Colorizing black-and-white movies is a heinous practice as a rule, except in the case of certain films. Some day a skillfully colorized King Kong could be a keeper. Colorizations are still far from the mark, but they’re getting there. The idea in colorizing a 1933 film is to make the color look primitive, almost like the old two-color process. Kind of a glowing amber-brownish tint. Look at that grayish, slightly blue sky behind the Empire State Building…not bad!

For the next couple of weeks Tatiana is visiting family (mother, son, sister) and old friends in Russia. She’s currently staying at 9 Tverskaya Street, just down the road from Red Square. By my humble HE standards, the place is a little too Kardashian. I like Moscow rentals that are more historical and old-school-ish — a residence that reeks of early 20th or late 19th Century, a pad that Vladimir Lenin or Sergei Eisenstein or Peter Tchaikovsky or Anton Chekhov might’ve lived in back in the day. But that’s me.

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At the end of this year Louis Malle‘s Damage will celebrate its 30th anniversary. I saw it when it opened, of course, but I’ve had a thing for this film since buying the Warner Archive DVD 11 years ago. I’ve probably seen it nine or ten times, and I really wish that an HD streaming version would be made available. as the DVD’s 480p resolution is unsatisfying.

Boilerplate synopsis: “Adapted by David Hare from the short, same-titled novel by Josephine Hart, this is a gripping tale of a desperate sexual obsession and scandalous love affair in upper-crust British social circles. Stephen Fleming (Jeremy Irons) has wealth, a beautiful, well-bred wife (Miranda Richardson), two younger children, an adult journalist son (Rupert Graves), and a prestigious political career in Parliament.

“But Fleming’s life lacks a certain spark of passion, and this emptiness drives him to an all-consuming, and ultimately catastrophic, relationship with his son’s fiancée, Anna (Juliette Binoche).”

No, I don’t personally relate to the idea of surrendering to obsessive sexual madness and self-destruction, and yes, the movie defies basic logic in terms of normal human behavior and priorities. But it’s one of the best cinematic explorations of that famous Woody Allen-ism, “The heart wants what it wants, or at least the loins do.” (Alternately: “You don’t choose who to fall into obsessive love with — obsessive love chooses you.”)

Another first-rate film that understands crazy doomed love affairs is Francois Truffaut‘s The Woman Next Door (’81).

Damage ends in death, devastation, downerism and ruin, but the first two-thirds are quite tantalizing in a crazy, well-behaved sort of way.

There’s a brief moment near the very beginning when Malle conveys the “lack of passion” aspect; he does this by having Irons gaze at his well-tended living room with a look of utter boredom. Please accept my apology for failing to properly frame the footage, but here it is:

A scene or two later Fleming meets Anna at a party, and the way they look at each other tells you it’s a done deal. It’s obvious they’ll be slamming ham within hours if not sooner.

Even in jest I’ve never heard anyone mention No Time To Die as a potential Best Picture contender. Never so much as fiddled with. But the same kind of pitch, obviously, could and should be made for Spider-Man: No Way Home. The copy would read “Spider-Man: No Way Home pretty much saved exhibition, you bastards, and it’s still saving it as we speak. So when you vote, show a little decency and respect for what this film has done. Because it didn’t just ‘sell tickets’ but generated repeat business. Because people truly love it, which is something that no other 2021 film has managed to do. Think about it.”

I’m sorry but Jon Finch‘s reciting of William Shakespeare‘s “tomorrow and tomorrow” soliloquy in Roman Polanski‘s Macbeth (’71) strikes me as far more moving (i.e., more bitter an∂ despairing) than Denzel Washington‘s version of same in Joel Coen‘s The Tragedy of Macbeth.

Finch delivers like a perfect British instrument — carefully measured. exquisitely phrased, a straight-up RADA version minus anything quirky or modernist or side-angled. Denzel, on the other hand, is doing it “the Denzel way”, which is fascinating in its unaffected manner but at the same time lacking sufficient passion — more of a tone of lament and defeat than anything else.

Don’t even talk about Michael Fassbender‘s 2015 version in this context. Don’t even bring it up. Not a chance.