Chasing the Blues

Three movies

Inspired by the Academy Awards, I've been on my annual midwinter movie-watching spurt. Over the last month, I've seen "The Descendants," "The Artist" and "A Separation," only yesterday.

My favorite was "The Artist," with its cinematic images a reminder that film is primarily a visual medium. I loved the characters as well. However, the film is another example of our culture's nostalgic binge; a lot of the film was loving homages to scenes from movies past. Now our nostalgia is moving back to 1927, black and white silent films? I loved the dog, but dog tricks are not exactly a sign of creative originality.

"The Descendants" was disapponting, not nearly the Oscar-level film it was purported to be, although enjoyable. Clooney was fine, but the most captivating star was the young woman who played his teen daughter. The movie picked up energy wheneer she was on the screen.

The deepest, most distrurbing, film was "A Separation," a bleak look at Iranian society. The movie required a lot of concentration, keeping up with the subtitles and the convoluted plot, some points of which don't make logical sense. Still, it's a strong movie. 

I've fallen into the habit of staying at home and watching films on On Demand. Going to the theater to see these movies reminded me of what an entertaining experience it is.

Farewell to Angelo Dundee, Ben Gazzara

I've reached the age where death takes on more significance. Someone's passing can unexpectedly reveal a passage into my past. Such was the case with two deaths this week: Angelo Dundee and Ben Gazzara.

The death of Dundee, trainer of Muhammad Ali and Sugar Ray Leonard, recalled the era of 1960s television, when I watched ABC Sports boxing telecasts and heard the loved/hated Howard Cosell pronounce his name with his affected Brooklyn accent, Angelo Dun-Dee. Dundee was the Italian American mentor behind Ali, a strong rebuttal to the anti-white claims of Ali's Black Muslim cohorts. He was part of the reason I adored Ali, unlike most people in Baton Rouge.

After Ali was stripped of his heavyweight title for refusing to Vietnam, I defended Ali in a debate with one of our neighbors, a very nice man with a gravelly voice who ran the biggest funeral home in the city and later buried my father. He's gone now, of course; on a visit back to our neighborhood, his wife confided to me that he "wasn't well." We stood in his carport, I defending Ali, and he, a very large man, calling Ali a traitor. The death of Dundee brings it all back. 

I loved all of the iconoclasts of the time: Ali, Joe Namath. They gave me hope of escaping Baton Rouge, although I also had a deep love for it, especially the crazy countercultural world of LSU that I entered into. I believed in Joe Namath, the quarterback who repeatedly carried Bear Bryant's Crimson Tide to wins over our Tigers, and so took him at his word when he guaranted a New York Jets win over the Baltimore Colts in the 1969 Superbowl, and I bet on the Jets against my friend Ray, the greatest athlete I ever knew and the most tragic character as well. How triumphant I was to collect my meagre winnings from Ray the Monday after Namath had engineered his famous upset.

And then there was Gazarra, whom I loved on the TV show "Run for Your Life." Again, that show was a glimmer of hope, a vision of a wider world, beyond Baton Rouge. His character was hip, cool, "existential," although I didn't know what the hell it meant. I'd read it somewhere in one of the magazines I picked up every week at the newsstand in downtown Baton Rouge where I used to go when I began playing hooky from Sunday school at First Presbyterian.  Existenialism: It sounded good to say. The show came on in the loved Thursday night lineup of NBC: Dean Martin's variety show also sticks out, a weekly smashup of Hollywood and Vegas show  biz, that also tantalized my muddled adolescence (Ah, Joey Heatherton, you live in my dreams.)

Later, I loved Gazzara in the John Cassavetes movies we caught at Baton Rouge's Varsity, an art cinema house now a very good restuarant. Ah, the Varsity, where I saw Visconti movies, porn flicks (The Wicked Die Slow) and Zappa's "200 Motels" (horrible). 

Dundee, Gazzara. They loom in my memory and esteem. 

August, the Dog Days, or is that old man wolf howling at the door?

