May 29 - Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets

Today’s movie is a fantasy drama with a scene that happens on May 29. I hope you will enjoy this film and watch it tonight.

HARRY POTTER AND THE CHAMBER OF SECRETS    

       

Dobby the house elf visits Harry Potter at the Dursleys to warn him not to return to Hogwarts as bad things are going to happen When Harry refuses Dobby causes trouble that gets Harry locked in his room. Ron Weasley and his twin brothers ‘borrow’ their Dad’s flying car and rescue Harry. On a trip to Diagon Alley, they meet Gilderoy Lockhart, the new defense against the dark arts teacher, and have a run-in with Draco Malfoy and his father, Lucius. When Harry and Ron can’t get onto Platform 9 ¾ to take the Hogwarts Express, they ‘borrow’ the flying car to take them to school. The car crashes, causing Ron to damage his wand and then disappears into the Dark Forest. Lockhart is revealed to be an incompetent teacher and egomaniac. Harry starts hearing things that no one else can and they find Filch’s cat petrified. A message left on the wall in blood says the Chamber of Secrets has been opened. The three friends learn this is a secret chamber supposedly built by Salazar Slytherin, one of Hogwart’s founders, containing a monster that only his heir can open. It had been opened 50 years ago.  A student is petrified and Harry learns he can talk to snakes. After another student is petrified and Harry visits Dumbledore’s office. Hermionie brews shape shifting polyjuice potion.  Harry and Ron use this to assume the appearance of two Slytherin students  and they pump Draco for information, but he doesn’t know anything. Moaning Myrtle, a ghost who lives in a girls bathroom at the school has a book thrown at her. Harry takes the book and learns it belonged to a student from 50 years ago named Tom Riddle. Riddle allows Harry to see what happened 50 years ago at the school. The Chamber of Secrets was opened, a student was killed and Hagrid was blamed. The diary is later stolen and Hermione is petrified. Hagrid is arrested and Dumbledore is removed as headmaster. Harry and Ron go into the Dark Forest, where they learn from Agragog, the leader of the giant spiders that live there that Hagrid is innocent and that the student who died 50 years ago was found in a bathroom. Harry deduces this is Moaning Myrtle and they learn Hermionie figured out that the monster is a basilisk, a giant snake that has been using the sewer pipes to travel around the school.  On May 29, 1993, a message is left saying that Ron’s sister Ginny has been taken into the Chamber of Secrets. Lockhart, deputized to deal with the monster tries to run away, but Harry and Ron force him into the chamber, the entrance of which is in Myrtle’s bathroom. Lockhart tries to use Ron’s damaged wand to erase their memories, but instead erases his own.   Harry enters the chamber and finds an unconscious Ginny and a revived Tom Riddle, who reveals he is Lord Voldemort, Harry’s mortal foe. Fawkes, Dumbledore’s phoenix  flies in and drops the Sorting Hat. Fawkes blinds the basilisk. Harry pulls the sword of Gryffindor out of the hat and uses it to kill the basilisk. He then uses a fang from the basilisk to destroy the diary, which destroys the manifestation of Tom Riddle.  Fawkes’s tears heal a fatal bite Harry had gotten from the basilisk. [1:50:59 to 2:17:57] Harry later tricks Lucius Malfoy into releasing Dobby from his service. Hermionie and the other students are revived and Hagrid and Dumbledore return. All is well at Hogwarts … until next year. 

A good adaptation of the book. It retains most plot elements has a lot of scary and funny moments. If you’re a Potter fan you’ll love it, otherwise probably not.

In Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets by J.K. Rowling (Scholastic Press, New York, 1998) we are told that exams will start on June 1, 1993 at page 283 and that the entrance into Chamber of Secrets happens three days before their first exam at page 284. 

Director - Chris Columbus

Producer - David Heyman

Screenplay - Steve Kloves

Released – November 3, 2002

Runtime – 2 hours 41 minutes

Starring –

Daniel Radcliffe as Harry Potter

Rupert Grint as Ron Weasley

Emma Watson as Hermione Granger

Kenneth Branagh as Gilderoy Lockhart

John Cleese as Nearly Headless Nick

Robbie Coltrane as Rubeus Hagrid

Warwick Davis as Filius Flitwick

Richard Griffiths as Vernon Dursley

Richard Harris as Albus Dumbledore

Jason Isaacs as Lucius Malfoy

Alan Rickman as Severus Snape

Fiona Shaw as Petunia Dursley

Maggie Smith as Minerva McGonagall

Julie Walters as Molly Weasley

Shirley Henderson as Moaning Myrtle

Copyright by Ivan Walters 2014. 

