Today's Words of Wisdom - December 3, 2015

Today is the birthday of the following people:

Joseph Conrad (1857 -1924):

“Being a woman is a terribly difficult task, since it consists principally in dealing with men.”

and

“My task, which I am trying to achieve is, by the power of the written word, to make you hear, to make you feel--it is, before all, to make you see.”

and

“Facing it, always facing it, that’s the way to get through. Face it.”

Jean-Luc Godard (1930 - ):

“Why must one talk? Often one shouldn't talk, but live in silence. The more one talks, the less the words mean.”

and

“A story should have a beginning, a middle and an end, but not necessarily in that order.”

and

“When we talked, I talked about me, you talked about you, when we should have talked about each other.”

Ozzy Osbourne (1948 - ):

“I used to get upset by people not understanding me, but I’ve made a career out of it now.”

December 3, 2014

Good Morning! Here are your daily birthday quotations...

Joseph Conrad (1857 -1924):

“Being a woman is a terribly difficult task, since it consists principally in dealing with men.”

and

“My task, which I am trying to achieve is, by the power of the written word, to make you hear, to make you feel--it is, before all, to make you see.”

and

“Facing it, always facing it, that’s the way to get through. Face it.”

Jean-Luc Godard (1930 - ):

“Why must one talk? Often one shouldn't talk, but live in silence. The more one talks, the less the words mean.”

and

“A story should have a beginning, a middle and an end, but not necessarily in that order.”

and

“When we talked, I talked about me, you talked about you, when we should have talked about each other.”

Ozzy Osbourne (1948 - ):

“I used to get upset by people not understanding me, but I’ve made a career out of it now.”

Films of the 60s, Part 27: All the Lonely People

“All the lonely people,
Where do they call come from?
All the lonely people,
Where do they all belong?”
- The Beatles, “Eleanor Rigby”



In Haruki Murakami’s critically acclaimed, latest novel, 1Q84, his character Aomame makes a distinction between being lonely and being alone. That passage, among many others, resonated with me on a deeply personal level. There have been times in my life in which I have felt incredibly alone and incredibly lonely, yet the two do not necessarily go hand in hand. One can feel lonely while being surrounded by friends and acquaintances, and in the reverse, one can be alone yet not feel the sting and pain of loneliness. When I was a teenager, prone to bouts of loneliness and depression, a wise man told me that I had to make a friend of loneliness. While at the time it seemed esoteric and nonsensical advice, that phrase stuck with me. As I grew older, that piece of advice became a mantra for me. The three films in this post all, in some way or another, made me recall the feelings of loneliness, as each director amazingly and heartbreakingly captures it in words, sounds, and images.



Vivre Sa Vie (My Life to Live) (1962, Jean-Luc Godard)

Vivre Sa Vie, Jean-Luc Godard’s fourth film, starts with an epigraph from Montaigne that was eerily similar to the advice I mention above. “Lend yourself to others, but give yourself to yourself.” What follows is a tragic tale of a woman struggling in the modern era, a victim of a changing world that values money and fame but objectifies people, especially women, in the process. Anna Karina is Nana, a young girl with aspirations of becoming an actress. Told in twelve separate vignettes, we follow episodes of Nana’s life, seeing her with different jobs, different men, and in some hopeless situations. Godard specifically shoots from behind Karina’s head, sometimes not allowing us to see whom she is talking to. It doesn’t matter in the slightest. We are Nana. We connect with her in her attempt to navigate a pop culture world that could easily, and does, chew her up and spit her out.

Like many of Godard’s films, Vivre Sa Vie is incredibly meta and has only become more so in recent years thanks to Quentin Tarantino’s homage. While Godard was paying homage with Karina's bob haircut to Louise Brooks, Tarantino was paying homage to Godard with Uma Thurman's character in Pulp Fiction. In his own inimitable style, however, Godard tends to blur the lines between reality, play acting, real acting, and everything in between. Failing to make her dream come true as an actress, a direct contrast with the real Anna Karina, we see Nana’s dreams dashed in increments amidst a world of consumerism. It is a brave new world that idolizes Americana, pop music, films, and gangsters. Particularly relevant to the story are references to Truffaut’s Jules and Jim and Poe’s short story, "The Oval Portrait," which somehow seems to reveal the nature of Godard and Karina’s on and off screen relationship. Nana works at a record store, essentially selling art as product. Eventually, Nana resorts to prostitution, feeling it is the only path to take in order to make ends meet. It is a searing indictment of the treatment of women in a capitalist world. If that weren’t convincing in and of itself, Nana is sold from one pimp to another, as a piece of property, as an object, as product.

