Soundtrack September Selection #4: WALK HARD (2007)

Soundtrack September Selection #4 comes from Angie & Chantale at Cinema Obsessed. They picked a sublime soundtrack indeed:

WALK HARD: THE DEWEY COX STORY

“Oh man, did this movie surprise us. As much faith as we have in Judd Apatow and John C. Reilly, they just don’t make spoofs like they used to. We’re SO done with these “Not Another ‘blank‘ Movies.” They just throw in every pop-culture reference they can think of, and have entirely lost the true meaning of spoofing. I mean honestly, what does Amy Winehouse have to do with a Disaster movie? Ridiculous.

Back to the film at hand. Walk Hard had a brilliant soundtrack, full of original songs that fit the decades they are emulating PERFECTLY. Many critics praised the soundtrack, saying the songs were not only funny, catchy and well-written, but perfectly reflected the genres and times of the film.

The soundtrack was nominated for both a Grammy and Golden Globe Award and was nominated and won the Sierra Award for Best Song in a Motion Picture from the Las Vegas Film Critics Society. (Wikipedia)

Some of the influences (in story AND in music) of Dewey Cox are:

Bob Dylan, Elvis Presley, Roy Orbison, Jim Morrison, Brian Wilson, Glen Campbell, Ray Charles, Jerry Lee Lewis, Donovan, John Lennon, Sir Paul McCartney, George Harrison, and Ringo Starr, but mainly Johnny Cash.

Reilly was nominated for a Golden Globe for his performance. Not only was it comedic triumph, but he played guitar and sang his own songs.

The film was actually a flop, earning less at the box office than the film’s budget, but received critical acclaim later, especially for the brilliant soundtrack.

Here you see Dewey’s early music in the 50s (as a 14 year-old. Yes. Hilarious). His utterly offensive and blasphemous Take My Hand. As Dewey’s unsupportive father tells him, “You know who’s got hands? The DEVIL! And he uses ’em for holdin’ things!”

Below we get a taste of Dewey’s 70s Bob Dylan phase, when he’s wacked out on drugs and writing very “deep” songs.

Lyrics:

Mailboxes drip like lampposts in the twisted birth canal of the coliseum
Rim job fairy teapots mask the temper tantrum
O’ say can you see ’em
Stuffed cabbage is the darling of the Laundromat
‘N the sorority mascot sat with the lumberjack
Pressing passing stinging half synthetic fabrication of his– Time
The mouse with the overbite explained how the rabbits were ensnared
‘N the skinny scanty sylph trashed the apothecary diplomat
Inside the three-eyed monkey within inches of his toaster oven liiife…

Not to be missed is the title track, Walk Hard, and the lovely Let’s Duet, a wonderful piece of harmonious, hilarious innuendo.”

For more Sublime Soundtracks, visit cinemaobsessed.com.

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WATCHMEN: The Film Babble Blog Review

WATCHMEN (Dir. Zack Snyder, 2009)

Darker than THE DARK KNIGHT and raunchier than any other Superhero movie ever, WATCHMEN busts out of development Hell into theaters today and it’s sure to be #1 this weekend. Knowing nothing of the source material, I sat transfixed and alternately baffled at what I saw at a late screening last night. Set in an alternate America in 1985 in which Nixon (played with a cartoon-ish prosthetic nose by Robert Wisden) is still president, a group of Superheroes has been disgraced and placed under governmental control. When The Comedian (Jeffrey Dean Morgan), a power player with a crusty charisma is murdered, Superhero turned vigilante Rorschach (Jackie Earle Haley) focuses on tracking down the killers. Among the not-ready-for-the-Justice-League heroes are Nite Owl II (Patrick Wilson), Silk Spectre II (Malin Ackerman), Ozymandias (Matthew Goode), and Billy Crudup as the completely CGI crafted Doctor Manhattan.

Much of this film feels like a Frankenstein monster of a movie with pieces from pop culture classics stitched together – the rain drenched neon-lit dystopian cityscapes from BLADE RUNNER and the War Room set reproduced exactly from DR. STRANGELOVE for instance. For an over the top action movie it’s really exposition heavy at times which works better than expected especially the soft spoken Crudup, who somehow makes a giant naked blue man animation into a study in eloquence. As for the action, the fight scenes lack edge and urgency, but the overall thrust is engaging if not transcendent. As Rorschach, complete with a cool morphing ink blot mask, Haley is the stirring standout showing how far he’s come from pitching for the BAD NEWS BEARS. A sequence involving Rorschach in stir is absolutely gripping with Haley stealing the movie away from his co-stars and the scores of expensive bombast.

As I mentioned above I have not read the original beloved graphic novel on which this is based so I can’t judge how faithful it is, but it certainly felt like a true comic book movie. It was almost as if bold panel edges and invisible establishing text were present while Crudup’s Doctor Manhattan looked like he had literally walked off the printed page. The soundtrack is quite unorthodox for a Superhero epic – an opening montage set to Bob Dylan’s “The Times They Are A-Changin’” sets the tone with odd choices like Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah”, Simon and Garfunkel’s “The Sounds Of Silence”, and Nena’s “99 Luftballons” following suit. Unfortunately, despite all these eccentricities and that it’s leaps and bounds better than Snyder’s 300, the film is way too long with a number of plodding parts that don’t gel. As a better than average popcorn flick it’s sure to have many fans, but it had ambitions way above that. Despite that WATCHMEN doesn’t soar to the heights it aims for, its intense intent and wicked sense of self is nearly intoxicating enough.

More later…

GONZO: Fawning & Loafing On The Bio-Doc Trail

GONZO: THE LIFE AND WORK OF DR. HUNTER S. THOMPSON (Dir. Alex Gibney, 2008)

Every book on my shelf has a different definition of the word “Gonzo”; it’s a style of journalism, it’s an ethic – when I was a kid it was a Muppet. The basic meaning, as best I can gather, is when a commentator, reporter et al. is so intensely immersed in their story that they become part of it. The alternate meanings can be summed as an ‘in your face’ fact and fiction blurred aesthetic where anything goes. Despite Spanish or Italian roots (again depends on what book you read) the term became part of the popular lexicon in the introduction of an article by Hunter S. Thompson in 1970. Thompson who by then already had a reputation as an gun-toting druggie “Freak Power” anarchist is the subject of this over reverant documentary by Oscar winning dierctor Alex Gibney (TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE).

Thompson spent much of the last 40 years in front of a camera when he wasn’t shooting up (in every possible way) so there is much fascinating footage to wade through with news reports about his Hell’s Angels meddling, talk show appearances, and amatuer film of his campaign for Mayor of Aspen, Colorado making for a juicy narrative. Johnny Depp, who played the man in Terry Gilliam’s 1998 adaptation of FEAR AND LOATHING IN LAS VEGAS (which this film uses too many clips from), frames a number of segments with readings from Thompson’s work but since that device drops and he isn’t heard from throughout lengthy chunks of the film he can’t really be considered a narrator though he’s credited as such.

Then there’s the music – with some of the most obvious 60’s songs employed to make easy points this has to go down as one of the least imaginative soundtracks for a period doc ever. I mean, how many times am I gonna have to see “All Along The Watchtower” * cut to war footage? Stones, Joplin, CCR, Lou Reed’s “Walk On The Wild Side”; come on! Gibney makes a movie that feels like it was made by somebody whose never seen any 60’s or 70’s docs before. It’s also so not neccessary to go through the deaths and overused footage of MLK, RFK, and General Nguyen Ngoc Loan executing a Viet Cong prisoner in Saigon to get to the heart of Hunter S. Thompson but there it is and go through it again I guess we’re doomed to do forever.

* To the films credit the version of “Watchtower” used is from Bob Dylan and The Band’s live performance on “Before The Flood” (1974) not the incredibly done to death (movie-wise that is) Hendrix version.

Concentrating mostly on Thompson’s early career and glossing over the rest since the 70’s to his death in 2005, GONZO does have its merits. There are interviews with the charming yet still smarmy asshole Rolling Stone editor Jann Wenner, former Nixon-aid turned Republican Presidential candidate now full-time Conservative commentator Pat Buchanan (who surprisingly has reams of insight), 1972 Democratic Presidential nominee George McGovern, and especially Thompson’s ex-wife Sandy Conklin Thompson (whose name is now Sondi Wright). There are many great anecdotes with Ralph Steadman’s iconic splattered cartoons injecting the proceedings with some much needed rough edges. For the uninitiated this portrait may be an eye opening overview; to those well versed in the counterculture and the beginnings of the “new media” this may come off as an incomplete too respectful playing of Thompson’s greatest hits with very little new insight gleemed. In the end it’s just more than a bit disapointing that a film about the Gonzo mind-set and output of one of the most notorious and unruly writers of the last half century could be such a standard straight forward bio-doc; in other words so non-Gonzo.

