The Bodyguard

Title: Yojimbo
Year: 1961
Director: Akira Kurosawa
Writers: Akira Kurosawa & Ryuzo Kikushima
Starring: Toshirô Mifune
Music: Masaru Satô
Distinctions: currently #132 on IMDb’s Top 250
Length: 110 minutes
Synopsis: a wandering samurai tries to get rival gangs to kill each other
How I saw it: on video (rented from Netflix), yesterday
Subjective Rating: 8/10
Objective Rating: 10/10

Great, fun movie. Mifune’s character is probably one of the best (or at least most important) ever put on film. This movie’s not quite as good as the spaghetti westerns it inspired, though. (Interestingly, it isn’t just the plot and characters that Sergio Leone ripped off, but also the style. And the few aspects of the style Leone missed got picked up by Quentin Tarantino in Kill Bill.) I would just give it a 7/10, but I bumped it up a point simply because of the music. My new favorite film score.

The Hustler

Title: The Hustler
Year: 1961
Director: Robert Rossen
Writers: Sidney Carroll & Robert Rossen, based on the novel by Walter Tevis
Starring: Paul Newman, Jackie Gleason, Piper Laurie, George C. Scott
Music: Kenyon Hopkins
Distinctions: Oscars for best cinematography (black-and-white) and art direction/set decoration (black-and-white); currently #182 on IMDb’s Top 250
Synopsis: a pool shark is bad at gambling and has relationship troubles
Length: 134 minutes
How I saw it: on video (rented from Netflix), January 2009
Subjective Rating: 5/10
Objective Rating: 6/10 (points off for story, pacing, special effects/design and subjective rating)

Very pretty looking movie, with a great score and great acting (especially from Gleason), but mind-numbingly boring. It feels like two or three different movies mashed together. The “sets” (read “locations”) and costumes etc. are great, but the sound is a garbled mess.

Judgment at Nuremberg

Title: Judgment at Nuremberg
Year: 1961
Director: Stanley Kramer
Writer: Abby Mann
Starring: Spencer Tracy, Burt Lancaster, Richard Widmark, Marlene Dietrich, Maximilian Schell
Music: Ernest Gold
Distinctions: Oscars for best screenplay (non-original) and actor (Schell); currently #144 on IMDb’s Top 250
Synopsis: an American tribunal for Nazi judges
Length: 186 minutes
How I saw it: on video (rented from Netflix), yesterday
Subjective Rating: 6/10
Objective Rating: 8/10 (points off for pacing and music)

Interesting, but very, very long. I like how the camera’s always moving, especially the fast zooms. I’m a sucker for fast zooms. The music is a silly mess; I can’t even figure out what effect it was meant to have.

Breakfast at Tiffany’s

Title: Breakfast at Tiffany’s
Year: 1961
Director: Blake Edwards
Writer: George Axelrod, based on Truman Capote’s novel
Starring: Audrey Hepburn, George Peppard
Music: Henry Mancini
Distinctions: Oscars for best score and song
Synopsis: a neurotic girl forces herself into her neighbor’s life
How I saw it: on video (rented on VHS from the library), yesterday
Subjective Rating: 8/10 9/10
Objective Rating: 8/10 (points off for concept and cinematography)

You’ve got a character who’s obnoxious, and a story that only works if every other character (not to mention the audience) loves her; I don’t think anyone other than Audrey Hepburn could have pulled that off. And speaking of amazing feats of Audrey Hepburn, when she sings “Moon River,” it somehow sounds like a good song. Between that, the piano music over the climax, and the almost postmodern five & dime sequence, I have to love the music in this movie, even though 90% of it consists of an incessantly annoying tune.