May 28 - Million Dollar Babies

Today’s movie is a biographical drama with a scene that happens on May 28. I hope you will enjoy this film and watch it tonight.

MILLION DOLLAR BABIES       

The poor Dionne family lives in rural Ontario, Canada. The mother, Elzire collapses and goes into what everyone thinks is premature labor. Even though they have no money the husband, Oliva races to get a doctor. Early on the morning of May 28, 1934 she gives birth to five daughters. [03:50 to 20:58]   The quints birth soon causes a media frenzy. Helena Reid, an American  radio personality arrives on the scene. Oliva and the other children leave in order to save the quints from infections. After Americans take the lead in providing for the quints, the Ontario government finally starts to provide some assistance. Oliva signs a deal to have the quints displayed at the Chicago World’s fair and he is attacked for this by Helena Reid.  The Canadian government moves to take the kids and they all develop high fevers, but are pulled through by Dr. Dafoe. The Ontario government declares the quints wards of the state and Dr. Dafoe is named their guardian. The kids are taken away and placed in a house built just for them across the road. Dr. Dafoe starts to profit from the kids, including taking them on tour. They kids are put on display and the area acquires a circus-like atmosphere. Finally, the parents are only allowed to visit with Dr. Dafoe’s permission.  The Dionne parents try to tell their story and in response the government extends the guardianship until the quints are 18. Dr. Dafoe makes tons of cash in endorsement deals for the quints. The Dionnes have a baby boy. The quints are kept on a strict schedule isolated from everyone else and put on display for mobs of tourists, but only one of their nurses disapproves of this and is fired. The parents finally find a lawyer to help them get the girls back. He takes the tack that the quints were only taken away only because the parents were French-Canadians. They get French nurses and teachers hired. The parents get better access. The government finally gets ticked off at Dr. Dafoe excesses and removes him as guardian. Oliva finds out that the quints are paying for all their expenses out of their funds. Helena Reid returns and now sides with the Dionnes. It all comes to a head in a dramatic confrontation when Emilie goes to Dr. Dafoe instead of her mother. Ms. Reid gets Dr. Alfred Adler to condemn the regime that the children are living under. The quints and their parents meet the King and Queen. The guardianship is dissolved and the girls are returned to their parents. 

An interesting film. You can’t help but feel sympathy for the parents who were accused of exploiting the girls, so they were removed from them and actually exploited for years. The girls were eventually returned, but as the film’s final minutes hint, the damage had already been done.  

   

In The Dionne Years: A Thirties Melodrama by Pierre Berton (W.W. Norton & Company, Inc., New York, 1978) at page 11 we are told that “[o]n May 28, 1934, between the hours of three and six in the morning, there were born ….. five identical girl babies” .Date is also given in film at 3:55.

Director - Christian Duguay

Producer - Bernard Zukerman

Screenplay - Suzette Couture, Stuart Foxman and John Nihmey

Released - November 20, 1994

Runtime – 3 hours

        

Starring -

Beau Bridges as Dr. Allan Roy Dafoe

Roy Dupuis as   Oliva Dionne

Céline Bonnier as   Elzire Dionne

Sean McCann as Premier Mitch Hepburn

Ginette Reno as  Madame Legros

Domini Blythe as Nurse Lena de Keyzer

Kate Nelligan as Helena Reid

Copyright by Ivan Walters 2014.

May 27 - Operation Daybreak

Today’s movie is an action/adventure film with a scene that happens on May 27. I hope you will enjoy this motion picture and watch it tonight.

OPERATION DAYBREAK                                                                            

Three Czech Sergeants serving in the British Army during World War II, Jozef Gabčík,   Karel Čurda and Jan Kubiš, are recruited to return to their homeland and assassinate Reichsprotektor Reinhard Heydrich, the Nazi ruler of the occupied Czech territories of Bohemia and Moravia. They parachute into the country. Curda goes to visit his wife, but the three are successful in making contact with Czech resistance members. They eventually develop a plan to kill Heydrich. However, on May 27, 1942 [54:25 to 1:05:03] when Gabcik steps into the street to shoot Heydrich in his car, his gun jams and won’t fire. He has to run as Heydrich’s driver chases after him. However this allows Kubis to toss a grenade into the car. Heydrich appears to be only slightly injured, but the grenade forces shrapnel and bits of the horsehair seat covers into his blood system and he dies eight days later. In  revenge the Nazis destroy the Czech village of Lidice and kill thousands of others. Curda betrays the others to the Nazis for the reward. They are trapped in the basement of a church and after a gun battle with the Germans, the survivors kill themselves to prevent capture. After the war, Curda was executed for treason.