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The Film Babble Blog Top 10 Movies Of 2007

I’ve hesitated making a list of the best of what has been an exceptionally good year because there are still many potential candidates that I haven’t seen yet – THE SAVAGES, GONE BABY GONE, THE ASSASSINATION OF JESSE JAMES…, PERSOPOLIS, and THE DIVING BELL AND THE BUTTERFLY among them. I should be able to see those all fairly soon but then, come on, there will always be 2007 films that I haven’t seen out there. So here’s my Top Ten:

1. NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN (Dir. Joel & Ethan Coen)

The Coen Brothers frighteningly faithful adaptation of the Cormac McCarthy novel is undoubtedly an immediate classic. I’ll refrain from Oscar predictions but there’s no way this goes home with nothing from the pathetic press conference that the Academy Awards ceremony is threatening to be. With incredible cinematography by Roger Deakins and great performances by Tommy Lee Jones, Josh Brolin, and especially as evil incarnate – Javier Bardem. Read my original review here.

2. THERE WILL BE BLOOD (Dir. Paul Thomas Anderson)

An uncharacteristic film for PTA and another based on a literary work (Upton Sinclair’s “Oil”) this is a mesmerizing masterpiece with a showstopping performance by Daniel Day Lewis as an evil Oil baron. That this and the Coen Bros. are meeting in the same desert area where both films were shot (the West Texas town of Marfa) for a Best Picture Oscar showdown makes it sadder that for this competition there may be no show. My original review here.

3. I’M NOT THERE (Dir. Todd Haynes)

It was wonderful that Cate Blanchett won a Golden Globe and got a Best Supporting Actress nomination for her role as Jude Quinn – one of 6 personifications of Bob Dylan (the others being Richard Gere, Christian Bale, Heath Ledger, Ben Whishaw, and Marcus Carl Franklin), because she was the one that really nailed it. Roger Ebert wrote that Julie Taymor’s Beatles musical ACROSS THE UNIVERSE was “possibly the year’s most divisive film” but I think this divided movie goers to a greater extreme. I heard some of the most angered comments I’ve ever heard about a movie in my theater’s lobby and there were many screenings that had multiple walk-outs. To me though these folk were crazy with the same moronic heckling mentality of those who booed when Bob went electric back in ’65-’66. This is a movie as far ahead of its time as its subject: the Fellini, Godard, Altman, Pekinpah, and Pennebaker visual riffing throughout will take decades to fully absorb as well the context of the classic music presented – cue “Positively 4th Street”. Read more in my original review here.

4. ZODIAC (Dir. David Fincher)

An unjustly overlooked new-fangled stylized, though with old-school ALL THE PRESIDENT’S MEN tactics, serial killer period piece procedural – which I know makes it sound either too scary or too boring (or both), but damnit this is a knock-out of a movie. Fincher utilizes every bit of info available about the original late 60’s to 70’s case about the Zodiac killer through his baffling coded killings to the sporadic nature of his possible identity, through the incompetent technology of the time and the mislaid evidence because of separate investigations. So fascinating, it will take a few more viewings to fully appreciate how fascinating it is – and I haven’t even seen the Director’s Cut! With passionate performances by Jake Gyllenhall, Robert Downey Jr., Chloë Sevigny and Mark Ruffalo. Read my original review here.

5. 3:10 TO YUMA (Dir. James Mangold)

In this remake of the 1957 film based on the Elmore Leonard short story set in the 1880’s, Christian Bale is a down on his luck handicapped farmer who takes on the job of transporting evil yet poetic outlaw Russell Crowe across dangerous terrain to the scheduled train of the title. An amazing sense of pacing plus the ace performances of the principals help this transcend the “revitalizing the Western” brand it’s been stupidly stamped with. A stately yet grandly entertaining movie with an extremely satisfying ending. Read my original review here.

6. AWAY FROM HER (Dir. Sarah Polly)

Julie Christie is going to be hard to beat for Best Actress this year because her portrayal of a woman suffering from Alzheimer’s is as heartbreaking as it gets. Gordon Pinsent is understated and affecting as her estranged husband – lost to her mentally and helpless as she is institutionalized. He’s sadly confined to the sidelines as she falls in love with a fellow patient played by Michael Murphy. My review (based on the DVD) is here.

7. RATATOUILLE (Dir. Brad Byrd)

Flawless animation enhanced by an ace script with embellishment by star Patton Oswalt (he voices the rat) makes this story about a Parisian rodent that happens to be a master chef as tasty a dish as one could salivate for in the proud Pixar present. My original review – of course it’s right here.

8. BEFORE THE DEVIL KNOWS YOU’RE DEAD (Dir. Sydney Lumet)

Phillip Seymour Hoffman and Ethan Hawke are brothers who plot to rob the jewelry store owned by their parents. Tragedy ensues – some hilarity too but it’s of the cringe-variety. Read my review here.

9. THE SIMPSONS MOVIE (Dir. David Silverman)

Some may think that it’s funny that in this year of worthy candidates that my choice of this big screen version of one of the 20 year old TV cartoon family’s adventures, but as Homer says “I’ll teach you to laugh at something that’s funny!” This is definitely here because of personal bias but isn’t that what these lists are all about? Original review – here.

10. MICHAEL CLAYTON (Dir. Tony Gilroy)

A surprisingly non glossy legal thriller with a downbeat but nuanced George Clooney. Didn’t really pack ’em in but got respectable business and critical notices. Despite enjoying and obviously thinking it’s one of the year’s best, I was surprised it got a Best Picture Nomination – I really thought INTO THE WILD would get it. Since this is the superior picture I’m happy to be wrong. Also nice to see Tom Wilkinson getting a nomination for his intense turn as Clooney’s deranged but righteous key witness. My review? Oh yeah, it’s here.

Spillover:

The ones that didn’t quite make the Top Ten grade but were still good, sometimes great flicks – click on the title (except for ACROSS THE UNIVERSE which links to its IMDb entry) for my original review.

NO END IN SIGHT (Dir. Charles Ferguson)
HOT FUZZ (Dir. Edgar Wright)
ATONEMENT (Dir. Joe Wright)
BREACH (Dir. Billy Ray)
ACROSS THE UNIVERSE (Dir. Julie Taymor)
SiCKO (Dir. Michael Moore)
THE HOAX (Dir. Lasse Hallström)
2 DAYS IN PARIS (Dir. Julie Delphy)
AMERICAN GANGSTER (Dir. Ridley Scott)
SUPERBAD (Dir. Greg Mattola)

So that’s it for now – I may revise this at some point but I’m thinking it would be better to let it stand.
This post is dedicated to Heath Ledger (April 4th, 1979 – January 22nd, 2008). He, of course, was one of the Bobs (pictured above) in my #3 Film of the year and I enjoyed his performances in BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN, THE BROTHERS GRIMM, and MONSTER’S BALL (those are the only ones of his I’ve seen so far). As I write this many pundits on cable are pontificating on the cause of his death exaggerating every tiny detail of what should be his private life. I prefer to just look at the work he left behind. His role as the Joker in the upcoming Batman sequel THE DARK KNIGHT is surely going to be the most anticipated role of 2008.

R.I.P.

More later…

Blasting Bogdanovich & 10 Definitive Rockumentaries

Who knew Peter Bogdanovich could rock?

This guy – the refined ascot wearing autuer who directed THE LAST PICTURE SHOW but is best known to the masses as Dr. Melfi’s shrink on The Sopranos not only can rock but he can rock for a long ass time. 4 hours in fact – the length of his new rock documentary TOM PETTY AND THE HEARTBREAKERS: RUNNIN’ DOWN A DREAM.

I made it through the whole thing and loved it (I hope my review below won’t take 4 hours to read) and it got me to thinking about other great rock documentaries, or rockumentaries if you will, so yeah – I made another official Film Babble Blog list. First though let’s take in Bogdanovich as he goes off on a Tom Petty tangent:

TOM PETTY AND THE HEARTBREAKERS: RUNNIN’ DOWN A DREAM (Dir. Peter Bogdanovich, 2007)

“Marty took 3 hours and 40 minutes to tell 6 years of Dylan and I figured, if that’s the case, why shouldn’t we take 4 hours to tell 30 years of Tom Petty?”
– Peter Bogdanovich on Sound Opinions (broadcast January 7th, 2008)

A big package this is – 4 discs, 2 of which are the 4 hour 15 minute director’s cut of the documentary, the 3rd disc is the complete 30th Anniversary Gainesville, Florida concert from September 30th, 2006, and the 4th is a soundtrack CD featuring 9 previously unreleased songs. Whew! Hard to claim to be just a casual Petty fan after absorbing all of that. Bogdanovich’s film even at its bloated length is engrossing and never lags.

