13 Nights of Shocktober: Shadow of a Doubt

 by A.J. 

Night 5: Hitchcock Night/Suburban Horror Night II

“Do you know if you ripped the front off houses you’d find swine? The world is a hell.”

Shadow of a Doubt

Master filmmaker Alfred Hitchcock directed so many truly great movies that even several of his less famous movies are among his greatest and the greatest of any era. Shadow of a Doubt is not as famous as Rear Window, Vertigo, Psycho, or North by Northwest, but it is secretly one of his greatest movies. At first it may seem like a slight or minor movie given its small scale and quaint setting, however these aspects belie its dark and unsettling plot. It is also the epitome of Hitchcock’s ultimate career long theme: danger is always lurking and will come at the most unexpected time in the most unexpected form to someone who feels completely safe.

The stars, Joseph Cotton and Teresa Wright, are two of my favorite classic era performers. This movie is where I first saw them. The setting is Santa Rosa, California, a town so average it could be Anytown, USA. It is so idyllic and cozy that things like crime and murder and even war don’t seem possible there, even though the year is 1943. There is no trace of darkness in the home of Young Charlie, that is until Uncle Charlie arrives. 

Teenage Young Charlie (Teresa Wright) is discontent with the mundanity of suburban comfort and longs for something to rejuvenate her family. The change comes with the arrival of lively and charming Uncle Charlie (Joseph Cotton), who does indeed recharge the household dynamic. He also brings darkness that Young Charlie could not have imagined. Though mother Emma (Patricia Collinge)–Hitchcock’s last sympathetic portrayal of a mother–delights in having her brother with her, the real connection is between the two Charlies. The very morning she planned on sending him a telegram to come visit, the family receives a telegram that Uncle Charlie is on his way. No one has any suspicions that he is possibly The Merry Widow Murderer.

There are a lot of things I like about Shadow of a Doubt, but what makes it special are the performances of Teresa Wright and Joseph Cotton. They are excellent choices to play average Americans while still being distinct. Joseph Cotton rarely played a villain but he does a fantastic job playing a complex character that is as sinister as he is charming. He never does anything forthrightly villainous, at least not for most of the movie, but he behaves just suspicious enough for Young Charlie to have doubts about him. In Cotton’s best scene Uncle Charlie’s jovial mask begins to slip and delivers a speech brimming with contempt and disgust about rich windows: “[Husbands] die and leave their money to their wives, their silly wives, .... these useless women...drinking the money, losing the money… faded, fat, greedy women.”

As Young Charlie, Teresa Wright is fresh-faced and lively, at first. She is perhaps naïve but she is not dull or dim. Once her suspicions are raised, she does detective work of her own and puts the pieces and clues together. The scene where she finds the newspaper story about the Merry Widow Murderer that Uncle Charlie hid from the family is an effective one. Hitchcock wanted the camera instead of Wright to gasp so it pulls back from a close-up to a wide overhead shot. My favorite moment comes when Young Charlie finally makes her appearance at a dinner party as Uncle Charlie is about to give a toast. She descends the stairs wearing the ring he gave her, a ring she now realizes is evidence. The camera pushes in from a wide shot of Charlie to a close up of the ring. Neither she nor Uncle Charlie say anything about the ring, but the tone of the entire scene changes for her and him and the audience though it remains the same for the other characters. 

That things are not what they seem and pleasant appearances and behavior belie a hidden menace were frequent themes of Hitchcock’s movies. Just about every Hitchcock movie dealt with the dark side of human nature and society to some degree. This is especially pronounced in Shadow of a Doubt. Perhaps the darkest sequence is when Uncle Charlie takes his niece to a seedy bar to confront her about her suspicions. Smoke fills the bar and their waitress is a former classmate of Young Charlie’s who wears a bitter, dour expression, looks at her and says, “I never thought I’d see you here.” When he realizes that he cannot charm her any longer, Uncle Charlie tells her how little she knows about the world. His words are harsh and cynical but they sting because there is truth in them. This scene is similar to the sequence in David Lynch’s Blue Velvet where young and naïve Jeffery (Kyle MacLachlan) goes to Lincoln Avenue, the bad and dangerous part of his small, quaint town, and sees and learns harsh realities. I do not know for sure how much Shadow of a Doubt influenced Blue Velvet but the two films share similar themes and would make a great double feature. (Shadow of a Doubt certainly had a more direct influence on the film Stoker, a previous Shocktober recommendation, which is also about a newly arrived sinister Uncle Charlie who casts a spell over his niece). The ending might feel anticlimactic but it turns out to be a subversive conclusion fitting for this surprisingly dark and challenging classic.

