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Every Day is a Birthday: Fighting the Power in the films of Craig Baldwin

rode.alan — Thu, 21 Dec 2006 00:00:00 +0000

What can film mean when everyone is an actor, or can be their own filmmaker? Does the access to personal cameras and digital media liberate or distract? With everyone capable of making their own movies, music videos and games, are they prone to be less or more aware of their manipulation by mainstream media and politics? Today, answers to these questions have to address this: When the largest producer of media distortions is the government itself, how does one interpret the truth? Is pursuing personal creative exploration and innovation to come at the expense of a communal willingness to respond to government abuses of power? Can truth be apprehended or understood in this saturated climate of images and personal networks, or are we content to live in our own realities, so long as we remain free to pursue it? Is an artist who calls for an awakening to the liberating potential of the mind to process the truth through media just pissing in the wind?
Director Craig Baldwin has been posing and suggesting answers to such questions since the late 1980′s. His films build off McLuhan and Debord, Brion Gysin and Terence McKenna; by using cut-ups and absurd juxtapositions, and by creating a new visual possibility for found and famous images, he both exploits and exposes propaganda. His many films attack this from several angles, from exploring conspiracy theories through the use of old sci-fi movie clips and politicians own words; by offering alternate histories of regions exploited for profit; and by exposing the hypocrisy of stars who promote freedom by crush it when used to poke to fun at them. Like Monty Python, he uses humor in the service of angry satire, which makes his points more devastating than they would coming from the academic avant-garde, who would be too self-conscious to be as probing as Baldwin. The best Dada has always been funny.
But what can collage and absurdity mean in an era where the government is the largest producer of the surreal? Can agitprop fight agitprop when the audience is in its own safe world, with both more entertainment and creative options than any generation in history? By mining for images throughout pop culture and splicing them together, Baldwin is offering not only an alternative history, but an illustration of how history itself is spliced for one’s own uses.
No better example than this is his 1991 film Tribulation 99, Baldwin’s 1991 masterpiece, which uses shreds of 50′s sci-fi movies to tell the tale of American crimes in Latin America. The narrative is placed in a mythological context–the CIA was really fighting an ancient race that was disturbed from its sleep by A-Bomb testing, and which then vowed to destroy humanity, and provided “dupes” to, much like the CIA, infiltrate society and disrupt it. Was it aliens or shadowy government figures who assassinated Kennedy, and overthrew Allende in Chile? And just which side of the cosmic war did Howard Hughes, Ian Fleming and E. Howard Hunt really work for? As with all of his films, the narratives of fiction and non-fiction, history and fantasy, are scrambled, revealing hidden truths and buried lies. But the blurring is not some academic playing with “text”; by exploring the depths of the “carnival acts of history”, Baldwin re-arranges words and images in his “struggle between personal autonomy and assimilation.” Rather than use his cut-ups to teach, he uses even the trash clippings of culture to challenge the viewer to become active in her own history. His films are a celebration, and in some ways, a lament at the lack of, the visionary and mystical potential of both media and media consumer.
The implication is that, like found images re-imagined, we too are meant to be more than we often are.
But creative autonomy today is a risky business for the larger community. If we use unprecedented technology to explore and create our own niche-walled world, what becomes endangered is the idea that we belong to something larger, and that the world doesn’t revolve around us. Today we can literally create a world that does, which means that we can at once totally dedicate ourselves to the freedom of our interests and become slaves to those who are banking on our being distracted. Autonomy must be balanced by the continual skill in reading the way words and images are manipulated by power for sinister ends. Freedom is not enough.
When I think of autonomy, in the context of rebellion against mainstream thinking and with a liberating anarchy in mind, I think of Hakim Bey. His concept of the TAZ, a temporary autonomous zone in which one rebels against conformity when the occasion presents itself, or staking out a portion of one’s life for rebellion while still being part of the larger system, strikes me as a reassuring way for the affluent to play at rebellion. Clearly, an academic with tenure can spout revolutionary rhetoric while still maintaining a healthy consumer lifestyle; it is this fragmentation that allows one to be seemingly be daring while still also willingly taking advantae of the fruits of a corrupt economy. Is the internet providing one huge glorious TAZ for us to get lost in while society is pillaged by the few for their own gain?
In this context, playing at rebellion is no longer an option. Is being rebellious in one’s own little pond, rebelling within personal confines, to be a willing participant in tyranny? Is there still a way to incite awareness, to be fearless in the public arena?
Now, how to be a real rebel, when rebellion is just another visual or rhetorical option to browse?
Baldwin aims for permanent liberation, regardless of social opportunity. His films stand as a rebuttal to the current exploitation of the public’s visual knowledge, through the use of fake news reports, edited soundbites, altered video. His films are also a challenge to academia, and others on the left who have not acted, only self-righteously criticized this exploitation. In other words, an overview of Baldwin’s work suggests both a reaction to exploitation and a call to fight fire with fire. While the left has written books, parsing films according to Marxist, Feminist, or Semiotic trends, it has stood idle while governments have exploited the same visual images for their own agenda. The greatest failure on the left has been that passivity which, in my view, is not born of resignation, but arrogance, one that expects power to come to it once their superiority is recognized. While the left has been attending conferences for the converted and taking up every seat at the coffeehouse, holding out for their eventual coronation as the Vanguard, history has been made by the right, who have faced little but whining opposition. Today, one can be both more creative and also more passive to a government that will allow such creative freedom. Creativity needs at some point to be directed at power, not just at oneself, or when creative freedom is slowly denied, no one will notice until it is too late. The visions and warnings of Philip K. Dick, not Marx, will have won out.
In his films, Baldwin both parodies and subverts that, and assumes that the viewer can read the same symbols, decode them, and act. The implication in many of them is that the same hubris that allows power to manipulate is the same that drives them to talk “freedom” but try to discredit those who see through their definition of it. His work is especially vital now, given that the concept of freedom itself is politicized.
From his first film, the 1976 Stolen Movie, Baldwin has been trying to rouse the viewer to think for himself. In that film, As he said in a 2003 interview, “Everyday is a birthday.” His work is a conscious attempt to get us to the table to blow out the candles.
Likewise the challenge to separate truth from pose exists also in the claims of authenticity made by artists. When those who claim to support freedom and rebellion against the system are also part of that system–and act according to their power within it–what is true rebellion and what is rebellion as a marketing tool?
Sonic Outlaws details the battle of the band Negativland, in its fight against, of all people, U2. While Bono runs for sainthood and the band is promoted as the last classic band to uphold the spirit of rock, they also destroyed the career of a band that sampled one of their songs. That song, “I still haven’t found what I’m looking for”, was spliced with hilarious obscene outtakes by Casey Kasem from his American Top 40 radio show. Almost inexplicably, it was Kasem, who came across as a foul-mouthed barfly, who thought it was no big deal and did not pursue any litigation, while U2 sued for copyright infringement. They also lamely claimed that the sleeve of the released song was so close in resemblance to an actual U2 record that fans might be mislead. That lawsuit bankrupted Negativland, and in the face of criticism that they were using their star muscle to beat down a little guy, U2 blamed the suit on their label, Island records. That may have satisfied fans willing to forgive and forget–and preserve the band’s image reassuringly in their minds–but a closer look reveals a further manipulation of the truth. Without U2, Island would not be in business. Aside from a few relatively successful Tom Waits records, most of its income has come from U2 sales. For the band to say that it was label execs not them, that pushed the suit, is to overlook the fact that anyone at Island would have risked injury to stop a lawsuit had U2 wanted it stopped. The film is raises the subject not only of fair use, but of media manipulation.
So how does one truly rebel in a way that speaks to power and still take advantage of all our wondrous creative toys? With the internet, in theory the voice of anyone willing to cry in the wilderness can be heard, their idea read and compared with official versions of truth. But the internet raises two serious questions:
*How subversive is subversive, when even the most radical idea on the internet, whose power is supplied by snooping telecom industries, may as well be presented in the lobby of a police station?
*Why does power allow such ideas to be spread freely online? Is it because there is too much of a din created to present any real threat, or is it because, by virtue of its being driven by corporate technology, subversion is already co-opted? In either case, is meaning lost?
In most of Baldwin’s films, the CIA, NSA, corporate dupes and spooks are the usual culprits in helping to subvert or mold reality according to military-industrial aims. What can propaganda mean in a climate where the CIA etc is almost the voice of reason, attempting to present real intelligence to an administration obsessed with spinning all information to advance its political ends? Where can rebellion and dissent flourish?
The loss of meaning of words like “truth,” “rebellion,” and “freedom,” combined with the willful distortion of images and news venues traditionally valued, at least in America, as independent of propaganda, that calls for new ways to approach dissent.
Has meaning been so distorted and politicized that it is too late to restore meaning? Hell, is it just better to play the fiddle and wait for the fire to come up your street? It is ironic that, given the unprecedented opportunities for anyone to express creativity, be famous for a day, the best that the true rebel can hope for is to say his peace fearlessly, get crushed, and disappear without so much as a ripple made in the larger culture. The fifteen minutes of fame not only includes someone who eats a horse’s anus on Fear Factor or is caught on tape flipping his Cooper on World’s Most Wild, Fucked Up Car Chases; it may also apply to someone crying in the wilderness about where we have all gone wrong in our complacency. Like the other examples, most will just look, get a little thrill, and change the channel. Craig Baldwin raves on anyway, and that is not a bad idea at all. And yet, can even his work rise above the din?
Is there a problem in parodying the work of empire, causing further confusion? Baldwin assumes the intelligence of the viewer–for better or worse–to crack the code. His respect for his audience is also a reminder of the viewer’s duty. His most recent film, Spectres of the Spectrum, deals explicitly with the “corporate colonization of the imagination” currently creeping into the internet, as it did with cable TV in the mid-80′s. This colonization not only stifles creativity, but provides a constant venue for official manipulation, turning an egalitarian source of ideas into a consumer Wonderland. In this way not only the versions of history available are limited, but the viewer is both numbed and dumbed down by the fare that is offered. The twin teats of fear used by government as control and infantilization of the viewer into a consumer who actually likes reality shows and nostalgic recaps of has-been stars–pop has finally eaten itself, if you watch VH1–make awareness difficult. What are the alternatives to apathy, with choice shaved down to what there is to purchase, when political choice mean to be either Liberal or Conservative, Patriot or Traitor? One can create an isolated world of creative interests, but those in power do the same, and have more influence, only one example being the almost complete Bizarro World currently being constructed by Christian Nationalists, with its own universities, law schools, and “Scientific” research centers, dedicated to proving that Global Warming is an anti-Christian myth.
Spectres, like Tribulation 99, ends with destruction, though here, it is a destruction that leads to hope. Whereas in Tribulation, there is almost relief in the coming of the apocalypse, which brings to a burning end the political and religious corruption and endless games of trying to manipulate history for the benefit of the few, in Spectres it is the progress of media that is stopped in its tracks. In the settling dust, there arises the opportunity for a new, fresh look at the options open to all. Childlike, not childish, wonder, at the options open and to the potential in each, is one way to insure corporate colonization is never complete.
What can be done with this knowledge? In what ways can we then promote awareness and change? With the technological options available today, wake-up calls co-exist with distraction and distortion. Is a mass wake-up even possible any more? Why, then, is it important to know how you are being manipulated if there is no way to then dissent in a way that can bring change?
Here is where the individual, and the idea of autonomy, can come into play.
Baldwin’s films are the type of crying in the wilderness that usually wake up enough people to at least give power a short-term run for its money. That there is more of a din in the wilderness than ever before shouldn’t stop other attempts. His films challenge power, and also expose the ways the powerful have covered up their actions. We need not be fearful and complacent; we can use the toys that we are given to make to us lazy and distracted and put them to liberating use. Make a video, parody a speech or political ad, spread the word about a video or band, use network sites like My Space and You Tube for more than just being able to say you have 12,000 friends or have made a movie. Someone will listen, or watch. And then their eyes are open. True autonomy is doing more than saving or entertaining yourself: it means taking people with you for the ride to the wake-up call. Craig Baldwin’s films point to several ways to wake up; the questions posed here, I hope, may point to more.

