It has been so long since I’ve not had a movie to review that I kind of forget what other things I write about on here. I don’t think I’m going to weatherproof my apartment this year, because I seriously think it doesn’t do a bit of good. All of the drafts come from where the walls don’t square to the wood floors. I’ve been going to Civ consistently enough that they now know what I’m going to get based on the weather outside. Large Mexican Hot Chocolate and a toasted wheat bagel if it is cold. Something from the fridge if it is warm. Eventually I suppose I’ll just be able to walk in and say “peanut butter!” or “cream cheese!” since that will be the only variable.

A part of this viewing list: Criterion Collection Spine #160: René Clair’s À nous la liberté.

Ever since I first saw this film a few years ago its cheery theme song comes back as an earworm at least once a month. “À nous, à nous, la li-ber-té!” While it is no longer roll-on-the-floor hilarious, it is still a light-hearted and enjoyable jaunt through an idealized, not-yet-cynical 20th century industrial environment. I promise not to fill this review with hyphens, although it might already be too late. Even if Clair made the film today it still might be bereft of the cynicism, so potent is the joie de vivre of the main characters. The plot is relatively simple, two friends attempt to escape from the pen, but only one makes it, and becomes a successful industrialist. Years later his yurodivy friend ends up working in the same factory, even though he’d rather be napping in a field of wildflowers. They rekindle their friendship, by accident, but the center cannot hold as other criminals try to blackmail the escaped con/industrialist.

He manages to stave off this doom long enough to bequeath his entire corporation to the workers and escapes with his friend in the ensuing windstorm/riot. In a reprise of the theme song at the end, both friends are happy as wandering bums, free as the wind and with as few cares.

While the core of the plot requires little to think about [as the core of the film is comedy] its appendages are open to many readings. Throughout the film, comparisons are made between prison life and factory life, which you can see in the first two screen shots I’ve provided. Initially all the references to freedom are made by people who are, in some way, not free at all. The song is yearning and motivational at these points as opposed to its function as a hymn of rejoicing in the end. While the film has an unmissable socialist flavor to it, it is less a critique of authority than a document of man’s tendency to obsess about order, even unto the loss of freedom.

Even as an industrialist, Louis, is restricted by the expectations of his sycophants, the need to conform to the behavior that other wealthy people expect, and his past. He has managed to drug himself with his wealth and it takes the return of Emilé to remind him that life is not about being important, but about being happy and free. This recognition likely provides the inspiration he has to give the newly automated factory over to the workers, who can now spend their days bowling, playing cards, fishing or dancing instead of making phonographs. Despite its focus on freedom, the film isn’t really existentialist, since it equates freedom with a lack of responsibility instead of freedom as responsibility itself.

It is claimed and debated that this film was the inspiration/plagiarized for Chaplin’s Modern Times, but I think that whole discussion is missing the point; that in the context of the age, there was a need for films as specifically similar as these to be made. Socialism and the assembly line were relatively new and fresh ideas, ripe with promise and expectation. What René Clair creates in À nous la liberté is an alloy of the two, where automation leads to utopia and freedom for all. Despite the now-obvious errors in his idea, À nous la liberté’s hope for the future and zest for freedom remain inspiring even 75 years later.

• Criterion Essay by Michael Atkinson.
• DVD Journal essay by Mark Bourne.
• Senses of Cinema article by John Flaus.
• DVD Verdict essay by Barrie Maxwell.
• YouTube clip [a bit sketchy at the beginning, but settles out].

A part of this viewing list: Criterion Collection Spine #56: Alfred Hitchcock’s The 39 Steps.

I would like to preface this review by saying that Marian Keane’s Criterion Essay linked at the end is going to be much better than anything I will write here. The 39 Steps is my favorite Hitchcock film, made when he was still in Great Britain. In many respects his later work in The Lady Vanishes is related to this film. I have provided more than my usual number of screenshots because there were so many striking ones in this film. Some of the best cannot be reproduced in still photos, because the camera movement is the real star. I’m an unabashed fan of Hitchcock’s earlier works, possibly because of their quality in spite of budget and the British Board of Film Censors.

The plot of The 39 Steps is centered around a Canadian in Great Britain who becomes embroiled in a spy ring and is wrongly accused of murder. With only one clue and a talent for on-the-spot story-telling, he flees to Scotland from the cronies of a man with a shortened pinky finger in order to track down a Professor who turns out to have a shortened pinky finger. You see, they are trying to transport a government secret about a new plane out of the country to an unnamed foreign power. Of course, you don’t find out about this until the last minute or two of the film, in typical Hitchcockian suspense mode.

Along the way, the Canadian Richard Hannay keeps bumping in to this blonde woman who keeps turning him over to the police/spies from which he keeps escaping. Even in the most serious of scenes Hitchcock manages to place little bits of humor such as this to lighten the intensity of the action. And it isn’t the same sort of humor at every point, some is low-brow, some comes from awkward situation comedy and there is plenty of wry wit from the protagonist himself.

Most people think horror when they think Hitchcock, but it is mystery and suspense that are the bread and butter of his films. The deftness with which these traits are meted out in The 39 Steps, coupled with Hitchcock’s ability to add a twist right when we think the suspense is going to be suspended make the film interesting at every moment. The characters we meet, though only briefly, have lasting impacts throughout the film, and the most innocuous of items or actions create a similar ripple effect. It takes a special sort of director to so easily roughen the waters and subsequently still them and have a good time while doing it. Thankfully Hitchcock is that man.

