Thursday 26 July 2018

SPIRITS OF THE DEAD (1968) is more than just the best Edgar Allan Poe adaptation

SPIRITS OF THE DEAD (1968) is more than just the best Edgar Allan Poe adaptation


Its a gateway drug to European New Wave cinema, which never forgets to idolise the great American writer, while having some weird relevance to motorcycle and car enthusiasts.

A week after I saw this 50 year old movie I was still buzzing. I'm not a hater of the other Poe movie adaptations.. but this forgotten European omnibus movie, by three genre resistant New Wave 1960s directors, covering only one of the well known Poe stories (William Wilson) still, for me, blows all the other Poe adaptations away.

Ostensibly an adaptation of the short story collection Tales of Mystery and Imagination, it only gets to three of the tales and two of those are quite obscure. Doubtless they are away the major works are amply covered by Vincent Price and co. As Corman's Poe films were barely over an hour long, and these three segments are 40mins + each the are perhaps better regarded as a trilogy or even a mini-series rather then segmented parts of a whole.

They are;

(plots)



Roger Vadim's METZENGERSTEN : A Haunting, Erotic, Poe-etic precursor to Easy Rider

A sadistic European countess finds her cousin in a neighbouring dukedom is a moralistic man who melts her delusions of what life really is. When a jealous courtier arranges his death in a stable fire she adopts one of the surviving horses and develops an unhealthy obsession with it.

Metzengersten is completely Fondarific. This is the only movie in which brother and sister counter culture icons Jane and Peter Fonda appear together and they are both mesmerising for different reasons. Jane is completely convincing as an Elizabeth Bathory aristocratic sadist, Peter nails it as her enigmatic, moralist cousin.


It is slightly jarring initially seeing two iconic American actors in what is is apparently a very European set and told story, until you are forced to remember this is at heart an American tale told by an American writer. The presence of the Fonda's reminds us we are seeing Europe through the 19thC Bostonian's twisted prism.



It looks incredible. Vadim's stylish eroticism is on full show as as the leading actress is his wife of the time and it is comforting to know she is (presumably) happy with what she is asked to do. (Warning - some of this is soft core porn.) I've never seen Jane play the villain before and she is horribly convincing. Her eventual pangs of conscience are more affecting than Delon's similar evolution in the second installment.

Jane Fonda also shows off some pretty impressive horse wrangling skills in this movie. This is ironic.

While on the set for Spirits of the Dead, Peter Fonda and writer Terry Southern started working on a script would would eventually become EASY RIDER.. and seen in that light the doomed ending to that classic movie does have more than a touch of Poe. That fact that obsessive riding, of horses and motorcycles, is a major plot point in both Metzengersten and Easy Rider seems more than coincidence.

Four years before Fonda's co-star in Easy Rider, Jack Nicholson, starred in the 1963 adaptation of another Poe film, The Raven. Two years later in 1970 a chopper riding Poe, with Lost Lenore and a Raven riding pillion, would feature in Roger Corman's Gas-s-s-s.





Louie Malle's WILLIAM WILSON : Brunette Bardot's card sharp pricks the conscience of Delon's Doppleganger

In one of Poe's most famous tales, William Wilson  (Alain Delon) is an immoral villain who cheats and abuses his way through life, but is haunted at every step by a person who appears to be an identical version of himself, who exposes every filthy murderous deed.

If Louis Malle's William Wilson is the least of the installments in the movie at least he has one of the most obsessive and haunting Poe stories, and he makes probably the best adaption of it.


The tiny cameo of Bridget Bardot gets big billing but she does make quite an impression. The card game is a centerpiece of the plot.






 Federico Fellini's TOBY DAMMIT : Terence Stamp takes Withnail To Hell 

A 1960's actor escaping from swinging London attends an awards ceremony in Rome's film city of Cinecitta. Terence Stamp's Toby Dammit is a man who has lost all respect or enthusiasm for the gift of life. Someone is waiting to relieve him of his burden.

