The Siren of the Tropics (1927)

Directed by Mario Nalpas and Henri Étiévant
Starring Josephine Baker, Pierre Batcheff and Régina Dalthy

Andre Berval is a man with a problem.

He's in love with a beautiful woman named Denise, but unbeknownst to him, his employer and her godfather has designs on the young woman.

The villainous boss dispatches Berval to the Antilles under the pretext of surveying some land.  In reality, it's part of a not-so-elaborate plot for another employee named Alvarez to remove Berval from the romantic equation.

Complicating matters is a young native girl in Antilles named Papitou.  How does she complicate things?  First, she falls for Berval and those feelings put her into a position to save him on more than one occasion.  Second, Papitou is played by Josephine Baker and the movie becomes really uninterested in the original love triangle as it recognizes this side character has star power.

Can the rest of the cast wrest control back from the talent that is Baker?  And will we even care who Berval chooses in the end?  (Spoiler: The answer to both questions is "no.")

I'm torn.

The Siren of the Tropics is a directionless mess.  On the one hand, it wants to be about a young couple in love whose blossoming romance is threatened in its cradle by the woman's godfather.  The villain is infatuated with her and will resort to anything to keep them apart.  But the film's eye is constantly wandering away from that central conflict, which could be frustrating.

However, the source of the film's distraction is Papitou, the character played by the extraordinary Josephine Baker.

Honestly, any director worth his salt would have made the same decision.  The other characters in the film are staid and boring.  Papitou is life and energy.  The other characters sit in chairs and contemplate their next scheme or love.  Papitou jumps onto the chair, the desk, random pieces of furniture.  If you were casually watching all of these folks wander through life, your eye would be drawn to her too.

Of course, once the film focuses its attention on her, it has no idea what to do with her.  One moment she is showing off her agility escaping from Alvarez.  Next we see her dancing.  Then she's pratfalling all over a ship bound for France.  More dancing.  Saving her unreciprocated lover.  It's dizzying.

The force of Baker's personality stands out, but it's not hard to differentiate yourself when you are surrounded by an assembly of milquetoast characters.  It's honestly pretty puzzling why Papitou would fall for Pierre Batcheff's Andre Berval; she spends half the movie saving him.  Berval and Denise are perfect for one another as neither one has any personality to get in the way of their relationship.

The Siren of the Tropics is notable for Baker's authoritative arrival on the silver screen.  Sadly it's in a dud of a movie.  Her turn as a supporting character takes over the film and almost saves it.  But only almost.

** out of *****

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It (1927)

Cyrus trying to ignore the It-ness of Betty

Directed by Clarence G. Badger and Josef von Sternberg
Starring Clara Bow, Antonio Moreno and William Austin
Produced by Famous Players-Lasky Corporation and Paramount Pictures


Betty Lou Spence is one in a seemingly endless stream of employees at the local department store.  The women (and they all appear to be women) work under the supervision of the men (and the bosses are all men).  When Betty Lou and her coworkers aren't arguing about the store's return policy with their customers, they are ogling the owner of the store Cyrus Waltham.

Of course, Betty Lou isn't exactly like the other employees. You see, she has "It."

What is "It"?  It is basically a kind of natural magnetism that allows the owner to attract members of the other sex.  Cyrus has it.  And Betty Lou has it.

Or so we are told.  Cyrus doesn't seem to notice Betty, but his best friend Monty picks up on "It."  Betty is after Cyrus, but is willing to go out on a date with Monty as long as it gets her into the same restaurant as her real target.  Once Betty and Cyrus lock eyes in the restaurant, it's over. They fall for one another immediately.

Unfortunately, there is still an hour left to the movie so we need some obstacles to them ending up together.  Like Betty slapping Cyrus for kissing her on the first date.  Or Cyrus mistakenly believing Betty is a single mom (her roommate really is).  Or Cyrus being sort of, almost engaged to another woman.

Can they hurdle all of the obstacles or will "It" come between them?

Gorgeous and funny

It is the cotton candy of silent film, filled with sugar and air.  I know it's not good for me, but damn if I can't stop eating it.

The plot rotates around this contrivance that people have "It." Monty plays the role of "It" judge, rating each person according to their It-ness.  Every woman wants Cyrus, but once Monty pegs Betty as having It, there is only one way the plot can go.

I mention obstacles and most of them are pretty mindless.  After a fun date at an amusement park, Cyrus pecks Betty on the cheek and she slaps him and rushes off in a huff.  It seems way out of character, and sure enough, the moment she's back in her apartment, she's gleefully reenacting the kiss with a stuffed animal.

Then there is the whole mistaken baby thing.  Betty's roommate Molly has a newborn (who looks to be going on 2 years old), but the mother is also recovering from an illness.  One day, some women show up to take the child to a home because Molly is sick and doesn't have a job or a husband. Betty steps in and claims the child is hers (which is better because she has a job and is healthy).  Never mind that the job would mean she's not around to care for the baby.  Somehow that's an improvement.

Monty of course overhears Betty's claims that she's an unwed mother and informs Cyrus, who responds by... offering to take Betty on as his mistress?  Really?

Betty is so mad she hatches a revenge plot that includes seducing Cyrus into proposing to her so she can laugh in his face.  She carries out the plan and when the moment comes?  She actually laughs in his face.  She feels bad afterward, but still...

I know I'm focusing on the flaws, but the movie skips over them so quickly you hardly notice. The actors make you buy every moment. Clara Bow is incredible as Betty she has this independent streak that makes her stand out from the crowd.  Between her styling her own dress and taking the prim and proper Cyrus to an amusement park, Bow is now enshrined in my manic-pixie-dream-girl hall of fame.

William Austin = Comedy Gold

The other real cast standout is William Austin as Monty.  He makes you by the "It" in It. Monty is a heap of nervous tics and wide eyed stares and Austin is hysterical throughout.  Even when the serious moments threaten to weigh down the film, one fevered look from him and you know you are still firmly rooted in a comedy.  It's a ridiculous and over-the-top performance, but the movie needs him around.

As I said, I loved this movie.  Bow is another on my must watch list now, as is Austin.  It never goes for melodrama, preferring to keep things light and strike just the right tone.  If this were being made today it would probably be a sitcom, but I'm glad we have this caliber of cast supporting this material.

****1/2out of *****

NOTES:

• Yes, that was THE Gary Cooper in an almost nothing role as a newspaper reporter.
• Ever heard the expression "It Girl"? Thank this movie for that.
• Finally, I just have to point out the amusement park in this.  One of the rides is a big turntable that you sit on until it speeds up enough to send you flying off of it.  Another was this bridge that bucked worse than a rodeo bull.  And finally, park attendees are getting thrown around inside this rotating barrel.  It looked more like an episode of Wipeout than an amusement park.

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Formative Experience: 10 Years Ago...

Today's post is not movie-related.  At all.  It's my own experience of a day that frankly everyone has their own story about.  So here is mine and it takes place ten years ago, less than a mile from the Pentagon...

I awoke Tuesday morning September 11, 2001 in the Sheraton hotel in Arlington, VA.  I was there for a conference so I dressed, went downstairs to grab a quick bite, and then parked myself in the lobby.  The first speaker of the day was a U.S. Department of Energy speaker I had heard a couple of times so rather than hear the same talking points again, I opened my laptop and got caught up on some work.

I wasn't there long before I heard a couple of the hotel staff talking.  One of them said, "Somebody flew a plane into the Empire State Building."  They also mentioned that people were watching it on the TV in the bar, so I finished what I was doing and walked down to see it for myself.

One look at the screen and I realized the building was not the Empire State Building but one of the World Trade Center towers.  The image was of smoke billowing out.  The sound on the television was muted so the information was somewhat limited.  The people gathered around engaged in idle speculation about what happened.  A fire.  A bomb.  A small passenger plane.

Then we saw the video of the plane flying into the tower.  

At first, we thought it was a replay of image CNN had gotten from somewhere else.  Then one of the people crowded next to me pointed out that both towers were smoking.  A minute later the sound was on and the scope of what was happening became clear.  We all stood for minutes trying to comprehend the enormity of it all.

I hurried down to the ballroom where a couple of my colleagues were listening to a speaker and filled them in on what was happening.  

As I was walking between the ballroom and the bar, a sound like thunder reverberated through the lobby.  A few people ran outside.  I followed.