• Criterion Essay by Marian Keane.
• Detailed Film Site film review.
• Download the entire novel by John Buchan at Project Gutenberg.
• Hitchcock Online
• Dr. Macro has scans and WMV clips.

Here is the link to the ballot [PDF] I’ll be voting on in the upcoming election. Here is how I’ll be voting on the issues and why:

Issue 1: Referendum on Workers’ Compensation:

Although I might be missing some nuances to this legislation, especially in light of Bill Peirce’s stance against BWC, it appears to me that Issue 1 is providing some sensible amendments to current Workers’ Compensation law. As of now, I’ll be voting for Issue 1.

Issue 2: Minimum Wage Rate Increase:

I am voting for Issue 2. Having felt the pinch of minimum wage labor myself, I know how difficult it can be survive on a minimum wage job.

Issue 3: Allow in-state gambling/casinos:

I am voting against Issue 3. The reasoning behind this is simple. Everything I’ve seen about their campaign strategy is a three-card monte game, often gambling isn’t even mentioned in the ads, only an appeal to emotion, “Please think of the children!” Also, following much of the discussion at BrewedFreshDaily on the issue, I am convinced that gambling as an economic initiative is fundamentally flawed.

Issue 4: Smoking Issue #1:

This proposal would amend the Ohio Constitution to allow indoor smoking in a variety of public places and would counteract or create a loophole in any other law that would ban indoor smoking in public places. This bill is sponsored by tobacco companies. Voting Yes in Issue 4 would mean you would want to vote No on Issue 5, which is in direct opposition to this Issue. I’m voting against Issue 4, because although everyone talks about how it will be bad for business, I think people like beer more than cigarettes, and people who currently don’t go out to bars and other places because of the smoke [like me] will be more likely to do so if smoking in enclosed public places is restricted. Also, I don’t think an amendment about smoking belongs anywhere near the constitution.

Issue 5: Smoking Issue #2:

So I guess that means I’m voting for Issue 5, which is just a law and not a constitutional amendment. I grew up in a two-smoker household and my asthma and the chunks of yellow phlegm I used to cough up when I first started running are testament to the ill effects of second-hand smoke. I liken smoking in enclosed public places to any other sort of disturbance. Take it outside. Voting Yes on 5 means you want to vote No on 4, otherwise your votes will cancel each other out.

Issue 18: Cigarette Tax to fund the Arts in Cleveland:

Issue 18 would impose a 30¢ per pack cigarette tax on cigarettes purchased in the Cuyahoga County. The money from this tax would go to fund arts and cultural organizations throughout the county. At a Neighborhood Connections meeting I heard from a woman in favor of the Issue on the current state of Arts and Cultural funding in the county. Apparently all of the money to fund these institutions is private, from the Cleveland Foundation, or the Gund Foundation mainly. Other cities typically fund their arts and culture through the hotel tax, but in Cleveland that revenue goes to the Conventions and Visitor’s Bureau and to pay bond obligations on public buildings. Also, their campaign slogan is “It’s NOT a property tax.” which is the stupidest way to convince someone to vote for something as I’ve ever seen. I am voting against Issue 18, because while funding Arts and Cultural institutions and events is important, the problem in Cleveland is institutional, something a tax will only appear to fix.

Issue 19: Levy Adjustment to fund Health and Human Services in Cleveland:

Issue 19 will reapportion 1-thousandth of a cent from an existing levy for four years to fund health and human services organizations. As this is a tax-payer directed reapportionment of funding I will vote for Issue 19. The League of Women Voters offers the pros and cons [pdf] of this issue.

Issue 42: Should a local gas station be allowed to sell beer on Sundays:

There is a gas station down the street that wants to amend their liquor license to sell beer on Sundays. That’s fine with me. I will vote for Issue 42.

A part of this viewing list: Criterion Collection Spine #97: Spike Lee’s Do The Right Thing.

It might be a bit reductive to compare Spike Lee and Jane Campion [An Angel at My Table] in terms of minority filmmaking, but it is interesting to see how their films exert themselves in that sort of space. I think they can be called “minority films” because the directors’ engagement and identification with their minority status informs and directs what takes place on the screen.

I think Spike Lee is ultimately more successful at this. Do The Right Thing is still effective and contemporary because nothing in the film is contained; the experience of watching the film, and the action itself are just as messy as real life, while still presented in Lee’s unique subjectivity. Because of this, any person who watches Do The Right Thing has a point of access that is not alienating.

Violence as a way of achieving racial justice is both impractical and immoral. It is impractical because it is a descending spiral ending in destruction for all. The old law of an eye for an eye leaves everybody blind. It is immoral because it seeks to humiliate the opponent rather than win his understanding; it seeks to annihilate rather than to convert. Violence is immoral because it thrives on hatred rather than love. It destroys a community and makes brotherhood impossible. It leaves society in monologue rather than dialogue. Violence ends by defeating itself. It creates bitterness in the survivors and brutality in the destroyers.

-Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

They key point in the previous quote, as it seems to me, is: “it seeks to humiliate the opponent rather than win his understanding.” By providing such a varied and non-judgmental setting, Spike Lee enables King, Jr.’s words a chance to take effect. Whereas, in my experience of Campion’s films, points of access for understanding are much more difficult to discern due to her focus on a single protagonist’s subjectivity. In the Cut is a perfect example of this, but it is also present in Angel at My Table and to a lesser extent in The Piano.

