saul bass

Phase IV

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Ant in foreground, Kendra in the background

The legendary titles guy Saul Bass (he did the opening credits sequence for Psycho, The Man with the Golden Arm and Casino) made only one feature film and Phase IV is it. A fascinating sci-fi/horror tale set in the desert, it has ideas, some great acting, excellent close-up cinematography, gorgeous locations and an excruciatingly static sense of pace. It also has Nigel Davenport, a real asset as Dr Ernest D Hubbs, a scientist alarmed at what’s happening out in Arizona (Kenya, in fact) and heads off there with fellow scientist James R Lesko (Michael Murphy) to investigate. The ants, it turns out, have started building huge structures, with square quasi-industrial chimneys. What can … Read more

North by Northwest

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Cary Grant pursued by a plane in North by Northwest

A movie for every day of the year – a good one 31 October Mount Rushmore completed, 1941 On this day in 1941, the sculpture of four US presidents – George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln – was finished on a granite face near Keystone, South Dakota. Sculpted from a mountain known to the Lakota Sioux as the Six Grandfathers, the depiction of the four presidents was masterminded by Gutzon Borglum and carved (after dynamiting to remove the big stuff) by up to 400 workers, each head measuring around 60 feet (18 metres). The gigantic frieze was conceived and created for reasons of promoting tourism, rather than overarching patriotism, and … Read more