Scorsese Haiku

Once again, it's been awhile and I feel awful about it. I shant come up with excuses, so I'm just going to go ahead and dive right into my next entry. As the title suggests, I'm going to take a bit of a detour from my normal blogging and do something I haven't attempted since my freshman year of high school: I'm going to write some haiku. And I'm going to do it about the greatest living American filmmaker, Martin Scorsese and ten of my personal favorites that he's directed. Maybe this will inspire you all to write some silly haiku about your favorite films and/or directors. Mind you, I'm an amateur at this, so you'll have to excuse me if they're not quite as esoteric as others you might've seen. May we all come out at the end unscathed.

Mean Streets (1973)

Robert and Harvey

Small-time crooks loving trouble
Marty shoots Robert

Taxi Driver (1976)

You talkin' to me?
You...You...You talkin' to me?
You talkin' to me?

The Last Waltz (1978)

Marty and The Band
Film and music coexist
A beautiful thing

Raging Bull (1980)

Jealousy and rage
One of the all-time classics
Fuck Robert Redford


Goodfellas (1990)

Blood-letting mobsters
The greatest mob film ever
Fuck Kevin Costner


Casino (1995)

Pesci is back, man
More nuts than in Goodfellas
Vice...need I say more?


Gangs of New York (2002)

Day-Lewis is back!
Steals show from even himself
Fuck Roman Polan...


The Aviator (2004)

Down with OCD?
Marty's newest masterpiece
Fuck Clint Eastwood...FUCK!!!


The Departed (2006)

Sixty-three years old
Man! How does he still do this?
Fuck...wait...GO MARTY!!!

Shine A Light (2008)

The Stones and Marty
Dear Lord, I must be dreaming
My pants are now soiled



*End scene*

The Sublime Philosopher

I'm not sure if I've proven my worth as a blogger. First off, this is my first blog in close to two months. Did I hit a wall? Let's rephrase that: HAVE I hit a wall? Possibly. I haven't had much to discuss in the last month and a half. Maybe because college football season is in full swing, I'm just not feeling it quite as much. I don't know. I'm trying to remedy that, though. I, also, believe that my identity as a film-blogger needs to cover all walks of life within the film world. By that I mean I haven't quite branched out enough. I haven't discussed foreign films on a deeper level. Sure, I've mentioned the directors, but I haven't broken down their films. The themes, plots, characters, etc. I'd like to fix that, right now. I want to discuss a director named Jacques Tatischeff or better known as Jacques Tati.

Tati was an entertainer in the mold of the vaudeville acts of the early age of cinema. Like Buster Keaton and Charlie Chaplin before him, he wrote, directed, produced, AND starred in all of his films. He, also, made his films during the height of the "talkie" picture, yet, hardly ever uttered a single word in any of them. Yes, they had sound in the conventional sense, but dialogue was not really an issue. He loved observing human behavior and by doing this his films became comedies because he progressively viewed human behavior as something of a joke. Each film was seen through the eyes of Tati's alter-ego Monsieur Hulot. Hulot is a bit of a trouble-maker, though I'd say his heart is in the right place. He has no intention of causing trouble, but that's just what happens. At heart, the character is a very sweet individual who walks through life with the right amount of optimism.

Mind you, these are my own personal observations through viewings of only three of his films: Monsieur Hulot's Holiday, Mon Oncle, and Playtime. The latter became a personal failure at the time, bankrupting Tati, but the film has reached "masterpiece" status since then. In these three films, alone, viewers got to see a transition from light-hearted fare to light-hearted satire to a meditation on the times. Was Tati growing more cynical as he grew older? Monsieur Hulot's Holiday is a delightful French film, following Hulot to a French Riviera resort, where he encounters a motley cast of characters. Mon Oncle is Tati's transitional film. It's the bridge between Holiday and Playtime. Tati comments on industrialization, where houses have taken on a life of their own. The structures are impersonal and very uncomfortable. He makes his point clear by transitioning back and forth between his sister's family's home and his own neighborhood, which is probably the same neighborhood that he left to go on his vacation in Monsieur Hulot's Holiday. Yes, Hulot is optimistic, but he's also an older gentleman set in his ways. I guess so was Tati. The best satirical prop in Mon Oncle is a fountain at Hulot's sister's house. It's this ridiculous metallic fish standing upright that spews out a stream of water every time a button is pressed. Hulot's sister only does this when she has company. The sound effects in this film are hysterical. You think, in the beginning, that Tati has pushed the audio up way too much, but in actuality he's enhancing the satire by making all things industrial sound loud and obnoxious. It took me a second to get it.

