What was the last film you watched?

[Willie Oleson]

This is what they SHOULD remake:

(with explosions and nudity and plot twists and a brand new de-vocal fryer).

 

[Crimson]

BEETLEJUICE BEETLEJUICE (2024)

My fondness for the original has always been undercut by one major reservation: the title character. I love everything about the movie, except when Beetlejuice is on screen. Fortunately, he doesn't have a lot of screen time in the film and I just grit my teeth through his 15 minutes or so.

He has more screen time in this sequel, so it was surprising to me that I found him far less annoying; maybe Michael Keaton toned down his performance. Overall this was a pretty enjoyable follow up that captured the spirit and style of the original. The movie is overly long, with several needless side plots, but it all comes together nicely.

 

[Mel O'Drama]

Because it's trending on tellytalk, and I needed to know how the catfight played out.

How exciting that the torch is being passed on this way.

That is such modern thinking of you. The comparison would never occur to me but perhaps that has something to do with my personal and lonesome vigilante vendetta against A.I. (cue harmonica music).

Oh, I tend to give A.I. a wide berth as well (as much as possible, that is, but who knows what/who's real these days).

I think the reason it popped into my head was because of the video thumbnail which (probably because of the definition paired with the lighting) looks airbrushed and not quite real.

quiz/grande variété shows that ruled Dutch TV in the 1980s.
Everyone now and then I watch some of it on youtube but it all looks very much like time-filler and it's not much fun to go through it again

So often the case with these shows and especially the "celebrity" ones, I think.

That said I did enjoy binge-rewatching Give Us A Clue a couple of years ago, and I have the huge DVD set on the shelf which I'm sure I'll enjoy more than I ought.

Although set in the 1970s, the film completely abandons the PEYTON PLACE vibe. Presumably the filmmakers think modern audiences are too impatient for things like atmosphere, character development or specificity of location. The vampire is seen within minutes. One of the 1970s version's most iconic, creepy scenes was replaced with a cheap, silly jump scare followed by gore. And then I turned it off.

I didn't even know there was a new version. From what you've written that was probably not a bad thing.

I have the 1979 version on DVD, but can't remember the story at all, so perhaps I'm due a rewatch.

 

[Angela Channing]

BEETLEJUICE BEETLEJUICE (2024)

My fondness for the original has always been undercut by one major reservation: the title character. I love everything about the movie, except when Beetlejuice is on screen. Fortunately, he doesn't have a lot of screen time in the film and I just grit my teeth through his 15 minutes or so.

He has more screen time in this sequel, so it was surprising to me that I found him far less annoying; maybe Michael Keaton toned down his performance. Overall this was a pretty enjoyable follow up that captured the spirit and style of the original. The movie is overly long, with several needless side plots, but it all comes together nicely.

I saw this a few weeks ago and really enjoyed it. It still had all the madcap energy of the original film and most of the humour landed well. Overall, a very successful sequel.

 

[Willie Oleson]

SPEED (1994)



I enjoyed it very much when I watched it for the first time way back in the 1990s, but yesterday I noticed how truly outstanding this film is.
I'm sure there are lots of special effects, but....it just doesn't feel like it. It looks so different from modern blockbusters!
Never been Keanu's biggest fan but I simply cannot picture anyone else playing Jack. There's something about his soft-spokenness that really needs to be here, and his chemistry with Sandra Bullock is possibly the best I've ever seen in this type of film.
While it has its light moments there's enough room for genuine despair, and there's a lot of detail for everything else's that's going in the story.
None of the characters are terribly fleshed out but it's disaster spectacle from start to finish so I'm not sure when or how that should have happened.
Nevertheless, most of the supporting cast are given great little moments which makes it more colourful then it needed to be.

With all the fuss about modern "Jokers" (first Heath Ledger, now Joaquin Phoenix) I'm going to say that Dennis Hopper does a much better job at playing a Batman-esque villain.

There's some really quotable one-liners like "Poor people are crazy, Jack. I'm eccentric".