Bamboozled [if only I could find my Film Theory paper on it] is another Spike Lee Joint where multiple perspectives mesh together into a real-world mess of authenticity and subjectivity. It adds another facet to the milieu of Do The Right Thing. Everyone in Do The Right Thing is authentic, but in Bamboozled the characters have to confront the consequences of soul-selling and being considered a race traitor. I like Bamboozled more than Do The Right Thing, even if it is a less perfect and more troubling film.

I always seem to get to production values at the end. Do The Right Thing is a perfect film in this regard. Colors and film stock make the spectator feel the Bed-Stuy summer heat, increasingly prevalent dutch angles reinforce the precarious fire watch atmosphere, and when the confrontation finally comes it is still surprising how hot the conflagration gets. The aftermath is just as surprising. While Spike Lee is deliberately not specific with a Jerry Springer “Final Thought” the whole construction of the film is such that it encourages anyone with two neurons to rub together to think about what it means to do the right thing.

• Criterion Essay by Roger Ebert
• Screenplay
• Spike Lee Interview
• Salon article on the effects of Public Enemy’s Fight the Power. [Uncut and Uncensored YouTube music video]
• YouTube clip

A part of this viewing list: Criterion Collection Spine #289: Peter Gilbert’s, Steve James’s, and Frederick Marx’s Hoop Dreams.

I never really wanted to watch this movie again. I saw it twice in college during my History of Documentary Film class [along with Nanook of the North] and as it is nearly 3 hours long, it is quite a time investment. Hoop Dreams is a troubling film, both cinematically and contextually. These aspects are, of course, inter-related, but I’m going to attempt to deal with them as separately as I can.

First, cinematically. As a documentary, Hoop Dreams provides a level of intimacy with its subjects that many other docs attempt but ultimately fail at. This gives the entire film an authenticity that is perhaps a bit too strong, especially considering the inevitable effects that the filmmakers had on their subjects’ lives. They have the role of participant-observers but it quite easy to see them manipulate the action for their desired ends. This is most notable with Arthur Agee, who is plied with questions about Isiah Thomas on the way to a basketball camp and then gets to play him one-on-one with his hero. This event was staged, but there is impromptu manipulation as well; when, years later, he is prompted by the filmmakers to read a report on butterflies that highlights Arthur’s grammar-school level education and general embarassment and disregard for school.

In some sense every character in the film is an actor; so-and-so as him- or herself. At times they ham for the camera, and at others pretend as if it isn’t present. Perhaps the easiest example to show the prevalance of this cliché in the film is when William’s team fails to go down-state his senior year. The filmmakers get right up in his face as he walks off, and the barely restrained frustration and rage is evident. This moment does not feature William Gates as himself, but merely William Gates, a young man who feels the presence of the filmmakers as a tangible reminder of his failed promise. William is no longer the subject of a film in this moment, but a person again. Arthur has a similar moment, while playing one-on-one with his unstable father, when he states “This ain’t no con game anymore. I’m older now.”

The filmmakers manipulate the audience as easily as they do their subjects. The film is deliberately constructed so that we expect William to be the high school star and go to the pros and Arthur to fail. This becomes inverted fairly quickly as William is troubled by knee injuries and Arthur emerges as the one with the ability to lead his team down-state. Similarly, William’s child and girlfriend are introduced to us as a surprise, after the baby has been born for several months. The drug-addiction of Arthur’s father is similarly absent, until it serves as a plot spark.

Contextually the film juxtaposes the modern slave-market of basketball recruitment with the hopes of two ghetto kids for NBA stardom. Rich white person after rich white person sees a money-maker in William Gates, and talent scouts readily admit that they focus on serving “gourmet meat.” William is intelligent enough to not fully commit himself to this system, to make an effort at the educational opportunities offered to him, but his unwillingness to sacrifice himself on the hardwood altar ultimately earns him the scorn of his loathsome high school basketball coach, a man so jaded that when his star athlete leaves his office for the last time he shrugs “Another one leaves, another one comes in, that’s the way it goes.”

Due to constant reminders of The Institution of basketball, there is little focus on other paths of opportunity for these kids. When Arthur Agee surprisingly gets a visit to a junior college, he has no idea what he wants to do with his life, he mentions accounting, communications and real estate, a different answer for each time the question is asked. William, plagued by injury, seems to recognize that he needs another path if his dream dies, but he is surrounded by people who have pinned their dreams on his basketball ability and don’t want to hear about anything else.

In the end we’re left with a film that points out how fleeting the dream of basketball glory can be for ghetto youth, but offers no other alternatives for the betterment of the kids. Yes, basketball has gotten them into higher education, but without a safety net basketball could just as easily kick them out of it again. Combined with the slick manipulation in the editing suite, we’re left just as bereft as Arthur and William, unsure, chimeric. Hoop Dreams, not reality.

• Criterion Essay by John Edgar Wideman
• Roger Ebert Review
• Hoop Dreams Scholarship Fund
• Comprehensive Hoop Dreams site that may or may not be outdated.

I’m not in a content-providing mood this week. Instead, for a change, I’m linking to others’ content. Today I’ll post some links to mp3s you may or may not like.

Eric Satie: 1. Four Gnossiennes 1-Lent 3:34 [mp3]

— Satie was a French composer who lived in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. If you like this you can listen to much more on Ubu.

The Scarring Party: Ocean Bottom [mp3]

— I found this song through Metafilter Music and liked the band so much I bought their CD. It is great and this song is one of my favorites for 2006. There are a couple more songs available at their site. Please visit.

