[Initially posted on 7.16.15] This may not pass muster with traditional Western devotees (i.e, readers of Cowboys & Indians) but arguably one of the most influential westerns ever made is Johnny Concho (’56), a stagey, all-but-forgotten little film that Frank Sinatra starred in and co-produced. For this modest black-and-white enterprise was the first morally revisionist western in which a big star played an ethically challenged lead character — i.e., a cowardly bad guy.
The conventional line is that Marlon Brando‘s One-Eyed Jacks was the first western in which a major star played a gunslinging outlaw that the audience was invited to identify or sympathize with — a revenge-driven bank robber looking to even the score with an ex-partner (Karl Malden‘s “Dad” Longworth) who ran away and left Brando’s “Rio” to be arrested and sent to prison.
This opened the door, many have noted, to Paul Newman‘s rakishly charming but reprehensible Hud Bannon in Martin Ritt‘s Hud two years later, and then the Spaghetti westerns of Sergio Leone (beginning with ’64’s A Fistful of Dollars) and particularly Clint Eastwood‘s “Man With No Name.”
But before One-Eyed Jacks audiences were presented with at least three morally flawed western leads portrayed by name-brand actors. First out of the gate was Sinatra’s’s arrogant younger brother of a notorious gunslinger in Concho. This was followed in ’57 by Glenn Ford‘s Ben Wade, a charmingly sociopathic gang-leader and thief, in Delmer Daves‘ 3:10 to Yuma. And then Paul Newman‘s Billy the Kid in Arthur Penn‘s The Left-Handed Gun (’58).
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In the thread for yesterday’s “Speaking of Blind Sides,” Seasonal Aflac Disorder mentioned that the young Steven Spielberg was a film nerd “so you’d expect he’d be listening to film scores as a young man.”
To which I replied that I, too, was listening to film scores as a lad — Elmer Bernstein, Miklos Rosza, Maurice Jarre, Max Steiner, Franz Waxman. Bronislau Kaper, Dimitri Tiomkin, Bernard Herrmann, Hugo Friedhofer. Except I never bought a compilation album of Freidhofer’s best film music, and I dearly love his scores for One-Eyed Jacks, The Best Years of Our Lives, The Young Lions, Hondo, Vera Cruz, Soldier of Fortune, The Harder They Fall, The Sun Also Rises, An Affair to Remember, etc.
My first and only submission to Michael Rsadford‘s 1984 (20th Century Fox) happened in the late summer or early fall of ’84. A private viewing at the Samuel Goldwyn Co., where I was freelancing as a press kit writer. Myself and the whole crew at the time (including Samuel Goldwyn Jr. himself, Larry Jackson, Jeff Lipsky, Laurette Hayden).
The screening-room mood was funereal, to put it mildly. Radford’s film certainly delivered the chilly Orwellian dread, but it also made you feel narcotized. A discussion session followed. They all conveyed the same cautious, qualified opinions: “Somber…okay, downish but very well made…excellent John Hurt…good reviews assured…
I can’t recall if I expressed my own view during that meeting or later in an inter-office memo, but I’m pretty sure I the only one to share how this gloomy dystopian vision of British totalitarianism had actually made me feel. Six words: “It’s a movie FOR DEAD PEOPLE.”
1984 opened in Europe in late ’84, but the U.S. opening didn’t happen until 3.22.85.
Dr. Phil: “In Nineteen Eighty-Four, Oceania came in and said ‘we’re gonna tell you what words you can use, and what words you can’t use.’ Right now…what Oceania, 1984’s government, was doing, we’re now doing to each other.”
Bill Maher: “I understand. I couldn’t agree more.”
I’ve often bitched about 4K remasterings looking too dark, but I didn’t feel this way about Shout! Factory’s recently released 4K Bluray of John Sturges‘ The Magnificent Seven (’60).
My immediate reaction was “whoa, this looks like celluloid!” I felt as if I was watching a screening at a Seward Street post-production house of a mint-condition 35mm print made from the original negative.” Shout! informs, in fact, that it’s a 2022 restoration and color grading using an existing 4K scan of the original camera negative.
I was spellbound during last night’s viewing — it seemed absolutely perfect to me. Excellent earthy colors, never too dark, spotless, fresh from the lab.
