Sunday, December 6, 2009: A Pop Diva Double Feature - "Mahogany," and "The Bodyguard"

Hello friends and neighbors---well the time has come for another movie night club extravaganza, our first since the end of this year’s Halloween series, Scary Bitches. As Joseph has returned from a grueling affair afar, he was given the honor of selecting the next film feature screening and theme, which happens to be pop divas in film, a double feature event showcasing Diana Ross and Whitney Houston.

For our first pop diva feature, we will be screening the 1975 camp classic Mahogany, starring Diana Ross, her wardrobe, Billy Dee Williams and Anthony Perkins (yes, the Anthony Perkins you should all know). Mahogany happens to be the one and only feature film to be directed by producer Berry Gordy. British auteur Tony Richardson (ex-husband of Vanessa Redgrave and father to those Richardson girls, including darling Natasha, who passed away tragically this year) was originally slated to direct but was fired by Gordy. And from one diva to another, it was widely known that Perkins hated Ross, considering her to be an amateur actress, and therefore, was indubitably an ass to her on the set. Oh, those shameless purists. In honor of the Oscar nominated song from the film, “Do You Know Where You’re Going To,” (which was later covered by both Mariah Cary and Jennifer Lopez), we will be serving “Do You Know Where You’re Going To Eat Mahogany Cake.”

And for our second pop diva feature, we will be screening the 1992 sensation, The Bodyguard, the romantic comedy thriller musical starring Whitney Houston and Kevin Costner. Now, The Bodyguard has an interesting back story—originally this was going to be a vehicle for Ms. Ross in the mid 1970’s, co-starring Steve McQueen, but was rejected as being too controversial (I’m assuming this was due to the explicit “interracial” nature of the story). Then again in the late 70’s this was going to be a vehicle for Diana Ross and her then boyfriend, Ryan O’Neal, which also never fell through (this time the blame being placed on the lovers’ quarrels). Other tidbits---Costner based his portrayal on Steve McQueen, this was director Lawrence Kasdan’s first written screenplay, the proposal for the film was rejected 67 times, and a hasty, hasty recut of the film was administered when test audiences were distracted (this is a screaming euphemism) by Ms. Houston’s performance. In honor of all things Whitney and The Bodyguard, we will be serving “I Will Always Love You Interracial Pastries.”

Please RSVP for showtimes.

Out of the Past: The Week in Film

Cess Pool Cinema:

1. Mannequin (1987) Dir. Michael Gottlieb - US

2. Trigger Happy (1996) Dir. Larry Bishop - US

Astounding Cinema:

4. Anna (1987) Dir. Yurek Bogayavicz - US

3. Au Hasard Balthazar (1966) Dir. Robert Bresson - France

2. Ghosts (2005) Dir. Christian Petzold - Germany

1. Clash By Night (1952) Dir. Fritz Lang - US

Theatrical Releases:

5. New Moon (2009) Dir. Chris Weitz - US 1/10

4. 2012 (2009) Dir. Roland Emmerich - US 7/10

3. Black Dynamite (2009) Dir. Scott Sanders - US 10/10

2. The Road (2009) Dir. John Hillcoat - US 10/10

1. Precious (2009) Dir. Lee Daniels - US 10/10

Re-watched Goodies:

1. Working Girl (1988) Dir. Mike Nichols -US

2. Fido (2006) Dir. Andrew Currie - US

3. The Ice Storm (1997) Dir. Ang Lee - US

For some bizarre reason, when I was a small child (about 6 years old, or so) I loved the made for television movie A Mom For Christmas (1990), which starred Olvia Newton John as a department store mannequin that comes to life and fulfills a small child's dream by becoming her mother and falling in love with her father (a plot device that sounds vaguely familiar, doesn't it? A mannequin here, a prostitute in Milk Money, 1994). However, I always confused it in my head with the 1987 box office success, Mannequin, starring Kim Catrall and bratpack alum Andrew McCarthy. Though I wouldn't think that A Mom For Christmas quite holds up to the standards I apply to cinema as a young adult, sitting down to watch Mannequin was an atrocious experience. First of all, Andrew McCarthy was never what one would call leading man material, and here he's more geeky/nerdy than ever as an idiot savant artist, unable to hold down any "blue collar" jobs. So passionate for his art is he, a mannequin he constructed in a department store comes to life. Perhaps avoiding any Pygmalion cliches, it turns out that Emmy the Mannequin (not Emmy the Award) is an ancient Egyptian princess, or something, though she's blonde and speaks English like your typical American ingenue, whom the gods have cursed/punished/granted her wish to avoid marrying a camel dung tradesman or some such emptyheaded blah blah. Catrall, though beautiful, is as vapid as they come---turns out this Egyptian princess has a knack for window displays, and helps McCarthy build stunning displays overnight in the Macy's-like store he's been hired in by Estelle Getty (yes, that Estelle Getty) though his supervisor, a sickly looking James Spader, is attempting to sabotage the success of the store. God, what a piece of shit this was. The only highlight of the film is Meshach Taylor playing a very flamboyant employee that befriends McCarthy, named Hollywood Montrose---but as gay friendly as this film seemed to be in the late 80's, Montrose is still castigated as a "mary" and a "fairy." This was director Michael Gottlieb's debut feature---he'd go on to unleash more cinematic garbage like The Shrimp on the Barbie (1990)---which was released as an Alan Smithee film, Mr. Nanny (1993) and A Kid in King Arthur's Court (1995). Mr. Gottlieb is still alive, though thankfully, he no longer directs films.

And this week's second cess pool selection goes to the film that was coined the worst film of 1996, Trigger Happy, which was filmed under the title Mad Dog Time. With an A-list cast, an incoherent plot and one of the worst scripts this side of the late '90s, this steaming pile was directed and written by a man named Larry Bishop. It was such a flop that it would be 12 years before someone didn't do their research and decided Mr. Bishop should be given another chance to direct a film, Hell Ride (2008), which, believe it or not, is not a self reflexive title indicating how it will feel to watch the film. Trigger Happy stars Richard Dreyfuss as a crime lord boss who is mentally unstable, driven to a breakdown when his girlfriend, Diane Lane (Yeah, right) breaks up with him. Pregnant, she hooks up with sharpshooter Jeff Goldblum, who works for Dreyfuss. Getting out of a sanitarium, Dreyfuss wants to kill Goldblum, but only Goldblum knows where Lane is, and Goldblum is also diddling her sister, Ellen Barkin. Along the way we also see Billy Idol, Gabriel Byrne (in an atrociously bad role), Burt Reynolds, Joey Bishop, Richard Pryor, Gregory Hines, Angie Everhart, Kyle MacLachlan, and Billy Drago---and none of them, not a single one, is believable. Put this piece in the compost--what a waste.

