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6:00 PM IFC
Kill Bill Volume 2 (2004 USA): If you've been a regular reader of this column, you know I'm far from being a fan of Quentin 'I Have An Opinion About Everything, So Focus the Camera On Me Because I'm Damn Well Going to Share It With You' Tarantino. Consider this strictly one of my informational listings, then, as Kill Bill Volume 2 makes its widescreen television debut this evening (Volume 1 popped up in its correct aspect ratio ages ago on Starz). Also airs 6/11 at midnight.

11:00 PM Turner Classic Movies
The Shop On Main Street (1965 CZH): According to the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, this was the Best Foreign Film of 1966. I'm not quite sure I'd agree with that analysis - I probably would have opted for Kwaidan, if given a vote - but it is a heckuva film nonetheless. Set in World War II Slovakia, the story revolves around Tono (Jozef Kroner), a dirt-poor peasant hired - in a roundabout fashion - by a little old lady (Ida Kaminska, whose performance earned her a Best Actress nomination) to help run her sewing business. Unfortunately, she's also a little old JEWISH lady, and when the authorities decide it's time to get rid of the local Jews once and for all, Tono is faced with an impossible dilemma: should he turn her in and claim the remains of her business, or keep quiet and run the risk of endangering his own life? Filmed during the brief Prague Spring of the mid '60s, The Shop on Main Street was co-directed by Jan Kadar, who came to the United States with Kaminska in 1970 to shoot the less-successful fable The Angel Levine.

Monday 06/11/07

3:30 AM Turner Classic Movies
Utopia (1950 FRA): Laurel and Hardy's career as a comedy team came to an inauspicious end in this unjustifiably obscure fable about the boys' adventures on a remote Pacific atoll. Whilst traveling to collect an inheritance, Stan and Ollie (as well as their cook and two stowaways) are shipwrecked on an uncharted island, where they proceed to set up their own utopian government. There's just one problem: the island is rich in uranium, and soon the world's superpowers come a-calling to get their hands on it. Utopia has plenty of funny moments, but L & H had aged considerably by this point and don't look entirely happy with the proceedings. Nonetheless, it's a unique footnote to their splendid career, and well worth a look.

11:00 PM Turner Classic Movies
The Strange One (1957 USA): A film about homosexuality that dares not utter the 'h' word, The Strange One features Ben Gazzara as the aptly named Jocko De Paris, a slimy cadet leader at a military academy in the Old South. Jocko enjoys abusing his authority, and gets plenty of opportunities to do so with an effeminate student named Simmons (Arthur Storch). The school's headmaster (Larry Gates) doesn't like the sadistic De Paris, but finds himself outmaneuvered by the younger man, who uses his sycophantic buddies Koble and Gatt (Pat Hingle and James Olson) to get the goods on his superior. Based on a play by Calder Willingham and originally intended as a showcase for James Dean, The Strange One dances clumsily around its un-stated homoerotic theme, but remains an absolutely fascinating period piece from erstwhile director and Holocaust survivor Jack Garfein, who went on to direct the equally outrageous (but ultimately superior) Something Wild in 1961. Extensively cut on release to lessen the taint of its homosexual subtext, The Strange One is yet another film crying out for DVD restoration - assuming the off cuts still exist in someone's library.

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