Great Movie Monologues 5 - "Jaws"

Watching "Jaws" (1975) again, I am reminded - again - of how perfect a film it is. Performances, music & sound design, editing, and writing come together to make a masterpiece. In truth, none of these elements is perfect in the film - close, but not quite. But somehow they were brought together, on a production where everyone seemed convinced they had a disaster on their hands, to produce one of the greatest horror movies and greatest adventure movies.

At night, aboard the fishing boat, Orca, our three heroes - Brody, a police chief afraid of water; Matt Hooper, a young marine biologist; and Quint, a seasoned shark fisherman exchange comical stories about their scars. When Hooper asks about the scar of a removed tattoo on Quint's arm, actor Robert Shaw launches into one of his best scenes as an actor and one of the best monologues in movies:

QUINT: (pointing to the tattoo) That's the U.S.S. Indianapolis.

HOOPER:  (breathless) You were on the Indianapolis?

BRODY:  What happened?

QUINT:  Japanese submarine slammed two torpedoes into her side, Chief. We was comin' back from the island of Tinian to Leyte. We'd just delivered the bomb. The Hiroshima bomb. Eleven hundred men went into the water. Vessel went down in twelve minutes. Didn't see the first shark for about a half-hour. Tiger. thirteen-footer. You know how you know that in the water, Chief? You can tell by lookin' from the dorsal to the tail. What we didn't know...was that our bomb mission was so secret, no distress signal had been sent. They didn't even list us overdue for a week. Very first light, Chief, sharks come cruisin' by, so we formed ourselves into tight groups. It was sorta like you see in the calendars, you know the infantry squares in the old calendars like the Battle of Waterloo and the idea was the shark come to the nearest man, that man he starts poundin' and hollerin' and sometimes that shark he go away... but sometimes he wouldn't go away. Sometimes that shark looks right at ya. Right into your eyes. And the thing about a shark is he's got lifeless eyes. Black eyes. Like a doll's eyes. When he comes at ya, he doesn't even seem to be livin'... until he bites ya, and those black eyes roll over white and then... ah, then you hear that terrible high-pitched screamin'. The ocean turns red, and despite all your poundin' and your hollerin' those sharks come in and... they rip you to pieces You know, by the end of that first dawn, we lost a hundred men. I don't know how many sharks there were, maybe a thousand. I do know how many men, they averaged six an hour. Thursday mornin', Chief, I bumped into a friend of mine, Herbie Robinson from Cleveland. Baseball player. Boson's mate. I thought he was asleep. I reached over to wake him up. He bobbed up, down in the water, he was like a kinda top. Up-ended. Well...he'd been bitten in half below the waist. At noon on the fifth day, a Lockheed Ventura swung in low and he spotted us, a young pilot - a lot younger than Mr. Hooper here - anyway, he spotted us and a few hours later a big ol' fat PBY come down and started to pick us up. You know, that was the time I was most frightened. Waitin' for my turn. I'll never put on a lifejacket again. So, eleven hundred men went into the water. 316 men come out, the sharks took the rest, June the 29th, 1945.

(with a smile - or a sneer?)

Anyway, we delivered the bomb.

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go to Great Movie Monologues 4 - "The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp"

Great Movie Monologues 4 - "The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp"

My favorite filmmakers are my favorite filmmakers because they give me some new gift every time I revisit their work. So I find myself never able to stick with a permanent choice for My Favorite Film. It might be "Kagemusha" (1980) this month (I prefer the leaner American release version, I feel embarrassed to say), next month "Seven Samurai" (1954). "The Birds" (1963) this month, next month "North By Northwest" (1959). Usually, I will say that "Black Narcissus" (1947) or "Stairway To Heaven" (1946) (aka "A Matter Of Life and Death") are my Powell/Pressburger films du mois. However, this mois, the movie in the #1 Archers spot is certainly "The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp" (1943). "Blimp" is a film made with one foot in WWII-era British propaganda and the other wedged in between Cervantes' "Don Quixote" and Truffaut's "Jules and Jim" (1962). It spans 40 years of a British soldiers life and covers everything from love to humiliation, honor to stupidity, idealism to self-delusion, Germany to England. And it features Deborah Kerr playing not just one mouth-watering female lead, but three.

The monologue below comes from our pompous hero's best friend, the realist Theo Kretschmar-Schuldorff, superbly played by Anton Walbrook in a performance which spans 40 years of a character's life.

In this scene, Theo, who has fled Nazi-controlled Germany, opens his tired, broken heart to an English Judge preparing to deny him asylum in England - homeland of his deceased wife, place of his incarceration in a WWI POW camp. The entire monologue takes place in a single shot on Walbrook, seated, leaning on his cane -

THEO

I have not told a lie. But I also 
have not told the truth. A refugee soon learns that there is a big difference between the two.

He pauses. The JUDGE nods.

THEO

The truth about me is that I am a
tired old man who came to 
this country because he is homesick.
          (he smiles)
Oh please don't stare at me like that, sir, I am all right in the head. You know that, after the war, we had very bad years in Germany. We got poorer and poorer. Every day retired officers and schoolteachers were caught shoplifting. Money lost its value, the price of everything rose. Except of human beings. We read in the papers, of course, that the after-war years
were bad everywhere, that crime was increasing and that the honest citizens were having a hard job to put the
gangsters in jail. Well, I needn't tell you, sir, that in Germany, the gangsters finally succeeded in putting the honest
citizens in jail. My wife was English. She would have loved to have come back to England, but it seemed to me that I would be letting down my country in its greatest need, and so she stayed at my side. When in summer '33, we found that we had
lost both our children to the Nazi Party, and I was willing to come, she died. None of my sons came to her funeral.
          (eyes burning)
Heil Hitler ... And then in January '35, I had to go to Berlin on a mission for my firm. Driving up in my car, I lost my way on
the outskirts of the city, and suddenly the landscape seemed so familiar to me. And slowly I recognized the road, the
lake, and a nursing home, where I spent some weeks recovering almost forty years ago. I stopped the car and sat still - remembering. And ... you see, in this very nursing home, sir, I met my wife for the first time ... and I met an Englishman who
became my greatest friend. And I remembered the people at the station in '19, when we prisoners were sent home, cheering us, treating us like friends ... the faces of a party of distinguished men around a table who tried their utmost to comfort me when the defeat of my country seemed to me unbearable. And - very foolishly - I remembered the English countryside, the gardens, the green lawns,  the weedy rivers and the trees ... she loved so much. And a great desire came over me to come back to my wife's country. And this, sir, is the truth.

Silence in the schoolroom after THEO'S long speech. The JUDGE rises and walks round the table.

click here to listen to the monologue 

at www.antonwalbrook.co.uk

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go to Great Film Monologues 3 - "Network"

Great Film Monologues 3 - "Network"

Paddy Chayefsky was one of the great writers of motion pictures. His masterpiece, "Network" (1976), lost the Best Picture Oscar to "Rocky". "Rocky" is an excellent movie. Really great. But "Network" is transcendent.