                       

An interesting film. Notable for being shot on location in Prague at the height of the Cold War. The film implies that Curda turned traitor to protect his family, but history seems to indicate he did it for the reward.  By the way there is a museum dedicated to the team in the church where they died.

The Killing of SS Obergruppenfuher Reinhard Heydrich by Collum MacDonald (The Free Press, New York, 1989) at page 169 gives the date of the attack

Producer - Carter DeHaven

Director - Lewis Gilbert

Screenplay - Ronald Harwood

Released -   February 29, 1976

Runtime -  1 hour 58 minutes

Starring –

Timothy Bottoms as Jan Kubiš

Martin Shaw as Karel Čurda

Joss Ackland as Janák

Nicola Pagett as Anna Malinová

Anthony Andrews as Jozef Gabčík

Anton Diffring as Reichsprotektor Reinhard Heydrich

Carl Duering as Karl Frank, acting Reichsprotektor

Cyril Shaps as Father Petrek  

Copyright by Ivan Walters 2014.

May 26 - 13 Going On 30

Today’s movie is a romantic comedy with a scene that happens on May 26. I hope you will enjoy this film and watch it tonight.

13 GOING ON 30             

Jenna Rink is an “uncool” girl having her 13^th birthday on May 26, 1987. [1:46 to 12:49] who wants to look like the models in Poise magazine. She gets the cool ‘six chick’ group to come to her party by agreeing to do a school assignment for them. Her nerdy, overweight friend Matt comes to the party and gives her a doll ‘dream house’ that he built for her and sprinkles ‘wishing dust’ on it. The six chicks show up at the party with some boys, including the hunk Chris Grandy, who Jenna has a crush on. They play ‘seven minutes in heaven’, but everyone except Matt  leaves while Jenna is in the closet. She is embarrassed by this and sits in the closet and knocks some of the ‘wishing dust’ off the doll house onto her as she wishes to be “thirty, flirty and thriving’. The next thing she knows, she wakes up in a New York apartment and she is thirty. Her best friend Lucy (who’s later revealed to be Tom-Tom, leader of the chick six) drives her to their jobs as editors at Poise magazine. Jenna learns Poise has been scooped by their rival Sparkle for the last seven months.  She finds Matt and discovers they’ve been estranged since high school.  Poise’s promotional party is crashing until Jenna revives it with 80’s tunes that get everyone dancing.  Jenna has to learn how to do her job and finds out that Matt is engaged, while she has a boyfriend she does not like. Jenna learns she had been having an affair with a married man and that Lucy is putting together her own idea for a redesign of the magazine. Jenna realizes that she hates her life. She goes back home and reconnects with her parents. She hires Matt to  help her with her redesign project. The magazine’s senior editor, Richard likes her redesign idea. Then everything crashes. Poise is to be shut down because her photos from the redesign plan ended up in Sparkle. Lucy learned that Jenna was the one who had been feeding stuff to Sparkle. Lucy used this knowledge to con Matt into signing the rights to the redesign photos over to her and she takes them to Sparkle as its new editor.  Jenna meets Chris Grandy, who’s now a cabbie and goes to Matt’s house on his wedding day. He admits he loves her, but can’t change the past. He gives her the dream doll house. Some of the ‘wishing dust’ falls on her as she wishes to be 13 again.   Jenna is back in the closet. She charges out and kisses Matt and tosses the six chicks out of her house We jump ahead to Jenna and Matt’s wedding.

                       

This is a funny female version of Big. Jennifer Garner does a fantastic job of portraying a 13 year old in a grown up world. Her out of touch behavior help make this a very funny movie.    

Date given in film at 5:10 on video

Producers - Susan Arnold, Donna Arkoff Roth and Gina Matthews

Screenplay - Josh Goldsmith, Cathy Yuspa and  Niels Mueller

Director - Gary Winick                       

Released – April 23, 2004                                         

Runtime – 1 hour 37 minutes                                    

Starring - 

Jennifer Garner as Jenna Rink        

Mark Ruffalo as Matt Flamhaff

Judy Greer as Lucy Wyman

Andy Serkis as Richard Kneeland

Christa B. Allen as Young Jenna

Copyright by Ivan Walters 2014. 

