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The Curse of the Cat People is not so much a sequel to 1942’s Cat People as it is its own special little film.

Producer Val Lewton was given the title of this 1944 film by RKO’s front office and had no choice but to use it. It didn’t stop him, however, from charging writer DeWitt Bodeen with the job of going in a completely new direction.

Unlike the typical Universal sequel in which a dead monster such as Frankenstein or Dracula would simply rise from the dead, Lewton was determined that his RKO unit would do something different. Simone Simon may be back, but instead of reprising her role of cat-woman Irena, she is now Irena’s ghost, the imaginary friend of 8-year-old Ann Carter, the daughter of Irena’s widower (Kent Smith) and his second wife (Jane Randolph) who saves her from danger in a dilapidated old mansion inhabited by a lonely retired actress (Julia Dean) and her menacing daughter (Elizabeth Russell).

Co-directed by Gunther von Fritsch and Robert Wise, this was Wise’s first directorial credit. He was not credited on The Magnificent Ambersons which he completed at the insistence of the studio after Orson Welles left the project. It was veteran actress Dean’s first film since 1919. Extras on the Shout! Factory Blu-ray include a 19-minute audio interview with Ann Carter. The child actress (I Married a Witch, The Two Mrs. Carrolls) passed away in 2014.

The 1960 Oscar winner for Best Foreign Language Film, The Virgin Spring, was the first nomination in that category for both a Swedish film and one written and directed by Ingmar Bergman despite the acclaim of such earlier Bergman films as Smiles of a Summer Night, The Seventh Seal, and Wild Strawberries, all of which earned other prestigious awards. Wild Strawberries had brought Bergman the first of his own nine Oscar nominations the year before.

A beautifully filmed saga of religion, murder, and revenge, The Virgin Spring has been given a sparkling new 2K Blu-ray transfer by Criterion with the usual wealth of Criterion extras. It features an alternate English-dubbed soundtrack, a rarity for Criterion and most other DVD and Blu-ray producers who tend to ignore the English-dubbed soundtracks that accompanied most foreign language films released in the U.S. from the 1950s through the 1970s.

Woodfall Film Productions was established in 1958 by director Tony Richardson, writer John Osborne, and producer Harry Salzman in order to make a film of Osborne’s play, Look Back in Anger. In all, there would be twenty Woodfall films, named after a street sign in the Chelsea section of London, produced through 1984. Now the British Film Institute (BFI) has released a nine-disc Blu-ray set titled Woodfall: A Revolution in British Cinema coded for Region B.

The set includes the eight most rewarded and influential films in Woodfall’s history, all beautifully restored: Look Back in Anger, The Entertainer, Saturday Night and Sunday Morning, A Taste of Honey, The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner, Tom Jones (both the original theatrical release and the 1989 director’s cut), Girl with Green Eyes, and The Knackโ€ฆand How to Get It.

All eight films have long been available on DVD in the U.S. and both A Taste of Honey (in August 2016) and Tom Jones (in March 2018) have been released on Blu-ray by Criterion in the same transfers as in this set. The Knackโ€ฆand How to Get It was given a January 2016 Blu-ray release by Kino Lorber in the U.S. All discs in the BFI set contain extensive extras with interviews with, among others, actors Rita Tushingham, Tom Courtenay, and Joely Richardson, the daughter of Tony Richardson and Vanessa Redgrave.

Look Back in Anger (1959) stars Richard Burton as the loud, obnoxious college-educated street vendor of the title opposite Mary Ure (Osborne’s second of five wives) as his frightened wife, Claire Bloom as Ure’s actress friend, and Edith Evans, in her first film since The Importance of Being Earnest seven years earlier, as Burton’s childhood nanny. They’re all good, but only Burton was nominated for both a Golden Globe and a BAFTA award. Ure had been nominated for a Tony for the Broadway version opposite Kenneth Haigh. Evans’ role was written for the film.

The Entertainer (1960) stars Laurence Olivier reprising his London and Broadway stage role of the seedy seaside comedian in a role written for him by Osborne at Olivier’s request. Brenda De Banzie and Joan Plowright (the future Baroness Olivier) reprise their London and Broadway roles of Olivier’s second wife and his daughter from his first marriage, respectively. Alan Bates and Albert Finney make their film debuts as his sons from his second marriage and Roger Livesey, less than a year older than Olivier, plays his father. Olivier and Plowright were nominated for Tonys for the Broadway version. Olivier was nominated for an Oscar for the film version for which both he and Plowright were nominated for BAFTAs.

Saturday Night and Sunday Morning (1960 U.K., 1961 U.S.) stars Albert Finney in his career defining role as a factory lathe operator who has an affair with a married woman (Rachel Roberts) while pursuing his future wife (Shirley Anne Field). This was the first Woodfall film neither written by Osborne nor directed by Richardson. Richardson produced, Alan Sillitoe adapted the screenplay from his novel, and Karel Reisz directed. Finney, Roberts, and Reisz won BAFTAs.

A Taste of Honey was discussed in detail in my 8/30/2016 review.

The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner (1962) stars Tom Courtenay in his second, albeit first starring role, as a juvenile offender who is urged to run in a competitive race by his reform school governor (Michael Redgrave) in this fondly remembered film which Richardson directed from Sillitoe’s screenplay from another of his novels. Courtenay won a BAFTA.

Tom Jones was discussed in detail in my 3/6/2018 review.

Girl with Green Eyes (1964) stars Rita Tushingham and Peter Finch in the bittersweet tale of a young Irish girl who has an affair with an older, married writer who will inevitably return to his wife and child. The film won a Golden Globe for Best Foreign Film in the English Language and both Tushingham and Lynn Redgrave, who plays her roommate, won BAFTAs for their performances in the film written by Edna O’Brien from her novel, The Lonely Girl. It was the first film directed by Desmond Davis, the cameraman on Tom Jones and other Woodfall films.

The Knackโ€ฆand How to Get It (1965) stars Tushingham, Ray Brooks, Michael Crawford, and Donal Donnelly in a fast-paced comedy combining the antics of swinging Londoners involved in the kind of farce that might have been the province of Laurel & Hardy forty years earlier. Directed by Richard Lester (A Hard Day’s Night), it was scripted by Charles Wood (Lester’s Help!) from Ann Jellicoe’s play. Tushingham and the film were nominated for Golden Globes. Tushingham, Crawford, Lester, and Wood, as well as the film, were all nominated for BAFTAs.

This week’s new releases include Where Is Kyra? and Dietrich and von Sternberg in Hollywood.

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