Even More Tales from the Socialist Literary Collective*

"Friday Night Lights" (Peter Berg, 2005) I missed this movie in its first go-'round, but seeing the pilot for the eventual NBC series put "the hooks" in me. I wanted to see what had inspired the series, which had impressed me, and see if the movie was as good.

Short answer. Yes. And a bit better. It's another High School football movie, replete with all the drama that situation lends to it. The pressure on the kids to win. The pressure on the coach to make them winners. The crush of expectations, and the town's sense of worth wrapped up in the team. It's all there, but shot in the "caught off-guard" style of a documentary that gives it more power, more immediacy. You don't feel sympathy for Tom Cruise in "All the Right Moves" because, hey, he's Tom Cruise. But a bunch of nobodies, with the melodrama tamped down, takes it out of Hollywood contrivance, and makes you look away from the glare of stars and see into the drama. You begin to think that anything can happen. You begin to care. The film is dedicated to Alan J. Pakula, producer-director, who in the 70's made dispassionate, stylistically intimate films that had that same lived-in quality--"Klute," "All the President's Men"--even if it was Jane Fonda and Robert Redford on the screen. Here the biggest star in Billy Bob Thornton, who excells at low-key, lived-in, but even he feels like a bit of a distraction from the rest of the movie's verisimilitude, so completely does Berg maintain the illusion. It's a damned good film.


"The Night Of the Hunter" (Charles Laughton, 1955) One of the most stylized, creepiest movies ever made--the only one ever directed by actor Charles Laughton--"The Night of the Hunter" tells the story of an almost-elementally corrupt minister who comes to town seeking fortune by seducing and murdering the wife and terrifying the children of his old cell-mate, and tells it in the manner of a magical fairy tale. As two of the targets of the Rev.'s obsessions are the impressionable children of Willa Harper (Shelley Winters), the film becomes a battle between Good and Evil as seen through their eyes. The Good is represented by the Grandmother, played forthrightly by silent film star Lillian Gish. The Evil is the right Rev. Harry Powell, who strides into town with the conflicts in his soul tatooed on his fists. It's a bravura performance by Robert Mitchum, who wasn't known for bravura performances, usually satisfied maintaining a laconic air to get by. Here he brays and exhorts like a bull and it's an amazing thing to see so theatrical a performance out of him--in fact, it's the role he's best remembered for. The film itself is a creepy blend of reality and fantasy, of realism and theatricality and the clashes of those sensibilities jar one's attention, while burrowing into the soft places of one's skull. Despite poor box-office and crtical pans when it opened in 1955, "The Night of the Hunter" abides. It abides and it endures.

"Wilde" (Brian Gilbert, 1997) A nearly definitive biographical film of the scholar and playwight whose career was destroyed and life shortened by the spiteful trial and imprisonment for "indecent acts" directly relating to his gay trysts. Stephen Fry plays Wilde, and he's a bit too old for the part but the resemblance is there, and his bulk and refinement put you in the sphere of what it must be like to be a bull in a china shop. Vaness Redgrave (wonderful, as always) plays Mother Wilde, Jennifer Ehle as his wife Constance, and as the earnest young men in Wilde's affections, a virtual parade of young British heart-throbs--Orlando Bloom (for 3 s., tops), Ioan Gruffud, Michael Sheen, and as Wilde's obsession Lord Alfred "Bosie" Douglas, Jude Law in full schizophrenic movie mode. One becomes aware all too quickly that Wilde's problems stem from a bad match and his tragedy is that he could never stop going back no matter the cost to him or those around him. Frye communicates the "struck dumb" quality that must have evoked, which for a man of Wilde's intellect and eloquence must have been over-powering. Tom Wilkinson is hissingly malevolent as "Bosie's" father, The Marquess of Queensbury, the acknowledged "rule setter" for the subtle art of bashing someone's brain in. Here he forgets his own rule about hitting below the belt. The film is a cautionary tale of how reaching the heights of fame guarantee the hardest of falls, and how hubris has a remarkable way of proving to be one's undoing.

"I Know Where I'm Going!" (Michael Powell/Emeric Pressburger, 1945) Wendy Hiller stars as a determined woman whose whole life has been planned out and played out according to her own well thought-out scenario. Now, she's travelling to the Scottish Highlands to marry her industrialist fiancee on the Island of Kiloran. But to get there she must book passage from the Island of Mull. But Nature and Fate conspire to keep her Mulling and scuttle her schedule, while the cutely eccentric citizens cast a spell all their own. Powell and Pressburger create a film concoction with fantasy elements, surreal dream sequences and musical interludes, taking a straightforward story and apply an extremely creative approach to it. The story may seem overly familiar, but not the approach to it which keeps one watching intently to see not so much what will happen, but how. It's a lost little gem that shows what a creative force "The Archers"--the team that made "The Red Shoes" could be. Also, look for a short appearance by a child-actress named Petula Clark. Yup, that one.

