Movie: Across 110th Street (1972)

Some movies are made to be watched on hot summer nights. Take this brutal pulp melodrama. A trio of gunmen disguised as cops take the Mafia’s Harlem operation for 300K. They’re hunted by an uneasy alliance of black and Italian gangsters, as well as a similar pair of detectives (Yaphet Kotto and Anthony Quinn). It’s a nasty, fast-paced time capsule of New York’s Fun City days. You can practically smell the trash in the streets. And for the sartorially-inclined, there are some fine blaxploitation threads on display, particularly by Antonio Fargas in proto-Huggy Bear mode.

I felt a thrill when I saw the name Fouad Said in the credits. Said developed the legendary “whammy chart” popularized by screenwriting guru Syd Field. It showed that action movies need an explosion every ten minutes to hold the audience’s interest. In his book A POUND OF FLESH, Art Linson credits “some Egyptian who worked at American International Pictures” for passing the theory along to a pair of then up-and-coming producers. “(Joel) Silver and (Lawrence) Gordon live very well,” Linson wrote. “No one seems to know what happened to the Egyptian.” There’s one mystery solved. As for Syd Field, he’s now helping the Pentagon teach scientists to write for the movies.

Quentin Tarantino used the Bobby Womack title song over the opening credits of JACKIE BROWN. In a quirk of timing, that movie came on soon after I finished watching this one. Stranger still, the music plays as we watch Pam Grier pass the LAX tile mosaic that features memorably in POINT BLANK, which I also watched this week. Increasing the sense that all the movies I’ve seen are in fact one endless loop.

Miscellaneous: Link

Forget Syd Field. Write for Hollywood the Joe Eszterhas way!

TV: Kathy Griffin

The nuts-and-bolts of celebrity fascinates me. Not rarified, A-list celebrity, an alternate existence captured in the following sentence from this recent article on the subject: “Mariah Carey becomes a star at 18, and she never has to think about the weather for her entire adult life.”

I’m talking about the kind of fame exemplified by Rene Russo’s character in GET SHORTY: a one-time scream queen who goes to the supermarket to buy her own groceries.

That fascination is why, after one episode, I’m ready to watch Kathy Griffin’s MY LIFE ON THE D-LIST every week.

It’s not a reality show about people who were once famous or arguably never were; Griffin’s act about her run-ins with the great and near-great makes her a staple on the stand-up circuit. And unlike, say, Bobby Brown, she’s not deluded about the show affecting her place in the Hollywood pecking order.

If anything, D-LIST is a lot like Anna Nicole Smith’s horrible TV show. Only, you know, good.

It turns out being a semi-known name is hard work, and Griffin is completely serious about it. She’s careful about which events to attend, although at a kabbalah book party – I can’t believe I just typed that – she’s the only name there, a fact that depresses her mightily. She’s also frank about using her celebrity to get free (or at least cheap) stuff; to convince a designer to give her a custom-built sofa at cost, she unleashes her surprisingly thick press kit and almost beats the poor man into submission. Her life seems exhausting and not even remotely fabulous.

The show also has its share of only-in-L.A. scenes, such as Griffin’s husband strapping on ankle weights so he can reach the minimum weight to qualify for gastric bypass surgery.

I have to say that Griffin owns an absolutely beautiful home. If this is what being the third banana on a sitcom nobody liked can net you, I’m in the wrong business.

Miscellaneous: Links

Speaking of celebrities, Tony Kay weighs in with a terrific report from the Hollywood Collectors’ Show – complete with photos! And show biz types scream? Is that true?

Movie: Hustle & Flow (2005)

There’s plenty to love about this Sundance award-winner. Terrence Howard’s incendiary performance as DJay, a small-time pimp and drug dealer driven to make a name for himself as a rapper. Terrence Howard’s hair. The sultry vibe of backstreet Memphis. And the music; the lethal hook to DJay’s record (“It’s hard out here for a pimp ...”) will be playing in my head for the rest of the summer.

Best of all, writer/director Craig Brewer actively embraces the conventional aspects of his story, and in so doing gives them new power. He combines two schools of ‘40s melodrama, Up-From-The-Streets and Let’s-Put-On-A-Show, for a potent mix. The movie reminded me of the short Charles Willeford piece “An Actor Prepares,” about a dishwasher who turns to the stage so he can make “a small sound,” because “everyone wants to make one before he dies.”

Like all American movies, H&F includes scenes in a strip club. Here they not only make sense (DJay runs one of his girls out of the club) but are sharply observed (the dancers have to work around buckets because the roof is leaking). The location is so common in films now that it’s become boring. When the clones go to a sleazy bar that’s a half-step up from a strip club in THE ISLAND (Keenan’s One Word ReviewTM: air-conditioned), I found myself tuning out of the action. This raises the disturbing possibility that I’ve watched entire movies set in strip clubs and simply don’t remember them.

Miscellaneous: Urban Legend

According to Hollywood Elsewhere, there’s an episode of THE ODD COUPLE in which Oscar and Felix visit a talent agent. A family is leaving the office as they arrive. The agent tells the boys, “They’re called The Aristocrats. What an act!”

I badly, badly want this to be true.

Miscellaneous: Link

Bill Crider becomes a SLIGHTLY SCARLET fan. There’s a cult building for this movie, I can feel it.

DVD: Cat Ballou (1965)

Like Mr. White and Mr. Blonde, I’m a big Lee Marvin fan. For years I’ve been lobbying for membership in the semi-secret society known as the Sons of Lee Marvin, even though I’ve heard the dues are steep and the hazing brutal. I should be a shoo-in; I share the actor’s signature philtrum, and I’ve been told by those in the know that our calves are similar.

But until recently, I’d never seen Marvin’s Oscar-winning performance in this comedy western.

He gets not one but two roles, the drunken gunman Kid Shelleen and the hired killer Tim Strawn, complete with steel nose. Marvin is somehow able to underplay his overplaying; his Shelleen is broadly funny but always real. I also loved Stubby Kaye and Nat King Cole as the wandering minstrels who narrate the story.

But honestly? I thought this movie was lousy.

Rosemarie, as usual, made a swift and accurate diagnosis: “There’s nothing worse than a star vehicle built around someone you don’t particularly like.” Jane Fonda, always a studied actress, is too modern for her role as a virginal schoolmarm. It doesn’t help that her character has been saddled with a tragic story in what is purportedly a comedy.

And that’s my main problem with the movie: it just ain’t funny.

Marvin doesn’t actually have that much screen time. I guess dual supporting roles equal a lead. I’m certainly not going to begrudge the man his Oscar, even though his competition that year included Rod Steiger in THE PAWNBROKER and one of my all-time favorite performances, Richard Burton in THE SPY WHO CAME IN FROM THE COLD. Actors always win for the wrong movies. It’s not like the Academy was going to acknowledge Marvin for POINT BLANK.

Miscellaneous: I Like ‘Em Stacked

The local Tower Records celebrated its move to a new location by putting every DVD in the store on sale. Rosemarie and I went in with a specific agenda: pick up the new disc of John Boorman’s POINT BLANK as well as any bargain oddities we stumbled on, like a copy of Larry Cohen’s sublimely berserk GOD TOLD ME TO for only five dollars.

When we got home, I put our latest purchases on top of a few used DVDs we picked up the week before. On the floor, next to what we laughingly call “the entertainment center.”

And realized, to my horror, that I had created a stack.

Stacks in and of themselves aren’t bad. There’s nothing wrong with putting things on top of other things, as Monty Python has taught us. It’s where the stacks are that matters.

For instance, our first apartment in Seattle had a loft over what we laughingly called “the living room.” We used it to store books. Thousands of them, in dozens of piles. But as nobody could see them without climbing a ladder – which was impossible because we kept non-perishable foodstuffs on the rungs – those stacks didn’t count. Out of sight, out of mind.

We divested ourselves of most of those books when we moved to our new digs. Since then, I’ve acquired a small collection of older paperback crime novels. Stacks of them are balanced on the front of our shelves. But as they are technically on the bookcases, again they don’t count. I prefer to think of them as a creative utilization of space.

But this pile of DVDs on the floor, in plain sight? That’s a stack. Even if I find some nook into which I can wedge these discs, I know another stack can’t be far behind. Thus marking the start of the long slide toward GREY GARDENS territory.

Unless, of course, we move to a bigger place. Then we’re hipsters who own lots of cool stuff.

Movie: Lonely Are The Brave (1962)

Here there be spoilers. The movie should bear a similar warning, because it manages to spoil itself.

Kirk Douglas has cited this as his favorite of the films he made, and with good reason. He plays John W. Burns, a cowboy who rides the deserts of New Mexico, sleeping outdoors, living off piecework as a ranch hand. He rides into town primed for a bender, only to learn that his drinking buddy has been thrown in jail. Burns promptly gets himself arrested so he can bust his friend out. When the friend decides to stay and face the charges, Burns flees the law on his own.