He's super evil, from an era when it was still OK to love-to-hate the bad guy.
Of course now that I'm posting it here on tellytalk, sneaky algorithm will inform Hollywood about SPEED's newfound popularity, and before you know it there's going to be a Howard Payne origins movie that shows his adventures as the bullied misfit who needs to embrace the empowerment of being different. Because an anti-hero is still a hero, and that means: franchise!
Oh well, kay sirra sirra.

Of course it's possible to say that DIE HARD which also benefited from Jan de Bont's cinematography was the better one (IMDB seems to think so) and I would definitely agree that it was the one that rejuvenated the gloriously over-the-top blockbuster genre, but SPEED has the additional element of the physical experience.
Bomb threats happen in many stories, but watching the bus crashing through traffic without a moment of relief was often a palm-sweaty business.
It goes from one disaster scenario to the next, Howard Payne is unstoppable.
The last part in the metro wasn't really necessary and has a bit of a sequel feel to it but I guess the villain had to be stopped in an equally spectacular way.
And Sandra Bullock needed all the practice she could get as she would continue her career as the queen of disaster flicks.
I have no memory of SPEED 2, only that it happens on a boat. It's only a matter of time before I click "play!".

On the previous subject of origins sob stories, a counter-culture movement has arisen: the Poohniverse, and one of the latest additions is CINDERELLA'S CURSE.
I knew it was trash but I was curious to see how bad it was, and while I was watching it I entertained the possibility that it was one of those The Asylum blockbuster knockoffs (they don't care how good or bad the original blockbuster is).
But no, it's from the same producers as Pooh - Blood And Honey. Not that it makes any difference.
The villains in Cinderella's Curse are slasher-happy maniacs and via a CARRIE rip-off they all get their well deserved comeuppance. And then some.
I can't say that the film disappoints, it does what it says on the tin. Production and special effects are piss-poor but the performances are enthusiastic enough.
Actress Danielle Scott plays the badass stepmother and even in her last breath she keeps humiliating Cinderella. She would do just fine in a more convential version of the famous fairy tale.

Lo and behold, today I found out that there is another 2024 Cinderella horror film: CINDERELLA'S REVENGE. But it's still not a The Asylum production!

 

[Crimson]

I have the 1979 version on DVD, but can't remember the story at all, so perhaps I'm due a rewatch.

It would appear to be right up your alley -- a tawdry small town soap slowly overtaken by horror. It's as if Spielberg had spent more time developing Amity before the shark attacks started.

 

[DallasFanForever]

Plucking the Daisy (1956)

I had never seen this one before but had always heard about it so I decided to give it a try. Basically a French comedy film starring the beautiful Brigitte Bardot. It’s good for a few laughs but overall I found it to be just fair. I’d say it definitely has some entertainment value but the plot is kind of weak.

 

[Seaviewer]

maybe Michael Keaton toned down his performance.

First Batman and now Beetlejuice. I wonder what other characters Keaton might consider revisiting

 

[Mel O'Drama]

The Amityville Horror (2005)

It's a very long time since I watched the 1979 version and I did consider rewatching that in the coming days. But I only had a small window yesterday, and Prime listed this remake's running time as a very manageable 1 hour 23 minutes. Why not, I thought, take advantage of the distance from the original to watch the remake in isolation... especially since I'm not that attached to the '79 version.

Firstly, Amazon lied about the running time. It's actually an hour and 29 minutes. And believe, me, those six extra minutes made a difference when I started watching the clock towards the end of what felt like a 2 hour plus film.

As mentioned, my memory of the first film is very dim, but I seem to remember an atmospheric film with the emphasis on psychological horror, with characters and audience questioning whether what we saw could be caused by something innocuous. The 2005 version leans into jump scares every five minutes, with cadaverous ghosts suddenly appearing in mirrors, in cupboards, or wherever (usually accompanied by a loud sting, which is what really causes the jump). I had a feeling I should have just stopped watching when the first ghost appeared, and it's times like this I wish I wasn't so all-in when it comes to watching something. Living characters in the film can see these corpses... Or not, depending what's convenient at that moment in time (in one of the most sigh-inducing moments, the ghost of a young girl took the hand of a living woman and placed the finger in the bullet hole on the ghost's forehead. For... reasons).