Friend: Flora [mp3]

— Friend is one of my favorite local music acts. It is amazing how the music can quiet down the rowdy indie crowd. This isn’t my favorite song which is called Tess, but this is another good one. You can hear more on MySpace.

This Moment in Black History: Tape Don’t Lie [mp3]

— Probably my favorite Cleveland band. Great live shows. They’ve got a new album available called It Takes a Nation (of Assholes to Hold Us Back). This track is from that album. Hear more on MySpace.

Bob Log III: Log Bomb [mp3]

— Phil over at Lead Singer Disorder slapped me in the face with Fat Possum Records the other day, and I’ve listened to a ton of their free mp3s since. This fat blues jam comes from there.

Jonathan Coulton: Mandelbrot Set [mp3]

— This guy writes very entertaining songs about a variety of things, including SCIENCE!. This one happens to be about fractals. Many of his songs are free, or donation-based downloads. His business model predates the iTunes store by quite a bit. Go listen to more by him.

Kansas Joe and Memphis Minnie: When the Levee Breaks [mp3]

— All of the songs on this site are from the Web Archive collection, but since they’re already culled and good bluesy stuff it might be more useful. This song is NOT a cover of the Led Zeppelin tune, as people keep thinking when I make them listen to it. LZ covered it!

The Up Ensemble: Belly Dancing [mp3]

— These Cleveland guys do great free-form jazz as well as creating some excellent fusions between various world music styles. More at MySpace.

Enjoy!

This clip, gratuitous and exploitative as it is, is one fine piece of filmmaking; which is the main reason it is so deliberately gratuitous and exploitative. Note how the timing of the cuts and changes in shot framing ramp up the sexiness of the scene, and by proxy, its comedy. Also, take note that I, Adam Harvey, have now said Something Good™ about a teenybopper romantic comedy done in the style of 1980s Brat Pack Crapfests™.

To distract you from what you most certainly think of as my blasphemy here is a spoof of the end of every 80s movie. 80s Ending.

I also recommend watching these animated shorts from Blur Studio:

Gopher Broke
Rockfish
In The Rough
Aunt Luisa

The city is tired
and the people are watching
                            tired
of watching the city’s
collision
          bend sinister,

with the same sorrow
and the same song
and the same
             sometimes.

We, the city,
              harrowed,
the valiant
            hence.

Kookaburras
            watch
and
    laugh
and
    wonder
why nothing
            happens.

Why time is laconic;
                     abrupt.

Performance note: Wear “who the fuck is tremont?” shirt if reading.

This needs to go somewhere else, but right now I don’t know where to take it and maintain its sparseness.

v.2

The city is tired
and the people are watching
                            tired
of watching the city’s
collision
          bend sinister.

The streets roll over in their sleep.

Where are the valiant
on the ten o’clock news?
Who still wonders
why time is laconic;
                     abrupt

Still not right, but better.

A few weeks ago I received a request to review a short film that acts as a teaser for a feature film called Sex, Love & Z-Parts. I received the screener last week, along with comprehensive supplemental materials and have also traded a few emails with Marcus D. Russell, the driving force behind the production. So here’s the review:

Sex, Love & Z-Parts immediately recalls Soderbergh’s Sex, Lies and Videotape, but since I’ve not seen that film, I can’t speak to any other parallels. This is likely for the best, since I know of few things that independent filmmakers hate more than being accused of derivative style. The first thing you notice about this film is the quality of the production values. The filmmakers are only amateur in the sense that no studio is paying them to do the work. It is obvious that each aspect of the production was chosen carefully, from the film stock to the pacing of the action. This care has enabled the filmmakers to provide a space in which the story can be told through multiple subjectivities.

The style and content is informed by a careful rendering and exposition of Generation X traits, enumerated in the thesis that was part of the supplementary materials:

The films of Generation X have the following characteristics:

1) Conspicuous absence of parental figures…

2) Longing for the iconographic male bravado commonplace in the cinema that preceded it…

3) The ever-present sense of failure…

4) The issue of manhood. How would a man act?…

5) An inability to mold into the American framework…

6) The relationship problem…

This manifesto was informed by Dogme 95, but Big Hit’s ideas focus on more existential themes than cinematic requirements. It is possible to see glimpses of this in the shortened feature I was sent, and while it will take the full film to flesh out and prove whether or not Marcus and his crew have been accurate as well as precise in their targeting, they are certainly doing more with this film than most other independents.

From an email:

Scott and I didn’t think we could really get out point across without extremely high production values. They are so used to grainy digital images that they fall in love with the prettiness….that gives us an edge and a level of trust that is tough to create in indie film. We really try to emulate some of the popular looks/setups of film and TV..and then invert the meaning.

This is an interesting film because you are really not supposed to do this kind of shit on the short film circuit. The expectation is that you are an amateur…so you can imagine that they aren’t exactly happy that two loud mouth guys from LA…are puttin’ it down in the frame.

Personally, coming from someone born at the ass-end of the Gen X curve, they seem to have the baggage behind the label under their thumbs. The prolonged adolescent estrangement from the baby boomer worldview and simultaneous implanted desire to live up to it, the struggle for agency, authenticity and loyalty in spite of it all resound strongly in SLZP. The mission of Gen X, to me, seems to be the process of defining what it means to be an adult in a life that has had a distinct lack of them. Thanks in part to their choice of film stock ["Eastman Kodak 7278 (500 Tungsten balance) for the interiors and the night shoots... Eastman Kodak 7274 (200 Tungsten balance) for the ext/day stuff"] the film almost feels like it was shot in the early 80s, seems to say “this is how we would have done things [including make movies] if we were adults when we were children. They might not be the best choices, but we’ll roll with it and accept the world for what it is.” And if that isn’t Gen X, I don’t know what is.

