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


 

Ben-Hur (1959) and seeing it on a big screen

This past April I went to see Ben Hur at the Pickwick Theater in Park Ridge IL. I tried to imagine myself as a film goer of 1959 seeing this up on the screen for the first time. The lavish sets and cinematography really are nothing but impressive. Experiencing that chariot race again reminded me that none of it was done with CGI.

The Pickwick Theater in Park Ridge, Illinois opened in 1928

"Ben-Hur" started at 7 PM, and left the theater at about 11 PM

Now Showing: "Ben Hur". 

I've always been curious about the film's subtitle "A Tale of the Christ". This subtitle made a bit more sense to me on this rewatch, seeing how the entire film leads up to the final miracle of Christ.  In the Bible a number of Christ's miracles are mentioned, including healings; what's not told are the life stories of those people that were healed, such as the blind man for example. This movie is an attempt to dramatize one of those families touched by the Christ. 

Midway (1976)

Midway was shown on American network television in June of 1992, and I remember watching it and really enjoying the battle scenes, and learning a little about the battle of Midway.

Toshiro Mifune plays Japanese Admiral Yamamoto and Henry Fonda plays American Admiral Chester Nimitz. The battle is planned and executed.

There is a subplot involving American naval captain Charlton Heston and his son played by Edward Albert, whose girlfriend is Japanese. The interracial romance was reflective of the times and relevant to the audiences of the 1970s but otherwise the film isn't  too remarkable.

It's an all star cast, so if you know your classic movie stars, you can play the game "Oh look it's .....". James Coburn, Glenn Ford, Robert Wagner, Dabney Coleman, Pat Morita, Erik Estrada, Robert Mitchum, Hal Holbrook, Tom Seleck, Cliff Robertson and more.

Read another review from the blog Mike's Take on Movies here. 

The Ten Commandments (1956)

Really should have been titled, "The Life of Moses", as it essentially is, from his very birth to his death.

It is a fine effort of Cecil B. Demille to remake his own silent film of Moses over 30 years earlier.

 The music score is memorable, and most of the scenes in the movie are filmed as if they are paintings.

 DeMille apparently disliked the Cinemascope/widescreen process, and never did a widescreen film.

The visual optical effects are impressive for the time: scenes of miracles such as the burning bush, staffs turning into snakes, and the parting of the sea earned the film an Oscar for Best Visual Effects.

Charlton Heston, in the role he is most remembered for, plays Moses as a young man and old who leads the Israelites out of captivity from Egypt and into the Promised Land of Israel.

The rest of the cast includes Anne Baxter, Edward G. Robinson, Yvonne De Carlo, Debra Paget, John Derek, Cedric Hardwicke, Nina Foch, Martha Scott, Judith Anderson, Vincent Price, John Carradine, Woody Strode.

Oscar Flashback: 60th Annual Awards Ceremony (1988) with Olivia de Havilland, Joan Fontaine and more

It was a memorable Oscar show 22 years ago at the milestone 60th annual ceremony. The Academy invited lots of Hollywood royalty to the LA Shrine Auditorium that hot April day in 1988: Paul Newman, Gregory Peck, and Audrey Hepburn, just to name a few. There was supposed to be a huge "year by year" salute toward the end, kind of like how they did it for the 70th and 75th Oscars show, but the whole segment flopped, which I'll explain further in a minute.

Among the legends who were invited: Olivia deHavilland and Joan Fontaine. Yep. That's right: Joan and Olivia! Did the famously feuding sisters get along? Did they speak? Hmmm... What really happened that night?



Well, for one, they both arrived separately.

According to the book, "Inside Oscar" by Mason Wiley and Damien Bona:

Rebecca's Joan Fontaine managed to arrive on time without the help of the Academy's escort-who never materialized-but her sister wasn't so lucky. Olivia had to hop out of her car and hike 10 blocks in order to be there to hand out an award. Robert Osborne recounted that "She and others were all dressed to the nines, hurrying off to a ga-ga glmaour event while rushing past taco stands, donut shops, and gawking onlookers, the latter munching on hot dogs and cradling babies, surprised at the unexpected passerby. Sigh!