Another long assumed certainty crumbles: the U.S. no longer has a AAA credit rating. Chatterers on CNN say don't worry, it really means nothing. The Wizard of Oz scenario once more; pay no attention to that man behind the curtain.

Nothing better to do while waiting for the Apocalypse and or the start of college football season than to deeply engage with the Braves. Now they are playing at the Mets' Citi field. Although the Mets are severely diminished, another victim of the financial crash except for the splendid Reyes, the Braves playing there always seems more like real baseball than when they're playing against a team like the Arizona Diamondbacks, which could disappear tomorrow and I wouldn't care. New York among other things means baseball to me. 

Of course, watching the Braves on TV pushes my tolerance for the cornball announcer Chip Caray, who shows little of the talent for low-rent humor of his dad, Skip, or his grandad, Harry. Recently, I escaped Chip by listening to the Braves on the radio with Don Sutton and whoever his partner is. Sutton and pal give more insightful analysis and a more pointed, adult humor. But, I like to watch on TV. Perhaps I'll turn down the sound and listen to the radio.

Last night, the Braves at last bested the Mets behind Dan Uggla's amazing revival. The Braves broke through when the Mets removed their young knuckleballer R.A. Dickey, one of the traditionalists who wears his uniform trousers above his stockings. Watching Dickey's knuckleballs, I wanted the pitch to be banned, like the spitball. Although I loved Phil Niekro, and even Hoyt Wilhelm, the knuckleball seems bogus, based on trickery more than skill. Dickey appears to be an OK guy, a bit nervous, but I say throw the slider, the fastball, the curve or get out of the game. Ban the knuckleball!

Even my TV viewing's lost, after the end of "Treme." I watched the three episodes of a strange little show on PBS, "Zen," which starred Rufus Sewell as a detective in Rome. I liked the depiction of the ancient, corrupt Italian city, and a luscious Italian actress who after making it as a Bond girl to Daniel Craig now does three-episode Masterpiece series shows. I'm unable to get back to "Curb Your Enthusiasm" and "Entourage," both of which I've already buried. 

So, after long days of eyeball-searing work, I ruin the old orbs even further with reading. Faulkner's "The Hamlet," a long tome on World War I, books on Huey Long, Jonathan Yardley, the New Yorker, Commonweal, the Kenyon Review, the New York Review of Books, The New York Times. At times, I'll sit down and play the piano, lately I've been practicing on "Rally Round the Flag Boys."

 

Eddie Fisher, Tony Curtis and Arthur Penn's Hollywood Moments

We used to say in the news business that deaths occurred in threes; recently we've had Eddie Fisher, Arthur Penn and Tony Curtis, an interesting trio. Eddie Fisher and Tony Curtis were among stars of the late '50s and early '60s, when I was heading into adolescence and discovering the world of Hollywood and celebrity.

I can't remember much about Fisher as a singer; he was best known for being the husband of first Debbie Reynolds and then Elizabeth Taylor, and the scandal of how he left the wholesome Reynolds for the sultry Liz was a staple of discussion during my mother's afternoon coffee circle and elsewhere. Plus, I remember the movie mags of the time with Eddie's picture splashed across the cover.

One of the first movies I remember going to by myself was "The Vikings," with Tony Curtis in the starring role of the film later lampooned by Monty Python. I remember Tony's Viking prince having his hand cut off, and still wondering how they managed the realistic stump. The New York Times obituary on Curtis said it was a myth that he uttered in his native Bronxese the line "Dere is de castle of ma faddah;" I could have sworn I heard him say it in "The Vikings," although the Times said he allegedly said it in another medieval costume drama. Like Fisher, Tony was a staple of the movie mags, and also had his share of glamourous broken marriages, including one to the lovely Janet Leigh.

Arthur Penn was the only death to warrant the New York Times front page, largely because his "Bonnie and Clyde" is seen as a major ground-breaking movie, bringing the end of the old star system of which Fisher and Curtis were late products. "Bonnie and Clyde" brought a new openness of violence, sex and social themes,foreshadowed in earlier movies such as Curtis' "Some Like It Hot," directed by Billy Wilder and also starring Jack Lemon and Marilyn Monroe in one of her most memorable performances. "Bonnie and Clyde," according to the Times, set the stage for a new era of "auteur" directors such as Francis Ford Coppolla and Martin Scorsese.

