Bo Kho is an anise charged, lemongrassed fueled Vietnamese beef stew that we love to have here in the Fierro home the moment the thermometer dips. For this slow cooked dish, you will need about 2 pounds of beef, star anise, garlic, fish sauce, soy sauce, oyster sauce, black and cayenne pepper, ginger, olive oil, one can of puree tomatoes, and a packet of Vietnamese beef stew seasoning which you can get in almost any Asian grocery store. Enjoy and let us know what you think when you make yours!!
Music is by that Beethoven guy, Violin Concerto in D, Op. 61. Enjoy!
What a mind-opening experience it was to hear director Ken Weiderhorn talk about his most famous film, “Shockwaves,” last week at the Coolidge Corner. Though I was thrilled to hear him speak in person about his now notorious 1977 underwater Nazi zombie film, his overall tone that night was that of a dad who was forced to talk about his son’s recent ballet recital. After hearing him sadly recount his story of how a late night CBS television screening of his film caused folks at his then television job to lose respect for him, thus making it difficult to thrive in his chosen career, I get it, he was not happy. But let’s put the potentially un-PC, career-ending subject matter aside, “Shockwaves” is a visually unique chunk of horror that can boast about a cast containing a pre-“Days Of Heaven,” Brooke Adams, and B-horror movie legends( who were only paid for four days of shooting BTW) Peter Cushing and John Carradine at their creepiest. Also, “Shockwaves” can still give you the thrill of saying to your co-workers, “well tonight I’m seeing one of those underwater Nazi zombie films” because that statement should be good for at least another forty years of bad looks.
The film begins with a father and son who rescue a sunburned, disturbed woman from her rudderless dinghy. Something horrific has happened to her and you need to know why. As she starts to recall what occurred, you begin the backtracking by placing her on a pleasure boat that is being captained by a very drunk John Carradine (he’s was really good at this) , with a salty crew of young and old, and a passenger list containing a cast of vacationers that any 70s film would be proud to have: You have the hunky curly-haired guy, the annoying know-it-all redhead, who is of course married to the whiny Herb Tarlick-styled salesman, and the radiant, raven haired, level-headed protagonist of our film, Brooke Adams, who was our gal adrift at sea whom we just saw at the beginning of the film. The boat is far from ship-shape, the meals are cooked my a man who usually eats chili with his fingers, and the captain played the always cantankerous John Carradine, who has a pony bottle of Bob’s Vodka permanently glued to his hand as an accessory. As mutiny begins to fill the air, they are sideswiped by a ghost ship which does some damage and are forced to land the SS Minnow on a desolate island that has the shell of a long since destroyed military ship off its coast. Our captain goes missing and is then found dead, and so now it’s up to the passengers crew to figure out a rescue plan.
Director Ken Weiderhorn at The Coolidge Corner
They soon come across the lavish, dilapidated estate of a semi-retired SS Commander (Peter Cushing), I say “semi” as he almost immediately explains that his group of “Death Corps,” a scientifically created group of immortal soldiers, still roam the island. These troops were designed to be U-Boat crew members so they really like the deep blue sea and continue to live there, but as World War Two had ended some thirty years prior, they just got to kill everything they see out of loyalty or boredom once they uniformly pop up from the various rivers and ponds on the island. Armed with this knowledge, the crew find a place to hide and try not get killed before they can and make a dash off of Club Hitler the next day. I must admit the story is pretty thin but the Death Corps zombies are the most interesting thing about “Shockwaves.” These zombies (for lack of a better word) behave more like” Val Lewton” zombies and not like the Romeroesque “eat your face” zombies of “Night Of The Living Dead” which had come forth from beyond a decade earlier. More maniacal and cunning than shambolic, yes this 70s cast will not be a food source for walking meatloaves; they will be drowned and strangled by these highly trained, and oddly nostalgic, undead fascists. These choices of murder strategies that they employ were due more to budgetary restraints, than a thoughtful desire to omit bloody outcomes. In fact, as we learned from Mr. Weiderhorn that night, a lot of this film was guided by the lack of funds. Ken stated that the money people had a desire to bankroll a horror film because, “they always make their money back,” and according to our director, they did make their bread back with “Shockwaves.” Also as we all know, sometimes being restricted by funds does bring out some creative alternatives that work better than the usual, and there are several clever ways that Ken got results out of small money.
