The Seventh Art and the Eighth Wonder of the World

For the movies about movies blogathon, at Goatdog blog. King Kong! (and a bit of Busby Berkeley.)



King Kong is a movie that is explicitly about movies. It's also pretty explicitly autobiographical, both in the characters populating the film (Carl Denham being a dead ringer for Merian C. Cooper and all), and in the development and structure of the film itself. The film planned in the story of the film is the film we're watching, pretty much. In fact, King Kong is about both movies and movie making directly, and metaphorically - it is a figure for movies in general. That's not unusual in films, and especially not in the early 1930s, a period with a good deal of technological and social change. What is unusual about King Kong is how explicit it is, especially its direct comments about spectacle, sex, the market, and so on. It's especially unusual in a film as enthusiastic about films as this one is.

Films that are or contain figures of film tend not to be so direct. Usually, they use another art form - books, the stage, music - to stands for film. (Or, taking a recent example - cooking, in Ratatouille.) Denham's show in NY, displaying Kong, works that way - it's a pretty direct analogue to the film we're watching, no pretending otherwise - but it is not, itself, cinema. What makes King Kong different is how everything else in the film that points to cinema does so without any disguise. The story is about a man who sets out to make a film: adventure! Spectacle! Sex! Drama! Beauty and the Beast! Denham and company come right out and say it - and they aren’t sentimental about it. They say it, they plan for it, they rehearse it, and then life (in the film) comes along and does it, more or less to cue. And with fine eye for spectacle - the natives stake out Ann Darrow just like a master showman would - and indeed Denham repeats the staging almost exactly in his show in NY.



Repeats Kong's defeats, too...



And of course King Kong the movie is, from start to finish, built around cinema - it’s designed to look good as a film; it’s conceived around the technology of film. And revels in it - the stop motion animation, the elaborate mattes and models and process shots. It's set up to look right on screen. They aren't trying to hide these things - they are presenting us with an amazing spectacle, and expect us to marvel in it, all of it. The planning, the formal properties of the film, are made more explicit by being prepared by Denham's talk. His attempts to film on the island, his attempts to stage-manage the villagers or the fights with Kong, etc., set up the formal structure of the rest of the film - the parallel imagery on the island and in NY (the wall on the island serving as stage and curtain, that recurs in the second half; the parallels in how Ann and Kong are staked out for display; the parallel battles on Kong's mountain and the empire state building, complete with dangerous birds. Even details like the several scenes in both parts of the film of Kong fishing around caves/apartments for people.) The depiction of the act of making a film sets you up to wonder at the artistry of the story proper when it gets going.



It's reminiscent of one of the other outstanding figures of cinema of the period - Warner Brothers' musicals, especially Busby Berkeley's parts. Berkeley’s numbers are almost parables for the shift from stage to screen. Their placement in the films (in 42nd Street, at least), and their overall structure, almost always enacts the shift from stage to screen. The numbers usually follow that pattern - starting on something like a real stage, then opening up toward film. First (usually) by shooting them from impossible places (the flies, through the floor), but eventually abandoning all sense of the spatial unity and integrity of the stage. The space in “42nd Street” (the song) or “By a Waterfall” or “Shanghai Lil” is pure cinematic space - much of it designed explicitly for the camera (and for editing), certainly constructing the three dimensional space of film. Interestingly, while this abandons the "real" space of the theater, it moves toward a "real" space of films - itself referring to the "real" space of, um - reality.



This is a bit like what King Kong does. The first section sets up the idea of the film Denham is going to make - they land on the island, he tries to start filming, but things go wrong: and then very wrong, and instead of making an adventure film, he has to live one. Which, of course, is almost exactly the film he planned all along (and certainly the one Cooper and Schoedsack were planning - and Denham "is" Cooper....) - though since his film plans fell through, he puts on his show the old fashioned way, on stage. This, perhaps, ties us back to the Warner's films. Of those films, Footlight Parade comes closest to matching King Kong's explicitness about the role of cinema. It comes closest to acknowledging the historical circumstances that these films reflect, the historical move from stage to screen. Jimmy Cagney stages musical preludes for movies - already, movies have replaced shows: now, they are starting to squeeze him. Largely, of course, because films like this have managed to recreate a good chunk of the spectacle of the stage. And of course - as Cagney holds off history a bit longer, he does it by staging “preludes” that are, of course, dazzling films.

Though one of the things this has in common with King Kong is the way they treat film as a part of a grander world of spectacle. Films, stage musicals, giant apes, are all attractions - all things put on for the amazement of the audience. Cooper and Schoedsack were no stranger to this - they made documentaries to show to lecture groups; they made films to be the Eight Wonder of the World! Cooper's later ventures, Cinerama, notably, work almost exactly like Denham's Kong exhibition - a grand event, demonstrating the wonders of something new. That's not far from what those Warner Brother's musicals were doing (or what Warner's did in the 20s, with sound films) - setting out to show that film was every bit the spectacle that theater could be. It's an approach that runs through King Kong - the way it was marketed, the way it is structured (with its overture and shows in shows and so on) - and the way it was made. Willis O'Brien's animation tests were central to the whole conceit. It's a film about spectacle - about story and everything else as an attraction. Presentationalist through and through, and quite delighted in it.

Another Links Post

Here are some things to have caught my eye - and things to look forward to.

Don't forget - starting tomorrow, it's a Movies about Movies blogathon, at the Goatdog blog.

UPDATE: Goatdog's main blogathon page.

Elsewhere - Ted Pigeon looks back at the films of 2007.

Bioscope looks at the history of Kinemacolor - part of its series on color (since they're British, I guess that's colour), and other things.

Screengrab takes a look at the 20 best animated films.

Spoutblog looks at some underrated fictional music.

East Bay View lists his favorite jazz records since 1970 - and before 1970. It's making me think about my own interest in jazz. I have an odd history with jazz - didn't listen to it much at all until the early 90s, though what I did hear I liked, though I didn't quite get - then - I went to New Orleans n the fall of 91, spend a couple nights wandering around Bourbon street mostly popping in and out of jazz bars, came home and decided to listen to Louis Armstrong and was, more or less immediately, completely converted. I listened to jazz, and almost nothing but, for the next five years - almost systematically, though tending to radiate out from Louis Armstrong, Charlie Parker and Coltrane, moving forward through time - until, mid-90s, I'd reached fusion. Sonny Sharrock and Electric Miles and John McLaughlin - and that led back to rock... to Richard Thompson, specifically, but then, to everything else. Since then, jazz has mostly been on the back burner, except for where it meets avant garde guitar players... Saw Miles Electric: A Different Kind of Blue this weekend - documentary about Miles Davis and electric jazz, with his performance at the Isle of Wight the centerpiece: boy oh boy, but I like that stuff... I don't know where this comment is going really, but it might lead to a video...