The 1987 film Anna stands as the directorial debut and only notable feature from director Yurek Bogayevicz, and mostly due to an astounding lead performance from Sally Kirkland, starring as the titular heroine, a New Wave Czech actress who emigrated to the US to follow her Czech director husband, who abandons her after they reach the states. Unable to recreate her success as an actress in New York, Anna is like all the other struggling actresses hungry for work. In her 40's, she's lucky to get the role of an understudy in a Broadway production. Meanwhile, a young woman from her native country seeks her out (model Paulina Porizkova) and emulates Anna, managing to make a success for herself as a film star, sending Anna into a nervous breakdown. Kirkland's performance is amazing, elevating this film from being more than a mediocre character study---her authenticity lends this film a distinct, European atmosphere, along the tragic lines of Sirk or Fassbinder. Kirkland had stiff competition at the Oscars in 1987, what with Glenn Close nominated for Fatal Attraction and Cher winning for Moonstruck---and it's too bad, it's quite a performance to be proud of.

Robert Bresson, painter turned art-house director (a term he despised, claiming those films labelled art house often lacked anything that could be called art) is a one of the world's greateast minimalist filmmakers, and not one whose films you should be watching when fatigued. Having recently watched his famous Au Hasard Balthazar (1966) starring his muse, Anna Wiazemsky, I'm eager to watch more of his work, as the only other film I've seen by him is the also excellent Les Dames du Bois de Boulougne (1945). Balthazar, supposedly a study on saintliness, tells the tale of Balthazar the donkey and Marie the girl, two abused creatures that share similar and at times, intertwined fates in a small town. Most of Bresson's work is open to interpretation, truly an auteur whose work is poetry in motion.

And I know it's serious that I've chosen works by modern German auteur Christian Petzold and classic auteur Fritz Lang over a Bresson work, but, such is life. Petzold is a filmmaker I've quite fallen in love with recently, mostly due to the extraordinary Yella (2007). I also quite enjoyed his modern take on The Postman Always Rings Twice with his film Jerichow (2008). His 2005 feature, Ghosts is kind of the evil German sister of David Auburn's The Girl in the Park (2007), if you were lucky enough to see that. At the heart of Ghosts is Nina, a late teens orphan living in a home for girls, it seems, in Berlin. Forced to participate with the other occupants in a work crew that cleans up the environment, Nina runs into a girl in trouble while cleaning in a park. Witnessing this young women nearly get raped, she supplies her with a shirt and the the girl follows her home. Her name is Toni, and she seems to have just broken up with her girlfriend. Nina is quite taken with her and they decide to run off together and try their luck at a casting agency. Meanwhile, a Frenchwoman who frequents Berlin in search of the daughter that was abducted from her nearly two decades ago, runs into the miscreant lesbians and is convinced that Nina is her daughter---but all is not right with Francoise, it seems (played by Marianne Basler, a dead ringer for Jessica Lange), who always seems to find young lost girls that could be her daughter. An interesting and quietly moving thriller, Ghosts plays with the theme of doppelgangers, mistaken identities, the ego and the id, make believe vs. reality, desperation and obsession. Petzold is an indeed an auteur, and surely one of the best filmmakers currently working in Germany.

Fritz Lang is indeed one of the greatest directors the world has ever known and ever will know. Lang's the real deal, who fled Germany in the early 30's and eventually came to the US under contract with MGM where he would direct some of the best film noir and genre films ever made. Lang was credited with influending filmmakers like Orson Welles, Alfred Hitchcock and Luis Bunuel. His 1952 feature Clash By Night is more of a melodramatic potboiler than a true noir, but it is often credited as being the latter. Starring Barbara Stanwyck as a woman who'd left her small coastal town, only to return bitter and cynical after the love of her life, a married man, died and left her penniless. Ending up at her brother's home, a fish cannery worker (who happens to be engaged to Marilyn Monroe, in somewhat of a small, but spunky role for her) Stanwyck is romanced by the doltish but well meaning Jerry (Paul Douglas), a co-worker of her brother's. Almost certain she would end up breaking his heart, Stanwyck marries Douglas againts her better judgement, gives him a daughter, and then breaks down into temptation by giving into the wolf at the door, her husband's best friend Earl (the always crass, always icky Robert Ryan). At the last minute Stanwyck questions whether she's making the right decision or not in leaving Douglas high, dry, and heartbroken, but it's where we see her longingly look out the window on the night sky as the waves crash onto the beach and the rocks, where inside her we realize that she's just not the woman meant to hang out the laundry, where it's her insides clashing against the grain, well, you realize that Lang's made a masterpiece ahead of its time, and gives Stanwyck a performance she shines in.

New Moon: The Death Knell of Cinema

If there’s anything true or certain about the second installment in the tween pop phenomenon called Twilight, it’s certain that, akin to abstinence, the socially sanctioned (and heterosexual, but not Catholic) practice it champions---it’s fucking dull. If cinema was a large face, a tabula rasa, if you will, then films like Twilight and New Moon are the boils and rank pustules that pop up on its surface, oozing and then bursting into flares that hose down the rest of the landscape, drowning and devouring anything ever known as quality. The Twilight obsession has gripped our culture like a strange and alarming disease, so much so it seems useless attempting to criticize or point out the obvious low quality of the product. Walking into the theater to see a Twilight film immediately makes me appreciate how Donald Sutherland and Brooke Adams feel in Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978), when they must walk amongst the dangerous aliens posing as humans, but must not display any sign of emotion that would blow their cover, so that they may avoid being slaughtered and devoured by the aggressive presence. But giving into apathy would only align me with the obvious lack of passion instilled in this garbage by the ridiculous authoress, the screenwriter, the directors involved and the sad sack child actors roped into this curdled cess pool called a narrative. The author of these abortions, whose name I don’t even care to write, I despise it to such an extent, has publicly claimed she never read or watched any other vampire literature or lore. Hence, her vampires famously trounce around during the day, glittering like bauxite in your flower garden. How convenient. It removes all those pesky night time rules and all sense of menace or danger. It is interesting to note that each Twilight title invokes a lack of sunlight, however---Twilight, New Moon, Eclipse---and why? Her plot-less, handicapped narratives have nothing to do with creatures of the night. The Twilight creatures are like diabetic vampires, about as watered down and neutered from their original forefathers as their fans are as brain atrophied, distant cousins to the problem solving humans they might once have resembled.

