I can tell why this pilot was not picked up; it lacks distinction. And apart from the protagonist's name, the Los Angeles setting, and a few lame quotations of famous phrases ("Trouble is my business"), it also lacks any meaningful relationship to Raymond Chandler's Philip Marlowe stories. Jason O'Mara's thoroughly modern P.I., confident, sexy, and smirky, certainly does not recall Marlowe's cynical, thoughtful personality in any way whatsoever. And while I enjoy watching hunky television actors in their late 30s and early 40s as well as the next gay guy - you could even call me an aficionado - there is just not enough going on with the character. Or anything here, really.
Reviews
23 Reviews
A Public Ransom
(2014)
Fascinating debut feature
10 July 2014
Warning: Spoilers
Pablo D'Stair's micro-budget, monochromatic, minimalist neo-noir (how's that for some abstract descriptors?) is more rewarding to watch and think about than many a conventional mainstream film, and I heartily recommend it to the adventurous. I noticed points of contact with Travis Mills' first two features, "The Big Something" and "The Detective's Lover," although the two directors may not know each other's work. Both are operating out of small-city America (D'Stair - Gaithersburg, Maryland, Mills - Tempe, Arizona) and have an eye for the particular scale and atmosphere of these places which film-makers typically ignore, although so many people make their lives in them. Both directors seem to call out a certain deadpan quality in their actors - Goodloe Byron's Bryant in "A Public Ransom" is distinctly reminiscent of supporting male characters in the two Mills features. Both directors draw attention to their framing in a way that that commercial film-makers try to avoid; among D'Stair's a priori decisions for "A Public Ransom" were to shoot everything from stationary camera positions and to hold those positions for fairly long scenes, which naturally throws a focus on the unmoving edge.
I'll stay away from straightforward plot summary here, because there is plenty of it in the external reviews. D'Stair has promoted his film energetically to bloggers; that is how I first found out about it. Looking at all those reviews, I notice that even a few of the film's champions get some key points wrong. They almost uniformly note that the film is dense in dialogue, which D'Stair in interviews has acknowledged was very precisely written - no improv here, thanks - but then some of the reviewers seem not to have paid as careful attention to that dialogue as they might. Specifically, in a film with only three on-screen characters, they bobble their descriptions of the key relationship between Carlyle Edwards' Steven and Helen Bonaparte's Rene, his good friend. The two are NEVER romantically or sexually involved; instead, Steven cheats on his unseen wife Lisa with another unseen woman, Deb - he has multiple phone conversations with both of them, and in the last scene Rene explicitly says that there is no way she ever would have become involved with Steven. I thought I'd clear this up because, as you will see if you watch the film, these issues are pretty pertinent to any meaningful discussion of the story. (By the way, "Carlyle Edwards" is D'Stair himself, and I wouldn't be surprised if "Goodloe Byron" and "Helen Bonaparte" are assumed names also, because Carlyle-Byron-Bonaparte, it's just too perfect.)
Anyway, the dense dialogue is worth engaging with, the images are worth absorbing, and the movie as a whole has a mesmeric middle-of-the-night quality. The meta-fictional angles are involving, too, since what we have here is a story about not one but two writers who are "collaborating" (sort of) on a story that is partly appropriated from real events that may or may not have been set in motion by the active member of the pair ("Strangers on a Train" with scribes). In the end it's the passive one who seems to come in for harsher moral judgment - but is the character who expresses that judgment standing in for the director? and is the audience meant to share that judgment? Most of the reviewers take it that the answer to both questions is "Yes"; I am not sure, but in any case I did not share the stringent view of the passive writer's inaction. The movie ends on a question mark; each viewer needs to work out his or her own answer.
I'll stay away from straightforward plot summary here, because there is plenty of it in the external reviews. D'Stair has promoted his film energetically to bloggers; that is how I first found out about it. Looking at all those reviews, I notice that even a few of the film's champions get some key points wrong. They almost uniformly note that the film is dense in dialogue, which D'Stair in interviews has acknowledged was very precisely written - no improv here, thanks - but then some of the reviewers seem not to have paid as careful attention to that dialogue as they might. Specifically, in a film with only three on-screen characters, they bobble their descriptions of the key relationship between Carlyle Edwards' Steven and Helen Bonaparte's Rene, his good friend. The two are NEVER romantically or sexually involved; instead, Steven cheats on his unseen wife Lisa with another unseen woman, Deb - he has multiple phone conversations with both of them, and in the last scene Rene explicitly says that there is no way she ever would have become involved with Steven. I thought I'd clear this up because, as you will see if you watch the film, these issues are pretty pertinent to any meaningful discussion of the story. (By the way, "Carlyle Edwards" is D'Stair himself, and I wouldn't be surprised if "Goodloe Byron" and "Helen Bonaparte" are assumed names also, because Carlyle-Byron-Bonaparte, it's just too perfect.)
Anyway, the dense dialogue is worth engaging with, the images are worth absorbing, and the movie as a whole has a mesmeric middle-of-the-night quality. The meta-fictional angles are involving, too, since what we have here is a story about not one but two writers who are "collaborating" (sort of) on a story that is partly appropriated from real events that may or may not have been set in motion by the active member of the pair ("Strangers on a Train" with scribes). In the end it's the passive one who seems to come in for harsher moral judgment - but is the character who expresses that judgment standing in for the director? and is the audience meant to share that judgment? Most of the reviewers take it that the answer to both questions is "Yes"; I am not sure, but in any case I did not share the stringent view of the passive writer's inaction. The movie ends on a question mark; each viewer needs to work out his or her own answer.
The Big Something
(2011)
Terrific indie feature
20 December 2013
Warning: Spoilers
This stylish first feature, shot by writer-director Travis Mills in Tempe, Arizona, is infinitely better than most Hollywood comedies. Mills states that he is influenced by Buster Keaton, and by Howard Hawks in his screwball comedy phase, and one can easily spot traces of both. The framing of the action is consistently funny in and of itself (Keaton), and the laugh-out-loud dialogue has a line-by-line quotability (Hawks). (Even a simple utterance like "Scratch that" elicits a guffaw because it is so perfectly placed.) "The Big Something" is a satiric murder mystery set in and around Tempe's low-rent, sometimes even scruffy establishments: a record store, a coffee shop, a pool hall, a bike repair "hellhole," a dilapidated former mental hospital (shades of the popular website Abandoned Places). The actors vary in professional level, as is pretty inevitable on a low-budget feature, but it scarcely matters because they all do create engaging characters that you want to know more about, none more so than our hapless-but-likable protagonist, Lewis the record store clerk, played winningly by Michael Coleman. There are many more bits of recognizable human behavior here than in slicker productions. And the stylistics are wonderful: the ultra-precise framing as mentioned, the clear bright cinematography (the Arizona sunlight is practically a character), the sprightly use of public domain jazz and blue recordings on the soundtrack, the sparing but pleasant touches of iris-ins and iris-outs and silent-film-style title cards. Highlights of the action include the unexpected revelation of a character as an accomplished harpist, an absurdist chess match with one player who doesn't know the moves, a fight amongst homeless over a dumpster "territory," the threatening deployment of a croquet mallet, and the use of "Bob Saget" as a secret password.
Shortbus
(2006)
Neither hot nor deep
18 December 2013
Warning: Spoilers
I give it points for being different, and I am all for art porn on principle. But in general, "Shortbus" is too weepy-sensitive to be hot. And John Cameron Mitchell's sexual ideology, as presented, is frankly puerile. A male character lacks affect until he is penetrated, and then all of a sudden, he can feel! A female character (who looks to be the world's worst couples counselor) can't experience an orgasm until she is jointly seduced by a Taylor Lautner-Taylor Swift type couple (we should all be so lucky), and then, well, the rocket's red glare, the bombs bursting in air! The movie ends on that latter scene, actually, and I didn't like it any more than I did when "Adventureland" was structured around Jesse Eisenberg's getting laid, and when he does, mission accomplished, the movie's over. Yuk. It also makes me nervous to think that Lars von Trier's new "Nymphomaniac" is apparently based on this same plot trope, the search for the missing female orgasm. And at four hours or more length, no less. (Word has it that the director's cut of "Nymphomaniac" is five-and-a-half hours.)
