Matt's Big Oscar Challenge Day 181: Rom-cons

I find the 1960s a really interesting period for cinema as it bridges the gap between the glossy product of the early years and the more experimental films from the years to come. A perfect example of this is Bonnie and Clyde a film that is shot a lot differently than many of the films I have watched up to this point and its levels of sex and violence mark it out from the safer movies at the time. The film itself concerns the formation of the Barrow gang led by Warren Beatty's forceful Clyde Barrow who hooks up with Faye Dunaway's Bonnie Parker while attempting to steal her mother's car. The two begin to rob banks and soon join forces with Clyde's brother Buck, his wife Blanche and local oaf CW Moss to become notorious throughout the country. The gang are beset by problems especially that Bonnie and Blanche just don't get on with each other while the quintet soon have an angry policeman on their hands after they embarrass Texas Ranger Frank Harmer. Eventually the gang make several mistakes which allows several of their number to be killed and the rest to hide out at the house of CW's father and while I won't spoil the ending I think most of us know how this story turned out. 

I was completely transfixed while watching Bonnie and Clyde from the opening bank robbery through to the bloody shoot-out and the final tragic scene everything about it felt new and fresh. Arthur Penn's directorial style owed a lot to the directors of the French New Wave with the camera angles focusing on the sexuality of both of the central characters. The key relationship is obviously that of Bonnie and Clyde and you can tell the two really do care about each other in between their bank robbing and killing sprees. The interesting thing about Bonnie and Clyde is that it makes a lot of the violence seem incredibly comic especially in the case of some of the music that is used while Gene Wilder's cameo is also an odd choice. Talking of Genes we had Mr Hackman here in his first notable role and as Buck he really is the brains of the Barrow family and even in his early days you could see that he would become a big star. In fact the acting in Bonnie and Clyde is great with all five central cast members getting Oscar nominations but the only win was for Estelle Parsons who played the cranky Blanche. Personally the best performance in the whole film comes from Michael J Pollard as the simple CW who really starts to idolise Clyde to the extent that he thinks he is invincible. That's not to put anything against Beatty or Dunaway who both became big name stars after this film and of course would go on to bigger and better things hereafter. With its breathtaking style and great performances it's not hard to see why Bonnie and Clyde was nominated for so many awards however in a year with so many great movies it only came away with two. However its legacy lives on today through the influential award-winning cinematography and through its comical presentation of violence. 

Matt's Big Oscar Challenge Day 180: Judgment Call

One of the interesting things about doing this Oscar challenge is seeing how the stars of the 1930s have changed when we get to the 1960s. Spencer Tracy for example, whose final film Guess Who's Coming to Dinner has already been talked about here, had his initial success in the 1930s however had a career resurface in his final decade. An example of this is Judgment at Nuremberg where Tracey plays a small town judge Dan Heywood who has been recruited to sit as the chief justice at one of the many military tribunals of German judges accused of committing crimes against humanity by sending people of different religious beliefs to Concentration Camps. One judge in particular is the quiet and reserved Ernst Janning, played by an almost unrecognisable Burt Lancaster, who feels that he shouldn't be tried alongside the crueller judges who seemingly knew what the Nazis were doing. The sides are argued by the forthright American Colonel Tad Lawson, played by Richard Widmark, and the passionate defence council Hans Rolfe played by Maximilian Schell who went onto win the Best Actor Oscar for his role. While in Nuremberg Dan meets Marlene Dietrich's Frau Bertholt a wife of one of the judges who was previously put on trial and one that he almost romances however he realises that she is trying to manipulate his feelings to give a different verdict at the trial. Most of the film is set during the trial but is still incredibly gripping as Stanley Kramer attempts to make us question if doing something when you don't know the full consequence is as bad as what the Nazis were doing at the concentration camps and I have to say it was a fascinating watch.

Despite its three hour run time Judgment at Nuremberg flew by thanks mainly to Tracy's great performance as the conflicted Dan who comes off as an ordinary guy who has to make an extraordinary decision. Dan's almost-romance with Frau Bertholt perfectly exemplifies his tough decision as she is one of the many characters who try to influence him in some way. The film is basically about accountability and how much each of these judges actually knew about the sentence they were giving to those who received them. Schell's Oscar winning performance was incredibly heartfelt as he is able to convey someone who is sticking up for the bad guys but can still justify it because he is 'doing his job' and his final words to Dan perfectly encapsulate his feelings on the matter. It's not just Schell though as I thought Tracy's performance here was just captivating and better in fact than his two Oscar wining turns back in the 1930s. He's one of those screen presences who can mesmerise you without saying anything at all and for that reason I feel in a way he should've won Best Actor over Schell. I also enjoyed Burt Lancaster, who is silent for the majority of his time on screen, as his final testimony is one of the highlights of the picture and once again adds to the moral ambiguity of the plot. While Judgment at Nuremberg may not be particularly cinematic it as at the same time an enthralling tale that I was never bored at and for that reason alone it deserved its place as one of the five Best Picture Nominees.