Flames and smoke were obscuring the side of the Pentagon.  People around me were cursing.  The emotions ran from anger and confusion to terror and horror.  At first, it was unclear whether the plane had actually hit the building or crashed in front of it.  It only took a few moments before the scene cleared enough to see that part of the building was gone.  After some time staring numbly at what used to be the wall of the Pentagon, I went back inside.  

The conference at that point was effectively over.  Most people were milling around the lobby, wandering in and out of the building to view the carnage.  One of my friends from another state had been on the top floor of the hotel for a session.  He told me that the entire building swayed from the force of the airplane as it flew low over the hotel before hitting the Pentagon.

Another friend and I ran up to our hotel room to watch the TV and call our families.  As I walked that hallway, I saw the image that more than any is burned into my brain.  The door to one of the rooms to my right was open with a housekeeping cart in front of it.  As I peered into the room, I saw through an almost floor-to-ceiling window the Pentagon belching black smoke.  Silhouetted in front of the chaos was a maid vacuuming the floor.  I often wonder what was going through her brain as she dutifully cleaned the carpet while this column of black smoke rose into the sky behind her.  It remains the most incongruous image I have ever laid eyes on.

We reached my hotel room and flipped on the TV.  There was another hijacked plane.  Wait, maybe there were two.  I tried to call my wife but could not get through.  I did reach work and tell them that I was all right and asked them to call my wife.

After a few minutes of watching television, there was a commotion in the hallway.  A couple of housekeepers were yelling in Spanish.  We opened the door in time to see them running down the hallway toward the stairs.  On a day like this, when you see people running, you assume they have information you don't have, so we ran after them.

Down on the first floor, everyone was herded into the large ballroom.  Comically, with hundreds of people sitting in this massive conference room, the best they could immediately do was set up a small 27-inch television with a microphone up to its speaker.  We could hear the anchors talking, but not see anything.  They were still reporting two additional planes in the air.  They seemed to be heading toward Washington, DC.  Which is where everyone in the room was.

The organizers decided to try and get the television image onto the big presentation screen, but doing so required them to turn off the television.  What followed were ten excruciating minutes of silence.  No knowledge.  No idea where the planes were and whether they were about to drop on our heads.

With a crackle, the sound of the anchors talking was back.  A moment later the image was on the large presentation screen.  They were talking about reports of a plane crashing in western PA.  Confusion reigned.  What happened to the planes headed to DC?  The reporters had obviously cleared things up while we were in our media blackout, but it took us another half hour to piece that together. 

From the moment I came down the stairs, we were not allowed to return to the upper floors.  Because the hotel overlooked the Pentagon, authorities were fearful of snipers.  It was both strangely comforting and horrifying that someone's job was to think that there may be snipers taking advantage of the chaos.  We were confined to the first floor lobby and ballroom, and we could go out front to look at the damage if we wanted.

The next few hours are a blur in my memory.  One of my colleagues collapsed from the stress.  There were reports of car bombs and other attacks in DC (all of which proved false).  Employees from the Naval Annex started showing up, treating the hotel as a sort of fallout shelter.  Some of them had medical issues as well, though no injuries from the blast itself.  I would stay in the ballroom for a bit until I couldn't take the news channel anymore, then I would walk the lobby and look at the Pentagon outside.

Wanting to do something, I suggested to the hotel that maybe the Red Cross should come by and organize an impromptu blood drive.  Of course, you could not get a phone line and even if you could, the Red Cross probably had better things to do, but under the circumstances, I was desperate to do something, even something futile.

A little before three o'clock, I overheard an employee of the hotel saying they were going to start letting people back up to their rooms.  I had agreed to drive some of the conference attendees, so I grabbed them and let them know they needed to be ready to go up and get their things.

When they let us up at 3:00, I was amongst the first groups to get on the elevator.  I quickly packed, grabbed my car keys and my parking slip.  I returned to the lobby and got my car from the valet.  As I was waiting, I was joined by the rest of my party.  Two people from New Hampshire, one from Arkansas.  We got in the car and left the hotel behind.  

The ride home to Pennsylvania provided the other image that stuck itself in my brain.  The Capitol Beltway.  It was empty.  I don't mean light traffic.  I mean there were no cars.  I've never seen anything like it outside of a movie.  It was like the opening of 28 Days Later.  As though everyone had disappeared.  The only reminder that we were not entirely alone was the rare passing car or the occasional traffic advisory sign warning us there had been a major incident in New York City and to avoid the area.

I dropped the man from Arkansas off at Dulles Airport.  At that point, the information we had was that flights would resume at noon on September 12.  Of course, flights actually did not resume until September 14.  I do know he got back safely with his own remarkable story.

The two from New Hampshire came to my house to spend the night.  I remember walking into my home and hugging my wife as though I'd been gone two years and not two days.  We spent the night watching the news as NYC continued to smolder.  The next day, our houseguests had secured a rental car and began to drive home to the Granite State.

I occasionally write down my recollections of that day.  I don't want to forget.  Hell, some days it is impossible to forget.  As I was sitting at a desk 14 floors up a couple of weeks ago and the building began to sway, my first thought was not earthquake.  I actually looked across the floor, half expecting to see it begin collapsing.

It's been ten years and that day has colored so much of the way I view my life.  9-11 is primarily associated with NYC and to the extent one can weigh a tragedy like this and apportion sympathy that seems absolutely right.  However, my story was in Virginia outside the Pentagon and I will never forget.

My thoughts and prayers are with those we lost that day, those we've lost since in Iraq and Afghanistan, and their families.  God bless.

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The Ring (1927)

Directed by Alfred Hitchcock
Carl Brisson, Lillian Hall-Davis and Ian Hunter
Produced by British International Pictures

A crowd gathers around a sideshow tent at a a carnival.  While most patrons find themselves on the rides, the mass around the tent is in for some real action.  The tent is where "One Round" Jack takes on all comers in the ring.  Men enter the tent cocky and certain and leave it bloody and humiliated.

The girl selling tickets for the show strikes up a flirtatious conversation with Bob Corby.  Jack has a thing for the girl and challenges Bob to a fight.  Surprisingly, Bob lasts a round.  More than that, Bob is winning.  For once, Jack is the one taking the beating.

After Jack loses, Bob reveals that he is really a champion boxer and that the fight was an audition for Jack to be his sparring partner.  If Jack can win one more fight, Bob will hire him.  Of course, Jack wins the fight and begins doing ring work with the champ.  He also starts a pro boxing career of his own.

Jack marries his girl, but she has eyes for Bob.  The girl loves to be out on the town partying and Bob is more than happy to oblige.

Jack soon learns of the affair.  Will the two pugilists settle their grudge in the ring?  And can Jack win his girl back?


There's a lot I could talk about here, but there are two words we need to start with:

Alfred.  Hitchcock.

The Ring is one of the suspense master's first features.  Hitchcock was one of my first true classic film loves growing up.  I have seen most of his later catalog and some of his earlier work.  It's impossible for me to view his films without the association to what will come later.

And through that lens, there is plenty to note here.  Hitchcock was always a master of constructing scenes and moments and that is on display even at this early point.  We are introduced to the amusement park through a montage of images from the carnival.  The camera gives us information, but in a kinetic way.  The camera shoots up from the ground at people on a swing.  We see a ride that rocks back and forth and then we are tight on the face of a woman enjoying the ride.  And then we are on the ride with the camera serving as our eyes in dizzying motion.  It's stuff a modern viewer will have seen before, but it's fresh and new here both in shot selection and editing.

While the love triangle isn't the murder mystery or espionage thriller Hitchcock is often associated with, he still finds plenty of moments of tension.  Most of it comes from observation of the details, a closeup of the tickets being taken at the sideshow or Jack's barely controlled rage as he he tries to keep his composure while simultaneously talking with a friend and seeking out Bob.

The real virtuoso Hitchcock moment is the final match between Jack and Bob.  During the first round, the action is conveyed through long shots of the ring and the crowd reaction.  The bell sounds and the two men return to their corner.  When the match resumes, Jack stalks right toward the camera and begins throwing punches at us.  From that moment, we are in the ring with the two men.  And when Jack gets knocked down at one point, we see the world through his eyes.  Images double, the ring spins into a confusion of ropes and canvas until our eyes open and we are staring at the overhead lights.

If there is a weakness here, it's the story itself from the only screenplay Hitchcock wrote himself.  It's a love triangle, with two men competing for one woman's hand, but the movie never gives a sense of why.  Hell, the credits only refer the the girl as "The Girl."  She's not a person here.  She just another trophy or title belt for the men.

