Ink Lake

And Here Come The Velociraptors

In Jurassic Park, Jeff Goldblum plays some kind of scientist, and he cites “chaos theory” in some bull-shitty explanation as to why the dinosaurs were eating everybody.

At the time the movie was made, it was a buzz-phrase, but chaos theory has nothing to with anything in that movie. What perhaps was illustrated, is that in a sufficiently complex system, it’s impossible to anticipate all possible outcomes. I think a corolarry to that, is that you can call yourself lucky if most of the outcomes are neutral, because almost anything but that, is bad.

I mention this, because I read in the Times, about how all sorts of bad shit is happening as a result of the completion of the Three Gorges Dam in China. How could anyone think you can build the world’s largest hydro-electric dam, displace 1.4 million people, and think everything’s going to just “work out”? Now lakes are drying up, stuff is dying, etc. An official is quoted as saying,

“We failed to think of all the impacts that the dam might bring about when designing the dam…”

You think? To quote Mickey Rourke’s character in Body Heat,

“…any time you try a decent crime, you got fifty ways you can fuck up. If you think of twenty-five of them, then you’re a genius... and you ain’t no genius.”

 

Local News

A strange thing about all the Anthony Weiner mishigas, is seeing so much of Forest Hills in the news.

Here the press follows Weiner outside of “The Natural”, a big Korean green-grocery. Those with a keen eye might notice it’s in the title sequence of The King of Queens. 

For those with an extraordinarily keen eye, an apartment building in the background is where Peter Parker first climbs a wall in Spider-Man. It was the only scene actually filmed in Forest Hills (Peter Parker’s home).

Mr. Demme's Wild Ride

A year ago, I wrote about the Jonathan Demme film, Something Wild, and how I felt it was under-appreciated. Well, I’m glad to see that some people felt the same way, as a Criterion Blu-Ray edition has just come out.

I wrote how the film seemed to fall through the cracks, because it’s hard to categorize. I wouldn’t know what shelf in the video store to put it in. The movie takes an emotional turn, unlike pretty much any I’ve ever seen, and Demme takes the audience right along. The Times has an article about the film and the its re-release. Marc Spitz writes,

Part romance, part road movie, part blood-spattered psychodrama, the film — starring Melanie Griffith as Lulu, a New York City wild child, and Jeff Daniels as Charles, her yuppie lover — was a tricky sell at the time. “It’s a schizophrenic movie,” Mr. Demme said in an interview. “A screwball comedy that turns into a film noir, as life itself does.”

John Waters, (a friend of Demme’s, and who has a cameo in the film), is quoted in the article, saying, “the mood changes like I don’t think any other movie since Psycho.”

That shift happens with the arrival of “Ray”, Lulu’s ex, played by Ray Liotta, in his motion-picture debut. The article describes what Demme was looking for when casting the character,

“I saw every young actor who was the right age and quote-unquote type,” Mr. Demme said. “They would do scenes, and I would think: ‘That’s good, but I’m not scared. I have to be scared.’ When Ray came in, just sitting in the conference room reading his lines, I was afraid of him. So I thought if I can be afraid of him sitting in the conference room, the audience will be terrified.”

I agree, and here (with the Feelies, as the high-school reunion band), is Ray’s introduction. Notice the blocking…you don’t see his face until the last instant.

 

A Blu-Ray Full Of Arsenic

 

Just picked up the newly released Blu-Ray of one of my very favorite films, Sweet Smell of Success.

Not only does the print look amazing, but the disc includes the original trailer, commentary by film scholar James Naremore, a documentary about the director, Alexander Mackendrick and one about the cinematographer, James Wong Howe. There’s also an  interview with Neal Gabler, who wrote a great biography of Walter Winchell, on whom the character of JJ Hunsecker is based.

“Match me, Sidney.”

C Train Bouillabaisse

This morning on the C train, I ran into a bunch of French tourists on a chasse au trésor (scavenger hunt).

They were looking for someone who could write down the words to the national anthem — pas de problème, Christine! Then they asked me to teach them how to sing it (not easy in about 8 minutes on a subway train, but I tried). The last thing I had to do, was to spell “anticonstitutionelle”. C’est jeu d’enfant!

