Le Grand Blond avec une Chaussure Noire (1972)

	Also Known As: Der große Blonde mit dem schwarzen Schuh
	Year of first release: 1972
	Director: Yves Robert (La Guerre des Boutons)
	Actors: Pierre Richard, Bernard Blier (Les Tontons Flingueurs), Jean Rochefort (Lost in La Mancha), Mireille Darc
	Country: F
	Genre: Comedy
	Conditions of visioning: 25.12.2016, 42" TV
Synopsis: A hapless orchestra player becomes an unwitting pawn of rival factions within the French secret service after he is chosen as a decoy by being identified as a super secret agent.
Review: An unforgettable classic French comedy from my youth of watching public television, hard to believe that it is 45 years old thanks to digital conservation and projection of such movies nowadays. The humour ages but the image quality not! Indeed I guess it would be hard for a young audience to laugh at the gags, quite typical of that decade. For me that character of the absentminded violinist (Mr. Nobody in fact) is likeable, so much that a sequel was soon produced in 1974 (Le Retour du Grand Blond), and in fact it is the kind of character Pierre Richard excelled at playing (already in Le Distrait in 1970). But what makes the most fun for me is the rivalry between a stern Jean Rochefort as Secret Services Head and his deputy played by Bernard Blier as nervous as a Wolfoni Brother. This rivalry and the high-tech spy techniques used by both teams put in contrast with the mundane life of the violinist (between toothaches, adultery and an invading best friend) is what makes the comedy work.
Rating: 5 /10

Joe Kidd (1972)

	Also Known As: -
	Year of first release: 1972
	Director: John Sturges (The Magnificent Seven, The Great Escape)
	Actors: Clint Eastwood (The Beguiled, Space Cowboys), Robert Duvall (Deep Impact, Apocalypse Now), John Saxon
	Country: USA
	Genre: Western
	Conditions of visioning: 22.06.2015, Blu-ray, Home cinema
Synopsis: In the early 1900's, Joe Kidd (Eastwood) is an ex-bounty hunter not fitting in a small city where Mexicans create disorder because of issues with properties. He will be hired to track down the head of the rebellion.
Review: I could recognize the touch of a great director like John Sturges in the way both actors landscapes are filmed, but also in which parts of the story are emphasized. In particular I liked the starting point when Mexicans rebel against the "Anglos" to whom they gave land when they conquered the country and that now appropriate everything under the false pretense that the old property claims got lost in a fire. What a bad faith, so not only the Native Americans got robbed of their land. Joe Kidd shows a bad side of the American people impersonated by the land owner Frank Harlan (played by Robert Duvall) ready to kill anybody in order to keep his property wrongfully acquired. The rest of the movie is more classical and even lazy sometimes: Clint Eastwood is not at his best (I read that he was sick during the shooting), the reaction of some characters doesn't make sense and the end duel is overdone. Not a bad Western, but not a great one either.
Rating: 5 /10

Kahdeksan Surmanluotia (1972)

	Also Known As: Eight deadly shots, Acht tödliche Schüsse
	Year of first release: 1972
	Director: Mikko Niskanen
	Actors: Mikko Niskanen, Tarja-Tuulikki Tarsala, Paavo Pentikäinen (Reiska)
	Country: FIN
	Genre: Melodrama, Documentary
	Conditions of visioning: 30.10.2014, CineStar4, NFDL2014, OV Finnish with English subtitles
Synopsis: In the winter of 1969, Tauno Pasanen shot four policemen in a small Finnish village. This real event was the rationale for Mikko Niskanen’s work on an epic about the difficult lives of simple people in the countryside. At the beginning of Niskanen’s version, shots are fired by the farmer Pasi (Niskanen). The rest of the four episodes show in flashbacks what led up to this bloody deed. Niskanen doesn’t judge his protagonists, but rather portrays their situation in detail. Taxes and land reforms threaten the farmer’s existence so that he can no longer pay his bills, seeking refuge in the alcohol that will destroy his family life.
Review: The movie is not supposed to be really a documentary. But the way it is shot is so real. The real daily life on the countryside. That I claim the movie as a documentary. Pasi has a small farm with four cows, one old horse and a bit of land. With his best friend Reiska (Pentikäinen) and some others he used to make vodka in the fields or the woods while they are working. This brings difficulties with the police everytime he gets drunk in public, especially because home-made alcohol is prohibited in Finland. His wife Vaimo (Tarsala) does not support him that much because she is afraid of his violence when he is drunk and has four children to deal with. The difficulties of small farmers compared to large farms is well known everywhere now in the news, especially since the European policy supports more the large ones. This brings difficulties to Pasi with the tax administration that is forcing him to sell his horse. An initial version of the film ran twelve hours; this version, the remaining 300 minutes are considered by Aki Kaurismäki to be the best Finnish films of all time.
Rating: 7 /10