The Penn obit also included photos of the "Bonnie and Clyde" set showing Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway, the stars of the movie about the two Depression-era gangsters who terrorized the rural Southwest and, in the movie's telling, were raised into legendary, Robin Hood figures. Beatty has a different kind of look than Curtis and Fisher, a bit more rugged and ragged, yet also more feminine and vulnerable. The young Dunaway's beauty glows, even in the drab black and white photos in the gray Times.

Fisher, Curtis and Penn all are figures from vanished eras of Hollywood. Fisher and Curtis' studio- dominated times were ended by movies like Penn's "Bonnie and Clyde." But then Penn's era was curtailed by blockbuster movies like Stephen Spielberg's "Jaws." Each man had major success in their youths, but struggled to match that success in later life, although Curtis had quite a busy career as an actor and raconteur. Nowadays, it's hard to imagine Hollywood producing a movie like "Bonnie and Clyde," or one like "Some Like It Hot." Also, although the celebrity engine churns endlessly, no one holds our attention the way Eddie Fisher and Tony Curtis once did.

New Looks at "The Deer Hunter" and "MASH"

I was drawn into "The Deer Hunter" on a cable movie channel the other night, finding it one of the few movies of the era that stands up. Previously, the movie's long, long sequences, such as the seemingly endless wedding in the Russian Orthodox church and subsequent drunken after party, had left me impatient, but this time I pesevered throughout Michael Cimino's epic.

The Viietnam-era themes of tribal patriotism and the exploitation of working class people for distant, ambiguous wars still strike home in the Iraq/Afghanistan era. While the "Heart of Darkness" narrative of American innocence corrupted in foreign military adventures remains current, the 1978 movie tracks major changes in American society. First, the young men who go off to war do so voluntarily, not out of economic necessity.They live in a small Pennsylvania town with a vibrant steel mill; American manufacturing has not yet collapsed. And women still are limited to traditional roles; war is still a masculine pursuit, and women have little to look forward to except being wives and mothers.

The year 1978, when I left Louisiana. When I was young, I was fascinated by seeing aging Hollywood stars like Jimmy Stewart, Cary Grant and Fred Astaire in their youths. Now, I mourn the lost youth of my own generation of actors. How young and lovely is Meryl Streep, who combines an ethereal presence and an earthy practicality in her role of a young woman torn between Robert DeNiro and Christopher Walken. The young Walken, the tragic Russian routlette player, possesses a haunting male beauty. DeNiro in contrast has the masculine assertiveness that made him the most thrilling star of the era, along with Jack Nicholson. The supporting cast,including the late John Cazale, is outstanding. Cazale, Steep's sweetheart, would go on to iconic performances in "The Godfather" films and "Dog Day Afternoon" before his tragic, early death.

The scenes have a stunning visual coherence and unforgettable brilliance reminiscent of European masters like Bergman and Trauffaut. The artistic control left me with the eternal dilemma of how Ciminio could have wrecked his career with the "Heaven's Gate"  disaster. With Hollywood and the movie business sinking further and futher into immature themes and overblown visual spectacles, we with Cimino could return with new movies on the level of "The Deer Hunter." 

Not holding up so well is Robert Atlman's "MASH," now celebrating its 40th anniversary. I recently saw the movie on AMC, which frequently trumpted "limited commercial interruptions." Since the commercials seemed to halt the action every three minutes, I wondered how bad unlimited commerical interruption would have been.

Altman's allegedly revolutionary techniques now appeared tedious; the antics of Hawkeye, Trapper John and the others sophomoric, tasteless and misogynistic. I would have gladly grabbed a gun and shot Donald Sutherland's Hawkeye. The destruction of Robert Duvall's Frank Burns was cruel and gratutious; one wonders if such a negative portrait of relgious fundamentalistm could even be made today. The devastating critique of the miliatry would also fall flat these days.Part of the problem might have been seeing Duvall in an unheroic role, which retroactively clashed with my view of him built over the years in his later heroic performances. The treatment of Sally Kellerman's "Hot Lips" Houilhan was a painfully dated relic of pre-feminist attitudes.

