Films of the 60s, Part 21: We Gotta Get Out of This Place

“We gotta get out of this place
If it’s the last thing we ever do
We gotta get out of this place
Girl there’s a better life for me and you.”
- The Animals, “We Gotta Get Outta This Place”



Many of the films of the 60s could be described as being stories of escape of some kind, including everything from Holly Golightly’s escape from country life and a loveless marriage in Breakfast at Tiffany’s to Marion Crane’s escape from low / middle class drudgery and harassment into a life of crime and eventual doom in Psycho. One could even describe some of the 60s films as audience escapes in such films as the James Bond series or exuberant movie musicals. These three films are more literal in definition, the first two being escapes from prisons of some sort, being the French prison of Le Trou and the German prison camp of The Great Escape, and the final, Dead Ringer, an escape not only from poverty, but also from identity.



Le Trou (1960, Jacques Becker)

I had never heard of Le Trou before I placed it in my Netflix queue (poetry unintended), but it ended up to be a film I will never forget. The title translates to “The Hole,” a word that is generally known as a slang term for a prison, but in the case of this film is also a literal reference to a hole that inmates dig in a corner of their cell in an attempt to escape. Le Trou is based on a true story, as it seems most prison escape films are, save The Shawshank Redemption and a small handful of others, and the director truly makes an effort to capture the realism of the tale. Becker, in fact, goes to great lengths in this endeavor in a few ways, one of them being the hiring of non-actors to fill the roles of the inmates, regular looking fellows one would perhaps expect to see in a prison environment. One of the actors is actually an inmate from the real life escape attempt from the La Santé prison in 1947. This “actor” introduces the film.

The film begins as we follow a young inmate, Gaspard, being put into a crowded cell with four other prisoners. The four are facing incredibly long sentences. However, we don’t know much else about them, allowing us as viewers to perhaps confabulate or ignore whatever their crimes may have been in order to curry our sympathies. Ultimately, it doesn’t matter what they have done in order to fuel the plot and action. Quickly, these prisoners must decide whether or not they can trust Gaspard. In a brief enough time, they determine that it is, if not wise, at least necessary in order to complete their goal. The prisoners are nothing if not resourceful, volunteering for “box-making” duty, not only to keep themselves busy, but to have their stack of flattened boxes to use as a convenient cover to place over the titular hole in the corner of the cell.

Some of the more realistic aspects to this film, aside from the non-actors, are the absolutely meticulous scenes and the lack of a score. We see close-ups of the hands of prison guards as they slice up sausages into small segments, plunge their hands into soaps and cheeses, systematically going through every care package in the search for contraband. The first actions involved in the escape are equally detailed, with long, unbroken shots of the prisoners using a rod from a bed frame to start hammering into the concrete floor and not resorting to a montage until nearly five minutes later. In this way, we sense the arduousness, the anxiety, and the difficulties that these prisoners face in this endeavor. We are escaping with them. It is brilliantly put together. As mentioned, the only music that appears in the film is in the closing scene and credits. Otherwise, throughout the rest of the film, we are left to feel a realistic tension that is not “dramatized” or escalated by the presence of a score. There’s a twist at the end, one I won’t reveal, but the line that comes from one of the characters in response to the turn of events is profound.



The Great Escape (1963, John Sturges)

Whereas Le Trou is atypical as far as most Hollywood films go, after all, it was made in France, not Hollywood; The Great Escape is absolutely typical of the Hollywood film, and the antithesis of Le Trou in style and atmosphere. Instead of “real” looking people, we have the chiseled, blue-eyed Steve McQueen and the slightly less-chiseled but still attractive James Garner, along with our requisite tough guys, Charles Bronson and James Coburn. Instead of a music free tense atmosphere, The Great Escape is packed with a rousing score by Elmer Bernstein, which has since gone on to become one of the most recognizable pieces of film music in history. Further, the civility shown between the warring sides here is most likely fiction, even though it, too, is (somewhat) based on actual events, at least historical certainties of POW camps in WWII. Though, I suppose the POW camps could have been different than the concentration camps.

This is not to say that The Great Escape is a bad film, but rather just a different one as compares with Le Trou. With such big Hollywood and international film stars, the events tend to become more glamourized by default. Yet, the planning, choreography, and dangers in the escape are palpable and riveting. And, lest you think that this is an overly sanitized version of events, there are moments of cruelty and arguable unwarranted shootings. In a mirroring of heist films, each prisoner has a duty or an area of expertise. As such, they also get memorable nicknames such as “The Ferret,” “The Scrounger,” or “The Tunnel King.” But our main point of focus is “The Cooler King,” so named because of the time spent in solitary, played by McQueen. If there is one thing to truly criticize in the adaptation from real life events to novel to screen, it is the focus of Americans as the more cunning escapees and stars of the film. In reality, American prisoners had little to nothing to do with the actual escape attempts.

