Film Forno

Seeing a great film for the first time is an intoxicating, inspiring event. Especially if it’s one that you’ve known about for years, seen stills of incredible images reproduced in books, read about, etc. This is the case with me and Jean Cocteau’s masterpiece Orpheus. I happened to catch the second half of it on TCM the other night and was mesmerized from the first frame. I caught it right when Orpheus climbs back into his bedroom and is told by Death’s chaufer that his wife, Eurydice, is dead.

I’m only telling you this to make a point. Coming in on the film like this I was immediately struck by the distinctly American feeling of this scene. The bedroom had a floral wallpaper, it was small, with small beds, Orpheus climbing in through the window, it really reminded me of Leave it to Beaver!

Gee Orpheus, Wally, I mean Eurydice’s dead!

The way it looked, the Black and White photography. Except they were talking about Death and the path they must take to the next world to rescue, or resuscitate Eurydice. This to me is the great power of this film. Cocteau takes the mundane, the everyday objects and places that make up our lives and shows them to be miraculous, full of mystery, portals to other dimensions. Can a poet strive for a higher goal?

Jean Marais puts his hands into a pool of Mercurey, that’s why Cocteau made rubber gloves the magical key to pierce the Mirror, Mercurey is deadly poison!

Mirrors that lead to the Underworld. Death as a beautiful women in a black Rolls Royce, escorted by two leather clad motorcyclists. What an image!

Death’s Wheels!

Death, What A Way To Go!

Death’s dress subtly changes from Black to White in the same scene. The costumes are exceptionally cool!

The elevation of the mundane to the marvelous is also a big part of Silent Film. This is why the masters like Keaton etc, were revered by the Surrealists. They created poetry from salt shakers,boats built in basements, houses moved by car, run through by locomotives. It became a basic tenet of Surrealism, an ordinary object placed in an unexpected context. Consider the urinal signed R. Mutt submitted by Marcel Duchamp to the Armory show, (okay Dadaist but a direct precursor to Surrealist). In a memorable section Cocteau illustrates the Creative Process in a beautiful unique way. Orpheus is obsessed by the strange broadcasts that he can only receive on the car radio in Death’s limousine, he copies them down and publishes them as poetry.

Later we find out that Death has Cegeste, a young poet she had killed by her cyclists , writing the poetry and transmitting it to the car radio expressly for Orpheus to hear.

Dead Poet Society- Cegeste (Cocteau’s current lover) transmits to Orpheus(Cocteau’s former lover)

Okay to me the Creative Process works like this: all artists are standing on the shoulders of those who came before and have passed on to the next dimension. Where do ideas come from? I often have the distinct feeling that they are transmissions from deceased artists to receptive beings here on Earth. I think Cocteau felt the same way hence this amazing illustration of the principle. Also a car radio, another run of the mill object we all deal with everyday! Although Radio is inherently mysterious, these invisible waves that beam around the globe carrying thoughts, voice, music, stories. The effects Cocteau uses are all basic film effects, reverse motion, rear projection, but once again transformed through the prism of his intellect into pure poetry, something direly missing from films made today. The world Orpheus lives in is a special place, where a poet is as famous as a rock star or a movie star.

Cocteau didn’t like the artsy type extras he got from Central Casting so he invited real Bohemians to populate his Cafe Des Poets!

Teenaged girls mob Orpheus as Death gets into her other Cool Car

This predates Elvis and the Beatles. Luis Bunuel said he had dreamed of the Beatles many years before they existed, four young men with strange haircuts who caused riots whereever they went!

Since this film was made in 1949 Orpheus looks kind of like Elvis Presley. Pretty Cool to take a Greek Myth and update it with teenagers, motorcycles, radios, coffee houses, etc. probably another reason why the film doesn’t seem dated. Also I noticed a cameo by director Jean Pierre Melville playing the manager of a hotel. Melville directed the adaptation of Cocteau’s novel Les enfants terribles.

Jean Pierre Melville’s Cameo

Finally Death is called to the carpet by a tribunal of Old White Men! The Old White Guys even get to pass Judgement on Death!

Even Death gets Judged!

To say I love this film is an understatement, I bought the dvd and it’s sadly lacking in extras, hey Criterion I’ll gladly do a commentary on this Masterpiece!
To sum it up, Watch this film! I dare you not to be Inspired or Astonished!

Columbia Pictures just released a film noir box set of 5 dvds, all of them classics. There’s Edward Dymytrk’s The Sniper an early serial killer story set in San Francisco and starring Monster On The Campus leading man Arthur Franz. Martin Scorsese adds a commentary.

Fritz Lang’s The Big Heat starring Glenn Ford, Lee Marvin and Gloria Graham. Directors Michael Mann and Scorsese toss their 2 cents in on this gem.