Not to pile on, but the football sequence at the end went on and on, just so much padding. The movie essentially ended about 45 minutes before. On the postive side,  Elliott Gould's performance as Trapper John doesn't totally lose its fascination, and the "Suicide Is Painless" sequence remains strong. But was it really so clever and inventive to recreate Da Vinci's "The Last Supper?" 

Although the AMC's chopping up of the film had an effect, I sadly cast "MASH" into the bin of overrated movies that don't hold up past their eras. Looking back, I realize that on a deep level, I never really found the movie that funny or earth-shattering. It always seemd a film that appealed to a group mentality in which lauding its supposedly brilliant scenes was obligatory.

The movie laid the ground for one of the phoniest most overrated TV shows ever, the CBS version of "MASH" with Alan Alda, et al. I watched the show, along with everyoen else, but now it often seems as dishonest a view of war as "Hogan's Heroes."

A Frenzied Flurry

The bad economy, GOP resurgence and right-wing glee, and the all-too-characteristic shell-shocked gloom of the Obama administration and Democrats have put a clog in my blog. I did post a piece about seeing all three episodes in one night of Larry McMurtry's "Streets of Laredo," but that disappeared in the ether of one of Comcast's breakdowns.

Yep, James Garner played the old Texas Ranger Woodrow McCall, instead of Tommy Lee Jones, who'd portrayed him in "Lonesome Dove." In the sequel to that fine miniseries, old Woodrow suffers the same fate as Robert Duvall's Gus McRae, having his leg amputated. Unlike Gus, though, Woodrow lives on without the limb, taken off in in time to stop gangrene's deadly invasion.

Sissy Spacek replaces Diane Lane as the reformed prostitute. The rest of the colorful cast includes Sam Shepherd as Woodrow's good-hearted sidekick, George Carlin of all people as a grizzled mountain man type, Ned Beatty as Judge Roy Bean and Randy Quaid as the brutal outlaw John Wesley Hardin. A lot of evil, malevolent bad guys, beautiful scenery and overcoming challenges of the primitive country make "Streets of Laredo" almost as good as "Lonesome Dove."

Outside of the political/economic doldrums, here are a few fine filips that make me feel like I'm fixin' to frolic: football, Franzen's "Freedom," Freddie Freeman.   

Ann-Margaret's Star Turn in "Bye-Bye Birdie"

 Recalling "Man Men" scene in which Sal inadvertently outs himself to his wife by excitedly riffing on Ann-Margret's closing scene from "Bye-Bye Birdie," I stayed up to watch the 1963 musical on Turner Classic Movies.

The young A-M's loveliness didn't quite save the movie from its cornball Middle-America take on "teen culture."  Many of the songs were lame, although "Put on a Happy Face" and "Kids Today" were strong numbers. A-M, a bit broad in the beam, sizzled in the dance number of "A Lot of Living to Do."

My favorite part was Paul Lynde, a prototype for Sal, as A-M's dad. Like many others, I during childhood thrilled to Lynde's snarky performances on "Hollywood Squares" and "Bewitched," seeing him as a blast of anarchy in brain-numbing TV land.

Also interesting in "Bye-Bye Birdie" is a brunette Janet Leigh, dancing and singing so soon after her terrifying turn in "Psycho." Dick Van Dyke, who also starred in the Broadway musical and had just begun his hit TV show "The Dick Van Dyke Show," is curiously understated, especially in comparison with Lynde's typically hammy, over-the-top performance.

Other performers of note are Bobby Rydell, and the guy who played Gilbert in "Leave It to Beaver," glimpsed as part of the kids dancing. Jesse Pearson is OK as the swaggering lout Conrad Birdie, apparently a takeoff on Conway Twitty. For some reason, Pearson's career died after the movie.

