Alias Nick Beal (John Farrow, 1949)

Audrey Totter and Ray Milland in Alias Nick Beal

Cast: Ray Milland, Thomas Mitchell, Audrey Totter, George Macready, Fred Clark, Geraldine Wall, Henry O'Neill, Darryl Hickman, Nestor Paiva, King Donovan, Charles Evans. Screenplay: Jonathan Latimer, Mindret Lord. Cinematography: Lionel Lindon. Art direction: Franz Bachelin, Hans Dreier. Film editing: Eda Warren. Music: Franz Waxman. 

An attempt to blend film noir and fantasy, Alias Nick Beal casts Ray Milland as the devil, who leads an honest politician (Thomas Mitchell) astray. Despite good performances and nice atmospheric detail, the film fizzles in a too-pat resolution of the plot. 

Fast Company (David Cronenberg, 1979)

Cast: William Smith, Claudia Jennings, John Saxon, Nicholas Campbell, Don Francks, Cedric Smith, Jody Foster, Robert Haley, George Buza, David Graham, David Petersen, Chuck Chandler. Screenplay: Phil Savath, Courtney Smith, David Cronenberg, Alan Treen. Cinematography: Mark Irwin. Art director: Carol Spier. Film editor: Ronald Sanders. Music: Fred Mollin. 

A cheesy racing flick with a low-wattage cast and not much suspense from a surprising director, Fast Company doesn't have much to offer anyone except devotees of David Cronenberg who will try hard (and probably fail) to see signs of auteurship. It's so carelessly put together that at one point you can see that the image has been flopped because the "Goodyear" logo on a character's cap is reversed. The mediocrity extends to a song score by composer Fred Mollin that sounds like it's ripping off "Born to Run" -- Springsteen couldn't be persuaded to provide the real thing. 

Black Coal, Thin Ice (Diao Yinan, 2014)

Liao Fan and Gwei Lun-mei in Black Coal, Thin Ice

Cast: Liao Fan, Gwei Lun-mei, Wang Xuebing, Wang Jingchun, Yu Ailei, Ni Jinyang. Screenplay: Diao Yinan. Cinematography: Dong Jingsong. Film editing: Yang Hongyu. Music: Wen Zi. 

When body parts start turning up in coal deliveries to factories in northeast China, the police launch an investigation that culminates in a botched arrest attempt. During the shootout, detective Zhang Zili (Liao Fan) is seriously wounded. Five years later, Zhang has quit the force and is far gone in alcoholism when he reconnects with police detectives who have reopened the investigation: Dismembered bodies have started turning up again, and the victims have a connection to Wu Zhizhen (Gwei Lun-mei), the widow of the supposed victim of the earlier murder. Wu works for a dry cleaner, and Zhang decides to do his own investigation, dropping off a coat to be cleaned and striking up a conversation with Wu. One thing leads to another, and Zhang finds himself deeply involved with her. Writer-director Diao Yinan takes a film noir premise and turns it into a darkly playful detective drama, interpolating sometimes downright surreal incidents, like horse in a hallway and a fully clothed woman in a bathtub. It ends both satisfyingly -- the mystery is apparently solved -- and enigmatically -- with a scene that evokes the original Chinese title, which translates as "daylight fireworks." Diao's control of setting and atmosphere and the performances of Liao and Gwei are exemplary. 

Queer (Luca Guadagnino, 2024)

Daniel Craig in Queer

Cast: Daniel Craig, Drew Starkey, Lesley Manville, Jason Schwartzman, Henrique Zaga, Drew Droege, Andra Ursuta. Screenplay: Justin Kuritzkes, based on a novella by William S. Burroughs. Cinematography: Sayombhu Mukdeeprom. Production design: Stefano Baisi. Film editing: Marco Sosta. Music: Trent Reznor, Atticus Ross. 

Daniel Craig's terrific performance as the junkie exile William Lee in Luca Guadagnino's Queer makes me wish that Craig had been freed from Bondage much earlier. Whether it's enough for me to recommend the movie as anything more than an acting showcase for Craig (and for Lesley Manville in a wonderful supporting turn) is another question. It feels a little slackly paced to me, and the character of Eugene Allerton (Drew Starkey), who becomes a partner in Lee's sexual and pharmacological obsessions, remains something of a blur. Director Luca Guadagnino also persists in the "pan to the window" discretion in filming same-sex coupling that for me marred his Call Me by Your Name (2017), although he's a bit bolder about it this time. On the whole, though, Queer seems to me a solid attempt at capturing William S. Burroughs's dark tragicomic tone and vision. 

You're a Big Boy Now (Francis Ford Coppola, 1966)

Peter Kastner and Tony Bill in You're a Big Boy Now

Cast: Peter Kastner, Elizabeth Hartman, Geraldine Page, Rip Torn, Tony Bill, Julie Harris, Karen Black, Dolph Sweet, Michael Dunn. Screenplay: Francis Ford Coppola, based on a novel by David Ignatius. Cinematography: Andrew Laszlo. Art direction: Vasilis Fotopoulos. Film editing: Aram Avakian. Music: Robert Prince. 

Francis Ford Coppola's You're a Big Boy Now, his master's thesis project at UCLA, is a coming-of-age comedy in the larky mid-1960s manner of Richard Lester's A Hard Day's Night (1964) and The Knack ... and How to Get It (1965). It's a manner that's now a little dated, a sometimes too-frantic piling on of editing tricks and goofball antics, but Coppola handled it well with the help of a willing cast. Geraldine Page even earned an Oscar nomination as the smothering mother of Bernard Chanticleer (Peter Kastner), trying to make it on his own in the big city. 