By now, half way through this substantial movie, you are due for a light rest from period shenanigans and literary heavyweight adaption, and the prospect of another 45 mins might seem too much. And that's when you are hit right in the eyes by  Federico Fellini's absolutely dazzling, climatic segment.

Seeming to be barely any kind of Poe adaptation until the final shocking twist, this is a mesmerising riff on Rome in the swinging sixties, with a genuinely wasted looking Terence Stamp playing a role which would today be best described as Withnail Goes to Hell.


Visually this is mindblowing and if you are as ignorant of the work of  Federico Fellini as I am you may feel a little ashamed at note paying more attention before. Vadim is obviously a great artist of scene and mood and Malle gets a lot from his actors but the only visual experience can compare to this final segment on an imaginative level is the best of Terry Gilliam or Wes Anderson.

This swinging, psychedelic bombardment has a real purpose - by the end you have completely forgotten it has any links to Poe, making the final reminder all the more effective.

It opens with an obviously LSD affected English actor (Stamp) trying to process his arrival at an Italian airport.



The only hint here of a Poe theme is that Stamp might have some kind of death wish. An addled Stamp then has to deal with an increasingly bizarre Italian movie awards ceremony which to be fair would shake anyone's grip on reality. (I'm sure the director is delivering a lot of well aimed digs at his own movie industry here)


And then the end arrives, and you recall this is a Poe adaption with one of the most genuinely shocking twists I've seen in some time.




Final notes
Terence Stamp shows off some pretty impressive car wrangling skills in this movie.

I can only assume hefty danger insurance was in place for Stamp and Fonda as they both push their respective horses and car as far as it will safely go. An alternative take on Spirits of The Dead is that Jane Fonda and Stamp took these largely unhindered by Hollywood safety regs movie roles just to make their stunt doubles in Hollywood up their game. (Delon in his story, doesn't have this level of danger but does have to deal with Bardot).

Based on the end you would think Ferrari drivers would worship this movie like VANISHING POINT or BULLIT. Perhaps Ferrari drivers just aren't the all knowing cognoscenti of fashion and style that out bling obsessed culture makes them out to be. The Golden Ferrari  (SPOILER IN LINK) is beautiful and it is driven like a demon in this movie, one more reason to watch it.

For those who care Metzengersten is entirely in English, William Wilson segment is in French, and though most of Toby Dammit is in English some is Italian and some maybe.... extraterrestrial.

A FACE IN THE CROWD is classic Black Mirror... from 1957

Elia Kazan's unrecognised 1950s classic is That Waldo Moment via The Twilight Zone

There is a Black Mirror episode, That Waldo Moment, which fearsomely predicts the effects of social media on politics.

Several news reports, including one by Chris Cillizza, political reporter for The Washington Post, compared Donald Trump's 2016 presidential campaign to the episode. In September 2016, episode writer Charlie Brooker also compared the Trump campaign to "The Waldo Moment" and predicted Trump would win the 2016 election. ...... On the night of the election, at the hour when Trump's victory was becoming clear to the nation, Black Mirror sent out a tweet proclaiming: "This isn't an episode. This isn't marketing. This is reality."

A Face In The Crowd is a fantastically entertaining movie from the 1950s with a very similar premise, warning not about social media, but mass media. It's skipped recognition until recently for what was perceived to be a nauseatingly cynical tone. Post 2016 it looks like an absolute classic, with elements of contemporary movies such as Sweet Smell of Success and later classics such as Network. It is as sharp and acerbic and bitter as Fight Club, with a powerful ending weirdly reminiscent of Scarface.

"You gotta be a saint to stand all the power that little box can give you."

A Face in The Crowd been getting some long overdue recogntion over the pond (for reasons which will be obvious) but seems mostly unknown in the wider world. A shame as this could be a story about the rise of Jeremy Clarkson as anyone else.

