(Springfield, Washington D.C., Alaska, Seattle; contemporary)
IMDb
Now we don't really need a Simpson's movie, as you know, but that being said its still an enjoyable novelty that gets to go a little farther in its button pushing then the TV show. You have a little fouler language, and brief animated nudity to boot. However most of the movie is a retread of things you've seen on the TV show, but would you really want/expect anything else out a Simpson's movie. To me the funnest gage was a joke on Disney style animation. 'Spider Pig' or 'Harry Plopper' is surprisingly central to the plot.
Tuesday, July 31, 2007
Monday, July 30, 2007
The Last Tycoon (1976)
(Hollywood, California; early-to-mid 1930’s)
IMDb
Elia Kazan’s last film is an adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s unfinished final novel, which itself was inspired by the short but eventful life of MGM production head Irving Thalburg. Robert De Niro is Monroe Stahr, a man who in a short 35 years of life rose from a New York Street kid to running a major Hollywood studio, International World Films. Always ambitious, he had become even more enveloped in his work after the death of his wife, a successful actress. One night on the studio lot Stahr spy’s a beautiful young women who reminds him of his late wife (Ingrid Boulting), instantly smitten he expends his resources on a search for the young women, whom he discovers to have ambitions only for a quite life.
The basic arc is classic Fitzgerald, a powerful man who is not happy because he can not have the women he loves, but playwright Harold Pinter, who composed the script, chooses to also explore the unfinished nature of story, like that F. Scott’s novel, or Thalburg’s life. The ending is thus left ambiguous, if leading. Despite some real thought in the writing, and an excellent cast, which includes the fun bonus of having former studio system actors play aging IWF employees, such as (John Carradine as a studio tour guide), relatively little happens in the film, and what does reminds one of superior De Niro movies such as Once Upon a Time in America and The Godfather Part II. Non-the-less a neat curio on several levels, including one of the better looking movies within a movie (Highway to Tomorrow) that I can recall. Also De Niro and Nicholson play ping-pong, no really.
IMDb
Elia Kazan’s last film is an adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s unfinished final novel, which itself was inspired by the short but eventful life of MGM production head Irving Thalburg. Robert De Niro is Monroe Stahr, a man who in a short 35 years of life rose from a New York Street kid to running a major Hollywood studio, International World Films. Always ambitious, he had become even more enveloped in his work after the death of his wife, a successful actress. One night on the studio lot Stahr spy’s a beautiful young women who reminds him of his late wife (Ingrid Boulting), instantly smitten he expends his resources on a search for the young women, whom he discovers to have ambitions only for a quite life.
The basic arc is classic Fitzgerald, a powerful man who is not happy because he can not have the women he loves, but playwright Harold Pinter, who composed the script, chooses to also explore the unfinished nature of story, like that F. Scott’s novel, or Thalburg’s life. The ending is thus left ambiguous, if leading. Despite some real thought in the writing, and an excellent cast, which includes the fun bonus of having former studio system actors play aging IWF employees, such as (John Carradine as a studio tour guide), relatively little happens in the film, and what does reminds one of superior De Niro movies such as Once Upon a Time in America and The Godfather Part II. Non-the-less a neat curio on several levels, including one of the better looking movies within a movie (Highway to Tomorrow) that I can recall. Also De Niro and Nicholson play ping-pong, no really.
Ingmar Bergman: 1918-2007
The Swedish born, death obsessed movie and stage director, with whom I share a birthday, has passed away at the age of 89. Bergman known for such films as The Seventh Seal and Fanny & Alexander was a favorite of critics and art-house types the world over. His films were dark mediation's on humanity and mortality and tended to be the exact opposite of what you might call a popcorn film. Religious overtones were also commonly present, perhaps a result of growing the son of the official Lutheran minister of the King of Sweden. I was pleased to read an article several years ago in which Bergman confessed he had finally made peace with his mortality, death having been the spectral bugaboo that brought dread to his mind since childhood. But it was that fear of death that added to the residence of many of his films, especially The Seventh Seal, and probably provoked him to the impressive output he left behind. Now might be a good time to sample some of that work, I know I intend to.
The Swedish born, death obsessed movie and stage director, with whom I share a birthday, has passed away at the age of 89. Bergman known for such films as The Seventh Seal and Fanny & Alexander was a favorite of critics and art-house types the world over. His films were dark mediation's on humanity and mortality and tended to be the exact opposite of what you might call a popcorn film. Religious overtones were also commonly present, perhaps a result of growing the son of the official Lutheran minister of the King of Sweden. I was pleased to read an article several years ago in which Bergman confessed he had finally made peace with his mortality, death having been the spectral bugaboo that brought dread to his mind since childhood. But it was that fear of death that added to the residence of many of his films, especially The Seventh Seal, and probably provoked him to the impressive output he left behind. Now might be a good time to sample some of that work, I know I intend to.
Sunday, July 29, 2007
La Dolce Vita (1960)
(Italy, mostly Rome; contemporary)
IMDb
I liked this Fellini film more then I liked 8 ½. I felt this movie was more diverse and entertaining, though it dwells on similar themes to its more recognized follow-up. La Dolce Vita follows roughly a year in the life of Marcello (Marcello Mastroianni) a reporter for a Rome based tabloid newspaper. The narrative is all a little diffuse, its not the standard three act structure (as Director Alexander Payne points out in the DVD introduction), but I suppose that is typical for Fellini. Rather it’s a collection of episodic events, tied together to varying degree’s, and meditating on the decent of the already cynical and disillusioned Marcello to new depths of internal madness.
Two storylines stand out to me, out of probably a half dozen. The first concerns two children who claim to have seen a vision of the Madonna near a tree in sparsely populated tundra near their home. These children we learn are obviously lying, their playing a game and exploiting the somewhat garish religious sentiments of the adults around them. The Catholic priest sent in from the Vatican to adjudge the claims of a miracle see’s this, and he leaves unimpressed. But hopeful town folks, as well as a horde of media await, staging a return visit of the duo to the tree that night. When greeted with all this attention and movie camera’s, the two act up, claiming to see the blessed virgin over there, and now over there, and there. Before long chaos has been let lose on the sight, with ecstatic Italian women tearing the tree apart in the hopes of taking home a little holy wood, destroying what they find sacred in a made rush of enthusiasm. The pounding rain that accompanies this sequence, and adds to confusion, just reinforces a sense of weeping at our collective inability to cope. Many of the sick, who came and laid on mats, holding candles and hopping for a miracle, die that night, as a result of the rain, cold, chaos, and general state of neglect.
The other story that stood out to me concerns Steiner, and acquaintance of Marcello’s whom he envies. Steiner is successful, well off, with a beautiful house, charming family, and fascinating friends. When Marcello confesses to his friend his envy, while attending a party at the mans home, Steiner responds that he is not to be envied, and we find that his seeming composer masks a form of existential despair. Yet I was surprised, much later in the film, when Steiner snaps and kills his two young children before taking his own life. Marcello is shocked to, and this appears to be the event the really unhinges him, leading to his departure from journalism, and debouched state at the end of the film. La Dolca Vita has its light moments too, which when added to the more poignant sequences produces a rich tapestry of a film, one that doubtless gains more resonance upon repeat viewing.
IMDb
I liked this Fellini film more then I liked 8 ½. I felt this movie was more diverse and entertaining, though it dwells on similar themes to its more recognized follow-up. La Dolce Vita follows roughly a year in the life of Marcello (Marcello Mastroianni) a reporter for a Rome based tabloid newspaper. The narrative is all a little diffuse, its not the standard three act structure (as Director Alexander Payne points out in the DVD introduction), but I suppose that is typical for Fellini. Rather it’s a collection of episodic events, tied together to varying degree’s, and meditating on the decent of the already cynical and disillusioned Marcello to new depths of internal madness.
Two storylines stand out to me, out of probably a half dozen. The first concerns two children who claim to have seen a vision of the Madonna near a tree in sparsely populated tundra near their home. These children we learn are obviously lying, their playing a game and exploiting the somewhat garish religious sentiments of the adults around them. The Catholic priest sent in from the Vatican to adjudge the claims of a miracle see’s this, and he leaves unimpressed. But hopeful town folks, as well as a horde of media await, staging a return visit of the duo to the tree that night. When greeted with all this attention and movie camera’s, the two act up, claiming to see the blessed virgin over there, and now over there, and there. Before long chaos has been let lose on the sight, with ecstatic Italian women tearing the tree apart in the hopes of taking home a little holy wood, destroying what they find sacred in a made rush of enthusiasm. The pounding rain that accompanies this sequence, and adds to confusion, just reinforces a sense of weeping at our collective inability to cope. Many of the sick, who came and laid on mats, holding candles and hopping for a miracle, die that night, as a result of the rain, cold, chaos, and general state of neglect.
The other story that stood out to me concerns Steiner, and acquaintance of Marcello’s whom he envies. Steiner is successful, well off, with a beautiful house, charming family, and fascinating friends. When Marcello confesses to his friend his envy, while attending a party at the mans home, Steiner responds that he is not to be envied, and we find that his seeming composer masks a form of existential despair. Yet I was surprised, much later in the film, when Steiner snaps and kills his two young children before taking his own life. Marcello is shocked to, and this appears to be the event the really unhinges him, leading to his departure from journalism, and debouched state at the end of the film. La Dolca Vita has its light moments too, which when added to the more poignant sequences produces a rich tapestry of a film, one that doubtless gains more resonance upon repeat viewing.
Saturday, July 28, 2007
Shane (1953)
(Unspecified western state, likely Wyoming; late 19th century, possibly 1890's)
IMDb
Beloved western staring Alan Ladd. Simple story elegantly told. Deals with archetypal American themes of the land, individual rights, and the stoic stranger. Excellent cast includes Van Heflin, Jean Arthur, Jack Palance, and Brandon De Wilde at the start of his far to short career. You should see this one.
Also today caught about 85-90% of Zodiac (2006) over at my brothers. Real good, I intend to see the whole thing some time.
IMDb
Beloved western staring Alan Ladd. Simple story elegantly told. Deals with archetypal American themes of the land, individual rights, and the stoic stranger. Excellent cast includes Van Heflin, Jean Arthur, Jack Palance, and Brandon De Wilde at the start of his far to short career. You should see this one.
Also today caught about 85-90% of Zodiac (2006) over at my brothers. Real good, I intend to see the whole thing some time.
Thursday, July 26, 2007
Viva Las Vegas (1964)
(L. A., Las Vegas and environs; contemporary)
IMDb
As we near the 30th anniversary of his death, I anticipate seeing a fair number of Elvis movies, provided to me by my Elvis fanatic sister. For the record my favorite Elvis movie is 1962's Follow That Dream. The plot of that movie involves Elvis as a hillbilly homesteader turned small town sheriff, who takes on a mob backed mobile gambling racket while fending off the romantic advances of a lady psychologist and his own adoptive sister. Yes, the movie is every bit as awesome as it sounds, and proves the rule of there being great camp value to most Elvis fair. This being the case, further perusal of the sub-genera seems worth some minimal effort.
For my first 30th anniversary selection I picked Viva Las Vegas from 1964. Here we have Elvis as a singing race car driver, and a plot involving missing money and a much needed motor. However this is purely a secondary detail, because as with most of Mr. Presley's films your not watching the thing for the plot. Women watch for the Elvis singing, mean for the Elvis love interests. In this case we have Ann-Marget in her prime as a swimming instructor (que bathing suites) and University student who seems to be majoring in modern dance (que yet more spandex outfits). Ann shakes, Elvis croons, and 90 minutes go by with nary a thing for the great William Demarest (here playing Ann's father) to do. Nicky Blair meanwhile evokes Maynard G. Krebs as Elvis's mechanic. As with most Elvis movies, there's really not a lot to analyses, just some totally inconsequential entertainment.
IMDb
As we near the 30th anniversary of his death, I anticipate seeing a fair number of Elvis movies, provided to me by my Elvis fanatic sister. For the record my favorite Elvis movie is 1962's Follow That Dream. The plot of that movie involves Elvis as a hillbilly homesteader turned small town sheriff, who takes on a mob backed mobile gambling racket while fending off the romantic advances of a lady psychologist and his own adoptive sister. Yes, the movie is every bit as awesome as it sounds, and proves the rule of there being great camp value to most Elvis fair. This being the case, further perusal of the sub-genera seems worth some minimal effort.
For my first 30th anniversary selection I picked Viva Las Vegas from 1964. Here we have Elvis as a singing race car driver, and a plot involving missing money and a much needed motor. However this is purely a secondary detail, because as with most of Mr. Presley's films your not watching the thing for the plot. Women watch for the Elvis singing, mean for the Elvis love interests. In this case we have Ann-Marget in her prime as a swimming instructor (que bathing suites) and University student who seems to be majoring in modern dance (que yet more spandex outfits). Ann shakes, Elvis croons, and 90 minutes go by with nary a thing for the great William Demarest (here playing Ann's father) to do. Nicky Blair meanwhile evokes Maynard G. Krebs as Elvis's mechanic. As with most Elvis movies, there's really not a lot to analyses, just some totally inconsequential entertainment.
The Shakers: Hands to Work, Hearts to God (1984)
IMDb
Early Ken Burns film chronicles the history of the United Society of Believers in Christ's Second Appearing, other wise known as the Shakers, an off-shoot of the Quakers. The Shakers were founded by a former English factor worker named Ann Lee, who I have been lead to believe declared herself the second coming of Christ, thought that issue is never directly dealt with in the documentary. Now extinct, and at the time of the making of this documentary numbering only a dozen, the Shakers were certainly a unique group. Adherents were celibate and lived communally. Like their Quaker cousins they valued simplicity, they also became noted for the quality of there carpentry and produce. They were social progressives, decrying racial prejudice and again like the Quakers, letting women hold high positions of authority in there ecclesiastical body's. What I did not know about Shakers was that they where inventors, creating both the close pin and the circular saw, not to mention the modern broom. I also hold there most famous him, Simple Gifts, to be one of the greatest of American musical compositions. So suffice it so, they interesting enough to spend an hour with.
Early Ken Burns film chronicles the history of the United Society of Believers in Christ's Second Appearing, other wise known as the Shakers, an off-shoot of the Quakers. The Shakers were founded by a former English factor worker named Ann Lee, who I have been lead to believe declared herself the second coming of Christ, thought that issue is never directly dealt with in the documentary. Now extinct, and at the time of the making of this documentary numbering only a dozen, the Shakers were certainly a unique group. Adherents were celibate and lived communally. Like their Quaker cousins they valued simplicity, they also became noted for the quality of there carpentry and produce. They were social progressives, decrying racial prejudice and again like the Quakers, letting women hold high positions of authority in there ecclesiastical body's. What I did not know about Shakers was that they where inventors, creating both the close pin and the circular saw, not to mention the modern broom. I also hold there most famous him, Simple Gifts, to be one of the greatest of American musical compositions. So suffice it so, they interesting enough to spend an hour with.
Tomorrow Land
Disney Treasures DVD set containing four ‘Tomorrow Land’ episodes of Walt’s 1950’s ABC program Disney Land. These particular programs are of an educational nature, combining animation, archival footage, and live-action demonstrations of future space travel and atomic energy usage. Surprisingly compelling, entertaining, and accurate even after all these years. The space shuttle program is predicted in one of these programs. The specials are hosted by Disney, Ward Kimball, Paul Frees and a handful of ex-Nazi scientists, including Warner van Braun. Also included are various special features such as an educational theatrical short, and Walt’s 1966 pitch for a highly ambitious EPCOT center (in its original form a sort of planed futuristic community) to members of Florida’s state government.
Saved! (2004), Left Behind (2000)
(Unknown state, possibly Maryland, possibly California; contemporary)
(Jerusalem, London, Chicago, New York City; ’the near future’)
IMDb-1
IMDb-2
A miss match of ’religious’ films I’d been putting off seeing provided my entertainment for the night. They also provide a good jumping off point for a not as yet fully developed meditation on Christian beliefs, particularly those of Evangelicals.
Saved! director/writer Brian Dannelly clearly had a not-so-great Christian school experience, and while this may have been bad for him, its good for us as we get to see this unconventional film offering which was inspired there-by. The basic plot of Saved! Concerns Mary (Jena Malone) a young born-again women and the events surrounding her senior year at a Christian High School. Mary has been a Christian since she was about three years old, shortly after the death of her father. Raised by her committed, but not entirely free from earthly desires mother (played by the always welcome Mary-Louise Parker) Mary seems to have the perfect Christian life. She has her best friend the perky yet domineering Hilary Faye (Mandy Moore) and ‘the perfect Christian boyfriend’ Dean (The 4400’s Chad Faust).
Towards the end of summer Dean confides to Mary that he thinks he might be gay. Concerned to correct what to her understanding is an obvious defect, and acting on a perceived vision of Jesus (actually the result of being saved from drowning by a bearded pool worker after sustaining a bump on the head), Mary has sex with Dean. And of course, she gets pregnant.
The rest of the feature is a tribute to Christian hypocrisy, as the well-meaning and sincere Mary confronts the disillusioning hypocrisies of her fellow Christians, which while apparently also sincere and well-meaning (at least to a degree), are also mean. Obviously this central observation does not hold universal and is a trifle simplistic (there are some mean atheists out there as well), but Dannelly is trying to make a point with some humor and I’d say he largely succeeds. If fault can be found in the ideological focus of Dannelly’s dramatics, where all the character’s problems can be traced back to some aspect of Christian life and belief (though admittedly less so with the Cassandra character), room for praise can be found in a generally sympathetic treatment of all involved. Even the arch-hypocrite Hillary Fay, finds a kind of redemption in the end, in which we come to understand her unrealistic strivings for perfection in her self and others, come from misunderstood belief, and having once been a fat and (presumably ostracized) child. Speaking of Mandy Moore I do have to say that I find it rather neat that the actress/singer stared in both this critical spoof of Evangelical youth, and one of the favorite films of that same demographic, the syrupy but oddly effecting A Walk to Remember (Ask me and I’ll tell you how that movie is a sort of sex fantasy for libido repressed Christian teen).
There are sub-plots aplenty in Saved! The most interesting of which is probably the romance between Hillary Fay’s partly paralyzed brother Roland (Macauly Culkin) and the schools one Jew, and constant target of attempted conversions, Cassandra (Eva Amurri). Present throughout all storylines remains the damage done by Christianity in peoples lives. This critique, present through the whole film, is eventually preached directly at the audience during a confront between the very pregnant Mary (and an assortment of allies, including both her gay, and her straight boyfriends) and the schools principle (who incidentally is cheating on his wife with Mary’s mother). Here we learn that standards imposed by others are often difficult if not entirely unattainable for those on whom they are afflicted, and that we should all let everyone be who they are and not impose own interpretation of a collection of ancient texts upon them. One can still be a Christian we are informed, but it should only be in watered-down, vague, God loves everybody, get along kind of way (also a kind of forced interpretation of text).
