On the hardships of rating old movies and some thoughts about M

One of the hardest things about writing a review is to give the movie a rating. The more I think about it, the more random does it seem and what exactly is it that differs a 3,5/5 from a 4/5?

If you press me for an answer, all I can come up with is “gut feeling”, which is pretty inadequate and vague compared to the imagined exactness that a figure represents. It’s a completely justified question to ask what affects my gut feeling. My mood? The whether? What I had for dinner? The last film I saw that still lingers in my mind? How I slept last night? Just about anything could have influence on my intestines.

But I do it anyway, paying no attention to my own grumblings about how hard it is, that I “don’t feel it” or some other nonsense justification for passing over.

I insist on making those numbers, not as much as a guide to readers as a tool to force myself to take a stance. Did I like it or didn’t I and what were my reasons? The mandatory rating task works as a catalyst for my thinking process.

Judging older movies
I’m never as close to bailing on giving out grades as when I watch older movies. I just don’t know what to make about them. My stomach feels unreliable.

On one hand there’s the sense of the wings of history that fills me with wonder, admiration and respect. If you know that a movie was a pioneer in a certain aspect and that this particular feature has been copied over and over again in film history, it adds a little something to the experience.

On the other hand, there’s this thing that I’m accustomed to a different standard. Even if I understand perfectly well why the image is unclear, the sound is muffled and the special effects are lame, it doesn’t change the experience. And don’t get me started on the acting! Back in the days they had different ideals of acting, with a great deal more of melodrama compared to the more muted, underplayed style that is common today. I make no secret of that I usually prefer the acting to feel as natural as possible.

Let’s face it: we’ve had a development here. Filmmakers have picked up a few things over the year, working out what works and what doesn’t work by trial and error and there’s nothing strange about this. The tricky thing is whether we should or shouldn’t let it affect our rating.

Is it fair and meaningful to use the same rating system for M, which I recently watched at my local film club, as I do for Mission Impossible IV? Can I compare a one-night stand that gave me wonderful rollercoaster ride for two and a half hour with a move that has left such an impact that I forever will be reminded of it whenever I watch a movie about a crazy murderer?

Probably not. And yet I do it. So bare with me if you think my guts have played up with me and the numbers are strange. This is not rocket science. It’s foolery.

What I thought about M
What about M then? Considering this post originally was intended as a review, I seem to be pussyfooting around it. But here we go.

In case you’re not particularly interested in film history, you might not know that this is a German thriller from 1931, which mostly is about the hunt for a series child murderer, “M”. Not only the police force is after him, but also the underworld, since the constant police activities interfere with their interests. A big chunk of the movie takes place in a building, where we see the murderer hiding in the shadows while the criminals are searching for him, trying to find him in and put him at a trial of their own before the police will arrive.

What I liked about this film more than anything else was the cinematography. There are loads of interesting and beautiful shots. The black and white doesn’t feel old and corny; it adds something to the mood.

Fritz Lang uses small means to create a dense atmosphere. He’s never explicit; we don’t see the murderer as much as touch the girls, and yet we know that something horrible is happening to them when we see a dropped ball rolling on the ground or a balloon he has lured them with drifting. And I’ll never be able to hear that theme from Grieg that M whistles whenever he’s about to commit a crime, without thinking of this movie.

For being a movie from 1931, it feels very modern in some aspects, mainly the aesthetics, but also some of the moral issues at stake, such as in the “trial”. The criminals are having a long argumentation about whether M should be considered insane or not and what negative consequences such a label can have since it automatically will lead to an earlier release from custody in case he’ll get his sanity back. Doesn’t it sound familiar from the news of today?

If there’s anything that pulls down M a bit for a modern viewer, it’s the acting style. My guts don’t care if melodrama was standard at that time or not; they just don’t like it.

But on the whole, the wings of history and the atmosphere was enough to satisfy me. Watching it in on a big screen probably helped quite a bit for my appreciation as well.

And now it’s time to hear what my guts say about this:

M (Fritz Lang, GE, 1931) My rating: 4/5