Playtime is in a class all its own. It stands by itself in the Tati canon for several reasons. Hulot is still in the film, but he's more of a background artist. Also, Playtime has no real story structure. It's just a bunch of characters coming in and out in this large, modern world. Hulot just ties them all together with his presence. If Hulot was the slightest bit confused in Mon Oncle, he is downright lost in Playtime. He doesn't do as much strolling in this film as he does in his others. He wonders about with an uncertainty that is told through his body language. I say this because not a single shot in Playtime is close-up. It's all long and medium shots. So, you have no choice but to judge the character's behavior by their body language. You never get to see their faces.

The story behind this film bankrupting Tati is that he created an entire city on the outskirts of Paris, which has become known as "Tativille". Watch this film and look how large it is. It's shot with the Panorama 70 millimeter camera lens, which is the same type used for such David Lean epics as Lawrence of Arabia and Doctor Zhivago. What comedian is this dedicated to this type of filmmaking? You'd still be hard-pressed to find any comedic director, today, who would shoot a film like this. All of the buildings, roads, street lights, and vehicles are all apart of this one massive set that Tati created. Nothing is officially "on location". I like that idea, because I feel that Tati conveyed his message even more so by doing it that way. He created a modern world that almost exists in reality, but it's all Tati. It's what he sees the world becoming. Impersonal, stifling, and out of reach. The best scene in the film comes about an hour in, where we see the opening of a restaurant. Most if not all the characters in the first hour end up appearing, all at once, in this restaurant, which has one of the most doomed openings you could ever imagine. The brilliant thing about it is that you never witness any of the characters having as much fun in the face of chaos as they do in this scene. It's a lovely thing to see.

Tati's vision became broader than some of the filmmakers who preceded him. Yes, Chaplin and Keaton, both, faced modernization head-on, but I don't think they did it in the scope that Tati did. Maybe Tati had to deal with serious issues of change in his society, but he was at the age where he still could still speak out about it. I feel that he wanted to be a spokesman for the ones who felt the same way he did, but he could still do it in such a polite and seemingly innocent way. I've walked away from each of the Tati films I've seen wondering if I truly appreciated them in the way they should be appreciated. I was skeptical at first and if you've seen any of his films before, maybe you were too, but I see the vision, now. I see his love for comfort and distaste for the not-well-known and I not only appreciate it, I truly identify with it. This was a great filmmaker.

Why Go Against the Majority?

I always feel the need to brace myself when doing something as ambitious as going to the midnight showing of a film. As a teenager, I used to think the crowd that attended these things were fairly certifiable, but I came to realize that there's something noble about it. Downing as many energy drinks as possible, waiting in an irresponsibly long line, and braving the insane amounts of people dressed as their favorite characters from (insert dorky franchise here). My first experience with the midnight showing came just two-and-a-half years ago. It was for Peter Jackson's highly-anticipated remake of the Merian C. Cooper classic, King Kong. This was a major leap for a first-time midnight viewer. Usually, one would want to start out on a film along the lines of ninety to a hundred minutes long. Nope. Not me! I was like the kid who just started drinking and wanted his first beer to be a Guinness. My first midnight showing was a three-and-a-half hour experience. I wasn't disappointed. And since then, I've gone to see Spiderman 3, Indiana Jones and The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, and most recently, The Dark Knight. All at midnight. The latter was not only the best out of the midnight-showing films I've seen, but it's the best superhero film I've seen, by far. Director Christopher Nolan has taken this franchise and made it into film noir. The Dark Knight feels as if there's a haunting presence lurking behind the equipment used to make it. I felt that Philip Marlowe could put on a bat suit and feel right at home in Nolan's Gotham City.

I'm not going to review the film as a whole, though. I'm scared that I might reveal plot points that don't need revealing. Most of you guys know the story, anyway. No, in this blog today, I'm going to discuss one thing and one thing only: Heath Ledger's performance. I understand that every critic and every blogger within a square mile of each other are discussing the very same thing. I'm just going to try and add my own insight to it.

It was common knowledge before the film was released, whether Ledger passed away or not, that his Joker would be the most discussed aspect of the film. Yes, his untimely death has brought more attention to the film and his character, but it cannot be said enough: this is one of the most brilliant character creations film has seen in a very long time. Ledger has done some fine work up to this point, but NOTHING he's done in the past will prepare you for what he does in this film. I've never seen anything quite like it.

I can't explain it, but there's something in a filmgoer that is fascinated by villainous acts done by a truly deranged character. We don't want a villain to succeed, but we do have a morbid curiosity as to how they go about doing what they do. The well-performed, well-conceived villains, at least, challenge us. We yearn for their presence on the screen, because those heroes just seem a little too boring for the moment. It's easy to name off some of the great screen heroes of our time, but it's a lot more fun to think of the bad guys. Hannibal Lecter, Anton Chigurh, Daniel Plainview, Alonzo Harris, Norman Bates, and Darth Vader are such effective villains that they make us desire for the heroes to get a little torn and frayed. My desire, though, is to not break down the psyche of said villains, but to talk about a performance that, in the end, saddens me deeply.