Through it all, Nana stoically traverses her life, but her loneliness, desperation, and crippling sadness are there, just under the surface. At one point, Nana has a dance number, hoofing it to up-tempo jazz music in a pool hall. The men simply ignore her joyous dance, and she ends by embracing a pillar in the room. One can’t help but sense that “look at me” desperation and subsequently feel your heart slowly cracking. Godard’s choice of filming from behind Karina’s head, so that she eclipses whomever she may be conversing with, forces us to see her and only her. We don’t see her face, because that would allow us to personalize her loneliness and not actually experience it for ourselves. It is as if, even though she has people with whom she interacts, they don’t exist. She is utterly alone. There are two moments that are crushingly heartbreaking, bringing me to tears. One is the inevitable end of the film, awful, stark, and yet incredibly true to the character Godard and Karina have created together. The other moment comes when Nana goes to see Carl Dreyer’s Joan of Arc in the movie theater. As she sits watching this tale of a martyr, essentially alone against the English, Nana weeps openly, tears streaming down her face. What is amazing about this scene, at least in my mind, is that Godard truly captures the connections we make with art, how we see ourselves: our fears, grief, joy, and pain in artistic representation. This is what great art should do, and I certainly saw many aspects of myself in Nana.




The Fire Within (1963, Louis Malle)

Maurice Ronet is Alain Leroy. Alain has a crippling depression due to his alcoholism. He has been staying at a rehab clinic, often calling himself “cured,” but his cure seems to only have power while his is sheltered in the clinic. He hasn’t talked to his wife of two years. She fled to America and this event only further fueled his sense of shame and regret. In a great scene, we see Alain getting ready to visit the city for the first time in a long while. He picks out his shirt, a tie, cufflinks, and rehearses a telegram to his wife. He does not know how to interact with the outside world anymore. This is merely a precursor for a Homeric journey that will lead to a somewhat inevitable end. We soon realize that this is not an attempt to insert himself once again into the real world, to dip his toes in the water of reality, but is a “farewell tour” before leaving the world entirely.

Once back in the city, he decides to visit his old stomping grounds, including his old hotel apartment. He has been “replaced” by a young soldier back from the Algerian war. He has stepped in to his old apartment, and representatively, his old life. He goes to see old friends, one of which, played by the luminous Jeanne Moreau, could have been more than a friend in the past. She is the only one who seems generally comforting to him, the rest having either moved on without him and preoccupied with their own lives to give him any notice. Eventually, after feeling the emptiness of his life, he resorts once again to drinking. Ironically, at one point, he is even saved from being hit by a car. One could read into these events that he is being given reasons to live over and over again, but he cannot see them. This is what depression is. Despite the good that may be present, you simply can’t see past the darkness enveloping you.

Even though his friends know that he is an alcoholic, they allow him to drink, even commenting at one point that his first drink after detox will make him sick. Some friends. The men in his life are selfish enablers with no compassion. The women in his life have compassion, but are ultimately ineffectual. He finally breaks down and admits that he is scared of the women around him and he cannot feel desire. He says, “I can’t reach out with my hands. I can’t touch things,” and “I wanted so much to be loved.” Toward the end, he is seen reading F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, which is resoundingly relevant for a number of reasons. For one, it is set during the prohibition and Alain is in detox. Gatsby is an enigmatic man who people can’t seem to figure out. Alain’s friends can’t seem to figure him out, nor do they seem to want to, and he can’t figure himself out. While Gatsby longs for Daisy Buchanan, Alain longs for his departed wife, who has gone off to America. The parallels could continue. And while the novel ends tragically for Gatsby, it likewise does for Alain. Upon returning to his room at the clinic, he shoots himself, unable to live with the loneliness that surrounded him.



