Only now does it occur to me... EVERGREEN (1934)

Only now does it occur to me... that in the midst of an otherwise traditional 1930s musical (the British classic, EVERGREEN), we'd take a hard left turn into a World War I flashback fantasy

 
that's an extended homage to German expressionist auteur Fritz Lang––particularly his masterpiece METROPOLIS (1927)––




which feeds us this majestic sci-fi imagery for about two minutes, including one amazing tableau (women forged into bullets)


that may have even inspired the H.R. Giger piece, "Birth Machine" (1967).

For reference, the rest of the movie takes place pretty much on stage/backstage at realistically depicted British music halls from the 1930s.

Only now does it occur to me... THE BODYGUARD (1992)

Only now does it occur to me... that Kevin Costner's character in THE BODYGUARD hates boats because he's experiencing psychic reverberations of the trials he will endure in the future of... WATERWORLD.







Speaking of "psychic reverberations of the future," he's talking to Whitney Houston's onscreen son there, played by DeVaughn Nixon. Throughout this film, he must live in fear of an unstoppable killer who wants to murder his mom. Not unlike his performance in TERMINATOR 2: JUDGMENT DAY, when a practically unstoppable killer (Linda Hamilton's Sarah Connor) wants to assassinate his dad (Joe Morton's Miles Dyson).

I must also give a shout-out to two major nods to arthouse cinema: first, during Whitney's "Queen of the Night," she is done up like Brigitte Helm in the notorious "Whore of Babylon" dance sequence from Fritz Lang's METROPOLIS:

as scenes from the film are projected behind her:

 Secondly, Costner takes Whitney on a date to see Akira Kurosawa's YOJIMBO,

which translates to, in English, "THE BODYGUARD." They review the film as follows:

I wish this would happen more often. What if, in Paul Haggis' CRASH, Thandie Newton and Terrence Howard had gone to the movies and seen David Cronenberg's CRASH? What if, in Cormac McCarthy's THE ROAD, Viggo Mortensen had arranged a post-apocalyptic screening of Fellini's LA STRADA? Some good possibilities there. Anyway.

Only now does it occur to me... DR. MABUSE––THE GAMBLER (1922)

Only now does it occur to me... a few thoughts about DR. MABUSE––THE GAMBLER, a criminally underrated work in the Fritz Lang oeuvre. 

While, like some epics of the era, it doesn't quite have enough plot to justify it's four-and-a-half hour runtime, it's still a dizzying, edgy roller-coaster of pure Weimar id, German Expressionistic fantasy, and creeping zeitgeist horror. Probably better translated as "DR. MABUSE––THE PLAYER" (in German, "spieler" refers to game-player, gambler, actor, and puppeteer, and Dr. Mabuse is certainly all four). 

Mabuse (Rudolph Klein-Rogge, the mad doctor of METROPOLIS) is a hypnotist/gangster/psychologist/master-of-disguise/general trickster/proto-Batman villain whose schemes have enveloped most of Berlin. The great film theorist Siegfried Kracauer saw Mabuse as among a "procession of tyrants" in post-WWI German film who foreshadowed the rise of Hitler.

Fritz Lang is really at the height of his powers here: in his staging and imagery, in his use of texture and dimension, in his contrast between stillness and motion––whether he's depicting a the mass hallucination of a Bedouin procession in a Berlin theater:

Otherworldly séances:

Powerful tableaus that resemble Renaissance paintings:

The expressionistic/Bauhaus interior design of Weimar's 1%:

For all its stylish exaggerations, it's an important time capsule of the era.

Decadent Weimar nightlife realness:

Which includes one unforgettably over-the-top display of insanity, whereupon a pas de trois commences between a dancer and two giant, terrifying (papier-mâché?) heads with exceptionally phallic noses and suspiciously testicular cheekbones.

These dudes seem to like the production design just fine

Then, in a visual worthy of Ken Russell, she ascends the noses and dances atop them until they climax with a "sneeze" that, incidentally, blows away most of her outfit and leaves her with

a creepy baby...

Hot damn, Fritz! Legitimately one of the more unexpected sequences in a silent––or any––film.

Finally, I must note the majesty of  Mabuse's descent into madness, which definitely prefigures the Moloch sequence from METROPOLIS. Here, pieces of industrial equipment are reimagined as quasi-mythical monstrosities which come to life and torment the much-deserving Dr. Mabuse.

It's also worth noting that this is the state in which we find Mabuse at the beginning of THE TESTAMENT OF DR. MABUSE (1933), Fritz Lang's brilliant sequel, which I also cannot recommend enough.

Only now does it occur to me... RANCHO NOTORIOUS

Only now does it occur to me...  that even within the confines of a 50s studio Western, Fritz Lang still found ways to work in Expressionistic flourish.

He always loved to "suggest" murder when possible, instead of showing it outright– a murdered child's balloon floating away or an assassinated man's derby rolling on the ground, for example.  Here, we get some pretty spectacular rigor mortis that (purposefully?) recalls the theatrical poster of M.

 
The film also stars Weimar and Hollywood legend Marlene Dietrich, pictured here in her native habitat:

Anyway, one particular scene features a near-cabaret-ish performance (not quite so sultry as the staging in her career-making BLUE ANGEL appearances)

and the outlaws gaze lustily toward her in a rapid piece of editing that feels less like something from a 1950s studio picture, and more like the insanely brilliant "Whore of Babylon" sequence from Lang's masterpiece, METROPOLIS.

Also of note, among the lecherous, gazing outlaws are George "SUPERMAN" Reeves

(sporting a wicked scar)

 and an exceptionally young Jack "ONCE UPON A TIME IN THE WEST" Elam, who probably played a henchmen in more Western films and TV series than any of his contemporaries, except for maybe Ward Bond.
  
As for the film?  It's not precisely a "classic," but it's a pretty terrific revenge picture shaded with moral ambiguity– very much in the vein of an Anthony Mann or a Budd Boetteicher flick.