Framed by footage from the before mentioned concert we are taken through the history of the band with interview segments spliced with photos, fliers, home movies, TV appearances, grainy videotape material, and every other source available. The ups and downs are perfectly punctuated with Petty standards – the punchy pop bright Byrds influence that brought forth the break-through single “American Girl” captures the band on a television stage young and green while the promotional video for “Refugee” shows them freshly on the mend from battles with lawyers and declaring bankruptcy.

Of course there are unavoidable rockumentary clichés that are as old than THIS IS SPINAL TAP – recording studio squabbles, the trials of transporting drugs over the borders, and the “Free Fallin'”-out of the band when they aren’t on the same page but they are amusingly displayed in a knowing manner that transcends the usual VH1 classic fodder. It’s hard not to think of Scorsese’s landmark Dylan doc when putting in disc 2 of RUNNIN’ DOWN A DREAM for the most obvious reason – as Part 2 starts the first words uttered, by Petty, are “Bob Dylan, I don’t think there’s anyone we admire more”. So the collaboration with Petty and Dylan begins – there is great footage from the HBO special Hard To Handle. Bob thrusts his hand behind him while playing his harmonica on the intro of “Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door” to stop the band from coming in too soon and it’s an amazing moment – the greatest songwriter ever (as Petty and I call him) directing the best working class Americana band of the mid 80’s and beyond.

Tom and Bob’s collaboration led to the Traveling Wilbury’s – the ultimate supergroup filled out by former Beatle George Harrison, legend Roy Orbison and Jeff Lynne of the elaborately Beatle-esque Electric Light Orchestra. Petty’s approach was forever altered – which we see as certain band members have to cope with his new direction. Especially former drummer Stan Lynch, (who refused to be interviewed for the film but is presented in archive footage) who says bluntly of Petty’s biggest selling album “Full Moon Fever” – “there were more than a couple songs I just didn’t like.” Through the 90’s up to now we see Petty and the Heartbreakers weather grunge (Nirvana drummer Dave Grohl played with them on SNL right after Lynch left), a death of a long time but still considered “new kid” bassist Howie Epstein, and the competition from a world in which “rock stars were being invented on game shows” all with their self declared “I Won’t Back Down” spirit.

Though you ordinarily wouldn’t think of him in the same company as Orson Welles and John Ford, this masterful showcase of material makes a solid case that Petty is indeed in the pantheon of those previous subjects of Bogdanovich’s. Eddie Vedder of Pearl Jam, who seems to show up in every rocumentary or rock related movie these days (even WALK HARD), appears at one point to sing a duet with Petty on “The Waiting” at a recent concert. When the song ends and the giant audience erupts Petty says to Vedder, “Look at that, Eddie – rock and roll heaven.” He’s right – for 4 hours and 15 minutes it sure is.

So since Bogdanovich’s Petty opus joins the ranks of great rockumentaries and because this year new docs ’bout U2, Patti Smith, and Marty’s huge Rolling Stones project will be unleashed on the market it’s time to appraise those ranks. So here’s:

10 Definitive Rockumentaries

1. A tie – DON’T LOOK BACK (Dir. D.A. Pennebaker, 1967) /NO DIRECTION HOME: BOB DYLAN (Dir. Martin Scorsese, 2005)

Despite the fact that I hate ties this shouldn’t surprise anyone, I mean have you met me? D.A. Pennebaker’s document of Bob’s 1965 British tour coupled with Marty’s wider scoped portrait of Dylan’s rise to fame are equally essential so I could not separate them. The Bob shown in these docs, with the wild hair, sunglasses and mod clothing is the same Bob that Cate Blanchett portrayed in I’M NOT THERE – the one most caged in his persona and held to the highest levels of scrutiny. Incredible concert footage flows through both films and hits its pinnacle in May 1966 when Bob faces a hostile crowd and a historic heckler – “Judas!” is shouted from the darkness one night in Manchester. “I don’t believe you – you’re a liar!” Dylan sneers before launching into a mindblowingly rawking “Like A Rolling Stone”. Scorsese and Pennebaker both capture lightning in a bottle and leave us with glorious glimpses of the greatest songwriter ever in his prime serenading the world even when most of the world wasn’t quite ready for his weary tune.

2. I AM TRYING TO BREAK YOUR HEART (Dir. Sam Jones, 2002)

Not a career overview but a capsule of one particular plagued period when a great band – Wilco – made a great record (“Yankee Hotel Foxtrot”) and it was rejected by their record company. Chicago critic, and co-host of the great NPR show Sound Opinions Greg Kot puts it best: “It’s not a VH1 “Behind The Music” story. It’s a not a drugs-groupies-celebrity kind of story at all. This band’s story is the music. 20 years from now their probably going to get more of their due than now.” Well let’s get them their due right now because this a compelling black and white film full of great music both in the studio and on stage. Key scene: leader Jeff Tweedy and guitarist Jay Bennett have a tense awkward argument over a crucial edit while mixing the album that shows how far they have drifted apart as collaborators. Indeed Bennett was asked to leave the band while the film was being made. The band grows stronger and gets a label and has a hit album which gives this rockumentary a happy ending and a nice second placing on this list.

3. THE KIDS ARE ALRIGHT (Dir. Jeff Stein, 1979)

Sure there’s that new more extensive and correctly chronological AMAZING JOURNEY: THE STORY OF THE WHO but this hodgepodge of Who with its odds ‘n ends, warts ‘n all, kitchen sink approach is much more exciting. In the first five minutes explosives go off in Keith Moon’s drumkit from a performance on the Smothers Brothers Comedy Show then we zigzag around to such ’60s shows as Shindig and Beatlcub, seminal gigs like WOODSTOCK and the Monterey International Pop Festival and then conclude with specially shot for the film footage from Shepperton Film Studios mere months before Moon’s death in ’78. We don’t get narration or anything in the way of historical context – none of the bits are titled and nobody is identified and it is all out of order – but the collage effect satisfies and everything jels together like one of best movie mixtapes ever. Key scene: The Who blow the Stones off the stage on their own TV special with a ferocious “A Quick One, While He’s Away”.

4. GIMME SHELTER (Dirs. Albert Maysles, David Maysles & Charlotte Zwerin, 1970)

The 60’s dream died here, or so the tale goes – just ask Don McLean. That fatal night at Altamont Speedway where Hells Angels acted as security for a free Rolling Stones gig made what could have been just an assembly line concert film (see LET’S SPEND THE NIGHT TOGETHER for that) into a piece of true crime documentation that could play on MSNBC as well as VH1 Classic. The Stones had shed psychedelia and were getting back to their roots so in 1969, touring with Ike and Tina Turner and we get a good sampling of a Madison Square Garden concert (also featured on the album “Get Your Ya-Yas Out”) and a stirring performance of “Wild Horses” at Muscle Shoals Studio in Alabama before proceeding to the scene of the crime in California. We see Mick Jagger and Keith Richards watching the Altamont footage in the editing room and they freeze the image of a knife in the hand held above the fighting crowd and it is one of the most chilling images in cinema that has ever been seen. I don’t know if Satan was laughing with delight like McLean sings in “American Pie” but he was sure smirking.

5. LET IT BE (Dir. Michael Lindsay-Hogg, 1970) Actually the 60’s dream died here too. The break-up of the Beatles with their final public performance on a rooftop in London is a tough sad watch but one that’s vital in understanding exactly how the mighty can fall. Unfortunately because as producer and former Beatles assistant Neil Aspinall said recently “When we got halfway through restoring it, we looked at the outtakes and realized: this stuff is still controversial. It raised a lot of old issues” – the film may not see the light of a DVD player anytime soon. That’s too bad – even though it’s not the Beatles at their best it’s them at their most human and as uncomfortable as George Harrison’s studio squabble with Paul McCartney is (George: “‘ll play, you know, whatever you want me to play. Or I won’t play at all if you don’t want me to play, you know. Whatever it is that’ll please you, I’ll do it.”) we still somehow feel the love in what they were trying to make. And in the end isn’t that what they were trying to tell us all along?

