Reeling Backward: "One-Eyed Jacks" (1961)

I didn't think I'd like "One-Eyed Jacks." It was directed by Marlon Brando at the precipice of his acting career, right before he slid off into a decade-long fallow period revived only by "The Godfather" in 1972. He had never directed before, and never stepped behind the camera again. Usually, that sort of thing happens for a good reason.

All in all, it has the ingredients of an overstuffed vanity project, a la Kevin Costner's "The Postman."

Early on, the film's languid pace (2 hours and 20 minutes) and Brando's mush-mouthed delivery of lines seemed to confirm my suspicions. But soon the film won me over with its curious mix of Western mythology, revenge story and romance.

It's perhaps the actor's most distilled expression of his persona as a performer, a moody wash of resentment and pride. His gunslinger Rio is the apotheosis of Brando's young rebel roles, now grown a little older and more cautious. He's not always quite sure what he wants or what the right thing to do is, but whatever path he chooses Rio commits to with all-consuming passion.

In his late 30s, Brando was no longer the smoldering screen presence of the 1950s. His torso had started to thicken, his jawline soften, and if his hairline wasn't yet fleeing back across his head, it was at least looking for the exits.

Set in the dusty foothills of Baja California and then moving to the idyllic seaside town of Monterey, "One-Eyed Jacks" is about a friendship gone bad.

Rio and Dad Longworth (Karl Malden) are longtime roustabouts robbing banks and having a good time. Dad is considerably older, a veteran bandit who picked up Rio when he was a kid and taught him the ropes. Even though he's far surpassed him as a gunman, Rio still looks up to Dad, who's starting to lose a step.

In Brando's close-mouthed, Southern-fried vernacular, "Dad" comes out sounding like "Ndahd." The same can be said for the rest of Rio's speech, which Brando delivers like he's chewing over every syllable and reluctant to spit it out.

A heist goes bad, the lawmen have them pinned on a mountain peak with only one spent horse and a rifle between them, and Rio suggests one of them hightail it down to a little ranch they know about nearby, pick up a pair of fresh horses and save the day. They opt to leave it to chance to see who rides off with the gold while the other waits.

Rio suggests Dad pick which of his hands is holding the bullet, but rigs it by pulling a cartridge from his gun belt so Dad will be the one to ride. Why? Perhaps he figures the older, slower Dad deserves a break. Maybe Rio figures that Dad, lacking a hat or shoes from their hasty getaway, won't last in the broiling heat. Or maybe he just loves Dad and trusts him.

In any case, Dad gets a fresh horse and then flees with the gold, leaving Rio to be captured by the Federales. Before he's taken in, the posse stops by the ranch where Rio learns of Dad's betrayal.

Flash five years later. After busting out of the Sonora prison with a Mexican pal (Larry Duran), Rio begins searching for Dad to exact his revenge. Along the way he throws in with Bob Armory (Ben Johnson), a quietly malevolent sort who wants to knock over the fat bank in Monterey.

Turns out that's where Dad has gone to ground, reforming his ways and even being elected sheriff. He's also married a widow named Maria (Katy Jurado) with a teen daughter, Louisa.

She's played by Mexican actress Pina Pellicer, who had a short but memorable career kicked off by her performance in "One-Eyed Jacks." With her thin, sallow face and languid eyes, Pellicer had a dark, unconventional beauty for her era. She also managed to instill more depth and emotion in the dialogue than screenwriters Calder Willingham and Guy Trosper did. Sadly, she committed suicide three years later.

The genesis of the screenplay is a little fuzzy, with Willingham, Trosper, Stanley Kubrick and Brando himself all contributing drafts at various points. It's a very, very loose adaptation of the novel "The Authentic Death of Hendry Jones" by Charles Neider.

It's at this point that the plot goes kind of sideways, but things get really interesting. Rio, Bob and their crew ride into town, but Rio peels off for a visit at Dad's place. Dad lies to him about the circumstances of his betrayal, and introduces him to his family, with an immediate spark between Rio and Louisa.

Now, this sounds like an exceptionally lousy way to go about robbing a bank. But Rio is less concerned about getting rich than getting even -- or, at the very least, getting satisfaction for being treated so shabbily by his best friend.

After a huge carnival party, which Rio uses as a cover to seduce Louisa and deflower her as a way to get back at Dad, the gunman realizes he doesn't really know what the wants. At various points Rio means to kill Dad, or run off with Louisa, but things don't quite work out.