May 25 - Thunderball

Today’s movie is an action adventure film with a scene that happens on May 25. I hope you will enjoy this motion picture and watch it tonight.

THUNDERBALL                                

British MI6 agent James Bond attends the funeral of SPECTRE agent Col. Bouvar and becomes suspicious of a woman at the funeral. Bond follows her back to her chateau, where it’s revealed the woman is actually Bouvar. Bond kills Bouvar and escapes on a jetpak. We see a meeting of SPECTRE, where their NATO project is mentioned. Count Lippe, a Spectre Agent and Bond happen to be staying at the same spa.  After he  searches Lippe’s room and an attempt is made to kill Bond. Major Derval meets his double and is killed. The double, a SPECTRE agent takes his place on a British nuclear bomber. He kills the crew and hijacks the plane. Back at the spa Bond sees the dead body of Major Derval  which was brought there by Lippe. Derval’s double lands the plane in the ocean and it is hidden underwater. The bombs are removed. There is a meeting of all 00 agents because SPECTRE has sent a ransom demand for $280 million or it will set off a bomb in a city. Bond is sent to Nassau as a photo of Derval was taken there. He meets Dervals’s sister, Domino and later her guardian and SPECTRE agent, Largo. On May 25, 1965 Q arrives in Nassau and equips Bond. [54:10 to 1:09:02] Bond searches both Largo’s yacht and compound looking for the bombs, but can’t find them. Later, with Domino’s help he sneaks on board Largo’s yacht, which is taking the bombs to Miami. After an epic underwater fight the bombs are secured and Largo and his henchmen killed.    

This installment of the Bond series is not the best. The plot is good, but the underwater ‘action’ sequences get dull after a while. When Bond and his foes are on dry land however, there’s plenty of action to go around.

In the film at 1:01:48 SPECTRE’s ransom tape says the diamonds are to be dropped at 8 p.m. GMT May 27. Leiter says while Q is there that it is 55 hours until that time, at 1:02:45 meaning its 3 p.m. on the 25^th in the Bahamas.

Awards – The film won the Oscar for Best Special Visual Effects at the 38^th Academy

                 Awards

Screenplay - Richard Maibaum and John Hopkins     

Director - Terence Young                  

Producer - Kevin McClory                                          

Released – December 9, 1965                                     

Runtime – 2 hours  10 minutes                                    

Starring –

Sean Connery as James Bond (007)

Adolfo Celi as Emilio Largo

Claudine Auger as Domino Derval

Luciana Paluzzi as Fiona Volpe

Rik Van Nutter as Felix Leiter

Bernard Lee as M

Guy Doleman as Count Lippe

Martine Beswick as Paula Caplan

Molly Peters as Patricia Fearing

Earl Cameron as Pinder

Paul Stassino as François Derval

Desmond Llewelyn as Q

Lois Maxwell as Miss Moneypenny

Copyright by Ivan Walters 2014. 

May 24 - In Which We Serve

Today’s movie is a war drama with scenes that happen on May 24. I hope you will enjoy this film and watch it tonight.   

IN WHICH WE SERVE                         

We see H.M.S. Torrin, a destroyer, being built and commissioned into the Royal Navy. We then jump to the waters off Crete during World War II, where the Torrin attacks a German troopship convoy at night. The next morning, May 24, 1941[8:35 to 14:14, 20:33 to 23:23; 31:00 to 31:38; 41:35 to 44:27; 1:12:02 to 1:13:06 and 1:38:16 to 1:44:15] the ship is attacked by Stuka dive bombers; is hit and sunk. In the water, the captain thinks back to commissioning day and his home leave to visit with his family. The captain gathers survivors together on a life raft, as they are strafed by the Germans.  Chief Petty Officer Hardy thinks back on leaving his wife and mother for the ship’s commissioning.  The crew works day and night for three days to get the ship ready for sea as war appears to be imminent. War is declared on Germany. The Torrin does not go into combat at once and they celebrate Christmas, 1939 at home. The captain’s wife gives a rousing speech about the life of a navy wife. After being wounded in another strafing run Seaman Shorty Blake thinks back to how he met his future wife, Freda, a relation of CPO Hardy,  on a train trip.  On the way to their honeymoon, they meet the Captain and his wife, who by chance are traveling on the same train. Mrs. Blake moves in with CPO Hardy’s wife and mother in Plymouth.  Blake and the Torrin are sent to the waters off Norway, where they engage in battle. The ship is torpedoed and 36 men are killed. They are towed back to port, attacked by German aircraft the entire way.   The captain gives a crewman who left his post a caution, instead of a court-martial. The Torrin is sent to help with the Dunkirk evacuation. The crew gets leave after this, but German aircraft start bombing England. In an  air raid on Plymouth CPO Hardy’s house is hit. CPO Hardy’s wife and mother are killed, but  Freda Blake lives and gives birth to a baby boy. Seaman Blake gets a letter informing him of these facts and he has to give CPO Hardy the bad news. The survivors of the sinking, including the captain, CPO Hardy and Shorty Blake are picked up by another destroyer. The captain tells the survivors of the crew that he is proud of them. 