Juliet of the Spirits (1965, Federico Fellini)

By 1965, Federico Fellini already had a number of films under his belt, including the now celebrated 8 ½ and La Dolce Vita, both masterpieces. Juliet of the Spirits is yet another visual stunner, and yet another film that continues Fellini’s streak of surrealism and strangeness. His wife, Giulietta Masina, plays the title role, and due to the fact that the actor and character have the same name, we can possibly read into the subtext of reality within the film. Fans of Fellini and Masina will also start to make connections between the sadness of this title character and that of the title character in the exquisite, Nights of Cabiria. We start the film at the anniversary party of Giulietta and Giorgio, which is “crashed” by neighbors and friends at the invitation of Giorgio, who we soon discover is a philanderer. We can see from Giulietta’s preparations that she desperately wants to be alone with Giorgio. We often see her face obscured by darkness, indicating the loneliness she feels in her marriage. Of course, his later actions show that he wants the opposite, desperate to be around people and take up the mantle of the object of desire. The party soon becomes the requisite dreamlike landscape that Fellini is known for, but this time in vivid color.

Giulietta is soon captivated by their glamorous neighbor, Gabriela. Gabriela is the epitome of independence, and thus the antithesis of Giulietta. Gabriela is somewhat flighty, new-agey, and at times, just plain ridiculously inane. Giulietta is taken to a Buddhist seminar that, like the party, takes a turn for the surreal. Fellini once again shows himself a master of the frame as he puts Masina against a bright red wall with a fan blowing in the corner, the two objects miniscule against the overwhelming presence of the wall. It is one of many ways that Fellini uses the camera to display her feelings of loneliness and being subservient to emotion. Eventually, she begins to see images and prophecies of what will or could come to pass, namely, being visited or haunted by spirits who will guide her in her near future.

One of these possible spirits is José, who gives her bullfighting lessons, telling her that the monster (read: husband) will be defeated. But, despite the repeated visits, the religious, philosophical, and mere friendly advice that she gets throughout the film, she still cannot resort to playing her husband’s game and cheat on him in return. Rather, still feeling hurt, she hires detectives to look into his cheating. At the close of the film, Giorgio tells her that he has not had sex with another woman, but instead has a deep and meaningful friendship with another woman. I honestly don’t know which is worse. I have been in this position, and it is not a comfort. The truly odd thing about this film is that Fellini intended it to be a “gift” to his wife, Masina. This gift seems to find excuses for his own possible philandering and encouraging Giulietta to become more independent. One also has to question the urgings from the last spirit that she must take her own life. This is just one interpretation, and anyone who has seen Fellini’s films will know that meanings are hard to come by. What is clear throughout is Giulietta’s pain and loneliness, which Fellini has captured exquisitely.

Films of the 60s, Part 15: Unless You Sing, Sing, Sing, Sing

“Baby, if you sing, sing, sing, sing, sing, sing
For the love you bring won’t mean a thing
Unless you sing, sing, sing, sing” – Travis, “Sing”



I’ve never been a fan of musicals. In fact, I was thinking of excluding musicals entirely from my survey of films from the 60s. The completist in me won out, however, over any arguments of personal taste. Plus, I wanted to give musicals, as a genre, a more reasonable try to combat the sour experiences I’ve had. If there is any one reason I could give for my bias, it would be that I find them to be disingenuous. When I think about it a bit longer, I realize that this is my bias toward most movies I don’t like, not just musicals. With musicals, this is usually manifested with characters breaking out into song for no reason other than to have it qualify as a musical. Even worse, there are the musicals that attempt to find younger audiences by using more modern rock tracks (Across the Universe, I’m looking at you). During my survey of the 50s, I watched Singin’ in the Rain. Now, it may be that this is widely considered the best movie musical of all time, but that film changed my perspective on the genre forever, and for a few very simple reasons. The simplest one is the basic framing of the narrative. As a movie about the making of a movie, it makes perfect sense that these performers could break out into song. It’s what they do! Anyway, these three films have also become some of my favorites, continuing to change my mind about musicals, in general.



Une Femme Est Une Femme (A Woman is a Woman) (1961, Jean-Luc Godard)

Jean-Luc Godard does not make films that could be considered mainstream, by any stretch of the imagination. Godard is a student of film, but he is also an experimental artist, playing with the boundaries of genres and pushing them to their limits. That is his way of showing his love for his favorite films. Throughout this survey, I have fallen in love with Godard’s movies. I have now seen nine of them, with four more in my queue. As much as I have loved watching all of the films and writing these mini-essays / reviews, I will always look back on this time as the year I found Godard (pun intended).

