Entry Twenty

Journey into Fear: Decent, though slightly derivative noir-thriller, co-scripted by star Joseph Cotten and (possibly) Orson Welles. The photography is the most notable thing about the movie, a beautifully expressive black and white that lends the movie some class.

Christmas in August: Similar in plot to the risible Love Story, but executed with a skill and tenderness that is missing in the American film, this features a dying man's tentative relationship with a regular customer and his doubts as they grow closer.

Among the Living: A b-noir, which is pretty routine except for the quality of the performances, in particular a young Susan Hayward as the coquettish girl who manipulates the simpler twin for her own ends. It ends abruptly and too conveniently, a problem often encountered in these types of films, and isn't really that engaging.

Kikujiro: A sublime Japanese comedy, starring and directed by Takeshi Kitano as a past his prime Yakuza ordered by his wife to take a lonely boy to his estranged mother. What follows is a road trip that is both beguiling and hilarious, with the (exceedingly) abrasive Kitano's experiences with "normal" people providing much of the humour. In short, wonderful.

Brother: Another Takeshi Kitano film, this one far different in tone, and his first American production. Kitano's impassive face works perfectly here, as a Yakuza exiled from Japan and setting up home with his brother and building a gang of his own in LA. Omar Epps provides good support, and its matter-of-fact violence is countered by it's melancholy tone.