This interpretation of the proper mode of Christianity holds considerably less water (pardon the pun) in the world of Left Behind. Don’t believe me, well just ask that poor pastor in the film, who was left behind because while he believed in the Christ’s truth, he didn’t know Christ’s truth, or was it the other way around? Anyway suffice it to say it really is a narrow road to salvation in the minds of author’s Jenkins and LaHaye, whose series of intrigue laden novels based on a particular evangelical interpretation of the Book of Revelation, have sold millions, and represent the beliefs of still millions more. In one scene a TV screen displays a number of estimated ’missing’ and its less then 200 million. Now while it is made plainly clear to us that the American children are lifted up to meet Jesus in the sky, along with what seemingly few adults who have managed to get themselves saved, the number given seems far from adequate to represent the worlds youth, I suppose many a Muslim child was just unlucky. Let’s hope that either they or I have got our numbers wrong on this one, or else this is a particularly disgusting belief.
Left Behind was made in a month for around 17 million dollars. Now it shows this a little in its look, but not overpoweringly so. The script is cliché ridden, from the media informant shoot before he can get important information to our hero reporter (notably born-again actor Kirk Cameron), to Brad Johnson and Chelsea Noble rehashing the Dean Martin/ Jean Seberg plot from Airport while on an international flight,… also Kirk‘s mentor is killed by a car bomb. However there is some genuine excitement to be had (not much but some), mostly in the form of the palpable tension in the days immediately following the rapture, and Gordon Currie’s Nicolae Carpathia showing he could prove to be a fun villain. In fact Currie’s performance really is the most fun to watch in the film, if a trifle hammy in conception.
The thing that really gets me about the movie though is the near total Biblical illiteracy of those left behind. Should such an event as the rapture here portrayed occur, and say I was left behind (my Mormonism and doubting proclivities having presumably bard me from the Evangelical Heaven), it would take me all of sixty-seconds to figure out what had happened and issue a pretty desperate prayer to Jesus. But then according to this movie I should have known better, and so should have the Jews, homosexuals and skeptics of Dannelly’s Saved!
I’m not completely immune to an understanding and even appreciation of certain aspects of an Evangelical world-view and theology, but I’m also quite libertarian in (and maybe only in) my approach to the exercise of free will. I believe God gave us free will, he also gave us a complicated world, and the deity of the New Testament (I’m gonna leave the Old Testament out of this) doesn’t strike my as a kind of sadist who really delights in torture. I include both the social torture that we can inflict on each other, as demonstrated by Dannelly, and also the apocalypticism on which all to many of the religiously minded seem to get off.
Listen I’m a Mormon, and I try to be a believing one, but certain characterizations of God, common in all sorts of religions, strike me as unbecoming a supreme being. From all that I’ve been able to observe and try to understand, I’m pretty sure that homosexuality, at least in most cases, is not a choice of the individual so identifying. In fact it’s a ticket to a harder life then they might otherwise have, so in this I give sympathy. Should such matters need to be sorted out in the eternity’s, I’m sure they will be, but for us now in mortality, its incumbent upon we who identify as Christians (as well as all people) to be decent to our fellow human beings. Please go and preach, and exhort unto repentance if you feel so inclined, it may well be that I’ve become to lax in this, but don’t try and force others to behave to a certain code. Who was it who said that morality by force ceases to be morality at all? Well I believe him.
As for the ’end times’ or more broadly the role God plays on the inflection with which we are bereft in this life, I tend to favor the reading of Rabbi Harold Kushner: ‘God dose not send these things upon us, only helps us through them.’ I could be wrong about all these things, and very likely my religious outlook will continue to grow and develop over time. But the constant that I try to hold onto in faith is that of simple decency. A mankind who learns an oft overlooked lesson from the story of the Virgin Mary and doesn’t try to stigmatize the pregnant teen, and a God who doesn’t need a big light show of destruction to satisfy ego and welcome in a pre-ordained triumph through human suffering, but rather one who will tend us through all our storms, even if agency means some of use go through hell to make it to the other side. These are my convictions, admittedly expressed through the light haze of writing at 12:30 in the morning, but there they are non-the-less. In both Saved! And Left Behind we see examples of the best and worse of Christian thought and behavior, and lets hope that both can serve as modern texts containing something worth learning from. But don’t my word for it, you can study them yourself.
(Jerusalem, London, Chicago, New York City; ’the near future’)
IMDb-1
IMDb-2
A miss match of ’religious’ films I’d been putting off seeing provided my entertainment for the night. They also provide a good jumping off point for a not as yet fully developed meditation on Christian beliefs, particularly those of Evangelicals.
Saved! director/writer Brian Dannelly clearly had a not-so-great Christian school experience, and while this may have been bad for him, its good for us as we get to see this unconventional film offering which was inspired there-by. The basic plot of Saved! Concerns Mary (Jena Malone) a young born-again women and the events surrounding her senior year at a Christian High School. Mary has been a Christian since she was about three years old, shortly after the death of her father. Raised by her committed, but not entirely free from earthly desires mother (played by the always welcome Mary-Louise Parker) Mary seems to have the perfect Christian life. She has her best friend the perky yet domineering Hilary Faye (Mandy Moore) and ‘the perfect Christian boyfriend’ Dean (The 4400’s Chad Faust).
Towards the end of summer Dean confides to Mary that he thinks he might be gay. Concerned to correct what to her understanding is an obvious defect, and acting on a perceived vision of Jesus (actually the result of being saved from drowning by a bearded pool worker after sustaining a bump on the head), Mary has sex with Dean. And of course, she gets pregnant.
The rest of the feature is a tribute to Christian hypocrisy, as the well-meaning and sincere Mary confronts the disillusioning hypocrisies of her fellow Christians, which while apparently also sincere and well-meaning (at least to a degree), are also mean. Obviously this central observation does not hold universal and is a trifle simplistic (there are some mean atheists out there as well), but Dannelly is trying to make a point with some humor and I’d say he largely succeeds. If fault can be found in the ideological focus of Dannelly’s dramatics, where all the character’s problems can be traced back to some aspect of Christian life and belief (though admittedly less so with the Cassandra character), room for praise can be found in a generally sympathetic treatment of all involved. Even the arch-hypocrite Hillary Fay, finds a kind of redemption in the end, in which we come to understand her unrealistic strivings for perfection in her self and others, come from misunderstood belief, and having once been a fat and (presumably ostracized) child. Speaking of Mandy Moore I do have to say that I find it rather neat that the actress/singer stared in both this critical spoof of Evangelical youth, and one of the favorite films of that same demographic, the syrupy but oddly effecting A Walk to Remember (Ask me and I’ll tell you how that movie is a sort of sex fantasy for libido repressed Christian teen).
There are sub-plots aplenty in Saved! The most interesting of which is probably the romance between Hillary Fay’s partly paralyzed brother Roland (Macauly Culkin) and the schools one Jew, and constant target of attempted conversions, Cassandra (Eva Amurri). Present throughout all storylines remains the damage done by Christianity in peoples lives. This critique, present through the whole film, is eventually preached directly at the audience during a confront between the very pregnant Mary (and an assortment of allies, including both her gay, and her straight boyfriends) and the schools principle (who incidentally is cheating on his wife with Mary’s mother). Here we learn that standards imposed by others are often difficult if not entirely unattainable for those on whom they are afflicted, and that we should all let everyone be who they are and not impose own interpretation of a collection of ancient texts upon them. One can still be a Christian we are informed, but it should only be in watered-down, vague, God loves everybody, get along kind of way (also a kind of forced interpretation of text).
This interpretation of the proper mode of Christianity holds considerably less water (pardon the pun) in the world of Left Behind. Don’t believe me, well just ask that poor pastor in the film, who was left behind because while he believed in the Christ’s truth, he didn’t know Christ’s truth, or was it the other way around? Anyway suffice it to say it really is a narrow road to salvation in the minds of author’s Jenkins and LaHaye, whose series of intrigue laden novels based on a particular evangelical interpretation of the Book of Revelation, have sold millions, and represent the beliefs of still millions more. In one scene a TV screen displays a number of estimated ’missing’ and its less then 200 million. Now while it is made plainly clear to us that the American children are lifted up to meet Jesus in the sky, along with what seemingly few adults who have managed to get themselves saved, the number given seems far from adequate to represent the worlds youth, I suppose many a Muslim child was just unlucky. Let’s hope that either they or I have got our numbers wrong on this one, or else this is a particularly disgusting belief.
Left Behind was made in a month for around 17 million dollars. Now it shows this a little in its look, but not overpoweringly so. The script is cliché ridden, from the media informant shoot before he can get important information to our hero reporter (notably born-again actor Kirk Cameron), to Brad Johnson and Chelsea Noble rehashing the Dean Martin/ Jean Seberg plot from Airport while on an international flight,… also Kirk‘s mentor is killed by a car bomb. However there is some genuine excitement to be had (not much but some), mostly in the form of the palpable tension in the days immediately following the rapture, and Gordon Currie’s Nicolae Carpathia showing he could prove to be a fun villain. In fact Currie’s performance really is the most fun to watch in the film, if a trifle hammy in conception.
The thing that really gets me about the movie though is the near total Biblical illiteracy of those left behind. Should such an event as the rapture here portrayed occur, and say I was left behind (my Mormonism and doubting proclivities having presumably bard me from the Evangelical Heaven), it would take me all of sixty-seconds to figure out what had happened and issue a pretty desperate prayer to Jesus. But then according to this movie I should have known better, and so should have the Jews, homosexuals and skeptics of Dannelly’s Saved!
I’m not completely immune to an understanding and even appreciation of certain aspects of an Evangelical world-view and theology, but I’m also quite libertarian in (and maybe only in) my approach to the exercise of free will. I believe God gave us free will, he also gave us a complicated world, and the deity of the New Testament (I’m gonna leave the Old Testament out of this) doesn’t strike my as a kind of sadist who really delights in torture. I include both the social torture that we can inflict on each other, as demonstrated by Dannelly, and also the apocalypticism on which all to many of the religiously minded seem to get off.
Listen I’m a Mormon, and I try to be a believing one, but certain characterizations of God, common in all sorts of religions, strike me as unbecoming a supreme being. From all that I’ve been able to observe and try to understand, I’m pretty sure that homosexuality, at least in most cases, is not a choice of the individual so identifying. In fact it’s a ticket to a harder life then they might otherwise have, so in this I give sympathy. Should such matters need to be sorted out in the eternity’s, I’m sure they will be, but for us now in mortality, its incumbent upon we who identify as Christians (as well as all people) to be decent to our fellow human beings. Please go and preach, and exhort unto repentance if you feel so inclined, it may well be that I’ve become to lax in this, but don’t try and force others to behave to a certain code. Who was it who said that morality by force ceases to be morality at all? Well I believe him.
As for the ’end times’ or more broadly the role God plays on the inflection with which we are bereft in this life, I tend to favor the reading of Rabbi Harold Kushner: ‘God dose not send these things upon us, only helps us through them.’ I could be wrong about all these things, and very likely my religious outlook will continue to grow and develop over time. But the constant that I try to hold onto in faith is that of simple decency. A mankind who learns an oft overlooked lesson from the story of the Virgin Mary and doesn’t try to stigmatize the pregnant teen, and a God who doesn’t need a big light show of destruction to satisfy ego and welcome in a pre-ordained triumph through human suffering, but rather one who will tend us through all our storms, even if agency means some of use go through hell to make it to the other side. These are my convictions, admittedly expressed through the light haze of writing at 12:30 in the morning, but there they are non-the-less. In both Saved! And Left Behind we see examples of the best and worse of Christian thought and behavior, and lets hope that both can serve as modern texts containing something worth learning from. But don’t my word for it, you can study them yourself.
Tuesday, July 24, 2007
Frank Middlemass: 1919-2006
How on Earth did I miss the death of Frank Middlemass, one of the greats.
Sunday, July 22, 2007
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (2007)
(England; roughly contemporary)
IMDb
Fifth Harry Potter is some strong Potter, with plot revolving around the continuing return of "He Who Must Not Be Named", and the refusal of Chamberlinian Minister of Magic Cornelius Fudge to accept that fact. As the 4th movie marked a real decent into the dark, this feature continues that trend but is more largely characterized with a sense of despair. The lead resistance organization against the dark Lord, the Order of the Phoenix, is having recruitment problems, while the government has firmly planted its head in the sand, and Harry's becoming a little unglued as he discovers his psychic connection to Ralph Finnes.
Some cool new sets, especially the Ministry of Magic, enough youthful hijinks's for the kids in the audience, and a couple of new characters (Imedla Stautnon's Dolores Umbridge and Evanna Lynch's wonderfully spaced out Luna Lovegood) add to the fun. An enjoyable outing whose only draw back is that you are instantly ready for the next chapter upon completion of viewing. Let's hope Radcliffe cops to his fate and agrees to make the next two.
IMDb
Fifth Harry Potter is some strong Potter, with plot revolving around the continuing return of "He Who Must Not Be Named", and the refusal of Chamberlinian Minister of Magic Cornelius Fudge to accept that fact. As the 4th movie marked a real decent into the dark, this feature continues that trend but is more largely characterized with a sense of despair. The lead resistance organization against the dark Lord, the Order of the Phoenix, is having recruitment problems, while the government has firmly planted its head in the sand, and Harry's becoming a little unglued as he discovers his psychic connection to Ralph Finnes.
Some cool new sets, especially the Ministry of Magic, enough youthful hijinks's for the kids in the audience, and a couple of new characters (Imedla Stautnon's Dolores Umbridge and Evanna Lynch's wonderfully spaced out Luna Lovegood) add to the fun. An enjoyable outing whose only draw back is that you are instantly ready for the next chapter upon completion of viewing. Let's hope Radcliffe cops to his fate and agrees to make the next two.
Friday, July 20, 2007
In Which We Serve (1942)
(England, the North Atlantic; 1939?-194?)
IMDb
On of the first foreign films to get a lot of Oscar buzz. Writer/actor/genius Noel Coward helmed this production about the crew of a Brittish navel vessel, with future directing master David Lean. This a very well put together film, but its also largely a boring one as well. Its not tightly focused, kind of plodding, and the narrative gimmick (flash backs while several surviving crew members are stuck in a life raft) is sometimes distracting. However its got losts of British charm, and some nice character sketches. A mixed bag really.
IMDb
On of the first foreign films to get a lot of Oscar buzz. Writer/actor/genius Noel Coward helmed this production about the crew of a Brittish navel vessel, with future directing master David Lean. This a very well put together film, but its also largely a boring one as well. Its not tightly focused, kind of plodding, and the narrative gimmick (flash backs while several surviving crew members are stuck in a life raft) is sometimes distracting. However its got losts of British charm, and some nice character sketches. A mixed bag really.
Wednesday, July 18, 2007
Executive Suite (1954)
(New York City and another town, possibly Pittsburgh; 1953)
IMDb
When Avery Bullard (1896-1953) the president of the nations third biggest furniture manufacturer drops dead from a stroke, it sets off a fight for corporate control among his five vice-presidents. Who will get the presidency, will it be the philanderer, the tightwad, the loyalist, the innovator, or the guy who just wants to retire? Excellent cast and intriguing premise mostly wasted by plodding script, though closing scene in cathedral like boardroom almost makes up for films other faults. Nicely shot, with innovative opening sequence where we see the last few minutes of Bullards life through his own eyes. Nina Foch received and Oscar nomination.
IMDb
When Avery Bullard (1896-1953) the president of the nations third biggest furniture manufacturer drops dead from a stroke, it sets off a fight for corporate control among his five vice-presidents. Who will get the presidency, will it be the philanderer, the tightwad, the loyalist, the innovator, or the guy who just wants to retire? Excellent cast and intriguing premise mostly wasted by plodding script, though closing scene in cathedral like boardroom almost makes up for films other faults. Nicely shot, with innovative opening sequence where we see the last few minutes of Bullards life through his own eyes. Nina Foch received and Oscar nomination.
Nate Dredge's: The 100 Greatest Films of All Time, Version 2.0
A slightly altered list eliminating Gandhi (not really an American movie) and Mystic River, for Mrs. Miniver (technically American) and Gangs of New York. Presented Chronologically:
1925
The Gold Rush
1928
The Crowd
1930
All Quite on the Western Front
1931
City Lights
1932
Grand Hotel
1933
Duck Soup
1934
It Happened One Night
1935
Mutiny on the Bounty
1936
A Night at the Opera
San Francisco
1938
Angles With Dirty Faces
Bringing Up Baby
1939
Mr. Smith Goes to Washington
Gone With The Wind
1940
His Girl Friday
The Grapes of Wrath
The Great Dictator
1941
Citizen Kane
Sgt. York
Sullivan’s Travels
The Lady Eve
The Maltese Falcon
1942
Mrs. Miniver
Yankee Doodle Dandy
1943
Shadow of a Doubt
1944
Double Indemnity
Laura
1946
The Best Years of Our Lives
It’s a Wonderful Life
1948
The Treasure of the Sera Madra
1949
The Heiress
1950
Harvey
Sunset Blvd.
1951
A Place in the Sun
The African Queen
1952
High Noon
Singing in the Rain
1954
Rear Window
Sabrina
1956
Giant
The Searchers
1957
A Face in the Crowd
Bridge on the River Kwai
Twelve Angry Men
Witness For The Prosecution
1958
Touch of Evil
Vertigo
1959
Anatomy of a Murder
North By Northwest
1960
The Apartment
Inherit The Wind
Psycho
1962
Advise and Consent
Lawrence of Arabia
The Manchurian Candidate
The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance
To Kill A Mockingbird
1963
The Great Escape
1964
Dr. Stranglove, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love The Bomb
The Night of the Iguana
1965
Dr. Zhivago
The Train
1967
In the Heat of the Night
1968
2001: A Space Odyssey
1969
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
1970
Patton
Ryan’s Daughter
1972
The Godfather
1974
China Town
The Godfather Part II
1975
Nashville
1976
Network
Rocky
1977
Annie Hall
1979
Apocalypse Now
Being There
1980
The Elephant Man
1981
On Golden Pond
Raiders of the Lost Ark
1982
E.T.- The Extraterrestrial
The Verdict
1983
A Christmas Story
1984
Once Upon A Time in America
1985
Back to the Future
1986
Blue Velvet
1989
Driving Ms. Daisy
1990
Millers Crossing
1992
Scent of a Women
Unforgiven
1993
Schindler’s List
1994
Ed Wood
Forrest Gump
Nixon
The Shawshank Redemption
1996
Fargo
1997
L.A. Confidential
1999
American Beauty
2001
A.I. Artificial Intelligence
2003
Gangs of New York
Pieces of April
1925
The Gold Rush
1928
The Crowd
1930
All Quite on the Western Front
1931
City Lights
1932
Grand Hotel
1933
Duck Soup
1934
It Happened One Night
1935
Mutiny on the Bounty
1936
A Night at the Opera
San Francisco
1938
Angles With Dirty Faces
Bringing Up Baby
1939
Mr. Smith Goes to Washington
Gone With The Wind
1940
His Girl Friday
The Grapes of Wrath
The Great Dictator
1941
Citizen Kane
Sgt. York
Sullivan’s Travels
The Lady Eve
The Maltese Falcon
1942
Mrs. Miniver
Yankee Doodle Dandy
1943
Shadow of a Doubt
1944
Double Indemnity
Laura
1946
The Best Years of Our Lives
It’s a Wonderful Life
1948
The Treasure of the Sera Madra
1949
The Heiress
1950
Harvey
Sunset Blvd.