And honestly, that would have been okay except the film also wants us to believe Jack truly loves her.  But we never see why.  When she makes her choice in the end, it doesn't really feel like it matters.

The actors are all more than up to the challenges of the script, but the real star here is Hitchcock.  He is already building images in a way that creates tension.  The Ring doesn't work as a whole, but so many of the moments do, it is worth a watch.  And the ending fight?  Classic.

***1/2 out of *****

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Formative Experience: Super 8 and Nostalgia Cinema

A good portion of my childhood seemed to have revolved around the movies.  My parents introduced me and my siblings to all manner of quality flicks.  There are moments I remember indelibly:

• Dropping my brother off at Nana's so I could see my first movie in theaters (Star Wars!)


• The moment I was told to cover my eyes in Raiders of the Lost Ark (I peeked and Nazi faces melted.  Nightmare fuel to be sure, but awesome.)


• The flowers coming back to life as we near the climax of E.T.


• Dreading Annie as we waited in the lobby and being too embarrassed to admit I enjoyed it afterward.

You get the picture.  Through it all, there was one constant. We saw most of our films at the same couple of theaters.  Today's young kids would barely recognize these places.  No stadium seating, sticky floors and a snap-crackle-pop sound system.  I'm not intending to go on an "in-my-day" kind of rant, just pointing out the differences.

So needless to say I was excited when Super 8's marketing highlighted the film as a throwback to the old Amblin movies.  Love J.J. Abrams. Love Steven Spielberg.  Love the vibe they are going for.

Still, I avoided it opening weekend.  And the subsequent weekends.  I was biding my time for the right experience.  First run theaters around me are pristine.  The sight lines are perfect.  The sound rumbles you out of your seat.  There's no way I can capture the magic of my youth in a counterfeit theater, right?

Super 8 finally came to the little second run place near my house.  You step across the seats, your feet crunching on day-old popcorn.The seating isn't flat, but it's far from stadium seating. And the speakers emit that familiar background hum from my youth.

Perfect.

I caught an early show after work and slid into a seat behind another group.  The screen lit up and showed its age with pitting and staining.  The lower right hand corner was perpetually out-of-focus.

It felt right.  For two hours, I was 10 years old again.  And watching the credits sequence on that screen made my year.

As to the movie itself, it was good but not great.  If it were a meal, I'd call the waiter over and point out that someone got a monster movie in my sweet coming-of-age soup.

Nostalgia is not supposed to be clean.  It's supposed to be scratches on old 8 mm or garish coloring in a video.  Super 8 could stand a little dirtying up and my theater delivered.

Super 8 may not be my favorite films of the year, but it may be my favorite film experience.

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The Jazz Singer (1927)

Directed by Alan Crosland

Starring Al Jolson, May McAvoy and Warner Oland

Produced by Warner Bros. 



Cantor Rabinowitz is the latest of five generations of cantors at his synagogue.  His dream is that his 13 year old son Jakie will follow in his footsteps, singing God's praises at the house of worship.  



Jakie wants to sing all right, but he's not interested in chanting Kol Nidre.  He prefers entertaining men at the local saloon by belting jazz standards.  Unfortunately for Jakie, a family friend named Moisha sees him and tells the boy's father.  The man retrieves his son and begins removing his belt to teach him a lesson.  Jakie announces that if his father beats him, he will run away from home.  The elder Rabinowitz drags the boy into a bedroom and, moments later, a teary-eyed boy emerges, kisses his mother goodbye and leaves.



Fast forward ten years, Jakie has changed his name to Jack Robin and earns a living as a singer.  In a club one night, he is called up on stage and performs a rousing edition of "Dirty Hands, Dirty Face."  Mary Dale, a dance in a theater company, hears his voice and offers to help advance his career.  



Jack begins traveling the country as a performer, earning a decent wage and writing home to his loving mother.  His father still won't acknowledge he even has a son.



Soon, Mary receives her big break: a featured role in a Broadway show.  Soon after Jack gets his own shot at stardom: a Broadway show of his own.  The show brings him home to his mother and close to Mary.



Jack visits his mom and performs for her, but his father arrives and forces his son out.  As Jack prepares for his dress rehearsal, his mother and Moisha arrive to tell him his father is gravely ill.  Jack proceeds with the dress rehearsal and is mother realizes that his place is at the theater, not the synagogue.



Still, Jack is troubled.  Should he go ahead with his opening night on Broadway, forsaking his heritage?  Or should he stand in his father's place as cantor, sacrificing his chance to fulfill hi won dreams?





It's impossible to review The Jazz Singer without talking about its major innovation: sound.  Specifically, the movie features Al Jolson singing and speaking and conversing with his mother in key sequences.  It also features the traditional silent film title cards, but when Jolson finishes singing "Dirty Hands, Dirty Face," he declares "Wait a minute, wait a minute, you ain't heard nothin' yet."  Not on a card, but with the actor's voice.



Having spent the fourteen months feasting on silent films, this is a kick in the teeth.  It feels anachronistic and exhilarating.  Even knowing it's coming, I couldn't anticipate the way it would sound when Jolson utters some of the most famous lines in history.



And, after another song, the movie reverts back to the silent film tradition for a time.  Silently moving lips, followed by words on the screen.  But as you watch it, the possibility remains that at any point, the characters may begin singing or speaking again.



It seems a silly thing, but the possibility of the leap forward still feels enticing.  I know how the history turns out and I'm still giddy with anticipation for the next recorded lines.



The story itself is relatively timeless, but with a confused ending.  A boy struggles to become his own man to tear free from what his heritage, only to discover that perhaps there is strength in his lineage.  Hell, Pixar as made millions off the idea (Cars and Finding Nemo).  



The ending is to me a misstep.  We are told Jack must choose: sing in the synagogue and never work in this town again, or have his opening night and deny all he is.  He chooses... both.  His opening night is canceled when he chooses to sing at the synagogue, but then, inexplicably, he still gets his own show afterward.  The choice he makes creates drama that is sucked from the room when he has his cake and eats it too.  The virtue in the ending is of course that Jack makes the right choice and we still get to hear him sing one last tune.



There is one other potential misstep that needs to be addressed: Jolson's Jack performing his later numbers in blackface.  In most films, it is a repugnant practice, a further degrading of a race.  Here, it seems informed by the themes of the movie.  Jakie changes his name to Jack and spends the entire movie sublimating his Jewish heritage.  The move to use blackface is a further attempt to deny who he really is.  The theme would have been more powerfully realized if Jolson performed at the conclusion sans makeup, but watching Jack apply the blackface makeup and don the wig plays into his character in a way that white actors playing black characters in films don't even contemplate.



Is The Jazz Singer dated?  Yup.  Does it have a simple, see-it-coming-a-mile-away story?  Affirmitive.  Still, it's more than just a film; it's an experience.  Jolson's voice and those words will reverberate in my head for a long time to come.



***** out of *****

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Berlin: Symphony of a Great City (1927)

Directed by Walter Ruttmann

A train roars across the countryside before coming into a station.  It's pre-dawn arrival in the city barely stirs the residents, but as the sun rises, the streets slowly come to life.  Machinery begins moving.  Automobiles and streetcars ferry passengers to and fro as pedestrians jump out of the way.  Children play.  Shopkeepers clean their front stoop.  A fight breaks out on a street corner.  A sad woman takes a suicidal leap into a river.



After the factories close, the residents begin their evening's entertainment.  There is hockey and car racing, gambling and shows.  The bright lights of the city shine as the fireworks erupt.  So what's this movie about?





Berlin: Symphony of a Great City is a documentary.  It is not like most modern documentaries where the story is real and the footage is real and the director finds the story within.  No, Berlin is about a thousand stories all taking place within one city on one day. It's meant to give you a sense of the rhythm and atmosphere of the place without ever telling its story.



You won't get any sense of Berlin's history watching this.  You won't even get a sense of its industries or people except on the most superficial level.  What you see and feel is the pulse of a city as it awakens and stretches in the morning, as it develops a frenetic pace in its daily activities, as it plays hard into the evening.  



A lot of that sense of momentum comes through the editing.  Director Walter Ruttmann never lingers on any shot person or location for more than few seconds.  His eye is constantly roaming, always searching for the next piece of the city, from the mundane to the extraordinary.



The movie succeeds so well at showing us this city in an hour that it underlines its greatest weakness.  Some of the moments captured are fascinating enough it leaves the audience to wonder at the backstory or to consider what happens next.  Why did the woman jump into the river?  Why were the two men fighting?  What was the guy on the street corner yelling that so commanded an audience?  



