Session 9 [dir. Brad Anderson]

Session 9 can be succinctly described as a blue-collar riff on The Shining. Unlike the swanky Hotel Overlook, the "Bad Place" (as Stephen King would describe it) here is a sprawling mental asylum fallen into disuse since the 1980's. To make the place viable for redevelopment, it is first required to bring it in line with regulations pertaining to safe removal of all asbestos material used in the construction, which is what brings in Gordon (Peter Mullan) and his team. Struck with family problems and desperate for the money, Gordon promises to finish the job in a punishing week-long schedule. With him are buddy Phil (David Caruso, where went he?), still mopey over losing his girl-friend to wiseguy and third member Hank (Josh Lucas), there's law-school dropout Mike (Stephen Gevedon, who co-wrote the picture with director Brad Anderson) who seems to know a lot of the asylum's history and Gordon's nephew Jeff, who is new to the job and has a fear of the dark.

Much of Session 9's allure comes from the eerie uncomfortable atmosphere generated by the location itself. Cavernous dust-choked hallways with sounds of water-dripping (and could those be whispers in the air?) and the ever-present hazard of asbestos fibres getting into the system. Tension builds in the men's minds, with each person seemingly encountering something in the building. Gordon hears voices that seem to call him, Mike finds the session tapes of a multiple personality disorder patient called Mary whose mind hosted some immensely disturbing alter egos, Hank finds a cache of old coins and strange objects...As each day passes, the sense of dread steadily rises until, as any horror fan can guess, it boils over into blood-soaked mayhem.

Anderson and his cinematographer Uta Briesewitz (who almost lost an eye capturing a chaotic shot) make the most of the setting - according to him, very little was needed by way of dressing the place up. The interplay of light and darkness is a crucial element in several scenes, generating a grim uneasy tone. One scene where a character is running terrified through a corridor while lights all around him go off is a throat-grabbing moment. The climax is an extremely well depicted unraveling of sanity that stands well with its predecessor in The Shining.

A few words on the blu-ray release from Shout Factory:

Session 9 was shot on 24 fps HD Video. Shout Factory's blu-ray gives an accurate depiction of the visuals and looks more polished than I remember of my previous viewing. Sound is stereo only (DTS-HDMA) but decent, although I would have been interested to hear a 5.1 remix that enhanced the sonic atmosphere. Extras include a solid 45 min retrospective making of with Anderson, Stephen Gevedon, DoP Briesewitz and other cast members, director's commentary and other featurettes.

Petta [dir. Karthik Subbaraj]

Petta is one of the best glamor shoots for its leading man Rajinikant. No really, after Mani Ratnam's Thalapathi as far back as 1991, this is probably the most beautiful looking 'Superstar' movie. Whether bathed in russet and amber glow, or cloaked in steel blue shadow, slightly out of focus like an emerging myth or sharp and up close like a sculpture in stone, the Rajini aura has almost never been so lovingly burnished. The legend himself, nattily dressed with mane-like coiffured hairpiece, looks relaxed and happy, a lion in his own jungle. Of course, Petta is far less ambitious than Thalapathi. In the erstwhile film Rajinikant played the Mahabharat inspired Surya / Karna, the iconic back-lighting as much in service of the character as of the star. Petta has no such thematic pretensions. The swanky production design (Suresh Selvarajan) and cinematographic lusciousness (S. Tirru) are for cosmetic effect (and what's wrong with that?). More crucially, Karthik 'Jigarthanda' Subbaraj's script is also purely in homage to the shrine of Rajini.

Using his iconic screen name 'Kaali', Rajini-saar swishes in as the new hostel warden of one of the strangest institutions: One with a cathedral sized assembly hall and a budget for candles that would make Sanjay Leela Bhansali proud, and prestigious enough to attract students from Australia, but where over-age thugs swagger the halls hazing newcomers, and the hostel idlis are hard enough to literally brain folks with. Kaali's entrance is equally strange - apparently his recommendation for the warden's post comes from the Prime Minister's secretary. When the true background of the character is revealed, one immediately wonders how he could have wrangled such a connection, but Petta's not a film for believable explanations. Kaali comes, he sees and he conquers - first the ragging thugs (led by Bobby Simha), then the corrupt mess contractor. While playing matchmaker to a young pair that came in from Australia, he meets cute with the girl's pranic healer mom (Simran, in real life near the age of Rajini's daughter, which here makes her an apt "mature romance" candidate).