I’m not kidding---either Twilight fans are unable to see the low quality of this series they’ve digested with such zealous idolatry that Mormon gods must be cringing, or they simply don’t care to expect it. After all, I am going on about a series whose main audience is teenage heterosexual females. Except that teenage heterosexual females aren’t the only consumers gulping down this poison. For some insane reason I still can’t seem to wrap my mind around how Robert Pattinson has become a sex symbol. Every scene (of which consisted mainly of uncomfortable and glaring close-ups) in which Pattinson appears in this new film created the most visceral reaction I had to the screening, in that I could just imagine his rank odor oozing out of the celluloid that contained him. Seriously, we get to see nearly every detail of Mr. Pattinson---his dental work, his shriveled, tiny, pale, white body that makes him look like he’s HIV positive (I mean, he’s glittery and more gaunt than anyone dying in Longtime Companion, 1990).

No, I haven’t really even begun to dismantle the plot, have I? Well, that’s because New Moon is like one of those mutated viruses—it’s a replicated version of itself. Daring to have a running time over two hours, the film blasts Kristin Stewart as our heroine in nearly every frame. You can count the number of times she smiles on one hand, instead going for a tortured animal look, the kind employed by Jessica Lange when she played Frances Farmer----after Frances has the lobotomy. Kristin gets dumped by Pattinson, for her own good, at the beginning of the film’s narrative (not unlike when a guilty pedophile struggles with the fact that he’s taking advantage of children) and is thrown into a deep, deep, depression that causes her to be an adrenaline junkie, and into the arms of Taylor Lautner, himself developing into a wolf-cub and running with the shirtless Native American boys in the woods. A note on the popcorn kernel werewolves (as that is what I refer to them as, what with the terrible, mid-90’s CGI level werewolf effects)---their, ummm, debilitation seems to be due to a gene in the bloodline. Now, I want you all to forget they become werewolves, and substitute the word werewolf with alcoholic. I also find it nauseating that the underage child Lautner was disgustingly ogled in the theater as soon as his shirt was removed. The ten year old face and the long hair weren’t appealing, but as soon as those abdominal muscles were revealed, boy, did some classy ladies decide the need to swoon their fluids all over the carpets of AMC. Meanwhile, every time Stewart’s character gets physically close to Lautner, it looks like she’s smelled a big, nasty fart. But as a friend pointed out, that’s generally how Kristin Stewart looks. Indeed, it is a bit mind boggling that a whole series, now a cinematic empire, has been devoted to this teenage character that’s so dull, lifeless, and pathetic. What’s painfully obvious is that she’s an insecure young girl that’s incapable of being alone---this bitch needs a boyfriend, and she obviously feeds on the drama of having monstrous paramours---I mean, isn’t that the ‘thrill’ of this romance attracting all these women? There’s nothing in this film even remotely resembling chemistry----and the question remains, what human boy/man would fall for a monotonous girl like the Stewart character, much less an immortal over 100 years old?

Michael Sheen (oh why, Michael, are you in this?) pops up as the very British head of the very Euro trash vampire clan that makes all the rules about vampire deaths and other important things you only conveniently find out about at the last minute (as if the author was telling stories to keep herself alive, not unlike Scheherazade in the Arabian Nights), and joyously announces that he, too, is unable to read Stewart’s thoughts. ‘Nothing!’ he cried. Of course. There’s nothing there to read---she’s a void. There isn’t one stilted conversation or gaze that can be held for more than five seconds to be had in the film. Even more offensive is the attempt at social commentary within the film. Playing at the local cineplexes is a zombie film, in which Stewart’s friend attempts to navigate through a one-sided conversation about the self reverential tropes of zombie cinema and consumerism. Bitch, please. Then there’s a romantic film called “Love Spelled Backwards Is Love,” and an action film called “Face Punch.” Oh, I suppose I’ll just lovingly refer to New Moon as “Brain Atrophy.” And then there’s Dakota Please-I-Need-Audiences-To-Love-Me-Again Fanning. What an awkward young wisp of a thing she is, playing an ancient vampire named, errr, Jane. Yes, how chicly European that is. I can see the author, tapping away at her keyboard as she named her European vampires. “Let’s see, Caius, Aro, and oh, what’s a good foreign sounding European named for a female vampire whose special power is inflicting pain, much like myself? Oh, yes, Jane!” And for a girl hell bent on becoming a vampire in order to jump the bones of her vampire boyfriend, just what seems so exciting about the prospect of marriage? I mean, if Stewart is going to be brought into an immortal union with the vampire clan, why the sharp intake of breath that’s supposed to leave us salivating for more when Pattinson asks her to marry him at the film’s conclusion? Isn’t that kind of the point, by turning her into a vampire? Of course, this bitch was only alone for several months before she found a werewolf boyfriend, so I guess I’d need some clarification as well. My initial thought, of course, was that something like the Defense of Marriage Act doesn’t have jack to say about vampires. Ere goes, supernatural Mormon creatures can be officially united in the US. But not the gays. And sadly, this new generation of tweens and Twilight moms forget that horror films and vampire cinema historically was used as an outlet for homosexual themes (sometimes dipping into exploitation, oh well). As a side note, I recently re-watched Kathy Bates’ stupendous performance in Misery (1990). I can’t help but draw comparisons between Annie Wilkes’ obsession with the “Misery” pop-phenom books in the narrative of that tale with the real life injurious devotees of Twilight. Those who wish to call the Twilight series quality cinema are about as simple as the followers of Marshall Applewhite, creator of the Heaven’s Gate cult, that thought they’d be carried away on the comet Hale-Bopp and committed mass suicide. If they handed out little white pills to consume at the entrance to the theater, Twilight fans would gladly swallow them.

A friend of mine, who, sadly, happens to be a Twilight acolyte, asked me what I was trying to prove when I told her I would be seeing the film. As a lover of cinema, it is a bit disheartening to sit in a theater with a throng of insipid humans that either champion this toxic sewage or are simply apathetic bystanders, merely penciled into their seats as they ingest this week’s popular movie. However I firmly believe that people need to speak out. In a world where we are forever in constant danger from the likes of Sarah Palin running for some official office, it’s up to those with standards to stand up and say, “Fuck this bullshit,” for that’s exactly what it is, my friends. Remember how the Nazi party was voted into power in Germany? We all look back and shake our heads at moments in history like that, but it’s exactly these moments in time where we have large amounts of people championing popular garbage like this that regression takes us by the throat and stuffs us into dark nightmares. Perhaps Twilight is simply a self-reflexive title, in reference to the state of cinema today---shrouded in the dark shadows of the mob comprised of the feeble minded masses.

