Mister Buddwing August 27, 2008
Posted by clydefro in : Classic Films, 1960s , add a comment
I propped up Mister Buddwing a couple of weeks ago in my weekly TCM picks. Some minor research left me hesitant but entirely intrigued. James Garner as a guy who wanders around the streets of Manhattan in search of himself sounded familiar. I’ve never experienced memory loss or found myself in Central Park without any idea of how I got there, but there are less literal ways of interpreting the plot.
There’s surprisingly little out there written on the film, and what there is seems mostly dismissive. My enthusiasm is often countered by dolts who act like this or that movie is so appalling as to have devalued their own ever-precious life. The disadvantage of everyone having an opinion on the internet is that, well, everyone has an opinion. Some are well-reasoned and considered while others are from the same type of people who desire, consume, and love the unchallenging byproducts of the entertainment lobotomies beamed directly into their living rooms daily. As someone who does in fact regularly give my own opinion on movies, I recognize the irony in those complaints. Still, dealing too much in absolutes makes me uneasy and I’d be the first person to encourage someone to watch based on one’s own views instead of a negative reaction elsewhere. If a movie sounds interesting, dive in headfirst and sort out the details later.
So that’s what I did with Mister Buddwing, directed by Marty helmer Delbert Mann and based on an Evan Hunter book. The film opens with a first-person point of view shot, black and white, in the city. The man whose eyes we’re looking through peers down at his hands. He’s wearing a ring, broken stone. An inscription of “From G.V.” lines the band. He starts walking from a bench in Central Park and to the Plaza Hotel. When we finally do see the man, he appears well-dressed in a suit and increasingly in need of a shave. At the hotel, he dials a phone number that had been written on a slip of paper he’d found inside the suit. A woman, Gloria, answers. Our man doesn’t know his name and he doesn’t know Gloria either so he has to navigate through some awkward introductions. Gloria, who’s played by the terrific Angela Lansbury, believes the man could be Sam, which is good enough for the stranger. The newly christened Sam makes plans to visit Gloria in hopes of getting this whole identity thing straightened out. He leaves the hotel, sees a Budweiser beer truck, looks at a plane flying through the sky, and decides on Buddwing as a last name.
It’s quickly established that the man is not actually Sam, which turns out to be the name of Gloria’s estranged husband. Gloria doesn’t know Mr. Buddwing any more than he knows himself. She asks him some questions that he doesn’t have the answers for, making the man more and more irritated at his lack of memory. He’s then sent on his way with a few extra dollars and still no idea what’s going on. At this point early in the film, and throughout actually, it’s most intriguing that the viewer is really no better informed than Mr. Buddwing. The line of defeat and frustration James Garner treads in his performance is equally shared by the audience.
I’ve always felt Garner was better as a screen presence than he necessarily was as an actor. He was adept at playing not just an everyman, but the ideal everyman. Who wouldn’t want to be James Garner? That deceptively easy ability to make the viewer identify with him was put to good use in Mister Buddwing. There’s a great deal of psychological undercurrent running through the picture. The mood it sustains reminded me of a less dystopian version of John Frankenheimer’s Seconds, released in the same year. Garner has to be believable as a guy we want to solve these personal mysteries, but there also has to be an air of danger where he could slip into almost insanity at any point. The reveal that a murderous mental patient has just escaped from a nearby institution adds enormous possibility, both for the film and Garner’s performance. The actor does well in never entirely hiding how unhinged his character is, creating conflict in the viewer by way of this lingering uncertainty as to Buddwing’s real identity.
More ammunition for Buddwing’s questionable mental health is sourced from the relationships the amnesiac develops with three random women he spots on the streets of New York. He sees a young brunette (Katharine Ross) and yells out the name “Grace,” but the woman ignores him as she gets into a taxi. Buddwing hails a cab, driven by Marty supporting actor Joe Mantell, and instructs the hack to follow the other car. En route, the driver recounts a fare he’d had recently, an attractive blonde woman who was drunk and less than candid on her $28 ride. Though this moment seems inconsequential, it comes up again later as we realize that much of the film feels like it was thrown into an unreliable blender. Everything doesn’t mix as it might should, leaving ample opportunity for false impressions.
Just as the nervous jazz score and frequent shots of Garner wandering around the city ply into the viewer’s consciousness, so do the perpetually ominous depictions of a city on a completely different pace as our protagonist. This constant unease amid a mass of people who at the very least know more than Buddwing because they know their own name is somewhat underexplored, but entirely effective when given the opportunity. The skyscraper-rich city is enough to induce confusion in anyone, much less a person in total disarray. As with much of Mann’s movie, the tension could have been ratcheted up even further, resulting in a bit of a missed opportunity. As a study in disorientation, however, Mister Buddwing should be re-discovered.
While the film hearkens back to amnesia-heavy suspense movies like Alfred Hitchcock’s Spellbound, as well as foreshadowing more recent fare including Memento and The Bourne Identity, it seems to also accurately predict the oncoming paranoia found in the 1970s. Buddwing becomes so at odds with himself that he can hardly trust his own instincts. In another of the film’s interesting decisions, each potential Grace, starting with Ross, flashes back to Buddwing’s memories of the woman. With every glimpse of the past, the relationship between Buddwing and Grace grows devastatingly harsher. The vibrant optimism of their newlywed days is replaced by turmoil and acrimony, slowly shattering the dreams of youth. That each incarnation of Grace is played by a different actress highlights the stark changes life has to offer over time.
Perhaps done unintentionally, but there’s a strange juxtaposition between how the past versions of Buddwing and Grace move further apart and how amnesiac Buddwing gets closer and closer with his false Graces. Janet, the woman played by Ross, brushes him off completely, even involving the police, but actress Fiddle (Suzanne Pleshette) takes him into her home. The blonde woman (Jean Simmons) he meets next is even more friendly and carefree. Yet, Buddwing seems to become less balanced as he struggles to piece together his past. By the end, when the nobody and the blonde find themselves involved in a high-stakes dice game, his memories spin him into levels near madness.
In trying to get a handle on the film, I found myself curious as to why it’s so little cared about or known, and why there’s not much support among those who have seen this strange portrait of memory loss. It’s far from perfect, not a great film really, and always seems like it could go further than it does (in contrast to Seconds). But there’s definitely something there. That feeling it emits, one of suspense but also caution and deep empathy for the protagonist, is rare in such a tightly wound movie of its era. There’s also a building turmoil we can see coming, but are helpless to stop. Buddwing’s destruction becomes inevitable and that nearly horrific unfolding of how he got to Central Park may be painful for the invested viewer.
The ending changes the game too much for my taste, ultimately making clear that there’s some heavy Christian symbolism at work as it placates the mid-sixties studio film audiences. I’m not impressed with the result, but I do like how it’s handled. The decision to retain a considerable dose of ambiguity is assuring despite an otherwise flat conclusion. I can imagine how I’d like to have the film end, but it doesn’t really matter. Even the apparent happy ending, when kept in the context with Buddwing’s memories, promises little outside the veiled religious undertones.
(Mister Buddwing was made for MGM. Its rights should rest with Warner Bros., but the film is not on DVD.)