Une Femme Est Une Femme is Godard’s love letter to musicals, specifically American musicals, but with his added touch of the French New Wave. Right off the bat, we can see that this is not going to be an ordinary musical, following the unspoken and unwritten rules of the genre. The gorgeous Anna Karina, who was Godard’s paramour, with this just being one of a series of great collaborations, is able to stop the music mid-stream with mere force of will, breaking all conventions, and making us think about the boundaries of diegetic and non-diegetic sound. With most musicals, the characters are not aware they are singing; it is merely a representation of their emotion. Again, this makes Singin’ in the Rain, and I suppose The Sound of Music (certain songs), stand out, as they are aware of it due to the narrative construct. Une Femme Est Une Femme takes it one step further, still employing the idea of unaware singing, but putting the characters in control. After one of these sudden stops, in which Karina walks away from the pining Jean-Paul Belmondo, now one of my absolute favorite actors of all time, Belmondo breaks the fourth wall saying, “Off she goes.”

The narrative itself is one that most in the industry, and frankly in the world, would not consider being worthy of the lofty nature of musicals. Yes, there is a love triangle, but it is not nearly as emotionally wrought or overly romantic as we would think. Karina and her lover, played by Jean-Claude Brialy, argue about nearly everything and most of it inconsequential. At one point, Karina even plays a childish copying game with Brialy, repeating his words and escalating the argument. The basic plot has Karina and Brialy in a relationship that is full of petty bickering. She is a stripper, but wants to have a child and take the relationship to the next level. He is completely resistant. On the outside is Belmondo, desperately in love with Karina and making it known at every turn.

Complicating the genre even further, Godard employs his usual method of meta-references; making us wonder about the reality of the film and in which spheres it actually exists. In one of the more amusing references, Belmondo mentions the film Vera Cruz, and his favorite actor, Burt Lancaster, giving a very Lancaster-like toothy smile to the audience. Other nods are given to Jules et Jim (amazingly referring to this one several months before its release), Shoot the Piano Player, and Godard’s own Breathless. It can’t get much more meta than that. I was most moved by a scene in a café, in which Belmondo plays a record by Charles Aznavour, the star of the previously mentioned Shoot the Piano Player and a legendary French singer, called “Tu t’laisses aller,” with lyrics that are vitriolic, reminding Karina of her troubled relationship. The song is amazing, and one of the few that is played in a true diegetic fashion, though it speaks to the narrative.

It is truly Godard’s experimentation with the convention that make this a memorable film, though much acclaim should be given to the actors involved, especially the great Anna Karina and Jean-Paul Belmondo. At one point, before an argument, Karina insists that she and Brialy bow to the audience, which they do, facing the camera. Touches like these keep us intellectually invested in not just the film, but in the art of filmmaking and the nature of narrative. The songs may not be as memorable as true musical set pieces and themes, but that wouldn’t have been Godard’s style. When Karina makes her final wink to us, her audience, we know that we have taken part in viewing something unique, a magical film that is rooted and based in the minutiae, reality, and degradation of everyday life. Few directors could make a musical out of this reality, even fewer could turn it into such genre-bending, challenging, and intellectually humorous fun.



Les Parapluies des Cherbourg (The Umbrellas of Cherbourg) (1964, Jacques Demy)

Jacques Demy’s The Umbrellas of Cherbourg is another example of experimentation with the general nature of movie musicals, but in a completely different way. Rather than a film in which people break into song at any given moment, there is never a moment when the characters are not singing. All dialogue in the film is in the form of continuous song, recitative in nature, much like an opera or operetta. While some may find this jarring, especially as some of the songs are not typical musical fare, but instead merely narrative dialogue set to music, I found it to be fascinating, keeping me more interested in the film than I would be with most examples in the musical genre. I was completely captivated by not only the nature of the film, but also its radiant stars, Catherine Deneuve and Nino Castelnuovo, its signature song, as well as the atypical resolution, the latter two making me weep like a child.