Shadow of a Doubt airs on TCM on Sunday, October 26th at 9PM CT and might be at your local library.

13 Nights of Shocktober: Mulholland Drive

by A.J.

Night 4: David Lynch Memorial Night

“I hope that I never see that face, ever, outside of a dream.”

Mulholland Drive

Earlier this year the great David Lynch passed away at the at age of 78 and his loss was greatly felt by fans and cinephiles. I never considered myself a fan but his death affected me more than I expected. It wasn’t until relatively recently that I came to appreciate his films and style. I think what really helped was that I realized his films are not puzzles to be solved. There are no answers because that was never the point. The point was what the experience made you feel. There was something very sincere and even endearing in the experience that he wanted to give the viewer.

Of all his notable films, Mulholland Drive has come to be regarded as Lynch’s masterpiece, at least by film critics. In terms of indecipherableness, Mulholland Drive rests in a sweet spot between being frustratingly incomprehensible like Inland Empire or Lost Highway and being relatively straight forward with some oddness here and there like Blue Velvet or Wild at Heart. I don’t mean to suggest that Mulholland Drive is decipherable but it is certainly less intimidating than the 3-hour surreal odyssey of Inland Empire. Mulholland Drive may not technically be a horror movie but it is frightening at times and unsettling throughout. The first time I saw it was late at night and it so unnerved me that I did not want to go to sleep. 

The plot oscillates between a fun amateur detective story and a strange, dark Noir. Naomi Watts plays fresh faced Betty who has just moved to Los Angeles to pursue her dream of being an actress. She is so impossibly innocent and kind hearted that when she finds another woman (Laura Harring) showering in her aunt’s vacant apartment she assumes the woman is a friend of her aunt. Actually the woman doesn’t know who she is but we know she barely escaped being murdered and was in a bad car accident. She calls herself Rita after a poster of Rita Hayworth and Betty befriends her and becomes determined to find out Rita’s lost identity. There is also the plot involving Adam (Justin Theroux), a young movie director being forced to cast a specific actress by mysterious men in suits. The plots do converge though not in a conventional way. 

What makes this a horror movie, more than any of the surreal, frightening imagery are the ideas at play. Dreams, nightmares, and what is really real loom large and foreboding over Mulholland Drive; not being sure which is which seems to be the main theme of the movie, at least for me. If you ever wondered what it is like to be trapped in a dream or not know whether you are awake or dreaming, this is a good example. Lynch rejected being labeled a surrealist, though that is the easiest way to describe his approach to films and television. Of course, the best adjective is Lynchian, though you have to watch a few of his movies before you understand what that entails, and even then the term has been defined only loosely. Lynchian can refer to how his films often presented a seemingly idyllic setting only to reveal the dark secrets and hidden violence known but not spoken of (Blue Velvet is a good example of this). It can refer to nightmarish but captivating imagery mixed with the mundane (Eraserhead, Lost Highway). It can refer just to the overall ominous mood that dominates whatever is on screen no matter how cheery or mundane it may seem. More than a story or theme, it is a mood or feeling that Lynch wants his films to convey. 

The scariest moment happens in a seemingly unrelated scene with minor characters. Dan (Patrick Fischler, a character actor who you’ll recognize even if you don’t recognize the name) meets with a friend at Winkie’s Diner and tells him about a dream. In the dream he is at Winkie’s Diner with that friend who is standing in line to pay and he is terrified and realizes that there is a “man” behind the restaurant making him scared. Dan brought his friend there to prove to himself that there is nothing to the dream. Then the friend gets up to pay and Dan realizes that the dream is happening. They go outside behind the restaurant and what happens is maybe the most effective jump-scare in film history, even though, like Dan, you know what is going to happen. Did he make the dream come true? Was he having the dream again? His experience is the same whether what happens is real or not, so does it matter? This dilemma reflects Betty’s experience, even in the surreal third act. It also reflects a real life fear that many people have, that in trying to find comfort in disproving something they make it true. 