Le cercle rouge August 19, 2008
Posted by clydefro in : Classic Films, 1970s , 2 comments
Something I’m fascinated by, as it manages to enter my thoughts at least daily, is what constitutes masculinity right now. In the DVD extras for The Ice Harvest, an underrated attempt at neonoir from a couple of years back, screenwriters Robert Benton and Richard Russo, both of whom are quite accomplished in their own right, bandied about the question of what it really means to be a man in modern times. A male no longer must hunt and gather or physically provide shelter and protection for his family. Men don’t even necessarily come home in a suit and fedora to happy homemaker wives. So what is our purpose in the 21st century? If this type of behavior is essentially in our evolutionary DNA, what’s the substitute? There are no cattle to herd or fields to plow for the vast majority of us. Is it military service? I certainly hope not. The constant realization that rites of passage simply don’t exist as they once did torments me to no end. I’m not looking to enter the wilderness and return with a skinned animal on my back, but I find constant reminders in everyday life as to how a generation of young people are forever mired in adolescence and I suppose I’m looking for the cure.
So it is with the subject of masculinity - how to get it, keep it, not abuse it, etc. A line necessarily has to be drawn here between what I’ll label as John Wayne masculinity, meaning infallible, stubborn, conservative, and lacking intellectual curiosity, and Lee Marvin masculinity, stoic without completely forgoing considered emotion, lived-in, intelligent but not bookish, and coldly distant when necessary. The former simply doesn’t interest me and I see any sort of backlash against reasoned and informed discussion to be entirely wrongheaded. I’m much more fascinated by ideas of cold, emotionally unavailable professionalism. Of having a task and accomplishing it without complaint, hesitation, or flaw. In terms of film, there’s really no equal to Jean-Pierre Melville when looking for these qualities. He is, to my eye, the most masculine director to ever establish a relevant body of work. With apologies to Ford, Hawks, and a pair of Manns, Melville’s obsession so dominantly touched his signature films as to make others’ ideas of masculinity seem either superfluous or anachronistic.
It’s there in Bob le Flambeur and Le samouraï, but there’s really nothing like Le cercle rouge. Character after character, action after action, everything in the film is filtered through a coolly male ideal. We can picture ourselves as any of the five main characters, though it’s probably Alain Delon’s Corey we’d most like to be. Delon was a handsome bastard and probably the ultimate Melville protagonist. Icy blue eyes, sculpted facial features, not a care in the world. He gets a moustache here and somehow retains his coolness without looking entirely ridiculous. I don’t think it’s really possible to understand Delon’s Melville characters. They neither beg for attention nor affection. They are singularly concerned with performing a task. Emotions, while being hinted at and thus present on some level, are shrugged off in favor of a job, an existence. It’s not just the professionalism to admire, but the focus and confidence that preparation will lead to the proper fate. Not success, necessarily. Not even continued life. The goal is performance.
Delon’s character in Le cercle rouge is essentially stripped of everything. His apartment has been absent for half a decade while Corey was in prison. Cobwebs litter the place. The woman he loved, at least on some undefined level, is now with an unindicted co-conspirator. I appreciate that Melville doesn’t spend very much time on this detail. It’s established, Corey is wounded and given even more reason to resent Santi, but nothing can be done. Melville presents fate as a cosmic joke that neither needs nor demands fairness. To exist in a Melville film is to release any sense of happiness or entitlement. The director took all the unappreciated pessimism of American gangster and film noir pictures and transformed them into stark, desperate situations where the viewer roots for everyone and no one. Moral ambiguity feels entirely satisfying.
Truthfully, I think Melville questioned these feelings of right and wrong and the ethics of criminality. If Gian-Maria Volonte’s character Vogel, a fugitive on the run in Corey’s trunk, shoots a couple of mobsters to prolong his own life, how should the viewer react? It’s death, yet it’s also somewhat just and unquestionably satisfying. Corey and Vogel must continue on. They must eliminate these obstacles, and why shed a tear for a couple of guys whose job it is to kill others. Melville’s protagonists, for all their murky morals, kill those who must be eliminated by necessity. Blame is for other circumstances. Melville surely enjoyed these explorations of crime and criminals since he populated most all of his films in this fashion, but the beauty of these pictures, especially Le cercle rouge, is how controlled the director’s hand is throughout, how even coincidences are completely intentional.
Corey and Vogel are warmly given a sympathetic eye, as is Yves Montand’s ex-cop and current thief Jansen. However, possibly the most admirable character of the main five is Mattei, the police commissioner played by comic André Bourvil. Mattei is given nuance and portrayed as someone the viewer can actually relate to. The twin scenes inside Mattei’s home illuminate his paralleled lonely existence with Corey. The latter has cobwebs whereas the former has cats. Neither seems to care too much for their masters. Mattei’s life is filled with redundant predictability and a certain sadness. A police chief states that all men are guilty. They’re born innocent, but they stray invariably in the direction of corrupt forces. Mattei, like the audience, questions this. Is this pessimism really possible? All men have guilt in their hearts? Mattei is reasonable, focused, and not cynical enough to place guilt over proof. Yet, he’s portrayed as somewhat naive of the idea that all men are deserving of their fate, without justice entering the discussion. He looks at his job as a means to administer order and doesn’t really question what happens afterwards.
Though it’s really impossible not to be persuaded by Corey’s cool, it’s Mattei who serves as the film’s true protagonist. Melville gives us a surrogate at every turn, though not always the same character. Jansen is the tragic figure. Santi’s the most despicable from the outside, though how many of us would proceed differently if in his shoes. Vogel and Corey both have their functions, but also both share the same fate. Only Mattei emerges as narratively in the right. This is conflict to the extreme. The unflappable quality of Corey, where a cigarette is simply part of the uniform, begs to be supported. In a most basic sense, he and Vogel and Jansen are doing a job. This is their professional choice. It’s the task that has to be completed. Likewise, Mattei is the counterpart and his position requires Vogel’s capture. Thinking, contemplation, questions of motive are all out the door. The setting of go has now been activated and there’s no room to consider why.
This strict adherence to accomplishment is what I find so intriguing about Melville and his ilk. Ultimately, it’s not about exploring whether these actions should be occurring. The only thing of importance is the act of doing, which should be accomplished with the utmost preparation and professionalism. How do we really assure that our actions won’t be useless? Melville’s answer, I’d imagine, would be along the lines of the process being superior to the results. Witness his extended, incredibly daring sequence of Corey, Vogel and Jansen robbing the jewelry store. This ends up being all for naught, but Melville takes such great care in showing every little detail of the heist that the outcome becomes unimportant. The suspense lies within the small inflections. White gloves. Black masks. A single, specially-made bullet hitting its exact target with no room for error. This is the process in excruciatingly suspenseful particulars and without regard to the supposed goal. What does Melville spend the most time on? The jewelry store robbery. His final climax is cold, abrupt, and necessary from a narrative point of view. His concern seems much more on the heist and, to a lesser extent, its varied implications.
The maddeningly quiet nature of the robbery places the viewer very near a surveillance camera watcher’s perspective. Watching, watching, watching this all unfold, completely helpless. It’s certainly an audacious stunt from Melville, even eclipsing Jules Dassin’s similar scene in Rififi. The placing is odd, and, as such, keeps the viewer completely on edge. Every little detail is unveiled, down to those sterile white gloves Melville so preferred, and the risk of taking the viewer out of the film is always there. Without any dialogue and minimal sound, the long period of aural inactivity becomes almost displacing. Anything less than total concentration, befitting the very participants in the heist, may cause the viewer to struggle amid inactivity.