The story is a simple one, full of romance and tragedy, somewhat mirroring the love triangle of Une Femme Est Une Femme, yet this one adds one more to make it a love quadrangle. We are quickly introduced to the young couple of Geneviève and Guy, she, working with her mother in an umbrella shop, and he, working at an auto repair shop. The film is immediately striking, not only because we realize they are going to be singing the entire time, but also for its amazing visuals, providing striking and brilliant colors. Not enough can be said or written about the color here, and the look of the town of Cherbourg. There is one scene in which the drinks that are served in a bar match the color scheme of the walls. This is one of the few films after Vertigo that really made me pay attention to color as being important to the film itself, corresponding to either different characters or moods. Further providing a noticeable distancing from the established musical tradition, Guy’s first song has him singing, in meta fashion about the nature of musicals, “All that singing gives me a pain. I like movies better.”

Guy is drafted to serve in the Algerian War, taking him away from his true love, after having spent the night with her, making her pregnant. Geneviève is encouraged to marry Roland, a handsome jeweler, after Guy’s letters become far less frequent. The nature of this relationship is somewhat of a reference to one of Demy’s previous films, Lola, which is a very French New Wave / Godard twist. Guy returns, however, injured and sullen, finding that everything has changed: the umbrella shop sold and his teenage love married. He goes through a bout of anger, drunkenness, misbehavior, and bad life choices, but is brought around by his godmother and guardian’s caretaker, Madeleine, who has always loved him unrequitedly. Guy rebounds with her help, opens a gas station and repair shop, marries Madeleine and has children. The ultimate scene finds Geneviève pulling up to Guy’s station, along with the daughter they created, and we begin to wonder what will happen. I won’t give it away if you haven’t seen it, but it is so moving, real, and contrary to the nature of most “Hollywood” storylines that I found it one of the most satisfying codas in film history.

The film’s musical centerpiece, “I Will Wait for You,” became a huge hit and not only the film’s version. Tony Bennett, Frank Sinatra, and literally hundreds of other artists have since made it a standard, each putting their particular stamp on it. But, the version sung by the characters in the film, even in French, a language I don’t speak, stands out to me because of the context of the song. Merely thinking about the song, its plaintive melody, and how the interpretation of the song changes from one point of the film to another, makes me choke up with a rush of varied emotions, some tied into the narrative of the film, and some tied to my own romantic experiences. For many different reasons, The Umbrellas of Cherbourg has become a personal favorite film. (I also just love saying “Parapluies.”)



Camelot (1967, Joshua Logan)

I’m not sure that anything I write about Camelot could do it the justice it deserves. There is so much to write about in relation to the film, the original Lerner & Loewe Broadway musical, the book on which it is all based, and the Arthurian mythology, that I fear of leaving out some important element or connection. Added to this fear is the fact that my mother is such a huge fan, that it just puts more pressure on me, and my subsequent analysis. I will, however, make an attempt. As opposed to the films above, Camelot is indeed patterned in the traditional American musical style, with memorable set-piece songs that guide along the narrative. In this case, the narrative is the famous love triangle between King Arthur, Guinevere, and the knight, Sir Lancelot, adapted from T.H. White’s fantasy masterpiece, The Once and Future King. The musical focuses on the third and fourth book, out of four, leaving out the chapters in which Arthur was a boy, learning from Merlyn, and coming of age, though the play and film often refer to particular scenes from those chapters. It is in these last chapters that the romance, drama, and the gravitas of the underpinnings of democracy truly reside, making it perfect subject matter for a musical adaptation.

Taking the place of the original Broadway cast of Richard Burton, Julie Andrews, Robert Goulet, and Roddy McDowall are Richard Harris, Vanessa Redgrave, Franco Nero, and David Hemmings. Though I’ve never seen the musical performed, I think I can safely say that the film’s cast handles their respective roles masterfully. Though I did find it somewhat jarring to see an Italian actor playing a French knight, Franco Nero is the embodiment of the handsome, valiant, and self-obsessed Lancelot, especially during his performance (albeit dubbed) of the great song, “C’est Moi.” He plays it so well, that I had forgotten about his starring as Django, a Clint Eastwood type cowboy in the film of the same name. The same can be said of David Hemmings as Mordred, and his other turn as the lead in Michelangelo Antonioni’s brilliant film, Blow-Up. The real standouts here, however, are Redgrave and Harris, and not just for the fact that they performed their own singing, but because of their outright fantastic acting skills. Harris and Redgrave inject each and every song with just the right amount of necessary emotion, neither underplayed nor overwrought. Some perfect examples revolve mostly around Harris, revealing a somewhat youthful naïveté during “I Wonder What the King is Doing Tonight,” done in a great talk-sing fashion; showing a more joyous pride and newfound love, yet also somewhat a self-deprecation, during “Camelot”; setting himself up for a grand fall with the vulnerability of “How to Handle a Woman,” and finally, somehow amazingly able to show a deep pain that he is also hiding below the surface while singing along with Guinevere, “What do the Simple Folk Do.”

