FEBRUARY 1982, STOCKHOLM

Robert Manthoulis: En remontant le Mississippi / Out of the Blacks, Into the Blues 1 : Le Blues du Sud / Along the Old Man River (FR 1973) Brownie McGhee sings "John Henry" (together with Sonny Terry, offscreen).

TV: Hit 1.2.1982. Sun Cats live. B. A. Robinson & Maggie Bell: Hold Me. Kim Wilde: Cambodia. Bill Haley: Crazy Man Crazy. The Tremeloes: Someone Someone.
Casanova / Casanovan lemmenseikkailut. FR 1927. D: Alexandre Volkoff. Ivan Mosjoukine. Filmklubben / Filmhuset. A 9½ mm presentation, ca 80 min, a passable pictorial quality. The orgy scenes famous from the stills were not in evidence in this print. An extravagantly magnificent spectacle, empty inside. Mosjoukine is impressive and not that different from Sutherland in the Fellini version.
TERHI'S VIDEOS. From the programme Chrome 22. The dB's: She's Not Worried [?, impressive colour transformations]: power pop. The Human League: Don't You Want Me: synth pop. Ray Davies: Predictable (*). Thomas Dolby: Europa And The Pirate Twins. Heaven 17: Penthouse And Pavement. +
Alfred Hitchcock Presents: Wet Saturday. TV episode. US 1956. D: Alfred Hitchcock. Sir Cedric Hardwicke.
Ball of Fire / Jään tänne yöksi. US 1941. D: Howard Hawks. tv. Somewhat namby-pamby despite script by Wilder & Brackett and the excellent Stanwyck as Sugarpuss.
A Chump at Oxford. tv. half. [2]
Sympathy for the Devil. GB 1968. D: Jean-Luc Godard. The Rolling Stones. Kvartersbion. Apparently the commercial version. The political side is just boring posing. The Rolling Stones part is good, fascinating documentation on how the track is developed.
JAZZ & BLUES 12. Fkl / Fh:
En remontant le Mississippi / Out of the Blacks, Into the Blues. TV doc. FR/DE 1973. 1: Along the Old Man River. 2: A Way to Escape the Ghetto. Robert Pete Williams, Bukka White, Furry Lewis, Roosevelt Sykes, Sonny Terry & Brownie McGhee (*), B. B. King (*), Mance Lipscomb.
JAZZ & BLUES 13. Fkl / Fh:
Chicago Blues. US 1971. D: Harvey Cokliss. Johnnie Lewis (*), Floyd Jones, Buddy Guy, Muddy Waters (*), J.B. Hutto and Junior Wells. +
Larry Johnson. US 1970. D: John Hammond, Jr. He's powerful.
Blues Like Showers of Rain. GB 1970. D: John Jeremy. A photo montage to music selected and recorded (?) by Paul Oliver. My favourite: J.B. Lenoir: Been Down So Long; It Hurts Me So Bad.
TV: Hit 8.2.1982. Vox Pop live. Carpenters: Beechwood 4-5789. ELO: Hold On Tight [?]. Sonny & Cher: I Got You Babe. Rachel Sweet: And Then He Kissed Me. Rachel Sweet: Be My Baby.
Rich and Strange / Rikkauden huuma. GB 1932. D: Alfred Hitchcock. Fkl / Fh. Strange but not rich.
The Unforgiven / Leppymättömät. US 1960. D: John Huston. Fkl / Fh. Starts beautifully, and the Griffith association is not only because of Lillian Gish. But ends uglily, the racist tones reportedly Burt Lancaster's fault.
JAZZ & BLUES 14. Fkl /Fh:
St. Louis Blues. US 1929. D: Dudley Murphy. Bessie Smith. +
Leadbelly. US 1945. He sings three numbers. Colour. +
Big Bill Blues. BG 1956. D: Jean Délire. He performs four numbers in a night club in Brussels. * +
Meade Lux Lewis. Three excerpts from 1940s movies +
Mahalia Jackson. CBS News 1961. A memorial programme of ca 30 min *
The Ministry of Fear / Erään merkin varjossa. US 1944. D: Fritz Lang. Graham Greene. Fkl / Fst. A masterpiece.
On purge bébé / [Pannaan lapsi potalle]. FR 1931. D: Jean Renoir. Michel Simon. Fkl / Fst. A dragging farce. The protagonist is an industrialist who is enthusiastic about an unbreakable chamberpot. In the presence of an army dignitary (Michel Simon) as lunch guest the new product is tested by throwing it against the wall, and it shatters into a thousand splinters. It could be promising (satire of the "anal character" of order and discipline), but the means of the sound cinema are not yet in R's command. The gap to his next film, La Chienne, is enormous.