6. DiG! (Ondi Timoner, 2004) Though most haven’t heard of either of the bands studied here – The Dandy Warhols and The Brian Jonestown Massacre this tale of the sometimes friendly rivalry will make people listen up. Billed as “a real-life Spinal Tap” DiG! follows these bands with their retro rock through a few years of touring, arguing, getting wasted, busted, and getting up to do it all again. Despite the fact that DW frontman Courtney Taylor narrates, BJM member Anton Newcombe steals the show over and over with his asshole antics and crazy talk like “I’m not for sale. I’m fucking Love, do you understand what I’m saying? Like, the Beatles were for sale. I give it away.” Maybe the funniest rockumentary on this list.

7. TIME WILL TELL (Dir. Declan Lowney, 1992) Bob Marley’s story is pretty glossed over in this doc but that is okay because it is so full of great footage with many full songs represented. Interview footage doesn’t really provide insights – except that Marley was always stoned – but footage from the One Love Peace Concert and various 70’s TV shows (particuraly the footage from the Old Grey Whistle Test, BBC 1973 pictured left) is worth many repeat viewings.

8. MADONNA: TRUTH OR DARE (Dir. Alek Kekishian, 1991) I’m sure there are those who will scoff but I added this not just because I realized that this list was too much of a sausage party but because it’s seriously a notable rockumentary. There sadly aren’t many docs about female artists so this will have to some representin’. This follows Madonna on her controversial Blond Ambition tour and has the backstage bits in DON’T LOOK BACK-esque hand-held black and white while the concert sequences are in color. We do actually get some amusing insights like when Warren Beatty, who briefly dated Madonna during the filming of DICK TRACY, says of her when she’s having a dental appointment filmed: “she doesn’t want to live off-camera, much less talk. There’s nothing to say off-camera. Why would you say something if it’s off-camera? What point is there existing? ” None I can think of.

9. THE LAST WALTZ (Dir. Martin Scorsese, 1978) Sure Marty and the Band (they were Bob’s band in 1965-66 under the name The Hawks) were both represented at the #1 spot on this list but this film deserves to place on its own. It’s a doc wrapped around a seminal concert film – the farewell performance of arguably the greatest Canadian band ever who play an incredible set helped out by their friends – including ace work by Eric Clapton,Muddy Waters, Joni Mitchell, Ronnie Hawkins, Ringo Starr, Neil Diamond (!), and their old bandleader Bob Dylan. The interview segments with Scorsese sitting casually around for conversations with Band members Robbie Robertson and Co. were parodied by Rob Reiner as director Marty DiBergi in THIS IS SPINAL TAP and they set a precedent for rockumentary etiquette. But for my money, the sequence in which Neil Young sings “Helpless” with The Band and accompanied by the beautiful backup singing of Joni Mitchell in the wings is one of the most infectious pieces of musical celluloid ever presented. That Marty had to visually edit a nugget of cocaine hanging off Young’s nose by rotoscoping in post production only adds to the affecting edge.

10. STANDING IN THE SHADOWS OF MOTOWN (Dir. Paul Justman, 2002) This film provides a great service – it shines a light on the largely unknown supporting players on some of the greatest music of the 20th century. The Funk Brothers provided the backing for literally hundreds of hits that defined “the Detroit sound” – the memorable melodies behind Marvin Gaye, Smokey Robinson, The Temptations, The Supremes, and many others. This film gives us interviews with Bandleader Joe Henry and various other surviving Funk Brother members and we see new live performances where they play with such soul notables as Me’shell Ndegeocello, Chaka Kahn, and Bootsy Collins. An incredibly entertaining and emotional experience with a band that should be grandly celebrated for, as narrating actor Andre Braugher tells us, “having played on more number-one records than The Beatles, Elvis, The Rolling Stones, and The Beach Boys combined.”

Postnotes: I tried to focus on wide-ranging documentaries not straight concert films hence the ommision of the Jonathan Demme’s amazing STOP MAKING SENSE (which would place high on a list of straight concert films) and other worthy films of that caliber. Some other honorable mentions:

THE DEVIL AND DANIEL JOHNSTON (reviewed on filmbabble Oct. 11th, 2006)
GIGANTIC (A TALE OF TWO JOHNS) – A great doc about They Might Be Giants, a band who many left behind in college but is still part of our Daily Show lives.
THE BEATLES ANTHOLOGY – If you ever have a day to kill you could do much worse than watching this 674 min. production.
MONTEREY POP
METALLICA: SOME KIND OF MONSTER – This hilarious doc about a once mighty metal and going into therapy is the real-life Spinal Tap IMHO.
THE FIFTH AND THE FURY– Julien Temple and the Sex Pistols – need I say more?
THE DECLINE OF WESTERN CIVILISATION This and its 2 sequels which cover the history of decadent underworld of punk and metal are as essential as rockumentaries can get.

Whew! Okay, that’s enough rockumentaries for now. If you think I’ve left out your favorite – that’s what the comments below is for.

This post is dedicated to
Brad Renfro (1982-2007)

He appeared as Josh in one of my all time favorite movies – GHOST WORLD (2001). At least he fulfilled that old maxim to die young and leave a good looking corpse. Sigh.

R.I.P.

More later…

Pop Culture 101: Today’s Class – WALK HARD

What better way to celebrate the holidays than to have another lesson in pop culture provided again by Judd Apatow and his cronies? Their new movie WALK HARD: THE DEWEY COX STORY follows the trajectory of a dramatized career overview and hits many familiar targets so it’s a perfect professor for our forum. First up – A review of said film:

WALK HARD: THE DEWEY COX STORY (Dir. Jake Kasdan, 2007)

Dewey Cox (John C. Reilly) now joins the ranks of The Rutles as well as the Christopher Guest cinematic concoctions Spinal Tap and The Folksmen: that is fictitious musical entities created not just to satirize specific artists or styles but an entire sweep of eras and cultural contexts. Of course it’s obvious by the title alone that the chief model of mockery here is WALK THE LINE – the fine but formulaic Johnny Cash biopic. The riffing on the tried and true formula of the modern music biopic (THE BUDDY HOLLY STORY, LA BAMBA, COAL MINER’S DAUGHTER, THE DOORS, etc.) is the name of the game here and for the most part it’s well played.

From his meager beginnings, oh you know the story – he grew up on a farm with a stern father (Raymond J. Barry) and a loving doting mother (Margo Martindale) and a brother (Chip Hormess – later played as a ghost by Jonah Hill) who he accidentally cut in half with machete, Cox discovers the blues and quickly becomes a star with his hybrid brand of jukebox glory. Just as quickly he is turned on by his drummer (Tim Meadows) to marijuana – “it’s not habit forming!” then over the years every other drug known to man. Also just as fast he meets the woman of his dreams – back up singer Darlene Madison (Jenna Fischer from the US version of The Office). He marries her before divorcing his first wife – the nagging Kirsten Wiig (SNL) and when found out is left by both women. This ushers in his dark period and we know this because Cox exclaims “this is a dark fucking period!” So I need not go on plotwise – from darkness to redemption, you get the picture. John C. Reilly carries the movie wonderfully – his singing on the sharp song satires is very strong, his wide-eyed airhead gusto is authentic, and his delivery of lines like “I’m locked in a custody battle right now. Custody is being enforced upon me which I don’t think is right” is dead on.

WALK HARD is very amusing but not roaringly hilarious – the tickling my funny bone got amounted to a series of chuckles though they were plenty enough to keep me smiling. I appreciated its tone and take on the smart-dumb kind of comedy, one that has more heart than those the smarmy scatological joke-a-minute SCARY MOVIE series that’s for sure. One of many running jokes is that there isn’t any subtext – everything is said out loud like in these random lines:

“Dewey Cox needs to think about his entire life before he plays.”

“The 60’s are an exciting and important time.”

“That was early Dewey, this is middle Dewey.”

WALK HARD continues Apatow’s winning streak (yes, I know he didn’t direct but he co-wrote produced and it’s being promoted as his enterprise) and gives us what we’ve been waiting for all these years – a full out John C. Reilly showcase (okay, maybe I’m the only one’s who’s been waiting). Take that, Joaquin Phoenix in WALK THE LINE! Eat it, Dennis Quaid in GREAT BALLS OF FIRE! In your face, RAY! Y’all gonna have to stand aside because though he surely won’t take home an Oscar for this (and that’s a damn shame) I predict that Reilly’s lampoon will have a longer lasting effect than their earnest yet often bland biopic offerings.