A travelling radio show run by a roaming archivist/music producer finds herself in a jail in rural Arkansas where she comes a showman of the highest order in the form of a drunken folk guitarist. She takes him from small time radio, to television personality to the highest political circles before realising the monster she's unleashed.

I learned of this movie listening to a Slate podcast
that in an earlier article called it
The Best Movie About Television That You've Never Seen

"Is it possible for a movie to be selected for the National Film Registry and still be underrated? Everyone who owns a TV set needs to know that A Face in the Crowd is unsurpassed as the great American story about television. "


and that was in 2009.



The director, Elia Kazan, had a history of socially conscious movie making such as A Streetcar Named Desire (1951) and On the Waterfront (1954) which brought him the attention of the McCarthyite anti communist witchhunt of the 50s. When making this movie he was filled with disillusionment, having seen so many of his ideals betrayed by Stalinist purges in the USSR. It shows.

Director Stanley Kubrick called him, "without question, the best director we have in America, capable of performing miracles with the actors he uses." For all it's non recognition in that year's awards ceremonies and since, this movie must have launched a thousand careers as all the acting parts have a familiar face.

In an era of perfectionist actors such as Marlon Brando, for the lead role A Face in The Crowd, as the mesmerizing con-man personality Lonesome Rhodes, Kazan picked a standup comedian. Andy Griffith is dynamite, and it's almost a tragedy that after this movie he become entombed in folksy straight version roles of the evil creep he plays in this movie. (I'm underplaying this because I'm the wrong generation to appreciate it... the truth is After A Face in The Crowd Andy Griffith became perhaps the most beloved tv personality on US tv for four decades.)


Patricia Neal plays the producer who discovers Rhodes, and who promotes him into the wider media world while being unable to keep him out of her bed. Neal was unforgettable as the Mary figure to Klaatu's Jesus in The Day The Earth Stood Still (she was also Mrs Ronald Dalh). She has to be tragic and smart and the character could have stepped straight from a modern drama set in the era such as Mad Men. Scenes where she is still covering and making a excuses for Rhode's, when he’s treated her and everyone she respects like dirt I'm sure will be familiar to many.


Along with the modern political signifance this is also a period #METOO story told with compassion. The scene when she is preparing for her marriage to Rhodes, only to be confronted with the first wife, is heartbreaking stuff

"... he thinks he has to take a bite out of every broad he comes across. Then he calls them a tramp, drops them, and there's all sort of psycho something-or-other, you know. I caught him red-handed with my best girlfriend. He broke my jaw."

Shortly after this Rhodes appears from a trip to Mexico with a completely different wife (played by a very young Lee Remick, yet another star making performance)



Walter Matthau fans should definitely check out what is effectively his his star maker role as Mel Miller, an initially mild mannered writer for Rhodes who comes to see him for what he is and hate him with everyone else. The loathing initialy includes himself, for not being yet another Alpha Male in Rhode's pack of jackals. As he unloads to Neal's character;

"Didn't you know? All mild men are vicious. They hate themselves for being mild, and they hate the windy extroverts whose violence seems to have a strange attraction for nice girls."

Mocked for his education as “Vanderbilt ‘44” by Rhodes, he eventually gets to deliver a delicious coup de gras.



But it's Andy Griffith's Lonesome Rhodes who will haunt you afterwards. On his journey towards "Secretary for National Morale" he utters a whole series of quotes which would thrill a MAGA crowd.
There is a whole internet industry drawing current political significance from this movie.

How Andy Griffith And Elia Kazan Predicted Donald Trump’s Rise (And Fall?) Way Back In 1957’s ‘A Face In The Crowd’

The movie that foretold the rise of Donald Trump

Not even a movie as cynical as A Face In The Crowd could predict Donald Trump

But for all the apparent similarities personally I think we may have gone beyond a point where this great movie is predictive.