As a grand musical film, it is very well put together. With a balance of indoor set-pieces and outdoor duels, jousts, and battle scenes, it captures both the feel of a stage musical and the grandiosity of an epic film. Camelot, the film, further bridges the gap between the two mediums by providing an opening Overture and an “Entr’Acte.” But, as someone who was not a big fan of musicals, it couldn’t have been these things that pulled me in. Partly, it was the fact that my parents love this musical, being able at times to recite not only each and every song by heart, but also dialogue, which, by the way, was taken at times verbatim from White’s book, particularly the last scene of the film, with Arthur on the battlefield talking to a young, want-to-be knight. But, we’ll get to that scene later. The other thing that drew me in was a love of the Arthurian legends, from Malory to Monty Python and beyond. I was curious to see how a musical could adapt the White book and also to see what parts would be the focus. I was not disappointed.

I was especially intrigued and impressed by the way that the film handled the characters as archetypes as well as individuals with their particular motivations. Arthur, as the progressive bastion of Democracy, and Mordred, as the totalitarian manipulator, were great foils for each other. I love seeing Arthur explain the round table, giving each knight, and the king himself, equal importance. It gives me hope in this time of great inequity. I also love the concept that Arthur espouses of the knights standing as "might for right" as opposed to "might makes right," a phrase that has often been spouted at me from staunch conservatives. If I were to stretch the analogy, I could probably peg Lancelot as a symbol of Capitalism, taking what he wants, using obfuscation when necessary, and following an Ayn Rand kind of selfishness, but as I said, that might be stretching it. Another memorable scene is the one in which he is trying to explain his new method of a fair trial by jury to Pellinore, to the guest king's befuddled consternation. Just like Umbrellas, the ending of the film made me well up with tears, played amazingly by Harris and Redgrave. Redgrave, in particular, made me cry like I hadn’t in a long time. Also, like Umbrellas, it was a good cry, one that truly reflected real reflective emotion and not just filmic manipulation.

The scene that immediately follows, the one I referred to earlier, finds a young boy with a bow wanting to join Arthur on the battlefield in his war against Lancelot. It is both hopeful and heartbreaking at the same time, a scene that will stick with me for years to come. (The young boy's name is Thomas, a supposed cameo for a young Thomas Malory who would go on to chronicle Arthur's adventures). The scene is also one that was a favorite of John F. Kennedy’s, having been a huge fan of both the musical and the T.H. White book, further solidifying the aura surrounding his presidency and youthful ideals, which is often characterized by the term, Camelot. The two are now nearly inseparable, even referred to in an episode of Mad Men. I couldn’t possibly go through all of the ways in which this connection is apt, but let’s just suffice it to say that the connection exists. Getting back to that last scene, however, it speaks to how precious and fragile democracy truly is, and how even just the actions of one person, and more importantly, a young person, are to preserving it. I think what I love most about the film, and also the book, is this message. As Arthur says to the young boy, Thomas, on the eve of battle, having had his heart broken, but not his values, in a speech that is echoed in the chapter’s title, "The Candle in the Wind":

“Thomas, my idea of those knights was a sort of candle, like these ones here. I have carried it for many years with a hand to shield it from the wind. It has flickered often. I am giving you the candle now – you won’t let it out?”

“It will burn.”

(p.637)

I truly hope so.



White, T.H. (1958) The Once and Future King. New York, NY: G.P. Putnam's Sons.

Films of the 60s, Part 6: On a holiday, so many miles...

“On a Holiday, so many miles, looking for a place to stay near some friendly star.” - The Pixies, "Motorway to Roswell"

While the first half of the decade continued the traditions of 50s pulp (which I also love), the second half of the 60s took the genre of science fiction in brand new directions, inspired by a wave of daring and creative authors. I’ve always felt that the best science fiction is not based around starship battles, lasers, and impractical things like flying cars and jetpacks, but is instead either heavily rooted in actual science or merely humanistic philosophical writings with sci-fi as a template. The following three movies are great examples of this distinction, having since become iconic in the genre.