I shuttled the screener off to Tremont Independent, maybe it’ll show at their December screening.

A part of this viewing list: Criterion Collection Spine #62: Carl Theodor Dreyer’s The Passion of Joan of Arc.

I must admit that the first time I saw this, I slept through the majority. I was fresh from fencing practice in the womblike screening room of O’Shaughnessy Hall and there was no accompaniment to the film. In the warm dark, I snoozed through one of my top ten greatest films ever made. The second time I saw this was at an Unsilent Film show put on by the now-defunct SynthCleveland at the the now-defunct Rain Nightclub. Local electronic musicians played original compositions while the film played behind the bar. In this atmosphere I paid more attention to the hot goth girls and my Guinness than the film. Yet last night, sitting down with the Criterion Collection edition proved that third time is the charm. Like the supplementary materials for A Night To Remember, Carl Dreyer’s Passion benefits hugely from the Criterion treatment and the addition of Richard Einhorn’s magnificent Voices of Light opera/oratorio.

There is something about this film and the life of Joan of Arc that demands artistic interpretation, reinterpretation and consistent examination. Dreyer’s focus on portraying “realized mysticism” by “…interpret[ing] a hymn to the triumph of the soul over life” is so successful that it is unsurprising that other are inspired to capture the same transcendental feeling. Dreyer states:

What streams out to the possibly moved spectator in strange close-ups is not accidentally chosen. All these pictures express the character of the person they show and the spirit of that time. In order to give the truth, I dispensed with “beautification”.

This is a bit of overstatement. Although the diegetic space is severe, the production values: quality lighting, graceful tracking shots, dutch-angle framing, and most especially close-ups to powerfully effective actors create an atmosphere that is perfectly described in the religious sense of Grace-ful. The camera is almost always stationary on Joan. In contrast, we are constantly made aware of the vast forces arrayed against her by long tracking shots in medium close-up of her learnèd judges. In moments of her greatest agony, she is framed as if the camera can’t bear to watch, ashamed of what it is witnessing.

Joan of Arc is a strong symbol in many different directions [French Nationalism, Religion, and Feminism to name a few] but I’m going to focus on its strengths as a feminist film, since these points kept popping up as I watched it. Joan is a 19 year-old virgin transvestite on trial in front of half a hundred or so old, bald, powerful men. They leer, they smirk, they look like devils and vultures; yet she confounds them at every turn. She is innocent, so they must first teach her guile before they are finally able to trick her into signing an abjuration of all she believes in. She is emotionally tortured and shown the instruments of physical torture, although they are not used. Her head is shaved, she is bled by doctors and given a crown and scepter like Jesus in the Gospel of John. The libretto from Voices of Light [linked at the bottom] echoes these visual acts of oppressive patriarchy, even creating vocal parallels between the “Glorioses playes” during the torture sequence and the final burning at the stake. The libretto is a must read for framing this film in a feminist context.

In revenge for my past cavalier treatment of this film I spent most of the night watching it over and over in my dreams and awoke with “Glorioses playes” echoing in my head. I want to insist that you follow the links I’ve provided and read more on this film. Even if you just read Roger Ebert’s review. And if you can get your hands on a copy of the Criterion edition of this film, watch it.

• Criterion Essay by Carl Theodor Dreyer.
• Roger Ebert review.
• Strictly Film School article on the film.
• Images Journal review with great stills.
• Senses of Cinema article on the film.
• Watch the entire film [no soundtrack] on YouTube.
• The Criterion Contraption Review.

• Voices of Light at Richard Einhorn’s site.
• Liner notes on Voices of Light.
• Read the libretto here. [Page 10 of the PDF].
• Joan of Arc Archive

A part of this viewing list: Criterion Collection Spine #224: Samuel Fuller’s Pickup on South Street.

I first saw this in a film noir class I took in college, That same week we watched Kiss Me Deadly, so I got a bit confused and thought this film involved Mike Hammer and ended with a nuclear bomb. Woops. Definitely shame on me for misplacing my memory of this sharply complicated but nevertheless deft little film. The most immediately striking aspect of this film is the dialogue. Overflowing with the argot of ’40s small-time crime, the New York presented in this film is markedly different from most portrayals. Like the characters themselves, most of the action takes place on the fringes of the city; the waterfront or underground in the subway. Spaces are small, crowded, claustrophobic, in typical noir fashion.

Also in typical noir fashion, everyone smokes all of the time and most of the action takes places at night. But Fuller inverts some of the other items on the noir checklist. The protagonist, while still anti-heroic, is not destroyed by his ambition, and although the female lead, an implied ex-prostitute, starts off this trouble, she is more femme sauveur than femme fatale. In addition to these inversions Fuller adds in a hefty dose of Red Threat that has echoes in Shock Corridor ten years later. The casting was spot on and the acting excellent, which coupled with the plot, is why this film is a staple of film noir.

As a side-note: my favorite trick in this film was Fuller’s constant emphasis on what was not on screen; typically bound to entrances involving Skip and how observant he is. He enters a room, glances around, completes some action [most notably the lighting of two cigarettes] and then the camera follows him to reveal what caught his notice [usually Candy].