Large chunks of "Shortbus" do not work at all - a long screwball scene at mid-movie involving a vibrating egg is simply embarrassing. The characters are by and large not engaging (a word I prefer to "likable" in this context - you can be engaged, held, by someone who is not likable, such as Henry Hill in "Goodfellas"). Every now and then, a little bit of the movie clicks - there is a jacuzzi seduction with one guy edging closer to another that packs more erotic charge than all the explicit scenes put together. And I like Justin Bond's line, while surveying an orgy: "It's just like the Sixties, only with less hope." (Bond as the club proprietor, Lindsay Beamish as a dominatrix, and Peter Stickles as a cute stalker are the best performers here.)
The film is clearly a fantasy, because it is hard to believe that the thoroughly polysexual Shortbus club could exist in the real world. When it comes to getting down to business, gay men don't like to be around women, lesbians don't like to be around men, straight men don't like to be around gay men, and there are never enough out bisexuals to go around. That leaves straight women, who I believe are indeed more ecumenically minded, but who also tend to avoid such establishments. Straight sex clubs seldom work because of gender ratio problems: they become either gay sex clubs, or brothels. That's the real world. Mitchell's concept of an establishment where everyone just gets along and gets it on is sweetly sentimental, though not without a certain wistful appeal.
Beyond all that, I have always maintained that a sex club that is not also a bath-house is an icky proposition. People need to shower!
Large chunks of "Shortbus" do not work at all - a long screwball scene at mid-movie involving a vibrating egg is simply embarrassing. The characters are by and large not engaging (a word I prefer to "likable" in this context - you can be engaged, held, by someone who is not likable, such as Henry Hill in "Goodfellas"). Every now and then, a little bit of the movie clicks - there is a jacuzzi seduction with one guy edging closer to another that packs more erotic charge than all the explicit scenes put together. And I like Justin Bond's line, while surveying an orgy: "It's just like the Sixties, only with less hope." (Bond as the club proprietor, Lindsay Beamish as a dominatrix, and Peter Stickles as a cute stalker are the best performers here.)
The film is clearly a fantasy, because it is hard to believe that the thoroughly polysexual Shortbus club could exist in the real world. When it comes to getting down to business, gay men don't like to be around women, lesbians don't like to be around men, straight men don't like to be around gay men, and there are never enough out bisexuals to go around. That leaves straight women, who I believe are indeed more ecumenically minded, but who also tend to avoid such establishments. Straight sex clubs seldom work because of gender ratio problems: they become either gay sex clubs, or brothels. That's the real world. Mitchell's concept of an establishment where everyone just gets along and gets it on is sweetly sentimental, though not without a certain wistful appeal.
Beyond all that, I have always maintained that a sex club that is not also a bath-house is an icky proposition. People need to shower!
Girl on the Run
(1953)
Curiously captivating carnival noir
27 September 2013
One of several worthy discoveries in Something Weird Video's "Weird Noir" set, and the most formally interesting of the bunch. "Girl on the Run" obeys the classical unities of action (one plot, which is all you have time for in 64 minutes), time (it all takes place in one evening), and place (it is set entirely inside a traveling carnival's grounds). The film is spatially fascinating: you really get a sense of how a carnival can pack a lot of activities into a smallish area, and how, out of direct sight of the public, the "inner world" of the carnival company can go on vigorously despite there being no apparent physical room for it. The sound design is dense and realistic and lends a high degree of verisimilitude to the film's texture.
"Girl on the Run" is bookended by an excellent night-time opening shot of the carnival and its Ferris wheel from a medium distance, very atmospheric, and a great closing shot of a laughing mechanical clown. Some thought went into the presentation here.
On the debit side, the acting is fairly ordinary, although protagonist Richard Coogan - television's first Captain Video - is certainly a handsome, energetic chap. The storyline is nothing special either. And yet the very standardness of these elements throws the more innovative aspects of the movie into higher relief, and the overall result is highly watchable.
I encourage any film history student or scholar looking for an offbeat candidate for detailed analysis to take a look at this movie; I think you might see rich possibilities in it.
"Girl on the Run" is bookended by an excellent night-time opening shot of the carnival and its Ferris wheel from a medium distance, very atmospheric, and a great closing shot of a laughing mechanical clown. Some thought went into the presentation here.
On the debit side, the acting is fairly ordinary, although protagonist Richard Coogan - television's first Captain Video - is certainly a handsome, energetic chap. The storyline is nothing special either. And yet the very standardness of these elements throws the more innovative aspects of the movie into higher relief, and the overall result is highly watchable.
I encourage any film history student or scholar looking for an offbeat candidate for detailed analysis to take a look at this movie; I think you might see rich possibilities in it.
Stark Fear
(1962)
A Gloriously Sleazy B Noir that Also Has Real Issues on Its Mind
30 August 2013
Warning: Spoilers
"Stark Fear," made in Oklahoma in 1962, was a one-shot feature for both director Ned Hockman (who later taught film production at the University of Oklahoma) and screenwriter Dwight V. Swain. It is a gloriously sleazy little number that ought to be taken up by feminist film criticism pronto, because the male of the species has seldom been depicted so viciously. With one exception, every man in the film is a louse and a rapist, potential or actual. Poor Beverly Garland suffers so much in this film, at the hands of sicko sadist hubby Skip Homeier and assorted other lowlifes, that you would think she would hightail it out of Oklahoma, if not off the planet. But no, she sticks around for worse! - although she eventually recovers her pluck with the help of a female confidante (in what is genuinely one of the more interesting depictions of women's friendship in that era).
The film verges on being a "roughie," a style that was starting to emerge at that time and was full-blown by 1967. It has quite a bit in common with other contemporary local productions such as Herk Harvey's "Carnival of Souls" and Steve Cochran's "Tell Me in the Sunlight." And what is it with psychos and sadists in the early Sixties? "Psycho" (1960), "Peeping Tom" (1960), "The Couch" (1962), "The Sadist" (1963), on and on.
The film verges on being a "roughie," a style that was starting to emerge at that time and was full-blown by 1967. It has quite a bit in common with other contemporary local productions such as Herk Harvey's "Carnival of Souls" and Steve Cochran's "Tell Me in the Sunlight." And what is it with psychos and sadists in the early Sixties? "Psycho" (1960), "Peeping Tom" (1960), "The Couch" (1962), "The Sadist" (1963), on and on.
Cambio de suerte
(2008)
A brilliant, overlooked film
14 July 2013
Warning: Spoilers
Of all the many films I have seen that were influenced by Tarantino's "Pulp Fiction," this is the best. Other movies that the film-makers might have seen and profited by are Goran Paskaljevic's "Cabaret Balkan" and Mike Figgis's "Timecode." In any case, I mainly list the comparisons in order to give potential viewers a sense of where the film is cinematically situated. This is a brilliant piece of work in its own right.
"Cambio de suerte" follows the intersecting adventures of about a dozen lowlife characters in the streets of a Mexico City neighborhood in one evening. If you are easily put off by nasty characters, don't watch this! - I had to remind myself that I was safe, that the scuzziness I was seeing couldn't leak through to my side of the screen.
We return to many events from different points of view that reveal unexpected dimensions to what we thought we had already digested - particularly in the case of an episode of sexual violence that bookends the film. Jorge Ramirez Rivera plays with politically incorrect material in a way that some might find offensive, but can actually be defended as philosophical. So I'm glad he took that risk.
I would love to see the film-makers' minute-by-minute chart of the characters' locations and movements! It all works out with an impressive hair's-breadth precision.
"Cambio de suerte" is available on DVD with English subtitles, but I might have missed seeing it if a friend hadn't loaned it to me, because the DVD case says that the film is in 1.33:1 full-screen, which would have put me off buying it. The case is in error. The film is correctly offered in all its 2.35:1 glory.
I hope that I have encouraged some of you to find this film and give it a chance. I watch a lot of movies, and I was really grabbed by "Cambio de suerte."
"Cambio de suerte" follows the intersecting adventures of about a dozen lowlife characters in the streets of a Mexico City neighborhood in one evening. If you are easily put off by nasty characters, don't watch this! - I had to remind myself that I was safe, that the scuzziness I was seeing couldn't leak through to my side of the screen.
We return to many events from different points of view that reveal unexpected dimensions to what we thought we had already digested - particularly in the case of an episode of sexual violence that bookends the film. Jorge Ramirez Rivera plays with politically incorrect material in a way that some might find offensive, but can actually be defended as philosophical. So I'm glad he took that risk.
I would love to see the film-makers' minute-by-minute chart of the characters' locations and movements! It all works out with an impressive hair's-breadth precision.
