Other Old Film Reviews
- Mr Smith Goes to Washington
- Lovers of the Arctic Circle
- Three Kings
- Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace
- The Insider
- Lulu on the Bridge
Mr. Smith Goes to Washington
Americans are cynical about politics. The sticker that reads "I
love my country but fear my government" can be seen affixed everywhere
from alongside the hand-painted peace symbols on old Volkswagen busses,
to the rear window behind the gun rack on pickup trucks.
Our political movies are rife with this cynicism. Witness the recent masterpiece of cynicism Wag the Dog. Even the beloved Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, a relic of a bygone era, is immediately recognizable to a modern viewer for what it is: a condemnation of the political system and of politics in general.
The great James Stewart — and in possibly no other role has he been more deserving of the popular nickname Jimmy — plays Jefferson Smith as an Everyman, perhaps a bit more naïve than most, but earnest, enthusiastic, trusting, a man enamored of his country, its history, and its ideals. He is made a U.S. senator, not through the electoral process, but through behind-the-scenes manipulation and political intrigue. It's important to note Jeff had no part in this process; he is moved by forces beyond his control, beyond his experience and scope, a cog in the mighty political machine. As an Everyman, he represents us in our naïvete; as a pawn, he represents us in our helplessness against the tide of corruption.
Jeff Smith is no fool. He soon learns how he has been used and fights back. In a different film, he might have won, beaten the odds, ended the corruption, but he doesn't. It may seem he does at first, but Frank Capra, director of Mr Smith Goes to Washington, presents us with a more intriguing and thoughtful conclusion than we may at first realize.
Jeff, facing a trumped-up corruption charge designed to railroad him out the Senate, takes control of the Senate floor with a protracted filibuster. His goal is simply to get someone to listen, but despite growing popular support and encouragement from the galleries, only one senator, the President of the Senate (Harry Carey), seems willing to do so. Most of the senators remain impassive and cynical, unmoved by this plea from the common man, deliberately and literally turning their backs, refusing to listen.
Jeff continues fighting until his body gives out, ending his filibuster, the Senate still largely unmoved. There Jeff's struggle would have ended, he expelled from the Senate and sent home in chains of shame, had not Capra introduced an abrupt and jarring deus ex machina ending: The real corrupt senator, Senator Payne (Claude Rains), moved by guilt, rushes to the Senate floor after Jeff's collapse and proclaims Jeff's innocence. Fade to black. Roll credits.
The ending seems false, as if Capra were pressured into a happy ending. The message remains unchanged, however. Jeff failed in the face of a stony and impassive Senate that wouldn't listen and wouldn't see justice done. The power of one honest man is insignificant in the face of such a relentless desire not to hear. Good didn't win; guilt did, but only just. Rent Mr. Smith Goes to Washington and watch it again with this interpretation in mind. The meaning of the term Capra-esque might change for you.
Steve
Lovers of the Arctic Circle
Like Lulu on the Bridge,
Lovers of the Arctic Circle deals with coincidence, happenstance,
and might-have-beens, but does so in a very different way, for it deals
directly with the question of fate. Lovers is a beautiful palindrome
of a film which tells the story of Ana and Otto, two Spanish children
who meet through happenstance and fall in love, only to become step-siblings
as their parents act out their own fates. Despite the newly forbidden
nature of their love, Ana and Otto cannot long remain apart and return
to each other, year after year, as they grow into adulthood. Ana and Otto,
whose names, as Otto notes, are palindromes, are destined, so it would
seem, to be together.
Lovers is not just rife with coincidence, it builds it into a framework of existence. Scenes at the beginning of the movie explain what happens at the end while scenes at the end explain what happens in the beginning. Incidents that occurred to their grandparents directly affect Ana and Otto as adults. A kindness shown a downed German pilot in the Second World War leads to new paths of destiny and kindnesses returned in the future. A paper airplane symbolizes all that is to come and all that fails to come. A face reflected in an eyeball tells a story of fate more eloquently than can words.
