Film Forno

A crazy film, maybe Melville’s transitional film between films of conscience ( usually coming from his time in the French Resitance) and his Crime/ Noir / Detective Period. A Classic detective film format, guys searching for someone, going from one colorful location to another on a search for clues. In this case the mythic playground of Manhattan at Night. Beautifully photographed like a memory of a dream, a dream with deep, rich blacks. First stop to interview an actress at the Mercurey Theater, a nod to Orson Welles company of the same name. Melville was a Welles fanatic, often quoting The Magnificent Ambersons as a big influence. Like the title says there are 2 men in manhattan, 2 characters on a quest, usually in the detective film there is only 1, Is Melville makiing a point? Both men are French ex-pats living in NYC, one is an alcoholic photographer willing to do anything to get the valuable picture, move a dead body and pose it for a more salacious effect, abuse an attempted suicide patient at a hospital to get some intel, sell out a hero of the French Resistance.

The other guy is played by Melville himself, cool, dapper, digging the night life of Manhattan in all it’s shades and stratas of culture, legitimate theater to Brooklyn strip club and after hours jazz joint.

But he draws the line at ruining the reputation of a French National Hero, even if the guy was stepping out on his wife, so what, 50 million Frenchmen can’t be wrong. In other words they all do it, it’s not a big deal. Still why are there 2 guys? Is it to show the different mind set of a Frenchman (melville) and an Americanized Frenchman? The differnt values systems? What happens to immigrants to a new country, how they take on the ethics of the new place? Could be. The film takes place in the course of one night, it ends on the streets in the early morning as the photagrapher wanders home, it really reminds me of a movie I saw once, the way it’s framed the location, even the way the character walks off, maybe it’s Robert Wise’s film Somebody Up There Likes Me? I’ll have to check. If you love Melville’s films, love the Romantic notion of Manhattan Past, love B&W cinematography then see the film, a lesser work from a Maestro of Cinema but intriguing and visually stunning.

Finally Jean Pierre Melville’s 1958 film Two Men In Manhattan is coming to the USA. It was never released here, I’ve never seen it and I think I’ve seen all of his other films, except an early short 24 Hours in The Life Of A Clown, so I’m looking forward to this one. Melville stars in this film, the only time he put himself in a leading role, another reason to check this out.

He acted in a few other films , most notably he played the novelist interviewed by Jean Seberg at the airport, a great character. I recently watched La Silence de la mer, an interesting early film that I enjoyed, a story of German occupation of a French village. The fatherand daughter refuse to speak to the German officer bivouacked with them even though he is obviously a refined, sensitive person.    Not a compelling story for the screen you might say? Maybe in today’s marketplace but it is a very engaging film. All of Melville’s work has a lot of deep thought behind it, nothing is as simple as it may seem on the surface, the interior lives of his characters comes bursting through their polished exteriors at unexpected times. For example when the police marksman in Le Circle Rouge (Yves Montand) suddenly takes his rifle off the tripod and shoots the target freehand or when he insults his former colleague as he lays dying, or when Gian Maria Volonte shoots the two thugs that have the drop on Alain Delon. Melville’s Cinema is dark and deep and worthy of a major retrospective and exhaustive study. Like an abandoned mine, still full of treasures for the curious explorer.
P.S. I just ordered the Blu Ray so I’ll review it soon.

Damn! I really wanted to write a fan letter to Fred Katz! What a genius! He just died at 94 years of age, he really crammed a lot into his stay here on planet Earth, Classical musician, Jazz musician, Composer, Ethnologist, child prodigy on two instruments, maybe the first guy to play Jazz Cello! I grew up digging his score to Corman/Griffith movies like Little Shop Of Horrors, a great score, quirky, idiosyncratic, unique just like the movie. There is really no other score like it that I can think of.  Plus he played with the great Chico Hamilton, he even appeared with Chico’s band in the sublime Sweet Smell Of Success ( a reference to the marijuana that features so prominently in the plot) .

Then he switched gears and became a professor of Shamanism, Mysticism, Magick! I wish I had taken one of his courses, I wish I had met him and told him how great he was. Too lAte! But maybe up in Film Music Heaven Fred can hear my compliments, I hope so. Dear Fred You were a giant talent and enriched my existence through your music, Fare Thee Well.

I just watched this on Hulu Plus, it’s not out on BluRay yet so I will wait to buy a copy, but hurry up Criterion! What a beautiful film, two amazing actors in their young, glorious prime. I’m speaking of the incomparable Monica Vitti and the super cool super handsome Alain Delon.

