The Harder They Come

The Harder They Come, set in 1970’s Jamaica, is a story about Ivanhoe “Ivan” Martin (Jimmy Cliff), a poor country boy who moves to the city after his grandmother’s death to pursue a singing career. What he finds when he reaches Kingston city is more than he bargained for. Trouble finds Ivan immediately, as he is robbed for all of his possessions by a local vendor and is denied housing by his mother (Lucia White) in her tiny home. He spends his first nights sleeping on the street.

Ivan’s mother sends him to live and work with a local preacher (Basil Keane) but he soon finds Preacher too overbearing and strict and is forced again onto the streets when he begins a romance with a young lady (Janet Bartley) that Preacher has been courting since a young age.

With no money, nowhere to live, and in dire straights, Ivan enters into the ganja trade, hustling ganja for the local “Don”, Pedro (Ras Daniel Hartman). He soon feels taken advantage of, paying most of his earnings to police and Pedro, leaving him with barely enough to survive. When he questions the politics of the ganja trade and confronts the “Don”, his real trouble begins.

Ivan thinks his luck might be changing when a local record producer, Mr. Hilton (Bob Charlton), lets him record a song and he hears it played that night in the local dance hall. But he soon learns the politics of the music business and is once again taken advantage of. Forced to sign the rights of his song away for $25.00, Ivan is once again with his back against the wall, fighting to survive.

He decides to challenge Pedro for control of the ganja trade, but it only puts him in deeper trouble. When he refuses to pay Pedro his weekly protection fee, Pedro has the police stop Ivan on his way back from the country with a load of ganja. Now a wanted man, Ivan eludes Pedro and the police until he is cornered one night and is forced to kill a police officer. Wanted for the murder of a police officer, Ivan must now fight for his very existence. His legend is growing and he receives much help from the community and is able to elude capture for quite some time.

Finally, Ivan is cornered on a sandy beach, armed with two pistols, he takes his last stand, but is tragically overpowered and shot down on the beach.

Overall, everything technical in the film, lighting, film, and sound, would be considered poor, but this movie truly captures the climate of 1970’s Jamaica like no other has been able to do since then, giving the viewer a very intimate perspective of Jamaica in the seventies. This is one of my all time favorite movies and I would it give it an A+ gangster rating.

Rear Window

Rear Window, released in 1954 and directed by Alfred Hitchcock is a classic, still as interesting today as I’m sure it was in the fifties. Considered to be one of Hitchcock’s best and most thrilling films, Rear Window takes us on a journey human curiosity and voyeurism. From the point of view of a lonely man in the city named L.B. “Jeff” Jefferies (James Stewart) who is confined to his wheelchair in his apartment because of a broken leg, he passes his time by watching his neighbors.

Mostly from the point of view of Jeff, we see what he sees. We see his neighbors, Lars Thorwald (Raymond Burr), a salesman, Mrs. Anna Thorwald (Irene Winston), Jeff’s wife, Miss Lonelyhearts (Judith Evelyn), a middle-aged woman who lives alone and acts out her romantic fantasies of men, Miss Torso (Georgine Darcy) who is a young dancer that practices in her underwear, the Husband and Wife (Frank Cady and Sara Berner) who live above the Thorwalds, a woman with a poodle (Bess Flowers), a newlywed man and woman (Rand Harper and Havis Davenport), along with others.

Armed with binoculars and a high-powered telephoto lens, Jeff is obsessed with watching these people. We are pulled into their lives through Jeff who starts to piece together an ironic happening where he believes a murder has taken place by Mr. Thorwald. Not actually seeing the murder himself, but instead piecing together what he thinks are odd behaviors, he calls on Tom (Wendell Corey), an old buddy from the Air Corps, who is now a detective. While not believing his friend that a murder could have taken place, Tom leaves.

As the film proceeds, we travel along with Jeff and his spying. Eventually it catches up to him and he is almost attacked by the presumed murderer. After a much-anticipated arrest of Mr. Thorwald, Jeff seems to end the spying on his neighbors, finding that maybe he shouldn’t be so consumed by voyeurism.

Originally intended for entertainment, this film has become known for it’s thrilling suspense. A must see for anyone, this Hitchcock film will never be forgotten and will remain a classic for years to come.

The Cove

In Taiji, Japan, a dirty secret is about to be exposed. Ric O’Barry, formerly the world’s lead dolphin trainer and trainer of the world famous Flipper, and the director, Louie Psihoyos, team up to make a highly charged, thought provoking, emotional documentary about Taiji’s secret capture and slaughter of bottlenose dolphins. Ironically, it takes the one who started the capture of dolphins to try to end it.

Armed with high definition cameras built into fake rocks (courtesy of Kerner Optical), underwater microphones, military grade equipment, and a special ops team including two world-class free divers, Ric O’Barry, and his motley crew, set out to shed light for the world to see the reality behind the dolphin trade. With the Taiji secret police on their heels around every turn, the mission proves to be everything they bargained for and more. Ultimately successful, bringing horrifying images of dolphin cruelty to our living rooms, the situation can no longer be ignored. Through hard facts and scientific reason, The Cove takes the viewer on an action packed, thrilling spy mission into the secret of Taiji.

Bride of Frankenstein Part 2

The Bride of Frankenstein starts out where its predecessor, Frankenstein, leaves off. The monster (Boris Karloff) escapes certain death and rises from the ashes of a burning mill and escapes for a time into the wilderness where he will meet his first and only friend, a blind, lonely hermit (O.P. Heggie) who exposes the monster to gin and cigars and teaches him his first words: “drink good, smoke good, food good”. Now for the first time, the monster begins to develop a sense of understanding and a connection to his emotions, enabling the audience to view him as less monster and more human. A cast out Frankenstein tries to survive in a world where he does not belong, finding friendship and love along the way.

A late night, knock at the door at the Frankenstein residence from a strange man, Dr. Pretorious (Ernest Thesiger), a mad scientist in his own right, leads to an agreement between the two, Dr. Frankenstein (Colin Clive) and Dr. Pretorious), to create a mate for the monster. They head back to the laboratory and begin yet another round of weird science.

Ultimately, the experiment fails, as the bride (Elsa Lanchester), rejects the monster. The monster’s new found understanding can not contain his emotions and he strikes one final blow, destroying the laboratory and taking his life, the life of his bride, and the life of Dr. Pretorious. Sparing only Dr. Frankenstein and his soon-to-be bride.

Although there are many different takes on the underlying meaning of the film, varying from homosexuality to sacrilege, it reminded me more of an average day with my 18-month-old son. Emotions are overwhelming and words are few for the monster. With the strength of ten men, and the emotional stability of a toddler, he expresses himself more with actions, most often violent, than words.

Bride of Frankenstein

Bride of Frankenstein Review by: Ruben West

A blast from the past, Bride of Frankenstein was indeed enjoyable and even slightly funny. Compared to today’s standards. Bride of Frankenstein is more like a play than what we know as a full-featured film. It was indeed on the cutting edge in 1935. The phony props, bad lighting, and poor sound quality are all part of the beauty of this movie. Making more with less in a time in Hollywood when movies were churned out every day like clockwork. A cast out Frankenstein trying to survive in a world where he does not belong, finding friendship and love along the way. Entertaining, funny, and sad. A classic.