Ledger jumped into this roll with the kind of vim and vigor that makes one giggle in delight with the things he does. Nolan and his brother Jonathan co-wrote the screenplay and they did a great job at giving us speeches. Philosophical speeches where the Joker reflects upon his own psyche. There's a terrific scene in the movie where The Joker explains to Harvey Dent the difference between himself and the people who set out plans of action. The Joker is impulsive with no desire to face or even care about any type of consequence. Ledger delivers these speeches in such a way that it's difficult to read whether he's serious or fooling you. He puts on one of the better poker faces that film has ever seen and it's not because of the make-up. Mannerisms are key to this performance and Ledger makes that the Joker's modus operandi. The way his tongue slivers between the corners of his mouth like a reptile or the low, neutral drawl in which he speaks, it is almost completely impossible to get a read on what he's thinking. He's smart, shifty and has a spirit (evil notwithstanding) that's very hard to break.

I loved the way Ledger uses his hands in this film. He points at his enemies in a way that dictates entire conversations. I found that in The Joker's quieter moments he was a lot more frightening than he was in the bigger ones. In a scene towards the beginning of the film, The Joker walks in on an underground mob meeting. He offers up his advice about how to handle the predicament they are in and one of the gangsters calls him crazy. Ledger takes pronunciation to a whole new level when he responds, "I'm not crazy". He doesn't simply say it that way, though. He places extra emphasis on the "t" in the word "not". Then, he pauses for a beat and finishes his statement. That simple enunciation on the "t" makes him more frightening than in any other scene in the film.

There are sheer moments of comedy that Ledger provides the character, as well. It's not because they're obvious comedic moments, either. I felt a little ashamed of myself for laughing at some of the things the character did. Others were laughing just as hard as I was, though, so I felt that it was okay. Once again, this is something that was completely laid in the hands of the actor and he knocked it out of the ballpark. I cannot stress that enough.

I've told many people this and I know they're tired of hearing me say it, but when Mr. Ledger was announced to play The Joker, there was not a doubt in my mind that he was the perfect choice for the part. He far exceeded my expectations. You can think about some of the characters he's played up until this film. In the beginning, he was essentially playing different versions of himself. The first real sign of a serious actor that we got from him was his performance in Monster's Ball. Then, of course, came his Ennis Del Mar character in Brokeback Mountain. This solidified his standing as the actor we witnessed up until his death in January. Even in Brokeback, though, you could still sense Heath Ledger, the actor. I saw no traces of Ledger in The Dark Knight. None whatsoever. I saw a total immersion by a man who was hitting his peak. His death puts him in the same company as James Dean and River Phoenix. Young, promising actors whose lives were cut short. Ledger, though, was going to be good as Brando. His body of work would have only gotten better. It would have challenged his audience even more and that's why I almost cried while watching this diabolical and mesmerizing performance. I don't get to discover the reaches to which he would've taken future characters. Heath Ledger's final performance will stand, in my eyes, as the most exciting and dynamic villainous turn in the history of cinema. Please go see for yourself, though.

I'm Willing to be Surprised

This evening, I went over to my sister's house to hang out with her and my lovely nephew, Samuel. I called and asked her before I picked up dinner if I needed to bring any DVDs. Maybe a season of Scrubs or The Office. She definitively said "no", because she rented a movie that needed viewing before she had to return it. This was a movie that she stated had Alexis Bledel in it. I immediately huffed and puffed knowing that she rented the film because she's such a fan of The Gilmore Girls. Don't get me wrong, I think Lauren Graham and Alexis Bledel are perfectly fine actresses, but that show is not quite my cup of tea. So, when she stated that ol' Rory from The Girls was in it, you'll have to excuse me if I was a little skeptical. She never mentioned the title of the film, so I was in store for a little surprise.

I got to her house and was happy to see Samuel running around the yard in his little swim diaper just having the time of his life. I proceeded in joining him...minus the whole...swim diaper part. We kicked a ball around. I chased him around for a little bit. By the time my brother-in-law's parents came to pick him up to take him to dinner, my sister and I sat down with our food and proceeded to watch I'm Reed Fish. I had heard of this film. I had heard of this film for the sole reason that an old high school friend of mine left a post on my facebook wall saying that I looked like Reed Fish. Not quite knowing what that meant, I went online to look up what I knew had to be a movie and lo and behold it was Jay Burachel playing the title character. My high school friend had once told me I looked like the same actor my senior year, when the show Undeclared was on for a single season. So, I responded back to her with a hearty "Haha", said a reluctant "thank you" and moved on. Cut three months later and I'm sitting on my sister's couch watching the beginning to this very charming film.