It’s a solid plot for a western. The difference is that the story, based on an Edward Abbey novel, is set in the then-present day. Burns is an anachronism, living as if the frontier were still a reality. Actions that wouldn’t have raised an eyebrow in Tombstone or Dodge City only a few decades earlier come across as revolutionary. Burns tells the police he doesn’t carry ID because “I don’t need it. I know who I am.” No one would ever think of asking the Duke or Gary Cooper for his papers. When Burns heads into the high country with his horse and his rifle, local sheriff Walter Matthau pursues him with helicopters coordinated by radio.

It’s the clash of the Old West versus the New brought to vivid, brawny life, and Douglas has seldom been better. So it’s a shame that the movie shoots itself in the foot from the get-go.

Very early on, the film makes a baffling stop in the Midwest, where we meet long-distance trucker Carroll O’Connor. He’s hauling toilets, he says. Taking them down New Mexico way. You know, that state where Kirk Douglas is.

Throughout the film, the action cuts back to O’Connor as he booms his way southwest. He’s pushing that big rig hard, swilling coffee, trying to stay awake. I kept wanting to say, “Archie, pull over, get some shuteye. Let the Meathead drive for a while.”

What I actually shouted at the TV was, “Why the hell are we seeing these scenes?” I doubted that Kirk was going to come up with a clever, MacGyver-esque plan to escape that would require several dozen porcelain privies at exactly the moment O’Connor’s rig rumbled past.

Nope. When these two meet, it’ll be bad news. And you know that from the first frames, which drains the movie of all tension. What happens between Douglas and Matthau doesn’t matter. It’s what happens between Douglas and the truck that counts.

Maybe these scenes were in Abbey’s novel. I suspect they were added by screenwriter Dalton Trumbo, a talented man who learned a thing or two about life the hard way. Perhaps he wanted to make a comment about fate, or the futility of fighting modernity.

All I know is they ruined an entertaining movie for me. It’s tough to be subtle with an idea that’s an eighteen-wheeler bearing down on the audience. Literally.

TV: Midnight Movies

Lately my cable box has been a greater source of entertainment than the multiplex. First the South Korean thriller MEMORIES OF MURDER makes its North American debut via On Demand. Then I discover that this documentary, fresh from the Cannes Film Festival, is available to Starz! subscribers.

Stuart Samuels’ film surveys the half dozen cult favorites that spawned the phenomenon of the midnight show: EL TOPO, the original NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD, John Waters’ PINK FLAMINGOS, THE HARDER THEY COME, THE ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW, and finally ERASERHEAD, which represents the movement’s greatest artistic achievement.

In a brisk, entertaining ninety minutes, Samuels talks to the makers of each film as well as distributors and theater owners. It’s clear that these movies existed in opposition to mainstream culture, down to the fact that audiences turned up to see them when most people were turning in. Now, as John Waters observes, that fringe mentality is the mainstream culture. Which sort of takes the fun out of it.

I risk embarrassment by admitting that I’ve only seen two of these six movies. I’ll limit the scope of the damage by not saying which ones.

Website Update: Links

I’m slowly gearing up to make some changes around here. I started by updating the links. Polly P.I. joins the permanent roster, as does Kung Fu Monkey. I was going to add Paul Guyot’s Ink Slinger, but he thinks we spend too much time in the blogosphere as it is.

Meanwhile, the missus has relaunched Lady, Make A Note Of This with a brand new focus. Stop by and make her feel welcome.

DVD: Slightly Scarlet (1956)

Is a Technicolor film noir even possible? It’s not going to be very noir, for starters. But if you are going to do it, play to the format’s strengths. Hire the great John Alton as cinematographer. And stock the movie with redheads.

Two, to be precise. The luscious Rhonda Fleming is more than a girl Friday to a reform candidate for mayor. Her sister Arlene Dahl, fresh out of the slammer, single-handedly keeps the DSM-IV in business: she’s an alcoholic, a kleptomaniac, and a nympho. Quite the trifecta. Both of them vie for the affections of fixer John Payne.

SCARLET, based on James M. Cain’s LOVE’S LOVELY COUNTERFEIT (and no, I don’t know what either title means), is indifferently plotted. I was still trying to figure out whether Payne was a sleazy P.I. or a political operative when next thing you know, he’s running the rackets. As for the sisters, their motivations are at times murky. Like it matters. Did I mention they’re redheads? (Sorry. Crimson-maned lovelies with loose morals are Irish kryptonite. Having two in one film damn near killed me.)

The movie’s an unhinged treat. It’s like a Douglas Sirk melodrama in which all of the sublimated emotion erupts on screen. You get the rich color and the craziness.

Payne, who began as a singer, is one of those “light” actors who proved startlingly effective in crime dramas. His romantic lead looks had curdled slightly by the time he appeared in movies like this and 1952’s KANSAS CITY CONFIDENTIAL. That made him ideal for playing desperate men who can’t coast on their charm any longer.

Rhonda Fleming, who is still very active with charity work, has her own lovely website that includes tributes to her costars. It’s well worth a look.

Movie: Wedding Crashers (2005)

I don’t want to overpraise this summer comedy. I’ll just say that the sequence cut to the song “Shout!” is the greatest use of montage since Eisenstein.

Book: The Golden West: Hollywood Stories, by Daniel Fuchs (2005)

Novelist Daniel Fuchs went west in 1937 to become a screenwriter, and a damn good one. He worked on Elia Kazan’s PANIC IN THE STREETS and won an Academy Award for 1955’s LOVE ME OR LEAVE ME, a musical bio of mobbed-up singer Ruth Etting. He not only wrote the legendary noir CRISS CROSS but received script credit on the remake that came almost half a century later, THE UNDERNEATH.

Thanks to TCM, I recently caught one of his first efforts, 1942’s THE HARD WAY. It’s an engrossing backstage melodrama with Ida Lupino stopping at nothing to turn her sister into a star. The film makes great use of the comedy team of Jack Carson and Dennis Morgan. Carson puts his antic mannerisms in service of a dramatic performance, while Morgan is a revelation as a cynical showbiz sharpie. They truly don’t make ‘em like that anymore.

Fuchs continued writing short fiction as well as occasional columns for Commentary about life in the movie business. Now those pieces have been collected in a book that’s a bracing take on the writer’s lot in Hollywood.

His stories show uncommon sympathy for stars (Fuchs knew his share) and for their behavior, motivated by the fact that “they didn’t know what they had ... or whether in fact they had anything at all.” In ‘Triplicate,’ he offers screenwriting advice that ranks with William Goldman’s: “Never write about people who can’t fiddle with their destinies.”

But it’s Fuchs’ non-fiction that makes the book essential. He tells of his encounters with William Faulkner, Frederick Faust (Max Brand), Harry Cohn and Samuel Goldwyn. He’s forthright about the question of money and addresses “the real grief that goes with the job. The worst is the dreariness in the dead sunny afternoons when you consider the misses, the scripts you’ve labored on and had high hopes for that wind up on the shelf.”

In a somewhat despairing introduction, John Updike wonders why a writer as gifted as Fuchs would abandon fiction for the movies. In one way or another, every piece in THE GOLDEN WEST is about that conundrum. Fuchs himself admits that his novels, which Updike greatly admires, didn’t sell until they were reprinted decades later, resulting in what he calls “a respectable following somewhere in the country.” In the meantime, the films he wrote afforded him a comfortable life and continue to find audiences even now.

Fuchs has a character in one of his short stories make the radical suggestion that perhaps that outcome is enough: “The whole idea is not to make great pictures but to enjoy life in the sun.” I’ve heard worse philosophies.

Miscellaneous: Link

Critic David Thomson recounts the fascinating tale of how he transformed an aborted collaboration between Marlon Brando and PERFORMANCE director Donald Cammell into a novel. Via Greencine Daily.

DVD: Clonus (1978)

Attractive young people clad in monochromatic running gear live in bliss and isolation, awaiting their chance to be sent to paradise. One of the innocents begins asking questions. When they’re not answered, he escapes into the outside world only to find somebody who looks an awful lot like him.

It’s not THE ISLAND, opening in theaters today, but CLONUS, aka PARTS: THE CLONUS HORROR, aka THE CLONUS HORROR. (I suppose the next release of the movie will be called HORROR. Or maybe just THE.) Reports of the similarities between these films have been circulating for weeks. But as long as I beat PARADE magazine, I’m content.

This is where I’m supposed to say that CLONUS outshines its big-budget competitor, that it’s a triumph of scrappy ingenuity. Sorry. ’tain’t. The fact that it’s been featured on MST3K is a dead giveaway. Director Robert S. Fiveson does what he can with limited resources, but the script is simply too thin. I’d prefer to see this story done on a grand scale with attractive stars like Ewan McGregor and Scarlett Johansson.