Mulholland Drive began as a TV pilot for ABC, the same network that produced Lynch’s beloved and classic series Twin Peaks, but the network canceled the pilot after an illfated early morning preview. After a year of negotiations, Lynch secured additional funding from the French production company Canal+, wrote 18 additional pages, reassembled the cast, and turned the failed pilot into a movie. You can probably guess the point where the pilot ends and the additional scenes begin. Yet, this provides another possible point for where dreams or reality stop, or start. A TV pilot typically contains many starting points for a series to expand upon in later episodes. This happens here but not every character or plot is expanded  or tied together, at least not in a conclusive way. My favorite of these false starts is the inept hitman. The most disturbing is the character of the Cowboy who meets with Adam the director and tells him, “Now... you will see me one more time, if you do good. You will see me... two more times, if you do bad.” 

You’ll hear or read that the first two thirds of the movie are a dream and the final third is the nightmarish reality. Of course the first two thirds could be a reality unrecognizable to us and the final third is a nightmare, quotidian and grim by comparison. Maybe the dream had a nightmare? One of the very first images we see is someone under bedsheets. Is everything after a dream? Was it Betty in bed? Or Rita? Or Diane? Or Camilla? Even Adam? Lynch, famously, would never answer direct questions about the meaning of his movies. When asked about symbolism or meaning of Mulholland Drive he would wryly answer with statements like “I think you know” or respond to an interpretation with a simple and definitive but polite, “No.” He began his career as an artist and painter, then an avant-garde experimental filmmaker before making his first feature, Eraserhead. I think understanding Lynch’s career path goes a long to way to understanding not the meaning but the purpose of his films. He created the work, set it out, and it is up to the viewer to provide the interpretation.

Mullholland Drive is available to rent on AppleTV and Fandango At Home. It is also available on DVD & Blu-ray from the Criterion Collection and probably at your local library.

Best Pictures #116: 2024 (97th) Academy Awards Best Picture Nominee: Conclave

by A.J.

Best Pictures #116: 2024 (97th) Academy Awards Best Picture Nominee

Conclave

“No sane man would want the papacy.”

A movie about the college of cardinals meeting in conclave, the paradoxically famous and secretive gathering to elect the new pope, could be so reverent and serious as to be pandering and dull or it could be so artificially sensational as to be tawdry and disrespectful. Director Edward Berger's Conclave, based on the novel by Robert Harris, finds a delicate and wonderful balance. This isn’t an exposé of the Catholic church, nor is it a Christ-sploitation movie. This is an exciting and thrilling film full of intrigue and secret conversations, incredible performances, and excellent filmmaking on every level. The result is an absorbing and electrifying film, without a doubt one of the best of 2024. 

After the death of the pope (from natural causes), the task of assembling and running the conclave falls to the dean of the college of cardinals, Cardinal Lawrence played by Ralph Fiennes. We learn early on that he is dealing with doubts, not so much in faith but in himself, and tried to resign from his position at the Vatican but the pope refused his resignation. He is dedicated to doing his job well, but everyone and everything seems to be against the conclave running smoothly. All the better for us. The candidates emerge: the liberal Bellini (Stanley Tucci), the conservative Adeyemi (Lucian Msamati), the ultra-conservative Tedesco (Sergio Castellitto), the opportunist Tremblay (John Lithgow), and the drama and infighting begins. 

The cast is an incredible collection of great performers, some well known, others lesser known but no less impressive. The breakout performance belongs to Sergio Castellitto as the ultra-conservative Italian Cardinal Tedesco. He arrives with such force that wind billows under his red coat making it look like a cape. At one point he howls with laughter and is constantly vaping. Carlos Diehz finds the exact notes necessary for the quiet and mysterious Cardinal Benitez, who no one knew about and arrived only at the last minute. Brían F. O'Byrne as O'Malley, Cardinal Lawrence’s right hand man, gets to play the only character who is maybe more stressed out than Cardinal Lawrence and provides some comic relief. Isabella Rossellini lends her great screen presence to a small and mostly silent role. Nevertheless she has a stand out scene and curtseys like it is a mic drop. Of course Tucci and Lithgow shine at every moment. 