 Also playing a bit role is the kid who played the young bluecoat Rusty in "Rin-Tin-Tin." Ed Sullivan, the king of Sunday night TV, has a long cameo role. In short, the movie, with all of its cloying parts, is a baby-boomer feast.

An eerie moment comes when a Russian ballet boss salutes "Jack Kennedy," the movie came out just months before JFK's assassination brought an end to an era. In many ways, "Bye-Bye Birdie" is a relic of that era, seeking to evoke an American "innocence" that it probably never had.

"Bye-Bye Birdie," part of Robert Osborne's night of '50s and '60s teen music flicks, followed "Rock Around the Clock," featuring performances by the groundbreaking Bill Haley and the Comets. The Comets' numbers sizzle with energy and passion, compared with the pallid would-be rock numbers in "Bye-Bye Birdie."

Although "Bye-Bye Birdie" was made seven years after "Rock Around the Clock," the Comets' performances still feel revolutionary. "Birdie" is more accomplished, stylized and polished, its music pleasant and unthreatening, archetypes of the fading popular Broadway musical. The Comets' wails are the true sound of youth rebellion.

Representing the R&B tradition are numbers by the Platters, with their spin-tingling tenor Tony Williams and the intriguing female backup singer Zola Taylor, who appeared with four male voices. The Platters' vocals on songs like "The Great Pretender" provided the lead for backup music which was essentially rhythm guitar and rhythm piano, both playing a simple three-chord progression.

Too bad it was too late for me to stay up to catch Elvis in "Jail House Rock." That scene when he and the prisoners do "Jailhouse Rock," with the screen cut into several recangular cellblocks through which Elvis moves with jungle-cat grace, is one of the best in movie history.  

 

   

Obituaries Show Variety of American Lives

The New York Times obituary page presented two interesting deaths: Harvey Pekar and Tuli Kupferberg. Pekar, who gained extraordinary fame from a meager literary talent, proved that in America just about anyone could find his or her 15 minutes in the spotlight. Along with Charles Bukowski, a much larger talent, Pekar the writer of the comic book American Splendor reflected the triumph of the underground man, the urban lumpenproletariat, the resentful, angry, sullen drone.

Kupferberg gained fame his fame as a member of the Fugs, the iconoclastic and satiric band from New York's Lower East Side. A survivor of the Beat Generation: his failed suicide attempt by leaping from the Manhattan Bridge was memorialized in "Howl," Kupferberg kept playing his icoclastic rock, or anti-rock, until his 80s.

His passing brought strong memories of my college days. Along with Frank Zappa's Mothers of Invention and Lenny Bruce, I loved listening to the Fugs. Not as musically advanced as Zappa, the jazz virtuouso, the Fugs exhibited a rougher, less subtle brand of humor. At the same time, they were more literary with their references to ancient and modern poetry.

My favorite member of the band was its leading force, Ed Sanders, also a fine poet. I followed Sanders' career past the days of the Fugs, when he put out two great satiric albums that also lampooned country music: "Ed Sanders Truck Stop" and "Beer Cans on the Moon." Like all fine parodies, the music while satirizng country music conventions also stood on its own as great country.

Along with Sanders' short story collection, "Tales of Beatnik Glory," I also was impressed by Sanders' account of the Charles Manson trial, the best report about the case.

In my music universe, I put the Fugs in the same place as Lou Reed and the Velvet Underground, New York hipsters with a burnt-out, urban, literary sensibility. While Sanders was my main interest, I had a strong respect for Kupferberg. He deserves a place as an influential figure in rock history.

What a constrast between Pekar and Kupferberg's lives and that of the biggest death of the week, so far, George Steinbrenner. I actually liked Steinbrenner's Yankees in the early part of his ownership when he built those great teams with Thurmon Munson and Reggie  Jackson, managed by Billy Martin. But his act grew old over the years, and now I'm at place either hostile or indifferent to the Yankees.

