While I wanted to celebrate the birthday of the oldest living Academy Award winner, I could not let today pass without noting the death yesterday of two individuals -- one of whom gave us some of the most marvelous films in world cinema and the other who, despite her protests, was the true embodiment of that overused word "hero".
Monday marked the passing of French filmmaker Eric Rohmer -- one of the last surviving members of La Nouvelle Vague (The New Wave) and also a genius writer-director. In a career that spanned some six decades, Rohmer was a novelist, a critic (for Cahiers du Cinema), an author (he and Claude Chabrol co-authored one of the best studies of Alfred Hitchcock) and filmmaker. His movies were eclectic, challenging, talky but never dull. Others have written more eloquently than I about the man and his work and I won't even pretend to try. I have enjoyed many of his films (which admittedly can be an acquired taste) and I'm sorry that there won't be one more. But we can savor the legacy he has left us.
I also want to note the passing at the age of 100 of Miep Gies, the woman who helped to shelter Otto Frank and his family in Holland for several years during World War II before their whereabouts was betrayed by person or persons unknown. Mrs. Gies in an interview claimed that she was not a hero, but I know I'm not alone in saying on that point she was wrong. What she did took enormous courage and strength and determination and a sense of morality that is lacking in many. Mrs. Gies was the one who collected the papers on which young Anne Frank composed the now famous diary and if it weren't for her we would have been deprived of that voice. Not only do we have that work of literature but we have a biography of Mrs. Gies, Anne Frank Remembered: The Story of the Woman Who Helped to Hide the Frank Family. It may seem trivial to do so, but I'd like to also point out the above average TV movie "The Attic: The Hiding of Anne Frank" in which Mrs. Gies was portrayed by Mary Steenburgen. There's also Pat Carroll's beautifully rendered cameo in Freedom Writers. And we have the lady herself in appearances in the documentary Anne Frank Remembered and in video clips on the Miep Gies Web Site.
Two very distinct individuals, both filled with humanity, who passed away on the same day.
Requiescant in pace.
Tuesday, January 12, 2010
January 12: Happy Birthday Luise Rainer!
Does anyone nowadays know who Luise Rainer is? Well today happens to be her birthday -- her 100th birthday.
For those who don't know or don't remember, Luise Rainer was the first actress to win back to back Best Actress Academy Awards -- for her performance as Anna Held in The Great Ziegfeld (1936) and as O-Lan (which she played in yellowface) in The Good Earth, an adaptation of the Pearl S. Buck novel.
Rainer began her career with Max Reinhardt in Germany as a teenager and she rose through the ranks to become a leading lady with his company. She also made a few appearances in German films and was scouted by American companies -- notably MGM which was always on the lookout for the next European who might be able to replace or, at least help keep in line, their temperamental star Greta Garbo. Rainer had to campaign to land her first leading role in American films in 1935's Escapade, a romantic comedy remake of the German Maskerade (1934). The film paired the actress with William Powell and she was to co-star opposite him in her next feature, the extravagantly produced biographical drama The Great Ziegfeld. While her role as the impresario's wife, whom he seduces, marries and abandons, isn't particularly large, Rainer made quite an impression on Depression-era audiences with a particular scene in which she telephones him to congratulate him on his marriage to Billie Burke. From the perspective of contemporary audiences, Rainer's performance might be considered a bit emotive but at the time it was enough to earn her the Oscar.
MGM set out to capitalize on her appeal but with her light German accent (even though the studio encouraged the notion that she was from Vienna) and her decidedly non-Hollywood approach, Rainer was difficult to cast. The studio teamed her Paul Muni to portray Chinese peasants in The Good Earth. Her character had little dialogue so Rainer had to rely on movement and her expressions to convey the character. Again, to contemporary audiences having Caucasian performers enact Asian characters borders on the racist, but it was the studio system which did not really allow for the grooming of leading men or leading ladies of ethnicity. Rainer once again impressed critics, audience and the Academy and picked up a second Oscar -- the first woman to win back-to-back awards, a feat not duplicated for thirty years.
Now that she had achieved that honor, the studio was at even more of a loss as to what to do with the actress. Offscreen, she had married playwright Clifford Odets and their relationship was tempetuous at best. Her feistiness spilled over into her work life at MGM as she often refused the roles the studio wanted her to play. After her double win, Rainer made a handful of films, of which only The Great Waltz (1938), about composer Johann Strauss was the best. By 1940, her Hollywood career was over, she divorced Odets -- the couple often worked on opposite coasts and his infidelities were fairly well-known -- and attempted to launch a stage career, appearing in Paris, London and New York, but to no avail.
Rainer made a one-shot return to movies during World War II with 1943's Hostages, before retiring from the big screen, In 1945, she married publisher Robert Knittel and divided her time between England and Switzerland while raising their daughter.
