Did Anyone Bother to Ask Lee Harvey What He Thought of the Movie?

Those of us who are students of the Kennedy assassination know the answer to this bit of historical trivia: What movie was playing when alleged JFK assassin Lee Harvey Oswald was arrested on November 22, 1963 in the Texas Theater?

The answer is, of course, Hell is For Heroes (1962).

Much as Manhattan Melodrama (1934) is principally known as the film John Dillinger had just seen when he was shot outside of a movie theater in Chicago. Hell is for Heroes is similarly more famous for who saw it then what they saw. Tis a shame, that.

I watched it via TCM Saturday. Ben Mankiewicz introduced the film. Having Mankiewicz as your host instead of Robert Osborne is like having Babe Ruth's backup start ahead of the Bambino. He may be good, but he's not "the man." Once you get over the fact that you're dealing with the second string you appreciate that the Manc (he needs a nickname) knows his way around a film intro too. Saturday he informed viewers that Hell is for Heroes was quite graphic. I hope he added, for its time (sorry, don't recall). If he did he was spot on.

Of all the many outstanding World War II films made, Hell is for Heroes is one of them. No, I'm not trying to be a smart ass (no effort required on my part). That Hell is for Heroes qualifies as one of the many excellent films dealing with World War II is nothing to sneeze at.

Gesundheit.

The man behind the camera was Don Siegal who was prolific as a TV director but was also responsible for the original Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956) and Dirty Harry (1971).

The cast is fascinating. First off you've got one of my childhood heroes, Steve McQueen. He sports a wisp of a beard (recalling Vic Morrow in the TV series Combat) and attitude appropriate to the film's title. He's all surly gumption and stoic anger. Then there's pop singer Bobby Darin whose premature death not only cost the world some nice music but some nice film performances as well. (It also contributed to Kevin Spacey's bizarre obsession with the man, but that's a story for another time and another blogger.) I've not seen much of Darin the actor but he more than held his own in this film.

So you've got an acting icon-to-be and pop singer. Say, was there a comic in the cast? Funny you should ask. No less a personage than Bob Newhart, who was just becoming, "big." They even stuck a telephone bit for Newhart to do in the film. Because audiences then and now are quite familiar with Newhart's phone gags, it sticks out like the proverbial sore thumb thus distracting from the movie. Otherwise Newhart is just dandy in the film.

Who else? Why none other than Fess Parker, TV's Davy Crockett. What an odd duck. Parker was the poor man's Gary Cooper. Make that the destitute man's Cooper. His delivery was so flat you can barely tell he had a pulse. Cross him with Rip Taylor on coke and you'd have a normal human being. I'm not sure what Parker's appeal to audiences was but I'd have cast him as a dead guy in a heartbeat.

I know you're wondering if a bespectacled James Coburn is in the film and as a matter of fact he is. Coburn was incapable of a bad performance and he was a lot more versatile than people give him credit for. Coburn fans should check him out in this film.

I suppose the only thing missing from the cast was a troubled young man who was later to fall victim to the supposed Rebel Without a Cause curse. A guy who, you know, died of an overdose in suspicious circumstances at a young age that sort of thing, real rebellious type. Lo and behold who was that playing a Polish refugee who joins the squad? Yup, meet Nick Adams. His star did not burn quite brightly enough for most of you to have heard of him so you may have to look him up. Interesting chap who meet all the requisites aforementioned.

The movie itself (set in the European Theater, likely in the weeks following D-Day) has a well worn but well executed premise. A small squad of soldiers must valiantly hold off an enemy with vastly superior numbers. Equal portions of cunning, guile and bravery will be required. Internal conflicts arise among this melting pot of disparate characters. But the GIs pull together for the common good. There is the inevitable arrival of the "cavalry" but not soon enough to save all our heroes. Don't get too attached to any of the lads as a number "fall" in battle. One has a particularly grisly death and another a quite heroic one. Manc wasn't lying about the film's gritty realism. It's a splendid example of the beauty of black and white.