Out of the Past: The Week In Film

The Banal, the Blah, the Banausic:
1. Twin Falls Idaho (1999) Dir. Michael Polish - US
2. The Proposal (2009) Dir. Anne Fletcher - US

Guilty Pleasure Cinema:
1. Screaming Mimi (1958) Dir. Gerd Oswald - US
2. MST3K 3000: Gunslinger (1956) Dir. Roger Corman - US

Astounding Cinema:
6. Odd Man Out (1947) Dir. Carol Reed - UK
5. Dancing Lady (1933) Dir. Robert Z. Leonard - US
4. The Bride Wore Black (1968) Dir. Francois Truffaut - France
3. Sounder (1972) Dir. Martin Ritt - US
2. Brothers (2004) Dir. Susanne Bier - Denmark
1. In the Electric Mist (2009) Dir. Bertrand Tavernier - US/France

Theatrical Releases:
2. Skin (2009) Dir. Anthony Fabian - UK/South Africa 10/10
1. Bachelor Mother (1939) Dir. Garson Kanin - US 10/10

Rewatched Goodies:
1. Serial Mom (1994) Dir. John Waters - US

I really, truly wanted to cherish and love and enjoy the well received conjoined twin indie drama Twin Falls Idaho (1999) directed by Michael Polish and starring the director and his brother Mark. It had all the right elements, it seemed, to be a film that cinephiles like myself exist for---creepy conjoined twins, a love story, with high praise and accolades coining it a Lynchian romance. But I just couldn’t stand it. As a directorial debut, the film is impressive---but there are way too many narrative holes that quirky just can’t cover up. Though the Polish brothers have steadily directed feature films since their hailed debut (Northfork, 2003 and The Astronaut Farmer, 2006 attracting impressive casts), much of Twin Falls Idaho suffers most from a severely off-key and stilted performance from it’s female lead, former model Michele Hicks (prancing around on screen like a poor man’s Jennifer Connelly). And yes, Lesley Ann Warren even makes an appearance as the mother of the conjoined twins, though each scene with her feels sorely out of place, making this film all style and no substance.

The best thing about The Proposal is that is was supposed to be headlined by Julia Roberts and luckily she was too proud to take a pay cut, paving the way for at least a decent comedic actress to take over the lead role, that being Sandra Bullock. Yes, yes, I’m completely aware that Ms. Bullock’s done her fair share of mediocre romantic comedies, but she’s never been as catastrophically talent-less as the toothy, formulaic zombie tool, criminally over-paid, lamprey-mouthed horse of an actress Julia Roberts has always been. That said, director Anne Fletcher (27 Dresses, 2008) takes no time to build any amount of believable chemistry between Bullock and male lead Ryan Reynolds, who, by the way, is less of the stilted smug asshole that he usually is. That leaves the sole entertaining reason to ever see this film in the hands of the hilarious Betty White (though I prefer her similar and more foul mouthed turn in Lake Placid, 1999). Oh, and one scene of hilarity involving an eagle and a puppy. Other than that, we have excellent actors (Mary Steenburgen) being wasted in absolutely pointless roles alongside utter crap performers like Malin Akerman (who looks like a Swedish farm lass whose head has been inflated to the bursting point with helium). Yeah, not a whole lot to love about this by-the-books chick flick.

Oh Anita Ekberg and her lovely breasts---it’s almost a thing of sadness to see her films before she ballooned into a monstrous bulk, as she was such a beautiful creature. However, Screaming Mimi (1958), a C-grade film noir that’s never been officially released on video or DVD, is hardly a film that shows off any of her assets, even when she was often limited to showing off the physical ones (catch her blowsy turn in La Dolce Vita, 1960). The extremely ludicrous plot centers around Ekberg going crazy after she’s haphazardly attacked by an escaped maniac from an asylum in an outside shower while visiting her artist step-brother. The doctor treating her falls in love with her beauty and convinces her step brother that she’s dead, moves her out of state and controls her mind (which the doctor makes seem, well, effortless) while letting her be employed as a night club sensation in a nightclub owned by a woman played by Gypsy Rose Lee. Except that Ekberg’s act is anything but sensational. She can’t sing or dance, so instead she enters the stage with a tattered dress and chains and seems to perform acts resembling futile calisthenics rather than anything provocative or sexual in nature. Her face expressionless, she doesn’t even break a sweat in her lazy writhings---yet the audience cheers anyway. Oh yes, her step-brother created a sculpture of Ekberg screaming while she was under attack, sold to various art-houses around the country---coined the ‘Screaminig Mimi.” Ekberg goes batshit crazy when she sees the sculpture, which leads her to kill people, for some reason. Meanwhile, she develops a romance with the lead journalist covering the murders of exotic stripper-blondes around the city. The saddest thing about the whole production is that it was helmed by German import Gerd Oswald, who could prove himself more than capable at directing a decent film with good material and good actors (see A Kiss Before Dying, 1956 or the Stanwyck headliner, Crime of Passion, 1957).

Well you can’t expect a MST3K treated film to be a diamond in the rough, especially one directed by Roger Corman. Filmed in seven days and headlined by Beverly Garland (of “My Three Sons” and “The Bing Crosby Show”) and also featuring hammy lead John Ireland, Gunslinger is a B-Western with a lot of attitude and absolutely nowhere to go. In fact, this little turkey was even hard to sit through with the expert commentary of the MST3K crew, which involves a woman (Garland) taking over as temporary sheriff when her sheriff husband is gunned down. Rumor has it, actress Allison Hayes (playing Garland’s saloon owning nemesis) purposely slid off her horse and broke her arm in order to get out of completing the film. Corman filmed her right up until the ambulance arrived.

Carol Reed is a favorite director of mine---any film lover who hasn’t seen The Third Man (1949) or Our Man In Havana (1959) should make a point to see them ASAP, and so I hurriedly sat down to watch Odd Man Out (1947) upon discovering that MGM was losing the rights to the motion picture next month, therefore making the film unavailable on DVD and on Netflix streaming. Headlined by James Mason playing an IRA agent in Belfast (yes, James Mason with an Irish accent), the film’s main focus is on the survival of Mason after he is fatally wounded after a failed bank robbery. Mason spends most of this noirish yarn in pain, slowly dying while he hides out in the cold streets of Belfast while the police search for him. Reed’s film is most known for the hallucinatory atmosphere evoked by its beautiful cinematography as Mason gets weaker and weaker, culminating in a fitting, yet dark ending. One particular famous scene has Mason staring down at faces appearing in the bubbles of spilt beer on a bar top—and it’s interesting to note that Mason himself considered this his finest performance, and it is indeed a fine one. The Heights Theater in Minneapolis, Minnesota has booked a print of the film in December for a screening, right before the film may possibly disappear for good.

Best known as Fred Astaire’s film debut, Dancing Lady (1933) is also significant for the fact that Joan Crawford was Astaire’s first onscreen dance partner. One of the eight Clark Gable/Joan Crawford vehicles, Dancing Lady was one of Crawford’s favorite films, playing a burlesque dancer who nabs the lead in a Broadway production and the heart of the director. Dramatic tension ensues when the show’s rich producer (Franchot Tone, who would become Mr. Crawford #2) cancels production on the show to have Crawford all for himself. Of course, the show must go on, and it does, featuring an expensive enactment of the show, which includes lots of sumptuous choreography and impressively elaborate set pieces. However, one particular segment features the chorus girls singing---and you’ll understand why you’re not supposed to let them sing after seeing this unintentionally funny scene. I prefer the Crawford and Gable pairing in Dance, Fools, Dance (1931), but this frothy little feature’s worth a look.

