5 Films I Enjoyed Discovering in January 2025
Experiment in Terror (1962)directed by Blake Edwards
If you're familiar with the work of Blake Edwards, especially in the 1960's, you're probably most likely going to associate him with comedy, be it through The Pink Panther series or films like Breakfast at Tiffany's, The Party, or The Great Race. It's not often that he delved into thrillers, which makes his skillfully crafted 1962 thriller Experiment in Terror a great surprise and an overlooked gem in his filmography that I'm glad I caught up with.
The film opens with bank clerk Kelly Sherwood (Lee Remick) driving back amidst the night lights of San Francisco to her home in Twin Peaks. As she pulls into the garage, she quickly learns there's an intruder, who then lays out the plot of the movie - he needs her to rob the bank she works for or else he will dole out considerable punishment, including potentially killing her and sexually assaulting her 16-year-old sister. It's an incredibly disturbing and unnerving home invasion scene that quickly sets up the stakes and sets the tone for the film. I know Lynch is on everyone's mind right now but the scene, complete with pitch perfect lighting that shines brightly on Remick and keeps the intruder in the dark, felt like something straight out of a Lynch film (and not just due to the "Twin Peaks" setting).
The rest of the film may not maintain the tension of the opening few minutes, but there's a ton of interesting elements and characters to discover, including Glenn Ford as a police officer, an Asian American single mother and her son (who may have some connection to the villain), and a woman who seemingly makes or repairs mannequins for a living. The villain face reveal happens less than halfway through the film, but I don't want to spoil it here because it's a good one and the actor is notable (especially if you're familiar with TV shows from this era). There's a plethora of interesting settings, including a sleazy bar, swimming pools, and a San Francisco Giants baseball game. The film isn't completely bleak, but much of the content and threats really seem like they are pushing the censorship limit for 1962.
At just over 2 hours Experiment in Terror may run a little long, but if you're looking for a stylish and well-crafted chilling thriller by a noteworthy filmmaker, I don't think you'll be disappointed.
New Year's Day (1989)directed by Henry Jaglom
Quiet City (2007)
directed by Aaron Katz
Take Care of My Cat (2001)
directed by Jeong Jae-eun
Take Care of My Cat is a Korean film centered around a group of five women who were friends growing up in the port city of Incheon (a city about an hour outside of Seoul). Despite their longtime friendship, they are all sitting at different situations in their lives. Hye-ju is trying to make it in the corporate world, working for a firm in Seoul. Bi-ryu and Ohn-jo are twins still living in Incheon. Also still in Incheon are Ji-young, who lives with her grandparents, and Tae-hie, who lives with her parents and does volunteer work. The film explores that post-grad crisis of trying to understand exactly what you need in your life now, and it examines the healthiness of ebbs and flows of friendships and how those evolve over time.
Watching this when I did led to a stronger personal connection to the film for a couple reasons. One is my age - as someone in their twenties still somewhat existing in that post-grad environment from a social perspective, I found the challenges faced by some of these characters particularly relatable. I also live in the suburbs, a similar distance from the city as Incheon is from Seoul, and the question of determining the best location for myself plus the stress and burnout of traveling back and forth from the city were definitely on my mind while watching. Additionally, I visited Korea just a few months ago and thus became acquainted with some of the cultural elements explored here, like underground malls and buses and subways and so on.
The film also feels like a beautiful snapshot of early 2000s South Korea, and the location and time is actually incredibly significant to these characters as they are living during the construction of the Incheon Airport (now the primary international airport for accessing the greater Seoul area). The contrast between the night lights of Seoul and the under-construction Incheon is evident, but there's a lot of love for both locations here. The way the architecture is shown in Incheon with respect to Tae-hie and Ji-young reminded me of the way Monica Vitti feels trapped in Antonioni films like L'Eclisse and Red Desert.
The cast is really good and includes a pre-Hollywood Bae Doona as Tae-hie. The music by Korean dreampop band Byul.org has quickly become a favorite of mine. Take Care of My Cat feels like a rare example of exploring friendship (and female friendship in particular) during that post-grad age in an authentic and immersive way, and I'm excited to dig into it again soon.
Woman in Chains (1968)
directed by Henri-Georges Clouzot
Woman in Chains (a.k.a. La Prisonnière) is the final film from French director Henri-Georges Clouzot, who is probably best known for his thrillers The Wages of Fear and Diabolique, and it's a bizarre, fascinating, and unique way to end your career for sure. The film centers around a woman named Josée who is connected with the French art world through her roommate/partner Gilbert, an avant-garde artist. She accompanies Gilbert to an art show hosted by Stan. During the show, she discovers that Gilbert has gone off alone with a female art critic, and isn't too thrilled about it. In response, she returns to Stan's living quarters, where he slyly introduces her to his passion - photographing women in bondage. Initially put off by this, Josée finds herself more and more drawn to both Stan and his hobby, so much so that she asks to sit in on a photo session and finds her relationship with Stan continuing to grow as the film progresses.
At its core this is another fine example of your classic love triangle story, where a woman finds herself more drawn to a newcomer who she seems to have a stronger connection with than her existing partner. Yet the subject matter, style, and execution separate this from more conventional entries and made the film really stand out as an interesting work to me. While it's not a thriller in the same way that The Wages of Fear and Diabolique are, there's a considerable amount of tension in this, both of a sexual nature and also just between relationships in general, as you're never quite sure when any of these characters are going to reach their breaking points. Josée's progression as she is slowly discovering what she really desires is fascinating to behold, and the sense of self-discovery that both Josée and Stan have as they become closer together is compelling and interesting.
Above all else, where the film really excels is in its gorgeous use of color and imagery. This is Clouzot's only complete film in color (not counting his unfinished Inferno) and it really makes me wish he worked more in color since the hues absolutely pop in here. "Kaleidoscopic" is an accurate way to describe the visuals - in true late '60s fashion, the film feels trippy and psychedelic in the best way possible and almost approaches the avant-garde and surreal at times. The elaborate sets, especially during the art show, are truly something to witness and reminded me of the underground lair in Danger: Diabolik and the unnerving walls of Blind Beast. I don't want to spoil it too much, but there's a crazy good dream sequence at the end of the film that really goes wild with its creativity. I actually wish the film had a little more of that energy sprinkled throughout, but it's easy to see how that could have overpowered the film, so the smaller doses are understandable.
Woman in Chains has been compared to some of its more well-known contemporaries like Blow-Up, Peeping Tom and (one of my personal favorites) Belle de Jour, and I'd say all of those are accurate to some degree. The emphasis on voyeurism will connect it to many Hitchcock and De Palma classics as well. It's not the most straightforward and accessible watch out there, but I found Woman in Chains consistently intriguing and challenging in a way that makes me want to further explore Clouzot's work.
So, there you have it - five films I'm glad I caught up with over the past month and they're all films I'd like to revisit again soon and spread the word about to encourage others to check them out. Again, these aren't definitively my "five favorite films I saw in January" but rather five films I enjoyed that I felt like writing about on this blog. Stay tuned for a similar article in future months reflecting on some more fascinating works of cinema I'm excited to discover!
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