Lovers of the Arctic Circle nearly defies description, but it is absorbing and beautiful to watch. It is gracefully photographed and elegantly circular, a film told more like a poem in which all ends lead back to the beginning. It is a film to spark thought and conversation.
Steve
Three Kings
Three Kings stars George Clooney as Archie Gates, an army major
ready to retire in the closing days of the Gulf War. He's bitter, jaded,
and tired and wants back some of what he's lost in life through his choice
of a military career, and he thinks he may have found it when three enlisted
soldiers (Ice Cube, Mark Wahlberg, and Spike Jonze) find a map to some
stolen Kuwaiti gold. They steal a Humvee and tear off across the desert
in search of the loot.
At first all they're searching for is the gold, but eventually they discover their consciences. Now that the war between the U.S. and Iraq is over, a new war between the Iraqi army and Iraqi citizens has begun. The Iraqi army is now engaged in the piecemeal slaughter of Iraqi villagers in retaliation for the villagers' attempts to use the war, at the U.S.'s instigation, to overthrow Saddam Hussein. The U.S. knows this, but proves the war was only about oil after all by failing to support the insurgents it inspired and created. After witnessing some of the terror inflicted upon a village by the Iraqi army, Major Gates and company choose to help some of the villagers escape to Iran. This move is in violation of their direct and explicit orders to remain uninvolved in Iraqi internal matters, but knowing they might be killed, and knowing they might all be tried and dishonorably discharged, perhaps imprisoned, if they survive, the four soldiers side with their own consciences and help.
I was a soldier stationed just south of the Iraqi border during the Gulf War. It surprised me how well the movie captured the look and feel of the final days of that conflict. They got it right more often than most movies of its type. They had the military markings right. They had the desert right — no rolling sand dunes, but vast, flat expanses of dried mud. They had the uniforms right, not just in the way they were supposed to look per regulations, but in the way they were actually worn. Although gas masks were noticeably absent in one scene, we all hated carrying them, so it's reasonable to suppose that with the war officially over, Major Gates and his men would choose to leave them behind. Stupid, but reasonable.
It also surprised me how much this improbable plot, despite a few small technical errors and some Hollywood license, rang true at its heart. No, it probably couldn't have happened, but it should have happened. Many of us wanted to help more than we were allowed to. After all, we soldiers had spent eight or nine months of our lives sitting and waiting to help, but after we finally did ride our Humvees into Kuwait City to the cheers of flag-waving Kuwaiti onlookers, we mainly sat some more. I actually gained ten or fifteen pounds from the inactivity — and I was assigned to an active Special Forces unit! I can only imagine how frustrating and demoralizing it must have been for the thousands of soldiers billeted in airport parking garages and warehouses hundreds of miles south of "the action" — how much more so when many of them died in one of the few successful SCUD attacks.
The village in Three Kings didn't look quite right. The real Arab villages I saw were far more squalid, dusty little blips of poverty and cinder blocks with no color, few people, and little hope. I met and worked with Saudis and Kuwaitis almost daily, and they were poor. The few Iraqis I managed to see were even worse. I saw an entire soccer field filled with tired and hungry Iraqi soldiers who had surrendered to our forces for a canteen of water, an MRE, and the promise of no more fighting. I saw the hodgepodge of unwashed civilian clothes and tattered uniforms they wore. I saw their faces.
When my unit cleared Iraqi bunkers, alongside the out-of-date Russian and American military equipment, Vietnam-era hand grenades, and abandoned uniforms and helmets, we found civilian clothes and shoes worn to strips and rags, dirtied family photos, and tattered copies of the Quran.
When the Iraqi army tried to flee north, our bombers bottlenecked them at a pass that cut through a high mesa. Hundreds were trapped and killed. They were fleeing, yet we continued to bomb them. They were targets, not people. You may have seen the film on CNN, the one of the Iraqi running from the missile bearing down on him, running from his death. That was real. He died.
