“What did you do during the pandemic, Aunty Marie?” “Well dear, I spent half the year watching a whole pile of black and white films, and the world felt like a better place.”
If you’ve read the first part of my top picks of 2020, you’ll know that I allowed myself some (well, a lot to be honest) wriggle room with my choices due to the limited number of releases and viewing opportunities I had for fresh fodder.
However, being on lockdown for effectively five months of the year allowed me to catch up with a truck-load of older films which I had been waiting to view. Some of them were ones I had been embarrassed not to have seen, others were names I had heard but knew little about – in both cases, a number of them completely overwhelmed me with their brilliance so I wanted to share my favourite first-time watches with you here. I was helped massively by taking advantage of a three-month free trial for Mubi, and I haven’t looked back since.
What follows is in a vague order of ranking, but only vague, as it seems unfair to put 50 years of cinema against each other!
Number 10 The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948, dir John Huston)
I love this! I mean, Humphrey Bogart is always a good watch, and I should not have been surprised, but I had always marked this down as more of a cowboy shoot ‘em up type thing. But no, but this is a lot more engaging and intricate than anything I had imagined, and turned out to be positively Shakespearian. Also, I coincidentally saw this not long before viewing Spike Lee’s Da 5 Bloods – which was helpful!
Number 9 The Big Heat (1953, dir Fritz Lang)
I enjoy a good noir but for some reason had never got round to this one before. It’s a nasty noir, with a good few brutal moments and a quite terrifying Lee Marvin. Glenn Ford battling corruption is a thing to behold, and Gloria Grahame is magnificent.
Number 8 Mephisto (1981, dir by István Szabó)
Kino Lorber did some great work this year with releases under its Kino Marquee umbrella for virtual screenings, and the 4K restoration of Mephisto was the standout title for me. It features a memorable performance from Klaus Maria Brandauer as a Faust-like character who becomes a puppet for Nazi propaganda while convincing himself that he is still only an actor. His downfall is inevitable, chilling and utterly avoidable, which is his true tragedy.
Number 7 Quai des Orfèvres (1947, dir Henri-Georges Clouzot)
I love Louis Jouvet in this! In fact, I love it all! A bunch of disparate people trying to get back on their feet post-war, with all the intrigue of jealous lovers and the chaos backstage at the music hall theatre. The audience (though not the police) gets the murder confession early on, and then accompanies Jouvet’s Inspector Antoine as he bumbles around Columbo-style trying to work things out. It’s great!
Number 6 Mr. Klein (1976, dir Joseph Losey)
Mubi did a short season looking at the films of Joseph Losey over the summer, so I was able to watch a number of them and I will admit that they turned out to be not generally my cup of tea. However, Mr. Klein is something totally different. With Alain Delon in the title role, the film examines identity and indifference in Nazi-occupied France in 1942. It’s an unsettling reminder of how passivity and arrogance combine to produce unintended complicity in something terrible. The final scene is chilling.
Number 5 Seventeen Moments of Spring (1973, Tatyana Lioznova)
Perhaps a little cheat, but this was a story that enthralled me! It’s a 12-part Russian spy series in which Vyacheslav Tikhonov plays a Russian spy who infiltrates the Nazi SS in 1945. It’s real East/West ideological stuff and puts the main (fictional) character in among true events while giving some real drama. I stumbled across it on social media somehow; it was made available for a short time by Kino Klassika. The twisty turny spy story was more Smiley than Bond, and was very entertaining. Great score, too!
Number 4 Blind Chance (1981/87, dir Krzysztof Kieślowski)
Blind Chance is part of the Arrow Academy box-set Cinema of Conflict: Four Films by Krzysztof Kieślowski which I was fortunate to be able to preview. The entire collection is worth investing in, but this is the one of the selection that really hit the right spot for me. Made in 1981 but only released in 1987 due to having been withheld from release by the Polish censor under martial law, it examines choice, chance and perhaps even destiny. The film presents three possible outcomes to a single, seemingly banal event – a young medical student running to catch a train – and has a most striking ending. It also features a short fragment which remains unrestored following censorship, but the audio that accompanies is more than sufficient to let the audience understand what is happening.
Number 3 Le Doulos (1962, dir Jean-Pierre Melville)
Another of Mubi’s gifts this spring/summer; they ran a series of films by the brilliant French director Jean-Pierre Melville just as I signed up, and I have to tell you, any of them could have made this list (apart from Le Samouraï, which I had already seen). But I went for Le Doulos in the end. There are not many films that end with me giving a round of applause while sitting all alone in my living room, but this succeeded. Yes, you do need to concentrate to keep up with the plot machinations, but it all falls into place sweetly. Jean-Paul Belmondo is fabulous. And a 10-minute one-shot, one-room scene so subtle that I had to go back and check that it actually happened – absolute genius from everyone involved.
Number 2 Dekalog (1989, dir Krzysztof Kieślowski)
Yes, in its entirety.
Having adored the Arrow Academy box-set Cinema of Conflict: Four Films by Krzysztof Kieślowski (see Number 4above) I noticed that the box-set of Dekalog was available on their site, so I picked it up as it had been on my watch list for quite some time. I was not disappointed. As a complete work, these 10 hours must be among the best ever made. I ranked and reviewed them as I watched them in this list, and there’s very little to choose between most of them in terms of ranking. On one viewing only, my absolute favourite was 5, the one I liked least was 3, and spots 4-8 are pretty much all on the same level. I’m sure I will watch these again and again, and I’m also sure the order will be flexible too. But what an amazing collection of films.
Number 1 La Grande Illusion (1937, dir Jean Renoir)
Apart from the fact that Jean Gabin was a total snack, it’s amazing to think that this film with a definite anti-war and anti-class system sentiment appeared so presciently in 1937. Also loved the editing; no hanging around, everything moves on at a fair pace. I also laughed out loud several times; the humour was spot on! So happy to have discovered this over 80 years after it was made.
Isn’t cinema wonderful!
(Editor’s Note: When you have a list like Marie does in 2020… it isn’t just Wonderful it’s transcendent.)