Phil Karlson’s 5 against The House with Brian “rub my jaw” Keith. A vegas caper flick. No commentary on this one, a telling comment in itself?

Don “I hate hippies” Siegel’s The Lineup starring Tuco himself, Eli Wallach gets comments from Noir Guru and straight man, Eddie Mueller and mad dog James Ellroy. A lot of fun to be had by all on this track.

And last but not least Irving Lerner’s Murder By Contract starring Hammerhead Vince Edwards, who I used to see at the racetrack all the time.

This film was a big influence on Mr. Scorsese, I think it’s really interesting how some of the best directors out there were influenced by B movies or even Z movies! Quentin Tarantino for example, also Jean Luc Godard has expressed his regard for Monogram Pictures ( the cheapest of the cheap). Anyway I for one have put this set on my Xmas list! I hope I find it under the tree when I awaken Dec. 25th.

Max Reinhardt, king of German theater had to flee Nazi oppression at the height of his creative success. He came to America, staged A Midsummer Night’s Dream at the Hollywood Bowl and was signed to a contract by Warner Bros. to direct a film version. I guess it didn’t make money because Reinhardt didn’t get to make any other films. But the film he did make with William Dieterle co-directing is incredibly beautiful. Fantastic images in luminous Black and White, they must have upped the silver content in that batch of nitrate film because the images positively glow!

A number of Reinhardt’s collaborators from Germany re-located to Hollywood and created some of the most creative films ever made there. Dieterle made the incredible Portrait Of Jennie, a magical film beloved by none other than the great Surrealist Luis Bunuel.

Although Dieterle was driven to drink and a nervous breakdown by the incessant barrage of telegrams from amphetamine fueled producer David O. Selznick. The cameraman Joseph August of that film died soon after of a heart attack, Selznick strikes again? John Brahm, director of The Lodger, The Locket, and Hangover Square was a Reinhardt alumnus.

John Brahm

So was Otto Preminger, not a filmmaker of Fantasy, but definetly a ground-breaker when it came to sex, race, drugs, Black-Listing. Plus he directed the archtypal Laura.

Mr. Freeze says “Where’s Dorothy Dandridge?”

And Edgar G. Ulmer labored in the Art Department for Reinhardt. He directed the Bauhaus influenced Horror fim The Black Cat. A curious coincidence, Reinhardt opened an Acting School in Hollywood to pay his bills, Anne Savage attended and hit it off with Max, she later starred in Ulmer’s Detour.

Edgar G. Ulmer, a Black Cat crossed his path at Universal

Here’s a promotional film about the making of A Midsummer Night’s Dream

Treasure Trove Of Kubla Khan or Gordon Liu

Dan Halstead, master of the grindhousefilmfest and the super cool Slums Of Shaolin has unearthed a veritable treasure trove of Kung Fu Films! Deep in the bowels of an old Chinese movie theater, in an inner city crack zone, Dan and his intrepid pal Leno unearthed these lost gems and brought them to the light of arc lamps for the first time in many years, all I can say is Bravo! And when can we get to watch! Check out more here: Treasure of the Forgotten Temple

We here at Film Forno believe in supporting independent film. In that spirit we present the trailer for Determinism, a feature by the Brothers Majumdar, identical twin filmmakers from back East. The film looks great, a lot of cool images in the trailer as you can see for yourself, excellent sound design, Check it out. I haven’t seen the film yet so I can’t comment on it but they did a great job with the trailer

And here is a link to the website about the film: CLICK ME!

Here’s a link to the great Meshes Of The Afternoon by Maya Deren and her husband Alexander Hamid. This was required watching in Film School and it expresses Hollywood 1943 Art Film like no other except maybe Kenneth Anger’s Fireworks. Underground Film in all it’s glory!

Maya At Work Editing One Of Her Films

I got the DVD of Arnold Laven’s film Without Warning! and watched it last night.

Psycho Killer Carl Martin

It’s a good film that features some incredible 50’s Los Angeles locations. The killer offs his first victim at a sleazy motel, they never show the actual killing in this film just the aftermath. The first one is great, a huge close up of the upside down face of the victim, this is an early cinematic use of this disturbing image, later used to great effect in Apocalypse Now for example. The police investigate and we are off on a cat and mouse chase throughout the seedy side of L.A. There is some early forensic science used to track the murderer, fibers from his torn suit jacket, and it’s interesting how the killer figures out that he could be traced by these means and so burns his expensive new suit. He also refrains from killing a blonde victim when she writes his name on a receipt, stamps the time on it and locks it in a safe. He realizes this damming document would lead the police directly to him so he must not act on his blood lust.

Chavez Ravine- In all it’s glory!