Over the years, there were rumors of returns: she had befriended playwright Bertolt Brecht who reportedly conceived a stage role for her -- but the story goes that the part was virtually a cameo and Rainer balked at playing it. Fellini had offered her a role in La dolce vita (1960) but Rainer and he clashed over the part and he dropped the idea. The actress continued to make occasional television appearances ("Combat" in 1965; "The Love Boat" in 1984), and a one-shot return to films (The Gambler, 1997) but Rainer found a new outlet for her talents after studying painting in London in the 1950s. After her husband's death in 1989, she settled in London.
Happy Birthday, Miss Rainer!
Rainer began her career with Max Reinhardt in Germany as a teenager and she rose through the ranks to become a leading lady with his company. She also made a few appearances in German films and was scouted by American companies -- notably MGM which was always on the lookout for the next European who might be able to replace or, at least help keep in line, their temperamental star Greta Garbo. Rainer had to campaign to land her first leading role in American films in 1935's Escapade, a romantic comedy remake of the German Maskerade (1934). The film paired the actress with William Powell and she was to co-star opposite him in her next feature, the extravagantly produced biographical drama The Great Ziegfeld. While her role as the impresario's wife, whom he seduces, marries and abandons, isn't particularly large, Rainer made quite an impression on Depression-era audiences with a particular scene in which she telephones him to congratulate him on his marriage to Billie Burke. From the perspective of contemporary audiences, Rainer's performance might be considered a bit emotive but at the time it was enough to earn her the Oscar.
MGM set out to capitalize on her appeal but with her light German accent (even though the studio encouraged the notion that she was from Vienna) and her decidedly non-Hollywood approach, Rainer was difficult to cast. The studio teamed her Paul Muni to portray Chinese peasants in The Good Earth. Her character had little dialogue so Rainer had to rely on movement and her expressions to convey the character. Again, to contemporary audiences having Caucasian performers enact Asian characters borders on the racist, but it was the studio system which did not really allow for the grooming of leading men or leading ladies of ethnicity. Rainer once again impressed critics, audience and the Academy and picked up a second Oscar -- the first woman to win back-to-back awards, a feat not duplicated for thirty years.
Now that she had achieved that honor, the studio was at even more of a loss as to what to do with the actress. Offscreen, she had married playwright Clifford Odets and their relationship was tempetuous at best. Her feistiness spilled over into her work life at MGM as she often refused the roles the studio wanted her to play. After her double win, Rainer made a handful of films, of which only The Great Waltz (1938), about composer Johann Strauss was the best. By 1940, her Hollywood career was over, she divorced Odets -- the couple often worked on opposite coasts and his infidelities were fairly well-known -- and attempted to launch a stage career, appearing in Paris, London and New York, but to no avail.
Rainer made a one-shot return to movies during World War II with 1943's Hostages, before retiring from the big screen, In 1945, she married publisher Robert Knittel and divided her time between England and Switzerland while raising their daughter.
Over the years, there were rumors of returns: she had befriended playwright Bertolt Brecht who reportedly conceived a stage role for her -- but the story goes that the part was virtually a cameo and Rainer balked at playing it. Fellini had offered her a role in La dolce vita (1960) but Rainer and he clashed over the part and he dropped the idea. The actress continued to make occasional television appearances ("Combat" in 1965; "The Love Boat" in 1984), and a one-shot return to films (The Gambler, 1997) but Rainer found a new outlet for her talents after studying painting in London in the 1950s. After her husband's death in 1989, she settled in London.
Happy Birthday, Miss Rainer!
Thursday, January 7, 2010
January 7: Centenaries in January
Happy New Year!
Now that the holiday season is officially over (yesterday was Twelfth Night or the feast of the Epiphany -- I get really annoyed when people don't realize that the song "The Twelve Days of Christmas" actually starts on the 25th of December NOT the 13th) ... but I digress.
On an earlier blog, I got a lot of positive feedback when I posted pieces on the year's centenaries. So I figured I'd try to do something each month. I'm a day late for novelist nad photographer Wright Morris, who would have turned 100 yesterday.
Today marks the 100th birthday of a notorious politician (isn't that an oxymoron? aren't all politicians notorious?). Maybe it's because I've spent the last two years working on a project dealing with the history of the civil rights movement but Orval Faubus' name is not one that I would rank as one of the good guys.
He was the governor of Arkansas in 1957 when Central High School in Little Rock was set to allow African American students to attend, three years after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled against the doctrine of "separate but equal" and paved the way for integration. It was certainly slow in coming, especially in southern states. Governor Faubus called out the state National Guard to prevent nine African American students from attending high school. The situation reached such a critical level that President Eisenhower was forced to send in federal troops to escort the students into the building. In hindsight, Faubus appeared foolish, but his actions won him the support of the people of Arkansas who kept him in office until 1967. He even made the cover of Time. Married three times, divorced twice, Faubus died of prostate cancer on December 14, 1994.
