Satire | Cagey Films

Joseph Losey’s The Servant (1963): Criterion Blu-ray review

Posted on July 5, 2023July 4, 2023 by Kenneth George Godwin

Architecture reflects social divisions in Joseph Losey's The Servant (1963)

Criterion’s new 4K restoration of Joseph Losey’s The Servant (1963) provides an excellent showcase for this pitch-black satire about the collapse of the British class system after World War Two and the dissolution of Empire. Harold Pinter’s script (adapted from Robin Maugham’s novella), Losey’s direction, Douglas Slocombe’s rich black-and-white cinematography and and a superlative cast – Dirk Bogarde, James Fox, Wendy Craig and Sarah Miles – combine to create one of the defining British films of the 1960s.

Back to the multiplex

Posted on February 8, 2023February 7, 2023 by Kenneth George Godwin

James Foster (Alexander Skarsgard) undergoes the duplication process in Brandon Cronenberg's Infinity Pool (2023)

Two new movies by directors who interest me offer a mixture of pleasure and slight disappointment. Both Brandon Cronenberg’s Infinity Pool (2023) and M. Night Shyamalan’s Knock at the Cabin (2023) have a strong strain of psychological horror somewhat compromised by endings which are not fully satisfying.

Recent Arrow viewing, Part Two

Posted on May 5, 2021November 11, 2023 by Kenneth George Godwin

Captain Seafield (Ryland Brickson Cole Tews) and sonar expert Nedge Pepsi (Beulah Peters) are shocked by the Lake Michigan Monster (2018)

Yet another wide range of titles from Arrow Video from a restored silent classic to aliens over Tokyo, woods infested with zombies, food which consumes those who eat it, apocalypse in an alternate future Los Angeles, friendship destroyed by political conflicts, rich people facing the loss of their wealth and a naively admiring time capsule of the U.S. on the brink of the ’60s.

Winter viewing: Severin Films

Posted on March 13, 2021March 11, 2024 by Kenneth George Godwin

Graf Saxon (Howard Vernon) engages in gruesome medical experiments in Adrian Hoven's Castle of the Creeping Flesh (1968)

Bingeing has been my default viewing mode for some time, but it’s only more recently that it’s come to encompass indulging in multiple releases by a particular company – which in turn is a result of those company’s offering regular sales and discount packages of monthly releases. The most prominent examples of this are Vinegar Syndrome and Severin Films, both of which specialize in genre and exploitation titles, pulling me into deep, often sordid, black holes.

Miguel Llansó’s trash aesthetic

Posted on November 4, 2020March 30, 2023 by Kenneth George Godwin

The Soviet Union virus (Ciaron Davies) tries to seduce Agent D.T. Gagano (Daniel Tadesse) with power in Miguel Llanso's Jesus Shows You the Way to the Highway (2019)

Once again, Arrow Video introduces me to a previously unknown filmmaker whose work is wildly imaginative, playful and challenging. Their two-disk set of Miguel Llansó’s Crumbs (2015) and Jesus Shows You the Way to the Highway (2019) is one of the year’s most engaging releases.

Pandemic viewing, Part One

Posted on April 29, 2020December 10, 2022 by Kenneth George Godwin

Brigitte Lahaie serves the bloodsucking Count in Jean Rollin's La fiancee de Dracula (2002)

Social isolation and “working from home” mean a lot of time for movie-watching … and the volume far outstrips my ability to say anything substantive about many of the films I do watch: so here I mostly just acknowledge what I’ve been viewing in the past 4-6 weeks. Part one of four.

Asia extreme

Posted on April 8, 2020December 10, 2022 by Kenneth George Godwin

Boxer Leo (Masataka Kubota) and prostitute Monica (Sakurako Konishi) face off against yakuza gangs in Takashi Miike's First Love (2019)

Although there are obviously differences from culture to culture, many Asian movies share a tendency to to ignore the kind of “realism” Western, and particularly American, movies so often feel is necessary – which is one reason so many U.S. remakes of Asian genre movies take on a pedestrian quality nowhere evident in the originals. Three recent Asian movies – from Korea, Japan and China – use different approaches to explore societies in which economic and social inequality engender violence and to some degree madness. One uses blackly comic satire, one pushes genre tropes to absurd extremes, and one pushes neorealism into the realm of nightmare.

More Arrow …

Posted on December 25, 2019December 10, 2022 by Kenneth George Godwin

Nami (Meikjo Kaji) takes care of the old woman's body in Shunya Ito's Female Prisoner Scorpion: Jailhouse 41 (1972)

Among recently viewed Arrow Blu-rays are a classic Italian political satire, a scrappy independent from Dayton, Ohio, a dark children’s fantasy, an end-of-the-world romance, and a violently stylish Japanese series of women-in-prison movies.

Speed reviewing, Nov. 2019 – part three

Posted on November 27, 2019December 10, 2022 by Kenneth George Godwin

There's something hiding in the basement in Mike Flanagan's The Haunting of Hill House (2019)

More recent viewing, heavy on the sci-fi, fantasy and horror – the latter including an ambitious Netflix series and a grim documentary about violence in America.

Brief comments, part two

Posted on November 21, 2018October 16, 2022 by Kenneth George Godwin

The deadly Daruma doll in the bloody opening scene of Takashi Miike's As the Gods Will (2014)

More brief notes on recent random viewing choices; another mixed bag of classic fantasy, generic thrillers, dramas drawn form real life, spectacular martial arts and gritty war action, and a scattershot, off-the-wall satire by “the world’s worst living director”.

Tag: Satire