Part of my problem is that the lead in CLONUS is Tim Donnelly, a member of the Jack Webb stable of players. He was a regular on EMERGENCY, but I know him from his numerous appearances on DRAGNET. In one episode he played Stanley Stover, a lonely geek who donned a homemade costume and fought crime as ‘The Crimson Crusader.’ Thanks to DRAGNET’s harshly clinical style, Stanley is one of the most pathetic characters I’ve ever encountered. So much so that I recoil whenever I see Donnelly in another role.

On the plus side, CLONUS does feature a true B-movie attitude toward nudity. Which THE ISLAND could have had but doesn’t, due to financial concerns over the movie’s rating. Sometimes capitalism simply doesn’t work.

According to the publicity material for THE ISLAND, director Michael Bay wants the movie to spark conversation. CLONUS certainly did the job around here. Assuming it were possible to develop a clone to be used for spare parts, I said I’d probably do it but would have moral qualms. Rosemarie said she’d have moral qualms but would probably do it. It’s the little differences that keep a marriage lively.

Book: The Men Who Stare At Goats, by Jon Ronson (2004)

Ronson writes about outrageous subjects in a deceptively personable way that allows you to see how serious they really are. THEM: ADVENTURES WITH EXTREMISTS is an incisive look at people who believe secret cabals actually run the world.

The title of his new book refers to a top secret program at Fort Bragg that trains Special Forces troops to harness psychic energy. It’s part of a post-Vietnam push to build supersoldiers using New Age concepts. The plan has gotten a new lease on life because of the War on Terror; some of the techniques developed in the program are turning up in the battlefields of Iraq. Along the way, Ronson meets an Army general trying to teach himself to walk through walls, and a martial arts/dance instructor with a government contract to baffle hamsters using only his mind. It’s about time my tax dollars were spent on something I approve of.

Miscellaneous: Links

My new favorite blog is P.I. Files, the adventures of Polly, a private investigator in the Midwest. Slate offers a fascinating give-and-take on Steven Spielberg’s WAR OF THE WORLDS, with Timothy Noah accusing the director of exploiting 9/11 and film critic David Edelstein coming to his defense. For what it’s worth, I’m on Edelstein’s side. And the Los Angeles Times declares that the era of the hipster is over. Thank God. I could use the rest.

Movie: Diamonds Are Forever (1971)

Now that SUVs come equipped with DVD players – America’s Roads: Getting Safer All The Time! – choosing movies has become another step in planning the family vacation. USA Today offers suggestions for several summer travel destinations. This 007 film is their children’s recommendation for Las Vegas.

I know today’s kids are sophisticated, what with the Internet and DEGRASSI: THE NEXT GENERATION. But this strikes me as a spectacularly bad idea, because DIAMONDS unnerved me as a ten-year old.

It’s largely due to the hit men/lovers Mr. Kidd and Mr. Wint, played by jazzman Putter Smith and actor Bruce Glover. They have a childlike yet oddly formal relationship that makes their violence even more disturbing. It’s like watching the Goofy Gophers go on a killing spree.

DIAMONDS is thought of as the first Roger Moore Bond film even though it stars Sean Connery, because it marks the point when the series began to emphasize comedy and outlandish set pieces. The producers hadn’t perfected the balance, so the smarm factor is high. Another reason it’s not appropriate for kids. At one point Connery has to hide a cassette, so he slides it into the bottom of Jill St. John’s bikini.

I have no recollection of anything that follows.

Here’s my choice for a movie to prep the youngsters for Vegas: HONEY, I BLEW UP THE KID, about a giant baby terrorizing the Strip. Wholesome fun for the entire family! After seeing the film, Rosemarie and I made a pilgrimage to the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino so we could get a photo of the huge neon guitar that the kid rips out of the ground and strums like a ukulele.

Movie: Memories of Murder (2003, U.S. 2005)

On my bleary-eyed Friday morning march through the New York Times, I took special note of Manohla Dargis’ rave review of this South Korean film. I had missed it during its brief run at the Northwest Film Forum a few weeks back – one of the rare occasions when a movie opened in Seattle ahead of the Big Apple – and wanted to catch up with it.

I did the very next day. In the comfort of my own home. For free.

MEMORIES is part of Palm Pictures’ new video on demand film festival, run in conjunction with Comcast Cable. Palm asks viewers to vote for the films online to determine which ones receive theatrical and/or DVD release. So far their website keeps rejecting my vote, which would be to get this movie into as many theaters as possible.

It’s based on a true story and unfolds primarily in 1986, as South Korea gears up for a critical election. A serial killer begins preying on women in a rural section of the country. The lead local detective is a cagey brute content to force the most likely suspect into confessing. As the murders continue, he’s paired up with a brilliant but damaged inspector from Seoul determined to take a more intellectual approach.

All the stock elements are in place. Mismatched partners? Check. Depraved psychopath who kills according to an elaborate set of rules? Check.

But they’ve never been delivered like this before. Writer/director Bong Joon-Ho perfects a singular tone, one that incorporates deadpan black comedy – even the big city cop is woefully unprepared to investigate a crime of this magnitude – to chilly reverence. He also skillfully weaves in political commentary, as South Korea’s national upheavals play out in the background. It all culminates in a quiet, utterly devastating climax.

In the last few weeks, entrepreneurs as varied as Mark Cuban and Morgan Freeman have made noise about turning the mechanism of film distribution upside down. I’ve had my doubts. But if this is the future – having one of the year’s best movies debut on your cable box instead of falling into the cracks – I say bring it on.

Miscellaneous: Link

Patrick McGilligan, author of the indispensable BACKSTORY books, interviews my hero Larry Cohen. From getting in on the ground floor of blaxploitation films to directing Bette Davis’ last movie, it’s all here. Courtesy of GreenCine.

TV: Ultimate Film Fanatic

Looks like my 15 minutes aren’t quite up yet. Welcome to anyone who caught the rebroadcast of my UFF episode. Glad you stopped by. By popular demand, here are the Operation Travolta pieces on Michael Keaton, Sandra Bullock, Rutger Hauer and Peter Weller, as well as my behind-the-scenes take on the show. Feel free to come on back.

Books: The Glass Cage (1973) and The Venice Train (1974), by Georges Simenon

A conversation about last year’s film RED LIGHTS reminded me that it had been too long since I’d read Simenon. Any excuse to visit the remarkable downtown branch of the Seattle Public Library is fine with me. I grabbed two because his novels are so economical you can read them in one sitting.

Simenon personifies a key difference between the U.S. and European schools of suspense. In the typical American thriller, some external force threatens home and hearth, and our hero rallies to save them from harm. The protagonist of one of Simenon’s “psychological novels” gets into trouble and finds those bonds of marriage, family and society constricting.

VENICE is a pure exploration of this theme. A husband and father has a chance encounter on a train and comes into possession of a large sum of money. He realizes he can’t spend any of it without arousing the suspicion of those close to him.

“At home, in his own apartment, he, a man of thirty-five, married and with children, a man with responsibilities, did not have a single place where he could hide an object ... it meant that he was a prisoner of his household.”

Dark, unsettling stuff with an undercurrent of genuine sadness. Not exactly Hollywood material.

Miscellaneous: Link

I can’t help linking to this local story, which is in no way grimly hysterical. To keep it on-topic, I’ll call it a tribute to the Spinal Tap classic “Sex Farm.”

Miscellaneous: The Meme Generation

Not only did Bill Crider tag me with this meme, he also swiped the Fredric Brown tribute I wanted to use as a title. Someday he’ll get his.

Here are my answers. Prepare to be disappointed.

1. Imagine it’s 2015. You are visiting the library at a major research university. You go over to a computer terminal (or whatever it is they use in 2015) that gives you immediate access to any book or journal article on any topic you want. What do you look up? In other words, what do you hope somebody will have written in the meantime?

First: me, to see if any of my projects ever made it off the ground. I’m assuming this part won’t take long. Then a quick check of all the latest innovations in pornography. It’s not like it’s my computer.

I’d want a list of the Block and Westlake books I’d missed. It would be nice to know how many times Terrill Lee Lankford and Jess Walter hit the bestseller list in my absence.

There would be several political questions I’d want answered. I’d be curious to see how events playing out now would be seen ten years hence.

But the above is mere prelude for these two questions:

How many times have the Mets won the World Series?

How much will it cost me to replace all my DVDs with whatever the new format is?

2. What is the strangest thing you’ve ever heard or seen at a conference? No names, please. Refer to “Professor X” or “Ms. Y” if you must. Double credit if you were directly affected. Triple if you then said or did something equally weird.

I’ve never been to a conference. I can say, though, that while I’ve heard all manner of shameful stories about Professor X, I have always found Ms. Y to be the salt of the earth.

3. Name a writer, scholar, or otherwise worthy person you admire so much that meeting him or her would probably reduce you to awestruck silence.

David Mamet. In part because he’s been a huge influence. Mainly because I don’t want to blather in front of someone who uses language with such concision. Will you go to lunch?

