V is For Vertigo

 A to Z Challenge

A Month At The Movies

This year I am copying from a myriad of other A to Z  challengers by reprinting the same synopsis about my theme with every letter.  You can skip over this part if you want to.  

I love movies and have decided to share with you a movie each day that I have enjoyed to one degree or another.  With each entry, I'll give a brief synopsis of the film, share a positive and negative review from Rotten Tomatoes ( a website, I didn't use much at all until preparing for the challenge), discuss its resiliency (the theme of the A to Z challenge this year), and other tidbits like whether the film may appear in my top 100 film list, which I have been revamping this year. I think that's enough in the way of introduction, considering you'll be reading it (hopefully) 4  more times this month.

Film: Vertigo (1958)

Director: Alfred Hitchcock

By Saul Bass - http://aliceovolk.files.wordpress.com/2012/11/vertigo-1958-usa-movie-poster-art-by-saul-bass-james-stewart-in-alfred-hitchcocks-vertigo1.jpg, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=25318666

I haven't seen this movie for a while so I went tot he library today and checked it out and am watching it as I make this post.  I've been watching for an over an hour, and am at the point of the movie where the pieces should be coming together but they are not.  

Positive Tomato: One of Hitchcock's finest achievements, layering drama, a love story, adventure, and hair-raising suspense into a psychological murder-mystery that simply has no peers. Mike Massie - Gone With The Twins 

Negative Tomato: Even such a master-craftsman as director Alfred Hitchcock sometimes forgets that more than enough is too much, as he proves in this photogenic San Francisco suspense-mystery, which is still badly in need of the cutter's shears. Clyde Gilmour - Maclean's Magazine

Jimmy Stewart starring in his 4th Alfred Hitchcock film plays a retired detective who is asked by an old friend to protect his wife from herself, but all is not as it seems.  

Leyostone Tube Station

By Mike Quinn, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=45941673

I just got to the point of the big plot twist, I had forgotten all about it.  Things are getting interesting, I'm not sure how its going to end.

Resiliency: This movie is a psychological thriller in every sense of the word.  The way the killer operates here is to steal all of Stewart's resiliency.  He is unable to move forward so instead he moves backward.

Top 100: I just finished watching the film , and I am leaning towards the verdict of the negative tomato rather than  the positive one.  I mentioned in a previous review, that I don't know what my #1 Hitchcock film is, well It is not Vertigo.

I was disappointed in the ending.  It made sense and it kept me guessing until the end.  I just didn't like how it played out.  One reason is that Barbara Bel Geddes isn't in the last act of that film and she made every scene she was in so much better by her presence.   Bel Geddes who played the matriarch in the T.V. soap Dallas, plays an interesting role in this movie.  I would have liked to see her utilized more in the film.  Not to say that the star Kim Novak doesn't do a good job, she does.  It's just I fount myself rooting more for Bel Geddes than Novak.

A to Z Connections: This is the second Alfred Hitchcock directed film in the challenge (North by Northwest).  

There are 3 A to Z connections with It's A  Wonderful Life: 

• They both star Jimmy Stewart.
• They both have a scene where Stewart jumps into water to save someone who doesn't need saving.
• Neither did well in their original cinematic runs and over the course of time became more and more well regarded.  They are both in the top 25 of the American Film Institutes (AFI) Top 100 Film List

Next Time: Will there be swans?

U is for UHF

Hello and welcome back to A Month at the Movies,  my contribution to the A to Z challenge for 2023.

This year I am copying from a myriad of other A to Z  challengers by reprinting the same synopsis about my theme with every letter.  You can skip over this part if you want to.  

I love movies and have decided to share with you a movie each day that I have enjoyed to one degree or another.  With each entry, I'll give a brief synopsis of the film, share a positive and negative review from Rotten Tomatoes ( a website, I didn't use much at all until preparing for the challenge), discuss its resiliency (the theme of the A to Z challenge this year), and other tidbits like whether the film may appear in my top 100 film list, which I have been revamping this year. I think that's enough in the way of introduction, considering you'll be reading it (hopefully) 5  more times this month.

Film: UHF (1989) 

Director: Jay Levey

Weird Al's Apartment in UHF
By Mountain Mike Johans…, CC BY 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=47260199

I love parodies. I grew up listening to one of the greatest parodists of all time, Allan Sherman.  My Mom and Dad would send out a Christmas Card each year where they would write our family's annual exploits to the tune of a Christmas carol.  I myself have written a number of parodies and have posted many in my blog. 

I even wrote a parody last Saturday to publicize my S is for Silverado post and put it on my Facebook page.

 (Sung to the tune of Desperado by The Eagles) 

Silverado, you are in my top eleven.

You star two great Kevin’s 

Plus one Glenn, and one Glover 

You’re a western

 But so much more than your genre 

Which is why I’m so fond a 

 This joy I’ve discovered.  

But with no disrespect to Alan Sherman, my parents, or myself, my favorite parodist is Weird Al Yankovic.

When Weird Al first started out he would send his songs to Dr. Demento who would play them on his syndicated radio program.  My favorite of which, and my all-time favorite Weird Al Song, is It's Still Billy Joel to Me, performed to the tune of It's Still Rock and Roll to Me by (Wait for it ....) Billy Joel.

 

I mean Weird Al had the audacity to rip Billy Joel's music while performing Billy Joel's music. I was impressed. In 1989, Weird Al set his sights on television and the movies at the same time by starring in and co-writing UHF a movie about a t.v. channel.  

At the time most network television was broadcast on VHF (Very High Frequency) and most independent stations were broadcast on UHF (Ultra High Frequency).  While some might argue about the quality of these frequencies.  The quality of the programming was generally regarded as infinitely better on VHF. 

 Positive Tomato - The individual parts may be greater than the sum of the whole, but man, are those parts funny. Austin Trunick - Under The Radar

Negative Tomato - This is the dreariest comedy in many a month, a depressing slog through recycled comic formulas. Roger Ebert - Chicago Sun-Times 

If I were to give UHF a 6 or less-word film review it would be: Walter Mitty meets SCTV. The film is essentially a bunch of parodies with a plot sandwiched in between them.  The movie begins with a pretty good Raiders parody.

Resiliency: Michael Richards (Kramer from Seinfeld) is the best part of this movie.  He plays Stanley Spadowski who shows resiliency after being fired from the best t.v. station in town where he worked as a janitor and ended up getting hired as a janitor at the station Yankovic manages to host a wildly successful children's t.v. program. 

Top 100: This movie straddles the fence between so dumb it's funny and so dumb it's dumb. It has many fine moments, but it is nowhere near making my top 100.

A to Z Connection: This is the 2nd film in the challenge about television (Quiz Show). 

Next Time: VHF (Very High Fears)