Maybe it's the dictionary definition of 'overkill' but in the first new cinema release since the Oscars we have such a mixed bag it seems as though the distributors didn't know who the hell would bother coming out to the movies this weekend. We have Hollywood fare The Adjustment Bureau, an Inception-style thriller starring Matt Damon and Emily Blunt; Archipelago, a brooding British family drama; Rango, starring Johnny Depp as an animated chameleon, as well as a violent medieval action picture, a drama based on the Welsh community in Argentina's Patagonia, a 3D stage version of the opera Carmen, an American political documentary and a film about a group of mentally challenged people battling to stop the closure of their commune. I would say 'stay outside', but it's suddenly freezing again.
Thankfully, for the nostalgic among you, there's one film missing from the above list. Digitally restored for its sixtieth anniversary, The African Queen opens today at BFI Southbank. Its Oscar-winning director John (father of Anjelica) Huston lives large in the folklore of Old Hollywood; the former boxer, reporter and Parisian painter and Mexican cavalry rider - turned writer, director and actor - made some the Great American Films. The directorial equivalent of what Ernest Hemingway, Humphrey Bogart and Johnny Cash meant to literature, acting and music respectively.
The African Queen is notable for many things: It's dreamy
Technicolour (in the hands of cinematographer-extraordinaire Jack
Cardiff; he did The Red Shoes, too), it's troubled production
(the entire cast and crew endured great sickness, except
Bogart. He reportedly never drank the water, preferring to
stick to the large supply of whiskey he had brought with him) and
the chemistry between its two leads: Humphrey Bogart and Katherine
Hepburn, neither on better form (this film brought Bogie his
only Academy Award for Best Actor). Above all, it does remain
one of the Great American Films.
If you do fancy escaping the big chill this weekend, this is the place to do it (oh wait, cinemas are always bloody freezing, aren't they...?)
The African Queen opens today at BFI Southbank.
