I've got behind and I'll get more behind if I leave this until tomorrow so I'm just going to blast through these in the order that I saw them. Caught The Turning Point from lovefilm, I cannot believe how this got double-figures oscar nominations, it's so unendingly average. The two leads provide an interest but their argument/resentment is not that deep and simplistically drawn. The subplot of the daughter and the male dancer is just awful, it's so devoid of anything believable and the actors (who are dancers, not actors) were very wooden and didn't help matters. Far too over the top, camp and soapy for my liking, just an incredibly disappointing, terribly written film.
I did though do much better by downloading the "sequel" to (or continuation of) The Emigrants, namely The New Land. Same deal as before, no subs and detailed plot outlines but this was even easier to follow as there was a 30 minute section of dialogue-free flashbacks which was just pure cinema. Magnificent job by Jan Troell (who wrote, directed, shot and edited the film), this surpasses the original, Ullmann is again incredible and Von Sydow comes into his own the more the movie goes on. Again as before would love to see this properly, but this was great as it was.
Saturday was a day where there was just so much consistently on I couldn't see it all. I caught most of Gigi before lunchtime on TCM and enjoyed it more than I expected to. Caron was a little disappointing (she was fine but nothing special), I always seem to enjoy Louis Jourdan and Maurice Chevalier was an absolute hoot. Luscious production, not entirely my kind of thing but stylish and a good watch.
Thereafter I caught a couple of 40s comedies, The Miracle at Morgan's Creek and I Was a Male War Bride. The former is an excellent Preston Sturges comedy about a girl in small town America who cannot remember drunkenly getting married to a soldier before he left for the war. Of course she gave a false name and cannot remember the husband's either and calls on the local guy who's been in love with her forever to help her out and things go from bad to worse. Consistently amusing, way ahead of its time (they got *so* much risky stuff in here), fun, fun, fun.
The latter film though was not as successful. Cary Grant is on snooze mode and while Ann Sheridan tries, it's just not that funny. It picks up towards the end when Grant (playing a "French" officer the way Sean Connery plays "Russian" submarine captains) has to be taken as Sheridan's "war bride" and gets bounced around trying to cut through all the red tape, but by that point it's too little too late. Cute film but not much there, especially as a comedy.
Finally Pushing Daisies started here so I watched that on tv (I've seen it all online anyway) before discovering that BBCFour are showing The Best Of Youth over the next month. I may miss next week's episode though but I can't really feel too bad about that. Well made but not much going on to be honest. Maybe it picks up, I can't for the life of me see what all the fuss is 90 minutes in to it.