4. What are two or three blogs or websites you often read that don’t seem to be on many people’s radar?

I’m very unadventurous on this score. My usual stops are on the Links page. I don’t even have anyone I can tag. Whoever wants to answer next, step right up.

Miscellaneous: Link

We’re halfway through the year. Time to check the quote whore scoreboard.

DVD: Prime Cut (1972)

For all the talk of the 1970s (which for purposes of discussion run from 1967 to ‘75) as a golden age in American movies, how many great comedies can you name from that period?

Which is why I’ve always been a fan of Michael Ritchie. Starting with 1972’s THE CANDIDATE, he put together a string of sharp, character-driven films that didn’t stint on laughs. SMILE may be his best work, a backstage look at beauty pageants that’s one of the era’s most neglected movies. He followed it up with two sports films – THE BAD NEWS BEARS and SEMI-TOUGH – that work against all the genre’s clichés.

He got sucked into big-budget crap in the ‘80s, along with everyone else. On the plus side, he directed FLETCH. But he’s also responsible for the sequel.

He had a modest comeback by returning to form. THE POSITIVELY TRUE ADVENTURES OF THE ALLEGED TEXAS CHEERLEADER-MURDERING MOM is one of the best TV movies ever made. And 1992’s DIGGSTOWN is a ‘70s film in modern drag, about losers and hustlers and packed with twists. It didn’t fare well at the box office, but it found a long life on video and cable. Every guy I know has seen it at least twice.

Leonard Maltin describes this early Ritchie effort as “tongue-in-cheek trash that fans of sleazy crime melodramas should love.” Regular readers will know that this description applies to me. I was ashamed that I hadn’t seen the movie. When a bare-bones DVD hit the streets last month, I pounced on it.

At last I know why PRIME CUT seldom surfaces on TV. ‘Sleazy’ is the operative word; over the opening credits, we watch a man get ground into sausage.

There’s barely a plot. Enforcer Lee Marvin is sent by the Chicago outfit into the wilds of Kansas City to collect from a gangster known only as Mary Ann (Gene Hackman). That’s it.

In some respects PRIME CUT is a forerunner of this year’s SIN CITY, taking a stock hardboiled set-up and inflating it to the level of a cartoon. Mary Ann doesn’t just sell young girls, he auctions them off from pens in his slaughterhouse. And so on.

I hesitate to recommend PRIME CUT. I will say it’s outrageous enough to command your attention. I’d watch Lee Marvin in anything; nobody exits a room like him. And if, like me, you’ve ever wondered what would happen when a stretch Lincoln meets a thresher, well, this is the movie for you.

DVD: Seed of Chucky (2004)

Somehow I managed to miss the CHILD’S PLAY movies. The closest I’d come to seeing Chucky the homicidal doll in action was watching Jon Gruden coach during football season.

The series was revived with the emphasis on jokes in 1999’s BRIDE OF CHUCKY. I checked it out for one reason: Jennifer Tilly. She’s a terrific comic actress in the Judy Holliday mode who works against her sexpot image. She’s been a favorite since 1989, when she played a gambler’s moll who’s not as dumb as she appears in LET IT RIDE and auditioned memorably for THE FABULOUS BAKER BOYS.

BRIDE OF CHUCKY is terrible. But Tilly, as usual, is very funny in it.

I had forgotten the movie completely until I was asked a question about it on the IFC game show ULTIMATE FILM FANATIC. Knowing the answer let me advance to the next round.

So out of gratitude I watched the series’ latest installment, a meta-epic in which Tilly plays herself as well as a killer doll.

I hereby declare whatever karmic debt I owe the Chucky movies to be repaid. In full. Many, many times over.

But again, Tilly is hilarious. Considering her new hobby, maybe now she can hold out for better material.

Message Movies: Silver City (2004)/Land of the Dead (2005)

Experiment in Viewing #12: Can agitprop hold up after it fails to do its job?

The filmmakers and cast of SILVER CITY made no bones about the movie’s intent. They wanted to help usher George W. Bush out of office. But the film debuted too close to the November election to have much impact. (Confidentially, I think some other film might have stolen its thunder.) I was curious, though, to see if it stood on its own merits past its expiration date.

The W surrogate is the dim bulb scion of a Colorado political family who’s running for governor. John Sayles often structures his films around a central mystery. Here it’s the question of whether someone is out to sabotage the campaign.

From the beginning, the story gets bogged down in issues. What’s worse is that the issues are so old hat that the movie itself can’t get worked up over them. Did you know that money influences politics? That businesses matter more than the voters? Why, in some cases lobbyists ... oh, never mind. It’s as if Sayles filmed an issue of MOTHER JONES.

Whatever you think of President Bush, it’s obvious that he’s given his opponents plenty of new material to work with. But SILVER CITY is content to stick with the Bleeding Heart Liberals’ Greatest Hits. Sayles should have taken his cues from Karl Rove. Attack your rivals on their strong points and watch them flail helplessly.

Plus, the movie’s a tad obvious. The candidate is named Pilager, for Christ’s sake. Chris Cooper does wonders mimicking Bush’s speech patterns, but having his character be a simpleton does the actor and the film no favors.

Contrast this movie with LAND OF THE DEAD. Like Sayles, George A. Romero loads his films with political content. His latest tackles the yawning gulf between the haves and have-nots and the use of fear mongering to keep the public in line.

Yes, there’s too much on-the-nose dialogue. There are also bracing action sequences shot in the efficient, muscular style of John Sturges or early John Carpenter. And zombies, zombies, zombies.

I’m all for reasoned discourse in politics. But in the movies, I want my issues served up with entrails and a kickass battle truck. They just help things go down easier.

TV: Watch The Skies!

This TCM documentary on 1950s science fiction films was somehow able to squeeze in the new version of WAR OF THE WORLDS. (Long story short: I liked it fine.) A mite convenient, I say. Still, it did give Steven Spielberg the chance to explain that business with the red vines, which didn’t exactly make sense to me. (Long story short: terraforming.) Initially I thought it was an extreme form of product placement, because I found myself craving Twizzlers.

The high point of the show was seeing James Cameron light up at the mention of THE MONOLITH MONSTERS. I’m glad someone else shares my affection for this low budget 1957 film, which demonstrated true ingenuity in having its villains be ... rocks. To this day, I have a lingering fear of minerals.

Ernest Lehman, R.I.P.

The screenwriter passed away on Saturday at the age of 89. One look at his credits makes it plain that he had one of the greatest careers in the movies. SWEET SMELL OF SUCCESS, NORTH BY NORTHWEST, WEST SIDE STORY, so many other classics. He always was and always will be an inspiration to me, and he shall be missed.

Book: The Fountainhead, by Ayn Rand (1943)

The New York Times recently described Christopher Cox, the California congressman nominated to the Securities and Exchange Commission by President Bush, as “a devoted student” of Ayn Rand. Raising the prospect that fifty years from now, one of President (Chelsea) Clinton’s nominees might be “a devoted student” of Dan Brown.

Later, George Will claimed Cox’s enthusiasm for Rand was overstated. The Rand Institute said that Cox’s first act should be to abolish the commission he’s been named to lead.

Rand has always seemed like something you should read at an impressionable age, like Tolkien or INTERVIEW WITH THE VAMPIRE. I never got to those. Saw the movies, though.

Over the years I’ve picked up a little about Rand’s philosophy of objectivism. Most of what I know about her I learned from a guy who lived in my freshman dorm. Over Christmas break, he read both THE FOUNTAINHEAD and ATLAS SHRUGGED and came back to school a changed man. I can still remember him striding down the hall upon his return, arms spread messianically wide. When he reached his room, he pulled a marker out of his coat and wrote EGO in huge letters on the door. Only then did he enter, smoke a few Winstons and doze off.

What made an impression on me was the fact that he’d carried the pen with him. No stopping to search through luggage for him. I respect anyone who inspires others to feats of showmanship, and vowed to read one of Rand’s novels.

What can I say? The last few years have been a little busy.

First, as a work of fiction: The only character who behaves in a remotely human fashion is the one Rand holds up to ridicule. In a book purportedly about architecture, her descriptions of the craft make no sense. The ending is ludicrous. Her style is turgid.

But I couldn’t stop reading. Rand’s tale spans decades and includes epic grudges, thwarted passions, dizzying rises and falls. She wrote in an era when authors strove to tell big stories, and the force of her narrative carries the day.

As a philosophical work, things get a tad muddled. But the core ideas – the power of the individual, the dangers of groupthink – resonated with me. It’s easy to see how they could be misinterpreted or misapplied. There’s a section on discrediting someone through false charges (“Reason can be fought with reason. How are you going to fight the unreasonable?”) that seems to have been grafted directly into contemporary political playbooks. I’d wager that free-market conservatives like Cox respond to Rand’s notion that there’s nothing evil about the desire to make money or even spending it to enjoy luxury. But they probably miss her larger point that money is only a means to an end, and that personal luxury eventually becomes a wasted effort to impress others.

