Dame de Paris"("The Hunchback of Notre Dame" in a very French version,) where Alain Cuny plays Claude Frollo, the mad priest. Here he is a most sympathetic character winning more sympathy all the way, until his real identity is revealed, and then there is a party. It is very expressionistic, reminding of the best days of German expressionism, and the story is not too bad - it even finds a happy ending with everyone most content. It's the Gothic scenes however that make the film worth watching, especially the extremely suggestive somnambulant scene, which is quite outstanding in cinema history, for its poetry, beauty and extreme romanticism. The film is a curiosity and invaluable as such, fitting into the pattern of other Cocteau films like "The Beauty and the Beast" and "L'aigle Ă deux tĂŞtes" and is extremely atmospheric - while you could do without the comedy element. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0122392/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1 The Purple Heart (1944) (9/10) A true story of conditions at their worst for war prisoners, a kind of prelude to 'The Manchurian Candidate' 10 July 2017
Although you wouldn't believe it, this is actually a true story from the beginning of the war (1942), and the fall of Singapore takes place during the course of the trial, which the Japanese interrupt for celebration including judges and attorneys. Four of the eight war prisoners were really executed, while four survived prison camps in China with difficulty (see the review by 'ustye'). It's a great story of hardship in Japanese prison, as the Japanese take out the prisoners one by one to torture them leaving them maimed for life, one losing his mind, another his voice, and so on. Of course, they go dreaming in the necessary therapy of escapism, and those are the finest sequences of the film, contrasting sharply against the prison sterility. The Japanese are not satirized or exaggerated in their manners in spite of this being made during the war, and two of them actually end up as casualties as well. It's an odd film for Lewis Milestone but as well made as any of them, only somewhat more sinister. Dana Andrews, Farley Granger and Richard Crenna grace the cast, but the Intriguing conspiracies and dark secrets in the fogs of London and Canada best speech is actually not Dana's final speech but the previous one by Lt. Peter Vincent (Donald Barry), which is almost Shakespearean in intelligent eloquence. It's a hard film of hard times under inhuman circumstances, and yet it is very edifying and gives much afterthought - however would you act under similar circumstances? Their final decision how to vote for their destiny is a triumph of humanity. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0037197/?ref_=nv_sr_2 The Suspect (1944) (10/10) Charles Laughton at his best trying to get out of an extremely unhappy marriage
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