In return, I asked them to sing their national anthem, La Marseillaise. Like the Star-Spangled Banner, it’s a war song, and parts are pretty gory. They wanted me to sing along, but I only knew the “money” verse; you know, the one where Ingrid Bergman gives a big ‘gulp’, gazing at Paul Henreid in Casablanca.

Aux armes, citoyens,	To arms, citizens,
Formez vos bataillons,	Form your battalions,
Marchons, marchons!	March, march!
Qu’un sang impur abreuve nos sillons	Let impure blood water our furrows

 By the way, Conard Veidt, (General Strasser), was in fact virulently anti-Hitler, and left Germany (where he was its highest-paid film star) with his Jewish wife, when the Nazis came to power in 1933. Veidt became a citizen of the UK and helped his friend Henreid, who was Austrian, avoid deportation from England at the outset of the war.

 

Semi-unrelated note: I find interesting in this scene, one of the most emotionally-charged of the film, is director Michael Curtiz's decision to add a close-up of Ilsa showing an almost mawkish admiration for her husband.

You can see in the long take, Bergman gives a much more realistic, and touching reaction.. the realization that the man she loves has to do what he does, even if it will get him killed.

Casablanca is still perfect, but without that gratuitous shot, it would have been a little more perfect.

Two Thumbs Up

Saw The Filth And The Fury, Julien Temple’s documentary about the Sex Pistols.

Wonderful. Sweet. Sad. Life-affirming. As the Times review said, “electrifying.”.

I was only 12 years-old when the Sex Pistols became known in the U.S., and back then I really wasn’t into music. I just knew what they would say on the Today show  and thought they were a bunch of lunatics who stuck safety pins in themselves and spat on one another. I had no idea.

The Filth and The Fury, like the career it documents, ends on a San Francisco concert stage, with Mr. Rotten demanding of the audience, “Ever get the feeling you've been cheated?” It was a rhetorical question at the time, but in retrospect, the answer is no. The Sex Pistols gave everything they had, and Mr. Temple’s film is a gift to them and to their fans. Nihilism like this makes you glad to be alive.

R.I.P., Sidney Lumet

Serpico

Dog Day Afternoon

The Pawn Broker

Prince of the City

Night Falls On Manhattan

He wasn’t born in New York, but Sidney Lumet was a quintessential New York director, and New Yorker.

Here are two of my favorite scenes from the first movie he ever directed, 12 Angry Men. This first  is with a young Jack Klugman, and Henry Fonda as jurors at 60 Center Street. I once served as a juror there, too.

 

Below, is the final scene in the film. Two anonymous people share an experience, and then head their separate ways; Juror #9, heading to the Brooklyn Bridge subway station (just out of shot).

When I tutor on Saturday mornings, I come out that same entrance in Foley Square, on my way to Chinatown. Those courthouse steps are in many an episode of Law & Order, and when I pass by, often a group of old folks, practicing t’ai chi.

Libya

Yes, to the no-fly zone. Of course. What would Richard Blaine do? I just hope it’s not too late.

 

                                      RICK
                         Louis, whatever gave you the 
                         impression that I might be interested 
                         in helping Laszlo escape?

                                    RENAULT
                         Because, my dear Ricky, I suspect 
                         that under that cynical shell you're 
                         at heart a sentimentalist.

                            Rick makes a face.

                                     RENAULT
                         Oh, laugh if you will, but I happen 
                         to be familiar with your record. Let 
                         me point out just two items. In 1935 
                         you ran guns to Ethiopia. In 1936, 
                         you fought in Spain on the Loyalist 
                         side.

                                     RICK
                         And got well paid for it on both 
                         occasions.

                                     RENAULT
                         The winning side would have paid you 
                         much better.

What Are They Gonna Say? That He Was A Kind Man? That He Was A Wise Man?

I’m guessing that after some period of wandering in non-corporeal planes, Dennis Hopper’s soul has found its way into Charlie Sheen.

Coincidentally, that’s Martin Sheen in the bamboo cage.

Max Has A Side?

Rest in peace, Shifra Lerer, who died last Saturday, in Manhattan, at the age of 95. The obituary in the Times said, 

“If not the last, Ms. Lerer was certainly among the few remaining actresses to have performed in the heyday of the Yiddish theatre...”

Here she was in the role of Dolly, in Woody Allen’s, Deconstructing Harry. 

She was buried in Mount Hebron Cemetery in Queens in a section reserved for members of the Yiddish Theatrical Alliance.