After Rio kills a drunk in a fair fight, Dad uses the incident as an excuse to take revenge for Louisa. He beats Rio to a pulp, flays his back to shreds with a whip, and pulverizes his gun  hand with the butt of a rifle. Rio spends a couple months at a nearby fishing village healing up, with Bob and his partner growing increasingly frustrated. They signed on for a rich bank scheme, not a Shakespearean revenge drama.

Bob finally robs the bank without Rio, shooting a girl bystander and getting killed himself in the process, but Dad uses it as an excuse to hang Rio and rid himself of his troubles. Malden's steely, internal performance suggests that Dad doesn't really hate Rio, but he despises that his presence reminds Dad of his own failings.

Rio, for his own part, is incensed that Dad has managed to turn his life around as easily as flipping over a poker card. "You're a one-eyed jack around here, Dad. I seen the other side of your face," he accuses.

Also notable is Slim Pickens as Dad's jackal of a deputy, Lon, who has designs on Louisa. Pickens usually played bumbling, cartoonish characters, but he's chilling here.

Like other novice directors, Brando made the wise choice to hire a veteran cinematographer, Charles Lang, to handle the visual look of the picture. The result, nominated for an Oscar, has a scuffed-up kind of a beauty, vivid colors mixed with off-putting close-ups.

The most interesting thing to me about "One-Eyed Jacks" is that it relies more on the power of inference than overt depictions to demonstrate the internal workings of its characters, especially Rio and Dad. Rio is such a deviation from the classic Western protagonist, in that he's a man of action who often isn't sure how to act.

Six-shooter characters, even when they aren't supposed to be heroic, are often defined by their single-minded pursuit of a goal -- think John Wayne in "The Searchers." Rio is more akin to Brando's urban characters of the '50s, torn apart by misdirected passion and existential angst.

3.5 stars out of four

Review: "For a Good Time, Call..."

There's a difference between comedy and zany behavior. "For a Good Time, Call..." aims for the former but mostly contains the latter.

This Sundance Film Festival favorite is about two down-on-their luck Manhattan roommates who start a phone sex business to make ends meet. Now, phone sex is like prostitution lite -- a sex act is involved, one-sided in terms of pleasure received, money is exchanged, though the parties never meet in person.

Big in the '80s, it seems anachronistic in this day in which countless terabytes of free porn are available on the Web. I would think visually-inclined men would go that way instead of opting for an audio-only format. Not to mention, at $4.99 a minute, the Great Recession must have shrunk the customers base considerably.

But it's also why Katie and Lauren are able to clean up so well. Katie (Ari Graynor) is blonde, outspokenly slutty and under-motivated. Lauren (Lauren Miller) comes from privilege, is prim and a bit awkward. Katie works the phone sex thing as a side gig, making $1 a minute.

Lauren is predictably appalled when she finds out, but has the business sense to point out Katie could make a lot more if she stopped being a contractor and went into business for herself. They name their company "1-900-MMM-HMMM," which seems a recipe for misdialing the competition.

Over time, the two opposites learn to work together and even become close, the uptight one loosening up and the crazy cohort gaining some semblance of responsibility. I should point out that this is essentially the same plot as "Night Shift" with Michael Keaton and Henry Winkler, minus the morgue component.

In the finest Judd Apatow tradition, "Good Time" is a product of nepotism. Lauren Miller is married to comedian Seth Rogen, who appears in a cameo along with other famous funnymen and -women like Kevin Smith, Justin Long and Nia Vardalos.

Miller is also a co-screenwriter and co-producer with Katie Anne Naylon, her actual college roomie when they were at Florida State University. They supposedly based the story on their real-life experiences. (University of Florida alum, insert joke here.)

As we see in flashback, Lauren and Katie have A History. Back in college they barely knew each other, until there was an incident involving a brand-new car, a plastic cup and a full bladder. Ten years later, their mutual best friend -- catty gay caricature Jesse (Long) -- suggests they shack up together when they're both low on cash.

Katie inherited her grandmother's fabulous apartment overlooking Gramercy Park, but the rent control is going bye-bye. Meanwhile, Lauren's lawyer boyfriend (James Wolk) tells her he needs some space to evaluate, and wants her to move out of their apartment.