So now onto the Pop Culture 101 Schooling:

Warning: Many Potential Spoilers

Like I said above, of course the life and legacy of the late great Johnny Cash by way of WALK THE LINE provide the film’s narrative arc and it’s most evident in the first act with Cox’s clothes, mannerisms, his first hit record (the title song), and the dead brother all borrowed from the Man in Black. However the winning over of skeptical African American music purists comes from THE BUDDY HOLLY STORY and Buddy Holly appears briefly played by Frankie Muniz (Malcolm In The Middle). Muniz actually has a more accurate physical appearance than Gary Busey did to Holly in the 1978 biopic and he establishes a Cox tradition of calling celebrities by their full name as in – “I’m awful nervous, Buddy Holly.”

The only exception to the full name is Elvis portrayed by Jack White of the White Stripes. The blatant mis-casting is part of the joke here as White does an exaggerated cartoon version of the King’s swagger – “look out! I could chop a man in half!” Elvis also had a dead brother – a twin that died at birth and as legend has it haunted him his whole life so there’s that too.

After his first dance with cocaine (of course provided by Meadows) Cox inadvertenly invents punk rock. Dave (Matt Besser), Dewey’s guitarist, protests “ain’t nobody gonna listen to music like this. You stand there playing as fast as you can looking like some kind of… punk.”

Cox’s Dylan period is pretty defined as well – in a bit made to look like mid 60’s grainy black and white press conference footage an interviewer even puts forth – “people are saying that your new music sounds a lot like Bob Dylan”. Cox responds “well maybe Bob Dylan sounds a lot like me!” We get a few other DON’T LOOK BACK-esque shots of Cox in Bob mode – singing lyrics like “mailboxes drip like lampposts in the twisted birth canal of the coliseum” (written by folk singer songwriter Dan Bern) and another has him wearing the same Triumph motorcycle t-shirt under a mod emblemed dress shirt just like Dylan wore on the cover of “Highway 61 Revisited”.

During the short time that WALK HARD shared the theatre I work at part-time with I’M NOT THERE (at the end of its run) I noted that both twisted anti-biopics have 2 sets of actors playing The Beatles. They are just briefly seen extras in I’M NOT THERE but they are all name cameos (to some degree) in WALK HARD. Paul Rudd (on the left) plays John Lennon, Jack Black does a horrid yet still aptly amusing Paul McCartney impression, Justin Long (the Mac guy from those commercials) does a passable George Harrison, and Jason Swartzman does an odd constipated clinched teeth take on Ringo Starr’s heavy Liverpudlian accent.

After witnessing their bickering Cox remarks “it seems like there’s a rift happening between The Beatles.” He drops acid with the fab four and has a animated YELLOW SUBMARINE derived hallucinatory experience. “We’re the trippy cartoon Beatles” Ringo (I think) says in case we didn’t make the connection.

A Brian Wilson descent into madness (complete with paisley attire and Wrecking Crew style accompaniment) follows as Cox attempts to make his highly orchestrated masterpiece that none of his fellow band members understand – i.e. the ill-fated “Smile” sessions. Inspired by Wilson’s outrageous recording methods (right down to the use of barnyard animals for sound effects) and friction with the rest of the Beach Boys, Cox’s resulting song – “Black Sheep” is, though ridiculous, a pretty groovy track.

A decade later Cox has a TV show which is most certainly based on The Johnny Cash Show but there’s also a Sonny and Cher/Laugh In variety show element to it too. His version of David Bowie’s “Starman” done with an astronaut outfit and dancing space girls is taken from many embarrassing attempts by outdated acts in the 70’s to crossover and connect with younger audiences on the small screen. The disco-fied version of the title song also drives the point home.

Late-period Dewey has him finding out that his music has been sampled by rapper L’il Nutzzak (Jacques Slade) which is perhaps inspired by Ice-T’s defense during the “Cop Killer” crisis of ’93 – “When people criticize the lyrics of rap music, I tell them to listen to ‘Folsom Prison’ – “I shot a man in Reno just to watch him die.” I’ve never heard any rap song that hard-core.” In general though it’s just a comment on the younguns yet again co-opting the old guard.

Lastly let’s look at the promotional materials – the poster picture (on the left) is based on the famous “Young Lion” photo of Jim Morrison taken by Joel Brodsky in 1967 (on the right) though the film itself has little DOORS spoofing except in a general ‘a rock star gets trashed way’. This is right in line with the posters for THE 40 YEAR OLD VIRGIN and KNOCKED UP – all you have to do feature a large close-up of the goofy looking protagonist and the crowds are sure to flock to the multiplex. Don’t know if the image of John C. Reilly’s mocking mug is going to put bums in the seats but I still find it funny.

The advertising campaign for WALK HARD includes a joking attempt to get the film nominated for an Academy Award – as Apatow said “our movie is the dumbest movie to ever beg for an Oscar.” Imitating iconic Johnny Cash’s famous giving the Nashville music industry the bird pose in an infamous ad in Billboard Magazine*, Cox makes his position well known. I do think the soundtrack is award worthy but against such competition as HAIRSPRAY and SWEENY TODD I seriously doubt that it will get any gold.

* The shots scanning up a page of Billboard charts to see the artist’s record hit #1 – (usually lit up) is a music biopic cliché from Hell! I can’t think of a film in the genre in which that doesn’t appear.

Now I’m sure I’ve missed many individual pop culture points and just about every trailer or TV spot I’ve seen has material not in the movie but I thought it was best to just concentrate on what’s in the theatrical release. When the DVD comes out I may do a revised edition of this Pop Culture 101 entry.

More later…

Dylan Mythology Dissected Magnificently

“It has chaos, clocks, watermelons…you know what I’m sayin’…it’s everything.”
– Jude (CATE BLANCHETT)

I’M NOT THERE (Dir. Todd Haynes, 2007) It’s funny that the upcoming WALK HARD: THE DEWEY COX STORY (the Judd Apatow written and produced comic mock epic with John C. Reilly as the lead) proposes to set fire to the tried and true clichés of modern music bio-pics because after the exciting experimental experience that is I’M NOT THERE those worn methods are already ashes. As most reading this know well by now Bob Dylan is portrayed by 6 different actors (Christian Bale, Cate Blanchett, Richard Gere, Marcus Carl Franklin, Heath Ledger, and Ben Whishaw) who embody the man in different distinct eras and incarnations. Each has a different name, a different attitude, and of course, a different aesthetic. It may seem weird or even a bit pretentious in concept to cast a young black kid as a box-car hopping tall-tale telling pre-fame Dylan or an Australian Academy Award winning woman to play his Bobness at the height of his amphetamine-fueled rock star glory but the way it’s played out here is mindboggling in its magnificence.

The finger-pointing protesting period provides the always up to the task Christian Bale with the Bob with most conscience through separate eras one – political and one intensely religious. Gere’s Billy The Kid hiding from society persona seems to be the Dylan who is the most free – or at least pretending to be. Seemingly drawn from a tapestry woven from words spoken in every Dylan interview, every song in Dylan’s catalogue being official or bootleg, and every single photograph or footage of the real man, some of the most affecting moments are the quietest. When Gere’s Billy-variation-on-Bob surveys the vast unpopulated wilderness beneath him from a high mountain trail a notion of what Greil Marcus called the “Invisible Republic” can be sensed. That however is the musing of a Dylanologist like myself – someone who can’t quote Bob chapter and verse may find that and other sequences slow and hard to decipher. Man, I pity those people.

Cate Blanchet as Jude has the most amusing and electric (yep, I went there) material and her presence in the black and white as-if-filmed-by-Fellini mid-60’s montages never falters. As many have remarked she may look and act the most like Dylan – at that particular time that is. She has obviously studied DON’T LOOK BACK so she has every mannerism perfected -right down to the handling of a cigarette and the frantic on-stage flailing of arms. Blanchett’s Jude is the most hostile and cornered of all the Dylans. If you’ve seen NO DIRECTION HOME or have at least heard the leering lyrical equivalent to acid being thrown into a former lover’s face ditty “Positively 4th Street” – you may have an inkling why.Ben Whishaw as Arthur is the Bob with the least impact and screen-time. He simply recites carefully chosen media-taunting cryptic one liners from the public record. While the quotes are good – he’s my vote for the weakest link here. Ledger’s section (or sections as the structure gets broken up quite frequently) in which he plays an actor playing Bob (or actually Jack – Christian Bale’s character) has a lot of merit with its discomforting domestic bliss breakdown and break-up intertwined with a Vietnam war time-frame but it’s not as well visualized and vital as Blanchett’s or even Gere’s portions. Marcus Carl Franklin’s bits are achingly sweet and for the youngest player here – his assured poise transcends any thought of gimmick casting. Other than the Dylans, the supporting cast is splendid – David Cross as Allen Ginsberg, Julianne Moore wonderfully mimics Joan Baez, and Bruce Greenword beautifully personifies the over-educated but still clueless interviewer / interrogator Mr. Jones from Dylan’s classic “Ballad Of A Thin Man”.