I believe that plot-wise, Tarantino’s Kill Bill (2003) owes a lot to a little potboiler by New Wave artist Francois Truffaut, The Bride Wore Black (1968), featuring Jeanne Moreau as a woman whose husband is shot down on the stairs right outside the chapel, while she vows to wreak vengeance on those responsible. Spending the running time seducing and killing the five men responsible, Moreau happens to look frumpy and somewhat uncomfortable in nearly every ensemble she’s placed in---which makes her even more entertaining to watch in her wicked machinations. This is Truffaut’s homage to Hitchcock, whom he was obsessed with. Based on a story by Cornell Woolrich (who also wrote the source material for Hitchcock’s Rear Window, 1954) Truffaut also hired Bernard Herrmann to compose the score. An entertaining little piece of French murderous chic, catch it for the compelling Moreau.

A depressing, though overall uplifting tale about Depression-era black sharecroppers in the South, Sounder (1972) sports Oscar nominated performances from Cicely Tyson and Paul Winfield. After Winfield is caught stealing food, it’s up to Tyson and her children to continue harvesting the crops or be turned out of their home while Winfield serves a year of hard labor. The story really focuses on their son, David (played by Kevin Hooks) as he struggles to find out which work camp his father was assigned to (with the help of a friendly woman that his mother does laundry for, Mrs. Boatwright, played by Carmen Mathews). A truly heartfelt film about Depression era life, the lead performances are definitely not worth missing. Sounder is the name of their dog and I don’t know why exactly this is the name of the film. Intriguingly, Kevin Hooks would go on to direct a 2003 television remake starring Carl Lumbly and Suzzanne Douglas.

Before the soon to be released American remake hits theaters this December, I made it a mission to watch Susanne Bier’s critically acclaimed original film, Brothers (2004), starring Connie Nielsen, Ulrike Thomsen and Nikolaj Lie Kaas, and it is truly an amazing film that I am almost certain the remake will not be able to live up to. It’s interesting to note that Bier (an excellent filmmaker, who also helmed After the Wedding, 2006 and Things We Lost in the Fire, 2007) anchors the film around Nielsen, a woman whose husband (Thomsen) is sent to Afghanistan. When he’s pronounced dead after a fatal helicopter crash, Nielsen looks to her husband’s troubled, recently released from prison younger brother (Kaas), who also looks to Nielsen for emotional support. Though they don’t truly engage in any sexual activity, it’s quite obvious that the possibility is there---until it’s discovered that Thomsen is alive and has been a POW in Afghanistan after having survived some truly horrific events that he refuses to talk about but have obviously affected his mental health. Upon Thomsen’s return, emotions and events spiral out of control, making this a tasteful, tragic, and illuminating film of great beauty.

And by a nose, the number one film this week is the English speaking debut of French master Bertrand Tavernier, In the Electric Mist (2009), which screened at Berlin but received a direct to DVD release in this country, which is quite unfair as this features an excellent performance from lead Tommy Lee Jones (though conflicts between star and director were widely reported) as well as excellent support from Mary Steenburgen, John Goodman, Peter Sarsgaard, Kelly Macdonald, and Ned Beatty. Based on novel by James Lee Burke, Mist is set in Post-Katrina New Iberia Bayou in Louisiana. Jones is Dave Robicheaux, a detective investigating the murder of a young prostitute that may or may not have something to do with a mobster (John Goodman) who is now a film producer, sinking his money into a movie currently filming there with an alcoholic Hollywood star (Sarsgaard) and his TV star girlfriend (Macdonald) also in tow. Jones simultaneously stumbles upon the corpse of a black man, murdered decades before, gunned down in a swamp, a crime which Jones had been witness to as a young child, which he wishes to dredge up and properly execute justice, much to the chagrin of the murderers. With the current investigation of young prostitutes in New Iberia paired with the angry feelings of the past, Jones is joined by an FBI agent on the case (Justina Machado) as things begin to heat up, endangering Jones and his family. An excellent crime thriller, and a well filmed Burke adaptation, if you like the Southern gothic neo-noir, this is the film for you. I am saddened that it arrived with such a muted reception on our shores (rumor has it that different prints were released state side, with a ‘toned’ down ending as well).

Out of the Past: The Week in Film

The Banal, the Blah, the Banausic:
1. The Man Who Cheated Himself (1950) Dir. Felix E. Feist - US


Guilty Pleasure Cinema:
1. How Awful About Allan (1970) Dir. Curtis Harrington - US


Astounding Cinema:
6. Beyond Rangoon (1995) Dir. John Boorman - US
5. Therese Raquin (1953) Dir. Marcel Carne - France
4. The Stepfather (1987) Dir. Joseph Ruben - US
3. Pretty Poison (1968) Dir. Noel Black - US
2. Born To Kill (1947) Dir. Robert Wise - US
1. Before the Fall (2008) Dir. F. Javier Gutierrez - Spain



Theatrical Releases:
4. The Fourth Kind (2009) Dir. Olatunde Osunsanmi - US 5/10
3. New York, I Love You (2009) Dir. Various - US 6/10
2. The Box (2009) Dir. Richard Kelly - US 10/10
1. Thirst (2009) Dir. Park Chan-wook - South Korea 10/10

Oh, poor Felix E. Feist, I’m not sure he could direct an interesting film if his life depended on it. After the dismal (though momentarily entertaining) This Woman Is Dangerous (1952), I caught this film, The Man Who Cheated Himself (1950), a B-noir of some minor acclaim. The plot’s pure noir, concerning a cop (Lee J. Cobb), dating a rich dame (Jane Wyatt) who kills her husband (kind of accidentally, in a hysterical and bizarre way) but their plot to cover up the murder is thwarted by the cop’s newly hired kid brother (John Dall). Except at every turn, at every frame of film, I felt like strangling John Dall, playing the bright and shiny kid bro with the heart of gold admiration for his older, crooked brother to the proverbial hilt. Dall, no stranger to noir (his similar performance in Gun Crazy, 1950, works quite well) sinks this film. Cobb’s a bit of a dull lead here, though he’s quite the celebrated character actor in classics like On the Waterfront (1954), 12 Angry Men (1958), and The Brothers Karamazov (1958). No, the biggest mistake is neglecting our femme fatale, Jane Wyatt, who Fritz Lang puts to good use in House By the River (1950).