Sugar Lyn Beard has a short but memorable turn as a business recruit with an impossibly squeaky, girly voice -- and then, she takes it up (or down) a notch.

First-time feature film director Jamie Travis is a bit shaky with the pacing. Sometimes the jokes and loony bits fly at us so fast the audience can't hardly field them all. Other sections linger and mope.

The language coming out of the girls' mouths while they're working the phones is supposed to be shocking in its filthiness, but the wind-up overshadows the pitch.

Graynor has the bigger, flashier role as the hard-bitten girl with an embarrassing Big Secret, but I never bought her as authentic -- she's more personality than person. Lauren is more relatable, but it seems like the movie has all her moves are laid out for her five minutes in.

"For a Good Time, Call..." has a handful of genuinely funny bits. But compared to other films in the recent trend of R-rated female-centric comedies ("Bridesmaids"), it doesn't find the sweet spot.

2 stars out of four

Review: "Neil Young Journeys"

“Neil Young Journeys” is as elegantly simple as its title suggests. Director Jonathan Demme recorded two days of Young’s performance at Massey Hall in Toronto during a 2011 solo tour. Before that, the camera crew followed the iconic singer/songwriter on a drive from his hometown of Omemee, Ontario, on his way to play at the concert.

The film intercuts footage from his performance with reminisces about growing up in 1950s small-town Canada. Young, driving a 1956 Ford Fairlane, talks about where he started as a boy, while his music relates the tale of his journey as an artist.

For hardcore Neil Young fans, it’s a mesmerizing and intimate visit with a performer who is identified most closely with rock ‘n’ roll, but whose artistic curiosity has taken him in myriad directions musically throughout his 40-plus-year career. To those like myself whose appreciation is more casual, it’s an opportunity to encounter some of his lesser-known recent hits as well as classics like “Ohio” and “Hey Hey, My My.”

In his mid-60s, Young’s high tenor voice is eerily unchanged from his youth. It’s a great instrument that he’s made full use of throughout his long time on the stage. He can bend it smooth like soft butter, or sharpen it into an angry knife.

Young, dressed in a loose-fitting white suit and matching fedora, stands alone on a multi-tiered stage full of instruments, which he putters around between for various sets. In one of the most engaging bits, he dangles his electric guitar by the neck in front of a series of amplifiers, moving it around back and forth to take the keening yawl of distortion and turn it into an ethereally beautiful series of chords.

Demme makes some daring stylistic choices with his camera, most but not all of which pay off. For a couple of songs he ties a small camera to Young’s microphone for an ultra close-up; for long stretches we only see him from nostrils to jowls. It’s meant to be a distracting, offbeat angle, but it’s held for too long and becomes unnerving.

The mix is about 80 percent singing and 20 percent traveling, and I wish it had been more like 60/40 in the other direction. Not because the performance isn’t entertaining, but because the private moments are so much more so.

Young looks at how much his small town has changed, as bulldozers turn over the earth and reshape the landmarks he once knew. "It's all gone. But it's in my head. That's why you don't have to worry when you lose friends,” he muses.

He also talks about his love of the road and old cars, and how they combine with his own appetites as a consumer of music. “When I do my listening, I do it in cars. I don't give a sh** if I'm doing it on a speaker this big,” he says, holding his fingers slightly apart.

“I can tell if I like the music by listening to it in a car.”

We also get a glimpse at his backstage ritual before heading out before the crowd. In a darkened corner, a few candles cast a dim glow over a small table set up like a shrine. He drinks some tea for his throat, takes a few swigs of a domestic beer and sucks on a lemon wedge, savoring each

Soothing and sharp, comforting and off-putting – that combination of flavors could also describe the musical progress of an artist who has always seemed to appreciate the voyage more than the destination.

3 stars out of four

Video review: "Snow White and the Huntsman"

The only thing worse than having two different Snow White adaptations competing for our attention is that neither one of them turned out to be worthy of more than five minutes of it.

First came "Mirror, Mirror" in the spring with a winsome, comedic takeoff on the Brothers Grimm fairy tale. It managed to be more cute than funny. Then for summer we got "Snow White and the Huntsman," a down-and-dirty version where Snow grabs a sword and shield and takes it to the evil Queen.

Alas. First-time director Rupert Sanders and star Kristen Stewart may have shared some heat in real life, but it's certainly not up on the screen. This is a long, listless affair featuring a whole bunch of pouting, interrupted occasionally by action scenes with a heavy CGI assist.

