top of page

Locked-Down Cinema
Film reviews of all the films I should have seen but didn't...
What do you do if you receive a Christmas present that is a membership to the British Film Institute when there's a pandemic on...?
Search


"The Organizer", Dir: Mario Monicelli, 1963
it features the actor in a very uncharacteristic role as a scruffy bespectacled academic in a film about 19th century Italian mill workers
Ravi Swami
Sep 11, 20243 min read


Belmondo, Belmondo, Belmondo !...3 films.
All three films share the fact that they were either written by or directed by Jean-Pierre Melville, as frequent collaborations..
Ravi Swami
Mar 12, 20247 min read


"L'Innocent", Dir: Louis Garrel, 2022
"L'Innocent" (Eng: "The Innocent") by a director I'd never heard of, Louis Garrel, and featuring French Moroccan actor, Roschdy Zem..
Ravi Swami
Jun 1, 20232 min read


Amarcord, Dir: Federico Fellini, 1973
"Amarcord" roughly translates as "I remember" and the film is a semi-autobiographical recounting of life in an Italian village...
Ravi Swami
Feb 25, 20238 min read


A trio of black comedies by Bruno Dumont
I only really stumbled upon Bruno Dumont's 2018 film "CoinCoin and the Extra-Humans" while flicking through the films on offer on Mubi...
Ravi Swami
Nov 22, 20226 min read


"An Autumn Tale" / "Conte D'automne", Dir: Éric Rohmer, 1998
"Conte D'automne" (Eng: "An Autumn Tale") marks the final part of Rohmer's themed film cycle "Tales of Four Seasons"..
Ravi Swami
Sep 22, 20223 min read


"Bloodstone", Dir: Dwight H. Little, 1988
As a Western "cross-over" film, in this case co-produced by former tennis champion Ashok Amritraj and written by Nico Mastorakis..
Ravi Swami
May 8, 20225 min read


A Trio of Truffaut, 1957, 1972, 1973
As with many film directors, alongside their most well-known, career-defining films, there are films that I certainly wasn't aware of...
Ravi Swami
Feb 25, 20224 min read


"Harold & Maud", Dir: Hal Ashby, 1971
It also depends on watching a film whose effect might linger until the next morning, as is the case "Harold & Maud"...
Ravi Swami
Dec 12, 20214 min read


"100 Spook Stories / 100 Monsters", Dir: Kimiyoshi Yasuda, 1968
Arrow's title is "100 Spook Stories" (Japanese: Yōkai Hyaku Monogatari) and it is variously titled depending upon the region..
Ravi Swami
Oct 22, 20213 min read


"That Darn Cat", Dir: Robert Stevenson, 1965
Launched with the hugely successful "Pollyanna", Mills soon found herself cast with top billing in a slew of Disney films..
Ravi Swami
Sep 19, 20214 min read


"Zazie Dans Le Metro", Dir: Louis Malle, 1960
Zazie (Catherine Demongeot) herself is a bit of a disfunctional tearaway who wastes no time in trying to explore Paris herself...
Ravi Swami
Sep 6, 20213 min read


"Lucky To Be A Woman", Dir: Alessandro Blasetti, 1956
However, this is really Sophia Loren's film and she is placed center-stage as a street smart young woman...
Ravi Swami
Sep 5, 20213 min read


"La Grande Bouffe", Dir: Marco Ferreri, 1973
I watched Marco Ferrari's 1973 film "La Grande Bouffe" (Eng: "The Blow-Out", though it translates more accurately as "The Big Feast")..
Ravi Swami
Jul 30, 20215 min read


"The 10th Victim", Dir: Elio Petri, 1965
The film opens with shots of modernist buildings in New York as a woman (Ursula Andress in a brown wig) is being pursued...
Ravi Swami
Jul 18, 20214 min read


"Il Sorpasso", Dir: Dino Risi, 1962
I stumbled on this film by chance and was instantly hooked by the preview featuring two men in an open-topped sports car..
Ravi Swami
Jul 13, 20214 min read


"Boccaccio 70", Dir: Fellini, De Sica, Visconti, Monicelli, 1962- Part#2
As promised in Part #1 of a review of "Boccaccio 70", and since I felt each film in the portmanteau deserved a separate review..
Ravi Swami
Jul 3, 20216 min read


"Cinema Paradiso", Dir: Giuseppe Tornatore, 1988
Giuseppe Tornatore's much lauded and garlanded film about a love affair with cinema, "Cinema Paradiso"..
Ravi Swami
Jun 4, 20217 min read


"La Visita" / "The Visit", Dir: Antonio Pietrangeli, 1963
"La Visita" stars Sandra Milo as "Pina" - by this point a regular in Pietrangelo's films - with the French actor François Périer as "Adolfo"
Ravi Swami
May 29, 20216 min read


"The Bachelor"/ "Lo Scapolo", Dir: Antonio Pietrangeli, 1955
I came across his 1955 "Commedia All'Italiana" film starring Alberto Sordi, an actor most associated with the genre...
Ravi Swami
May 29, 20213 min read
Contact
Thanks for your interest in Lockdown Cinema. For more information, feel free to get in touch and I will get back to you soon! - Ravi
Subscribers are welcome, but if you have nothing sensible to add in comments, you will be deleted.
London, United Kingdom

bottom of page