But, with those things in mind and set aside as mere annoyances in storytelling fiction as opposed to truth, this is an enjoyable film. McQueen’s performance is one that surely cemented him in Hollywood legend and perhaps elevated him to the status of icon, especially with his motorcycle stunts. The music helps to establish a dramatic tone throughout the film as one of hope amidst diligence, as opposed to what it could have been, which is incredibly dour and despairing. As an action film, the right decisions were made, but it is definitely interesting to see the comparison which a film as diametrically opposite as Le Trou, despite covering similar topics.



Dead Ringer (1964, Paul Henreid)

Dead Ringer is another film that was a pleasant surprise, as one that I had not heard of, despite its star director and legendary star. Bette Davis is magnificent playing twin sisters, Margaret and Edith, a feat she had performed eighteen years earlier in A Stolen Life. Karl Malden is equally magnetic and engaging as Police Sergeant Jim Hobbson, the man in love with Edith, the poor sister. While Edith is poor, living in a squalid apartment above a jazz club in an alley (albeit a Hollywood studio alley, nearly sterile), her sister, Margaret, is extraordinarily wealthy, living in a mansion that has been used in over 81 films and television shows, including The Social Network, The Big Lebowski, X-Men, and There Will Be Blood. Margaret’s husband dies and Edith, three months’ behind on her rent and about to be evicted, concocts a plan to eliminate her sister and take her place.

Whereas some of today’s thrillers might focus on the tension leading up to the murder, this film gets to it in a hurry, as the more interesting part is how Edith psychologically deals with the guilt (if any), smartly maneuvers through this new life, and ultimately is found out. Please, how else could it end? The murder itself is tastefully done, cutting quickly from the seated Margaret’s face as she turns to face the gun creeping in from the side of the chair to the jazz drummer’s sticks hitting the snare from the club below. At first, Edith’s plan seems flawless. She cleverly ensures that the murder looks like a suicide based on poverty and depression, and has the real Margaret’s arm fall from a position that would match a self-inflicted gun wound. She later uses subtle and sly tricks to make sure that the mansion’s staff doesn’t let on to her lack of knowledge about the geography. When it comes to a point at which she must learn to sign her sister’s signature, she cunningly, but perhaps insanely, picks up a hot poker with her right hand in order to be forced to sign with her left to mask the discrepancy.

Ultimately, a few unexpected wrinkles do her in. For one, Duke, the Great Dane that belonged to her late husband, hated Margaret, but loved Edith. Duke, the only non-human character in the film, is the first one and the only for quite a while, to know the difference. The maid and the butler seem to be taken aback by her unorthodox behavior, in opposition to the behaviors of the real Margaret, but remain in the dark. Peter Lawford, who plays Margaret’s boy toy, eventually tricks her into revealing her true identity, but his harsh treatment of her leads the dog to attack and kill him. As Edith is tried for the crime of killing Margaret’s boyfriend, she makes one desperate attempt to convince Sergeant Hobbson that she is, in fact, Edith, but he cannot believe that the woman he fell in love with could commit such heinous acts. She, somewhat unbelievably, gets the death penalty, and Hobbson asks if what she said was true, if she truly was Edith, but she denies it, knowing that she had truly succeeded in escaping her previous life, yet could not escape her resultant fate. One of the more moving moments of the film comes when the butler approaches her and asks her what she would like him to say at the trial. “You knew the whole time?” she asks him. It appears that Edith was much better to the staff than Margaret was, and that means something to them. It is a truly memorable moment.

Films of the 60s, Part 7: When I Look to the West

“There’s a feeling I get when I look to the west…” – Led Zeppelin



As I wrote in my piece on westerns in the 50s, this one time ubiquitous genre now only peppers the pop culture landscape, if at all. Auteurs such as the Coen brothers have lent a bit of credibility to a once thriving style of film, which had its heyday in the first half of the 20th century, and its last strong breaths in the 60s. The late part of that decade and especially the 70s brought about a dramatic sea change in style. Stories became less about adventures and characters that were disconnected from the audience. Instead, they became personal, psychological, intimate, and eminently real portraits of life, no matter how stark and uncomfortable. But, the 60s still had some great western adventure stories left to tell, some with humor, some with tragedy, and some that seemed vaguely familiar…