And we get the insertion of an unnecessary element, a pumped-up repository of Y-chromosome fortitude -- the eponymous Huntsman, played by Chris Hemsworth fresh off his "Thor" stint. The Huntsman is big and brutish, tagged by the Queen (Charlize Theron) to kill young Snow, but instead signs up as her right-hand man.

Usually in these sorts of movies, it's the useless female character crammed into mix. It turns out doing it the other way doesn't work any better.

The seven dwarves are here, suitably grizzled and alienated as befits the material. And Theron has a few cool scenes as the sorcerous queen, who wants to ensnare Snow so she can suck out the soul to preserve her unearthly beauty. The Mirror on the Wall is turned into a creepy, drippy golem of molten gold whispering in her ear.

Video extras are splendid. The DVD comes with an extended version of the film, a making-of featurette and feature-length commentary by Sanders and his creative team.

Go for the Blu-ray upgrade, and things really get interesting. An interactive viewing feature for tablet or computer lets you pop in and out of the story for behind-the-scenes peek. There are also featurettes focusing on rejuvenating the fairy tale, casting the key roles, creation of special effects and a 360-degree tour of the kingdom.

Movie: 2 stars out of four
Extras: 3.5 stars

Reeling Backward: "Street Smart" (1987)

Morgan Freeman has had one of the greatest film careers in cinematic history, in my opinion, and perhaps the most amazing thing about it is that it didn't take off until he was 50 years old.

He had supporting parts in mainstream movies, including 1984's "Teachers" with Nick Nolte, but in 1987 most people knew Freeman as a cast member on "The Electric Company" during the 1970s, playing a variety of urban caricatures helping to educate little kiddies: "Top to bottom, left to right, reading stuff is outta sight!"

"Street Smart" did not make any lasting impression on audiences, other than Freeman's amazing turn as Leo Smalls Jr., aka Fast Black, a chillingly unscrupulous pimp and killer. It earned him the first of five Oscar nominations -- he eventually won for "Million Dollar Baby" -- and he soon found himself cast in leading roles in "Driving Miss Daisy," "Lean on Me," "Se7en" and "The Shawshank Redemption," not to mention supporting turns in high-profile films like "Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves," "Glory," "Unforgiven" and more.

Such was the pinnacle of Freeman's reputation by the 1990s that when he was cast as the U.S. President in "Deep Impact," it caused little stir to see a black man in the role -- a full decade before a real-life African-American would be elected to that post. By the 2000s, when producers needed somebody to convincingly play God Himself in "Bruce Almighty" and its sequel, I doubt if any name other than Freeman's even came up.

"Street Smart" is in some ways analogous to "Girl, Interrupted." It was the pet project of an established star who wanted to use the material to showcase their more serious side, but another largely unknown performer stole the show and would eventually leave them in the dust. Just as Anjelina Jolie's career has soared while Winona Ryder's crashed, Freeman's took flight right as Christopher Reeve, having recently hung up Superman's cape, saw his falling to earth.

(Indeed, according to Reeve's own account, the studio only agreed to finance the low-budget "Street Smart" in exchange for him signing on to do the fourth, unmemorable Man of Steel flick.)

Freeman is terrific as Fast Black, charismatic and chatty one minute and threatening to kill or maim the next. He wears a coiffed Afro, flashy clothes, a gold tooth and has long, sharp white fingernails that give him an almost supernatural look -- abetted by what appears to be eyeliner, which makes Freeman's steely gaze electrifying.

He's so damn good, in fact, that whenever he's not on camera, the movie drags and heaves, like a glacier crumbling under its own inertia. Based on his sixth-place billing in the credits, however -- after such luminaries as Jay Patterson and Andre Gregory -- it's clear the studio wasn't expecting him to be such a mesmerizing presence.

Reeve plays Jonathan Fisher, a nondescript name for a nondescript man. A well-heeled magazine writer for the fictional New York Journal, he's desperate to get ahead. The patrician editor (Gregory) doesn't like any of his story ideas, so he pitches him a left-field notion about an insider's view of a New York pimp, which grabs more attention.