The temptation to cite Le cercle rouge primarily for its wordless centerpiece is hopefully not that strong. It’s an important, effective scene, but not one I find persuasive or essential enough to slight the remainder of the film. Melville’s themes and his ideas about masculinity, right and wrong, and what it means to be a professional remain foremost in my mind. I may be a fatalist, but I appreciate Melville’s treatment, or lack thereof, of growth in his characters. They do what they have to because that’s who they are. There’s no altering or maturing in the mix. It’s incredibly comforting to view life as a one-way street where we all operate as unalterable figures, unable to truly adapt or change. Death, and whatever it entails, can be the only outcome for fate’s worst dealings. I’m not in control and neither are you.
The TCM Ten 8/16-8/22 August 17, 2008
Posted by clydefro in : Classic Films, The TCM Ten , add a commentSorry for the delay! With Saturday and Sunday being filled with films already on DVD, I opted to skip anything from those days. Several far more interesting selections are in the cards, including full days’ worth of Barbara Stanwyck and Ava Gardner. You could most definitely do worse. As always, all times are EST and program days begin at 6:00 AM.
Saturday August 16 - Fred Astaire
Sunday August 17 - Gene Kelly
Monday August 18 - Jack Palance
9:15 AM Ten Seconds to Hell (Aldrich, 1959) - BW-93 mins. - Half a dozen German soldiers return to Berlin at the end of WWII to dispose of bombs amid highly dangerous conditions. Palance and Jeff Chandler lead the group. Certainly this is the kind of material Robert Aldrich excelled at, foreshadowing The Dirty Dozen by a few years. The potential for tension is enormous. Though it was released by United Artists in the U.S., the film was apparently produced by Hammer Films. It’s not on DVD, to my knowledge.
4:30 PM Once a Thief (Nelson, 1965) - BW-106 mins. - Alain Delon’s presence ups the intrigue. He’s joined by Palance, Ann-Margret, and Van Heflin in a typical noirish story. Delon is an ex-con with a family, trying to go straight, etc. No relation to the John Woo film of the same name (though Chow Yun-Fat was sort of the Hong Kong version of Delon). This one was made for MGM, should now be controlled by Warner Bros., but isn’t on DVD.
6:30 PM Second Chance (Maté, 1953) - C-82 mins. - Robert Mitchum, Linda Darnell, and Jack Palance? Does the plot really matter? Unfortunately, this was designed to be seen in 3-D, a gimmick that doesn’t breed confidence in overall quality of the material. The Mexican-set movie still has my interest, but it may not be as good as the three leads would indicate. Without looking into it very much, I also wonder if Howard Hughes might have tinkered with the picture since it was made for RKO. His changes rarely improved coherence. The film’s not on DVD and its rights are held by Warner Bros. in R1.
Tuesday August 19 - Barbara Stanwyck
11:15 AM Forbidden (Capra, 1932) - BW-85 mins. - A day full of Stanwyck and I feel limited to just a couple of choices. Many of the films being shown aren’t on DVD so fans of hers may want to consult the channel’s schedule. This pre-Code movie is usually considered the least compelling of the Capra-Stanwyck collaborations, but it still has some charm. The story spans 20 years, with Stanwyck’s Lulu falling for a married district attorney played by Adolphe Menjou. The film’s title hints at some of its supposed tawdriness. Made for Columbia, there’s no DVD available in R1 and, I think, this title is absent elsewhere as well. It’s not in the R2 Stanwyck that contains The Miracle Woman and The Bitter Tea of General Yen.
8:00 PM The Locked Door (Fitzmaurice, 1929) - BW-74 mins. - A must-see for Stanwyck fans (which presumably explains the time slot) because it was her first leading role, and regarded by her as a debut film. She’d previously only had a small part in a silent movie called Broadway Nights. With art direction by William Cameron Menzies. The film was put out by United Artists, but I’d guess it’s now in the public domain. A couple of other interesting Stanwyck pictures, Witness to Murder at 11:15 PM and B.F.’s Daughter at 4:00 AM, air later in the night.
Wednesday August 20 - Edward G. Robinson
Thursday August 21 - Ava Gardner
9:00 AM The Bribe (Leonard, 1949) - BW-98 mins. - The lovely Ms Gardner is joined by Robert Taylor, Charles Laughton, Vincent Price and John Hodiak in a sweaty, Central American-flavored noir (noir-lite?). Taylor is a federal agent, initially narrating in flashback, on the trail of stolen plane motors. He runs into married couple Hodiak and Gardner, and is attracted to Ava. The film was made for MGM, but hasn’t been released on DVD by rightsholder Warner Bros.
4:45 AM My Forbidden Past (Stevenson, 1951) - BW-70 mins. - Ava is in love with doctor Robert Mitchum, but their marriage plans are interrupted after a secret is uncovered. Melvyn Douglas co-stars. The film is set in 1880s New Orleans and is another of Howard Hughes’ RKO hackjobs. Seventy minutes, really? And why does IMDb list 81 minutes for the UK version? Though it’s not out in R1, a French Éditions Montparnasse release is available. Check out Mitchum in his white suit on that cover.
Friday August 22 - Trevor Howard
8:30 AM The Golden Salamander (Neame, 1949) - BW-96 mins. - This is an excellent week on TCM so I’m somewhat surprised to find myself picking three titles from Trevor Howard day. He’s joined by Anouk Aimée and Herbert Lom in Ronald Neame’s foreign intrigue crime drama. Howard is an archaeologist working in Tunisia, where he encounters a criminal syndicate. The film was released by Eagle-Lion Classics in the U.S. so where does that place it now rights-wise? Well, Eagle-Lion Classics was the product of a merger between J. Arthur Rank’s Eagle-Lion Films and Film Classics. The library of their output was purchased by United Artists so MGM most likely holds the R1 rights to The Golden Salamander. It doesn’t seem to be on DVD anywhere in the world.
8:00 PM Outcast of the Islands (Reed, 1951) - BW-102 mins. - Another rare Trevor Howard movie, this Carol Reed adventure was the director’s follow-up to The Third Man. It’s based on a Joseph Conrad novel centered on betrayal and destruction. There are also some cannibalistic bits thrown in for good measure. Ralph Richardson headlines, with a noted performance from Robert Morley and Wendy Hiller in further support. It’s not on DVD, but I’m really not sure what outfit controls the rights in R1. Warner Home Video released a VHS version in the UK.
2:00 AM The Passionate Friends (Lean, 1949) - BW-95 mins. - Howard reunited with his Brief Encounter director David Lean for this H.G. Wells adaptation. Ann Todd plays a woman who again finds Howard’s professor character, the man she’d once loved, and their tortuous feelings of romance are scandalously rekindled despite her marriage to the older Claude Rains. (!) This was one of the titles announced for R1 DVD release by MGM a few years ago, but abruptly canceled. It’s still not in R1, but ITV has a new edition due on September 15th in R2, which is probably the same disc found in their David Lean Collection and Centenary Collection sets. Again, I couldn’t say who has the rights in R1, though the film is currently touring as part of a Lean retrospective. It will be at Film Forum in New York City on September 16.