Filled with mostly Bob originals and a number of great sharp covers, the soundtrack * is spectacular but that’s far from surprising. What is surprising is how this perverse take on the bio-pic formula works so damn well and how hypnotic its effect is. One shouldn’t go see it to make sense of the myths or to put into any concrete cinematic context the life of Bob Dylan (director/writer Todd Haynes knew going in that that’s impossible) but if one views it like a piece of modern art – where you have to squint to make certain parts focus and you have to open your eyes wide to see how distorted the details really are – they are certain to get more than just mere glimpses at greatness.

* As I suspected the bulk of the covers that make up the 2 disc so-called soundtrack (previously reviewed – Film Babble Blog 11/10/07 I’M NOT THERE Soundtrack Is Where It’s At) are not featured in the movie. The amount of original Dylan recordings used could make up a nice alternate/actually accurate soundtrack – hey, now there’s an idea for a great CDR comp!

More later…

I’M NOT THERE Soundtrack Is Where It’s At

“There was a movie I seen one time, I think I sat through it twice.
I don’t remember who I was or where I was bound.”
– Bob Dylan (from “Brownsville Girl” – Knock Out Loaded, 1986)

So with less 2 weeks to go til one of the most anticipated movies of year (at least by me), I’M NOT THERE comes to my area (it’s released here Nov. 21st) I thought I’d post a review of the spectacular soundtrack to this film which is largely known by the masses as the film in which Cate Blanchett plays Bob Dylan (see above pic). It seemingly has a lot more to offer than just that – from this soundtrack alone it appears to have something for everybody. So hey ho – let’s go:

I’m Not There (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack produced by Randall Poster, Jim Dunbarm and Todd Haynes) Dylan covers (and collections of such) have been commonplace ever since the era when he first became a household name. Some are the product of a an artist or a band showing off their hipster literary chops (Judy Collins, Bryan Ferry, The Byrds, The Hollies, Odetta, etc.), some are of various artists under a genre categorization (Is It Rolling Bob?: – A Reggae Tribute, Tangled Up In Bluegrass: A Tribute To Dylan, and Dylan Country), and some are artists not content just to cover a single song – they cover full albums like Mary Lee’s Corvette’s version of Blood On The Tracks or they cover entire concerts – like Robyn Hitchcock’s faithful re-recreation of the incredible 1966 Royal Albert Hall concert. So what’s so special about the new soundtrack from I’M NOT THERE? Well, it has great new renditions of Bob classics from modern as well as old timey acts that form a narrative over the 2 disc collection seemingly inspired by the film, it has Bob’s approval, and most importantly it has Bob himself on the 40 year-old never before released title track. But more about that song later.

This new batch of Dylan interpretations features a veritable who’s-who of the recent respected rock scene – Eddie Vedder, Sonic Youth, Calexico, Cat Power, Iron & Wine, Jeff Tweedy of Wilco, Sufjan Stevens, the Black Keys, and so on. From the old guard – Roger McGuinn, Richie Havens, Ramblin’ Jack Elliot, and Willie Nelson show their hands on the table admirably and perform alongside their younger counter-parts fluidly (Nelson and McGuinn are backed by Calexico). John Doe from the legendary L.A. punk band X has one of the collection’s most show-stopping numbers – “Pressing On”. One of Dylan’s most overlooked Gospel era songs is presented with such soulful gruff conviction that it is sure to elevate the scene in which Christian Bale lip-syncs it (I’ve seen the clip and it does).

Film babble favorites Yo La Tengo put in a rowdy blazing take on “I Wanna Be Your Lover” and a plantive pretty “Fourth Time Around” as well. Stephen Malkmus of Pavement has 3 songs (including the subtlety-on-fire “Ballad Of A Thin Man”) with the soundtrack house band ( The Million Dollar Bashers *) – all of which sound more relaxed and rocking than he has in years. Mason Jennings, a young folk singer from Bob’s home state of Minnesota, does 2 Bob songs, one of which has been covered to death – “The Times They Are A Changing” but it doesn’t seem so when he sings it. Just about everyone else (including Los Lobos, Mark Lanegen, Charlotte Gainesbourg, and The Hold Steady) clock in with nice Bob tributes. Only one or two miss the mark like Eddie Vedder’s “All Along The Watchtower” (talk about overdone !) which has him repeating the last lines over and over in such an unnecessary fashion – to be fair Neil Young and Chrissie Hynde have done the same thing in their covers of the song but it’s just more obnoxious when Vedder does it!

* The Million Dollar Bashers feature Steve Shelley, Tony Ganier (long-time Dylan bassist), John Medeski, Tom Verlaine, Lee Ranaldo, Smokey Hormel, and Nels Cline.

What makes this disc worth buying alone is the original 1967 title track originally named “I’m Not There (1956)”. It has been available only to the connoisseurs of bootleg Dylan – it came from The Basement Tapes – the informal demos Bob made with the Band in Saugerties, NY while he was supposedly recovering from his alleged motorcycle accident. To be honest the sound quality on this first official release of the song is not that much better than the bootlegs I’ve heard over the years – seems like some of those hardcore Bob fanatics know a little about re-mastering. This is despite that this new mix comes from the master – long hoarded by Neil Young on his ranch since the time of tin soldiers and Nixon’s coming. It’s ballsy for Todd Haynes to title his unconventional biopic after an unreleased song only known to mostly hardcore Dylan fans – even ballsier to name it after such an unfinished unreleased song. That’s right – there are lines in which Bob hums or inserts what he later called “dummy lyrics” – line fillers until the real line was worked out but as history tells us – that never happened. It doesn’t matter though – the song, even unfinished, is as mystic and enveloping as any in his catalogue. A series of murky declarations set against a hazy bar-room organ background it seems at first listen to be impenetrable; every further listen renders it sublime.

It’s funny – Sonic Youth usually deconstruct musical norms, but here in their cover of the title track “I’m Not There” (yes, it appears twice here – in Dylan’s original and in this cover) they reconstruct an unfinished song as best as they can and like Malkmus’s tracks it’s one of their most recent likable efforts. As the booklet for the seminal Scorsese doc NO DIRECTION HOME said “this is not a soundtrack in the traditional sense” – this is an amazing amalgam of many diverse styles to form one big picture and that bodes very well for this reportedly grand but off kilter biopic. One of the only true to the soundtrack sense-of-being renderings is Marcus Carl Franklin’s (known among the 7 actors playing Dylan as the little black kid) magnificent “When The Ship Comes In.” Since by all reports the film is full of Bob originals this soundtrack appears to be more of a ‘inspired by’ compilation but I can’t vouch for that until I actually see it. When I do – you’ll be the first to know.

This post is dedicated to Norman Mailer (January 31, 1923-November 10, 2007). Yesterday on Wikipedia it said that among the literary highlights of his illustrious career he had co-written episodes of the 70’s buddy cop show Starsky And Hutch. This is unconfirmed by IMDb and yeah, I know the changing nature of the Wiki-reliability. Turns out it was somebody’s joke as that tidbit is gone today. Whew! That’s a relief – the thought that the author of The Naked And The Dead wrote dialogue for Huggy Bear would take a lot to process.

Another funny thing recently removed from Wikipedia (on the grounds that it was too trivial) – “In the film SLEEPER Woody Allen is shown a picture of Mailer, Allen confirms his identity and states that Mailer donated his ego to the Harvard Medical School.”

R.I.P. Mr. Mailer.

More later…

The Sopranos = GOODFELLAS -The TV Show?

“Some will win, some will lose.
Some were born to sing the blues.
Oh, the movie never ends –
it goes on and on and on and on.”
– From Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believing” (written by Jonathan Cain, Steve Perry, and Neil Schon)
A few days ago I finally caught up with the 12 million Americans who watched the series finale of The Sopranos last July. It was hard to avoid hearing how it ended because it became a part of the National dialogue – I mean even Hillary Clinton spoofed it in a campaign ad! For those of you who like me don’t have HBO and held out from downloading it from torrent sites and haven’t gotten the DVD set that was released last week – don’t worry. I won’t give anything away about the controversial last scene except that Meadow (Jamie-Lynn Sigler) can’t parallel park to save her life and the Soprano family (Tony, Carmella, and A.J.) devour their onion rings whole rather than taking small bites. No surprise there. What was surprising is how much the scene left on the table and angered a lot of people because of it. I loved it though – the beautiful manipulation of the cutting and the use of Journey (quoted above) were glorious touches.

