ANDY: Once Upon a Time in the West (Leone, Italy, 1968)
Sergio Leone begins his masterpiece by making us wait for a train. Like commuters on the delayed 07:45 to London Bridge, not a word is spoken between those waiting as […]
Category Archives: Andy’s List
ANDY: Chungking Express (Wong, Hong Kong, 1994)
For me, Hong Kong is the most cinematic of cityscapes. By night it can feel like wandering through the neo-noir labyrinth of Ridley Scott’s BLADE RUNNER (although rumours that the […]
ANDY: The Old Dark House (Whale, US, 1932)
It was a dark and stormy night. In Wales. Welcome, traveller… With FRANKENSTEIN (1931), THE INVISIBLE MAN (1933) and THE BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN (1935), visionary director James Whale made some […]
ANDY: The Wages of Fear (Clouzot, France, 1953)
In 1974 William Friedkin, riding on the crest of a wave after the consecutive successes of critically-lauded THE FRENCH CONNECTION (1971) and box office behemoth THE EXORCIST (1973), arranged himself […]
ANDY: Went the Day Well? (Cavalcanti, UK, 1942)
Recently I’ve been working my way through Mark Cousins’ epic documentary THE STORY OF FILM (2011), and have been struck by just how many important and game-changing films in the […]
ANDY: Five Easy Pieces (Rafelson, US, 1970)
The greatest decade in the history of mankind had ended, but as the hippie wigs went up for sale on the shelves of Woolworths, American cinema was entering the last […]
ANDY: Ugetsu Monogatari (Mizoguchi, Japan, 1953)
When Kaneto Shindo, director of CHILDREN OF HIROSHIMA (1952) and ONIBABA (1964), died at the age of 100 last month, obituaries everywhere acknowledged the debt his films owed to Kenji […]
ANDY: A Taste of Honey (Richardson, UK, 1961)
Post-1977, a phrase that entered the lexicon of music critics everywhere to describe the impact of punk rock after it burst onto an international stage was “scorched earth”. Anything that […]
ANDY: Bringing Up Baby (Hawks, US, 1938)
In the interests of full disclosure, BRINGING UP BABY is probably the film I’ve watched more times than any other. If the internet has taught us anything it’s that people […]
Dirk Redux: This Must Be The Place
Last night I used my connections in London film circles (£1.40 off with my BFI membership card) to gain entrance to a preview of Paolo Sorrentino’s new film THIS MUST […]
The Dirk Malcolm Alternative 