At the head of the incredible ensemble is Ralph Fiennes, giving one of his best performances in a very impressive career. His Best Actor nomination is most deserved. It is clear Lawrence does not want his job, and he certainly doesn’t want votes when they start coming his way, but he also wants everything to go the way it should and the most worthy man to be elected. When his frustrations boil over, even his outbursts feel constrained, but Fiennes conveys everything that Lawrence tries to conceal. Lawrence does not have the most lines. He is a character who observes and reacts. Fiennes makes a would-be passive character into a sympathetic and relatable leading man.

Many reviews have called Conclave pulpy, trashy, even like an airport novel, but I have a word that better describes Conclave: fun. I suspect that this caught many people off guard and will continue to do. For several scenes Cardinal Lawrence has to be a detective, searching for information and answers without directly breaking the sequester. Characters gossip, scandals are uncovered; there are whispers in hallways late at night, and shouts in the cafeteria. The pageantry and rituals of the Vatican provide a certain level of class and seriousness, but the brilliance of this story is that it remembers that all of these aged holy men are just people and people can be petty, ambitious, deceitful, secretive, and sometimes even righteous. The Oscar nominated screenplay by Peter Straughan (who also wrote the adaptation for the brilliant character piece Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy) provides for nuance as well as showpieces and speeches. Nothing that happens in Conclave feels contrived or unbelievable. Even an explosion (shown in the trailers) does not feel out of place.

Of course you don’t have to be Catholic or religious or familiar with anything about the church to enjoy Conclave. Neither director Berger or Straughan’s screenplay condescend to the audience. Explanations arise as they would in the natural course of events. When Lawrence tries to cardinal-splain simony to Bellini, Bellini responds curtly, "I'm aware of what simony is." If you are not aware of what simony is it becomes apparent a few scenes later. At its core, this is a movie about a stressed out manager, which is something that is very relatable.

Nominees: Tessa Ross, Juliette Howell and Michael A. Jackman, Producers

Director: Edward Berger

Screenplay: Peter Straughan; based on the novel by Robert Harris

Cast: Ralph Fiennes, Stanley Tucci, John Lithgow, Isabella Rossellini

Production Companies: FilmNation Entertainment, House Productions, Indian Paintbrush

Distributor: Focus Features

Release Date: October 25th, 2024

Total Nominations: 8, including Best Picture

Other Nominations: Actor-Ralph Fiennes; Supporting Actress-Isabella Rossellini; Adapted Screenplay-Peter Straughan; Editing- Nick Emerson; Production Design-Suzie Davies (production designer), Cynthia Sleiter (set decorator); Costume Design-Lisy Christl; Original Score-Volker Bertelmann

13 Nights of Shocktober: Doctor X

by A.J.

Night 11: Classic Horror Night

Out Thrills Them All!

Doctor X

In the early 1930's, to compete with, and cash in on, the success Universal Studios had with Dracula (1931) and Frankenstein (1931), Warner Bros. released Doctor X in 1932. It is a very peculiar horror film. Unlike Universal’s monster movies which were based on famous 19th century novels and involved castles and period settings, Doctor X was based on a play and has a contemporary, urban setting. It also has more of a mystery plot than a horror plot. The director is Michael Curtiz, who would become famous for directing classics like The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938) and Casablanca (1942). It's interesting to see his name on a horror movie the and skill he brings to a genre picture. The most peculiar element is its look. It is not a black and white film but it is not exactly a color movie either. It was shot on two strip technicolor film which used shades of only two colors: orange and green. The result looks like an eerie colorization of a black and white film or a faded color picture. This look works in the film’s favor giving it an eerie, mysterious atmosphere in every shot.