Intentions of Murder August 12, 2008
Posted by clydefro in : Classic Films, 1960s, Shohei Imamura , add a commentForever transforming intricate layers of sleaze into something profound, Shohei Imamura continued on the same path he’d journeyed in 1963’s The Insect Woman with its follow-up, Intentions of Murder. The 1964 film approaches many of Imamura’s favorite subjects, notably an unremarkable and unhappy woman dragged through conflict and emerging with complicated victory. The women in his films tend to be forgotten and ignored. If they had any discernible positives, you could also add underappreciated. Their greatest strength is often mere survival, and in the case of this particular heroine, Sadako, it’s achieved accidentally. Through her repeated displays of common, unrefined mediocrity, she transcends the nature of ordinary and demands interest, even sympathy. Sadako’s suffering becomes a theme of sorts, encompassing more than just herself, and her reactions, while appearing perverse at times, remain steadfastly human.
The lived-in commonness Imamura gives Sadako, a young, but frumpy common-law wife and mother, is consistent with the director’s interest in the lower middle class of postwar Japan. His films resonate through an artificial universality, as the audience may not truly share the heroine’s situational concerns, but Imamura’s jaundiced eye makes us feel like we do. There’s a griminess to witnessing Sadako’s invasion, of home, privacy and self. A man, later identified as failing musician Hiraoko, wields a knife as means to take only a few dollars, but becomes inspired in the process to force himself on Sadako. It’s a repulsive act given full horror by Imamura. What’s unexpected, leaving the viewer further disoriented, is the single tear that falls down Hiraoko’s face when he rolls off of Sadako. Aside from bringing to mind questions of character and motive, the tear humanizes, for better or worse, the rapist and presents him not as a crazed monster, but a multi-dimensional person whose actions disgust even himself.
This possibly makes it easier to accept, though not necessarily understand, Sadako’s behavior in the remainder of the film. Her rapist transitions into a stalker, an admirer, and, finally, a lover. When she has the chance to end the arrangement, Sadako summons up the nature of her own humanity by saving Hiraoko’s life. True to the film’s title, her intentions eventually do include murder, but Imamura warns that this is no answer for a much more complicated problem. Metaphor is tucked away inside Sadako’s actions. For such a seemingly simple woman, her strength in feeling and action lends itself to gloriously complex readings. Imamura’s films, especially of this period, are obsessed with showing that those treated as not mattering by more forward-thinking society people are usually the ones who best represent the hope within humankind. Sadako’s basic good, in the face of mistreatment and shunning to the point of not even being acknowledged as the mother of her own son, doesn’t triumph in a soul-stirring moment, but it does more realistically permeate her every action when those around her often deserve much harsher treatment.
Playfully, Imamura gives just such a fate to a particularly loathsome character, the long-time mistress of Sadako’s librarian husband. The director’s dark humor is almost always sprinkled unexpectedly throughout his films, and the shocking, morbidly funny dismissal of the bespectacled would-be spy is deeply satisfying, perhaps even too much so. One gets the feeling that Imamura especially detests the character and those like her who are so hypocritical as to be humorous. Hypocrisy was always a favorite target for the director, and in the case of Intentions of Murder, the heroine’s world crumbles partially due to the Japanese customs that stray far from consistent or fair. Sadako’s rape, of which she was entirely a victim, would have disgraced her entire family had it become known, yet her husband’s affair raises little concern. She develops, in her own primitive way, a plan to deal with the shame, but her ineptitude also becomes a savior.
Imamura may be too clinical to allow a reading of Sadako’s failed suicide as anything other than narratively pleasing. It’s simply one step, the lowest before reversing course, in the continued process of her experiencing life through tragedy. Some viewers have found Imamura cold in his depictions of those barely above the fray, but it’s really more of a chilly empathy, designed as objective though not always staying there. His endings, unlike many of his contemporaries in the Japanese New Wave, tend towards hopeful, perhaps not in a traditional sense, but nonetheless with some degree of optimism. Part of the merit in Imamura’s work is that he doesn’t simply draw attention to a problem and artfully snicker. Intentions of Murder and many of his other films offer subtle reminders that dealing with the issue can be a solution in itself.
Sadako begins the film without claim to her son or husband, not respected by her mother-in-law, and potentially in danger of losing everything. It takes harrowing circumstances to correct these problems, but she emerges, despite the psychological scars, with a more stable situation, and one far better than if she had ignored the rape. If you’re inclined to dig for broad metaphors. Sadako is Japan and her rape is the country’s defeat in World War II, including the twin atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Keeping that analogy, Sadako’s despair was only solved after she came to terms with the attack and its aftermath. Facing it head-on, regardless of intention, became the necessary option.
Though knowledge of Imamura’s films obviously helps put Intentions of Murder in context, it plays quite well even on its own, non-metaphorical terms. The black and white Scope photography is frequently beautiful and framed with great care. A shot of Sadako at the far right of the frame waiting for a train reminds us why 42″plasma televisions should never be the ideal point of reference. The snow storm that hits the Tokyo area near the film’s end cleanses some of the muck, adding purity in mind if not in truth. Visually, scenes like these give the film a richness that begs to be experienced more than simply watched. Another sequence, on a train, is quite commanding, as well. At one point during that particular section, the viewer can see shadows of the camera and its operator in the window. Usually the assumption would be that this was an unintentional error, but given some of the ideas explored in Imamura’s own A Man Vanishes, the director may have at least left it in on purpose. Probably not, but who knows for sure.
Likely to be entirely intentional, and a noted signature in many of Imamura’s films, is the presence of insects or other lowly creatures. Anthropological wonders crawl around the wide black and white frame in obvious parallel to the director’s tread-upon characters. Intentions of Murder has a flashback to a silkworm making its way along Sadako’s thigh before disaster strikes. The worms appear again late in the film and it’s difficult to forget the oozing insides crushed out of one particularly unlucky fellow. There’s also a pair of white mice, pets of Sadako’s young son, featured prominently by Imamura. Though the action isn’t shown, one literally eats through his companion. The image of a dead mouse with a hole through its midsection is another that’s hard to shake after seeing. These apparent interludes are done in such a matter-of-fact style as to be fascinating. I think of the ill-fated worm and mouse and then I think about how Intentions of Murder makes the viewer feel. It doesn’t seem entirely different. Imamura gnaws your insides when he’s not squeezing the life out of you and it’s oddly thrilling.
Little Murders August 10, 2008
Posted by clydefro in : Classic Films, 1970s , 2 comments
My enthusiastic suspicions have now been confirmed. Elliott Gould is, forever and always, one cool cat. I caught the Gouldness sometime after seeing California Split and The Long Goodbye in fairly close succession - amazed, humbled, and envious at every turn. Gould may not necessarily have been the best actor or movie star of the 1970s, but I do believe he came to epitomize the decade. Time magazine famously labeled him “Star for an Uptight Age,” a moniker borrowed by the Brooklyn Academy of Music’s Cinematek series dedicated to the actor. It fit way back then, even before anyone could have possibly put the laurel in perspective, and it certainly fits now. He’s never been Redford, Pacino, Hackman, Hoffman, De Niro, or Nicholson, but Elliott Gould, if you really think about it, probably represents both America and Hollywood in the ’70s better than his more popular, longer lasting peers. His films and performances remain as snapshots of the era, owing completely to that decade and unimaginable elsewhere. Gould’s neurotic comfort, knowing everything is messed up but not really caring, is the ultimate symbol of a time possibly invented in our own heads.
