July 26, 2014

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

George Bernard Shaw (1856 – 1950):

“Life isn't about finding yourself. Life is about creating yourself.”

and

“A life spent making mistakes is not only more honorable, but more useful than a life spent doing nothing.”

and

“There are two tragedies in life. One is to lose your heart's desire. The other is to gain it.”

and

“People who say it cannot be done should not interrupt those who are doing it.”

and

“The world is populated in the main by people who should not exist.”

and

“The power of accurate observation is commonly called cynicism by those who have not got it.”

Carl Jung (1875 – 1961):

“The meeting of two personalities is like the contact of two chemical substances: if there is any reaction, both are transformed.”

and

“Everything that irritates us about others can lead us to an understanding of ourselves.”

and

“Your visions will become clear only when you can look into your own heart. Who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakes.”

and

“I am not what happened to me, I am what I choose to become.”

Aldous Huxley (1894 – 1963):

“Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored.”

and

“After silence, that which comes nearest to expressing the inexpressible is music.”

and

“Words can be like X-rays if you use them properly -- they’ll go through anything. You read and you’re pierced.”

and

“I wanted to change the world. But I have found that the only thing one can be sure of changing is oneself.”

and

“If one's different, one's bound to be lonely.”

and

“Maybe this world is another planet’s hell.”

Stanley Kubrick (1928 – 1999):

“I think the big mistake in schools is trying to teach children anything, and by using fear as the basic motivation. Fear of getting failing grades, fear of not staying with your class, etc. Interest can produce learning on a scale compared to fear as a nuclear explosion to a firecracker.”

and

“However vast the darkness, we must supply our own light.”

Mick Jagger (1943 - ):

“You can't always get what you want, but if you try sometimes, you might find, you get what you need.”

and

“It's all right letting yourself go, as long as you can get yourself back”

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.

Films of the 50's Part 9: War! What Is It Good For?

Night and Fog (1955, Alain Resnais)

Possibly the most devastating thirty minutes of film I’ve ever seen exist in the French documentary called Night and Fog. Released on the 10th anniversary of the end of the war, I’d imagine that emotions were still running high, and that several of the images seen in the film were quite shocking to the viewing public. The title comes from a division of the Nazi government that rounded up dissidents and threw them into camps. They would get an “N / N” painted on the backs of their coats, representing “Nacht und Nebel.”

Night and Fog is a powerful marriage of three elements, visuals, which are a mix of stock war footage and shots of the camps in 1955, stark and riveting narration by Michel Bouquet, off a script written by Gusen concentration camp survivor Jean Cayrol, and an indelibly moving score by Hanns Eisler, regular collaborator of Bertolt Brecht, whose music was banned by the Nazis. Eisler fled to the states during the war. Night and Fog was one of the first, and possibly one of the more shocking, revelations of wartime atrocities and the Holocaust put into mass media.

Something that struck me while watching this short film is that the images of the abandoned camps, the overgrown weeds covering the train tracks leading to the camp buildings, the empty wooden bunks, and the gas chambers, all telling stories through a haunting absence. These absences can’t help but evoke overwhelming feelings of despair for humanity. It is most likely because of this that French schools required their students to watch Night and Fog, to understand what happened, and what we need to be ever vigilant to be sure never happens again.

You can see Night and Fog for free on Google Video, as well as read the Criterion collection essays about the film online at Criterion.com.



Mister Roberts (1955, John Ford & Mervyn Le Roy)


From a devastating documentary about the camps to another side of World War II, we have Mister Roberts, a comedy-drama set on a naval cargo ship in the Pacific during the last days of fighting. Henry Fonda stars as the title character, the executive officer that acts as the respected middleman to Lt. Commander Morton, a pain in the ass Captain, played to the hilt by James Cagney. Morton won’t let any of his men out on leave, or ‘liberty’ as they call it in the film. Roberts is constantly trying to get off the cargo ship, looking for a more meaningful assignment on the front lines, writing letter after letter, essentially driving Morton crazy.

Morton and Roberts make a deal. Morton will let the men have their ‘liberty’ as long as Roberts ceases his letter writing campaign to get off the cargo ship. There is an odd, yet effective balance in Mister Roberts. There are serious and heartbreaking moments throughout, especially the bittersweet ending, but the film is punctuated by hilarious comedy, usually involving Ensign Pulver, played by a young Jack Lemmon, who is spectacular in the role, as evidenced by winning the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor.