Alphaville (1965, Jean-Luc Godard)

“What?” you may be asking, “a sci-fi film without special effects?” Yes, that’s exactly what Alphaville is. Jean-Luc Godard’s prescient look at the increasing rise of technology was way ahead of its time, and all without using advanced technology. Is that a paradox? Not really, at least according to some of the underlying messages within. Eddie Constantine is perfect as Lemmy Caution, an established hard-boiled noir detective in a strange new world. Constantine had already been playing the detective in a series of noir films, which is probably why the role seemed so effortless and fitting. Caution is meant to appear as a fish out of water, however, a stranger in a strange land, to appropriate another science fiction touchstone. He has a few little missions in Alphaville, a city run by a computer, called “Alpha 60.”

There is very little in this film to denote that this is science fiction, other than literary and visual devices. For instance, we consistently get images of flashing lights, blinking at different variables, and many arrows pointing to the right, as if into the future, signifying progress. The future of Alphaville is more the future of Huxley and Orwell, awash in bureaucracy, in which Caution is consistently told to check in with Civil Control, which he then consistently blows off. But, the most disconcerting, jarring, and uncomfortable sci-fi trope is the voice of Alpha 60, performed by a man with a mechanical voice-box, like those provided to former smokers who have completely destroyed their larynges. Sounds of swallowing and hitches in the breath accompany the mechanical voice, which is almost too horrifying to listen to, but is ever present. This can’t be accidental. It’s as if Godard is signifying that this is incredibly wrong.

The people who inhabit Alphaville are equally curious, devoid of emotion, as that is the law of Alpha 60, and ending every conversation with “I’m very well, thank you, you’re welcome,” or “Yes, I’m fine. Don’t mention it.” They keep a book they call “The Bible,” that is filled with the words that have been outlawed from human usage as they evoke too much emotion. Natasha Von Braun, played by the exquisitely beautiful Anna Karina, watches Eddie being abused and is asked if she is crying. “No,” she says, as a tear rolls down her cheek, “because that’s forbidden.” One person says to Caution, “Never say why, only because.” And what happens when people cross the line, showing too much emotion? They are executed, with the killings watched as sport.

This might have been the fist mix of sci-fi and noir mystery (don’t hold me to that), but it certainly wasn’t the last. Jonathan Lethem, Philip K. Dick, and many others continued this great blend of genres. Parts of this film reminded me of La Jetée, Gattaca, Children of Men, and other sci-fi films that were more warnings of the present than warnings of the future. At a certain point, Alpha 60 questions Caution in a brilliant scene of masterful dialogue. “What is the privilege of the dead,” asks Alpha 60. “To die no more,” answers Caution. “What transforms darkness into light?” “Poetry,” responds our hard-boiled hero in a moment of surprising vulnerability. Four years later, as we will see, Stanley Kubrick presented a take on the self-realized computer, though his voice was much easier to listen to, if equally as chilling.



Planet of the Apes (1968, Franklin J. Schaffner)

The ending of Planet of the Apes has been parodied so many times that it had lost the power of its twist ending, like Citizen Kane or Psycho. Amazingly, as I had never seen the film until just before writing this, it didn’t take away from my enjoyment of the movie. Based on a French novel, by Pierre Boulle, this film has become part of the sci-fi canon. Equal parts Twilight Zone narrative, allegory of race relations, and commentary on the debate of religion vs. evolution, Planet of the Apes is a film that has everything, plus a generous amount of camp. After resisting seeing this movie for as long as I have, I was surprised at how much I enjoyed it, even to the point of considering buying it on Blu-Ray.

Charlton Heston is perfect as ANSA (a not so clever version of NASA) mission leader, Taylor. His brash machismo and self-righteous demeanor make him the ideal “captured savage.” While he may be the central figure, he has to battle for screen time with the costumed simians, as played wonderfully by Malcolm McDowell, Kim Hunter, and Maurice Evans, as Cornelius, Zira, and Dr. Zaius, respectively. Their carefully arranged hierarchy is riveting to watch and analyze. The chimpanzees, of which Cornelius and Zira are members, are smaller and smarter, scientists and open thinkers. The orangutans are rigid followers of the law and religion, constantly quoting the sacred scrolls. The gorillas are the military force, rounding up the primitive humans and rarely speaking. I’ll let you make your own connections to real world counterparts, in both stereotypes and actual correlatives, including coloration.