It might lead to a meme - Samurai Frog offers up an iTunes game - iTunes as magic 8 ball, really. Basically:

1. Put your iTunes/ music player on Shuffle
2. For each question, press the next button to get your answer.
3. You must put down the song name no matter what.

That might lead somewhere too.

Though not before noting - fafblog's The Medium Lobster has a new gig!

And now? Since I've stopped doing the Friday Random Tens, I haven't posted much of anything about music. Alas! Miles and company can rectify that - this being a performance of "Ife" from 1973. Broken in two - part one:



And Part Two, which is where things really get me: right now, my jazz world really revolves around Pete Cosey, who lets it rip on 12-strong here....



And good night - and see you at the movies about movies blogathon!

Manny Farber

One of the world's great film critics - some would say, the greatest - has died - Manny Farber. Greencine, as usual, has all the links.

Link Day Links

Wednesday upon us, so with nothing much to say, let's post some interesting bits...

There's this - the story of Shanta Rao Dutt, film Pioneer - maybe. Via Bioscope, a blog I've started reading only lately, and find quite wonderful.

Or this - films in films Christopher Campbell at Spoutblog wants to see. Me too, for quite a few of them.

UPDATE: I want to add a similar project Andrew Osborne at Screengrab posts a series devoted to the best movies about movies. I've written a longer post on it at the Film & Discussion blog, but I want to note it here too - it fits too well with the previous two items.

Or - a blogathon announcement - James Bond blogathon, at Lazy Eye Cinema, November 5-7. Should be good.

And - welcome back, Edward Copeland - here's hoping his health problems are on the mend. I've missed him.

And of course, another week, another interesting post from Girish - this one on Creative Geography. Extended, as usual, in comments...

Meanwhile: I haven't been watching the Olympics - with football season starting? I jest, of course - though if that game got much worse, we wouldn't be joking about Youilis kicking a field goal, we'd have been making cracks about hitting a three pointer. You gotta love the Rangers - in that game and the previous one, they combined to score 32 runs on 40 hits - and split. Counting the 9-0 and 9-1 losses to Baltimore over the weekend and tonight's 8-4 loss, they've given up 52 runs in 5 games - scoring 37, even with the shut out.... Great fun. I should be more concerned with the Boston bullpen - taking a good shellacking last night, and one of the few who didn't fuel the flames coming in tonight and offering up a quick three run homer... but the main starters and the end of the pen are so good (Lester dominant again tonight), and the offense still so potent that things look pretty good for the local 9. Even with guys hurt we're catching the breaks - we lose Lowell, but Tampa loses Langoria and Crawford - all this just as Ellsbury starts hitting again, Jed Lowrie comes up and looks like the real thing (leading all SS in RBI since the all star break - couple more tonight) - it's good.

So - that's it for tonight. Some film stuff to read, and Baseball - what else can you ask? (I should write up some of the films I've seen lately - nice weekend of films, though I did miss one I wanted to see - Kon Ichikawa's last film - thanks to a monsoon; I did see an excellent documentary on Ichikawa, directed by Shunji Iwai; along with Man on Wire, Boom, the La Chinoise DVD and some William S. Hart. Maybe over the weekend - there are a couple more playing in town. Mourning Forest, say. We'll see.)

Marlene says hello

I have a new toy.

Double Bills to Double Your Fun!

There's a lot of talk going around about double features. Diablo Cody's week at the New Beverly Cinema set off a swarm of posts - a meme, red in tooth and claw, circling the internet in the usual manner... And Sight and Sound, probably not inspired by Diablo or Piper, though who can say, offers up their own set of double features (that's PDF, I'll have you know), chosen by a host of critics and film people. Girish expands, and the comment section buzzes with suggestions and, lately, math.

There's nothing for it but to combine these - or, really, to do the meme, though taking off from the Sight and Sound list. Specifically, Brad Stevens' suggestion of a pairing of Celine and Julie Go Boating and Inland Empire. Ryland Walker Knight is also moved by the matchup. It's good. I was surprised to find I hadn't brought up the comparison in any of my Rivette posts last year - nor my Inland Empire "explanation"*. I knew I wrote about them - turns out, it was part of a draft for those Rivette posts linked above, and left on the cutting room floor. Or blogger's abandoned drafts. It's not all that profound - in fact, I think there are more overt references to Celine and Julie in Mulholland Drive than Inland Empire - the way one woman finds another sleeping on her doorstep (so to speak), the girl detective plot, etc... But there are plenty of parallels between any of these films - the way they combines multiple stories, sometimes at the same level, sometimes splitting the levels - the way they moves in and out of these stories stylistically, and so on. Though in some ways they are inverted, Rivette and Lynch: with Lynch, everything that gets into the film is given the weight of “reality” (within the fiction) - that is, Laura Dern’s journeys through god knows how many plots and ontological orders in Inland Empire are all played as if what you see, what she sees, at any given moment, is completely and inescapably real. With Rivette, you get the exact opposite - the sense instead that everything you see, everything the characters see, do, experience is always a game, a play, a joke - though Rivette is quite flexible about this.

Anyway: the point of all that is that you can, sort of, look at Lynch's films as a kind of disguised remake of the Rivette film. And that suggests a film festival! So - a dozen films, arranged in pairs - linked pairs: twisted (or not) remakes, or separated twins...

1. So start right there: Celine and Julie Go Boating and Mulholland Drive.

2. The Wizard of Oz & Stalker - that's what Stalker is, right? three men go into a zone looking to be granted wishes. This moves from black and white to color. They hallucinate, pass through various threats... find out it's all a bit of a joke, though whatever changes changes inside them. Right? (It's been ages since I've seen Stalker: I think the parallels are better than that even.) So there.

3. Vanda's Room & En Construccion - two films shot more or less simultaneously in Lisbon and Barcelona with similar ambitions and technical conditions (Costa shooting more or less alone with digital video; Guerin shooting on film, but as part of a film school project, that made it possible to shoot for free, with a minimal crew, and to spend a long time in the place they were shooting, as Costa did.) And coming out with similar stories, about the destruction of old neighborhoods and their replacement with new - all of it (both films) anchored by charismatic tough drug addicted women...

4. Play Time & Alphaville - day and night in 60s new Paris.

5. Cat People & Tropical Malady - it's as though Weerasthukal combines Cat People with I Walked With a Zombie, combining the inner divisions of the first with the spatial divisions of the second - the divided character and the two places, house and jungle... why not? A film that masters the Lewton/Tourneur use of suggestion, and deep ambiguity...

