Well, dear readers, it’s the countdown to our annual Rockin’ New Year’s Eve Do, a completely interactive online affair. It’s the best and safest New Year’s Do in the world and I, for one, am looking forward to it very much. I shall make lots of interactive food, and we shall have interactive dancing and the whole thing will just be too too. I do hope that many of you will be in attendance. I know I will be. Speaking of attendance, yesterday was a very peaceful day. I slept till ten, jogged, then packaged up a few orders. After a while, I went to the postal office, where there were exactly 0 people in line. I was in and out in just a few minutes, and then I went home and sat on my couch like so much fish. I ate some small foodstuffs from Gelson’s, then made a few ounces of spaghetti so I could use up the rest of my sauce. That was the sort of day it was – relaxing, nothing much happening, and just what I wanted and needed, not necessarily in that order.
Yesterday I watched several things on DVD, beginning with the TCM documentary about Louise Brooks (included as an extra on the Pandora’s Box DVD). It wasn’t that well done, but had some interesting things in it. After that, I watched a motion picture on DVD entitled The Black Dahlia, a film by Brian de Palma from the novel by James Ellroy. I was really looking forward to it, until I read the disastrous reviews – when every review basically says the same thing you know something is awry. Of course, that didn’t stop the usual suspects from shouting to the heavens that it was yet another misunderstood de Palma masterpiece. Note to usual suspects – Mr. de Palma has made no masterpieces, if you ask me. He is, for me, one of the worst filmmakers in the world because he simply has no originality whatsoever – everything is a homage to Hitchcock or some other filmmaker. He used to deny it, but basically freely admits to it these days. He’s certainly a competent technician, but he has made a string of some of the most awful films ever from someone who’s perceived as a major filmmaker. I’m sad to say that the reviews were kind to The Black Dahlia. I was not quite prepared for how inept and really bad it is. There is not a single worthwhile thing in the entire film. The storytelling ranges from incoherent to boring, the production design (and CGI) gets most of the details right but they don’t feel organic at all – they feel like production design. Contrast that with Richard Sylbert’s brilliant production design for Chinatown, where it all feels perfect and organic and never feels like it was done just for the movie. Mr. de Palma and his cameraman, Vilmos Zsigmond, make the usual ridiculous choice of draining the color from the image because it’s a “period piece” – note to director and cameraman – LA was not sepia in the 40s. LA was a full color town (again, see Chinatown for a film that gets it perfect). So, shoot the movie in black-and-white or color – don’t make it look like one of those bad Warners transfers of a 60s film. The screenplay is convoluted, filled with some amazingly risible dialogue (I mean laugh out loud risible, especially in the last fifteen minutes), and, as I said, is incoherent most of the time. And then there are the actors – I have been saying for some time that this is a generation of actors without charisma, personality, or even much acting ability. It is a generation of whispering actors (as if that were “real”), angst-ridden actors, self-obsessed actors, and self-aware actors. Some acting teacher somewhere is responsible for this rotten state of affairs. And put these people in a period piece? Well, it’s laughable watching Josh Hartnett and Aaron Eckhart trying to look comfortable in their fedoras and 40s togs. In fact, they look like high school acting students acting roles for which they are not suited. Mr. Hartnett especially should have actually watched some 40s noir to see how actors moved and talked – they certainly didn’t move and talk like petulant little twenty-somethings. Scarlett Johansson seems to get worse with every film (one of my favorite things on the DVD are the trailers for Focus Films – they have one for Scoop, where the narrator intones “The new mystery from the director of Match Point” – that’s how you want to sell a Woody Allen film, all right), and she, too, looks like a child playing grown up. The love scene between her and Josh Hartnett is one of those tearing the clothes off and throwing the girl on the dining room table things and I just howled with laughter and then threw my shoe at the TV. Hilary Swank is doing her own movie – her accent is unique and seems to come from no known country, and her role is a complete waste of time. The character actors have no personalities either – they are just wallpaper – we have no character actors anymore, not like the old days. And then there’s Mark Isham’s Chinatown-wannabe score, which starts off with music that sounds like it should be accompanying Attila the Hun, then transmogrifies into a soulful trumpet. Like most of today’s scores, it just lays on top of the film like a sponge, but never gets inside the film or the characters like Jerry Goldsmith’s Chinatown. Mr. Goldsmith didn’t have a soulful trumpet just to have one – it meant something. The transfer is excellent and replicates the silly sepia look of the film perfectly. All in all, a complete and utter failure in every way.
I then had to watch something good, so I chose Robert Wise’s film, Somebody Up There Likes Me, the story of Rocky Graziano, starring Mr. Paul Newman, Miss Pier Angeli, Miss Eileen Heckart, Mr. Harold Stone, Mr. Sal Mineo, Mr. Steve McQueen (unbilled), Mr. Robert Loggia, Mr. Everett Sloane and many other fine actors. I saw the film when it came out and loved it. I haven’t actually seen it since. I’ve tried to watch it on a couple of occasions, but have not wanted to because of the absolutely wretched title song sung by Perry Como that plays over the film’s main titles. I have, in the past, just shut it off because of that disastrous way of starting the film. This time I slogged on and am I glad I did, especially after watching such a disgusting waste of celluloid like The Black Dahlia. Robert Wise was a real director – someone who knew his craft, didn’t copy others, knew how to cast a film, and didn’t show off, but served his material. And then there’s the material, the screenplay – a REAL screenplay by the marvelous Ernest Lehman. A screenplay filled with wonderful scenes, great dialogue, strong structure, and real cleverness. A cast of actors and character actors who have voices and faces and who don’t whisper and who aren’t poseurs. Mr. Newman has a difficult task and he pulls it off splendidly (the character of Mr. Graziano is so unlikable in the film’s first third that one can imagine hating any of today’s actors who’d be cast) – Mr. Newman has the bravado and charisma to make you understand the guy and root for him. Miss Angeli is lovely, and everyone does a great job. The boxing scenes are fantastic and never become boring. The transfer is very nice.
What am I, Ebert and Roeper all of a sudden? Don’t we have to click on the Unseemly Button below before this becomes the longest first half of the notes in history?
Today will be a bittersweet day, for today is the last day of business for Heavy Rotation, my local DVD store. I am truly saddened that they’re closing their doors forever. They’ll still be buying and selling, and I and a few other loyal customers will get first dibs on all the DVDs they get early, so that part is nice. I’m bringing a cake to the wake, and I’ll probably hang out there for a few hours.
I have another few orders to ship (so much for not shipping until after the first of the year), otherwise, I’ll just be taking it easy again. I have a lunch or dinner tomorrow, and a lunch on Friday, but I think those are the only things I have planned.
Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must, for example, jog, attend the wake, bring a cake, and watch DVDs all the livelong day and night. Today’s topic of discussion: And so we begin out 10 best of 2006 lists – what were your 10 favorite movies of 2006? Also, it’s Ask BK Day, so you can also ask me or any dear reader any old question you like and we can give any old answer we like. So, let’s have loads of lovely questions and loads of lovely answers and loads of lovely postings, shall we, as we begin our countdown to our Rockin’ New Year’s Eve Do.