A Law Unto Themselves

With a title like Seven Blood-Stained Orchids, you’d probably expect a fascinating nature documentary divulging the secrets of a rare flower. . . but of course not, this is part of the continuing series of giallo films reviewed here on Filmizon.com. Written and directed by Umberto Lenzi (and loosely based upon Cornell Woolrich’s novel “Rendezvous in Black”), the filmmaker immerses the viewer into a sordid tale of bloody revenge. A murderer, dressed (and gloved) in black, is dispensing of women in and around the city of Rome.

Oh, how time flies. . . twenty two years ago, Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) was outsmarting many a villain, one of which was Max (Vanessa Redgrave) – a woman who was a British arms dealer. . . now, in 2018's Mission: Impossible – Fallout, it is implied that the American spy is dealing with that original foe’s daughter, the White Widow (Vanessa Kirby). It is a signal of a franchise that, for the most part, has done things right. . . each movie (other than the woeful second effort), finding a quality mix of action, adventure, spycraft and intrigue (all while developing an entertaining story that combines outrageous, authentically shot stunts that somehow outdo the previous film’s seemingly unbeatable sequences), while also highlighting the longevity of a successful franchise and career (Tom Cruise now only a year younger than Jon Voight was in the original movie).

I’ve said it once, and I’ll say it again. . . Tom Cruise is the reincarnation of several silent film stars. Think Buster Keaton – the man willing to jump, fall, slide and put his life on the line for his beloved fans (the front of a house almost crushing him – miraculously finding his way through the upstairs window thanks to a perfectly placed nail on the ground). . . or Harold Lloyd, dangling from a breaking clock eight stories high. . . also Douglas Fairbanks Sr., who we see falling down a ship’s sail with only his dagger jammed into the fabric to control the drop. . . as well as the countless gags performed by the magical Charlie Chaplin. With Mission: Impossible – Fallout being released today (the sixth film in the jaw dropping franchise, I thought it would be a prudent idea to revisit the 2015 fifth feature, Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation). Opening with a death-defying stunt which has Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) dangling from the exterior of a plane taking off, it is a perfect example of what I am taking about above. Completely real, you are actually seeing the actor take off (it took eight tries to get everything perfect), and, each time they reached an incredible five thousand feet. He had to wear special contact lenses, as a speck of dust in the eye would have blinded him, whilst also helping him keep his eyes open.

With its sequel being released today, I thought this was the perfect time to look back at 2014's The Equalizer – the first time the director/actor duo of Antoine Fuqua and Denzel Washington re-teamed since their impressive 2001 effort Training Day (they have since filmed The Magnificent Seven and The Equalizer 2 together). Loosely based upon the 1980s television series of the same name (starring Edward Woodward), Denzel Washington steps into the role of Robert McCall. . . a lonely, quiet and highly OCD man living in Boston. . . who is clearly low on sleep – as he spends his evenings at an all-night diner reading classic literature. During his days, he works at a big box hardware store, a semblance of a bland, repetitive life (his mind often lingers on the past, a complicated history of regret and loss). . . his fellow employees constantly guess what his former job was. . . McCall claims he was a former Pip (as in Gladys Knight & The Pips), showing off his dance moves as the much younger employees look up the reference.

A tale with some eerie similarities to its real-life character, filmmaker Carl Theodor Dreyer set out to make a motion picture on the legendary Joan of Arc. Upon its completion in 1928 (The Passion of Joan of Arc), he was hounded by French nationalists, French government censors and the Archbishop of Paris, first complaining that a Dane (who is not Catholic) could not do justice to the greatest of French stories, then taking aim at the film itself – whitewashing the narrative (the French premiere eliminated the nastiness of the Judge and religious theologians and priests, as well as any other edgy visuals), thus leaving it in a truncated form that truly disgusted the screenwriter/director (a semblance of being tried by jury). Then, a truly disastrous event occurred – the original film negative burned in a fire at the UFA Studios in Berlin (a truly bizarre coincidence). . . the filmmaker distraught, was forced to piece the entire film back together by way of all of his discarded footage and alternate takes (a perfect example of the director’s extensive attention to detail, the movie was reconstructed to a very similar state that very few would be able to differentiate – though obviously Dreyer was less than pleased). Fate once again reared its ugly head when a lab fire burned this copy, leaving just a few extremely damaged prints (based upon both the original first and second cut) that had been circulated across Europe. Edited and changed by future hands, it was long believed that no one would ever see the man’s original vision again (the prints that survived were often missing twenty plus minutes, were chopped up and were changed to suit the meddling hands of re-releasers – some had added narration, others injected Baroque scores and changed the intertitles).