As we now know, every zombie has an Achilles Heel, and these happy go lucky denizens of the deep cannot lose their special Biggles of the Camel Squadron goggles or they go all floppy. Why? According to Ken, “we had to come up with an easy way of killing them that would not compromise their makeup, which was the biggest challenge of the shooting, as getting makeup to stay on when the Nazi’s are going in and out of water is a pain.” Still, the look of eyeless, waterlog undead creatures of the sea writhing in pain with screeching synth music playing behind their passing adds a good amount of dare I say, “shock.” Also, getting back to their particular killing style, these whimsical fascists love bringing the living back down to their murky un-graves as they seem pretty upset about having to live out eternity as overdressed bottom-dwellers, so I suppose that they want company. Unlike the flesh-eating in Romero films which I rarely found scary, these slow suffocating deaths are actually quite chilling. And the Death Corp, unlike the boogeymen of children’s stories, love walking around in plain sight during broad daylight, which I would say is pretty ballsy. Because of this brash behavior, you usually see them before their victims see them, and that too adds to the shock of “Shockwaves.”
So where did the idea for these creatures come from? I was lucky to have personally asked Ken the question of where he got his inspiration for such a strange horror film monster. Sure, these days you can’t turn on the History Channel without some program on “Hitler and the Occult” or “The Satanic Armies of the Third Reich,” but what was there in 1975 when the film was written to inspire such a creation. Ken responded that there was a book that he had read entitled “Occult Reich” that had all of this info about Hitler and his weird obsession with the Satanic rites, so from there he thought that perhaps that wacky millennialist was using these methods to fuel his campaign of world domination by creating some kind of super solider. Ken continued by saying, “Even their symbol, the swastika, wasn’t that a sacred Buddhist symbol that was perverted by Adolf and crew to go counter-clockwise?” I’m glad he answered that question and I am very glad that he showed up to the Coolidge that night, a night when a hundred or so loyal horror film fans braved some seriously cold weather to see his film, ask him some questions, and acknowledge his 1977 work as a lost and nifty film that is packed with some well-done politically incorrect instruments of terror.
The good folks at Blue Underground have also acknowledged this work and just recently, they have released “Shockwaves” on Blu Ray. Pick one up, it looks great.
The British gangster film is truly its own genre that normally delineates itself from its American and Japanese counterparts by including a kind of ugly humor and coldness that is rarely seen in any other crime film genre. Starting with John Boulting’s superb 1947 film, “Brighton Rock,” through the 50s and 60s, the genre flowed next to The British New Wave and was quite popular even though the plot lines and characters had gotten a bit too formulaic that is, until real life gangsters and brothers, Reggae and Ronnie Kray dominated the headlines. Though the Krays were as violent and ruthless as Hisayuki Machii and Al Capone, there were two distinct things that differentiated them from their American and Japanese counterparts: Reggae and Ronnie were both exceedingly lovely towards their mother Violet, and Ronnie had been well known in crime circles as bisexual, a fact that British journalists had a field day with at the time. British gangster films of course took notice of these facts and “homosexuality and bisexuality” would play a role in many of the genre’s subsequent films. From early efforts like Nicolas Roeg’s “Performance” released in 1970 to John Mackensie’s 1980 film, “The Long Good Friday,” and even recently in films such as Mike Hodges, “I’ll Sleep When I’m Dead” in 2003.” But somehow lost in this melee of bisexual, mother-loving, sadistic gangster films is Michael Tuchner’s strong 1971 film “Villain.”