"Cambio de suerte" is available on DVD with English subtitles, but I might have missed seeing it if a friend hadn't loaned it to me, because the DVD case says that the film is in 1.33:1 full-screen, which would have put me off buying it. The case is in error. The film is correctly offered in all its 2.35:1 glory.
I hope that I have encouraged some of you to find this film and give it a chance. I watch a lot of movies, and I was really grabbed by "Cambio de suerte."
Texas Killing Fields
(2011)
Badly Underrated and Misunderstood
20 May 2013
Ami Canaan Mann's "Texas Killing Fields" went nowhere commercially, despite a boost from Mann's father Michael Mann (who is listed as a producer). It was barely released and only grossed $45,000 domestically; it received poor reviews when it was reviewed at all. And yet, although it is not a great movie, it is a very good one, and I believe it was thoroughly misunderstood. Although not quite at the level of "Zodiac" or "Memories of Murder" as an elliptical police procedural about a creepy chain of killings, it is nearly as original as those two great films.
Commenters, both professional and amateur, complained that "Texas Killing Fields" is unclear and confusing, although some did note the rich, layered Texas small-town atmosphere (Mann actually shot on location in Louisiana). Certainly, it is not a transparent piece. Chunks of exposition are withheld. We have to puzzle out the backstory. Relationships are not clear at first. A fair number of Sam Worthington's lines are mumbled indistinctly (in a quite convincing Texas drawl). Various elements of the plot turn out to be completely unrelated to each other, and some of them just dribble off the edge of the film. There is no neat wrap-up that ties everything together.
I submit that all of this is done on purpose by Mann and screenwriter Donald F. Ferrarone, and that one of the movie's major stylistic influences is Robert Altman's "McCabe and Mrs. Miller," which Pauline Kael famously praised for exactly the narrative and stylistic choices that "Texas Killing Fields" is attacked for. Apparently making those choices today is not OK, unless you are a big enough name (Terrence Malick, Paul Thomas Anderson) to get away with it.
If I were Ami Canaan Mann, I think I would be very frustrated that my intentions were not noticed, and my film dismissed as not worthy of attention. Maybe she should have gone for a pure art-house approach, without the infusion of commercial elements such as a car chase (although, those elements are quite well handled). Then the film probably couldn't have gotten financed, though.
"Texas Killing Fields" was originally slated to be directed by Danny Boyle, and Mann was brought in as a replacement, although you wouldn't guess it. Her handling of the material seems personal. In one sense, it is not surprising that the conventionally-minded would not "get" what she is up to here, since the commercial elements that allow the film to get made can mislead some viewers into thinking that "Texas Killing Fields" is trying and failing to be a "movie-movie" thriller.
On the other hand, grounding in the auteur theory is supposed to allow more sophisticated viewers to discern individual artistic styles in ostensibly commercial movies – that's what the theory is for, right? We know that a genre film is going to display certain tropes, and although we look at them, we also look beyond them. But apparently some film enthusiasts can only pull this off when the film-as-object is comfortably in the past, and cannot manage it when it's a new film right under their noses.
We should be getting all kinds of auteurist analyses of the underbrush of contemporary film production – straight-to-DVD projects, "amateur" and mumblecore films, stuff that only gets aired at a few smaller festivals. But I see very little of that sort of critical work being done. Most reviews linked at the IMDb are simplistic thumbs-up thumbs-down reactions (that's the bad side of Roger Ebert's influence), rather than hardcore criticism. I am seldom bowled over by the freshness or unexpectedness of these reviewers' "takes." I seldom see detailed argumentation that proceeds on a set of aesthetic principles.
The acting in "Texas Killing Fields" is sensational up and down the line. Although Sam Worthington's hot-headed cop may appear to be a somewhat clichéd character initially, the irony is that his supposedly calm, centered partner, played by Jeffrey Dean Morgan, turns out to be far more of a hot-head, a dangerously obsessive guy. Worthington does the best performing I have seen from him, and inhabits his character physically, with great exactitude. But although he is top-billed, it is really Morgan's movie, and he impresses as a powerhouse presence here. The contrast between him at 6'2" and Worthington at 5'10" seems several inches greater than that, and the troubled friendship between the two men, who may love each other without even liking each other, is one of the best cop relationships on film, all the more so for being unemphatically handled.
As Worthington's ex-wife and a commanding cop in her own right, Jessica Chastain is so authentic that you want a few more scenes for her. In an almost wordless villainous role, the always versatile Jason Clarke is frighteningly edgy (and in fact is often at the edge of the frame, or of our ability to see him – he slides quickly by, a slippery eel). And as a young girl who has been dealt the worst possible start in life, Chloe Grace Moretz, who was only 13 years old when the film was shot, recalls another great actress at that age, Jodie Foster in "Taxi Driver" – that's heady company.
My refraining from plot summary is deliberate. "Texas Killing Fields" is designed to make the viewer work, and each should do that work for himself.
Commenters, both professional and amateur, complained that "Texas Killing Fields" is unclear and confusing, although some did note the rich, layered Texas small-town atmosphere (Mann actually shot on location in Louisiana). Certainly, it is not a transparent piece. Chunks of exposition are withheld. We have to puzzle out the backstory. Relationships are not clear at first. A fair number of Sam Worthington's lines are mumbled indistinctly (in a quite convincing Texas drawl). Various elements of the plot turn out to be completely unrelated to each other, and some of them just dribble off the edge of the film. There is no neat wrap-up that ties everything together.
I submit that all of this is done on purpose by Mann and screenwriter Donald F. Ferrarone, and that one of the movie's major stylistic influences is Robert Altman's "McCabe and Mrs. Miller," which Pauline Kael famously praised for exactly the narrative and stylistic choices that "Texas Killing Fields" is attacked for. Apparently making those choices today is not OK, unless you are a big enough name (Terrence Malick, Paul Thomas Anderson) to get away with it.
If I were Ami Canaan Mann, I think I would be very frustrated that my intentions were not noticed, and my film dismissed as not worthy of attention. Maybe she should have gone for a pure art-house approach, without the infusion of commercial elements such as a car chase (although, those elements are quite well handled). Then the film probably couldn't have gotten financed, though.
"Texas Killing Fields" was originally slated to be directed by Danny Boyle, and Mann was brought in as a replacement, although you wouldn't guess it. Her handling of the material seems personal. In one sense, it is not surprising that the conventionally-minded would not "get" what she is up to here, since the commercial elements that allow the film to get made can mislead some viewers into thinking that "Texas Killing Fields" is trying and failing to be a "movie-movie" thriller.
On the other hand, grounding in the auteur theory is supposed to allow more sophisticated viewers to discern individual artistic styles in ostensibly commercial movies – that's what the theory is for, right? We know that a genre film is going to display certain tropes, and although we look at them, we also look beyond them. But apparently some film enthusiasts can only pull this off when the film-as-object is comfortably in the past, and cannot manage it when it's a new film right under their noses.
We should be getting all kinds of auteurist analyses of the underbrush of contemporary film production – straight-to-DVD projects, "amateur" and mumblecore films, stuff that only gets aired at a few smaller festivals. But I see very little of that sort of critical work being done. Most reviews linked at the IMDb are simplistic thumbs-up thumbs-down reactions (that's the bad side of Roger Ebert's influence), rather than hardcore criticism. I am seldom bowled over by the freshness or unexpectedness of these reviewers' "takes." I seldom see detailed argumentation that proceeds on a set of aesthetic principles.
The acting in "Texas Killing Fields" is sensational up and down the line. Although Sam Worthington's hot-headed cop may appear to be a somewhat clichéd character initially, the irony is that his supposedly calm, centered partner, played by Jeffrey Dean Morgan, turns out to be far more of a hot-head, a dangerously obsessive guy. Worthington does the best performing I have seen from him, and inhabits his character physically, with great exactitude. But although he is top-billed, it is really Morgan's movie, and he impresses as a powerhouse presence here. The contrast between him at 6'2" and Worthington at 5'10" seems several inches greater than that, and the troubled friendship between the two men, who may love each other without even liking each other, is one of the best cop relationships on film, all the more so for being unemphatically handled.
As Worthington's ex-wife and a commanding cop in her own right, Jessica Chastain is so authentic that you want a few more scenes for her. In an almost wordless villainous role, the always versatile Jason Clarke is frighteningly edgy (and in fact is often at the edge of the frame, or of our ability to see him – he slides quickly by, a slippery eel). And as a young girl who has been dealt the worst possible start in life, Chloe Grace Moretz, who was only 13 years old when the film was shot, recalls another great actress at that age, Jodie Foster in "Taxi Driver" – that's heady company.