6. California Dreamin' (Endless) and Darjeeling Limited - not remakes of course since they were made about the same time - but two films about Americans on trains in strange countries - they become almost mirrors: Anderson’s Americans see everything around them as a means to their own salvation - while Nemescu's lot sees the Americans as their salvation, a chance to work out something of their own. Though there's a bit of that in Darjeeling Limited as well - both films, for example, have local women using American men to get out of something, while letting the American think he's using her... Anyway - a double bill I'd love to see, and that's the real point...

I suppose there are plenty more like this - but this is a week of films I would love to see. So - that's all anyone can ask, right? And as I mentioned in Girish's comments, there are so many ways to approach something like this - like - real double features I've seen, whether intentional (programmed by someone) or accidental - like the day I saw Letters from Iwo Jima and Jeanne La Poucelle (all 6 plus hours of it) more or less back to back...

* Take THAT, Parallel Universe Film Guide! They haven't actually added Inland Empire, but when they do, if they don't call it, "You Think You're So Smart Explaining the Last One, Try Explaining This!" they could call it, "I Love Lamps!" I would.

Creepy Suburban Doings Right Under Your Nose*

Via Screengrab, I have discovered another world, lingering just the other side of the movie screen - a Parallel Universe! with its own film guide and everything. I may never leave.... who wouldn't want to see Alienation with an F/Stop? or the classic rom-com, All in All, I'd Rather Marry the Rich Handsome One? not to mention the surrealist masterpiece, Venomous Stink of the Hoi Polloi.

There's plenty of fun to be had figuring out the references, though even when they're obvious, they're a hoot - take the works of the famed Rave brothers - Slack Jawed Yokels on Parade; Slack-Jawed Yokels in Minnesota; Slack-Jawed Yokels Picaresque and Slack-Jawed Yokels Feelin' Philosophical - it's mean, but what can you say? And can you improve on All Men Are Scum Sucking Pigs in summing up Mizoguchi?

* From the auteur of You Explain It...

Baseball Post Manny

Well - Manny Ramirez is no longer with the Red Sox. Traded to LA - with Andy LaRoche from LA, and Brandon Moss and Craig Hanson going to Pittsburgh. The sox had to give up a lot right there - but on balance, I like the deal. Manny's problems are well documented - though even on the field, I don't think it's a bad deal. He's not the hitter he used to be - he's still very good - about the same as Drew or Youkilis, or Jason Bay... he was a good deal more than that in his prime. But now - he hits like Drew or Youk or Lowell - but he doesn't bring their defense. And the odds are, he's not going to suddenly morph into his 2004-5-6 form again - he should maintain what he's doing - but that's all... And Bay gives them that - and Bay should play better defense... and costs a third as much.... This is what they would have had to do at the end of the year - find someone to replace Ramirez. So I'll take this deal.

As for the other teams involved? The Dodgers get a real hitter - can't be bad, at least as long as they know enough to sit Pierre. The Bucs? LaRoche was supposed to be ready this year, but got hurt; Hanson hasn't figured it out yet, but will probably have some decent years eventually - though who cares? Moss - provably won't do too much,but has the potential to be a solid major leaguer, I think. Though only LaRoche is good enough to maybe be as good as Bay...

Meanwhile - an even better player, though even more washed up, got traded - Ken Griffey heads t the south side of Chicago, where he is supposed to play center field. That doesn't sound wise - but if he can do anything, that could give them a boost... I mean - I still play center field once in a while, and I'm almost as old and crippled as Griffey...

Anyway - it is exciting. Some nice pennant races shaping up - in the AL East and central, all the NL divisions, though the west, even with Manny around, is a sad sad thing...

Links July 30

Being completely lazy and without discipline, and trying to work out the best way to use Newsfire (since it rather messes up my favored Save-It-For-Later device, the Shared Google page), I shall have recourse to a links roundup. Of course as usual, this takes as long as a real post would have....

Budd Boetticher's Seminole DVD - Glenn Kenny, at the Auteur's Notebook.

Watching silent movies online, from The Bioscope.

David Cairns explores the horror of Sea Monkeys.

TCM's blog examines Written on the Wind.

Grand hotel Screenshots at Sixmartinis and the Seventh Art.

And a Rug Rats Blogathon, I just found.

In other news, Orson Scott Card is crazy.

Pacze Moj writes about the Olympics, politics, and money.

And oh yeah - new Tor site, with an all star cast.

Finally - and anticipating a real post here, I hope -Dennis Lim's history of the fight scene in Slate is getting a lot of attention. For example - Glenn Kenny - Screengrab - David Cohen at Anne Thompson's Variety blog - to pick three I remembered to bookmark.

Lawyers, Guns and Money, meanwhile, takes on both Lim's fight post, and A.O. Scott's dismissal of the superhero film. Putting the two together like that reminds me: Lim's big How To Stage A Fight Scene example - Oldboy - IS a superhero film. At least as much as any Batman is.

Youssef Chahine

I just want to adda note about the passing of Youssef Chahine, the great Egyptian director. I've seen a handful of his films, and heard him speak once, promoting Al-Massir, his Averroes musical. The best of his films, for my money, was Alexandria, Why? - an autobiographical/national epic told in a breakneck style - there are swarms of characters, representing the cultural richness of Egypt (though some of it about to be lost): the main (autobiographical) character, Yehia, and his family; a Jewish family, with a daughter who loves a communist; a pair of bumbling Egyptian nationalists; an evil rich man and his more decent son; a decadent aristocrat who falls in love with a British soldier he kidnaps; a petty crook - and mobs of people around these, people who keep popping in out of nowhere and taking surprisingly substantial places in the story, all of a sudden.... Chahine tells his stories fast, getting a wealth of incident and plot into a short amount of time, and does it in many registers - melodrama, politics, musical numbers, love scenes, intercut documentary footage, etc. It's a great film, and not the only great film he did.

Kurosawa Blogathon (etc)

Since I jumped the gun by a week, it's probably no surprise to learn how excited I am to see the Kiyoshi Kurosawa blogathon up and running at the Evening Class.

Also, the X-Files blogathon at South Dakota Dark is running another day.

Meanwhile - one of the ongoing threads in online writing about the film world is the continued hand wringing about the fate of critics: Philip Lopate weighs in at Film in Focus.

And another, from Nathaniel Rogers. This article also joins the ongoing debate over the Dark Knight (the "cons" are starting to gain on the "pros", I think), and contributes to a Dangerous Trend - St. John of the Cross Puns!

Kiyoshi Kurosawa's Retribution

Today is Kiyoshi Kurosawa's birthday - an excellent excuse to post about him. It helps that I have had Retribution out from Neflix for a while, putting off watching it until I would have the time to do justice to it, maybe even write about it.