"All the King's Men" (Robert Rossen, 1948) The Oscar-winner for Best Picture of 1949 and it's hard to argue. Rossen's adaptation of Robert Penn Warren's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel about the corrupting powers of politics, it boasts two powerful (and Oscar-winning)performances: Broderick Crawford as innocent-turned-player Willie Stark and Mercedes McCambridge as his cynical-to-the-marrow political assistant. McCambridge is so good and so inventive that she might just as well have been given the statue for the next five years. Would that the other performances have been as electric as these two, but one could say that they shine even more brightly next to the lesser lights. It's particularly interesting to see Crawford so restrained at the beginning of the film, but once he sees how the game is played he turns on the after-burners and soars over everybody else in the frame with him. Mention should be made of the ocassional glimpses of a documentary style in the rally scenes amid the more traditionally blocked studio framing. And the film may seem a bit abrupt in places--but that's because Rossen, determined to get the film below two hours, gave his editor instructions to take most of the scenes and cut precisely thirty seconds from the front of it and thirty seconds from the back (making sure not to clip off any dialog). What was left was the hard nugget of the scene's core and "All the King's Men" feels more brutal in its pace and attitude because of this uncompromising strategy.

"The Lady Vanishes" (Alfred Hitchcock, 1938) Poor Iris Matilda Henderson has "been everyhwere and done everything," and is on her way to marry what her travelling companions call a "blue-blooded check-chaser" when she gets beaned by a suspiciously-unanchored flower box. She is helped onto her departing train and administered to by the elderly Miss Froy, a vacationing governess in love with the music of the Alps. Waking up from a recuperative nap, Iris discovers the woman missing, and what's worse, no one on the train claims to have seen her. Is everyone on the train lying, or has Iris just imagined the whole thing? The only ally she can find is the eccentric and rather obnoxious musicologist (Michael Redgrave, father of Lyn and Vanessa, and grandfather of Joely Richardson), whose racket has kept her awake nights at their lodgings. But now he comes to her aid ("My father taught me to never desert a lady in trouble. In fact I think that's why he married my mother!") to determine just what's been lost--the old lady or Iris' mind. Redgrave supposedly didn't get on with Hitchcock, and didn't have much respect for movie-acting, either--until another cast member saw him on-stage and wondered why he was so brilliant on the boards and so lackluster on-screen. For his part, Hitchcock took the material and accentuated the comedy and sexual situations, giving each of the train participants their own contrary behavior. It proved to be one of the most beloved of Hitchcock's British films, and legitimately can stand up to any of "The Master of Suspense's" later classics.

"Road to Rio" (Norman Z. McLeod, 1947) I've got a weakness for the "Road" movies--those Paramount programmers with Hope, Crosby and Lamour--where the least excuse for a plot is thrown together (usually the boys are scammers on the run), Hope and Crosby do their best to ad-lib over the other one, and the fourth wall is practically nonexistent. In fact, one of my favorite jokes in this one, has Crosby and Hope do a 3/4-quarters-in recap of the plot and what has to happen to resolve everything, when suddenly there's an off-screen scream. "What was that?" says Bing, and Hope looks askew and says "It's the Warner Brothers--they're jealous." Right. This, the fifth in the "Road" series has the boys on the lam to Rio De Janeiro, where they hope to keep Lamour, hypnotized by her scheming aunt, from marrying a hand-picked ne'er-do-well. And with that much sophistication to the plot, you know Hope-Crosby have to get hypnotized, too. It ain't art-house material--more like burlesque-house--but it is entertaining.

"Broken Flowers" (Jim Jarmusch, 2005) Don Johnston ("You're Don Johnson?!" "No. With a 'T'") is in a funk. A computer millionaire, he has no energy for anything. No desire. No drive. Certainly no energy for his girlfriend who walks out on him at the beginning of the film. In other words, he's Bill Murray's usual grown-up slacker, but without the savage wit. Murray may be the best conveyor of malaise since "Buster" Keaton was drummed out of the talkies. Adding to his girl-friend's anger, he has just recieved a pink envelope addressed in red ink from an old girl-friend, who warns him that the son he never knew existed is looking for him. It's a mystery,a nd he wants no part of it. But it's a "clue" to his mystery-buff neighbor (Jeffrey Wright) who sets up an elaborate scavenger hunt with four of his "passed ships" as the check-points (and they are Sharon Stone-really good, Frances Conroy, Jessica Lange, and an unrecognizable Tilda Swinton). It's a bit like Ulysses on an Odyssey of old battlefields. But he's a reluctant Ulysses and never too sure what to say to the women, but the object of his quest is his son. And by the end of the film, his world has been opened up, or at least there are more opportunities for him to get into trouble.