On a far lighter note, next week marks the centenary of funny woman Patsy Kelly who won a Tony Award in 1971 for the revival of "No, No Nannette". Born in Brooklyn as Bridget Sarah Veronica Rose Kelly, she was one of six children of a Irish immigrants. Her father became a New York City policeman and her mother encouraged her to sing and dance. One of her contemporaries in dance class was Ruby Keeler, with whom she would strike up a life-long friendship and with whom she would appear on Broadway in 1971. Kelly's brother Willy was working with comedian Frank Fay but once Fay met Patsy, he chose to work with her. Their working relationship was tempetuous at best -- Fay tended to ad-lib; Kelly preferred to work from a script. The pair was hired to perform their act as part of "Harry Delmar's Revels" in 1927 which marked her Broadway debut. While on tour, Fay made a romantic pass at the tomboyish Kelly who turned him down. Eventually they parted ways -- there are stories that Fay fired her after she refused his advances and then had the temerity to address him as "Frank" rather than "Mr. Fay".
Whatever the case, Kelly bounced back working alongside Will Rogers in "Three Cheers"; William Frawley (who later appeared on "I Love Lucy") in "Earl Caroll's Sketch Book" and later Jack Benny in "Earl Carroll's Vanities" and Al Jolson in "Wonder Bar". During the run of the latter, she was "discovered" by a film scout and began making comedy shorts. She returned to Broadway for the first time as a star in the revue "Flying Colors" in which she appeared with Buddy and Vilma Ebsen, Tamara Geva and Clifton Webb.
When she left Broadway in 1933, it was with a contract with producer Hal Roach. Moving west, Kelly was certain her film career would be a bust. But Roach saw something special in her and teamed her in a series of short films with Thelma Todd. The pair worked magic together and they might have gone on to greater things had Todd not died under mysterious circumstances in 1935.
In the meantime, Kelly was allowed to work in feature films and she earned critical praise for her comedic work in "Going Hollywood". But as with many of today's actresses, the studio was not happy with her weight and the actress struggled with the issue throughout her career. Even more detrimental was that she lived as an open lesbian. By the mid-1940s, her Hollywood career was over.
Kelly returned to the stage, touring in stock production and found work in the nascent television industry. For much of the 1950s, she lived with actress Tallulah Bankhead, sometimes pretending to be her maid as a cover for their romantic relationship. She returned to work in feature films as a housekeeper in "Please Don't Eat the Daisies" (1960) and worked extensively as a guest actor in television. In 1968, she had a supporting role in "Rosemary's Baby" and then came her triumphant return to Broadway with childhood pal Ruby Keeler in "No, No, Nannette". After appearing as Debbie Reynolds' mother in "Irene", Kelly returned to California and appeared in "Freaky Friday" (1976) and was featured in the comedy "The North Avenue Irregulars" (1979).
In 1980, Kelly suffered a stroke and was forced into retirement. In September 1981, she died of pneumonia at the Motion Picture and TV Country Home and was buried in a plot near her parents in New York.
__________________________________________________________________________________
Other notable figures who would have celebrated 100 this January are:
Baseball Hall of Famer James Hanna "Dizzy" Dean (January 16)
Born Free author Joy Adamson (January 20)
(Photo: © Yevonde Portrait Archive)
jazz guitarist Django Reinhardt (January 23)
five time Academy Award winning costume designer Irene Sharaff
and Hogan's Heroes co-star John Banner
Now that the holiday season is officially over (yesterday was Twelfth Night or the feast of the Epiphany -- I get really annoyed when people don't realize that the song "The Twelve Days of Christmas" actually starts on the 25th of December NOT the 13th) ... but I digress.
On an earlier blog, I got a lot of positive feedback when I posted pieces on the year's centenaries. So I figured I'd try to do something each month. I'm a day late for novelist nad photographer Wright Morris, who would have turned 100 yesterday.
Today marks the 100th birthday of a notorious politician (isn't that an oxymoron? aren't all politicians notorious?). Maybe it's because I've spent the last two years working on a project dealing with the history of the civil rights movement but Orval Faubus' name is not one that I would rank as one of the good guys.
On a far lighter note, next week marks the centenary of funny woman Patsy Kelly who won a Tony Award in 1971 for the revival of "No, No Nannette". Born in Brooklyn as Bridget Sarah Veronica Rose Kelly, she was one of six children of a Irish immigrants. Her father became a New York City policeman and her mother encouraged her to sing and dance. One of her contemporaries in dance class was Ruby Keeler, with whom she would strike up a life-long friendship and with whom she would appear on Broadway in 1971. Kelly's brother Willy was working with comedian Frank Fay but once Fay met Patsy, he chose to work with her. Their working relationship was tempetuous at best -- Fay tended to ad-lib; Kelly preferred to work from a script. The pair was hired to perform their act as part of "Harry Delmar's Revels" in 1927 which marked her Broadway debut. While on tour, Fay made a romantic pass at the tomboyish Kelly who turned him down. Eventually they parted ways -- there are stories that Fay fired her after she refused his advances and then had the temerity to address him as "Frank" rather than "Mr. Fay".