I'm not going to write a full review about it. A review might cheapen the experience of watching this lovely little movie. I'm not saying it's the end-all-be-all of films, but I was pleasantly surprised. This was a sweet, funny indie romantic comedy, which I found out had been made in eighteen days. Impressive for any full-length motion picture. I will say that if you haven't seen this movie and you're willing to open yourself up to something a little bit different, you might enjoy it yourself. I think what made this film work for me, personally, was that it took quite a different direction about half-an-hour into it. You think it's going to throw off the rest of the story that you had been watching up to that point, but you're sucked right back into it. It was an interesting move to make for the writer, whose name happens to be Reed Fish. I think, either direction he wanted to take it, I would've been perfectly fine. It could've been a completely linear rom-com and I would've still cared for the characters the same way. Maybe, in the end, I did care for the characters more so than the actual....wait....I'll just stop there.

This isn't, necessarily, a run-as-fast-as-you-can-to-rent-it kind of film. It's one of those ones that you just stumble upon and go along with it as you watch. There's no dire need for the three or four of you who read this blog to rent it, but if it you do happen to come across it in the back of your mind, do yourself a favor and give it a shot. The worst thing that can happen is that you waste an hour-and-a-half of your time and, in the end, there are a lot worse time-wasters than this.


Thanks, Court!

Great Scenes Part II: "Jaws"

It's been a little while since I've done my last blog, mainly because I've been trying to think of something that I felt passionate enough about writing. I wanted to space out my "Great Scenes" series a little more, but that's just going to have to go by the wayside for the time being. When one gets inspired, one finds it difficult to think or write about anything else. Thus, my second "Great Scenes" entry in a row.

Since I was about nine or ten years of age, I have lived and breathed the Steven Spielberg classic Jaws. Both TBS and TNT would run this film at least five times a year, each. It would usually be on a Saturday night or Sunday afternoon. I have fond memories of sitting in front of my television and watching this film with my dad. I loved the performances by its three primary actors. I loved the dry sense of humor that was always on display. Mostly, I loved the minimal screen time of the title character. That's the most important aspect of the film; one that I mentioned previously in my salute to "The Great Adjectives". It can't be stated enough. Spielberg had a mechanical shark that did not work and, by that fault, it birthed one of the great miracles of cinema of the last forty years. This is one of my all-time favorites.

There are so many scenes in this film that I find great in one way or another. Obviously, the opening scene works very well. The killing of the Kintner boy terrifies me more than any other attack in the film. The scenes where Matt Hooper, Richard Dreyfuss' character, first arrives on the island are terrific. All of these scenes work. The one that works for me the most, though, HAS to be Quint's (Robert Shaw) speech to his two boat mates, about the U.S.S. Indianapolis. Sometimes I just put in the DVD to watch this scene, alone. It staggers me every single time. Our three main characters, Brody (Roy Scheider), Hooper, and Quint, are out to sea, tracking down the great white shark that's killed several people. These are three men of different values and ethics, but they share one common goal. I love to see different personalities onscreen coexist with one another to achieve a greater purpose. By the time we get to the Indianapolis scene, the guys have already tasseled with the predator once. It's nighttime and they're in Quint's raggedy boat, drinking and sharing stories. Quint and Hooper proceed to compare wounds they've gotten from various sharks and finally Brody asks Quint about a scar on his arm.

Quint, who's primal by nature, says that the scar comes from a tattoo that he had removed. Hooper, still drunk and playing the wound-comparison game, says, "Don't tell me. Don't tell me. 'Mother'". He laughs hysterically at his own joke and Quint is quick to point out, "Mr. Hooper, that's the U.S.S. Indianapolis". Hooper is immediately taken aback and asks, "You were on the Indianapolis?" We know that Hooper knows what the Indianapolis is, but Brody asks, "What happened?" That's where Quint lets Hooper and Brody and most importantly, the audience, in on what occurred aboard the doomed ship that delivered the atomic bomb to Hiroshima. What makes this speech so great is that Quint is drunk when he's telling it. For some reason, it gives the words an edge that it wouldn't have, if he was sober. The story is vivid and quite terrifying. I felt like he was a history teacher dictating the most important lesson of the year. It's about a five-minute speech with the most detailed visuals: the Japanese submarine slamming two torpedos into the ship's side, the tiger sharks, the Lockheed Ventura helicopter coming in to pick them up, the shipmates staying in close circles to fend off the sharks, etc. My favorite line in the whole movie is Quint's description of a shark in his drunken, Irish brogue,

"Ya' know the thing about a shark is that he's got lifeless eyes. Black eyes, like a doll's eyes. When he comes at ya', he doesn't seem to be livin'. Until he bites ya'. Then those black eyes roll over white and...oh, and then you hear that terrible high-pitch screamin'. The ocean turns red and despite of all the poundin' and hollerin', they all come in and...rip ya' to pieces"

The perfect ending to this scene, though, is when Quint begins singing the old English shanty, "Spanish Ladies", which leads Hooper right into "Show Me The Way to Go Home". This is truly the only time in the film where the three men are able to all come together and just be "mates". There's no squabbling, or stupid arguments about who's tougher. It's simply three men, some alcohol, and a perfect boat song. It comes at the perfect time, due to the intensity of the last five minutes.

