The Statement

How about another minor Michael Caine film that you probably have not heard of. The Statement was a 2003 joint Canadian/French/British production with a well known cast, a famed director, and very little else about it to recommend.

Michael Caine plays a French collaborator who was responsible for the rounding up and execution of some French Jews during WWII. Since then, he been on the run in the South of France. I wonder if one can actually be on the run for nearly 40 years? The answer is – apparently you can with key assistance from an unexpected source.

After the opening in which we watch 7 Jews executed by the Nazis after their homes were pointed out by Caine’s character called Pierre Brossard. We pick up the scene and it is the early 1990′s. A French Judge, played by Tilda Swinton joins up with a French Army Colonel – because the police couldn’t be trusted. Their goal – to track down Brossard and bring him to justice.

So who has been helping Brossard? Well he has been shuttling between towns in the south of France – those with churches, monasteries and a place to put him up. He also receives a monthly stipend. The French clerics of the region resolutely deny that they are either harboring this man who is wanted for crimes against humanity, or aiding and abetting his flight from justice.

Now as Caine plays him, Brossard is a double character – one is an old man, pious, and devout – who wishes only for a state of grace when he dies. He’s also a cunning and devious killer – quite talented with sussing out when he might be in danger. And who is after him – a shadowy group which we are lead to believe, at least initially, that this group could be the Jewish ancestors of those who were executed, or it might be another group of vengeance minded Jews. We aren’t entirely sure.There’s hints but nothing concrete. In fact, after Brossard escapes and kills his pursuer in what was supposed to be an ambush – we are pointedly told by a French detective that the deceased was definitely not Jewish.

You Cannot Look Away: Harry Brown & Outrage

Right. You cannot look away. Don’t we all have a fascination with revenge on the one hand, and the internecine battles between hoodlums, mobsters, gangsters, assorted members of Organized Crime families, and even the Yakuza, on the other hand. We can’t say with certainty that films like the Charles Bronson Death Wish series or The Godfather trilogy started the trend, or that The Sopranos made killing so fashionably entertaining, sorry – fascinating. But we can use those visual mediums as the mileposts on the long highway of cinematic and broadcast mayhem.

Michael Caine who most of us have come to love in his various incarnations over his more than 50 years as an actor in films, has played many kinds of roles -  like a spy (The Ipcress File), a ladies’ man (Alfie), a gangster (Get Carter) or even a gentlemanly con-man (Dirty Rotten Scoundrels) to name but a few of his most iconic and memorable, now appears as the titular character in Harry Brown.

Caine/Brown plays a British ex-marine living out his retirement years in South London in what they call an estate in the film. We might call it an apartment block, or even more accurately – a housing project. Not too long into the film, we learn that Harry is a brand new widower, and then, he’s going to lose his best and only friend to the neighborhood ‘kids’, and that the neighborhood is going bad, and quickly.

The neighborhood values have changed to a degree ...

So Harry whose life was a daily pint or two of ale and a quiet game of chess with his buddy at the local pub … now has lost even that. From his direct view of the goings on from his 3rd story flat – the picture is decidedly bleak. But the film posters and the taglines tell us everything we need to know about what will happen:

•  Every man has a breaking point.
• The law has limits. He doesn’t.
• One man will take a stand.

Harry Brown: What's all this about? D.I. Frampton: I'm sorry to have to tell you this but Mr. Attwell is dead...

Africa Once More

Africa once more. Back in October of 2009, I wrote a piece called Africa: A Grand Setting For the Movies . Time has passed and I’ve recently watched two more films about Africa and heard about a third film that will be released later this year. The first was entitled Goodbye Bafana (2007). An alternate release title for this film was The Color of Freedom. The word bafana is the Xhosa language word for boys. 

The second film was The Wilby Conspiracy (1975). Whereas Bafana was the story of Nelson Mandela and his prison’s censor officer and prison guard, James Gregory, and easily fits in the Dramatic Film Category, Wilby was more of thriller with Sidney Poitier as a just released prisoner called Shack Twala, and Michael Caine as Jim Keough, a British mining engineer. They are on the run from the authorities after an street altercation happened literally just moments after Shack Twala had been freed in the courthouse.

Both films were set in South Africa. Bafana was actually filmed in South Africa, but Wilby was shot mostly in Kenya and some sound stages in the UK. In 1975 the political climate in South Africa was such that a film of this nature, could not be filmed in country at that time.

The Quiet American

As The Quiet American begins we hear these words spoken by Michael Caine as Thomas Fowler:

I can’t say what made me fall in love with Vietnam – that a woman’s voice can drug you; that everything is so intense. The colors, the taste, even the rain. Nothing like the filthy rain in London. They say whatever you’re looking for, you will find here. They say you come to Vietnam and you understand a lot in a few minutes, but the rest takes a lifetime.

As you watch this 2002 film, which is set in Vietnam, circa 1952, a series of thoughts and ideas will percolate in your mind. The film stars Michael Caine, Brendan Fraser, and Vietnamese beauty, Do Thi Hai Yen. There’s not much of a mystery about what will happen with these three people. Their roles look self-evident.