It’s well known that The Sopranos owes a lot (maybe everything) to Martin Scorsese’s amazing mob movie classic GOODFELLAS (1990). Creator David Chase once said that “GOODFELLAS was the Qur’ān for me”. Even the opening credits are done in the same style. Ray Liotta was reportedly offered the role of Tony Soprano but thankfully he turned it down. It’s difficult to imagine anyone else but James Gandofini playing the part and that connection may have been too much. Still, the connection is too strong to deny especially with Lorraine Bracco, Michael Imperioli, Tony Sirico and Vincent Pastore being just 4 out of the over 2 dozen actors who have been in both GOODFELLAS and The Sopranos (See below). Unlike THE GODFATHER series which is referred to so many times that the characters mention the movies by their Roman numerals (I, II, III obviously) and watch bootlegs of the series in the days before Paramount released it on DVD, The Sopranos appears to take place in the same universe as GOODFELLAS. This is despite the fact that the film is name-checked by Christopher (Michael Imperioli) who lists it as one of his screenwriting inspirations when he’s taking a acting class. To my recollection that is the only time it’s mentioned. If I’m wrong – that’s what the Comments below are for.

If GOODFELLAS is the Qur’ān then Martin Scorsese is God which is what I’ve been saying on this blog the whole time! The second episode “46 Long” (1999) has Scorsese played by Anthony Caso (who was in GOODFELLAS as a truck hi-jacker) going into a club. From the crowd on the sidelines Christopher yells out “Hey! KUNDUN! I liked it!” One of all time favorite moments in the series. Christopher tries to show off that he’s a hardcore fan by loudly acknowledging one of the man’s least appreciated and little seen works. Kind of like if I saw Bob Dylan and yelled at him “Hey! “Knocked Out Loaded”! I didn’t think it sucked!” Scorsese is mentioned usually by first name throughout the series as when Silvio (Steven Van Zandt) muses in one of the last episodes about Christopher’s slasher movie-within-a-TV-show “Cleaver” – “Christopher was the last person I’d confuse with Marty but it wasn’t bad.”

So to really get a hold on this whole thing we gotta take a good look at the players –

The GOODFELLAS/Sopranos Master Crossover Cast List:

“GOODFELLAS spawned The Sopranos – you know, the Mob can be quirky and funny and real and accessible. If you look at the main cast of The Sopranos about half of those you can see in GOODFELLAS.”
– Director Joe Carnahan (BLOOD, GUTS, BULLETS AND OCTANE) from the featurette MADE MEN – THE GOODFELLAS LEGACY on the GOODFELLAS Special Edition DVD – 2005.

Yep, there are a lot of familiar faces in said film/TV show though as you’ll see many of them appear only in the background of nightclubs or in crowd scenes at receptions and restaurants.

Frank Adonis – (pictured on the left) A veteran of many Mob-related movies (KING OF NEW YORK, GHOST DOG, FIND ME GUILTY, etc.) usually playing a guy named Frank, Adonis played Anthony Stabile in GOODFELLAS (GF) and Guest #1 (see what I mean?) on the episode “House Arrest” (2000) of The Sopranos (TS).

Frank Albanese – Played Mob Lawyer in GF and Uncle Pat Bludetto in 4 episodes from 2004 to 2007 on TS.

Anthony Alessandro – This unlucky backgrounder was never given a name – he’s just part of Henry’s 60’s crew in GF and a waiter in TS! Poor bastard.

Vito Antuofermo – Prizefighter in GF and Bobby Zanone on 2 TS episodes – 2000-2001.

Tobin Bell – Jigsaw from the SAW movies! Yep, this guy’s credits are extensive and impressive – he’s always the heavy or a crucial creep (He even played Ted Kaczynski in a TV movie!). He’s a Parole Officer in GF and Major Zwingli on TS. I also fondly remember him as Ron – the record store owner who refuses Kramer and Newman’s business on Seinfeld (“The Old Man” – 1993).

Lorraine Bracco – Like Liotta turned down the Role of Tony, Bracco turned down the part of Carmella Soprano because she felt it was too similar to the character of housewife Karen Hill in GF. She took instead Dr. Jennifer Melfi – the psychiatrist that attempts to treat Tony throughout the show’s run. Though Dr. Melfi does very much have a different dynamic to Karen – the motions that she goes through – her dropping him and taking him back as a patient again and again seems definitely rooted in that seminal scene in GF in which Henry Hill hands Karen a bloody gun. Karen: “I know there are women, like my best friends, who would have gotten out the minute their boyfriend gave them a gun to hide. But I didn’t. I’ve got to admit the truth. It turned me on.”

Nicole Burdette – Carbone’s girlfriend (that’s her actual credit) in GF is given a name – Barbara Giglione and a nice 5 episode run on TS – 2000-2001.

Gene Canfield – Plays a prison guard in GF and a cop in TS. A look at his filmography on IMDb shows that “Detective” comes up the most. Nice that he stays on the right side of the law, isn’t it?

Anthony Caso – Like I wrote above this guy oddly portrayed Scorsese on an early episode of TS. I thought it was Scorsese for years but from what I’ve read he’s barely seen the show. Maybe he has too strong a “been there, done that” feeling.

Nancy Cassaro – Joanne Moltisanti was a incidental female family member (seen mostly only at occasions like weddings and funerals) on TS played by 2 different GOODFELLAS actresses. See also Marriane Leone.

John ‘Cha Cha’ Ciarcia – One of Batts’ Crew (credited as #1 to be precise) in GF, Ciarcia played Albie Cianflone – Phil Leotardo’s (Frank Vincent) 1st hand man in the last season of TS.

Victor Colicchio – Another guy on the sidelines – one more of Henry’s 60’s crew in GF and a guy named Joe in an early TS episode.

Daniel P. Conte – I gotta like this guy because he almost always plays characters named Dan – Dr. Dan in both GF and CASINO, and Danny in THE DELI. However on TS for 3 episodes in the final season he was Faustino ‘Doc’ Santoro.

Tony Darrow – (pictured on the right) As restauranter Sonny Bunz, Darrow has one of my favorite lines in GF – “he looked at me like I was half a fag or something!” He parlays that same kind of charm (or lack of it) into Larry Boy Barase on 14 episodes of TS (1999-2007).

Joseph Gannascoli – Uncredited but listed on IMDb as “Guy who walks downstairs at Paulie’s house” in GF. Got a much more substantial role as Vito Spatafore in 40 episodes of TS 1999-2006.

Paul Herman – Just a Dealer in GF but got named as Beansie Gaeta in 5 episodes of TS – 2000-2007.

Michael Imperioli – (Pictured on the left) Probably the most connected cast member here because his small but piviotal part as young lackey ‘Spider’ is one of the most memorable characters in GF. Spider gets shot in the foot then later whacked by Tommy (Joe Pesci) in one of the most powerful scenes in the picture. As Christopher Moltisanti on TS, Imperioli is able to pay homage to his former personage – in an early episode he shoots a young guy at the bakery in the foot and the guy yells “you shot me in the foot!” Chris: “it happens.”

Marianne Leone – see Nancy Cassaro.

Gaetano LoGiudice – Talk about incidental – yet another member of Henry’s 60’s crew in GF and only listed as Bada Bing Patron, Guest at Wake, and VIP Room Guest on TS.

Chuck Low – Annoying wig salesman Morrie Kessler in GF and Hasidic hotel owner Shlomo Teitlemann in TS.

Vincent Pastore – Credited as “Man w/Coatrack” in GF – Think I’ll have to watch it again. Don’t remember seeing him. As Salvatore ‘Big Pussy’ Bonpensiero in 30 episodes of TS, 1999-2007 he’s unmissable.

Frank Pellegrino – Johnny Dio in GF, Agent Frank Cubitosi – 12 episodes, 1999-2004.

Angela Pietropinto – Paulie’s Wife in GF, Helen Barone – 1 episode of TS (2006)

Suzanne Shepherd – Karen’s mother in GF, Mary De Angelis in 20 episodes of TS – 2000-2007)

Tony Sirico – (Pictured on the right) Another major connection. Though he has a very small part only in the opening sequence as Tony Stacks in GF it’s such a glaring smiling mug he has that it resonates through to his immaculate performance of Paulie ‘Walnuts’ Gualtieri in 82 eipsodes of TS. A real hood back in the day, Sirico has carved quite a career out of his post Wise guy life. Nobody can scowl quite like him.

Frank Vincent – As Billy Bats in GF he gave the world a great catch-phrase – “why don’t you go home and get your shine-box!” in his tension-teasing taunting of Tommy (Pesci). His character of Phil Leotardo on TS seems rooted in Bats’ ballsiness. Of course looking at his other gruff work in DO THE RIGHT THING, COP LAND, and other Scorsese works like CASINO and RAGING BULL (in which his character’s name was Salvy Batts by the way) that may just be all Vincent.