In the end, this speech defines the character of Quint. He's the old salt from the sea who hunts sharks and we know why after he tells us about this terrifying event. I think what impresses me the most is that while the film is considered the starting point to the "summer blockbuster", it had enough respect for its audience to tell a brilliant story about a little-known, yet tragic event during World War II. I know I've done research on it, since I saw the film for the first time. I'm very glad Sterling Hayden and Lee Marvin turned down the role of Quint, because i truly cannot see anyone BUT Robert Shaw playing such a rugged, inappropriate individual. His being Irish just makes the character that much better. Movie monologues, especially the ones three minutes and above, have to stir something in the audience member watching. Because, by and large, our short attention spans require fast cuts and little dialouge. You'll find that a lot of my "Great Scenes" are characters talking. Speeches are my crack and, dammit, if this isn't one of the best ones in film.

On a little sadder note, I'd like to thank my wonderful co-workers at the MTSU Athletic Ticket Office, who've shown unbelievable patience in my inability to move forward in life. I've worked at the office longer than what should be considered legal, which makes it all the more difficult to say 'goodbye'. Well, I've finally gotten my act together, so I'd like to thank Dustin, Joy, Peggy, Derek, Renee, Jason, Mary, and Chris for your warmth and humor. I love you all.

Great Scenes Part I: "Lost in Translation"

Roger Ebert is, quite possibly, my favorite writer. Since I'm not as much of a reader as I want to be, I take refuge in Ebert's sharp and always fair-minded articles on films past and present. There's a pure joy in what he does and you can tell from his writing. He would give a film a chance that no one else was giving and a lot of the time, once his review was read, that movie became acceptable. He's had major influence come Oscar time just through his articles. His review of Juno and Ellen Page's performance, put that film on the map. Two months later, it was nominated for four Academy Awards including Best Picture. When he took ill in 2006, I missed his reviews greatly. I, honestly, refused to read anyone else's, because I was too familiar with his specific style of writing. When he was healthy, he would write a review every other Sunday for an older movie that he had just re-watched. This would compile into his "Great Movies" list. He's released two books with said reviews on films ranging from The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie to A Christmas Story. Saying all of this, I'm starting a little series of my own discussing some of my favorite scenes from certain films. In Sofia Coppola's beautiful Lost in Translation she pairs two seemingly different, but altogether lonely people, who find mutual attraction in one another through their loneliness. In one particular scene they lay in bed together.

You just know that Coppola went into this movie knowing how each little nuance that she wrote in her screenplay was going to play out on film. She wrote a splendid scene about two-thirds of the way through the film where the two principal characters, Bob and Charlotte, have come back to their hotel from an evening of strip clubs and chasing moving billboards to retire to their respective rooms. We see Charlotte tossing about in her bed. She gets up and wanders around the room and suddenly a note is slipped under her door. She opens it up and it's Bob wanting to know if she's still awake. Let me just say that this detail alone is very important to the overall design of Bob and Charlotte. They've known each other for two days and they already feel a necessity towards the other. Not sexually, mind you, but through a force of understanding that the two of them have. They have a love for one another that's shared through quiet talks about their lives. It's the kind of desperation that HAS to be discussed instead of numbed by the act of sex.

So, she comes to Bob's room and they share some sake while watching La Dolce Vita on tv. Eventually, they tire and commence in laying down on Bob's bed. This shows how absolutely comfortable they are with each other. They are finally able to rest easily. Half awake, they begin talking about marriage and children. Charlotte fears the long road ahead with a man that is probably not her best option. It's not that she's just opening up to Bob to be emotionally available. She's turning to Bob for help. She wants advice from a man who is not only older, but has been in the throes of a marriage stuck in neutral. Charlotte needs to know that there are rough patches, but she will be able to get through them. Bob delivers a great monologue about his marriage, but then he suddenly starts talking about his children. I felt as if he were talking to me. It's such a personal discussion. Coppola's really allowing her audience the privilege of sitting in on this intimate conversation. The most beautiful thing about this entire scene is that they allow each other to talk and, in turn, listen.