I’m still immature enough to feel pride at finishing a book that’s over 700 pages long and doesn’t feature a boy wizard. Eventually I’ll tackle ATLAS SHRUGGED. I have to rest my arms first.

Miscellaneous: The Story So Far

Around the Fourth of July, I always like to take a look back at what the first six months of the year have wrought.

Scratch that. I usually like to do it. But not this time.

People are forever saying what a bad year it is for movies, and I’m the one who shouts ‘em down. There are good films out there, I say, but you have to seek them out.

I can’t muster up that kind of enthusiasm anymore. Maybe I haven’t been taking my own advice. Maybe I haven’t been adventurous enough. All I know is that by this point in 2004, I’d already seen ETERNAL SUNSHINE OF THE SPOTLESS MIND; SPARTAN, which ended up being my favorite film of the year; and a good half-dozen other titles of note.

I’ve enjoyed several of 2005’s movies. But I’ve only seen three contenders:

OLDBOY
KUNG FU HUSTLE
LAYER CAKE

Pretty thin. So I’ll fill out the list with a few odds and ends.

2004 Film That Would Have Made My Best-Of List If It Had Opened In Time: BEYOND THE SEA. So help me, I loved this movie, in spite of its flaws. And perhaps because of them. We’ll see how it holds up when I watch it again on video.

2004 Films I Caught On DVD That I Should Have Seen In Theaters: BIRTH and CODE 46.

On to books. I’ve been doing a lot of research reading the last few months, so I haven’t finished my usual quota of novels. Which made these gems shine all the brighter.

RED JUNGLE, by Kent Harrington
CAVALCADE, by Walter Satterthwait
CITIZEN VINCE, by Jess Walter

Read any of them. They will not disappoint.

DVD: Junior Bonner (1972)

Mmmm ... crow ...

A while back, there was a dust-up around here when I confessed that I didn’t get Steve McQueen. I tended to agree with the critic David Thomson, who wrote that McQueen’s “range was severely limited” and that he “did too much routine work in which his ... impassivity grew monotonous.”

Several McQueen fans rose to his defense. The recent revival of his films on DVD has prompted reappraisals, so I decided to join in.

BONNER seemed a good place to start. It has a director in Sam Peckinpah who knows how to harness machismo. (He and McQueen also collaborated on 1972’s THE GETAWAY, but the strange vibe between the actor and Ali MacGraw taints that movie for me. Let’s face it, McQueen’s not good with women onscreen.) It’s a contemporary western in which McQueen plays an aging rodeo rider, another plus because McQueen is at his best when doing something physical. Best of all, his parents are played by Ida Lupino and the great Robert Preston.

It’s one of those ‘70s movies in which little happens, but what does is beautifully observed. It unfolds over a few days in a small town, and by the movie’s end I was sure I could draw a map of the place from memory.

In this setting, McQueen’s minimalism doesn’t seem like a harsh affectation but an essential part of the character. And he’s gracious with his costars, hanging back in his scenes with Joe Don Baker as his ambitious brother, letting Preston walk off with the movie.

I’m not going to go overboard and say that I get McQueen now. But I’m beginning to understand Thomson’s point when he asks: “He may be brutal, or brutish, at times – but when is he fake?”

Miscellaneous: Links

I was going to write a post about my perverse fascination with the HBO/Lisa Kudrow misfire THE COMEBACK. Then I found this chart. And who took the sex out of popular music? Via Arts & Letters Daily.

Movie: Gangster Story (1959)

Most people justifiably think of Walter Matthau as a comedic performer. I always associate him with the trio of tough crime dramas he made in 1973 and ’74: CHARLEY VARRICK, THE LAUGHING POLICEMAN, and THE TAKING OF PELHAM ONE TWO THREE, which I really need to stop talking about.

He stayed in the genre for his only directing gig. The resulting movie is terrible. GANGSTER STORY has that wall-eyed look you only see in MST3K films. Every line of dialogue was looped. The interiors were shot at crew members’ houses in Anaheim.

Still, Matthau’s character Jack Martin pulls off a brilliant bank robbery at the beginning of the film, one that involves inviting the police in advance. It’s like something Donald E. Westlake would dream up.

As a director, Matthau made one key mistake. He hired himself. He’s so much better than the rest of the cast that he throws the movie out of whack. It’s a clear violation of the Joe Queenan Guitar Rule.

In THE UNKINDEST CUT, his book about independent filmmaking, Queenan compares hiring an actor who outshines the others to leaving a guitar out at a party. Many guests will pick it up and noodle around with it, strumming a few chords. Then one guy, who used to be in a band, will play an entire song and make everyone else feel inadequate. The party’s mood will shift. Guests will make excuses and leave. The next thing you know, they’re all gone by 9:30 and you’re tossing out perfectly good shrimp. I told you we didn’t need to buy the big platter. Whenever we throw a party you never listen to me. If we’d put on that jazz CD like I suggested, we wouldn’t be in this mess. And why do we keep inviting your friend Carol? I can tell she has it in for me. And she zeroes in on the good gin like a guided missile.

OK, that one got away from me.

Movie: Batman Begins (2005)

I’ll be honest. I had reservations going into this one. I’m not even sure if I saw the last BATMAN movie. Who were the villains again? Tim Robbins as Egghead and Kevin Costner as Shame, right? With a cameo by Alan King as Louie the Lilac? Or was that a dream I had?

Plus I was feeling burned out on costumed avenger movies. How could you improve on the dizzy operatic heights of SPIDER-MAN 2?

But Spidey is a hero who rules the day. We need one who haunts the night. And Christopher Nolan is the man to give him life.

There’s too much mystical hooey at the beginning and too much everything at the end, but overall this is smart filmmaking with a flair for pop psychology and Gothic imagery. Nolan and co-writer David Goyer wisely put the focus on Bruce Wayne. It’s an opportunity Michael Keaton, Val Kilmer, George Clooney – hell, Adam West – never had. And Christian Bale is more than up to the challenge.

Cillian Murphy and his scarily low-tech Scarecrow mask get the job done in the villainy department. Some critics have taken Gary Oldman to task for his strenuous regular guy performance as Detective Gordon, but I’m enough of an Oldman fan to think that the effort is intentional. His work here called to mind the May Sarton line that opens John le Carré’s THE RUSSIA HOUSE: One must think like a hero to behave like a merely decent human being.

My favorite performance in the movie, though, is from Tom Wilkinson as Gotham’s crime boss. Instead of doing another variation on the GOODFELLAS idea of a gangster, Wilkinson harks back to older examples out of the Warner Brothers library. And it works beautifully. It’s a treat to watch him channeling Edward G. Robinson, a dandy intoxicated by his own power, chewing his dialogue like breadsticks. His scene with Bruce Wayne is the strongest in the movie. I was sorry to see him go.

Overlawyered can tell you how much this movie would cost Bruce Wayne. Luckily, he can afford it. Thanks to Bill Crider for the first link.

Operation Travolta: Peter Weller

Last week’s film meme asked which movie character I’d like to be. My back-up reply: Buckaroo Banzai. Surgeon. Rock star. Adventurer. Lover of two incarnations of Ellen Barkin.

Wait. Can I change my answer?

Anyone who can carry off such a role with the casual aplomb Peter Weller brought to it should be besieged by work. But as I have done before, I’m challenging the filmmaking community to give this man a part worthy of his talents.

I first saw Weller in 1983’s OF UNKNOWN ORIGIN, in which he plays a New York yuppie waging war on the rat sharing his swank new digs. Weller’s performance elevates the movie to the level of allegory, and established his prowess at playing superficially successful men beset by neuroses.

THE ADVENTURES OF BUCKAROO BANZAI ACROSS THE EIGHTH DIMENSION followed a year later. 1987’s ROBOCOP introduced the character for which the actor is best known; Paul Verhoeven’s film remains a scabrously funny comic book satire. I even like the 1990 sequel, which some critics found too dark. Weller was smartly paired with the hangdog Sam Elliott in 1988’s SHAKEDOWN, an appealingly low-brow actioner from B-movie maestro James Glickenhaus.

The early ‘90s brought Weller’s best work. In David Cronenberg’s NAKED LUNCH, he embodies both the writer William Burroughs and the narrator of Burroughs’ seminal novel. Personally, I prefer his other collaboration with actress Judy Davis, who referred to herself and Weller as “the Astaire and Rogers of dysfunction.” 1994’s THE NEW AGE is one of the decade’s great films, an unsparing portrait of a privileged Los Angeles couple as their marriage buckles under financial and spiritual woes. Weller has never been better, and he’s perfectly matched by Davis. The film also features a scorching cameo by Samuel L. Jackson before he became “Samuel L. Jackson.” It’s a crime that Michael Tolkin’s film remains unavailable on DVD.

The latter half of the decade wasn’t as kind. Weller turns up briefly in Woody Allen’s MIGHTY APHRODITE, but what should be a surefire collaboration goes nowhere. In the low-budget Philip K. Dick adaptation SCREAMERS, he issues my favorite order by a military officer: “Relent!”