This is about Retribution. It’s a ghost story (which kind of spoils it, though not really, since it doesn't waste much time before turning fantastic.) Koji Yakusho plays a cop investigating the murder of a woman, drowned in salt water. He starts finding clues that he was the criminal - he thinks he can’t be, but for some reason he can’t shake the feeling. Then he starts dreaming and seeing ghosts... The story will be familiar to J-horror fans, and Kurosawa fans - vengeful female ghosts, mystical serial killers. It plays a bit like Cure for a while (complete with sinister madhouses), before sliding toward a more conventional J-Horror ghost story - but Kurosawa makes it unmistakably his own, bringing a characteristic intense sadness to his apocalypses. Its a beautiful film, moving, and thrilling to look at.

I want to pull out one stylistic device Kurosawa uses heavily in the film. He has a tendency to film characters in murk or from behind, and bring them into the light, or a clearer shot - as this shot, Yoshioka seen through a plastic screen:



But even when they are not obscured - he very frequently composes shots to put the characters in a darker, more shadowy foreground, with a bright, intrusive light source in the background - usually a door or a window, or something leading out of the space of the shot.

This shot of the police station (repeated a couple times in the film):



Or the first shot of the ferry, again using the dark foreground, bright background:



And almost every shot in Yoshioka’s house has some variation on this. His introduction, being awakened by an earthquake - all fairly shadowy, noirish, but with two bright windows puncturing the background:



A dinner scene, with recessive openings leading to a bright window, almost threatening in the background:



These compositions quickly take on thematic, dramatic force - Kurosawa withholds what they signify at first, but it’s hard to see these shots and not know something isn’t quite what it seems right now.

Harue leaving:



Harue commenting on the neighborhood - full of screening effects, plus the lighting in the background:



All of which pays off in the end. Kurosawa sets up the pattern and carries it through - those background lights keep haunting the shots, as much as the ghosts do. In the madhouse, Yoshioka moves through darkness, with slashes of lights cutting the background, before finding what he was looking for - with a nice visual rhyme to the earlier shots of Harue, as well:



All that, while maintaining the tightrope between uncanny and marvelous, that Kurosawa usually walks. How much of all of this is in Yoshioka’s head?



And how much in the world?



(Or - )



But through it all - Harue's story, while always seeming to be in the background, carries the most weight - and is given the most weight, by Kurosawa's camera (not to mention the last word, which I am not going to include, in a belated and feeble gesture at not "spoiling" anything.) But these shots - one of the couple together, one of the couple parting - seem to me to be the center of the film. Both come before the real plot of the film has been revealed - but they show everything....

Harue in the light:



Harue leaving:

Weekly Post

This is getting awful. I am back on my summer schedule, lucky to post once a week... I don't know. I can blame vacations or the heat or watching the Red Sox or playing softball, but who knows...

All right: keep a toe in until I get some energy back.... The Film of the Month Club has moved on to its new film: The Fireman's Ball. I look forward to this - Czech new wave is one of those things I have never really explored - in fact, I don't know if I have explored it at all... This is a perfect excuse. Assuming I can muster the energy to sit down in front of the TV and watch a movie...

There are other blogathons going on, coming, or just concluded - check out the blogathon page to the right. The one I'm itching for is Maya's Kiyoshi Kurosawa blogathon (mentioned down at the bottom of this post) coming on the 19th. That's coming up fast: if Im going to show some life it had better be quick.

The year is halfway through: I should make a list or something... the year so far. Others have. Maybe I should make a list of the films that have played in Boston, possibly for the only time in years - that I was too lazy to go to? Boarding Gate? Chaotic Ana? God - how can I face myself?

The best I have seen? Quite a few of this year's releases made it onto last year's retrospective lists - so this is only since the last list post. 2008 releases, best since May:

1. Edge of Heaven
2. My Winnipeg
3. Chop Shop
4. Up the Yangtze
5. Gonzo: Life and Works of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson
6. Speed Racer
7. Operation Filmmaker
8. Monkey Warfare
9. All For Free
10. The Tracey Fragments

Heavy on the documentaries and Canadians, as usual this time of year. I have to write some of these up, if I ever get the energy to sit in front of the computer for a couple hours... Right.

And music? Haven't been buying a lot of stuff, down from usual. But some recent good stuff... new Beck record (Modern Guilt) sounds pretty good, though I just got it... And the Melvins have a new one out - I've been listening to the Melvins a lot lately. Working backwards from Boris, I guess you'd say. New one is called Nude with Boots... And I've been digging up Mark Stewart records when I can - Edit, the new one, is pretty interesting. And Sigur Rus - who in the last couple years have become one of my favorites. Haven't quite gotten into this one yet, but they usually come... Still - overall, I haven't been buying that many records this year: the best all year are probably the Earth record (Bees Made Honey in the Lion's Skull) - with Bill Frisell! and the latest Nick Cave (Dig, Lazarus, Dig!)

All this of course is an excuse to post a video - easy material! Let's use live Earth - Engine of Ruin. Another beautiful song...

Summertime Links

Yes, it's high summer, with its holidays and vacations and heat and softball games (and attendant aches and pains, for I have become old), and so there's not much blogging being done here. There's plenty going on elsewhere though - so here are some links:

First - a couple blogathons: Culture Snob's Self-involvement blogathon starts today. I quote: "Most film writing is movies filtered through the self; I want the self filtered through movies.”

At the Valve, John Holbo is hosting discussions on Douglas Wolk's book, Reading Comics. A first day round up here.

And though it was scheduled to finish on July 3, there are still posts coming in related to the New York films blogathon at 12 Grand in Checking. This one, for example, from the Self-Styled Siren.

Meanwhile: the midyear roundups are starting to appear - multiparter at Fin de Cinema, starting here. And Larry Aydlette sketches the first half of the year in several media. I may join that party one of these days...

And - another obituary: Bruce Conner has died. GreenCine, Ray Pride round up links and notes.

Even Happier Independence Day

Meanwhile - The Feelies are back on their holiday schedule, more or less - what could be better?

Happy Independence Day

It's summer vacation time, so, you can see the rate of posting... but I can pop in long enough to note the passing of someone who did more than his share to piss on the legacy of this holiday - Jesse Helms. Don't speak ill of the dead, yeah yeah yeah... easier said than done - he worked to make the country a worse place for decades. What am I supposed to say? People like Helms should not be part of our public life. Just being reminded that he was alive is a downer...

Anyway, to help you cheer up - let's let Galaxie 500 get the last word - happy fourth of July!

Miscellany

I wish to apologize for the last post. I don't know what could have happened there. Some strange disturbance in the universe. Who can explain? In expatiation - this month's Wire cover boy - Mark Stewart, in Pop Group, doing Boys from Brazil...



Anyway - with Piper's folly out of the way, there's not much time to start on the next blogathon I know about - New York in the movies - starts Sunday, runs all week. A subject I need to work something up for....

As for the regular blogosphere - another interesting conversation, about received ideas about films and filmmakers, over at Girish's place. Lots of conversations going on about Entertainment Weekly's new classics, and the AFI's latest list show - but I might as well link to the other blog I'm on - another excuse to post counter lists, always welcome.