Of course, none of these people or stories matter.  The point, the only point, is the heartbeat of Berlin.  Ruttman captures it in exquisite detail from its architecture and industry to its rich and its beggars.  The film has no linear narrative, but it is an extraordinary portrait of a place and a time that left me riveted and wanting more.



**** out of *****



NOTE: I should add to this that while I believe it is on the whole a documentary, I cannot believe some of the scenes weren't staged.  Particularly given the camera technology of the time, it's a stretch to believe that Ruttman just happened upon the suicide or the street fight (filmed from multiple angles).  The staged nature of some of the shots takes nothing from the authenticity of the whole.

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1927: Can You Hear Me Now?

Time to leave behind 1926 and look to 1927.  And wow, what a year it is.



There is a lot of focus on making connections.  Charles Lindbergh completes the first transatlantic flight in The Spirit of St. Louis, which also presumably featured the first instance of an airline losing someone's baggage.  The first transatlantic phone calls happen and the Holland Tunnel connects New York City to New Jersey.  In other transportation news, after 19 years of successful sales of the Model T, Ford unveils the Model A (which is most noted for being the antique car that ferried my wife and I from our wedding to our reception).



In movie news, it's a big year, but one development clearly supersedes the others: sound.  While there had been successes with the use of sound in cinema, The Jazz Singer is considered to be the watershed moment for the technology.  Few quotes in cinema history are as understated but critical as Al Jolson telling the audience "Wait a minute, wait a minute, you ain't heard nothin' yet."  I have heard it numerous times, most notably on The Great Movie Ride at Disney's Hollywood Studios.



What else happened in the film world?  Douglas Fairbanks founds the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, which, two years later, will begin handing out the Academy Award.  Twenty-four frames per second becomes the standard for film.  Metropolis debuts (enough said).  The Hays Office issues guidelines as to what should be avoided in film (though they are still a few years from being able to enforce anything).  The iconic Grauman's Chinese Theater opens in Los Angeles.  And MGM's mascot Leo the Lion survives a plane crash while on a cross country tour.



So what are we watching? The Jazz Singer obviously (though no Neil diamond in sight).  Wings (the first Oscar winner) if I can find it.  Metropolis (which is on Watch Instantly).  Clara Bow in It (which is where the expression "It Girl" comes from).  Sunrise from F.W. Murnau (because Murnau is awesome).  Lon Chaney in The Unknown.  The Second Hundred Years (first appearance of Laurel and Hardy!).  The Lodger (Alfred Hitchcock!).  I'm sure there will be others, but that is a hell of a list to start with.

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Battling Butler (1926)

Directed by Buster Keaton

Starring Buster Keaton, Sally O'Neil and Walter James

Produced by Buster Keaton Productions



Alfred Butler is a well-to-do, but foppish young man.  His every need is taken care of thanks to his parents and his loyal servant Martin.  Alfred's father decides that his son could stand a toughening up and sends him to live in the wilds for a time.  It's up to Martin to "arrange" it.



And arrange it he does.  Alfred lives at a campsite that features a full kitchen and a massive tent featuring a brass bed, a bathtub and a bearskin rug.  Roughing it indeed.



Alfred tries his hand at hunting.  Unfortunately, when he turns right, waterfowl emerge from the bushes behind him.  When he turns left, it happens again.  The only thing he successfully finds in the woods is love.



A young mountain girl finds Alfred and his valet and takes a liking to the man.  She comes over to his cabin for dinner and they are so infatuated with one another, they do not even notice the dinner table sinking into the mud.  At the end of the night, the gallant Alfred walks her back to her home, but needs a little help finding his way back.  



The next morning, a newspaper is delivered to the camp and Alfred notices a boxer with the name Alfred "Battling" Butler is fighting for the lightweight title.  Odd that the man should have the same name as our hero.



Alfred soon dispatches Martin to "arrange" a wedding with the mountain girl.  Unfortunately, the father and brother will only marry her off to a real man and they think Alfred is too much of a dandy.  The valet then tells them that his employer is really "Battling" Butler the boxer.  If our hero Alfred wants the girl, he's going to have to pretend to be a pugilist.



How long can Alfred keep up the charade?  And what happens when the real Battling Butler gets wind of our hero's scheme and decides he'd much prefer to let another man take the punches for him?





Here's my quick guide to the Battling Butler: fun set-up, dull payoff, terrible ending.



For the set-up, the movie is ingenious.  The site gags and pratfalls come one after the other as Alfred navigates the world of the wilderness.  The tent and campsite are one laugh piled on top of another.  The fun of his initial hunting attempt, followed by his ill-fated attempt to shoot a duck from a boat go on just long enough.  Keaton has this uncanny sense of comic timing and it shines in the early going.



However, once he assumes Battling's identity, the movie falls apart.  It's the same joke over and over.  There is only so much of Keaton running from a sparring partner in a boxing ring that a man can take.  It's tedious and unfunny.  Adding to the problems is that a clothed Keaton looks every bit the wimp, but when he's standing in a sleeveless shirt, it's apparent the guy is muscular.  One look at him and you know he's not a weakling.



SPOILERS! And the ending?  Alfred is preparing to defend Battling's championship when they reveal it was all a ruse to teach Alfred a lesson about assuming another man's identity.  Could have ended the film there, but they add a final reason for Battling and Alfred to fight in the dressing room and, after getting pummeled, our milquetoast hero fights back.  He knocks Battling to the ground.



I'm with the movie to this point. The last fight is a little contrived, but that's okay.  After Alfred knocks the boxer down, he picks him up and hits him again.  Down goes Battling.  So Alfred picks him up and knocks him down again.  There's a brutality and mean streak to these final moments that is both uncharacteristic and makes me hate Alfred.  I'm sure that's not what they were going for, but still....



As to the acting, Keaton is Keaton.  He plays these well-to-do man-child characters as well as anyone ever did.  The only other notable is the always reliable Snitz Edwards as Martin, the servant.  He gets some great moments and reaction shots to the insanity that surrounds him.



All in all, Battling Butler is an okay film, ruined for me by its last minute.  A good one for Keaton completists, but others can skip it.

**1/2 out of *****

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Geheimnisse Einer Seele, or Secrets Of A Soul (1926)

Trippy

Directed by G.W. Pabst

Starring Werner Krauss, Ruth Weyher and Ilka Grüning

Produced by Neumann-Filmproduktion



An apartment.  A husband and wife have a normal everyday conversation.  He is shaving, she asks if he can trim some of the hair from the back of her neck.  As the razor goes to make its first cut, a cry of "Murder!" is heard outside the window.  It seems a neighbor has been killed during the night.  The startled man looks down and sees he has left a small, superficial wound on his wife's neck.  It's an accident, so no big deal.



Or so you would think.



The husband named Martin soon begins having strange dreams.  He is flying and a man in a tree shoots him out of the sky.  A city pops up on a hillside as though made of cardboard.  A bell tower spirals from the ground adorned with three ringing bells made of women's faces.



That's not all.  He develops a fear of knives.  The phobia is so bad, he cannot even go to the barber for a shave, let alone wield a razor himself.  What's worse?  He has an urge to kill his wife.  



Will Martin give into his psychosis and bloodlust? Or will he... wait a minute... what's this?  Oh, he met a psychoanalyst who takes Martin under his care for several months, divining the source of his phobias and urges and curing him.  The end.



Huh?



Did that just happen?



Did a movie that could have been about a murder mystery or a protagonist's slow descent into madness really just turn into a high school science reel titled "Psychoanalysis and You"?



Wow... just... wow.



Secrets of a Soul does a fair job early on of building a sense of foreboding with Martin's behavior.  The dream sequence is a visual treat, appropriately surrealistic and unsettling, the true stuff of nightmares.  You feel him cracking and you are waiting for either him to snap or even for him to take an interest in the murder in some way.



Of course, neither of those things happened.  We are told in a quick exchange that the murderer has been caught.  And Martin bumps into a psychoanalyst who starts walking him through his phobias and dreams.  The dissection becomes clinical and staid with the actors confined to a room talking to each other.  



It's too bad because Pabst clearly has a flair for the visual medium.  The opening shot of Martin shaving his wife knows just when to punctuate a mundane scene with a closeup to build a sense of dread.  The dream sequence and his childhood memories feel like dreams and memories.  It's a shame it's all in support of an infomercial for psychology.