The Magnificent Seven (1960, John Sturges)

The Magnificent Seven is that film that might seem familiar. You see, it’s a photograph of a drawing of a photocopy. Though that might be slightly unfair, let’s look at where it came from. The film is a reimagining of Akira Kurosawa’s Seven Samurai. Seven Samurai is, itself, greatly inspired by the style of American westerns and noir films. But, for a remake of an homage, it’s pretty darn entertaining. It’s at least cast well, with Yul Brynner, Eli Wallach, Steve McQueen, Robert Vaughn, Charles Bronson, and James Coburn as some of the cowboy specialists hired to defend a beleaguered Mexican town, targeted by bandits.

Seven Samurai practically invented the “getting the team together” trope, which was co-opted by The Magnificent Seven, and then employed throughout decades of American adventure and caper films. But, whereas Kurosawa made most of his samurai characters honorable and skilled, director John Sturges made his cowboys skilled, but perhaps not all as honorable. Vin and Bernardo, played by McQueen and Bronson respectively, are both broke, Vin from gambling. Lee, played by Robert Vaughn, has gotten himself into some kind of trouble and has to lay low. The one constant is Chico, played by German actor Horst Buchholz, who is a direct correlation to the scene-stealer of Seven Samurai, Toshiro Mifune’s similarly named, Kikuchiyo.

Whereas The Magnificent Seven clocks in at a relatively fast-paced 128 minutes, Seven Samurai takes an extra hour and a half to build the drama and let its story unfold. Another difference is in how the American version perhaps gives its characters more “larger-than-life” personalities, pushing the characteristics to be near cartoonish. After that, the films are very much alike. The real appeal of The Magnificent Seven is in its Hollywood heavyweight movie stars, its incredible score by Elmer Bernstein, and little flavorful touches, such as James Coburn’s knife throwing and fighting abilities, somehow mirroring the katana duel of Kyuzo, a pivotal scene in Seven Samurai. This wouldn’t be the last time that Hollywood would adapt a foreign film for its audience, but not many since have done it as engagingly.



Cat Ballou (1965, Elliot Silverstein)

This is a really strange film, still somehow stuck in between eras, genres, and messages. It’s a western, but also a comedy. It’s a comedy, but also had dark themes and imagery. It seemed conflicted about feminism, diversity, and sexuality. One look at that movie poster above will give you some clue as to its irreverence. But, it has somehow continued to be revered throughout the decades as an example of great silliness and concise storytelling. My complaints have nothing to do with irreverence. I revere irreverence. I liked Cat Ballou, I just think it’s a strange, strange film. A young Jane Fonda, or should I say, a young and incredibly beautiful Jane Fonda plays the titular character (no pun intended), a schoolteacher headed to Wolf City, Wyoming to visit her father. What ensues, from the train trip on, is a series of mishaps, succeeding events, and revenge plots that escalate and build, carried along by the dual role performance of Lee Marvin.

Marvin plays both drunk and washed up, yet legendary gunfighter, Kid Shelleen and the villainous Tim Strawn, aka Silvernose. Cat gets involved in her father’s fight against a greedy development corporation and enlists the help of Shelleen to battle the injustices they face. In a not-so-comedic moment, Cat’s father is killed. Later, there is literal gallows humor, with jokes surrounding a public hanging. There are definitely funny moments in the film, especially surrounding Marvin’s drunken character of Kid Shelleen, such as when he actually misses shooting the broad side of a barn. Further, there is a great scene in which Kid’s horse appears drunk as well, crossing its legs and leaning up against a shed. Horses don’t cross their legs, and it apparently took the trainer quite a bit of time to train the horse to do something so unnatural.

But, the American Film Institute named Cat Ballou as one of the top ten western films of all time. Though I liked the film, I can easily name probably 20 other westerns I enjoyed more. I’ve seen six of the other nine on the list and think they are appropriate, but I’d probably replace Cat Ballou with either version of True Grit, Tombstone, Silverado, The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, or any one of Eastwood’s films, which, except for the later Unforgiven, were mysteriously absent from this list. The greek chorus of Nat King Cole and Stubby Kaye, singing songs about our heroine, were simply weird. I understand that a musical aspect was present in many early westerns, but by this point they were somewhat out of date. But, that didn’t stop the Farrelly brothers from being inspired by their presence. While Cat Ballou was entertaining, it wouldn’t be in my own top ten.



