No.170 : The Captor (2018)

The Captor at the IMDb

Known elsewhere in the world by the rubbish, non definitive, ‘Stockholm’ ‘The Captor’ is a fictionalised account of a 1973 Swedish bank Robbery, that ultimately gave birth to the term 'Stockholm Syndrome’. On reflection ‘Stockholm’ is probably a  better title but we’ll work with what we get.

The fictionalised part is an annoyance as you come out not knowing what was true and what was made up. I get the sense it’s mostly true and that they didn’t want to offend or indeed pay, any of the real participants as the sequence of events isn’t very cinematic with the ending drawn out in a hocky-cokey fashion.

Anyway, Ethan Hawke plays Lars, a career criminal who likes American things now. He puts on his Texas biker jacket and a flowing wig before heading to the bank. He shoots the place up and grabs some hostages including the large spectacled Noomi Rapace who triggers the silent alarm, beginning the stand off with the police that lasts the rest of the film.

Hawke immediately demands the release of his criminal pal Mark Strong who is allowed to enter the bank after the majority of hostages are freed. We then get an hour of shouting as the two sides try to broker a settlement that keeps everyone happy. As things develop the three remaining hostages get friendly with their captors and Noomi even gives out some loving after she takes a bullet when a stand off goes wrong.

After a few days and with sufficient run time gained, the police lose interest , along with the audience, and plan to end the siege by pumping tear gas into the vault where our heroes are holed up. Who will survive? And will Noomi like Hawke when she sees it’s really a wig?

This was an OK film but I think the story would have been better served with a documentary rather than by trying to add humour and drama to an already interesting subject. We don’t know what was really said or done in the vault - at least not if you rely on the film - so the action seems like speculation at best. The ending was so muddled with them in the vault, out the vault then back in the vault and then out again you assume that bit must have been true. Early on you knew it wasn’t going to be a bloodbath so there was no real sense of peril.

The film hinged on the relationship between Hawke and Rapace’s characters and I wasn’t buying. In the real life event the bonding took place over 5 days - in a 90 minute film she just looks mental for immediately falling for an obvious nutter.

The sets and costumes were great with the 70’s beige look excellently realised. I didn’t like the annoying and dithering police inspector and I felt the usually reliable, Aviva voice over man, Mark Strong was miscast as the balding bank robber, Gunnar.

It’s a decent offering but you won’t learn anything and the mishandled ending will leave you feeling dissatisfied. If the plan was for you to gain a bond with the characters and to defend their lacklustre film after spending 90 minutes with it, it failed!

THE Tag Line Swede Drama’s a Turnip 58%

No.111 : The Desperadoes (1943)

The Desperadoes at the IMDb

 
A crooked banker in a frontier town plans to rip all the townsfolk off for half their savings - how times have changed! Nowadays they wouldn’t be left with half! The scheme involves hiring an outsider to ‘rob’ the bank and then tell the folks that the banks will repay half their losses with the other half going to the crook. Unfortunately the hired gun fails to show and a local mob, hired on the rush, shoot the place up and kill three locals.

The original robber eventually shows up and is not best pleased to see that his  gig has been stolen. He thaws however when he finds his friend is the sheriff and the local floozy catches his eye. Meanwhile the bad guys get nervous as their employers turn out to be loose cannons and a lost fancy spur may spell trouble.

A local posse of well meaning idiots challenge the Sheriff, Steve (good name), to catch the villains and given he’s Randolph Scott he has little choice. For some reason he invests in the counsel of the evil Uncle Willie but we remain hopeful that the two former friends will triumph and at least get the top button undone on their overdressed wenches.

From 1943 this was Columbia Pictures’ first colour movie and it shows in the gaudy costumes and sets  which are clearly used to impress the audience who were still in black and white. It is a basic, unimaginative western with the usual good guys / bad guys motif with a saloon floozy thrown in for a bit of glamour. There is also a scene of two greased up men giving each other a massage only to be embarrassed when the saloon madam walks in - like I say something for everyone!

It does stand above a lot of its contemporaries in terms of locations and a couple of stars in the shape of Randolph Scott and Glenn Ford.  Scott is wooden and I can never see any star quality in him - he’s more like stern history teacher. Ford is better as Bill ‘Cheyenne’ Rogers who wrestles with morals and presumably with the buckles on Randolph’s corset. There isn’t much in the way of danger or menace although I was surprised to see three locals get shot in the opening bank raid - maybe they were just over enthusiastic extras.