Unfortunately, the preppy-dressing Jonathan doesn't have much luck getting anyone to talk to him from the Big Apple's seedier side. In desperation, he makes up a character and a story to go with it. The editor runs the piece on the cover, it makes a big splash, Jonathan becomes a celebrity and even gets a side gig doing an investigative TV segment, dubbed "Street Smart."

Things get complicated when a D.A. prosecuting Fast Black for murder becomes convinced that Jonathan based the story on him, and demands his notes as evidence. Fast Black's lawyer cleverly embraces the ploy, realizing the case will turn into a First Amendment crisis and remove the focus from his client. The pimp and the writer even buddy up to one another -- which lends Jonathan a way to satisfy his boss' demand to meet the subject of the story at a fancy cocktail party.

Tagging along, and eventually getting into the middle, is Punchy (Kathy Baker), one of Fast Black's top call girls, who connects the two of them together. Other than Freeman, Baker is the only other actor with any real presence in the film, a mix of small-town innocence and streetwise allure.

My biggest problem with the movie is that director Jerry Schatzberg and screenwriter David Freeman don't delve very deeply into Jonathan's anguish and guilt. I know I'm biased given my own journalistic background, but there should be more focus on the way his lies keep piling up atop each other. As with Stephen Glass, Jayson Blair, Jonah Lehrer, Janet Cooke and other fabulists, their dreamed-up stories are exposed in the end.

For Jonathan, it should feel like the walls are closing in on him, as he dreads the day his fabrications are revealed and his career is ended. Instead, the story focuses on the threat of Fast Black, who wants him to create fake notes that exonerate him. Their budding friendship soon turns into one of victim and victimizer -- a challenge to stage convincingly, given Reeve's imposing 6-foot-4 build.

Jonathan has one brief conversation with his girlfriend (Mimi Rogers) in which he discusses the ramifications of concocting a story and then lying repeatedly about it.

"How do you feel about this?" she asks.
"I'm amazed that I got away with it. And I'm ashamed that I got away with it. What the hell, back in business, right?"

Not exactly Dostoevsky-esque torments of the soul, that.

In fact, the story ends with Fast Black dead, the lieutenant who had been fooled by Jonathan into killing him in jail, Punchy murdered and mutilated -- and Jonathan still on the streets, doing his TV reports.

We can thank "Street Smart" for helping put Morgan Freeman on the big stage. Considered in of itself, though, it's a film of little consequence.

2 stars out of four

Video review: Harry Potter Wizard's Collection

Everyone loves collector's editions, especially videophiles who like having the entirety of a film franchise in one handsome repository, complete with special goodies to go with them. The problem with these collections is that just when you think you've got the "ultimate" edition of something, another, supposedly better, one comes along.

(iPhone owners know all too well of what I speak.)

Just this month, "Bond 50" will encompass the first five decades of James Bond, 22 films in all. Of course, that won't include the 23rd Bond film, "Skyfall," coming out in November, or the 24th or any thereafter. Nor will it have any "unofficial" Bond movies, like David Niven's 1967 spoof or Sean Connery's 1983 spinoff, "Never Say Never Again."

A few years ago I was thrilled to get my hands on "The Adventures of Indiana Jones: The Complete DVD Movie Collection," with all three films. Since then, the quality bar has been raised with the Blu-ray format, and Harrison Ford donned the fedora and bullwhip again for another movie. So, you guessed it, "Indiana Jones: The Complete Adventures" arrives Sept. 18.

So where does "Harry Potter Wizard's Collection" fit in this spectrum?

Fans of the boy wizard saga are at least assured of one thing: it is very unlikely there will be any latecomer movies to crash the party. Author J.K. Rowling has assured the literary world repeatedly that she will write no more Pottery books past the seventh. So these eight films (the final book was split into two movies) are it.

The "Wizard's Collection" includes both Blu-ray and DVD versions of all movies. So how do the extras stack up? For a $350 list price, the 31-disc Wizard's Collection comes up short.

It's essentially all the extras included in previous individual film editions, plus five hours more of behind-the-scenes footage, including a one-on-one chat between Rowling and star Danielle Radcliffe.

The really special stuff comes in the physical collectibles.

The edition arrives in a 19-pound chest that folds out in all sorts of ways, every corner stuffed with something neat. Included are high-quality prints of concept drawings, a blueprint of Hogwarts School, a cloth map of the wizarding world, a 48-page hardcover book detailing all of Harry's magical artifacts, a Hogwarts Express train ticket, and even your own Horcrux Locket.