"Network" tells the story of the news anchor of a major network who, after a psychotic break, becomes a prophet condemning the very corporate media that employs him, and that exploits his anti-television ranting to further expand its influence and profit.

You can read Chayefsky's entire script online HERE.

Paddy Chayefsky spent most of his career in television, and he got to an intimate view of the electronic medium's move from a curiosity in the 1940's to the center of American life in the 1970's.

This scene, in the last half of the film, consists entirely and exclusively of a single monologue, masterfully performed by Peter Finch in the role of Howard Beale:

INT. THE STUDIO

A bare stage except for one stained glass window, suspended by wires upstage center. HOWARD BEALE, in an austere black suit with black tie shambles on from the wings. TUMULTUOUS APPLAUSE from the STUDIO AUDIENCE.

HOWARD
"Edward George Ruddy died today! Edward George Ruddy was the Chairman of the Board of the Union Broadcasting Systems - and he died at 11 o'clock this morning of a heart condition and woe is us! We're in a lot of trouble! So ... a rich little man with white hair died. What does that got to do with the price of rice, right? And why is that woe to us? Because you people, and sixty-two million other Americans are listening to me right now. Because less than three percent of you people read books! Because less than fifteen percent of you read newspapers! Because the only truth you know is whatever you get over this 'tube'. Right now, there is a whole, an entire generation that never knew anything that didn't come out of this tube! This tube is the gospel. The ultimate revelation. This tube can make or break Presidents, Popes, Prime Ministers. This tube is the most awesome goddamned force in the whole godless world! And woe to us if it ever falls into the hands of the wrong people! And that's why woe is us that Edward George Ruddy died! Because this company is now in the hands of CCA, the Communications Corporation of America. There's a new Chairman of the Board, a man called Frank Hackett, sitting in Mr. Ruddy's office on the twentieth floor. And when the twelfth largest company in the world controls the most awesome goddamned propaganda force in the whole godless world, who knows what shit will be peddled for truth on this network? So, you listen to me. Listen to me! Television is not the truth! Television is a goddamned amusement park! Television is a circus, a carnival, a travelling troupe of acrobats, story-tellers, dancers, singers, jugglers, side-show freaks, lion- tamers and football players. We're in the boredom-killing business! So if you want truth, go to God. Go to your gurus. Go to yourselves! Because that's the only place you're ever going to find any real truth!
(laughing)
But, man, you're never going to get any truth from us. We'll tell you anything you want to hear. We lie like hell. We'll tell you that Kojack always gets the killer, and nobody ever gets cancer in Archie Bunker's house. And no matter how much trouble the hero is in, don't worry, just look at your watch - at the end of the hour, he's going to win. We'll tell you any shit you want to hear. We deal in illusion, man! None of it's true! But you people sit there day after day, night after night, all ages, colors, creeds - we're all you know. You're beginning to believe the illusions we're spinning here. You're beginning to think the tube is reality and your own lives are unreal. You do whatever the tube tells you. You dress like the tube, you eat like the tube, you raise your children like the tube, you even think like the tube. This is mass madness, you maniacs! In God's name, you people are the real thing! We are the illusion! So turn off your television sets! Turn them off now! Turn them off right now! Turn them off and leave them off! Turn them off right now, right in the middle of this sentence I'm speaking to you now! Turn them off!! - "

At which point, HOWARD BEALE, sweating and red-eyed with his prophetic rage, collapses to the floor in a prophetic swoon.

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go to "Great Film Monologues 2"

Great Film Monologues 2 - "Doctor Zhivago"

Robert Bolt was a very lucky writer - terribly talented, yes - but lucky, lucky, lucky. He wrote only a very few screenplays, and most of those that he wrote were produced, and most of those he wrote won many awards, and most of those he wrote were made into superb movies. Compare him with the majority of screenwriters - many excellent screenwriters, first-rate screenwriters - who write a dozen, two dozen, screenplays and maybe get one produced - and probably with other writers' names on it as well.

This tremendous "luck" is one more reason us crazies in the basement consider Robert Bolt something of a screenwriter's saint. The fact that his work on the "Lawrence of Arabia" (1962) script was interrupted because he had been arrested at a Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament protest also makes him kind of cool.

"Doctor Zhivago" (1965) features some of the best use of voice over in any English language film. The story is essentially told by the General Yevgraf Zhivago to a young woman who may - or may not - be his niece. Apart from the introductory and concluding bookends, Yevgraf, as a character, never speaks in his appearances in the story. The voice over of the older Yevgraf, remembering the events, covers any dialogue that would actually have been spoken by his younger, remembered self.

What makes the "Zhivago" voice overs - monologues, we will call them for the purposes of our article - worth careful study is how carefully and deliberately they complement or harmonize with the images and actions they are describing. One particularly nice example is Yevgraf's describing his dropping the bombshell on his poet-brother Yuri that his poems are "not liked" by the Bolsheviks.

Yuri, in the scene, asks, rather pathetically: "Do YOU think it's personal, petit-bourgeois, and self-indulgent?"

CUT TO 

CU, Yevgraf mouths a single word: "Yes."

But Yevgraf's voice over says: "I lied...But he believed me. And it struck me through to see that my opinion mattered."

Again, to fully appreciate the following monologue, it must be seen played against the images and music. But to sit back and enjoy the meaning and poetry of the language itself is still a treat.

The following is Yevgraf's first major monologue, and the first time we see him as a young man, joining the ranks of Russian soldiers heading off to fight the First World War. This monologue, and the montage accompanying it, manage to cover the entirety of WWI and its impact on each of the main characters in a few minutes - a beautiful, elegant feat of compression.

Soldiers march off to war flanked by flag-waving, adoring crowds. And Yevgraf speaks:

"In bourgeois terms it was a war between the Allies and Germany. In Bolshevik terms it was a war between the Allied and German upper classes - and which of them won was a matter of indifference. I was ordered by the Party to enlist. I gave my name as Petrov. They were shouting for victory all over Europe - praying for victory to the same God. My task - the Party's task - was to organize defeat. From defeat would spring the Revolution. And the Revolution would be victory for us. The party looked to the conscript peasants. Most of them were in their first good pair of boots. When the boots wore out, they'd be ready to listen. When the time came, I was able to take three battalions with me out of the front line - the best day's work I ever did. But, for the moment, there was nothing to be done. There were too many volunteers like me. Mostly, it was mere hysteria. But there were men with better motives, who saw the times were critical and wanted a man's part. Good men, wasted. Unhappy men, too. Unhappy in their jobs. Unhappy with their wives. Doubting themselves. Happy men don't volunteer. They wait their turn, and thank God if their age or work delays it. The ones who got back home at the price of an arm or an eye or a leg, these were the lucky ones. Even Comrade Lenin underestimated both the anguish of that nine hundred mile-long front, and our cursed capacity for suffering. By the second winter of the war the boots had worn out. But the line still held. Their great coats fell to pieces on their backs. Their rations were irregular. Half of them went into action without arms. Led by men they didn't trust ... And those they did trust? ... At last, they did what all the armies dreamed of doing - they began to go home. That was the beginning of the Revolution."

