Two for the Road (Stanley Donen, 1967). This comic drama about the evolution of a marriage, with particular focus on the sharp degradation it experiences, is playful with its chronology in a way that must have been completely novel at the time of the film’s release. Now, it’s a more familiar cinematic approach, which doesn’t make Two for the Road terribly ineffective, though it does undercut some of the sillier moments that were presumably inserted to make the film easier to grasp a hold of for perplexed audiences. Audrey Hepburn and Albert Finney are both terrific as they play the members of the couple on the various spectrum stops between smitten and hostile. They’re especially good with the bits of Frederic Raphael’s screenplay that are sharp enough to draw blood, exchanging verbal blows like they’re in an especially nasty-minded classic screwball comedy, which, to a degree, is exactly the film that they’re in. Not every twist of the relationship is compelling–an affair that temporarily breaks up the couple seems especially arbitrary given the way it’s presented–but overall the film represents a fascinating survey of the treacherous contours of a marriage.

Payment on Demand (Curtis Bernhardt, 1951). A little more marital misery, as Bette Davis plays the wife of a wealthy man who rose from a small, struggling law office to become a wealthy steel company executive, a trajectory developed in no small part by machinations by the wife on his behalf. The film focuses on the moment late in the marriage when the husband asks for a divorce, fueled by the mounting guilt he feels over his success, his disdain for the upper-crust society to which he’s become bound and the resentments he holds towards his wife for ushering him to this point. The film cuts back and forth between the steps towards divorce and flashbacks to the earlier days of the relationship, using fascinating theater stagecraft (such as set walls that become transparent through lighting tricks to show what’s on the other side) to make the transitions. At times, the abundance of technique running through the film has the effect of dulling its energy, but Davis carries the emotion of the film wonderfully, as would be expected.

The Parallax View (Alan J. Pakula, 1974). Nothing like a Nixon White House to make paranoid political thrillers as abundant as bubbles on a roiling river. Warren Beatty plays a reporter who investigates a possible conspiracy theory involving the assassination of a presidential candidate, a murder that was termed the act of a sole madman by a chilling Warren Commission stand-in. Pakula clearly loved making these sorts of films that circled around smart people putting together scattered fragments to discover something larger, especially if there could be ample scenes of characters speaking tensely on the phone. In this outing, Pakula favors long holds of wide master shots, which gives the film an almost hypnotic quality at times, especially since the director seems largely disinterested in the scenes of actual action, rushing through them as quickly as possible, which has the misfortune of making them a little more confusing and awkward than they should be. Beatty is in movie star mode here, playing most of his scenes with a sort of perplexed casualness that was his trademark approach in any movie in which he didn’t have a significant creative investment.

Without Love (Harold S. Bucquet, 1945). This may not be one of the better known pairings of Spencer Tracy and Katherine Hepburn, but it’s a completely engaging example of their effortless chemistry together on screen. Tracy plays a curmudgeonly scientist who rents out the home of a widow, largely because his war effort research on high altitude oxygen deprivation down in her spacious cellar. Hepburn’s character has a science background as well, and the two become partners, which leads to a marriage of convenience since they’ve both decided they have no further need for actual love in their lives. Naturally, things don’t play out according to their button-down plans. Bucquet has a bit of a stodgy approach to the directing, but Tracy and Hepburn are smartly effusive enough together to enliven the film enough all on their own. There’s also a nice supporting performance by Lucille Ball as a sharp-tongued friend that suggests the highly enjoyable path her movie career could have taken if things had just broken her way.

Beat the Devil (John Huston, 1953). A bleakly entertaining bit of downtrodden lunacy, Beat the Devil features Humphrey Bogart as a creaky, cynical vagabond-for-hire who is hired to help a little band of lowly fellows secure some African land rich with uranium deposits. Adapted by Huston and Truman Capote from James Helvick’s novel, the film proceeds with a sultry recklessness with enough lurid twists and betrayals that the plot often seems on the brink of collapsing in on itself. Naturally, the film abounds with colorful characters, but arguably the chewiest role is handed to Jennifer Jones, who knew a thing or two about sinking her teeth into a part and tearing away. She plays a version of a femme fatale with the icy assurance replaced by a demeanor that’s seemingly always on the brink of becoming unhinged. It’s one of those performances that’s short of nuance, but more than makes up for it with how purely enjoyable it is to watch. Huston provides a solid, crafty directing job, giving the film a wickedly unpredictable pulse.