POINT BLANK (John Boorman, 1967).
What if you combined the tough characters and moody fatalism of Film
Noir with the evocative imagery and artistic editing style of the New
Wave? You'd get Point Blank, a remarkable example of late 60s
cinematic daring. Lee Marvin plays Walker, a gangster who has been betrayed
and left for dead by his partner (the truly insane looking John Vernon).
In his quest for revenge, and for the money that was taken from him,
Walker hooks up with his dead wife's sister (Angie Dickinson) and takes
on not only his former friend, but the entire syndicate. The premise
is pure pulp revenge fantasy, but the English director Boorman uses
quick cutting and strangely subjective camera work to make the movie
seem like a fevered dream inside the head of Marvin's anti-hero. Sudden
flashbacks and other disjunctive effects punctuate the action. It's
an art film disguised as a crime picture. As Walker aims higher and
higher in the echelons of syndicate power, the enemy becomes more mundane,
less involved in any personal connection to Walker's drama. The point
of Point Blank is the institutionalized nature of American corruption.
The bitter joke of the film's ending may not even register unless you
approach the film as a political statement rather than the mere thriller
it pretends to be. The film doesn't always work - sometimes the method
overwhelms the material, like Samuel Beckett adapting a Mike Hammer
novel. But overall it retains its intriguing power. In style, Point
Blank seems wholly a symptom of its time, and although it has been
imitated since, ad nauseam, it has never really been equalled. It remains
one of the enduring signposts of late 60s alienation.
SHE WORE A YELLOW RIBBON
(John Ford, 1949).
U.S. Cavalry Captain Nathan Brittles (John Wayne) is reluctantly facing
retirement, while Indian trouble is brewing. The second in Ford's so-called
Cavalry Trilogy, this was also only his second color picture, and the
cinematography was specially crafted to imitate Remington photos - winning
DP Winton Hoch a well-deserved Oscar. Ford's uncanny instinct for camera
placement and composition of men and horses in the frame is again in
evidence. He was the master of the seamless style - by this time it
was all second nature to him - as they say in sports, he was unconscious.
Wayne is fine in the role of the aging officer - the whiskers definitely
look good on him, he is amazingly mellow and restrained, and he only
indulges in his more typical mannerisms a few times here and there.
There are the usual formulaic elements - young lovers at odds (Joanne
Dru and John Agar - yawn) and Irish drunk humor courtesy of Victor McLaglen
(a little better than usual but I'm still not taken with this recurring
aspect of Ford's films). In the end, there's nothing very urgent about
the plot; it's more of a mild portrait of the old warrior than an adventure
yarn, which is fine with me. As for the Indians, though, I must say
that my awareness of historical reality always makes enjoyment of these
cavalry movies problematic, to put it mildly. Part of the western movie
myth (which Ford didn't invent, only inherited and elaborated on) is
that the white settlers and soldiers were a beleaguered, peaceable minority
harassed by dangerous and unreasonably hostile savages. (The supposed
menace is actually belied by the film's rather abrupt resolution to
the Indian threat.) Some people choose to ignore this or make allowances
for mythology. Others make fun of it. I tend to react with grumpiness
and criticism. I admit I'm not a big fan of the westerns, but that doesn't
stop me from sampling Ford from time to time and appreciating his artistry.
THE HANGING GARDEN
(Thom Fitzgerald, 1997).
It's hard to describe this Canadian feature without making it sound
much more solemn than it is. The Hanging Garden is about being
gay, and about grief and forgiveness and putting the past to rest. It's
part comedy, part drama, with an eccentric verbal wit and a strange,
moving idea of time as an interlocking maze of possibilities. William
(Chris Leavins) returns home after ten years for the wedding of his
sister (Kerry Fox), an amusingly brash young woman who tends to get
her own way. His desperately controlling mother (Seana McKenna) presents
him with a tux which is way too big for him - when William left home
he was a fat boy, but he's returned quite thin and openly gay. The father
(Peter MacNeill) has put all his love and energy into his flower garden,
while tyrannizing over his family. As the night proceeds, past scenes
weave into the present - we meet son and daughter as teens (Troy Veinotte
and Sarah Polley) and witness William's first gay experience, with the
boy who is later to marry his sister. To describe any more would spoil
the movie's series of weird surprises. Suffice it to say that William's
return has a meaning both sad and ultimately hopeful, and that Fitzgerald
bends the laws of time and space for a glimpse into the heart of regret
and lost chances. He's given many of the people the names of flowers
- William is Sweet William, the sister's name is Rosemary, the mother
is Iris, and there are other characters named Violet, Laurel and Dusty
Miller. This veers on the precious, but it's in keeping with the picture's
tone - poetic, ironic in a warm sort of way, filled with glancing insights
into the sickness of families, but - and this is what I found so admirable
- loving in spite of all the hurt. A hit at the Toronto film fest, it
never got much distribution. The Hanging Garden is one of those
hidden gems that I hope will gain wider exposure in time.