You'll have to conjure up a lot of cash for this collection, so I would deem it for hardcore Harry Potterites only.

Movies: B
Extras: B

Reeling Backward: "Fahrenheit 451" (1966)

Francois Truffaut called "Fahrenheit 451" his "saddest and most difficult" filmmaking experience, and it's not hard to see this disappointment translated onto the screen.

Star Oskar Werner battled throughout the production with the filmmaker, who also co-wrote the screenplay with Jean-Louis Richard, based on the seminal novel by science fiction icon Ray Bradbury. It was Truffaut's first film in English and with color.

Werner was Austrian and spoke English with a heavy accent, which makes him stand out from the rest of the cast, which is largely British. Truffaut himself spoke little English, and as a result he failed to properly monitor the tone and intonation of his actors. Most speak in a curiously flat cadence, like Werner, or rush through their dialogue as if they're in a race, like Cyril Cusack.

These things could actually work for the film, since it's about a dystopian future where all books are banned and society molds its citizenry into anti-intellectual complacency. Since people talk without thinking, their speech would tend to be scattered. And because Montag is a  fireman who eventually rebels against his comrades, in some ways it makes sense for him to be different from the pack.

But I think these are not attributes of the movie; rather, they are unintentional problems that creep into the mix. Truffaut himself preferred the French-dubbed version of the film, by all accounts.

Of course, in Bradbury's haunting vision, firemen do not put out infernos but start them -- bursting into houses, jackbooted thugs dressed in militaristic black uniforms. They are highly trained in the ways of hiding, and uncover all the illegal books in the abode and set them ablaze. If enough books are found, they may just condemn the entire house and put it to the flamethrower torch.

As the story opens, Montag is the finest fireman in his station, and is informed that he has been selected to replace the Captain (Cusack) when he retires shortly. But with the help of a young schoolteacher who lives near him, Montag begins secreting away the books and reading them instead of destroying them. All that reading gets him to thinking, which is the last thing the controllers of this strangled society want.

What's interesting about "Fahrenheit" the movie is that the leaders of this system are never glimpsed or overtly referred to. Bradbury often said that his book was not about censorship so much as the way television and a lack of reading has a brain-deadening effect on people. Large television "wall sets" occupy every home, blaring virtually nonstop and lulling viewers into a state of dreamlike passivity.

We see the effects wrought by the great and mighty Oz, but not Oz himself. Who actually runs the government and the media? We never know.

In perhaps the film's strangest scene, Montag's wife Linda is selected to "appear" in a live play broadcast over the airwaves. (It's never made explicit, but it seems clear that there is only one channel playing.) This consists of two men discussing arrangements for a dinner party, and occasionally turning toward the camera to seek as Linda's advice, which she delivers from memorized dialogue. Presumably, the rest of the audience sees Linda's responses during this time. She flubs her first line, but the play keeps rolling along as if nothing happened.

Linda is played by Julie Christie, who also plays the rebellious schoolteacher Clarisse (wearing a horrendously fake-looking wig.) Truffaut obviously sees Clarisse and Linda as two sides of the same coin, but the gimmick casting is a distraction. (Terence Stamp, who was cast prior to Werner, left the project because he felt Christie's dual roles would upstage him.)

The only other notable actor is Anton Diffring as Fabian, a fellow fireman, Montag antagonist and competitor for his position. I'm not sure if he ever speaks more than a line or two of dialogue; the role operates strictly by having the hawk-faced Diffring cast suspicious glances at Montag from time to time.

Visually, the film is an orgy of oversaturated colors, intended I think to give everything a hyper-real look that's supposed to be disconcerting.Truffaut's camera work is surprisingly staid and pedestrian -- other than a few pans, the view hardly ever seems to move. The musical score, highlighted by a fast-paced little march whenever the firemen are on the move, is repetitive and silly.

Truffaut stripped much of the futuristic science fiction elements out of the story, perhaps to make it more relatable to everyday life but probably also for budgetary concerns. The one genuinely "sci-fi" shot, of a group of policemen wearing jet-packs searching the countryside for Montag, is simply laughable. They move in precise formation, instead of spreading out to make their search more effective. I think Truffaut was simply enamored of the image, logic be damned.

A morality lesson with little juice, "Fahrenheit 451" never brings the human story to a boil.

2 stars out of four