Recently, I acquired a copy of the entire taped broadcast, and was able to watch it again (I remember watching it live back in 1988, but I didn't know who all the celebrities were back then). Screenshots of the best moments from the show are below below.





Totally '80s moment: Patrick Swayze appeared with his Dirty Dancing co-star Jennifer Grey to present an award.











PS. I heard that the long anticipated Wall Street sequel is coming out soon.









Below: This was one of the most bizarre stunts of the evening. Some guy dressed as Robocop pretended to shoot another robot on stage who started to attack Pee Wee Herman. We then see Pee Wee jumping up 50 feet in the air (on wires) and "hanging" from the rafters, while Robo saves the day. Another totally 80s moment.



Below: Liza and Dudley present the Best Song nominees. Before each preformed song, they sang some old fashioned tunes devoted to the art and craft of-songwriting. These ditties (with Dudley on piano) just didn't seem to fit with the more modern, up-tempo rock songs that were preformed, but it was nice to see them back together again!



Below: Ahh, a time when hit songs that people actually liked and could hum along to were nominated for Best Song:




While I was doing research on the 60th ceremony, I found some photographs taken by photographer Alan Light, who, back in '88 was lucky enough to score a ticket from a friend to the event; he took awesome pictures on the red carpet and even got some photos with some of the stars (photos used with permission). Check them out:







According to the book "Inside Oscar" by Mason Wiley and Damien Bona:

The Academy, for the milestone "60th Anniversary" ceremony, was planning a grand segment meant to air toward the end of the program.

It was supposed to be a salute to all 60 of the past Oscar winning years. Supposedly, the Academy invited at least one cast member from an Oscar winning film from each year (1927-1987), and they would appear on stage and on camera for a brief moment as each year and film would be introduced one by one.

But the "Year by Year" segment flopped. Shortly before air time, legendary silent/20s/30s actress Anita Page (age 77) was so overcome with heat exhaustion that she collapsed as she approached the red carpet. She was rushed to a local hospital and treated.



Thankfully, Ms Page was OK after awhile, but her absence left a void in the "Year by Year" presentation. Apparently she was the only person there to represent the year 1928 (The Broadway Melody) So the producers of the show scrapped the segment at the last minute.

As a consolation, the director made sure the cameras picked up a few glimpses of some of the recognizable stars throughout the night, so viewers were able to at least see Mercedes McCambridge (All The King's Men, 1949), Celeste Holm (All About Eve, 1950), Charlton Heston (Ben Hur, 1959), and Burt Lancaster (From Here to Eternity, 1953), even for just a few seconds.

Other legends were there in the audience, such as Roddy McDowall (How Green Was My Valley, 1941) and Robert Stack (Written on the Wind, 1956), but sadly, they didn't get any screen time, not even a reaction shot. I'm sure there were more stars present, but I just don't know who.

Below are some cool reaction shots that the director picked up on camera. Sadly, the ones who did make it on camera didn't get a credit, but I've provided the names myself!




Above: The leading man from the first Picture winner Wings (1927).









Above: Ms. Fontaine is not amused with Chevy Chase's unfunny monologue.

According to the aforementioned book Inside Oscar, Joan became a little impatient towards the end of the ceremony, and was wondering when it was time for her appearance onstage. Reportedly she was sitting very close to Roddy McDowell, and at one point turned to him as asked, "When do we go on?" "Later Later" he assured Rebecca's second Mrs. deWinter.

Apparently a number of the stars were never told that the segment was cancelled, nor that Anita Page was hospitalized.

Joan wasn't asked to present (either that or she refused), but her sister was invited to present the Oscar for Art Direction and she accepted. Olivia's appearance was within the first hour of the ceremony, right after Olympia Dukakis won the Oscar for Best Supporting Actress Moonstruck.