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go to "Great Movie Monologues 1"

Night and Fog (1955)

"A concentration camp is built like, a stadium or a big hotel. You need contractors, estimates, competitive bids. And no doubt a bribe or two. Any style will do. It's left to the imagination - Swiss style; garage style; Japanese style; no style at all. The architects calmly plan the gates through which no one will enter more than once. Meanwhile - Burgher, a German Communist; Stern, a Jewish student from Amsterdam; Schmulszki, a merchant in Cracow; Annette, a schoolgirl in Bordeaux - all go on living their everyday lives, not knowing that there is a place, a thousand miles away, already awaiting them. "

I watched Alain Resnais's "Night and Fog" (1955) this morning, on DVD, with my 6 month old ...

Great Film Monologues 1 - "How To Get Ahead In Advertising"

At the disheartening conclusion of Bruce Robinson's SECOND comic masterpiece, "How To Get Ahead In Advertising" (1989), the ... the ... well, the antagonist, let's just say, for those who have yet to see the film ... has won out. Greed has triumphed again. 

And Richard E. Grant, in the second greatest performance of his career, roams out onto his wide and green estate on horseback, and like a deranged corporate-world Henry V, delivers a mighty, triumphant soliloquy:

"We’re living in a shop. The world is one magnificent fucking shop. And if it hasn’t got a price tag, it isn’t worth having. There is no greater freedom than freedom of choice. I was brought up to believe in that, and so should you, but you don’t. You don’t even want roads. God, I never want to go on another train as long as I live! Roads represent a fundamental right of man to have access to the good things in life. Without roads, established family favourites would become elitist delicacies. There’d be no more tea bags, no instant potatoes, no long-life cream. There’d be no aerosols. Detergents would vanish, so would tinned spaghetti, and baked beans with six frankfurters. The right to smoke one’s chosen brand would be denied. Chewing gum would probably disappear, so would pork pies. Foot deodorisers would climax without hope of replacement. When the hydrolized protein and monosodium glutamate reserves ran out, food would rot in its packets. Jesus Christ, there wouldn’t be any more packets! Packaging would vanish from the face of the earth! But worst of all, there’d be no cars. And more than anything people love their cars. They have a right to them. If they have to sweat all day in some stinking factory making disposable cigarette lighters or everlasting Christmas trees, by Christ they’re entitled to them. They’re entitled to any innovation technology brings, whether it’s 10 percent more of it or 15 percent off of it. They’re entitled to it! They’re entitled to one of four important new ingredients! Why should anyone have to clean their teeth without important new ingredients? Why shouldn’t they have their CZT? How dare some smutty, Marxist carbuncle presume to deny it to them! They love their CZT! They want it! They need it! They positively adore it! And by Christ, while I’ve got air in my body, they’re going to get it! They’re going to get it bigger! And brighter! And better! I’ll put CZT in their margarine if necessary. Shove vitamins in their toilet rolls. If happiness means the whole world standing on a double layer of foot deodorisers, I will see that they get them. I’ll give them anything and everything they ever want! By God, I will! I shall not cease ‘till Jerusalem is builded here on England’s green and pleasant land!"

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go to "Great Movie Monologues 2 - Doctor Zhivago"

Top 5 Jesus Movies

So you're probably thinking: "Well this is not a very good subject for a Top 5 List! Just how many movies about Jesus (aka Iesus, aka Yeshua, aka Josh) of Nazareth are there to choose from? Heck, there can't be more than, like ... a half a dozen Jesus flicks altogether, right? I'm afraid I shall have to set your house on fire."

But after reading the following list of Top 5 Jesus Movies, you will be begging my forgiveness. But will I give it? Will I give my forgiveness? Maybe. Maybe not. What's in it for me?

In no particular order:

Jesus Of Nazareth (1977) - Franco Zefferelli shoots right down the middle and scores big-time with this miniseries. This is the Peter Jackson's "Lord Of The Rings" version of the Gospels - a big-budget attempt to illustrate as faithfully as possible the traditional conception of the Jesus story. Every first-rate actor in the Western World appears in "Jesus of Nazareth" and every one gives a fine perfomance. The casting choices themselves are superb - even down to Ernest Borgnine as The Centurion who, believe it or not, works perfectly. And the Maurice Jarre score is wonderful.

The Last Temptation of Christ (1988) - And on the other side of the coin ... Martin Scorsese finally realized his dream project, based on the novel by Nikos Kazantzakis (writer of "Zorba The Greek"), on a shoestring budget, to popular outrage. Young Marty had wanted to be a priest when he was a pale asthmatic Brooklyn kid, and the inevitability of sin has been a theme in virtually every one of his films. Despite our best intentions, our personal power, wealth, prestige - and no matter how cozy our relationship with God - we will still always go astray. The experiment behind "The Last Temptation" is, in part, to put our traditional understanding of the Jesus story on the other side of the looking glass. Up is down, black is white. The film opens with the crucifixion of a familiar-looking, bearded prophet, for whom the carpenter Jesus has fashioned a cross. This Jesus even assists in the man's execution. And we ask: "How can THIS chap be the Anointed One?" - which might lead us to another question, "How can anyone?" The Peter Gabriel score is superb.

Jesus Christ Superstar (1973) - People forget what a dynamite filmmaker Norman Jewison is ("Moonstruck", "Fiddler On The Roof", "Rollerball", "In The Heat Of The Night"). For my money, "Jesus Christ Superstar" manages some of the most emotionally powerful interpretations of the Jesus story in cinema. A musical - not to mention a rock musical - a rock musical by Andrew Lloyd Weber - can go places forbidden to straight drama. The relationship between Jesus and Judas is nicely drawn in the film. In fact, the performance by Carl Anderson - outraged, self-important, and at his core lost and frightened - may be my favorite Judas performance in film. The concluding rendition of the title song, with Judas and a host of sexy angels singing down to Jesus from the audience seats of a Roman amphitheatre, is terrific.




Jesus of Montreal (1989) - Denys Arcand's film is a passion play about a group of Montreal actors putting on a passion play. The home run of the movie is the French-Canadian Lothaire Bluteau, as an actor named Daniel who, in the passion-play-within-a-passion-play acts the part of Jesus. He mesmerizes as the compassionate Christ, whose heart seems ever on the verge of breaking at what he sees in the world around him.

Ben-Hur (1959) - It's iffy putting William Wyler's super-epic in the Top 5. Jesus appears as a secondary character throughout the film, but His face is never shown us. It's a simple, effective device, that engages our imaginations and keeps the character slightly beyond our understanding and experience. The story is about the spiritual awakening of a wealthy Jewish nobleman, whose life loosely intersects that of Jesus. So the Gospels are merely the scaffold on which the bulk of the plot hangs, but the movie is so solidly executed, that it stands out as one of the best screen depictions. Stories of a well-known figures are often best told through the point of view of complimentary or antagonistic characters, (i.e., the Mozart story presented as the story of Antonio Salieri in "Amadeus"). Examining the Jesus story through the eyes of one of his less renowned contemporaries is not a bad way to go about it.