Takagi Masakatsu, life so beautiful

rode.alan — Mon, 18 Dec 2006 00:00:00 +0000

Masakatsu takes the randomly photographed world and plays with it, isolating gestures or angles, adding colors or bursts of colors, to highlight just how beautiful the world actually is. Or can be; it this celebration of the mundane and the mundane manipulated that gives the short films in this collection their power.
Working from a palette of mages shot in Turkey, Cuba, German, France, and enhanced with his own music, Life attempts to reveal the beauty inherent in the world by distorting it and turning it into one huge canvas.
While many of the scenes are gorgeous, and Masakatsu’s alteration of the film with his coloring and stop-motion effects help each image transcend the action of each piece, many of the ten shorts here seem like outtakes from a larger video art piece. Scenes featuring children in various playful activities certainly illustrate the universality expressed, but in many of the films there is no context. The viewer is left pausing to muse on a beautiful scene that could mean anything or nothing.
Where Masakatsu’s vision and technique triumph is in two very powerful pieces. In “Sorina Street,” we are drawn to the plight of a little girl playing the accordion on a bust Istanbul street corner. Her wise yet delicate features speak for both the fear and the defiance in all of us. She becomes truly universal, whether bathed in manipulated color or framed in black and white. She is a calm and strong oasis amid the bustle around her.
Making great use of black and white is “Birdfland2,” which follows the slowly building group action of a flock of birds as they prepare to leave their trees and head to where instinct leads them. Here the profound in the mundane is explicit, and moving.
Over all, there are too many static images, altered with color and their meanings suggested by music, to make a truly arresting statement. Still, as a reminder of what we often miss daily when we are blind to everything we think we’ve seen before, life is so beautiful offers a sweet testament to what glory surrounds us, ready for appreciation. The artist could have chosen more active scenes to prove his point.