1951
A Place in the Sun
The African Queen
1952
High Noon
Singing in the Rain
1954
Rear Window
Sabrina
1956
Giant
The Searchers
1957
A Face in the Crowd
Bridge on the River Kwai
Twelve Angry Men
Witness For The Prosecution
1958
Touch of Evil
Vertigo
1959
Anatomy of a Murder
North By Northwest
1960
The Apartment
Inherit The Wind
Psycho
1962
Advise and Consent
Lawrence of Arabia
The Manchurian Candidate
The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance
To Kill A Mockingbird
1963
The Great Escape
1964
Dr. Stranglove, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love The Bomb
The Night of the Iguana
1965
Dr. Zhivago
The Train
1967
In the Heat of the Night
1968
2001: A Space Odyssey
1969
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
1970
Patton
Ryan’s Daughter
1972
The Godfather
1974
China Town
The Godfather Part II
1975
Nashville
1976
Network
Rocky
1977
Annie Hall
1979
Apocalypse Now
Being There
1980
The Elephant Man
1981
On Golden Pond
Raiders of the Lost Ark
1982
E.T.- The Extraterrestrial
The Verdict
1983
A Christmas Story
1984
Once Upon A Time in America
1985
Back to the Future
1986
Blue Velvet
1989
Driving Ms. Daisy
1990
Millers Crossing
1992
Scent of a Women
Unforgiven
1993
Schindler’s List
1994
Ed Wood
Forrest Gump
Nixon
The Shawshank Redemption
1996
Fargo
1997
L.A. Confidential
1999
American Beauty
2001
A.I. Artificial Intelligence
2003
Gangs of New York
Pieces of April
Tuesday, July 17, 2007
Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle (1994), "Would You Kindly Direct Me to Hell?": The Infamous Dorthy Parker (1994)
(New York City, Hollywood; 1919-1958)
The Movie-IMDb
Dorothy Parker (beguilingly essayed by Jennifer Jason Lee) has become a personification of both wit and the independent women, an American Virginia Wolfe if you will. This comparison has the added virtue, if you want to call it that, of reflecting a shared internal despair and predilection to suicide attempts. However unlike Wolfe, the are no charges of lesbianism floating around Mrs. Parker. She married young to a well intentioned, but relatively simple minded stock broker from Connecticut (Andrew McCarthy) whose primary attraction for her was his physicality. However that marriage was to be ill fated, they were a mismatched pair who never had that much in common, and after his return from the first World War his addiction to morphine followed by one to alcohol, pretty well de-sealed the deal. She however always kept the last name.
Even during the period of her first marriage, Mrs. Parker fooled around. It is suggested by some that she found her true love in the person of Charles Macarthur (Matthew Broderick) a married writer and solder from Chicago, who may have broken her heart and served as inspiration for some of the poetry on suicide she produced. Pain seemed to be a wonderful inspiration for her, it brought out her defensive wit in even more substantial force then was otherwise typically, and it was never something found to be wanting in supply.
Parker was the most well known female member of the famed Algonquin Round Table, a collection of wits and other talents who often meet for lunch at the restaurant in the famed New York City hotel. I’d long been fascinated by this whose who, perfect characters for a movie, which included such luminaries as Berlin, Kaufman, Levant, Willcot, Ferbner, Marx (Harpo), and Robert Benchley (Campbell Scott). Benchley may have been Parkers great unconsummated love, a perfect mate for her intellect and wit, though having seen him in film not the sort of man I’d expect women to find especially attractive physically (at least not as he appeared in middle age), though the shorts he stared in during his Hollywood days were routinely hysterical.
Parker went to Hollywood to, eventually, a success at all sorts or reviews (books, theater) but not so much in plays, or other more involved projects she attempted in New York. So she flew out to California and worked, largely unaccredited on a good number of films (including Hitchcock’s Saboteur), and a smaller number of credited titles with her second husband Alan Campbell (Peter Gallagher). She was never satisfied there, or pretty much anywhere, with pretty much anybody, but she remained a person who held a strong attraction to certain elements of the public, particularly those who held themselves to be more educated or erudite. Dorothy park died of an heart attack in her 70’s after more then half a decade of serious illness, and the very fact that this icon of the 20’s intelligencea had still been alive startled many of her obituary readers. She was a fascinating but sad women whose life provides much to feed our voyeuristic impulses in film, yet still human enough to prompt and deserve genuine reflection, much more then can be said for nearly any of today’s empty witless celebrities.
The Movie-IMDb
Dorothy Parker (beguilingly essayed by Jennifer Jason Lee) has become a personification of both wit and the independent women, an American Virginia Wolfe if you will. This comparison has the added virtue, if you want to call it that, of reflecting a shared internal despair and predilection to suicide attempts. However unlike Wolfe, the are no charges of lesbianism floating around Mrs. Parker. She married young to a well intentioned, but relatively simple minded stock broker from Connecticut (Andrew McCarthy) whose primary attraction for her was his physicality. However that marriage was to be ill fated, they were a mismatched pair who never had that much in common, and after his return from the first World War his addiction to morphine followed by one to alcohol, pretty well de-sealed the deal. She however always kept the last name.
Even during the period of her first marriage, Mrs. Parker fooled around. It is suggested by some that she found her true love in the person of Charles Macarthur (Matthew Broderick) a married writer and solder from Chicago, who may have broken her heart and served as inspiration for some of the poetry on suicide she produced. Pain seemed to be a wonderful inspiration for her, it brought out her defensive wit in even more substantial force then was otherwise typically, and it was never something found to be wanting in supply.
Parker was the most well known female member of the famed Algonquin Round Table, a collection of wits and other talents who often meet for lunch at the restaurant in the famed New York City hotel. I’d long been fascinated by this whose who, perfect characters for a movie, which included such luminaries as Berlin, Kaufman, Levant, Willcot, Ferbner, Marx (Harpo), and Robert Benchley (Campbell Scott). Benchley may have been Parkers great unconsummated love, a perfect mate for her intellect and wit, though having seen him in film not the sort of man I’d expect women to find especially attractive physically (at least not as he appeared in middle age), though the shorts he stared in during his Hollywood days were routinely hysterical.
Parker went to Hollywood to, eventually, a success at all sorts or reviews (books, theater) but not so much in plays, or other more involved projects she attempted in New York. So she flew out to California and worked, largely unaccredited on a good number of films (including Hitchcock’s Saboteur), and a smaller number of credited titles with her second husband Alan Campbell (Peter Gallagher). She was never satisfied there, or pretty much anywhere, with pretty much anybody, but she remained a person who held a strong attraction to certain elements of the public, particularly those who held themselves to be more educated or erudite. Dorothy park died of an heart attack in her 70’s after more then half a decade of serious illness, and the very fact that this icon of the 20’s intelligencea had still been alive startled many of her obituary readers. She was a fascinating but sad women whose life provides much to feed our voyeuristic impulses in film, yet still human enough to prompt and deserve genuine reflection, much more then can be said for nearly any of today’s empty witless celebrities.
The Work and the Glory III: A House Divided (2006)
(Ohio, Georgia, Missouri; 1836-1837 or 38)
IMDb
The last of the Work and the Glory films for which Utah businessman Larry H. Miller has guaranteed financing. While the series of books goes on for a good number more volumes, ending the (at least initial) run of the film series at this point works well, as a sort of trilogy is completed in the form of the arc of Steed family disunion and reconciliation. While the film series starts out focusing on the dueling brothers Nathan and Joshua, it gradually shifts its emphasis to the feud between Joshua and his father Benjamin, the latter by the way final joins the Church in this picture. I mentioned in my last review how Ben had been the surrogate for non-Mormon viewers, now he takes on a new role, that of the long time investigator turned convert, and from my experience, those are some of the most committed Mormons you’ll find, because the change did not come easy for the them, they don’t embrace things lightly.
Joshua’s storyline receives the most time in this picture, because he most undergo an even bigger change then his father. Prominently involved in the persecutions that drove the Mormons out of Jackson county, Joshua had a sort of a breakdown at the end of the last film, after letting his friends severely whip his brother Nathan. In his despair Joshua set his own house on fire and then proceeded into the yard to have a good cry. Well two years later Joshua has again rebuilt his financial holdings from scratch (this is the second or third time), and again found himself a love interest, this time a southern bell, who is again fated to be attracted to the Mormons. This would be totally ridicules if it didn’t result in some sort or resolution of Joshua’s troubles with his family, and with the Mormons more generally, which it fortunately does. Joshua is simply not willing to lose a third time in love, and his character has certainly grown from the abusive gambler and indiscriminate Mormon hater he once was.
The kind of character change that Joshua goes through was necessary for his redemption, and vital if he was to remain at all sympathetic. You see one way in which I would fault the film (which I did like, and which works as mythology) is in its depiction of Mormon/genital conflicts as so thoroughly one sided. It seems the Mormons can do no wrong, unless of course they are turning on themselves, which the Ohio settlers do as a result of the folding of the ill advised Kirtland Safety Society Bank, and the aftermath of recrimination which that generates. In Missouri its all Mormon against genital, with the Latter-day Saints segregated to two counties chartered just for them, a constitutionally questionable arrangement that is bound to end badly when rising politician Lillburn W. Boggs sets his sites on the movement, and others its land (as governor Boggs would later issue his famous 'extermination order' against the Mormons, the only such order ever issued against a predominantly white group of American citizens, and one not officially rescinded until the 1970’s).
Tempered by his experiences during the states first ‘Mormon War’, Joshua is initially reluctant to get involved with the rising tide against the LDS settlers. He wants nothing to do with them, and since they are congregating solely in counties to the north of him, it seems a tenable arrangement. Yet economic and political interests in the state opposed to the Mormons, feel that Joshua would be a helpful figure to add to there cause, given the creditably he has on the issue with other west Missouri locals. Unable to get him to turn attention away from his business and new wife and daughter through persuasion, they stage an attempted assassination of the man, and list his name in a forged document they circulate, alleged to be a ’Mormon hit list’, people whose families the Mormons have “sworn on the name of Joe Smith” to get revenge on for what happened in Independence. That this is a blatant forgery, completely unrepresentative of the intentions of the Latter-day Saints, and dark and conspiratorial on the order of ‘The Protocols of the Elders of Zion’, is but one way in which the filmmakers draw parallels to anti-Semitism. The most obvious scene in which they do this comes at the beginning of the film in Ohio, Joseph and others are gathered at his famed Hebrew class, for which he was able to draw away a respected Jewish scholar on the subject from nearby Oberlin college. Sitting in Joseph’s residence late at night, discussing the Torah, something flaming is thrown through the window to disrupt the meeting. The startled middle aged Jew asks “Do they do this because I am here?” After a pause Joseph replies, “No they do it because I am here”. The Jew responds with a look of confusion, as to how this polite young man could possibly engender a hate greater or equal to that which he has no doubt experienced his entire life.
While certain parallels to anti-Semitism certainly do apply in light of the persecutions inflicted upon 19th Century Mormons, the divide between them and there neighbors was certainly more complicated and less one sided. There were differing economic interests, the Mormons tended to buy together, and politically they voted together. They were also largely Yankees and had abolitionist tendencies. The non- Mormons had some cause to feel threatened, the Saints tending to swarm an area, buy up almost everything and attempt exert unified political control. Yet the Mormons tended to acerbate the problems by being self righteous about it, and not always economically fair to there neighbors, a problem even Joseph recognized. While the smoky clouds of history and partisanship make it nigh impossible to know who really started what in Ohio, and especially in Missouri, it should be remembered that both sides contributed to the fall out, something I didn’t feel received adequate stressing in the course of this film. While some ’old time’ Missouri settlers did unforgivably massacre Mormon settlements, lets not forget that the Mormon vigilante group the Danites did exist, and did seek some violent revenge of its own, though curiously they are absent from this picture.
IMDb
The last of the Work and the Glory films for which Utah businessman Larry H. Miller has guaranteed financing. While the series of books goes on for a good number more volumes, ending the (at least initial) run of the film series at this point works well, as a sort of trilogy is completed in the form of the arc of Steed family disunion and reconciliation. While the film series starts out focusing on the dueling brothers Nathan and Joshua, it gradually shifts its emphasis to the feud between Joshua and his father Benjamin, the latter by the way final joins the Church in this picture. I mentioned in my last review how Ben had been the surrogate for non-Mormon viewers, now he takes on a new role, that of the long time investigator turned convert, and from my experience, those are some of the most committed Mormons you’ll find, because the change did not come easy for the them, they don’t embrace things lightly.
Joshua’s storyline receives the most time in this picture, because he most undergo an even bigger change then his father. Prominently involved in the persecutions that drove the Mormons out of Jackson county, Joshua had a sort of a breakdown at the end of the last film, after letting his friends severely whip his brother Nathan. In his despair Joshua set his own house on fire and then proceeded into the yard to have a good cry. Well two years later Joshua has again rebuilt his financial holdings from scratch (this is the second or third time), and again found himself a love interest, this time a southern bell, who is again fated to be attracted to the Mormons. This would be totally ridicules if it didn’t result in some sort or resolution of Joshua’s troubles with his family, and with the Mormons more generally, which it fortunately does. Joshua is simply not willing to lose a third time in love, and his character has certainly grown from the abusive gambler and indiscriminate Mormon hater he once was.
The kind of character change that Joshua goes through was necessary for his redemption, and vital if he was to remain at all sympathetic. You see one way in which I would fault the film (which I did like, and which works as mythology) is in its depiction of Mormon/genital conflicts as so thoroughly one sided. It seems the Mormons can do no wrong, unless of course they are turning on themselves, which the Ohio settlers do as a result of the folding of the ill advised Kirtland Safety Society Bank, and the aftermath of recrimination which that generates. In Missouri its all Mormon against genital, with the Latter-day Saints segregated to two counties chartered just for them, a constitutionally questionable arrangement that is bound to end badly when rising politician Lillburn W. Boggs sets his sites on the movement, and others its land (as governor Boggs would later issue his famous 'extermination order' against the Mormons, the only such order ever issued against a predominantly white group of American citizens, and one not officially rescinded until the 1970’s).
Tempered by his experiences during the states first ‘Mormon War’, Joshua is initially reluctant to get involved with the rising tide against the LDS settlers. He wants nothing to do with them, and since they are congregating solely in counties to the north of him, it seems a tenable arrangement. Yet economic and political interests in the state opposed to the Mormons, feel that Joshua would be a helpful figure to add to there cause, given the creditably he has on the issue with other west Missouri locals. Unable to get him to turn attention away from his business and new wife and daughter through persuasion, they stage an attempted assassination of the man, and list his name in a forged document they circulate, alleged to be a ’Mormon hit list’, people whose families the Mormons have “sworn on the name of Joe Smith” to get revenge on for what happened in Independence. That this is a blatant forgery, completely unrepresentative of the intentions of the Latter-day Saints, and dark and conspiratorial on the order of ‘The Protocols of the Elders of Zion’, is but one way in which the filmmakers draw parallels to anti-Semitism. The most obvious scene in which they do this comes at the beginning of the film in Ohio, Joseph and others are gathered at his famed Hebrew class, for which he was able to draw away a respected Jewish scholar on the subject from nearby Oberlin college. Sitting in Joseph’s residence late at night, discussing the Torah, something flaming is thrown through the window to disrupt the meeting. The startled middle aged Jew asks “Do they do this because I am here?” After a pause Joseph replies, “No they do it because I am here”. The Jew responds with a look of confusion, as to how this polite young man could possibly engender a hate greater or equal to that which he has no doubt experienced his entire life.
While certain parallels to anti-Semitism certainly do apply in light of the persecutions inflicted upon 19th Century Mormons, the divide between them and there neighbors was certainly more complicated and less one sided. There were differing economic interests, the Mormons tended to buy together, and politically they voted together. They were also largely Yankees and had abolitionist tendencies. The non- Mormons had some cause to feel threatened, the Saints tending to swarm an area, buy up almost everything and attempt exert unified political control. Yet the Mormons tended to acerbate the problems by being self righteous about it, and not always economically fair to there neighbors, a problem even Joseph recognized. While the smoky clouds of history and partisanship make it nigh impossible to know who really started what in Ohio, and especially in Missouri, it should be remembered that both sides contributed to the fall out, something I didn’t feel received adequate stressing in the course of this film. While some ’old time’ Missouri settlers did unforgivably massacre Mormon settlements, lets not forget that the Mormon vigilante group the Danites did exist, and did seek some violent revenge of its own, though curiously they are absent from this picture.
Sunday, July 15, 2007
The Work and the Glory: American Zion (2005)
(New York, Ohio, Missouri; 1830-1834)
IMDb
Second of the flimzations of Gerld R. Lunds popular series of historical fiction novels about the much put upon Steed family. This is a stronger movie then the first one, which I found rather maudlin. The continuing trials of a 19th Century American family divided by religion has residence, not just because a similar dynamic is repeated in LDS circles world wide, but because the drama of brother-against-brother touches upon a vain that is particularly poignant in light of the historical setting. The Mormon/gentile divide, which often ran straight and vehemently down a family line, can be considered a kind of precursor to the American Civil War, in much the same way that the Spanish Civil War of the 1930's prefigured on a smaller scale the events of World War Two.
The primary drama would seem to be just that, the twin stories of brothers Nathan Steed (Alexander Carroll), a Mormon, and Joshua Steed (Eric Johnson), decidedly not. This was also a primary story dynamic in the first film, and while I think it bears better in the sequel, largely in part to greater nuance in the portal of both characters, it is not the most interesting story element. No the most interesting story element has to do with the two men's father Benjamin Steed (Sam Hennings). Benjamin is not a Mormon, yet he is consistently and unwillingly dragged along within the movements orbit, and perhaps more particularly the orbit of Joseph Smith (Jonathan Scarfe), whose storyline receives fuller treatment in this film. When Benjamin's family starts showing interest in Smith and his budding movement, he is at first adamantly against there having any involvement with it. Yet, as can often happen in matter of religion, things get beyond the control of the head of the household, and in short time only Ben and his estranged son Joshua are left without the Church fold. When his family desires to follow Smith and the majority of the Saints to Ohio, Ben holds out as best he can, but in time finds himself again being lead, reluctantly to the center of the LDS movement so as to be with his family.
Benjamen is the proxy for most of the movies non-Mormon viewers. Most likely any non Mormon who would view these films has something of an interest in the Church (or religion or American history more broadly), but he probably knows someone whose in it, probably even like and respect that person, but in all probability has a hard time understanding his (her) bizarre religious tastes. Now this movie can't fully explain those tastes, relatively little relating to matters of doctrine are discussed in it (or the others for that matter). However a gradual thawing is brought across nicely, Benjamin doesn't believe in the Church (though his character is ultimately fated to join it in a later installment) but he's coming to understand it, by virtue of his proximity to its members, their actions, and story's (Brigham Young's mentioning of his prolonged struggle with the Church prior to joining, seems to hit a cored with the man). Perhaps Mormonism can not really be explained to the satisfaction of a non-believer, but that hard to define something that draws people to it can come across when appropriately handled, as I believe it is in this film, far more so then in its somewhat heavy handed predecessor.