The first part of an Anthony Perkins ‘double-bill’ I sat down to watch with my mother and sister was the 1970 TV film, How Awful About Allan, directed by a personal favorite of mine, Curtis Harrington. The film opens with Perkin’s father burning to death in his room, an event it seems that may have been avoided if Perkins had sprung to action. Instead, Pa dies and his sister (Julie Harris) gets badly burned. Perkins has a sort of guilt breakdown, suffers from hysterical blindness and is treated to an eight month stay in a mental institution. After his release, still blind, he goes to live with his sister again, who now has what appears to be a large chicken breast attached to her face (the prosthetic skin used to cover up her scars). Enter Joan Hackett, the girl next door and the once almost fiancée of the Perkin’s character---don’t ask, they don’t elaborate. The movie then tends to be a bit bland in its obvious plot that someone is either trying to drive Allan completely insane or he is insane. While the production’s a bit wooden, when the plot’s not being bland, it’s all a bit campy, and hence worthy of being a slice of guilty pleasure cinema. I recommend for fans of the three leads or any Harrington nuts out there, though this is far from his best directorial effort.

I do quite like Patricia Arquette, who seemed to get a plethora of intriguing and exceptional roles in the 90’s, working with directors like Scorsese, David Lynch, Ole Bornedal, Tim Burton, and Tony Scott. Here she’s paired with John Boorman for the historical action adventure, Beyond Rangoon (1995), a tale “inspired” by true events (meaning our lead heroine white lady is most likely entirely fictional) of an American tourist caught up in the democratic uprising against the dictatorship in late 80’s Burma (which is now Myanmar), an event that was not being documented by the US media at the time. Arquette’s character is used to such a degree that it’s obvious she’s simply an entry or diving board into more important subject matters, a foil for identification purposes, if you will. But no matter, she’s still a fierce little cookie. Frances McDormand pops up in the beginning as Arquette’s sister, the reason for their “vacation” in Burma, while Spalding Gray is a tour guide. Directed by John Boorman of Deliverance (1972) and Excalibur (1981) fame.

There have been few actresses worldwide that have been as luminous, as beautiful, and as striking and talented as that of Simone Signoret. I was highly intrigued that Chan Park-wook’s latest film, the excellent Thirst (2009) uses Emile Zola’s tale Therese Raquin as a basic template, namely the tale of a repressed and lonely housewife married to a simpering weakling attached to a domineering mother in a fabric shop. Though I’d always meant to read the novel, I finally sat down to watch Marcel Carne’s (Children of Paradise, 1945) film noir-ish adaptation of Zola’s novel, filmed in 1953 starring Signoret in the signature role. Carne, a master filmmaker, weaves the spellbinding melodrama into noir territory, but the tale never becomes about a woman leading a man astray. Italian actor Raf Vallone stars as the truck driver Signoret falls for, the man who kills her awful husband, an irritating performance by Jacques Duby. While the definitive cinematic adaptation of Zola’s masterpiece seems to be the UK 1980 mini series starring Kate Nelligan, Carne’s version is worthy of attention. See it for Simone.

Before seeing what looked like a direct-to-DVD remake of The Stepfather, I sat down to watch the 1987 original and was blown away at the production value, that not only includes a well written script, somewhat believable characters and a lead performance that elevates this film above the ludicrous. Terry O’Quinn (who contemporary viewers will associate only with the television series, “Lost” or “Alias”) stars as Jerry Blake, a man determined to have an old fashioned family that relies heavily on traditional, American Pie family values---except that when anything subversive hints at ripples in the heteronormative epidermis, he goes apeshit crazy and kills his family, thus having to move to another town and start up again. I don’t know what to examine first---the obvious implications the movie points to about what really happens under surfaces of domestic bliss in the American household, or the fact that there’s so many single mothers raising children desperate for a father figure. What must be every single female suburbanite’s nightmare ensues (though if I was a single well-to-do soccer mom trapped in the burbs I’d mostly be concerned with whether or not I actually looked as simple and ridiculous as Shelley Hack). All in all, a must see for horror fans---especially if you like well made entries in the genre.

The second half of my Anthony Perkin’s double bill is an excellent little late 60’s feature called Pretty Poison (1968), which also stars a luminous Tuesday Weld and Beverly Garland as her mother. The film begins with Perkins leaving a mental asylum (boy, don’t they all start that way!) and upon finding work in a factory, he spies the beautiful Weld in cheerleader practice one day and becomes enamored with her. Approaching her, he convinces her that he is a CIA agent and he needs her help in a mission---and she responds, all too willingly. Perkins initially instigates an innocent game for flirtation purposes, but when Weld starts killing people in cold blood (all for the agency) Perkins realizes he somehow released a monster. Tuesday Weld gives an amazing and exceptional performance in this film (though her only Oscar nod was for playing Diane Keaton’s sister in Looking For Mr. Goodbar, 1978). Directed by Noel Black, the cinematography for the film is gorgeous, lending the film a timeless, modern look that somehow takes it out of the late 60’s---it looks like it could have been filmed recently. And then there’s the tagline for the film: “She’s such a sweet girl. He’s such a nice boy. They’ll scare the hell out of you.” Indeed.

Speaking of scary performers, there haven’t been many like Lawrence Tierney (not a relation to Gene) whose menacing on screen performances are outmatched by the real life persona. Robert Wise (a favorite director of mine) cast Tierney as his lead in Born To Kill (1947), a man who fits the title. Tierney was known for his shocking, violent bar brawls at the time, seemingly unable to go anywhere without causing a fight (as a grizzled old man, he showed no signs of letting up, enraging all the cast members and Tarantino on the set of Reservoir Dogs, 1992, and frightening the entire cast of “Seinfeld” as an appearance as Elaine’s dad so much so that he was never asked to return). If you could make Ben Affleck look mean and menacing, that’s how Tierney looks in Born To Kill, playing a man that murders his girl and her paramour and falling in love with the equally insidious woman who discovers their bodies and says nothing, played by one of the most wicked femme fatales I’ve yet to see, the strangely beautiful Claire Trevor. While Tierney’s attracted to Trevor, she has no money, her large income dependent on her rich step-sister who own the San Francisco newspaper. Seducing her sister in order to be close to her, Trevor is also involved with a rich playboy for his money, that soon abandons her when it becomes obvious that she’s infatuated with the, err, extreme assholishness of Tierney. If you like a hard and dirty little noir, this is a not to miss film.