The Way West (1967, Andrew McLaglen)

Most people’s knowledge of the Oregon Trail has come from a video game in junior high social studies. But, that journey was so much more than simply, “You have died of dysentery.” Seventeen years after the novel by A.B. Guthrie won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction, Hollywood came calling with the promise of an adaptation of The Way West. Veteran actor and director Andrew McLaglen helmed the picture, casting the great Kirk Douglas, Richard Widmark, and Robert Mitchum as the trio of male leads, and featuring a young Sally Field in a somewhat risqué role for a one-time surfer girl, and soon-to-be flying nun. The Way West depicts exactly what the title promises, a wagon train of farmers and ranchers heading to the Oregon territory to find independence and fortune.

Widmark plays the novel’s central character, Lije Evans, but he is given somewhat of a backseat role to the somewhat bigger stars for the film adaptation. Douglas plays William Tadlock, a politician traveling with his young son, driven both to get to the west as soon as possible as well as lead a group he finds malleable and lesser than. Along for the ride is Dick Summers, played by Mitchum, the loner Han Solo character, standoffish and silent, but more experienced than anyone else in the party. This film illustrates the hardships these travelers faced, including fording deep and dangerous rivers, encounters with Native Americans (played less politically correct in the film than in the book, more on that later), stampedes, lack of medical attention, and anything else you can name from this period. The film doesn’t even bother to replicate the rattlesnake bite that one child dies from in the book, maybe because it would have been overkill.

In the novel, Native American tribes act only after being provoked, with one of their own killed by one of the travelers who was sniping from a tree. In the film, they attack for no reason, perpetuating the stereotype of the savage. Even further, they make the Indians fairly ineffectual, firing arrows at near point blank range and having no effect whatsoever. These are skilled hunters and survivalists! Yeesh. Other than that, The Way West is a well-made film, well acted, and with incredible cinematography. Sally Field’s portrayal as the somewhat loose and easy Mercy McBee may surprise some, knowing her usual casting as the girl next door. But, in this, she seduces a married man and becomes pregnant with his child! Gasp! At least Guthrie and Hollywood each decided to present situations as they happened in reality, refusing to whitewash it with political correctness. It’s just a shame that they didn’t see the reality of the Native Americans in the same way, defaulting toward what was more “entertaining.”

Films of the 50's, Part 6: A Trio of Westerns

Shane (1953, George Stevens)

For a few of these installments, I’ve decided to expand my selections to more than two. I have to get through all these somehow, and two at a time just isn’t cutting it. So, in this case, welcome to a special Westerns edition of “Films of the ‘50’s.”

Westerns, at one time, were incredibly popular. These days, even if you combine the western genre with another one, say science fiction, you can’t even get a show to last for half a season. Western novels used to take up entire sections of bookstores. Now, you’ll be lucky to find more than a few shelves, even if they’re all Louis L’Amour. The 50’s were probably the last bastion for the ‘white hat’ westerns, those stories where a squeaky-clean cowboy would protect the defenseless in the lawless west. The 60’s would bring both a new artistry and grittiness to the genre with the Sergio Leone Spaghetti Westerns. Soon after, the category seemed to practically disappear from the theaters. But, every once in a while, someone finds a new take, or a gripping story, and the ailing western is given a new breath of life, at least for a short time.

Shane is one of the most famous westerns of the innocent ‘white hat’ age. Out of all of these films I’ve seen, Shane is the only one in which the hero actually does show up in a white hat and suit (well, it’s sort of a cream color, but close enough). Alan Ladd plays Shane, a gunslinging drifter who chances upon a homesteading family fighting for their survival against a gang of land-grabbing toughs. Shane, the altruistic good-guy that we take him to be, offers his help, including one of the most homo-erotic scenes I’ve witnessed, involving the removal of an old tree stump. The community and family, especially their young boy, become attached to Shane. Already, even if you haven’t seen the film, you can predict what’s coming. After the big showdown, in which it remains unclear whether Shane’s injuries are critical or superficial, our white-hatted hero rides off into the sunset yet again, leaving the really creepy, beady eyed, big-headed young boy to call out to him, his needy voice echoing into the valley.

Despite its reputation and seemingly straightforward tale of bravery, I had a few problems with Shane. For one, that kid scares the hell out of me. Secondly, there is a scene in which Shane begins to teach the child in question how to use a gun. The boy’s mother, Marian, protests, saying she doesn’t want her child to live that kind of life. This prompts Shane to give her a speech, saying, “A gun is a tool, Marian; no better or no worse than any other tool: an axe, a shovel or anything. A gun is as good or as bad as the man using it. Remember that.” I know this is a standard defense for guns, and makes sense for the old west, yet it still bothers me. Not only do I believe the argument is complete bunk, but this supposed good guy is directly defying the wishes of the child’s mother, a child he has known for all of a few days.