And for all the noisy, unsubtle action on screen, I found myself bored and tuning out in the final thirty minutes, mentally going over my to-do list.

Not helping matters, the main characters aren't very well-formed. I didn't find the Kathy character to be likeable at all (I got an icky vibe from the actress playing her. Information I've since read has validated that feeling), so when George became increasingly irritated with her I found myself sympathising with him.

It's set in the mid-Seventies, but doesn't successfully capture how that era felt beyond the usual stereotypical concessions to wardrobe and props. There are the expected anachronisms. And are we really expected to believe that this is the torso of a man whose work appears to be office-based, and who has no athletic equipment in their five bedroom home?

No amount of chopping wood is going to give these results.
​

It would appear to be right up your alley -- a tawdry small town soap slowly overtaken by horror. It's as if Spielberg had spent more time developing Amity before the shark attacks started.

Well, if I wasn't sold before...

I'm not sure when I'll get round to it, but this has definitely moved it onto my viewing list.

 

[Mel O'Drama]

I See You (2018)
AKA 14 Cameras

After watching I See You on Prime, I found out it's really named 14 Cameras, and is a sequel to another film named 13 Cameras. There's not really anything in the film that leaves one feeling they've missed something, though it's possible (or probable) that the back-story with the creepy guy's "son" and the woman who's been in the hole in the ground for years were part of the original film. Whatever the case, this particular outing is not a great film. And for the sake of argument, let's just call this one I See You.

A few years ago I watched a film called The Rental, which I disliked at the time. This film (made a couple of years before The Rental) has an identical premise: Airbnb-type holiday let is rigged with cameras behind fan covers, in sockets and shower heads.

Compared with that film, I See You completely lacks any kind of suspense or mystery. We know who is behind the rigging, so the "horror" comes from watching him walk through the house while the tenants are out or asleep, sniffing knickers, using toothbrushes (why does nobody in these films own an electric toothbrush? Could it be because the urban legend of people doing things with toothbrushes always involves manual ones?) and even sucking on a lipstick. If you're particularly easily grossed-out, there are a few little touches that might make you shudder. Beyond this there's very little.

Probably the darkest and most compelling this gets is following the chat for the livestream he's putting out, as viewers start requesting items of underwear before finally bidding on one of the girls. But even that all comes to a head almost immediately, losing any potential tension.

With the backstories and various characters' stories crossing over, there are quite a few strands here, and this feels like a story with potential. It's just very poorly executed, and never manages to rise above feeling like a movie of the week.​

 

[Seaviewer]

Firstly, Amazon lied about the running time. It's actually an hour and 29 minutes. And believe, me, those six extra minutes made a difference when I started watching the clock towards the end of what felt like a 2 hour plus film.

The extra six minutes is ads, I assume.

 

[Crimson]

First Batman and now Beetlejuice. I wonder what other characters Keaton might consider revisiting

MR. GRANDMOM?

Unlike Harrison Ford, who seemed to resentfully revisit his classic roles with an eye firmly on the paychecks, Michael Keaton seems to joyfully embrace his iconic parts.

 

[Mel O'Drama]

The extra six minutes is ads, I assume.

That would be a reasonable assumption, since many films on Prime/Freevee now have ads (the one I watched last night had three or four breaks)

But in the case of Amityville there were no advertisements. Amazon had simply listed had the wrong running time.

 

[Willie Oleson]

since many films on Prime/Freevee now had ads (the one I watched last night had three or four breaks)

This hasn't been implemented by Dutch Prime yet, but I guess it's only a matter of time, and that will be the time I'll cancel my subscription (although the ads may not appear in rentals which is 70% of the films I watch on Prime).
It's annoying enough that it happens on youtube but at least that doesn't cost me anything.