Doctor Xavier (Lionel Atwell), a renowned pathologist and researcher is assisting police in the investigation of the mysterious cannibalistic “moon killer” murders. Clues point to the killer being someone at Doctor Xavier’s research lab, where everyone is some degree of creepy or suspicious. 

All kinds of different research is done at Doctor Xavier’s lab. There are experiments that involve large machines and also psychological experiments. Doctor X is able to convince the police to let him conduct his own investigation to find the killer. For the sake of the plot, the police commissioner agrees. Complicating things as much as helping the investigation is a reporter played by Lee Tracy. He is basically comic relief but also one of the main characters. Fay Wray plays Doctor X’s daughter, and it’s only appropriate that her first line is a startled scream–she is the original scream queen after all.

The contemporary urban setting is unusual for a horror movie of this era and would be until the late 1960’s with the release of Night of the Living Dead and Rosemary’s Baby. Warner Bros. was known for its urban gangster movies so it makes sense that their horror movie would have the same setting and aesthetic. The city setting and mystery story give this film an almost Noir-ish feel with green tinged backgrounds and skies substituting for stylistic shadows. There is also more of an edge than you might expect. Since this was a Pre-Code movie it was able to get away with some more gruesome visuals and disturbing subject matter for the time. By far the most memorable and shocking visual is the killer applying a mask of “synthetic flesh” giving them a truly monstrous and scary looking face. 

Doctor X’s experiment to determine the killer’s identity is very reminiscent of a famous scene from John Carpenter’s The Thing. The doctor restrains all of the suspects in a row while they watch a reenactment of the murder so he can gauge their reactions. When the real killer pops up, everyone else is trapped and struggles to get free. 

Fay Wray’s character could be more developed. She ends up being the screaming damsel in distress, but her screen presence makes up for lack of character depth. The reporter character is funny, but not very charming so his romance with Wray feels forced and obligatory. This movie isn’t scary but it is creepy and eerie and entertaining. Like many classic era horror movies it is also pretty short (76 minutes) and it's impressive how much it gets done in that time. If you’ve seen all of the more famous horror classics, I highly recommend Doctor X for an eerie Shocktober night. 

Doctor X airs on TCM on Thursday, October 31st at 5AM CT.

Best Pictures #100: 2023 (96th) Academy Awards Best Picture Nominee: Anatomy of a Fall

by A.J.

Best Pictures #100: 2023 (96th) Academy Awards Best Picture Nominee

Anatomy of a Fall

“This is your own trap.”

Anatomy of a Fall feels like the kind of courtroom drama that Hollywood studios used to turn out in the 1980’s and 90’s. This winner of the prestigious Palme d’Or winner at the Cannes film Festival has gone on to international acclaim and relative box office success (for a foreign language film released in America anyway), and now has earned 5 Academy Award nominations including Best Picture, Best Actress for Sandra Hüller, Director for Justine Triet, Original Screenplay, and Editing. In its best moments it blends the drama of a murder trial, the tension of a mystery, and the emotions of a marital drama, which is impressive since one of the spouses dies right at the very beginning. This is essentially a legal procedural elevated by its embracing of uncertainty, great performances, and marital and family drama played not for sensation but to give the characters dimensions and complexity. 

German actress Sandra Hüller plays a successful author, also named Sandra, living with her French husband, Samuel (Samuel Theis), their son, Daniel, and dog, Snoop, in an isolated home in the snowy French countryside. Samuel dies from a mysterious fall out of the attic window. We do not see the fall. The only witness is 11-year-old Daniel (Milo Machado-Graner), who is visually impaired from an accident. It seems unlikely that Samuel just fell. Did Sandra push him? Did he commit suicide? Sandra’s high-profile trial, which is most of the 2 ½ hour film, digs up the drama and discord of her marriage that makes each scenario as likely as the other. 

Justine Triet’s direction and screenplay, co-written with Arthur Harari, never lean too far one way or the other about Sandra’s possible guilt or innocence. As soon as secrets are revealed and sympathies built for either Samuel or Sandra, the story slyly introduces doubt. Nearly every scene in the trial is underplayed in a way that lets tension creep in and build slowly. When a secret recording Samuel made of an argument the night before his death is played in court, the movie cuts to an extended flashback. This is Samuel Theis’s only significant scene and both he and Hüller are brilliant. The scene captures, maybe too well, the uneven ups and downs of a real argument: valid points mixed with petty sniping, shouting mixed with measured tones. Triet wisely cuts back to the courtroom right when the argument turns physical and we have to decide if we believe the prosecution or Sandra about the sounds of breaking dishes and slapping and hitting.