The closing shot has supposedly inspired a cult following and I can imagine far triter scenes to celebrate. It's powerful good stuff.

Manc tells us that McQueen did not get along with anyone on the set, most notably Darin. Us McQueen fans give him all the slack in the world. He may have been a pill on set but the on screen results were always good. He's part of the reason tht Hell is for Heroes is a helluva movie.

Wonder how Lee Harvey liked it.

In a Class of Its Own

Today I went to a movie theater and saw my story told...in French. The film was Entre les murs, it's called The Class in English markets. By any name it was France's offical submission as best foreign film at the most recent Academy Awards and it was the first French film to win the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival since 1987 and it was a unanimous choice.

It's the best film about teaching I've seen. Ever.

The story centers around a school year in the classroom of a French teacher in a quite racially diverse Paris school. The students are 14 and 15 year olds. Like just about every other age group between 0 and 18 it can be safely classified as "difficult."

I spent about twenty years teaching History to racially diverse classrooms' full of students only a year or so younger than the ones in the film.

France, California, same issues, same attitude, same problems, same challenges, same triumphs, the same conviction that this year or this day or this student can be different. Because you know what? Sometimes it can be different. Sometimes the teaching process works. Sometimes there's a breakthrough, an understanding. It doesn't happen often enough but when it does -- what a great feeling.

As audiences learn from watching Entre les murs, it's a two-way street. Teachers don't have a monopoly on the answers – or even on good behavior. Teacher, student, parent, we can all be real schmucks at times. Watch the teacher, played by François Bégaudeau, upon whose book the film is based, go just a bit too far with the sarcasm while engaging in the same sort of put downs at which his students are so adept. (Been there, done that.) Watch him lose it and cause actual insult. (Been there, too, regrettably). Watch the students pounce on any misstep by an adult. They don't miss a thing. Whether it's a perceived case of inequity, a shoelace undone or a mispronunciation, students will catch it and hold tight. They'll take an adult's error in their teeth and shake it like a dog with a bone. They'll gnaw at you.

But as we learn in Entre les murs there's a reason, if not a method, to this particular madness. Look how students are so often boxed into corners -- or at least feel that way. They're stuck in a place they don't want any part of, learning things of little or no interest or seeming relevance. They have to follow rules they had no role in creating. Add to this that they often come from homes that can be anything from unpleasant to ghastly.

Meanwhile, teachers are underpaid, overworked and unappreciated. They conjure imaginative lessons that fall flat in the face of bored, chatty or insolent students. The frustration mounts on both sides and the results can be unpleasant.

But good teachers know that the most important thing they can do is show up. Good students do the same and though there is the constant push and shove there is also compromise and small victories, some merely moral, celebrated by both sides.

It's the system, I tell ya. Education in western culture doesn't work. For gifted students it's fine. For average students it's a tough slog. For many from outside the European culture, like African Americans or African French, it can be a disaster waiting to happen and the waiting isn't all that long. All the education reform in the world won't help. A revolution is in order.

This is abundantly clear from my experiences and those of our teacher in Entre les murs.

There is no heroic breakthrough. No miracles. That's the stuff of Hollywood-style teacher films. But there is the daily grind in all its agony and ecstasy. There is progress and regression in equal parts but, by God, there is effort. This is not a depressing film. It's real, it's honest and it's totally compelling. Yes, I enjoyed it largely because I could relate to virtually every second. But the missus, who was with me, enjoyed it, too and so have audiences all over. This is something great cinema can do: take the mundane, even slightly unpleasant, and make great storytelling out of it.

I reiterate, the best film about teaching I've seen. Ever.

So You Want to Start Watching Pre Code Films...

From shortly after the addition of sound to motion pictures until the middle of 1934, Hollywood ignored the production code. The code placed severe limitations on what films could and could not show. Sex, nudity, or immorality or crime going unpunished? Not under the watch of Hollywood's the Hays Office. Simply put rigid censorship was enforced.