And the Film of the Month club is continuing - discussion of DeMlle's 1915, The Golden Chance. It took forever for the damned thing to arrive from Netflix, but it finally did, and I'm looking forward to jumping in. A very eat film, too, if you can get it...

And - another music video, another bit of penance for the last post...



Hell - Bobby Darin, too: this might atone for My Humps...

5 Musical Geniuses!

I don't have much to say - some quick links: Bizarro Days are upon us again, chez Piper. Great fun! Hijinks galore! I wish I could contribute, but I can never come up with anything appropriate for this kind of spoofery - so I'l leave it to the witty people. And - let's face facts: there are times - haven't we all felt? - when the endless irony and meta-meta-meta-metaness of the internet becomes so depressing - does anyone really need another snarky wiseass pretending to love Jean-Claude Van Damme in order to mock Jean Claude Van Damme? Pretending to pretend to hate Citizen Kane to prove they really love Citizen Kane so snobs won't laugh at them? No, that won't be me. Sincerity is my middle name.

So since I don't have any actual content, I think I will have recourse to that old standby, the Music Post. How about a list? Five Great Songs!

1. Creed - My Own Prison: who doesn't love Creed? speaking of sincerity - truly, has ever a pop star exuded more sincerity than Scott Stapp? Look at that hair! His hair alone is a higher being! Look at him grasp the microphone stand! what a man! what a star! he's created his own prison, you know. Irony is a prison! satire is a prison! snark is a prison! No more snark! Think back to the wonderful days of the late 90s when this might be heard on any radio station in the land! Ah - just thinking about how much we all miss Scott Stapp's hair makes me want to run to a Denny's for a grand slam.



2. Jewel - Foolish Games: better than Joni Mitchell, you know! and from one of the Great films of the 90s - so let us enjoy this fine piece of crooning, and not engage in the "foolish games" of making fun of such a talented artist. Or this high tech and oh so artistic video... these foolish games are tearing her apart!



3. Air Supply - I'm all Out of Love: sadly, embedding has been disabled on this fine piece - taking me back to my youth - many happy hours spent spinning the radio dial trying to find a station that wasn't playing this. Was - was playing this.... what are you thinking of?

4. For some things - words simply can't ...



5. I don't know what this fine song from those toweringly talented nu-metal geniuses, Linkin Park, is called - but I know, it's a worthy addition to this list: words are failing me again... god bless pro tools!



I think I may have caused myself permanent brain damage writing this post. Damn you Bizarro Piper!

George Carlin

I wish this is just a Bizarro Blogathon hoax, but I'm afraid it isn't: George Carlin has died. His records were a fixture in my college days - we'd listen to them as much as music... I still think of them, probably because he had something funny to say about almost anthing people do. I've been through the MFA's (quite marvelous) Antonio Lopez Garcia show a couple times, and every time, come to this and start doing Carlin's ice-box man routine. It's Meatcake! (Audio version here, at the 5:34 point.)



So farewell and thanks, Mr. Carlin.

Thanks Kevin(s)!

I should come in here to say something about the Celtics' rousing championship - it was dpne in fine fashion: they dominated from the beginning of the season, and outside of a few unduly interesting playoff games, never really let up. (And the playoffs - the first series, Atlanta ran them out of the building in Georgia, and the C's seemed pretty wound up throughout the series; then they had to play Cleveland, which may not have the best talent in the game, but they play hard, and they have the best player in the world. Anyone who wants to try to claim it's Kobe Bryant - compare his elimination game - 22 points, 3 rebounds, assist) to LeBron's - 45, 5 and 6... Kobe's got skills, but LeBron elevates his team.)

Anyway - Pierce was immense, and everyone else contributed (like the sox have done in their world series' wins - everybody seems to end up with a moment or two) - though it's hard to deny that it all comes down to Kevin Garnett. He certainly got off the best lines after the game - quoting Jimmy Cagney (not Titanic - he got the "made it ma!" in there too) - then that exchange with Bill Russell: "I hope we made you proud." I'd say they did - at some level, this team should annoy me - I don't like buying championships, I don't like teams built for the short term - but one of the things that marked this team was that they never quite played like that. Maybe in the Atlanta series... but most of the year, they have played like they have been together for years - or just added one part. They played as a unit, they played defense, they were tough, they kept their heads (except for the Atlanta series) - they were admirable all year.

Finally - thanks has to go to Kevin McHale as well - he should get credit for his 4th Celtics championship, because he certainly gifted us. He bailed out Danny Ainge whose track record until he made that trade was perfectly awful. And much as I have hated Danny Ainge (and Doc Rivers) through the years - it's as if getting Garnett made them smarter. Ainge signed the right players - Posey and House; Brown and Cassell later; Rivers kept the whole roster involved, and able to perform on short notice, while keeping the stars focused and active. You can almost forget that Danny Ainge traded Brandon Roy for Sebastian Telfair (more or less) just a year before. Let's hope it lasts: they ought to have another year or two of contention with this group - if they don't want to relive the 90s, they will have to find some kids to replace them. They'll have to take advantage of what time they have - you can see 4 or 5 teams in the east coming fast - Orlando, Atlanta, maybe Toronto - and sooner or later Cleveland's going to get someone worthy of LeBron, and he'll take a couple rings... But for now - it's a fine thing.

Honor thy Father and Mother

I can't quite justify this as a father's day, Dads in Media post - it's more of an honor thy father and mother post. Or - a fortuitous opportunity to revisit one of the questions in SLIFR's Memorial Day Quiz: #32: "Name a favorite film and describe how it is illuminated and enriched by another favorite film." I had the chance to see Leo McCarey's Make Way For Tomorrow, and that inspired me to return to an all time favorite, Tokyo Story. The former is often suggested as a direct source for the latter - believable enough. This is not a finished essay - these are notes, comparing them, to draw out some of the specific concerns of each. If it matters - I won't pretend to avoid spoilers; after 50 and 70 years, I hope that's not too much a concern.

1) Seeing them together, it's notable that McCarey's film is a good deal harsher than Ozu's. Make Way for Tomorrow is one of the saddest movies ever made, and the story is quite a bit darker. The old couple in MWFT are forced out of their home - they have nowhere to go, they have to rely on their children. In Tokyo Story, the old couple is just visiting. They have a home to go back to - they are still independent. Not only that - in McCarey's film, the couple is separated - the film is about their forced separation. Not so much in Ozu - when they do separate, it's only for a night,and it's voluntary. (Though this obviously changes at the end of the film - though more later.) The tone is lighter too in the Ozu -and there are decent people - Noriko (Setsuko Hara's character) notably; Kyoko, the youngest daughter, also comes off pretty well. None of the kids redeems themselves in MWFT - strangers,and a shop keeper, treat the old couple well, do them a good turn or two, but the kids all fail.

