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Cinema
by
Leonard Heldreth
Movements, miracles, music and other oddities
The films this month include two Academy Award winners and, at
the opposite end of the popularity spectrum, two independent films.
Milk
Gus Van Sant’s bio-pic of Harvey Milk (Sean Penn), from the
time he moved to San Francisco in 1972 to his assassination by
Dan White (Josh Brolin) in 1978, is an account of a shy New York
Jew’s growth into a very capable politician and gay rights
activist. The plot is well-known, and Van Sant, who alternates
between independent films like My Own Private Idaho and Paranoid
Park, and big productions like Good Will Hunting and Milk, is
an excellent director. The acting is solid across the board, with
many of the actors looking a lot like the people they play.
Penn deserved his Academy Award nomination and probably the win,
although I haven’t seen all the other films. Part of the
fun of the film, and of Penn’s performance, is watching Milk
make himself over as he realizes what it will take to get elected
in San Francisco. He drops his pony-tail, puts on a coat and tie,
cultivates the teamsters’ union, and, after losing three
elections, manages to be elected as an openly gay city official.
When his long-time lover indicates he can no longer share Milk
with his public, Milk chooses public service over repairing his
personal life. Diego Luna, in a major shift from his part in Mr.
Lonely, is effective as Milk’s new and confused Latino lover
in the latter part of the film. The crew and director captured
the look of San Francisco in all the aftermath of its flower-power
confusion and gay activism.
This is not a film that needs explanation, but with all the current
flap about gay marriage, it needs to be seen, even by those who
support gay rights. It’s an excellent film as well as a solid
history lesson. For those interested in a documentary on the same
material, see The Life and Times of Harvey Milk, a touchstone
for Van Sant’s film. Milk won Oscars for Best Actor and Best
Original Screenplay. Top
Mr. Lonely
Harmony Korine’s newest film, which he co-wrote with his
brother Avi, is a strange story that has to do with belief in
oneself and in others, and how that belief affects who we are
and who we become. The film alternates between two completely
separate narratives, one set on an island in Scotland and one
set in Panama.
The Panamanian story, shorter in length, follows the adventures
of Father Umbrillo (famous German director Werner Herzog) as he
flies his small plane about his parish distributing food and supplies
with the help of a group of nuns. During one flight, a nun falls
out, but, telling herself she can fly, she drifts down to the
ground—a miracle. This and other miracles lead to an invitation
to visit the Pope in Rome, and Father Umbrillo sets out near the
end of the film with his plane full of nuns to fly there, hoping,
as he puts it, to have a drink with the Pope—Father Umbrillo
is what was once called a “whiskey priest.”
The other story begins with a young man doing imitations of Michael
Jackson in the Paris streets and making enough money to live on
from coins tossed in the hat and an occasional performance at
an old folks home, hospital or wherever his agent can get him
a job. At one of these performances, he runs into Marilyn Monroe
(another impersonator played by Samantha Morton) and they become
friends; she invites him to come back with her to an island in
Scotland where her husband, Charlie Chaplin (Denis Lavant), and
her daughter, Shirley Temple (Esme Creed-Miles), live in a castle
with the Pope (James Fox), Madonna (Melita Morgan), Sammy Davis,
Jr. (Jason Pennycooke), Abraham Lincoln (Richard Strange), and
the Queen of England (Anita Pallenberg). Also in the castle are
Buckwheat from the All of these are imitators who have become
absorbed into their roles.
The various characters have a series of adventures, and they decide
to put on a show, a la Judy Garland and Mickey Rooney. They build
a ramshackle theatre and advertise the event, but when the performance
is given, it’s pretty bad, everyone gets depressed and problems
occur.
The plot is not the most interesting thing about the film. The
acting, quirky characters and gorgeous photography carry it, even
when the plot gets bogged down or strays off track. The imitators
are not very good, but just good enough to seem like people trying
to imitate these characters.
Mister Lonely is not a great film, but it’s a distinctly
offbeat, interesting one. If you are looking for something out
of the ordinary—Abraham Lincoln who spouts profanities or
photography that will linger, such as the slow-motion shots of
Michael on a child’s bike—this film is worth a look.