ROPE (1948)



Yes, I tried another Hitchcock film even though at this point I suspect nothing's ever going to match is four super-films: The Birds, Notorious, Rebecca and Psycho.
I was aware of ROPE's gay undertones, and without a particular context a lot of that first dialogue could indeed suggest a secret of the forbidden love.
I feel the real "kink" starts with hosting a dinner party literally on top of their very dark secret, it's something that borders on sexual exhibitionism, the excitement of getting caught.
But this part of the story is somewhat undermined by an equally strong angle: the feeling of superiority and the right to determine the significance of the lives of other people.
It doesn't ruin the story, it's just that it doesn't always look as interesting as it could have been.

Performance-wise, my favourite is Joan Chandler as Janet who balances her act between uptight and adorably self-reflective.
The story is predictable enough, I don't think anyone actually expected them to get away with it, and this is further confirmed by the insecure behaviour displayed by one of the murderers.
Of course the biggest contrivance, the badly used MacGuffin, is David Kentley's hat. It happens somewhere in the second half of the story and this implies that the original set-up of the perfect murder had never been sustainable. It comes out of nowhere and has nothing to do with the party and the characters hovering around the body in the trunk.
Speaking of which, the macabre aspect thereof is very effective especially because it's so easy to forget about it for a while. The recurring "sudden" realisastions that they're eating food that is displayed on top of the corpse of a loved one is wickedly sick.

After the film had ended it took a me a little while to understand that the solution to the murder mystery wasn't the main goal, hat or no hat. As I said, that comeuppance seemed almost self-explanatory from the very beginning.
The real comeuppance belongs to James Stewart's character Rupert Cadell who had always explained his murder-can-be-useful theory in such a smug and quasi-intellectual way.
Of course it was obvious that it was all "talk" but that never stopped him from talking about it, and apparently that goes back to the university years of these characters.
I'm not saying that he's to blame for what happened, it's the confrontation of his fancy and ignorant theory becoming reality, and his desperate ways to distance himself from it. He thought he was so clever, but he never thought about what he was saying beyond his own feelings of superior intellect.
Therefore I still think he's the villain of the piece, similar to Maggie Smith's character in The Prime Of Miss Jean Brodie.

Hitchcock ranked (so far):
The Birds
Notorious
Rebecca
Psycho
The Man Who Knew Too Much (1956)
Rope
Suspicion
Shadow Of A Doubt
Vertigo
Strangers On A Train

(Frenzy, I don't remember enough to rank it)

 

[Toni]

This hasn't been implemented by Dutch Prime yet, but I guess it's only a matter of time, and that will be the time I'll cancel my subscription (although the ads may not appear in rentals which is 70% of the films I watch on Prime).
It's annoying enough that it happens on youtube but at least that doesn't cost me anything.

ROPE (1948)

View attachment 54611

Yes, I tried another Hitchcock film even though at this point I suspect nothing's ever going to match is four super-films: The Birds, Notorious, Rebecca and Psycho.
I was aware of ROPE's gay undertones, and without a particular context a lot of that first dialogue could indeed suggest a secret of the forbidden love.
I feel the real "kink" starts with hosting a dinner party literally on top of their very dark secret, it's something that borders on sexual exhibitionism, the excitement of getting caught.
But this part of the story is somewhat undermined by an equally strong angle: the feeling of superiority and the right to determine the significance of the lives of other people.
It doesn't ruin the story, it's just that it doesn't always look as interesting as it could have been.

Performance-wise, my favourite is Joan Chandler as Janet who balances her act between uptight and adorably self-reflective.
The story is predictable enough, I don't think anyone actually expected them to get away with it, and this is further confirmed by the insecure behaviour displayed by one of the murderers.
Of course the biggest contrivance, the badly used MacGuffin, is David Kentley's hat. It happens somewhere in the second half of the story and this implies that the original set-up of the perfect murder had never been sustainable. It comes out of nowhere and has nothing to do with the party and the characters hovering around the body in the trunk.
Speaking of which, the macabre aspect thereof is very effective especially because it's so easy to forget about it for a while. The recurring "sudden" realisastions that they're eating food that is displayed on top of the corpse of a loved one is wickedly sick.

