Directed by Steven Spielberg
Written by Robert Rodat
Starring Tom Hanks, Tom Sizemore, Edward Burns, Barry Pepper, Adam Goldberg, Vin Diesel, Giovanni Ribisi, Jeremy Davies, Matt Damon, Ted Danson, Paul Giamatti, Dennis Farina, Nathan Fillion, Bryan Cranston, Harve Presnell
I had just settled in to watch Saving Private Ryan for the first time in probably ten years. Like many movies in my collection, it has quietly travelled with me across the continent and back, standing alongside its brothers on one shelf or another, always ready for duty but never getting the call. Thanks to this little project, all of these films will finally have another day in the sun.
And so the movie began, with its distinctive shot of the U.S. flag waving with sunlight shining through and its awkward framing story. This was followed soon thereafter by the most justly famous section of the movie, the invasion at Normandy beach. I enjoy most of the journey that the movie takes us on, but my favorite moment occurs early. I won’t give it away, but my spontaneous reaction to it today was saying “Goddamn it!” and then laughing out loud.
After the opening fireworks had settled, the exposition scene was just starting to get the main storyline moving. And that was when I got the telephone call from Tom Hanks.
“Hello, Mister … I’m sorry, I’m not sure how to pronounce that.”
I started to answer, but Hanks cut me off.
“You know, for marketing research purposes it really doesn’t matter. Actually I’m going to save a little time here and go ahead and check a few of these boxes. Age bracket -- B … income -- we’ll be generous and call that one a D ... single … Virgo … and your favorite color is -- periwinkle.
“OK, so that’s the preliminary stuff. The reason I’m calling today, Mister -- you know, why don’t I just call you Skip? It’s informal, it’s fun, it’s easier to remember and it definitely rolls off the tongue nicer than that mess of consonants you got going on there. Skip, the reason for the call is that the surveillance chip embedded in your DVD player shows that you are watching one of my films, specifically Saving Private Ryan. I believe you should be at the scene where Harve Presnell is reading Lincoln’s letter right about … now.
“I want you to go ahead and pause that. If you’ve got some popcorn, you could make some. I should be there in about five minutes. Also, do you like RC cola? Because I get a discount on it and I was going to get a two-liter. You want to go halvsies on it?”
I decided to hold off on making the popcorn for a few minutes, which worked out for the best. Tom didn’t arrive at the house until nine minutes after the call, owing to a busy store and a clerk who had been a pain to haggle with. I showed him in, paid the $.39 which was my share of the cola minus Tom’s share of the popcorn, and we resumed the film from where I’d left off.
“Don’t mind me, Skip,” Tom said through a mouthful of popcorn while he took photographs of my DVD shelves. “I’m just doing demographic research. Hey, do you have any Heckle and Jeckle cartoons?”
I shook my head, and then had a sinking feeling as I realized what he was bound to ask at some point.
A dying Vin Diesel was on screen, trying to hand a blood-covered note to one of his fellow soldiers. “Huh. Whatever happened to that guy?” said Tom. Some of his popcorn was flying out of his mouth in little pieces and landing on my tatami mats. I made a mental note to sweep them later.
Tom’s eyes were once again roaming my well-organized movie collection. “Let’s see, no Fast and Furious, no Chronicles of Riddick. Guess you’re not much of a Vin Diesel fan.” He noted this in his research. And then it happened.
“Holy crap! Where is your copy of Forrest Gump? Did you loan it out to someone?”
I couldn’t bring myself to meet his eyes.
Tom stood up slowly. His jaw was slightly opened, and I noted he was drooling a little. “Philadelphia … Big … Cast Away?” He was now frantically moving his hands over the spines of my DVDs, looking for a Tom Hanks movie, any Tom Hanks movie. He looked at his notes again. “But … your demographic … you should own Road to Perdition! Or maybe, --”
He scratched through some numbers and, I think, carried a one.
“Splash! Or Bachelor Party! One of them has to be here!”
I muttered something about kind of wanting to see Joe Versus the Volcano again, but it didn’t seem to comfort him.