Gould has been all over the local New York papers in the last week or so, making for his second time in the sun in as many years. It was just April of 2007, coinciding with a run of The Long Goodbye at Film Forum, when he was treated to a Village Voice cover story, one that apparently was incorrect in stating Gould hadn’t seen an Ingmar Bergman film prior to working with the Swedish director on The Touch. Of some interest, that picture is being screened in the actor’s personal print on August 21st at BAM, and I hope to finally be able to see it. Just prior to Gould’s Scandinavian trek, he made the film version of Jules Feiffer’s play Little Murders, screened for the occasion and followed by a question and answer session with its star. Though the film is on DVD from Fox, I’d never seen it and the disc is now out of print, fetching large sums of money if you can even find it. (Why do DVDs go out of print again?) I’m disappointed to be missing out on a commentary with Gould and Feiffer, though rental may still be an option.
The new 35 mm print, struck by Fox especially for this occasion, looked beautifully ’70s, complete with the inherent grain that repertory mavens love. As I was new to the film, and generally don’t read much on movies I’ve not seen, my impressions were muddled. It’s deeply, darkly satiric, especially in the final portion, which resembles Buñuel more than any American film I can think of right now. There’s also a superbly daring element to the movie. It’s difficult trying to imagine the majority of viewers now, much less then, appreciating how dry some of the bits are. Gould’s character steps onto a crowded New York City subway car, covered in blood against his white clothes, and no one reacts. Jaded apathy to a fault.
In thinking back on the film now, I’m most struck not by the Buñuellian aspects, since I find a lot of those flat even in Buñuel’s tries, but the other, more reflective element. The particular scene that especially stands out is when Gould’s character Alfred, a nihilist photographer incapable of feelings and married as a challenge by a woman desperately trying to mold him, unfolds this long monologue about his younger days. He sort of became an activist and was monitored by the government, which lead to a guy reading his mail every day. After Alfred realized this, he decided to write letters to the surveillance man. The scene details this experience and it’s absolutely stunning, both in writing and performance. Gould, in great contrast to his Altman characters, is mostly quiet in the film and hearing him deliberately recount the situation makes for a brilliant scene. It truly ranks with the actor’s finer pieces captured on film. Just absurdly good.
This fusion of thick satire with more introspective cultural surveying leads Little Murders all over the place. The result is a slash and burn of American society, unleashed often without warning. Few films could be called uneven as a compliment, but this is probably one of them. Familiar faces come out of nowhere, likely owing to the picture’s stage origins. Alan Arkin appears briefly (and hilariously) as a disheveled police lieutenant working on 345 unsolved murders in the last 6 months. Vincent Gardenia gives a mammoth performance. Marcia Rodd, an actress I’m unfamiliar with and someone who doesn’t have a lot of film credits, is second-billed and also effective. In addition to Arkin’s short turn, Lou Jacobi and Donald Sutherland pop up in similarly gut-busting scenes. Calling them cameos would be almost disrespectful. The guy who perhaps steals the film out from under everyone is Jon Korkes, whose name and face I didn’t know. He was present tonight, too, and a quick peek at IMDb reveals nothing as substantial as his turn in this film. He’s entirely loony as Rodd’s brother, drawing laughs at every opportunity.
Arkin also ended up in the director’s seat. He actually has a few directing credits, but I’ve not seen any of the others. I can say, with confidence, that Little Murders is well-made, and not just competently done. Gordon Willis undoubtedly deserves some of the credit, as well. He’s near the top of my favorite cinematographers and his work here is typically excellent. Michael Chapman, who went on to shoot Taxi Driver and others, is credited as the film’s camera operator. So while it may seem that this was a low-budget kind of movie, the talent was undeniably there. Actually, from listening to Gould after the screening, I suspect he too had some input, and he did serve as a producer on the film. The Broadway version of Feiffer’s play, with Gould starring, only lasted a week, though it was more successful off-Broadway.
The original idea was for Jean-Luc Godard to direct, which would have obviously changed absolutely everything. Godard never directed anything in Hollywood or English so one can only imagine how different the film might have been. Gould wrote to the French director and got a response, which lead to a meeting in New York. As he told it this evening, Gould talked with Godard in New York about making the picture, but it never really went anywhere. He remembered walking with Godard down 57th Street, past Carnegie Hall, and realizing the collaboration wasn’t going to happen. “If my wife and child ask me to tell them I love them,” Gould recollected Godard saying, “I tell them to go fuck themselves.”
I went in blind to the film and that was probably for the best. It’s certainly quite different than Feiffer’s Carnal Knowledge screenplay. You don’t know what to really laugh at or where to wince, etc. (though my audience was like a readymade laugh track at all times). The film can be overwhelming in its absurdity. I’m sometimes at a loss with that type of satire, finding it difficult to completely determine what exactly is being laughed at and whether the punch lines are as much on the audience as the target. Gould’s character here exhibits no emotion. We first see him as a photographer getting beaten up with a boxer’s mouthpiece affixed, simply waiting for his attackers to become tired. In some sense, his apathy is refreshing. Not everyone should live and die by emotion so how about exploring the even-keel guy. I’m not entirely sure this is fully rendered, but there’s so much thrown up in the film that you can hardly expect anything to really feel complete. Its charms are there for the picking, wholly without regard to convention.
Thought it now seems somewhat dated in its muted anger, Little Murders is still refreshing. A reminder that studios once did make films catered far, far away from the mainstream. It’s more than just a time capsule, and the film actually seems prescient now, tame in everything except its climactic absurdity. I wish we still had working writers like Jules Feiffer, those who were content with staying within the lines of the ridiculous components of satire and who could produce somewhat ordered insanity that, in turn, meant something more than half-hearted diatribes lacking any real bite. Gould is probably a one of a kind so I suppose I’ll accept what too few performances there are of his that really matter. In a decade when every other actor wanted to be like Brando, Gould seemed to want to just be himself, whoever that was.
The session that followed the film screening saw the actor drop plenty of names, including a mention that Sam Peckinpah wanted him as the lead in Straw Dogs. “Can you read between the lines?” the director asked. Gould responded, “I live between the lines,” as he expressed hesitancy at mixing his methods of working and living. A sly reference to poker games with Sidney Poitier at the Belafontes was also thrown in, though not really as a boast. Listening to him or reading his interviews, it becomes apparent that Elliott Gould is a supremely interesting and genuine guy.
He would start off answering people’s questions from a seemingly unrelated point, only to come full circle for an appropriate, well-considered and frequently candid response. If there’s any one thing I took away from it all, it’s probably that he comes across as someone who’s spent many, many hours in search of some form of introspection. A quick judgment might even brand Gould as a bit of a flake, but I don’t think that’s a particularly fair conclusion. No one could have imagined him as an essential movie star of the seventies. The fact that that actually happened, and that it didn’t last, must’ve taken a toll on him. To come to terms with it all, making peace with your temporary spot in the firmament, seems admirable.
Tuesday with Shirley July 23, 2008
Posted by clydefro in : Classic Films, Billy Wilder , add a commentHow does one approach Shirley MacLaine? With respect? Surely. With admiration? Maybe. With awe? Possibly. If The Apartment is as close as any to being your favorite film, you probably do so equipped with something related to that movie, book-wise. Arm twisted for no apparent reason, I’d probably choose The Apartment, along with It’s a Wonderful Life and Rear Window, as personal top of the heap. I love most everything about Billy Wilder’s cinematic instruction manual for life, including MacLaine’s performance as elevator operator Fran Kubelik. Miss Kubelik is a bit of a dour character who could so easily be tilted too far one direction or the other, but Ms. MacLaine delivers the sadness, the pixielike allure, the imperfect heroine with a warmth and subtlety that win me over every time. I hope there’s nothing improper about having a crush on a 48-year-old movie character. (Don’t tell me even if there is.)