When they both start to close their eyes, they're still in this trance-like state. They're half-heartedly fighting sleep by keeping the conversation light. The brilliant thing about this scene, though, is that Coppola used this conversation as a way for them to both finally fall asleep. They just needed the comfort of each other's company to do it. I can't stress how much this type of desperation moves me. Just the idea of finding someone who stabilizes you, while you're in such a spinning motion, to the point that you just need to be in their presence. The last great moment of this scene comes in a high-angled shot over the bed, looking at the two of them. Both of their eyes are closed and they haven't said a single word for about ten to fifteen seconds. Slowly, Bob places his hand on Charlotte's foot. It's one of the most intimate moments I've seen in a film. The subtlety of it speaks volumes. This is a friendship that is playful and fun. The ending works so well, because you're not sad that they won't end up together; you're sad because they may never have a chance to talk, again. Ultimately, that's the scariest prospect of any friendship.

I've met too many people who disliked this film because they thought it lacked the proper emotion they felt most Hollywood films have. I completely disagree. I love being able to follow characters around during a film and just listen to them talk. Coppola achieved something so rare in a film. She was able to create a writer's film where there wasn't a whole lot of talking. We did quite a bit of observing. What makes it a writer's film, though, is that when there is a conversation, namely between Bob and Charlotte, there's not a wasted word. We make sure that we listen. The bed scene in Lost in Translation is the best example of two people just being. Love has never looked so real.

Cut or Fade: Dilemma of the Celluloid Exit

I'm reaching a little with this next entry, so you'll have to bare with me. As I type, I have no real idea as to how this is going to play out, but I'll see you guys at the end. I was thinking, recently, about how I view films and the way they end. Not really in story, but the physical transition to black and then credits. These are things that I tend to stew about. The final transition is very important. It holds just as much emotional significance as the conclusion of the story.

We go to a movie to be entertained, first and foremost. We all know that watching films is a form of escapism. Now, to what extent you escape differs from person to person. I love to be entertained, but my form of escapism is picking apart a film as I watch it. It varies with each film, but whether it be camera movement, the writing, the acting, the directing or the general story, I have a need to critique what's occurring in front of me. Given that, I can't wait to see how a film transitions to black. I will admit that I do tend to pay more attention to the ones that I believe have more artistic merit than others, but nevertheless, I watch for it. Then, it becomes a matter of which one you prefer. I know which one I prefer, but that doesn't mean I'm not open to the other. As long as a transition supports the weight of its final message, then I'm all good. Dazzle me with YOUR transition, I say.

Okay, let's establish, very quickly, which transition I prefer. I'm a sucker for the cut to black. The films that I tend to watch these days are made by directors who love cutting to black. I don't think it would be a mystery for those who know me if I were to say that I dig Martin Scorsese's films. Over the last two years, if I had to choose a favorite director, Mr. Scorsese would be the guy. This man is in his mid-sixties and he still makes films with more energy and chutzpah than most directors half his age. A lot of that energy comes via his long-time editor/collaborator, the great Thelma Schoonmaker. She's brilliant. They've had a long, fruitful partnership since 1980's Raging Bull, because they seem to know each other's little quirks. It shows in the films. Scorsese cuts to black often and he does it in such a way that feels like the last sucker punch in a schoolyard fight. You never know when he's going to do it, but when he does, it completely catches you off guard. The aforementioned Raging Bull does it. So does Goodfellas, The Aviator, The Departed, and Mean Streets. These are films that exit in a way the rest of the film calls for. It's energetic and I feel like I've just seen something completely new. I can say the same thing when I view a film by Tarantino, both P.T. and Wes Anderson, Joel and Ethan Coen, and Robert Altman.

This doesn't mean that I don't like the fade to black. The fade is the friend that'll take you out for a beer and talk to you about sports or girls or girls who play sports. It doesn't feel complicated or disturbing. The fade to black, in all honesty, fits with a movie that's rife with emotion. I'm a sucker for the emotional stuff. Truly I am. The best example that I can think of is Mr. Holland's Opus. I love this movie. I don't care who knows it. It's a movie about teachers and music. Needless to say, both mean a lot to me. The last ten minutes make me cry like no other. It's not just a celebration of the career of this highly respected music teacher, but it's a celebration of the profession and the art form. The fade to black is subtle and just right. I feel most movies that end with a fade to black have glided along in a very elegant and wistful manner and that cutting would compromise its integrity. Cameron Crowe does that in his films. For crying out loud, Casablanca ended in a fade! Are you really going to be the one to tell me that Casablanca was wrong in any way shape or form?! It's heresy, my friend. Of course, it's a generational thing. Most classics of the golden age of film didn't cut to black. The turnaround came in the early sixties with the French New Wave filmmakers like Jean Luc Godard, Francois Truffaut, and Eric Rohmer. They were using jump cuts and fancy camera tricks that no one else was using. They changed the way a film could be made. That's including the transition to black.

