No Way Out (Fox Film Noir) (1950) Review

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(More customer reviews)Joseph L. Mankiewicz's able direction accurately chronicles the ugliness of racism as seen through the eyes of the characters in the flick "No Way Out".
Sidney Poitier is his first starring role plays dedicated and idealistic physician Dr. Luther Brooks. Poitier is working the prison ward of the county hospital when Ray Biddle played by Richard Widmark and his brother Johnny are brought in. They both had been shot in the leg by cops during a gas station heist.
Widmark, a hellacious bigot, balks when he and his brother are examined by a black doctor.
Poitier becomes suspicious that brother Johnny Biddle is in much more dire straits than from just a leg wound. Fearing brain damage he performs a spinal tap but the patient expires during the procedure. Widmark immediately blames Poitier for killing his brother. Poitier with full support of his boss Dr. Wharton played by Stephen McNally, requests an autopsy to prove the suspected presence of a brain tumor. Widmark however refuses.
The brother's ex-wife Edie played by Linda Darnell is coaxed by the doctors into changing Widmark's mind. The plot plays out with the despicable Widmark using a third brother to mobilize their lowlife racist friends to attack the local black neighborhood. A racial riot ensues and the hospital becomes full of victims but an unsatisfied Widmark is still out for blood.
"No Way Out" is a very disturbing look at the 1950's version of racism. The picture is not a very pretty one. Both Widmark playing the mad dog racist and Poitier the moralistic physician gave very effective performances.

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Nominated for the 1950 Oscar® for Best Writing, Story and Screenplay, this intense drama about racial hatred pulls no punches.When a white patient in a hospital dies under the care of a black intern (Sidney Poitier), the victim?s racist brother (Richard Widmark) seeks to destroy the doctor?s career. Although the hospital?s idealistic Chief Resident (Stephen McNally) tries to diffuse the escalating tension, the victim?s ex-wife (Linda Darnell) seems to go along with the vengeance-seeker?until she realizes she?s on the wrong side.

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Doctor Zhivago (TV Miniseries) (2003) Review

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(More customer reviews)It may be somewhat sacrilegious to admit this, but I actually prefer this production to the David Lean classic. That is an admission however that I do not take lightly, the Lean version having left an indelible impression on my younger life and the beautiful Lara's Theme having haunted me since I first saw the original version on television back in the 1980s.
No, when I sat down to watch this 2002 adaptation of the Boris Pasternak epic I was all prepared to be both disappointed and resistant to a newer version of the Omar Sharif/Julie Christie favorite - so what happened? Why am I now sitting here so impressed and involved in what should by all accounts be a poorer step child to the colorful, star-filled 1960s movie.
Simply put this movie has the advantage of time. A whole hour longer than the other movie that extra time gives the production of filling in some of the blanks that inhabited the original and more fully exploring the human relationships and interaction between characters. Matheson may not have the acting ability of Sharif but what he does have is the opportunity to more fully realize the character of Zhivago. In this sense this movie is more faithful to the source material and all the better for it.
Matheson plays the part of Zhivago, a man brought up in the shadow of tragedy who feels the pull of loyalty to his wife (and childhood friend) Tonya and a deep infatuation for Lara. With the violence of World War I and the Russian Revolution as a backdrop, Zhivago travels through life torn by conflict.
Less colorful than the original this mini-series compensates with a strong, well defined script and some star turning peformances by Sam Neill and one-time Bond girl Maryam D'Abo (as Lara's mother). Many have also dismissed Keira Knightley in her role as Lara, but I found her both competent and powerful in the role. I found myself both involved in her story and convinced by her portrayal - she was certainly a different Lara than the one depicted by Christie some four decades ago, but one no less realized or compelling. In fact, I would go as far as to say that Knightley's Lara is a more rounded character than Christie's, no doubt due to Knightley's impressive screen presence, but also the longer screentime afforded to her character.
One device I found both clever and interesting was real archive footage from the period that is woven into the story in a fascinating manner.
Included on this DVD is a text biography of author Boris Pasternak as well as over an hour of interviews with the cast. Prepared to be surprised by this DVD and be prepared to fall in love with a whole new version of the DOCTOR ZHIVAGO story.

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DOCTOR ZHIVAGO A man torn between two women amid the chaos and brutality of the Russian Revolution One of the world’s most famous love stories and half a century of Russian history come to life in this adaptation of Pasternak’s masterpiece by celebrated screenwriter Andrew Davies (Bridget Jones’s Diary, Pride and Prejudice). War and revolution bring poet and physician Yury Zhivago (Hans Matheson) together with the beautiful Lara (Keira Knightley), his muse and all-consuming passion. But both are haunted--Yury by guilt over his betrayal of Tonya, his beloved wife, and Lara by fear of Komarovsky (Sam Neill), the powerful man who means to have her any way he can. DVD SPECIAL FEATURES INCLUDE 70 minutes of cast and crew interviews, photo gallery, filmographies, Boris Pasternak biography, English subtitles. Complete UK broadcast edition RECOMMENDED FOR MATURE AUDIENCES

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