Fanny and Alexander, Night of the Demon, & A Lion in the House

Fanny and Alexander is definitely a Bergman film, with its evil religious figure, the belief that there is no god, that we're all puppets, but the magic is real aspect is not something that really fits in with most of his other films. I liked it, but it was too long. It felt like it could have been cut a lot. I'm happy I didn't try to sit through the five plus hour long version. I've not enjoyed his later films nearly as much as his earlier ones. After Persona, I just don't like the films as much. His best period, the eleven or so years from Smiles of a Summer Night to Persona has his best films. Later films may be praised, but they just arne't quite as good.

Night of the Demon is Jacques Tourneur's entry into the demon and witchcraft genre. Not as good as Cat People, but still a very good horror film, even if the producers did force him to show the demon. That would have been better than the goofy looking thing they did finally use. The early English horror films all have a good bit of style to them, and this is definitely full of it. Tourneur also did Out of the Past, one of the best film noirs. He's very talented, and it's a shame that he didn't get better films and bigger budgets. I'm not exactly happy with the ending, but a lot of that can be blamed on the fact that the demon was shown. Would have been better if we never really knew if the demon was real or not. I wonder if the estate of Aleister Crowley was pissed about the movie? Or, more accurately, if he himself was pissed from his post-death state. Doctor Karswell is clearly based upon Crowley.

A Lion in the House is for people who want to cry for four hours. Because if you aren't crying very soon into it, you have no heart. I also thought it was nice to see Cincinnati Children's Hospital again. I recognized a lot of the doctors. Not that I knew them all, well, I did watch Dawn of the Dead with one of them, and I definitely have talked with a couple others during my two plus years working there. I had to wander around these halls for various job related things, and seeing these kids, and kids just like them struggling to live would make me happy to be working on improving their care and lives as much or as little as I was. Working there was a very important part of my life, even if I regretted every time I saw the kids in the cystic fibrosis area, knowing about it. I recognize just about everything in the movie, when they're going around Cincinnati. It's very nostalgic for me as well as a powerful film. I cannot recommend this film highly enough.