The Hi-Def Digest comparison footage below (the fast-draw contest between James Coburn and Robert Wilke) suggests that the disc is darker than it needs to be. It didn’t look that way to me. It struck me as more organic-feeling than previous versions, but that’s an enhancement in my book. I didn’t notice any teal tinting either.
TMS was shot by Charles Lang (Some Like It Hot, The Facts of Life, One-Eyed Jacks) in 35mm Panavision anamorphic. Lensing began in Mexico on 3.1.60. The Mexican village and the U.S. border town were built from scratch. The locations included Cuernavaca, Durango and Tepoztlán. Indoor filming was done at Mexico City’s Churubusco Studios.
To me a perfect film understands itself perfectly, embraces the virtues of self-discipline and doesn’t mess around.
It tells the truth (or at least its own truth), throws nothing but strikes, allows no opposing hits and leaves no dangling threads.
It’s always a step or two ahead of the average audience, but not too far ahead. It’s smart and perceptive, and yet it never bores even the dumbest audience member, and it understands pacing and story tension and how to deal the right cards in the right way, and at the right time.
It knows, in short, what beginnings, middles and ends are supposed to achieve, and it follows through like a pro. It presents a spherical, recognizable world that adds up no matter how you slice it.
In his new book “Cinema Speculation“, Quentin Tarantino lists seven 20th Century films that he regards as perfect:
I’m not disagreeing with Quentin’s choices exactly. I certainly agree with five of them, but if I was forced to select my own seven perfectos I definitely wouldn’t include Hi-Ho Steverino‘s Jaws (a very satisfying and finely crafted summer popcorn film but saddled with a few problems) and I certainly wouldn’t choose Tobe Hooper‘s The Texas Chainsaw Massacre…please.
Here are more perfect or near-perfect films…50 of them….the top third from “HE’s 160 Greatest Films of All Time” (posted on 7.24.15). I believe with all my heart that these 50 are just as perfectly assembled as Quentin’s seven. There’s no way to make a convincing case that Quentin’s seven are more perfect than any of HE’s 50, whatever that could possibly mean. Everything is arbitrary, personal…there’s no formula.
HE’s Top Ten Greatest American Films: (1) The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, (2) Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned To Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb, (3 & 4) The Godfather & The Godfather, Part II (5) The Graduate, (6) Election, (7) Zodiac, (8) Rushmore, (9) Pulp Fiction, (10) Some Like It Hot.
Greatest American Films (11 to 20): (11) North By Northwest, (12) Notorious, (13) On The Waterfront, (14) Groundhog Day, (15) Goodfellas, (16) Out Of The Past, (17) Paths of Glory, (18) Psycho, (19) Raging Bull, (20) 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Greatest American Films (21 to 30): (21) Annie Hall, (22) Apocalypse Now, (23) Strangers on a Train, (24) East of Eden, (25) Bringing Up Baby, (26) The African Queen, (27) All About Eve, (28) The Wizard of Oz, (29) Zero Dark Thirty, (30) Only Angels Have Wings.
Greatest American Films (31 to 40): (31) Repo Man, (32) Heat, (33) Red River, (34) Drums Along the Mohawk, (35) Gone With The Wind, (36) Rebel Without a Cause, (37) Ben-Hur (38) The Best Years of Our Lives, (39) The Big Sleep, (40) Shane.
Greatest American Films (41 to 50): (41) Rear Window, (42) Bonnie And Clyde, (43) The Bridge On The River Kwai, (44) Casablanca, (45) Chinatown, (46) Citizen Kane (47) One-Eyed Jacks, (48) King Kong, (49) 12 Angry Men (50) The Informer.
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…after staying with Peter Jackson’s 468–minute Beatles doc over a two-day period:
Somewhere during the third or fourth hour I began to feel a little bit Beatle–ed out. But I’d suspected that would happen so it wasn’t a big surprise and I knew I’d eventually…well, feel proud about having watched the whole thing. Which I am.
It’s basically fly-on-the-wall stuff. Quite interesting. A casual, shaggy, very cool hang. But after a while it loses a little something. Zero narrative tension, of course, but that’s built into the concept. It almost bores at times but not quite. Because I’ve never really seen or felt the Beatles this “unguarded”, this “just being themselves”, or smoking this much. I’ve never felt this much access to their inner vibe or sanctum, if you will.