2) On the other hand - Ozu is more complex and detailed in showing the social relationships in the family. Not only are some of the (extended) family members quite nice, but we see the problems between the old couple. McCarey presents them as happy together - deeply in love - never having any real doubts about one another, despite their failures. Ozu, however, shows a happy old couple that has not always been happy. The father used to be a drunkard, and probably abusive - indeed, the difference between his behavior when he drank and when he didn't might influence the way his children react to him. Shige and Koichi knew him when he was a mean drunk - he stopped drinking when Kyoko was born, and Noriko only knew him after she married Shoichi. In any case - in Ozus film, this is a couple who have hurt each other in the past, have hiurt their children - just as their children are hurting them now. If there is anything like that involved in the McCarey family, it's not in the film.

3) Tokyo Story is more socially and economically detailed. That isn't t say that money and class and all that aren't significant in the cCarey film - they are - but that Ozu digs into it deeper. I think this is a fairly important point - Ozu is usually not treated being particularly socially relevant, yet throughout his career he deals with the social and economic world with good deal of care. Tokyo Story contains a precise set of observations and analysis of the world - he addresses money and class in remarkably subtle and intelligent way. He's more subtle than McCarey - McCarey makes explicit points: about unemployment and foreclosure; about Anita giving bridge classes to maintain a certain standard of living (which is not enough to add another member tot he household - though that's because they are selfish) - as well as jokes, like the idea of old people having millions stashed away. But he doesn't really link it to the outside world. The links are obvious, in 1937 - they don't have to be spelled out... But Ozu, also not spelling things out, does weave the various strands together. The parent's expectations vs. the kids' lack of success; their stinginess, especially compared to Noriko's generosity and very noticeable poverty; the links between the conditions all of them live in and the conditions in Japan, 1953 - a period when Japan began to bounce back from the war, but did so very unevenly. Money was being made, but it wasn't being spread around very well. Those issues probably come out more clearly in Naruse's films, or Ichikawa's, or Kurosawa's contemporary films, but Ozu does a fine job of showing the contradiction. Here the contradictions are implied - in Good Morning, say, the contradictions - the expectations that people should live a certain way compared to the difficulty most people have living up to those expectations - are much clearer. But still - here, the war, the boom, the need to work to survive and get ahead, the ways people work - the social issues involved in what people do (shops in the home and so on) are all implied.

4) A point about awareness. It is interesting that McCarey gives the old couple a chance to take a shot at the kids - when they decide to ditch dinner with the kids, Bark tells Nelly what he thinks of them. The message gets through - they talk about it. It is interesting though that we don’t get to hear it. Compare this to Tokyo Story - where no one tells Shige and Keizo what they think of them - indeed, Noriko and the father remain solicitous to the end. But - Shichiki and Tome do discuss it, as do the three drunkards. (This is similar to Bark and Max talking.) And more importantly, perhaps - after the funeral, Kyoko lights into the rest of them. We hear it - but they don’t. In MWFT - they hear it - we don't. One thing both films have is the middle generation indulging in self-pity and guilt: oh, how awful we are! The end of the McCarey film does this rather neatly - the four of them sit around and say they knew what bastards they were, though it only hurts when Dad says it. And they go on - we really are monsters - but none of them does anything to stop it. None of them is going to raise a finger to change the way things are. They wallow in their misery, they let their self-recrimination take the place of any decent behavior. This is more pointed than the similar scenes in the Ozu film - but it’s there too. Shige wails about mom’s death; Keizo says what a bad son he was (Shige does too, of course) - neither of them lets it do more than fill them with the delight of self-pity.

5) Finally - going back to the first point. MWFT is, ultimately, about separation - the story is almost as much a variation on Love Affair, with it's tragically parted lovers (after an idyllic interlude), as about the generation canyon. It is also about the old couple's helplessness and dependency on their children, where Ozu’s is about the failures of the kids merely to be good enough. Circumstances do not force the couple apart - they have a home to return to. But as if in compensation for this - Tome dies. It's odd - this may be more final than the ending of MWFT, but it does not seem quite as dark. They stay together to the end, after all - though more, McCarey’s ending focuses on the human choices being made. The couple is not parted by anything absolute - they are parted by the selfishness of their children. They suffer directly through the meanness of their children. Ozu’s couple parts by death - something outside the range of human agency.

It's a different dynamic. Ozu is, in the end, less devastating than the McCarey film. Everything is more ambivalent, and the ambivalence is more explicit, closer to the surface - the fact that some of the younger people are nice, the lack of direct complicity by the children in the suffering of their parents, the more complicated relationship between the old people and so on. McCarey focuses the melodrama, the anguish - both by emphasizing the doomed love aspect of the story, and the responsibility the children bear for it. Ozu diffuses it - makes the film about life itself. Allows more time for the other failures of the kids - their mediocrity (present in McCarey, but somewhat underplayed - though interestingly, he plays it up in Bark’s case: he’s shown as a genial mediocrity himself), the broader generational themes, the connection of the generational issues to the specific circumstances of their lives. There is more a sense of flow in Ozu - which is typical of his work.

Indeed - it’s what marks him out: nothing ends in Ozu. I think this also connects him more to Capra than McCarey (a controversial statement I know...) McCarey’s films end - fairly definitively, even if the ending is a beginning (as it is in The Awful Truth.) Capra’s end, but they end on patently artificial notes. It's as though Capra were telling us: this is where we are going to stop; everyone is happy everything has worked out for these nice people. But if you have been watching this film, you know that every time things work out, something new comes along - don't be fooled into thinking this is different, just cause I'm ringing a lot of bells on the soundtrack.

Ozu dispenses almost entirely with the happy endings - indeed, with anything that could really count as an ending. The films end - definitively, but that's because he establishes himself as their maker so forcefully - he ends them formally - as here, with echoes of the opening of the film... But the story - the worlds - the things happening to the people in the film, are usually well on the way by the time he reaches the end of the film. This effect - of continuation, of constant change - is usually reinforced by the fact that soething in the story we have been told almost always foretells the things that will happen next. Even in as devastatingly sad a film as Late Spring - we have been told about the father's marriage, which started badly, was loveless and sad - but turned into something else - became happy. This film (Late Spring), crushing us with the separation of two people who love each other - already contains within it an image of the rest of their lives, where this pain will give way to something else. (A new set of pains, when the daughter has to marry off her children? Late Autumn?)

Quick Hits on Friday

Lots going on, on the blogs:

For father's day, the Dads in Media Blogathon is up and running, at Strange Culture. Good stuff to be had.

The second month of the Film of the Month Club is underway. Cecil B. DeMille's 1915 film, The Golden Chance is on the menu for June - plenty of good stuff should be forthcoming over the coming weeks.