The Iraqis our bombers bottlenecked at that pass were fleeing in stolen civilian vehicles because so many of their military vehicles had already been destroyed. They were fleeing with their loot — not Kuwaiti gold to be liberated by Archie Gates, but clothing and bedding and food and water. I saw this. I saw some of what we did to them. I saw some of what we failed to do for them, Kuwaitis, Iraqis, and Saudis alike. I saw the rest on CNN in relative comfort, surrounded by sandbags and the detritus of modern warfare.
In supporting the diplomatic efforts of governments, the U.S. failed so many people.
No, Army-issued flak jackets cannot stop a rifle bullet at close range (notice it's called a "flak" jacket and not a bulletproof vest), but despite a few small improbabilities like this, Three Kings presents us with the heroes many of us Gulf War veterans wish our government had allowed us to be.
Steve
Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace
I've now seen Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace twice. Like
many movie-goers, I noticed a little racism in the depiction of Jar Jar
Binks, but then I thought, "Maybe I'm just interpreting this as
racism." As a society, we have become very sensitized to racism over past
few decades; perhaps George Lucas was merely trying to create a different
accent for the Gungans and we're just over-reacting.
Then I thought, "No, it's racism. But it's not our racism." Jar Jar doesn't represent some marginalized human race — that's us imposing our racism on him — and on Lucas. He has an accent, and his ways are different, so we, as audience, substitute "Black-stereotype" or "Asian-stereotype" or whatever for "Gungan." Lucas didn't mean that. He was depicting the racism of the Star Wars universe, a universe ruled by very clear class and race distinctions. And it's always been there.
Examine, if you will, Princess Leia's famous quip to Han Solo: "I'd sooner kiss a Wookie." Did you ever see any inter-species marriages in Star Wars? There may have been some implied interspecies sex, especially at the palace of Jabba the Hut, but it generally took the form of something sordid like slavery or prostitution and was not paraded about in daylight among the good clean, white, Christian folk of the Republic or of the Empire.
General Akbar may have been non-human, but he just stood there and talked. Most of the heroes and the major villains have always been humans. Usually non-humans and droids served as comic relief or as primitive threats: Jawas, Tusken Raiders, Wookies, Ewoks, Greedo, Jabba the Hut, C3P0, R2-D2, whatever. The humans, good or bad, were always in charge. Yoda is the main exception, but even Luke views him as a primitive parasite when he first encounters him on Dagoba, just as Obi-Wan views Jar Jar as a member of an inferior race when they first meet.
(That last parallel, I believe, lends credence to the theories that Jar Jar is more than he would at first seem, some sort of nascent Jedi poised to save the day in a future movie.)
So is this all Lucas bowing to reality? In his desire to make a universe that wasn't all shiny and new, did he make it culturally less benign than Star Trek would have it? Or was he merely reflecting his opinion, conscious or unconscious, of how the universe — Earth — really is?
One possible answer may come from his choice of names for Jar Jar's species. "Gungan" seems to echo "Gunga-Din." In Kipling's story (and, perhaps more tellingly, in the movie versions that Lucas would have undoubtedly seen) the Indian boy Gunga-Din, presumed to be of an inferior race by the English he serves, displays unexpected (to the English) bravery and valour and saves the day, prompting the famous line, "You're a better man than I am Gunga-Din." (I didn't check my Kipling; apologies if I have misquoted.) He was better than the expectations the English held for him. Is that Jar Jar's role? To educate the humans? To foster some sense of racial equality, at least among those whose lives he touches?
Of course, the English only revised their opinions of this one Indian boy, not of the whole race. So, there we are again. Maybe...
