Movie Review: Edge Of Darkness (1943)

A World War Two drama, Edge Of Darkness is a stirring tale of resistance in a small Norwegian village.

In the occupied Norwegian fishing community of Trollness, all the residents and all the stationed German troops are found dead. The events of the prior week are revealed in flashback. 

The German commander Koenig (Helmut Dantine) maintains order through intimidation, and his soldiers keep close tabs on the restless villagers, including resistance sympathizers Gunnar Brogge (Errol Flynn), a fisher, and his lover Karen Stensgard (Ann Sheridan). But not all the residents are hostile. Cannery owner Kaspar Torgersen (Charles Dingle) is a German collaborator. Karen's father Martin (Walter Huston) is the village's only doctor and stays neutral, while his wife Anna (Ruth Gordon) is borderline delusional. The innkeeper Gerd Bjarnesen (Judith Anderson) lost her husband to the war and is fending off a German soldier's unwanted romantic advances. 

Gunnar and Karen learn the Allies will drop off a weapons cache from the sea. The villagers are only able to communicate at secret meetings, and have to decide whether to unite, organize and take up arms against the occupiers while guarding against the threat of informers.

An adaptation of the book by William Woods, Edge Of Darkness is an engrossing multi-character drama. The Robert Rossen screenplay patiently explores the tensions simmering among residents chafing under the Nazi occupation, and director Lewis Milestone keeps the story moving, using most of the two hours to delve into the challenge of uniting a group towards a common purpose as the fuse is lit for a raucous climax.

From the opening sequence showing dead bodies strewn all across the village, Edge Of Darkness sets itself apart as a grim and uncompromising view of war. Despite propaganda objectives to rally anti-Nazi support when the war's outcome was very much in doubt, the story rises above shallow pedagogy by avoiding crass emotions and histrionics. Instead Milestone gets down to the pragmatic business of occupiers and the occupied engaged in a deadly game of mental and physical manoeuvring for intimidation and control.

The underlying theme is strength in unity, and despite the presence of stars Errol Flynn and Ann Sheridan, they have relatively limited roles. Gunnar and Karen are just two of the many villagers making up a community with diverse viewpoints on how to deal with a well-armed occupying force. And while businessman and factory owner Torgersen is easy to dislike as an all-in collaborator, the grey middle zone of uncertainty is most compelling. 

Doctor Stensgard, his mentally suffering wife Anna, and the church pastor are among prominent citizens unsure whether carrying guns and charging at the Germans is the wisest course of action, while elderly and retired school teacher Andersen (Morris Carnovsky) seeks an independent method of resistance.

In addition to debates between here-and-now action and pick-the-right moment strategy, an undercover agent adds intrigue, while the weaponization of sex features in the story of Polish captive Katja (Nancy Coleman) and a harrowing rape incident. The narrative depth extends to commander Koenig's own ambitions and disillusionment with his superiors.

When the time comes for the bullets to fly, Milestone and cinematographer Sid Hickox deploy gliding camera work to capture a village turning into a battlefield. Filled with human-centred intrigue, Edge Of Darkness is a sharp moment of reckoning.



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Movie Review: Rosemary's Baby (1968)

A suspense drama with horror elements, Rosemary's Baby tracks a young mother as she experiences the pregnancy from hell.

In New York City, married couple Rosemary and Guy Woodhouse (Mia Farrow and John Cassavetes) move into an apartment at the Bramford building. Guy is a struggling actor yet to land his first big break. Their friend Hutch (Maurice Evans) warns them the Bramford has a history of bizarre crimes and deaths. Rosemary and Guy meet their new neighbours, elderly couple Minnie and Roman Castevet (Ruth Gordon and Sidney Blackmer). Minnie is exceptionally nosey; Roman is a well-traveled smooth talker and entrances Guy with tall stories.

Guy finally lands a leading role after another actor suffers a sudden tragedy, and he soon suggests to Rosemary they have a baby. After eating a strange-tasting desert prepared by Minnie, Rosemary experiences a nightmare where she is raped by the devil. She does get pregnant, and Minnie refers her to the renowned Doctor Abraham Sapirstein (Ralph Bellamy). But the early weeks are an agony of pain and weight loss, and with Guy acting strangely and Minnie providing a daily mysterious herbal drink, Rosemary starts to suspect something is very wrong.