“I don’t know what to say to you, Skip. Here I’ve spent the last three decades entertaining you. And don’t try to deny it. I have the receipts from when you saw Catch Me if You Can and The Terminal in theaters. So I know I’ve made some kind of connection with you. You’re not going to let the ice melt in that RC, are you?”
Not wanting to upset him further, I took a long sip. And then I saw it, on the fourth shelf from the top, the remake of The Ladykillers starring Tom Hanks. I started to tell Tom, but he interrupted.
“I know. I saw it there too. But we both know that one doesn’t count.”
On screen, machine guns were firing. But it wasn’t enough to drown out the awkward silence in the room.
Tom took a deep swig from his RC and put the glass down on the mantelpiece. He gathered up his research materials and started to say something to me. But the hurt in his eyes said it all. He opened the door and sighed.
I’m sorry, Tom, I was saying to him. But he was already gone.
Directed by Joel (and Ethan) Coen
Written by Ethan and Joel Coen
Starring Billy Bob Thornton, Frances McDormand, Scarlett Johannson, James Gandolfini, Tony Shalhoub, Jon Polito
The Man Who Wasn’t There is a great-looking curiosity piece. The same could probably be said about most of the Coens’ movies. I’m a fan of them, as are most film people I know. They’ve put their stamp on a lot of different genres and created a few truly unique movies. What other movie is like O Brother Where Art Thou, or The Hudsucker Proxy?
This time around the genre is film noir. Working with their regular cinematographer Roger Deakins, they nail the look. That’s a given. There’s a reason Deakins is one of the best-known people of his profession. The basic elements of the plot fit in with the genre as well. There is betrayal and murder. The protagonist, Ed Crane the barber, is less than heroic. He narrates his story with unflinching cynicism.
But the feel of the movie is different from classic noir. Maybe it’s über noir. The movie just oozes hopelessness. It’s not without the Coens’ comic touches, but they aren’t enough to let any sunshine in to this bleak tale. Scarlett Johansson’s Birdy is the brightest spot, but even her character isn’t immune to the effects of the general malaise.
A decade before, the Coens made Miller’s Crossing, a film that was as good a gangster picture as it was a sendup of the genre, depending on how seriously you feel like taking it. It is one of many high points in their careers. Of that film’s protagonist, Tom Reagan, it is said that he doesn’t hate anyone -- or like anyone. That statement can be applied and amplified to Ed Crane. To say he “isn’t there” is fair enough. His life seems to have happened around him, without any initiative on his part. When he makes the decision to go into business with Jon Polito’s dry cleaning entrepreneur, his actions are motivated out of spite for his own wife. It makes him impossible to sympathize with, even if he had his own reasons for doing what he did.
The second half is a little easier to take. Events of the first section wrap up sooner than expected, and better for our protagonist than he deserves. Ed gravitates toward the light he sees in Birdy’s piano playing out of misplaced affection, and her presence is as much a relief for the audience as it is for him. But eventually his past comes back to haunt him, even if the specifics are a little off, and the story ends as it must.
I don’t know what kind of business the film did or how it was received critically, but I suspect history will be kind to the movie. Despite the detachment between protagonist and audience, it has to be said the movie is immaculately made. Writing, performances, direction, cinematography, and music all work together to create an experience that is cinematic in the best sense of the word.
And now the movie’s over and I’m bummed. That’s why I haven’t watched it in forever until now.
Interesting Facts
-- After initial discussions with the Coens about taking on the role of Ed Crane, Billy Bob Thornton watched every episode of The Andy Griffith Show featuring Floyd the barber repeatedly in preparation for his performance. Then, upon reading the final script, he said “what the fuck did I do that for?”
-- The moving piano piece that Birdy plays at her recital is “Move It On Over” by Hank Williams.
-- There is an anachronism toward the end of the film when Ed sees the UFO. The movie takes place in 1949, but the spaceship he sees is clearly a 1957 model. The dual exhaust and chrome highlights give it away.