But don’t read this or watch the clip of Scorsese below until after you have seen the film. See it in your innocent state unaware of the treasures it holds, then come back and read this if you like, I don’t want to compromise the experience of seeing this film for the first time for anyone.

A visionary director at the peak of his creative powers and my new favorite cameraman of all time, Gianni DeVenanzo,(what a genius!) There’s something about a director in love with his leading lady that can be stupendous. I am reminded of Godard and Anna Karina, they made such beautiful, honest, moving films together.

Maestro and Muse
Here Antonioni does it with his Muse Monica Vitti, the love scenes that play out in this film are so real so immediate, I dare you not to be transported back to your own first stirrings of intense passionate love. it is all photographed so beautifully and allowed to breathe and live on the screen, to me when a film is really working, it’s like it comes to life on the screen before your eyes, like the characters can step off the screen and dance around the theater or the top of your Steenbeck. The film going through the gate seems to pulse with life, to breathe. This is true Cinema, the magical machine that captures the essence of humanity and preserves it like a fly in amber for all time. I don’t even care what this film is about, Italian stock market crash, white African neighbor, breakup of one relationship beginning of another, it’s the informed point of view of the filmmakers that really elevates it to the stratosphere, a point brought home by the amazing montage at the end of the film, it goes on for 10 minutes, it features none of the actors even though Antonioni plays a trick on the viewer by having a blond woman enter the frame during this sequence, is it Vitti? No it’s just some woman walking through the same spot where some of our story took place.

This montage shows the culture alive at that moment recorded by an artist, it can’t help but convey his world view, his philosophy in a series of seemingly random images, but this is another basis of Cinema in the capable hands of an artist like Antonioni. Jess Franco had the ability to say so much with just an establishing shot of a European city, you somehow got more than some shots of buildings at dusk, a clock tower, whatever, it’s not just postcards when filtered through the mind of a genius.  It’s like a Jazz musician playing a riff on Civilization, improvising with images and ideas. And by the by these sequences are usually accompanied by music. Images and Music, does it get any better than that?

And here for your viewing pleasure and cinematic edification is  Martin Scorsese discussing Antonioni.

 

Hey I’m on a Norman Foster kick. I just heard about this film. The czar of noir Eddie Mueller showed it recently to an enthusiastic crowd, it has great San Francisco locations and a wonderful final scene at an amusement pier complete with laughing fat lady dummy and roller coaster. An amazing roller coaste sequence that has some almost abstract photography shot from the moving coaster. Very effective, I watched it on YouTube and the quality is not good. Hopefully someone will put a dvd out soon, I’ll buy it!

Plunk your Magic Twanger Froggy and watch Woman on The Run

I’ve been watching the Mr. Moto film series that was made at 20th Century Fox. They have all been digitally restored and released in a 2 volume dvd boxed set. Great Job by all involved, I really enjoy the special features, a short film about a person involved with the series.  The films are very well made, low budget productions shot on the left over sets from the high budget films. Because less money was at stake, and owing to the genre, the filmmakers were able to let their imaginations run wild and pull off some amazing content.

First of all you have Peter Lorre, arguably one of the greatest Cinema actors of all time, just watch Friz Lang’s M or Hitchcock’s  The Man Who Knew Too Much. Lorre had to flee Nazi Germany, he wound up in Hollywood. It’s tough to re-establish yourself in a new culture, many emigre’s didn’t make the switch but Lorre did. Mr. Moto is an interesting character, he’s kind of like Batman, rich, super intelligent, tough as nails, Moto is a Jiu Jitsu expert, and ruthless. He routinely kills his adversaries ( usually ones deserving such a fate) He is also a combination of Good and Evil. During Think Fast Mr. Moto you are not sure what side he’s on for a lot of the picture. This adds a lot of dimension to the character and with an actor like Lorre you are assured of a great ride at the Cinema.

Harvey Parry
The stunts and fights are top notch, there is an interview with veteran stunt man Harvey Parry on one of the discs that is wonderful. Parry was a diving champion and national boxing champion who doubled for Lorre or as he called him Pete. A superb athelete he flings himself on his adversaries with such abandon it exhilarates the heck out of you. There is an amusing anecdote told by Louise Brooks about William Wellman’s Wild Boys Of The Road that I think involves Parry, (I’ll have to find it again and make sure I’m right before I include it.)

Norman Foster
Finally we come to the amazing Norman Foster, an unsung hero of Hollywood. The Moto films that he co-wrote as well as directed (6 of the 8 ) are models of atmosphere, action, intrigue and efficiency. Usually starting with documentary footage from far off lands then plunging into action with Moto in one of his many disguises, they take off and don’t let up, the only dull spots are usually the romance angle between the two white leads. Moto doesn’t get to have a romance although their are some Asian women that work as his accomplices.