Nits: The chronology seemed a little off at places, and there was a fair bit of event compressing, but at least it resulted in a tightness absent from the first chapter. Also on Scarfe's portal of Smith, I'll say right up that no portal is likely to satisfy me, I think the man was an enigma, and the Smith here felt a little to clean. I'd be happy to claim this serene Smith as my own, and I'm sure he had his moments of supreme calm like shown in the movie, but he was a decidedly more complicated figure then portrayed. Never-the-less an idolized version of Joseph Smith does have its place in terms of capturing, not so much how he was, but how he seemed to his followers and how they felt about him. His brief outburst of frustration in light of threat's from the Missouri mob, is the most predominate of two-or-three moments in the film, where the fuller Smith is hinted at.
IMDb
Second of the flimzations of Gerld R. Lunds popular series of historical fiction novels about the much put upon Steed family. This is a stronger movie then the first one, which I found rather maudlin. The continuing trials of a 19th Century American family divided by religion has residence, not just because a similar dynamic is repeated in LDS circles world wide, but because the drama of brother-against-brother touches upon a vain that is particularly poignant in light of the historical setting. The Mormon/gentile divide, which often ran straight and vehemently down a family line, can be considered a kind of precursor to the American Civil War, in much the same way that the Spanish Civil War of the 1930's prefigured on a smaller scale the events of World War Two.
The primary drama would seem to be just that, the twin stories of brothers Nathan Steed (Alexander Carroll), a Mormon, and Joshua Steed (Eric Johnson), decidedly not. This was also a primary story dynamic in the first film, and while I think it bears better in the sequel, largely in part to greater nuance in the portal of both characters, it is not the most interesting story element. No the most interesting story element has to do with the two men's father Benjamin Steed (Sam Hennings). Benjamin is not a Mormon, yet he is consistently and unwillingly dragged along within the movements orbit, and perhaps more particularly the orbit of Joseph Smith (Jonathan Scarfe), whose storyline receives fuller treatment in this film. When Benjamin's family starts showing interest in Smith and his budding movement, he is at first adamantly against there having any involvement with it. Yet, as can often happen in matter of religion, things get beyond the control of the head of the household, and in short time only Ben and his estranged son Joshua are left without the Church fold. When his family desires to follow Smith and the majority of the Saints to Ohio, Ben holds out as best he can, but in time finds himself again being lead, reluctantly to the center of the LDS movement so as to be with his family.
Benjamen is the proxy for most of the movies non-Mormon viewers. Most likely any non Mormon who would view these films has something of an interest in the Church (or religion or American history more broadly), but he probably knows someone whose in it, probably even like and respect that person, but in all probability has a hard time understanding his (her) bizarre religious tastes. Now this movie can't fully explain those tastes, relatively little relating to matters of doctrine are discussed in it (or the others for that matter). However a gradual thawing is brought across nicely, Benjamin doesn't believe in the Church (though his character is ultimately fated to join it in a later installment) but he's coming to understand it, by virtue of his proximity to its members, their actions, and story's (Brigham Young's mentioning of his prolonged struggle with the Church prior to joining, seems to hit a cored with the man). Perhaps Mormonism can not really be explained to the satisfaction of a non-believer, but that hard to define something that draws people to it can come across when appropriately handled, as I believe it is in this film, far more so then in its somewhat heavy handed predecessor.
Nits: The chronology seemed a little off at places, and there was a fair bit of event compressing, but at least it resulted in a tightness absent from the first chapter. Also on Scarfe's portal of Smith, I'll say right up that no portal is likely to satisfy me, I think the man was an enigma, and the Smith here felt a little to clean. I'd be happy to claim this serene Smith as my own, and I'm sure he had his moments of supreme calm like shown in the movie, but he was a decidedly more complicated figure then portrayed. Never-the-less an idolized version of Joseph Smith does have its place in terms of capturing, not so much how he was, but how he seemed to his followers and how they felt about him. His brief outburst of frustration in light of threat's from the Missouri mob, is the most predominate of two-or-three moments in the film, where the fuller Smith is hinted at.
Sports Night: The Complet Series (1998-2000)
(New York City; contemporary)
IMDb
One who knows me might question why a two season comedy/drama about a Sports Center like television program might interest me, well the answer is: Sorkian. Before the West Wing television guru Aaron Sorkin created this inventive genera-defying program, that was critically acclaimed but viewerly challenged. The writing is excellent, with many a satisfying mini-arc, and provides myriad evidences not only for Sorkins talents, but also for the fact that he is own of the most self-cannibalizing writers out there, as witness everything from the father issues to the unconsummated office romance, to witty guys named Danny. But because Sorkin is so good this cannibalizing works, or at least it did for Sports Night and The West Wing, while what little I've seen of Studio 60 provides some cause for alarm that the streak may have ended. Before closing I just need to give a shout out for the cast, some of whom went on to bigger things like Peter Krause (Six Feet Under) and Felicity Huffman (Desperate Housewives), whose husband William H. Macy has a multi-episode arc as an enigmatic ratings specialist, and gets to deliver a killer monologue. Engaging, quality television at its best.
IMDb
One who knows me might question why a two season comedy/drama about a Sports Center like television program might interest me, well the answer is: Sorkian. Before the West Wing television guru Aaron Sorkin created this inventive genera-defying program, that was critically acclaimed but viewerly challenged. The writing is excellent, with many a satisfying mini-arc, and provides myriad evidences not only for Sorkins talents, but also for the fact that he is own of the most self-cannibalizing writers out there, as witness everything from the father issues to the unconsummated office romance, to witty guys named Danny. But because Sorkin is so good this cannibalizing works, or at least it did for Sports Night and The West Wing, while what little I've seen of Studio 60 provides some cause for alarm that the streak may have ended. Before closing I just need to give a shout out for the cast, some of whom went on to bigger things like Peter Krause (Six Feet Under) and Felicity Huffman (Desperate Housewives), whose husband William H. Macy has a multi-episode arc as an enigmatic ratings specialist, and gets to deliver a killer monologue. Engaging, quality television at its best.
Thursday, July 12, 2007
Melody Time (1948)
IMDb
While I've seen most if not all of the cartoons that make-up this 'feature' before, I don't know if I ever saw them all together in this form or not. However that doesn't matter much to me, because they were nice to see again and I've always been a sucker for those Disney compilation films of the 40's. I just find them soothing, collections of simple tales backed up by the vocal work of various largely forgotten musical talents of the time. On of these Buddy Clark, who is the master of ceremonies for this film, actually died in a plane crash about a year after its release. This movie also comes recommend as perhaps the only way you'll get a three year old now days to watch Roy Rogers. Love the Goonie Bird.
While I've seen most if not all of the cartoons that make-up this 'feature' before, I don't know if I ever saw them all together in this form or not. However that doesn't matter much to me, because they were nice to see again and I've always been a sucker for those Disney compilation films of the 40's. I just find them soothing, collections of simple tales backed up by the vocal work of various largely forgotten musical talents of the time. On of these Buddy Clark, who is the master of ceremonies for this film, actually died in a plane crash about a year after its release. This movie also comes recommend as perhaps the only way you'll get a three year old now days to watch Roy Rogers. Love the Goonie Bird.
The Shakiest Gun in the West (1968)
(Philadelphia and the frontier west; 1870)
IMDb
Typical Knotts comedy has Don a newly minted dentist traveling west to start his practice. On the way he meets up with, and marries, Barbara Rhoades, a notorious lady outlaw who as part of a clemency deal with the government, is hunting down Indian gun runners hiding in a wagon train. There are a number of nominally funny bits scattered through out the film, but the best one comes at the beginning during Don's final dental school examine. Don "Red" Barry, star of many B-westerns of the 30's and 40's, plays one of the villains.
IMDb
Typical Knotts comedy has Don a newly minted dentist traveling west to start his practice. On the way he meets up with, and marries, Barbara Rhoades, a notorious lady outlaw who as part of a clemency deal with the government, is hunting down Indian gun runners hiding in a wagon train. There are a number of nominally funny bits scattered through out the film, but the best one comes at the beginning during Don's final dental school examine. Don "Red" Barry, star of many B-westerns of the 30's and 40's, plays one of the villains.
The Love God? (1969)
(New Jersey, New York, Chicago, L.A., Miami; contemporary)
IMDb
I wanted to see The Love God? because the concept seemed like such a train wreck, Don Knotts plays Abner Peacock, the small town publisher of a bird watching magazine who is mistaken for a swinging pornographer. It's a Don Knotts film on acid, a curiously prudish sex farce that ends with a virginal wedding. A certain awesomeness must be attributed to this however, because its Disneyisque about sex, something that quite frankly should never have been, but the fact that it was makes it utterly memorable. Mr. Peacock even gets a pretty cool sounding, though lyrically limited, sixty's rock anthem about himself. Fine comic performance by B.S. Pully as 'Icepick Charlie', the mafioso who pay roles the smut magazine Knotts reluctantly finds himself the publisher of. Big nit: Two or three major characters disappear entirely from the film towards the end, and for no clear reason.
IMDb
I wanted to see The Love God? because the concept seemed like such a train wreck, Don Knotts plays Abner Peacock, the small town publisher of a bird watching magazine who is mistaken for a swinging pornographer. It's a Don Knotts film on acid, a curiously prudish sex farce that ends with a virginal wedding. A certain awesomeness must be attributed to this however, because its Disneyisque about sex, something that quite frankly should never have been, but the fact that it was makes it utterly memorable. Mr. Peacock even gets a pretty cool sounding, though lyrically limited, sixty's rock anthem about himself. Fine comic performance by B.S. Pully as 'Icepick Charlie', the mafioso who pay roles the smut magazine Knotts reluctantly finds himself the publisher of. Big nit: Two or three major characters disappear entirely from the film towards the end, and for no clear reason.
Wednesday, July 11, 2007
Monday, July 9, 2007
Nate Dredge's: The 100 Greatest Films of All Time, Version 1.0
Well I’ve decided to finally attempt a “100 Best List”. This of course will be a continuing project, a work in progress, because I’m bound to change my mind on some of these, forgot films I should have added, and want to add new films. So I ask for your feedback on this so I can further refine the list over time. I’m going to build this list first off of borrowings from other pre-existing lists, such as those prepared by AFI, and build from there. Also I should point out this list is limited to films I’ve seen, and there are some major, important, and assuredly deserving of list statues films that I haven’t. Also remember that this reflects my thinking at this particular time, I’d probably produce a slightly different list if I were to attempt this in a week or so. Also remember this a ’Greatest List’, there are films that I might enjoy more that I will leave off the list because they don’t qualify for what I’d consider ’Great’ statues, also I’m limiting myself to American films. So now on to my original top 100 list, presented in no particular order:
1. The Crowd (1928)
2. City Lights (1931)
3. Duck Soup (1933)
4. A Night at the Opera (1936)
5. Citizen Kane (1941)
6. The Lady Eve (1941)
7. Shadow of a Doubt (1943)
8. It’s a Wonderful Life (1946)
9. Sunset Blvd. (1950)
10. Singing in the Rain (1952)
11. Giant (1956)
12. The Searchers (1956)
13. The Apartment (1960)
14. Lawrence of Arabia (1962)
15. To Kill A Mockingbird (1962)
16. DR. STRANGELOVE, or HOW I LEARNED TO STOP WORRYINGAND LOVE THE BOMB
17. Patton (1970)
18. The Godfather (1972)
19. The Godfather Part II (1974)
20. Apocalypse Now (1979)
21. Being There (1979)
22. China Town (1974)
23. Nashville (1975)
24. Back to the Future (1985)
25. Millers Crossing (1990)
26. Unforgiving (1992)
27. Fargo (1996)
28. Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942)
29. American Beauty (1999)
30. On Golden Pond (1981)
31. Bringing Up Baby (1938)
32. Twelve Angry Men (1957)
33. A Place in the Sun (1951)
34. Grand Hotel (1932)
35. The Gold Rush (1925)
36. The Best Years of Our Lives (1946)
37. The Manchurian Candidate (1962)
38. Network (1976)
39. Driving Ms. Daisy (1989)
40. Vertigo (1958)
41. The Elephant Man (1980)
42. Blue Velvet (1986)
43. Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)
44. All Quite on the Western Front (1930)
45. A Face in the Crowd (1957)
46. Bridge on the River Kwai (1957)
47. Ryan’s Daughter (1970)
48. Rear Window (1954)
49. Doctor Zhivago (1965)
50. Double Indemnity (1944)
51. It Happened One Night (1934)
52. The Night of the Iguana (1964)
53. High Noon (1952)
54. Annie Hall (1977)
55. The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948)
56. The Maltese Falcon (1941)
57. Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939)
58. Gone With The Wind (1939)
59. E.T. - The Extra-Terrestrial (1982)
60. 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)
61. The Grapes of Wrath (1940)
62. Psycho (1960)
63. In the Heat of the Night (1967)
64. The Shawshank Redemption (1994)
65. A.I. Artificial Intelligence (2001)
66. Forrest Gump (1994)
67. Nixon (1994)
68. The Great Dictator (1940)
69. Sullivan’s Travels (1941)
70. The African Queen (1951)
71. Harvey (1950)
72. Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969)
73. North By Northwest (1959)
74. Rocky (1976)
75. Schindlers List (1993)
76. L. A. Confidential (1997)
77. The Great Escape (1963)
78. Touch of Evil (1958)
79. Once Upon A Time in America (1984)
80. Gandhi (1982)
81. Witness for the Prosecution (1957)
82. Ed Wood (1994)
83. A Christmas Story (1983)
84. Mystic River (2003)
85. Anatomy of a Murder (1959)
86. Sgt. York (1941)
87. His Girl Friday (1940)
88. Sabrina (1954)
89. The Train (1965)
90. Angels With Dirty Faces (1938)
91. Advise and Consent (1962)
92. The Heiress (1949)
93. Inherit The Wind (1960)
94. Laura (1944)
95. San Francisco (1936)
96. Scent of a Women (1992)
97. The Verdict (1982)
98. Pieces of April (2003)
99. The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962)
100. Mutiny on the Bounty (1935)
1. The Crowd (1928)
2. City Lights (1931)
3. Duck Soup (1933)
4. A Night at the Opera (1936)
5. Citizen Kane (1941)
6. The Lady Eve (1941)
7. Shadow of a Doubt (1943)
8. It’s a Wonderful Life (1946)
9. Sunset Blvd. (1950)
10. Singing in the Rain (1952)
11. Giant (1956)
12. The Searchers (1956)
13. The Apartment (1960)
14. Lawrence of Arabia (1962)
15. To Kill A Mockingbird (1962)
16. DR. STRANGELOVE, or HOW I LEARNED TO STOP WORRYINGAND LOVE THE BOMB
17. Patton (1970)
18. The Godfather (1972)
19. The Godfather Part II (1974)
20. Apocalypse Now (1979)
21. Being There (1979)
22. China Town (1974)
23. Nashville (1975)
24. Back to the Future (1985)
25. Millers Crossing (1990)
26. Unforgiving (1992)
27. Fargo (1996)
28. Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942)
29. American Beauty (1999)
30. On Golden Pond (1981)
31. Bringing Up Baby (1938)
32. Twelve Angry Men (1957)
33. A Place in the Sun (1951)
34. Grand Hotel (1932)
35. The Gold Rush (1925)
36. The Best Years of Our Lives (1946)
37. The Manchurian Candidate (1962)
38. Network (1976)
39. Driving Ms. Daisy (1989)
40. Vertigo (1958)
41. The Elephant Man (1980)
42. Blue Velvet (1986)
43. Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)
44. All Quite on the Western Front (1930)
45. A Face in the Crowd (1957)
46. Bridge on the River Kwai (1957)
47. Ryan’s Daughter (1970)
48. Rear Window (1954)
49. Doctor Zhivago (1965)
50. Double Indemnity (1944)
51. It Happened One Night (1934)
52. The Night of the Iguana (1964)
53. High Noon (1952)
54. Annie Hall (1977)
55. The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948)
56. The Maltese Falcon (1941)
57. Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939)
58. Gone With The Wind (1939)
59. E.T. - The Extra-Terrestrial (1982)
60. 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)
61. The Grapes of Wrath (1940)
62. Psycho (1960)
63. In the Heat of the Night (1967)
64. The Shawshank Redemption (1994)
65. A.I. Artificial Intelligence (2001)
66. Forrest Gump (1994)
67. Nixon (1994)
68. The Great Dictator (1940)
69. Sullivan’s Travels (1941)
70. The African Queen (1951)
71. Harvey (1950)
72. Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969)
73. North By Northwest (1959)
74. Rocky (1976)
75. Schindlers List (1993)
76. L. A. Confidential (1997)
77. The Great Escape (1963)
78. Touch of Evil (1958)
79. Once Upon A Time in America (1984)
80. Gandhi (1982)
81. Witness for the Prosecution (1957)
82. Ed Wood (1994)
83. A Christmas Story (1983)
84. Mystic River (2003)
85. Anatomy of a Murder (1959)
86. Sgt. York (1941)
87. His Girl Friday (1940)
88. Sabrina (1954)
89. The Train (1965)
90. Angels With Dirty Faces (1938)
91. Advise and Consent (1962)
92. The Heiress (1949)
93. Inherit The Wind (1960)
94. Laura (1944)
95. San Francisco (1936)
96. Scent of a Women (1992)
97. The Verdict (1982)
98. Pieces of April (2003)
99. The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962)
100. Mutiny on the Bounty (1935)
Sunday, July 8, 2007
The Dick Cavett Show: Comic Legends
Four disks of the affable Mr. Cavetts television talk show, which ran from 1969-1974. This set of course concentrates on comic performers including 90-minute (minus comerical time) solo episodes with the likes of Bob Hope, Jerry Lewis, Carol Burnett, and Lucile Ball.
Saturday, July 7, 2007
He Loves Me, He Loves Me Not (2002)
(Bordeaux, France; contemporary)
IMDb
In reviewing this film I am faced with a challenge perhaps even greater then my recent review for Sicko. With Sicko the problem was not necessarily wanting to go 'on the record' about certain things, as well as feeling inadequate to communicate the points the movie made in a satisfactory manner. With He Loves Me, He Loves Me Not, I fear the prospect of giving to much away, because it was exactly the unexpectedness of the movie that made it so amazing. Suffice it to say one could write a rich and in depth analysis of this film, a masterpiece of construction and casting, which could offer the quite fulfilling prospect of reconnecting with the essence of the film again, or of at least trying to. However this would be only enjoyable for those who have seen and appreciated this work, while it would be unfair to those who have not. So if you trust me as a reviewer, rent this thing and see at what I mean. Not telling you anything about this picture is the best I can do for you, as one who is crazily in love with it (and by extension, Audrey Tautou).
IMDb
In reviewing this film I am faced with a challenge perhaps even greater then my recent review for Sicko. With Sicko the problem was not necessarily wanting to go 'on the record' about certain things, as well as feeling inadequate to communicate the points the movie made in a satisfactory manner. With He Loves Me, He Loves Me Not, I fear the prospect of giving to much away, because it was exactly the unexpectedness of the movie that made it so amazing. Suffice it to say one could write a rich and in depth analysis of this film, a masterpiece of construction and casting, which could offer the quite fulfilling prospect of reconnecting with the essence of the film again, or of at least trying to. However this would be only enjoyable for those who have seen and appreciated this work, while it would be unfair to those who have not. So if you trust me as a reviewer, rent this thing and see at what I mean. Not telling you anything about this picture is the best I can do for you, as one who is crazily in love with it (and by extension, Audrey Tautou).