Others: Of course, I bet Pier Paolo Pasolini's "The Gospel According To St. Matthew" (1964) should be on the list. Black and white, no professional actors. Must be art. But I ain't seen it yet.

Then there is Mel Gibson's "The Passion Of The Christ" (2004), but it is too much a mixed bag to make the Top 5. When it is good, it is genuinely revelatory, when it is not good, it's a little silly.
Avoid "The Greatest Story Ever Told" (1965) , except for the Herod scenes directed by David Lean.

Joyeux Anniversaire, Cannes!

On this day, in 1946, the first Cannes Film Festival opened.

Back then they didn't have color, or black and white even. No, back then they had to enact the script on a large stage with a silver screen backdrop (hence the expression, "stars of the silver screen"). This is one reason many of the small-scale, post-war "Italian Realist" films were received so well at the early Cannes Festivals - much easier to put on. During the staging of the big-budget American movies, something inevitably went wrong (witness the death of 8 flying monkeys by fire during a special Cannes presentation of "Wizard Of Oz" (1939, two weeks before Hitler invaded Poland), which detracted from the production value. In that first year of the Cannes Film Festival, the top prize was shared among 11 films - which is surprising since only 7 films were entered. And back then they weren't presented with today's well-coveted "Pomme d'Or", but with an award called the "Grande Prik".

FUN FACT: Ingrid Bergman and Ingmar Bergman are not brother and sister! They are parent and child!

After 1950, things changed. What with the new technologies, movies were at last able to be made in both back and white and could be watched without having real-live actors get near anyone. Throughout the 1950's, Doris Day films inevitably won every award the Festival had to offer. That all changed with Doris Day's mysterious suicide by a lone gunman in 1962.

In 1990, the Pawm d'Orr was given to the David Lynch film "Wild At Heart" (1990). Meanwhile, that year's Academy Award for Best Picture went to "Driving Miss Daisy" (1990). These were known as "The Dark Times" (A.D. 1990).

FUN FACT: Billy Crystal has never hosted the Cannes Film Festival! But never say never!

It is rumored - and also rumoured - that next year's Cannes Film Festival, now traditionally held in the spring because of those fascist bastards over in Venice, will feature a retrospective of the films of the late Michelangelo Antoniononinoi in new, digitally-restored 3D versions!

Idiotic Movie Translations - "Casablanca"

So what we do is we take famous movie dialog, and we run it through Alta Vista's Babelfish translator to translate it to a foreign language, then we translate it back into English. Then we laugh and laugh.

Today's Idiotic Movie Translation, from the closing scene of "Casablanca" (1942), this from English > French > English:

ILSA: "You say this to only incite me to go."

RICK: "I say it because it is true. Inside us, us all the two soaps which you belong with the winner. You form part of his work, the thing which maintains it. If this plane leaves the ground and you are not with him, you will regret it. Perhaps not today. Perhaps not tomorrow, but soon and for the remainder of your life."

ILSA: "But and us?"

RICK: "We will always have Paris. We did not have, us, we lost it until you came to Casablanca. We recovered the last night to him.

ILSA: "When I said I would never leave you ... "

RICK: "And you never will. But I have a work to make, too. Where I go, you cannot follow. What I have to do, you cannot have very left. Ilsa, I am not any good with being noble, but it does not take much to see that the problems of three imps do not rise with a hill of beans in this insane world. One day you will include that. Now, now... Here kid looks at you."

The original classic dialogue:

ILSA: You're saying this only to make me go.

RICK: I'm saying it because it's true. Inside of us, we both know you belong with Victor. You're part of his work, the thing that keeps him going. If that plane leaves the ground and you're not with him, you'll regret it. Maybe not today. Maybe not tomorrow, but soon and for the rest of your life.

ILSA: But what about us?

RICK: We'll always have Paris. We didn't have, we, we lost it until you came to Casablanca. We got it back last night.

ILSA: When I said I would never leave you ...

RICK: And you never will. But I've got a job to do, too. Where I'm going, you can't follow. What I've got to do, you can't be any part of. Ilsa, I'm no good at being noble, but it doesn't take much to see that the problems of three little people don't amount to a hill of beans in this crazy world. Someday you'll understand that. Now, now... Here's looking at you kid.

Your LOTR Guide

What with so many of Peter Jackson's "The Lord Of The Rings" movies flying around like drunken nazgul on a night out, it's easy to become bewildered and to lose all hope and fall into shadow. After all, you don't want to watch the entire 3 hours of the theatrical release version of "The Lord Of The Rings: The Fellowship Of The Ring" and then hear later on that the special extended edition is much, much better. That's three hours of your life gone. You're never going to get that back. And to add insult to injury, you've copped a resentment against the "Lord Of The Rings" movies. And you don't want to be in a state of resentment against the "Lord Of The Rings" movies. It's just not right.

What you need is a guide. You need your very own Gollum to guide you through the marshes of the multiple versions of "The Lord Of The Ringses".

I could be that Gollum.

Please. Please, let me be your Gollum.

PETER JACKSON'S "THE LORD OF THE RINGS" FILMS
RATED FROM BEST TO LEAST-BEST

(in the interest of clarity, I've omitted "The Lord Of The Rings: " from the beginning of each title, but note the title of "The Fellowship Of The Ring", for example, is actually "The Lord Of The Rings: The Fellowship Of The Ring")

So, from best to not best:

1. "The Return Of The King", original theatrical release (201 mins) - no, it is not too long, it's almost perfect - almost - and after the triumph of the previous films, it has earned the right for its long, steady, really quite sad wind-down at the end; still have no idea what's going on with that Denethor-setting-Faramir-on-fire thing, though
2. "The Fellowship Of The Ring", special extended edition (208 mins) - the original theatrical release was a chase film, this extended version has more character moments and, as a result, is more engaging and so actually seems to run much faster than the theatrical release.
3. "The Two Towers", original theatrical release (179 mins) - a rock-solid Act II.
4. "The Return Of The King", special extended edition (251 mins) - yes, it's too long - and my apologies to Christopher Lee, but those Saruman scenes really don't work very well; on the other hand, the Emissary Of Sauron, the shattering of Gandalf's staff, the fiery wolf's-head battering ram, and other elements are extraordinary.
5. "The Fellowship Of The Ring", original theatrical release (178 mins) - good as it is, its story is fairly narrow - the only one of the films where you feel like you really want a little more; but as the first step in an unprecedentedly massive filmmaking enterprise, taking that cautious approach was probably a wise strategy.
6. "The Two Towers", special extended edition (223 mins) - much repetition of scenes which serve the same function - i.e., Gollum's monologue, so effective in the theatrical release, is watered down by several other, less effective monologue scenes; on the other hand, extended swordplay at Helm's Deep can never be a bad thing.

And watch the Ralph Bakshi animated movie, "The Lord Of The Rings" (1978) which covers "The Fellowship Of The Ring" and some of "The Two Towers".

The film's treatment of Gollum became the iconic image of the character until the Peter Jackson movies. It's also a more somber take than the Jackson versions - exactly what you would expect from Mr. Bakshi.

