The Fine Young Cannibal

Somewhere in the throne room of the Beautiful Loser Hall of fame there sits a double-sided bust of one Chet Baker, with whatever trumpet he had in his possession at the time of his death in 1988 lying nearby. The bust is finely etched, one side the profile of a farm fed Okie kid with alabaster features and the look of a dreamy angel, aglow with a future sparkling with promises, the other side craggy, dissolute and ravaged--a dope fiend’s visage, collapsed and pummeled by time. Bruce Weber’s Baker documentary Let’s Get Lost was initially released in 1988 to a heady mix of consternation and disinterest. Photographed in luminescent black and white, the movie goes for the obvious in one way-juxtaposing the simple visual contrast of the early china doll-meets-boxer Baker look with the then ancient 57-year-old wastrel, yet it pulls the rug out by refusing to do the straight docu route, being short on performance footage and factual narration, spending an inordinate amount time following the nearly comatose Baker around Santa Monica in the company of unconnected hepcats like Flea, Lisa Marie, and Chris Issak. Newly reissued, the movie is something of a minor revelation. It now seems apparent that Weber’s intention all along, in lieu of piecing together a flesh and blood tale (a virtually impossible task with the vampiric, contradictory, ever drifting Baker), Let’s Get Lost (click on link)is an extended riff, a blast of cinematic impressionism, a deconstructed look at the dirty dreams of showbiz. As one of Baker’s jazz cats later commented in author James Gavin’s excellent Deep In a Dream: The Long Night of Chet Baker, the movie is perfect because Chet’s lying about everybody and everybody’s lying about Chet, epitomizing his work and life in a movie-nutshell. If you can catch this in a theater during its limited re-release, do it up.

Turning Japanese

Clint Eastwood’s Letters from Iwo Jima (Warners, $34.98), the companion piece to his well-made, thoughtful, but not wholly successful Flags of Our Fathers, is easily the best picture of the duo, a quietly stirring and unobtrusively evocative filmic retelling of the Japanese side of 1945 Iwo Jima battle. It obviously wasn’t box office boffo, although the simple accomplishment of making a sub-titled, Japanese soldier point-of-view without one central white-faced figure would have been nearly impossible in the Hollywood of the past, even during Eastwood top-of-the-world-ma- heyday in the late 60’s--early 70’s. Clint the filmmaker brings his usual plethora of John Ford-meets-Don Siegel-meets-Sergio Leone cinematic mechanics to the fore, and the film (magnificently shot by cinematographer Tom Stern) is all grays, flying dirt, and misty vistas seen through a grunts-eye-view with only the slightest of omniscient shots to set the tale in motion. The violence is of the non-operatic variety, quick, lethal, and casually brutal, and the movie’s mission to lay out the opposing philosophies of the ground soldiers of two sides amidst their shared fear of imminent death is done without trotting out the message board. Letters from Iwo Jima is a first-rate examination of war and warfare and one of Eastwood the Auteur’s finest technical and thematic efforts.

Notes From the Noir Underground

Despite the fact that most of my readers (like me) are old, older, and way past prime time, it might make most of yer shrinking, soured, and barely beating curmudgeon hearts thump a little bit stronger if you knew that there are indeed young and fervent fellow pop culture vultures out there. After being blown away by a home screening of Howard Hawk’s prototypical Chandler/Bogie 1946 noir, The Big Sleep, a young, married vulture couple had the smarts to ask me to direct them further into the noir world, by (yee-hah) making a list for their enthusiastic perusal. They asked, I complied:

Glad to see you are pursuing your cinema studies with such verve and attention to detail, kiddies. The noir world is far too large, unwieldy and indefinable for me to go quickly there without going to great lengths, so I stuck strictly (purty much) to private eye stuff, ala The Big Sleep, with a few offerings thrown in that are close enough to sneak by. By the way, this was indeed a labor of love; cuz there is nothing I like more than a good list. (And a good trailer!)

Professor Scotty D

The Maltese Falcon (1941)-The definitive hard-boiled with Bogie as a Sam Spade that’ll never be beat, written and directed by John Huston from a Dashiell Hammet classic, and peopled with a first class supporting cast.

The Glass Key (1942)- Another solid Hammet adaptation, not exactly a private dick tale, with Alan Ladd as our tough guy hero and Veronica Lake as the romantic interest, William Bendix as a weirdly homoerotic baddie, exquisite running time of 86 minutes, and a catchphrase for the ages: “Gimme the roscoe.”

This Gun For Hire (1942)-Ladd and Lake again, perfect running time of 80 minutes, adapted from a Graham Greene book, the political crap has aged badly, but Ladd’s angelic looking toughie makes a hell of an impression from the infamous opening sequence throughout.