Meanwhile, outside blogs and movies, Tim Russert has died. I don't know what to say, other than extending condolences to his family. He's one of those public figures I read about every day, more or less, but might well not have been able to identify from a photograph. Teevision news is not something I take very seriously.

On happier news - I haven't done much blogging about the Celtics, and - strangely enough, have barely watched them since February (a habit I developed in their lean years that seems to have come back this year; I suspect the real answer is - once the baseball games start, basketball is just a distraction.) But they are one game away from a championship. Defense wins, especially if you can score too, and the Lakers do not seem to have the defense they need.... Though 1 game isn't a given at that level: ask the Indians.

And in the real world:



They were shooting a movie last week, on Mass Ave. Pedro Costa is right - shooting a movie is like an invasion: trucks up and down the road, wires everywhere traffic diverted.... This is the tail end, breaking down - still junk everywhere. I don't know what film they were shooting, but I doubt it will be very good. There's something creepy about shooting on location and turning the location into a sound stage - with all that crap, what else can they do? You move away from the artifice of the studio, but then recreate it on the street? Gah...

And, sort of finally - treated myself to a concert last night - Damon and Naomi at TT The Bears, with Helena Espvall and Masaki Batoh opening. A fine time was had! I tested my camera - I'm curious about how it works in bad light: some digital cameras work very well - this one, I'm afraid, does not. At least, I haven't found the right setting. This is about as good as they get:



Though this one, of Espvall, gotten by monkeying around with the settings in the dark, looks very cool:



Anyway - enjoy the weekend, and I hope I make it back here with a father's day post before the weekend is out...

Homework - 3 Weeks Late

Once again, from Sergio Leone and the Infield Fly Rule - pop quiz! More like a freakin' final exam - that I'm weeks late on... It has gotten a bit ridiculous. It's time to post. Though even now, I'm probably going to have to skip a couple of the questions - the best ones, probably. Though I should maybe make a virtue of it - pin em on the wall, and when I have a good answer for them, it'll be another post! hooray! Anyway - with no further ado, because if I'm not careful, it'll be fourth of July already:

UPDATED (7/9): Dennis has posted selected answers: Part 1 - Part 2 - Part 3. A good way to kill a morning or two... I've also added links to my "promised" makeup work.

1) Best transition from movies to TV (actor, actress, producer/director, movie/show)
- This isn't easy - I don't watch much TV anymore - what I've seen in the last 20 years I've caught up with after the fact... since it should be someone I've actually seen - I'm tempted to say Fred MacMurray - a fine film career, and then a big TV career - though he's bland on TV. William Demerast then? though I'm tempted to go to something more basic - Edward Everett Horton, whose voice is utterly engrained in my head...

2) Living film director you most missing seeing on the cultural landscape regularly
- Not easy - one way to answer would be to lament the unavailability of films by people like Tsui Hark, Peter Chan, Zhang Yuan... but another - a director gone missing - Whit Stillman? I miss Alan Rudolph, too...

3) Eugene Pallette or Charles Coburn
- Coburn is probably a better actor, but Pallette is in too many films near and dear to my heart. And - he is a wonderful presence n all of them.

4) Fill in the blank: “I pray that no one ever turns _____________ into a movie.”
- Hard to say - maybe Calvin and Hobbes? though I suppose the right people could do it - right now though, I suspect it would end up looking like Garfield or something...

5) Jane Greer or Veronica Lake
- Gotta say Veronica Lake

6) What was the last movie you saw in a theater? On DVD? And why?
- This keeps changing, as I keep putting off posting it. The last couple weeks have been very rich: from Love Eterne (Shaw Brothers, Chinese opera, the first full blown opera film I have ever seen), to 14 Amazons (Shaw Brothers again, 14 Amazons plus Lilly Ko as the son of the family... to The Awful Truth - the HFA has been very good to me lately.
- DVD? - would be Modesty Blaise. Why? David Cairns. (And what I said about the HFA? It's not on their web site yet, but in July - the HFA is promising "The Complete Joseph Losey"....)

7) Name an actor you think should be a star
- I suppose one answer is that I think Louis Garrel will cross the Atlantic in a couple years, to be the French Gael Garcia Bernal; in this land - is Paul Dano a star yet?

8) Foxy Brown or Coffy
- No idea - Coffy I think, but I'm not sure. Haven't seen either one anywhere but on TV.

9) Favorite TV show still without its own DVD box set
- I don't know - I don't pay close enough attention to DVD releases to know what it and isn't available. Though I know that Max Headroom is not available, and that's one of the great shows of the 80s...

10) Jack Elam or Neville Brand
- not much hope here... I'll say Jack Elam, for no particular reason

11) What movies would top your list of movies you need to revisit, for whatever reason?
- Among older films - Kurosawa's The Idiot, which I saw on VHS many years back and didn't get much out of... Dreyer's Joan of Arc, just because it's been too long since I've seen it.... Rio Bravo, ditto.... more recently: The Ice Storm comes to mind... I need to rewatch some Cronenberg's - I might like them better. There are filmmakers I've seen once and want to see again - Olmi, Ichikawa, etc... And - RC reminds me - a couple Coen Brothers films - actually, about half of them, but especially The Man Who Wasn't There...

12) Zodiac or All the President’s Men
- Zodiac - for the way it looks, I think, though there's nothing wrong with how ATPM looks or Zodiac's story...

13) Using our best reviewer-speak, what is an “important” film comedy? And what is to you the most important film comedy of the last 35 years?
- "Important" is always trouble - I don't think I can answer that in any context... Rushmore is the best, for many many reasons - but important? setting Bill Murray on his latter day career path is a good reason - though that if so, maybe the answer should be Groundhog Day... I suppose another way to go might be to say, Evil Dead: besides giving Sam Raimi his career, it ushered in a kind of horror/comedy hybrid... etc. I don't know. I might come up with a better answer later - this is one I plan to hold on to and answer at length if I come up with something good.

14) Describe the ideal environment for watching a movie.
- Any good theater, really - with good seats, plenty of room to prop up the feet without poking anyone in the back - no one in front of you or behind you, but a decent crowd in the building, enough to react to things that need reactions. Clear view of the screen, no talkers, no one coming and going during the film, good screen good projection, good sound - it's not that unusual, really. I see a fair number of films that make the grade pretty well any given year - month, even. Those nice clean Shaw Brothers prints, a modest but enthusiastic crowd - what more could you ask, except maybe better seats...

15) Michelle Williams or Eva Mendes
- Williams sounds right. Sometimes, she seems in danger of turning into Renee Zellweger, but it hasn't happened yet.