Directed by Edward F. Cline
Written by W.C. Fields (as Mahatma Kane Jeeves), Richard Carroll
Starring W.C. Fields, Shemp Howard
It was, I believe, last Wednesday night. Whichever night it was raining and that fog seeped in. I was taking the train home from work when I became convinced by a completely illogical premonition that the conditions would somehow cause us to derail. I made it a point to disembark at the next stop.
I found myself in a part of town that I had never seen before. It smelled like it was laundry day, and everyone had washed their clothes in urine before hanging them out to dampen in the mist. I was shivering and pulled my coat up tight. But I needed a different kind of warmth in my belly.
I walked toward where the fog was at its brightest yellow-grey. I found there a tavern lit by gas lamp, with a better-than-average weeknight crowd, no doubt driven by the same impulses as myself.
Edgar Allan Poe and Mark Twain were arm wrestling in a booth. A lively game of Texas Hold ‘em was underway in the middle of the room. Colonel Sanders was holding a cigar and looking very confident. Minnie Pearl and one of the Monkees each had a decent stack of chips. Paul Lynde appeared to be out of the game and was just hanging around to chat. Poor Elisha Cook was obviously about to be dealt out.
There was one open stool at the bar and I worked my way over, careful to avoid a collision with Carmen Miranda balancing a tray of drinks atop her head.
Shemp Howard was moving faster than I would have imagined him capable, applying a lemon twist to a martini on his left and pouring a jigger of amaretto on his right, then quickly turning around to tighten up a faulty beer tap. I didn’t want to interrupt his work to place my order just yet, and looked to the neighbor on my left.
“It ain’t a fit night out for man nor beast!” said W.C. Fields, and threw down a shot. He had his own bottle of rye, and immediately poured another.
“What an apt phrase,” said the silly old bear to my right. He turned up his hunny jar and then, licking his lips, offered it to me. I politely declined, but then the bear leaned in and whispered to me in confidence.
“It isn’t really hunny, you see. Or at least it hasn’t been in some time. Do you, sir, imbibe of mead?”
It was a libation I had never tasted, but my curiosity was piqued. I hefted the hunny jar in both hands (it was surprisingly large), took a cautious whiff, and drank in a large gulp.
“You won’t tell anyone, will you?” the bear continued. “None of my friends know, but then none of us are very bright. I feel I’ve been sending warning signals for years, vainly hoping for intervention.” He sighed loudly. “How very silly of me.”
I had drunk more than I’d intended, and I passed the jar back to my gracious host. But his expression changed to one of consternation.
“Oh bother, all gone.”
On my left, Fields stopped his glass halfway to his lips. He glanced nervously at our companion. “Everything OK there, Mister Saunders?”
“How very, very silly of me,” the bear repeated, swaying awkwardly on his stool.
By now his behavior had drawn Shemp’s attention. He poured a glass of ice water and placed it before the drunken old bear. “You uh, want us to call that boy to come get ya?”
Apparently that had been the wrong thing to say. The bear knocked back his stool and stood on his haunches. “That boy -- is never coming back!”
And then, his balance lost, he fumbled his paws around the hunny-mead jar just as his body rolled over with a crash. Somehow he worked the jar over his entire head and then pawed and clawed in the air like a turtle on its back.
Aghast, I looked to Fields, but he had already returned to his rye. “Silly old bear,” he muttered.
The mead was burning in my stomach. I’d gotten what I came for. Sensing that the place would be closing and perhaps ceasing to exist very soon, I made for the exit and never looked back.
Starring Humphrey Bogart, Edward G. Robinson, Lauren Bacall
Well, I got a pretty good one to start things off. Was afraid the computer (hereafter known as Ziggy Jr.) would end up picking something obscure like Armageddon for my inaugural foray with this blog. Key Largo stars my favorite actor working with his favorite leading lady in one of their better films together. My order of preference for the Bogart-Bacall collaborations: The Big Sleep, Key Largo, To Have and Have Not, Dark Passage. All but the latter are indisputable classic Hollywood entertainments.
