Editor’s Note: Freeline Media movie critic Mike Fried takes a look at whether there’s an expiration date on movies considered classics. Do they all hold up? Read on!
By MIKE FRIED
REVISITING SOME OLD CLASSICS
SHOLAY (1975)
*****
If you would have told me 25 years ago that there was an excellent western that came out of Bollywood, I would have scoffed. I mean, Bollywood was all about musicals and dramas, right?
Well, my good friend Aarti opened my eyes when she bought me the DVD of Sholay back in 2001 and I immediately fell in love with it.
Inspector Thakur Baldev Singh has some troubles, and he recruits two small time criminals to help him. He remembers them from a few years back when — even through Singh was escorting them as prisoners — they came to Singh’s aid to repel a group of bandits. The two men, Jai and Veeru, agree to help Singh capture a notorious bandit named Gabbar Singh. Thakur Baldev Singh wants revenge against Gabbar Singh for killing his family.
And the scene that happens happens in comes straight out of Sergio Leone’s epic Once Upon a Time in the West, right down to the camera angles and the creaking metal against a silent backdrop. It’s a masterfully crafted scene in a masterfully executed movie, and it’s why this movie is my favorite Indian film of all time, even ahead of some wonderful Satyajit Ray movies and other classic movies of the 1950s and recent big budget films. There’s even some scenes that echo The Wild Bunch with its slow motion shootouts.
It’s a really serious movie; but the relationship between Jai and Veeru, especially in the early scenes, lightens the mood.
Interestingly, this film was not received well when it first came out, with reviewers claiming it had too much of a western influence; but that’s what makes it work for me. But it did run for five (5) years straight and it revolutionized Hindi cinema. I don’t know if we would have films like Baahubali or RRR without Sholay.
Ramesh Sippy’s direction is spot on and the performances by Sanjeev Kumar as Thakur Baldev Singh, Dharmendra as Veeru and the great Amitabh Bachchan as Jai makes this film work so well. Hema Malini adds a lot of humor as Basanti, Veeru’s love interest. In addition, Vikas Anand as a goofy jailer with a thorough inferiority complex makes the scenes he is in very enjoyable.
What the film does best is mesh low humor and high drama into a 190 minute delight that is so well paced that it seems half the length. There is never a moment where the movie flags.
It is an exciting action film that has inspired many, many future action films and we should be grateful for that.
I can only hope that the Final Cut finds its way to a 4K release or even better, a U.S. theatrical release near me.
There is nothing about this film that I did not like.
WATCH IT!
SEVEN DAYS IN MAY (1964)
*****
A Marine Colonel, Jiggs Casey, the adjutant to James Mattoon Scott’s Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, intercepts a message from the Navy Chief of Staff bowing out of the Chairman’s Preakness betting pool. But then he runs into an old buddy of his who is the second in command of a secret Army base called Econcom, a base which he — as adjutant to the JCOS — should know about.
Only, he doesn’t.
And Jiggs gets a few more disturbing bits of information that lead him to believe that an alert scheduled for seven days hence is nothing more than an attempt by Mattoon to lead a military overthrow of the U.S. Government. He goes to the President with his concerns a small group of men whom the President trusts try to derail this attack.
This is a really scary movie because it makes clear how easily this could happen. Rod Serling’s script is eerily prescient and while the notion of a coup d’état might not happen, it is strongly plausible that a seizure of command and communications could occur, especially as outlined in this film.
Under John Frankenheimer’s astute direction, this movie crackles. It is in my top ten of governmental films and based on the novel by Fletcher Knebel and Charles Bailey II, this film never gets old. It is one of the most perfectly cast films in history. Kirk Douglas — who produced and plays Casey — and Burt Lancaster, as Mattoon, team up for the fifth time and you can tell that they enjoy acting together, even though they play characters thoroughly at odds. Fredric March is outstanding as Jordan Lyman, the beleaguered president whose approval rating is the lowest in history.