Weller plumbed the moneyed depths of Southern California again in Bernard Rose’s IVANSXTC, which combines Tolstoy’s “The Death of Ivan Ilyich” with the tragic story of Hollywood agent Jay Moloney. Weller received an Independent Spirit Award nomination for his performance, but sadly, I haven’t seen it. The film, which may have cut too deep for many in the business, did not get theatrical distribution and has never been released on video in the United States.

Behind the camera is where the actor has flourished of late. In 1993, his short film “Partners” was nominated for an Academy Award, and he directed a sharp adaptation of the Elmore Leonard novel GOLD COAST for Showtime.

I look at the career that Christopher Walken has had and wonder why Weller hasn’t gotten similar opportunities. They share many qualities: a flair for the theatrical, flawless timing, a great sense of personal style. Some enterprising filmmaker should think of Weller’s name the next time Walken is too busy to take on a juicy supporting role.

And I, for one, haven’t given up hope of seeing Buckaroo take on the World Crime League.

Music: Paul Anka, Rock Swings (2005)

When I heard about this album – Paul Anka doing big band covers of rock songs – I thought it was a joke. Kind of like the medley Joe Piscopo did as Frank Sinatra, moving from “Born To Run” into “Smoke on the Water.”

Then Rosemarie sampled the record online and said, “I think we need to buy this.” Now I can’t stop playing the damn thing.

Some of the songs have a lipstick-on-a-pig quality. No amount of showbiz pizzazz is going to make Bon Jovi’s “It’s My Life” sound better or R.E.M.’s “Everybody Hurts” less obvious. At other times, Anka’s old school approach – adding a Count Basie call-and-response to Van Halen’s “Jump,” performing the Pet Shop Boys’ “It’s A Sin” as a bossa nova number – livens up unlikely material. He even brings some Threepenny Opera swagger to Survivor’s “Eye Of The Tiger.”

It’s no accident that the best covers are of songs that were strong to begin with, like Spandau Ballet’s “True” and especially “Wonderwall” by Oasis. And Anka’s take on Soundgarden’s “Blackhole Sun” is surprisingly potent. I was disappointed that he skipped the spoken word part of Billy Idol’s “Eyes Without A Face.” I wanted to hear him say:

I’m on a bus, on a psychedelic trip,
Reading murder books and trying to stay hip.

And then we come to Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit.” The selection that has come in for the most scorn.

At times, Anka’s approach to the song imparts a Joel-Grey-in-CABARET vibe that’s wholly appropriate (“Hello, hello, hello, how low”). Seconds later, it seems an affront to the laws of God and man. But any recording that provokes such an intense response is worth listening to.

The lush arrangements unfortunately underscore how little depth most of these songs have. Conventional wisdom holds that popular music suffered with the advent of the singer-songwriter and the decline of the interpretive artist. Rock Swings bears that theory out.

Anka and Kurt Cobain make an odd pairing: the consummate pro and the tortured poet. Filmmaker Mike Figgis once said, “My heroes all seem to have been junkies ... they’re often very brave people who burned fast – because accelerated creativity yields a higher gain.” I’ve always found that argument absurd, so much so that I seem to have gone out of my way to avoid “junkie literature.” Many of the artists I admire are prolific, professional, and dismissed by critics as “slick.” As if productivity and devotion to craft couldn’t yield rewards of their own.

I suppose what I’m saying is that, on the Anka/Cobain spectrum, I tend toward the Paul Anka side. Just so you know.

Miscellaneous: Meme’s The Same

I usually don’t go in for this kind of thing. I’m a loner, Dottie. A rebel. But it’s all the rage among the GreenCine regulars, so I want to play, too.

1. Total number of films I own on DVD and video

112. Wow. I didn’t think it was that many.

2. The last film I bought

A “Classic Monster Movies” collection featuring DOCTOR BLOOD’S COFFIN, FURY OF THE WOLFMAN, and THE BRAINIAC on one disc.

Look, it was only five bucks. What do you want from me?

3. The last film I watched

THE HARDER THEY FALL (1956). A tough, pulpy boxing drama from a novel by Budd Schulberg. Bogart’s last film. I watched it because Max Baer, the villain of CINDERELLA MAN, appears in it as an exaggerated version of himself.

4. Five films that I watch a lot or that mean a lot to me, in no particular order

Here I’m going to cheat and give each selection a similarly-themed alternate. It’s a meme, people. I can do what I like.

ALIEN (1979) – In a lapse of judgment she has come to regret, my mother took me to see this when I was a kid. I had never realized you could frighten adults before. That revelation made me want to make movies. Alternate: BRAZIL (1985)

THE TAKING OF PELHAM ONE TWO THREE (1974) – Pound for pound, the most entertaining movie ever made. Alternate: RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK (1981)

BLOWUP (1966) – For peerless writing. It tells its story in purely visual terms. Alternate: CHINATOWN (1974)

NORTH BY NORTHWEST (1959) – The complete movie package, and the level of artistry to which I aspire. Alternate: L.A. CONFIDENTIAL (1997)

THE THIRD MAN (1949) – As good as it gets. Alternate: DR. STRANGELOVE (1964)

Bonus Entry: OUT OF THE PAST (1947). Just because.

5. If you could be any character portrayed in a movie, who would it be?

Gene Hackman in THE POSEIDON ADVENTURE. Because he goes out cursing God and saving Pamela Sue Martin. And because I’ve never looked good in a turtleneck.

Who’s next?

TV: Celebrity Charades

All my life I have waited for a worthy successor to THE BATTLE OF THE NETWORK STARS. This limited-run AMC series created by Bob Balaban, Chad Lowe and Hilary Swank isn’t it – for one thing, there’s no dunk tank – but it’s close.

TV: Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy

In the end, the envelopes got to me.

Online DVD rental outfits like Netflix and GreenCine want you to hang on to movies for weeks at a time; it improves their numbers. But I’d see those envelopes stacked up next to the TV and feel guilty. I really ought to turn those around, I’d think.

The trick is to rent discs that take days to get through. Titles like Kino Video’s silent film compilations, for instance.

The ideal solution would be to rent TV shows. I don’t watch much TV, so I’d have plenty to choose from. I could catch up on ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT or dig into FX’s highly lauded lineup (THE SHIELD, NIP/TUCK, RESCUE ME). As for older series, I wouldn’t know where to begin. Here I shamefacedly admit that I haven’t seen a minute of classics like, picking two at random, THE ANDY GRIFFITH SHOW and GREEN ACRES.

But I can’t do it. If I can get by without watching TV shows at their appointed airtimes, why should I binge on them once they reach DVD?

So I struck a compromise. I’d rent long-form programs, what ABC used to call “Novels For Television.” All the comfort of a series, with the satisfaction of an actual ending. I began with this 1979 adaptation of John le Carré’s book, often hailed as one of television’s finest productions.

Alec Guinness stars as George Smiley, a cashiered intelligence officer brought back into the fold to determine which of four key players in the service is a Soviet mole.

In many respects, TINKER, TAILOR hasn’t aged well. It takes its time; one scene consists entirely of a shot of Guinness in a ratty cardigan reading a file, and like every shot in the series, it’s held several beats too long. Only one of the four suspects is developed in any way, so it’s no surprise when he’s revealed to be the traitor.

But the series exerts a powerful hold, and does an extraordinary job of depicting how isolating intelligence work can be. As for Guinness’ performance, no other actor could make reading a file while wearing a ratty cardigan so compelling.

The sole extra is a 2002 interview with le Carré, in which he speaks in dense, perfectly formed paragraphs for thirty minutes.

Miscellaneous: Take Me Out To The Ball Game

Webster’s Dictionary defines popular culture as ... hang on, the phrase isn’t in here. And this isn’t a Webster’s Dictionary.

Baseball counts as popular culture, right? Too bad if it doesn’t, because baseball was the only thing on my mind the last few days.

I’d been waiting for this weekend for ages. The Seattle Mariners were finally hosting the New York Mets. My New York Mets. And I had tickets for the first of their three games.

Growing up in Queens, you had to be a Mets fan. On summer evenings, every radio in the neighborhood would be tuned to the game; you could run down the alleys for blocks and never miss a pitch. We didn’t live too far from Shea Stadium, and my father would take me to the ballpark at least once a season.

New York has few hard and fast rules. One of them is: if you like the Mets, you hate the Yankees. But I still went to see the Bronx Bombers play when I won tickets in my school’s Sports Night raffle. Another of New York’s hard and fast rules is never pass up anything free.

Whenever I moved, I kept the habit of living close to stadiums. There was no professional baseball team at the time I lived in the Tampa Bay area – you could make the case that there’s still not – but the Toronto Blue Jays’ spring training facility was blocks from my house. One morning on my way to school a foul ball landed at my feet, and a Jays’ outfielder asked me to throw it back. When my best pitch thumped the roof of a CBC van, he laughed and said, “Kid, you suck!” Not exactly a Mean Joe Greene moment. My apartment in Boston was directly under the Citgo sign you can see whenever anyone hits a shot over the Green Monster at Fenway Park. It was easy for me to pull for both teams, because they were rivals of the Yankees.