Key Largo is basically a reworking of The Petrified Forest (1936), which contained Bogart’s breakthrough performance in the role of villain Duke Mantee. Warner Bros.' original choice for that role had been Edward G. Robinson, who was already an established screen star thanks to his turn as Rico in 1931’s Little Caesar and subsequent gangster pictures. Robinson’s performance as Johnny Rocco in Key Largo gives us a good idea what he would have been like as Mantee. Bogart, as protagonist Frank McCloud, has a grittier edge than Forest’s hero, the proper gentleman actor Leslie Howard. In both films, the heroes and villains are confined together during a storm and drama ensues. It’s one of the great formulas that still works.
I don’t believe in giving star ratings nor letter or numerical grades. So I’m not going to do that. My opinion of Key Largo is: very good movie, with entertaining story and performances that hold up well. My one gripe is that Bacall is underutilized.
Randoms
-- Johnny Rocco is one of those gangsters who likes making tough speeches while someone nervously shaves him with a straight razor. Possibly inspired a similar scene with Robert de Niro’s Al Capone in The Untouchables (1987).
-- Bacall is pretty fearless for a hostage. Would you spit on the leader of a bunch of hoods holding guns? Luckily she had Bogart there to talk him down with one of his patented dizzyingly fast speeches. If that hadn’t worked, I’m sure Bogart still had the magical shoulder-chop KO in his bag of tricks.
-- Rocco’s gang has guys named Ziggy, Curly, and Toots. What are the odds of assembling a group of mooks with names like that?
-- “What’s worse, Curly? A dumbbell or a wiseguy?” Curly answers "wiseguy". Maybe in his line of work he’s right. Me, I can’t abide stupidity. I’d have told him to shoot the dumbbell.
-- “One Rocco more or less isn’t worth dying for.” Would that line be convincing with any actor other than Bogart delivering it?
-- Inclement weather = natural drama. Screenwriters take note.
-- Rocco makes his poor alcoholic floozy sing for a snootful, then refuses to give her a drink because “you were rotten”. What an asshole.
-- One minor drawback to this particular Bogart-Bacall film is their lack of flirtatious scenes together. Their chemistry is better displayed in The Big Sleep and To Have and Have Not.
-- This was the last of the five films featuring Bogart and Robinson together. In all the previous films, Robinson was the star and Bogart a supporting player. In Key Largo, both actors get top-billing. Robinson kind of steals the show though.
-- Key Largo was the second film starring Bogart and directed by John Huston released in 1948. The other was The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, containing what is possibly Bogart’s best performance.
-- So you ditched a dead body outside and a lawman stumbles over it. What to do? Blame it on the Indians! Now that’s thinking like a white man.
-- Bogart is pretty restrained right up until he kills everybody.
Interesting Facts
-- John Huston was not the original director attached to the project. Key Largo was intended to be a technicolor musical and would have been the debut feature for a very young Stanley Kubrick. Hostilities broke out between Kubrick and Bogart, who harbored a deep jealousy of the acclaim James Cagney had received for Yankee Doodle Dandy. Bogart insisted on doing his own singing and choreographing all his big dance numbers with Bacall and Robinson. This set the production back several weeks before Kubrick was sacked. Some of his original footage was discovered perfectly preserved in a crypt in Switzerland shortly after Kubrick’s death in 1999. The material remains unavailable to the general public but by all reports is really, truly awful.
-- The fact that Bacall makes less impact in Key Largo than in her other screen adventures with Bogart may have to do with her replacing Betty White at the last minute. White apparently screen-tested very well, but refused to sign a contract stating that she would not be allowed to film her scenes nude.
-- Edward G. Robinson, on the other hand, had enough clout to add a nudity clause into his own contract, as evidenced by his bathtub introduction scene. It was common practice for the bigger stars of the time to demand these vanity nude scenes the first time their characters appeared in a movie. Unfortunately all home video versions have been based on the cropped and censored prints from the late 50s to early 60s, and most of these nude introductions are forever lost to us.