For me, it’s The Apartment, but I know it’s Terms of Endearment for others, or maybe The Turning Point or any number of her roles. From starting with Hitchcock in The Trouble with Harry to serving as the Rat Pack mascot and doing Some Came Running alongside Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin, she’s nothing short of a legend. After The Apartment, I’ll take Being There as a somewhat distant second favorite, even if her role is overshadowed by Peter Sellers. Wilder’s Irma La Douce isn’t close to fully utilizing either director or actress, but it’s another good turn and one I also enjoy. Plus, you know, she’s a little nutty in real life. Growing up, I associated Shirley MacLaine with her, let’s say, unorthodox views on reincarnation, alien life, and probably half a dozen other interesting topics. It took the discovery of her films from the fifties and sixties to really make me appreciate the acting and star presence.
So what would the demographic of a big city book signing be like for an Academy Award-winning actress, best-selling author, beloved icon of spirituality, and Warren Beatty’s big sister? In short, lots of older people and lots of females. The thing with New York City events like this (meaning, free) is that they always seem to attract a myriad display of eccentrics. A rogues’ gallery of poor hygiene, indescribable fashion, and a complete lack of candor. The most vocal members of this type of crowd have seen it all and left social scars all across the city. People will ask most anything, regardless of coherence or appropriateness. Add in some air conditioning when it’s ninety degrees outside and the fun simply creates itself.
Something I’ve begrudgingly grown to love about book signing lines are the inevitable wait times. If I’d not queued up, as my friends on the other side say, I wouldn’t have seen the absolute disgust repeatedly met by the book store worker’s announcements that Ms. MacLaine would only be signing and not reading, answering questions, or singing (!). The delight here was especially exacerbated when Shirley came out obviously unaware of the store’s warning. She very casually inquired about the plan for the night and asked if anyone had any questions for her. Question #1 - Why is the government covering up the existence of UFO’s? clydefro reaction #1 - Oh boy, this is going to be a hoot. Trust me, this is not the kind of thing you can uncover just everyday, for free nonetheless, even in Manhattan. I had hit upon a goldmine of sociological observation.
There has to be a level of sheer, bewildered admiration in seeing a bona fide film legend like Shirley MacLaine be so brave and honest in her opinions. I truly revere her openness. I think she’s touched, but I still have the utmost respect for her willingness to share. Of course, she has a sense of humor about it all. When someone asked about Frank Sinatra, she briefly pretended to summon him from beyond. It also shouldn’t go unnoticed that people really adore this woman, and, at least in this audience, it doesn’t even seem primarily to be for her film roles. I was thrilled when someone finally asked about making Some Came Running for Vincente Minnelli. Shirley’s reply? Minnelli was a great director of curtains, of furniture, but pretty much left his actors alone. (No wonder Minnelli made an entire film about curtains!)
She also gave her fans ample opportunity to speak. With the Q&A already unannounced and, thus, eating into the allotted signing time, a book store employee attempted to cut things off by proclaiming a particular question as the last one. Having none of it, Shirley immediately negated that and made a definitive motion to continue on, which the session did for another ten or fifteen minutes, thirty in all. This allowed for an Obama question (Shirley’s a fan) and the previously mentioned Sinatra moment. Time a wastin’ already, the signing started soon afterwards, but she again seemed intent on meeting and greeting everyone (not a common reaction by any means). I don’t know if everyone was able to have their book scrawled on, but my wait paid off and I was glad to share how much I love The Apartment with her.
There’s a really attractive Billy Wilder book from Taschen that I received as a birthday gift last year. It has lots of photos and concise text about all of his Hollywood films as writer or director. In the back of the book there’s a nice picture with Wilder and MacLaine, and an unidentified man between the two of them. There’s also some white space at the bottom of the page. Perfect. I felt bad about not purchasing her book so I’m now the semi-proud owner of a paperback copy of Sage-ing While Age-ing. Signings have different degrees of security/pushy big dudes. Thankfully, this was fairly laid back and I was able to present the page of the Wilder book to her, which she signed without hesitation but only after trying to remember if she knew who the guy between her and Billy Wilder was. You can see why people love her so much. She does come across as being out there in another place, but she’s also genuine. That’s not a quality often seen or associated with “movie stars.” I think Shirley probably is more interested in another kind of stars anyway. When someone asked about her astrological sign, she asserted herself as a Taurus, placing her index fingers on either side of her forehead.
I Am a Cat July 18, 2008
Posted by clydefro in : Classic Films, 1970s , add a commentI wasn’t sufficiently acquainted with Kon Ichikawa’s work (and, truthfully, I’m still not), but the entire tone of his relatively obscure I Am a Cat caught me somewhat by surprise. I’d loved Ichikawa’s Fires on the Plain, a deeply and darkly humorous look at the ridiculousness of war played against that looming seriousness that’s always prevalent in those kind of films. I was then ready for some kind of Japanese incarnation of Harry and Tonto. That’s really not what I got, though. I Am a Cat is definitely steeped in comic undertones, with Tatsuya Nakadai almost parodying himself, but it’s absolutely far removed from Harry and Tonto. Instead, we’re left with some odd tribute to Nakadai’s eternally grumpy protagonist and the stray cat who’s his only true confidante.
Nakadai is an English teacher at a local school. He’s put-upon like the patron figure of dozens of films and televisions shows. Viewers who are especially fans of Nakadai will appreciate how the actor comically rants about here. His home life is almost disastrous, with a ditzy (but attractive) wife, three young children, a loud school nearby that’s controlled by a corrupt businessman he loathes, and frequent visits from layabout friends. And the grey-furred, green-eyed cat! I was mistakenly under the impression that the cat narrates the film, but this is patently false. Only the very last portion, mere minutes, is told from the cat’s perspective. We instead get the ruminations of Nakadai’s decidedly upset protagonist.
As such, the film will appeal particularly to a pair of contingents - those fans of Nakadai and the cat lovers. I, with head hung in semi-shame, volunteer as a part of both. The feline aspect is an especially winning part of the film, though not the focus. Sure those susceptible to some whiskers and such will be satiated by the throwaway shots of the cat, but the film is pretty good otherwise, as well. Nakadai’s constant disbelief at everything around him is pure brilliance. Baseballs come flying across the fence from the school. Not just a stray one or two, but ball after ball. Nakadai blows a fuse and then ends up humiliated. Suddenly the actor is delivering pathos to this grumpy middle-aged man. The comedy is still there, but it’s now twinged with a bit of sadness. You realize the film is battling an entire shift in Japan society. Businessmen are corrupt and powerful. Their newfound wealth has lead to unearned snobbishness. And kids just don’t respect their elders. It may not be an entirely unique or profound message, but the point is made.
Let’s get back to the cat, though. Furry little guy. Ichikawa completely plays to the kinds of moments that feline foes will loathe. The cat-friendly viewer smiles when the screen is filled by the whiskered star doing basically nothing except living up to the film’s title. Sure it’s pandering and the era-specific synthesizer music doesn’t help, but there’s a quaintness at play that saves these detours from harming the film. The cat is an important element in the movie and he serves as Nakadai’s companion when not out competing with a larger male for the affections of a female cat. The other male cat, called simply “Black,” provides by far the biggest laughs in a recurring bit about a weasel and his flatulence. There are few bigger crowd pleasers in an arthouse cinema than hearing Nakadai, with utmost seriousness, discuss “the fetid fart of the weasel” and its relation to the pride of this local cat community.