“Villain” is the story of Vic Dakin, a charismatic but vicious crime lord who like the real life Ronnie Kray, loves his ailing mum and is bisexual, depicted here as Dakin maintains a turbulent sexual relationship with amateur pimp to the mob and heartthrob Wolfie (an young Ian McShane), a good-looking lad who Vic must punch around a bit before a session of lovemaking. Though Vic is the master of his neighborhood, he wants a bigger score and sets up the mark with another kingpin as they set in to rob a plastic factory. When the deal goes down badly and his co-conspirator is wounded in the heist, Vic wants to silence his partner in crime before the police inspector (well done by Nigel Davenport) can get a confession out of him. From there its a game of cat and mouse as Vic tries to find the money and elude capture while sneaking away occasionally to share a moment or two of sexual violence with Wolfie. It must be said here that you never see any actual sexual moments in “Villain” between McShane and Burton as their one lovemaking scene was deemed too racy for early 1970s England and discarded from the final cut. What was kept in “Villain,” are a few scenes of violence that Little Alex in “Clockwork Orange” would describe as “ultra violence.” The English audiences may not have been primed for the kind of sexuality that Villain wanted to portray but the time was right for this level of “red red groovy” to be shown on the screen.
1971 Trailer for “Villain”
The last third of this film plays out tightly and with real grit as a both main characters play off of each other in trying to avoid prison. Burton, who for most of his career had played a sex symbol, is raw and ugly and although he is not given much in terms of dialog, plays a fairly complex character well with varying intensities of emotion. Ian McShane, who had gotten good notice for his performance as Charlie in the sweet 1969 Mel Stuart film, “If Its Tuesday, This Must Belgium,” is the shining star of “Villain” as he brings a lost, desperate overtone to the character of Wolfie. If one aspect of “Villain” is truly lacking, it is the visual aesthetic of the film. Tucher, fresh off of television does not have much of an eye, and thus the cinematography seems very small-screen. Compared with “Performance” shot by the always-daring eye of Nicolas Roeg a year earlier, “Villain” must have underwhelmed an English audience hoping to see something in their favorite genre that would knock their sock offs.
Although “Villain” also boasted the star talent of the great Richard Burton, it did not do well both with critics and at the box office as it was publicly known that all was not well with Richard. Two years earlier, Burton had played Rex Harrison’s gay partner in Stanley Donen’s dreadful drama-comedy “Staircase,” about a pair of flamboyant East End barbers who are constantly at each other for laughs. That film was a critical and box office disaster and although Burton took home a hefty salary of 1.2 million, it was the beginning of a bad period for Richard as he notably took a slew of bad parts just to cash a check. Possibly after that fiasco, Britain was not ready for Burton playing bisexual again which is a pity, as they would’ve most likely had been impressed with this hard as nails fictional take on the real-life Ronnie Kray. Audiences would have to wait almost twenty years for an actual biopic on the Krays, as director Peter Medak would enlist real life brothers Gary and Martin Kemp from the new wave group, Spandau Ballet to play Reggie and Ronnie. Who knows, given the recent successes of Nick Love and Ben Wheatley’s modern British gangster films, “Piggy” and “Down Terrace” respectively, we may see a new audience dust off “Villain” and give it the viewing it deserved in 1971.
Spezzatino (Italian beef stew) is one of those hearty Northern Italian dishes that is rarely served in restaurants in the States but one that is perfect for the fall and winter. Most commonly served with potatoes, I prefer to serve it on a bed of orzo. This quick to prepare dish will only require, beef, tomato puree, garlic, oregano, salt, pepper, onions, peas, carrots, and olive oil. Should take about 90 minutes from prep to table. Music is the Cello sonata in D, from 12 Sonata, Op. 6 by Pietro Locatelli. Enjoy!!!
Lily has been making an improvised char siu ever since she returned to eating meat. Generoso loves char siu. Lily thinks that her version is not traditional enough, but it is mighty delicious. Lily shows you how to make her version of char siu in this week’s edition of Cooking with Generoso and Lily. The recipe lies primarily in the marinade, and once that’s prepared, the rest is quite easy. Enjoy! Music: Muzio Clementi’s Piano Sonata ‘Didone Abbandonata’, Op. 50 no. 3
This week we started off with two sets of fun Jamaican ska, beginning with a cut, recently unearthed by Lily from The Sensations, called “Juvenile Delinquent,” which was released on Treasure Isle in 1966. We then we ended that two set ska start of the show with “Sun Rises In The East” by Dotty and Bonny, also on Treasure Isle, this time from 1963. We ended the first hour of the show with a set of rocksteady, culminating with the king of the reggae harmonica, Roy Richards, and a tune he cut for Bongo Man in 1966, “Rub A Dub.”