A brilliantly shot "hero" action sequence with flashlights dancing in darkened corridors culminates in a dramatic reveal of Kaali's true purpose (with the expected drawn out flashback), and the introduction of new antagonists - Nawazuddin Siddiqui (dubbed) and Vijay Sethupati. The rest of the movie is about how Kaali takes the fight into the enemy's stronghold for the ultimate showdown, no prizes for guessing who wins. Some of the violence towards the end is unnecessarily gruesome (although not uncommon in the 80's potboilers Petta's roots lie in)

Petta is in the best and worst ways, a brand Rajini film: He talks, he walks, he dances, he nun-chucks, he everythings. There are numerous movie nods to both Rajini filmography and other  references - Mullum Malarum's Raman aandalum Ravana aandalum, rival Kamalahaasan's Andhi mazhai, Ennio Morricone's TGTBTU theme also gets a hat-tip. No character other than 'baas' carries any real weight. Simha and Sethupati have sufficient talent to bring nuance to their parts (and to be fair, Subbaraj does strive to make them more than run of the mill henchmen), but I doubt they would have accepted the roles without the R-factor. Some interesting supporting actor / cameo choices for Tamil movie fans - veteran comedian YG Mahendran, actor-director M Sasikumar (Subramaniapuram) and J Mahendran (he directed Rajini in Mullum Malarum) The women (Simran, Trisha, Malavika Mohanan, Megha Akash) uniformly have "say your two lines and GTFO" appearances. Once the action begins they are pushed off-stage, not returning even for a "The End" frame. Baas' party is purely a Boys' affair, but those invited are guaranteed a good time.

Le Trou aka The Hole [dir. Jacques Becker]

What is it with the French and crime procedurals? They seem to have an almost innate talent at turning out kickass movies centering around criminals either carrying out a caper or escaping from custody. Jules Dassin's Rififi, Jean-Pierre Melville's Le Cercle Rouge (and any others I've missed), Claude Sautet's Classe Tous Risques. These often feature a set-piece where a delicate and risky maneuver is depicted in exquisitely excruciating detail, making the audience feel one with the participants and feel their tension. I am happy to have found Jacques Becker's Le Trou (aka The Hole) to be another proud member of this clique.

Becker's film was adapted from a book (written by José Giovanni) based on a true-life prison escape attempt. A group of men sharing a cell make an audacious plan to escape from their confines by digging their way into the underground sewer system from where they can tunnel out of the prison. Jacques Becker's commitment to capturing the realism of the event was so great he not only had sets built to closely correspond with the original locations and shot the prison cell scenes in an equally cramped and claustrophobic space, one of the major actors in the film (Jean Keraudy, he called himself) was a real-life participant in the original escape. Becker decided to use Keraudy after speaking with him and becoming extremely interested in the colorful inventive man, and decided to populate his film with non-professional actors.

Le Trou is almost entirely set in the confines of the prison. It begins with one of the characters entering as a new occupant in the cell already occupied by four men. After chatting with the new man, they decide to accept him as one of their own group and include him in their escape plan. The film covers each aspect of the escape with loving detail and an eye for realism. When floors and walls are dug through, they don't just break apart in a couple of blows, but take about as much effort as you would expect concrete structures to. Iron bars take a lot to be sawed across. Between each set of operations the gang has to be careful to wipe off or put away all traces of their covert activities. The film establishes a routine and constantly reminds us of it. In the wrong hands this could have ended up as a rote and boring exercise, but between the screenplay, the actors, the superb production design and strikingly austere B&W photography, we become one with the rhythm and are constantly riveted. When they break through into the sewer labyrinth and open a manhole to see the road outside the prison, there is a palpable sense of fresh air and freedom.

Do they actually manage to escape? I recommend you watch Le Trou to find out. But Becker's film is not just about the suspense. The prisoners are not action figures carrying out the motions. They have personalities and the relationship between them - trust, friendship, brotherhood - is equally important, in fact the lynchpin of the film's lasting impact.

Emmanuelle [dir. Just Jaeckin]

Whatever I expected from a film described on the back blurb of the blu-ray case as "the seminal soft core porn classic", it certainly wasn't hearing a wholesale ripoff of legendary prog rock band King Crimson's Lark's Tongue in Aspic Part II used as a soundtrack theme. Stealing it was, but I have to admire the gumption of (ha!) composer Pierre Bachelet to imagine that gnarly intimidating track as a serenade to nearly every major sex scene in the film, and some of the reworkings using flute and acoustic percussion ain't half bad.

 For the rest, Emmanuelle sets the E(u)rotic movie pattern. The titular heroine (Sylvia Kristel, very easy on the eye) is the archetype fish out of water in exotic Thailand where she has come to join her husband Jean (Daniel Sarky) - as Roger Ebert describes in his review "a world of wicker furniture, soft pastels, vaguely Victorian lingerie, backlighting, forests of potted plants, and lots of diaphanous draperies shifting in the breeze". Add to that description, a batch of native servants who like to spy on their employer's sexual activities and in turn carry out their own physical comedies.