My refraining from plot summary is deliberate. "Texas Killing Fields" is designed to make the viewer work, and each should do that work for himself.
Crazy, Stupid, Love.
(2011)
More horrifying than "Saw" or "Hostel"
8 March 2013
So, I thought I would check out the state of the contemporary rom-com, and this seemed like a good bet. I mean, actors like Julianne Moore, Ryan Gosling, Kevin Bacon, Marisa Tomei, how can you go wrong?
Very,very wrong. What I got was one of the most appalling movies I have seen in a long time, a sick demented number full of crazy stalkers, that entirely endorses and promotes stalker-ish behavior. Because, you see, as long as YOU are convinced that the target is your "soul-mate," it can't be considered stalking.
Hello, Mr. Screenwriter! Have we forgotten that John Hinckley was fully convinced that Jodie Foster was his soul-mate? We know how that turned out, correct?
Ah, well, I guess we don't. So keep on pursuing your "romantic" thesis, and thanks for the details on 13-year-old boys masturbating and 17-year-old girls taking nude pictures of themselves. You are keeping it real and contemporary!
By the way, the answer to the burning question, What kind of dad hangs out at the same singles bars as his offspring? is, Creepy-as-Hell Dad!
Apart from pointing out the descent into the moral pit that this movie represents, I must also ruefully report that there is nothing of any aesthetic interest or pleasure here. No sprightliness, no style, no charm, not even such as might show up in the service of an entirely misguided plot. Not a single shot worth looking at, not a single line worth listening to. The characters are utterly boring, contourless screenwriter creations - no interests, no hobbies, no thoughts worth sharing, nada. No actors no matter how good could do anything with this material.
Steve Carell certainly cannot convince us that he could suddenly become a swingin' SoCal ladies' man, effortlessly picking up women half his age - and again, given the third act revelation here, it's a big yuck that he would want to.
Have fun.
Very,very wrong. What I got was one of the most appalling movies I have seen in a long time, a sick demented number full of crazy stalkers, that entirely endorses and promotes stalker-ish behavior. Because, you see, as long as YOU are convinced that the target is your "soul-mate," it can't be considered stalking.
Hello, Mr. Screenwriter! Have we forgotten that John Hinckley was fully convinced that Jodie Foster was his soul-mate? We know how that turned out, correct?
Ah, well, I guess we don't. So keep on pursuing your "romantic" thesis, and thanks for the details on 13-year-old boys masturbating and 17-year-old girls taking nude pictures of themselves. You are keeping it real and contemporary!
By the way, the answer to the burning question, What kind of dad hangs out at the same singles bars as his offspring? is, Creepy-as-Hell Dad!
Apart from pointing out the descent into the moral pit that this movie represents, I must also ruefully report that there is nothing of any aesthetic interest or pleasure here. No sprightliness, no style, no charm, not even such as might show up in the service of an entirely misguided plot. Not a single shot worth looking at, not a single line worth listening to. The characters are utterly boring, contourless screenwriter creations - no interests, no hobbies, no thoughts worth sharing, nada. No actors no matter how good could do anything with this material.
Steve Carell certainly cannot convince us that he could suddenly become a swingin' SoCal ladies' man, effortlessly picking up women half his age - and again, given the third act revelation here, it's a big yuck that he would want to.
Have fun.
Premonitory? (Major Spoiler)
12 December 2009
Warning: Spoilers
I don't honestly think this is one of the better Twilight Zone episodes, but it has one fascinating element. The knowing look of the stewardess at the end, and the immediate explosion of the plane upon take-off, suggests that what we are seeing is an instance of domestic terrorism/suicide bombing, a good many years before such notions gained currency. Does anyone else see the ending this way, or am I reading too much backward into it? Certainly the stewardess/morgue nurse has been depicted as an agent of death throughout the episode. Her creepiness gives the episode a memorability that it otherwise might not have had, and to read her as a bomber is not difficult at all.
Come and Get It
(1936)
An Insufficiently Recognized Gem
4 February 2007
Warning: Spoilers
Perhaps in part because of its unusual co-directorial credit (Howard Hawks and William Wyler), Come and Get It hasn't tended to get the recognition it deserves. By all accounts, Hawks directed most of the movie (until he had a falling-out with producer Samuel Goldwyn), and it sits comfortably within his oeuvre. The manly, rough-and-tumble logging world of turn-of-the-century Wisconsin is an apt Hawksian setting, and the realistic human dynamics are also quite characteristic. Several characters marry for reasons other than "love" and make what they can of their situations. Hawks was adult about such things. The ending of the film, which has to do with a protagonist's disappointment and sad enlightenment rather than his fulfillment (as Hollywood would generally have it), is strikingly mature.
The bi-generational structure of both Edna Ferber's novel Come and Get It and the movie, is reminiscent of Emily Bronte's novel Wuthering Heights (not the movie versions, such as Wyler's, which have usually wrecked her careful symmetries). The open question of the movie is, will the younger generation make different decisions with more favorable outcomes, or not? The narrative leads one to hope so, but doesn't give a definite answer. One of the submerged issues here is whether marrying on the basis of love necessarily does lead to better outcomes than marrying for other reasons.
Wyler's sequences (something between the last ten minutes and last half hour of the film) blend seamlessly with Hawks's, as do the striking logging sequences filmed by a second unit on location under the direction of Richard Rosson. Those sequences are visually quite Wisconsonian, but were actually filmed in Idaho. I found this account at Boise State University's Idaho Film Collection online catalogue:
"The Idaho Statesman (March 17, 1936) reports around 50 technicians and specialists will arrive that week from California, to film the annual log drive down the North Fork and Clearwater rivers for the movie. The Lewiston Morning Tribune, (April 1) reports the film company will be moving from their main location camp at Camp Rosson and going 20 miles north to the head of Beaver Creek. The same article further recounted that the second staff of camera men had finished the day before and had returned to Hollywood already and that total production cost for the film would be $1,250,000, with $200,000 spent on location work in the Lewiston region. Two days later the same paper reported that two dogs of a dog sled that had been hired to haul supplies fought and both died. Other injuries reported: two woodsmen hospitalized for various injuries and one member of the company dying of heart failure atop a 50-foot tree. As for other events related to the filming, a labor strike and deep snow had stalled filming for some time."
The location scenes look grand and add considerably to the texture of the movie. One of Come and Get It's virtues is its status as one of the finest historical films set in a state, Wisconsin, that has had less than its due on screen. I am having the opportunity to introduce the film at a screening by the Green Bay Film Society, and I expect the audience will thoroughly enjoy the Wisconsin lore and the settings in Iron Ridge (actually Hurley, on the border of Michigan's Upper Peninsula, a legendarily "wicked" town; the prototype for Frances Farmer's character is a prostitute who was murdered there) and Butte des Morts (actually Neenah, on the Fox River, which indeed became one of the most prosperous cities in Northern Wisconsin, as the film suggests; there are plenty of old-money mansions dating from that era that are still standing). The Hurley scenes are mainly 1884, the Neenah scenes mainly 1907. Hawks actually spent part of his boyhood in Neenah at around that time, from the ages of four to ten (1900-1906), so he was on familiar ground.
A final word on the acting, which is really quite fine down to the tiny roles, although one may have reservations about the "Yumpin Yiminee!" Swedish stereotyping of Walter Brennan's role (which nonetheless won him the first Supporting Actor Oscar ever given). Those Swedish stereotypes were everywhere for a few decades, but seem to have completely disappeared after the Fifties (fortunately). Edward Arnold shines in one of the best roles he ever had, and Frances Farmer does a lovely job in her crucial dual role (Exhibit A for those who consider her a great actress, since she didn't get many chances after this because of her other instabilities). Joel McCrea is as charming as always, and there are a couple of neat performances by Cecil Cunningham as Arnold's knowing secretary and Andrea Leeds as his spunky daughter. The father/daughter scenes are unusual in their casual bantering intimacy (she calls her dad "Barney," and he can discuss matters with her that he would never think of raising with his wife). That, again, is Hawks all over, even though he didn't write the words.
The bi-generational structure of both Edna Ferber's novel Come and Get It and the movie, is reminiscent of Emily Bronte's novel Wuthering Heights (not the movie versions, such as Wyler's, which have usually wrecked her careful symmetries). The open question of the movie is, will the younger generation make different decisions with more favorable outcomes, or not? The narrative leads one to hope so, but doesn't give a definite answer. One of the submerged issues here is whether marrying on the basis of love necessarily does lead to better outcomes than marrying for other reasons.