Captain Beefheart Under Review

rode.alan — Mon, 18 Dec 2006 00:00:00 +0000

Since he gave up music for painting in 1981, Don Van Vliet (Captain Beefheart) has not publicly spoken about his music. Even when he was recording, he was evasive and elliptical in his descriptions of his intent and his success in music. Beefheart created his own musical territory, a mixture of blues, surrealism, and shamanism, and left a body of work unique in its complexity and challenging to even the most jaded ear. That his musical vision was often difficult to translate to his band (one infamous example is his telling his drummer to play “like the sun is purple, but you can’t see it”) is legendary. It is fitting, then, that in this documentary, it is left to various members of the Magic Band to discuss the records they made with Beefheart; in his silence, it is left to the band to describe the creative process of an erratic genius.
Chief among these musicians are several who were key to helping Beefheart express himself musically. Drummer John French and guitarist Gary Lucas, though involved in the Magic Band at different times, were two who understood Beefheart’s ambitions, or at least to the degree that they helped translate his ideas to the rest of the band. The documentary traces the evolution of The Magic Band, from a somewhat traditional blues band influenced by Howlin’ Wolf and relying on the Captain’s vocal similarities to him, through his great experimental period, which produced the classics Trout Mask Replica and Lick My Decals Off Baby. It was at this point that the band slipped off the rails, and of course, opinions differ as to why. While Clear Spot continued in Beefheart’s vein of challenging blues, his next few records in the mid-’70s were either, depending on your loyalty, half-assed attempts at commercial music, or a return to the original brand of Magic Band traditional blues. As expected, those band members who were with the early, mid-’60s versions of The Magic Band tend to look less favorably on the experimental period, one in which they were unable to participate. Their replacement by such younger, less schooled musicians like French and guitarist Zoot Horn Rollo were more receptive to Beefheart’s compositions.
The real meat of the film is in the discussions of Beefheart’s late ’70s early ’80s records, which represented a surprising return to form and produced some of his most adventurous music. The Magic Band at this time was lead by Lucas, a fan and guitarist. While more professionally produced than his late ’60s masterworks, Shiny Beast/Bat Chain Puller, Doc at the Radar Station, and Ice Cream For Crow displayed an aggressive rock sound, one that relied more often on Beefheart’s sax playing than his earlier records. If these were his final statements, they were definitive. The band members of the time recall it both as an incredible experience musically, but a frustrating time personally, in dealing with Beefheart.
The tension between the professional and the mystic was always at the root of Captain Beefheart’s music. In this film, that tension is expressed by his musicians, who wrestled with him to make his vision coherent to his audience. In the end, you have a better understanding of what went into the creation of some of the most challenging, disturbing and profound rock music, but are no better equipped at apprehending the artist himself. This is as it should be. Worth seeking out, and a good companion to this, is the short film Some Low Yo-Yo Stuff, in which the artist, now again called Don Van Vliet, discusses his paintings.

Our Stars / The Little God

rode.alan — Tue, 14 Nov 2006 00:00:00 +0000

Our Stars raises one big question, yet leaves the viewer with many more, mostly about his intentions. Who owns the images of those we see on screen? The power of film lies with the viewer, who incorporates the visuals into a personal narrative based on experience, longing, loss. But that is filtered through the director, whose choice of how images are presented determines the viewer’s experience.
Initially a homage to silent era starlets, Lemaitre here wonders what their thoughts and feelings were, and what would our experience of them be had they been allowed to speak for themselves beyond their facial iconography. Who owns Lilian Gish, Louise Brooks? The face is a silent soundtrack, yet more if allowed greater freedom. He posits the question, then offers a solution:
With the cooperation of the audience, he will present a silent series of current avant-garde actresses, who in the future will be allowed to speak for themselves. Privacy will be ensured by the random insertion of their voices–their face and true voice will never be properly synched. This will allow a freedom of verbal expression, safely unattached to her true face. Visually, the film is a collage of faces of women who seem about to act or speak, and then are cut away from; mostly silent, there are English subtitles for the occasional French voice, then English subtitles strung out over the silence.
What is true here? The faces are manipulated by the director, distorted, colored, swirling. Did they themselves agree to not having their words on screen at the same time as their faces? Did they agree to be a part of the original collage? Collage itself lends to questions about ownership of the image. Is the audience cooperating in the liberation of the actress, or in the manipulation by the director?
Why are they “Our Stars”? Did not Gish and Brooks and Pickford “belong” to us as well? Does the actress, the artist, surrender ownership of themselves in any damaging way, to the audience?
Would our stars merely be revealing themselves to the director, who can then use their inner self as he pleases on screen in the same way he uses their faces?
Whatever the level of investment you care to make in Our Stars, it confronts you with questions that will keep you muttering whether your next stop after viewing is the bar, the bed or the bank. Too few movies these provoke this much thought, and one 22 minutes long at that.
The Little God is a surreal children’s story, told entirely in words on the screen. The story itself is about the ultimate silliness and futility of trying to name anything, since all is one, or could be, with the exercise of one’s power to name. The irony that such wisdom is being imparted solely through words, a sort of Buddhist tease that even pointing out possibilities is to become trapped in them.

