Review of The Woman in the Window (1944) by Torsten D — 30 Nov 2004

[b][size=2]RIFIFI (Jules Dassin, 1955) - 8.5 / PRO (-).

[/b]They say that this is the mother of all heist movies and that is almost has made all its successors obsolete. Whoever "they" are, I must admit that "they" are right.

This is indeed probably the best movie of its kind. It?s full of vivid ideas. There were a lot of scenes where I wondered, how they will solve a specific problem or whether they had given thought to it at all and the film always came up with nice ideas (e.g. the umbrella).

Does anybody have any clue why films can?t have endings like this anymore these days?

[b]FAHRENHEIT 9/11 (Michael Moore, 2004) - 6.5 / pro (-).

[/b]I don?t have much to add. I saw this film the night before the election and I don?t have to tell you, how I felt, when I woke up the next morning and heard the news on the radio.

I liked Fahrenheit enough to give it a pro, but IMO "Bowling" is a far superior film.

[b]THE WOMAN IN THE WINDOW (Fritz Lang, 1945) - 8.0 / pro(+).

[/b]The first half of this film is incredibly well-written. It?s amazing how all those details and almost every word, that is said, return and get significance. I knew that I was seeing an outstanding film, but it all went slightly downhill. The second half about the blackmail is very much by-the-books and then there is this ending. Some may see it as a gimmick, which does not have much importance, but, I think, that the ending might make sense on paper, but not on film. The film is presented way too realistic, which makes the ending implausible.

[b]THE SHIPPING NEWS (Lasse Hallström, 2001) - 5.5 / mixed.

[/b]If I remember it correctly this film was oscar bait on its release and I was very surprised by the down-beat tone. Visually the film is very nice and also enriched by some nice ideas. However, in the end, I could not tell at all, what this film wanted to be about. There are many characters, many stories are told and many incidents take place. Few of them amount to anything. The film goes into several directions at the same time without being able to bring them together in the end. In the end, it tells the story of a sad man who finds his will to survive, but the film too much "tells" us this instead of making us feel it. [/size].