Friday, July 6, 2007
Bobby (2006)
4/27/07
Movie: Bobby (2006)
Setting: Ambassador Hotel, Los Angels California; June 4th & 5th 1968.
Bobby will probably be remembered for assembling one of the most impressive casts this decade, in fact it harkens back to the tradition of the all-star drama, such as Grand Hotel which the movie actually references by name. It is a series of vignettes so varied that none will suffice as an example to represent the others, okay maybe the Freddy Rodriguez, Laurence Fishburn one, I really liked the Freddy Rodriguez, Laurence Fishburn one. While pretentious in concept, and overly idolatrous of its title character, the film still manages to be effecting despite an overly long denouncement. Emilio Estevez's mustache deserves to be pointed out for its hideousness. Good period atmosphere goes without question.
Addendum: At last, finished with the transcription.
Movie: Bobby (2006)
Setting: Ambassador Hotel, Los Angels California; June 4th & 5th 1968.
Bobby will probably be remembered for assembling one of the most impressive casts this decade, in fact it harkens back to the tradition of the all-star drama, such as Grand Hotel which the movie actually references by name. It is a series of vignettes so varied that none will suffice as an example to represent the others, okay maybe the Freddy Rodriguez, Laurence Fishburn one, I really liked the Freddy Rodriguez, Laurence Fishburn one. While pretentious in concept, and overly idolatrous of its title character, the film still manages to be effecting despite an overly long denouncement. Emilio Estevez's mustache deserves to be pointed out for its hideousness. Good period atmosphere goes without question.
Addendum: At last, finished with the transcription.
Hatari (1962)
4/26/07
Movie: Hatari (1962)
Setting: 'East Africa', probably Kenya; contemporary
Hatari is Swahili for danger. Howard Hawks directed adventure film is mixture of lite comedy and wildlife scenes. John Wayne is the leader of a multi-ethnic group who capture animals for zoo's and circuses, Elsa Martinelli is the Italian photographer who intrudes on their men's club existence. Red Buttons somehow wins the only other girl in the picture (Michele Girandon). The movie is often slow and repetitive, but fun enough to make good video wall-paper. Henri Mancini's 'Baby Elephant Walk' was introduced in this picture.
Movie: Hatari (1962)
Setting: 'East Africa', probably Kenya; contemporary
Hatari is Swahili for danger. Howard Hawks directed adventure film is mixture of lite comedy and wildlife scenes. John Wayne is the leader of a multi-ethnic group who capture animals for zoo's and circuses, Elsa Martinelli is the Italian photographer who intrudes on their men's club existence. Red Buttons somehow wins the only other girl in the picture (Michele Girandon). The movie is often slow and repetitive, but fun enough to make good video wall-paper. Henri Mancini's 'Baby Elephant Walk' was introduced in this picture.
Walk on the Wild Side (1962)
4/26/07
Movie: Walk on the Wild Side (1962)
Setting: Texas, New Orleans; early 1930's.
A conservative Texan (Laurence Harvey) goes looking for his lost love (Capucine) only to find her working in a whore house. Melodramatic story never really brought me in, despite some good character parts for Anne Baxter (as a Latina) and Jane Fonda (as a teen aged temptress). Barbara Stanwyck plays the house madam. The best thing about this movie is its much remarked upon opening title sequence.
Movie: Walk on the Wild Side (1962)
Setting: Texas, New Orleans; early 1930's.
A conservative Texan (Laurence Harvey) goes looking for his lost love (Capucine) only to find her working in a whore house. Melodramatic story never really brought me in, despite some good character parts for Anne Baxter (as a Latina) and Jane Fonda (as a teen aged temptress). Barbara Stanwyck plays the house madam. The best thing about this movie is its much remarked upon opening title sequence.
I Am A Fugitive From a Chain Gang (1932)
4/23/07
Movie: I Am A Fugitive From a Chain Gang (1932)
Setting: New Jersey, Boston, New Orleans, Wisconsin, St. Louis, Kentucky, Chicago; 1919-193?
Famed story of a man wrongly sentenced to ten years on a chain gang, his escape, subsequent reinvention of himself as a successful Chicago area engineer, and later re-imprisonment by the state of Kentucky. Movie makes you angry at perverted hick justice. Paul Muni stars. Based on a true story.
Other films featuring Southern Chain Gangs: Sullivan's Travels, The Man Who Broke A Thousand Chains (same story), Oh, Brother Where Art Thou.
Movie: I Am A Fugitive From a Chain Gang (1932)
Setting: New Jersey, Boston, New Orleans, Wisconsin, St. Louis, Kentucky, Chicago; 1919-193?
Famed story of a man wrongly sentenced to ten years on a chain gang, his escape, subsequent reinvention of himself as a successful Chicago area engineer, and later re-imprisonment by the state of Kentucky. Movie makes you angry at perverted hick justice. Paul Muni stars. Based on a true story.
Other films featuring Southern Chain Gangs: Sullivan's Travels, The Man Who Broke A Thousand Chains (same story), Oh, Brother Where Art Thou.
Hamsun (1996)
4/22/07
Movie: Hamsun (1996)
Setting: Norway, Germany, Austria; 1935-1952
Powerful bio-pic of Nobel Prize winning poet Knut Hamsun (1859-1952), his rocky relationship with his wife, and the consequences of his largely ignorant embrace of the Nazi cause. Max von Sydow is amazing as Hamsun, a stubborn cranky old man, a misguided patriot whose embrace of the Germans was rooted more in a historic resentment of British arrogance, then a support for National Socialist ideology (referring to Hitler: "I don't understand his anti-sematism."). Ghita Norby is equally excellent as Hamsun's wife Marie, who simultaneously resents her husband for not supporting her own writing, and costing her a career on the stage, while struggeling even after he disowned her to clear his name. These characters, no these people, are rich and deep, and imposable to sum up in any superficial manner. You never fully understand why Knut continued to support Hitler, even after it became clear to him in a personal interview with the man, that he had no intention of ever giving Norway back its true independence. However you must admire his insistence that he pay for his mistakes there after, going so far as to hire a lawyer to sue for the right of trail. There was even an attempted to have him declared insane to save the nation the embarrassment of having a national hero stand trial for treason. In the end Hamsun had his trial, but being that he was in his late 80's was given only a hefty fine rather then prison time. Anyway this was a quite and effecting movie, and Leonard Maltin was correct in writing that it should be more widely known then it it.
Movie: Hamsun (1996)
Setting: Norway, Germany, Austria; 1935-1952
Powerful bio-pic of Nobel Prize winning poet Knut Hamsun (1859-1952), his rocky relationship with his wife, and the consequences of his largely ignorant embrace of the Nazi cause. Max von Sydow is amazing as Hamsun, a stubborn cranky old man, a misguided patriot whose embrace of the Germans was rooted more in a historic resentment of British arrogance, then a support for National Socialist ideology (referring to Hitler: "I don't understand his anti-sematism."). Ghita Norby is equally excellent as Hamsun's wife Marie, who simultaneously resents her husband for not supporting her own writing, and costing her a career on the stage, while struggeling even after he disowned her to clear his name. These characters, no these people, are rich and deep, and imposable to sum up in any superficial manner. You never fully understand why Knut continued to support Hitler, even after it became clear to him in a personal interview with the man, that he had no intention of ever giving Norway back its true independence. However you must admire his insistence that he pay for his mistakes there after, going so far as to hire a lawyer to sue for the right of trail. There was even an attempted to have him declared insane to save the nation the embarrassment of having a national hero stand trial for treason. In the end Hamsun had his trial, but being that he was in his late 80's was given only a hefty fine rather then prison time. Anyway this was a quite and effecting movie, and Leonard Maltin was correct in writing that it should be more widely known then it it.
Curious George (2006)
4/22/07
Movie: Curious George (2006)
Setting: New York?, Africa; contemporary
Pleasant but unremarkable kiddie feature taken from the books by Margret & H.A. Ray. Glossy animation style and Jack Johnson soundtrack more memorable then stock plot about saving a museum. Fun casting of Dick Van Dyke as museum head. Ed O'Ross gets to voice another Russian. Current PBS series, and even the minimally animated shorts I watched as a kid, are better then this.
Movie: Curious George (2006)
Setting: New York?, Africa; contemporary
Pleasant but unremarkable kiddie feature taken from the books by Margret & H.A. Ray. Glossy animation style and Jack Johnson soundtrack more memorable then stock plot about saving a museum. Fun casting of Dick Van Dyke as museum head. Ed O'Ross gets to voice another Russian. Current PBS series, and even the minimally animated shorts I watched as a kid, are better then this.
Grindhouse (2007)
4/19/07
In Review: Grindhouse (2007)
I decided that I wanted to see Grindhouse for two reasons (after initially not knowing what to make of the poster). First off, I like to support creative efforts to expose a mass audience to forgotten or perhaps dis reputed sub-genera's of film, and Sergio Leoni and the Infield Fly Rule got me excited about exploring this type of filmmaking. Secondly, I wanted to see Rose McGowen with a machine gun strapped to her partly amputated leg blasting zombie solders lead by Bruce Willis. In addition to all this you get some fun send up trailers, Machete, Werewolf Women of the S.S., Don't, and clever plays on genera conventions such as reuse of many of the same performers, and a recurring gage of reels gone missing at convenient points in the story line (i.e., sex scenes). But Grindhouse isn't really one film, it's two and I'd like to discuss each of them briefly:
Movie: Planet Terror (2007)
Setting: Rural Texas, Mexico; contemporary
The overarching plot device of Planet Terror is that of a zombie movie. In this case the zombie faction is accomplished by way of a gas, a biological weapon developed by a scientist/illicit business man with a decidedly nasty hang up about taking a certain male body part as a trophy from his enemies. Anyway this gas is captured and released by a group of wronged military men, as part of roundabout effort to find a cure for the effects it had on them when exposed in Afghanistan. This however is just the gimmick of the story, the story itself is actually a number of stories, the primary one being that of former lovers Rose McGown (a Go-Go Dancer), and the wonderful Freddy Rodriguez (a wreckage hauler with a secret past). These two reunite as they attempt to save them selves and a handful of apparently immune survivors (who the solders I guess want to use to find a cure) from the bloated, boil covered cannibals. Another notable plot concerns Marley Shelton (who is not Anna Faris), a doctor trying to run away with her lesbian lover from her sadistic doctor husband, played by Josh Brolin who gives one of the movies most intriguing performances in only about a dozen minutes of screen time. While this film is suppose to look like B grade type stuff, it is a finely done homage that pays off on every little thing it introduces. The better of the two films.
Movie: Death Proof (2007)
Setting: Austin Texas, rural Tennessee; contemporary
The second feature itself is like two movies in one, the first half being slow, atmospheric and talkie, the second being less slow, but also talkie, and containing two really cool extended car battles, which is what you'll end up remembering most about it. Kurt Russell is just hands down great as the at first seemingly charming yet ultimately disaffected former Stuntman Mike ("I was Robert Urich's driving double on the third season of Vega$, then Bob did another show called Gavilan and he took me with him"). The first sequence in which Mike stalks and kills a group of young women, anchored by the strangely appealing Vanessa Ferlito, becomes almost hypnotic in its slow passed living-in-the-movie sensibilities. The group stalked in the second part of the movie, headed by Rosario Dawson, is less appealing; however they do get into some really wild games of chicken with Russell, who provides the topper to the movie by showing his demented crazy man to be in fact a complete and total cry-baby (delicious scene in which he attempts to tend to a gunshot wound in his car). While this does in fact constitute my first Tarantino flick, I am aware of his propensity to certain degree of self-indulgence, which is on display here (he even casts himself in bit roles in both films, as a bar owner in Proof, and an infected solder in Terror), however when the very concept of your double feature is self indulgence, I say go for it. In the end Grindhouse is event viewing, the type of which where unlikely to see again soon given its lack-luster box office performance thus far. It's sure to be a cult hit though.
Factoid: Marley Shelton's character of Doctor Dakota Block is one of several to appear in both movies.
In Review: Grindhouse (2007)
I decided that I wanted to see Grindhouse for two reasons (after initially not knowing what to make of the poster). First off, I like to support creative efforts to expose a mass audience to forgotten or perhaps dis reputed sub-genera's of film, and Sergio Leoni and the Infield Fly Rule got me excited about exploring this type of filmmaking. Secondly, I wanted to see Rose McGowen with a machine gun strapped to her partly amputated leg blasting zombie solders lead by Bruce Willis. In addition to all this you get some fun send up trailers, Machete, Werewolf Women of the S.S., Don't, and clever plays on genera conventions such as reuse of many of the same performers, and a recurring gage of reels gone missing at convenient points in the story line (i.e., sex scenes). But Grindhouse isn't really one film, it's two and I'd like to discuss each of them briefly:
Movie: Planet Terror (2007)
Setting: Rural Texas, Mexico; contemporary
The overarching plot device of Planet Terror is that of a zombie movie. In this case the zombie faction is accomplished by way of a gas, a biological weapon developed by a scientist/illicit business man with a decidedly nasty hang up about taking a certain male body part as a trophy from his enemies. Anyway this gas is captured and released by a group of wronged military men, as part of roundabout effort to find a cure for the effects it had on them when exposed in Afghanistan. This however is just the gimmick of the story, the story itself is actually a number of stories, the primary one being that of former lovers Rose McGown (a Go-Go Dancer), and the wonderful Freddy Rodriguez (a wreckage hauler with a secret past). These two reunite as they attempt to save them selves and a handful of apparently immune survivors (who the solders I guess want to use to find a cure) from the bloated, boil covered cannibals. Another notable plot concerns Marley Shelton (who is not Anna Faris), a doctor trying to run away with her lesbian lover from her sadistic doctor husband, played by Josh Brolin who gives one of the movies most intriguing performances in only about a dozen minutes of screen time. While this film is suppose to look like B grade type stuff, it is a finely done homage that pays off on every little thing it introduces. The better of the two films.
Movie: Death Proof (2007)
Setting: Austin Texas, rural Tennessee; contemporary
The second feature itself is like two movies in one, the first half being slow, atmospheric and talkie, the second being less slow, but also talkie, and containing two really cool extended car battles, which is what you'll end up remembering most about it. Kurt Russell is just hands down great as the at first seemingly charming yet ultimately disaffected former Stuntman Mike ("I was Robert Urich's driving double on the third season of Vega$, then Bob did another show called Gavilan and he took me with him"). The first sequence in which Mike stalks and kills a group of young women, anchored by the strangely appealing Vanessa Ferlito, becomes almost hypnotic in its slow passed living-in-the-movie sensibilities. The group stalked in the second part of the movie, headed by Rosario Dawson, is less appealing; however they do get into some really wild games of chicken with Russell, who provides the topper to the movie by showing his demented crazy man to be in fact a complete and total cry-baby (delicious scene in which he attempts to tend to a gunshot wound in his car). While this does in fact constitute my first Tarantino flick, I am aware of his propensity to certain degree of self-indulgence, which is on display here (he even casts himself in bit roles in both films, as a bar owner in Proof, and an infected solder in Terror), however when the very concept of your double feature is self indulgence, I say go for it. In the end Grindhouse is event viewing, the type of which where unlikely to see again soon given its lack-luster box office performance thus far. It's sure to be a cult hit though.
Factoid: Marley Shelton's character of Doctor Dakota Block is one of several to appear in both movies.
Monster House (2006)
4/19/07
Movie: Monster House (2006)
Setting: unspecified suburban; possibly early to middle 90's judging by circumstantial evidence.
I watch parts of a lot of kids movies with my nephew, but seldom do we make it through an entire feature. Monster House is one such exception. This was just fun, in fact I'd say it was the funnest CG animated movie I've seen since Over the Hedge. Simple story about a group of kids who come to believe that a house in there neighbourhood is possessed by an evil spirit, which turns out to be Kathleen Turner's spirit, the late wife of old man Nebbercracker Steve Buscemi (only in animation would those two get paired up). Anyway its old school animated, coming of age fun, with a surprisingly dark yet empathetic back story. Appropriate bit part for Jon Heder. Also Maggie Gyllenhaal was the babysitter, it took me a while but I knew I knew that voice.
Movie: Monster House (2006)
Setting: unspecified suburban; possibly early to middle 90's judging by circumstantial evidence.
I watch parts of a lot of kids movies with my nephew, but seldom do we make it through an entire feature. Monster House is one such exception. This was just fun, in fact I'd say it was the funnest CG animated movie I've seen since Over the Hedge. Simple story about a group of kids who come to believe that a house in there neighbourhood is possessed by an evil spirit, which turns out to be Kathleen Turner's spirit, the late wife of old man Nebbercracker Steve Buscemi (only in animation would those two get paired up). Anyway its old school animated, coming of age fun, with a surprisingly dark yet empathetic back story. Appropriate bit part for Jon Heder. Also Maggie Gyllenhaal was the babysitter, it took me a while but I knew I knew that voice.
The Last Mogul: The Life and Times of Lew Wasserman (2005)
4/18/07
Movie: The Last Mogul: The Life and Times of Lew Wasserman (2005)
Documentary probing the life of Lew Wasserman (1913-2002), super-agent, studio head, and financel force behind presidents from Kennedy to Clinton. One of the more interesting aspects of Wasserman's life was his association with Ronald Reagan, one of his very first clients whom he helped segway into his leadership position in the SAG, and whose later political ambition he extensively underwrote. The movie makes the point that Wasserman and Reagan broke many industry rules in the early 50's when transitioning from film to television dominance (at one point Wasserman's company's produced 60% of the programs on network television), but in so doing enabled both Lew to outlast the other moguls, and (quite likely) Reagan's eventual presidency. Lew's story is especially interesting to hear given his ironic media shyness and failure to leave any substantive writings behind, however the documentary itself is unremarkable save for getting Jimmy Carter to be one of it's talking heads.
Movie: The Last Mogul: The Life and Times of Lew Wasserman (2005)
Documentary probing the life of Lew Wasserman (1913-2002), super-agent, studio head, and financel force behind presidents from Kennedy to Clinton. One of the more interesting aspects of Wasserman's life was his association with Ronald Reagan, one of his very first clients whom he helped segway into his leadership position in the SAG, and whose later political ambition he extensively underwrote. The movie makes the point that Wasserman and Reagan broke many industry rules in the early 50's when transitioning from film to television dominance (at one point Wasserman's company's produced 60% of the programs on network television), but in so doing enabled both Lew to outlast the other moguls, and (quite likely) Reagan's eventual presidency. Lew's story is especially interesting to hear given his ironic media shyness and failure to leave any substantive writings behind, however the documentary itself is unremarkable save for getting Jimmy Carter to be one of it's talking heads.
Grandma's Boy (1922)
4/18/07
Movie: Grandma's Boy (1922)
Setting: unspecified semi-rural, possibly the South (Dabney county); contemporary
Harold Lloyd's first feature length comedy has no great standout gages, yet is generally amusing and representative of his work as a whole. Harold here is his trademark 'glasses character', a 19 year old attempting to woe Mildred Davis. However Lloyd has a competitor in his efforts, a bully played by Charles Stevenson who consistently gets the upper hand, that is until our hero's grandma (Anna Townsen) presents him with a "magic" charm that supposedly helped her late husband become a Civil War Hero (this is depicted in a sort of flashback sequence, with Lloyd playing his own grandfather). In the end LLoyd must capture a feared local vagrant 'the Rolling Stone' (Dick Sutherland) and defeat Charles Stevenson to get the girl. The result, a decent hours worth of entertainment.