THE BROTHERS QUAY COLLECTION
(Stephen and Timothy Quay).
The Quay twins are American animators who have lived and worked in
London since the 70s. This is a collection of their best short pieces,
put out by the indispensable Kino Video. First on the bill is The
Cabinet of Jan Svankmajer (1984), a tribute to the Czech animator
which employs a puzzling array of exits and entrances by the Quays'
trademark children's dolls, employing various bizarre, surrealist inventions.
Also on the video is Street of Crocodiles (1986), in which various
strange objects interact with another impassive doll in a three-dimensional
labyrinth of musty curiosities that is apparently an abandoned subterranean
museum. As you can see, attempting to describe the Quays' work in understandable
terms is a daunting prospect. Their pieces are spooky, ingeniously constructed,
yet extremely dry and cerebral in tone. The Quays' universe resists
the urge to entertain, instead confronting the audience with inexplicable
scenarios involving sudden emergence, interpenetration, etherealized
matter, and other themes too weird to adequately verbalize. Rehearsal
for Extinct Anatomies (1987) is a black and white ballet of shapes,
seemingly abstract but suffused with a vague sense of disturbance. The
Comb (1991) is perhaps their most accessible work, an exploration
of shifting perspectives within the world of dreams. Their work definitely
has to be seen to be believed, but even then you won't be quite sure
what to make of them. This is not laid-back cinema - prepare yourself
to be put to work. (In case you were wondering, I am hereby giving this
video my highest recommendation.)
DEEP CRIMSON (Arturo Ripstein, 1996).
An overweight, depressed single mother named Coral (Regina Orozco)
longs for romance. Through a personal ad, she meets and falls for a
"Charles Boyer type" named Nicolas (Daniel Gimenez Cacho) who turns
out to be a gigolo with a toupee. Undaunted, she declares her total
love, gives her child up for adoption, and runs away with him. They
hatch a scheme where they pose as brother and sister, he woos lonely
widows with his charm, weds them and then takes all their money. But
Coral can't stand to see other women enjoy her man's attentions, so
she kills them, and the couple end up going on a murder spree. Ripstein
is one of Mexico's top film directors. He and screenwriter Paz Alicia
Garciadiego have taken the familiar true story of the "Lonelyhearts
Killers" and adapted it to a 1940s Mexican setting. The film's vision
is unsparingly dark. In Deep Crimson, the doomed couple must
hold on to illusions about themselves in order to survive, even though
they really know these illusions for what they are. Orozco gives a performance
of monstrous fascination - Coral is ferociously needy, vulnerable to
the point of madness, yet completely dominating her partner so as to
keep him for herself. Cacho's portrait of evil is just as disturbing
in its furtiveness and submissive vacillation. Ripstein's style is almost
austere at times, considering the lurid story, and the photography and
set design are first rate. (In a bonus, the great Marisa Paredes does
a scary turn as one of the victims.) The picture progresses from a kind
of dark comedy to a truly horrifying story of desperate spiritual depravity.
There is no redemption in Deep Crimson's world - the pathetic
protagonists, in thrall to an obsessive love which can't distinguish
the real from fantasy, take a ride straight to hell with no chance of
getting off. In the film's theatrical run, there were reports of massive
walk-outs by audience members as the story gets grimmer. The truth is,
Ripstein's treatment is not sensational, but eerily matter of fact,
and that, I suppose, is part of what makes it so disturbing. I guess
you could say this film is not for everybody, whatever that means. I
was really shaken by it, haunted by its hopeless vision and admiring
its craft. But then, I tend to like my movies black, without cream or
sugar.
Chris Dashiell
