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Blind Shaft Chinese movie about two miners supplementing their income by killing other miners. Simple, effective story, but mainly this is interesting as a picture of how the poor live in modern rural China. Shock Corridor The word 'potboiler' seems to have fallen into disuse. Too bad, it's a good word. This is a Sam Fuller potboiler from the early '60s--starring Peter Breck of The Big Valley!--set in an insane asylum. I found it a bit too pulpy and over-the-top. I'd recommend The Naked Kiss as a better Sam Fuller potboiler from the same period. Previously seen by Mary-Jane, unseen by me. Same for the two movies below. Roman Holiday I haven't seen many Audrey Hepburn films, for some reason. Sabrina and the suspense movie Wait Until Dark, and that's about it. Roman Holiday is as charming as advertised, much as I remember Sabrina to be. Happy-Go-Lucky I hadn't seen a new Mike Leigh film since Career Girls, and Mary-Jane recommended this after seeing it last year in England. It's about a schoolteacher called Poppy who has what seems an impossibly optimistic outlook on life. She takes some getting used to; in the first 15 minutes, you wonder if her elevator goes to the top floor, she seems almost to not live in the real world. Her bike is stolen, so she decides to take driving lessons, and ends up with Scott as her driving instructor, an angry misanthrope who is essentially her polar opposite. There's not a whole lot of plot, you meet various people in her life and follow her progress learning to drive. Those scenes are somehow funny while at the same time excruciating, as Scott brings out the worst in Poppy. He's so angry and humorless she can't resist needling him constantly, and to be honest, I was half afraid the movie might turn into Taxi Driver at any moment. But it doesn't. It ends up being something remarkable. Eventually you realize that Poppy very much lives in the real world. She sees people clearly, and genuinely tries to connect with them. She's not insipid or daft (which one might think if not really paying attention) but is unapologetically herself and sincerely interested in people. It might be wearying to be around her all the time, she never shuts up and half of her jokes are lame, but there's a real goodness there, without judgment. Sally Hawkins plays Poppy, I'm completely unfamiliar with her, but she's amazingly good. Recommended.
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