Kehr on "Spirit"
N.Y. Times DVD columnist Dave Kehr, whose dismissive snortings have prompted an occasional retort from this corner, has gotten it wrong again. In his current column he refers to Billy Wilder's The Spirit of St. Louis, a not-half-bad 1957 James Stewart flick about Charles Lindbergh's 1927 solo flight from New York to Paris, as "stunningly impersonal."
In terms of auteurist brushstrokes, he means. And Kehr is right -- the film has none of the wit or subversion in Wilder's best films, and it does seem as if Wilder made it for the paycheck. But in its mid-1950s, earnestly stodgy way, The Spirit of St. Louis is moderately watchable -- it moves along in a steady, workmanlike fashion -- but also pays off emotionally at the very end. In a blatantly dishonest way, yes, but effectively. And I've always found this fascinating.
It's mainly because of Wilder's storytelling discipline -- he was always one to plant seeds and make them pay off much later in a film -- and also, partly, due to Franz Waxman's music. But Kehr can't be bothered to mention this, perhaps because he never realized it or is too smug to pay attention. I only know that I hate it when smart critics diss a film that's at least partly successful.
Just before the exhausted Stewart is about to land his plane at Le Bourget field in Paris, he starts to lose it -- he starts freaking and whimpering over a sudden inability to focus on the basics of landing a plane.
The movie has briefly acknowledged about an hour earlier that Lindbergh was an atheist who believed only in his own aeronautical skills and in the engineering of planes. But just as Stewart is melting down above Le Bourget he thinks back to a "flying prayer" that a priest passed once passed on, and he says aloud, "Oh, God, help me." And of course he lands safely.
And I swear to God it seems like the right thing to say at that moment -- for Stewart/Lindbergh, for the audience, for the film. And I'm saying this as a half- atheist myself. (I found satori when I was 20 -- I held universes in the palm of my hand -- but mystical flotation fades over time.) It was shameless of Wilder and coscreenwriters Charles Lederer and Wendell Mayes to have pulled such a cheap trick (pandering to conventional religious sentiment, etc.), but it's amazing when bullshit works despite it obviously being bullshit.
Jean Luc Godard had a somewhat similar reaction when he said he was seized with affection for John Wayne's Ethan Edwards at the end of The Searchers when he picks up Natalie Wood and says, "Let's go home, Debbie." That's a dishonest moment also -- Ethan is a racist sonuvabitch, and there's no way he's doing to do a last-minute 180. But the moment works anyway.
I've always felt that any movie that puts at least one lump in your throat is not impersonal. If the filmmakers are talented and clever enough to "get" you, they're always coming some emotional place themselves. You can't be totally cynical and touch people. You have to mean it on some level. And that means getting down to the "personal".
Posted by Jeffrey Wells on August 15, 2006 at 4:42 PM
comment #1
Nate West
says ...
Let us review:
1. The film "has none of the wit or subversion in Wilder's best films."
2. "it does seem as if Wilder made it because he wanted the paycheck."
3. In its "earnestly stodgy way," the film is "moderately watchable."
4 "...it moves along in a steady, workmanlike fashion."
5. "...[it] pays off emotionally at the very end. In a blatantly dishonest way, yes, but effectively."
Oh, I don't know, but, to me, a stodgy, moderately watchable, workmanlike movie, lacking in wit and honesty, strikes me as a tad "impersonal." The reason it's "stunningly" impersonal is because Mr. Wilder is otherwise a superior satirist.
What is truly stunning, however, is that Billy Wilder, of all people, would choose to celebrate a nativist anti-Semite who admired the fascist state and urged the United States to stay out of the war because Nazi victory was certain.
It wasn't just the cornball ending that was "blatantly dishonest."
Posted by Nate West
at August 15, 2006 10:50 PM
comment #2
JoeGreenia
says ...
I’ve had a Dave Kehr problem for a while. If somebody wants to “de-bunk†classic Hollywood, to question and reappraise without compromise, fine. Good idea, in fact. But Kehr has this streak of acrimony to him - a chip on his shoulder. I don’t know if he’s the man for the job. He seems unable, for instance, to refer to Michael Curtiz without calling him a “hackâ€. Why the constant pejorative? (Perhaps this stands out because we watch Cutiz’s films so often.) Compare Kehr to David Thomson’s stuff on the same period.
Posted by JoeGreenia
at August 16, 2006 11:45 AM
comment #3
Mike Stone
says ...
"What is truly stunning, however, is that Billy Wilder, of all people, would choose to celebrate a nativist anti-Semite who admired the fascist state and urged the United States to stay out of the war because Nazi victory was certain."
Hmmm...John F. Kennedy was an adulterous womanizer whose foreign-policy clumsiness precipitated the Cuban Missile Crisis. Does that mean we should never celebrate the good things he accomplished during his presidency?
However Lindbergh was about Nazism and American involvement in World War II, he still flew across the Atlantic Ocean in a plane none of us would dare fly to Palm Springs. With historical figures who accomplish great things, we often have to overlook their flaws.
Besides, I believe Lindbergh later admitted that his views on Nazism were wrong. He certainly put his own life on the line to help the war effort in the Pacific, teaching fighter pilots how to extend their long over-water flights to make deeper strikes against the Japanese.
Posted by Mike Stone
at August 16, 2006 4:36 PM
comment #4
Nate West
says ...
In fact, JFK resisted the urgings of his military advisors to invade Cuba, an invasion which WOULD have precipitated a nuclear exchange. And I hardly place his womanizing on a par with Lindbergh's blithe indifference to the fate of the British people and the Jews. (See Lindy's 1941 speech in Des Moines, Iowa.)
That being said, I have no trouble with a Lindbergh narrative that tells his WHOLE STORY, the heroism and the isolationism combined. I'm just surprised that Billy Wilder, himself a Jewish refugee from Berlin, elected to be the man to tell only half the tale. YOU may wish to overlook Lindy's call to leave the Jews to their fate, but it's stunning that Wilder did, too.
Of course, this was the 1950's, and what better way to shore up one's credentials as a patriot than to direct a biopic about a famous American aviation hero starring a genuine (and rightwing) hero of World War II.
Posted by Nate West
at August 16, 2006 5:23 PM