Long Before “Inherent Vice” And Even Altman’s “The Long Goodbye,” Stephen Frears Gave Us “Gumshoe.”

“Gumshoe” Lobby Card from 1971

With all of the deserved praise being bestowed up the new post-modernist detective film by Paul Thomas Anderson, “Inherent Vice,” I thought that this week I would take a look back at “Gumshoe,” the debut work of Stephen Frears and a favorite dysfunctional detective film of mine, that, like our PT Anderson film and Altman’s “The Long Goodbye,” would take the best ideas of Dashiell Hammett and Raymond Chandler and spin them in a way that is less concerned about a cohesive narrative and more about the small moments and gestures of a flawed private eye.

Though we now recognize his talents, I had always wondered how director Frears had been able to land a talent like Albert Finney for his first film. After all, Finney had been on an epic roll as an actor since his sensational debut in Karel Reisz’s 1960 British New Wave masterpiece, “Saturday Night, Sunday Morning.” And with Tony Richardson’s “Tom Jones” and Stanley Donen’s “Two for Road” included in Finney’s oeuvre from the sixties, it just didn’t add up that Finney would go for this odd role of a hapless comedian turned private eye in “Gumshoe” for a then virtually unknown Frears. Perhaps it was that Frears had directed some television for the BBC? But it is more likely that it was due to Frears having been the assistant director for two of the finest English films of the late 1960s, Lindsay Anderson’s “If…” and Karel Reisz’s “Morgan!”

“Gumshoe” combines two of my favorite genres, film noir and the lesser known “everyman who gets in way over his head” genre, a la “North by Northwest” and “Into The Night.” Finney plays Eddie Ginley, a small time comedian and bingo caller who would rather be the next Sam Spade. One day, Eddie decides to put his fantasy to the test and places an ad in the paper offering his services as a private investigator, which gets immediate results. Eddie goes to a local hotel where he meets the big man who tells him that he has a job for him and proceeds to give our Eddie a package with a thousand pounds, an address for a book store that deals in the occult, and a gun. Bizarrely enthusiastic, Eddie takes the job and is soon thrust into the exact world that he has always dreamed of, complete with corpses, femme fatales, and a whole lot of trouble. Not surprisingly, Finney eats up the screen and seems to love playing Eddie with all of that character’s nods to Mitchum and Bogart. In every scene, Finney just looks like he’s in love with his trench coat.

“Gumshoe” shares much with the newest Paul Thomas Anderson film in that its humor and drama switch up on you so fast that you start to not care about the plot. And I’ll say that with both films, I am perfectly OK with this approach as by 2014, we know that we aren’t making the next “Maltese Falcon,” so why not carve it up into tasty bits and give us a main character who just seems to glide through the body count? Also with both films, all of the supporting characters add the necessary color needed to make any noir a blast to watch, and the classic noir-ish dialog here spoken with Liverpoolian accents becomes as entertaining as watching a Thai Western for its ethnocentrism.

Sadly, one major error in the film is the score by Andrew Lloyd Webber (yes, the guy who did “Cats”), which never seems right for any scene. It is as if he was hoping to score a different, more serious kind of noir than the one that was before him. He doesn’t kill it, but his music, which frankly is too intense for many scenes, was just not the best choice for our young director, even if Frears himself wanted the score to supplement the disorienting environments and events in “Gumshoe.” The other tragic error in the film, and one that might keep it from a repertory theater screening anytime soon, is its casual use of racial epitaphs, which in a film like 1973’s “The Friends of Eddie Coyle,” make complete sense given the vérité of its titular lead character, but in “Gumshoe,” it just comes off as a clumsy attempt to make a bad joke that I cannot imagine was even that funny in 1971.

Gumshoe Trailer :

Despite these two errors in judgment, “Gumshoe” is successful in giving us a character who you can say was one of the first to demystify the classic hard-boiled detective; Altman’s very successful version of a sloppy Phillip Marlowe in “The Long Goodbye” wouldn’t be released for another two years. Sadly, “Gumshoe” did not find an audience in 1971, so it would be another fourteen years before Frears would make a feature film again, but he would come back with a vengeance by directing Terence Stamp in the massively underrated and terribly serious 1984 British gangster film, “The Hit” before becoming one of the hottest English directors of the 1980s with “My Beautiful Laundrette” and “Prick Up Your Ears.”

So, if you haven’t had enough well-intentioned mess of a detective after seeing “Inherent Vice,” I think a trip to “Gumshoe” will give you not only a different take on the messy private eye but also will hand you a world class actor in Finney and a soon to be brilliant director in Frears, whose first go at it was trying to break up a noir the best he could.

Bovine Ska and Rocksteady: 12/10/14: Winston Samuels

Winston Samuel’s Biggest Hit on Lyndon Pottinger’s “SEP” Label

We started off this past week’s very mysterious Bovine Ska and Rocksteady, with the enigmatic, “Prince of Darkness” who tossed down the incredibly danceable sounds of “Burial of Longshot,” for Dandy Livingstone on the Downtown label in 1969. The track is a response to the classic cut “Longshot” by The Pioneers. We then burned through two sets of reggae, a very fast mento set and a set of ska to get you in the mood for the ska sounds of Winston Samuels.

Winston Samuels, after much research and reaching out to scholars and Jamaican legend, remains somewhat of a mystery. What we can gather about this magnificent singer is that with the exception of his hit, “Be Prepared,” there is very little known about Winston’s personal history and his career beginnings. According to Studio One artist and Bovine Ska and Rocksteady friend, Dudley Sibley, we know that Winston Samuels first recorded for Coxone in the early 1960s , and other sources indicate that his first release on Coxsone’s All Star imprint was a single with two sides with conflicting names and themes: “Paradise” and “In Jail.” We started off the spotlight on mighty vocalist Winston Samuels, with “In Jail” and with that you got a preview of the amazing voice that he would hone and perfect throughout his career. One of the real surprises was the magnificent quality of the tracks Winston would do curing the rocksteady period for Prince Buster. His voice may be at it’s best here.