Must See: Harold Lloyd's 1923 opus Safety Last, regarded by many as his greatest film, it features his famed free-climbing race up an office tower.
Movie: Grandma's Boy (1922)
Setting: unspecified semi-rural, possibly the South (Dabney county); contemporary
Harold Lloyd's first feature length comedy has no great standout gages, yet is generally amusing and representative of his work as a whole. Harold here is his trademark 'glasses character', a 19 year old attempting to woe Mildred Davis. However Lloyd has a competitor in his efforts, a bully played by Charles Stevenson who consistently gets the upper hand, that is until our hero's grandma (Anna Townsen) presents him with a "magic" charm that supposedly helped her late husband become a Civil War Hero (this is depicted in a sort of flashback sequence, with Lloyd playing his own grandfather). In the end LLoyd must capture a feared local vagrant 'the Rolling Stone' (Dick Sutherland) and defeat Charles Stevenson to get the girl. The result, a decent hours worth of entertainment.
Must See: Harold Lloyd's 1923 opus Safety Last, regarded by many as his greatest film, it features his famed free-climbing race up an office tower.
Coffy (1973), Foxy Brown (1974)
4/16/07
Movies: Coffy (1973), Foxy Brown (1974)
Setting: Unspecified, southern California?; contemporary
She is the Queen of blackspoltation, a living legend for an ill reputed genera. Though probably best known to current audiences for her role on The L Word, the cultural presence of Pam Grier's 70's work is still very much alive, as witness Beyonce's embodiment of her in Goldmember. As I try to brace myself for a possible viewing of the 70's cult film homage Grindhouse, I thought I'd take a look (courtesy TCM late nights), at some actual examples of the periods sensationalized and exploitive fair, and one of its most well known performers.
There is a definite formula, or perhaps its just a shared world view between these two films. While they entertain with flash, and a gory over the top violence, they also capture something of the African American zeitgeist of there era. Black has become beautiful, and there's a definite racial pride and sense of superior hipness here, but recognition of a collective situation that is far from ideal is also apparent. The destructive powers of drugs and prostitution are simultaneously condemned and exploited, but hey there's a reason these are called exploitation films. I find it interesting that both films posit an exploitation of poor blacks by rackets controlled by rich and powerful whites, aided by corrupt cops (mostly raciest), and pushed retail by turn coat members of the black community. This no doubt rang true to the films intended audiences then, and in good part still rings true to white bread Mormon me 35 years later. Ethnically these rackets my now be more spread out, and I remain (perhaps in my white denial) ambiguous about the extent of a corrupt government presence therein, but the institutional racism can not be denied, the black community still pays an unproportionit share of the price for this system.
Now that I've hit on the social implications, I'll write briefly on these works as films. I know there suppose to be a kind of schlock now, and were kinky and low-brow even at the time of there release, but I must admit I kinda liked 'em (more so Coffy). I just enjoyed seeing Pam Grier get revenge on those who wronged her. In the first film its about avenging her little sister, who had been forced into an institution to recover from the effects of the drugs that ratfink thugs had pushed on her eleven year old self. In Foxy Brown, she's out to avenge her boyfriend, a sort of DEA agent who was gunned down by those he had investigated, after her brother sold him out. Actually both films feature an upstanding young black man and Grier love interest being killed or horribly maimed early on. In both movies Pam quickly decides she needs to go undercover as a call-girl, and we get to see her turn on a surprised client, as well as get involved in a brawl with a bunch of other women (at a party in Coffy, at a Lesbian bar in Foxy). Yes it sex and violence, but its also social justice (vigilantly social justice), so you get to finish the movie feeling okay about yourself. I can see what Tarentino sees in these films. Finally Kathryn Lodars madam comes across as Carolyn Jones meets Joan Collins by way of Annette Bening.
Movies: Coffy (1973), Foxy Brown (1974)
Setting: Unspecified, southern California?; contemporary
She is the Queen of blackspoltation, a living legend for an ill reputed genera. Though probably best known to current audiences for her role on The L Word, the cultural presence of Pam Grier's 70's work is still very much alive, as witness Beyonce's embodiment of her in Goldmember. As I try to brace myself for a possible viewing of the 70's cult film homage Grindhouse, I thought I'd take a look (courtesy TCM late nights), at some actual examples of the periods sensationalized and exploitive fair, and one of its most well known performers.
There is a definite formula, or perhaps its just a shared world view between these two films. While they entertain with flash, and a gory over the top violence, they also capture something of the African American zeitgeist of there era. Black has become beautiful, and there's a definite racial pride and sense of superior hipness here, but recognition of a collective situation that is far from ideal is also apparent. The destructive powers of drugs and prostitution are simultaneously condemned and exploited, but hey there's a reason these are called exploitation films. I find it interesting that both films posit an exploitation of poor blacks by rackets controlled by rich and powerful whites, aided by corrupt cops (mostly raciest), and pushed retail by turn coat members of the black community. This no doubt rang true to the films intended audiences then, and in good part still rings true to white bread Mormon me 35 years later. Ethnically these rackets my now be more spread out, and I remain (perhaps in my white denial) ambiguous about the extent of a corrupt government presence therein, but the institutional racism can not be denied, the black community still pays an unproportionit share of the price for this system.
Now that I've hit on the social implications, I'll write briefly on these works as films. I know there suppose to be a kind of schlock now, and were kinky and low-brow even at the time of there release, but I must admit I kinda liked 'em (more so Coffy). I just enjoyed seeing Pam Grier get revenge on those who wronged her. In the first film its about avenging her little sister, who had been forced into an institution to recover from the effects of the drugs that ratfink thugs had pushed on her eleven year old self. In Foxy Brown, she's out to avenge her boyfriend, a sort of DEA agent who was gunned down by those he had investigated, after her brother sold him out. Actually both films feature an upstanding young black man and Grier love interest being killed or horribly maimed early on. In both movies Pam quickly decides she needs to go undercover as a call-girl, and we get to see her turn on a surprised client, as well as get involved in a brawl with a bunch of other women (at a party in Coffy, at a Lesbian bar in Foxy). Yes it sex and violence, but its also social justice (vigilantly social justice), so you get to finish the movie feeling okay about yourself. I can see what Tarentino sees in these films. Finally Kathryn Lodars madam comes across as Carolyn Jones meets Joan Collins by way of Annette Bening.
Rebel Without A Cause (1955)
4/15/07
Movie: Rebel Without A Cause (1955)
Setting: L.A.; contemporary
Iconic movie of teen angst and 50's juvenile delinquency. The kids are troubled but wise, the parents dysfunctional. Notable performances for Jim Backus and Sal Mineo. Also Natalie Wood was hot. There is much in this film to be analysed, but I think I'll pass on the amature sociology and psychology tonight. Let's just say this is one of the essentials, and you should probably see it. Now that I've seen all three of James Deans staring films, I still like Giant (1956) the best.
Movie: Rebel Without A Cause (1955)
Setting: L.A.; contemporary
Iconic movie of teen angst and 50's juvenile delinquency. The kids are troubled but wise, the parents dysfunctional. Notable performances for Jim Backus and Sal Mineo. Also Natalie Wood was hot. There is much in this film to be analysed, but I think I'll pass on the amature sociology and psychology tonight. Let's just say this is one of the essentials, and you should probably see it. Now that I've seen all three of James Deans staring films, I still like Giant (1956) the best.
The Roaring Twenties (1939)
4/15/07
Movie: The Roaring Twenties (1939)
Setting: France, New York; 1918-Dec 31, 1933
It's amazing how quickly a decade can by mythologized. The full nostalgia treatment is given this Raoul Walsh directed love letter to the entire gangster genera. This is not to say that the movie has nothing new to offer, or that it isn't an accomplishment in it's own right, because it really is. Based on a story by Mark Hellinger, himself a rather well known crime reporter of that era, we have here one of the more well developed, near Shakespearean efforts offered in this particular type of film pre-Martin Scorsese. We have the three great movie types in the good and principled young lawyer Lloyd Hart (Jeffrey Lynn), the bad and subtly sadistic George Hully (Humphrey Bogart), and the conflicted Eddie Bartlett (as essayed by James Cagney). All three characters meet up in France during their service in the first world war, only Bartlett has the toughest time getting on upon his return home. While Lloyd has his law practice, and George slips into the vague recesses that lead to organized crime, Eddie tries desperately to get work in an economy already overrun with returning G.I.'s.
Eddie's descent is tragic and identifiable because he is the everyman character here, he's on the whole a good an honest guy, but he's frustrated by a run of bad luck and a desire for the good things in life. A cabbie, he is wrongly convicted of running liquor during prohibition, only to get into actual bootlegging after his release, a release facilitated by speak easy madam "Panama" Smith (Gladys George), who has the hots for Eddie. Eddie however is taken by young Jean Sherman (Priscilla Lane, who I'm sorry but she's not a great singer), who as a high schooler wrote Eddie during the war, and who he runs into again by accident (having meet her once briefly upon his return from the war, only to be disappointed upon learning how young she was) while collecting late liquor money from the producer of a theatrical show. Jean however is an innocent, even as she so easily seems to accept the criminal lifestyle of her one time "dream solder". But in the end she falls for straight arrow lawyer Lloyd, who had tried in vain to set poor Eddie straight. Lurking again in the background of all this is clever George, just waiting to make his move.
This movie quickly grew on me upon reflection, though I actually only finished it several hours ago. It didn't strike the emotional gut, lest not mine, but it was so well executed that I'm appreciative. Don't make this your first Cagney gangster picture, but rather save it for a sort of epilogue after you've finished both his early entry's in the genera, and his valedictory White Heat (1949). Like the sense of nostalgia it was designed to solicit, this feature brought back many a memory of the great mobster films of Jimmy Cagney.
Note: DVD contains (among other things) a decidedly unfeminist short called The Girls Takeover, in which acting mayor June Allyson sings "We've Got to Make the City Pretty", and somehow sells it.
Movie: The Roaring Twenties (1939)
Setting: France, New York; 1918-Dec 31, 1933
It's amazing how quickly a decade can by mythologized. The full nostalgia treatment is given this Raoul Walsh directed love letter to the entire gangster genera. This is not to say that the movie has nothing new to offer, or that it isn't an accomplishment in it's own right, because it really is. Based on a story by Mark Hellinger, himself a rather well known crime reporter of that era, we have here one of the more well developed, near Shakespearean efforts offered in this particular type of film pre-Martin Scorsese. We have the three great movie types in the good and principled young lawyer Lloyd Hart (Jeffrey Lynn), the bad and subtly sadistic George Hully (Humphrey Bogart), and the conflicted Eddie Bartlett (as essayed by James Cagney). All three characters meet up in France during their service in the first world war, only Bartlett has the toughest time getting on upon his return home. While Lloyd has his law practice, and George slips into the vague recesses that lead to organized crime, Eddie tries desperately to get work in an economy already overrun with returning G.I.'s.
Eddie's descent is tragic and identifiable because he is the everyman character here, he's on the whole a good an honest guy, but he's frustrated by a run of bad luck and a desire for the good things in life. A cabbie, he is wrongly convicted of running liquor during prohibition, only to get into actual bootlegging after his release, a release facilitated by speak easy madam "Panama" Smith (Gladys George), who has the hots for Eddie. Eddie however is taken by young Jean Sherman (Priscilla Lane, who I'm sorry but she's not a great singer), who as a high schooler wrote Eddie during the war, and who he runs into again by accident (having meet her once briefly upon his return from the war, only to be disappointed upon learning how young she was) while collecting late liquor money from the producer of a theatrical show. Jean however is an innocent, even as she so easily seems to accept the criminal lifestyle of her one time "dream solder". But in the end she falls for straight arrow lawyer Lloyd, who had tried in vain to set poor Eddie straight. Lurking again in the background of all this is clever George, just waiting to make his move.
This movie quickly grew on me upon reflection, though I actually only finished it several hours ago. It didn't strike the emotional gut, lest not mine, but it was so well executed that I'm appreciative. Don't make this your first Cagney gangster picture, but rather save it for a sort of epilogue after you've finished both his early entry's in the genera, and his valedictory White Heat (1949). Like the sense of nostalgia it was designed to solicit, this feature brought back many a memory of the great mobster films of Jimmy Cagney.
Note: DVD contains (among other things) a decidedly unfeminist short called The Girls Takeover, in which acting mayor June Allyson sings "We've Got to Make the City Pretty", and somehow sells it.
The Ghost Breakers (1940)
4/14/07
Movie: The Ghost Breakers (1940)
Setting: New York, cruise ship, Cuba; contemporary
Re teaming of Bob Hope and Paulette Goddard in vehicle designed to mimic success of the previous years similarly themed The Cast and the Canary. The ridiculous plot involves Lawrence Lawrence (Hope) a New York City radio personality who specializes in underworld gossip, who thinking he killed a man (Anthony Quinn), finds refuge with young Mary Carter (Goddard), who herself has just inherited a supposedly haunted Cuban castle; told you it was ridicules. Hope is accompanied in all this by his valet Alex (Willie Best), who plays the kind of retrograde (and in this case comic) black stereotype that could cost Don Imus his job. Not much to this movie, but its likable, Hope gets to crack a lot of jokes and Goddard gets to look gorgeous. The creepiest thing in the movie are that the corpses of Mary's ancestors are kept in glass coffins on display in a room in the castle, I mean really, your just asking to gross-out your descendants when you make that kind of arrangement for your dead body.
Movie: The Ghost Breakers (1940)
Setting: New York, cruise ship, Cuba; contemporary
Re teaming of Bob Hope and Paulette Goddard in vehicle designed to mimic success of the previous years similarly themed The Cast and the Canary. The ridiculous plot involves Lawrence Lawrence (Hope) a New York City radio personality who specializes in underworld gossip, who thinking he killed a man (Anthony Quinn), finds refuge with young Mary Carter (Goddard), who herself has just inherited a supposedly haunted Cuban castle; told you it was ridicules. Hope is accompanied in all this by his valet Alex (Willie Best), who plays the kind of retrograde (and in this case comic) black stereotype that could cost Don Imus his job. Not much to this movie, but its likable, Hope gets to crack a lot of jokes and Goddard gets to look gorgeous. The creepiest thing in the movie are that the corpses of Mary's ancestors are kept in glass coffins on display in a room in the castle, I mean really, your just asking to gross-out your descendants when you make that kind of arrangement for your dead body.
Stingaree (1934)
4/12/07
Movie: Stingaree (1934)
Settling: Australia, locations throughout Europe; 1874-187?
Re teaming of Richard Dix and Irene Dunne, stars of the 1931 best picture Oscar winner Cimarron. Dix plays Stingaree (outback for 'the Stingray'), a dashing ozzie bandit who posses as a visiting London composer. Dunne is the servant girl whose singing career Dix helps launch. I would classify this film as part of the middle 30's operetta craze. Andy Devine provides comic relief as Stingaree's sidekick.
Movie: Stingaree (1934)
Settling: Australia, locations throughout Europe; 1874-187?
Re teaming of Richard Dix and Irene Dunne, stars of the 1931 best picture Oscar winner Cimarron. Dix plays Stingaree (outback for 'the Stingray'), a dashing ozzie bandit who posses as a visiting London composer. Dunne is the servant girl whose singing career Dix helps launch. I would classify this film as part of the middle 30's operetta craze. Andy Devine provides comic relief as Stingaree's sidekick.
A Man to Remember (1938)
4/11/07
Movie: A Man to Remember (1938)
Setting: 'Westport County'; 1919?-1938
More polished remake of One Man's Journey, departs from the original in many ways, but stays true to its sentiment. Interesting framing device having the story of Dr. Abbots life (Edward Ellis, who is great in this) told in flash backs inspired by old bills in his 'safety' box, as they are examined by his creditors after his death. This films association with blacklistie Dalton Trumbo, and its evident socialistic undertones, might explain why only existent copy was located in Holland. Budding romance between brother and adopted sister kind of creepy.
Movie: A Man to Remember (1938)
Setting: 'Westport County'; 1919?-1938
More polished remake of One Man's Journey, departs from the original in many ways, but stays true to its sentiment. Interesting framing device having the story of Dr. Abbots life (Edward Ellis, who is great in this) told in flash backs inspired by old bills in his 'safety' box, as they are examined by his creditors after his death. This films association with blacklistie Dalton Trumbo, and its evident socialistic undertones, might explain why only existent copy was located in Holland. Budding romance between brother and adopted sister kind of creepy.
Living on Love (1937)
4/11/07
TCM continued with its lost film series tonight, I will briefly review the two remakes presented, and will cover the original film (Stingaree) which I have taped but not yet watched, at a later time.
Movie: Living on Love (1937)
Setting: New York City (seemingly implied); contemporary
Remake of Rafter Romance changes some details (the apartment here is in the basement, not the attic), but maintains basically the same plot (man and women who share a room in shifts fall in love). Mixed bag compared to the original, though I'm starting to think this would make a good stage play. I would have liked to have seen it made once again in the late 40's with Alan Young and Priscilla Lane.
TCM continued with its lost film series tonight, I will briefly review the two remakes presented, and will cover the original film (Stingaree) which I have taped but not yet watched, at a later time.
Movie: Living on Love (1937)
Setting: New York City (seemingly implied); contemporary
Remake of Rafter Romance changes some details (the apartment here is in the basement, not the attic), but maintains basically the same plot (man and women who share a room in shifts fall in love). Mixed bag compared to the original, though I'm starting to think this would make a good stage play. I would have liked to have seen it made once again in the late 40's with Alan Young and Priscilla Lane.
The Next Voice You Hear (1950)
4/11/07
Setting: Los Angles, California; contemporary
Existential horror and redemption story has the voice of God emanating from the worlds radios. Plot concerns the reactions of the financely struggling Smith family(James Whitmore, Nancy Davis (Reagan), & Gary Gray) to this earth shattering event. I must complement the movie on what I would call a very realistic depiction of period family dynamics for a movie of the time, you see the vague resentments of the characters to their situations, yet their is a warmth there that mostly avoids sitcom saccharine.
Observation: In the 2003 TV movie The Reagan's, Ronald proposes to Nancy while she is making a movie that requires her to were a fake 'pregnancy bag'. Now she wears such a device in this movie, but its production is chronologically off from the date of the couples real-life marriage. In addition I thought I saw actor George Murphy's name on display on a 'directors chair' in the background, while Murphy was not in The Next Voice, he did play Reagan's dad in the 1943 musical This is the Army.
Setting: Los Angles, California; contemporary
Existential horror and redemption story has the voice of God emanating from the worlds radios. Plot concerns the reactions of the financely struggling Smith family(James Whitmore, Nancy Davis (Reagan), & Gary Gray) to this earth shattering event. I must complement the movie on what I would call a very realistic depiction of period family dynamics for a movie of the time, you see the vague resentments of the characters to their situations, yet their is a warmth there that mostly avoids sitcom saccharine.