The plot centers around Skip McCoy, a cannon fresh from the clink, who binges a dame named Candy of her pocketbook on the subway and unknowingly ruins a government sting operation. He’s stolen some microfilm containing secrets that would lead the government to “Mr. Big.” The police call a stool pigeon to identify Skip and give a lead on his whereabouts. Meanwhile, the commies are also trying to track him down to reclaim the microfilm. Candy and Skip get caught in the middle of this power play and it turns out the Candy isn’t a commie, just their pawn. There are a few brutal scenes of violence against Candy and plenty of loose morals, so I doubt the film would have been approved without the strong nationalistic flavor. It could be argued that Candy and Moe get what is coming to them, the former for consorting with communists, the latter for being an informer, but Moe’s murder is more martyrdom than punishment. She’d inform on anyone to anyone except a communist.

It is important to note that Skip McCoy doesn’t fight the commies out of a sense of nationalism, ["Don't wave the flag at me."] but because he finally realizes that Candy loves him. So it is strange to see that he is not affected at all by the maelstrom he’s found himself in. Perhaps because he’s such a slim customer, with a cock-eyed smartass smile that embodies a certain idea of American pugnacity all this drama is expected to roll off his back. Well, it does, and he is the man, not the cops or the feds, who ultimately breaks up the commie plot and captures Mr. Big, all thanks to his skills as a pickpocket.

The resounding message is that while some Americans may be enemies with each other in civilian life, when a threat to the nation appears, they’ll work together to defeat the damn dirty commies. Just another type of exploitation cinema for your viewing pleasure.

• Criterion Essay by Luc Sante.
• Essay by Grant Tracey.
• Bright Lights Film Journal with a great article putting the film in a cinematic context.
• Senses of Cinema article by Richard J. Thompson.
• Moe versus the Commie. Excellent clip from the film on Youtube.

I’d been frustrated trying to capture particular images from the films I’m watching in The Criterion Collection list. DirectX technology makes it hard to do a simple screen capture and paste into PhotoShop. But someone finally directed me to a way that works and doesn’t involve downloaded spy-and-adware full programs. And damn if it isn’t easy.

My laptop runs Windows XP, so this should work for any computer running that OS.

1. Open Display Properties
2. Select the Settings Tab
3. Select the Advanced button
4. Select the Troubleshooting Tab
5. Drag the Hardware Acceleration bar to “none”
6. Select Apply

Now pausing a DVD in WMP or whatever DVD program you use and doing a screen capture [ALT-PrintScreen] should result in a still image that can be saved. Just remember to turn hardware acceleration back on after you’re done.

I made ribs for the first time yesterday. They were on sale for $1.99# at Dave’s last month so I picked up a pack and planned on inviting some folks over when I finally cooked them. I called up my uncle, the family grillmaster, and asked for advice. Since I don’t have the hi-tech grill that he does, I was unable to cook them for six hours, but the rest of his advice helped. He told me to marinade them in half Italian dressing and half vinegar for about 24 hours to tenderize and suck some of the fat from the meat. This worked very well. I bought the cheapest BBQ sauce I could find, but supplemented it with Cajun seasoning and cooked the ribs on my kettle grill for about 2.5 hours. I flipped and repainted them with sauce whenever there was a commercial break during the Notre Dame game. They were delicious, but I forgot to take a picture of them. It is probably going to take 2.5 hours for me to clean my grill today.

A part of this viewing list: Criterion Collection Spine #227: Henri-Georges Clouzot’s Le Corbeau.

Le Corbeau was made in occupied France in 1943. It was denounced by the Vichy government, denounced by the French Resistance and denounced by the Vatican. For a film that seems rather innocuous in 2006 America there must be a lot of subtext that would have been picked up by World War II era French folks. The story takes place in a provincial town during the occupation and the action revolves around mysterious, anonymous “poison pen” letters that are circulated among the townsfolk, containing just enough truth and just enough lie to turn the town into a mob of pitchfork-and-torch-waving lunatics. Minus the pitchforks and torches.

Casting Pierre Fresnay, star of La Grande Illusion creates a distinct and immediate juxtaposition between both films. In one, Fresnay is a French officer and German captive and there is honor and respect from both sides. In Le Corbeau, there is not a German to be seen and Fresnay’s Dr. Germain is a suspected abortionist. Yet the absence of any mention of the war or Germany in the light of Fresnay’s 1938 performance in La Grande Illusion invites a comparison of the Germans then to now along with the juxtaposition. Clouzot could not have been openly critical of the occupied government, so casting Fresnay was inspired in this regard.

The Resistance probably didn’t like the film because there is no resistance in it. Everyone is just continuing with their lives as if the war was not even happening. They should have been happy with the obvious statement that informing on people is one of the surest ways to destroy a community. But perhaps this was the very reason they objected, since this film shows just how effective it can be. This is just conjecture.

The Vatican obviously hated this because of all of the abortion talk and all of the pre- and extra-marital sex that is going on while husbands are “gone”.

In terms of a mystery and suspense film the execution is extraordinary. Most of the main characters have the means, motive and opportunity to pen the letters, and it is only as the film progresses that some are eliminated. Added into the mix we have copy-cat corbeau’s, inquests, a nun named Marie-Corbin who everyone initially suspects, and a morphine thief. There is murder and mayhem, and some of the ugliest and mannish French women I’ve ever seen. Until the last two minutes we’re still not sure who Le Corbeau is.