After the film had ended it took a me a little while to understand that the solution to the murder mystery wasn't the main goal, hat or no hat. As I said, that comeuppance seemed almost self-explanatory from the very beginning.
The real comeuppance belongs to James Stewart's character Rupert Cadell who had always explained his murder-can-be-useful theory in such a smug and quasi-intellectual way.
Of course it was obvious that it was all "talk" but that never stopped him from talking about it, and apparently that goes back to the university years of these characters.
I'm not saying that he's to blame for what happened, it's the confrontation of his fancy and ignorant theory becoming reality, and his desperate ways to distance himself from it. He thought he was so clever, but he never thought about what he was saying beyond his own feelings of superior intellect.
Therefore I still think he's the villain of the piece, similar to Maggie Smith's character in The Prime Of Miss Jean Brodie.

Hitchcock ranked (so far):
The Birds
Notorious
Rebecca
Psycho
The Man Who Knew Too Much (1956)
Rope
Suspicion
Shadow Of A Doubt
Vertigo
Strangers On A Train

(Frenzy, I don't remember enough to rank it)

Great ranking though I´d put "Vertigo" at the top. I also rewatched "Rope" recently, and realized the current "subject" of the movie with today´s eyes is not if they are gonna be caught, or if they indeed are gay (I always assumed they were), but how vicious and deprecating John Dall is towards his friend (and lover): it´s almost a study on domestic violence, just look what a beech that character he is, how close their bodies are shown especially if they are arguing, and how frequently Dall´s character bashes Granger´s alone and, mainly, in front of other people. Yes, both of them are sociopaths but I highly doubt Granger ever dared to kill anyone at all if wasn´t so absorbed by Dall. This POV makes it a whole different movie, especially given the details of the play it´s based on, where Stewart´s professor had an affair with Dall´s student in the past. If Ryan Murphy notices all this, he´ll turn it into another of his morbid "Monster" miniseries...

"Remember this rope? I used to tie you up with it in bed..."

And yes, both actors were undeniably gay...in real life.

​

 

[Willie Oleson]

is not if they are gonna be caught, or if they indeed are gay (I always assumed they were), but how vicious and deprecating John Dall is towards his friend (and lover): it´s almost a study on domestic violence, just look what a beech that character he is, how close their bodies are shown especially if they are arguing, and how frequently Dall´s character bashes Granger´s alone and, mainly, in front of other people.

I'm not sure what to think of them as friends (or a couple, from a gay perspective). There's nothing leading up to the murder therefore it's difficult to interpret Phillip's condition, his opinion of the victim or Brandon's superiority theory which apparently had to be explained to him (but in reality to us) after the fact.
I think Phillip mostly serves as a character that could ruin the secret between the audience and the murderers, and Brandon is only interested in showing professor Cadell his masterpiece.
While the gay subject is in the dialogue in the first act, I feel the gay connection is between Brandon and the professor.
This may sound a little fanficy but I could interpret Phillip's insecurity as being fueled by jealousy because he instinctively knew that it was never about him.
He's the "Sue Ellen" in this story.

 

[Willie Oleson]

A HARD DAY'S NIGHT (1964)



The Beatles: Folie à Quatre.



Is it a film or is it a Beatles film? All I know for sure that it isn't a musical.
The story shows the Beatles responding mildly anarchistic to their pop stardom, further complicated by the shenanigans of Paul McCartney's on-screen grandfather. It wasn't clear to me from the beginning that he actually was a Beatles grandfather but it seemed improbable to keep him around for a such a long time if he wasn't.
The film also creates the opportunity to look at The Beatles, and what surprised me the most is that George Harrison whom I sacrilegiously refer to as "the fourth Beatle" gets way more screen time than Paul McCartney. It's almost as if the grandfather fills in for Paul.
John Lennon is obviously the one with the most sex-appeal, and Ringo Starr seems to be the most comfortable in front of a motion picture camera (although he was awful in the 1968 cult classic "Candy").