There are some rumors that he was a member of The Four Aces, but we were not able to confirm this, but what could be verified was that Winston Samuels was a prolific song writer who penned two festival song winners for Eric Donaldson: “Sweet Jamaica” and “Land of My Birth,” in 1977 and 1978, respectively. Then, after spending quite some time in the music industry, Winston Samuels moved to America, but his whereabouts since have been pretty mysterious.

Listen to the spotlight and the full show HERE.

Enjoy! The archived file will be available until 12/23/2014.

Generoso Finally Makes Spaghetti and Meatballs!

As I stated very early in this video, I think that the hidden desire within everyone who knows an Italian who cooks is; When will that man or woman make me spaghetti and meatballs!” This has been told to me over the years by several people whom I presented a plate of the aforementioned family favorite dish. The length of time that this takes you in entirely dependent on who sweet you would like your tomatoes to be. The longer the cooking time, the more mellow the tomato will be. For this dish you will need two pounds of a ground beef and pork mix that cannot be less than 80% lean, two cans of puree tomatoes, two eggs, ten gloves of garlic, fresh parsley, oregano, salt, pepper parmesan cheese and of course, spaghetti. Please let us know how yours turned out! Music: Giuseppe Torelli’s Trumpet Concerto in D ‘Estienne Roger 188. Enjoy!!!

The Political Grunts and Groans of Claude Faraldo’s 1973 Film, “Themroc “

1973 Poster for “Themroc”

During the final two hours of Jacques Rivette’s four hour 1969 film “L’Amour Fou”, we see the dissolving marriage of two theatrical sophisticates, Claire and Sebastien, turn into an almost primitive sequestration whose sole purpose is to reject the intellectual ideals that have strangled their love. So, if the next step for the sophisticates in that Rivette film is a transformation into a state of small moments and music, combined with gentle moments of love making, then what is to become of our titular working-poor hero, “Themroc?”

Themroc (Michel Piccoli) lives with his widowed mother, his miserable wife, and his sister who saunters around the flat in various states of undress. Themroc also exists on the lowest rung of the proletariat ladder, a member of the “exterior maintenance crew” whose charge is to paint the outside of a fence while (you guessed it) the “interior maintenance crew” paints the inside of the same fence. Rarely has the stifling monotony of the working man been so aptly recognized. Though he is not happy, Themroc goes about his tedious job until one day when he witnesses his boss nuzzling the secretary of the company and is summarily dismissed. Themroc’s response to his sacking is a trip back home where he will begin his withdrawal from society but not in a “Neil Simon/Prisoner of Second Avenue” neurotic New Yorker kind of way. No, our Themroc sledgehammers a hole in his wall out into the street where he lobs the conveniences of modern society out for all to see while he turns his sexual frustrations away from his wife and towards his own sister (Beatrice Romand from Rohmer’s infinitely tamer masterpiece, “Claire Knee”).

Now that Themroc has gone off the rails, he continues to turn his place into a sort of man cave but again not one with a hi-fi system and lava lamp or even the gentile “L’Amour Fou” kind; our Themroc is going back to the stone-age. Again, this would be fine normally sans the incest and the fact that he is living in a city where these kinds of things tend to be frowned upon. Eventually, his threatening actions will soon draw the attention of the police, and they come by to check on our man but because Themroc is unemployed, and no longer hitting the grocery shops, and the man who is playing him in the film, Michel Piccoli, appears somehow still hungry after starring in Marco Ferreri’s equally shocking glutton-a-thon from the same year (1973) “Le Grande Bouffe”, he (Themroc) turns our boys in blue into a barbeque dinner complete with rotating spit. Adding to the frenetic mood that takes over the second half of the film is that none of what has happened or will happen in this film is translated through a recognizable language. It will be all grunts and groans from here on out which adds to the primordial hostilities of the main character and just like Faraldo’s previous work, “La Jeune Morte,” this is a low-budget piece of guerrilla film-making that fits the harshness and in some ways the comedy that is coming through here in the same way that forces you to laugh in between the revulsion of non-stop eating and whore-screwing that is “Le Grande Bouffe.”

Added into the mix are the acting talents of Miou Miou and the late Patrick Dewaere, who would star two years later in Bertrand Blier’s breakthrough comedic classic of stunted sexuality, “Going Places.” With that, I must write that “Themroc” now seems like a harbinger for what would happen in European cinema over this decade. As exciting as the Italian Neo-Realist Movement, The French and British New Waves were to audiences in the 1950s and 1960s, there appears to have been a collection of young filmmakers who were poised to pull film into visceral and nasty place that would seem a natural response to the May 1968 riots. The aforementioned Marco Ferreri and Betrand Blier, Alan Clarke, and the last films of Pier Paolo Pasolini would set standards of honesty and raw depravity that few filmmakers around the world would be able to match.

Themroc (1973) Full Movie:

Though it received mixed critical and box office reception upon its release in 1973, I feel that “Themroc” would have fit right in with the recent films from European filmmakers like Bruno Dumont, Catherine Breilliat, and Gaspar Noe who would emerge the malaise of the 1980s with the same-minded style of Claude Faraldo and Jean Pierre Mocky, whose primary purpose was to pull the politeness out of what was a tired medium for their generation.

Lily Does Her Chao Right! (Vietnamese Congee)

A simple version of congee with an onion broth and fish sauce and Lily will show you how to make it! It can be eaten on its own or with a meat and veggie of your choice. Finish it off with pepper and sesame oil to make it extra special 🙂 Please let us know what you think of it if you make your own! Music by Edvard Grieg, Peer Gynt Suite no. 1, Op. 46

Mike Leigh’s Debut Film Is a Small Masterpiece: 1971’s “Bleak Moments”

The brilliant Anne Raitt of “Bleak Moments”

There have been few British film directors over the last forty years whose overall body of work I would label as “uncompromising.” Especially difficult was to stay real past the era of creative freedom that was the 1970s; there was the creative lock down and resulting button down stiffness of the 1980s, a decade that forced the British film industry to get all “Chariots of Fire” on us. Which of course, lowered our standards and set the plate for what would be the most successful English filmmaker of today, the human codpiece, Danny Boyle. Truly one British director whom never succumbed to the vile era of the period piece and or uptown glitz over this time is director Mike Leigh. With Leigh’s 24^th film, “Mr. Turner,” about to be released here in the States, I thought to go back and look at Mike’s astonishing 1971 debut effort, “Bleak Moments.”

