Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=5820588
Midway - (1976)
Up until the advent of CGI, it was much easier to film land battles than air or sea ones, and
Midway had to be content with using actual footage of naval/aerial warfare in the Pacific theatre. I recently watched
Overlord (1975), which did the same thing - mixing in real footage with that taken for the movie. Otherwise this film works best when confined to the Japanese admirals and brass (Toshiro Mifune, James Shigeta & Pat Morita) kind of acknowledging how damned risky their attack on Midway is, and then sweating their own decisions at probably the most crucial moment of the war as far as Japan was concerned. Risking and losing too much. Was it luck? Or was it the fact that the Americans were better at figuring out what the other side was up to? Charlton Heston, Henry Fonda, James Coburn, Glenn Ford, Hal Holbrook, Robert Mitchum, Cliff Robertson and Robert Wagner - it's stuffed with stars, but neither this nor the Roland Emmerich version in 2019 could make much of a cinematic gem from this crushing victory America had over the Japanese in 1942.
6/10
By May be found at the following website: https://www.cinematerial.com/movies/...080/p/aco0zyjr, Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=65820720
Texas Across the River - (1966)
Dean Martin and Alain Delon in a film together? I had to see this. I thought it'd be fun at the very least, but it was a little too much of a "muck around" movie for my taste. Nobody takes anything seriously, and for some reason Delon is playing a Spanish guy instead of a French one? I don't know. Not much in this made much sense, with impromptu bull fights and Joey Bishop in brownface as a Native American - all of whom get pretty rough treatment inasmuch as they're made to look ridiculous. It's absolutely silly for the most part, with Delon's Don Andrea killing a wedding crasher (in self defense) which has him pursued by some Union cavalry out for vengeance and justice. Martin plays a cowboy who hooks up with him and spars with him when they're not getting along - Delon getting to kiss Martin and slap him numerous times, in a couple of the movie's best running gags. I like comedy, but this was too loose and not very palatable.
4/10
Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=25826184
Hyenas - (1992)
Based on Friedrich Dürrenmatt's play
The Visit, about a wealthy, powerful woman's return to the town she grew up in, and the power her promises now have to spill blood. All-up, the coming together of context and original narrative here makes up something pretty special, and this is one of the best African films I've ever seen - it works as a film of gravity, vision and poetry. Full review
here, in my watchlist thread.
9/10