As the film winds down, we’re again left with that tragicomic malaise. Nakadai’s character has suffered a break-in that Ichikawa delicately plays for humor. The teacher even takes the cat to spend a night away from his quarrelsome wife. Problems also persist at work. Things just aren’t turning out well for him. Silently (unwillingly, you might say) supporting him through it all is the nameless cat. He’s taken up with the creature just when he feels let down and frustrated with everyone else. Things are necessarily changed for both by the ending, and I don’t want to spell it out here, but it’s unclear whether we should expect the Nakadai character to alter his languid musings or general grumpiness. Eccentric melancholy rules the day. For better or worse, we all have some fart of the weasel in us.
(Kon Ichikawa’s I Am a Cat is unavailable on DVD, at least with English subtitles. Masters of Cinema recently revealed plans to release several of Ichikawa’s films next year, but it’s unknown whether this will be one of them.)
Mann of the Hour July 9, 2008
Posted by clydefro in : Classic Films, 1950s , 5 commentsEven several years into the DVD format, it’s still a pleasant surprise when one particular filmmaker has multiple, unrelated releases hit shelves around the same time. Now, over 40 years since his untimely death, 2008 seems to have accidentally turned into the year of Anthony Mann in R1. His two epics, El Cid and The Fall of the Roman Empire, were released in late January and April, respectively, under the Weinstein Company’s Miriam Collection tag. Likely by pure coincidence, the director’s clamored-for Man of the West was finally put out by MGM in May. Like its R2 counterpart released a few years ago, the disc is free of extra features, but its status as a much in-demand title makes MGM look good just for finally going to the trouble to press the discs.
Only a week after Man of the West escaped from the vault, Universal did their part by re-issuing the three James Stewart westerns made for the studio. Packaged quietly in the James Stewart: The Western Collection set, Winchester ‘73 got an image upgrade, Bend of the River remained in its already quite good transfer, and The Far Country was presented in anamorphic widescreen for the first time in R1. The latter still looks rough in its somewhat soft video, but I can’t speak highly enough of how Winchester ‘73 shines. Three other Stewart westerns are found in that set as well, with Night Passage being the most interesting to Mann admirers because he was scheduled to direct it, but backed out to make The Tin Star (the R1 of which has inexplicably gone out of print from Paramount) instead. The film suffers from mediocrity as a result, and the two men never worked together again, ending a string of eight films together in just five years. Along with their other two westerns, The Naked Spur and The Man from Laramie, these are my favorite Mann films. His film noir output, made the decade before, is frequently exceptional, but I have the highest regard for those five.
Prior to working with Stewart, Anthony Mann already had two westerns under his belt in 1950. His first was Devil’s Doorway, which isn’t yet on DVD, but more on that in a second. He then immediately stepped into The Furies, with Barbara Stanwyck and Walter Huston and now available on DVD from the Criterion Collection. My review of that release can be found at DVD Times so there’s no need to repeat in full here how exciting the entire package is for fans of the director. In some odd way, the attention by Criterion seems to further legitimize how accomplished Mann’s direction was and does a good deal to combat his being somewhat ignored on the DVD’s of his other films. Even Warner Bros.’ contentious release of The Naked Spur was atypically lacking any kind of appreciation as to the quality of the film. So despite being wrapped in with what’s likely to be, at best, Mann’s seventh finest western of the fifties, those still too brief supplements from Criterion are entirely precious.
Back to reality again from the WB, who get in on the Mann festivities next month by releasing his Cimarron remake, but with only an apparent trailer as bonus material. That puts the count on new R1 editions of Mann films at seven this year alone, not counting the duplicated Bend of the River. Pretty good, even if The Tin Star getting discontinued feels like a small step backward.
The other notable bit of information in store for fans of the director is his frequent presence on the Turner Classic Movies channel. When I started doing “The TCM Ten” picks every week last fall, I noticed a programming trend of repeatedly scheduling Mann films usually relegated to public domain hell. I’m not sure what happened (maybe they ran out of fresh titles), but his lesser-known movies disappeared from future schedules. Thankfully, the cycle seems to have started again and the next few months bring several prime selections. All of these will be mentioned again in my weekly picks, but Mann aficionados can look forward to his French Revolution noir The Black Book (aka Reign of Terror) next week, on July 14. A few of the more readily available titles are peppered into the schedule in the days and weeks after that, until, late night on September 22, we’re treated to Devil’s Doorway and the Abraham Lincoln-themed The Tall Target. I’m hoping for another airing of Desperate at some point, as well, since my recorder seems to favor Mann less than I do, having failed me when the film aired last November.
Harakiri June 21, 2008
Posted by clydefro in : Classic Films, 1960s , 5 comments
Living where I do and having an interest in some form of the popular arts (film, music, literature) has allowed for many opportunities to view people whom I admire up close. It’s a weird sensation, undoubtedly, but even stranger is when it stops seeming like a big deal. I never have anything worthwhile to say or ask so I usually just politely demur or thank the person if there’s an autograph involved. I’m always (overly) cognizant of trying to avoid embarrassing myself, first and foremost, and, additionally, not bothering anyone more than is absolutely necessary. I rarely take pictures, not because I wouldn’t like to have them, but more to avoid the trouble. So I play the role of observer and soak it all in. This establishes a bit of a routine that prevents nervousness and the like, but also keeps me from losing my marbles when so-and-so is a few feet away, especially if I’ve watched/read/listened to so-and-so’s work enough to imprint their sensibilities somewhere in the midst of my own budding tastes and opinions.
That’s a long, explanatory introduction to my experience of watching a beautiful Scope print of Masaki Kobayashi’s Harakiri at Film Forum and then immediately watching the film’s star, Tatsuya Nakadai, get up from his seat three rows in front of mine to read a few prepared statements and take questions from the small, 150-member or so audience. Difficult to not be affected by that kind of breaking of a 46-year-old fourth wall. The idea that Nakadai, whose films essentially are Japanese cinema of the 1960s, would be in the same place where I was still seems unimaginable. This is arguably Japan’s greatest, most versatile movie star. I’m with the Mifune mifunites as much as the next person, but Nakadai has him beat in terms of a filmography to rival most any actor in any country at any time. Nakadai’s versatility alone, moving from Kobayashi’s The Human Condition trilogy and Harakiri to The Face of Another, films with Kon Ichikawa, Mikio Naruse and Hideo Gosha, and starring in Kurosawa’s two epic achievements of the 1980s, Kagemusha and Ran, remains astounding. I’m not saying he’s Japan’s best actor or that Mifune was inferior, only that Nakadai showed a greater range and worked with a wider array of directorial talent than Mifune. I wouldn’t trade the latter for anyone, but if someone put a tantō against the skin covering of my entrails, I’d pick Nakadai over Mifune.