Wyler's sequences (something between the last ten minutes and last half hour of the film) blend seamlessly with Hawks's, as do the striking logging sequences filmed by a second unit on location under the direction of Richard Rosson. Those sequences are visually quite Wisconsonian, but were actually filmed in Idaho. I found this account at Boise State University's Idaho Film Collection online catalogue:
"The Idaho Statesman (March 17, 1936) reports around 50 technicians and specialists will arrive that week from California, to film the annual log drive down the North Fork and Clearwater rivers for the movie. The Lewiston Morning Tribune, (April 1) reports the film company will be moving from their main location camp at Camp Rosson and going 20 miles north to the head of Beaver Creek. The same article further recounted that the second staff of camera men had finished the day before and had returned to Hollywood already and that total production cost for the film would be $1,250,000, with $200,000 spent on location work in the Lewiston region. Two days later the same paper reported that two dogs of a dog sled that had been hired to haul supplies fought and both died. Other injuries reported: two woodsmen hospitalized for various injuries and one member of the company dying of heart failure atop a 50-foot tree. As for other events related to the filming, a labor strike and deep snow had stalled filming for some time."
The location scenes look grand and add considerably to the texture of the movie. One of Come and Get It's virtues is its status as one of the finest historical films set in a state, Wisconsin, that has had less than its due on screen. I am having the opportunity to introduce the film at a screening by the Green Bay Film Society, and I expect the audience will thoroughly enjoy the Wisconsin lore and the settings in Iron Ridge (actually Hurley, on the border of Michigan's Upper Peninsula, a legendarily "wicked" town; the prototype for Frances Farmer's character is a prostitute who was murdered there) and Butte des Morts (actually Neenah, on the Fox River, which indeed became one of the most prosperous cities in Northern Wisconsin, as the film suggests; there are plenty of old-money mansions dating from that era that are still standing). The Hurley scenes are mainly 1884, the Neenah scenes mainly 1907. Hawks actually spent part of his boyhood in Neenah at around that time, from the ages of four to ten (1900-1906), so he was on familiar ground.
A final word on the acting, which is really quite fine down to the tiny roles, although one may have reservations about the "Yumpin Yiminee!" Swedish stereotyping of Walter Brennan's role (which nonetheless won him the first Supporting Actor Oscar ever given). Those Swedish stereotypes were everywhere for a few decades, but seem to have completely disappeared after the Fifties (fortunately). Edward Arnold shines in one of the best roles he ever had, and Frances Farmer does a lovely job in her crucial dual role (Exhibit A for those who consider her a great actress, since she didn't get many chances after this because of her other instabilities). Joel McCrea is as charming as always, and there are a couple of neat performances by Cecil Cunningham as Arnold's knowing secretary and Andrea Leeds as his spunky daughter. The father/daughter scenes are unusual in their casual bantering intimacy (she calls her dad "Barney," and he can discuss matters with her that he would never think of raising with his wife). That, again, is Hawks all over, even though he didn't write the words.
Images
(1972)
An Important Rediscovery
29 December 2006
I am continuing to fill in my Altman gaps. Images is another striking, important, neglected film, although about as different as you could imagine from my other recent Altman rediscovery, A Perfect Couple. One of the ways in which it is different is subtle. A Perfect Couple is a "sport," both within film history and within Altman's oeuvre. Its closest filmic relations, and they are not even that close, are with other Altman films; but essentially, it is out there on its own, a glorious oddity, of uncertain parentage and with no progeny.
Images, despite its obscurity and persistent non-availability, is situated quite differently: it is connected in a dozen ways to other films and film-makers; it has obvious parents and children; it is deeply embedded in both film history and its particular cinematic moment.
Images focuses intensely on the mental breakdown of an upper middle class woman played by Susannah York, and takes place largely at a remote country house in a magnificent landscape (it was shot in Ireland). Psychological thrillers and psychological art films were something of a rage in the Sixties and Seventies. Altman has admitted explicitly that Bergman's Persona was his starting-point and is in "the DNA" of Images. Patrick McGilligan in his Altman biography Jumping Off the Cliff states that:
"Altman has said that, with Images, he wanted to make a Joseph Losey- type film. Losey was one of those few film directors, like Huston and Welles, whom Altman would admit to admiring."
Losey, a great and singularly under-rated director, is worthy of Altman's admiration, and Images indeed bears the Losey stamp. It also has a good deal of Polanski in it (Repulsion, Rosemary's Baby; there are also strong affinities with The Tenant, which postdates Images).
A line can be drawn from Images, backward or forward, to almost any film that depicts mental instability largely from a mentally unstable protagonist's point of view (Barton Fink and A Beautiful Mind, to cite two wildly different examples).
McGilligan also positions the film in a quartet of Altman projects having to do with unstable women: That Cold Day in the Park; Images; Three Women; Come Back to the Five and Dime, Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean.
Another affinity is with other highly polished, stylized, sharply and precisely visualized and auralized films: Losey fits there, so does Nicolas Roeg, and I was strongly reminded of Fassbinder's Chinese Roulette. Images, like Chinese Roulette, uses plenty of glittering glass, mirror, and crystal imagery. The cinematography of the justly celebrated Vilmos Zsigmond is eye-popping, both in the tricky-to-film interiors and the hypnotic landscape exteriors.
Images also shares its DNA (love that phrase of Altman's!) with, and perhaps even exerted a direct influence upon, Peter Weir's Picnic at Hanging Rock, made just a few years later. Images might very well have played theatrically in Australia; a number of Altman films seem to have had better distribution abroad than in the United States.
Altman never made a visually and dramatically tighter film than this; his famed looseness is nowhere in evidence. With a cast of only six and the isolated setting, Images does play like one of Bergman's famously tight chamber films; it's reminiscent not just of Persona in that respect, but also of Through a Glass Darkly, Winter Light, and others.
The actual title on the film's title-frame is "Robert Altman's Images," which is a gambit reminiscent of Fellini and is as acutely self-reflexive a title as any film-maker has ever dared. "Robert Altman's Images," indeed! That's a signature card for his entire work.
In an interview on the Images DVD, Altman reiterates his frequently-made point that all his films are installments in an ongoing vision and that assessments of the installments as being higher or lower in quality don't matter much to him: if you're interested in the vision, you're interested in the vision, right? I think we should take Altman seriously on this: it is a challenge to us to re-frame our way of experiencing films. This is not to say that there are no differences of quality between films or that those assessments don't matter in some ways; it is to say that, once a director has shown their artistic distinction and their ability to control their projects without major compromise, everything they do is interesting and of value because it expresses their vision.
Look at most of the directors mentioned in this post: Losey, Polanski, Bergman, Fassbinder, Coen, Fellini, Roeg, Huston, Welles, Weir (we'll leave Ron Howard out of it) -- all of them have tremendous artistic distinction, all control their projects to a very large extent (certain exceptions involving studio interference easily noted), and I would therefore advance the thesis that none of them ever made a "bad" film. We need everything they have done.
This business of charting an artist's work strictly in terms of peaks and valleys is pop journalism, not serious criticism. Pauline Kael set the tone for discussion of Altman in her early reviews, which went up and down like a ping-pong ball; loved MASH, hated Brewster McCloud, loved McCabe and Mrs. Miller, hated Images (and at that point she said that since she had discerned a definite alternating hit/miss pattern, she couldn't wait for his next film). She continued on in that opinioneering way throughout his career. Kael wrote much that was interesting on Altman, but I would submit that as his biggest champion, she nonetheless misunderstood the actual pattern of his work pretty completely. Pauline Kael didn't care about Robert Altman's vision; she cared whether she liked the movie. That's a serious flaw in a critic.
Images, despite its obscurity and persistent non-availability, is situated quite differently: it is connected in a dozen ways to other films and film-makers; it has obvious parents and children; it is deeply embedded in both film history and its particular cinematic moment.
Images focuses intensely on the mental breakdown of an upper middle class woman played by Susannah York, and takes place largely at a remote country house in a magnificent landscape (it was shot in Ireland). Psychological thrillers and psychological art films were something of a rage in the Sixties and Seventies. Altman has admitted explicitly that Bergman's Persona was his starting-point and is in "the DNA" of Images. Patrick McGilligan in his Altman biography Jumping Off the Cliff states that:
"Altman has said that, with Images, he wanted to make a Joseph Losey- type film. Losey was one of those few film directors, like Huston and Welles, whom Altman would admit to admiring."