Whatever the case, Kelly bounced back working alongside Will Rogers in "Three Cheers"; William Frawley (who later appeared on "I Love Lucy") in "Earl Caroll's Sketch Book" and later Jack Benny in "Earl Carroll's Vanities" and Al Jolson in "Wonder Bar". During the run of the latter, she was "discovered" by a film scout and began making comedy shorts. She returned to Broadway for the first time as a star in the revue "Flying Colors" in which she appeared with Buddy and Vilma Ebsen, Tamara Geva and Clifton Webb.
When she left Broadway in 1933, it was with a contract with producer Hal Roach. Moving west, Kelly was certain her film career would be a bust. But Roach saw something special in her and teamed her in a series of short films with Thelma Todd. The pair worked magic together and they might have gone on to greater things had Todd not died under mysterious circumstances in 1935.
In the meantime, Kelly was allowed to work in feature films and she earned critical praise for her comedic work in "Going Hollywood". But as with many of today's actresses, the studio was not happy with her weight and the actress struggled with the issue throughout her career. Even more detrimental was that she lived as an open lesbian. By the mid-1940s, her Hollywood career was over.
Kelly returned to the stage, touring in stock production and found work in the nascent television industry. For much of the 1950s, she lived with actress Tallulah Bankhead, sometimes pretending to be her maid as a cover for their romantic relationship. She returned to work in feature films as a housekeeper in "Please Don't Eat the Daisies" (1960) and worked extensively as a guest actor in television. In 1968, she had a supporting role in "Rosemary's Baby" and then came her triumphant return to Broadway with childhood pal Ruby Keeler in "No, No, Nannette". After appearing as Debbie Reynolds' mother in "Irene", Kelly returned to California and appeared in "Freaky Friday" (1976) and was featured in the comedy "The North Avenue Irregulars" (1979).
In 1980, Kelly suffered a stroke and was forced into retirement. In September 1981, she died of pneumonia at the Motion Picture and TV Country Home and was buried in a plot near her parents in New York.
__________________________________________________________________________________
Other notable figures who would have celebrated 100 this January are:
Baseball Hall of Famer James Hanna "Dizzy" Dean (January 16)
Born Free author Joy Adamson (January 20)
(Photo: © Yevonde Portrait Archive)
jazz guitarist Django Reinhardt (January 23)
five time Academy Award winning costume designer Irene Sharaff
and Hogan's Heroes co-star John Banner
Thursday, December 31, 2009
December 31: Happy New Year!
I'm refraining from writing a full out movie review because frankly I'm tired and my head is swimming because I did see several movies in the past couple of days. Some were better than others and I'm still formulating my thoughts about some of them.
So instead, I'll just take the time to wish you a Happy New Year! I do hope that in 2010 we can move closer to a world that is peaceful and hopeful. We do need to treasure the days we have -- sometimes we -- well I -- forget that.
Take care all. Party responsibly and please DO NOT DRINK AND DRIVE.
So instead, I'll just take the time to wish you a Happy New Year! I do hope that in 2010 we can move closer to a world that is peaceful and hopeful. We do need to treasure the days we have -- sometimes we -- well I -- forget that.
Take care all. Party responsibly and please DO NOT DRINK AND DRIVE.
Wednesday, December 30, 2009
December 30: Middletown
This one was supposed to be published on December 28 but somehow got lost in the shuffle -- so better late than never.
As I mentioned in a previous blog entry, one of the frustrations of some of the film festivals I used to cover was that there might be several movies screening at the same time that I wanted to see. Middletown was featured at the 2007 Tribeca Film Festival and while I kept seeing intriguing postcard advertisements for the film, I could never make any of the screenings. So when I saw that it was available from Blockbuster, I added it to my queue. Well, I recently got the film and watched it and all I can say is that maybe the spirits were trying to tell me something when I missed the film the first time around.
Middletown is an Irish film written by newcomer Daragh Carville and director by novice filmmaker Brian Kirk making his feature film debut. The director went on to helm episodes of the Showtime series The Tudors, Brotherhood, and Dexter and he enjoyed a bit of praise for the Daniel Radcliff vehicle My Boy Jack which aired over PBS stations.
The movie's plot owes a bit to the Biblical parable of the Prodigal Son. In this case, Gabriel Hunter (Matthew Macfadyen) returns to his hometown situated somewhere near the border in Northern Ireland. Gabriel was the chosen one who went off to study for the ministry and who has returned determined to clean up the town and right what he feels were the mistakes of the priest he is replacing.