Top
Cadillac Records
Darnell Martin wrote and directed this brief look at the history
of Chess Records, undoubtedly the most important record label
in the history of blues, and, with Sun Records in Memphis, the
most important in the history of rock ’n’ roll. Her
picture of the people and times may seem a little incoherent at
times, but it’s probably more accurate than not, and the
music, performed by the actors, is solid.
In Chicago, after World War II, Leonard Chess (Adrien Brody) realizes
that “race” music and the blues will become a hot and
profitable commodity. He starts a club and then his own state-of-the-art
recording studio, Chess Records. He champions and launches the
careers of Muddy Waters, Little Walter, Howlin’ Wolf, Bo
Diddley, Chuck Berry and Etta James, among others. Chess obviously
exploits his artists, giving them Cadillacs to celebrate their
successes (hence the film’s title), but concealing the financial
statements. On the other hand, he genuinely seems to care for
them, and without his mentorship and knowledge of the record business,
many of them would not have been successful.
Most of the film is, as they say, “based on real events,”
but there are some significant omissions and additions. Left out,
except for a scene in the DVD outtakes, is Leonard’s brother
Phil, who was instrumental in running the business and who still
is alive. Also left out is any reference to Bo Diddley, who, together
with Waters and Wolf, anchored the blues for Chess. The additions
are equally curious: the relationship between Chess and James
seems to be a fabrication to add some romantic interest, and Etta’s
story about her father being pool player Minnesota Fats seems
to have little to back it up except her mother’s memory of
a customer. The history of popular music is full of myths masquerading
as facts, and the bio-pics dealing with these figures, e.g., Loretta
Lynn, Ray Charles, Johnny Cash, tend to compress the ordinary
parts of these lives and exploit the melodramatic. Cadillac Records
is no different in that respect, and it has the usual clichés
of infidelity, drug and alcohol abuse, breakdowns and recoveries,
and, to up the ante, race relations.
The major structural difference between this film and most bio-pics
is that it focuses on the life of a recording studio instead of
an individual, and therefore, the music and acting cover a broader
range. For example, James doesn’t show up until the last
third of the film. Some reviewers, of course, complained about
the film’s “haphazard” structure, but the director
was clearly interested in showing the period and the individuals
that moved through this studio, not in giving a definitive film
biography of even the major players.
The film is full of fine acting. Brody portrays Chess as a man
who both uses and advances his musicians. As Howlin’ Wolf
points out to Muddy Waters at one point, “His job is to make
money off of you,” a stance to which Wolf had accommodated
himself. Of course, Wolf, who grew up illiterate, took accounting
classes after he became successful so he could track his own finances,
and died comfortably well off. On the other hand, Willy Dixon
sued the Chess estate and collected more than a million dollars
in back royalties.
Jeffrey Wright, one of the finest and most versatile actors working
today, plays Muddy Waters, successfully capturing the man, his
pompadour and his music; it is interesting to watch Waters carefully
develop his image as he moves from share-cropper to successful
musician. Columbus Short embodies harmonica player Little Walter
in all his self-destructive talent, and Mos Def captures Chuck
Berry’s duck-walk and his musical stances. Most surprising
is Beyoncé Knowles as Etta James; she drops the glamorous
diva pose and belts out James’ numbers with raw feeling.
She also manages to hold her own with the other actors.
The most difficult character to portray is Howlin’ Wolf,
a muscular six-foot-four man who could pick most men up and shake
them like a dog would a toy. Bonnie Rait says Wolf was the sexiest
man she ever saw, and others testified to his magnetism. When
he walked into a room with those size-14 feet, everybody just
backed away and shut up. Eamonn Walker, although only six-one
and slender, manages to capture some of Wolf’s danger when
he comes into the studio and baits Muddy Waters; his voice is
a good imitation of Wolf’s growl.
Cadillac Records is an entertaining though superficial history
of the blues in Chicgao in the ’40s and ’50s. It’s
full of good acting, good music and good drama. Who cares if it’s
not completely accurate? Top
Slumdog MIllionaire
British director Danny Boyle seems to thrive on constantly trying
something new, and while he sometimes fails, when he succeeds,
he does it by invigorating material and a genre that would have
seemed unusual for him. His first film, Trainspotting, focused
on young drug addicts in Scotland, and brought Ewan MacGregor
to the world’s attention.