Top 10 Movie Wizards

So you're a respected actor toward the end of a first-rate career. What do you do?

You play a wizard.

The Top 10 Movie Wizards and the actors who depicted them:

1. Yen Sid - "Fantasia" (1940) (segment "The Sorceror's Apprentice" directed by James Algar)
   
2. Dr. Erasmus Craven (Vincent Price), "The Raven" (1963)
3. Obi Wan Kenobi (Sir Alec Guinness), "Star Wars" (1977), et al
   
4. Avatar (voice by Bob Holt), "Wizards" (1977)
   
5. Merlin (Nicol Williamson), "Excalibur" (1981)
   
6. Ulrich (Sir Ralph Richardson), "Dragonslayer" (1981)
7. The Wizard (Mako), "Conan The Barbarian" (1982), et al
8. Lo Pan (James Hong), "Big Trouble In Little China" (1984)
9. Albus Dumbledore (Richard Harris), "Harry Potter and the Sorceror's Stone" (2001), et al
   
10. Gandalf the Grey/White (Sir Ian McKellan) - "The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring" (2001), et al
    

L.A. Dreams Goodbyes

When I came to Los Angeles in Sept. 1985, I had hopes and dreams.

I was beginning my college days, attending a university with the most respected cinema program in the world. I had a couple scholarships to help defer the hefty tuition, including a National Merit Scholarship. I wanted to be a famous film director - or a poet, if the film director thing didn't pay off. Self-esteem had never been a strong suit of mine, and despite people telling me the contrary, I always felt dumb as post. Still, since I was in 6th grade, I had a firm conviction that not only did film directors actually exist somewhere in the world, but that I could very easily be one of them. The more I studied, the more I learned, the more I began to see that undertaking such an occupation was a very real option. When film school professors whispered praises in my ears, my certain success was confirmed.

It is years later. I have been a paid screenwriter. I have made heaps of cash in the Spec Sale 1990's. I have had a house in the Hollywood Hills. I have been arrested on Sunset Boulevard for drunk driving.

Somewhere along the way, the one thing that I came here for, the directing part, has escaped me.

Or, to be more honest, I have escaped it.

Yes, try as the gods might to hand me opportunities, I have evaded them at every turn.

One of my favorites was when a notable production company began talks with me about directing The Common Vampire - my low-budge, Scorsese-esque vampire script (I know, you also have your own low-budge, Scorsese-esque vampire script - tough luck, I got in first). I did everything I could, short of shitting on the producer's desk, to avoid following through with that offer.

As John Cassavetes said to Martin Scorsese: "In order to catch the ball, you have to want to catch the ball."

I have had so much blind faith - or stupidity, one might call it (and a healthy dose of stupidity is an asset for long-term success in any artistic enterprise) - during my time here in L.A. It is galling to see how much utter dread and fear have been lurking beneath it, taking a secret step back for every step I appear to take forward. When I have visited friends from my Ohio high school years, they always remark: "Wow. You always said you were going to go to L.A. and get into movies. And then you really did it! Wow." And I stare back at them, a little baffled, and think: "Of course, I did it. Did you think I was kidding?" and I feel my heart sag a little when I realize that when they were articulating their big dreams back in the 1980's, they were only kidding.

I have made films with the Alpha 60 collective, done the video podcasts here on the blog, experimented with moving images on my own. But this is still sketching, training, exercising. It is not what I came here to do. Asked a couple decades ago what the status of my motion picture career would be in 2006, the projected future would not have been a question of whether or not I had directed a film, but whether I had received Academy Awards for Directing AND Writing yet (having become quite familiar with our beloved Academy over the past few years, and having attended a number of the shows, the prospect of winning an Oscar has become increasingly less interesting to me however)(I don't think that's sour grapes)(or is it?).

So, I'd better get on it, huh? Better roll up my sleeves and get on that sucker?

The irritating thing I've noticed - and to my chagrin, continue to notice - is that my life here in Los Angeles seems to have had some kind of subtle guiding principle behind it - that is, I seem to have been led and guided in spite of my ambitions. And I believe more and more - and this too is irritating - that my ambitions are sometimes a road to misery and chaos and death - a roadmap for taking me directly to the places I'd rather not go. So I've learned then to soften my grip on the reins, to trust that the horse has traveled this path more often than I and that he may not need second by second guidance to get me to the destination. In fact, my constant commands will probably end with him bucking me into the ditch and spoiling what might have been an enjoyable ride.

On Saturday, my wife and I will be moving to London, which is in England.

For years and years I have said that I would like to live in London, England - home of my foremothers and grandsires - but couldn't tell you exactly how that would come about. Now, here we are, about to leave this L.A. that I've become very cozy-comfy with over the past 20 years, and I couldn't really tell you exactly how it happened. It just...happened. Step by step, revelation by revelation. This thing that seems to always be taking care of the big picture - cagey bastard that it is - is subtle and quiet, and not to be denied.

I am very, very, very blessed. And I am very, very, very ordinary.

So the future? My future? Our future? On Saturday, we will get on the plane at LAX. When we land at Heathrow, we will get off the plane. That's about as far as I'm willing to plan ahead these days.

Still, as I leave Los Angeles, in Sept. 2006, I have hopes and dreams.

Top 20 Director/Actor Collaborations

There is a dazzling variety of life-long partnerships between film directors and their favorite actors. In the case of those listed below, it would seem that almost any one name could be dropped and replaced with another. John Mills, for example, was in more of David Lean's films than Alec Guinness, but I believe that, in the masterpieces that Lean and Guinness made together, each artist was essential for the other to do his best work, and the films they made would have suffered without the presence of both. Likewise, Max von Sydow was famously Ingmar Bergman's male lead of choice, but I would argue that Bergman's collaborations with Liv Ullmann reveal the deeper talents of both director and performer in ways that neither could match alone. And, again, one might insist that Federico Fellini's greatest collaboration was not with Marcello Mastroianni, but with his wife, Giulietta Massina, but Marcello - he is more than just an actor, no?

I invite you to submit your own choices - or to shoot down mine - in the Comments section.

With that in mind ...

The 20 Greatest Director/Actor Collaborations

1. Woody Allen / Diane Keaton
2. Ingmar Bergman / Liv Ullman
3. The Coen Bros. / John Goodman
4. George Cukor / Katharine Hepburn
5. Federico Fellini / Marcello Mastroianni
6. John Ford / John Wayne
7. Jean-Luc Godard / Anna Karina
8. D.W. Griffith / Lillian Gish
9. Akira Kurosawa / Toshiro Mifune
10. Werner Herzog / Klaus Kinski
11. Alfred Hitchcock / James Stewart
12. John Huston / Humphrey Bogart
13. David Lean / Alec Guinness
14. Mike Leigh / Timothy Spall
15. Bruce Robinson / Richard E. Grant
16. Martin Scorsese / Robert De Niro
17. Don Siegel / Clint Eastwood
18. François Truffaut / Jean-Pierre Léaud
19. Wong Kar Wai / Tony Leung Chiu Wai
    
20. Zhang Yimou / Gong Li

Top 10 Red Movies

Ten Best Movies with "Red" in the title:

1. Deep Red (1975)
2. The Hunt For Red October (1990)
3. Little Red Riding Rabbit (1944)
4. Raise The Red Lantern (1991)
5. Red Beard (1965)
6. Red Dawn (1984)
7. Red Desert (1964)
8. Red River (1948)
9. The Red Shoes (1948)
10. Trois Couleurs: Rouge (1994)

Honorable Mention: Red Scorpion (1989) (written & produced by Jack Abramoff!)