Bad Brains: Live at CBGB ’82

rode.alan — Tue, 14 Nov 2006 00:00:00 +0000

Punk has been celebrating its history well lately. Part of it I’m sure is the fact that these days any tape lying around can be released and sent out, to our benefit. The information age has allowed everyone’s private collections to be shared, and we are better for it. The recent Minutemen DVD We Jam Econo should hold up as the classic punk doc of the era between 1979-1986, but this DVD is the definitive record of the live performances of the era. For those of us aging punks, this is as close as it comes to reviving memories of going to any and every show that came to town, the best ones being those where you were happily never sure of coming out alive.
Moreso than in the staged documentaries like Urgh! A Music War and Decline and Fall of Western Civilization (both 1984), this gives one a sense of what it was like at a typical hardcore show in their early ’80′s. In energy alone, this show ought to shock young punks by its ferocity, and is only matched by the classic punk road movie, 1983′s Another State of Mind. Shot from both audience and stage point of view, you get the feel of the creative violence and lack of barriers between audience and band that was the glory of punk. Audience members jostle each other and the band, stage diving and taking turns singing lyrics to the songs right from the band’s mics. You get the sense of a community, and of one hell of a cathartic experience.
Bad Brains were the standard of what could be done live. Vocalist HR, guitarist Dr. Know, Drummer Earl Hudson and bassist Darryl Jenifer were easily the fastest and most ferocious band of their time, virtually inventing Hardcore and as well as the community inspired by it. In Washington, DC, the band’s hometown, soon to be legends such as Ian MacKaye and Henry Rollins took in some early Bad Brains shows and started their own bands. No one who heard the ridiculously fast and raw first Bad Brains single, “Pay to Cum” in 1979 was unchanged. This full show consists of killer version of all their early classics: “How Low Can A Punk Get,” “The Big Takeover,” “FVK,” “Banned in D.C.,” “Attitude,” etc.
Punk and Hardcore were quickly snapped up by the mainstream and its creative force was largely gone by 1986, when acts like Hüsker Dü and Replacements signed to major labels, Black Flag became metal, and Bad Brains imploded due to personnel problems and Rasta conservatism. But for those tricked into believing that Green Day is punk, check out this DVD, and any and all punk records released from the early ’80s.
Bad Brains live at CBGB ’82 is both a reminder and a revelation of what was, and could have continued to be.

City2City

rode.alan — Thu, 17 Aug 2006 00:00:00 +0000

I can’t remember which sociologist it was who said that a city was a living organism, streets and roads being the veins and arteries that funneled the blood—us—to its main organs. Lowave is a DVD label that has produced many collections of short films. This amazing and varied release deals with, as the liner notes to one says, the “catastrophe and boundless beauty” that is the city. It also positions the label as one to watch for innovative work.
Ranging in time from 4 to just under 18 minutes, the DVD features the work of ten artists from nine countries. Visions of the city for most of us include movement, noise, chaos that either causes fear or excitement, sometimes both. Opportunity and variety are explored here, as is movement. Missing from these films are questions of whether or not the city provides opportunity and variety for all; the is beside the point. Here people react to the city, and in some sense, are at the mercy of its rhythms, which are alive in and of themselves. Yet many other questions are raised by these films, from the silly to the profound.
In Crossings, Marina Chernikova presents images of a disembodied pair of eyes centered on screen as around them a trains-pace view of cities roll by; eventually local music and voices are heard–from the train or the passing city? Is it just as well to pass through as enter?
Nose Chan’s Nil becomes claustrophobic, noisy, eventually. Hong Kong awakes to silence, and slowing builds a collection of noises and movements, until it becomes fully alive; in both cases, the city was completely present and whole within itself. It wakes on its own time, and its people respond appropriately.
From 7pm to 7pm, Alli Savolainen builds off the classic time-lapse photography technique common in documentaries, yet twists its normal meaning. Rather than use the technique to advance time –real and film time- this film uses the slightly rapid display of sun and shadow as it plays off the city in a 24 hour period to emphasize the distance that such technique creates from its subject. The city, when seen from this approach, is a place where almost nothing happens. The city in this case is victim of a visual lie.
The central film in the collection for me is John Smith’s Worst Case Scenario.
Here, the worst-case scenario seems to be stasis, or calm; the city comes to life when active, dangerous, again moving to its own rhythm. When there is a pause, when the lights are red, or the train or bus has yet to arrive, people wait with anxiety, and seem grotesque, seemingly having a psychotic episode of twitches and ticks. The inhabitants have not only become used to the city’s natural rhythms, they cannot stand to be deprived of it.
Less successful that the Smith, though similar in theme is Pablo Estes’ Street Crossing. A meditation of the movement of the city past one crossing, the film suggests that one can remain static and have the city come to them, and that what will arrive is always the same. Its main visual focus is a CitiPost news truck, which passes the isolated crossing over and over. Is the news always the same, too, like the route of its delivery?
But does the action only take place within the city limits, or on its surface? What about interior life? Ulrich Fischer, in Es Geht Auch Schneller, home movie stills of communist-era housing complexes, factories; memories flood during the times the city can be frozen in photos. Footsteps of a shadow figure who becomes a guide opens windows, enters rooms, leading us to other still photos of rooms, walls, windows. This guide could be anyone, giving anyone a tour of anywhere. A park and children offer the first real action and response, a calm before the travel begins, a hustling to and from where? Most of the films seem to suggest that the only place to go is to the place in the city where one goes every day, day after day. The city has a grip on its residents’ present, and provides evidence of their pasts.
However,Augustin Gimel’s stunning Je Nai Pas Du Tout L’Intention De Sombrer, suggests a destination.. In a rapid clash of buildings, angles, facades, face off at their corners; the images speed increases to the drone of industrial machines, grinding, gently pounding. Slowly a space opens, blue sky above, light. The infinite is not interested in this contest–it is present and patient as always. Finally, it is the only thing that remains.