Foster directed Journey Into Fear for Orson Welles during Welles tenure at RKO, Welles loved what Foster did with the Moto films.

Sloan, Cotten, Welles, Mercurey Players

He also directed the My Friend Bonito, segment of Welles aborted It’s All True project. Later Foster wrote and directed the TV series Zorro for Walt Disney, The opening of Zorro is a tour de force of filmmaking. I heard Foster even wrote the Zorro theme song, which is memorable and features a great section with the word Zorro echoing at you from all angles, as if to say you never know where Zorro will strike next.

Foster, Disney, Zorro
He directed Davy Crockett for Disney as well and that series created a phenomenal cultural effect, selling coonskin caps to all the kids. Foster also directed episodes of the Batman series, another work of cultural iconographic significance. And another story of an underdog, a loner fighting for Justice, a theme Foster excelled at. Interestingly enough Orson Welles spoke of his interest in making a Batman film back in the 40’s when the character first appeared. Strange that Foster would work on it .

There should be a book written about this great artist. I get the feeling he was not a big self promoter, that he put all his efforts into creating excellent films that blasted their way into our consciousness through sheer power of image making and storytelling. A critical study of this man is long overdue, let’s hope it happens soon.

Here is a blast from the past. an interview with David Lynch from 1979. And it takes place at the location of Eraserhead, actually the early scenes of Henry wandering through an industrial waste land.

The interesting thing is it’s an old oil field where the Beverly Center now sits, I always thought it was shot in Philadelphia, PA. There is also some great footage of people leaving the theater after seeing Eraserhead and their reactions to the film. You can see all this here.

I was saddened to learn of the death of William Cartwright. I didn’t know him but every citizen of Los Angeles and really every human being owes him a debt of gratitude. Mr. Cartwright was a filmmaker and editor, cutting some impressive documentaries while working for early TV maven, David Wolper. His work on  1964 ‘s The Making Of the President won an Emmy. He also edited some feature films, produced and directed documentaries and had a long creative career. Bill was lucky enough to study at USC under the great Slavko Vorkapith, montage maker from the Golden Age of Hollywood and major Film Theoretician, a huge influence on American Avant Garde Films of the 50’s and 60’s.

Vorkapich at work
But the (to me) most incredible thing Mr. Cartwright accomplished began back in 1958. He was going to visit a relative and he got lost driving around South Central Los Angeles, he turned a corner and lo and behold, a shimmering surreal vision appeared in the midst of a borderline urban tract, the Watts Towers!

He was amazed and wanted to know more, soon he was buying the Towers from their owner, not the man that built them, Simon Rodia, but a neighbor that Rodia gave them to.

Once purchased, he learned they were to be torn down so he conducted a stress test to prove to the City they could withstand an eartquake. They are still here thanks to this man’s efforts! ( and a lot of others he recruited to help) What a wonderful gift to the future citizens! If you haven’t been there, GO! They are a marvel, a testament tpo the Creative Spirit of One Man and the determination to preserve them of another.

Finally! I have been waiting for a good copy of this film for a Loooong time. Masters Of Cinema has put out a beautiful presentation of this great film, Fuller’s personal favorite. I love newspaper movies and this is one of the finest examples of the genre. Right up there with Deadline U.S.A. another masterpiece. Fuller spent his own money to make this film and I for one am glad he did, he survived and the resulting work of art is immortal. I really admire artists, especially filmmakers who pay for their own projects and make something great! Francis Ford Coppola has been doing this for his past few films and I say “Bravo”. Fuller was a maverick when they’re weren’t any maverick’s, maybe Jean Pierre Melville but he was in France. He wanted to make this film and Darrel Zanuck said OK, in Technicolor, a musical comedy. “No” screamed Fuller. “The paper is grey, the ink is black, it has to be B&W!” “It won’t make a dime.” Zanuck sneered. Well maybe DZ was right but at least Fuller got to make his film his way and we get to enjoy it, thanks to Masters Of Cinema! There are some amazing tracking shots in this film, and long takes where the camera follows actors from one building, down the street to another building and the scene continues, really cool Orson Welles kind of stuff. It also reminds me of some of the classic Playhouse 90s, long takes , great scripts, great actors. Not an easy way to make a film, it takes vision and preparedness. But you should see it for yourself, Fuller grew up working on newspapers in NYC, they shaped him, this film is his love letter to the newspaper business that took a kid in off the street and turned him into a great storyteller. It’s especially poignant right now, with the state of the Press today, we need to cherish and protect our free press, the barrier between us and Fascism.