I cannot imagine as to what folks thought of “Bleak Moments” when it was released in the early 1970s. Though devotees of the films from the British New Wave were used to seeing fairly tough to watch fare like “A Taste of Honey” and “Saturday Night, Sunday Morning,” we must remind ourselves that although those films possessed some fairly shocking themes for the time (abortion, homosexuality), their actors and the overall tone would still rise above the hardships to provide the viewer with many entertaining moments. No such uplifting time exists within “Bleak Moments,” a film that succeeds in a dour, hopeless tone that few films have been able to reach since. Much of that not only is due to our Mr. Leigh, who both wrote and directed “Bleak Moments,” and its talented actors who convey the desperation to create this unrelenting, low mood but also it’s modest budget, which lead to the dark visuals and low-fi sound to enhance its already stark feeling of hopelessness.

The film is about Sylvia (Anne Raitt) an office worker, who after putting in a hard day, tends to her mentally challenged sister in her tiny apartment. She is a pretty and somewhat cynical woman whose only amusements given her charge in life and financial situation are the occasional good book and a glass of sherry. At work she chats with her friend Pat, (Joolia Cappleman) who also has the burden of taking care of a physically incapable family member, her elderly mother. They commiserate, but little is actually said about their true sadness that is their lot in life. Sylvia has a man in her life, the equally quite teacher, Paul (Eric Allan) who wants to be with Sylvia but lacks the fire necessary to break through to her and show her how he really feels. There is also Norman (Mike Bradwell), a hippie folk song singer who also fancies Sylvia and rents the garage, but he also lacks in the self-worth category, so when he is dismissed by Paul as a failure, Norman takes the failure route out.

Paul and Sherry go out on a date, but what follows is a series of awkward dialogs, an incredibly rude waiter that exposes Paul’s inabilities to be a man, and a scene of courtship that occurs back at Sylvia’s place that may never be rivaled for its depiction of sad desperation in screen history. Again, whereas an earlier British New Wave film would’ve resorted to moments of comedy in such a scene, Leigh never lets you off the ropes because he shouldn’t. These are people whom we all know, good-natured people whom life has pushed aside, but you know that deep down inside that there is little in their makeup to allow them to overcome their self-imposed malaise. You know that they are doomed to “live lives of quiet desperation” that I’m sure would even go well beyond Thoreau’s imagination of such as he penned that line. First time director Leigh allows for every small moment to hit home. It is exceptionally intelligent work for a director the age of 28.

Though this was Leigh’s first outing as a film director, his knowledge of the theater allowed him to select the right acting talents to head this project, a project that was funded by the stars of many of those British New Wave classics, Albert Finney and Michael Medwin, whose production company, Memorial Films, had just bankrolled Lindsay Anderson’s “If” and provided the twenty thousand Pounds that was necessary to get Leigh’s career as a director off the ground. This decision was made by the two after they saw Leigh direct “Bleak Moments” at the Open Space Theater. Though Finney and Medwin could boast such illustrious acting careers, I personally would also hope that they would be as proud as to have helped start the career of our Mr. Leigh.

Norman Sings Us A Sad One in “Bleak Moments”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E62rL6v2GBg

I was once asked by my friend Charlie some thirty years ago, shortly after I described “Bleak Moments” to him and before I shoved a VHS copy of the film into my player; “Why would you ever want to watch something that would make everything seem so hopeless for decent people?” A question I really respected at the time and one that made me wonder for years to come. Though this answer is some thirty years late, I think that in the case of “Bleak Moments,” you feel there is a poetic beauty in even the saddest moments of the film because as much as you hope that characters like Sylvia and Paul could just rise above the troubles that have been bestowed upon them, you are moved to see how they delicately maintain themselves in the face of it all.

Generoso’s 2014 Top Ten Film List, Supplemental Films, Biggest Disappointments, Worst Film Of The Year and, Best Rep Film Experience

2014…Another excellent year of cinema has passed. Much love to my dearest Lily who watched all but two of these films with me. Romania and Chile continue to pour out excellent new work and my favorite is by the great Arnaud Desplechin, who can do no wrong in my book.

Note; At the time of the final edit, I regrettably have not seen the new Mike Leigh film “Mr. Turner,” which I hear is sensational or the new one by Bruno Dumont or Hong Sang-soo but I did just see the new Paul Thomas Anderson film “Inherent Vice” and Bennett Miller’s “Foxcatcher,” and both did not make the cut.

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MY FAVORITE FILMS OF 2014

1) Jimmy P: The Psychotherapy of a Plains Indian-Arnaud Desplechin (France)

There is much that went into my selection of this film for my pick as the best of 2014. We have all seen the films based on psychological case studies but Desplechin offers no quick solution to this very complex case of a World War Two Native American who is suffering from catatonia and severe headaches. Benecio Del Toro turns in the best performance of his career as Jimmy P, a Plains Indian who is treated and becomes friends with a psychoanalyst named Georges Devereux (Mathieu Alamaric) who is one of the few people in his field that understand the culture of the Plains Indian . There is no buildup to a melodramatic breakthrough as it blends this very particular psychological trauma while fostering a compelling friendship between its leads. As with all work by Desplechin, “Jimmy P” is masterful storytelling on a level that few directors can accomplish these days.

2) Norte: The End of History-Lav Diaz (Philippines)

Cast in the same mold as the films of Bela Tarr and Jacques Rivette, Lav Diaz’s approach to narrative storytelling relies heavily on the duration of scenes to set up mood than most directors working today. A brilliant re-working of the Dostoyevsky’s classic “Crime and Punishment” with a length of 250 minutes, Diaz nuances that classic of Russian literature with the changing social imperatives that have resulted from the political nightmare in his native Philippines. Diaz supplants Dostoyevsky’s Raskolnikov with Fabian, a law school dropout who quotes Neitzsche and radical philosophies to his friends until he must deliver on his threats of revolution. What truly distinguishes this adaptation of Crime and Punishment from other previous versions is the creation of “Joaquin,” a simple farmer who is sentenced for Fabian’s crime. The story then becomes Fabian’s eventual self-destruction from guilt, but without pressure and fear from a detective like Porfiry; Instead the guilt comes only from what Fabian’s crime has done to Joaquin and his family which causes their lives to descend into a sad hell, which then parallels Fabian’s journey into madness. An epic adaptation that never feels it’s running time. Despite the unrelenting tone of the film, you remain transfixed until the very end.