I’ve always wished the Mariners well, but I can’t call myself a fan. Setting the modern-day record with 116 wins in a season but failing to make the World Series indicates certain fundamental flaws in the organization. Safeco Field is a beautiful stadium, though, and I was eager to see the Mets play there. So was Rosemarie, the original flashy girl from Flushing, who can’t sing ‘Meet the Mets’ without tearing up. Here we are.

The game moves faster when you’re there in person. Maybe it’s not having to sit through all the ads for local car dealerships. And between innings there’s always some kind of activity going on, although nothing as elaborate as Milwaukee’s Weiner Races. I enjoyed a beer in the stands for the first time. I don’t think there’s a better way of passing a summer evening, and I hope to go back before this season is over.

As for the game, the Mets lost 5-zip. In fact, the Mariners swept the series. I don’t want to talk about it.

DVD: Hitch (2005)

When this movie opened, some friends emailed me with a startling observation. They were convinced that character actor Adam Arkin, appearing as a New York newspaper editor, was, in fact, playing me.

“It was like he was channeling you,” they said, finding it so eerie that they had to comment on it during the movie.

I saw Arkin in person once, over 10 years ago. At the time he had a recurring role on NORTHERN EXPOSURE, which filmed outside Seattle, and seeing cast members on the streets of the city was a common occurrence.

I was leaving a coffee shop when I saw him. I did my patented I-know-who-you-are-but-I’m-not-making-a-big-thing-out-of-it half-smile, a deft social gesture that has won the hearts of the great and the near-great. Arkin nodded amiably at me in return.

Having seen the movie, I can now only assume that somewhere in that transaction, the actor was able to capture my essence. To download my soul, as it were.

Part of it is that we have the same haircut. Close-cropped but stylish, projecting an unforced masculinity. Or so my barber tells me. But the man has the rest of me down pat: facial expressions, head movements, rhythm of speech, general attitude. And above all, the innate decency.

Of course, I’m not the best judge. I don’t watch myself all day. Mainly because I haven’t figured out how to get paid for it. So I was relying on Rosemarie’s opinion.

She cackled every time my doppelganger appeared. Her final verdict: “I can see it. I can definitely see it.”

Arkin doesn’t get much screen time, but I’m more of a second banana anyway. Always leave ‘em wanting more, that’s my motto.

Movie: Fourteen Hours (1951)

Noir expert Eddie Muller writes about this movie in the introduction to his book DARK CITY. But in many respects the film isn’t noir so much as a grim fable of urban life.

It’s based on an actual incident, but similar tales unfold all the time. A young man (Richard Basehart) in deep despair climbs out on the ledge of a building. As he debates whether he’ll take the plunge, New York coalesces around him. Cabbies takes bets on what time he’ll hit the ground. One couple meets, another reconciles. And aging beat cop Paul Douglas becomes the kid’s only lifeline.

Basehart is extraordinary as the city’s oddly polite victim, and Martin Gabel shines as a police psychiatrist. But the movie is truly about Douglas’ character, a working-class flatfoot all too familiar with disappointment who’s suddenly asked to explain why life is worth living. The reasons he gives are good ones: the first sip of beer on a hot day, an afternoon out fishing, cracking a tired old joke so you can see your wife smile.

The film originally had a much darker ending that was altered when the daughter of Fox exec Spyros Skouras committed suicide by leaping off Bellevue Hospital on the day of the film’s premiere. The edited version still packs a wallop.

Watching the movie, I thought of a phrase that seemed the exclusive property of sportswriters until I heard it in conversation recently. A man I was talking to in a bar in Los Angeles was telling me about a documentary he’d just seen about seminal punk band The New York Dolls – and specifically about Arthur ‘Killer’ Kane, who overcame tremendous odds to join the Dolls for a reunion concert. “You really should see it,” my newfound friend told me. “It’s full of wonderful music and great human drama.”

Human drama. No ticking clocks, no cartoon villains. Just the drama of being human. That’s what FOURTEEN HOURS has in spades.

Book: Watch Your Back!, by Donald E. Westlake (2005)

Today’s comedy lesson: Verbs can be funny! Example:

“Holy shit!,” Stan realized.

Movie: The Driver (1978)

Terrill Lankford – read his novel EARTHQUAKE WEATHER, you’ll thank me later – wrote about this stripped-down noir on Ed Gorman & Friends a while back. His review prompted me to catch up with it, one of the few films by Walter Hill that I hadn’t seen.

My film school professor summed up why I’m a Hill fan when he said that, alone among contemporary action filmmakers, Hill is able to get a genuine sense of danger into his movies. Just look at his best-known films. THE WARRIORS uncannily captures that feeling of dread that erupts an instant before violence does. 48HRS. may be famous for launching Eddie Murphy’s big screen career, but there’s real menace lurking in the corners of the frame – and in Nick Nolte’s performance.

Hill’s flair for depicting the low life remains evident in his later films, like the underrated JOHNNY HANDSOME. And he’s still riding tall in the saddle, winning an Emmy last year for directing the premiere episode of HBO’s DEADWOOD.

So why had I blown off THE DRIVER? Two words: Ryan O’Neal. I couldn’t see him as a tough, monosyllabic wheelman targeted for a personal vendetta by obsessed cop Bruce Dern. It was the tough part that bothered me; I figured the monosyllabic thing was doing O’Neal a favor.

The movie, made in Hill’s customary lean style, is an example of pure action cinema. There’s only the bare bones of a plot, which makes just enough sense to hang together. What it does have is stupendous vehicle work, great use of downtown Los Angeles locations, and a rough American approximation of the self-conscious cool of Jean-Pierre Melville films.

If THE DRIVER had been made in France, it would be hailed as a minor classic. If it starred anyone other than O’Neal, who’s too light a presence to register in this role, it would be a tough-guy staple. As it is, I’ll go along with TL on this one: it’s an interesting failure that’s definitely worth watching more than once.

And now you’ll get your chance. The movie debuted on DVD last week, and you can pick it up for as little as seven bucks.

Miscellaneous: Links

Speaking of pure action cinema, one of the best film stories of recent months was Michael Davis. After decades of working in Hollywood, he hit the big time with his original screenplay SHOOT-‘EM-UP. I had the chance to read it and thought it was a blast, a wild, kinetic ride that used Hill’s spare writing style to describe over-the-top mayhem.

And now that Clive Owen has been signed to play the lead, I’m ready to camp out in front of Mann’s Chinese Theater for tickets. Even if the movie doesn’t play there.

Book: Citizen Vince, by Jess Walter (2005)

Great. Now I’ve got to come up with something else to call my memoirs.

It wasn’t the title that got me to read this book, although to be honest it helped. It was the name Jess Walter on the cover. With his third novel, Walter vaults to the top of the short list of authors whose work I won’t miss.

His previous effort, LAND OF THE BLIND, perhaps shouldn’t have been marketed as a mystery novel; no real crime is committed, and yet everyone is somehow guilty. It was one of my favorite books of 2003.

The genre is thick with writers who claim to be regionalists, but Walter is the genuine article. All of his books feature loving depictions of Spokane, Washington, where Walter works as a newspaper reporter. His portrait of this overlooked, hardscrabble corner of America is one of his strengths.

The Vince of the title looks at the city with fresh eyes. He’s a low-level New York hood dropped into the Pacific Northwest courtesy of the witness protection program in 1980. Armed with one legitimate skill – making donuts – he tries to start his new life. Which includes, for the first time, voting. There’s a presidential election coming up, and Vince is determined to make the right choice: Carter or Reagan? Even the appearance of another East Coast thug isn’t about to deter Vince from fulfilling his obligations as a citizen.

It’s a terrific book – funny, packed with surprise cameos, and ultimately moving. Walter’s three-for-three now, and I can’t wait for the next one.

Movie: Wild, Wild Planet (1965)

TCM slipped this swinging ‘60s Italian SF epic on in the wee hours of the morning. That’s the ideal time to watch it, when you’re not sure if you’re dreaming the whole thing.

It’s set in a future when residents of Earth live in scale models of cities and travel in Matchbox cars. The planet is invaded by an army of inflatable women accompanied by four-armed clones of actor Michael Berryman, also inflatable. (The clones, not Michael Berryman. Well, maybe he is. I’ve never met him.) The invaders set about miniaturizing the world’s great thinkers. When one of the attacks is interrupted, a dwarf is brought in to take over the role of the victim.

Around this time, I began questioning whether I was truly awake.

It’s all part of a mad scientist’s plan to create a master race. Which also has something to do with melding two personalities into one body. I never figured out how the shrinking business fit in. Frankly, I don’t see how the scientist got grant money for any of it. The action ends with a tidal wave of cranberry juice and a credit for "wigs and hair-do."