While watching Secrets of a Soul, my mind wandered to all of the more interesting places the movie could have gone.  It becomes boring and monotonous in a way that makes you imagine the better unmade films this could have been.  It's an infomercial with a beautiful dream sequence in the middle.  Do yourself a favor: seek out the dream sequence and skip the rest.



*1/2 out of *****

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Flesh and the Devil (1926)

A bugle sounds announcing the start of a new day on a military base in Germany.  Men pour out of the bunks and begin to change into their uniforms.  One of the men, Ulrich, is a little slower at leaving his bunk.  He delivers a kick to the bed above him to wake its occupant and finds it... empty.  His friend Leo has spent the night out on the town again.

Ulrich quickly arranges Leo's bed to make it look like someone is in it.  When Leo is missed at roll call, Ulrich announces that he is ill.  The commander goes to investigate, pulls the covers and...

Leo is sleeping in the bed.  The commander leaves and the friends celebrate pulling one over on the officer, until the officer returns and finds the sick Leo dancing.  They are both sent off to shovel dung out of the stables.

A few months later, the two friends head for home.  At the train station, they are met by Leo's mother and Ulrich's sister Hertha, who clearly has her eye on Leo.  However, Leo's eyes are drawn to another, a beautiful woman exiting the train.

He asks his mother who the woman is.  She does not know but speculates the woman is in town for the ball.  We know where Leo is headed next.

At the ball, Leo rebuffs the advances of Hertha and looks for the mysterious woman.  He finds her across the floor and sweeps her onto the dance floor.  The pair soon are walking from the hall into a secluded part of the garden.  There is a cigarette.  They kiss...

Cut to them waking up in the woman's bedroom.  All is right with the world.  Until her husband arrives.  He challenges Leo to a duel the next morning, a duel which Leo wins.

However, because he has killed a man, he must spend five years at a military outpost in Africa.  Before he goes, he asks his friend Ulrich to look after the young widow.

Ulrich gets Leo out of the service a couple of years early and the exile returns to find his friend has married the love of his life.  Ulrich believed the duel was over cheating at a card game and not the stunning young woman.  He had no idea Leo had designs on her.

Will the three overcome these new obstacles or will their passion erupt in violence once more?

We've all seen movies with a love triangle, right?  Except when you think about it, rarely is it a love triangle.  More like two lines that meet at one point.  When there are two guys and a girl, it's not usually a question of whether the two guys will end up together.

Flesh and the Devil is a true love triangle.

Leo loves the woman.  Ulrich loves the woman.  And Leo and Ulrich love each other.

Yes, you read that right.

Sure it's not overtly romantic.  Except for the way the embrace.  And look into each others' eyes.  And speak to each other.  They even get married (sort of).  In 1926, there is only so far the movie could go with these themes, but it's hardly subtext.  More like supertext.

The film excels at showing us instead of telling us about these relationships.  We see Leo and Ulrich's friendship.  We see Leo fall hard for Greta Garbo's Felicitas.  And we feel every bit of the betrayal Leo feels when he returns to find Ulrich and Felicitas married.  You believe these relationships.  Leo and Ulrich feel like they have known each other forever.  Which makes the knife twist all the more painful.

The direction by Clarence Brown made me sit up and take notice.  Despite having seen two of his previous features, it was like I was seeing him for the first time.  The camera is always right where it needs to be and every zoom and movement has a purpose.  Really virtuoso stuff here.

There are a lot of great uses of light and shadow.  The ethereal light that bathes Garbo in a glowas Gilbert goes to light her cigarette.  The shadow of Garbo's husband stalking the young lovers before he enters the room.  The ominous silhouettes of the duel.   Gorgeous.

The symbolism is heavily slathered onto this movie, but that suits the melodrama perfectly.  We see the statue of the two "friends" in the beginning.  After their relationship fractures, we see it again, this time overgrown with vines with a literal branch growing between the figures.  The lake that surrounds the Isle of Friendship freezes over as their relationship turns chilly.  

The acting here is all around perfect.  Gilbert's Leo has a mischievous streak, but also a loyalty to those he loves.  His eyes allow you to see his love and lust, his seething rage when Felicitas is taken from him and his sad sense of defeat when he sees no escape from his feelings but death.

Lars Hanson's has a Ralph Fiennes look as Ulrich.  He does not even realize he has betrayed his friend and Leo's distance literally wears him down.

Garbo is less a person here and more a device to bring the friends into conflict, but she fills her character's empty vessel with just the right sense of mystery and sensuality.  She's Helen of Troy and with one look she can send men off to die for her.

I have a few years yet to go, but I will be shocked if Flesh and the Devil is not near the top of my Best of the 1920s list.  It's brilliantly filmed, superbly acted with a story that's both simple and timeless.  A must see.

***** out of *****

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5 Thoughts: Captain America

While my cinematic journeys are primarily focused on the past, I still catch some newer releases. You won't get a full review on these, but you will get five thoughts and a bottom line. 

1. Maybe the best use of a supporting cast in a superhero movie. Tommy Lee Jones is gold in every one of his scenes. Stanley Tucci hangs over the entire movie despite an early exit. And Neal McDonough is a lot of fun as the underused Dum Dum Dugan.

2. On the other hand, I could have used more of Bucky Barnes. The relationship with Cap is painted in broad strokes and is really the most important for the character.

3. I'll take my Howling Commandos movie now. Please.

4. Alan Silvestri's best work in years is on display.  Loved the score.  And Alan Menken's 'Star-Spangled Man'?  Perfect.

5. The effects work is great then meh. Seeing Steve before the transformation was almost seamless. Some of the action CGI (particularly in the train sequence) was fake looking.

Bottom Line: It's a miracle this film exists. I cannot believe we got a WWII-era Captain America film. Joe Johnston knocks it out of the park with a perfect script for the character. I wish some of the adventures with the Howling Commandos weren't glossed over, but all in all, this is a near-perfect translation from comic to screen.

****1/2 out of *****

For your listening pleasure:

'Star-Spangled Man'

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Bardelys the Magnificent (1926)

Directed by King Vidor

Starring John Gilbert, Eleanor Boardman and Roy D'Arcy

Produced by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM)

Bardelys is the ultimate ladies' man in King Louis XIII court.  He's bedding the wives of other men, then casually dueling them until they relent and leave.  It's all a lark to him and he's having the time of his life.



There is something he cares about though: honor.  And when his rival Chatellerault is rejected by the beautiful Roxalanne, the man plays on Bardelys pride.  Chatellerault bets Bardelys that he cannot win the hand of the maiden.  Bardelys at first laughs off the bet, but having his romantic prowess questioned in public shames him into accepting.



The bet is immediately complicated when the king prohibits his court from leaving due to the growing civil unrest in the surrounding countryside.  Bardelys, with the bet and his honor on the line, defies his monarch and heads off to find Roxalanne. 



He comes across a dying man named Lesperon and, after a brief exchange and the man's death, Bardelys assumes his identity.  Later, Bardelys encounters some of the king's soldiers.  Because he is a fugitive, he passes himself off as Lesperon.  Bad move.  It turns out Lesperon was the leader of the rebellion against the king.  Bardelys battles the men and escapes, but is wounded.  He collapses outside of Roxalanne's estate.



The woman nurses the man she believes to be Lesperon back to health.  They fall in love.  There's a boat ride through a willow tree.  However, when the moment comes to marry his love, Bardelys cannot bring himself to do it.  The relationship is built on a lie.  Angry, the woman summons the soldiers to take "Lesperon" away.



Bardelys is brought to trial before a panel of judges that includes Chatellerault.  The villain refuses to correct Bardelys true identity and he is sentenced to death.



Can Bardelys escape the executioner?  And will he win the hand of Roxalanne?



Let's get this out of the way: the plot is really silly.  Bardelys is a regular in King Louis' court, but nobody recognizes him?  The supposed leader of the rebels is off convalescing with Roxalanne and he is still considered the leader of the rebels?  Roxalanne and her dad (who are both sympathizers with the rebellion) never ask their guest whether he should be off, you know, rebelling?



Here's the thing though.  Bardelys the Magnificent has a momentum and proficiency that captivates you while you are watching it.  Crucial to this is the acting and magnetism of John Gilbert in the lead.



Gilbert elevates the material through his nuanced portrayal of the lead character.  The changes that wash over his face throughout sell the tale and pull the audience along.  There are so many big moments that he sells with his performance.  His awkward attempts to laugh off the bet.  The change in his eyes as Roxalanne professes his love and he feels the weight of his guilt.  The relief and then horror as he slowly realizes Chatellerault is betraying him in the court.  They are scenes that need no dialogue cards to express what is going on.