3) Winter Sleep-Nuri Bilge Ceylan (Turkey)

For almost two decades, Nuri Bilge Ceylan has set a standard for filmmaking that few directors can live up to. In fact, Nuri’s major competition has been Nuri himself. With the increasing high standards that he has set for himself with his last three films, all better than the last, it would take a miracle for him to surpass the genius of his 2011 film “Once Upon a Time In Anatolia.” Winter Sleep is a semi-autobiographical sequel of sorts to the wretched character he created in his own image in “Climates.” Here we have Mr. Aydin, a vile egoist who sits like a king inside his mountainside hotel, pontificating about his epic thespian past while his local business interests stifle the village below. Mr. Aydin is married to the beautiful Nihal, who is eyeing the door, and they both live with Aydin’s sister Necla, who tears at Mr. Aydin with sharp, sometimes hysterical barbs throughout the first half of the film. Funnier than any previous Ceylan outing, “Winter Sleep” does not have the complex plot or transcendence of “Once Upon a Time In Anatolia” but it is no less daring and intense on its bold attack of its villain (a Ceylan in the future perhaps?).

4) Under The Skin-Jonathan Glazer (England)

Before I make one single comment about this sensational film from Jonathan Glazer, I would just like to apologize to our director for the hideous Q&A that he endured at the hands of the audience at the Coolidge Corner. Pretentious twats they all were, and I truly feel sorry for the onslaught of the usual Boston, “I must ask a question so you know that I am smart” question/statement: “Why didn’t you adapt the better novel by Michael Faber?” Asked one consistently irritating audience member who should have met the end of many of Scarlett Johansson’s victims in Under The Skin. Now, let’s talk about the film…Glazer took one of the most desirable women the world, Scarlett Johansson, donned her in a black wig to not only hide her celebrity but to enhance her inner femme fatale, and set her lose in Scotland to lure actual unsuspecting men on the street into her van as to then bring them into the eventual destination of her alien abattoir to become a food product back on her world. What remains is a clever essay on what makes us desirable and ultimately human in the same way that Roeg’s “Performance” would challenge our ideas of gender and sexuality.

5) Night Moves-Kelly Reichardt (USA)

To me, Kelly Reichardt, is one of the few great voices left in American independent cinema. Since her debut film, River of Grass, some twenty years ago, Reichardt has established herself as the queen of minimalist filmmaking here in the States. She has been noticeable absent since her last gem, 2010s “Meek’s Cutoff” and she has come back with her best film to date, “Night Moves.” Less the pure observational construction of her earlier films such as “Oldjoy”, “Night Moves” is a critical indictment of the modern eco movement. Here, Josh (Jesse Eisenberg) and Dena (Dakota Fanning) live among the faux-liberal collective farms, ignoring their own privilege as they plot to destroy a seemingly unimportant hydroelectric dam with the help of Harmon (Peter Saarsgard), a hypocritical and marginalized Gulf War veteran. Josh and Dena seem to be existing in an era that no longer exists, and only plot to prove themselves as true believers in the cause as suggested by the title of the film which is drawn from a boat they use in their terrorist action. The boat is interestingly named after the long lost Arthur Penn film from the 1970s when such actions were still relevant. Reichardt skillfully attacks their belief system and methods by getting top performances from the films three leads.

6) Exhibition-Joanna Hogg (England)

Hogg casts Viv Albertine of The Slits as “D” and artist Liam Gillick as “H,” a childless couple who live in their gorgeous modernist London apartment sans children. They are both quite successful, sexually dead, and obsessive over their splendid home, which for some unknown reason, they are dying to unload. While alone, “D” roams about and eroticses her surrounding with a masturbatory array of poses and grindings. As ridiculous as it all seems, Hogg’s purpose it seems is not to humiliate this couple, but to have the audience almost revel in their perverse bourgeois tendencies to find a impossible explanation for their erratic behavior. Are they simply falling apart? Or are “D” and “H” finally understanding that this amount of comfortable living may in conflict with their own creative and intellectual growth? Hogg leaves that decision for you.

7) A Field In England-Ben Wheatley (England)

I might be alone here in my adoration of this psychedelic history piece set during the English Civil War, written and directed by the always surprising Ben Wheatley. Here Wheatley takes a group of war deserters on a whimsical path through the countryside until they meet with the brutal necromancer, O’Neil (Michael Smiley) who doses our deserters with magic mushrooms in order for them to help him on his quest to find a proverbial pot of gold. Shot handheld and in black and white, Wheatley creates a disturbing environment that is unnerving, clumsy, but ultimately victorious as his (Wheatley) determination to tell a story in a way that has never been done before wins out over any small shortcomings that this film possess. All of this culminating in the best three minutes of experimental imagery and sound that I have witnessed from a pseudo mainstream director this year. This may not be for all, but it did make me excited for every scene in a way that only a handful of films have done in this decade.

8) Child’s Pose- Calin Peter Netzer (Romania)

And the winner of this year’s overbearing mother award goes to Cornelia Keneres (amazing performance from veteran actress, Luminita Gheorghiu). Like many films of this Romanian New Wave that we have been graced with over the last decade, older characters such as our Cornelia, represent the old Ceausescu led Romania, a slightly more corrupt world of bribes and favors that still has not died off to this day. Cornelia is a well-off and successful architect who is not pleased at her son Barbu’s (Bogdan Dumitrache) choice of partners, a fact that she makes very clear to her sister early in the film. When Barbu causes a major incident, mom comes to the rescue but not in the intense, unconditional loving way that Kim Hye-ja modest matriarch does in Boon Joon Ho’s.”Mother.” No, Cornelia is packing misery in the form of backroom deals to get her son off, and she is thoroughly despised for her actions by all parties. A critical, mean film from the country that loves a dour moment and a film that also contains one powerhouse performance from Gheorghiu. A phenomenal sour punch in the gut.