The female leads do OK in the standard window dressing roles with plenty of fancy gowns to keep the ladies happy and to let the men play butch. There is also an ill-advised comedy bar brawl which was always going to happen when the saloon keeper says he’s selling up tomorrow. The usual pratfalls and dazed ‘Oh I’ve been knocked out’ expressions ensue but it was good to see a proto-Mongo who would later win the day in ‘Blazing Saddles’.

The early reveal that the late arriving bad guy was once a goodie with the will to reform was puny character development and it was no surprise at all when the two former friends put bygones aside to fight the common enemy.  The weasely banker was good fun as was the likeable and murderously traitorous ‘Uncle Willie’ who was played for laughs but a real bastard.

There was nothing in the way of social commentary and any hints of a moral tale above the standard good versus evil were dispelled early on. Of course it was the 1940s and there had to be something for everyone along with no sex and limited violence you can tell this isn’t going to make any top ten list.

It was competently made and had a lot to like in its naïve view of the world where good beat bad and the nasty banker got what was due to him. Are you watching Financial Crime Office? Probably not.

THE Tag Line : Bill and Steve Moderate Adventure  56%

No.110 : The Spoilers (1955)

The Spoilers at the IMDb

 This review of  ‘The Spoilers’ may contain spoilers. It was his childhood sled. There told you.

The spoilers in question aren’t movie reviewers with a heightened sense of their own worth but people who spoil things for other people - in this case gold miners.

It’s frontier time in Nome Alaska and the sluts at the local saloon are showing an ankle for two bits - well it is 1955. Whoremaster Anne Baxter has a new dress in every scene so there’s clearly cash in teasing the toothless prospectors with low cut tops that on closer examination appear to be flesh coloured flannel.

Gold is in tham thar hills and so are claim jumpers, spoilers who try to make claims against the legitimate miners working on the legal precedent of ‘finders keepers’. To stop these carpet baggers a circuit judge is employed to vet the legal veracity of the claims. In Nome the Judge is due but so is Anne’s boyfriend and she tarts herself up in her finest duffel coat as the ship appears. But wait! Her beau Roy has hooked up with the Judge’s matronly looking daughter.

Happily for Anne she is not short of admirers and despite Roy’s protestations of innocence she’s soon showing an ankle to Alex, who is a dirty dog if ever I saw one. Roy’s mine is one of those challenged and he foolishly ignores his toothless hillbilly partner and turns his claim over to the Gold Commission for the Judge’s verdict. Alas this is delayed 90 days meaning the mine could be stripped clean by the time they get it back.

This can’t be good old American justice and of course it’s not as we soon learn that the Judge and ‘the Gold commission’ are a bunch of big fakers. What follows is a predictable sequence of bar fist fights and shoot outs before a toy train falls over and honour is restored. Roy gets a kiss on his dirty face and could that be a bit of real cleavage as the credits roll? Oh I’ve come over all faint!

This 1955 effort was a remake of a film from the 1930s - God knows what the bar room sluts looked like in that! Here they were a gaudy technicoloured bunch of hefty hoofers but no less fun for all that. Clearly no one could look nicer than Anne Baxter who shined in every scene - mostly due to intense lighting and a costume budget that would match King Kong’s.

The film skirted a thin line between comedy and drama with the drunken yokel and drunken maid playing it for laughs that never came against some pretty nasty schemes and murders. There was of course no doubt that right would prevail but I have to admit being wrong footed when the judge was revealed to be bent - can’t trust anyone these days!

The sets and costumes were as you’d expect with the location work kept to a minimum. There was a horse shit free main street and a basic mine set but you could tell the western was on the way out when the whole bar set was smashed up at the end in a scene reminiscent of ‘Blazing Saddles’.

It’s clearly an unsophisticated film made for simpler times with goodies versus baddies and no one catching syphilis. I quite enjoyed it for the most part but I doubt it’s one that I’ll ever revisit or even remember after this beer. Cheers!

The Tag Line : Not Authentic - It’s twoo, it’s twoo   57%