More of a melodrama and a propaganda film than a war movie. Noel Coward gives a surprisingly good, very underplayed performance as the Captain.

The date of May 23^rd 1941 is given in the film at 5:55 for the first day. So the next day when the Torrin is sunk, must be May 24^th.

Awards - Nominated for the Best Picture and Best Original Screenplay Oscars at the 16^th Academy Awards.

                                                                                             

Directors - Noël Coward and David Lean        

Producer  - Noël Coward                                          

Screenplay - Noël Coward                                       

Released -  September 17,  1942                              

Runtime - 1 hour 55 minutes                                    

Starring –

Noël Coward as Captain E.V. Kinross

James Donald as Doc

Bernard Miles as CPO Walter Hardy

John Mills as Seaman Shorty Blake

Celia Johnson as Alix Kinross

Michael Wilding  as Flags

Leslie Dwyer as Parkinson

Kay Walsh as Freda Lewis

Copyright by Ivan Walters 2014.

May 23 - Cloverfield

Today’s film is a monster movie with scenes that happen on May 23. I hope you will enjoy this motion picture and watch it tonight.

CLOVERFIELD                  

The movie begins with an indication that it was taken from a camera found in an area formerly called “Central Park”. The first segment shows Rob waking up Beth after they have spent the night together and they go to Coney Island. Then we see the farewell party Rob’s brother Jason and his girlfriend Lily give for Rob, who is moving to Japan. Their friend Hud does the filming.  Beth leaves the party. Shortly after midnight on May 23, 2009 [15:31 to 1:13:07] an apparent earthquake hits New York, causing a brief power outage. TV reports an oil tanker has capsized in the harbor. The partygoers  climb to the roof to try and find out what is going on, but there is a distant explosion that sends shrapnel flying their way. Rob, Jason, Hud, Lilly and Marlena leave the building and see the severed head of the Statute of Liberty lying in the street. Hud films what looks like a monstrous arm several blocks away and the Woolworth Building collapses. The group heads towards the Brooklyn Bridge to get off of Manhattan, but a creature with tentacles attacks the bridge, and they barely escape with their lives, except for Jason, who is killed. TV shows the army attacking the creature, which sheds smaller beasts that attack people. Rob finds a working phone and listens to his messages. One is from Beth telling him she is trapped in her wrecked apartment building. The group travels to rescue her, going down into the subway where the smaller creatures attack them and Marlena is bitten. They leave the subway and find an army command center/hospital where Marlena dies. They learn the last helicopter will leave the island at 6 am, before action is taken to destroy the creature. They rescue Beth. At the evacuation center Lilly is put on one helicopter and Rob, Hud and Beth are placed on another one. They witness a B-2 bomber attack the creature, which lashes out, causing their helicopter to crash in Central Park.  They get out of the wreckage, but the monster kills Hud. Beth and Rob hide underneath a bridge. Then bombing starts and the camera (and presumably Rob and Beth) is buried. We then switch back to a brief segment of the Coney Island trip.  

An unusual docudrama style monster movie. The film starts out like a young adult drama. Suddenly, it morphs into a terrifying monster flick.   

Date given in film at 1:11:41-42. At 15:34 a clock shows it’s about 12:10 a.m.

Producer - J. J. Abrams and Bryan Burk

Director - Matt Reeves  

Screenplay - Drew Goddard                                                                                          

Released – January 18, 2008                                                             

Runtime -  1 hour 25 minutes

Starring –

Jessica Lucas as Lily Ford

Michael Stahl-David as Robert "Rob" Hawkins

T. J. Miller as Hudson "Hud" Platt

Odette Yustman as Elizabeth "Beth" MacIntyre

Lizzy Caplan as Marlena Diamond

Mike Vogel as Jason Hawkins

Ben Feldman as Travis

Billy Brown as Staff Sgt. Pryce

Copyright by Ivan Walters 2014.