That he returns to a place where his father Bill (Gerald McSorley) and his younger brother Jim (Daniel Mays) live is more than a coincidence. Of course, Gabriel doesn't seem to appreciate the sacrifices that these men have made that have allowed him to study and not work a day in his life. (In the opening scene, we seen a teenage Gabriel being told that he has been chosen by God to do God's work -- which should automatically set off warning bells.)
There's conflict between the brothers as well. Jim has always been seen as something of a muck-up and now that he's saddled with a pregnant wife Caroline (Eva Birthistle) who happens to be the daughter of the owner of the local saloon, he still can't seem to make things right. He and the wife live in a caravan on land next to a house that is being built -- but never seems to get anywhere near to completion thanks to Jim's inability to manage money. He'd rather gamble away the few dollars he has than pay the laborers to build a house for his wife and child.
Gabriel blazes into town like an avenging angel and sets about to "fix" things -- denouncing from the pulpit anyone who dares to cross him. First it's Caroline, then it's Jim. Unfortunately Gabriel only sees things in black and white and it soon becomes predictable what will occur. Well, I concocted a few possible scenarios and one of them was exactly how the movie unfolded.
I have to say that I understood what the screenwriter and the director were trying to get at -- the idea that fundamentalism -- or the embrace of any religion a bit too tightly -- can lead to a misreading and misinterpretation of the ideas that a religion espouses. Clearly, there's a very strong germ of an idea there. But in execution, Middletown falls fairly short. The setting is more or less modern day but there seems to be no police presence in the town -- not even a volunteer to enforce law and order. Instead, it is left up to the minister -- in this case Gabriel -- to serve as judge and jury -- and the fact that everyone in the town except Caroline and later Jim embrace his beliefs didn't ring true. I get that the filmmakers were trying for an analogous situation and all, but it just didn't work.
The performers do what they can with their roles, with Birthistle emerging as the most memorable perhaps because she's the only one to really show any gumption. Mays doesn't exactly handle the transition from whipping boy to man with spine very well -- but I think a lot of that is flawed writing. Macfadyen is even more lost, left trying to play an idea. Part of the problem is that the audience never gets a sense of who he was before he left the town or of what happened to him while he was away. He just returns and assumes this stance of vengeance. Since we know so little of him, we hardly care, despite the actor's best efforts.
Middletown ends in a conflagration that alters the lives of several of the key players -- but the audience is left wondering why we bothered. If it hadn't already been used by a much better writer, the title for this could have been Much Ado About Nothing.
Rating: D
As I mentioned in a previous blog entry, one of the frustrations of some of the film festivals I used to cover was that there might be several movies screening at the same time that I wanted to see. Middletown was featured at the 2007 Tribeca Film Festival and while I kept seeing intriguing postcard advertisements for the film, I could never make any of the screenings. So when I saw that it was available from Blockbuster, I added it to my queue. Well, I recently got the film and watched it and all I can say is that maybe the spirits were trying to tell me something when I missed the film the first time around.
Middletown is an Irish film written by newcomer Daragh Carville and director by novice filmmaker Brian Kirk making his feature film debut. The director went on to helm episodes of the Showtime series The Tudors, Brotherhood, and Dexter and he enjoyed a bit of praise for the Daniel Radcliff vehicle My Boy Jack which aired over PBS stations.
The movie's plot owes a bit to the Biblical parable of the Prodigal Son. In this case, Gabriel Hunter (Matthew Macfadyen) returns to his hometown situated somewhere near the border in Northern Ireland. Gabriel was the chosen one who went off to study for the ministry and who has returned determined to clean up the town and right what he feels were the mistakes of the priest he is replacing.
That he returns to a place where his father Bill (Gerald McSorley) and his younger brother Jim (Daniel Mays) live is more than a coincidence. Of course, Gabriel doesn't seem to appreciate the sacrifices that these men have made that have allowed him to study and not work a day in his life. (In the opening scene, we seen a teenage Gabriel being told that he has been chosen by God to do God's work -- which should automatically set off warning bells.)
There's conflict between the brothers as well. Jim has always been seen as something of a muck-up and now that he's saddled with a pregnant wife Caroline (Eva Birthistle) who happens to be the daughter of the owner of the local saloon, he still can't seem to make things right. He and the wife live in a caravan on land next to a house that is being built -- but never seems to get anywhere near to completion thanks to Jim's inability to manage money. He'd rather gamble away the few dollars he has than pay the laborers to build a house for his wife and child.
Gabriel blazes into town like an avenging angel and sets about to "fix" things -- denouncing from the pulpit anyone who dares to cross him. First it's Caroline, then it's Jim. Unfortunately Gabriel only sees things in black and white and it soon becomes predictable what will occur. Well, I concocted a few possible scenarios and one of them was exactly how the movie unfolded.
