Beware if a man in a film noir complains about his humdrum life, as Dick Powell does in Pitfall (1948).  He’s destined to have his life stimulated by violence and, possibly, the kiss of a woman who’s not his wife.  The said woman is played by Lizabeth Scott, whose boyfriend is in the clink.  A nerdy aggressor (Raymond Burr) wishes to take advantage of this imprisonment by running away with lovely Scott, but Powell, the would-be adulterer, remains in the way. . . Whatever Jay Dratler’s novel is like, presumably it was good material for a movie, for a very involving story—solidly directed by Andre de Toth—gets underway.  The casting alone is very involving.

Pitfall (1948 film) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Powell and Scott aren’t perfect—indeed, they’re superficial (for more nuance, there’s Jane Wyatt)—but they still fit noir material like a glove.  I only wish Pitfall was on DVD: I had to watch it on YouTube.

At bottom Margarethe von Trotta’s German film, Marianne and Juliane, is a bore, just ultra-leftist or radical enough not to condemn a woman who has gone from activism to terrorism in the (figurative) war to end Third World agony, and even in 1981, the year of the film’s release, was such ultra-leftism ludicrous.  The terrorist in question is Marianne (Barbara Sukowa), and although von Trotta probably prefers the merely social, not terrorist, activism of Marianne’s sister Juliane (Jutta Lamp), it is abhorrent that she seems little bothered by Marianne’s bombs.  How boring this is; we’ve lived with such sentiments for many years now.  And it doesn’t improve matters that Marianne is such a bland character.

(In German with English subtitles)

Jake, a black pastor in The Second Chance (2006), is abrasive and insulting, although at other times he is too good to be true.  Not a well-drawn character.

Ethan, a white associate pastor, is poorly acted by Michael W. Smith.  Steve Taylor’s Christian movie doesn’t work.  It has a good feel for inner city life, but is sometimes less than credible: e.g. Ethan doesn’t seem to be secretly hoping other people are watching him give alms in the ‘hood, and yet this is what mean Jake repeatedly accuses him of.

Cover of The Second Chance

The only good thing about No Escape (2015) is that it is wildly suspenseful.  Critics who have called it trashy—trashy in the sense of sloppily dumb—are right.  The film stars Owen Wilson and Lake Bell (acceptable).  Sterling Jerins, the young girl who plays one of their daughters, is a talented cutie, but the two brothers who made this thing are talented exploiters.

The German movie Phoenix (2015), by Christian Petzold, brought certain thoughts to mind.

First, if people will not behave humanely during wartime, when will they behave humanely?  Second, the film concerns ordinary people living in a defeated Germany after WWII, and their actions are mundane, unheroic, sometimes scheming.  At the same time, they are often rising from the ashes (the book Phoenix is based on is titled Return from the Ashes):  such is the case with Nelly (Nina Hoss), a concentration camp survivor.

Though overrated, the film is a good one, finely directed and photographed.  One of its few flaws is that it peters out instead of actually concluding.  But listen, Hoss: your acting is marvelous, as is that of Ronald Zehrfeld.  That is, Hoss is marvelous playing a woman with a broken spirit, one who seems normally sensitive and deeply appreciative of a man’s love but is also capable of rebuilding strength and initiative when necessary.  Zehrfeld pulls off a smart working-class dude, the husband of Nelly who does not recognize her.

(In German with English subtitles)