There are a few things I did enjoy about Shane. In an uncharacteristic fashion to the more innocent days of westerns, Shane contains one of the longest, bloodiest, and most believable bar fights in the genre. The movie should also be remembered for the standout performance of Jack Palance, portraying the hired gun for the black hats. I also always enjoy the performances of Elisha Cook, Jr., a wide-eyed actor best known for playing the ‘gunsel’ in The Maltese Falcon.



Gunfight at the O.K. Corral (1957, John Sturges)

I don’t know if there is any other western story as famous or as prevalent as the gunfight at the O.K. Corral. The tale of unlikely friends, Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday, proved that sometimes truth is stranger and more interesting than fiction. Yet, at the same time, it has inspired some pretty darn great fiction. One of the early standards was the simply titled, Gunfight at the O.K. Corral. Burt Lancaster and Kirk Douglas, in their second team-up that would eventually become legendary, are Earp and Holliday, respectively. Lancaster, who was known as all teeth and muscle, and Douglas, with a perfect mix of cockiness and panache, play off each other incredibly well, which is why it’s fairly easy to see how their partnership continued so successfully.

This movie was a real hodge-podge. It’s full of memorable lines and great performances, but devoid of much action, drags along from town to town in order to preserve the historical timeline, and has the goofiest theme song, which would be forgiven if it wasn’t interspersed throughout the film, acting as summary narration. Ultimately, the biggest drawback is somewhat an unfair one, having to do with the passage of time. I don’t know if Tombstone could be considered a remake, since it’s merely telling the same real-life story, but it’s difficult to look back on any other Earp story after it. Val Kilmer’s Doc Holliday is easily one of the most quotable and entertaining roles in westerns, or frankly any other film for that matter.

That’s not to say that Douglas’ performance is lacking. In fact, he has some great lines that certainly could have been inspiration for the 1993 version. For instance, “I do handle them [guns] pretty well. The only trouble is, those best able to testify to my aim aren’t around for comment.” Further, in comparison to Shane, Lancaster’s Earp has a more palatable message regarding guns, “I never knew a gunslinger yet so tough he lived to celebrate his 35th birthday. I learned one rule about gunslingers. There's always a man faster on the draw than you are, and the more you use a gun, the sooner you're gonna run into that man.”

There are two appearances to watch for in Gunfight, DeForest Kelley and Dennis Hopper. Kelly, best known for playing Dr. Leonard “Bones” McCoy in the original Star Trek series and films, plays Morgan Earp. Hopper, in a small but memorable performance, plays Billy Clanton, a youngster who feels trapped into being a gunslinger by his older brothers, a nice contrast to the Earp family sense of unity.



Rio Bravo (1959, Howard Hawks)

I mentioned Rio Bravo previously, in my capsule on High Noon. As I said before, Rio Bravo was made as John Wayne and Howard Hawks’ response to the Gary Cooper film, which they felt was unbelievable (and not in the good sense). So, instead of a Marshal who can’t find anyone in the town help fight the villains, western icon John Wayne finds a motley bunch of friends and strangers that band together in the same mission.

There’s the town drunk, Dean Martin in a pretty much typecast role, the rickety old jailer, also typecast with Walter Brennan, the young noncommittal drifter, played by Ricky Nelson, and the strong, beautiful, independent gambler, played by Angie Dickinson. On paper, this film could have been a huge mess. Hawks didn’t particularly want to cast Nelson, and the idea of singing cowboys was quickly becoming an outdated concept. Plus, remaking High Noon, a beloved film, was a risky proposition, even if they didn’t believe in its politics.

But, the movie succeeds on several levels. Rio Bravo is mostly carried by its co-stars, and nearly stolen by supporting characters, such as Pedro Gonzalez Gonzalez as the hotel owner, Carlos. Even the songs, including the memorable duet between Martin and Nelson, “My Rifle, My Pony, and Me,” stand out. It’s rumored that Quentin Tarantino shows Rio Bravo to his dates, and if the girl doesn’t like it, they never have another. I certainly didn’t feel that strongly about it, but there are very few westerns I can claim to love. In this day and age, after Silverado, Tombstone, and more recently, the hybrid show Firefly, and the ultra-gritty realism of Deadwood, it would be difficult for any of these movies to win me over.