"The 7 Faces of Dr. Lao" (George Pal, 1964) One of those movies I wanted to see as a kid, but never got the chance. An ersatz Western directed by film-fantasist George Pal ("The War of the Worlds," "The Time Machine") with a screenplay by the mordantly sunny Charles Beaumont, responsible for many of the best mind-twisting "Twilight Zone" episodes. Dr. Lao is the "Mysterious Stranger" who comes into the troubled town of Abalone with a circus that exposes truth, shines a light on hypocrisy, and turns lives around. One might be a bit off-put by Lao's initial pigeon-English, but it's as epehemeral as everything else about Dr. Lao, for he's not any nationality ("He looks like a 'Jap' to me" "Naw, he's more Chinese" "How d'you know that?" "'Cause I'm not stupid!"), sticks to no dialect or any sex, for that matter--if he's made of matter, at all! One should be more concerned with the idea that a "Good Man" will unstarch the collar of the Local School-Marm, except that this transformation (by the Circus' "Pan") leaving Barbara Eden sweating and panting is bravurely provocative for a G-rated kid's film. That's something Disney wouldn't try! Everything turns nicely-nicely at the end, but there is trauma along the way to balance it. Tony Randall plays Lao beneath all sorts of William Tuttle (another "TZ" alum) make-up that doesn't hamper the elasticity of his performance, and as a kind of bow/acknowledgement he appears in the circus audience gravely shaking his head.

But back to Beaumont. Check out this thesis speech delivered in low reverent tones by Randall:

"The whole world is a circus, if you know how to look at it. The way the sun
goes down when you're tired, and comes up when you want to be on the move.
That's real magic. The way a leaf grows. The song of the birds. The way the
desert looks at night with the Moon embracing it. Oh, my boy. That's circus
enough for anyone. Every time you watch a rainbow and feel wonder in your heart.
Every time you pick up a handful of dust, and see not the dust, but a mystery--a
marvel, there in your hand. Every time you stop and think "I'm alive, and being
alive is fantastic!" Every time such a thing happens, you're a part of the
Circus of Dr. Lao."

That is heavy stuff, delivered in an intoxicating rhythm and smoothness of tone--it's joy mounting as the commonness of the examples increases, getting down to the dirt. That's a great speech. And as Beaumont could be dark in tone, his words could excite and throw apart any veil of despair. But even if that speech gets a little heavy, Beaumont has the cure. "I don't understand," the child answers. Lao grabs the top of his head and leaps over it. "Neither do I!" he exults, and begins a high-kicking dance. Life is too wonderful to spend your time saying how wonderful it is. Use it. Dance!

"Get Out Your Handkerchiefs" (Bertrand Blier, 1978) French comedy about a man in love with a woman who is acutely depressed. He doesn't understand women. He doesn't understand much of anything. All he knows is he wants to make it better so he'll feel okay.

Hilarity ensues.

Well, not so much. The hilarity is under the surface a bit, since the film only shallowly reflects real behavior for comic effect. Below the goofiness, though, is some truth. For instance, to prod her out of her zombie-like depression, Raoul (Gerard Depardieau) approaches a narcisistic academic (who loves Mozart--acts like they're best of friends--and his apartment is dominated by a collection of every Penguin Pocket Book ever published, alphabetized). "She's attracted to you! Sleep with her!" he says. And as she's attractive (and spends much of the film undressed) he does. But she's still subject to collapsing into a fugue state at the drop of a stitch (she's a constant knitter--and folks, that's a clue) Suffice it to say that these adults aren't nearly mature enough, but she does find happiness, fulfilment and a good jolt of "wake-me-up" in unexpected places. It's safe to say that this film is in the top five of Mary Kay Letourneau's favorite films.

As I do with foreign language films, I watch the English language version and turn on the captions to see if there's any major disconnects between translation and performance. Nothing too disparate here, But there was an odd side effect. The actor dubbing Gerard Depardieau's "Raoul" has a distinctive New York whine that sounds alarmingly like Jerry Seinfeld. Within ten minutes, I was seeing the film as just another "Seinfeld" episode, albeit one with a point besides how self-absorbed people can be.

* Your Public Library
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