Jean claims to want Em to not feel tied to him, and to try out any sexual experiments she wants. But it would appear in fact that little Jean wants her to be liberated only in the shallow unromantic manner he and his society of expats indulge in. When she ignores the clique of bored grope-happy neighbors and falls for a winsome lady archeologist (Marika Green), he shows himself a jealous husband like any other. Sylvia's scenes with Marika are some of the best in the film, sexy, funny and carrying a palpable sense of romance. Most of the sex thus far is of the tame variety, pleasant to look at without being outright fap material (unless you're in your teens, in which case little isn't).

After she is sent off by Marika, Em returns to Jean who then coaxes her to go with aging Casanova Mario (Alain Cuny). Mario looks somewhat like David Lynch and talks like you would expect Lynch to, if you knew him only from his movies, a lot of solemn balderdash. Mario's ideas of sexual liberation take the film into queasy territory, including a gang rape sequence and later one where Em is made the prize of a Thai boxing bout. She accepts these situations with questionable equanimity and we must believe that they contribute to her erotic awakening. Maybe it's just me, but I find the frank exploitation scenes of Zakhmi Aurat or Savage Streets more palatable than such arty rape fantasies.

Still, for most of its running time, Emmanuelle is a pleasant trip with good looking actors, ravishing locales, lovely soft focus photography (Richard Suzuki)...and yes, large swathes of Larks Tongue in Aspic Part Sex.

Kavaludaari [dir. Hemanth M Rao]

Last night, on a friend's recommendation, I tried the recent Kannada flick Kavaludaari (Crossroads) on Amazon Prime.

In the story, a frustrated traffic cop (Rishi) wants to be a crime-solver and after a road excavation reveals decades old bones, obsessively aims to solve a long-closed case on his own. In his quest he meets with a scoop hungry journalist (Achyut Kumar) and later the cop who did the original investigation, now a disheveled drunk (the legendary Anant Nag). Whether they manage to solve the crime and bring justice forms the rest of the film.

Kavaludaari has a fantastic first half, in which we see Rishi's cop single-mindedly digging into the case. I appreciate that Rishi is shown as a novice detective finding his way with a mixture of amiability and doggedness, than the obnoxious sociopathic know-it-all favored by modern crime shows. Director Hemanth Rao essays a terrific visual showcase of past events as seen through Rishi's perspective, even incorporating them as part of a song that pushes the story forward. Rishi in this role has a very approachable presence and one empathizes with his character's desire to rise above his job. The entry of Anant Nag at a pivotal point adds another color. In his initial appearance as the rundown loner ex-cop Nag is so very convincing with his slovenly appearance, unsteady gait and trembling lips, it is almost disturbing. To the script's credit it doesn't immediately bow down to the bigger star - Nag's senior cop is a strong support to Rishi's investigation but does not supplant him.

So far so amazing. Alas, once the main baddie is revealed, which is a good while before the end, it succumbs to convention with muhahaha type "let me explain my masterful scheme" villainy, eye-rolling masala revenge, casual disregard of previously revealed details and leaps of logic that sully the precise and methodical way the film was built up till that point. There are still interesting visual metaphors and the actors are sincere, but it certainly falls short of the tense mystery-noir thriller it could have been. Still, damn it that first half certainly made it worth the while.

Super Deluxe [dir. Thiagarajan Kumararaja]

It would seem these days that making a film with a single plot is no longer good enough. No, if there is one thing that Mr. Tarantino has taught us, it is that multiple stories must must twist around and crash into one another, especially if one wants to build a cult value around it. Perhaps I'm being unnecessarily critical here - Thiagarajan Kumararaja (let's call him TK for convenience) is certainly an ambitious maker. I haven't seen his previous Aaranya Kaandam (Incident in the Forest), but it carried a lot of word for style quotient, and given the significant degree of acclaim for Super Deluxe (SD) - resulting in a far more widespread release than the typical Tamil film, with English subtitles to boot - I was eager to check out the work of the new dog and his new tricks.

In both the good and bad senses of the term, SD is a messy affair, with multiple writers including TK himself (who I assume wrote the overall framework), Myshkin (of Pisaasu fame, who also plays a role here) and Nalan Kumaraswamy (Soodhu Kavvum) and multiple cinematographers. At least some of the messiness appears to be deliberate, as though TK wants us to not just see the finished product, but the individual fingermarks in the material. The story of a precocious young boy (Ashwanth Ashokkumar) waiting for the return of the father that had long abandoned his mother is mixed with the misadventures of three horny teens scheming to watch a porn film ("Mallu Uncut" being the title given to their obscure object du désir) and again with a married woman (Samantha Akkineni)'s sexual tryst with a former flame ending with his death in her home.