Olivia walked onstage to "Tara's Theme". There was a standing ovation. The television cameras didn't get a shot of Joan; so viewers couldn't tell if she was standing or sitting during the ovation.






Olivia presented the award for Best Art Direction; the winners were the team from The Last Emperor.



Below: Towards the end of the evening, Audrey Hepburn and Gregory Peck took to the stage to present the writing awards. There was another standing ovation for them.



Below: Paul Newman presented Cher with her Oscar for Moonstruck.



It's too bad the "Oscar-Year-by-Year" segment flopped. It might have been cool. The Academy tried again for the the 70th and 75th ceremonies, but they invited all Oscar recipients of acting awards, and it didn't matter what year they represented. They were introduced alphabetically.

Postscript:

No, there was no reunion between Olivia de Havilland and her sister Joan Fontaine that night. It's possible that the last time the two sisters were in the same building together. According to the book "Inside Oscar", Joan was upset about the segment being cancelled, and that she didn't receive any screen time other than one split-second reaction shot. She reportedly vowed to never return to another Oscars ceremony which explains her absence from the 70th and 75th anniversary tributes.

However, at the end of the evening, all of the night's Oscar winners, presenters, performers, and legends were invited to come up to the stage to basically just stand there and wave while the credits rolled. With all the credits scrolling up, you could hardly make out who was on stage. Enjoy one more photo from Alan Light from inside the auditorium at the end of the show:

Airport (1970) and its crappy sequels (though the original wasn't so great, either)

Airplane from 1970 the first in a line of popular "disaster films" from the 70s, but was not seen as such upon first release.

The movie was based on a novel, and was treated as a serious  drama-thriller at the time, with distinguished actors such as Helen Hayes and Maureen Stapleton as ill-fated passengers.

The film itself was nominated for 10 Academy Awards, including Best Picture. (Ms Hayes won Best Supporting Actress as an elderly, clever stowaway). Dean Martin was miscast as the plane's pilot, but he's fairly tame in his performance, thankfully. (No drinking). The movie gets interesting when a lunatic (Van Heflin) threatens to blow up the plane with a bomb he brings aboard. This was parodied in the movie "Airplane 2: The Sequel" (1982). 

The movie is sappy and long, and is probably best watched having a certain context and frame of reference.



The next movie in the series was the less-than-creatively titled Airport 1975, featuring another all star fest, and trying to bank on the popularity of the recent disaster films "Earthquake" and "Towering Inferno".

This time Charlton Heston is the man to save the day. Helen Reddy plays a singing nun and Linda Blair is a child in need of an organ transplant. These characters were later lampooned in 1980's Airplane! Gloria Swanson also appears, in her last film.

The blog Cult Movie Reviews recently posted a synopsis of this terrible film. I'm so thankful another blogger watched the movie and has written about it...so I don't have to.





 
These next films are so awful, despite having some huge names in the cast. It's amazing to me why these films were made - were the filmmakers sadistic?  The first Airport movie was a success, followed by Airport 1975, but they probably should have stopped there.

In Airport '77 (funny how the "19" in "1977" was cut from the title), Jack Lemmon saves the day, and stopping by for cameos are Jimmy Stewart and Olivia DeHavilland.

Did they need the money?

Fortunately, Jimmy is only in one or two scenes. Probably the lowest point in his filmography.

Finally, we have The Concorde: Airport 79 a disaster (pun intended) starring Robert Wagner.

Arbor Day Commercial / Plant A Tree! Listen to a 1995 radio ad w/ classic stars

I remember first hearing this on the radio years ago, and loved hearing these stars' voices: Charlton Heston, Eddie Albert, John Denver, and Lloyd Bridges. Who knew some of them were environmentalists? Sadly, they are all gone now. But the trees live on.

I love when Lloyd Bridges when he says, "Is there anything as marvelous as trees?"

LISTEN NOW

Visit the organization's website for more information.