His film Millions, about young boys discovering a bag of money,
managed to keep a positive note and an upbeat ending while conveying
the fear of children menaced by ruthless adults; he also managed
to avoid the sentimentality that often undercuts films about children.
28 Days Later virtually reinvented the zombie film, and Sunlight
combined state-of-the-art special effects and a humanistic point
of view to create a film that balanced self-sacrifice with an
upbeat ending. Each of these films possesses qualities that lead
directly to Slumdog Millionaire, yet this most recent film is
different in a variety of ways from anything Boyle has done before.
The screenwriter is Simon Beaufoy, whose previous films include
The Full Monty and Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day, while the original
source is Vikas Swarup’s popular novel, Q&A. While putting
such versatile professionals together doesn’t always guarantee
great results, in this case they complement each other, and the
result is a very polished and entertaining film.
Boyle’s title, while perhaps referencing his earlier film
Millions, also puts the emphasis on the game show aspect of the
story in a way the novel’s title did not, and thus he cleverly
downplays the fact that this is a very familiar story about boy-loves-girl,
boy-loses-girl, boy-overcomes-great obstacles-to-win-girl again.
Eighteen-year-old Jamal (Dev Patel and two younger actors) has
loved Latika (Freida Pinto and two younger actors) since they
were children. Their constant companion, until he succumbs to
a life of crime, is Jamal’s brother, Salim (played by Madhur
Mittal and two younger actors), who both obstructs and encourages
Jamal’s love for Latika. Over the ten-year period during
which the children grow up (hence the need for three actors for
each of the major roles), they are separated several times, and
Jamal ends up on the game show, “Who Wants to be Millionaire?”
essentially to find Latika.
The ingenuity of the plot is its structure. It begins in medias
res just before he is to answer the final question. Because the
police think Jamal, being an ignorant “slumdog,” couldn’t
possibly know the answers he gives on the quiz show, they interrogate
him the night before the final show, and the film gives us his
life in flashback as he answers their questions.
The other clever twist that Boyle has given this traditional story
is to set it in India, an exotic location for most of the English-speaking
audience. He exploits this location in a variety of ways. The
gorgeous photography makes even the squalid slums of Mombai (formerly
Bombay) glow in bright colors, and a scene involving an open sewer
recalls the famous scene in Trainspotting in which MacGregor tries
to retrieve some drugs he has accidentally dropped down the toilet.
Other scenes in India could have come straight from a tourist
documentary. There’s even a very funny sequence, with Boyle
himself as a tourist, at the Taj Mahal. The director uses the
poverty and squalor of Mombai to capture scenes that could have
come straight from Dickens—a group of children organized
into being professional beggars and the crippling of some of them
to make them more pathetic. The social layers of India with its
extreme poverty and extreme wealth, and its professional criminals,
also reflect nineteenth century London, and India’s contrast
of hi-tech industries and low-tech living conditions adds a contemporary
gloss to this traditional story. Boyle also moves the narrative
so quickly that the audience doesn’t have time to question
the coincidences, another familiar quality of Dickens. In addition
to the excellent photography, the film has Boyle’s trademark
rapid editing, and two of the songs in the film were nominated
for an Academy Award. Be sure to watch the Bollywood dance number
as the credits roll.
Slumdog Millionaire was much better than I expected it to be,
although I usually like Boyle’s films. Its feel-good quality
is balanced by a realistic view of a world that is usually unfair
and often vicious, as Jamal is reminded when he meets his former
friend who had been blinded to make him a better beggar.
As in his earlier films, Boyle emphasizes the importance of luck;
here luck appears in the questions that Jamal is asked, but Boyle
also conceals it as fate, or, as the film says at the end, “It
is written.” Given the current economic situation, two on-going
wars, global warming, possible pandemics and other menaces, we
could use more of the realistic but upbeat view Boyle’s films
provide.
The Motion Picture Academy certainly thought so by awarding the
film eight Oscars—for Best Picture, Best Director, Best Song,
Best Music, Best Editing. Best Sound Mixing, Best Photography
and Best Adapted Screenplay. As the Academy has indicated, Slumdog
Millionaire is a very professional film. Except for some subtitled
Hindi in the earlier part of the film, Slumdog is in English.
Top
—Leonard G. Heldreth
Editor’s Note: All films reviewed are available on DVD or
VHS from local stores.
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