One of the more memorable scenes of the film involves a concoction by Roberts, Pulver and the ship’s doctor to create a bottle of Scotch with some clear alcohol, Coca-Cola, and iodine. Another hilarious moment involves Morton confronting Pulver, asking the ensign how long he’s been aboard the ship (as Pulver has been avoiding the Captain since being on the ship), Pulver hesitates, then hilariously reveals, “Fourteen months, sir.”



Paths of Glory (1957, Stanley Kubrick)

Paths of Glory might not be the most famous film in which Stanley Kubrick and Kirk Douglas teamed up (that would be Spartacus), but I’m not sure it shouldn’t be. The film, based on a novel of the same name, takes place during World War I, and is separated into two distinct parts. The first part involves the taking of the ‘anthill,’ a strategic position that, with the combatants current entrenched positions, would be impossible to reach. The second part involves a trial, a court martial of four soldiers accused of mutiny.

Much like one aspect of Night and Fog, Paths of Glory displays the vast difference between the worlds of power and the worlds of the ‘expendable.’ The French General Broulard, played by Adolphe Menjou, orders General Mireau on a suicide mission to take the ‘anthill.’ While at first resistant, he is swayed by the offer of a promotion. Mireau then orders Colonel Dax, played by Douglas, who is also hesitant, but a devoted soldier, intent on carrying out his duties. The attack goes badly, with many killed, and one whole company, led by a cowardly lieutenant, refusing to leave their bunkers. Mireau actually orders, from his cushy station behind lines, the bombing of his own men to get them out of the bunkers. Dax goes back for the company, meaning to spur them into action, but it pushed back into the bunker by a falling French soldier, and by then it is too late.

Furious, Mireau wants to have 100 men executed for mutiny, but General Broulard scales it back down to three to make an example. The three are to be chosen by lot, one from each company, but they’re actually chosen for different reasons. One is chosen for witnessing his cowardly commander mistakenly kill his own soldier, one for being an outsider, and the final actually by lot. Dax feels the entire affair is preposterous and offers to represent the three soldiers during the trial. The rest of the film finds Dax trying to save the three ‘mutinous’ soldiers from the firing squad, but we find that common sense has no place in war. What is truly sad about this is that it was based on a true story, including the General ordering an attack on his own troops.



Operation Petticoat (1959, Blake Edwards)

Cary Grant and Tony Curtis team up in one of Blake Edwards’ early comedy films, Operation Petticoat. Grant shows up to see the decommissioning of his old vessel, the Sea Tiger, a World War II submarine. While waiting for its current captain, he finds his old logbook and begins to reminisce about his war days aboard the ship, and that’s where the hilarity ensues. We are quickly introduced to Matt Sherman, played by Grant, and one of his crew, Nick Holden, played by Curtis. Holden shows up in dress whites, much to the amusement of the crew of the Sea Tiger, but it turns out he’s not in the military out of duty, but as a way to meet a rich wife. He also turns out to be a masterful con man, someone who can procure difficult to get items, becoming an asset Sherman never anticipated.

The two work well with each other, which is assuredly helped by the fact that Curtis idolized Grant, and saw Grant as the inspiration for his entering the acting business. Already having trouble with the submarine (one engine continually backfires, which seems somewhat impossible, but funny), they end up taking on five attractive female passengers, which ruffles the feathers of the somewhat by-the-book Sherman, and even more hilarity ensues. Amazingly, Curtis starred in two of the funniest and more successful films of that war, this one and Some Like it Hot.

Operation Petticoat moves a bit slowly, and isn’t necessarily laugh-out-loud funny, but is endlessly watchable. The stars are charismatic and there are plenty of signature moments to take with you after its over, not the least of which is the one in which Curtis needs to procure paint for the sub, but is only able to get half of what they need in red, and half in white. You can guess what happens from there. Operation Petticoat is one of those films you’d call a ‘fun romp,’ and certainly puts the heavy messages of these other war films into perspective. While the somewhat similar Mister Roberts still displayed some of the seriousness of war, Operation Petticoat is all humor, a lighthearted look at the absurdities that can surround military life.