Steve
The Insider
Based on a true story, director Michael Mann's latest film, The Insider,
stars Al Pacino as Lowell Bergman, a 60 Minutes producer fighting to air
inside information about the machinations of the tobacco industry, provided
by former tobacco company vice-president Jeff Wigand, played by Russell
Crowe. The movie also stars Christopher Plummer, who plays the part of
CBS anchor, Mike Wallace.
Russell Crowe portrays Wigand as individual caught between his duty to his family and his duty to the public good. Either choice will ultimately tear at his conscience. If he chooses to reveal what he knows about the tobacco industry, his quiet life as a husband and father will be shattered. If he keeps his counsel, he will lose his self-respect. Crowe plays out this ethical dilemma subtly, as the camera records the haunted gaze in his eyes, nervous and furtive glances, and beads of sweat on his tortured brow. As an actor, Crowe has the ability to absorb himself into his characters until nothing seems left of Russell Crowe the man. His performance alone makes this movie worth seeing. But we don't have to rely on his performance alone, as The Insider also features fine performances by Al Pacino and Christopher Plummer, excellent cinematography, and a haunting and evocative musical score, all illustrating an important and compelling story.
Perhaps this story this film tells is best summed up by an exchange between the characters Bergman and Wallace. After a restaurant meeting with Wigand and his wife, Wallace asked Bergman, "Who are these people?" Bergman simply responded, "Ordinary people facing extraordinary pressures." Many of us have been where Jeffrey Wigand sat, perhaps not in front of the cameras, perhaps not in the courtroom, but we have faced the conflict between our personal security and our ethics, and the way Wigand faces that conflict in The Insider makes him both the everyman and the hero.
Denise & Steve
Lulu on The Bridge
It's an unfortunate fact of life that most of us have set aside our dreams
in favor of the practicalities of everyday life. In Lulu on the Bridge,
Harvey Keitel plays Izzy Maurer, a man who has set aside the practicalities
of everyday life in favor of his dreams. As a saxophone player who has
spent most of his life performing in smoky bars and jazz clubs, Izzy knows
little else, so when he is accidentally shot in the chest while performing
one night, forcing the removal of one lung and the end of his musical
career at the moment his first CD has been released, Izzy must decide
if life, for him, is still worth living.
In the process of making that decision, Izzy stumbles upon a dead man in an alley and impulsively steals the man's briefcase. Inside, packaged within several progressively smaller boxes, Izzy finds an odd looking stone, which he discovers emits some sort of blue light when placed in darkness. This frightens Izzy, and he becomes desperate to find the answer to the rock's mysterious nature. A phone number on a cocktail napkin in the dead man's briefcase leads him to Celia Burns, played by Mira Sorvino, who agrees to help Izzy despite having no knowledge of the rock or of the dead man. Celia brings herself to do what Izzy could not and touches the mysterious stone while it is glowing. She is rewarded to discover that the glowing rock imparts its holder with a comforting bliss and sense of connectedness. Izzy tries it, and under the stone's influence, the two fall madly in love. What follows is the tale of their growing love, Celia's rising career as an actor, and the attempted recovery of the stone by vying interests, including one represented by Dr. Van Horn, played by Willem Dafoe.
Written and directed by Paul Auster,Lulu on the Bridge is a very engaging film that seamlessly combines a love story, the story of a life renewed, and a mysterious fantasy, brought to life by the more than able acting skills of Keitel, Sorvino, and Dafoe, actors who seem to become in some subtle way the characters they play. The film also has an excellent supporting cast in Gina Gershon, Mandy Patinkin, and Vanessa Redgrave. In Lulu on the Bridge, Auster, a novelist who had previously written the screenplays for Smoke and Blue in the Face, muses gently on the nature of coincidence, the tragedy of happenstance, and impact of might-have-beens, while never revealing its secrets more quickly than necessary. Watch it, and when you do, pay close attention to the opening scenes. (For similar themes with a different perspective, I highly recommend you rent Lovers of the Arctic Circle.)
Steve
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