Ava Gardner: Love is Nothing

rode.alan — Wed, 10 May 2006 00:00:00 +0000

Ava Gardner possessed such luminescent beauty that both sexes experienced a sharp intake of breath and weak knees when seeing her for the first time.
As the ultimate movie love goddess, no film, movie, photograph or publicist’s adjectives could ever do Ava justice. Her life of volcanic excess proved to be similarly elusive until Lee Server’s Ava Gardner: Love Is Nothing.
Server, who perfectly captured Robert Mitchum’s laconic laissez-faire in Robert Mitchum: Baby, I Don’t Care, follows with another captivating chronicle of one of Hollywood’s most enduring stars.
“Love is nothing but a pain…” said Ava, concluding the sentence with an exact anatomical locale. For Gardner, love and pain became a swirling, kamikaze-like froth of high-speed existence before decades of overload finally broke her down.
A literal “Tobacco Road” refugee from Grabtown, North Carolina, Ava’s beauty was instantly recognized in a quickie MGM screen test, and she was signed to a long term contract. Stardom was not instantaneous. The legendary studio’s overstocked production line moved at a glacial pace, and Ava’s southern brogue and total lack of acting experience required considerable polish.
After six years of small parts and loan-outs in dreck such as Ghosts on the Loose (1943) with Bela Lugosi, it finally took Mark Hellinger casting her in Universal’s The Killers (1946) to make her a star.
“It was sex-two-and extra,” wisecracked the fast-talking Hellinger when asked why he chose Ava for the starring role. Gardner’s striking performance as a lethal femme fatale who double-crosses Burt Lancaster remains a seminal screen performance. After The Killers, Gardner never had to glance backwards for stardom, but many of her subsequent films didn’t do her justice.
She shined in several pictures, including Show Boat (1951), Mogambo (1953) and The Barefoot Contessa (1954), when her beauty wasn’t used to hype poorly designed material. Gardner lacked confidence, and acting was always a chore. Only craftsmen directors like John Ford and Joe Mankiewicz were able to bring out her considerable talent.
It is Ava Gardner’s publicly private life that is presented in mesmerizing fashion by Server.
She was a virginal teenager at MGM, until bending to the incessant blandishments of that diminutive superstar and Hollywood sharpie, Mickey Rooney. After a whirlwind honeymoon on Rooney’s terms at Pebble Beach, “…sex and golf and sex and golf,” Gardner’s high octane jealousy was piqued Mickey’s incessant philandering. She moved on to charismatic bandleader Artie Shaw, who quickly became as coldly demeaning as he was with his other seven wives. Ava became more case-hardened, yet increasingly vulnerable, looking for love in all the right and wrong places.
Ava’s craving for sex, booze and wild times quickly rose to tsunami heights, and the wave failed to crest for many years. Although she held off an ardent Howard Hughes, Gardner was forever restless, fearing loneliness over all else. No matter how bored or free of spirit, though, no other relationship in the star’s life rivaled her thermonuclear marriage to Frank Sinatra.
The seismic pairing of both rags-to-riches superstars that pegged the Richter scale of destructive passion became the centerpiece of Gardner’s life. Ava and Frank’s unbridled desire for one another was as unchecked as their inability to coexist without screaming invective and hurled bric-a-brac. Yet it was a love that endured like a flame of pure fire.
If all of this sounds like a prurient show business gossip biography, it isn’t.
Gardner’s life is depicted in an upbeat, attuned style. Polemics and titillation are refreshingly absent from a mesmerizing story supported by superb research. Server fondly brings Gardner to life as a warm, refreshingly unpretentious star whose appetites eventually overwhelmed her spirit.
Whether defining amnesia as “noir’s version of the common cold” or recalling Mark Hellinger placing a censor’s letter about The Killers script in a file labeled”Fuck You,” the author’s ability to imbue cinematic history within the narrative is peerless.
In the end, a desiccated Gardner iteratively listens to Sinatra’s records in her London flat as her health fails. The poignancy of Ava Gardner’s destructive quest for love will bring a lump to your throat.
Ava Gardner: Love Is Nothing is a compelling triumph of a biography.

Glenn Ford’s 90th Birthday Tribute in Hollywood

rode.alan — Tue, 02 May 2006 00:00:00 +0000

Hollywood turned out en masse to honor one of Tinseltown’s most enduring screen stars, Glenn Ford, on the occasion of his 90th Birthday.
Ford remains unique as an archetype actor in multiple genres, significantly film noir and westerns during a durable 54 year career.
Presented by the American Cinematheque in association with the Heartland Film Festival, TCM, Sony Pictures and Variety, the sold-out Egyptian Theatre became a facsimile of a golden age Hollywood premiere with vintage celebrity stars fording through a blizzard of photographers and rubbernecking film buffs.
It was eagerly anticipated that Glenn Ford would make his first public appearance in 15 years at the event. The ailing star, confined to his home and under constant care after a series of strokes, had to cancel at the last minute due to his tenuous health.
A poignant video message projected prior to the movie screenings showed a game, but diminished Glenn Ford thanking everyone for their birthday wishes. The great actor, clearly struggling with speech concluded, “I wish I were up and around, but I’m doing the best I can… There’s so much I have to be grateful for.”
The legendary star was well-represented by his family, including son and biographer, Peter Ford who co-hosted the event with writer and American Cinematheque trustee member, Martin Lewis.
The tributes that poured in from the present and former U.S. Presidents as well as the guest speakers who worked with the veteran star were appropriately effusive.
Debbie Reynolds praised Ford as an actor who was always prepared and did his job exceptionally well.
Actress Shirley Jones remembered, “Glenn Ford was so good, he never appeared that he was acting. She lauded the actor as “one of the cornerstones of our industry, and there aren’t many left.”
Martin Landau, who was cast with Ford in The Gazebo, recalled that after watching Ford work, “…the bar for me to be a successful film actor was set very, very high. He was a giant and I am still trying to be as good as Glenn Ford.”
Jamie Farr had it pretty much right, forcefully seconding Ron Howard’s open letter this week in Daily Variety that championed the Motion Picture Academy to honor Glenn Ford with a lifetime Oscar. Farr cut his remarks short, stating that he wanted to watch Gilda because ‘Corporal Klinger’ wanted to check out the dress Rita Hayworth wore while singing, “Put the Blame on Mame”!
The evening screenings began with Ford’s first film appearance, a Paramount short, Night in Manhattan (1937). The youthful 21 year old played a nightclub emcee (and, according to Peter Ford, had to wear Marlene Dietrich’s 1930 tuxedo from Morocco!) A restored 35mm print of the unforgettable film noir Gilda (1946), starring Ford and Rita Hayworth followed to the delight of the capacity crowd. Kudos must go to the UCLA Film and Television Archive and Sony Pictures for the beautiful restoration.
The post screening birthday celebration featured cake, vodka martinis and wine served in the Egyptian Theatre courtyard capped off the evening’s tribute to Glenn Ford as the stars mingled with the theatergoers in a convivial atmosphere. It was fun to watch the stars tippling and jawboning about Glenn Ford and the movies with the vintage film buffs and industry types.