Inside Pitch Pitch

If you are a screenwriter and you aren't reading the Q&A blog for screenwriters called "The Inside Pitch" (http://twoadverbs.blogspot.com) by ICM's executive story editor, Christopher Lockhart, well, then...you just aren't reading it then are you?

I think that's a fact we can all be in agreeance on.

However, you are also depriving yourself of some essential information on your malaria-ridden, leech-infested, lost-without-a-machete slog through the quagmire of the screenwriter's life.

Recently, he addressed the following question from a Hollywood writer:


What is the proper etiquette for switching managers/agents, assuming you already have representation that doesn't seem to be working for you?

Read Chris's sensible and straightforward response.

The River (1951)

First, let's just make it clear that I do love the Motion Picture Academy.

Or I love what the Academy is supposedly supposed to aspire to. That, I love.

I saw, on Wednesday, for the 2nd time in my life, Jean Renoir's coming of age story, "The River" (1951), based on the novel by Rumer Godden. Godden also wrote the novel "Black Narcissus".

My 1st viewing of "The River" was in London, on New Year's Day, 2005, on my honeymoon. My wife and I went to the screening of a newly restored version of the film that the National Film Theatre was introducing as part of its "India Vu Par" series. I count it as one of the fine filmgoing experiences of my life - taking my new wife to that cinema Mecca beside The Thames, where I had sat alone on my visits to the UK, in the 90's and in the 80's, watching "Dr. Zhivago", watching "The Pillow Book", watching "The Last House On The Left" (or was it "The Hills Have Eyes"?), browsing before and after the tables of used books out front, or sitting by the river writing an over-romantic letter to whoever I was dating, waiting for the screening to start, or gushing to the poor girl all about a film I just saw that she couldn't care less about.

The print my wife and I saw - a print struck in England by the BFI, I think (if anyone knows for sure, please tell me) - was beautiful, the color remarkable, stunning. "The River" is famous for being one of the greatest examples of Technicolor photography ever, and after seeing that print on New Year's Day, I began to understand why.

Having seen "The River" this 2nd time, I can feel the film climbing toward the upper reaches of my favorite films list.

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences film restoration program, however, is plummeting toward the lower reaches of my favorite restoration program's list.

Despite my love for the filmmaking, throughout the screening on Wednesday, a loud voice kept shouting through my head: "This looks like crap. This looks like crap. This looks like crap."

"No, it doesn't," I would reply to myself.

"Oh, yes, it does," I would reply to my reply to myself, "Utter crap ..."

Mike "Pogo" Pogorzelski, director of the Academy Film Archive, introduced "The River" saying that an attempt was made to make the film appear exactly as it would have in 1951.

To me, the print - though clearly new and utterly free of scratches and tears - looked grainy, muddy, high contrast.

So what happened?

One possibility is that I don't know what I'm talking about. But we know that this is the risk you take whenever you read the rabbit + crow blog.

The 2nd possibility is that the cinematography of "The River" is embarrassingly overrated. Critics raved about it in 1951. Critics still rave about it. Martin Scorsese raves about it. But maybe the eyes of those fanatics are color-blinded by their love of Renoir. Yes, the direction is impeccable, the shots perfectly composed, the lighting superb - but color is not something that seems remarkable to me in that movie - my opinion based solely on Wednesday night's screening. Oh, I suppose you could sit me down and explain to me - educate me to - the merits of "The River's" color photography. Yes, I could be convinced. My palate could be trained, I suppose. I may just be a philistine who doesn't appreciate good color. If that's the case, I'm willing to learn.

The 3rd possibity is that the Academy's print was sub-par - which brings up the question of whether or not the whole 2004 restoration was flawed. This restoration was a joint effort between the Academy and the British Film Institute. The original sound elements were missing, but the sound was (and very nicely too!) restored from a complete print owned by young gotham indy helmer Martin Scorsese. The original Technicolor nitrate camera negatives were still intact however, and one of the great things about black-and-white nitrate negatives is if they don't deteriorate, then they will stay in very good condition. It's all-or-nothing with nitrate. Theoretically, it should be possible to make a perfect print - like new - from these original negatives. However, we do not have Technicolor labs anymore, expert in the dye-transfer process, and so no print made today is going to look like a 1951 Technicolor print made with the original dye-transfer process. For one, dye-transfer, unlike the standard optical, photographic process - produces a print free of grain. No grain. Nope. Grain, nyet. You forget that you're looking at film. Seeing a great dye-transfer Technicolor print is like looking through a magic window into a yummy color world where flesh-tones look so real you just want to pinch the actors' cheeks. On Wednesday, if I had the urge to pinch the actors' cheeks, I would have paused, for fear of scraping myself on the sandpaper-like grain of the film.

But its graininess aside, the print's color was murky. Not "muted". I have no problem with muted. It was murky. Lots of brown. A montage of flowering trees denoting the start of spring probably elicited gasps in 1951. I'm thinking the most it got out of the crowd on Wednesday was the fleeting thought: "What gorgeous trees! I bet they would be really pretty and colorful in real life!" Technicolor uses a 3-color process, often with a 4th keytone strip of graytones to modulate the color - exactly like Photoshop's CMYK. Each element - the C, the M, the Y, and the K - is stored on its own strip of black-and-white film, then all four are, in effect, sandwiched together (sort of), to create the final image. The Academy's "The River" print looked as if someone at the lab had gone hog-wild with the black-and-white keytone strip - or as if some drug addict had sneaked in and said "Man, this color freaks me out! Turn down the color, maaaan!!!" It did give the print an "old-fashioned" look, so I guess that's one plus. You know, like when you order a special sepia-tone on your family photos to make them look all antiquey? Maybe Renoir was going for an antiquey, old-fashioned look.

Or maybe India is just an antiquey, old-fashioned looking country. That's probably it. It's India. I'm going to blame it on India. They probably didn't have as much color as we did back then because they were so poor.

So why was the NFT print so much better than the Academy's print? Better labs in England than Los Angeles? Possible. Was I seeing the film through honeymoon-colored glasses? Possible. Was the NFT's screening room much smaller than the Academy's massive Samuel Goldwyn Theater and so able to provide a more concentrated image on the screen? Very possible.

It seems only natural to compare "The River" and "Black Narcissus", two Technicolor masterpieces, based on books by Rumer Godden about sexual awakening and the mixing of cultures, both featuring Esmond Knight. I was similarly disappointed with the Academy's "Black Narcissus" print. And that hurts. Yes. Like the cobra's bite, it hurts. For I am very fond of both films. And I want them treated with reverence. Yes, reverence. Reverence.