A groundbreaking cinematic journey into the world of witchcraft, satan worshipping, and horror hiding in plain sight, Rosemary's Baby is an exercise in mounting anxiety. The Ira Levin book is adapted and directed by Roman Polanski, in his Hollywood debut, as an artistic tableau of doubt, betrayal, and helplessness, evil seeping into Rosemary's life and consuming all that was good.

Without resorting to any cheap tricks or jump scares, Polanski builds a mood of creepiness and dread. This brand of evil does not announce itself, instead infiltrating with a confident smile and facade of dotty helpfulness. The back-to-back apartments provide just a thin wall between the Woodhouse and Castevet couples, and from the permeability of sounds to Minnie's frequent obtrusive appearances at Rosemary's front door, the assault is a study in subjugation through stealth.

In addition to the satanic threat, Rosemary's Baby provides overlapping commentary on the fragility of marriage, the duplicity of friendship, the lure of career success, and the hazards of blind trust in doctors. The multiple deceptions encircle Rosemary in a conspiracy exposing the human condition at its worst.

Mia Farrow's outstanding performance is central to the film's success as the drama unfolds from Rosemary's perspective. Farrow displays frailty, trust, friendliness, instinctiveness, and then doubt, projecting every expectant woman's complicated emotional journey towards the complexities of motherhood. Ruth Gordon is equally unforgettable as the neighbour Minnie, smothering Rosemary with difficult to resist oleaginous friendliness. Dark, vulnerable and physically uncomfortable, John Cassavetes personifies the exploitable weak spot.

Rosemary's Baby is the dream of consummation and rebirth turning to a nightmare, the dark sides of ambition and sacrifice pursuing the ultimate triumph.



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Movie Review: Harold And Maude (1971)

A dark romantic comedy about nothing less than death and its place in life, Harold And Maude is low-key, eccentric and always engaging.

Harold (Bud Cort) is a young man suffocating under his domineering but very rich mother (Vivian Pickles). They live in a huge estate, and Harold mostly occupies himself with staging ever more elaborate mock suicides to try and get a reaction out of his mother. She is routinely dismissive. Harold's other past-time is attending the funerals of strangers, and he buys an old hearse to drive around in. Sessions with a psychiatrist don't appear to help.

Harold spots the elderly Maude (Ruth Gordon) attending many of the same funeral services. She approaches him and they strike up an unusual friendship. A former radical protester for the cause of the day, the whimsical Maude loves art, music, and plants, but mostly appreciates life and lives it according to her own rules. She freely "borrows" the cars of others, disobeying all traffic rules, and relocates trees to help them grow. As Harold's mother arranges a series of dates to try and get him to settle down, he grows more attached to Maude, who is finally giving him something to love.

Directed by Hal Ashby, Harold And Maude is a film with modest ambition and exceptional scope. Scenes of gruesome yet funny mock suicides alternate with the warmth of an unlikely friendship, and Ashby achieves a steady tone where dark humour, pathos, and the essence of being alive comfortably cohabitate.

Essentially a two-person character study constructed with humour through a series of off-kilter encounters, the film charts the natural progression of a relationship between two unique individuals. Harold is a young man seemingly pining to die, Maude is an old but sprightly woman literally racing around in life, and in each other they find liberation.

Maude gravitates towards teaching the morose Harold about the value of a life lived fully with principles that adhere to no rules and behaviours that respect no standards. She sets her own boundaries and joyously explains herself to anyone willing to listen, and in Harold she finds a willing student. Her guiding principle is the limited time available before death, and the need to enjoy every minute with no constraints.

Harold finally finds a reason to start enjoying life once he gets to know Maude. Stifled to the point of emotional strangulation by his domineering mother, Harold is dead in all but name until Maude comes into his life. She provides a reference point to how life can be lived, and he awakens to the joys of emotional independence and unrestricted love.

Harold And Maude bravely goes where few films have gone before and since. An extrapolation of themes from The Graduate, Harold represents burnt out youth completely detached from the achievement of his parents, and Maude the strangely alluring older woman. Her attractiveness starts out as more intellectual than physical, and the love that develops between them is less a seduction than an education. The age difference carries greater shock value, and Ashby deploys the services of no less than a screen priest to articulate just how hideous their relationship must appear to greater society.

Harold And Maude don't care. When nothing less than understanding what it means to be alive is at stake, jolting society out of its stuffy confines is a small price to pay.

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