9) The Overnighters-Jesse Moss (USA)

It has been said that some documentaries connect an audience simply due to its subject matter now matter how it’s presented (Marc Singer’s excellent 2000 film, “Dark Days” is a fine example) and some receive notice to its production value alone, amounting to little more than eye candy (like 2010s Detropia). Given the subject matter and editing of Jesse Moss’ fine documentary, “The Overnighters,” I would still be impressed if the doc were shot on a 2004 flip phone. Since the controversial technique of “fracking” arrived in North Dakota in 2008, the state has had an employment boom and has also become the second largest oil producing state behind Texas. So, what is there to do with a town like Wiliston, North Dakota, a town that has been besieged by workers from all over America who are looking for a chance to make good money during this dead economy. Considering that there is absolutely no housing available, and that it is illegal to sleep in your car, where will all of these incoming workers sleep? Here enters our hero, Pastor Jay Reinke, who much to the outrage of his fellow neighbors is allowing these workers to sleep in his church and in the church’s parking lot. Herein lies the conflict of the documentary, but the answer to this problem is much more complicated than anyone had ever imagined. Hopeful and heartbreaking, this non-glamourous documentary clearly shows the modern ramifications that result from an act of charity towards desperate group of strangers by a flawed but very good man.

10) When Evening Falls On Bucharest or Metabolism-Corneliu Porumbiou (Romania)

Paul (Bogdan Dumitrache) , the protagonist and possibly the alter-ego of Romanian director, Corneliu Porumbiou, is faking an ulcer during the filming of his new movie so he could have some extra romantic time with his lead actress Alina (Diana Avramut). This may sound like the beginning of some “rom com” but fans of Pourumbiou’s work fully know that these two characters words and actions will be picked apart clean by the time the credits roll. This film has little to do with their actual relationship but more about how that relationship plays out in the form of cinema. If they speak about nudity for example, the visuals will follow suit and every action will either affirm or condemn the statements that were previously made. Like Porumbiou’s last film, the dark and comedic, “Police Adjective” there is an analysis of the medium and language that occurs here in “When Evening Falls…” that allows the viewer a chance to connect dialog and visuals in a way that only Porumbiou can do. Also, never has there been a funnier colonoscopy scene and if that doesn’t pull you in, I don’t know what will.

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SUPPLEMENTAL LIST

1) Gloria-Sebastian Leilo (Chile)

Since the fall of Pinoche, Chile has been experiencing an exciting new wave of film production. Pablo Larraín, Patricio Guzmán, and Sebastian Leilo have all looked back at the days during Pinoche and have also shown us a modern Chile that is both full of hope and promise but sometimes regret for what occurred there between 1973 and 1990. “Gloria,” Leilo’s fourth feature film since 2006 is a sometimes sad and heart wrenching story of two divorced people who are trying to bury a past that never seems to leave them. Wonderful performances from Paulina García and Sergio Hernández in the lead roles make this a can’t miss film.

2) Super Duper Alice Cooper-Sam Dunn (Canada)

Admittedly, I am a huge Alice Cooper fan so my expectations were very high for this biopic on everyone’s favorite horror madman from Detroit. Sure, there are the usual moments of “Behind The Music drug use and abuse” that would be in almost any biopic centered around a musician from the 1970s, right? What does propels this story; Is the absolutely daring use of no on-screen interviews. Yes, all of your information is transmitted through over-narration and a dazzling array of animated photos and graphics, as well as rarely seen archival footage and although I normally repel from such slick documentaries, this particular time the unique presentation of information gives the narrative a timeless effect. Like Alice himself, this doc has a lot of flash and viscera, but inside there is a compelling story of a very entertaining preacher’s son who got very weird, was widely adored, and became a music legend while still being a pretty nice guy.

3) Me and You-Bernardo Bertolucci (Italy)

To be frank, Bertolucci has been on quite a bad tear since “The Last Emperor” won every award possible in 1987. To be blunt, as much as I admire his early work, from “Le Commare Secca” in 1962 to “The Last Emperor,” I am as repelled by most of his output since. To make matters worse, a few of these films during this time have been a kind of clumsy apology for some of Bertolucci’s earlier beliefs and artistic mistakes such as Bernardo’s awful 1993 film, “Little Buddha”, which is clearly an apology for his previously held Marxist beliefs. That said, I truly feel that his superb film from this year, “Me and You” is an on-point correction of all of the mistakes that Bertolucci made with his controversial 1979 film, “Luna”, a film that wasted a superb performance from the late Jill Clayburgh as an opera singing mother who has an incestuous relationship with her junkie son. “Me and You” is the story of Lorenzo (Jacopo Olmo Antinori), the discontented son of a wealthy overbearing mother who is so attached to her son that he schemes to go on a school trip so that he can simply hide in the basement of his apartment building to get a few days of peace and freedom. All is well until Lorenzo’s gorgeous junkie half-sister, Olivia (Tea Falco), shows up with a ton of attitude and crashes Lorenzo’s hideout because she has no place to go. Over the next few days, Olivia begins to fascinate Lorenzo, but where an older Bertolucci would have infused an awkward sexuality, here their relationship turns into several small conversations that help Lorenzo figure out why their parents divorced in the first place. Though not in the realm of his earlier masterworks, “Me and You” is a modest film with real things to say about urban young people in today’s Italy and unlike the pointless nostalgic bore that was Linklater’s “Boyhood,” “Me and You” is a concise film that goes deep into the thought process of its two main characters and is never concerned with just feeding you slices of nostalgia.