 

Natalie Wood vs. Katharine Ross

Last night, I caught most of "West Side Story" on TCM, where it's Natalie Wood week. Although I find the Bernstein-Sondheim-Robbins classic contrived and corny, I do get caught up in it. Natalie is girlishly lovely, not yet showing that cool sophisticated beauty of her later years. After the show, Robert Osborne said she'd been self-conscious about her dancing in "West Side Story." She had no such worries about her singing; another actress did that duty for dubbing.

Whenever I see the movie, I always remember that the neighborhood depicted, with its satirical/harrowing look at "juvenile delinquency," was destroyed by Robert Moses for Lincoln Center, where Bernstein enjoyed success with the New York Philharmonic. I bit of historical irony.

After "West Side Story," I found by cable surfing "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid." Robert Redford and Paul Newman certainly showed a different type of male image than Richard Beymer, Charles Chakiris and the others on "West Side Story." The "West Side Story" crew tries valiantly to project a macho male, but with all of that dancing and hammy singin , they don't quite pull it off. Redford and Newman achieve it naturally.

Once again, I saw Newman and Redford apparently die, although they are left standing at the end of the picture. After all of the endless chases, the move to Bolivia, the bank robberies, and more chases, I was glad to see them at last meet their deserved end.

Meanwhile, Katharine Ross is lovely as the Sundance Kid's loyal gal pal. What a dark, sultry presence, compared with Natalie Wood' ethereal look. That left me with the idea of one of those faceoffs based on the NCAA basketball brackets: Hollywood beauties. Who would you choose, Katharine Ross or Natalie Wood? Probably because of the way she wore those late 19th century frocks and bonnets, I would take Ross. On another day, I'd likely take Natalie. 

Seeking that Mastroianni Look

I decided to have an eye exam, since I haven't had one in at least 10 years. My old friendly neighborhood doctor was still there to flash the rows of letters before my eyes and ask which one was clearer.

It turns out my vision has actually improved, which required a new prescription. Every development appears to warrant a new prescription. I've noticed my eyesight has never stayed the same, ever since I had to begin wearing glassed back in elementary school.

I looked at several pair of glasses, hoping for that European movie star effect, a la.Marcello  Mastroianni. At the end, I decided to stay with my present glasses. I keep thinking it's still 1985, when glasses cost about $150, so the sticker shock gets me. As I tried on my glasses, seeing myself as the dashing star of "La Dolce Vita," a Latino family came in to buy glasses for several young girls. A woman selling eyeglasses had to go fetch a young woman medical technician to translate the terms and prices for the family in Espanol.

Back in the doctor's office, my eyes dilated, I heard a bit more news. The doc found clouds in my eyes, the sign of cataracts. No, this is not bad news, he assured me. It's actually good news. Now insurance will pay for my visits. And I can have surgery for all-new bionic eyes. "The technology keeps improving," he assured me. A whole new bionic body could be possible, I thought.

One thing hasn't changed over the years. The optimetrist still dilates your eyes, and you still receive temporary sunglasses if, like me, you don't normally wear shades. This is bad news for my movie star bonafides.

One other thing I noticed: the optometrist, like other medical professionals I know, is the king daddy working with a small group of women who are medical technicians. As my dentist now has a woman technician to clean my teeth and my internist a young  woman to check my blood pressure, etc., the optimetrist now has a young technician  who put the drops in my eyes and checked me  for glaucoma etc. Years ago, the doc did all of these tasks, but now the labor is diversified. 

This has undoubtedly improved opportunities, especially for women. But has this caused the medical costs, and the costs of insurance, to go up? Some economist has probably figured it out.

As usual, my doctor entered a sports discussion. This topic was whether a high school baseball star was better going to play college ball before going to the pros, or going right to the pros. We decided that if you were good enough for a first, second or third round draft pick, it was better to take the bonus money without going to college first. Even if you never made it to the big leagues, you'd have the money, and could always go to college. You might even have the chance, if you were like Atlanta's Quincy Carter, to still have a football career after your baseball career had ended due to the inability to hit a professional curveball. Bionic eyes would surely help.

My eyes dilated, I staggered out into the bright sun. I'm ready for those bionic eyes, not to mention bionic back, bionic knee, bionic foot and so on.