Observation: In the 2003 TV movie The Reagan's, Ronald proposes to Nancy while she is making a movie that requires her to were a fake 'pregnancy bag'. Now she wears such a device in this movie, but its production is chronologically off from the date of the couples real-life marriage. In addition I thought I saw actor George Murphy's name on display on a 'directors chair' in the background, while Murphy was not in The Next Voice, he did play Reagan's dad in the 1943 musical This is the Army.
Deceived (1991)
4/8/07
Movie: Deceived (1991)
Setting: New York City; roughly contemporary the film covers about seven years.
This is a great example of strictly b-grade material made truly entertaining by two strong lead performances. Goldie Hawn is a New York City art restorer, John Heard (in what is probably his best performance ever) is her to good to be true husband. After Heard's character dies in an auto accident following an argument with Hawn, his widow starts to uncover things she never know about his past. Because of the title of the film, and the fact that the first scene is Goldie meeting John, you pretty well know where its all going from the start. However its fun, and maybe just a little over the top, reminds me of some of the crime programmers from the 40's. Good entertainment in a pinch.
See also: Laura (1944), The Women in the Window (1944), Murder 101 (1991).
Movie: Deceived (1991)
Setting: New York City; roughly contemporary the film covers about seven years.
This is a great example of strictly b-grade material made truly entertaining by two strong lead performances. Goldie Hawn is a New York City art restorer, John Heard (in what is probably his best performance ever) is her to good to be true husband. After Heard's character dies in an auto accident following an argument with Hawn, his widow starts to uncover things she never know about his past. Because of the title of the film, and the fact that the first scene is Goldie meeting John, you pretty well know where its all going from the start. However its fun, and maybe just a little over the top, reminds me of some of the crime programmers from the 40's. Good entertainment in a pinch.
See also: Laura (1944), The Women in the Window (1944), Murder 101 (1991).
Death of a President (2006)
4/5/07
Movie: Death of a President (2006)
Controversial fake documentary on the assassination of President George W. Bush, in Chicago on October 19th 2007. An intriguing concept this moderately well executed film is strongest when depicting the day of the assassination. I found I wanted a more fully developed sense of the world after such a definitive event then this movie gave me (espically in terms of what the public response would have been), but that may have well been beyond the scope intended and budget here available. That a Syrian was convicted on circumstantial evidence, while the father of a solder who died in Iraq was the more likely candidate to have committed the murder, seemed an overly easy narrative choice to me. Like last years CSA, I loved the concept of this mock-doc, but was perhaps inevitably disappointed by the finished product. Still I liked this movie.
Movie: Death of a President (2006)
Controversial fake documentary on the assassination of President George W. Bush, in Chicago on October 19th 2007. An intriguing concept this moderately well executed film is strongest when depicting the day of the assassination. I found I wanted a more fully developed sense of the world after such a definitive event then this movie gave me (espically in terms of what the public response would have been), but that may have well been beyond the scope intended and budget here available. That a Syrian was convicted on circumstantial evidence, while the father of a solder who died in Iraq was the more likely candidate to have committed the murder, seemed an overly easy narrative choice to me. Like last years CSA, I loved the concept of this mock-doc, but was perhaps inevitably disappointed by the finished product. Still I liked this movie.
The Great McGinty (1940)
4/5/07
Movie: The Great McGinty (1940)
Setting: Unspecified
Screenwriter Preston Struges first time behind the directors chair isn't the type of screwball comedy that would mark his five year Renaissance. In fact McGinty is more the sort of social consciousness picture that the director vicariously longed to make in Sullivan's Travels. Brian Donlevy is elevated from the bread lines to the governors mansion by way of an eastern European born political boss (Akim Tamiroff). A dishonest man all his life McGinty is inspired by his wife (Muriel Adams in her last screen performance, though she lived until 2004) to change his ways and really try to help people with his political power. However a bridge built on graft while he was serving as mayor comes back to haunt him. Jailed McGinty determines he simply can not risk a life in prison, and escapes with his former political boss to a Latin American country. This film starts out with a suicide attempt and somehow manages to leave off on an even lower emotional note, dispite some mostly unsuccessful comedy in between. Well at least Sturges got better, much better, and don't let this review turn you off from his work.
Factoid: Donlevy would play McGinty again in a cameo in the later Sturges comedy The Miracle of Morgans Creek, though technically this doesn't jive with the chronology of the earlier film.
Movie: The Great McGinty (1940)
Setting: Unspecified
Screenwriter Preston Struges first time behind the directors chair isn't the type of screwball comedy that would mark his five year Renaissance. In fact McGinty is more the sort of social consciousness picture that the director vicariously longed to make in Sullivan's Travels. Brian Donlevy is elevated from the bread lines to the governors mansion by way of an eastern European born political boss (Akim Tamiroff). A dishonest man all his life McGinty is inspired by his wife (Muriel Adams in her last screen performance, though she lived until 2004) to change his ways and really try to help people with his political power. However a bridge built on graft while he was serving as mayor comes back to haunt him. Jailed McGinty determines he simply can not risk a life in prison, and escapes with his former political boss to a Latin American country. This film starts out with a suicide attempt and somehow manages to leave off on an even lower emotional note, dispite some mostly unsuccessful comedy in between. Well at least Sturges got better, much better, and don't let this review turn you off from his work.
Factoid: Donlevy would play McGinty again in a cameo in the later Sturges comedy The Miracle of Morgans Creek, though technically this doesn't jive with the chronology of the earlier film.
One Mans Journey (1933)
4/4/07
One Man's Journey
The treasure among the films shown tonight. An earnest doctor movie staring Lionel Barrymore. He's raising his son as a single parent, he takes in the baby daughter of an ungratefull farmer after the man's wife dies, he fights Small Pox and Typhoid, and cares for poor country folk who don't entirely trust him, and all in the first half hour. Man anything Barrymore did in the 30's was just meant to pull at your heart strings. Oh, and God wastes no time punishing pre-martial sex in this movie, no wonder it was in the BYU archives.
One Man's Journey
The treasure among the films shown tonight. An earnest doctor movie staring Lionel Barrymore. He's raising his son as a single parent, he takes in the baby daughter of an ungratefull farmer after the man's wife dies, he fights Small Pox and Typhoid, and cares for poor country folk who don't entirely trust him, and all in the first half hour. Man anything Barrymore did in the 30's was just meant to pull at your heart strings. Oh, and God wastes no time punishing pre-martial sex in this movie, no wonder it was in the BYU archives.
Double Harness (1933)
4/4/07
Double Harness
A largely downer drama about how jaded and deceptive people stand in the way of there own happiness. Ann Harding gives an intriguing performance as a women who traps a consummate bachelor into marrying her, while William Powell gets to be his trademark sophisticated self. It took me a while to figure that Harding and Powell had slept together, due to the nature of some period films in talk around such things. (Excerpt from my thoughts while watching the film: Why is Henry Stephenson so upset that his daughter was at Powell's apartment at night? ... Oh!). Subplot concerns Ann's sister's (Lucile Browne) overspending, film culminates in dinner party for Post Master General. Why was this movie at the BYU archives?
Double Harness
A largely downer drama about how jaded and deceptive people stand in the way of there own happiness. Ann Harding gives an intriguing performance as a women who traps a consummate bachelor into marrying her, while William Powell gets to be his trademark sophisticated self. It took me a while to figure that Harding and Powell had slept together, due to the nature of some period films in talk around such things. (Excerpt from my thoughts while watching the film: Why is Henry Stephenson so upset that his daughter was at Powell's apartment at night? ... Oh!). Subplot concerns Ann's sister's (Lucile Browne) overspending, film culminates in dinner party for Post Master General. Why was this movie at the BYU archives?
Rafter Romance (1933)
4/4/07
Tonight Turner Classic Movies presented a real treat as part of their periodic efforts to showcase rare or seldom seen movies. A few years ago they presented a number of Howard Hughs produced films from the 20's, including a picture called The Mating Call, which featured a surely rare instance of silent era rear nudity. Tonight, and again next Wednesday night, the channel is featuring a total of six films that have not been shown on television in roughly 50 years, all of this steaming from a dispute between RKO studios and producer Merian C. Cooper in the middle 1940's. All of tonight's films were released in 1933, and ended up in the film archive at Brigham Young University.
Rafter Romance
First up is a New York City based romantic comedy staring a pre-Fred Astire Ginger Rogers, and Norman Foster. The two share loft-like apartment in shifts, he's a struggling artist and night watchman, she's a, get this, telemarketer. Robert Benchley plays Rogers boss and would be suitor, but as in The Major and the Minor nine years later, he fails to get her. (Must see's: The Benchley shorts How to Sleep and How to Wake Up, the apparent inspirations for a number of Disney cartoons).
Tonight Turner Classic Movies presented a real treat as part of their periodic efforts to showcase rare or seldom seen movies. A few years ago they presented a number of Howard Hughs produced films from the 20's, including a picture called The Mating Call, which featured a surely rare instance of silent era rear nudity. Tonight, and again next Wednesday night, the channel is featuring a total of six films that have not been shown on television in roughly 50 years, all of this steaming from a dispute between RKO studios and producer Merian C. Cooper in the middle 1940's. All of tonight's films were released in 1933, and ended up in the film archive at Brigham Young University.
Rafter Romance
First up is a New York City based romantic comedy staring a pre-Fred Astire Ginger Rogers, and Norman Foster. The two share loft-like apartment in shifts, he's a struggling artist and night watchman, she's a, get this, telemarketer. Robert Benchley plays Rogers boss and would be suitor, but as in The Major and the Minor nine years later, he fails to get her. (Must see's: The Benchley shorts How to Sleep and How to Wake Up, the apparent inspirations for a number of Disney cartoons).
Blades of Glory (2007)
4/3/07
Movie: Blades of Glory (2007)
Setting: Oslo, Colorado, Montreal; roughly contemporary
You get about what you'd expect with this figure skating comedy staring Will Ferrell and Jon Heder. The latter actor is sure to have his relevance extended by virtue of the sure-fire box office that any Will Ferrell comedy generates now (thou time will tell how lasting either performers vogue is). Anyway its funny, never takes its self to seriously yet maintains a consistent internal logic, at least until the last 10 minutes or so. Lots of jokes involving issues of the varied sexuality of professional skating, including those creepy brother/sister teams (here Amy Poehler and real-life husband Will Arnet). Ferrell and Heder have some funny arguments, mostly in the first half of the film. Jenna Fischer is rather fetching as Heder's love interest. Finally Craig T. Nelson as the coach, need I say more.
Movie: Blades of Glory (2007)
Setting: Oslo, Colorado, Montreal; roughly contemporary
You get about what you'd expect with this figure skating comedy staring Will Ferrell and Jon Heder. The latter actor is sure to have his relevance extended by virtue of the sure-fire box office that any Will Ferrell comedy generates now (thou time will tell how lasting either performers vogue is). Anyway its funny, never takes its self to seriously yet maintains a consistent internal logic, at least until the last 10 minutes or so. Lots of jokes involving issues of the varied sexuality of professional skating, including those creepy brother/sister teams (here Amy Poehler and real-life husband Will Arnet). Ferrell and Heder have some funny arguments, mostly in the first half of the film. Jenna Fischer is rather fetching as Heder's love interest. Finally Craig T. Nelson as the coach, need I say more.
East of Eden (1955)
4/1/07
Movie: East of Eden (1955)
Setting: The Monetary to Salinas area of northern California; 1917
This Elia Kazen helmed adaptation of the John Steinbeck novel represents 1/3 of the James Dean cannon. Dean's performance in the film is ample demonstration of his talent, had he lived he could well have dominated cinema for decades as a cross between Paul Newman and Marlon Brando. However it seems the young man may have been destined to pass early, troubled and moody he is rumored to have been both a promiscuous bisexual and a masochist prone to cutting himself. However all of that may have been why he was such an intense performer, and why he worked so well in this clever twist on the story of Cain and Abel. As for Raymond Massey, in addition to a memorably strong performance, he would not be surpassed in cinema as a man obsessed with refrigeration until Harrison Ford in The Mosquito Coast. I loved the look of this film.
Included among the special features is a cheaply made 1988 documentary entitled: Forever James Dean, that uses the same tribute song three times.
Factoid: Dean tormented religious conservative Massey on the set with profanity's, so as to illicit a more powerful performance from the oft staded actor.
Movie: East of Eden (1955)
Setting: The Monetary to Salinas area of northern California; 1917
This Elia Kazen helmed adaptation of the John Steinbeck novel represents 1/3 of the James Dean cannon. Dean's performance in the film is ample demonstration of his talent, had he lived he could well have dominated cinema for decades as a cross between Paul Newman and Marlon Brando. However it seems the young man may have been destined to pass early, troubled and moody he is rumored to have been both a promiscuous bisexual and a masochist prone to cutting himself. However all of that may have been why he was such an intense performer, and why he worked so well in this clever twist on the story of Cain and Abel. As for Raymond Massey, in addition to a memorably strong performance, he would not be surpassed in cinema as a man obsessed with refrigeration until Harrison Ford in The Mosquito Coast. I loved the look of this film.
Included among the special features is a cheaply made 1988 documentary entitled: Forever James Dean, that uses the same tribute song three times.
Factoid: Dean tormented religious conservative Massey on the set with profanity's, so as to illicit a more powerful performance from the oft staded actor.
World Trade Center (2006)
3/27/07
World Trade Center (2006): I generally find it kind of hard to write about 9/11 movies, the story and subject matter are generally so straight forward that there's not a lot to analyze that hasn't been made clear during the films proceedings. I have the sense that there is more to Oliver Stone's take here then might appear on the surface, though I've not yet been able to sort out what that might be in detail. The movie is more cinematic then United 93 but feels less real. 24's Mike Novak (Jude Ciccolella) has a small role
World Trade Center (2006): I generally find it kind of hard to write about 9/11 movies, the story and subject matter are generally so straight forward that there's not a lot to analyze that hasn't been made clear during the films proceedings. I have the sense that there is more to Oliver Stone's take here then might appear on the surface, though I've not yet been able to sort out what that might be in detail. The movie is more cinematic then United 93 but feels less real. 24's Mike Novak (Jude Ciccolella) has a small role
The Illusionist (2006)
3/26/07
The Illusionist (2006): One does not often get to see a film set in turn of the century Vienna, so to start off with the setting's cool. But even cooler then the neat atmosphere, flash-bulb cinematography, and Philip Glass score, is the central 'illusion', one that really pulled me in and fooled me. Even the presence of Jessica Beil can not diminish this movie.
The Illusionist (2006): One does not often get to see a film set in turn of the century Vienna, so to start off with the setting's cool. But even cooler then the neat atmosphere, flash-bulb cinematography, and Philip Glass score, is the central 'illusion', one that really pulled me in and fooled me. Even the presence of Jessica Beil can not diminish this movie.
The Holiday (2006)
3/25/07
The Holiday (2006): Each December requires at least one Christmas themed romantic comedy for me to watch out of season, and The Holiday is serviceable in this role. The Kate Winslet story was likable enough, but I didn't really care about Diaz. In fact the only strong reason to watch this movie, at least for me, was the Eli Wallach subplot. I applaud the producers for taking the risk of casting the then 90 year old legend as elderly screenwriter of the 'Billy Wilder school'. Also while this movie is strictly average in most ways, it at least recognizes what good movies are, as evidenced by repeated references to various classics throughout the film, that alone bumps this up from a C to a C+.
The Holiday (2006): Each December requires at least one Christmas themed romantic comedy for me to watch out of season, and The Holiday is serviceable in this role. The Kate Winslet story was likable enough, but I didn't really care about Diaz. In fact the only strong reason to watch this movie, at least for me, was the Eli Wallach subplot. I applaud the producers for taking the risk of casting the then 90 year old legend as elderly screenwriter of the 'Billy Wilder school'. Also while this movie is strictly average in most ways, it at least recognizes what good movies are, as evidenced by repeated references to various classics throughout the film, that alone bumps this up from a C to a C+.
Stranger Then Fiction (2006)
3/25/07
Stranger Then Fiction (2006): I was with this movie from conception to nearly through execution. This is a spoiler but I have issues with the ending, as my first instinct would have been to kill Harold. Not killing him lessened the dramatic impact and irony of his transformation, as pointed out by the Dustin Hoffman character (in a performance I really enjoyed by the way). However when the film cheats, it at least acknowledges that its cheating, when trading in greatness for an okay but more likable alternative. This acknowledgment is what saves the film and makes it work in a perhaps less artistic but more populist form. Maggie Gyllenhaal becomes more likable with each performance.
Stranger Then Fiction (2006): I was with this movie from conception to nearly through execution. This is a spoiler but I have issues with the ending, as my first instinct would have been to kill Harold. Not killing him lessened the dramatic impact and irony of his transformation, as pointed out by the Dustin Hoffman character (in a performance I really enjoyed by the way). However when the film cheats, it at least acknowledges that its cheating, when trading in greatness for an okay but more likable alternative. This acknowledgment is what saves the film and makes it work in a perhaps less artistic but more populist form. Maggie Gyllenhaal becomes more likable with each performance.
Rocky Balboa (2006)
3/24/07
Rocky Balboa (2006): I confess that I had only seen the first one of these films about ten years ago, but that's really all you need to have seen to enjoy this final entry. Balboa surprised me in its being so sad and sentimental, really one of the most unexpectedly moving films I'd seen in some time. Kudos for the casting of Milo Ventimigilia as Rocky's son, and some totally engaging boxing action. Totally satisfying.
Rocky Balboa (2006): I confess that I had only seen the first one of these films about ten years ago, but that's really all you need to have seen to enjoy this final entry. Balboa surprised me in its being so sad and sentimental, really one of the most unexpectedly moving films I'd seen in some time. Kudos for the casting of Milo Ventimigilia as Rocky's son, and some totally engaging boxing action. Totally satisfying.
Annie Get Your Gun (1950)
3/23/07
Movie: Annie Get Your Gun (1950)
Setting: Ohio and locations throughout the midwest (espically Minnasota), the great cities of Europe and New York New York; the story plays it all a little lose with actual history, so it should probably be in the 1870's but sevral refrences place it in the 1880's.
Beatty Hutton was actully substituing for Judy Garland in a role that now seems taylor made for the recently departed actress ("Were always looking for a good Betty Hutton"-Sheldrake). Based on the popular musical by Irving Berlin, this film is esstenally a rather unconvinicng love story between dandy sharp shooter Frank Butler (Howard Keel) and the rough necked shooting prodgany Annie Oakley (Hutton). With some good songs, enjoyable character actors and a fun visual style, this film mostly makes up for what it lacks in real plot. You could probably get young children to watch this its so colorfull.
Note: The story of actor Brad Marrow, who played little Jake Oakley in the film is kind of sad.
Factoid: There are many plot and tonal simularites between this film and a movie Ms. Hutton did two years later called The Greatest Show on Earth.
Movie: Annie Get Your Gun (1950)
Setting: Ohio and locations throughout the midwest (espically Minnasota), the great cities of Europe and New York New York; the story plays it all a little lose with actual history, so it should probably be in the 1870's but sevral refrences place it in the 1880's.