Opening Weekend of the 8th Annual Festival of Film Noir at American Cinematheque at the Egyptian and Aero Theatres: April 8th through 16th

rode.alan — Fri, 07 Apr 2006 00:00:00 +0000

Los Angeles was reaffirmed as the epicenter of film noir by special guest James Ellroy with the opening of the eighth annual film noir festival at Hollywood’s historic Egyptian Theatre in Hollywood last night.
Festival host and programmer, author and founder of The Film Noir Foundation, Eddie Muller was joined by legendary novelist and chronicler of historical darkness, James Ellroy, for an opening night double feature introduction and Q&A session for “Crime Wave” (1954) and “Between Midnight and Dawn” (1950).
The dark underbelly of LALA land held center stage with the screening of two 1950′s crime drama rarities that are not on DVD. In a comprehensive scrubbing of the various studio film archives by Eddie Muller, fully half of the 24 films on the festival screening schedule are true rarities that haven’t made it to the small screen as yet.
The Film Noir Foundation is having startling success into locating ‘lost’ film noirs from the 40′s and 50′s. Working in partnership with the studios, many films that haven’t seen the light of a projector for decades are now being made available for screenings and issued for sale in pristine DVD packages. America’s noir heritage is being restored, one film at a time.
“Crime Wave” (1954) is a cliché title for an unambiguously refreshing “B” film shot on location in the dark streets of Los Angeles with remarkable deep focus skill by the late Andre de Toth. For the tight story and the hard-edged performance of a tooth-pick chewing Sterling Hayden as the prototype L.A.P.D. Robbery-Homicide dick, this briskly paced “B” noir is not to be missed. For a more detailed review of this minor gem of picture, please click here:
Crime Wave
The second feature, “Between Midnight and Dawn” (1950), originally titled “Prowl Car”, also carried a great deal of heft. A prototype cops-as-partners saga, the picture chronicles radio car cops and roommates, Edmond O’Brien and Mark Stevens on the hunt for a homicidal gang boss. Bullets fly as the buddies take on the crooks while wooing the same woman, a comely police dispatcher, played by Gale Storm. All of the three leading players acquit themselves well with O’Brien’s vigorous performance taking center stage. The prototype film noir leading man, O’Brien is never better as a hard-edged beat cop particularly when snapping off terse, hard-boiled noir dialogue to a crook in a nightclub or repetitively backhanding a gangster’s moll in a frantic effort to make her talk.
Gordon Douglas, an underrated director who scored in multiple film genres adds to an impressive noir resume-”San Quentin” (1946), “Walk a Crooked Mile” (1948), “Kiss Tomorrow Goodbye” (1950)–with this film. Another picture shot in the actual environs of the L.A.P.D. communications suite and detective bureau, this film has a more wholesome story that turns progressively darker culminating in a wild finale replete with hostages, searchlights and smoke bombs. We’ll save the spoilers, but suffice to say, any child protection services official viewing this film might want to lock up the cops after the denouement. One can quickly deduce that this 1950 film became the antecedent of innumerable television cop shows and movies. In a case of Hollywood Darwinism, film noir never really died out, it simply moved to television in the middle 1950′s and evolved into something different. Kudos must go to Mike Schlesinger, Grover Crisp, Rita Belda, and the folks at Sony-Columbia for striking the beautiful new print of “Between Midnight and Dawn” that was screened last night.
Eddie Muller and James Ellroy took center stage prior and after the first screening. For those sheltered souls who haven’t been exposed to Ellroy’s public shtick, it is outrageously profane, funny and always prescient. Introduced as the ‘greatest living noir author’, Ellroy’s riff on his dark upbringing in 1950′s L.A., the root theme of film noir (“…so you are… f#$! ed!) and one-liners about his “present and future masterpieces of writing…” was interspersed around his thoughtful and frequently uproarious responses to questions from a sold-out house in the Egyptian Theatre. The always-fascinating James Ellroy noted that Hollywood’s next send-up on his work, “The Black Dahlia” directed by Brian De Palma is in postproduction and scheduled for release in September 2005.
Warner’s Home Video is expected to release “Crime Wave” as a DVD selection in one of their upcoming boxed sets with the commentary track by Eddie Muller and James Ellroy. One hopes that the commentary, particularly from the ribald “Demon Dog” of noir fiction, remains intact and uncensored as an adult narrative companion to a film noir from the classic era.
The Eighth Annual Festival of Film Noir will be screened at the Egyptian and Aero theatres from April 8-16 courtesy of the American Cinematheque.

