Post 52

I threw a movie party this last Saturday night. We watched Charade. Quality, quality flick; they do not make movies like this anymore, and that makes me inexpressibly sad. Let me give you a few reasons why everyone should see this movie:

1) Camera work. Charade was made back in the days when cinematography was still an art. The angles and shots are all masterful. For one brilliant example, when Audry Hepburn is looking through the magnifying glass at the photograph, we get a glimpse from her perspective four different times. On the first and fourth time, there's a cool zoom effect that really takes full advantage of the way light bends through curved glass--but only the first and fourth time; the second and third glimpses are just straight--no zoom effect. Shake things up a bit, ya know--just because something's cool doesn't mean it has to be done every time.
That's the only specific example I can think of now, but when next you watch it, pay attention to how the camera moves and the angles it shoots--they're all very good. Granted, the stamp thing may have been a little melodramatic, but it did its job very well, and you can't ask for much more than that.

2) Dialog. Somewhere in the last couple decades, witty dialog has died out from movie culture. Now, rather than having highly entertaining conversations between characters, all we ever get are snappy one-liners. Charade has amazing dialog sprinkled throughout--especially between Audry Hepburn and Cary Grant. There is no way to give a very thorough sampling here, but if you just watch the movie, you will most certainly understand what I mean.
Humor was of a different caliber back in those days, too--more refined, really. There's a movie called Holiday (Cary Grant acting with Kathrine Hepburn) that I've only seen once but desperately want to own. There was some dialog in there that made me think, "Holy cow, that's really clever!" but that didn't make me laugh out loud. I really respect that kind of humor. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy laughing--and I laughed a lot while watching Charade--but just that something can be humorous without being raucous is--a foreign idea in my generation.

3) Unfolding (?). I think there's a highfalutin literary term for this--probably some French word--but it escapes me now. Just the whens and hows of the telling of the story are brilliant. For example, when Cary Grant (I believe he's still Peter Joshua at that point) follows Scobie by hopping from balcony to balcony and then follows him into the room and strikes up a conversation--I, the viewer, think, "Woah. That's one heckuva way to pick a fight! Ballsy, Mr. Grant--very ballsy," and then I realize, "What he's--he's one of them? How can that be?" Little by little, the screenwriters reveal what's really going on--another good example is when the real Mr. Bartholomew gets a phone call--all of the timing is just perfect, and we don't know until the very last scene what was really going on. It's amazing.

4) Music. Henry Mancini was a genius; I've always known that, but I never realized until this past Saturday as I was watching this movie just how much of an opportunist he is (that's probably a bad term for it, but I don't have better). It's impossible to pick up on unless you're familiar with the movie's theme--and the only reason I happen to be familiar with it is because it's on the Henry Mancini CD I own. But if you can familiarize yourself with that theme, you'll realize that anytime there is ambient music in that movie--not the underscore, but actual ambient music being played in the numerous restaurants and even the carousel in the park--all of that ambient music is based around that theme. It's--very creative and very impressive, and I really appreciated the overall effect.

So there are just four reasons why you should see that movie. Other less critical reasons include things like Cary Grant and Audrey Hepburn and Walter Matthau (and Jame Coburn, if you know him; I know him from Maverick, though I didn't realize that as I watched the movie), a funny French investigator, a villain with a claw for a hand, and "It's a rip roaring good time!"