I have to say that I understood what the screenwriter and the director were trying to get at -- the idea that fundamentalism -- or the embrace of any religion a bit too tightly -- can lead to a misreading and misinterpretation of the ideas that a religion espouses. Clearly, there's a very strong germ of an idea there. But in execution, Middletown falls fairly short. The setting is more or less modern day but there seems to be no police presence in the town -- not even a volunteer to enforce law and order. Instead, it is left up to the minister -- in this case Gabriel -- to serve as judge and jury -- and the fact that everyone in the town except Caroline and later Jim embrace his beliefs didn't ring true. I get that the filmmakers were trying for an analogous situation and all, but it just didn't work.
The performers do what they can with their roles, with Birthistle emerging as the most memorable perhaps because she's the only one to really show any gumption. Mays doesn't exactly handle the transition from whipping boy to man with spine very well -- but I think a lot of that is flawed writing. Macfadyen is even more lost, left trying to play an idea. Part of the problem is that the audience never gets a sense of who he was before he left the town or of what happened to him while he was away. He just returns and assumes this stance of vengeance. Since we know so little of him, we hardly care, despite the actor's best efforts.
Middletown ends in a conflagration that alters the lives of several of the key players -- but the audience is left wondering why we bothered. If it hadn't already been used by a much better writer, the title for this could have been Much Ado About Nothing.
Rating: D
December 30: Julie & Julia
Anyway, the film received a lot of attention because Meryl Streep was playing Julia Child. Now Ms. Streep is arguably one of American cinema's greatest actresses but I do have the feeling that sometimes she gets a pass when she shouldn't. I mean Music from the Heart was an okay movie but hardly Oscar worthy and yet she picked up one of her innumerable nominations for that picture. Undoubtedly she's headed to add yet another one for this movie but throughout I had the distinct feeling I was watching her do an impersonation as opposed to giving a performance. It didn't help that Ephron included Dan Ackroyd's famous sketch from Saturday Night Live. There was something a bit off about that moment and for me it marred Streep's work.
(Yes I know she's getting awards for this but I cannot fathom it -- the performance isn't one of her best. At this point I think she gets a prize as long as she shows up and tries out a new accent.)
Ephron seems to have more of a flair for Child's life with her husband Paul (a fine Stanley Tucci). Those scenes have more life to them (which I think is where the critics go blind thinking that it is all Meryl Streep and not noticing that she's supported strongly by Linda Emond, Joan Juliet Buck, Tucci, Jane Lynch, and Helen Carey).
I was a bit disappointed by this movie, especially since this was supposed to be about food. Ephron would have done well to examine Tucci's movie Big Night for pointers. I left that one craving Italian food. After watching Julie & Julia, I wasn't in the least hungry.
Rating: C
December 29: Ragtime
I had hoped to get to New York City in January to see the revival of the stage musical Ragtime. Back in 1998 when the show first opened at the new Ford Center for the Performing Arts on 42nd Street (the Hilton Theater since 2005), I sat transfixed watching the opening number. Frankly, it brought tears to my eyes and gave me goosebumps. It's probably one of the most perfect opening numbers for a musical I've ever seen in my long years of theatergoing. (The Tony Award telecast that features an abbreviated but no less thrilling version of the number can be viewed here -- and for fans of Glee, see if you can spot Lea Michele in an early stage role.). The rest of the show left me with mixed feelings -- I felt the direction was somewhat lacking -- more of a staging of a pageant or an opera rather than a musical. The performances were mostly topnotch and several were memorable -- Brian Stokes Mitchell, Audra McDonald, Marin Mazzie, Judy Kaye, etc.
So when I read about this new production that started at the Kennedy Center I was intrigued and then when I heard it was transferring to Broadway -- I really had hoped to catch it. My work schedule for the fall, though did not allow me the luxury of travel time and now that the show is closing on January 3rd, well .... I guess I'll have to wait and see if someone somewhere produces another version of the show before I kick the bucket. Or I'll just have to be content with my memories of the show.
As the next best thing, I rented the DVD of the 1981 Milos Forman-directed film from Blockbuster as a sort of consolation prize. This was Forman's follow up to Hair and he reteamed with screenwriter Michael Weller on the project. Having read E.L. Doctorow's novel, I was a bit surprised that someone decided to condense the project into a 2-1/2 movie instead of turning it into a prestigious television miniseries. The book was so dense and contained so many historical figures who interact with the fictional characters that Doctorow had created it cried out for a longform treatment. Nevertheless, Forman and Weller perservered and crafted a flawed but engrossing movie. What makes it so much fun to watch now in hindsight is to spot several actors whose careers were in their nascent stages -- blink and you might miss Fran Drescher (The Nanny) or John Ratzinberger (Cheers) or Frankie Faison or Jeff Daniels or Samuel L. Jackson or Michael Jeter. There's supporting work from Robert Joy (as Harry K. Thaw) and Moses Gunn (as Booker T. Washington) and in a DVD extra Mariclare Costello as Emma Goldman (although it's easy to see why that scene was cut).