4) Jodorowsky’s Dune– Frank Pavich (USA)

The story of Alejandro Jodorowsky’s attempt at producing a film version of Frank Herbert’s epic science fiction novel, “Dune,” has been bandied about for years in film circles. The legend had it that in 1973, Jodorowsky, fresh off the cult successes of his films “El Topo” and “The Holy Mountain,” had spent considerable time and resources to assemble a group of some of the hottest young talent in Hollywood to come up with storyboards and a script to make a pitch for funds from Hollywood to make “Dune.” His bizarre selection of actors from Orson Welles, to Salvadore Dali was part of this insane plan, which according to this very entertaining doc was completely true. Jodorowsky himself fuels the narrative of this documentary by regaling sometimes hysterical stories of how he lured in talents like Swiss surrealist painter and sculptor, H.R. Giger and young special effects guru, Dan O’Bannon, to work on this adaptation of a book that Jodorowsky had never bothered to read in the first place! After years of pitches, the job of filming “Dune” went to David Lynch who we all know really made a humongous mess out of the project; A fact that still seems to bring Jodorowsky much joy to this day. A incredibly entertaining documentary, that not only clears up the myths of this attempted version of “Dune,” but also gives you a glimpse into what Hollywood can fiendishly do with the creative remnants of projects that are sent to the scrap bin.

5) Closed Curtain-Jafar Panahi (Iran)

This is Jafar Panahi’s second film that he has made while under house arrest. The sentence carried out a couple of years ago also stated that Panahi could not make any films for the next two decades, so this film was actually directed by Kambuzia Partovi (not really). Unlike his last outing, “This Is Not A Film,” “Closed Curtain” is a sort-of narrative piece that tells the story of a famed writer who arrives at his beautiful home on the shore with a very interesting piece of contraband in tow, a dog named “Boy.” I say “contraband” because the act of walking or owning a dog will soon cost you 74 lashes in the country of Iran because these animals have been deemed “unclean” and a symbol of decadent influence from the West. While our protagonist covers his windows to keep the eyes of the government off of his new friend, “Boy” watches a real television report that shows the grotesque execution of dogs. Our writer then hopes to rest quietly but is awoken late into the night by a brother and sister who are being hunted by the police. Our hero offers to hide the sister who behaves erratically and she is soon tearing down the writer’s curtains. Soon after that, the real Jafar Panahi appears and interacts with neighbors and it is at this point that the narrative of the film gets thrown away. The brother, sister, and the writer occasionally reappear in the film, but these moments are fragmented and this new structure suggests that Panahi does not see a point in making a film under these conditions. As to not give spoilers, I feel that the pervasive tone and structure of “Closed Curtain” is there solely to makes the viewer wonder as to how long Panahi will continue to make films given these circumstances. If Panahi’s “This Is Not a Film” was an act of rebellion, “Closed Curtain” may be his waving of the white flag.

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MOST DISAPPOINTING FILM (TIED)

Ida-Pawel Pawlikowski (Poland)

After watching two of his previous films, “Summer of Love” and “Last Resort,” I did not have any desire to see more work from director Pawel Pawlikowski until I read astonishing reviews of his new film, “Ida” in both Film Comment and Cinemascope. Sadly, as I believed about his film “Last Resort” which I found to be an almost shot for shot rip off of Victor Nuñez’s superior 1993 film, “Ruby In Paradise,” “Ida” is an watered down “homage” that carelessly references other masterworks of Polish cinema (here he borrows from Kawalerowicz and Wajda) to tell the story of a novice nun who is met by her Jewish aunt before she is to take her final vows. What follows in this brief throwaway of a film is a kind of road movie where our novice nun is exposed to the hideous truth of her Jewish parents demise during World War Two, which has little dramatic impact given the speed of the narrative. After her aunt’s suicide, our novice then begins an immediate and almost surrealistic transformation (Or is it a dream? Dear Lord, save me) that includes wild jazz musicians, parties, and promiscuity that borders on the comical. A hack job of a film.

The Grand Budapest-Hotel-Wes Anderson (USA)

Everyone’s white hope of direction, Wes Anderson, had been shooting little adorable blanks since his 1999 masterpiece, “Rushmore.” Based on my love for his first two films, I also admit to being as guilty as every other American male of my generation who kept seeing each subsequent film in the hopes that Wes would regain his form. So, when “Moonrise Kingdom” was released to much deserved critical praise in 2012, it reminded all of us that maybe Wes should have possibly slowed down a bit during the last decade so that he could have made something that was a worthy followup to the aforementioned “Rushmore.” That is why I am saddened to say that “The Grand Budapest Hotel” can be tossed into the woodpile along with the other trite Anderson efforts in the 2000s. This star heavy mess neither excels through its leads or its story, a Marx Brothers styled farce whose allegory suggests a condensed World War One style conflict centered around the titular hotel. Ralph Fiennes is the only redeemable thing about this tired, frenetic mess that seemed to wow the audience more with its star power more than any other aspect it tried to present. Let’s just call it “A Mad Mad Mad Mad World Part Two” and file this ornate phone cozy in a cute hand-painted box.

Boyhood –Richard Linklater (USA)

I have been assassinating this film from about a thousand directions since I saw it a few months back, so let me try and take a new angle on this overlong farce..So, if “Boyhood” is just an observational film about a boy and his family with no direct political slant infused into the narrative (or at least that is how it has been explained than Mr. Linklater) then please explain how this “working poor” or even “lower middle class” family can exist in cities like Houston or San Marcos, Texas without one Hispanic or Latino person in their inner circle? I have never pulled the race card in a review, but if this film has no intended statement and it is just a honest look at a boy growing up in this geographic region with those socioeconomic levels, than explain how that could possibly happen? Also, your main character’s celebratory journey to whitebread Austin to hunt for colleges must be the bee’s knees for the milquetoast set who need to escape the world of hard working brown people, but to me it is another reminder that your films have almost consistently been made for the upper class Johnsons and Smiths of this world so if its OK with you, I’ll sit out your next few films.

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WORST FILM OF THE YEAR (TIED)

Memphis-Tim Sutton (USA)

Hi Tim Sutton, it is so awesome that you love African American culture, but here’s the problem; After seeing your film, I am fairly confident that you are another useless over privileged Brooklyn hipster who has never really known any African Americans. At least known them in a profound enough way that would have given you the confidence to make a film about their world like you done and failed with here. So your hackneyed, done a million times, sketch of a story which just seems to be the framework for a bevy of Instagram-style imagery to make other sad talent-less children like you think that they are seeing “art,” is actually doing immense disservice to the people and community whom you are trying to lovingly represent. Feel better? Your finished film comes across as one of those mid 1960s well-intentioned, but hopelessly clueless liberal trifles like 1965s “A Patch of Blue” that bored me to tears then so believe me that your little “musical drama” put me into an expensive coma ($13 at the IFC Center in NYC to watch this on a screen the size of a card table). Couldn’t you have just have easily asked mom and dad for less money and made a film about your true roots, like a hard-hitting documentary about your favorite Williamsburg ukulele or cronut shop?

