Tcm

[Johann]

Grand Hotel is grand indeed...
Garbo shows us why she's adored- her acting is superb.
IMDB reviews talk about the fact that this is a pre-WWII film, and a historically interesting one at that.
World War I is referenced, and Wallace Beery's character was a typical German art monger of the times, not just a fat cat.

[Johann]

BULLITT (1968)


Steve McQueen is Bullitt, a San Francisco cop hired to protect a witness for a mob trial.
He's hired by Robert Vaughn, and when the witness is shot dead, Bullitt suspects Vaughn was behind it.
The rest of the movie is Bullitt tracking down the kingpin who may have done it, and there are two great chase sequences-
one with the famous Dodge Charger, the other on an airplane tarmac- you decide which is better.
Great music score by Lalo (Starsky & Hutch) Schiffrin!
This is a slow movie, some might even say boring. I found it gripping and worth watching.
Late 60's gritty police drama.

[Chris Knipp]

1968.
Peter Yates directed. IMDb tells us that "Peter Yates started out as a professional racing car driver and team manager - albeit briefly - before turning his attention to film."
Steve McQueen was an icon without equal today. These days, there's a different Steve McQueen, a black British filmmaker (originally an artist who made short art film videos) who's been featured in the NYFF since 2008, who clearly likes to browbeat the audience. People who like punishment admire his work. He's featured again this year with three one-hour films, part of a TV miniseries of five such films. Drawing from a TV miniseries for the festival's opening night film is a departure from former standards.

Of Bullitt all I remember is the cars racing over the hills of San Francisco. Those sequences were unique, avery exciting, hard to believe but fun. I wound up driving over those hills for many years myself, but usually at a more measured pace and not in that kind of big American car, in British or German cars.

[Johann]

I hadn't heard of the other Steve McQueen. Every day in August TCM is highlighting an actor: "Summer Under The Stars".

Bullitt is really only remembered for the car chases- the acting is rudimentary, the story is kinda stock and plain.