From John Anderson’s Wall Street Journal review:
Tapped out in stages through the day…
Anderson is correct in calling Get Back many things (including occasionally tedious) rolled into one. 60 hours of footage boiled down to 468 minutes (nearly eight hours) — a chopped English salad of this and that song or conversation or mood jag, pieces of fun and improv and shaggy affectionate humor and experimentation, and so much smoking you’ll feel cancer seeping into your lungs. (There’s actually a warning about the smoking at the beginning of each episode.)
It’s never not interesting, and you gradually begin to pick up on things implied and unsaid.
Episode #1 covers the first seven days, and ends on 1.10.69. Most of it consists of casual, enjoyable playing of new and old tunes. The best musical performance by far is of an old standard — Chuck Berry’s “Rock & Roll Music”.
A fair amount of “Abbey Road” numbers are played in rough form.
The 16mm image quality is very good considering. The cropped HD scanning (16 x 9 aspect ratio) has a high-grade clarity. No noticeable grain to speak of.
It’s fascinating when cameras are focused on a verbal discussion while Paul McCartney’s first stabs at “Let It Be” are heard in the background.
Nobody except Linda Eastman (who drops by a couple of times) says a word to Yoko “black hole” Ono, and who could blame them?
George Harrison’s frustration with McCartney’s ego & dominant band-leading (which was conveyed in Michael Lindsay-Hogg’s original half-century-old doc) is not especially readable here. George’s temporary departure was reportedly preceded by a big lunch-hour blowup between himself and the reportedly heroin-sedated John, but this happens off–camera.
There’s a fascinating discussion between Paul and others about how John and Yoko ‘s obsessive relationship prevented John and Paul from seeing each other and thereby composing together, and how Yoko’s constant presence led to a blocking of the old collaborative hormones.
There’s a SERIOUSLY MESMERIZING passage near the beginning of episode #2 in which John and Paul retire to the lunch room to privately discuss George having “quit” the band, but Hogg and his team have covertly planted a mike in a flower pot and so we hear every line, every word. And Jackson prints out the dialogue as it happens.
Once the Harrison-quitting episode is resolved, what little narrative tension the doc had is out the window.
12:30 pm update: Most of episode #2 (which runs 173 minutes) happens inside the newly created basement recording studio at Apple headquarters on Saville Row. This is where they record the “Get Back” album — not the worst Beatles album (that would be “Magical Mystery Tour”) but the second worst.
Seriously: Episode #2 is less interesting, a bit flabbier than episode #1. Do I need to watch the whole thing? Can I just jump to episode #3?
This will sound petty, of course, but somewhere in the middle of episode #2 (i.e., Saville Row recording studio) and for a couple of days, George Harrison begins wearing a pair of black high-tops with thick white laces. And they really look awful — about as far away from HE’s Italian suede lace–up aesthetic as you can get. Absurd as it may sound, those high-tops brought me down.
2:20 pm update: Episode #2 (173 mins.) has finally ended. Episode #3 (138 mins.) has begun. It’s been a long and winding road since I began watching this bear yesterday afternoon. With all due respect, I’m starting to feel a little John, Paul, George and Ringo–ed out.
3:45 pm update: The Saville Row roof concert is good. A little short (what is it, seven or eight songs?) but a crescendo of sorts. Observed by maybe 100 or so onlookers on nearby rooftops and whatnot. The delighted fans down below can’t see a thing. Two young policemen knock on the Apple door with noise complaints from older people, and insisting that the volume levels are too loud. Mal Evans takes them up on the roof. Their mindsets are so banal. ‘Twas ever thus.
I liked Jackson’s decision to use a horizontal split-screen presentation during the concert…three screens, two screens, occasional singles.
David Poland has called The Beatles: Get Back “the greatest art process documentary I have ever experienced.” I think it’s the greatest art process film since Curtis Hanson’s 8 Mile.
Altogether a historic achievement. I’m not sure how truly great or (if you’re reading Poland) Shoah-level it might be, but it’s one marathon-sized music epic that you probably need to submit to.
Peter Jackson says his greatest fear making The Beatles doc #GetBack was finding out one or more of them were “primadonnas or assholes.”
They were not. “They are good guys… It sounds so simplistic. But I’m so happy that the four Beatles turned out to be good guys. Nice guys.” pic.twitter.com/MgixYe46ds
— Kevin Polowy (@djkevlar) November 24, 2021
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