We started the second hour with a spotlight, selected by Lily, on the Gaylettes.
The Gaylettes were originally Judy Mowatt, Merle Clemenson, and Dawn Hanchard. As a trio, the girls first recorded as a group for Linford Pottinger’s Gaydisc label. However, after their earliest tracks did not lead to great popularity, Judy Mowatt returned to dancing, which was actually her original desired career path, and The Gaylettes went on hiatus. While dancing with a group in Kingston and selling products for the Colgate-Palmolive Company to survive, Judy met Beryl Lawson. While rehearsing a dance routine at the Baby Grand Club, Judy and Beryl began to sing together, and upon realizing their ability to harmonize together, Judy called over Merle Clemenson, forming a trio that would become the next incarnation of The Gaylettes. Good reputations for the girls formed as they performed together, and eventually the trio caught the attention of Lynford Anderson, an engineer and record mastering supervisor for WIRL in 1967. Anderson connected The Gaylettes to Lee Scratch Perry, who was at the time a freelance producer/engineer after his departure from Joe Gibbs’ stable. After hearing the girls perform, Lee Perry invited them to sing backup on “How Come.” Perry would continue to work with the Gaylettes while they recorded at WIRL. We played one of their only other WIRL tracks next, this time its a one that was not so dirty. After this last of the WIRL tracks, we then played The Gaylettes recordings for Merritone while they were under contract with Federal Records, where they would record their first big hit, “Silent River Runs Deep,” a track written by Henry Buckley.
With Anderson as a major supporter of the Gaylettes, The group would continue to work with Lynford Anderson throughout 1969, seeing great success with spectacular covers of everyone ranging from Dusty Springfield to O.V. Wright. By 1969, they were the most popular female group in Jamaica, but at toward the end of the year, the Gaylettes broke up when Beryl and Merle immigrated to America. The Gaylettes were still under contract with Federal, so Judy went under another name and sang some solo tracks. Mowatt eventually became an “I-Three” along with Rita Marley, and Marcia Griffiths who would sing backup for Bob Marley throughout the 1970s.
After a really lovely spotlight of one of the few prominent girl groups to come out of Jamaica in the 1960s, we ended the show with a long intense set of early reggae which featured a gem from Roman Stewart called “Fire At Your Heel” which came out on Sun Shot in 1975.
Listen to the this 11/5/14 edition of the Bovine Ska and Rocksteady HERE.
Enjoy! The archive will be available until 11/18/2014.
Given the recent success of Bernardo Bertolucci’s latest film, “Me and You,” the story of a bourgeois boy who spends a few days locked away with his gorgeous junkie half-sister while hiding from his overbearing mother in the basement of this condominium, it immediately brought to mind Bernardo’s controversial 1979 film of incest, “Luna.” “Luna” was ripped apart by the critics in 1979 and was even sermonized during a Sunday service at my local church, which, of course, made me want to leave immediately and see the film myself.
I originally didn’t see “Luna” in the most ideal way, with my elderly Italian-Catholic father in a downtown Philadelphia theater. Pa also had it in a bit for Bernardo as my dad was a proud fascist who hated Alberto Moravia, who had written the book that Bertolucci’s “The Conformist” was based on and thus despised the film. Regardless, as Dad was sweet about most things and would on my request see just about anything except for science fiction, we went to see the film at the old Ritz Theater. Let’s just say that when Luna was over, pa was not pleased. Translating from Italian, he called the film “sensationalistic garbage.” With all respect to my father, I didn’t agree with him then, but I’m not sure that it needed to be seen again.
Watching “Luna” again recently, I was immediately struck by the beautiful photography of Vittorio Storaro, who that same year had lensed Coppola’s “Apocalypse Now.” Storaro had been working with Bertolucci since they collaborated on the aforementioned “Conformist” and for his time,was the finest cinematographer on earth. Much can also be said for Jill Clayburgh, the star of “Luna,” an exceptional actress throughout the 1970s, who a year earlier had shined in the equally controversial Paul Mazursky film, “An Unmarried Woman.” Clayburgh, it has been rumored, relished the opportunity to work with Bertolucci and truly does the most she can with what was given to her and turns in a fine performance. As for Bertolucci; he was on quite the roll, from his first film in 1962, The Grim Reaper, through the 60s and 1970s, and although he had stumbled a bit in his 1976 film, “1900,” he had won every conceivable accolade possible for “Last Tango In Paris,” “Love and Anger,” and “Partners.”