Noir City 4

rode.alan — Thu, 19 Jan 2006 00:00:00 +0000

The Noir City film festival in San Francisco has grown legs in year number 4… long ones that are sturdier, but still have the willowy look of film noir.
Noir author and cultural archeologist, Eddie Muller www.eddiemuller.com and the Film Noir Foundation ramped up this eagerly anticipated festival into a synergistic noir event that opened on Friday night at the sumptuous Palace of Fine Arts at the foot of the Golden Gate Bridge.
In the cavernous lobby, the dulcet rhythms of The Johnny Nocturne Noir Combo and Marcus Shelby Trio blended perfectly with the femme fatale blowup portraits and scenes of noir films and posters flashing on both sides of the stage. With a fully stocked bar adjacent to the bandstand serving complementary cocktails, several patrons wondered aloud whether Ida Lupino would appear in a skin-tight cocktail dress, warbling “Don’t Call it Love” to complete the backdrop ambience of a film noir nightclub, circa 1948.
The chronology of rare film screenings, celebrity guests and special events is a wide-angle, kaleidoscopic view of Pax Americana–Film Noir Festival Style. For event details, the screening schedule and information about the Film Noir Foundation please check out the festival web site at www.noircity.com .
The festival is being staged at dual sites with the marquee presentations and special guest appearances at the Palace of Fine Arts being buttressed by three days of film screenings at the historic Balboa Theatre highlighting films from the gateway year of 1946.
All Noir City 4 festival proceeds support the non-profit Film Noir Foundation whose goal to restore ‘America’s noir heritage’ by preserving classic film noirs in their glorious 35mm original format. Two films presented during the festival, “The Window” (1949) and “Nobody Lives Forever” (1946) will be screened with brand-new 35 mm prints courtesy of the Film Noir Foundation.
From special guests ranging from the relentless’ demon dog’ of noir literature James Ellroy to iconic film noir leading man Farley Granger and superstar actor/director Sean Penn plus a jazz concert by renowned jazz bassist Charlie Haden and his quartet, Noir City 4 has the cover charge down this year on the national film noir renaissance.
The sell out crowd on opening night was treated to a landmark double feature starring the legendary Farley Granger: Hitchcock’s masterpiece “Strangers on a Train” (1951) and Nick Ray’s poetically tragic “They Live by Night” (1949). The iconic star, making his first Bay Area appearance in 43 years, joined Eddie Muller on stage for a prolonged interview after a standing ovation. Granger discussed his close friendship and complete admiration for Alfred Hitchcock- “he knew exactly what he wanted to do and had it already done…” and his eventual souring on Hollywood film acting that he departed from to the stage and New York City over half a century ago. “I like to act in things that have a beginning, middle and an end” declared the still debonair Granger. At 80 years of age, this reluctant film star who simply wanted to be an actor remains a wry charmer whose soon-to-be-published autobiography is eagerly anticipated by multiple generations of cinephiles.
The Saturday evening double-feature highlighted the “B” movie roots of film noir with two classics- “The Narrow Margin” (1952) and “Decoy” (1946). Producer/Writer Stanley Rubin joined me on stage with a special surprise guest who flew in from Texas, Jacqueline White, star of “The Narrow Margin”. Rubin, a seemingly ageless oracle of Hollywood history who arrived in Tinseltown on a Greyhound bus in 1933, was accompanied by his wife of 51 years, the lovely “Queen of 3-D” film productions, Kathleen Hughes.
“The Narrow Margin”, routinely labeled ‘the greatest ‘B’ movie ever made’ was Rubin’s first production that launched him on a long and fruitful career as a film and television producer after grinding out scripts and original stories for over a decade. The veteran filmmaker succinctly described how the obsessive Howard Hughes almost ruined the film with ill-advised post production cuts and retakes that were a near miss. Jacqueline White reminisced about an all-too brief career that ended with “The Narrow Margin” as she opted for a spectacularly successful marriage and family life. This unique guest appearance at Noir City 4 was a rare return to the limelight for the still-glamorous star. Both of these cinematic veterans proved to be a tribute to enduring talent, grace and courtesy with the duo seemingly having a lock on the elusive Fountain of Youth.
“Decoy” (1946) starring the deliciously evil and tragically short lived Jean Gillie was a delightful, fanciful romp with Gillie’s performance being compared to Widmark’s in “Kiss of Death”- she played a femme fatale that was a female ‘Tommy Udo’.
After a Sunday afternoon paean to one of Hollywood’s most pithily skilled screenwriters, Bill Bowers with the screenings of “The Web” and “Larceny”- starring the late, great Shelley Winters-the evening show was ‘Demon Dog’ hour.
Following the comically bizarre ‘nuclear noir’ film, “Split Second” (1953), James Ellroy, author of noir classics including “The Black Dahlia”, “L.A. Confidential” “American Tabloid” and the gut-wrenchingly introspective, “My Dark Places”, took to the stage with Eddie Muller for an extended interview and Q&A.
“Took to the stage” is insufficient. Ellroy runs on full throttle as an elemental force of dark delight. The resultant badinage, while alongside Eddie Muller, was like watching a Noir City version of Abbott and Costello. The rangy writer’s uproarious and profane takes on film noir, his writing and tumultuous life were a series of verbal karate-chops reminiscent of a Coltrane sax riff that had the audience delightedly shaking their heads. Who else would use his own Mother’s murder as part of a comedic punch line?
Martin Luther King Day was graced by two esteemed classics- “Nightmare Alley” and “Kiss of Death” both Fox Productions that were released in 1947. One of the original Dark City Dames and the star of both films, Coleen Gray, charmed the audience with amusing career reminisces and an easy chemistry with Eddie Muller that dates through numerous personal appearances by the duo over the last decade. The star’s recollections of legendary Hollywood personages including Tyrone Power, Richard Widmark and Henry Hathaway were preciously memorable.
Miss Gray, still moved to tears at the climatic ending of “Nightmare Alley” stressed a life of ‘virtues ahead of the vices’ that allows her to take a nostalgic look backwards while living relentlessly in the present.
The festival continues at the Palace of Fine Arts through January 22 and at the Balboa Theatre from January 23 through January 26. Tickets are still available. Hope to see you in Dark City.
Noir City 4…continued
The Noir City 4 festival at the Palace of Fine Arts concluded the week with a whirlwind of landmark screenings capped by a special appearance by contemporary superstar actor/director Sean Penn on Saturday night.
The Tuesday evening screenings were a tribute to legendary screen writer, Ben Hecht.
Hecht, who was arguably the most prolific and skilled screenwriter of the 20th century (Underworld, The Front Page, Scarface, Gone with the Wind, Gunga Din, Lifeboat, Duel in the Sun, Kiss of Death,–Hecht’s list of credits is a virtual excellence-in-cinema histography tour) partnered with Charles MacArthur at Paramount’s Long Island Astoria Studios at the height of the Depression. Producer Walter Wanger persuaded Paramount head Adolph Zukor to ink the Broadway wunderkind duo to a four picture deal to write, direct and produce their own features without studio brass interference.
“Crime without Passion” (1934) and “The Scoundrel” (1935) were the artistic high points of an all-to-brief creative epoch which marked one of the few occasions that writers were given sole authority by a major studio to make their own films. The stellar prints, courtesy of the UCLA television archive, gave added heft to the screening of these rare classics.
The former picture stars the vigorously brilliant Claude Rains as a caddish lawyer who adeptly plays one end against the other with multiple love affairs, but ultimately ends up outsmarting himself. The jaw-dropping cinematography of Lee Garmes is matched by a beautifully cast story and screenplay by Hecht. For purists who believe film noir didn’t originate until the 1940′s, this film is a must-see: pure noir at its best!
“The Scoundrel” is not film noir, but an acidic fantasy about a vitriolic, amoral publisher (Noel Coward) who uses the numerous women and other people in his orbit like disposable handy wipes. When destiny intervenes and Coward has to find one person on Earth to mourn his departure from this mortal coil, the wormy publisher executes a 360 degree pivot. This truly unusual, entertaining film is carried by Coward while earning Hecht the 1936 Oscar for Best Original Story. The dyspeptically delightful dialogue in “The Scoundrel” could have a PH acidic content listed on the credits. Audience reaction to both of these pictures was overwhelmingly positive.