Allow me to describe one final emotional pull for me in the transition. The music. The way directors use certain songs to exit out of their movie can make me stand up and applaud. Fade or cut. A great example of the fade that I've seen recently was Sarah Paulson's Away From Her. The two main characters are in an embrace that we've been waiting for for most of the film and it's played to k.d lang's version of Neil Young's "Helpless". The camera swirls around the two and then it actually fades to white over this beautiful song. That transition alone to that song solidified my opinion of the film. Wes Anderson LOVES to use a great song over a last scene done in slow motion. He did it wonderfully in Rushmore to the Faces "Ooh La La" and in The Royal Tenenbaums to Van Morrison's "Everyone". Quentin Tarantino uses The Lively Ones' "Surf Rider" brilliantly at the end of Pulp Fiction. Scorsese has used Sid Vicious' version of Sinatra's "My Way", Roy Buchanon's "Sweet Dreams" and the "Cavallerina Rusticana", to exit his films. Here's the thing that each of these films, fade or cut, have in common: they use the music as a rhythmic device to transition. For example, the first chorus will end and right as the second verse comes in, there will be a cut to black and we'll see the director's name come up on the screen. I can't stress how important the usage of music is to a film's ending.

I guess if a film serves its purpose, the transition will be invisible and not really matter, but then you wouldn't have schmucks like me who come along and obliterate that particular purpose. Personally, I'm okay with it. I accepted a long time ago that I'm quite the film snob. I have lots to learn, don't get me wrong, but I'm a snob, nevertheless. Those who exclaim that one transition is better than the other need to reevaluate the way they look at films. You can enjoy one more than the other, sure, but transitions to black serve best the energy of the movie. If you don't like the movie, most likely you won't like the transition...or you'll love it, because it's transitioning to you not having to view that movie anymore. My point being is that it's more fun to judge a film on HOW a director used a certain transition to black; not why.

The Great Adjectives

I was reading an article at www.thefilmjournal.com by a man named Gregory Avery. In the article, he was reviewing a newly-released book about Alfred Hitchcock, called Hitchcock Style by Jean-Pierre Dufreigne. I was taken by a sentence in the first paragraph of the article which read, "...Hitchcock can now claim the singular honor of having become an adjective". I always knew of the term "Hitchcockian" and I knew what it meant, but I had never once thought about it being an adjective. Not once. To break down a director to such a base level would seem almost disrespectful, but I don't think a filmmaker can achieve a higher mark. This is a filmmaker who has created a body of work so specific in theme and/or visuals that their name can be used to describe somebody else's work. Thus, the term "adjective". It's really quite something.

I can think of several directors who deserve to be adjectives. Of course, Alfred Hitchcock is the first one that comes to mind. The main themes of his movies were formed by his strong visual sense. The simple tricks he did with the camera; the things he didn't show you; these were the visual techniques of a man who was feeding the suspense of the story. There are only so many avenues a screenplay can go down in the way of moving the suspense along. A great director can take it the rest of the way. Hitchcock famously stated, "A bomb is under the table and it explodes: that is surprise; the bomb is under the table but it doesn't explode: that is suspense". He implored this methodology in such films as Rear Window, Strangers On A Train, Vertigo, The Birds, Notorious, Psycho, and North By Northwest. It's almost as if he was forcing you to look at what was going on and then make you feel guilty about it, afterwards. He was just as much a prankster as he was a "master of suspense". A generation of directors would soon use the "Hitchcockian" method to further their own stories: Steven Spielberg, M. Night Shyamalan, and quite blatantly, Brian De Palma. I, personally, believe that Spielberg did the best job of it in Jaws. What little you saw of the shark made it that much more terrifying. We never knew when this thing was going to attack, we just knew that it would and that, my friends, is the bomb that doesn't explode.

Another director who I immediately think of as an adjective, is Frank Capra. Here's a director who has drawn about as much derision as he has praise from critics and fans alike. Personally, I know more people who enjoy his movies than don't, but he is a specific type of filmmaker. "Capraesque" is the term. Any movie that bases itself around an idealistic principle or has a yearning for a simpler time where patriotism didn't seem so overwhelming, is considered "Capraesque". He was truly the director of the people. With titles like Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, Mr. Deeds Goes to Town, It Happened One Night (first film to ever win the big five at the Oscars), You Can't Take It With You, and It's A Wonderful Life, under his belt, it's hard to refute the fact that he was America's director. When I watch Rob Reiner's The American President or Ivan Reitman's Dave, I automatically think "Capraesque". The idealistic principle is always prevalent in both of those films. In fact, Aaron Sorkin alludes to it in the screenplay of The American President. The Annette Benning character, a lobbyist, has just arrived in Washington to have a meeting at the White House. She comes up to the guard at the main gate to the building and introduces herself. She's very excited about what she's doing and her co-worker tells her that she doesn't have to tell the guard her name. She apologizes and says, "I was just trying to preserve the sort of 'Capraesque' quality". The co-worker, cynically, says "He doesn't know what that means". Without missing a beat the guard says, "Sure I do. Frank Capra. Great American director of It's A Wonderful Life and Mr. Smith Goes to Washington". It's right there. Sorkin has paid tribute to the man with actual dialogue about him. Two other great examples are Phil Alden Robinson's use of, what I like to call, "realistic fantasy" in Field of Dreams and Frank Darabont's use of the America of old in The Majestic. The former is more of a modern-day version of a Capra film, while the latter would fit in the exact time frame of any Capra classic. There is one scene from each film that takes the Capra sentiment and enhances its ideas. In Field of Dreams, it's James Earl Jones' speech about baseball and the country who yearns for the days when things were much simpler. In The Majestic, it's Jim Carrey's testimony, as a Hollywood screenwriter, to the HUAC. A testimony fighting the forces who say that he's not American enough. "Capraesque" defines the better nature in all of us.