So, what went wrong?
Let’s start with the story and dialog of the film, co-written by Bertolucci, his brother Giuseppe, and his wife Clare Peploe, which has no desire to either fully ground itself to reality or to allow the operatic style drama of the piece to flourish into a surrealistic experience. The story goes like this; Caterina Silveri (Clayburgh) is a wealthy opera singer who is married Douglas Winter (Fred Gwynne), and they have an erratic bratty teenage son named Joe (Matthew Berry). Together they all live happily in their New York townhouse until dad dies suddenly which makes mom whisks Joe and herself off to Italy to grow her career. Once in Italy, Caterina’s career flourishes in grand opera, while Joe becomes more bitchy, chatty, and erratic. He appears to worship his mother in an almost romantic fashion but of course, treats her like crap whenever he can, which in some ways is very Italian Catholic, but these people are supposed to be Americans, so what gives here? This character flaw is the beginning of the many issues that I have with “Luna” as I am not sure that Bernardo ever wants this to be an American family.
Joe follows this behavior by experimenting with hetero sex, gay sex, and of course heroin, a fact that his mother discovers during a somewhat hedonistic birthday party for Joe. Once Caterina discovers that little Joe is on the horse, she breaks out into full maternal mode, abandoning all and even buying a fix for Joe once his dealer Mustafa leaves town. This culminates in one “key” scene when Joe forks his arm in frustration when he runs out of needles for his fix. Even more bitchy and obnoxious, Joe is inconsolable, so mom kisses and masturbates him to climax, until he falls into a peaceful junkie sleep. This scene provides another moment of frustration for me as Caterina’s somewhat maternal but sexual reaction to Joe’s junkie freak-out is as believable as Joe even being able to get an erection while strung out. If given the stylistic context of an opera, these mistakes would be taken in as operatic license but here they just appear confused as to what they want to portray.
At this point, we aren’t sure where Joe’s addiction stands, but Caterina decides to pull Joe into the country to trace back the time when she met Joe’s father. You see, unknown to Joe, Douglas was not his biological father, so Caterina, after another few rest stops that lead to even more moments of sexual uncertainty, leads Joe to Giuseppe (Tomas Milian), a poor, country elementary school teacher, who is loved but still lives in the town where they met. Perhaps what Bernardo is saying here is that Caterina wanted more than just being a mom, so she was off to America where she has always denied who she really loved and has now brought those hidden desires to her son. Sure, there are moments when we see that Joe and Giuseppe have accidentally dressed the same, but that’s all Bernardo is going to give you to draw that conclusion. Once everything is out in the open, the film bizarrely culminates in an outdoor performance of Verdi’s “Un Balla in Maschera.” If you are looking for a connection between Verdi’s three act opera and the story of “Luna,” I will save you some trouble. There isn’t one, and this pseudo operatic tale of tragedy and regret is now over. Not surprisingly, the critics of that time seemed more concerned with the audacity of the film, but they should have been more upset at its lack of focus.
Watch Joe wander and rant through the streets of Italy in “Luna”
The good news is that with 2014’s “Me and You,” Bertolucci has corrected the mistakes of “Luna” by allowing his characters’ dialog to speak for their broken realities and not by forcing them into constant over the top moments of dire melodramatics. It is a film that is grounded in reality but is no less dramatic (or beautiful for that matter) for its choice of narrative style. Lorenzo, the struggling adolescent in “Me and You,” is selfish and callow in his actions at first, but once he understands the causes of his inner turmoil through the ranting of Olivia, his economically trapped roommate and junkie sister, he is free and able to leave the basement with peace. Though there are suggestions of possible intimacy between Lorenzo and Olivia, Bertolucci sidesteps those moments and does not allow for a physical encounter to happen, which is an excellent decision for a film that has chosen the ground for launching its familial drama. So what if it took 35 years for this to happen, I was thrilled that Bernardo was able to pull it off right this time.
This past week’s Bovine Ska and Rocksteady is one of our favorite shows of the year….the Halloween show!!!