We see the killer at home, he lives in Chavez Ravine, a working class community with a birds eye view of downtown Los Angeles and City Hall. This is pre Dodger Stadium Chavez Ravine, a big community that was wiped out by bulldozers in the name of progress. Some people wouldn’t leave and were ripped out of their homes, kicking and screaming, as bulldozers crushed their domiciles and their slice of the American Dream.

An Unwilling To Move Resident is Dragged Out Of Her Chavez Ravine Home!

Check out Ry Cooder’s album for a musical re-telling of the story. Also Chavez Ravine is one of the most popular dumping spots for serial killers so having their protagonist live their was a stroke of psychological cinema verite.

The killer takes one of his victims under the Brand New not yet opened Hollywood Freeway and it’s cool to get a glimpse of the nascent road system before hordes of angry commuters descended on it.

The lead actor Adam Williams is very good as Carl Martin gardner/killer but I found the investigating police kind of stiff. There is a tense climatic scene where the daughter of the nursery owner delivers an orchid to the killer, realizes he’s the killer and has to hang around and have a cup of tea with him while he tells her of his failed marriage. If you dig 50’s L.A. crime, check this movie out. James Ellroy would drool over this film.

Producer- Director Arnold Laven has passed on. He’s responsible for a large amount of influential film and television. I just read a great interview with him the other day. It was done for the Noir City Sentinel, the newsletter of the Film Noir Foundation and you can read it here. I was so impressed with this interview I ordered the DVD of Laven’s directorial debut, 1952’s Without Warning, one of the first serial killer pictures and full of great Los Angeles location photography. I will post about it once I get it.

Besides his great film noir work Laven was in a large way responsible for two giant Western television sagas, The Rifleman and The Big Valley. Both big sources of inspiration for a generation of filmmakers including Quentin Tarantino who has expressed as much to me.

He also directed Tim Holt’s last picture The Monster That Challenged The World, Laven and Holt met many years earlier on the set of The Arizona Ranger and became good friends. He talked Holt out of retirement to make this SciFi /Horror movie. It has a gripping scene of a woman and a young girl trapped in a closet as the monster breaks through the door to get them. Check it out.

Here’s part 1 of an 8 part documentary on the late, great Cine Maestro Federico Fellini. The best part of the film are the interviews with Fellini, when he speaks of the filmmaking process it’s like a philosopher, so sensitive and insightful, worth watching by every would be filmmaker. He speaks of editing on a Moviola and screening the film with only the dubbed voices of the actors for a sound track, no music, no sound effects and how different the film is when played that way. Check it out.

The great L.A. born vocalist Kitty White has moved on to the next dimension, she’s singing up among the stars now, harmonizing with the music of the spheres or more likely soloing over it. She sang a duet with the King (Elvis Presley) in King Creole, dubbed the vocal of the lounge singer (Mady Comfort) in Kiss Me Deadly and sang the Farmhouse Lullaby in Night Of The Hunter. You can’t pick three more influential 50’s films to be involved with, from a super-coolness perspective! Fare Thee Well beautiful voiced Kitty, we’ll all hear you again in the Promised Land. I thought she had dubbed the little girl’s voice in the boat as they float down the river but I was mistaken, thanks to Preston Neal Jones author of the fabulous book Heaven And Earth To Play With, The Filming Of Night Of The Hunter for pointing this out.

Night Of The Hunter- Kitty’s vocals come in at 1 min. 42 secs.

Here is her voice in Kiss Me Deadly at 7 mins 39 secs. in from the top

A Diabolik inspired hero, he even drives a Jaguar XKE. Enjoy courtesy of Toutube.
P.S. the music is by the great Berto Pisano, he also scored Nude per l’assassino (Strip Nude For Your Killer) and the ultra psychotic Giallo a Venezia(Giallo in Venice)

The Locket is a wonderful psychological noir featuring Robert Mitchum playing a Greenwich Village artist. It’s directed by John Brahm, a German ex-pat who learned his stuff at UFA then came over here to avoid the Nazis and made some great films. I got turned onto him through the 20th Century Fox Horror Classics dvd collection, featuring three films directed by Brahm- The Undying Monster, The Lodger, and Hangover Square. These are all great and definitely worth watching.

German Genius- John Brahm

A little research led me to The Locket, an RKO gem lensed by one of my favorite cameramen, Nicholas Musuraca (the original Prince Of Darkness). Brahm also directed a Raymond Chandler based film, The Brasher Doubloon, aka The High Window, a Vincent Price vehicle The Mad Magician, and the super groovy Hot Rods To Hell! He then directed a lot of cool TV, Outer Limits, Man from U.N.C.L.E. etc. An interesting note, Brahm directed some episodes of Alfred Hitchcock Presents, he directed a version of The Lodger years after Hitchcock did and Hitchcock’s Marnie is very similar to The Locket, but in my opinion inferior to the earlier B&W noir. The Locket is not on dvd but you can watch it as I did on YouTube.

The Locket- Part1