Solaris (1972)

	Also Known As: -
	Year of first release: 1972
	Director: Andrei Tarkowskiy
	Actors: Donatas Banionis, Natalya Bondarchuk, Yuri Yarvet, Anatoliy Solonitsyn
	Country: SU
	Genre: SF
	Conditions of visioning: 09.08.2014, DVD, Russian version with English subtitles
Synopsis: The Solaris mission has established a base on a planet that appears to host some kind of intelligence, but the details are very secret. After the mysterious demise of one of the three scientists on the base, a psychologist (Banionis) is sent out to replace him. He finds the station run-down and the two remaining scientists (Yarvet and Solonitsyn) cold and secretive. When he also encounters his wife Khari (Bondarchuk) who has been dead for ten years, the psychologist changes his opinion on that intelligence.
Review: I find the plot very interesting. This does not only sets questions on extra-terrestrial life, but questions what humans are looking for in their space quest and their open-mindedness about new discoveries. The acting of both main characters is quite, subtle and therefore good for me but the other's not that much. I like that spiritual and society topics are set in an abstract way on the screen, e.g. Mr. Nobody and Mars & Avril. This abstraction makes it, in my opinion, easier to touch everyone. And this might be the strength of Science-Fiction. For Western viewers this movie will remind 2001: A space odyssey from the conceptual directing.  I wanted to watch this movie because of the reputation of Tarkowski and I am quite happy of that. It is a bit slow and the sound track is quite empty, but his ideas gave me motivation to watch more from his work.
Rating: 7 /10

The getaway (1972)

	Also Known As: -
	Year of first release: 1972
	Director: Sam Peckinpah
	Actors: Steve McQueen, Ali MacGraw
	Country: USA
	Genre: Polar
	Conditions of visioning: 09.12.2013, DVD
Synopsis: Doc McCoy has been granted parole. The catch is that Sheriff Beynon expects a small favor from McCoy for his generosity: robbing another bank! Beynon does not really intend to let McCoy walk away after the heist and neither does co-robber Rudy Butler, but stopping Doc proves a trifle difficult.
Review: The story looks really like the legendary Bonnie and Clyde one. So it is told also a bit like road movie. Some scenes seem to be repeated and this slows the rythm of the movie. The acting of McQueen is perfect. He seems really authentic. McGraw also even if there is a kind of naivety in her acting and dialogues. This may be volontary to paint her role. The action scenes, as usual with McQueen as stunt man, are good but no so impressive even for that time (Bullitt was in 1968). So the movie used the talents of both actors and a plot typical of a good box office success in the 70s but is finally only entertaining.
Rating: 6 /10

Sette Orchidee Machiate de Rosso (1972)

	Also Known As: The Half-Moon Killer, Le Tueur à l'orchidée
	Year of first release: 1972
	Director: Umberto Lenzi (Cannibal Ferox)
	Actors: Antonio Sabato, Uschi Glas, Pier Paolo Capponi
	Country: I
	Genre: Thriller
	Conditions of visioning: 14.09.2011, cinema St Ex, Strasbourg, SFFF2011
Synopsis: The husband of a woman whole barely escaped a serial killer starts his own investigation to find him.
Review: Projected as part of the Edgar Wallace retrospective, this movie uses the classical recipes of this Krimi series, i.e. investigation about some murder(s), but adds to it elements of what would become the Giallo genre in Italy: murderer with black gloves, funky/jazzy music, flashy colors, extraordinary setting of the murders, and lots of blood. In that particular movie the investigation follows the rules of a Krimi, while the murders themselves the ones of the Giallo. The story is rather classical. The investigation is a bit long and tortuous, with the introduction of many characters that the hero has to visit in order to accumulate clues. The music is repetitive but definitely adds some quality to the movie. Discovering this movie makes me want to watch some more Krimis and Giallos. The projection was dubbed in German (although all actors are clearly Italians) and I suspect the most bloody murders were censored, so I recommend to rather watch the Italian version.
Rating: 6 /10