The show featured songs with ghoulish, sinister themes and titles ranging from devilish reggae, duppy mento, dracula reggae, and zombie ska. There’s even an entire set of duppy themed reggae and a duppy story weaving through the sets! We started off with a set of “Satan” themed reggae, beginning with a new acquisition here at The Bovine Ska and Rocksteady, “Satan Side” by Keith Hudson and Chuckles which was released on DUKE in 1972 and was produced by Keith Hudson himself. That opening set ended with a back to back version excursion from The Ethiopians on Matador, “Satan Gal” and “Satan Boy.”
Given that the Bovine Ska and Rocksteady almost always needs a spotlight, this show has a special one from the most terrifying reggae voice of all, King Horror!
This 1969 King Horror cut is pretty spooky!
Much of the fun of the King Horror spotlight comes from the question: Who is King Horror?
The real answer is that we have no idea, but we have a few suspicions. Across all accounts, the most likely answer is that King Horror was Lord Davey, who was produced by Laurel Aitken. Given the involvement of Laurel, there is some confusion surrounding who really performed on the King Horror tracks. On many of the tracks, it is clear that you do not hear Laurel‘s voice, which would confirm that King Horror is actually Lord Davey. But, of course to make the identity more puzzling, it is believed that Laurel Aitken actually did cut a few singles as King Horror, but the rest of the singles were Young Growler, a calypsonian named Errol Naphtah Davy who immigrated to London from Trinidad in 1961.
Given the name similarities, we could guess that Young Growler and Lord Davey are most likely the same person. While multiple sources point to Davy, there is another claim to the King Horror name out there. Joe Mansano, of Brixton’s Joe’s Record Centre, claimed that King Horror was one of his DJs known as Lloydie and Lloyd the Matador, not to be confused with Lloyd the Matador Daley. Lloydie was apparently not the best looking man, and consequently, Joe and his people began to call him King Horror.
Regardless of the identity, all of these King Horror tracks feature eerie sound effects, great screams, and amazing reggae rhythms.
Listen to the spooky edition of the Bovine Ska and Rocksteady HERE.
Enjoy! The archive will be available until 11/11/2014.
This dish is a must in the Fierro household as Lily has admitted on many an occasion that she “could and will eat this several days a week without a complaint.” This class Italian dish of course comes from Bologna and its first appearance is said to be around 1891. Spaghetti Bolognese first made its appearance here in Somerville for Lily in 2011, and it has been a blast to make ever since. It is a fast dish (taking less than 2 hours to make from prep to plate) and you will only need the following ingredients to make more than enough for six people: Two boxes of spaghetti, one pound of fatty ground pork, one pound of fatty ground beef, four large carrots, a can of tomato puree, a bulb of garlic, salt, pepper, oregano and olive oil. No need to write this down, I will show you how to make this step by step below. Let’s me know how yours has come out! Music from Giulio Regondi’s “Etude no. 6” and then Tommaso Giordani’s “Guitar Sonata in Cm.”
OK, I admit it; I am a closeted Larry Cohen fan. I got my first taste of Larry Cohen’s handiwork when my friend Sam and I scored a VHS copy of the then notorious 1974 baby-killing-everyone-in-its-way film, “It’s Alive.” A film where a baby is born deformed and when the obstetrician tries to kill it, it goes all rip and tear on all who threaten it. Despite its bizarre concept, “Its Alive” was a sharp piece of satire on the abortion movement (Roe v. Wade was only a year earlier) and remains as Cohen’s most popular film as it did spawn (no pun intended) two more sequels. “It’s Alive” is not Cohen’s first attempt at directing a satire on the current state of American culture, his debut film “Bone,” would be Cohen’s opening and comedic salvo at an America rotting from the top down.
“Bone” begins with super car salesman, Bill Lennox (Andrew Duggan) pitching his wares which consist of mauled bodies in trashed cars during a fantasy television commercial sequence that clearly eludes to Godard’s 1967 classic, “Weekend.” I say this because reality kicks in soon afterwards, as we soon see a bourgeois Bill with his luxurious wife Bernadette (Joyce Van Patten) going through the motions in a faux paradise while Bill secretly knows that it is all a façade. And to make things worse, there is a rat in pool’s filter, a big black rat, and Bill isn’t going to fish it out and neither will Bernadette. What is there to do? Here enters our “hero,” Bone (Yaphet Kotto).