Losey, a great and singularly under-rated director, is worthy of Altman's admiration, and Images indeed bears the Losey stamp. It also has a good deal of Polanski in it (Repulsion, Rosemary's Baby; there are also strong affinities with The Tenant, which postdates Images).
A line can be drawn from Images, backward or forward, to almost any film that depicts mental instability largely from a mentally unstable protagonist's point of view (Barton Fink and A Beautiful Mind, to cite two wildly different examples).
McGilligan also positions the film in a quartet of Altman projects having to do with unstable women: That Cold Day in the Park; Images; Three Women; Come Back to the Five and Dime, Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean.
Another affinity is with other highly polished, stylized, sharply and precisely visualized and auralized films: Losey fits there, so does Nicolas Roeg, and I was strongly reminded of Fassbinder's Chinese Roulette. Images, like Chinese Roulette, uses plenty of glittering glass, mirror, and crystal imagery. The cinematography of the justly celebrated Vilmos Zsigmond is eye-popping, both in the tricky-to-film interiors and the hypnotic landscape exteriors.
Images also shares its DNA (love that phrase of Altman's!) with, and perhaps even exerted a direct influence upon, Peter Weir's Picnic at Hanging Rock, made just a few years later. Images might very well have played theatrically in Australia; a number of Altman films seem to have had better distribution abroad than in the United States.
Altman never made a visually and dramatically tighter film than this; his famed looseness is nowhere in evidence. With a cast of only six and the isolated setting, Images does play like one of Bergman's famously tight chamber films; it's reminiscent not just of Persona in that respect, but also of Through a Glass Darkly, Winter Light, and others.
The actual title on the film's title-frame is "Robert Altman's Images," which is a gambit reminiscent of Fellini and is as acutely self-reflexive a title as any film-maker has ever dared. "Robert Altman's Images," indeed! That's a signature card for his entire work.
In an interview on the Images DVD, Altman reiterates his frequently-made point that all his films are installments in an ongoing vision and that assessments of the installments as being higher or lower in quality don't matter much to him: if you're interested in the vision, you're interested in the vision, right? I think we should take Altman seriously on this: it is a challenge to us to re-frame our way of experiencing films. This is not to say that there are no differences of quality between films or that those assessments don't matter in some ways; it is to say that, once a director has shown their artistic distinction and their ability to control their projects without major compromise, everything they do is interesting and of value because it expresses their vision.
Look at most of the directors mentioned in this post: Losey, Polanski, Bergman, Fassbinder, Coen, Fellini, Roeg, Huston, Welles, Weir (we'll leave Ron Howard out of it) -- all of them have tremendous artistic distinction, all control their projects to a very large extent (certain exceptions involving studio interference easily noted), and I would therefore advance the thesis that none of them ever made a "bad" film. We need everything they have done.
This business of charting an artist's work strictly in terms of peaks and valleys is pop journalism, not serious criticism. Pauline Kael set the tone for discussion of Altman in her early reviews, which went up and down like a ping-pong ball; loved MASH, hated Brewster McCloud, loved McCabe and Mrs. Miller, hated Images (and at that point she said that since she had discerned a definite alternating hit/miss pattern, she couldn't wait for his next film). She continued on in that opinioneering way throughout his career. Kael wrote much that was interesting on Altman, but I would submit that as his biggest champion, she nonetheless misunderstood the actual pattern of his work pretty completely. Pauline Kael didn't care about Robert Altman's vision; she cared whether she liked the movie. That's a serious flaw in a critic.
A Perfect Couple
(1979)
A Glorious Oddity, An Altman Gem
29 December 2006
I finally got around to seeing this for-many-years-as-good-as-lost Altman film, and I must say, I was extremely impressed. It is a highly unusual piece. Altman biographer Patrick McGilligan says "There is not another movie like it in the Altman canon," and he's not kidding; there is scarcely another movie like it in anyone's canon. The closest I can think of is George Romero's also criminally underrated There's Always Vanilla, which also deals with the arc of a romance between "ordinary" people with no touch of Hollywood iconography about them.
The film is conceived in terms of a number of binaries: two families, a rigidly patriarchal Greek family and a rock music collective with its own sort-of-patriarch; classical music and pop music, which join hands in the climax; a "perfect couple" of two decidedly imperfect, non-glamorous people, and a near-silent "imperfect couple" of two glamor-pusses, whose path repeatedly crosses that of the perfect couple, but in ways that only the audience perceives. (The perfect couple meets through a video dating service that is a direct precursor to the Internet dating services of our own day; that lends the film an oddly timely-contemporary touch.)
The rock music collective, Keeping 'Em Off the Streets, co-formed by Altman collaborator Allan Nicholls, actually existed and concertized a couple of times, but failed to win a recording contract. (The soundtrack was preserved on Altman's own Lion's Gate label; I recently scored a copy of this rare LP.) As many of the reviewers here at the IMDb enthuse, the music is quite delightful, and rather difficult to pigeonhole, with rock, pop, jazz, and theater music elements. There are a lot of musicians, a lot of singers, a lot of people (and even a dog) just hanging around, in somewhat elaborate and rather magical spaces (courtesy of master designer Leon Ericksen), and the musical numbers seem to emerge from the ambiance. The film is very driven by the songs.
Adding to the flavor of A Perfect Couple is a remarkably casual-positive attitude toward several gay and lesbian characters, so much so that Vito Russo singled the film out in his book The Celluloid Closet as being "special" for its era in its recognition of a "happy, well-adjusted" lesbian couple as a "family."
In the lead roles, Paul Dooley is remarkably winning, and Marta Heflin has a mysterious, somewhat withdrawn quality that suddenly announces itself forcefully in her one solo number, "Won't Somebody Care", which is also one of the great musical sequences in all of movies, if you ask me -- right up there with Keith Carradine's "I'm Easy" in Nashville.
The next forgotten Altman film that needs to be rehabilitated is H.E.A.L.T.H., which Helene Keyssar praises most interestingly in her book Robert Altman's America. I saw it only once many years ago and am eager to see it again.
The film is conceived in terms of a number of binaries: two families, a rigidly patriarchal Greek family and a rock music collective with its own sort-of-patriarch; classical music and pop music, which join hands in the climax; a "perfect couple" of two decidedly imperfect, non-glamorous people, and a near-silent "imperfect couple" of two glamor-pusses, whose path repeatedly crosses that of the perfect couple, but in ways that only the audience perceives. (The perfect couple meets through a video dating service that is a direct precursor to the Internet dating services of our own day; that lends the film an oddly timely-contemporary touch.)
The rock music collective, Keeping 'Em Off the Streets, co-formed by Altman collaborator Allan Nicholls, actually existed and concertized a couple of times, but failed to win a recording contract. (The soundtrack was preserved on Altman's own Lion's Gate label; I recently scored a copy of this rare LP.) As many of the reviewers here at the IMDb enthuse, the music is quite delightful, and rather difficult to pigeonhole, with rock, pop, jazz, and theater music elements. There are a lot of musicians, a lot of singers, a lot of people (and even a dog) just hanging around, in somewhat elaborate and rather magical spaces (courtesy of master designer Leon Ericksen), and the musical numbers seem to emerge from the ambiance. The film is very driven by the songs.
Adding to the flavor of A Perfect Couple is a remarkably casual-positive attitude toward several gay and lesbian characters, so much so that Vito Russo singled the film out in his book The Celluloid Closet as being "special" for its era in its recognition of a "happy, well-adjusted" lesbian couple as a "family."
In the lead roles, Paul Dooley is remarkably winning, and Marta Heflin has a mysterious, somewhat withdrawn quality that suddenly announces itself forcefully in her one solo number, "Won't Somebody Care", which is also one of the great musical sequences in all of movies, if you ask me -- right up there with Keith Carradine's "I'm Easy" in Nashville.
The next forgotten Altman film that needs to be rehabilitated is H.E.A.L.T.H., which Helene Keyssar praises most interestingly in her book Robert Altman's America. I saw it only once many years ago and am eager to see it again.
Point Counter Point
(1968– )
Perceptive View of the 1920s
24 December 2006
I have very fond memories of this adaptation, which I saw when it first aired and, I believe, in re-runs, but have not seen in more than thirty years. I would very much like for it to re-surface. I was a fourteen-year-old high school freshman when this was shown on Masterpiece Theatre in 1973, and it fired my imagination to learn more about the fascinating decade of the 1920s. Everything I watched on PBS had a similar effect; it was such a stimulating network for budding young intellectuals (of which there were many, in those days, and we didn't need to be bribed to watch; my high school had a cadre of Masterpiece Theatre viewers).