Eleanor Boardman is perfect as the object of Bardelys desire.  She is fiery, but tender.  Most silents fall into the trap of making their women a cipher or a plot device.  Boardman's Roxalanne is a person.  She has her own political views and she doesn't bow to any man.  



The other star of note is Roy D'Arcy as Chatellerault.  He's a cunning villain, taking full advantage when opportunity presents itself.  He is also terrifically over the top, particularly in the court scene.  He doesn't just play that he doesn't recognize Bardelys; he does so with a knowing wink at his rival that twists the knife further.  



The direction by King Vidor is one of constant motion.  There are two scenes that show the director's mastery over different types of emotion.  First is the boat ride through the willows.  This is pure paperback romance.  They sit across from each other as the willow branches touch them.  They embrace, him kissing her, her writhing in pleasure.  It's foreplay and consummation, as close to sex as you'll get in 1926.



The other is Bardelys' escape attempt from the executioner.  It's the first time I can remember seeing action choreography married to cinematography in such a compelling way.  We get point of view shots as Bardelys slides down some long handled axes.  We get a perspective looking down on the actor as he swings from a banner.  The scene is endlessly inventive in how he uses the setting and its weapons to create a getaway.



The climax between Bardelys and Chatellerault gets a little too melodramatic for my tastes.  The whole set-up of the scene seems like a way to both have a satisfying duel and keep the blood off of our hero's hands.



In the end, Bardelys almost out swashbuckles Douglas Fairbanks.  In many ways the film is superior to Fairbanks' productions because it actually pays attention to the female lead and writes her as more than a prize to be won.  Of, course others' mileage may vary, but Bardelys the Magnificent is a pleasant and welcome surprise.



**** out of *****

NOTE: Bardelys the Magnificent was considered a lost film until 2006 when a nearly complete print was found.  The film is missing the third reel.  The available version of the movie includes production stills and dialogue cards in the place of the missing scenes.

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The Bells (1926)

Directed by James Young

Starring Lionel Barrymore, Caroline Frances Cooke, and Gustav von Seyffertitz

Produced by Chadwick Pictures Corporation 

Mathias and his wife Catharine run an inn and a mill together.  They both have their ambitions.  Catharine wants to succeed as an innkeeper and is mindful of ensuring that their patrons pay for the drink.  Mathias however wants to be the town Burgomaster and if he needs to ply the townspeople with alcohol on credit that never gets paid, so be it.



The problem with Mathias' approach is that they owe the local banker for the money they used to purchase their businesses.  And Mathias' approach to the balance sheet has had an unfortunate impact on the balance sheet.



Enter a traveling merchant.  Not just any merchant, but one with a heavy money belt.  He relaxes at the inn for an hour, but Mathias sees an opportunity.  He sets off after the man and with a swing of an axe, the innkeeper's money troubles are over.



He pays off the inn and the mill.  He even has a nice dowry for his daughter to marry the local lawman.  And Mathias becomes the Burgomaster.



If only that were the end of things.  The murder has been discovered and the merchant's brother arrives in town demanding justice.  For help, the victim's kin has hired a mesmerist to ascertain the guilty party.  As Burgomaster, Mathias must lead an investigation.  Meanwhile, he is haunted by the ghost of his victim and the sounds of the man's sleigh bells.



Will Mathias be discovered?  Or will the madness of his crime consume him?



The Bells has a fantastic central concept in an ambitious innkeeper being haunted by his crime.  It also has actors that make one prepare for greatness: Lionel Barrymore and Boris Karloff.



If only the script was worthy of the effort.



There is certainly some good stuff here.  For most of the film, Barrymore plays Mathias' descent into madness in a relatively understated way.  He never really flies off the handle.  It's all wild-eyed stares and disheveled hair.  He both has the weight of his guilt hanging over him and conceals his crime from the town.  Barrymore is certainly up to the task of playing a virtuous man whose ambition leads him into some bad choices.



But the way this plays out is baffling.  A merchant is murdered and the next day Mathias is rich.  The local constable points out that the victim's body can't be found and that it was likely burned in a lime kiln; Mathias points out that he has lime kilns.  He tries to put off the investigation by pointing out the scandal that a murder would bring to the town.  It does not take a Law & Order junkie to figure out the murderer.



Karloff gets top billing today, but in truth he is barely in it.  He glowers menacingly and smiles menacingly and performs all other manner of human movement menacingly, but he exists only to provide Mathias the threat of being discovered.



There is some interesting effects work here.  The way the bells hover over Mathias.  The ghostly hand that appears and then reveals a full ghost.  But the tone is never right.  It never feels dark or foreboding enough.  There's no real terror at the hauntings and the plot depends on those moments being dreadful.



SPOILERS AHEAD.  And then there is the ending.  Mathias is visited by the ghost again, but the murderer repents his sin and is forgiven by the dead man.  At peace at last, Mathias sees a halo develop around the religious shrine in his room and he dies.  It feels like the movie just ends.  Like it lost all of its steam and petered out.  The buildup of the movie was the threat the mesmerist posed to Mathias world order and that never really comes to fruition.



In the end, The Bells is a tale we have seen a million times.  It may be one of the first, but it's only a half-baked attempt.  It never decides what story it's telling and elements flit in and out without resolution.  There are great moments, but they do not add up to a whole film.



** out of *****

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My Day as an Extra at The Dark Knight Rises

We take a break from our normal trip through cinematic history to talk about the experience of being an extra in The Dark Knight Rises (2012).  Unlike the other reports I have seen, I am keeping this spoiler-free and just focusing on how the day went from the perspective of someone who has never done anything like this before.

So I spent part of my weekend as an extra at Heinz Field this past weekend for a small, independent film called The Dark Knight Rises. It was my first experience on a movie set and I thought it might be fun to share some observations.

Now, let me start by saying that I am not going to spoil any aspects of the film. There are plenty of sites that are already doing that. Which leads to point number two: I am amused by the authority with which some of those leaking info speak. There's some stuff we saw that I have confidence about, but there are a lot of people taking an assistant director at his word (because the production team clearly has no motivation to lie to 10,000 random spectators about a plot point or two).

The entire day was really well-organized by the production team and BeInAMovie.com. The shuttles to the stadium were a seamless operation and by the time I arrived on set the early morning rain had petered out.

The stadium seemed to be less than a quarter filled, but I am sure will appear sold out in the final film. Movie magic and all that.

The crowd itself was an interesting mix. There were Steelers fans, comic book geeks, film fans and a few curious locals. I myself am obviously a film fan, but I am also a comic nerd and a sports fan (though Philly teams are my drug of choice). I felt right at home.

After filming a quick early scene, several sections (mine included) were moved around the stadium. A nice spot about twelve rows behind the endzone would be my home for the rest of the day.

The stadium was cool from the rain for a bit, but when the sun emerged mid-morning, it got hot. Really hot. The production provided water bottles. We started out periodically grabbing a bottle for ourselves. Soon, people were doing water bottle runs for a few people around them. By the end of the day, if you got up for a bottle you came back with a box full, hawking them like a stadium vendor.

Between takes there was entertainment in the form of Dante, a comedian featured on Last Comic Standing. I didn't catch his on-field intro, but I was a big fan of the reality show so I eventually remembered who he was. My recollection was that he was arrogant and unfunny on the show. Sometimes people change. And sometimes, people are Dante.

There were raffles throughout the day. The average gift was an iPod Touch or Shuffle, or a collection of comics. There were some unique gifts: a Michael Keaton Batman standee (that sagged because it was left in the rain), an electronic Batmobile, a Batman poster signed by Gil Kane. The big prizes were free roundtrip plane tickets, a trip for 2 to the movie premiere and a new Chrysler. I won... the respect and admiration of those around me and sadly, nothing more.

There were a lot of small moments that were fun for me:

• People were encouraged to wear black and gold, the color of both the Gotham City Rogues and the Pittsburgh Steelers.  But you could not have any logos on the shirt, including the Steelers logo.  Several audience members had creative t-shirts and hats made up, but I would say the most popular fashion statement was the inside-out Steelers t-shirt.


• One of the production folks excitedly introduce Art Rooney, the owner of the Steelers to the crowd.  Only problem was it was "Dan" Rooney. 