There's one more adjective that I'd like to discuss and that's "Felliniesque". I'm going to preface this by saying that I'm not a big Federico Fellini fan by any stretch of the imagination. I do think his work is undeniably important to not only the Italian cinema, but worldwide, as well. Through the few films I've viewed, though, he's not quite my cup of tea. I am going to be the guy in the movie line, standing behind Woody Allen in Annie Hall and say that La Strada is my personal favorite of his. I've got plenty more to see, though, and I'll leave it at that. Fellini's films, like Hitchcock, tell as much visually as the plot does. He's probably one of the greatest visual minds the cinema has ever seen. If it wasn't his camera, it was what he put in front of his camera that enhanced the viewer's experience. Movies like Juliet of the Spirits, 8 1/2, La Dolce Vita, Fellini Satyricon, and Amarcord are filled to the brim with the unique visuals that almost always call for multiple interpretations. He, too, was a prankster of sorts, who always seemed to be one step ahead of his viewers. I know he was one step ahead of me when I was watching Juliet of the Spirits. It's a little bit more difficult to pinpoint filmmakers whose work has been considered "Felliniesque", but I think David Cronenberg, David Lynch, Terry Gilliam, and even Oliver Stone, to an extent, have probably used Fellini as a compass at one time or another. Watching Stone's Natural Born Killers is a lot like watching a Fellini film. It's physically and emotionally exhausting, but you can't really take your eyes off of it. Even Martin Scorsese has borrowed from Fellini. In his documentary My Voyage to Italy, Scorsese discusses Fellini's I Vitelloni and its characters. He states that it had a major impact on his breakthrough crime drama Mean Streets. The "Felliniesque" quality is harder to pinpoint mainly because it's harder to duplicate. It's one of the most specific.

There are so many other filmmakers who, with just a little more time, will soon be adjectives. Quentin Tarantino, P.T. Anderson, Wes Anderson, M. Night Shyamalan, and Alexander Payne all have qualities that are specific enough to be duplicated for generations to come. They're all true storytellers and visual mavericks. They follow in the footsteps of their heroes: Martin Scorsese, Robert Altman, Joel and Ethan Coen, and Steven Spielberg. They break convention and come out on the other end unscathed. The biggest risk-takers end up getting to be the greatest.

Prologue

I love film. There are many people who love film. I know plenty who love watching movies. I, also, am familiar with a certain group of folk who love to attend the cinema. Each of these groups are, in fact, helpless victims to the undeniable power of the moving image. We could all, easily, say that we're fans of the moving image, but we would all sound like jackasses. So, we choose the sub-name of the moving image that we're most comfortable saying and that ends up being our go-to expression. As I just stated, I love film. I'm a filmgoer. There aren't a lot of things that make me happier than sitting down and looking at a good film. Maybe Alabama football, but I've been at that one for awhile, now. That's in a league by itself.

I believe I'm doing this blog for several reasons. I want to hone my writing skills, because I'm looking at going to grad school for film studies. Also, I would like to express my opinions in a little bit more formal of a setting than a bar with a hapless friend who could care less about my pontificating. My biggest hope is that discussions can arise from these entries. That's my ultimate goal. Someone will feel some type of emotion and want to argue or just have a great discussion. Talking about film is too much fun for me. Talking about the less-than-stellar ones is almost as much fun as talking about the great ones, simply for the challenge. To be able to come up with a lucid argument, showing the hidden genius behind Ace Ventura: Pet Detective, Tommy Boy, or Billy Madison is an exercise in cinematic maneuvering.

Bottom line: any film, movie, or piece of cinema deserves to be discussed. I'm not saying just the good ones. The bad ones deserve it, too. If you think I'm wrong, then I dare you to tell me that you've never told a friend, almost ecstatically, how horrible the piece of crap you just saw, truly was. You start talking about why it was so horrible, don't you? Certain shots or dialogue absurdities. It's a great feeling. Anyway, I hope you enjoy what I'm attempting to do. Thanks.

Jonathan