With all the hours to be filled, you’d think more movies like this would turn up on cable. God knows they’re out there. And Antonio Margheriti, aka Anthony Dawson, is responsible for plenty of them. His son Edoardo set up a website in his honor that includes more information on this film.

Book: Everything Bad Is Good For You, by Steven Johnson (2005)

I haven’t read this book, but thanks to a mountain of publicity I got the gist of it. Johnson argues that popular culture, specifically television, is making us smarter in part because of the complexity of the storytelling.

I had written his argument off as a crock. Then I tried to watch an episode of STARSKY & HUTCH that I had fond memories of. After twenty minutes of tedium, I thought: maybe the man’s got a point.

R.I.P. Anne Bancroft

Her career speaks for itself. And don’t overlook her many stage credits.

I would not be the first to point out that her legendary role as Mrs. Robinson in THE GRADUATE typed her as “the older woman” far too early. As a result, much of her best work surfaces in unexpected places. Her single scene as an alcoholic selling out her daughter for a bottle in MALICE is like a mini-tribute to Thelma Ritter. In an appearance as Marge’s psychiatrist on THE SIMPSONS, her delivery permanently enshrined one line – “Let’s not go nuts” – in the Keenan family pantheon.

Most of all, I admired Anne Bancroft for her marriage to Mel Brooks. Largely because it seemed so improbable: elegance and boisterousness, joined for four decades. Brooks stood in such awe of his wife that he referred to her by both names. Bancroft once said of her husband, “I get excited when I hear his key in the door. It’s like, ‘Ooh! The party’s going to start!”

If there’s a better model in this life, I can’t think of one.

TV: Jeopardy!

Rosemarie here. Vince asked me to contribute a few words about my JEOPARDY! experience. You could call it a companion piece to his write-up of what it was like to be on ULTIMATE FILM FANATIC.

First, the try-out in Seattle. A 50 question timed test. A screen in front of the hotel ballroom flashing the questions while I and 99 other people who think we're pretty smart scrawl down our answers. I wasn't sure if I was doing well until I saw that the guy next to me had answered only half the questions. Eight of us made the cut - no word on what a passing grade was.

The contestant coordinators said they would call us for the show, if they did, within 14 months. I was summoned two weeks later. Too bad. I had planned to use those 14 months studying geography, the periodic table and words ending in "ola."

Taping day was fun, with a professional make-up artist on hand to glam us up a bit. During every commercial break she ran up and applied another layer. By the end of the show I looked like Glenda Jackson in ELIZABETH R.

In sum, while my buzzer technique was nonexistent and I have proven for all posterity that I am ignorant of fly fishing, I had a blast.

Plus all the folks at work said I looked great. So when do I get my sitcom pilot?

Movie: Cinderella Man (2005)

Playing boxer James J. Braddock, Russell Crowe somehow rearranges his features so that he looks vaguely like John Garfield. I don’t know how he did it. For that matter, I don’t know he managed to deliver another terrific performance, one that manages to be relentlessly physical even when he’s sitting still.

And he’s more than matched by Paul Giamatti. After AMERICAN SPLENDOR and SIDEWAYS, you have to ask: is there a better actor in American movies right now? I came across SPLENDOR on cable again last night, and it’s become one of those films that I can never turn off. It’s got so much to say about life, work, and art, and those rare instances when all three can be the same thing. Above all it’s got Giamatti, offering so many grace notes that every viewing yields a new delight.

Watching these two heavyweight actors spar is a treat. And Ron Howard shoots the hell out of the fight sequences, especially the climactic bout between Braddock and Max Baer (Craig Bierko).

But personally, I’d rather see a movie about the other guy.

TV: Jeopardy!

Another reminder to tune in and see my lovely wife Rosemarie on the show tonight. Or go to the JEOPARDY! website and watch her Hometown Howdy. Honest, that’s what they’re called.

Miscellaneous: Link

“Who else is still around who can say he wrote a screenplay with F. Scott Fitzgerald, yakked about movies with Sergei Eisenstein and is still owed $100 by Harry Cohn?” Budd Schulberg, that’s who.

Movie: Layer Cake (2004, U.S. 2005)

It’s a familiar story. A criminal (in this case a mid-level drug dealer) who fancies himself above the game makes plans to get out. It’s the skilled assurance of the telling that makes it special.

Producer Matthew Vaughn, making his debut behind the camera, puts the flashy tricks he learned from Guy Ritchie in service of the story. Their earlier collaborations could be fun, but there’s real psychological heft here.

Which receives its sharpest expression through the acting. Daniel Craig, The Man Who Might Be Bond, owns the screen from the first frame. Something tells me that whatever I’m supposed to feel when I watch Steve McQueen is what I’m feeling here. Colm Meaney again proves himself to be one of the most reliable actors in film. And the great Michael Gambon walks off with the movie as a Mephistophelean crime lord.

They’re all aided by the movie’s design. Smart threads, flash cars, guy’s guy furniture. Never underestimate the power of possessions to put a movie across.

But it’s J. J. Connolly’s script, based on his book, that really pops. It has an almost novelistic texture, weaving the story of gunman Crazy Larry into the background, making room for a jaunt into African politics that’s like something out of Ross Thomas.

Please note that I could have said “This CAKE has the right ingredients,” but I didn’t. No need to thank me.

TV: Jeopardy

Just an early reminder that Rosemarie, designer of and frequent contributor to this website, will be appearing as a contestant on Monday night’s show. Check your local listings.

TV: Steve McQueen: The Essence of Cool

This may cost me some street cred (like I have any), but here goes: I’ve never gotten Steve McQueen. Director Lawrence Kasdan, a fan who appears in this TCM documentary, describes watching him in THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN as a boy, and his comments hit on my problem with the actor: McQueen always seemed to be playing a child’s version of a man.

Using the doc’s title to put it another way, there’s the kind of cool that comes from genuinely not caring what anybody else thinks (see Marvin, Lee and Mitchum, Robert). And then there’s the McQueen variety, which always involves a look in the mirror of other people’s eyes. Granted, his style of acting can be enormously effective. But I can’t say I’ve ever watched a film because McQueen was in it.

This documentary doesn’t shy away from the actor’s dark side, and as a result delivers a well-rounded picture of him. It made me want to check out a few more of his films. And I’ll say this for him: he was one hell of a driver.

TV: Dancing With The Stars

LOST? Haven’t seen it. DESPERATE HOUSEWIVES? Nope. But put on a celebrity ballroom dancing competition in which the most famous participant is the guy who played J. Peterman on SEINFELD and I’ll watch it. Or at least record it and speed through it later on.

God, I love summer television.

DVD: Iceman (1984)

If I could put a word in Roger Ebert’s ear, I’d advise him to book this movie in his Overlooked Film Festival. I’d schedule it elsewhere if I could. A ‘Great Films of the 1980s’ series, say, or a retrospective of the best science-fiction movies ever made. It features two of my all-time favorite scenes, and what is easily one of the finest performances in cinema history.

And yet nobody’s heard of the damn thing.

For years I was a one-man cult following for this movie, watching it a dozen times in 1985 alone. The premise – a Neanderthal man is brought back to life – was played for laughs eight years later in the Brendan Fraser comedy ENCINO MAN. Here it’s served up straight, with bracing intelligence and a unique respect for both science and spirituality. Yes, it gets a tad earnest at times. But that’s part of its charm.

John Lone stars as the title character, in a performance that is simply unparalleled. He’s asked to portray a man 40,000 years out of time, and does so without resorting to tricks. Which is probably why his work was ignored when 1984’s awards were handed out. Lone may be better known for THE LAST EMPEROR and his stylish Chinese-American gangster in YEAR OF THE DRAGON (he’s the best thing about that movie, coming to DVD this month). But he was at his peak here, in one of the greatest displays of acting that I have ever seen.

Two scenes have always haunted me: Lone and anthropologist Timothy Hutton singing together, and the ending, which consistently reduces me to rubble. I watched the film for the first time in 15 years the other day. Both moments hold up.

The only drawback to revisiting ICEMAN was the DVD, which sets a new definition for the term ‘bare bones.’ There’s not even a menu. But I suppose a special edition is out of the question.

Screenwriter Charles ‘Chip’ Proser also wrote 1987’s SF romp INNERSPACE. He’s a fellow Boston University alumnus. Posters for his movies adorned the halls of the film school while I was there. Several of his screenplays are available online, including INTERFACE, which American Film named one of the ten best unproduced scripts in Hollywood in 1984.

Miscellaneous: Links

The Los Angeles Times considers the merits of the book tour with mystery novelist Harley Jane Kozak. MTV offers a few tips on making a quality superhero movie. And the San Francisco 49ers’ training film, complete with racist jokes and a lesbian wedding, leaks out. Hard to believe a team this hilarious went 2-14 last season.