But what I really want is to see a digital restoration of "The River" - like the recent "Singin' in the Rain" restoration. The Academy is dedicated soley to photographic restoration of films, which is a key component of preservation of the actual film materials and is vital in keeping the films around for the long, long term, and so a great digital restoration is outside their mandate. And "The River" money has been spent. That's it. No more restorations of "The River". It's had it's turn. I am told the DVD transfer of the film is very, very good however.

Okay, here's what I really, really want: a full-scale, completely working, manned with genius technicians, 3-strip Technicolor dye-transfer-only facility that makes perfect restorations of technicolor prints on some kind of perfect nitrate stock that doesn't explode. Please? It will only cost a few hundred million dollars or so, and it will make me very happy. And I think it will also make Jean Renoir very happy.

Great Movie Beheadings #3

There are many good beheadings in Peter Jackson's first-rate interpretation of "The Lord of The Rings" (2001 - 2003). But the one most worth study - because it is the most iconic, as well as one of the most significant in the history of Middle Earth's Third Age - is the beheading of the Witch-king's Fell Beast by the young warrior-maiden Éowyn (AKA Lady of the Shield-arm, AKA White Lady of Rohan; later titled Lady of Ithilien, AKA Lady of Emyn Arnen).

Since first reading Tolkien's books as a child, this has been one of my favorite moments in the story, and I'm sure that the heroic lone figure of Éowyn on the battlefield helped inspire me to write the stories of my own beloved Battle-Maidens - Boudicca, Penny Morehouse, et al. It's an archetype which inspires to this day.

Also I'm married to one, so that's good.









← Great Movie Beheadings #2

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Great Movie Beheadings #2

Because losing your head is one of the coolest things you can do nowadays, we bring you #2 in our series, "Great Movie Beheadings".

Today's beheading takes place in the final moments of Fred Zinnemann's adaptation of Robert Bolt's "A Man For All Seasons" (1966). The actual beheading occurs off-screen, at the moment we CUT TO black, thus ending the movie, and Sir Thomas More's life, with a single stroke.







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Great Movie Beheadings #1

In an attempt to keep up with the times, we introduce "Great Movie Beheadings".

Our introductory beheading takes place at the climax of the great Frazetta-esque adventure, "Conan The Barbarian" (1982)...








Great Movie Beheadings #2 →

Buy the "Conan The Barbarian" DVD at Amazon.com.

Black Narcissus (1947)

I saw "Black Narcissus" (1947) last night at the Motion Picture Academy's Samuel Goldwyn Theater, the kick-off for a 100th birthday tribute (though he died at age 84) to British master director, Michael Powell. The tribute features a weekend of screenings of Powell's films.

An unexpected treat were video greetings from Martin Scorsese and Michael Powell's widow, Thelma Schoonmaker, Scorsese's long-time editor. Expressing their regret that they couldn't attend in person - they are cutting "The Departed" - each gave a short tribute to Powell, Schoonmaker's concluding with obvious emotion. Schoonmaker met Michael Powell, in 1979, when Martin Scorsese invited his hero to New York during the cutting of "Raging Bull" (1980). "Raging Bull" won Schoonmaker the Oscar for Best Editing.

I have seen "Black Narcissus" dozens of times. I first saw it on a VHS tape my dad had made from a copy he borrowed from his local library. My dad sent me dozens of these pirated VHS's in the years after I left college and it kept me immersed in movies that I, being young and of narrow taste, might not go out of my way to see. Now I am older and have broader, deeper, wider taste and there are still many movies I should see but might not go out of my way to see.

There was a discussion before the film with cinematographer / Technicolor titan, Jack Cardiff, who is over 90 and has more energy and wit and good humor than I have - or could hope to. Film historian David Thomson moderated. Thomson was a friend of Michael Powell and responsible for setting the director up as Dartmouth's artist-in-residence in the 70's when Powell was suffering the obligatory British Genius Backlash, in which great British directors are forgotten for a decade or two before being praised to the skies again just before they die with everyone saying "Oh, I was always a fan of his. I'm surprised you've never heard of him. Have you seen 'Tales Of Hoffman'? Oh, you must. It is a masterpiece. It is exquisite. Yes, I'd like to think of him as my artistic spiritual godfather." Then you kick that person in the groin until they stop screaming.

After Sid Ganis, the new Academy President, gave a canned "Michael Powell, Michael Powell, Michael Powell" speech, Thomson got up to tell several moving stories about his acquaintanceship with the master, but he began his speech by mentioning - for the first time in the evening - Powell's partner, Emeric Pressburger. I was the first audience member out of the gate to applaud. The man next to me kicked me in the groin until I stopped screaming.

Because we in America love the myth of individual success, and we treasure, above all things, the integrity & triumph of the individual human ego, we tend to make a single genius responsible for the excellence we see. We chase, drooling, the top supermodel, the top grossing movie, the top sports team, the top serial killer. Everyone else is an "also-ran". But Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger were partners on the Archers films. On over a dozen movies of the 40's and 50's the credit reads: "Written, directed, and produced by Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger". We are inclined to forget that. We should not.

The first question Thomson asked Jack Cardiff was about the ins & outs of the Powell / Pressburger collaboration. Cardiff said they very much balanced each other with Michael Powell being the experimental, improvisational half of the partnership and Pressburger the down to earth, practical half. I was reminded of the David Lean / Robert Bolt collaborations. There the dividing line between director and writer was clearly drawn, but Lean was said to be the intuitive, emotional side of the partnership and Bolt the intellectual, theoretical side.

The screening was a digital projection of a digital restoration made from the "original" (I don't know if this means camera original) 3 black-and-white Technicolor strips (for a quickie tutorial on the Technicolor process go here) and was the best version I have seen of the film to date, better than the Academy Film Archive photo-chemical restoration of a few years ago which was fine, but occasionally murky. The clarity of the image was such that one or two of the process shots showed their seams in a way that might have been disguised by a traditional print.

What I most enjoyed about seeing "Black Narcissus" on a large screen with such clear and clean projection was not that it was even more visually stunning - although that is true - but that I could enjoy the subtleties of the performances which are difficult to see on even a big-screen tv. Slight movements of the eyes describe gigantic internal character movements. A mild tightening of the lips reveals blazing internal shame. I found myself grinning widely, delighted by Deborah Kerr's giddy girlish grin as she begins to remember the locked away passions of her past. Moments between characters seemed magnified too and the sexual tension in scenes was far more taut than many 21st century films. In fact, this time around seeing the movie, I was shocked at how filthy and sordid it all is - all that sex. Sex, sex, sex. It's all about the sex, that picture. Digusting. And so, so wonderful. And what could be more sexy than Deborah Kerr, as a nun, trying day and night not to think about sex - trying not to even think about thinking about sex? Even better, Deborah Kerr, as a nun, trying day and night not to think about sex, while trying to get juicy Jean Simmons (who plays a convincing South Asian) to stop thinking about sex? At the same time, "Black Narcissus" is a deeply spiritual film and tackles the irreconcilable clash between desire and devotion head on.