<SPOILER>


Rhodes is brought down by a recording. This is difficult to imagine currently. With the knowledge we have now, we know Rhode's supporters would laugh off any recording as Fake and any opposition as Lonesome Rhodes Derangement Syndrome.

But A Face in The Crowd does have one final moment of relevance in it's minor Twilight Zone twist. At the end Patricia Neal's character actually apologises to Rhodes, coming to realise that she is the originator of the problem, as the person who took him from deserved obscurity into the homes of the nation.

I've been saying for a while now, the real problem isn't with the scumbag opportunist. It's with his enablers.




Wednesday 11 July 2018

AMC's period Arctic monster fest, THE TERROR, makes The Walking Dead look like a summer holiday (mild spoilers)

During the fabulous summer weeks of the 2018 World Cup I thought my only exposure to cannibalism would be Uruguayan footballers. How wrong I was.



It's over a week a week since I finished watching AMC's THE TERROR and I'm still constantly reminded of some of the horrible images and contents within. Last Saturday, in the middle of the England v Sweden World Cup semi final, I found myself describing The Terror as the scariest, most harrowing thing I've ever seen with Ridley Scott's name on it, including the original Alien.

Had I seen Alien in 1979 I probably would not have said that, and I have to say Alien : Covenant and Prometheus I both loved. But nothing so far this year, even to my astonishment Westworld S2, has hit me like AMCs follow up to Walking Dead.

Imagine the 'highlights' of six seasons of Walking Dead boiled down to ten taught episodes in a gripping setting, with engaging, believable characters, magnificent script and world class performances. I'm a massive fan of Jared Harris since he defined the movie version of Professor Moriarty (in Game of Shadows) he is absolutely magnificent in The Terror, presenting a character that could almost be a variation on his character from MAD MEN, another love struck disaster heading for his doom.


I would like to pick out other actors but honestly the entire cast is stellar and will make you marvel at British and Irish acting talent. If I had to pick favourites, Ian Hart as Blanky and Paul Ready as Goodsir are merely the most inspirational characters but I couldn't even call them standouts from a stunning group performance. It's tough. Over ten episodes, you will see most of the 100 men depicted die individually, in horrible circumstances. I'm still too affected by the fate of individual characters to praise one actor above another.

I could pick out two non Brits, two actresses, Greta Scacchi and Nive Nielsen, who have to react against the obvious early doom of the crews and both provide a welcome relief but also a quiet reinforcing role in the narrative.



Fans of both The Thing (all of them) will love the setting. The Thing (1982) is my favourite movie.

Apparently there is a tradition at Amundsen–Scott South Pole Station of watching all The Thing movies at the start of each winter. I would urge them to think twice before The Terror. Perhaps first dig Cold Nights Death out instead if looking for widening your viewing diet. The Terror is bad for diet's generally.

While having plenty of the gore and body horror of a modern horror show The Terror carries with it plenty of old classic scares. It wreaks of Lovecraftian horror and is an obvious portal to a later adaptation of At The Mountains of Madness. It could almost be a prequel.

Episode 6, 'A Mercy', screams classic Edgar Allan Poe.


Those objecting to some of the fantastic elements in the Terror (I think it's an Inuit variation on The Wendigo) should be aware that this is an adaptation of Dan Simmon's novel, rather than any attempt to tell the real story of HMS Erebus and HMS Terror. I'm now seriously thinking of picking Simmon's book up, and having now seen many Youtube history documentaries on HMS Erebus and HMS Terror I'm not sure the fantasy version of events is any worse than what probably happened in real life.

In what might be  my favourite bit of real detail from this disastrous expedition (which highlights the danger and remoteness of the original mission) the RN Discovery Service eventually sent two ships to look for the Erebus and The Terror in the uncharted Arctic. The two ships were HMS Investigator and the 10th HMS Enterprise. Of the four ships, only HMS Enterprise (1848) returned from the area.