And the number one film this week is a little pre-apocalyptic Spanish film that seems to have fallen under the radar, Before the Fall (2008). In something like 72 hours, an asteroid is going to hit the earth and most likely obliterate the human race. Victor Clavijo stars as Ale, a down and out loser that’s always lived in the shadow of his successful brother, a heroic figure from his youth, who happened to have caught a serial killer of children. Well, since pandemonium grips the world, prisoners everywhere are revolting and escaping, causing Ale’s mother (who he lives with) to conclude that said serial killer, who vowed vengeance, will most likely be attempting to wreak it on the brother’s children. Fleeing to her older son’s house with Ale, they discover that his children have been left alone while their parents are on a trip somewhere, and unaware of the turn of world events. Attempting to placate and protect the children, Ale and his mother say nothing of the impending meteor. Director F. Javier Gutierrez hatchets up the intensity when night falls, grandma disappears, and a menacing stranger appears like a wolf at the door, while Ale is too young to remember what really happened in his youth. An excellent, and intense little film, it seems that pure genre fans didn’t embrace the ending, which I found fitting, tragic, and particularly moving. Excellent cinema.

Out of the Past: The Week in Film

Guilty Pleasure Cinema:

1. Dragonwyck (1946) Dir. Joseph Mankiewicz - US

Astounding Cinema:

9. Arch of Triumph (1948) Dir. Lewis Milestone - US

8. Dracula (1931) Dir. Tod Browning - US

7. Frenzy (1972) Dir. Alfred Hitchcock - US

6. Darkman (1990) Dir. Sam Raimi - US

5. Inland Empire (2006) Dir. David Lynch - US

4. Martha (1974) Dir. Rainer Werner Fassbinder - West Germany

3. Christine (1983) Dir. John Carpenter - US

2. Kansas City (1996) Dir. Robert Altman - US

1. Leave Her to Heaven (1945) Dir. John M. Stahl - US

Theatrical Releases:

2. The Canyon (2009) Dir. Richard Harrah - US 7/10

1. An Education (2009) Dir. Lone Scherfig - UK 10/10

All in all, a pretty solid week of cinema, with one guilty pleasure pic from 1946, the directorial debut of one of my favorite directors, Joseph Mankiewicz (who helmed one of my favorite films ever made, Suddenly, Last Summer, 1959), the Gene Tierney/Vincent Price headliner, Dragonwyck, a gothic romance based on the novel by Anya Seton (an author who specialized in historical romance pieces---her modern day counterparts would be authors like Tracy Chevalier and Philippa Gregory). Dragonwyck is indeed a 1940’s Hollywood picture—it’s very restrained and attempts to be rather epic in scope. The usual over the top Vincent Price is somber and serious, while Tierney, though breathtaking, is saddled with playing a simple country girl seduced and controlled by the landowner of Dragonwyck (much of the dynamics of the plot center around vague, though apparent, Marxist beliefs concerning ownership of land). Price is obsessed with having a son, and when Tierney gives birth to a boy with a bad heart (oh, he disposed of his older first wife since she couldn’t have babies), all hell breaks loose. The most intriguing part of the whole production is a young Jessica Tandy, playing Tierney’s crippled, Irish hand maid. Yes, she is blatantly crippled and blatantly Irish. Price, it seems, is very disturbed at this, uttering the best lines of the film over the crippled Tandy: “Deformed bodies depress me.” And when his son dies, he bemoans the fact that a disgusting cripple like Tandy was allowed to live while his own, “healthy looking” son was allowed to die. That’s some good shit. Otherwise, the film veers off into inconsequentiality by the end, while we’re left to believe the flaccid, Marxist doctor (Glenn Langan) that has pined for Tierney throughout, is going to chase after her. And Tierney’s parents are played by the severe looking Anne Revere (she won an Oscar for Gentleman’s Agreement, 1947) and Walter Huston. Both religious zealots, if Huston annoyed you at all as Joan Crawford’s enemy in Rain (1932), he’ll do the same here.

Speaking of Lewis Milestone’s Rain (1932), I caught Milestone’s adaptation of Erich Maria Remarque’s Arch of Triumph (1948), an epic love story amongst the cafes and cobblestones of Paris, reuniting Ingrid Bergman and Charles Boyer after the highly successful Gaslight (1944). Boyer stars as a German doctor, terrorized and forced to flee Germany due to an antagonistic and cruel Nazi officer (played by Charles Laughton) who kills the woman Boyer loves. Living as an illegal immigrant in Paris, Boyer stumbles upon Bergman, desperate and attempting to kill herself. Bringing her to his apartment, the two eventually fall in love. However, unlike similar war time romance epics, Arch of Triumph is a curious beast---we watch them fall out of love and into bitter turpitude. And of course, the film ends before WWII actually begins, making this one of the most nihilistic 1940’s Hollywood films I’ve yet to experience. And when the last 3/4 becomes a revenge thriller as Boyer satisfies his blood lust for Laughton, you won’t be able to predict the degree of 40’s nihilism you’re about to experience.

Yes, I’d actually never seen the original Dracula (1931), directed by one of my favorite American directors ever, Tod Browning, who directed excellent films like The Unknown (1927), Freaks (1932) and The Devil Doll (1936). Browning had his share of films I didn’t love either, such as Outside the Law (1930) and especially the awful, Mark of the Vampire (1935), with which Browning was shamelessly trying to capitalize on the success of Dracula (both films star Bela Lugosi as a vampire). Though obviously different from Stoker’s novel, the film will always be best known for it’s gorgeous cinematography and creepy performance by Lugosi, who would never really do anything better (it didn’t really help his career when he refused to learn English for many years). Strangely, many films using Lugosi imagery to reference Dracula tend to use close up shots of Lugosi from White Zombie (1932). While Dracula doesn’t manage to be my favorite Browning production, it is undoubtedly an important film, and truly is the first of its kind.

On my way through Hitchcock’s works, I watched his second to last feature, Frenzy (1972), which is notable for several reasons---it is the first Hitchcock film to be rated R and also his first film to be made in his native Britain in over 20 years (Hitch was reportedly bitter that Michael Caine turned down the role that would go to Barry Foster). Frenzy plays like a ghoulish re-hash of Jack the Ripper, a serial killer tale about a killer known as the “neck-tie” murderer, a man who rapes and then strangles women with a neck tie. Jon Finch is our lead, accused of the crimes due to his ex-wife’s secretary (a mousy Jean Marsh) spying him leaving his strangled ex-wife’s body in her office. The rape and murder of Finch’s ex-wife (Barbara Leigh-Hunt) is the most graphic and infamous scene of the film. Another notable actress is Billie Whitelaw, whom audience will always remember as Mrs. Baylock, Damien’s Satanic nanny in The Omen (1976). Altogether, a very Hitchcockian production, but far from my favorite.

Speaking of Hitchcockian flairs, I can’t believe I neglected to realize how much fun Sam Raimi’s Darkman (1990) was. Having seen snippets of it as a child, I had always reduced it to a hammy, inconsequential film. Upon sitting down to watch it as an adult, I loved it’s B-super hero quality, with a score by Danny Elfman making it seem more like a rip off of Batman (1989) than it really is. Liam Neeson is entertaining as a burnt up scientist attempting to exact revenge on the vague mobster-like madmen that are responsible for his disfigurement, and Frances McDormand is his girlfriend. Of course highly illogical, Darkman was around before the comic book adaptation had become old hat. And Neeson was always good at kicking ass. And every time he bellows his girlfriend’s name like an angry bull charging the matador, we had to rewind it and watch it over again. “Julie!”