With that unpleasant image in mind, how about upgrading to the entirely gruesome shot of Akira Ishihama trying to commit the film’s titular act with a dagger made of bamboo. On DVD, reclining on one’s couch in privacy’s creature comforts, the scene feels affecting and uncomfortable. But projected onto a large screen, in a darkened room with a full audience, it’s nearly unbearable. The black and white cinematography hardly mitigates the palpable pain, even if the blood is inky black instead of deep red. That crude oil look that blood has in black and white films seems to be far more effective than the distractingly fake stuff of horror movies and Peckinpah westerns. Unless I’m seeing internal organs, this scene in Harakiri ranks with any in terms of audience discomfort. When the viewer is sitting helpless in a screening room, hardly able to even avert one’s eyes, the excruciating length of time Kobayashi lets it play out is squirm cinema at its best. Part of the scene’s extraordinary nature is that it comes in a film that’s largely nonviolent and only contains any action sequences in its very last part, which even then Kobayashi playfully avoids showing in their entirety.
Still, I think those final, vengeance-infused showdowns between Nakadai and everyone else, scored to perfection by Tôru Takemitsu, are what the viewer largely takes away from Harakiri. The actor admitted after the screening that he couldn’t compete with Mifune’s madman swordsmanship, but Kobayashi’s film is only concerned with the climactic scenes of Nakadai against everyone else in the aftermath of a great deal of background having already been established. Though Kobayashi aligned himself with the popular reading of the film as a plainly harsh attack against feudal Japan, as well as the more modern powers behind the country’s entry in World War II, I also think it’s important to remember how essential the title is. This is a film about, concerned with, and in critique of the practice of seppuku, and one wholly without an endorsement. It’s like the samurai equivalent of suicide bombing. Nakadai’s own words, when answering a not entirely well thought out question from an audience member, probably sum things up best. He said something to the effect of not being able to support any government that requires its citizens to kill themselves, regardless of the reason.
As an increasingly conflicted American who hopes to soon find the flame of hope in his own country, it’s too easy to forget the courage of filmmakers and actors like Kobayashi and Nakadai. Japan is hardly the first nation one associates with radical directors of the 1960s, despite the somewhat subtle subversions everywhere in the films of Teshigahara, Imamura, and Oshima, but the ones who did place their politics on screen did so with extreme skill. Certainly Ichikawa’s Fires on the Plain is one of the most striking and compelling films against the practice of war that I’ve seen. Kobayashi was apparently outspoken all along, somehow navigating through Japan’s studio system for years before turning independent. Harakiri is a stark slap against the cheek of the country’s insincere history on film. Kurosawa romanticized the samurai to an extreme that wasn’t completely his fault, but nevertheless remains to this day. How many wasteful Americans proudly own an “authentic” samurai sword? The answer: too many.
I’m in the minority, but I’ll gladly take Harakiri over any of Kurosawa’s samurai films, or anyone else’s, for that matter. By facing the glaring hypocrisy head on and without apology, Kobayashi destroyed the Western myth of samurai as honorable warrior with one deft slash across cinema. There are few images more damning against a nation’s symbolic heritage than Nakadai destroying the armor edifice late in Kobayashi’s film. The director, as well as Shinobu Hashimoto’s expanded adaptation of the source material, simply refused to adhere to Kurosawa’s wandering ronin populist images found in Yojimbo just one year earlier. Harakiri’s retainers are insects with swords. They obey the orders of a corrupt master without considering any consequences, ethical or otherwise. As Kobayashi brilliantly lays out both with contained subtlety and obvious conviction, true honor is a foreign concept to these men. There’s the idea of maintaining total conviction to the samurai calling, but it’s all at the expense of freethinking. The parallels, essentially, are abundant for any military-based dictatorship, either in confirmed action or Orwellian doublespeak. Kobayashi would not be happy with my country circa the last seven plus years.
Politics aside, it’s a bit of a disservice to assign Harikiri as a film strictly concerned with an agenda. It’s a great movie period. I had it at number twenty in my 1960s list, and, while it may be difficult to really scare up a spot any higher, it’s completely deserving of that ranking. What begins somewhat deliberately envelops the viewer to an extent hardly common or easily explained. The simple storytelling of the Rentaro Mikuni character’s flashback, leading to Nakadai’s recounting of his experiences in broken parts, may be deceptive in its simplicity, but only a skilled combination of artists could keep the viewer repeatedly mesmerized. By the time Nakadai’s displaced ronin unveils one of the great minor twists in film history, affixed in an intricate topknot itself, the viewer is transfixed on the actor’s every move.
Of Lubitsch, Sturges, and Wilder June 12, 2008
Posted by clydefro in : Classic Films, 1930s, 1940s, Billy Wilder, Ernst Lubitsch , 4 commentsThough it initially seemed anticlimactic, the recent fire at Universal Studios in California proved to be more damaging than common sense would have first envisioned. Screening prints of the classic Paramount films of the ’30s and ’40s, owned by Universal and including films by the three directors in the post title as well as several others, were destroyed forever. A programmer for Film Forum in New York told the NY Times that a potential Preston Sturges festival would most likely be scrapped as a result. Bad news all around. The media focused on a comparatively inconsequential King Kong theme park ride while beautiful silver celluloid is transformed into ashes. I can’t hardly classify the loss as tragic, a word which really should be reserved for life and death calamities, but it’s upsetting nonetheless.
These three guys, Lubitsch, Sturges and Wilder, form the backbone of classic Hollywood comedy. Their colleague Leo McCarey was another vital presence who also worked at Paramount and whose key films (including Ruggles of Red Gap) remain largely unreleased, now increasingly difficult to see in repertory screenings, as well. Josef von Sternberg is right there, too. If there’s anything at all worth smiling about, it’s that several films related to this trio have recently surfaced on DVD. Quite a few of their films as writer and director are still without a DVD release, possibly deterred even further by this turn of events, but I wanted to mention the few that have reached the market, which, conveniently, I’ve also reviewed for DVD Times.
Back in February, Criterion’s Eclipse line released Lubitsch’s four Paramount musicals in a nifty, extras-less edition. It’s a must-own for fans of the director. Around the same time, Wilder’s The Apartment got a nice upgrade from MGM. (It was originally released by United Artists.) More recently, the BFI put out Lubitsch’s final completed film, Cluny Brown. Made for Fox in 1946, it’s an appropriate ending to a great career. I had vastly underestimated the film after an initial viewing when I put up a review back early last year on this site. The more pertinent Paramount/Universal titles hit stores in April. I’ve reviewed all these, including Wilder’s first film as director in Hollywood, The Major and the Minor. Also out are a pair of Mitchell Leisen-directed efforts. Easy Living, with screenplay from Sturges, and Midnight, a sparkling film written by Charles Brackett and Billy Wilder, finally received their digital releases, I believe, for the first time anywhere in the world.
This still leaves several Paramount-made, Universal-controlled pictures from the Lubitsch, Sturges, and Wilder cycle unavailable on R1 DVD. Most notably - Angel, directed by Lubitsch and available in a Marlene Dietrich set in R2, Bluebeard’s Eighth Wife, another Lubitsch picture and written by Brackett and Wilder, Remember the Night, written by Sturges and directed by Leisen but not on DVD anywhere, Hold Back the Dawn, which was directed by Leisen and scripted by Brackett and Wilder, and two early Wilder-directed films, Five Graves to Cairo and A Foreign Affair. Both of those latter movies are available in other regions, but still absent in R1. There are a handful of others, things like Arise My Love which I’ve been anxious to see, but I’m now hesitant as to whether any of these films will make it onto R1 DVD in the near future. Despite business concerns, it would seem appropriate for Universal to reveal exactly what films were lost (surely their bookkeeping contains such records) instead of playing so coy.