I doubt its an obvious reference but there is also an element of 'Alien' horror, which sits well with Ridley Scott's credit as Exec Producer (this is a Scott Free production*). I've said before part of the nightmare of the first few Alien films is the loss of authority (Captain Dallas dies early on in Alien,  Lieutenant Gorman is shockingly ineffectual in Aliens, Charles Dance goes early in III). The real horror in The Terror is seeing such an ordered environment as a Royal Navy crew slowly devolve into animals.

This is of course part of the power and tragedy in movies about the Titanic. The disaster is bad enough as it is but seen against the doomed stiff upper lips in A Night to Remember and James Cameron's movie the events are all the more shocking.

I'n a regular reader of Patrick O'Brian novels and nothing shipboard in terms of dialog or detail looked out place in The Terror. I would go so far as to say this is the most realistic portrayal of "wooden ships and iron men" since Peter Wier's masterful Patrick O'Brian adaptation Master and Commander. It's all the more shocking and upsetting that The Terror goes in such a different but yet convincingly different direction.
(Quite what they are doing with Congreve Rocket's on this expedition I'm not sure, but much like the flamethrower in The Thing, I'll put it down to .. movie spectacle).

Reservations? Some of it seems a little studio bound. Personally I would have liked the ice flow scenes to be on location rather than set bound but I know what John Carpenter's cast and crew went through filming in Alaska on a much smaller scale, so I will give them a pass on that. The two ships, Erebus and Terror, and the arctic hell around them are magnificently presented and you would be forgiven for thinking this was a far bigger production than it actually is.

If you are stuck in a heatwave and need chills it is a handy place to go.. but be warned it may be a difficult to escape.





* Plenty of other great creative people have passed in the last five years or so, but I'd just like to acknowledge Tony Scott.. whose dazzling, eclectic movies I'm really starting to miss.


You can't call Trump a Traitor - but you can call him a Quisling

​​I’m reminded when watching the excellent Okupert  - you can’t call Trump a traitor - but you can call him a Quisling.


Trump loves some old timely references doesn't he?

Rod Rosenstein,  the United States Deputy Attorney General has been referred to as 'Peepers'
and
Jeff Sessions the, United States Attorney General, has been called Mr Magoo

Here’s an old word Trump might be aware of - Quisling
Quisling was the name of an infamous collaborator with the Nazis who helped undermine Norwegian Democracy in the run up to the Nazi takeover of the country in World War II.

Though you'd be a fool not to see Trump's outright treacherous behavior on behalf of Vladimir Putin, by the American definition of traitor you apparently you have to be at war, so in a strict legal sense 'Traitor' does not apply to Trump.. so 'Quisling' is more apt. (Though perhaps a future redefinition of war to include Active Measures might change this).

I guess we could add the US Republican party as a whole to that as well. If we consider the other party, which has won the popular vote in five of the last six US Presidential elections and is now completely powerless to stop the Supreme Court, Congress and Senate from being further rigged and gerrymandered against it, we can definitely conclude the Republican effort to undermine US democracy, with active help from a hostile foreign power, has been hugely successful example of collaboration.

Congressional Republicans' trip to Russia was a shameful fool's errand

Trump is lucky he’s a US citizen, because the UK definition of treason is different.  Based on our thousand year old 'constitution', which history teachers previous to 2016 argued a problematic series of bodges compared to the US version, if Trump was looking at these accusations of treason in a British court, up until 1998 at least, he'd facing the end of a rope.

The penalty for treason was changed from death to a maximum of imprisonment for life in 1998 under the Crime And Disorder Act. Before 1998, the death penalty was mandatory..

UKIP backer Aaron Banks, who 'met Russian ambassador 11 times' before EU vote perhaps also should be aware of this.

Interestingly Trump's actions perhaps relate more easily to Sedition. Perhaps the Mueller investigation will charge him with that, assuming there is anything left of the US Justice system when that finally happens.