I can only speculate about the reasons this film was made, it certainly isn't particularly flattering or salesman-like. Not that their confidence needed a boost in 1964, of course.
It's also not a film to inform us that "see? The Beatles can also act!", and it's cleverly interspersed with montages of the band members behaving most energetically.
The one thing that always puts a big smile on my face is the hysterical fans, and while The Beatles were undoubtedly loved for their youth and sound I think it also shows - from the fans' point of view - a craving for celebrity for the sake of celebrity, and a mass hysteria that basically feeds itself as long as the band is considered relevant.

The music sounds as good as ever except that the more ballad-style songs only emphasize that they didn't do the greatest pop ballad of the 20th century: Sealed With A Kiss. But then again, if you play the 45 of All My Loving at 33rpm it kinda sounds like Sealed With A Kiss.
The story climaxes with a performance of She Loves You and sounds really great, but when I think about the fact that most Beatles songs of that time were versions of "she loves you yeah yeah yeah" I wonder what kind of impact it had on the artistic aspirations the band members may have had during this Beatlesmania.
There is something slightly disheartening about watching them performing those fantastic popcorn tunes in one consecutive sitting, and from that point of view the staged anarchy seems more than justified.

The editing is tight and I found it impossible to "get" the many gags, and if I have to be painfully honest, there were a few moments when I caught myself zoning out.
The performances by the supporting cast is uniformly good, and Victor Spinetti's knitted sweater is a real scene-stealer.
I put the DVD on the shelf, it's currently sitting between Disney'sThe Sword In The Stone and Séance On A Wet Afternoon. I just love it that this chronological order makes no sense whatsoever. I call it my "decorative confusion" although a less anally retentive person might point out that my DVD collection looks painfully neatly organised.

 

[Mel O'Drama]

Red Lights (2012)

The first I knew of this film was seconds before I watched it. I saw Sigourney Weaver's face in the thumbnail and that was enough for me.

As hoped, she's great here. Playing the expert in her field, haunted and somewhat incapacitated by unresolved trauma and a medical condition that requires her to pop pills reminded me greatly of Helen Hudson in Copycat and, to a lesser extent, Ellen Ripley in Aliens. The "field" here is paranormal phenomena. Her character has devoted decades to debunking and exposing psychics in general and Simon Silver in particular. Cillian Murphy is aiding and abetting her quest and it turns out the catalyst for each of them was a single encounter with a psychic (different in each case) where they received information relating to a loved one that turned out to be damaging.

The cast is an interesting mix. Robert De Niro as the slimy psychic gets to go theatrically large, with lots of roaring monologues to his character's assembled fanbase. Joely Richardson is boo-hissably arch as his aide (I found myself feeling anger at her smug character belittling Sigourney's character during a televised debate). Marvel's Wanda is the student out to learn from the two protagonists. Toby Jones and Ben Roberts' supporting roles worked particularly well, and I found myself questioning their motives.

The premise feels refreshingly different and there's plenty of scope for exploration, but I'd say it ultimately tries too hard to have its cake and eat it: aiming to please both sceptics and believers alike, whilst frustrating both. It talked big in its first hour, but ended up feeling more hollow and predictable than it should have. The last act felt far too Hollywood. There are a couple of twists and turns along the way. Most can be seen ahead of time. There's a significant change to cast dynamics after the first half, which isn't for the best.

It might not have delivered as powerfully as I'd hoped, and I have no desire to watch again, but I'm still glad I watched.





​

The real comeuppance belongs to James Stewart's character Rupert Cadell who had always explained his murder-can-be-useful theory in such a smug and quasi-intellectual way.
Of course it was obvious that it was all "talk" but that never stopped him from talking about it, and apparently that goes back to the university years of these characters.

His realisation that his own theory is the basis for this murder feels like the moment towards which it all builds. Based on his looks as each piece of the puzzle falls into place for him, I don't even think there's a question of him joining the collusion or keeping the secret. When he fires the gun into the air, I read it as an admission of his own defeat and failure as much as anything else.

it´s almost a study on domestic violence, just look what a beech that character he is, how close their bodies are shown especially if they are arguing, and how frequently Dall´s character bashes Granger´s alone and, mainly, in front of other people. Yes, both of them are sociopaths but I highly doubt Granger ever dared to kill anyone at all if wasn´t so absorbed by Dall.

