Two Days, One Night (2014)
Belgian realists Luc and Jean-Pierre Dardenne reimagine It’s a Wonderful Life minus the angels, Frank Capra, and the wartime expectation of a cheering outcome. Here is what your neighbors really think about you, Sandra (heroically portrayed by Marion Cotillard): While you are convalescing in recovery from clinical depression, your boss invites your coworkers to choose between conserving your position or bonuses for themselves. Bonuses win, and everybody loses. Partly as second chance but mostly as sport, the boss gives Sandra a weekend to change minds before a second vote on Monday morning. In film, we typically only meet characters of this mettle and see them rendered by actors of this caliber on settings related to ballfield or battlefield. Sandra works her way through a list of undesirable or outright hostile exchanges, children and husband in tow, because she must.
The Killers (1946)
You’ll find no flaw with the 1946 noir telling of this Ernest Hemingway (by way of Jim Thompson) short story. Thirty-three year-old Burt Lancaster is dreamy in his screen debut after an injury cut short his career as circus acrobat. Ava Gardner poses and preens opposite and generally lives up to the legend. It’s a contract hit on a boxer (Lancaster) who agrees with the hitmen that he deserves to die. The 1964 remake—included in this two-fer Blu-ray package which would do well to provoke a marketing trend—is inferior in small ways but remains well worth seeing.
The Tall Blond Man With One Black Shoe (1972)
A tasty trifle from the Continent, The Tall Blond Man, starring Pierre Richard as concert violinist Francois, spoofs the spy movies that dominated box offices during the Cold War 1970s. Surprisingly, even as Francois plays the buffoon in this case of mistaken identity, he is miles suaver than any screen James Bond of the same decade. Numerous scenes are stolen by wardrobe, and lean and lanky Richard has a vocabulary for physical comedy to rival silent-era Buster Keaton—his triple-jointed frame is absolutely made for trapezoidal double-breasted jackets atop silk flares and Italian shoes. Underdog complex aside, it really doesn’t surprise anybody when Christine (Marielle Darc), secret weapon of the French secret service, switches sides in favor of Francois.
I’ll Be Me (2014)
This would have been the film to watch with Oliver Sacks. I’ll Be Me follows country music superstar Glen Campbell and family on an 18-month tour that began in 2011. The occasion was Campbell’s impending retirement following the diagnosis of his Alzheimer’s disease. It’s interesting to observe how performing has shaped the connections between Campbell’s mind and memory. Offstage, he is emotionally erratic and kind of a handful for his family, friends, and doctors. Declarative sentences become questions as he forgets what he is in the process of saying. Over the course, he is able to name his wife and children about 25 percent of the time. But on stage he times his memory lapses for comic effect, like a Vegas showman, and seems most content while improvising some long and fairly smoking guitar solos.
Chris Barrett's Shelf Life alerts readers to new arrivals at the Lawson McGhee Library's stellar Sights and Sounds collection, along with recommendations and reminders of staples worthy of revisiting. He is a former Metro Pulse staff writer who’s now a senior assistant at the Knox County Public Library.
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