Beatty Hutton was actully substituing for Judy Garland in a role that now seems taylor made for the recently departed actress ("Were always looking for a good Betty Hutton"-Sheldrake). Based on the popular musical by Irving Berlin, this film is esstenally a rather unconvinicng love story between dandy sharp shooter Frank Butler (Howard Keel) and the rough necked shooting prodgany Annie Oakley (Hutton). With some good songs, enjoyable character actors and a fun visual style, this film mostly makes up for what it lacks in real plot. You could probably get young children to watch this its so colorfull.
Note: The story of actor Brad Marrow, who played little Jake Oakley in the film is kind of sad.
Factoid: There are many plot and tonal simularites between this film and a movie Ms. Hutton did two years later called The Greatest Show on Earth.
Breakfast at Tiffany's (1961)
3/22/07
Movie: Breakfast at Tiffany's (1961)
Setting: New York City; contemporary
I have recently been reminded just how many people I know (especially women) really love this movie. I however was disappointed in the picture, perhaps this is a case of impossible expectations. I understand how the romantic aspects of the film can be attractive, heck I'd love to spend a day doing stuff I've never done before with a lovely young women. The thing is this picture is much more melancholy then romantic, leaving me a little perplexed as to its near universally beloved statues. It does have John McGiver in it though, and John McGiver was awesomely ubiquitous in the 60's and 70's. Suffice it to say I still prefer to get my Audrey Hepburn fix by way of Sabrina or Charade.
P.S. Name the cat already!
Factoid: Paramount exec's originally wanted to cut the Mancini/Mercer song "Moon River", feeling it too hokey. Ironically "Moon River" is now considered one of the all time great songs from a motion picture.
Movie: Breakfast at Tiffany's (1961)
Setting: New York City; contemporary
I have recently been reminded just how many people I know (especially women) really love this movie. I however was disappointed in the picture, perhaps this is a case of impossible expectations. I understand how the romantic aspects of the film can be attractive, heck I'd love to spend a day doing stuff I've never done before with a lovely young women. The thing is this picture is much more melancholy then romantic, leaving me a little perplexed as to its near universally beloved statues. It does have John McGiver in it though, and John McGiver was awesomely ubiquitous in the 60's and 70's. Suffice it to say I still prefer to get my Audrey Hepburn fix by way of Sabrina or Charade.
P.S. Name the cat already!
Factoid: Paramount exec's originally wanted to cut the Mancini/Mercer song "Moon River", feeling it too hokey. Ironically "Moon River" is now considered one of the all time great songs from a motion picture.
Crime Doctor (1943)
3/21/07
Movie: Crime Doctor (1943)
Setting: 'Kings County' unidentified state; 1932-1942
First in a series of films taken from the radio. Warner Baxter is an amnesia victim, who unable to remember his past, becomes a psychiatrist. Ten years after losing his memory Dr. Robert Ordway is appointed head of the state parole board, around this time some men show up claiming he is really 'Phil Morgan' a man who helped organize a hist of $200,000 dollars. This money was hidden by Morgan in an attempt to cheat his associates, it was in their attempt to beat the information out of him that Phillip lost his memory. Of course Dr. Ordway is able to recover his memory, apprehend the criminals and return the stolen money, only to be granted a retroactive ten year sentence for his crimes, thus enabling him to remain a free man and have further adventures. Enjoyable and relatively short, I wouldn't mind seeing other entry's in this series. Crime Doctor also features a never fully developed sub-plot about the rehabilitation of a decorated World War One vet who committed manslaughter.
Factoid: Female characters repeatedly comment on how 'attractive' Dr. Ordway supposedly is. This is probably due to the fact that actor Warner Baxter was in his 50's when he played this part, probably to old for the role, and the studio wanted to remind audiences that the character was suppose to be viewed as dashing.
Also recommend in films about men with thin mustaches and amnesia: Random Harvest
Movie: Crime Doctor (1943)
Setting: 'Kings County' unidentified state; 1932-1942
First in a series of films taken from the radio. Warner Baxter is an amnesia victim, who unable to remember his past, becomes a psychiatrist. Ten years after losing his memory Dr. Robert Ordway is appointed head of the state parole board, around this time some men show up claiming he is really 'Phil Morgan' a man who helped organize a hist of $200,000 dollars. This money was hidden by Morgan in an attempt to cheat his associates, it was in their attempt to beat the information out of him that Phillip lost his memory. Of course Dr. Ordway is able to recover his memory, apprehend the criminals and return the stolen money, only to be granted a retroactive ten year sentence for his crimes, thus enabling him to remain a free man and have further adventures. Enjoyable and relatively short, I wouldn't mind seeing other entry's in this series. Crime Doctor also features a never fully developed sub-plot about the rehabilitation of a decorated World War One vet who committed manslaughter.
Factoid: Female characters repeatedly comment on how 'attractive' Dr. Ordway supposedly is. This is probably due to the fact that actor Warner Baxter was in his 50's when he played this part, probably to old for the role, and the studio wanted to remind audiences that the character was suppose to be viewed as dashing.
Also recommend in films about men with thin mustaches and amnesia: Random Harvest
Ocean's 12 (2004)
3/20/07
Movie: Ocean's 12 (2004)
Setting: Rome and Lake Comeo Italy; East Haven, Connecticut; Provo, Utah; Miami, Florida; East Orange, New Jersey; London, England;Chicago; East Hampton, New York; New Orleans; Las Vegas; West Hollywood, California; Amsterdam; Paris, France; 2001 & 2004
To be honest I only watched this movie so that I can better enjoy 13 (which looks real good) when it comes out. My expectations were not high which I'm sure factored, but I enjoyed 12, it was a fun if inconsequential vanity project. Cathrine Zeta-Jones makes a fine addition to the Ocean's pantheon. I have mixed feeling about the Bruce Willis cameo.
Movie: Ocean's 12 (2004)
Setting: Rome and Lake Comeo Italy; East Haven, Connecticut; Provo, Utah; Miami, Florida; East Orange, New Jersey; London, England;Chicago; East Hampton, New York; New Orleans; Las Vegas; West Hollywood, California; Amsterdam; Paris, France; 2001 & 2004
To be honest I only watched this movie so that I can better enjoy 13 (which looks real good) when it comes out. My expectations were not high which I'm sure factored, but I enjoyed 12, it was a fun if inconsequential vanity project. Cathrine Zeta-Jones makes a fine addition to the Ocean's pantheon. I have mixed feeling about the Bruce Willis cameo.
An Ace in the Hole (1951)
3/19/07
Movie: An Ace in the Hole a.k.a. The Big Carnival (1951)
Setting: New Mexico; contemporary
While well received by the European intelligentsia, this Billy Wilder film was both a critical and box office flop at home, resulting in its current seldom seen statues and lack of DVD release. Having now seen the film I find it surprising that it has not had more of cinematic rehabilitation, I mean its a fine example of Wilder at the top of his game. The plot concerns a once hot shot city reporter (Kirk Douglas) reduced to working for an Albuquerque paper. In a cynical attempt to reestablish a name for himself, the reporter conspires with a corrupt sheriff (Ray Teal) to keep the victim of a cave-in at an old Indian cliff dwelling (Richard Benedict) trapped underground for days so they can milk the story for publicity. The area outside the cave-in quickly becomes a media circus complete with a real carnival (hence the alternate title), which the victims loveless wife (Jan Sterling) is more then ready to cash in on. A happy song about efforts to rescue the trapped World War Two vet, "Leo, Leo, Leo", adds further surreality to the proceedings. A bleak ending to this cynical story may have further put off 50's audiences.
Factoid: Many obvious parallels to this movie exist in the 1997 feature Mad City, which I must say failed where Ace succeeded.
Movie: An Ace in the Hole a.k.a. The Big Carnival (1951)
Setting: New Mexico; contemporary
While well received by the European intelligentsia, this Billy Wilder film was both a critical and box office flop at home, resulting in its current seldom seen statues and lack of DVD release. Having now seen the film I find it surprising that it has not had more of cinematic rehabilitation, I mean its a fine example of Wilder at the top of his game. The plot concerns a once hot shot city reporter (Kirk Douglas) reduced to working for an Albuquerque paper. In a cynical attempt to reestablish a name for himself, the reporter conspires with a corrupt sheriff (Ray Teal) to keep the victim of a cave-in at an old Indian cliff dwelling (Richard Benedict) trapped underground for days so they can milk the story for publicity. The area outside the cave-in quickly becomes a media circus complete with a real carnival (hence the alternate title), which the victims loveless wife (Jan Sterling) is more then ready to cash in on. A happy song about efforts to rescue the trapped World War Two vet, "Leo, Leo, Leo", adds further surreality to the proceedings. A bleak ending to this cynical story may have further put off 50's audiences.
Factoid: Many obvious parallels to this movie exist in the 1997 feature Mad City, which I must say failed where Ace succeeded.
The High and the Mighty (1954)
3/15/07
Movie: The High and the Mighty (1954)
Setting: (TWA?) flight from Honolulu to San Francisco, with a few scenes at both locations; contemporary, 1950's.
Prototypical airplane/disaster flick, featuring John Wayne as a co-pilot who doesn't lose his cool, and a bunch of lesser-known actors in subplots aplenty. Claire Trevor does her shtick, William Schallert and Pedro Gonzalez Gonzalez have bit parts. Enjoyable but kind of lengthy, with an exposition heavy first twenty minutes.
Factoid: Robert Stack, who players the nervous pilot, also had a part in the later genera send-up movie Airplane!
Movie: The High and the Mighty (1954)
Setting: (TWA?) flight from Honolulu to San Francisco, with a few scenes at both locations; contemporary, 1950's.
Prototypical airplane/disaster flick, featuring John Wayne as a co-pilot who doesn't lose his cool, and a bunch of lesser-known actors in subplots aplenty. Claire Trevor does her shtick, William Schallert and Pedro Gonzalez Gonzalez have bit parts. Enjoyable but kind of lengthy, with an exposition heavy first twenty minutes.
Factoid: Robert Stack, who players the nervous pilot, also had a part in the later genera send-up movie Airplane!
8 1/2 (1963)
3/15/07
Movie: 8 1/2 (1963-Italian)
Setting: An Italian spa community; early 1960's + flashbacks
I was worried that I wouldn't like this film, that it might be portentous (which of course it was) and mostly of value in terms of being able to say that one had actually seen it. I was pleasantly surprised, I really liked this movie, it grew on me quite a bit over the course of my viewing. Stylistically this film is something of a milestone, like Eisenstein's Battleship Potemkin, and many famous directors have been noted to drool over this work. Beyond the stylistic inspiration provided, it is probable that many of the movies director fans, like it so much because it's about the stress of being a director, and having ones private life bleed over into the screen. A good example of this is the sequence in which director Guido Anselmi (Marcello Mastroianni) is casting for characters obvious based on people in his life, down to having one actress asked to put on glasses so as to more closely resemble his wife (in the movies context this scene is rather cruel). I would be remiss not to mention a fantasy sequence which starts with all of the women in Guidos life (past and present) living together with him in harmony, only to have them rise up against him in the end, this guy can't win even in his fantasy's. Finally I must recommend this film because any chance to see Claudia Cardinale on screen is simply worth it, one of the most beautiful actresses of all time.
Factoid: 8 1/2, particularly the ending sequence, is referenced in a number of films including Woody Allen's Stardust Memories and Tim Burton's Big Fish.
Nate's Favorite Italian Films (in order of theatrical release): The Bicycle Thief, The Leopard, and Life is Beautifull.
Movie: 8 1/2 (1963-Italian)
Setting: An Italian spa community; early 1960's + flashbacks
I was worried that I wouldn't like this film, that it might be portentous (which of course it was) and mostly of value in terms of being able to say that one had actually seen it. I was pleasantly surprised, I really liked this movie, it grew on me quite a bit over the course of my viewing. Stylistically this film is something of a milestone, like Eisenstein's Battleship Potemkin, and many famous directors have been noted to drool over this work. Beyond the stylistic inspiration provided, it is probable that many of the movies director fans, like it so much because it's about the stress of being a director, and having ones private life bleed over into the screen. A good example of this is the sequence in which director Guido Anselmi (Marcello Mastroianni) is casting for characters obvious based on people in his life, down to having one actress asked to put on glasses so as to more closely resemble his wife (in the movies context this scene is rather cruel). I would be remiss not to mention a fantasy sequence which starts with all of the women in Guidos life (past and present) living together with him in harmony, only to have them rise up against him in the end, this guy can't win even in his fantasy's. Finally I must recommend this film because any chance to see Claudia Cardinale on screen is simply worth it, one of the most beautiful actresses of all time.
Factoid: 8 1/2, particularly the ending sequence, is referenced in a number of films including Woody Allen's Stardust Memories and Tim Burton's Big Fish.
Nate's Favorite Italian Films (in order of theatrical release): The Bicycle Thief, The Leopard, and Life is Beautifull.
States of Grace (2005)
3/15/07
Movie: States of Grace (2005)
Setting: Santa Monica California; present day
Director Richard Dutcher is considered by many to be the 'father of Mormon cinema', a statues he's not as comfortable with now as he might have been back in 2000, when his breakthrough picture God's Army first came out. Dutcher has come to reject the label of Mormon filmmaker, as his life's journey has lead him both creatively and spiritually away from such a boxed designation, and because so much of what calls itself Mormon cinema just really isn't that good. Of course even from the beginning Dutcher was a controversial figure in LDS circles, his portals of deeply flawed and spiritually hurting Latter-day Saints, including characters who where missionary's and Bishops, presented a level of ambiguity that many in audiences raised on propagandistic church produced educational films, where decidedly uncomfortable with (so they went to see Charlie and The Singles Ward instead).
In States of Grace (billed in some Mormon markets as God's Army 2, though that label can only very loosely be applied), we find what is in my opinion, the most spiritually satisfying 'Mormon' movie ever made, and Dutchers best work to date. It is a mediation on the atonement, a story of spiritual pain, growth, and lose, sin as well as forgiveness. It is a movie that demonstrates its directors frustration with Mormon dogmatism, and sense of moral superiority. While not rejecting the structures of the institutional church, in fact arguable accepting them in near completeness, the director pines for the superiority of 'spirit' not 'law' based approach to Godly living. This idea is typified in the film when the Mormon Elders Lozano (Ignacio Serricchio) and Farrell (Lucas Fleischer) take a homeless Pentecostal street preacher into their apartment, after finding him lying drunk and sick behind a dumpster. That action is against the missionary's rules, but it is what Jesus would do. While that event may prompt a low level reassessment of proper spiritual behavior on the part of some LDS viewers, Dutcher is not content to let the audience off with only a procedural sense of ambiguity. Rather later in the film Elder Farrell sneaks out of his apartment at night, to comfort Holly, the troubled young neighbour women the missionary's have befriended (Rachel Emmers, whose face and light blue eyes are a treasure to gaze upon), which before sunrise leads to sex between the two (don't worry moralists, he pays a high price).
The boundary's between grace and behavior, law and love are what Dutcher is grappling with in this film, and he wants his audience to know that there aren't always easy answers. Fornication born of compassion, of all the right desires. How is an LDS audiance to deal with that? The pain that follows may be necessary and proper, but when Elder Farrell's father won't journey to see his recently hospitalized son (he slit his wrists in shame about having to go home), holding to his early statement that he'd rather see him come home in a coffin then dishonorably, we must ask isn't this level of pain to sever to be warented. I love this film, I think it really gets it, not just about being Mormon, but being Christian, being human. Forgive this film its trespasses, its unmaskabley indie and has its contrivances, watch it, and you'll find something there about how we can all stand to be a better person.
Factoides:
During its original theatrical release, a California movie theater started warning potential customers that States of Grace was not a "Christian" film. It seems some Evangelical viewers felt they were mislead by the movies title and had not expected it to be a 'Mormon' film. As a result of this, a protest by some Mormons and there sympathisers was held outside of the theater, despite director Dutchers pleas to just let it be.
An Evangelical minister protested that the advertising for Dutchers 2000 film God's Army was misleadingly targeting Evangelical youth. The reason for this charge stemming from the supposed resemblance of God' Army star Matthew A. Brown to born again actor Kirk Cameron, then appearing in a series of Left Behind films.
Movie: States of Grace (2005)
Setting: Santa Monica California; present day
Director Richard Dutcher is considered by many to be the 'father of Mormon cinema', a statues he's not as comfortable with now as he might have been back in 2000, when his breakthrough picture God's Army first came out. Dutcher has come to reject the label of Mormon filmmaker, as his life's journey has lead him both creatively and spiritually away from such a boxed designation, and because so much of what calls itself Mormon cinema just really isn't that good. Of course even from the beginning Dutcher was a controversial figure in LDS circles, his portals of deeply flawed and spiritually hurting Latter-day Saints, including characters who where missionary's and Bishops, presented a level of ambiguity that many in audiences raised on propagandistic church produced educational films, where decidedly uncomfortable with (so they went to see Charlie and The Singles Ward instead).
In States of Grace (billed in some Mormon markets as God's Army 2, though that label can only very loosely be applied), we find what is in my opinion, the most spiritually satisfying 'Mormon' movie ever made, and Dutchers best work to date. It is a mediation on the atonement, a story of spiritual pain, growth, and lose, sin as well as forgiveness. It is a movie that demonstrates its directors frustration with Mormon dogmatism, and sense of moral superiority. While not rejecting the structures of the institutional church, in fact arguable accepting them in near completeness, the director pines for the superiority of 'spirit' not 'law' based approach to Godly living. This idea is typified in the film when the Mormon Elders Lozano (Ignacio Serricchio) and Farrell (Lucas Fleischer) take a homeless Pentecostal street preacher into their apartment, after finding him lying drunk and sick behind a dumpster. That action is against the missionary's rules, but it is what Jesus would do. While that event may prompt a low level reassessment of proper spiritual behavior on the part of some LDS viewers, Dutcher is not content to let the audience off with only a procedural sense of ambiguity. Rather later in the film Elder Farrell sneaks out of his apartment at night, to comfort Holly, the troubled young neighbour women the missionary's have befriended (Rachel Emmers, whose face and light blue eyes are a treasure to gaze upon), which before sunrise leads to sex between the two (don't worry moralists, he pays a high price).
The boundary's between grace and behavior, law and love are what Dutcher is grappling with in this film, and he wants his audience to know that there aren't always easy answers. Fornication born of compassion, of all the right desires. How is an LDS audiance to deal with that? The pain that follows may be necessary and proper, but when Elder Farrell's father won't journey to see his recently hospitalized son (he slit his wrists in shame about having to go home), holding to his early statement that he'd rather see him come home in a coffin then dishonorably, we must ask isn't this level of pain to sever to be warented. I love this film, I think it really gets it, not just about being Mormon, but being Christian, being human. Forgive this film its trespasses, its unmaskabley indie and has its contrivances, watch it, and you'll find something there about how we can all stand to be a better person.
Factoides:
During its original theatrical release, a California movie theater started warning potential customers that States of Grace was not a "Christian" film. It seems some Evangelical viewers felt they were mislead by the movies title and had not expected it to be a 'Mormon' film. As a result of this, a protest by some Mormons and there sympathisers was held outside of the theater, despite director Dutchers pleas to just let it be.
An Evangelical minister protested that the advertising for Dutchers 2000 film God's Army was misleadingly targeting Evangelical youth. The reason for this charge stemming from the supposed resemblance of God' Army star Matthew A. Brown to born again actor Kirk Cameron, then appearing in a series of Left Behind films.
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