Snowpiercer-Bong Jo Hong (Korea-US/France)

I had feared that this mess would happen last year not soon after seeing Bong Joon-ho’s fellow countryman Park Chan-wook flounder in his American film debut “Stoker,” To make matters worse, Bong Joon-ho has suffered an even worse fate than Park, as he has tried to adapt French graphic novel Le Transperceneige by Jean-Marc Rochette, into English (a language Bong does not speak) with the help of the meager talent that is playwright Kelly Masterson (who speaks no Korean, of course). You got all that, right? “Snowpiercer” is a dreadful, heavy handed, pandering political “science fiction” film that contains the funniest (not intentional) moment of dialog in cinema this year; The line occurs when our hero played by Chris Evans utters the following line, “I hate them because they forced me to find out what a baby tastes like,” during the supposed dramatic climax of the film. You want more? Tilda Swinton with fake teeth, playing comically spastic (I’m done with her now BTW), a bunch of unsympathetic extras from the “occupy movement,” and a clairvoyant who can predict the future but not what’s through the door in front of her. Also, I cannot count the amount of internet and print media crybabies who posted about upset they were that “the Weinstein’s shuffled the film off to suburban theaters after Bong refused to edit the film down to two hours.” Well, you know what makes me upset? The fact that this film made me agree for the first time in my life with that talentless enemy of the people, Harvey Weinstein. Well, not completely, as I think that “Snowpiercer” isn’t even good enough for the mall theaters that it was forced into and should have been sent directly to North Korea in the hopes that they wouldn’t take the USA (or South Korea for that matter) seriously enough to invade. Lastly, as a loyal devotee of graphic novels for my entire life, I have this message for all of you who have not yet learned from awful graphic novel adaptations like; “Scott Pilgrim,” “Blue Is The Warmest Color,” or this hunk of crap..Just because it was adapted from an indie comic book, it does not make it cutting edge. And before you say anything else..Yes, film adaptations of video games are a much worse proposition.

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BEST REPERTORY EXPERIENCE (TIED)

Fat City (1972) Director: John Huston. Novelist/Screenwriter Leonard Gardner’s Q&A

Former boxer turned screenwriter Leonard Gardner’s March 31st, 2014 appearance at the Harvard Film Archive will go down as one of the best experiences that I have ever had at the Carpenter Center. Still as sharp as a tack, Gardner had a bottomless bag of stories about his experiences working with legendary director John Huston on set in Stockton, California during the filming of “Fat City.” To me, the simple fact that Huston allowed Gardner to amend the script during shooting tells me why the film has a brilliant looseness of dialog that is on par with any film made during that period by much younger, more “hip” directors. The only thing that I regret about that night was that I didn’t try to shake Gardner’s hand in fear that I might accidentally kiss his cheek in gratitude for his appearance, and thus possibly me getting a mouth full of fist. Still, that would have been worth it for me.

Killer Joe (2012) Director: William Friedkin

William Friedkin, is a scholar and a gentleman who the evening before the screening of his film “Killer Joe” had stayed at the Harvard Film Archive until almost midnight to speak with film students and fans alike after the screening of his ignored masterpiece, “Sorcerer.”. So, when his brutal, 2012 film, “Killer Joe” screened the next night, I didn’t expect Mr. Friedkin to be as insanely hysterical as he was, culminating with a response to my friend Sean Burn’s question about Friedkin’s choice to use Clarence Carter’s suggestive song “Strokin,” during the credits of what was a very nasty film. Friedkin retorted that “every film and play, even “Hamlet” would be drastically improved with “Strokin” at the end.” The next five minutes of his response were a blur due to my laughter. Somewhere lost in this was Friedkin, whom my wife Lily and I had met the night before, began his Q&A by waving at us and saying; “Hey guys, great to see you again.” All I have to say is; “Wow, what a guy.”

See you next year!

Generoso and His Beloved Linguine Carbonara

Generoso will teach you how to make this classic dish that originated in Lazio, Italy his way. Quick to cook, linguine carbonara has a modest list of ingredients: Pecorino Romano cheese, eggs, bacon, parsley, garlic, light cream, salt, pepper, olive oil and of course linguine. A quick dish that is great for cold winter nights. Let us know how yours turned out! Music: Ottorino Respighi’s Suite no. 1 from Ancient Airs and Dances.

Bovine Ska and Rocksteady 11/25/14: Bunny and Skitter

Count Ossie Adds Some Furious Drumming To This Bunny and Skitter Classic

As this week’s show aired twenty four hours before Thanksgiving 2014, we just had to start with the only Jamaican track to honor our day of overeating, football, and some thanks, Prince Buster’s sublime mid-tempo ska, Thanksgiving. A fun cut that was released in Jamaica on the “What a Hard Man Fe Dead” LP in 1967. We then surrounded that cut with two sets of tantalizing rocksteady, culminating with a Merritone label track from Hopeton Lewis entitled “At The Corner of The Street,” which up until recently was a long forgotten song on tape until the kind folks at Dub Store Records in Japan released it.

Our last set of the first hour featured some splendid ska instrumentals which included “One More Time” from Lloyd Brevett and his Group, released on Lyndon Pottinger’s SEP Label in 1964 and ending with a sensational instrumental from Roland Alphonso recorded for Justin Yap called, “Live Desire.”

For our spotlight this week, we chose the early Jamaican rhythm and blues duo, Bunny and Skitter, who despite recording some fantastic hits during the pre-ska era, also remain quite the enigma as there’s still a little bit of mystery surrounding the identities of Bunny and Skitter. There is some solid agreement on the identity of Skitter, who was Vernon Allen. There are reports that Bunny was Zoot Simms and other reports that identify him as George Dudley. Though, the exact identity of Bunny is not clear, we do know quite a bit about their discography. Bunny and Skitter recorded their earliest tracks for Coxone’s Worldisc label and after working with Coxone, the duo would work with Prince Buster and Vincent Randy Chin. It must be said that although they would only do one session with Buster, it would produce a high point for their career in the song called “Chubby.”