But it’s the supporting cast that really shines. From White House Chief of Staff Martin Balsam to Presidential confidant George Macready and Senator Edmond O’Brien (who was nominated for a best supporting actor Oscar for his performance), the entire cast really brings the plot to life. Ava Gardner is wasted but still good in a small but pivotal role. And 1960s TV mainstay Andrew Duggan is excellent as “Mud” Henderson, the second in command of the secret base that he doesn’t realize is so secret. There’s even the film debut, albeit uncredited, of future Oscar winner John Houseman.
Frankenheimer’s close relationship with JFK helped aid in the realism of the film and it was one of the first movies, if not the first, to accurately portray the interior of the White House, given the access that was provided by President Kennedy. And it was so realistic that the production design was nominated for an Oscar as well.
Fun Fact: this movie was banned in Brazil due to the military coup that occurred there because of the plot similarities.
It’s a terrific film that gets better with each viewing and a terrifying portend of things that have not yet come to pass.
WATCH IT!
THE BANK DICK (1940)
*****
Still one of the finest comedies ever made.
This, coupled with Its A Gift, are WC Fields’ two greatest works. As Egbert Souse (Sousay — accent grave over the E), Fields shines as a smoking, drinking reprobate who manages to direct a motion picture and nail two bank robbers, thus getting him the titular position — which he screws up immediately.
Fields is at his best and the entire supporting cast equally serves their master ably with a fine script by Mahatma Kane Jeeves (Fields under a pseudonym that comes from his old vaudeville joke ‘My hat, my cane, Jeeves”). Kudos go to Cora Witherspoon, Una Merkel, Grady Sutton and Shemp Howard — yeah THAT Shemp Howard — add so much to the story as does regular comic foil Franklin Pangborn who Fields goes out of his way to torment.
Sight gags galore abound and the final car chase is hysterical. “The old Mogo on the a-go-go” as well as the construction ditch gags are timeless classics.
And it doesn’t hurt having Shemp Howard’s Joe the Bartender whistling “Listen to the Mockingbird” which was used in the Three Stooges shorts up until a couple of years before this film.
Do yourself a favor: If you haven’t seen this, WATCH IT!
If you’ve seen it, Watch it AGAIN!
And we can’t have a discussion of The Bank Dick without discussing It’s a Gift, so here we go.
IT’S A GIFT (1934)
*****
Harold Bissonette (don’t let his wife hear you say anything but “Bison-ay”) is a disgruntled grocery store owner who decides to sell his grocery store and buy an orange grove in California, which he has been told is worthless, but he doesn’t care. But he keeps getting yelled at by his shrewish wife, sometimes deservedly, sometimes not as much. His kids are no winners. And this happens and that happens.
The plot is so unimportant to this film, WC Fields’ best film. What does matter is the gags. And they are priceless.
There’s “I want my kumquats,” where a blind man is in the grocery store filled with light bulbs, a picnic on private property and, above all, Harold trying to sleep out on the back porch with constant interruptions.
I’ve watched this movie innumerable times and I still laugh. Like Airplane, it never gets old.
Fields is as curmudgeonly as ever. His slow burn is used to his maximum effect and there are nice slices of his old vaudeville routines. Fields oversaw the entire production, even writing the script under the pseudonym Charles Bogle (he wrote The Bank Dick under the pseudonym MAHATMA KANE JEEVES – “my hat, my cane Jeeves so why not?)
This is one of those MUST WATCH films.
Michael Fried has no formal training in movies, except having watched over 26,000+ movies — if not more — in his 60-plus years on this planet, starting with Goldfinger as his first cinema experience. He knows what he likes and he knows what he doesn’t like, and it’s quite often different from the conventional wisdom. He knows that the best franchise is Godzilla and he loves action movies and comedies. He has not been nominated for any awards except some boring insurance awards which has no applicability to movies (with the possible exceptions of Billy Wilder’s Double Indemnity and John Cassavettes’ Big Trouble). He is part of a team that won the 1980 SUNY Albany Trivia content by correctly guessing the question, “Who played the president of Klopstockia in Million Dollar Legs?” So he has that going for him, which is nice.
Contact Mike at moviemike3@yahoo.com and mike.fried@yahoo.com.
