I'll start off with a film I should have talked about last time but I hadn't rated it on imdb so I forgot it when I went to look at what I'd seen recently. I'd noticed a while ago that the Swedish film As it is in Heaven had been on megavideo but after that site changed its player I couldn't get anything to work. That's now changed and I took the opportunity to see this film that was oscar nominated in the foreign language category in 2004. It's absolutely joyous. It's about a world famous conductor who, following a heart attack leaving him with grim prospects, returns to the small town of his youth and buys the old school to live in. Of course before long he's roped into running the local church choir and the story goes from there.
This is such a lovely film, the scenes of him rehearsing the choir with his unusual methods (preferring them to bond first and sing later) are sublime and just put a smile on your face. The film is not without darkness though, there are subplots involving marital abuse and guilt over sin, but it then shows just what an escape the music is for these characters. The ensemble is uniformly good, I especially liked Frida Hallgren as the friendly blonde and Helen Sjöholm as the abused wife. This has a finale to absolutely die for though, the end of the film is wonderful and is a simultaneously uplifting and heartbreaking conclusion, which is necessarily perfect. It's not without flaws as it's a little simplistic at times and some of the drama a tad obvious, but nonetheless this is something I'd thoroughly recommend, especially to music lovers.
I caught a film I've been intrigued about for a while (and had actually forgotton existed), Jack Nicholson's sequel to Chinatown called The Two Jakes. When you're following a film of that quality, it's almost a foregone conclusion it won't be as good so I had no such expectations, but I was surprised that given it's written again by Robert Towne it felt so strange. The tone of the film (and maybe this is Nicholson the director's doing) was quite uneven but I do think the writing added to this. Nicholson, considering when this was made, is actually acting rather than "being Jack", which is what holds this film together. The plot's not streamlined enough, whereas the original was highly skilled drip-feeding of information this has no centre, no focus to the plotting and what remains is a confused narrative where in three back to back scenes you'll have different reveals all going in different directions with no honing down what's important. The cast is fine (including a very game Harvey Keitel) but it all felt rather moot and I'd only really recommend this is you have a special affection for the original and are curious to see where they go with the character.
Irene Dunne is one of my favourite classic actresses and in seeing Anna and the King of Siam I was only reminded why. This is a woman who had the most impeccable comic timing (as witnessed in the bona fide classic screwball comedy The Awful Truth) but she was also an excellent dramatic actress. I'd seen her in the very obscure The White Cliffs of Dover by leaving a tape running so it could catch it at 5am on TCM and was extremely impressed and it was only more of the same here. I don't care for The King and I at all (strange, considering my love for Deborah Kerr) but this earlier dramatic version of the story I enjoyed greatly. Rex Harrison is his usual delicious self and Linda Darnell is as alluring as ever but this is the Irene Dunne show and she's exceptional. Such a soulful actress who here managed to balance that movie-star approach with genuine emotion - it's reminscent of Norma Shearer in The Divorcee in that respect. Cracking stuff.
Which brings me on to Christmas morning, where I watched Sky's premiere of The Golden Compass. It's a very strange film with some interesting ideas (people's souls in this parallel universe are manifested outside of their bodies in animal form, called daemons) and other not so interesting ideas. The special effects are fantastic and the polar bear battle is the highlight of this. The cast is good too, Nicole Kidman gives a suitably charming turn as the mysterious Mrs. Coulter and the girl they quite literally "found" for the lead, Dakota Blue Richards was impressive. This is one of those films though that I'd have no idea who to recommend it to, it's lurching in tone, hearing characters talk about the importance of "dust" or suddenly throw in the odd word of working class slang whilst keeping a straight face is very surreal. The experience is also that this is very obviously a film, there's no real storytelling to get lost in. I've read criticism that the overt chastising of the church in the novels wasn't here but I don't think it would add anything to this movie, it would make it a bit different but hardly much better. The interesting parts aren't necessarily cinematic, which would make me inclined to read the book, if only the author didn't come across the way he does in his interviews (claiming his books are for smart people and those who criticise them are crazy 
).
What it did though was make me check out Dakota's recent BBC film on the iPlayer, called Dustbin Baby, which I'd had mentioned to me after it was on the other day. It's a film, obviously about a girl who was abandoned in a dustbin as a child and shows the aftermath of an argument with her guardian (Juliet Stevenson, lovely as ever) on her 14th birthday, combined with how they came to live together. The scenes with Stevenson and Richards are the reason to see this, both are first rate and it's beautifully done. I found the cutting back to Dakota's character as an infant to be less successful as that was where the writing was more repetetive and obvious and it didn't have the bonus of the performances being given in the present-day storyline. Very realistic portrayal of a girl of that age (and her wants and desires), some may find the way issues such as her self esteem are dealt with to be too simplistic but it worked for me for what it was. The end was not unpredictable but moving regardless, and combined with the other film earlier I've become a fan of Dakota's in the space of a day.