When my husband was cleaning out his parents’ apartment in Santiago, Chile, after their deaths last year, one of the things he found was a well-worn leather satchel, crammed full of postcards and dinner menus from his mother’s 1938 ocean journey on the Hamburg-Amerika steamer Rhakotis when she and her family fled Germany for a new life in Chile.  She was a teenager then, and among the cards and mementos of the trip were a selection of movie star postcards which she had obviously collected, faces and autographs of personalities probably unfamiliar to most of us, but the stuff of a young fraulein’s dreams.  There were several photos of stars we would recognize — a couple of Shirley Temples, a Greer Garson, a Gary Cooper — but it was those other stars who caught my eye.  Who were these intriguing unknown celebrities?  John Boles I know, but who was, for instance, Lilian Harvey?

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I am always impressed with the biographies that my fellow Morlocks Moirafinnie and Medusamorlock often pull together for this blog site. Thorough, well researched, and entertaining, these bios are far more informative than most of the blurbs found in film encyclopedias or dictionaries. Inspired by their dedication and sincerity, I thought I would try my hand at writing a bit of biography. 

Not too long ago, I saw Milos Forman’s last completed film, Goya’s Ghosts, on DVD. I had wanted to see it on the big screen, but in all of Chicago, it played on only one screen in one theater. It is a crime that big-screen access to a film directed by the man behind Amadeus, Hair, and One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest was so limited, when garbage like The Transformers or Iron Man was shoved down our throats on multiple screens in thousands of cineplexes. Well, I best not get started down that path. 

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In an earlier post, I admitted a fondness for quirky foreign films, particularly foreign versions of popular genres such a science fiction, westerns, or horror movies. (Maybe one day when I am feeling brave, I will explain my love for live-action talking-animal movies.) I am actually more curious and open to foreign genre films than I am to the serious foreign fare that receives all of the awards and acclaim. While I appreciate the Bela Tarrs, Krzysztof Kieslowskis, and Alexander Sokurovs of world cinema, I am entertained by the Julius Machulskis and Vaclav Vorliceks. And, a good genre film can be as artistic and meaningful as a drama — sometimes more so. Like their American counterparts, foreign genre films are too often overlooked because they are formulaic, entertaining, or just plain fun.

In the wake of the media blitz surrounding the opening for The Dark Knight this past weekend, plus the recent news of a remake of Barbarella in which Robert Rodriguez will attempt to rework Roger Vadim’s 1968 cult classic, I am reminded of one of my favorite quirky foreign flicks — Who Wants to Kill Jessie? READ MORE