In this way, Planet of the Apes is a much deeper film than I at first surmised it to be. Sure, there are over the top moments, such as Heston’s maniacal laugh near the beginning of the film, when Landon plants an American flag in the desert sand, or the fact that he smokes a cigar in a spacecraft. Sure, that could happen. Even more out of place in later viewings, like my own, are the 60s, flower child, hippie slogans, such as when Heston tells young Lucius, “Don’t trust anyone over 30.” But, Planet of the Apes has more going for it than not. Despite the primitive costumes, in which the mouths of the monkeys hardly move at all, one loses oneself in the world envisioned by the author and filmmakers. The score by Jerry Goldsmith is suspenseful and engaging. The performances are wonderful, even by the hammy Heston. The cinematography is breathtaking, especially in the opening moments of the film, with long shots of our astronauts walking through the desert, and overhead shots of the gorillas closing in on the primitive humans in the tall fields. And, without giving anything away, though it is simply part of the social consciousness, there is not much in this film in the way of special effects to denote science fiction, just like Alphaville.

The Simpsons has parodied this movie dozens of times, possibly as many times as they have The Godfather, The Graduate, and Citizen Kane. My favorite, however, has to be when Homer is picked to be an astronaut and then pieces together the symbolic twist ending, much later than any reasonable man should, finally replicating Heston's final exclamations in hilarious fashion.



2001: A Space Odyssey (1968, Stanley Kubrick)

It is still amazing to me that 2001: A Space Odyssey was released a full year before man actually even landed on the moon. Its visions of space travel, space stations, and other leaps in technology and science were more than prescient, they were staggeringly accurate. Okay, so maybe we don't have Pan-Am passenger space flights, but we do have video phones. So, how much longer is it going to be until we actually see passenger space flights? I'm looking at you, Paul Allen.

Unlike the previous two films, 2001 does employ special effects, and they are mind-blowing, though not in the way that we are accustomed to today, in 3-D, CGI, and digital animation. Instead, Kubrick uses both old school camera trickery and newfound techniques to display such things as altering gravity, gyroscopic satellite runs, and trips through a “Star Gate.” Co-written with sci-fi master, Arthur C. Clarke, 2001 was and still remains one of the best examples of the artistic and philosophical side of this genre. Because of input from Clarke and luminary figures in science, such as Carl Sagan, everything in 2001 feels somehow real. There are no sounds in space. There are no humanoid aliens. There is both a beauty and precision to scenes in which ships dock with space stations. Some may call Star Wars a space opera, but 2001 is far more classically operatic than Star Wars, even to the point of being divided into four separate movements.

The first movement involves the dawn of man, the moment when monkey-like primitive humans first learn how to wield tools. The second features a scientist traveling to a space station orbiting the moon who is summoned to explain a found anomaly. The third is likely the most remembered and most quoted, featuring space travelers headed on a mission to Jupiter some eighteen months later, on a ship run by a computer called “HAL 9000.” The fourth and final movement centers around one of those astronauts, Bowman, and his final journey of discovery. The common through line amongst these individual parts is the monolith, a large black rectangle that keeps mysteriously popping up, with many, including the audience, wondering just what it may mean.

Kubrick and Clarke purposefully set out to write a story that would have to be viewed again and again, mined each time for meaning, philosophically and existentially. This is certainly not a straightforward story. Perhaps this is why the third movement, with HAL, is the most remembered, being a somewhat self-contained story of a computer that becomes self-actualized. By the way, the idea that the name HAL came from the three letters preceding IBM is apocryphal. It actually stands for Heuristic Algorithmic Computer. Much of the reason I love 2001, and can watch it repeatedly is in its enigmatic nature. Philosophy is personal, it is not meant to provide ready answers and simple solutions to our most difficult questions. Instead, 2001 presents those difficult questions in a particular setting and then asks questions those scientists and futurists are asking about life in the cosmos. A sci-fi film this intelligent had never been made before, and I’d argue that it hasn’t been duplicated since. Do I have my own take on what is happening here? Sure I do! Am I going to tell you? I’m afraid I can’t do that, Dave.