Murder My Sweet (1944)- Dick Powell is Philip Marlowe in this adaptation of Raymond Chandler’s Farewell My Lovely in this wonderfully stylized and acutely cynical Edward Dmytryk version, with Powell as Marlowe doing the voice over narrator thang about as good as it gets.

Laura (1944)-Otto Preminger’s beautifully sensual tone poem, a gliding, probing dream of a film, with a very off kilter central performance from Dana Andrews as a hard guy obsessed with a dead gal, the emblematic presence of Gene Tierney, the infamous title song by Johnny Mercer and David Raskin, one of the greatest character names evuh in Waldo Lydecker, and a pallid “happy ending” that in no way removes the heavy shadows of complicity the film traffics in.

The Blue Dahlia (1946)- From an original screenplay by Raymond Chandler, a sour, dissolute black tale of post war noir blues, filled with blackmail, amnesia, and corruption, featuring Ladd and Lake again, with another great bit from William Bendix.

Lady in the Lake (1947)- Another Chandler book brought to the screen with Robert Montgomery directing Robert Montgomery as Marlowe, and, in a totally bold experiment for it’s time, the movie is mostly photographed from Montgomery/Marlowe’s subjective point of view, while screenwriter Steve Fisher retains huge chunks of Chandler’s marvelously pithy and archetypal dialogue.

The Lady From Shanghai (1948)-A huge personal favorite of mine, I’ve watched it countless times and continually marveled at writer/director/star Orson Welles’s sheer filmmaking ingenuity and audaciousness. Adapted from a mediocre novel, Welles makes this low budget bit of noir into a true cult classic, with Welles’s then-wife Rita Hayworth as one of the most memorable cinematic femme fatales of all time. Welles truly utilizes his prodigious skills to elevate his version of noir into something quite complex and dreamlike. The Lady From Shanghai (click on link)is more baroque than most noir films, and it’s shifting juxtapositions of locale, character, and imagery, makes this a stunningly elliptical movie; an 86 minute ticking time bomb of fate.

Kiss Me Deadly (1955)- Robert Aldrich kicks this 50’s noir into overdrive in his brutally streamlined version of a Mickey Spillane Mike Hammer book, with deadpan hunk-of-beef Ralph Meeker as the ultimate Hammer, a callous and sadistic not-so-white knight. A hipster favorite for many reasons, including a picture perfect supporting cast, an outré literary subplot/clue, the private-eye-meets-cold-war search for “the great whatsit”, and Aldrich’s richly textured but ultimately simplistic narrative-driven direction. Ten thumbs up.

Alphaville (1965)-Strange, mutant mix of sci-fi and noir, one of Jean Luc Godard’s most successful attempts at self-conscious art, with tough potato Eddie Constatine a sorta secret agent/private dick of the future. An absolute visual stunner, and also a movie almost impossible to get out of one’s mind after viewing.

Marlowe (1969)-A somewhat pedestrian, but earnest, update of Raymond Chandler’s The Little Sister with a solid James Garner as a slightly anachronistic Marlowe awash in the chaos of the 60’s. Bruce Lee puts in an unforgettable cameo.

The Long Goodbye (1973)-Yet another long time fave of mine, with Elliot Gould as Phillip Marlowe, in Robert Altman’s sublime attempt to subvert the noir genre the way he did up the western in 1971’s McCabe and Mrs. Miller. Despite the fact that Gould is as deadpan and cynical as any big screen Marlowe, he is also a truly wounded and lost man, one who silently believes in a seemingly discarded chivalrous code yet keeps muttering to the non-listeners around him and to himself “It’s O.K. with me.” Like the traditional private eyes, he solves the mysteries, but winds up with no victory other than the hollow sense that’s he’s done the right thing in an uncaring void, a theme equally vividly displayed in 70’s companion pieces Chinatown and Night Moves. Altman’s casting of the one and only Sterling Hayden as drunken novelist Roger Wade is only one of his delicious supporting choices, alongside Nina van Pallandt, Henry Gibson, director Mark Rydell and baseball rebel Jim Bouton.

Night Moves (1975)-Gene Hackman is Harry Mosby, small-time private detective with a nose for the truth and doing the right thing in Arthur Penn’s sadly overlooked contemporary noir, impeccably scripted by Alan Sharp (The Hired Hand, Ulzana’s Raid), as a mediation on middle-age, post-Camelot America, and the gut wrenching irony that knowledge no longer equals power. The film finished off with one of the most superb and subtle final shots in movie history, a pronouncement I wouldn’t toss around lightly.