Prior to this enforcement of the code there was thus a short Golden Age of uninhabited films now called pre codes. Viewers of today may be drawn to pre code films out of curiosity and titillation. But they'll stay for the quality of the films. It was a damn sight easier to make a good movie without a raft restrictions on the types of stories you could tell.

More and more of these movies are becoming available on DVD. Turner Classic Movies is releasing its third set of pre code films later this month and Universal is getting in to the act as well with a set to be issued in April.

There are a few excellent books on pre code films, none better than San Francisco Chronicle film critic Mick LaSalle's Complicated Women: Sex and Power in Pre Code Hollywood. If you don't have either the time or money to invest in a book you can always get a primer from Wikipedia.

But the best part of learning about pre code is by watching the films. Here is a modest list of ten to get you started. There are many, many others that did not make the list simply because they are not yet available on DVD. Lots of these are shown on Turner Classic Movies. The following are available now or will be part of the forthcoming TCM release.

Baby Face (1933). What could be better than watching Barbara Stanwyck sleep her way to the top? Even by today's standards Baby Face would be a shocker. We meet Stanwyck living at home with dear old dad. He's her pimp. This arrangement doesn't suit her and she leaves for the big city. Using her sexual charms Stanwyck seduces man after man on progressively higher rungs of the corporate ladder until she's on top of the world, pa. Baby Face is the quintessential pre code film and its terrific fare by any standard. Get to this classic sooner rather than later.

Wild Boys of the Road (1933). Coming soon to DVD (unless you're reading this after March 24 in which case it's available now). One of the things they did particularly well in the pre code days was produce powerful social commentary. This William Wellman film is a prime example. It's Depression-ravaged America and some youngsters have left the squalid poverty of home to try their luck on the road. All is not peaches and cream. Wild Boys is a film of gritty reality and provides a vivid look back at the early 1930's.

All Quiet on the Western Front (1930). It wasn't just about sex in the pre code era. War pictures were far more realistic. Almost 80 years later this is still one of the great war films ever made. It is an unflinching cinematic version of Erich Maria Remarque's fantastic book. War is not glorified but shown as the terrifying slaughter it really is. Nothing sentimental here.

Night Nurse (1931). If you are at all like me and love Stanwyck and Joan Blondell this is not to be missed. They spend a lot of time undressing (no, actually nudity mind you, but sexy). However Night Nurse is not about sex. This is an entertaining crime drama with Stanwyck in the title role. A menacing young Clark Gable (sans mustache) plays a sinister chauffeur. Another from the great director William Wellman.

Midnight Mary (1933). Loretta Young grew to be lovely woman and fine actress appearing in such films as the Bishop's Wife (1947) and Farmer's Daughter (1947) (for which she won an Oscar) in her 30's then was merely a handsome middle aged woman while hosting her own show in the 50's. But in her late teens she was a real dish. She practically steals Platinum Blonde (1931) from Jean Harlow. Is heart-breaking in Born to Be Bad (1934), enriches Heroes For Sale (1933) is a fit companion for James Cagney in Taxi! (1932) and is a triumph in Employee's Entrance (1933). All of these films are from the Pre Code era and all were made when Ms. Young was between 18-21. I selected Midnight Mary because I think it is was her ultimate star vehicle. We start with her character on trial for murder and follow the Dickensian story that got her there. Franchot Tone and Ricardo Cortez co star and Wellman -- who else? -- directed.

Red-Headed Woman (1932). Jean Harlow with an edge. She is oh so sexy, oh so bad. She doesn't hesitate to wile a man with her charms, even a married one. Harlow and the pre code era went together like hand and glove and this is perhaps the ultimate expression of that marriage. The wonderful cast includes Charles Boyer, Lewis Stone and Chester Morris. None a match for Harlow. Was any man?