The French courtroom seems to be designed for maximum drama. The opposing lawyers and even Sandra are allowed to interrupt and cross-examine whenever opportune. Tangential speeches introducing hypothetical theories are made while a witness stands in the witness box in the background. Swann Arlaud as Vincent, Sandra’s lawyer, who is not entirely concerned with Sandra's innocence or guilt, is a great scene partner for her and a great verbal sparring partner for the zealous Advocate General, played by Antione Reinartz. Milo Machado-Graner has some key towards the climax and the young actor is more than up to the task. Even the Snoop the dog, played by Messi, does some impressive dog acting. 

It would be wrong to describe Anatomy of a Fall as a mystery because it is not so much concerned with solving Samuel’s mysterious death or proving Sandra’s innocence or guilt. It is more concerned with the doubt and uncertainty that can exist between people that are supposed to be the closest. Despite this, the style and structure are straightforward. The differing perspectives are made in the courtroom only through words; this is not a Rashomon tale where we see different points of view dramatized. Uncertainty looms over the entire story, even the ending, which though not ambiguous, still feels inconclusive in a way that may not satisfy all but fits the tone and themes. 

13 Nights of Shocktober: Twixt (2011)

 by A.J.

Night 8: Ghost Story Night

“Our work must be the grave that we prepare for its lovely tenant.”

Twixt (2011)

My podcast The Directors’ Wall, co-hosted by Bryan Connolly, recently wrapped up season 2, covering the career of Francis Ford Coppola and we ended on a high note with Coppola’s most recently released film, Twixt, which we both enjoyed very much. We also reviewed Coppola’s re-edit titled B’twixt Now and Sunrise: The Authentic Cut. While both begin the same, major changes to the ending give B’twixt a more open ended “arthouse” conclusion (or lack thereof). The emphasis is on the main character’s emotional journey to confront the tragedy in his past and the horror plot is downplayed. Coppola’s original cut of Twixt, we both agreed, captures the character’s emotional journey while also being a lively and fun horror movie. Currently, only B’twixt is available to stream, but Twixt, if you can find it, is the version we both recommend. Our discussion contains major spoilers, but if you don’t mind (or care) or think it might peak your interest please give it a listen on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, or our website.

A brief spoiler-free summary and review:

Released in 2011, Twixt marked Coppola’s return to the horror genre for the first time since Bram Stoker’s Dracula in 1992. Twixt tells the tale of third-rate horror novelist Hall Baltimore, played by Val Kilmer, who stops on his book tour in a small town with a dark past and a recent mysterious murder. The local sheriff, played by Bruce Dern, thinks that the murder is tied to a group of goth teens, led by Alden Ehrenreich, who he believes are vampires, and wants to collaborate with Hall on a book about the murder. Hall is desperately in need of money, so he reluctantly agrees. 

Coppola effectively creates an eerie atmosphere through striking dream sequences, encounters with strange characters, and touches like the body in the morgue with a giant stake still stuck in it and the seven-faced clock tower that tells seven different times. The dream sequences are what really make the movie. They are not so much in black and white as they are drained of color, except for certain things like a red carpet or yellow lantern. In these dreams Hall wanders in the woods and meets V (Elle Fanning), a ghost and victim of the long ago murders. In the dreams Hall is also visited by Edgar Allan Poe, played wonderfully by Ben Chaplin, who discusses writing techniques, the nature of tragedy and melancholy, and also reveals the secrets of the terrible murders that happened in the town decades before. There are also some funny moments like Hall’s video calls to his wife and then his publisher and an out of control Ouija board session. These scenes add in some comedy without turning the movie into a horror-comedy. Twixt is not especially violent and not especially scary, but it is eerie and creepy and entertaining and the kind of movie you should settle in with on a Shocktober night.