Labor Day Weekend - Movie Fest

This was the first weekend I've had off in about a month. I've been working steadily, and have had no time off... so I got to sit down and watch four new DVDs that I received over the past week. I'll do them in the order I watched them, with clever little anecdotes about my weekend... you know, so you don't get too bored.

Dressed to Kill, 1980

Prior to the success of Carrie (1976), De Palma had directed three other films that were out to establish him as a director with a vision... one that was trying to parallel Hitchcock... I think that was his schtick, you know? His gimmick. Sisters (1973), Phantom of the Paradise (1974) and Obsession (1976). Obsession the most of all, a version of Vertigo, that almost labeled De Palma as an outright thief.

You could see where De Palma was going... into the reasons of the mind... into duality (especially with Sisters and Obsession)... into the suspense ring.

Carrie was popular for a number of reasons. Steven King. John Travolta. Sissy Spacek (fresh off of Badlands). Amy Irving. William Katt... all, then, fresh faces that would, in time, define a generation or two.

Fresh off of the popularity (and money) of Carrie, he would direct The Fury, a big budget ESP flick with name power behind them... but no gas. The Fury was another film I saw this weekend, which I'll get to.

In 1979 he would direct Home Movies with Nancy Allen, Kirk Douglas and Keith Gordon. A comedy this time... it would draw only so much water...

But, in 1980, De Palma would go back to his love of Duality, Mystery, Hitchcock. There should be a genre called Hitchcock. Noir really doesn't do the genre much justice, since the Noir film died out in the 50's. Noir became something different. It became cop movies, heist movies, getaway movies... pure noir doesn't exist anymore because the audience is almost all dead.

Dressed to Kill was De Palma's first script in almost four years. And it was a doozy. Trying to capitalize on the confusion of human existence (sexual) in the late 70's... De Palma tried to use the idea of sexual identity to evoke mystery and suspense... almost in the way Hitchcock did in Psycho. With a thick layer of atmosphere, some twists that, certainly, shocked 80's audiences... some nudity and gore... De Palma gives todays audience a neat, atmospheric movie that one can see from a thousand miles away.

You have to keep in mind, when watching this film, that this movie was before all of the sexual identity pictures of the last fifteen years. It was a nice, original story with a neat twist.

Using Nancy Allen again (and would use again in 1981 for De Palma's best film, Blow Out), along with Michael Caine, Angie Dickinson and Keith Gordon (of Jaws 2, Christine, Back to School fame), he would create a neat world with some original characters, a dated but familiar backdrop (late 70's Manhattan)... and a familiar tension (familiar to us, now) that make the two hour film fly by.

One of the things I thought was ok, but not great, was the cinemtography. Ralf Bode has been behind the camera since the mid 70's. His first real break was on Saturday Night Fever, in '77. From there, it's almost as if his career went stagnant... not really breaking ground, even though that film did amazing. Dressed To Kill was in '80... and he followed it up with Coal Miner's Daughter that same year, which got him a nomination at the Academy in 1981. But, from there, his career flattened out. Gorky Park, Critical Condition, The Accused, Uncle Buck, Cousins, One Good Cop, Don Juan Demarco... but nothing so incredible, so note worthy. Some television, an Emmy nomination, but nothing else.

You get the feeling, while watching it, that the shots were set up just to get the shots, not to break ground on anything to distinctly visual, or breathtaking. There's some trademark De Palma stuff, with camera movement between two people talking... that kind of drifting back and forth between dialog, catching a character one at a time... but other than that, it would take De Palma one more film to really get a DP he trusted... to try and break the confines of what the audience would see on the screen, and what they would see in their minds eye. I'm specifically talking about Blow Out... (a take on Michelagnelo Antonioni's Blowup (1966)) one of the great films to come out of the 80's, and to establish De Palma (in later years) as an atmospheric genius.

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The Fury, 1978

Farris wrote the novel The Fury, in 1976, smack in the middle of his career... one taken seriously by the likes of Richard Matheson and Steven King (who later would create his own version of The Fury in Firestarter, four years later). He's been the backwater writer, not gaining too much publicity for his work, though the inspiration for some of todays most illustrious horror and mystery writers. He's that guy, the one people don't talk about, but the right people know about.

Off of the success of Carrie, De Palma got a group of actors together for a big budget ESP thriller. Kirk Douglas, John Cassavetes, Carrie Snodgress, Charles Durning, Amy Irving... all popular faces... all helping to create a film that, by all intents and purposes, should have been a great box-office smash. But the film is too cerebral, too personal. For a seventies audience, the film was too deep. Make this same film today, even without the use of special effects... they'd call it an art-house winner. Around this time, a few films were coming out that took a bent on psychic abilities. One of the was Scanners, by David Cronenberg (1981). He took the idea of psychic abilities and government and took the idea step farther, as Cronenberg does.

In those four little years, blood, gore, effects and the audience itself had changed so much, that The Fury took on a comic nature. The Dead Zone, in 1983, has echoes of The Fury in it, visually. You can see that, again, the right people were looking at this film, seeing the positive sides of it, the suspense, the atmosphere, the incredible trick photography showing Amy Iriving's character drifting in and out of time, viewing things she was seeing through other peoples eyes. It was Cronenberg's trick in The Dead Zone, straight out of The Fury.

Psychic abilities in film is nothing new. But if you think back on history... if you think of what directors had to do, had to use with what was available, you can see The Fury with different eyes... and see the film for what it was, what it was trying to be, what it accomplishes in the realm of story telling.

I would also like to point out, as a side note, that this was James Belushi's first picture, even though he was uncreditited with a bit part as an extra. Crazy.

Another thing this movie has going for it is the music, with an incredible score by John Williams... having just come off of Close Encounters and Star Wars... it's fantastic, atmospheric music.

Richard H. Kline was the cinematographer for this film. It's good. It's good work, especially the scenes with Irving and her abilities... I really enjoyed those.

Kline was the DP on the pilot of The Monkees, if you can believe that. He went on to do some serious work in the late 60's and 70's... good work for the time, movies that really made an impact on American audiences. Camelot, Hang 'em High, The Moonshine War (the first of a few films Kline would shoot that were adaptations of Elmore Leonard books), The Andromeda Strain, Soylent Green, Mr. Majestyk, The Terminal Man, Star Trek: The Motion Picture, Body Heat... and then, in the 1980's, he would do some decent comedies... Deal of the Century, All of Me, The Man with One Red Shoe... good films all around (though he did shoot Howard the Duck...), and in 1990 he would shoot a great film, Downtown, that would be an underground hit. A man who has a good eye, who is trusted, obviously, by the directors...

I was pleased with the overall look of The Fury. I think that, for its subject matter, for its brashness with attempting to juxtapose the audience into a psychic ability... it broke new ground in storytelling ability... but again, the film was overlooked.

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Vamp, 1986

Alien is the first film I remember watching with my dad that would have pissed my mom off to high heaven. It was a rental, and I was about nine. From there, it was anything I could get my hands on. The Toxic Avenger, Bloodsport, Buckaroo Banzai, Carpenter's The Thing (we were both big Carpenter fans), An American Werewolf in London, Evil Dead... and all things vampire.

Fright Night. My Best Friend Is A Vampire, Near Dark, Salem's Lot, Vampire's Kiss, Once Bitten, The Lost Boys... there were tons of them. And then there was Vamp.

There wasn't a lot of sex in the movies I saw with my dad... and that wasn't on purpose, it was just that we saw other films, and sex just wasn't a part of it. Vamp was one of the first films I saw (with my dad) that had erotic undertones... and it was kind of uncomfortable, you know? Cause my dad was into it, and I'm there, 13, watching strippers and Grace Jones do her thing... weird, man, a moment in history, kind of like thinking of your parents having sex or something.

Weird.

This is one of those quintessential 80's films. You know the ones I'm talking about. This one came from the Michael Jackson's Thriller school of film, with the strange colored background, the hollow eyed make-up, the rolling whites of the eyes... all curtousy of Greg Cannom, who has been responsible for some of the greatest make-up effects in movie history. Check out his list of features here because I won't list them.

In regards to acting power, you've got Robert Rusler, who was, then, fresh off of Weird Science... you've got Chris Makepeace (from Meatballs, My Bodyguard...), Dedee Pfeiffer (who actually got decent work in the late 80's through today) Gedde Watanabe (who has been all over the place... in bit parts and memorable cameos) and Grace Jones, who is so strange and who does not have one single piece of dialog in this whole picture... she was perfect.

Two DP's on this one... and I couldn't find out why. Strange. Elliot Davis has amassed a great career, starting off with Vamp as one of his bigger mainstream films and moving on to Shakes the Clown and Memphis before, in 1993, working with Steven Soderburg on King of the Hill. He would then work with Soderberg on a number of his other films, including Underneath, Gray's Anatomy, and Out of Sight. Elliot would work on a number of decent/good productions. Father of the Bride II, Thing to Do In Denver When You're Dead, Breakfast of Champions... among others.

Douglas F. O'Neons started his DP career with this film, but would not go on to be as successful as Elliot. Mostly, O'Neons is a camera operator, and would work on some fairly decent sized blockbuster films in the 90's... not too shabby.

I was impressed with a certain amount of the cinematography. There are some decent angles, some nicely lit shots (those pastel freak colors come out pretty good, and add a certain kind of atmosphere directly related to the 1980's)... and working with special effects, as a DP, is a job in and of itself, so they get good grades all around.

Director/writer Richard Wenk fell off the map for a little while, after doing Vamp. He would not find himself behind the camera (as writer/director) until 1999, directing a film called Just the Ticket in France. He's also working on a film called Wishcraft with Meatloaf, if you can believe it... very strange. I can't tell if this is a director just wanting to work, looking for a second chance, or if this is something Wenk is looking forward to creating...

The other writer of this was the producer on the film as well... who, after Vamp, went on to produce a bunch of B-movie crap. Motorama, Samantha, Meatballs 4, Jailbait, Criminal Passion... jesus, this is what happens when you produce a Grace Jones film? His other work, prior to Vamp, was actually decent. Fear No Evil, The Beastmaster, Children of the Corn, Crimes of Passion, Tuff Turf... not great, but known.

Very strange. It's a fun movie, with some decent ideas. I think it's great for vampire film buffs and people who dig the 1980's and all its splendor.

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Marathon Man, 1976

This is, for certain, one of the 10 best movies to come out of the 1970's. John Schlesinger was at the top of his game... a game that had been going on for seven years, after his Best Picture/Best Director for Midnight Cowboy in 1969... the man has made some decent to great movies... this one is a close second in my book.

Taken from the novel of the same name by William Goldman (who also wrote the script), and starring three fantastic actors... Dustin Hoffman, Laurence Olivier and Roy Scheider... this movie, with its subject matter, with Schlesingers fantastic ability to tell a story... its no wonder it's so fantastic.

This is an excerpt from Goldman's fantastic book "Adventures in the Screen Trade" on Marathon Man:

I don't remember much clearly about Marathon Man. I wrote, in a compressed period of time, two versions of the novel and at least four versions of the screenplay, and after that, someone, I suspect Robert Towne, was brought in to write the ending. So all in all, it's pretty much a maze.

What I do remember clearly, as clearly today as then, is Olivier.

The part Olivier wanted to play was that of the Nazi villain, Szell, who is living in considerable luxury in South America. Circumstances force him to come to New York to retrieve a fortune in diamonds.

The Olivier role called for him to be bald. In his past, the character had been nicknamed "the White Angel" because of his glorious white hair. In the script, in order to help disguise himself, Szell shaves himself bald. Now a delicate moment was at hand: Olivier was old, he had been desperately ill, he didn't look all that terrific anyway - and no one wanted to bring up the subject of having his hair shaved. (There were rumors about his health flying everywhere and this would only add to it, "I just saw Olivier and his hair has fallen out. He looks worse than I've ever seen him. Bald. How much longer can he last?")

A barber was hired for the day, but he was hidden in a room downstairs. For all anybody knew, maybe Olivier didn't even want to play the part bald. Christ, we all have vanity, and this was once one of the world's matinee idols.

Rehearsal time approached. The barber was waiting below. But who the hell was going to ask this legend about getting disfigured?

There were no volunteers.

On time, Olivier moved silently and alone into the large room. We all made our hellos. Olivier carries none of his greatness with him. He is famous for taking directors aside early on and saying, "Please, you must help me. Tell me what you want." Most stars like to be thought of as being private people, being shy. We even grant those attributes to Woody Allen, this in spite of the fact that he must be the most visible celebrity in New York.

It's not an act with Olivier. He never has considered himself to be all that much as a film actor. On the stage, obviously, he is Something. In films, he thinks of himself as being just another player.

He also never refers to his great career as a director. No mentions of Henry V. Orson Welles, another great director, reputedly has on more than one occasion, when he first came on the floor to act, looked around, then nailed the director with probably one eyebrow raised and intoned, "Is that where you're going to put the camera?"

Anyway, after we greeted each other there was this very long pause. Broken by Sir Laurence, who said, "Would it be possible for me to be shaved bald now? I think it might be best to get it done."

Relief, may I add, abounded.

Isn't that great? It's just one of those little things you would never hear of... and this book is great for things of that nature... inside the eyes of an outsider...

I cannot say enough about the acting in this film. Hoffman and Scheider give their all in their performances... I love watching them act. Olivier... I won't even comment on, because it's not even necessary.

William Devane plays Peter Janeway, Scheider's boss in The Group (or The Company, or The Service...). Janeway has been around for god knows how long, and has managed to wrangle his way into spy movies since the beginning of time. He's got that face... the handsome everyman face... and that makes for a good spy. His character is extremely likeable in this film... I won't give him away, but you'll dig his work. Most recently, you can see him in Payback, Space Cowboys and Hollow Man... his role in Payback is quite a similar role to this one.

Conrad Hall is a genius behind the camera. He's been shooting films since 1958 and, coincidentally, shot one of the first features William Goldman ever wrote... Harper (1966). From there... whew, dig this. The Professionals, Cool Hand Luke, In Cold Blood, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid... he didn't have too much luck in the early 1970's, and then came across Schlesinger's production in 1976. After Marathon Man... his work got more mainstream. Much more. Tequila Sunrise, Class Action, Jennifer 8, Searching for Bobby Fischer, Without Limits, A Civil Action, American Beauty (winning the Oscar), and the soon to be released The Road to Perdition. He's been nominated 8 times for Academy Awards, and he's won twice... the second for Butch Cassidy. His work is incredible, his trust in directors has obviously made his life and the lives of directors easier... and he's still at the top of his game, over 40 years later.

All in all, this movie is absolutely incredible. It's narrative, the acting, the script, the shots, the direction... it's all so perfect. It is definitely one of the best movies to come out of the 1970's, and it's a must see for anyone who's ever even thought of doing a thriller, espionage, spy movie.

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