The whole thing feels like an extension of their closeted relationship. Now there's another forbidden secret into which Phillip has been drawn thanks to Brandon's powers of persuasion. And once it's done Brandon has even more power because Phillip feels guilt. Brandon's brand of sociopathy means he feels nothing but a temporary thrill.

Brandon is only interested in showing professor Cadell his masterpiece.

And this is the key reason why it was doomed. Brandon's ego needs people to know what they've done so he can bask in his superiority, but the perfect crime is only truly perfect if nobody finds out.



Incidentally, a big part of Rope's appeal for me is the real-time aspect, and the fact it's shot to look like one continuous take. It feels charmingly stage-like.

Yes, I tried another Hitchcock film even though at this point I suspect nothing's ever going to match is four super-films: The Birds, Notorious, Rebecca and Psycho.

Are Rear Window and North By Northwest on your Hitch list? They're both towards the top of my list of his films.

 

[Willie Oleson]

The whole thing feels like an extension of their closeted relationship

I didn't realise that the homosexual part of their relationship is factual, rather than something that could be "interpreted as".

And once it's done Brandon has even more power because Phillip feels guilt

Yes, as long as that feeling of guilt doesn't become too consuming. After all, the only way to get rid of the burden of guilt is to confess.
I guess it's only Brandon's larger-than-life ego that prevents him from worrying about anything. Maybe the possibility of Phillip's unpredictable behaviour would add to the excitement of it all.
I believe Brandon was the first one to bring up the subject of foul play connected with David's absence, there's a lot of teasing and flaunting that contradicts the desire to commit the perfect crime.
On the other hand, that kind of bluff could also work as a smoke screen based on the idea that a true criminal would never implicate himself, let alone in such a cocky way.

And that's what I meant with clashing themes. Is it the perfect crime and the joy of getting away with it in the most dangerous way, or is it about ridding population of its inferior or unwanted beings, as per professor Cadell's theory?

Gosh, it feels like Barnabas and Julia Hoffman trying to make sense of the strange goings-on in Collinsport.

Brandon's ego needs people to know what they've done so he can bask in his superiority, but the perfect crime is only truly perfect if nobody finds out.

And it would have looked so much better if it turned out that Brandon had planted the clue of the hat, just to make sure that Cadell wouldn't let it rest.

Are Rear Window and North By Northwest on your Hitch list?

Yes, they are to be watched in the foreseeable future, but not right now. I don't find Hitchcock very binge-watchable (and I'm currently binging something else at the moment).

 

[Mel O'Drama]

I didn't realise that the homosexual part of their relationship is factual, rather than something that could be "interpreted as".

I believe the characters were in a gay relationship in the original play, which wouldn't have flown in 1940s American cinema due to the Hays Code, so I've leaned towards it being implicit in the material (and of course it's easy to find).

Years ago I remember watching or reading something on the making of the film where it was said how brave Jimmy Stewart was to take the role when all three characters were "it".

But yes, equally I'm sure it's possible to watch without seeing any kind of suggestion and still get something from the film.

Maybe the possibility of Phillip's unpredictable behaviour would add to the excitement of it all.

Yes, I can imagine the risk is what makes it worth doing for Brandon. I'd think he'd find it too easy otherwise.

There's also that moment where he kind of throws Phillip under the bus with that chicken-killing story. He's toying with his guests by laying it out in the open and toying with Phillip by seeing how far he can be pushed in front of said guests.

He really wanted to see how far he could take it.

And it would have looked so much better if it turned out that Brandon had planted the clue of the hat, just to make sure that Cadell wouldn't let it rest.

Oh yes. That hadn't occurred to me, but I really like it.

Yes, they are to be watched in the foreseeable future,

Great! That's something to look forward to.