Gosford Park (2001)

 ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆

Gosford Park (2001) – R. Altman

I never watched Downton Abbey but perhaps I should have because I really enjoyed writer Julian Fellowes’ script for this late Robert Altman outing.  I suspect I first watched it because it was Altman but perhaps also because, like the Charlie Chan films it references, it was heralded to be a pretty good whodunit, taking place in the Upstairs-Downstairs world of British period drama (circa 1932).  And it is that, but, of course, Altman lets the plot meander all over the place, introducing characters who may not be entirely distinguishable who also talk over each other (a directorial trademark) making it difficult to determine exactly why they are there in the country estate owned by patriarch Michael Gambon and younger wife Kristin Scott-Thomas.  Suffice it to say that we hear enough to deduce that very nearly every character – at least those upstairs, if not also downstairs – has a motive for killing Gambon (which doesn’t actually happen until quite a long way into the film).  Only new ladies maid Kelly MacDonald (working for Dame Maggie Smith) and perhaps outsiders Bob Balaban (a Hollywood producer) and Ryan Philippe (his valet) are unlikely suspects (or are they?). The cast features an amazing array of British acting royalty, doing their thing expertly:  Helen Mirren, Alan Bates, Derek Jacobi, Emily Watson, Richard E. Grant, Clive Owen, Stephen Fry, Jeremy Northam, Eileen Atkins, and more.  Class differences are trotted out and the whole thing is gloriously gossipy. In the end, Altman and Fellowes drop enough hints to help viewers to figure out the culprit, even if detective Fry probably never will, but then again, there’s a twist that makes the watching even more worthwhile. 

 

Dark City (1998)

 ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆

Dark City (1998) – A. Proyas

Preface:  I found this blu-ray when cleaning out our laboratory which has now been refurnished as staff office space (students don’t attend class in person now, let alone show up for psychology experiments). I don’t think I can describe it without some spoilers (although I’m sure I watched it decades ago and didn’t remember a thing).  So be warned.

Written and directed by Alex Proyas (who had previously made The Crow, 1994, and subsequently made I, Robot, 2004, among other less successful films), this takes its cues from film noir, with Rufus Sewell waking up in a sordid room with a dead prostitute and no memory of who he is or how he got there.  The film seems to take place in the 1940s to boot, with wife Jennifer Connolly singing in a nightclub and detective William Hurt traversing the city at night looking for clues (and for Sewell who has fled the scene).  But all is really not what it seems, as Proyas melds science fiction onto the noir frame to create something much more unique (but which still plays like a crazy homage to cinema classics gone by). I suppose the film could be called “high concept” if you had time to dwell on whether our memories make us who we are or whether there is something more fundamental or innate than that.  But there is no time for that, what with Kiefer Sutherland’s mad psychiatrist running around with huge hypodermics at the beck and call of some bizarre alien creatures animating corpses from the nearest morgue (including children) to pump everyone full of other people’s data.  There, I’ve done it – but isn’t this a spoiler that just makes you want to see what kind of insane work this may be, a work that Roger Ebert called “a great visionary achievement”?  For the record, I watched the Director’s Cut.