Initially the tone in all the episodes is lightly humorous, the sort of deadpan banter Tamil cinema does best. The boy's father turns out a transvestite (Vijay Sethupati, effective and immensely courageous), the porn film features the mother of one of the boys (Ramya Krishnan), unspooling its own set of spiraling consequences, the married woman and her cuckolded husband (Fahadh Faasil) having to work together to get rid of the body. But the seams are already beginning to show: the shifts between narratives are not always organic, and to my mind the film would have done better to snip one of the plot threads (the corpse cover-up episode in my view most of the time seems its own film).

As the film progresses further the differences grow more starkly. The transvestite father episode gets more emotionally intense (Myshkin-like?), the horny teens segment is still trying to generate laughs (Kumaraswamy?), while the neo-noir husband-wife-body part still seems like a forced appendage. It may seem here like I am saying that a film should have the same tone throughout. I can understand that generating a different feel for each thread can be its own special experiment, but I am saying that for me, it seemed like an exercise for the sake of, especially when the joints where they fuse become more unwieldy. The over-the-top sleazy cop who is so apt for the femme infidèle segment is too cartoonish for the transvestite thread. There is a scene where the transvestite confesses a shocking crime, one you imagine will never cease to haunt her, but the script feels obliged to give each of its branches a happy ending and in this one it just feels forced.

I also felt there was a significant element of soap-boxing. Characters give sermons about discrimination, social / religious hypocrisy, universal oneness in an obvious manner, and Fahadh's rants come across as director mouthpieces than something his character's mind would come up with. A great screenplay is not one that has worked out all its flaws, but one whose strengths keep you sufficiently engrossed to gloss over them. The contrivances that occurred in Soodhu Kavvum seemed a natural part of its zany universe. In SD, I was pulled out by logical inconsistencies and deus ex machina because I could not give over my suspension of disbelief to the material. There are some terrific individual scenes here (the transvestite's confession in the subway, the immediate aftermath of the kid learning that his mom was a porn actress, the sleazy cop terrorizing the couple) but I felt that TK should have better respected the material by with less of cramming events, shifting viewpoints and too-clever-by-half twists.

I must confess here that apart from a few references, like the Star Wars theme (on a nadaswaram), and some of the references made to older Tamil films, I did not have the background for a lot of the film's clever homages (a friend had to explain the context for the song Ennadi Meenatchi and that a henchman character's t-shirt said F.U.C.K. in Tamil).

Adventures of Captain Marvel [dirs. William Whitney & John English]

Of course when I should have been working I binge-watched through the remaining episodes of the 1941 movie serial Adventures of Captain Marvel (AoCM). Still considering that apart from the pilot, all episodes are 15min each, that's only a couple hours lost. Plus the time to write this up :p 

I can definitely see why DC lost their shit and sued over the original Captain Marvel comic book character. Apart from a magical origin (when the Tintin-like Billy Batson is given a boon to turn into CM by uttering the word "Shazam!"), the Superman parallels are unmistakable - the Capt has super-strength, is invulnerable to bullets and can fly. The movie serial also has its Lois Lane and Jimmy Olsen characters in Batson's colleagues Betty Wallace and Whitey Murphy.

The serial follows an archaeological expedition into a Valley of Tombs in Siam (although it could have as well been Egypt, considering how vague the setting is). The very doings that give Batson his CM power also reveal a Golden Scorpion with a half-dozen lenses which when combines make a ray that vaporises living beings and turns base metals to gold, so yep every megalomaniac's dream. The megalomaniac here is one Scorpion who hides behind a most cumbersome robe and mask. The expedition members decide to split the lenses among themselves for safekeeping but the Scorpion is determined to track and hunt them down. Every episode till the finale ends on a cliffhanger note.

Unlike the ethical codes followed by more modern heroes (the non R-rated ones, at least), CM has no qualms about gunning down unarmed men or throwing them off the tops of cliffs and buildings. Separate actors play the parts of Billy Batson (Frank Coghlan Jr.) and Captain Marvel (Weightlifter-turned-actor Tom Tyler, whose buff looks make him quite convincing and he gets to lift and throw a lot of folks or their dummies). The visual effects are pretty good for the time and budget. Even when the technique is obvious, like the use of a full-size dummy along a pulley system, there's a special thrill to the flying sequences.

AoCM is a nice harkback to the simpler goofier kind of superhero adventure, recommended mainly for the Golden Age nostalgics.