It is interesting to learn that this mini-series was actually produced in 1968, which puts it at a mere four decades remove from the era it is depicting; the exact same remove that we have from the 1960s now. As a youngster, the events of the 1920s (goodness, even those of the 1950s) seemed terribly remote to me because they fell before any time I could remember; but I see clearly now that for mature adults, the 1920s were not impossibly remote in 1968. Indeed, they were still vivid in recollection, although becoming "historical," as the 1960s and 1970s are becoming for us.
I would dispute the other reviewer who finds Aldous Huxley a mediocre novelist notable only for Brave New World. Point Counter Point is actually a very fine novel (hardly a "loser"!), well worth reading, as are Huxley's others. I would also dispute the point that adapters should only look to novelists' best-known titles; the freshness has been sucked out of many properties that way, since later adapters often tend to rework earlier adaptations rather than refreshing their work at the original sources. Recent successful adaptations of Dickens's Our Mutual Friend and Trollope's The Way We Live Now (great novels, but scarcely household words) demonstrate that there is plenty of scope to be found among lesser-known titles (and, for that matter, lesser-known authors).
The title Point Counter Point has, in addition to other meanings, a musical one; Beethoven's chamber music figures prominently and movingly in the storyline. Huxley demonstrates his own contrapuntal technique as a novelist by weaving a large cast of characters and their doings into a brilliant narrative. This approach is post-Dickensian and pre-Altmanesque, and especially after seeing Gosford Park, one can imagine Robert Altman working wonders with Point Counter Point. But the British mini-series would always possess the unique perspective of when it was made, exactly forty years after the novel was issued. We think of adaptation and translation as neutral activities in relation to their own time period and culture, but they are not; they are inevitably reflective of and revealing about their own period and culture, and the relation of that period and culture to the period and culture that are being adapted or translated. This is why there are no "definitive" translations, and why classics need to be re-translated every generation or two. This adaptation of Point Counter Point has permanent value and is worthy of a DVD release.
It is interesting to learn that this mini-series was actually produced in 1968, which puts it at a mere four decades remove from the era it is depicting; the exact same remove that we have from the 1960s now. As a youngster, the events of the 1920s (goodness, even those of the 1950s) seemed terribly remote to me because they fell before any time I could remember; but I see clearly now that for mature adults, the 1920s were not impossibly remote in 1968. Indeed, they were still vivid in recollection, although becoming "historical," as the 1960s and 1970s are becoming for us.
I would dispute the other reviewer who finds Aldous Huxley a mediocre novelist notable only for Brave New World. Point Counter Point is actually a very fine novel (hardly a "loser"!), well worth reading, as are Huxley's others. I would also dispute the point that adapters should only look to novelists' best-known titles; the freshness has been sucked out of many properties that way, since later adapters often tend to rework earlier adaptations rather than refreshing their work at the original sources. Recent successful adaptations of Dickens's Our Mutual Friend and Trollope's The Way We Live Now (great novels, but scarcely household words) demonstrate that there is plenty of scope to be found among lesser-known titles (and, for that matter, lesser-known authors).
The title Point Counter Point has, in addition to other meanings, a musical one; Beethoven's chamber music figures prominently and movingly in the storyline. Huxley demonstrates his own contrapuntal technique as a novelist by weaving a large cast of characters and their doings into a brilliant narrative. This approach is post-Dickensian and pre-Altmanesque, and especially after seeing Gosford Park, one can imagine Robert Altman working wonders with Point Counter Point. But the British mini-series would always possess the unique perspective of when it was made, exactly forty years after the novel was issued. We think of adaptation and translation as neutral activities in relation to their own time period and culture, but they are not; they are inevitably reflective of and revealing about their own period and culture, and the relation of that period and culture to the period and culture that are being adapted or translated. This is why there are no "definitive" translations, and why classics need to be re-translated every generation or two. This adaptation of Point Counter Point has permanent value and is worthy of a DVD release.
Seven Days from Now
(1957)
Under-appreciated Classic
10 June 2002
Once seen, never forgotten. Very few films have ever moved into Hitchcock's territory and beaten him, but Seven Waves Away / Abandon Ship is one: ultimately it's a much superior film to Hitchcock's similar Lifeboat. Seven Waves Away was made with impressive conviction and passion by writer-director Richard Sale, who was very active in the 1950s but didn't get another opportunity to direct a feature after this one, despite living 36 more years (what's up with that?). Working with production designer Wilfred Shingleton and art director Raymond Simm and filming almost entirely in a large tank (except perhaps for a few long shots), Sale created an unforgettably immediate atmosphere for a completely harrowing and uncompromising tale of survival at sea under the worst imaginable physical and ethical circumstances.
The cast performed admirably under very trying circumstances (imagine being wet all day, every day); in fact, the miseries of the filming process influenced the acting in a quasi-documentary manner that benefits the picture enormously. Even seen on television, Seven Waves Away is an intensely experiential movie; I can only imagine what it felt like on the large screen.
This was practically Tyrone Power's last hurrah; in his early forties when the movie was filmed, he died of a heart attack on a project shortly thereafter (as his actor-father Tyrone Power Sr. had before him). Power acts with tremendous force and tension as the "captain" here; the dramatic arc of the story is contained entirely within his decision-making process, and for a first-time viewer his key decision (which I will not reveal) will always register as startling because it runs so counter-intuitively to our received sense of ethics. But that is part of what gives Seven Waves Away its wallop.
The cast performed admirably under very trying circumstances (imagine being wet all day, every day); in fact, the miseries of the filming process influenced the acting in a quasi-documentary manner that benefits the picture enormously. Even seen on television, Seven Waves Away is an intensely experiential movie; I can only imagine what it felt like on the large screen.
This was practically Tyrone Power's last hurrah; in his early forties when the movie was filmed, he died of a heart attack on a project shortly thereafter (as his actor-father Tyrone Power Sr. had before him). Power acts with tremendous force and tension as the "captain" here; the dramatic arc of the story is contained entirely within his decision-making process, and for a first-time viewer his key decision (which I will not reveal) will always register as startling because it runs so counter-intuitively to our received sense of ethics. But that is part of what gives Seven Waves Away its wallop.
Gosford Park
(2001)
In the Hands of a Master
5 December 2001
Robert Altman is at the very top of his form in the scintillating Gosford Park, and he's working with a dream cast, all of whom, down to the bittiest bit player, have wonderful material to work with and who do it complete justice. The Altman work this has the closest affinity with is A Wedding, a strong but messy film during which you feel that a number of sub-plots and minor characters have been largely lost in the cutting room. No such problem here. The mastery of the director is everywhere evident, and the screenplay by Julian Fellowes, based on an idea by Altman and Bob Balaban, provides a rock-solid structure. Clearly there are several genres and influences in play in Gosford Park: the Agatha Christie-style murder mystery, shading ever so slightly into Clue-land; the Jean Renoir country weekend in The Rules of the Game; the classic British television series Upstairs Downstairs (this last debt is underlined by the fact that the Gosford Park cast includes Meg Wynn Owen, who played Hazel in Upstairs Downstairs, and Eileen Atkins, who co-created the series with Jean Marsh). The cinematic style is utterly fluid, and the rooms and halls of the great house (an actual noble estate) are as palpable to us as if we were guests.
There are too many fine actors in Gosford Park to single out all of them, although one must mention the foxiness of Clive Owen (headed toward major stardom, believe me); the gravity of Helen Mirren; the inevitable perfection of Maggie Smith in a role that seems tailored for her; the brittle aristocracy of Kristin Scott Thomas; the severity of Charles Dance; the furtive appeal of Ryan Philippe; the solid masculine charm of Jeremy Northam (and who knew he could sing?); the skunkiness of James Wilby; the hauteur of Richard E. Grant; the moral centeredness of Kelly Macdonald; the goofy ineptitude of Stephen Fry; the seen-it-all knowingness of Emily Watson; the nasty lordliness of Michael Gambon; the cracks-in-the-facade of Alan Bates. But everyone has scenes to remember (such as Tom Hollander's and Sophie Thompson's exchange over a pot of jam). This is a marvelous film that will amply repay subsequent viewings.