The main family doesn't even have conventional names; they are known simply as Mother (Mary Steenburgen fresh off her Oscar win for Melvin and Howard), Father (James Olson) and Younger Brother (Brad Dourif). They are an upper middle-class family who has settled in the wilds of New Rochelle in the early 1900s. At the time, mixing with immigrants and African Americans just wasn't done. So when a black baby turns up on their property and Mother pushes to take in the child and its mother Sarah (Debbie Allen strinking a wrong note by channeling Butterfly McQueen), the times are a-changin'. Younger Brother develops a crush on Evelyn Nesbit (a fetching Elizabeth McGovern), the chorus girl at the center of a scandal due to her relationship with Stanford White (Norman Mailer sounding a great deal like Tommy Lee Jones) and her husband Harry K. Thaw (the aforementioned Robert Joy). The pragmatic and mercenary Evelyn sort of romances and then drops Younger Brother -- partly leading him to channel his anger and throw his lot in with Coalhouse Walker, Jr. (Howard Rollins, Jr.).
Coalhouse is an educated African American -- what some of the prejudiced characters term "uppity" -- who makes his living as a piano player. He's also the father of Sarah's baby -- the one she left on the grounds of the family's home. He drives to New Rochelle in his new Model T to woo her and eventually she agrees to marry him. On his way home from one of his weekly visits, he gets stopped by racist firemen led by Willie Conklin (Kenneth McMillan) who can't comprehend a black man being able to own a car like that. They foul it up and he complains to the police (Jeff Daniels) which leads to Walker's arrest and his quest for justice.
All he wants is restitution for the damage done to his car. Sarah intervenes and pays a terrible price for it which only spurs Coalhouse's determination and fuels his righteous anger.
There's also a subplot about a Jewish immigrant called Tateh (Mandy Patinkin), a man with a young daughter to flees the Lower East Side to reinvent himself as a movie director known as the Baron Ashkenazy. While he later directs Evelyn in a movie, he is strangely drawn to Mother who begins to return the favors.
Also in the mix is the police commissioner (James Cagney in his last screen role) who oversees the last third of the film when Coalhouse and his band take over the Morgan Library. Here is where the movie becomes a bit of a curiosity and may be why the audience for the musical was a bit reluctant to see the show. One might argue that Coalhouse Walker embraces what became known as the Black Power movement in the 1960s. He certainly doesn't embrace Martin Luther King Jr.'s nonviolent approach. Walker is pushed to the limits and the refusal by those in power in the Caucasian circle (he seeks the proper channels to file a complaint only to be given the bureaucratic runaround) as well as a rejection by his own people -- a black lawyer (Ted Ross) refuses to take his case and Booker T. Washington denounces him. When Walker resorts to violence, it is an outlet for the frustrations he has experienced -- and in Doctorow's novel it seems inevitable. In both the movie and the stage play, it becomes something of a choice. Judging him by today's standards -- he might be considered a home-grown terrorist -- and that may be something audiences don't want to see. The world has changed so much since 1981 when the film was released and 1998 when the musical opened.
The film's production values are suberb as one come to expect from Forman and his collaborators. (Special mention goes to Randy Newman's exquisite musical score.) In the general cannon of Forman movies, Ragtime falls between his two Oscar winners. It aspires to greatness but sadly falls a bit short. Weller's script tries to condense too much and some of the storylines are dropped or not followed through enough. I'm sure someone could write a thesis on the way Weller approached adapting the novel and contrasts that with Terrence McNally's approach for the book of the musical. McNally's version streamlines in a different manner and builds up aspects that Weller doesn't. (For instance, the relationship between Tateh and Mother in the musical becomes more organic -- and the intersection of the three stories is so beautifully laid out in the choreography of the opening number.) The stage show sends Father off on travels whereas the movie focuses on him (and James Olson does yeoman work -- I think he was terribly underrated when the movie first opened).
Anyway -- they are definitely two different animals. Arguably both only partially succeed (although I love the stage score by Stephen Flaherty and Lynn Ahrens).
Rating of the film: B+
So when I read about this new production that started at the Kennedy Center I was intrigued and then when I heard it was transferring to Broadway -- I really had hoped to catch it. My work schedule for the fall, though did not allow me the luxury of travel time and now that the show is closing on January 3rd, well .... I guess I'll have to wait and see if someone somewhere produces another version of the show before I kick the bucket. Or I'll just have to be content with my memories of the show.