The Animal Kingdom (1932). Never heard of it? How's this, Myrna Loy, Leslie Howard and the vastly underrated Ann Harding. A very pre code menage a trois is the centerpiece of the story. The first time I saw it I found it disconcerting to see my beloved Myrna playing an unsympathetic character. You'll get over it like I did an enjoy her cold hearted performance. The movie is about much more than a failing marriage as Howard's character struggles with questions of art versus dollar signs.

I Am a Fugitive From a Chain Gang (1932). A story ripped from the day's headlines. The amazing and true tale of an out-of-work, out-of-luck gent wrongfully jailed in a Southern state and put to work on a chain gang. Paul Muni, who had a tendency to devour the scenery, was perfect in the lead role. So good it was banned in Georgia. Mervin LeRoy directed.

Gold Diggers of 1933 (1933). The pre code era does a musical! (You could also go with 42nd Street (1933) or Footlight Parade (1933)). The original and far and away the best of the Gold Diggers films is also directed by LeRoy and has one of the better casts you'll ever come across. Ginger Rogers, Dick Powell, Ruby Keeler, Warren William, Guy Kibbee, Ned Sparks, Aline MacMahon and Joan Blondell (Sigh!). Comedy, musical numbers and some strong commentary on the Depression. If you haven't seen it yet, waste no more time.

Blonde Venus (1932). The best of the Marlene Dietrich and Joseph von Sternberg collaborations. You could also go with Morocco (1930), the Blue Angel (1930) or Shanghai Express (1932) (If it ever appears on DVD). Dietrich's character of Helen Farraday is a devoted wife (to Herbert Marshall) and mother (to the ridiculously cute Dickie Moore). When illness strikes hubby she returns to her cabaret act. Marlene’s performance in a gorilla suit is one of filmdom's great moments. She also takes on a lover, played by Cary Grant, and eventually goes on the road with spouse in pursuit. Amazing, entertaining stuff the likes of which would not be seen for the 33 years of code enforcement.

So much left out.I never got around to two Norma Shearer films, The Divorcee (1930) or a Free Soul (1931). Should I have a part 2?

I Love a Good Miracle, Don't You?

There's nothing like a good miracle to pick up your spirits. And no, I'm not referring to seeing the Virgin Mary in your mashed potatoes. I'm taking about genuine, real life events that defy explanation. While obviously possible, they are highly improbable.

The birth of my first child was a miracle. At the outset of the wife's pregnancy it was discovered that she had a fibrous tumor pressing against her uterus. The embryo was in jeopardy as was any hope of future children and indeed, though to a much lesser extent, my wife's health and well being.

The pregnancy was difficult, to put it quite mildly. As the baby grew so did the tumor. Finally the tumor burst, with no harm to mother or child. No more tumor. Baby was born a month early but otherwise was perfectly normal. I say it was a miracle because that's what the doctors called it.

I had an earlier encounter with a miracle and in the world of sports its quite well known. November 20, 1982, a college football game between two of the biggest rivals in sports. Cal vs. St*nford. The coveted St*nford Axe going to the winner.

It was a remarkable game even before the fantastic finish. Great plays, lead changes, excitement aplenty. Then a miraculous drive by the hated Cardinal was climaxed by a field goal with four seconds left that seems to clinch the victory for them. But the Bears took the kick off back for a touchdown courtesy of five laterals and a romp through the St*nford band which had mistakenly and stupidly taken the field.

"The Play" was positively surreal. I'd never seen the likes of it before. It was coming back from the lip of the rim of the edge of the precipice through means never before imagined.

Miracles are often be depicted in films as well. Sadly movie miracles generally seem silly, corny, contrived, unrealistic or all of the above. However, one time that it works on celluloid is in one of my favorite all time films, Mike Nichols' The Graduate (1967). *Spoiler Alert.*

Ben Braddock travels up and down the state of California to stop the wedding of this one true love, Elaine Robinson, and claim her for himself. Not the least of his problems is finding the wedding. Nearing the nuptials he runs out of gas and must run the rest of the way to the church. This will prove fateful. Ben arrives just after the I do's are exchanged. Too late. It's over. Nothing more to be done. But he does not yield!! Ben pounds on the windows of the church screaming, "Elaine!" repeatedly.

