb Wikipedia
(YouTube)

Lumbering gangster George Bancroft, whose punch has earned him his nickname, has his girlfriend Fay Wray followed home from a nightclub. He becomes incensed when he finds out she is living with a bank clerk. She sets him up for the police, who almost bungle the arrest, but he is sentenced to death row. He frames her boyfriend for murder and has him put in a cell next to him. Intending to murder him before his own execution, Fay shows up to convince him otherwise. Bancroft's monotone delivery makes his best actor nomination something of a head scratcher.

The Royal Family of Broadway (1930)

Academy Awards, USA 1931

Nominated Oscar

Best Actor in a Leading Role Fredric March

Paramount Pictures
Directed by George Cukor and Cyril Gardner
My rating: 2 stars out of 4
IMDb Wikipedia
(YouTube)

A famous and successful family of Broadway actors live an unconventional lifestyle in their luxurious mansion. Their matriarch has no regrets about her chosen profession, her daughter is dealing with an old boyfriend who unexpectedly shows up from South America, while her granddaughter want to get married an leave the profession altogether. Into this mix arrives her son Fredric March, a Hollywood lover on the run from his latest conquest, press in tow. March is entertaining but overacts in his first Oscar nominated role.

The Revenant (2015)

The Revenant (blu-ray)

Academy Awards, USA 2016

Won Oscar	Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role Leonardo DiCaprio
	Best Achievement in Directing Alejandro G. Iñárritu
	Best Achievement in Cinematography Emmanuel Lubezki
Nominated Oscar	Best Motion Picture of the Year Arnon Milchan Steve Golin Alejandro G. Iñárritu Mary Parent Keith Redmon
	Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role Tom Hardy
	Best Achievement in Film Editing Stephen Mirrione
	Best Achievement in Costume Design Jacqueline West
	Best Achievement in Makeup and Hairstyling Sian Grigg Duncan Jarman Robert A. Pandini
	Best Achievement in Sound Mixing Jon Taylor Frank A. Montaño Randy Thom Chris Duesterdiek
	Best Achievement in Sound Editing Martín Hernández Lon Bender
	Best Achievement in Visual Effects Richard McBride Matt Shumway Jason Smith Cameron Waldbauer
	Best Achievement in Production Design Jack Fisk (production design) Hamish Purdy (set decoration)

Twentieth Century-Fox Film
Directed by Alejandro G. Iñárritu
My rating: 3.5 stars out of 4
IMDb Wikipedia
(Blu-ray, Fox)

Fur trapper Leonardo DiCaprio is viciously attacked by a grizzly bear. He is found barely alive, but his fellow trappers don't think he will survive for long. A couple of men, along with his half breed son, are paid to stay and give him a decent burial, but when he refuses to die one of them murders his son and tricks the other man into abandoning him. After witnessing the murder, DiCaprio is determined to track them down. He improbably survives alone, and gravely injured, in the cold wilderness, eventually befriended by an Indian and ending up at a fort where he finds the man. Incredible location shooting overwhelms just about every aspect of this film. There are a couple of obvious CGI moments, particularly the bear attack, that diminish the impact, but this is still an impressive, and obviously dangerous, shoot in perhaps the ultimate survivor story.

The Martian (2015)

The Martian [Blu-ray]

Academy Awards, USA 2016

Nominated Oscar	Best Motion Picture of the Year Simon Kinberg Ridley Scott Michael Schaefer Mark Huffam
	Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role Matt Damon
	Best Writing, Adapted Screenplay Drew Goddard
	Best Achievement in Sound Mixing Paul Massey Mark Taylor Mac Ruth
	Best Achievement in Sound Editing Oliver Tarney
	Best Achievement in Visual Effects Richard Stammers Anders Langlands Chris Lawrence Steven Warner
	Best Achievement in Production Design Arthur Max (production design) Celia Bobak (set decoration)

Twentieth Century-Fox Film
Directed by Ridley Scott
My rating: 3 stars out of 4
IMDb Wikipedia
(Blu-ray, Fox)

Astronauts exploring the surface of Mars are forced to abort the mission due to a severe wind storm that threatens to topple their lander. One of the crew members is struck by an antenna and left for dead. He wakes up after the storm buried in dust, but alone. His amazing improvisational skills and scientific knowledge, particularly in botany, allow him to survive, even thrive, in the harsh environment. He eventually manages to contact Earth and a rescue mission is planned using his old crew mates. Long but entertaining sci fi yarn, its dry scientific accuracy offset by equally dry humor from Damon.