Today, we look at this week’s Feed the Queue entry, noir thriller Out of the Past, Warren Beatty’s epic Reds, Bette Davis/Mary Astor drama The Great Lie and the two pilots of sci-fi western series Firefly.

So, here is what I watched this weekend:

REDS

There have been dozens of romantic epics and each one attempts to create a timeless story that decades later will still resonate with audiences. And while Reds may not have the staying power of Gone With the Wind, Doctor Zhivago or Titanic, it remains one of the most resonant social dramas in the last half century. The story resolves around an acclaimed American writer who attempted to protect the American worker from money-hungry capitalists by embracing what he saw in the Russian Revolution as a chance to bring a worker-centric government to the U.S. only to discover Communism itself was just as prone to abuse and corruption as capitalism.

Warren Beatty’s pet project which took more than a decade to fully realize, takes place in the years leading up to and entering World War I as minor American unions attempted to thwart American involvement in the war amid fears that the country was doing so out of a need to recoup its vast investments in France and Britain. While the film takes place nearly a century ago, the parallels with today’s social and political concerns is rather astounding. That this film was also released in 1981, the year Ronald Reagan took office is additionally interesting. Yet, only looking back can we see just how interesting such a release was.

Beatty co-wrote, directed, produced and starred in the film and did an admirable job in all four positions. The performances are all top notch from leads Beatty and Diane Keaton down to supporting players Edward Herrmann, Jack Nicholson, Paul Sorvino and especially Maureen Stapleton. Every technical aspect is perfectly constructed and although the film tends to feel every bit its near-four-hour length, you come to expect such in epic pictures. While it might not be for everyone, anyone looking for a keen and semi-prophetic look at modern politics might want to give it a watch.

OUT OF THE PAST

The guilty pleasure of American audiences which the Academy never took fully seriously, film noir is epitomized in Out of the Past about an ex-private investigator hiding out as a gas station operator in order to avoid the wealthy “businessman” whom he failed to finish a job for after falling in love with the woman he was following. Robert Mitchum plays Jeff Bailey, the hardened detective who ends up trying to become square with his old employer Whit Stirling (Kirk Douglas) so that perhaps he can spend the rest of his life in quietude with the new woman in his life.

While the film successfully touches on many of the traditions of noir, is a rather involving and carefully plotted thriller, it’s biggest flaw is in the performance department. Mitchum gives a strong central performance, but his character is as hard as he needs to be, but lacking that spark to make him a sympathetic person. He is also surrounded by a cast that largely depends on stereotypes of the genre and fail to connect with the audience. The story is certainly enough to enthrall and entertain and while it works for the most part and delivers a somewhat surprising conclusion, there’s a small portion of the film that lacks the emotional stimulus I would love to see in such a film.

THE GREAT LIE

Bette Davis takes on one of her few non-bitchy roles as a caring southern woman whose love has married a self-centered concert pianist and left her behind. Yet, the man, played by George Brent, still loves her and when he discovers that his marriage to Sandra Kovak (Mary Astor) has been nullified by a technicality. But after Sandra decides to do anything to get him back, including claiming she’s pregnant, matters get worse between her and Davis. And when Brent is lost over the Amazon, flying for the U.S. government, the two must put aside their differences to prepare for a birth.

Davis playing a kind-hearted person was certainly a stretch, but she does so with a touch of sassiness that carried a bit of her familiar traits. However, relinquishing the most tantalizing part to another permitted Astor to shine against Davis and show her up in the film. Although Davis would give many greater performances later in her career, the moment was most certainly Astor’s.

But aside from Astor, much of the film has a certain blandness. Epitomized in the performance of George Brent, whose performance is wooden and feels utterly immaterial, despite being a key element of the plot. The film never really takes off, fails to connect in a meaningful way and drifts aimlessly for large chunks, becoming cognizant of its power in small chunks, largely when Davis and Astor are on the screen together. In the end, The Great Lie is not really all that great and isn’t terribly dishonest.

FIREFLY

A lot of television series have had significant work done shifting from one screenplay of a pilot to the next. Most often it’s because the studio doesn’t think it can sell the show on what is first presented. In the case of Firefly, it may have been Fox’s biggest mistake. Claiming the first pilot, titled “Serenity” was too dark, the network commissioned a new first episode called “The Train Job” which lightened up on the violence and the humor in an attempt to appeal to a wider audience. However, since creator Joss Whedon had already made the critically celebrated and darkly humorous Buffy the Vampire Slayer, it was rather surprising Fox would have forced such change. Further mystifying is that Fox had already had success itself with the extremely dark The X-Files.

Matter of fact, it could be said that although the second pilot was enjoyable enough and set the tone rather well, the character development in “Serenity” and the general thrill of the episode probably could have helped save the show from an early demise. The show has promise and thankfully the DVD and Netflix operation have placed the “Serenity” episode at the beginning instead of later in the series. Thereby making the second episode the second pilot and thereby making a nice and understandable transition and helping to setup and establish an inventive premise.