Immediately after watching David Lynch’s grand opus, Inland Empire (2006), I was almost certain that I didn’t like it---but it’s grown on me. It’s the type of film that takes a patient cinephile to sit through and mull over. If it was a straightforward film, it would probably be described as terrifying. And though I do admit there’s some brilliance tucked in, folded over, stretched out and broken into Inland Empire, I still want to ask Lynch to hire a ruthless editor---there’s really no need for the film to be 3 hours long. Laura Dern does give an exceptional performance, and the film may indeed be saying something about the treatment of actresses in Hollywood. The threadbare plot centers around Dern as an actress, scoring a major part in a new film directed by Kinglsey (Jeremy Irons) and co-starring Justin Theroux as the male lead. But after one script read through, the film heads into pure Lynch territory, where indeed we have a “woman in trouble” but we can’t tell if Dern is the actress, the character, another character, a victim of a cruel joke, or maybe even Dern herself. This is a film that requires more viewings than Mulholland Drive (2001). It’s just too bad that I don’t want to take the time to give it those viewings.

One of my favorite Fassbinder muses is Margit Carstensen---I do believe I like her more than Hanna Schygulla, most likely because of her brilliant performance in The Bitter Tears of Petra Von Kant (1972)---which they both star in---so needless to say, I have been extremely excited to sit down and watch Fassbinder’s television film Martha (1974) with Carstenen and Karlheinz Bohm (that creepy man from Peeping Tom, 1960). Basically, Martha is familiar uncomfortable Fassbinder territory about a woman that’s kind of a masochist---who happens to find a man to replace her dead father, rather a sadist, whom we get to see use and abuse her throughout the film’s two hour running time. We can never really tell if this is a nightmare for Martha, the abused housewife, or just what she was looking for. Irritating, horrific, depressing, and overall Fassbinder, Martha delivers with a straight face. You’ll either cry or cheer at the end, or maybe you’ll be as unsure of how to react as Martha is.

And still making my way through neglected works by John Carpenter is the excellent adaptation he did of Stephen King’s Christine (1983). Anyone that loves cars should see this film. Basically it’s the tale of a nerdy high schooler (Keith Gordon) who becomes, well, evil, out of his love for his possessed 58’ Fury. Hell hath no fury like Christine. Harry Dean Stanton pops up as a cop that’s sort of on Gordon’s tale, while his best friend and estranged girlfriend figure out Christine for the bitch she is before anyone else. Kelly Preston shows up briefly as a pretty, but dull blonde, but the star of the film is undoubtedly the eponymous car. Definitely a must see if you haven’t already, and perhaps something to rewatch in appreciation of John Carpenter, who used to be an excellent director.

Also finally catching Robert Altman’s somewhat dismissed 1996 feature, Kansas City, I realized I had discovered yet another poorly received gem of a film from one of the world’s greatest auteurs. For the first 30 minutes or so of the film, I couldn’t decide why I was having such a bad reaction to the Jennifer Jason Leigh performance as she stomps around like a maniac hybrid of Gerri Blank (the Amy Sedaris character from “Stranger With Candy”) and Donald Duck. And then I realized she was playing a woman emulating Jean Harlow—at which point I found Leigh’s performance to be brilliant. The film is set in 1930’s Depression era Kansas City. Leigh’s a down and out gal named Blondie, a woman with shortly cropped auburn curls (turns out too much peroxide burned her hair off in her attempts at copying Harlow). Well, Blondie’s hoodlum boyfriend (Dermot Mulroney) got caught robbing a well to do black man named Sheepshan Red (A.C. Smith) while in black face. And Sheepshan happens to be friend with Seldom Seen, Kansas City’s most prominent black gangster (played by none other than the legendary Harry Belafonte). Miranda Richardson stars as the laudanum swilling wife of a powerful senator (Michael Murphy) whom Leigh kidnaps in order to get help for her kidnapped and endangered boyfriend. Sort of playing like a darker version of a Woody Allen film, the vicious conclusion will have you spinning, and maybe you’ll be able to realize what a powerful film it is --- oh, and if you love jazz, this is the film for you.

And my number one film this week goes out to the Technicolor noir melodrama, Leave Her To Heaven (1945), which gives breathtaking Gene Tierney her only Oscar nominated performance as one of the most heartless black holes of a femme fatale you’re likely to ever see (she lost to Joan Crawford for Mildred Pierce). Lovers of cinema should see this film, directed by John M. Stahl, who also directed the original Imitation of Life (1934) and Magnificent Obsession (1935), both which would be more famously remade by Douglas Sirk in the 1950’s. Sirk left Heaven alone, and for good reason---the film is perfect on its own. Its title taken from Macbeth, Leave Her to Heaven tells the story of Ellen Harland, a rich socialite who throws over her fiancé (Vincent Price, about to become the District Attorney) for a handsome author she meets on a train, Richard Harland (played by Cornel Wilde). Except, it’s creepy and noteworthy that Tierney thinks Wilde looks just like her father, a man, it turns out, that Tierney had an uncomfortably close relationship with (as her mother points out, “she loves too much”). After they becomes married after what seems to be only knowing each other for only a few days, it becomes apparent that Tierney wants Wilde all to herself. Knowing she’s a bad seed, you’ll still gasp in shock at the shenanigans she pulls to have him all to her self. Excellent performances and breathtaking cinematography, Leave Her to Heaven is a timeless film, dark and brooding while it festers under the bright sun (that's me attempting to be all Langston Hughes).

Sunday, November 8th: Scary Bitches Presents Woman Scorned with "Fatal Attraction" and "Misery"

Hello boys and girls. Well, Halloween has certainly come and gone already, but we've one more night of Scary Bitches to contend with, and next Sunday's theme examines the fury of women scorned with a double feature presentation of Glenn Close's iconic performance in Fatal Attraction and Kathy Bates' equally infamous portrayal in Misery (1990).

In honor of Fatal Attraction, you can't get away without boiling something, so feel free to bring your favorite boiled dish---I will be making Hell Hath No Fury Devilled Eggs.

In honor of Misery, I promise not to hobble anything, but instead will be serving Dirty Bird Burgers.

Showtime will begin just a tad earlier than usual, so please RSVP---whether you plan to attend, or not.

"You're here with a strange girl being a naughty boy." - Alex Forrest, Fatal Attraction

"You! You DIRTY BIRD! How could you?" - Annie Wilkes, Misery