Chinatown (1975)- No need to oversell this potent mix of Hollywood magic and artistic vision, combining the one-of-a-kind elements of Robert Towne’s transcendent screenplay, Roman Polanski’s razor sharp direction, and two all-time turns from Jack Nicholson and Faye Dunaway. If you haven’t seen this you musta been comatose.

Farewell My Lovely (1975)- Throwback Chandler film, with aging Robert Mitchum as a sad-eyed, world-weary Marlowe. Mitchum’s smoky voice sounds resplendent doing the voice-over, the production values on display are superb, and despite Dick Richards predictable direction that movie scores some extra points as an affectionate tribute to L.A., Chandler and noir.

Harper (1966)/The Drowning Pool (1975)-Two outings with Paul Newman as Ross Macdonald’s Lew Harper don’t really qualify as noir, but both are well cast, above average private detective entries, with Newman solidly filling the shoes of a window-peeping dick, and both manage to exhibit nice auras of curdled morality and back door blues.

The Late Show (1976)-Quirky, semi-comic tribute to Hammet and Chandler, ably written and directed by Robert Benton and boasting the most unusual detective team-up of all, Art Carney as an over-the-hill gumshoe and Lily Tomlin as his reluctant new-agey partner.

Realityapalooza

Just look at the pile of pure low brow excrement planned for the summer television schedule--Fast Cars & Superstars (ABC), Bridezillas (WE), Who Wants To be a Superhero? (Sci-Fi), Rock of Love with Brett Michaels (VH1), America’s Got Talent (NBC) and my true blue fave Hey, Paula (Bravo), which has the reality cameras following around that multi-talented scion of charisma Paula Abdul. (And that’s just dragging one plastic gloved finger through the surface of crapola.) Well, let me pitch the following:

Burrowing Into Bob Barkers Bowels-We follow the octogenarian around from bowel movement to bowel movement, with the ever charming Bob both narrating and analyzing for our pleasure, and some bonus comic relief from Bob’s home staff, including Ch-Chi, his 22-year-old Brazilian maid, Arable, his 23-year-old Dominican gardener, and Bona, his 24-year-old Columbian personal trainer.

Going Postal-A nationwide search gathers together as many US postal workers who have recently been laid-off, fired, checked into drug or alcohol rehab, suffered work-ending injuries, or have taken leaves of absences due to on-the-job stress, and comedian Joe Rogan and retired Major General Paul Eaton (former head of Iraqi training mission) put them through their paces in order to determine the best and most qualified to go postal at their former work place.

The Wide, Wide World of Dog Crap and Cat Vomit—Regular people from all over the country, from Glendale, CA to Baton Rogue, La., send in home made videos highlighting the wide variety and forms of dog waste and cat upchuck.

Cribbage Wars---Behind-the-scenes look at the rough and tumble world of competitive cribbage, peopled with unforgettable real life characters like Dotty the Baker’s Wife, Slim Jimmy Wolinski, and Matt “the Knife” Stewart.

Mowing It! —Deeply insightful, wonderfully panoramic look at the wide array of lawn care products, tools, and lawn mowers of every shape and size, hosted by the wry Richard Karn, formerly of the fondly remembered hit Home Improvement.

So You Think You Can Massage—Documentary crews hit the back alleys and out-of-the-way store fronts in crusty, busty run-down New England cities, searching for the one undocumented masseuse who can provide host Mario Lopez an empyrean happy ending, all for a $2,450.00 sweepstake price and an accompanying green card.

Middle Age Crazy

Judd Apatow, the producer-writer-director- comedy guru, may not exactly be mining spanking new comedic territory in his two directorial efforts, the mega-hit The 40-Year-Old Virgin, and his newest box office winner, Knocked Up, although he is at least putting a legitimately funny spin on the nature and nurture of the American male, sui generis. Coming home from an event the other a day, in a van full of 30 and 40-something males I listened with piqued interest to a brief off-the-cuff discussion of the new movie: “Anybody see Knocked Up?” “Is that by the same people who made The 40-Year Old Virgin?” “I think so, but it’s even funnier.” “Without that goofy bastard, Carell?” “Yeah, it’s kinda serious, and kinda touching, but it’s got a ton of sophomoric shit, and I need that.” “Sounds perfect.” Apatow skims the surface of the contempo middle class white male’s trials, tribulations and transgressions without ever digging in deep enough to provoke, although his genuinely laugh-inducing dialogue, constant side dishes of pop culture references, decently sharp comic situations, and frequent stops at the outhouse door, make his movies purty pleasurable. Perhaps one day, he’ll have the urge to take it up a notch, and go beyond his farcical tweaking into unique cinematic territory, but for now we can watch his stuff and enjoy a well-earned batch of solid (not sublime) laffs.