• The placekicker for the Rapid City Monuments was the mayor of Pittsburgh, Luke Ravenstahl.  Take after take, he placed the ball in the exact same area of the field.  On the seventh kickoff, he flubbed the kick wide left and the crowd started some good natured booing.  I think if your mayor can placekick under pressure, he should be mayor for life.


• The coach of the Rogues was former Steelers coach Bill Cowher.  Current Steeler Hines Ward got on the mic to welcome the coach back and announce that the coach would be covering the bill for beer and sandwiches.


• Cowher got on the mic and said he knew none of the crowd came for Batman, but to support the Steelers. That got a big cheer. 


• Cowher also was deadpan in reading off numbers for the raffle.   He was perplexed as to what some of the prizes were and would read the numbers quickly.  Once he counted to three, he moved on to a new number with a short "sorry" or "too bad."


• Cowher had the most hilarious, but potentially harrowing moment of the day.  After raffling off a number of prizes, he started walking back across the field... directly through the explosives that the crew had just set.  A crew member quickly got on the mic yelling "Bill... Bill... You do NOT want to go that way."


• Ward did a lap around the stadium seated on the roof of a Tumbler.  No one had as much fun as Hines Ward on Saturday.


• To kill time between takes, Dante held a singing contest.  The good folks at American Idol have nothing to worry about.  With the exception of the last singer, all the other talent plucked from the stands was not so good.


• The crowd jumped in as continuity editor late in the day.  The crew was about to film us reacting to an earlier scene, but nobody reset the game or play clocks in the stadium.  Our section started chanting "change the clocks."  After a minute, a crew member got on the mic and said "I think we need to change the clocks."


• Late in the day, one of the IMAX cameras very loudly ate a roll of film.  It turned into a teaching moment as a crew member told the crowd that a roll of film cost $750 and that there were only four of these cameras in the world.  Now you know!


• I was just 100 feet away from Tom Hardy and Christopher Nolan.  The star of Bronson and the director of The Prestige.  I was a happy man.


• As the day wrapped up and the last prizes were being raffled, a few crew members started tossing around a football on the field.  If your job is to create Gotham City for the day and then run a fade pattern into an NFL endzone for fun, you may just have: The. Best. Job. Ever.

Great day all in all.  Only negatives were the heat and the long lines for the shuttles to leave the stadium.  Certainly an experience I will never forget.

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Felix the Cat in Two-Lip Time

Felix notices a mouse run a rope and chases after it.  Unbeknownst to our title character, the rope is attached to a boat, which soon heads out to sea.  After a bout of seasickness, the feline finds himself among the tulips of Holland.  He takes a liking to a young girl, but there's a boy who already had his eyes on her.  Can the cat win the hand of the maiden?

The latest Felix the Cat short has a breezy humor to it.  There are little sight gags, enough to make you smile, but nothing completely guffaw inducing.  There is a naïve simplicity to the tale that is a breath of fresh air, a safe harbor from all of the live action artistry and misogynistic Disney cartoons of the era.

There are some fun moments to be had.  Felix first corrals the girl by tossing his heart to her.  It circles her a few times before she snatches it from the air.  Cute.

Later, when a man tosses a shoe at the cat, Felix turns it into a boat, using an exclamation point from his thoughts as a paddle.  In the end, our resourceful hero uses his own tail as a handle for a windmill to blow away one of his foes.

It's sad that after my experience with Disney's Alice shorts I am giving points to a movie for being entertaining without offending, but so it goes.  We are in safe hands here watching Two Lip Time.  There is no ambition but to bring some happiness to the viewer for a brief moment.  And it succeeds at that in spades.

**** out of *****

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Son of the Sheik (1926)

Directed by George Fitzmaurice
Starring Rudolph Valentino, Vilma Banky and George Fawcett
Produced by Feature Productions

A troupe of entertainers who prefer to be thieves sit in their camp outside of town, alternately cheating and accusing each other of cheating. Inside one of the tents, Yasmin, the daughter of the group's leader, sits dreaming of the handsome man she met earlier.

The man Ahmed is the son of a sheik (the title character of 1921's The Sheik). He has fallen for the dancer and is on his way to meet her in the ruins next to the criminals' camp.

Unfortunately, the entertainers learn of the lovers' secret rendezvous. They capture and torture the man, while planning to ransom him. Ahmed's right hand man Ramadan rescues him, but our hero believes that his love set him up.

When the troupe comes through the town where Ahmed is recovering, he kidnaps Yasmin to take his revenge. In the meantime, his father is growing impatient with his son's disobedience in recklessness.

Will Ahmed learn the truth about his love?  Can he earn the respect of his father and... wait, did our "hero" really just rape his captive?

I've seen movies overshadowed by a scene, both for good or ill. This may be the first I have seen where an implied scene almost subsumes the entire film.

Ahmed has captured Yasmin and is toying with her. He kisses her and shows her the helplessness of her situation. Then, she begins backing away from him and towards a bed. Fade out

The next time we see her, she is awakening in that same bed and her previous hatred is now boiling over. It doesn't take a brain surgeon to figure out what happened to her while the camera cut away.

It's a big and important moment. The movie wants us to root for our young lovers to figure out the earlier misunderstanding and get back together. But there are certain acts you can't take back.

The movie tries to keep us in the couple's corner. Yasmin has been promised to one of the other thieves. And he is a thug and a brute. Truly someone worth reviling. It gives Ahmed a foil to save his girl from. It gives Yasmin someone to run from and into the waiting arms of our hero.

But there are certain genies that just won't be bottled up. The movie comes close to making it work, but redeeming a rapist in the last twenty minutes is a hell of a hill to climb.

It's a shame too, because in most other respects, this is the Rudolph Valentino sweeping epic I have been waiting for. It's got action and romance and plenty of opportunities for Valentino to smolder.

Our lead actor is great in his dual roles as both Ahmed and his father (reprising an older version of his character from The Sheik). As the son, he shows a carefree side, a romantic side, and an angry, dangerous side. As the older sheik, Valentino flexes acting muscles I didn't know he had. He's regal and stoic, but softens when he sees a glimmer of his old self in his son.

Vilma Banky is that exotic beauty that you can see a ruler throwing away his throne for.  She's fiery and smart. And then, she's broken and filled with hate.

The supporting cast is equally good. Karl Dane managed to make Ramadan a memorable character with little screen time.  I get an Adam Baldwin vibe off of his performance.  Agnes Ayres is appropriately doting yet supportive reprising her role from The Sheik.

The use of Valentino's two roles is a technical marvel.  I've seen split screen in earlier films, but here it really seems seamless.  He finds ways to make the characters interact that are ingenious.

Son of the Sheik is a great film overwhelmed by a narrative misstep.  Ahmed could have been cruel.  He could have just slapped Yasmin.  But rape?  Ugh.  The movie wants Yasmin to choose between the hero and the villain.  But how does she know which one is which?

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The Wasp Woman (1959)

100 Years of Movies takes a break from our regularly scheduled programming to participate in the Forgotten Classics of Yesteryear 50's Monster Mash. 

The 1950s and 1960s saw the evolution of a very particular type of monster movie.  Filmmakers created stories that provided cautionary tales against the dangers of man's hubris, greed and vanity.  These were movies with a morale and they got their point across...


...with terrible acting, awful special effects and groan-inducing production values.

Their may not be a better example of the genre than 1959's The Wasp Woman.  Two characters are set up for a fall.  Our scientist who ignores the warnings of other scientists that his ideas are crazy.  And our beautiful cosmetic company CEO whose fading beauty and profits make her desperate.

Our mad scientist Zinthrop works for a honey farm, but he has this notion that introducing wasps to the bee colony may allow him to produce a miracle compound.  His boss tries to talk him down before firing him.  Just to solidify the crazy, Zinthrop starts talking to his wasps.

Meanwhile Janice Starlin has assembled the best minds at her cosmetic company to find a solution for the falling profits.  One of her underlings speaks up.  Starlin has always been the face of the company.  As the wrinkles have set in, the revenues have dropped.  The room is shocked at the suggestion, but Starlin agrees.  People trusted her products to make them look youthful because of her looks.  And those looks are fading.

Enter Zinthrop. He offers to use his wasp jelly to produce a serum that will reverse the aging process.  Starlin is dubious, but when she sees the process demonstrated on a couple of cats, she agrees to fund his work.

Zinthrop begins working in secret and the rest of Starlin's firm becomes suspicious.  When Zithrop readies the first batch of the serum, Starlin insists that she be the first test subject.

