The last couple weeks have brought me Eric Rohmer. I would describe his films as all story and no spectacle, and since most today are the reverse, this has been refreshing.

Summer is one of the most affecting movies I've seen in a while, and with a less conventional ending it would be one of my all-time favorites. I admit to really liking it with some reluctance, since it falls in the category of "Lonely French Woman on Voyage of Self-Discovery," and this sort of thing could ruin my reputation. The film gets everything right about its main character, though, and it all looks so natural--at times it feels like a documentary--that one wonders how Rohmer got it that way.

The cover to the DVD of Chloe in the Afternoon quotes Pauline Kael as saying "This movie is, in its way, just about perfect." I looked up the full quote, though, in which she immediately adds "but it's minor, and so polished that it practically evaporates a half hour after it's over." I think this addition is a bit unfair. The unresolved question of the film is whether there is any redemption in the average bourgeois life. About halfway through Frederic and Chloe are having lunch at a cafe, and they overhear an older woman at another table talking mindlessly about trout. Chloe wonders what the point of living is if she will just end up like her. Frederic interestingly responds that the diversity of people's lives fills him with hope. Does he/the film really mean this?

For the conventionality of its insights--Murrow was good, McCarthy was bad, TV could be better-- I found Good Night, and Good Luck to be pretty sanctimonious. The film is shot and edited tolerably well and the acting, especially David Straitharn as Murrow, is of high caliber. But the fact is that the script is poor. There is a subplot about a secretly married couple working for CBS that goes nowhere, and a bit of preachiness at the end that goes too far. Despite this stuff though it is generally a likable film. Also, there is one interesting thought in it about how everyone, wittingly or not, engages in censorship.

6/10