Far from dampening the festivities, the evening rainfall in San Francisco appeared to enhanced attendance at the Wednesday night screenings. A print of “The Man Who Cheated Himself” (1951) had been sought by Eddie Muller and the Film Noir Foundation for the last three years and was finally located in the dark recesses of the UCLA Film and Television Archive. While the prosaic plot of homicide dick Lee J. Cobb covering up the murder of his lover’s inconvenient husband (Jane Wyatt plays the unlikely fatale) is nothing special, the first public screening in over 50 years of this San Francisco location- filmed programmer sold out the house.
Jules Dassin’s “Thieves Highway” (1949) is not only a prime example of how to relate an adult story of revenge and passion that somehow skirted the pernicious Production Code. This classic Fox release was the cinematic catalyst that launched festival host and author Eddie Muller down the dark path of noir fixation after cutting school to catch it on local Bay Area television back in the 1970′s. The A.I. Bezzerides’ story set against the backdrop of the San Francisco produce market is a beautifully cast and written picture that becomes more memorable with each successive viewing.
John Garfield was on display at the Palace of Fine Arts on Thursday night. While “Nobody Lives Forever” is a handsome film that highlights the beauty of Geraldine Fitzgerald and the visual magnetism of Garfield, I found that the script lacked the usual élan normally associated with the great crime writer, W.R. Burnett. The new 35 mm print of this film was funded by The Film Noir Foundation as an initial step towards rescuing our film noir heritage from disappearing forever or being solely consigned to DVD/Video.
The second Garfield feature was better. Much better. “The Breaking Point” (1950) was recently resurrected by directors Curtis Hanson and Alexander Payne. For my money, this film is the definitive version of Hemingway’s “To Have and Have Not”; easily trumping it’s more famous Bogey and Bacall 1944 predecessor. John Garfield simply becomes fishing boat skipper, Henry Morgan, torn up between two women (Patricia Neal as a blond hottie and a lovably dedicated Phyllis Thaxter) and how to feed his family while holding onto to lost dreams. This is unquestionably one of Garfield’s best films that should spur a renaissance of interest. Warner’s Home DVD: are you listening?
Friday night was a “B” film doubleheader deluxe. The 35mm print of “The City that Never Sleeps” was loaned to the Film Noir Foundation by Martin Scorsese from his personal collection. The audience enjoyed one of the most underrated films of the 1950′s, scripted by ace noir writer Steve Fisher.
Gig Young is a conflicted policeman who loathes the ‘men in blue’ family tradition. He wants to leave the force and wife Paula Raymond for the twin allures of more money and gorgeous stripteaser, Sally “Angel Face” Connors (Mala Powers).
The Chicago-based story becomes darkly complex as both stars become entwined with the machinations of corrupt lawyer Edward Arnold and his alluring, but deadly wife, Marie Windsor. When the duplicitous Windsor teams up with bug-eyed heavy William Talman for a bollixed double-cross of her husband, all hell starts to break loose. Only in the 1950′s world of “B” films are the over-the-top dialogue and clichéd situations so delectable.
“Hollow Triumph” aka “The Scar” is a classic exercise in noir fatalism. Shot in L.A. by that master of low-key, characusco photography, John Alton, the picture is carried by Paul Heinreid as an arch criminal on the run from the mob. When Heinreid assumes the identity of a dead ringer Tinseltown headshrinker while wooing Joan Bennett, mundane matters become darkly complex. Joan herself sums it up best with a cogent film noir epistle about existential life in Noir City, telling Heinreid that, “It’s a bitter little world…”
Saturday afternoon featured a literary Noir event, co-produced by Noir City and Litquake, San Francisco’s nationally known literary festival. An estimable group of local noir fiction writers read from the collected works of Hammett, Chandler, Woolrich, Burnett, and Ellroy among others. Following each reading, film clips from the applicable adaptation were screened. This well-attended event underscored the underlying premise of Noir City 4: noir is a cultural vibe that runs through all of the arts like a vein of dark ore- literature, music, theatre as well as film. With that being said, stay tuned for next year!
Superstar director/actor Sean Penn was the guest of honor on Saturday night. Penn is one of the few contemporary filmmakers whose pictures, “The Indian Runner”, The Crossing Guard” and the ‘s special screening “The Pledge” (2001) embodies both the tradition and spirit of noir cinematic storytelling. Jack Nicholson stars as a burnt-out Nevada homicide cop who promises to catch a mother’s brutally murdered child. As professional dedication deepens into dangerous obsession, Nicholson literally becomes the single track detective; a character absorption that is light-years from the eye-brow lifting, comedic caricature that the great actor created as a preferred brand for several generations of film audiences.
During an insightful post screening discussion on stage with Sean Penn, Eddie Muller queried the director on how or whether the director “kept Jack from being Jack”. Penn responded that Nicholson is so consummate a performer that a singular bit of counsel from the director was gently rebuffed with a Nicholson riposte that Sean related with a spot-on imitation of Jack’s imitable vocal style.
When Muller asked him how he obtained financial backing for his films that did not necessarily have the tidy, upbeat finales usually preferred by Hollywood, Penn sardonically stated that one just has to laugh and smile at the end of the ‘pitch’ screening for the bigwigs and “they will think it is a happy ending!” This particular punch line captivated the packed house at the Palace. Sean Penn’s graciousness and affability both on and back stage belied the tabloid crapola reputation of his earlier years. Take it from me: Sean Penn in person was a true class act.
Penn credited rocker and close pal Bruce Springsteen with turning him onto the film that Penn selected as the surprise ‘director’s choice’ for the evening’s second feature: “Out of the Past” (1947). Much of the sold-out crowd stuck around for this legendary noir feature that has become an iconic standard bearer for the genre. Starring Robert Mitchum, Jane Greer and Kirk Douglas (why don’t young stars look that good anymore?), this picture remains a delicious revelation despite the unrelenting television and film festival screenings.
The Sunday afternoon matinee was a Cornell Woolrich double-feature, “Deadline at Dawn” (1946) and “The Window” (1949) both from RKO. With legendary playwright Clifford Odets scribing the verbal lyrics, “Deadline at Dawn” sets high audience expectations but disappoints. The film misses the mark with a literately ambitious, but muddled story that doesn’t ring true. Although the acting is fine- Susan Hayward is gorgeous, Bill Williams earnest and Paul Lukas nobly unctuous- and the dark photography is visually striking, the direction by Group Theatre eminence, Harold Clurman, really needed a Bob Wise or a Richard Fleischer to move matters along more cogently.
“The Window” (1949) is a terrific suspenser directed by Hitchcock’s favorite cameraman, Ted Tetzlaff. The pristine print of this classic shown at the festival was funded by the Film Noir Foundation.
Shot on location in New York’s Greenwich Village, the film depicts a bored youngster (Bobby Driscoll- special Oscar winner for his performance) who relates iterative tall tales to the point of disbelief of his parents (Arthur Kennedy and Barbara Hale). When Driscoll witnesses his upstairs neighbors (Paul Stewart and Ruth Roman) rolling and then murdering a sailor, no one believes him… except the sleazy couple that committed the dastardly deed! This film remains taut, believable and gut-wrenching. The shattering finale in an abandoned building takes on darker significance when one considers that the talented Driscoll subsequently turned up dead in a nearby West Side tenement nineteen years later after years of tragic drug abuse.
The spectacularly successful 12 day run at the Palace of Fine Arts codified Noir City 4 as the seminal event in the vanguard of the national film noir renaissance. With attendees traveling from as far as Sweden tp adding to a hard-core of Bay Area loyalists, the lineup and plans for next year’s festival are already being eagerly anticipated.
But wait!!!! Noir City 4 is not over yet. There are four days of screenings celebrating the seminal year of 1946 at the historic Balboa Theatre in San Francisco. Here at a smaller, neighborhood venue, patrons can eat popcorn and enjoy a lineup that includes obscurities such as “Night Editor” and “Suspense” along with genre classics such as “The Blue Dahlia” and “The Killers” in a celebration of the year when ‘Hollywood went dark’.