Author Archive: Peter Jakobsen
The Third Man
Here's Harry
(Dir. Carol Reed) (1949) Graham Greene once wrote on the back of an envelope; “I had paid my last farewell to Harry a week ago, when his coffin was lowered into the frozen February ground, so that it was with incredulity that I saw him pass by, without a sign of recognition, among the host of strangers in the Strand.” Thus the idea of a story was born and, although substantially re-jigged later, Greene had the outline and as he claims, “it is almost impossible to write a film play without first writing a story. Even a film depends on more…
Continue Reading →Lovely Spam, Wonderful Spam
I recently received two emails. The first was a pleasant surprise, concerning a slightly unorthodox dealing with an intestate estate: “Please accept my apology. I am a personal account manager to one of our foreign late customer. It is my interest to contact you in respect of this our client who opened a draft account in my bank. It is with good spirit of heart I opened up this great opportunity to you….After his untimely demise, I sent a routine notification to his forwarding address, but got no reply. He died without making any WILL. His draft account opened in…
Continue Reading →Odd Man Out
"When I was a child, I spake as a child."
(Dir. Carol Reed) (1947) A classic, sad and dreamlike treatment of a gang of IRA thugs and their leader, wounded and on the run after a mill robbery. Only, the leader is post-war dreamboat James Mason, and we are forced to be sympathetic by virtue of his great, Christ-like playing and the pathos-drenched script and direction. A powerful example of the potency of superior film technique, enlivened by some grand Irish-potato character roles, a very stern and noble Denis O’Dea as the Police Inspector, the impressively louche, kind and desolate Tober (Elwyn Brook-Jones), plus an eye-rolling, lip-smacking, face-twitching, whirling dervish cabaret turn by Robert…
Continue Reading →The Manchurian Candidate
"...when I take power they will be pulled down and ground into dirt for what they did to you and for what they did in so contemptuously underestimating me."
(Dir. John Frankenheimer) (1962) This is a nifty thriller, based on the intriguing brain-washing novel of 1959 by Richard Condon. While not entirely satisfactory, it features a wild, paranoid but plausible plot, great narrative drive and top drawer performances. Sergeant Raymond Shaw (Laurence Harvey) is given a Congressional Medal of Honour and general acclaim after his return from the Korean War, which is passing strange, since his entire unit hates him and there are several gaps in the story. Meanwhile, his vicious Mum and his churl of a stepfather, Senator John Iselin, a Joe McCarthy facsimile, have designs on the…
Continue Reading →Death Cloud Over Pompeii
"The Last Day(s) of Pompeii" (Karl Briullov, 1827-33)
(Pompeii, AD 79) On a pleasant warm day, a soft breeze soughing through the pines, we chugged on a local caboose through Campania from Sorrento to Pompeii. Buried under a massive blanket of ash and pumice from the eruption of Vesuvius in AD79, only uncovered in 1750, ruins remain but ruins of startling length and breadth, including extant frescoes, streets and buildings, and corpses. Pliny the Younger was a 17 year old and described in a letter how some of his family’s land went up in smoke (initially in a cloud of vapours, shaped like a pine tree) along with his uncle, who died attempting…
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