A new Criterion Collection "Black Narcissus" DVD came out a few years ago. I think it was made from the Academy restoration. I hope they reissue the film with this new, much better digital restoration.

Comic-Con 2005 - Ralph Bakshi / Fire and Ice (1983)

Almost famous I felt, seeing so many people I knew at last weekend's Comic-Con panels. I went straight from the sneak preview of Rob Zombie's "The Devil's Rejects", which stars my friend Bill, to a panel next door featuring Ralph Bakshi--my old "Cool World" boss (I was one of the movie's many assistant editors).

Ralph had come to promote the August 30 DVD release of his fantasy adventure collaboration with Frank Frazetta, "Fire and Ice". The film had been in need of restoration and Bill Lustig of Blue Underground approached Bakshi with the idea of a rehaul and release. "Fire and Ice" has been digitally restored, removing imperfections which were in the original cels when the film was shot. A sample of the film, showing the original vs. restored footage, was presented. Truthfully, I found it difficult to see any difference between the two, in the example screen, and I have a pretty finicky eye for that kind of thing.

I have never seen "Fire and Ice", but I'm anticipating its release. Since I was a wee barbarian man-child, I have loved both Bakshi's and Frank Frazetta's work, so how could I not be blown away by the collaboration Ralph described as being like an animated "Frank Frazetta comic"? But truth to tell, I am a little afraid. What if the film is terrible? I will be crushed. I just don't know if I have the strength to stand up to that kind of discouragement. I'll let you know. Based on the clip shown, it really does look right up my alley--sword fighting aplenty and brutish creatures carrying off haughty princesses.

The high point of the panel was Ralph's sneak preview of his current feature project. He had brought a DVD of some animation tests which, he said, he hadn't planned to show. It was hard to know if he was genuinely reluctant to show the work-in-progress, or if he was exercising some first-rate showmanship. After ten minutes of his hemming and hawing, we in the audience were literally begging to see it. The new project is called "The Last Days of Coney Island" and is a return to Ralph's "mean streets" style of animation, ("Coonskin", "Heavy Traffic"). Use of computers will allow Ralph to substantially lower his budgets for compositing and coloring, enabling him to spend more money on the the animation itself.

Though digital animation allows Ralph, essentially a low-budget filmmaker, to do work that twenty years ago would have been out of reach, he has a healthy fear of the luxuries computers afford. "Don't love the computer too much," he cautioned us, "You need the X Factor." When an artist creates with his own hands accidents happen--or perhaps it's the unconscious going to work--and things come about that could never be planned, never executed intentionally. He also pointed out that studio executives like being able to eliminate expensive artists. If a computer can approximate what 30 humans can do, the suited gang that worships the Bottom Line will always choose the computer. Ultimately, Ralph suggested, "They want to get rid of all of us and have the computer do everything."

"The Last Days Of Coney Island" looks to be a complex story, for adults, that depicts emotions adults understand--disenchantment, longing, nostalgia, regret. The film will be animated in L.A., so all of you Cal Arts students, get your portfolios ready.

Alas, I didn't get to say my "hello" to Ralph, though it seems unlikely he would have remembered me after a decade-plus. He was accosted by a guy from the Neighborhood (Brooklyn, that would be), someone he apparently hadn't seen in decades and off they went together to discuss..what?...Their days at Coney Island perhaps.

Nil By Mouth (1997)

Last night, on DVD via Netflix: Gary Oldman's "Nil By Mouth" (1997).

The movie exquisitely depicts a lower-class South London family's perpetual struggle with alcoholism, drug addiction, domestic abuse and...um...well that's about it: alcoholism, drug addiction and domestic abuse. It reminds one of "Trainspotting" but is not nearly as funny, though it would make a fine double feature with its cousin from the north. Just show "Trainspotting" second, so that the audience will be able to leave the theater with a spring in their step and a song in their hearts rather than in body bags, killed by self-inflicted soda straw wounds or asphyxiation via deliberate popcorn overdose.

Now I personally enjoy "depressing movies"--that's what my mum calls them--films like "Nil By Mouth" whose purpose is to show the degraded human condition. If executed correctly--and "Nil By Mouth" is--these films result in my leaving the theater with a heart full of compassion for us all. I understand that this sub-genre--which reminds us of the suffering of others, rather than our own beloved suffering--is not appealing to everyone. In fact, I was privy to a long argument this weekend about the merits of Todd Solondz's comedy "Happiness" on this very point. One combatant held that "Happiness" was a vicious exercise in exploitation and misanthropy, the other said that it showed authentically and admirably the reality of domestic nightmares that we all try to ignore. I tend toward the latter view of that particular film and I appreciate the same effect in others in this subgenre--"Requiem for a Dream", "The Sweet Hereafter", "The Ice Storm", "Five Easy Pieces", even the BBC comedy "The Office". These are stories which break your heart, but--to paraphrase Hubert Selby Jr.--break it OPEN.

I had seen a portion of "Nil By Mouth" a few years ago on TV--on the Independent Film Channel?--and was mesmerized by the authenticity of its characters, particularly its tough women whose great virtue--and tragic flaw--is an unending ability to endure. Even that glimpse of Kathy Burke's performance, as Valerie, stuck with me. I have, from that time to this, wanted to see the movie in its entirety primarily to see her whole performance. Burke won the Best Actress Award at the 1997 Cannes Film Festival for the role and was nominated for a 1998 BAFTA Award (losing to RSC juggernaut Judy Dench for her performance in "Mrs. Brown"). "Nil By Mouth" won the BAFTA Alexander Korda Award for the Outstanding British Film of the Year.

It's easy to find many average director-actors (applauded and awarded) who manage to direct other actors to average performances (also applauded and awarded). Gary Oldman was in the 1990's a very fine actor with much training and stage experience and "Nil By Mouth" shows how much can come of such understanding and expertise. Conversely, it illuminates just how underused and misunderstood actors are in 95% of movies made. Watching "Nil By Mouth" I am reminded, "Oh, that's what movie acting is supposed to look like. I'd almost forgotten." I haven't seen "A Bronx Tale" Robert De Niro's directorial debut or Anthony Hopkins's "August" and I am curious and cautious about them both, but there are many examples of superior actors directing actors to superior performances in superior movies--many of them British actors. British actors are--we hear ad nauseum--highly trained in technique. Technique is that thing that allows you to do well even when you don't feel like it, and I'm sure this technical knowledge gives them an extra edge in being able to construct the appropriate conditions for eliciting optimum performances. This is perhaps why "Nil By Mouth" features great performances, and "A Beautiful Mind" features good performances.

It's not difficult to make a pretty woman look pretty on the screen. It is a fine feat of actor-director collaboration when in "Nil By Mouth" leaden-faced Kathy Burke forgets the struggle of the moment and her sudden smile seems to light up the whole world. Her smile, set artfully in the midst of a world of concrete and fists and needles and terror, is one of the most beautiful things I've seen in the movies in a long time.