I won’t go into detail on the music angle because I wrote a piece last year on the use of music in the movies of Martin Scorsese – Exile On Mean Street (Oct. 22, 2006). It was mostly from a Stones angle but touched on the scorching soundtrack selections that enhance his ouvre overall. The Sopranos builds on this by also featuring impeccable taste with an amazing synching of situations with the most perfect song. From Nick Lowe’s “The Beast In Me” in the pilot through the retro-lounge replayings of Sinatra and the moralizing of Dylan’s “Gotta Serve Somebody” to the final cryptic but gorgeously overwrought Journey anthem quoted above every choice was dead on.

Ultimately, though I felt it would make a good blog post heading, to label The Sopranos as GOODFELLAS – The TV Show would be a gross simplification. While certainly built on Scorsese’s blueprint it has established its own identity and presented sometimes a deeper context to the consequences and the mundanity of the daily routines – it certainly spent a lot more time in hospitals than the fast paced world of GOODFELLAS allowed. I’m just thankful to The Sopranos because it gave us room to spend more time with those themes and some of the same people whether at the breakfast table in the morning or at the clubs at night. Since like many I loved GOODFELLAS so much I was sorry to see it end and with The Sopranos it felt like it didn’t have to. Now that we’ve got them both on the shelf – the special edition GOODFELLAS (have you heard the commentary the real Henry Hill did with former FBI Agent Edward McDonald? – It’s awesome T!) and the 86 episodes of The Sopranos we can just focus on the good times and know it goes on and on and on and on. So don’t stop… (cut to black)

More later…

The Magnificent Andy-Clones

” Andy Warhol looks a scream, hang him on my wall. Andy Warhol, Silver Screen, Can’t tell them apart at all.”
– David Bowie (from the song “Andy Warhol” off the album Hunky Dory – 1971)

Pop-art pioneer (and filmmaker – though the worth of his cinematic output is highly debatable) Andy Warhol has been portrayed by a host of notable actors since his death in 1987. The latest was Guy Pearce earlier this year in the Edie Sedgwick bio-pic FACTORY GIRL (newly released on DVD and reviewed below). How does Pearce rate compared to the other Andys? Well, let’s see…we’ll start off with :

Crispin Glover – THE DOORS (Dir. Oliver Stone, 1991) Definitely the best Andy though the next contender comes close, Glover scores because he is in real life almost as eccentric and creepy as Warhol was. Appearing very briefly in an extremely caricaturized version of the Factory scene Jim Morrison (Val Kilmer) in his usual stoned haze stumbles upon Andy holding court and fondling a gold telephone – “Somebody gave me this telephone… I think it was Edie… yeah it was Edie… and she said I could talk to God with it, but uh… I don’t have anything to say… so here…this is for you…now you can talk to God.” Morrison takes the phone but doesn’t make an attempt to speak to the Grand Deity – perhaps he knew he’d get his chance soon enough.

David Bowie – BASQUIAT (Dir. Julian Schnabel, 1996) With his incredibly informed interpretation (he even wore some of Andy’s actual wigs) of Warhol’s mannerisms Bowie benefited from actually personally knowing the man. Though from everything I’ve ever read possibly nobody really personnally ever knew the man. Bowie’s performance is all verbal ticks and unctuous posing framed by a laid-back lackadaisical hands-off approach. Warhol reportedly hated Bowie’s song “Andy Warhol” (quoted at the top of this blog post) but something tells me he would’ve been honored by this depiction. He probably would’ve thought Bowie made him look fabulous.

Jarred Harris – I SHOT ANDY WARHOL (Dir. Mary Hurrin, 1996) This movie perhaps has the most accurate, or at least most believable, simulation of the Factory scene. Extra points for casting indeliable indie-rockers Yo La Tengo to play The Velvet Underground too. Harris has quite a bit more energy than the others in his characterization of Warhol but it’s convincing and captivating at the same time. Dealing with the odd assassination attempt by radical feminist and sociopath Valerie Solanas (played by Lili Taylor) the film, despite a non-endorsement from Lou Reed, made quite a case for how Warhol’s smug indifference to the violent nature of the turbulent times could be deadly.

Gregory Sullivan – 54 (Dir. Michael Christopher, 1998) This isn’t really a performance – more like a costume party likeness. That is almost any pale skinny bloke can don the glasses and astronaut-silver wig and pull off a Warhol impression. Especially in the crowd scenes that dominate this empty as Hell misreading of historical decadence.

Mark Bringleson – AUSTIN POWERS: INTERNATIONAL MAN OF MYSTERY (Dir. Jay Roach, 1997) Ditto. It’s a throwaway fake cameo – nothing more.

And the rest : Warhol was also played by Bob Swain in DEATH BECOMES HER (Dir. Robert Zemeckis, 1992), Sergio De Beukelaer in ANY WAY THE WIND BLOWS (Dir. Tom Barman, 2003), Todd Boyco in DRUG-TAKING AND THE ARTS (Dir. Strom Thorgerson, 1994), and Allen Midgette in CALDO SOFFOCANTE (translation – SUFFOCATING HEAT – Dir. Giovanna Gagliardo, 1991) which I haven’t seen but the guy was in actual Warhol movies like LONESOME COWBOYS (1968) so maybe it’s worth a look.

So again, how does the new guy Guy Pearce rate as Warhol? Let’s take a look at the evidence:

FACTORY GIRL (Dir. George Hickenlooper, 2006) “You’re the boss, apple sauce” Pearce as Warhol says early on to Edie Sedgwick (Sienna Miller) and that stands as some of the only believable dialogue in this glossy mess of a movie. Sedgwick was indeed a sad victim of 60’s excess and her story could make an engrossing and profound film – but this sure isn’t it. Despite the use of period methods like split screen and tilted angles – the aestetic is purely TV movie quality and we’re never convinced that we’re anywhere but the current day with actors playing dress up. The basic story is this – ambitious girl comes to the big city and falls into the wrong crowd and dies because of it. Got it? ‘Cause there’s nothing else going on here. I mean, the only artistic analogy this film tries to make is that Edie is like one of Andy’s silver pillow balloons that floated away from his fragile Factory scene. This is displayed in a none too subtle shot of one of said balloons drifting upwards in the New York sky. Is that all you got in your bag of tricks, Hickenlooper?

Bob Dylan lobbied against this movie and wouldn’t allow his name or music to be used so we have Hayden Christensen playing a character only billed as “musician” and referred to as “Billy Quinn” though a shot of a newspaper article has him called “Tommy Quinn”. That’s just one of the many things this film gets wrong. Dylan was right to protest (was he ever wrong to protest?) – the dialogue Christensen spouts is embarrassing and unfathomable that Dylan ever said such garbage : case in point – “Lady, you don’t know shit about shit.” I get and appreciate that the premise is that Dylan offered a way out of the Warhol dungeon that Edie stupidly refused and that led to her downfall. It’s just that it’s such a simplistic dumbing down of their legacy that it leaves a disgusting taste in my mouth. But wait, what about Pearce as Warhol – the conceit of this entire blog-post? He’s very good – maybe the saving grace of the entire project. I’d rate him between Bowie and Jarred Harris. He obviously did his homework. But back to the film – as Miller (who does more than a passable performance – the film’s failings are far from her fault) as Sedgewick says at one point in the film “Andy took ordinary objects and made them iconic” – FACTORY GIRL, a misguided attempt to make a pop-art ALL ABOUT EVE, takes icons (Sedgwick, Warhol, Dylan) and makes them ordinary. Before seeing it I would have thought that would be impossible. I stand corrected.

Postnotes : I can’t leave without mentioning that Warhol actually appeared in some films (always as himself) – in DYNAMITE CHICKEN (Dir. Ernest Pintoff, 1972) with Richard Pryor, TOOTSIE (Dir. Sydney Pollack, 1982), and BLANK GENERATION (Dir. Ulli Lommel, 1980) to name a few. As for television he did a fair share of guest shots – he even did an episode of The Love Boat for Christ sakes!

Also I have to mention that Hank Azaria voiced Warhol in a brief surreal dream bit on The Simpsons. I doubt when Warhol conceived his famous quote “In the future everyone will be famous for fifteen minutes” he factored in the effect that a few seconds on the pop-culture juggernaut that is The Simpsons could have. To be fair he later amended the line to “In fifteen minutes everybody will be famous.” Today that line is more apt.

More later…