As the next best thing, I rented the DVD of the 1981 Milos Forman-directed film from Blockbuster as a sort of consolation prize. This was Forman's follow up to Hair and he reteamed with screenwriter Michael Weller on the project. Having read E.L. Doctorow's novel, I was a bit surprised that someone decided to condense the project into a 2-1/2 movie instead of turning it into a prestigious television miniseries. The book was so dense and contained so many historical figures who interact with the fictional characters that Doctorow had created it cried out for a longform treatment. Nevertheless, Forman and Weller perservered and crafted a flawed but engrossing movie. What makes it so much fun to watch now in hindsight is to spot several actors whose careers were in their nascent stages -- blink and you might miss Fran Drescher (The Nanny) or John Ratzinberger (Cheers) or Frankie Faison or Jeff Daniels or Samuel L. Jackson or Michael Jeter. There's supporting work from Robert Joy (as Harry K. Thaw) and Moses Gunn (as Booker T. Washington) and in a DVD extra Mariclare Costello as Emma Goldman (although it's easy to see why that scene was cut).
The main family doesn't even have conventional names; they are known simply as Mother (Mary Steenburgen fresh off her Oscar win for Melvin and Howard), Father (James Olson) and Younger Brother (Brad Dourif). They are an upper middle-class family who has settled in the wilds of New Rochelle in the early 1900s. At the time, mixing with immigrants and African Americans just wasn't done. So when a black baby turns up on their property and Mother pushes to take in the child and its mother Sarah (Debbie Allen strinking a wrong note by channeling Butterfly McQueen), the times are a-changin'. Younger Brother develops a crush on Evelyn Nesbit (a fetching Elizabeth McGovern), the chorus girl at the center of a scandal due to her relationship with Stanford White (Norman Mailer sounding a great deal like Tommy Lee Jones) and her husband Harry K. Thaw (the aforementioned Robert Joy). The pragmatic and mercenary Evelyn sort of romances and then drops Younger Brother -- partly leading him to channel his anger and throw his lot in with Coalhouse Walker, Jr. (Howard Rollins, Jr.).
Coalhouse is an educated African American -- what some of the prejudiced characters term "uppity" -- who makes his living as a piano player. He's also the father of Sarah's baby -- the one she left on the grounds of the family's home. He drives to New Rochelle in his new Model T to woo her and eventually she agrees to marry him. On his way home from one of his weekly visits, he gets stopped by racist firemen led by Willie Conklin (Kenneth McMillan) who can't comprehend a black man being able to own a car like that. They foul it up and he complains to the police (Jeff Daniels) which leads to Walker's arrest and his quest for justice.
All he wants is restitution for the damage done to his car. Sarah intervenes and pays a terrible price for it which only spurs Coalhouse's determination and fuels his righteous anger.
There's also a subplot about a Jewish immigrant called Tateh (Mandy Patinkin), a man with a young daughter to flees the Lower East Side to reinvent himself as a movie director known as the Baron Ashkenazy. While he later directs Evelyn in a movie, he is strangely drawn to Mother who begins to return the favors.
Also in the mix is the police commissioner (James Cagney in his last screen role) who oversees the last third of the film when Coalhouse and his band take over the Morgan Library. Here is where the movie becomes a bit of a curiosity and may be why the audience for the musical was a bit reluctant to see the show. One might argue that Coalhouse Walker embraces what became known as the Black Power movement in the 1960s. He certainly doesn't embrace Martin Luther King Jr.'s nonviolent approach. Walker is pushed to the limits and the refusal by those in power in the Caucasian circle (he seeks the proper channels to file a complaint only to be given the bureaucratic runaround) as well as a rejection by his own people -- a black lawyer (Ted Ross) refuses to take his case and Booker T. Washington denounces him. When Walker resorts to violence, it is an outlet for the frustrations he has experienced -- and in Doctorow's novel it seems inevitable. In both the movie and the stage play, it becomes something of a choice. Judging him by today's standards -- he might be considered a home-grown terrorist -- and that may be something audiences don't want to see. The world has changed so much since 1981 when the film was released and 1998 when the musical opened.
The film's production values are suberb as one come to expect from Forman and his collaborators. (Special mention goes to Randy Newman's exquisite musical score.) In the general cannon of Forman movies, Ragtime falls between his two Oscar winners. It aspires to greatness but sadly falls a bit short. Weller's script tries to condense too much and some of the storylines are dropped or not followed through enough. I'm sure someone could write a thesis on the way Weller approached adapting the novel and contrasts that with Terrence McNally's approach for the book of the musical. McNally's version streamlines in a different manner and builds up aspects that Weller doesn't. (For instance, the relationship between Tateh and Mother in the musical becomes more organic -- and the intersection of the three stories is so beautifully laid out in the choreography of the opening number.) The stage show sends Father off on travels whereas the movie focuses on him (and James Olson does yeoman work -- I think he was terribly underrated when the movie first opened).
Anyway -- they are definitely two different animals. Arguably both only partially succeed (although I love the stage score by Stephen Flaherty and Lynn Ahrens).
Rating of the film: B+
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