His Kind of Woman (John Farrow, 1951). How many other actors completely own a genre of film the way that Robert Mitchum does film noir? It’s like he was born into a delivery room filled with murky shadows and cigarette smoke, the doctor instructing the nurse to slap his bottom by growling, “Give him what’s comin’ to him, and make him sing when you do it.” He moves through this story of scheming and duplicity at a Mexican resort as if he’s walking through his own front door, tossing of aloof wisecracks with the ease of a guy who’s already got his paycheck in a secure pocket. The screenplay credited to Frank Fenton and Jack Leonard methodically piles on characters and motivations and sets it all spinning, marbles bounding wildly on a roulette wheel. Farrow’s direction (reportedly reshot and reworked by Richard Fleischer) largely settles for simply keeping things straight, but that’s accomplishment enough. Perhaps the most significant pleasure to be found in the film is a supporting performance by Vincent Price as a foppish, self-enamored movie actor who discovers his inner adventurer when he’s drawn into the plot. His effusive joy as he trades gunfire while briskly quoting Shakespeare is infectious.

Spellbound (Alfred Hitchcock, 1945). There’s a great story about the making of the film Spellbound involving a psychotherapist hired by producer David O. Selznick to serve as a technical adviser. The woman pointed out a problem with some aspect of the story, a complaint to which Hitchcock responded, “My dear, it’s only a movie.” Whether true or not, the story is telling. Like other works of his which boasted sensational, medium-bending elements, Hitchcock can sometimes seem like he’s just marking time with the scenes that fall outside of the splashiest parts of the film. Here, he pulls out all the stops in the bizarre dream sequences designed by Salvador Dali, and mostly putters around with the psychological investigation that surrounds them, save the occasional amusement of some characteristic visual craftiness. Ingrid Bergman does nice work as the doctor who helps Gregory Peck’s amnesiac determine the truth about his history, though he performance is undercut somewhat by unchallenged nonsense in the script about the feminine inability to operate rationally when emotions are in play, a backwards notion that’s certainly outdated by now.

Big Fan (Robert D. Siegel, 2009). Siegel makes his directorial debut with a film that bears some resemblance to The Wrestler, the film he scripted to great acclaim. The result has some of the same appeal as that earlier effort. It also shares some of the flaws. Big Fan follows a rabid New York Giants fan as he twists in agony watching his favored team march towards the end of the season, their place in the playoffs increasingly in doubt, a situation impacted by his own problematic encounter a star defensive player. Siegel’s treatment of the character is sympathetic and probing, continuing the fascination with those on the fringe that was the strongest element of The Wrestler. As played by Patton Oswalt, the character’s whole identity is wrapped up in his devotion, and the minor celebrity it affords as a regular participant in a local call-in radio show. The film feels a little thin, though. There’s no quite enough there to flesh out the world beyond Siegel’s initial clever ideas, and it starts to drag, especially during a pivotal sequence near the end that mistakes snail-like pacing for tension.

The Baader Meinhof Complex (Uli Edel, 2008). With a span and scope that rivals the big dramas that Hollywood studios used to strew about Oscar season like shiny ornaments on a Christmas tree, this film traces the beginnings of the West German “urban guerrilla” outfit the Red Army Faction from the late nineteen-sixties through the mid-seventies. The film is incredibly thorough, but there’s so much ground to cover as the group rises from humble beginnings to increasingly desperate acts of domestic terrorism that containing it all with the frames of a movie starts to seen nearly impossible. It’s helped immeasurably by nice performances–Johanna Wokalek is especially good–that go a long way towards bringing the people, and by extension the era, to life (Johanna Wokalek). In the end, though, the film is just skating on the surface of history.

Ondine (Neil Jordan, 2010). Jordan’s latest has a promising beginning. Colin Farrell plays an Irish fisherman who pulls up his net to discover a lovely blond woman in it. She’s cryptic about her identity, so when her presence helps to change his luck, he figures his daughter’s theory that she’s a mystical sea faerie is as plausible as any. Through the first half, Jordan does a fine job with the challenge of telling a fairy tale in a modern, realistic setting. He focuses on the power of stories as buffer against the more unpleasant parts of life. Unfortunately, Jordan tips his hand too early and the charm drains out of the film, leaving a flat-footed mess as the storytelling fates start delivering the easiest of answers to the dilemmas facing the characters.