When “Chubby” was recorded in 1961, the Rastafarian was still viewed as a cult by proper Jamaican society. This fact seemed to elude Buster who had always operated with a downtown ethic. For this recording, Buster brought in the Nyahbingi drumming of Count Ossie and a team of four burro drummers as he had with the Folks Brothers R&B hit, “Oh Carolina” but here Buster removed the R&B elements to produce the first pure example of Nyahbingi drumming ever recorded in Jamaica which also proved a hit for Bunny and Skitter. Shortly after the success of “Oh Carolina” and “Chubby”, several other Jamaican producers such as Coxsone Dodd and Vincent Chin would turn to Count Ossie for a hit. With Bunny and Skitter’s voices and the Count Ossie drumming, a musical revolution had begun.

We were delighted to present the spotlight on Bunny and Skitter. Listen to this past week’s show HERE.

The archive will be available until 12/8/2014. Enjoy!

Bob Clark, Director of “A Christmas Story,” Gives Us a Soldier’s Horrific Homecoming from Vietnam: 1972’s “Deathdream.”

“Dead of Night” (Deathdream) Original Poster from 1972

I could easily dedicate this blog to just “post-Night of The Living Dead zombie films of the 1970s” as the genre was simply flooded after the cult film success of the Romero classic that defined the word zombie for decades to come. In fact to show how niche the genre got, just last week I reviewed the sublime and campy 1977 underwater Nazi zombie film by Ken Weiderhorn, “Shockwaves,” about a group of extremely loyal soldiers (they’re dead) of Adolf who still live and fight for the Third Reich while vacationing in the Caribbean. Someone else who definitely took inspiration from Romero was director Bob Clark, who knocked out a couple of rare underrated films in that genre, 1972’s “Dead of Night” (Deathdream) and 1973’s “Children Shouldn’t Play With Dead Things,” before bizarrely going off to make the seminal holiday film, “A Christmas Story” and the equally seminal but repulsive ten sex comedy, “Porky’s.”

“Deathdream” could easily be lumped into another genre that was also quite overloaded during this time period, the misery the returning Vietnam veteran film. The intense drama of those Vietnam era films is very much in place in “Deathdream,” with the caliber of acting from two of its leads, John Marley and Lynn Carlin, who were last seen together in Cassavetes “Faces” carrying much of the sadness of this horrific and well thought out film. It is the story of a US Soldier, Andy Brooks (Richard Backus), who is shot and killed in Vietnam, and as he lies dying, he hears his mother’s plea to “come back home.” The family receives Andy’s official death notice from another soldier, but his mom Christine (Lynn Carlin) still believes in her heart that the message is a lie and someday her son will come home. Unfortunately, Christine is right and Andy is on his way home, but Andy has been changed by the war; he rarely speaks, and for some unknown reason, he murders and drains the blood out of a truck driver who has kindly given Andy a lift home.

Andy sneaks into his family’s house soon after the killing, and after being warmly greeted by his family, Andy is still very quiet, avoiding seeing anyone outside of the immediate family and exhibiting small moments of rage, which seems just about right for a soldier just recently removed from combat. The next day, while lounging outside, Andy is greeted by the mailman, a longtime friend of the family, who gleefully explains how his experiences during World War Two were vastly different than Vietnam. This enrages Andy, and he finds refuge in his old bedroom where he pathologically rocks in rocking chair all day and night, drawing the concern of his father Charlie (John Marley) who will also recount how he never behaved like that after his service in World War Two. It is in these scenes where Bob Clark reminds the viewer of the old adage that was once uttered by the head of the Veterans Administration; “When a soldier returned from World War Two, everyone bought him a drink. When a soldier came back from Korea, he bought his own drink. And when a solider came back from Vietnam, he has to buy everyone else a drink.” Even though the town is adorned in flags and patriotic symbols, there is little patience for the PTSD exhibited by the soldiers who served in Vietnam, and in “Deathdream,” the PTSD is transformed into a need for Andy to drain the blood from the living in order to continue being part of this society that may not have time for him. More than most political metaphors that the zombie genre has carried over the years, this one really hits home.

Though there are a few scenes where a kind of comic relief is put in, the overall mood of “Deathdream” is dire and extremely sad. Attempts to reintegrate Andy into a world that no longer exists for him by his family are met with brutally violent ends, physically manifesting any soldier’s genuine contempt for those around him who have no desire to understand his pain and sacrifice during that unpopular war. The unrelenting and tragic end of this film, involving Andy’s parents and sister, show a commitment by Clark to illustrate the level of impact that war takes on a solider and those around him, even when the soldier is met by the best intentions of loved ones who even offer psychological counseling as the Brooks family offers their son Andy. “Deathdream” though brutal, hammers home the sad truth that if your son were even able to come home, he may never actually be home again.

Deathdream Trailer from 1972:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eIqA1ZbpYFw

As stated earlier, what truly pulls “Deathdream” together are the performances of Carlin, Marley, and Backus who take a minimal amount of dialog top help create a terse, heartfelt film that makes for a very necessary statement piece on the particular plight of Vietnam veterans. “Deathdream” succeeds by using grotesque horror methods to illustrate the struggle of Vietnam vets in ways that even award winning films like “Coming Home” and “The Deer Hunter” sometime fail to execute.

Director Bob Clark showed a clear talent for being able to draw top flight performances out of his actors in his early career. Several years after “Deathdream, Clark would direct legendary actor, Jack Lemmon, to an Oscar nominated performance in the equally forgotten 1980 drama, “Tribute.” It is a pity that the end of Clark’s career would be filled with the likes of Sylvester Stallone’s “Rhinestone,” and “Baby Geniuses,” as there was a true maverick talent that seemed to be destroyed after the unbelievable financial success of his “Porky’s films. Sadly, Bob Clark was killed in 2007 in a car accident with his son Ariel, a tragic end to a talent who for at least a decade was making interesting films, both in and out of the Hollywood system.

LILY & GENEROSO 4EVER!

Author: Generoso Fierro