And it works.  The lines begin to disappear.  Colleagues comment that she looks ten years younger.  All is well in the cosmetic giant world.

Well, not quite.  One of Starlin's colleagues disappears.  Then, the night watchmen is gone.

Could there be side effects to the serum?  And could they include turning the subject into a half wasp creature that feeds on human blood?

We are in Corman world so of course you know the answer.  Considering we are dealing with the schlock master, the acting and directing here are pretty good.  Susan Cabot in particular is great as Starlin.  She's not the one note megalomaniac a lot of people playing these roles go for.  You see conflict.  Before she meets Zinthrop, she seems to have accepted her aging.  Greed and vanity only come into play once she sees the possibilities.

Still it's Corman.  We know the smart guy is smart because he smokes a pipe.  We know the two young lovers will be critical to solving the mystery.  And we know the baddie will ultimately be a woman running around in a wasp mask.

They take the Jaws approach to that reveal.  We only see Starlin as the wasp woman at the end and it helps ramp up the tension.  Of course the reveal is disappointing, but it's also campy as hell.

The Wasp Woman is a great entry into the world of schlocky monster b-movies.  It has a message it beats you over the head with, some unintentionally funny acting and a plot that touches on universal themes.  Oh, and it has a guy with a pipe.

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The General (1926)

Directed by Clyde Bruckman and Buster Keaton
Starring Buster Keaton, Marion Mack and Glen Cavender

Johnny Gray is a man with two loves: his girl Annabelle and his train named The General. When shots are fired at Fort Sumter, Johnny tries to enlist in the Confederacy, but the recruitment office decides he is more valuable as a conductor.   Annabelle assumes he is a coward and refuses to see him until he is wearing a uniform.

A year later, Johnny is still working on his beloved train and still loves Annabelle from a distance.  Union soldiers steal The General to use as a Trojan Horse in a campaign against the confederates.  Johnny is soon in pursuit in another train.  To raise the stakes, Annabelle has been captured on The General by the Union army.
Can Johnny recover both of his loves?  Can he warn the Confederate Army of the coming danger?  And will it all be enough to win back the hand of his girl?

Okay, confession time: I really struggled with this review.

I turned on The General with pretty high expectations. It's generally acknowledged as a classic. I knew of the movie from a slew of "Best Movie Ever" type lists, but I didn't know anything about it.

It took some warming up for me to like this movie. I don't love it, but I like it.

Maybe it's the burden of expectation. Not that it would be the greatest film ever, but that it would be funny. I mean that's what a Buster Keaton film is all about, right?  My expectation was a stitch-busting comedy in the vein of his previous work.

It's not funny, or at least that's not principally the focus. Call it an action film or a chase film, but it's really not a comedy.

Once I accepted the movie on its own terms, I started to really enjoy it.

The General has two big things going for it: an interesting premise creatively executed and the complete fearlessness of its star.

At its core, this is a chase movie between a couple of trains. Think about that for a moment. A chase. Between two trains. On the same track. How interesting could that possibly be?

In the right hands, it turns out it can be enthralling. The film constantly wrings drama and tension out of the situation and it's endlessly inventive in creating new obstacles for the trains.

We see debris thrown onto the track. Rail switches used to dramatic effect. Rail cars set on fire and released. Wood dropped from an overhead rail onto the train passing below. Keaton and his crew understand the world of the train and squeeze out all of the dramatic possibilities.

Of course, to realize the drama and humor of the script, you need a star who is game for anything. And Keaton is audacious.

The danger to the star throughout the film only really hit me during a quieter moment. Keaton is standing on one of the cars chopping a piece of wood. My brain says: " man, he is awfully close to the edge... [pause] ... Oh my God, he is doing all of these stunts himself on a moving train!"

When today's Hollywood actor performs a dangerous stunt, the studio makes damn sure you know it in a "Wow, that really is Tom Cruise climbing the mountain" kind of way. The General never does that. It never underlines the peril the hero is constantly in.

Whether he is absent-mindedly moving up and down on a tender or sitting on the cowcatcher of a moving train, you never feel like it's a stunt. He races across train cars, jumps on and off moving engines and sits next to steel wheels that could crush him, but it's all second nature to Johnny Gray  It simply what the character has to do to clear the next hurdle.

That highlights one of the slight issues I had with the film. That constant danger never feels... well, dangerous. Keaton is so at ease in racing around that train that it undercuts a bit of the tension of his situation. If he had almost fallen or if we'd seen something crushed by the train, it may have amped things up. 




The movie features an ending action sequence that makes you scramble for Google.  Yes, Keaton really crashed a train surrounded by all those extras.  What today would be a moment of CGI trickery involved tons of steel and iron providing real human peril.  Remarkable.

I liked The General. A lot, but I didn't love it. That said, I am anxious to revisit it so I can experience the film without my prior preconceptions. It's a remarkable achievement to create a chase film between two trains, let alone one that has both tension and humor.

**** out of *****

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Simple Question, NOT So Difficult Answer: Keaton

So our first poll closes with a landslide victory for Buster Keaton over Charlie Chaplin. 73% to 26%. That's a spanking.

A year ago, before I started watching the films, this would have been shocking. My perception as an outsider to the silent film world was that there was Chaplin first, then everyone else. Having watched a lot of films by both men, I can totally understand this poll result.And agree with it.

My only trepidation is that I still have the bulk of Chaplin's classics (Modern Times, City Lights, The Great Dictator) yet to come. I was hopeful that things might improve a lot but... recalibrating expectations, recalibrating expectations... okay, I'm good.

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Simple Question, Difficult Answer: Chaplin or Keaton?

Keaton and Chaplin together

Time for our first 100 Years of Movies poll.  And it's a doozy.  An obvious doozy, but still a doozy.

Charlie Chaplin or Buster Keaton?

The Tramp or The Great Stone Face?

The Kid or The General?

Obviously, I still have a way to go before I can reach my own conclusion, but I have a preference today. 

So what do you think?  Poll is in the right sidebar.  Feel free to show your work below.

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Alice Comedies of 1926

Disney and KKK-like killers

Produced by Walt Disney Productions

I recently watched Alice's Mysterious Mystery, Alice's Little Parade, and Alice's Orphan. The experience allows me to say without hesitation:

Walt Disney was a messed up guy.

Of course, I say that as a modern viewer revisiting these. I am sure they are "of their time," but I just do not get it.

Let's start with Alice's Mysterious Mystery. I figured a fun detective comedy would be a way to forget my issues with the 1925 shorts. Man, was I wrong.

The "mystery" is solved pretty quickly as Alice and her cat follow footprints to a bird with shoes. But that leads them to a mouse and what-I-am-assuming-is-a-bear are operating a dog catching racket where they capture canines and ship them to a sausage factor.

How do they do this?  By donning KKK outfits, sorting the dogs (grade A or B) and sending them to the death chamber. Especially disturbing was a scene where a dog is pacing on death row and a priest arrives to give the last rites. The dog begs for his life, gets dragged into a death chamber and moments later, is dragged back out as links of sausage.  For a viewer in 2011, it's hard not to view this short through the eyes of World War II Germany.

In a similar vein, Alice's Big Parade has a misleading title. It's actually about preparing and executing a war.  Alice is the general, but her cat is the recruiter/field commander. As in previous shorts, the feline can remove his tail to use as a weapon. As they battle the mice, the cat stations himself at one end of the enemy's trench and leaves a slice of cheese.  As the mice are drawn to the smell, the cat clubs them over the head with his tail.

Alice's Orphan is about an orphan cat that Alice and her pet take care of. There were again some cringe-worthy moments. Early on, the cat is watching a female cat ice skate when she falls into the lake. He makes the save and she instantly falls in love with him.  But there's a problem: she's ugly. So the cat throws her back into the hole and seals it up (presumably drowning her). Later, when he unsuccessfully tries to get the orphan to sleep, our cat hero resorts to using a mallet on the child. Not funny. Not even smile-inducing.

The shorts continue the trend of completely sidelining the title character. She's slightly active in Alice's Mysterious Mystery, but in the other two, she's a non-entity. In Alice's Orphan she is barely in it and does nothing. I thought part of the appeal of these was the interaction between live action and cartoon characters?

I have never watched anything by Disney and felt like I needed to shower afterward. Until these Alice shorts. They are an historical curiosity but nothing more.

Alice's Mysterious Mystery: * out of *****
Alice's Little Parade: ** out of *****
Alice's Orphan: *1/2 out of *****

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