Three Seasons (Tony Bui, 1999)

Cast: Nguyen Ngoc Hiep, Don Duong, Zoe Bui, Nguyen Huu Doc, Harvey Keitel, Huong Phat Trieu, Tran Manh Cuong. Screenplay: Tony Bui, Timothy Linh Bui. Cinematography: Lisa Rinzler. Production design: Wing Lee. Film editing: Keith Reamer. Music: Richard Horowitz. 

Although somewhat soft around the edges, Tony Bui's Three Seasons is an affecting and often quite beautiful look at the lives of people on the streets of Ho Chi Minh City: a flower vendor, a pedicab driver, a prostitute, a small boy who peddles chewing gum and cigarettes, and a visiting ex-GI. 

If I Should Die Before I Wake (Carlos Hugo Christensen, 1952)

Néstor Zavarce and Maria A. Troncoso in If I Should Die Before I Wake

Cast: Néstor Zavarce, Bianca del Prado, Floren Delbene, Homero Carpena, Enrique de Pedro, Virginia Romay, Marisa Nuñez, Maria A. Troncoso, Marta Quintela. Screenplay: Alejandro Casona, based on a story by Cornell Woolrich. Cinematography: Pablo Tabernero. Production design: Gori Muñoz. Film editing: José Gallego. Music: Julián Bautista. 

This handsomely filmed adaptation of a story by Cornell Woolrich about a boy who attempts to catch a serial killer preying on little girls at his school somewhat gratuitously casts the story as a fable. It generates suspense but sometimes stretches plausibility. 

Jamón, Jamón (Bigas Luna, 1992)

Penélope Cruz and Javier Bardem in Jamón, Jamón

Cast: Penélope Cruz, Javier Bardem, Jodi Mollà, Stefania Sandrelli, Anna Galiena, Juan Diego, Tomás Penco. Screenplay: Cuca Canals, Bigas Luna. Cinematography: José Luis Alcaine. Production design: Gloria Martí-Palanqués, Pep Oliver. Film editing: Teresa Font. Music: Nicola Piovani. 

With its copulative roundelay, nude bullfighting, and death by ham, Bigas Luna's satiric black comedy Jamón, Jamón confused and offended some of its early viewers, who may have forgotten that Spain is the country that produced Goya and Dalí. 

Raising Victor Vargas (Peter Sollett, 2002)

Krystal Rodriguez, Silvestre Rasuk, and Victor Rasuk in Raising Victor Vargas

Cast: Victor Rasuk, Judy Marte, Altagracia Guzman, Silvestre Rasuk, Krystal Rodriguez, Donna Maldonado, Kevin Rivera, Melonie Diaz, Matthew Roberts, Alexander Garcia, John Ramos, Theresa Martinez, Wilfree Vasquez. Screenplay: Peter Sollett, Eva Vives. Cinematography: Tim Orr. Production design: Judy Becker. Film editing: Myron Kerstein. Music: Roy Nathanson. 

Teenage Victor (Victor Rasuk) is being raised by his Dominican grandmother (Altagracia Guzman) in a New York City apartment with his half-siblings, Vicki (Krystal Rodriguez) and Nino (Silvestre Rasuk). The sins of Victor's absent father are visited on him frequently by his grandmother, who blames him for corrupting his brother and sister. For example, when Nino is caught masturbating, her immediate response is to scapegoat Victor, and she hauls him down to social services, demanding that they take him off her hands. She's stymied in the effort, of course, but from then on his task is to try to get back in her good graces. That's complicated, however, by his pursuit of the prettiest girl in the neighborhood, Judy (Judy Marte), and his awkward attempts to figure out what it means to be a man. Though it maybe lacks some of the neo-realistic grit its setting needs, Raising Victor Vargas is a likable coming-of-age story with a capable cast of unknown performers.  

Demon Pond (Masahiro Shinoda, 1979)

Tamasaburo Bando in Demon Pond

Cast: Tamasaburo Bando, Go Kato, Tsutomo Yamazaki, Hisashi Igawa, Fujio Tokita, Hatsuo Yamaya, Dai Kanai, Koji Nanbara, Toru Abe, Yatsuko Tan'ami, Shigeru Yazaki, Jun Hanamura. Screenplay: Tsutomu Tamara, Haruhiko Mimura, based on a play by Kyoka Izumi. Cinematography: Masao Kosugi, Noritaka Sakamotu. Art direction: Setsu Asakura, Kiyoshi Awazu, Yutaka Yokoyama. Music: Isao Tomita. 

Masahiro Shinoda's fusion of cinema and kabuki, Demon Pond, affords us the opportunity to witness the art of Tamasaburo Bando, the famous onnagata, a male actor specializing in female roles, who appeared primarily on stage. He takes two roles: Yuri, the wife of Akira Hagiwara (Go Kato), and the dragon princess Shirayuki, who dwells under enchantment in the pond of the film's title. If she's ever released from the spell, the pond will inundate the village below. Akira and Yuki have taken it on themselves to remind the princess of the spell that binds her by ringing a bell three times a day. Unfortunately, the arrival of a traveler (Tsutomo Yamazaki) from the outside world who is an old friend of Akira sets in motion a series of events that end in calamity. It's a splendidly acted, well-told fable, enhanced by an eerie electronic score by Isao Tomita that includes themes from Debussy and Mussorgsky, and concluding with a cataclysm of special effects.