As subtle as this film is, it is still quite brave of Clouzot to make something such as this during the occupation. Lacombe, Lucien wasn’t made by Louis Malle until 1974, so fraught was the subject of French informing during the war.

• Criterion Essay by Allen Williams.
• Wikipedia entry on the film.
• Senses of Cinema article on Clouzot.
• Some stills from the film.

A part of this viewing list: Criterion Collection Spine #13: Jonathan Demme’s The Silence of the Lambs.

“Nothing is so frightening as what’s behind the closed door. The audience holds its breath along with the protagonist as she/he (more often she) approaches that door…
-Stephen King in Danse Macabre and before that Val Lewton.

The Silence of the Lambs is all kinds of great. For a horror movie it offers relatively little gore, instead relying on what is not seen to grow the fear. The film pretty much uses one cinematic trick over and over throughout, but it never gets old. Demme’s choice to use a shallow depth of field and straight-on framing of the characters do much to strengthen the relationships between character dialogue and relationship, the constant scopophilic gaze directed by almost every man to Agent Starlng creates a deliberate and constant sense of unease to her subjectivity, and the myriad references to change and metamorphosis ensure that no one thing we know can be seen as certain.

But time and time again what gives the movie its pep is the closed door, the reveal, the passage through. The next time you see this film, count them. Doorways are liminal symbols, inherently unpredictable and the constant action of opening, passage and closing taken by Clarice reflects her own growth as an FBI agent. The viewer grows along with her and gratification is delayed in almost every scene; when we think we are about to make a discovery, only another door is revealed.

The climactic sequence of the film [if only I could find it online!] has well over twenty doors that must be passed through or at least identified as a possible source of terror for Clarice. Coupled with the unpredictability of Hannibal Lector’s mind and the ease with which he manipulates an entire investigation it should be no surprise that the viewer is just as easily manipulated by the editing in the lead-up to the Starling’s confrontation with Buffalo Bill. This is a film that has got our number, can fool us over and over with the same cinematic parlor tricks and leave us wanting more. Hitchcock, who I had initially thought of as the man who made the closed door quote, would have been proud.

The other main strength of the film is the acting. Just about everyone is superbly creepy. This might be due to the fact that just as nearly everyone is a man and we are often encased within Agent Starling’s worldview as the object of desire, but even the bit-part actors are awash in uncanniness that is all the more effective because it is so natural. We all know people who are that sort of weird. The relationship between Lector and Starling is often that of a snake hypnotizing a bird. Certainly Anthony Hopkins acting is makes the film extra extraordinary and the quality of everyone else buoys his performance up even higher. I really have no criticisms of this film, it is so cruftless, polished and so effective at what it does that I can’t think of much else to say.

• Criterion Essay by Amy Daubin.
• Roger Ebert review.
• *.wav clips from the film.
• Outtakes on YouTube.
• Jodie Foster on Inside the Actor’s Studio talking about the film. [YouTube]
• The Criterion Contraption’s review.

A part of this viewing list: Criterion Collection Spine #19: Samuel Fuller’s Shock Corridor.

It was nice seeing this film again. Samuel Fuller has that peculiar position that only seems possible in the world of film; a master of cinema, but also a producer of schlock. Shock Corridor is a perfect example of this sort of doublethink. It most certainly is a piece of exploitation cinema, meant to bring people to the theater through its overblown and seedy portrayal of the mentally ill, but it also supplies the spectator with thorny political questions in a distinctive, masterful and lurid style.

The actors are no-names and the acting is blunt. So is the editing. So is the dialogue. Fuller has no patience with flair in this film. Although there are parts that seem quite stylistic, they were not done for stylistic reasons. Each choice is made for practical utilitarian efficacy and it is from this focus that the style derives. This is very different from The Sword of Doom, where madness is subservient to its portrayal. In Shock Corridor, madness points to its own causes as, in brief moments of lucidity, the patients explain and inherently criticize the social stresses which drove them mad.

Fuller uses these moments to make his great political points. One patient, a sort of Manchurian candidate traitor who thinks he is a Confederate general explains that Communism offered him what his own upbringing never could, education and open-mindedness, at the cost of his loyalty to his country. An infantile ex-Manhattan project scientist preaches of the evils of Cold War mentality arms-racing, and most disturbingly the first black student to attend a white university tells how the racism of the South drove him mad, ultimately convincing him that he is the founder of the Ku Klux Klan and a white supremacist. [See the YouTube clip linked at the end.]

In another vein, Johnny the reporter, who has infiltrated the asylum in order to determine which of the three characters above can identify a murderer, is slowly driven mad by his proximity to the patients and the treatments adminstered to him by the staff. The destruction of his personality due to an excess of ambition becomes the basis by which we can empathize with the plights of the other patients. The scene with the nymphos [Resulting in one of the best VO narration lines ever: "Nymphos!!"] is exploitation cinema at its best, but is a necessary step for Johnny’s road to madness.

There are aspects of noir to this film that can be examined in comparison to Fuller’s Pickup on South Street, but since that is also a Criterion film, I’ll do that then. I’ll simply say now, that a reporter protagonist and his stripper girlfriend are the archetypal seedy characters for noir.

This is another film where the cinematography is outstanding. Stanley Cortez’s camera movements and framing invite the viewer into each patient’s subjectivity. These sequences are the films most blunt and most effective. The viewer is startled by abrupt switches to color stock footage when the patients hallucinate and the scene with Paliacci’s singing is jaw-dropping in terms of both cinematography and post-production. [See the YouTube clip linked at the end.]