The Ministry of Fear [2]
Woyzeck / Woyzeck - kidutettu. DE 1979. D: Werner Herzog. Georg Büchner. Klaus Kinski. In the tiny screen of a mini tv.
Designing Woman / Mieheni entinen. US 1957. D: Vincente Minnelli. tv. Ok comedy. Two favourite scenes: 1) Gregory Peck's ex "lets slip" hot ravioli on his pants, 2) Peck visiting for the first time Lauren Bacall's design home compares it to his sport reporter's dump and states: "Bad for the ego".
TV: Hit 15.2.1982. Beauty live. The Hollies: a potpourri of their oldies + Take My Love And Run [?]. Little Richard: Long Tall Sally. Gene Pitney: Town Without Pity [?]. Adam Faith & The Roulettes: Poor Me [2]. The Specials: Ghost Town. Colin Blunstone: What Becomes Of The Broken Hearted. James Brown: Rap Payback. Stevie Nicks & Tom Petty: Stop Draggin' My Heart Around.
TV: Måndagsbörsen 15.2.1982. Chaz Jankel: Questionnaire (*). Alice live. ELO: Twilight. Lonnie Donegan live.
TERHI'S VIDEOS. Robert Palmer: Some Guys Have All The Luck. Landscape: Norman Bates. Depeche Mode: Just Can't Get Enough. Adam & The Ants: Prince Charming. The Pretenders: Message Of Love ("the reason we're here"). Pat Benatar: Fire And Ice. The Tubes: Suzie Girl. Linx: Intuition. Spandau Ballet: Paint Me Down. Duran Duran: Careless Memories. Pete Shelley: Homosapien. The Police: Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic. The Church: In Unguarded Moments. etc. +
Da nao tian gong / Uproar in Heaven 1-2 / Kung Markatta / Apinakuningas. CN 1965. D: Wan Laiming. Shanghai Animation Film Studio, based on the Pilgrimage to the West. A masterpiece.
TV: Dallas 37: Kvinnorna Ewing. US 1979
Finian's Rainbow / Finianin sateenkaari. US 1968. D: Francis Ford Coppola. tv. A version of over 2 hrs. Basically a fiasco, yet an often captivating fairy-tale. The American dream still in pure form: a 1940s Broadway hit, Fred Astaire, Hermes Pan, Rainbow Valley, still caught this well this late. The searchers find the end of the rainbow in a little village in Deep South. They find the treasure and are granted the opportunity to realize three wishes. One of the wishes is that the racist bigot white governor is turned black... (Because of this it was impossible to film this before).
TV: Hit 22.2.1982. Warm Guns live. Alvin Stardust live. The Human League: Open Your Heart. Dance styles: the madison (1960), the locomotion (1962). Dollar: Mirror, Mirror. Bill Wyman: Si, Si, Je Suis Un Rock Star. Shakin' Stevens: Oh! Julie.
TV: Måndagsbörsen 22.2.1982. Janne Garman live. M.A. Numminen & Pedro Hietanen live. Hall & Oates: I Can't Go For That. Secret Service: Flash In The Night. Chris de Burgh live.
The Fugitive / Elämisen oikeus. US 1947. D: John Ford. Graham Greene. Henry Fonda. Fkl / Fst. A phony look at the Mexican revolution.
TV: Dokument utifrån - Där kokainen härskar. FR. Shot in Bolivia, Florida.
Zezowate szczéscie / Kierosilmäinen onni / Olycksfågeln / Bad Luck / De la veine à revendre. PL 1960. D: Andrzej Munk. Fkl / Fh. The master's touch in evidence, but there is a bitter, burnt-out taste in this would-be-comedy.
Pasazerka / Matkustaja. PL 1961/1963. D: Andrzej Munk. The strongest fiction I had seen set on a concentration camp. The director's vision on levels seldom reached (Bergman, Resnais). This could have influenced others like Bergman's Persona.
Tristana. tv. half an hour. [2] His worst.
TERHI'S VIDEOS. Elvis Costello in Nashville (material from the album Trust). +
Alfred Hitchcock Presents: Into Thin Air. US 1955. D: Don Medford. The same story as So Long At the Fair (Terence Fisher).
A kedves szomszéd / Mukava naapuri. HU 1979. D: Zsolt Kézdi-Kovács. Fkl / Fh. Nice.