Once I borrowed a VHS of this film from Quentin Tarantinio, I watched it but it suddenly stopped before the film was over! I checked the tape, it was a 60 minute VHS ! The movies 84 minutes! Thanks a lot! So now I have my own copy , he can borrow it from me if he wants.

What a cool, crazy film. As the saying goes after you make a hit, you can make anything you want. Antonioni scored with BLOW UP so he got to make this non-commercial meditation on America, Death, Existence, Time, Humanity. The opening scne is a campus meeting of Radical Students and representatives of Black Power, talking about shutting down the campus, a common occurrence back in 1969.

The way the people talk and dress is so real, they’re not actors, Antonioni used real people that he felt were right for the part. Amazing Imagery, amazing music, Pink Floyd, Jerry Garcia jamming out to images of a Love In in the desert. Roy Orbison singing about Zabriskie Point.

The desert imagery was definetly an influence on Quentin Tarantino’s Kill Bill, where The Bride goes out to Bud’s trailer and where she walks through the desert, even the music of that sequence seems influenced by Zabriskie Point. Here’s the Bootleg Trailer I cut with Quentin for Kill Bill , the opening music is the music I’m talking about.

Another thing, ZP ends with a big explosion, a similar ending , actually a very similar ending occurs in Robert Downey Sr.s GREASERS PALACE, a huge explosion and a very long shot of a sunset. In Zabriskie, Antonioni is playing with persistence of vision, the shot of the sunset is on the screen unchanging for a long time, then it suddenly cuts to black, this creates an afterimage on your retina, very cool, very painterly, kind of a Rothko type trick. Super Cool. Check it out for yourself. It’s a comment on how the message is getting through to us, Persistence of Vision is how movie work, or rather why they work.

Anyway I’m going to drive out to Zabriskie Point one of these days and check it out for myself.

As  a lot of you have heard Deanna Durbin has left this plane of existence. I’ve been reading several of her obits and they all put down Christmas Holiday. A great film she made with the brilliant director Robert Siodmak. In the film she plays a prostitute and Gene Kelly a dissolute killer that she falls in love with. I think this was too much for the audiences and the critics of that era. But why do contemporary journalists repeat this wrong headed opinion? Because the movie didn’t make a lot of money when it first came out? The same could be said of Charles Laughton’s Night Of The Hunter, which is now recognized as one of the greatest films of all time. Maybe critics should re-evaluate Christmas Holiday and give Deanna and Siodmak their due. Here is a link to my piece on Christmas Holiday.

What a cool movie! I just saw it on YouTube. A great story that unfolds like a mystery, simple, compelling, intriguing. Geraldine Chaplin is wonderful as a crazy, obsessed waif who can kill you. Nobody messes with this tiny beauty and gets away with it. Ans as you watch the film you realize she is sort of a female Charlie Chaplin, she looks a lot like him, she is such a wonderful actress, in this film and the Carlos Saura films she did, I am a true fan of her talent.

Anthony Perkins is excellent too, so is Moses Gunn and a super skinny nerdy Jeff Goldblum. The way Geraldine plays all these people is amazing, it’s like she’s a ghost that can just walk into their lives, they don’t see her unless she wants them to. She actually is a kind of ghost from Tony Perkin’s past, and the way she causes Moses Gunn to fall for her is wonderful, a tough manager of an L.A. flophouse, he’s heard it all and seen it all. Nobody can break through his hard exterior except her, Emily. She has the guy loaning her money and doing chores for her in no time flat. And she is beautiful with her hair tied up in a classic style, transformed by buying a nice dress at a classy shop. this movie is kind of a paen to dedication, single minded attacking a problem, not letting anything stop you, and what a person can accomplish.

Another interesting highlight is the score, which consists of songs by the great Alberta Hunter, she was recently (when this film was made) re-discovered and made some amazing music in her later days. Another factor you’d never see in a movie today.And the movie was produced by the late great Robert Altman, a real American maverick. I had the distinct pleasure of meeting him once at an early screening of The Player. I had an idea for a cut so I told Altman’s publicist, and lo and behold he liked it and implemented it. It’s fitting that he produced this film,  Alan Rudolph worked with Altman on some of his films as Assistant Director, Nahville, California Split, and The Long Goodbye.

Alan Rudolph- Super Genius
This film falls into one of Quentin Tarantino’s favorite genres, female revenge movies. It is one of the most powerful types of film story out there, so compelling by it’s essence.  To me this film is the true extension of Film Noir, like Altman’s Long Goodbye, PostModern Film Noir. Future filmmakers, be inspired by this film! It shows you what a great story, excellent acting, and great storytelling technique can do, make an entertaining, thought provoking film, without special effects or zombies. Check this out.