For those who find grace and style to be inseparable and any art that is not “high” to be no art at all, this film will seem like so much trash. For the casual viewer the film will offer entertainment but its angry tone and suggestion that madness is the only escape from a world gone mad will not resonate. The result is a film that demands an open mind and broad taste for true appreciation of all its aspects. Just like everything else ever, really.

• Criterion Essay by Tim Hunter
• Culture Court essay by Rick McGrath.
• The Guardian review.
• Many stills and captions from the film.
• YouTube clip featuring the black white supremacist.
• YouTube clip of one of Johnny’s dream sequences featuring Paliacci.
• The Criterion Contraption’s review.

A part of this viewing list: Criterion Collection Spine #11: Ingmar Bergman’s The Seventh Seal.

1 And when he had opened the seventh seal, there was silence in heaven about the space of half an hour.
Rev. 8:1

There is little I can say about The Seventh Seal that has not been said before. I will say that I love the sound of Swedish and the way that I can almost understand it at times. I will say that I love the crystal cinematography and the way the lighting is nearly its own character, so strong is its presence on the screen. And I will talk a little about the motifs that I noticed this second time that I’ve watched the film.

Silence is the most noticeable theme, established quite early with the opening quotation from the book of Revelation and then reinforced when the appearance of Death mutes the sound of breakers rolling onto the shore of Sweden. It continues, but is not present through the entire film. Bergman insists, at first at least, that silence says more than speech if you listen correctly. Witness Jōns account of his interaction with the corpse of a plague victim:

KNIGHT
Well, did he show you the way?

JŌNS
Not exactly.

KNIGHT
What did he say?

JŌNS
Nothing.

KNIGHT
Was he a mute?

JŌNS
No, sir, I wouldn’t say that. As a matter of
fact, he was quite eloquent.

The knight Antonius Block’s disregard for this silence or his squire’s smartass comments shows another sort of deafness, to speak mixaphorically, the inability to hear what is under one’s nose. Jōns is the truth-speaker in the film, almost a Dostoevksian holy fool, except for the thick skin of cynicism that he has gained as a veteran of ten years of crusading. He has no illusions regarding the absurdity of his existence and thinks of religion as nothing more than entertaining folklore.

But Block refuses to give in to look into Nieztsche’s abyss. He seeks one significant act to make him feel as though his life has been worth something. And even Jōns, for all his talk, doubts his own doubt. As this turmoil builds within each character, the silence becomes less obvious and sound takes a larger role. A storm is building.

Enter Death! Even when Bengt Ekerot isn’t onscreen, the presence and threat of death is never far off. The mountebanks have a skull mask that is always hanging nearby, and shots are often framed so that the mask is looking over the shoulder of the characters. In Block’s most pastoral scene, the dinner of wild strawberries and milk at dusk, the mask of Death is at its liveliest, the eyes seem alive as a sheet blows behind them.

A similar progression as the one from silence to sound also takes place in terms of Death. Early in the film Death is to be respected but feared, and the scenes where he is present are filled with a vivacity that eventually becomes Death’s province by the end of the film. The lighthearted scenes seem shallow in the aftermath of the plague-swept countryside and the fear that drives men to burn a girl for fornication with the Devil. What Death offers becomes more and more appealing, almost joyous to the perils of living.

Yet Block still seeks the one meritorius act that will allow him to die at peace, even if his questions remain unanswered. He succeeds, in a transcendental moment [featuring my favorite shot, below] while playing chess with Death. He knows he has lost, but stalls long enough for the mountebank family to escape. He has cheated Death on others’ behalf, at the cost of his own life. Yet in some way, death is a reward involving the submission of his own will to that of the inevitable.

In the final sequence, as Death makes them dance along the hillside, it is interesting to see who is not in his train, Jōns girl and Block’s wife Karin are not included. I don’t know why, but I suspect it has something to do with the fact that they were the most welcoming of Death when he appeared.

This film is so ripe for examination that I could go on for much longer, talking about it as an allegory for the Cold War, as an existentialist morality play, as a film about dealing with religious doubt and tons more. But I’ve written enough for today.

2 And I saw the seven angels which stood before God; and to them were given seven trumpets.

3 And another angel came and stood at the altar, having a golden censer; and there was given unto him much incense, that he should offer it with the prayers of all saints upon the golden altar which was before the throne.

4 And the smoke of the incense, which came with the prayers of the saints, ascended up before God out of the angel’s hand.

5 And the angel took the censer, and filled it with fire of the altar, and cast it into the earth: and there were voices, and thunderings, and lightnings, and an earthquake.
Rev. 8:2-5

• Criterion Essay by Peter Cowie.
• Tons of good quality stills here.
• An undated draft of the script at IMSDb. The Criterion subtitling is superior, in my opinion.
• Analysis of The Seventh Seal from Film & the Critical Eye by Dennis DeNitto and William Herman.
• YouTube film student reenactment of a scene from the film. [I had to do one of these from a Steven Soderbergh film]
• The Criterion Contraption’s review.

Hello. This site is a chronicle of planning for a thru-hike of the Pacific Crest Trail. Hopefully, as the time between planning and actually hiking the trail progresses, this site will become useful to more people than myself. If you are also new to the PCT, I recommend joining the email listserv immediately. Right now I’m in a link-gathering stage, so go there and check things out.