Bone first comes off as what Spike Lee would call, “a magical negro,” you know, helpful with a dash of subservience, like Harry Belafone in 1970’s “The Angel Levine,” but that doesn’t last long. Soon, “Bone” gets down to business as he has been spying on the Lennox’s lavish home and he makes the natural but incorrect assumption that there is a lot of cash waiting inside which is soon finds is not there. Yes, the Lennox’s are mired in debt but after rifling through the Lennox’s home, Bone finds a bankbook and it seems that Bill has stashed away five grand without Bernadette’s knowledge. Now Bill must go out and get the money from the bank or else Bone would take out his rage on Bernadette in a not too pleasant threat of rape and beheading.
For the rest of the film, Bill and Bernadette are apart and experience two different kinds of journeys. Bill is offered a loan from his bank as opposed to full cash withdrawal. Being that he now has this option, Bill doesn’t seem too anxious to get home and wanders through Los Angeles until he finds a bar where he meets the dentally obsessed boozehound, Brett Somers, of TV’s “Match Game” fame. They share a drink and a view at her ex-husband’s dental records until he tires and flees into the company of a random kleptomaniac, played by the biggest name actress in the film, Jeannie Berlin, who had just received massive kudos from her role in “The Heartbreak Kid.” They plunder a supermarket and Bill eats a stolen steak with our klepto at her fabulous pad as she goes on about her many schemes to get free products and money. Bill quickly learns that she is no less the conman than himself and they go at it quickly before Bill decides to split.
Bernadette meanwhile has the daunting task of entertaining Bone, and first she tries to do so with her best upper class whiles which do not sit well. She offers to cook for him and after that fails, Bone’s thoughts turn to sexual assault which at first repels Bernadette, but then after putting up a small fight, she agrees to the rape which immediately deflates Bone’s imposing mojo and he seems defeated. After a bit of talking out of Bone’s loss of “nigger mystique,” they both have consensual sex and team up to go after Bill, who they feel has done them both wrong. There is a lot in this segment that will not sit well with the political correctness of this era, but it doesn’t make its overall message wrong by any means.
Bill and Bernadette’s individual dystopian journeys in “Bone” are what set it apart from so many of the well-intentioned but flawed racial films of its era. “Bone” is mean and quite funny at times, but unlike films like “Watermelon Man,” it pulls no punches and really gets at white America’s fear of the scary, uncontrollable black man and its own decaying class imperative. It’s 1972 after all, and racial issues are still on the forefront of the press coverage, as is the war in Vietnam, which is handled here in another one of the Lennox’s lies as they claim that their son is a helicopter pilot in Vietnam who we eventually find out is just another rich white kid who skipped out on the draft and is serving time in Spain for smuggling hash.
“Bone” did not fare well at the theaters. It was originally distributed in suburban markets as a tawdry expose and titled “Beverley Hills Nightmare.” After that failure, it was repackaged for black audiences as “Dial Rat For Murder” and “Bone” which also didn’t work, so they splattered the poster with an image of the film’s only big name, Jeannie Berlin, and renamed it “Housewife” for a chance to cash in on her fame in the arthouse circuit, which unfortunately did not work either.
Don’t Let The Title Fool You, It’s “BONE”
This would hardly be the end of Larry Cohen, who would direct two fairly popular films in 1973 with blaxpolitation film legend Fred Williamson, entitled “Black Caesar” and “Hell Up in Harlem” before scoring his biggest hit with the aforementioned “It’s Alive.” Cohen’s critical masterpiece “God Told Me To” about a deranged serial killer who receives divine inspiration to murder would be a couple of years later. Most of Cohen’s later efforts would be less on satire and more on the pure horror side with films like “Q” and “The Stuff.”
Sometimes entertaining and always audacious, Larry Cohen is the kind of exploitation film writer and director that is so sorely missing from today’s films. The kind of nasty, uncompromising filmmaker who is needed to get out the true message of an America rotting from the head down.
LILY & GENEROSO 4EVER! 