Notes Father's day.

From old pallie, co-founder (with me,of course) of the Ellen Barkin Worship Club, and longtime Culture Vulture-Beatnik Division, j. celenza.


My old man is now in his mid 80s having outlived the bulk of his people.

Of his fifteen brothers and sisters only three left.

His wife dead, the men he served with in the Pacific dead,

All those he worked for and with in the great post war building boom in

NYC have departed.



He saved his younger brother Tommy from being shot because of

inadvisable gambling debts.

He helped build the NY School for the Performing Arts and Lincoln Center

And worked for Donald Trump’s father (Fred)who build thousands of

garden apartments throughout the New York metro area.

It was only when I worked on some jobs with him in Brooklyn’s

Bed Sty and east NY

and on the inlet of workers paradise,

Coney Island I saw how well respected he was

And how unbelievable hard it was to work like that…

And what money meant to people who work to earn it.





ANd The cigar soaked concrete workers, the lathers who looked like brown tree

trunks with arms, sullen laborers, the electricians (prima donnas)

and the hoisting engineers, his fellow brickees,

guys with names like Jimmy Hooks and Rudi the Kraut,

Willie the mule driver, Frankie three eye

Monte three card, Mickey the Mook,

scaffold men with arms like steel girders,

and the union stewards

the little fierce paper-thin Jewish bookkeeper who floated like a kite when

there was a gust of wind,

who came to us from Treblinka…

All, they all called him uncle



He lives now in a retirement village in Florida

As one of the few men in the complex is very popular...and a big flirt



He is deaf and a little bit addled when I tell him anything.

Anything at all he invariably replies:

I went to the pool today and we went to eat at Angelo’s

and I had the tripe and I had a glass of wine

That’s a nice day.



He engaged in violence to his children and his wife.

The paradox of tracing that back to its roots is that it becomes less paradoxical

You can always find the reasons.

He was an unbelievable successful gardener: fig trees and cherry trees and

eggplant and tomatoes and herbs …



But the story I want is when

There was going to be a major anti war demo and these people in

Sunglasses came onto

the job site basically mob guys

and said we giving everybody the day off

But you got go up to Central park and beat those fucking fag snot bag

Commie Hippes we got some bags of bats and tire irons and wrenches…

You with me boys?

And are we being paid?

Yeah yeah full days pay

Okay USA USA

Once the sunglassed people left

Everybody put their tools away

Waited waited waited

And then everybody to a man

went to the nearest bar (it was an IRA-Westie bar

in Hells kitchen) spent the whole day signing Irish Polish Yiddish Italian

Spanish songs and getting sublimely shitfaced…



I am not a big believer in the greatest generation stuff

Except that almost all the generations after—the one after

and mine and the one after that: Clueless, pampered, self absorbed

Tedious whiners…

And boring…

And none would take the money from the wise guys and say fuck em and

and go to an Irish bar ….

Pardners

No comedy duo ever made me laff it up like Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis. As a youngster glued to the TV in the sixties I had plenty of chances to watch their movie output (which in actuality only consisted of 15 movies from 1949-1956), as all of it was regularly televised. The new collection, The Dean Martin & Jerry Lewis Collection, Vol. 2 (Paramount Home Entertainment, $30), is made up of their last five films together (without 1954’s 3 Ring Circus), Living It Up(’54), You’re Never Too Young (’55), Artists and Models (’55), Pardners (’56) and Hollywood or Bust (’56), all in wondrous Technicolor. As I kid I was all about the wackado Jerry, as an adult all about the deadpan Dean, but buried in the midst of godawful plotting, and a bunch of vaudeville spritzing are expanded moments of true comic chemistry, a yin and yang alchemy that can dropkick you in the gut, despite the fact Martin/Lewis bond was seriously fracturing in real life. As a kid I adored Pardners, a truly dopey comedy western and Hollywood or Bust, a broad Frank Tashlin (ex-Warner animator) directed Hollywood satire, but adulthood reveals the real treasures lie in Living It Up,(click on link) wherein the duo is undeniably operating on all cylinders, You’re Never Too Young, which allows Dean, with his infamous asides and hilarious reaction shots, to put the movie in his pocket, and Artists and Models, a bountiful bit of fifties escapism peppered with director Tashlin’s surreal bits and an almost refined burst of Martin/Lewis energy, plus it’s an astoundingly good looking film in general, with both production values and directorial acumen far above the typical Martin/Lewis fare.