There are too many fine actors in Gosford Park to single out all of them, although one must mention the foxiness of Clive Owen (headed toward major stardom, believe me); the gravity of Helen Mirren; the inevitable perfection of Maggie Smith in a role that seems tailored for her; the brittle aristocracy of Kristin Scott Thomas; the severity of Charles Dance; the furtive appeal of Ryan Philippe; the solid masculine charm of Jeremy Northam (and who knew he could sing?); the skunkiness of James Wilby; the hauteur of Richard E. Grant; the moral centeredness of Kelly Macdonald; the goofy ineptitude of Stephen Fry; the seen-it-all knowingness of Emily Watson; the nasty lordliness of Michael Gambon; the cracks-in-the-facade of Alan Bates. But everyone has scenes to remember (such as Tom Hollander's and Sophie Thompson's exchange over a pot of jam). This is a marvelous film that will amply repay subsequent viewings.
The Affair
(1971)
Delightful Rediscovery
1 August 2000
The house seems to be divided on this one, so let me break the deadlock with a rave review: this is one terrific little movie. Funny, surprising, sharply directed, engagingly written (great movie line: "our very existence depends on that beer"), well performed, and absorbing all the way. Great title, too! (Yes, it is explained in the film.) As Jonathan Rosenbaum has pointed out, There's Always Vanilla is highly evocative of the early 70s; and like many timely films of that era, it has been unjustly neglected. A realistic romantic comedy with a deft side-take on television and advertising, it turns interestingly serious in an abortionist sequence that illuminates the era of Roe v. Wade. Lead actor Raymond Laine is a find, charming yet believable. This movie is only screened very occasionally, and the print I saw (with the less memorable alternate title The Affair) is unfortunately color-faded. But if you ever get the chance to see this, it is a must. Romero at his best.
Bruiser
(2000)
Disappointment Screams "Straight to Video"!
30 July 2000
George Romero previewed Bruiser, his return to feature film-making after a long hiatus following The Dark Half, at the Gene Siskel Film Center in Chicago. Although the audience of Romero fans was respectful in questioning the director afterward, the movie has to be considered a severe disappointment. The central conceit (which I won't spoil) comes off as thoroughly gimmicky. Romero explores the same territory that Mike Judge does in Office Space -- the malaise of modern office life -- but not very insightfully. (There is a certain similarity in the endings of the two pictures, locating "authenticity" far down the pay scale from the executive suite.) Peter Stormare contributes an over-the-top performance as a ghastly philandering boss that is the acting equivalent of nails on a chalkboard. Ultimately the picture, shot in Toronto and financed by a Canadian company, resembles nothing so much, my friend Eric Johnson astutely pointed out, as the third-rate stuff you discover on Cinemax at three in the morning.
The Golden Bowl
(1972– )
Among the Best Television Ever
27 June 2000
Alistair Cooke, in introducing a re-broadcast of this six-hour series, called it the finest ever shown on Masterpiece Theater, and he'll get no argument from me: it was superb. I quite agree with my fellow commentor's perception that it was the slow unfolding over six hours that made the material mesmerize (the novel is very long too), so I share his concern about the Merchant/Ivory production, but I suppose we'll see. In any case, do not miss this version if you get the chance to view it. Following James's subtle analysis of human motivations is, Cooke memorably said, like "entering the mind of Sigmund Freud," and the greatest compliment I can pay this adaptation is that it does justice to that subtlety. I find the performances excellent, too (whatever happened to Gayle Hunnicutt, who shows such talent here?). And there's a memorable use of Ravel on the soundtrack.
The Half-Naked Truth
(1932)
Showcase for A Great Comic Actor
21 June 2000
Lee Tracy, too little known today, is one of the all-time great comic actors and a personal favorite of mine. He was the original Hildy Johnson in The Front Page on Broadway and although his major films are not numerous, each is a delight. Blessed Event with co-star Dick Powell and Bombshell with co-star Jean Harlow are gems long beloved by Thirties film buffs, but even they may not have seen The Half-Naked Truth, which is a pure jolt of the Lee Tracy magic. His physical and vocal presence are uniquely and unmistakably his: the lankily elastic body, the whirling-dervish energy, the sarcastic tone, the long fingers that always seem to be jabbing in someone's direction. There's not another screen actor I can think of who has quite the manic joie de vivre of the young Tracy. In The Half-Naked Truth, he plays a carnival barker and theatrical promoter who will go to any insane lengths to hog headlines (a very contemporary figure for us!). He's paired with Lupe "Mexican Spitfire" Velez, who proves to be an extremely apt partner for him; you believe in these two together, and that makes their final scene surprisingly emotional. (Tracy's magnetism definitely has its romantic aspect; watching Bombshell, an audience can be driven to heights of frustration waiting for Tracy and Harlow to realize that they are, in fact, perfect for one another.) The wonderful ending of The Half-Naked Truth also crystallizes the Tracy credo in a single line: "What good is life if you don't get some fun out of it?" You can have some of that fun by watching this film.
A Day at the Beach
(1970)
An Oddity
16 June 2000
This very peculiar movie, undoubtedly the most obscure in Roman Polanski's filmography, surfaced from its vault at Facets Multimedia in Chicago for a week's run a number of years ago. I don't believe it had ever been released before, and not too many people saw it in Chicago either. The extremely savvy film buff that I saw A Day at the Beach with hated the movie; but I, perhaps perversely, kind of liked it for its offbeatness and shabby atmosphere. Polanski wrote the screenplay and was originally set to direct this tale of a man wandering through a rundown British seaside resort and encountering odd characters. Although it can't be considered a major or fully successful piece of work, the movie deserves to be available. It continues to nag at my memory in a way that many better films don't. Its "lost" status lends a certain mystique to the film in and of itself, of course; we buffs are always intrigued by the fruit just out of reach.
Insignificance
(1985)
Great Cinematic Experience
13 June 2000
The collaboration between Nicolas Roeg and his wife Theresa Russell is one of the greatest between a director and an actress in film history, ranking right up there with Sternberg/Dietrich and Griffith/Gish. This is one of the fruits. Russell is "The Actress" (Marilyn Monroe) in a phantasmagoric nightpiece that brings together her, Albert Einstein, Senator Joe McCarthy, and Joe Dimaggio in a 1950s New York hotel during the filming of The Seven-Year Itch. The encounters between the four are mind-bending and richly entertaining, especially Monroe's delirious explanation of the special theory of relativity, using toy trains and balloons, for a delighted Einstein. (Monroe was a closet want-to-be intellectual, surprisingly well-read and capable of thoughtful comments in interviews.) Roeg's directing style is rich, propulsive, wonderfully matched to the material (which began as a stage play, although there's nothing the least stagy here, or gratuitously "opened out", either). The apocalyptic finale is fully the equal of the most comparable scene I can think of, the house-destruction at the end of Antonioni's Zabriskie Point. A not-to-be-missed experience. (By the way: what has become of Russell? Like Debra Winger, another of the great talents of her generation and her acting partner in Black Widow, she has hit her forties and Hollywood responds by giving these amazing performers nothing whatsoever to do. It's a darn shame. I'd look for Russell in more Roeg films, of course, but he seems to be in hiding too.)
Come Next Spring
(1956)
Wonderful Americana!
4 February 2000
This rural drama set in 1920s Arkansas is a thoroughly winning film, full of charm and sentiment balanced by straightforward honesty and a trace of grit. Talented screenwriter Montgomery Pittman creates a believable situation involving a ne'er-do-well alcoholic husband (Steve Cochran) who returns to his wife (Ann Sheridan) and family years after abandoning them, hoping to make amends. The wife, however, has learned to manage well on her own, and the way she reacts to this unexpected reappearance is breathtakingly direct and no-nonsense. The leads are terrific; Cochran produced this movie for himself and it shows off his talent extremely well. In fact, the great Italian director Michelangelo Antonioni must have been impressed, because he starred Cochran in the drama Il Grido two years later. I seem to recall that Pittman was also involved with that film. Pittman later wrote some rural-themed episodes for The Twilight Zone, one of which stars James Best, who has a small role in Come Next Spring. Earl Hamner, also a Twilight Zone writer, seems to have taken several hints from Pittman when he came to create The Waltons; the character of the Walton mother, especially as played by Patricia Neal in The Homecoming, is quite reminiscent of Sheridan's performance. An article in New York magazine several years ago revealed that Martin Scorsese is a great admirer of Come Next Spring, which is an urgent candidate for video/DVD release.
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