16) What’s the worst movie title of all time?
- If translation counts - can anything beat Tough Beauty and the Sloppy Slop? In English - Lucky Number Slevin? I Heart Huckabees? Dumb and Dumberer? Ithere are probably worse,but that's enough to think about for now...

17) Best movie about teaching and/or learning
***- This is too good a question: I don't have a great answer - but I like the question too much to let go. It's kept me from posting these two weeks or so. I have to give up. I will cheat: Drunken Master! I'll say - or 36th Chamber of Shaolin. But I will keep this question around to answer when I have a good one.

18) Dracula (1931) or Horror of Dracula (1958)
- Dracula, easy

19) Why do you blog? Or if you don’t, why do you read blogs? (Thanks, Girish)
- I like the give and take, I like the conversations, and blogging is how people interact online these days. I have been playing around online for 15 odd years - Prodigy to AOL to message boards and Usenet, now blogging - it's what people do. I do think blogging is one of the best ways to have this conversation about film - it's flexible, easy to do, easily integrated into the broader community, allows you to do anything with it. I certainly hope it isn't replaced by crappy systems like Facebook or MySpace - those things give e the creeps...

20) Most memorable/disturbing death scene
- One that always bites me - the end of Tabu, when the boy reaches the priest's boat and the priest reaches out and cuts the rope he's hanging too, as casually and easily as that...

21) Jason Robards or Robert Shaw
- Which one? Robards, I guess, no matter which one...

22) A good candidate for Most Blasphemous Movie Ever
***- this is another one I can't answer, even after 2 weeks of thinking. Maybe Passion of the Christ? Anyway - another one I will try to return to in the future....

23) Rio Bravo or Red River
- Red River, I will say, though it might be just because I've seen it n a theater and not Rio Bravo.... [Add Rio Bravo to the films to revisit list, I guess.]

24) Werner Herzog is remaking Bad Lieutenant with Nicolas Cage—that’s reality. Try to outdo reality by concocting a match-up of director and title for a really strange imaginary remake.
- I'm very glad this movie is happening. Not that I want to see it, but already, it has Abel Ferrera and Werner Herzog taking shots at each other like Coco Crisp and Carl Crawford. [That reference is already a week out of date! alas!] As for an equally absurd remake - the next two questions suggest a Judd Apatow remake of Max on Amour with Julia Roberts in the lead. Though I wish they didn't.

25) Bulle Ogier or Charlotte Rampling
- Charlotte Rampling. Oh yes.

26) In the Realm of the Senses— yes or no?
- Absolutely - great film.

27) Name a movie you think of as your own (Thanks, Jim!)
***- I should be able to answer this: I will come back to it. This is - like the others that I've skipped, a great question - it deserves an answer worth the time it's taking to think of one.

28) Winged Migration or Microcosmos
- Microcosmos, for no profound reason

29) Your favorite football game featured in a movie
- The easy answer is Horsefeathers - I'm not positive though. MASH, The Freshman, all have their merits...

30) Wendy Hiller or Deborah Kerr
- I'll say Kerr

31) Dirtiest secret you have that is related to the movies
- I don't know what to say to this.

32) Name a favorite film and describe how it is illuminated and enriched by another favorite film.
***- Another question that's too good to answer: this one, especially, is something I want to think about, turn over in my head, all by itself, until I have a good answer. If I don't complete wimp out, this quiz could give me half sumer's worth of blogging material... UPDATE: I answered this one! I was lucky enough to see Leo McCarey's Make Way for Tomorrow, and posted about its relationship to Tokyo Story.

33) It’s a Gift or Horsefeathers
- Horsefeathers - now if you asked about "You're Telling Me" that would get dicey...

34) Your best story about seeing a movie at a drive-in
- I don't know if I ever have, sadly enough

35) Victor Mature or Tyrone Power
- Power - I've been watching his films lately, after working through a bunch of Fairbanks and Flynn movis - neat stuff, though he's not in their league.

36) What does film criticism mean to you? Where do you think it’s headed?
- Where it's headed? I don't know - I imagine it will continue roughly as it is. Academic critics will keep rolling along, someone somewhere will be reviewing new releases every week, giving them stars and trying to steer the public toward better films - probably all of us, though, rather than trained professionals - either way - I am going to end with thought from yesterday, that last movie I ended up seeing, in fact: The Awful Truth. Which, as it happened, was shown with an introduction from Stanley Cavell, who wrote about it in Pursuits of Happiness. Two things came to mind - first, I was thinking about why Cavell is so good (for I think his film writing is among the very best there is): it's that he shows us things that are in the films, and in the world, that we might not have thought of. That's what critics should do - make us see things we didn't see - in the film, or in the world, related to the film. And the other - a reference to his description of what marriage is, what a good marriage is, what the comedies of remarriage show: a "deepening of the conversation." That is what criticism should be - a conversation about films, and about life, through films... This might be the answer to the "important comedies" question too - because this is what the contenders do. Rushmore - Groundhog Day - O Brother Where Art Thou - Life of Brian - Fallen Angels (the Kinoshiro half anyway) - White: they tell us about life, they give us life as conversation, and a way of talking about the world, of inventing ourselves and taking responsibility for ourselves in the world... So - if we keep talking about films, criticism should make it, in the end.

Presidential Politics Noted

I thought I'd take a moment to at least comment on politics. I am very happy, and relieved, that Barack Obama has clinched the democratic party nomination for president. Relieved because I'm tired of watching democrats campaign against each other - it's time to get after John McCain. And while the campaign seemed to generate an awful lot of ugly and stupid identity politics down the stretch, it's hard not to be a bit thrilled at the fact that a Black man stands the best chance of being elected president in a few months. And if he hadn't won, a woman would have been nominated, and this year, like Obama, would have to be considered the favorite. The fact that the US has had one president in its history who was not a white protestant man is disgraceful. Hell, we're 20 years behind Pakistan!

Anyway: on the subject of presidential primaries, 40 years ago today, Robert Kennedy was shot. American history has not trended upwards from that point. Political history at least - Nixon to Reagan to Bush have taken the good parts of government out at the knees through the years, while pushing us toward authoritarianism and militarism. It would be nice to see that trend turned. Clinton tried, but did in in the teeth of nasty resistance, and with an annoying tendency to run to the middle... Now - the republicans have run the country into the ground, in ways pretty much anyone can see. And the trends of cultural history have fairly definitively gone against them, as they have been going for the last century of so... There is a chance here, the first in a while, probably, to do more than hold off the most appalling tendencies of the right - there is a chance to actually move the country forward. Do things every other rich country does - health care, decent train systems. Free college tuition! (Though it might be too much for many American's to grasp that getting people educated without burying them in debt might have benefits even to their employers....)

Who do you Love?

I have to post this news: Bo Diddley has died. (Via Glenn Kenny.) Boy, but he made the world a better place.

UPDATE: and, a clip - live on TV, 1966: