Peggy Sue Got Married (1986)

I love this movie - it has emotion, heart, and smart writing/dialogue (by husband-and-wife team of Jerry Leichtling and Arlene Sarner, who unfortunately didn't write many other screenplays, per IMDB).

If you haven't seen this movie, it focuses on Katheleen Turner's character (Peggy), who at the start of the movie plays a 42 year old at her high school's 25th Anniversary Reunion, where she wishes what we all do - "if only I knew then what I know now".  Then - for the rest of the movie - she plays 17 and her character relives her high-school senior days in the spring of 1960. 

I don't think it's really a spoiler or a surprise if I say that the film (in my opinion) is very "Capra-esque", especially the ending...was her experience in 1960 all a dream, or did she actually time-travel back to 1960? Hmmmm. I still have fun thinking about that idea. You'll have to see it to fully understand what I mean. But there's profundity to it, too, as Peggy's relationships and fate may change as a result. 

So now it's time to shine a spotlight on the entire cast who make this movie so good - most of the main actors have the challenging task of playing two ages, 42 and 17, and they are all great - including Nicolas Cage, who plays Peggy's high school sweetheart of 2 years. 

I won't list the age of each actor, but all of them are either in their mid/late 20s or early 30s, and really convincing in both roles.

First I'll start with Kathleen Turner, course playing Peggy, a character with an adult mindset from 1985.  Of course, she plays both 42 and 17 fantastically. She was about 30 at the time when the movie was made/set, but when she plays both roles and delivers. 

Her scenes at school with Nicolas Cage are really great especially when she gets to say things to him she wished she would have said at 17; one of the best lines comes when Cage (who years later will cheat on Peggy) is expressing his jealously and says "when I imagine you going out with other guys, I feel...." and he can't find the words. Peggy says as an adult would...."rejected, worthless, and miserable? Good!". 

After awhile, Peggy realizes she is "trapped" in her predicament - is she dreaming or dead, she wonders. Then she does the most sensible thing anyone would do - reaches out to her school's high school expert on science (Barry Miller) and asks him if time travel is possible. She then begins to disclose some "future facts" she knows of (often humorously), such as heart transplants, man walking on the moon, televisions that get smaller, and radios "that get bigger" (referring to the boom boxes). Had the movie been made today, no doubt her character would reference the internet, smartphones, and Twitter for sure, but watching this movie reminded me that there were some pretty impressive achievements between 1960 and 1985. 

I enjoy seeing Peggy go directly to all the "forbidden" spots - her dad's liquor cabinet, the cigarettes hidden under the stairs. She argues with her dad and she humorously exclaims "I'm an adult --- I can do what I want!" and "I'm going to go to Liverpool and discover The Beatles!"

Another great scene is when Peggy sees her younger sister in 1960; her sister is a few years younger, perhaps 14 (played by Sofia Coppola - the only real teenager in the whole movie). The way Peggy responds to her is touching and convincing, she's almost in tears when she sees her. The details are not explained, but it makes me wonder if her sister had died tragically....or something bad happened to her where they became estranged or something and so therefore seeing her again would brought back alot of joy for Peggy.

The movie has a number of nice moments like that, especially when Peggy decides to visit her parents and grandparents -- both of whom  have died years prior to 1985. Sequences like these can make us think of our own relatives who passed and who we miss. Haven't we all dreamed about long-gone relatives or friends at one time or another? 

This is a really great performance by Kathleen Turner in one of her best movie roles in my opinion, and deserving on her Oscar nomination that year.

Next up, I wanted to write about Nicolas Cage in one of his first movie roles. At the start of the movie he's 42 and looks the age and is made up to look generally down-and-out and gruff, having made some questionable decisions in his life. Then, when the movie shifts to 1960, he's 17 and looks the age again, but this time he's optimistic and full of life and in love with Peggy, passionate about music, singing in a band, and his hair and wardrobe is made up to make him look like Fabian, who is his celebrity idol. (Full disclosure - I had to Google and look up Fabian to learn a little more about him LOL).  It's an amazing transformation, and even transforms his 1960 voice and mannerisms to match a teenager's. He's really good in this role. 

Jim Carrey is also in a small role, also playing 42 and 17. His character is meant to be something of a class clown and he really is - at both ages. His character only appears in few scenes, but I think it's just enough in my opinion - if he were in any more scenes, I think he would have unnecessarily stolen (or ruined) a good part of the movie with his comic antics. 

Also playing classmates are Joan Allen (The Crucible) and Catherine Hicks (Child's Play), and their costumes and makeup really convince you that they are teens, especially when they drive Peggy Sue home from school while "Tequilla" by the Champs plays on the radio.  

Kevin J. O'Connor was 22 but played 17, and played one of the "outcasts" of the school that Peggy reaches out to in 1960 and cheats on Nicolas Cage (who subsequently throws a jealous tantrum, but still professes his love for Peggy in the end).

John Barry's score, the costumers, set designers, and cinematographer deserve much credit for re-creating a very memorable and dream-like film. And it is superbly directed by Francis Coppola; in real-life, he is the same age and generation as the adult Peggy character so handles this film with a great sensibility for that late 50's/early 60s era. And of course, amazing job by the screenwriters who also have a great sensibility for the era and write some pretty funny, clever, and satirical dialogue without going over-the-top. 

I recommended the movie if you haven't seen it!

This post is part of the Fake Teenagers Blogathon!

Hosted by Taking Up Room (November 18-20, 2022)

P.S:  Realweegiemidget Reviews has a great post on this movie from a few years back!
It's a great post that features MORE about this awesome movie and its amazing cast!

Check out the post here!

Candy (1968)

I first heard about this movie from a post from the blog Mike's Take On The Movies which featured a newspaper ad for this movie from December of 1968, almost 55 years ago. Check it out at the link below-

https://mikestakeonthemovies.com/2019/03/25/now-playing-december-28th-1968-at-a-theater-near-you/

The movie came out around the same time as The Odd Couple, Hellfighters, and The Lion in Winter. 

Also I Love You Alice B Toklas and Skiddoo, which were comic satires about the current drug and hippy cultures that I enjoyed and found humorous.

With its all star cast that includes James Coburn, John Huston (believe it or not), and Charles Aznavour, I thought this movie might be a fun watch like those other movies. 

But it's not. It's horrible. 

This movie is so bad. I doesn't hold up well. If I were anyone involved in it, I would be embarrassed. Ringo Starr is in it, which is cool, but he plays a Mexican gardener in brownface and a bad accent, which is not cool. Marlon Brando also appears in brownface playing an Indian love guru, similar to a character that Mike Myers created in the 2008 movie The Love Guru. It's supposed to be funny, but it's not. 

It seems like very Hollywood actor wanted to appear in a comedy that lampoons the modern culture of hippies but this movie, which makes sex the main focus, falls flat. Buck Henry wrote it, and I guess I was expecting for it to be better. But I don't know what he's trying to say in this movie - that all adult men are sex crazed, or is there something about authority figures (doctors, gurus, soldiers) that he finds ridiculous and wants to criticize? I didn't get it. 

Every adult male character in this movie is awestruck by Candy, who is a pretty blonde white girl who wears short skirts, has pretty eyes, and is rather naive. Is the character's naivete supposed to be the gag? Or the fact that she's so sexually attractive that every adult man who meets her wants to have sex with her? It gets really cringy and creepy at times. There are even some creepy incest jokes involving the dad (John Astin)  And it's really bizarre to see a military general (Walter Matthau) order her to undress for him in the cockpit of a plane, and him trying to screw her. It's also super-creepy to see a middle aged poet (Richard Burton) want to sleep with her too after he visits her school to give a poetry reading. I did like Burton's chauffeur played by Sugar Ray Robinson who winks at the camera and is in on the joke that Burton is a buffoon. That was inspired comedy. But Candy just doesn't work in a modern era. I don't think it was funny back in 1968, either. What were they thinking?  

Read another review from The Magnificent 60s

Little Big Man (1970) and Midnight Cowboy (1969)

I've been wanting to see this movie forever, and finally did and really liked it! It reminded me of Dances with Wolves from 1990, primarily because it's about a white man raised by an indigenous tribe. Dustin Hoffman was an interesting choice to play this part. He was a big box office star from this time period, and he brings alot of that everyman essence to this part which I think is important for this role.

At the start of the film we meet Hoffman's character - a 120 year old man being interviewed by a reporter (William Hickey) interested in his long life and his supposed acquaintanceship with Civil War General Custer in the 1800s.

The old man lives in a nursing home; I have a relative who just moved into such a place, and they can be lonely places. I could understand why this old man would want to talk and tell his life story to someone who will listen. And he's had a long life, a really long life. He talks about being raised by a Cheyenne tribe, and later befriends historical figures Bill Hickock and General Custer. These sequences are episodic, but I really seeing him brush with historical figures. This was an idea that was used somewhat similarly later in the movie Forrest Gump, but I think works really good in this film.

I like how the old man narrates the movie throughout; this gave me the feeling that I was always being told the old man's story and not someone else's. He talks about the various "stages" of his life.... "My Indian Years", "My religious years", "My Outlaw Days", etc.  Faye Dunaway has a small supporting part where she plays a religious man's wife who becomes a prostitute later on.

I couldn't believe that it was Richard Mulligan playing a dramatic role as General Custer; I only knew him for his comedy roles on TV but he is really good in this.

There is also great standout performance by a Native American actor in the film - Chief Dan George. His part is significant as Hoffman's father figure and wise mentor who has some interesting (and racy) dialogue. I imagine that the audience of 1970 would like his line where he says, "Does she show enthusiasm when you mount her?" (referring to Hoffman's spouse).

It's unfortunate that the movie's marketing posters (as shown above) make this movie to look like a comedy, with Dustin Hoffman made to look like Don Knotts in The Shakiest Gun in the West. This is a really profound drama (with occasional comic relief), that was ahead of its time showing the perspectives of both indigenous and white peoples. Equally unfortunate is the lack of accolades that year - no Oscars...not even a Best Picture nomination. In 1970, the big winner was "Patton", which was a more traditional war film with a hero that audiences could probably relate to more. Little Big Man was unfortunately overshadowed by it, and I don't think audiences were quite ready to embrace such a film yet. Not until Dances with Wolves 20 years later.

I also re-watched Midnight Cowboy which I haven't seen in more than 20 years but remember liking it overall, especially the chemistry of the two leads (Voight and Hoffman). I forgot that there was a sequence where they go to a hippy artists' party in New York, and there are some real cameos by Andy Warhol protégés. After attending a Warhol art exhibit recently, I've been reading some of his biographies and a book of his journal entries; interestingly in one entry he wrote that he wanted to do a cameo in Midnight Cowboy but couldn't do it because he was in the hospital recovering from a gunshot wound (in the summer of '68).

I loved seeing all the on-location scenes of New York; I kept my eye peeled for any interesting posters that would have been of the times. I saw one poster/billboard with Jonathan Winters on it. And another poster was a movie ad for "Doctor Doolittle" starring Rex Harrison, which was interesting. Flash forward 50 years and we have yet another remake of "Doolittle" in theaters starring Robert Downey Jr (I'm planning to skip since it doesn't look all that appealing to me).

Another scene in Midnight Cowboy that I had forgotten about happens at the end where Joe Buck beats the old man in his hotel room, almost killing him (his actual death isn't shown but it's implied he might have killed him). This makes me feel less sympathetic toward the character, and even reminded me of what Brad Pitt does at the end of Once Upon a Time in Hollywood (my least-favorite sequence in that movie); now I'm wondering if Tarantino intended that scene to be an homage to Midnight Cowboy.

Read a blog post about this movie by Avvaganda.com here

All Fall Down (1962)

This is a movie I wanted to watch for a long while mainly to see an early performance by Beatty (3rd movie) and the other performances. It has a great cast with Angela Lansbury, Karl Malden, Eva Marie Saint and Brandon de Wilde (the main character, though not top-billed).

It's an OK movie. Not exceptional, but still has good performances. 

deWilde plays a teenager (age 16) and plays the part pretty well--he's naive, idolizes his older brother (Beatty), and then slowly becomes disillusioned as the movie progresses. 

I know what it's like to idolize a relative like that, and then realize he's not so perfect and not right all the time, so I liked that aspect of the film. I also think Lansbury does a great job showing how overbearing and manipulative her character is. 

Lansbury and Malden play characters with differing political and religious opinions (he's liberal, she's conservative....he's a socialist and she's capitalist....she's a churchgoer, he's not....). I found alot of their interactions to be really interesting. In one sequence, Malen invites some homeless men over for a Christmas dinner. Lansbury wants them out of the house so she pays each of them ten dollars to get out.

There's an interesting scene where deWilde chops up some vegetables and mixes them together in a blender to make a healthy smoothie; I can't remember the last time a character in a film did that so that was a cool part. 

I read somewhere that when this movie was being filmed in 1961, Beatty's first two movies had not yet been released (Splendor in the Grass & Roman Spring of Ms Stone). He had only been known for television work, for dating Natalie Wood, and for being Shirley Maclaine's brother.

I liked the scenes with the two brothers together; I felt convinced that they were related and that deWilde idolized him. In the movie, deWilde is constantly writing in his journal, and I wondered if that indicated he would be a writer in the future, and if the writer of the original novel - James Leo Herlihy - based the character on himself. 

After watching this movie I was intrigued by the entire making-of process.  I wondered how faithful it was to the original book, and was curious about John Houseman producing it and that whole process.

If only DVD commentaries and special features were around in 1962.

Regarding the title, I think it should be called "Berry-Berry", since everyone says it over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over again.  

Targets (1968) directed by Peter Bogdonovich

According to a recent article from TIME, Universal has canceled the American release of a new horror movie - called The Hunt - following two separate mass shootings that happened in America a week ago. "Now is not the right time", was part of the reasoning. From watching the The Hunt's trailer, it looks to be an ultra-violent film dealing with people who hunt people for sport. The trailer also seems to spoil who gets killed off; it looks like Amy Madigan's character does early (I like her, so to see her mercilessly terrorized and shot does not seem like fun to watch). The movie also features Hillary Swank and Emma Roberts; I don't know what their roles are, but I've read this film is supposed to satirical.

In 1994, I remember seeing Oliver Stone's satirical film Natural Born Killers, and I thought of that movie in the last week after the news of these shootings. I didn't like that film it at the time; it seemed to be presenting a society that idolizes serial killers, a concept I find really disturbing. I can't imagine anyone idolizing these latest killers in the news. I haven't watched that film in 25 years, but was thinking about rewatching it again sometime in the future. If I do I will post my thoughts about it. It was given 4 stars by Roger Ebert in his 1994 review.

Among the older films on my list to watch was Targets, which was released in the summer of 1968. It was Peter Bogdonovich's first feature film as director. The posters for Targets at the time showed an assassin/sniper, and like in the trailer for The Hunt, also warns the audience to expect violence and gives away some of the killings.  I can only imagine the advertisers at the time trying to promote this film. Targets was released just a few months after Martin Luther King Jr and Senator Robert Kennedy were shot, and one year before the horrendous murder of movie star Sharon Tate and others in her home.

Eating a sandwich before a killing spree.
What a Tarantino character might do?

I watched the movie over the weekend. It's OK. It's actually not entirely about the assassin to my surprise. He plays a major role, but the film doesn't explore his motivations and at the end we're left to our own interpretations. His dad and mom appear in a few scenes; the father is a hunter who has his own collection. The assassin's wife is depicted as hardworking, and they all watch TV together in the living room (they all live under the same roof). We don't get much background about the killer other than he's obsessed with guns (has a whole collection of them at home and in his trunk) and visits guns stores regularly, and that he's deranged. His age isn't specified, but we assume early 20s. There's no mention of him having any prior convictions, and no one acknowledges that he has a mental disturbance, or holds any political grievances. I'm amazed at how easy it was to buy his guns and ammunition at the various shops he goes to.

He basically kills people for sport, which is what he does in the film, and it's pretty disturbing to watch when he does it.

We are also are introduced to another main character, an aging horror-film star named "Orlock" played by Boris Karloff. It's not until the end when the two characters come together; the film builds up suspense until then. I liked Karloff's performance in this. Most of his sequences are comical in tone, hinting that this is a satire. Some of his dialogue, reactions, and expressions are funny, and he even plays drunk in one scene. My favorite part is when someone knocks on his door and he quips in his unmistakable voice, "Who's that knocking at my chamber door?" (a clear reference to 1967's Who's That Knocking At My Door). He also is shown watching some of his old movies various eras of his career  (which are real Karloff films; I liked these meta references).

While watching Targets, I wondered if Tarantino saw it, and wondered if it in some way inspired him while envisioning his latest movie, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood.

I found similarities in the two movies.

For example, in OUATIH, we also are introduced to an aging star who feels useless and washed-up (like Orlock). The Sharon Tate character in OUATIH also watches her latest film like Orlock does in this movie. The killer in Targets (played by Tim O'Brien -- he had a short career before dying early) drives around LA in his Ford Mustang convertible with the radio playing 60s music and DJs, similar to Pitt and DiCaprio in OUATIH.

By the end of Targets, it seemed a bit more clear me that this movie isn't solely about the assassin. In fact, I think it's more about the Orlock character - a horror film veteran who faces real-life horror on the verge of retirement.

An interesting article from Slate that talks about the making of the film, and how  Roger Corman and Samuel Fuller helped shape the film. Really interesting.

From 2006 Movie City News - a report on a screening of the movie with the director in attendance speaking about the film.

From Dissolve (2013) - Bogdonovich talks about the gun violence and the film's "unfortunate continued relevance"

Another review of this film from the blog Surrender to the Void

Another blog post from Lazarus' Lair

50 years later, Sharon Tate's sister keeps her memory alive

In this video clip, Debra Tate, sister of Sharon, speaks to CBS news (2 minutes, 30 sec)

She says, "The grief never goes away, but you learn to cope better".



What happened to Tate and the others that were murdered 50 years ago was a horrible tragedy. She was a real person, whose life and career was cut way too short.

Terence of A Shroud of Thoughts has a lovely tribute today on his blog here.

I also read an article on Nerdist - article link here - that mentions how Debra met with Tarantino and Margot Robbie who plays her in the new movie OUATIH. I was surprised to learn that Debra approved of the portrayal. Knowing this actually makes me want to reevaluate the movie; when I first saw it I really didn't think it was a fair portrayal. But apparently her sister approves of it.

Another article from The Nerdist - article link here - mentions that another film about Tate is in the works that is being produced by Debra Tate and starring Kate Bosworth. This movie also looks interesting.

Longer interview with Debra Tate here:

 

Once Upon a Time in Hollywood (2019) Spoiler warning

Of the films I've seen by Quentin Tarantino, the one that I like most is Jackie Brown (1997); it was fictional but didn't present a revised history of true events like some of his later films did.

So I'm among those who have a problem with the ending of his new movie.

For the most part I like every other thing about it: the story, the setting, the two main characters are interesting (the fading western star and his stunt double) and their lives and careers at the end of 1960s Hollywood. I like how Pitt and DiCaprio are shown in unglamourous moments, and pondering the future of their careers apart from the television shows they were so used to.  In perhaps one of my favorite scenes, DiCaprio takes a lunch break (while filming a western tv show) to read a book, and meets another actor - a young child star who is also reading, and they stop to form an interesting bond before their scene together.

I liked the recreation of 1969 era Hollywood, and enjoyed all of the music and film references as well. My friend who is older knew pretty much every actual actor and film mentioned.

There is an actor who portrays Steve McQueen, and he looks just like him; it was at the moment where I really felt transported into this world and captivated.

So I didn't have a problem with how the fictional characters brush with real-life characters.

But the ending of the film bothered me because it isn't true to history of who was killed and who wasn't killed in real life. Spoiler - Sharon Tate doesn't die; she lives on. It's basically Tarantino's fantasy alternate universe now, as if he jumped into a time machine like in Back to the Future and altered events.

As a viewer I felt like I'm being asked to buy into this imaginative world in which the real-life victims were never murdered, and the actual killers are the ones who get killed. I'm supposed to be entertained by that?

There's something to that ending that I think Tarantino is trying to say but I'm not sure I fully understand. Maybe I'm not meant to understand. Maybe the ending is a dream that Dicaprio is having? That might make more sense interpreted that way.

A new post from A Shroud of Thoughts is a lovely tribute to Sharon Tate, reminding us she was a real person. I knew who she was going into to see the movie, and knew what happened to her. But no doubt, others may watch this film and have no idea. This recent post talks about who's real and who's fake in the film.

The real Sharon Tate may have lived in a "fictional"/ "dreamland" of Hollywood, but she was still a real person, and her life deserves respect. Or maybe a biographical film of her own one day.

Meanwhile, I won't write off Tarantino entirely yet. I will check out some of his additional interviews to better understand what he's trying to say with his film.

The fact that he made a film that has got me thinking after it's over may mean that it's a great film after all.

Here are some of the blogs I recently read for some other perspectives.
- The Collider   Matt has some problems with the ending which I agree with.
- Cinematic Corner - Sati has the same problems that I have with the movie and also talked about audience reaction in her theater.
- Live for Films  Adam echoes some other critics who call it "a love letter to Hollywood… to film making… and to film lovers"; in Amanda's review, she criticized the many female characters whose sole purpose is to react to the men around them.
- From the Front Row  - "Going into a Quentin Tarantino movie, one usually has a certain set of expectations: there will be copious amounts of violence, creative (and constant) use of curse words, extensive references to older films, and lately, a new spin on familiar history."

Bobby Rivers, a teenager in 1969, has a few questions for Tarantino (me, too - the same).
Brian Camp, in his recent post, also was around in '69 and remembers some of the other films of that era.

Keith and the Movies posted about some criticisms of the film:

The author of this Variety article called this "the first dramatic feature about the Manson murders that has a happy ending. Good for him, I guess. And good for us. At least, if you believe that movies should be fairy tales." "Quentin makes the trashing of history look hip....that Sharon Tate “lives” is supposed to send us out on a feel-good cloud (when, in fact, it’s arguably a trivialization of her memory)" - I agree with that.

Blog post by Lazarus' Lair

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Videos

In this interview (below) from the Cannes Film Festival, Tarantino compares his film to the work of director Claude Lelouch.

Tarantino and the main cast talk to Entertainment Weekly (below)



Below: Cinemablend talks to Quentin Tarantino for about 20 minutes here (Cinemablend is biased and loves Tarantino). In the interview, Tarantino knows his history, and all, but doesn't really talk about the ending.

Agnes Varda short films

Agnes Varda was one of the great French filmmakers who emerged during the New Wave period, and continued making films until recently; her final was 2017's Faces/Places, which was nominated for an Oscar (I still haven't seen it yet but it's on my list). I recently attended a retrospective of her short films, noted below.

A Diary of a Pregnant Woman | L'Opéra-Mouffe (1958, 27 minutes)
This film, shot in black/white, was made when she was pregnant (hence the title); it's perhaps one of her most-personal shorts in the series. She films a couple - lovers - and scenes of  streetlife in a neighborhood in Paris called la Mouffe, with lots of interesting juxtapositions.

Along the Coast | Du Côté de la Côte (1958, 27 minutes)
This is a traveloge film (shot in color) showcasing the coast of Southern France. Lots of beach shots and shots of tourists and travelers, with narration throughout. A lovely musical score by Georges Delleurde. It's really cool to see this footage from the late 1950s, as well as plentiful scenes of Nice and Monte Carlo, where I visited in 2004 on a France trip.

Hello Cubans | Salut les Cubains (1963, 30 minutes)
Another traveloge, but this time it is in black-and-white, and using mostly photographs in B/W. Agnes took hundreds of photos which she compiled for this film. A narrator describes the history of Cuba and the events leading up to the revolution. She also took a number of quick-succession photographs and turned them into some cool-looking animations; one was of a rumba dancer. Really exceptional.

Elsa la Rose (1965, 20 minutes)
This is short documentary of an older couple, a man and a woman. The man is about 70 or so, and a poet.  His wife, also in her 70s, is also interviewed on camera and asked about how she feels about all of the many love poems he wrote to her over the years.

Uncle Yanko (1967, 22 minutes)
Agnes had an older Greek relative who emigrated to San Francisco and lived a bohemian life of an artist. This is her tribute to him. It's a pretty cool short film.  There's several scenes of him hanging out with some other artists and friends and eating and talking about art and music and politics. And lots of footage of his artwork. I was sad to learn that he passed away just a few years after this was made.

Black Panthers (1968, 28 minutes)
Made just one year after Uncle Yanko, Agnes again makes a short film set in the United States/California. This time in Oakland California, and focuses on The Black Panther protests during the imprisonment of Huey Newton, a founding member. Agnes interviews many of the Panther leaders including Stokely Carmichael and other people who are just tourists or passerbys who are interested in the protests. It's really a great documentary. It's amazing how she and a crew were able to interview Newton in jail for such a lengthy interview.

The Pleasure of Love in Iran | Plaisir D'amour en Iran  (1976, 6 minutes)
This lightly comedic short follows a young couple on a vacation. They relax on a courtyard bench admiring the colorful mosaics on the exterior of a mosque, and make some innocently irreverent comments about the architecture - how the domes look like breasts and the minarets look phallic. I like the part when the woman has a sudden burst of inspiration, and starts to write a poem on some toilet paper. It's a funny short, and feels like it could be one scene in a longer movie, which would be interesting.

Women Reply | Résponse des Femmes (1976, 9 minutes)
About a dozen women are brought together and filmed in short/quick segments talking about what it means to be a woman and how they feel about how women and women's bodies are portrayed in advertising and on television, and how they feel about men's perceptions in general. It's an amazing film, and so relevant for today. Made the year I was born. The baby in the film would be my age, too.

Ulysses  (1983, 22 minutes)
In 1954 Agnes took a photograph of two people on a beach standing near a dead goat corpse. It's a unique photo that she presented among her works of photography for many years. In 1982 she interviewed the man and boy in the photo and tried to see if they remembered it. They didn't. It's a really interesting and contemplative film. In a humorous touch, she films a real goat with a copy of the picture and the goat eats the photo.

I really enjoyed all of her films. I love how she always add a touch of humor in them.

Get Out (2017) and I am Not Your Negro (2017)

Get Out is a new film by Jordan Peele, who has done comedy in the past (I'm not familiar with his work, though). This movie has been getting alot of buzz and is hailed a modern day horror classic. I've totally been into the modern horror revolution, having enjoyed The Guest and It Follows most of all lately. Get Out isn't so much a slasher film but there are some violent parts, it's more a psychological thriller focusing on a young interracial couple (the man is black and the woman is white).  The white woman wants to introduce her beau to the fam, who turns out to be cultish and I had flashbacks to when I got involved in a cult-like group. I won't get into all those details but let me just say I'm really sensitive to the kinds of stories that involve cults. I still haven't seen The Master because I feel I'm not ready to handle it. The film is also a commentary on race; one of my favorite lines in the movie is when the young man (I forgot the actor's name) calls his friend and says "these people missed the movement". It's a freakish film and really well-done; the cult aspect of the film definitely got me unnerved.

I Am Not Your Negro is an engrossing documentary on James Baldwin, brilliant writer and activist who unfortunately died too soon - in the mid 1980s. The film is combination of his television interviews (with Dick Cavett and others), historical footage, and movie clips (including some Sidney Poitier and Doris Day movies that contrast the white and black experience on film during this period) from the 1960s through the 1970s. There is narration by Samuel L. Jackson, who reads the words of an unfinished manuscript by Baldwin. All of the compiled interview clips are definite highlights. Baldwin is very candid and honest about the real attitudes black Americans of the time, and how for example the media and Hollywood were not accurate depictions of real life. In one segment, the film The Defiant Ones is analyzed, and Baldwin talks about how he and others felt that in real life, the black fugitive would have and should have escaped and fended for himself but instead he's shown befriending and helping the other white fugitive. It made me think about that film in another light.



The film also shows clips of 1960s demonstrations and interviews that included hollywood celebrities like Marlon Brando, Harry Belafonte and Charlton Heston. Heston is usually dismissed as a racist and right-wing nut and in his later years because his rapid gun activism didn't win him universal favor. His early involvement with civil rights movement is typically forgotten. In Heston's biography I
n the Arena he talks about his involvement in the Civil Rights movement in the '60s, and then talks about what happened once he became president of the Screen Actors Guild. Martin Luther King Jr met with him to ask him about the lack of people of color in the union and in technical fields in general. Heston explained how he felt he couldn't do much of anything. Dr. King then met with members of other film unions and eventually persuaded them to allow people of color; there had been an rule in place where only children of the members of SAG could be admitted to technical unions.

In August of 1963 King lead a March on Washington which welcomed delegates from Hollywood. Heston was one of those who came and who gave a presentation; in the book, he mentions that his statement to the press was written by James Baldwin (Heston calls him "Jimmy" in the book and describes him as if the reader knows nothing about him). Heston was upset because he wanted to write his own speech, but ultimately praised Baldwin for his writing skill.

After seeing this I Am Not Your Negro, I wanted to read more of  Baldwin's work, and have begun to read Giovanni's Room, The Fire Next Time, and Go Tell It On the Mountain, which deals with religion. It's so fascinating to me that Baldwin had an early interest and exposure to churches and gospel music, which he often writes about, reflecting on the spiritual lives of people in society. I wonder what he might think of the film Get Out, which delves into the manipulation of the mind. And often what he would say about today's cultural landscape? His voice lives on and speaks to us today. The documentary feels so contemporary. Read Bobby Rivers' post on both of these films,

Read a blog post by Cliched Monologues on the documentary


 

Guess Who's Coming to Dinner (1967)

Hepburn and Tracy are liberal white parents whose attitudes and beliefs are tested when their daughter announces she's marrying a black physician (Sidney Poitier).

It's an important film of its time.

Tracey died within days of completing his part and Hepburn won her third Oscar for her performance.

This was Poitier's year: He also starred in 1967's Best Picture Winner "In the Heat of the Night".

Morgan! (1966) starring Vanessa Redgrave, David Warner

Madcap comedy about a guy named Morgan (David Warner) trying to win back his ex-wife (Redgrave).

Morgan has a unexplained "mental condition", as referred to in the film, and is obsessed with Marx and communism.

Redgrave is set to marry a "higher-class" gentleman, but Warner wants to break it up. He spends much of the movie jealously obsessing over Redgrave and her lover. There's some madcap comedic sequences of him speeding around town on a bike in a gorilla suit and crashing the wedding, which is funny.

What's so interesting about this 1966 British film is that the lead character here is a communist and communist ideas are spoken of highly by characters, and rather non-chalantly. In American films, pro-communist dialogue was still not heard of much during this time period, when anti-communist films such as "Pickup on South Street" and "The Manchurian Candidate" were being made.

The film was never released on VHS, but was released on DVD in 2005. The DVD has a few good special features including a few versions of the trailer.

Vanessa's role is more of a supporting one to Warner's Morgan, but her performance left an impression with many that year for her to be nominated for Best Actress Academy Award (losing to Elizabeth Taylor in "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?").

Her sister Lynn Redgrave, also had a good year - her film "Georgy Girl" was a hit as well, and she too was nominated for Best Actress.

The official, UK title of this movie is Morgan: A Suitable Case for Treatment.

Read another review from The Magnificent 60s (blog)

Otto Preminger's Skidoo (1968) with Jackie Gleason, Groucho Marx

Michael Constantine and Jackie Gleason

This is a bizarre comedy that must be seen to be believed; it's so strange and trippy. And features some legendary performers you wouldn't expect to see in a movie with pot-smoking hippies and tripping on LSD.

Actors such as Mickey Rooney, George Raft, Frankie Avalon, Carol Channing, and Jackie Gleason. Gleason was memorable as Minnesota Fats in The Hustler and from his image from 1950s television, but in this movie he goes on a full-on acid trip, which is actually pretty funny. Groucho Marx is part of the trip too.

Not on DVD, not on video. I don't really even hear this film called a "cult classic", so it seems like a forgotten film.

It showed in Chicago in September 2007 at the Music Box theater (Part of a Otto Preminger series) and everyone in the theater seemed to enjoy it. A very unusual film from Preminger, who usually made more serious films.

The Big Cube (1969)

The Big Cube aired last month on TCM. Though I didn't think it was very good, it was worth watching to see Lana Turner in one of her last movie roles, and for the camp factor, as it features the psychedelic shenanigans of young hipsters of the late 60s, including George Chakiris.

Chakiris plays a womanizing med student who makes LSD in his spare time and shares it with his hipster, artsy friends. One of his friends introduces him to a lovely blond (Karin Mossberg) whose mother is an actress (Turner) and stepfather (Dan O'Herlihey) is rich and "loaded". The girl mixes in with the LSD crowd, and rebels against her parents.

 At first, the girl is called a "square" and a "cube" (hence the title "The Big Cube", also referring to LSD cubes). But she soon mixes in and marries Chakiris, for better or worse.

In the first 30-45 minutes or so, the cool kids are the good guys and the parents are the villians. But after awhile, this slowly changes and it ends on a clear anti-LSD note. I won't bother with details but if you see the movie, you'll get it. Poor George Chakiris - there's a scene near the end where he's struggling and slithering on the floor after a bad trip. And even Lana Turner trips out, too. You have to see it to believe it.

Movies from 50 Years Ago - 1963

I was curious to look up what movies were popular in American theaters 50 years ago this weekend - the weekend when American found out that President John F. Kennedy had been assassinated. 

My research led me to a Wikipedia page that listed each of the top weekend box-office champions and this entry from Mr. Pop Culture.

I was surprised to learn that the Top Box Office movie the weekend of November 22-24 1963 was a live-action Disney picture, The Incredible Journey about the adventures of two dogs and a cat. It's interesting that a family movie did rather well that weekend, when the news of JFK's assassination was on everyone's mind.

Also in theaters 50 years ago this weekend: 
It's A Mad, Mad, Mad Mad World  provided  comic relief.  Paul Newman was in a rom-com called A New Kind of Love and The VIPs featured Elizabeth Taylor. 

#	Weekend end date	Film	Box office
1	01963-01-06January 6, 1963	Lawrence of Arabia	$2,573,392
2	01963-01-13January 13, 1963	Lawrence of Arabia	$2,385,298
3	01963-01-20January 20, 1963	Lawrence of Arabia	$2,185,395
4	01963-01-27January 27, 1963	Lawrence of Arabia	$1,937,583
5	01963-02-03February 3, 1963	Lawrence of Arabia	$1,836,384
6	01963-02-10February 10, 1963	Lawrence of Arabia	$1,273,256
7	01963-02-17February 17, 1963	A Child Is Waiting	$2,261,732
8	01963-02-24February 24, 1963	How the West Was Won	$2,757,635
9	01963-03-03March 3, 1963	How the West Was Won	$2,385,924
10	01963-03-10March 10, 1963	How the West Was Won	$2,185,372
11	01963-03-17March 17, 1963	How the West Was Won	$1,683,845
12	01963-03-24March 24, 1963	How the West Was Won	$1,539,932
13	01963-03-31March 31, 1963	The Birds	$2,900,043
14	01963-04-07April 7, 1963	It Happened at the World's Fair	$2,472,533
15	01963-04-14April 14, 1963	Bye Bye Birdie	$2,385,822
16	01963-04-21April 21, 1963	Bye Bye Birdie	$2,175,483
17	01963-04-28April 28, 1963	Bye Bye Birdie	$1,382,578
18	01963-05-05May 5, 1963	Bye Bye Birdie	$945,382
19	01963-05-12May 12, 1963	Dr. No	$2,673,277
20	01963-05-19May 19, 1963	Dr. No	$2,374,294
21	01963-05-26May 26, 1963	Dr. No	$2,187,824
22	01963-06-02June 2, 1963	Hud	$2,562,844
23	01963-06-09June 9, 1963	The Nutty Professor	$2,472,573
24	01963-06-16June 16, 1963	Donovan's Reef	$2,583,578
25	01963-06-23June 23, 1963	Cleopatra	$2,735,387
26	01963-06-30June 30, 1963	Cleopatra	$2,572,922
27	01963-07-07July 7, 1963	The Great Escape	$2,743,673
28	01963-07-14July 14, 1963	Beach Party	$1,953,593
29	01963-07-21July 21, 1963	Cleopatra	$2,583,244
30	01963-07-28July 28, 1963	Cleopatra	$2,395,422
31	01963-08-04August 4, 1963	Cleopatra	$2,175,274
32	01963-08-11August 11, 1963	Gidget Goes to Rome	$2,382,891
33	01963-08-18August 18, 1963	Promises! Promises!	$2,371,522
34	01963-08-25August 25, 1963	Flipper	$2,175,355
35	01963-09-01September 1, 1963	Promises! Promises!	$1,947,372
36	01963-09-08September 8, 1963	Promises! Promises!	$932,683
37	01963-09-15September 15, 1963	Shock Corridor	$935,385
38	01963-09-22September 22, 1963	X	$1,736,924
39	01963-09-29September 29, 1963	The V.I.P.s	$2,735,385
40	01963-10-06October 6, 1963	Dementia 13	$2,382,582
41	01963-10-13October 13, 1963	The V.I.P.s	$2,391,381
42	01963-10-20October 20, 1963	Johnny Cool	$1,972,577
43	01963-10-27October 27, 1963	The V.I.Ps	$1,824,428
44	01963-11-03November 3, 1963	A New Kind of Love	$1,824,385
45	01963-11-10November 10, 1963	It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World	$2,826,573
46	01963-11-17November 17, 1963	It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World	$2,783,482
47	01963-11-24November 24, 1963	The Incredible Journey	$2,673,285
48	01963-12-01December 1, 1963	Fun in Acapulco	$2,427,572
49	01963-12-08December 8, 1963	Charade	$2,382,278
50	01963-12-15December 15, 1963	Charade	$2,184,293
51	01963-12-22December 22, 1963	Charade	$1,573,284
52	01963-12-29December 29, 1963	The Sword in the Stone	$2,742,466

Games (1967) starring Simone Signoret, James Caan, and Katherine Ross

Interesting trio of actors

It's a psychological thriller starring Simone Signoret, James Caan, and Katherine Ross. Any movie featuring those three actors really piques my interest. It's one of Caan's early roles. Prior to this movie he terrorized Olivia de Havilland in Lady in a Cage. 

Went to see a screening of this last week at the Music Box Theater, which showed it in 35 MM. The film opens with a neat credit sequence featuring an animated deck of cards. Caan and Ross play a wealthy married couple living in a 2-story New York townhome. The interior of the home is decorated with all kinds of art and arcade-type amusement games such as pinball machines. The couple play host to the kinds of parties that Andy Warhol might attend, and they amuse their guests with bizarre stunts and tricks.

I love this poster.
It seems to exclaim "SHOCKER!"

Character actor George Furth plays a hipster party guest with a 60's perm. He seems to be having a ball, while their housekeeper gleefully announces that she's leaving town on a three-week vacation. Whether or not she'll be back is anyone's guess. Then there is the grocery errand boy who has a crush on the lovely Katherine Ross. He pops in and out of the house at the most inconvenient of times.

Outshining every other performer is none other than the great Simone Signoret (Diabolique), who enters the young couple's lives one day, and soon, the "games" begin - mind games if you will. The kind that put those in Who's Afraid of Virgina Woolf to shame. Real guns are used, and there's real danger. To her, pinball games are mere child's play.

There are some plot twists that are better left unsaid so as to not spoil anything. I was really surprised at the outcome of everything, and wasn't expecting what was going to happen. A few of my theater companions found the movie predictable, as did Roger Ebert in his review of the film.  But for the most part, the film had me in suspense. One scene involves a cat who had me thinking it might do something that may or may not happen. You'll have to see the movie to find out.

A mind-bending thriller that you will not soon forget. Directed by Curtis Harrington.

Ladybug Ladybug (1963)

William Daniels playing a teacher 30 years before
he played one on television on Boy Meets World

"...a picture dedicated to life"

That's the tagline to this haunting anti-war film, which attempted to express on film how people were feeling about nuclear war at the time. The setting is a rural school that has frequent duck-and-cover drills. One day an alarm goes off; its color-coded light indicates a nuclear attack within an hour. The principal dismisses all of the children per protocol, even though no one is sure whether it's a malfunction or the real thing. The concept makes for a good, thrilling drama.

William Daniels, one of my favorite actors, plays the straight laced principal convincingly. Nancy Marchand is one of the teachers who is assigned to walk the pupils home, breaking her heels in the process. Along the way, one her music students says to another, "I'm a Soprano", which is kind of funny to a modern viewer who might be familiar with Ms. Marchand's work on the television show The Sopranos.

Estelle Parsons assures her frightened daughter that
if there really was going to be a nuclear attack,
they'd hear announcements on the radio.

In the meantime, the principal and the other school employees frantically try to connect with someone via the one telephone line in the building, but they keep getting busy signals (there was no voice mail back then) They also have no way of communicating any status updates with the other teachers who have left to walk the children home. This movie should really make you appreciate your cell phone, among other things.

The main focus of the film is on how the children react. As one child goes home, she's frightened to death; her down-to-earth mother (Estelle Parsons) tries to calm her senses. It's sad to see the little girl run to her room and hide under the bed with her fish in the fishbowl. Another group of students stick together in a shelter and argue amongst each other about war.

This film serves as another interesting time capsule of this period in history.

I didn't know what the title meant until I looked it up and found it was the title of a nursery rhyme which I was never familiar with it during my school days in the 1980s. I did recognize the monkey doll in one of the rooms to be Curious George; I did read and loved all those books.

Frank Sinatra in The Detective (1968)

I first watched this in 2005, curious to see Frank Sinatra play a detective in one of the very first R-rated movies (in the United States, "R" means - "Restricted to persons 18 years of age and over).

Frank plays a detective in this crime drama, but the tone of the movie feels like it's made for television. The French Connection had not yet come out.

Frank investigates a case where a homosexual is killed. He first inspects a room with a corpse...and takes notes of what he finds: "Male Caucasian. Lying nude on floor....Penis cut off...side of skull smashed in...cuts on face and chest...fingers shredded...semen stains on the sheets".  It's unusual to hear Frank Sinatra recite those lines.

In small roles are Jacqueline Bisset, Robert Duvall, Jack Klugman and Al Freeman Jr. ("Malcolm X").

There's some softer moments with his love interest, played by Lee Remick, but I wasn't convinced they were really interested in each other.

Duvall plays a tough cop who goes to a gay hangout to find a suspect, and then beats one of the suspects. Sinatra then calls him a miserable son-of-a-b-----.

There are strange moments like that throughout this film, which is otherwise unmemorable, and doesn't portray the gay community very positively. I was reminded of 1992 when there was alot of protest over similar crime films with gay suspects such as Basic Instinct and Silence of the Lambs.

This is probably a film that may be best enjoyed by fans of Frank Sinatra.

From 20th Century Fox films.

A Patch of Blue (1965)

This film is memorable for being one of the first films to tackle the subject of interracial couples (Sidney Poitier and Elizabeth Hartman). 

A touching element of the story is that Hartman is blind, and loves Sidney regardless of the color of his skin.

Shelley Winters plays her racist mother. She's so mean in this film that I didn't like her for a long time. Not until I saw her in The Diary of Anne Frank and The Poseidon Adventure. 

The performances are brilliant, as is the direction. I also enjoy the location shots on real city streets and in a real grocery store where you can see how low prices were back then. 

It is also a film that I think many can relate to, even in our modern times, because the characters are so familiar to real people that we likely know or have heard about. 

Every time I re-watch this movie, it just keeps getting better and better, and is one of those movies that really holds up well after so many years. 

Under the Yum Yum Tree (1963) starring Jack Lemmon

This movie - from 1963, same year as "Tom Jones" is a dated but interesting movie about American sexual morality in the early 60s. The basic message of the movie is, "yes, young people are starting to experiment with sex outside marriage, but it's better to get married before living together". Based on a moderately successful Broadway play of the same name, the film is about a young college couple (Carol Lynley and pre-Disney Dean Jones) who live together -unmarried of course- in landlord Jack Lemmon's apartment. Swinging bachelor Lemmon has a secret crush on Carol and - comically - eavesdrops in on the couple's conversations for kicks. Lemmon kind of reminds me of his character in "The Apartment"; but in this film he is more sex-crazed. He only rents to single young girls, and loves to hit on them all. His role is really a supporting one; the main character here is Carol Lynley, who is supposed to personify the liberal, sophisticated young 60s woman willing to experiment with co-habitation before marriage. Paul Lynde and Imogene Coca have supporting roles as the apartment building groundskeeper and his wife. Coca's character is cranky and judgmental about the ideas of young people living together. So here we have Carol Lynley, who is supposed to be so liberal and sophisticated, yet in the end, traditional morality wins out, after some stiff lectures by her female college professor (Edie Adams) about shacking up before marriage: living together properly means being married. So basically, Adams plays a socially conservative college professor, portrayed in this film a positive light. Kind of thing you don't see ever anymore in movies, is it? American culture has changed in 45 years, and this film is proof of that. The final scene with the talking cat is pretty funny.

Read Dawn's recent post on this movie at Noir Chick Flicks.

Michael's Movie Palace