What's this? She responds to this beyond desperate plea? She runs to him. But Ben and Elaine must reckon with a church full of opposition. Miraculously they allude one and all, even locking their pursuers in the church with a cross. The film ends with them on a bus. Ben has succeeded, not in stopping the wedding, that battle is lost, but in winning the war. He has Elaine.

Under Nichols' direction and with the accompaniment of Simon & Garfunkel's music, this is a worthy and fitting finish to a terrific film.

Miracles do visit us. They are more products of perspiration then inspiration. And they can be a joy to behold. When they are successfully done in films as in The Graduate, well that's miraculous.

Margaret Dumont and Joe Pesci Would Make Such a Cute Couple

First of all take a big sip of water and don't swallow. Ready?

I was watching A Night at the Opera (1935) on TCM Saturday and got to thinking about how similar it is to Goodfellas (1990).

Spit take!

Those of you who haven't already concluded that I'm round the bend may now join the rest of the universe in assuming that all's not well in Riku's gray matter. The Marx Brother and the mob? Rufus T. Firefly and Paul Cicero? Thirties comedy and Nineties gangster?

It's all in the anarchy, folks. Groucho, Chico and Harpo don't play by the rules. Laws, conventions, social norms mean nothing to them. If it felt good, they did it. Especially if it got a laugh. For Henry Hill, Jimmy Conway, Tommy DeVito and the rest of the "gang' in Goodfellas, laws and rules are at most a minor inconvenience. Certainly nothing to get in the way of a few dollars or a good time.

To the brothers Marx and the fellas good, society was something to take advantage of not aspire to. No traipsing carefully around civilized, cultured types, they are squares who don't know from fun. As for cops and dowagers, they were foils. In fact anyone who presumed to authority or respectability was subject to a good smack or a clever jibe.

One of the great appeals of both the Marx Brothers in particular and the gangster genre in general is the vicarious thrill derived from watching people do whatever the hell they want to do -- and for the most part getting away with it. Of course someone walking into a cafe and spitting on the floor would neither be entertaining nor interesting. But pulling of a heist or cracking wise at the expense of a society dame...as the song goes..that's entertainment!

Movies are, after all, an ideal form of escape. There's nothing like living out the fantasy of doing what you want on your own terms be it killing em with laughter or a gat. Harpo bounds around wordlessly creating havoc and chasing women -- literally-- just as we might like to do. Meanwhile Jimmy Conway takes what he wants, when he wants, but always as a gentleman, leaving cash with the hijacked truck drivers. With laughs or panache, its all done outside regulations.

The rest of us our confined by society's conventions. Sure, we may cheat a little here, or take a bit extra there, or ignore section something code something else. But we do it behind close doors and maybe even a little guiltily.

The Marx Brothers and the gangsters of Goodfellas are also honest. They don't pretend to be respectable like we do. There are no false fronts in the way they live their lives, actually live them. How gleefully audiences applaud those who are true to their spirit, living life on their own terms. how jealous we are of them.

Not our cinematic friends. They've the cajones to do in front of god and everyone else.

Imagine.

No Escaping Politics, Not Even in a Classic Western

There is no escaping conservative gasbags railing about government meddling and high taxes.

I thought I was safe watching a John Ford film today. Safe from crybaby Republicans yammering about government regulations while secretly picking our pockets. No such luck.

Stagecoach (1939) is the story of nine very disparate characters riding on a stagecoach into the teeth of Geronimo's war party. You've got such characters as Dallas (Claire Trevor) the shamed prostitute booted out of town. Doc Boone (Thomas Mitchell) the shamed town drunk similarly asked to hit the road. The Ringo Kid (John Wayne) a fugitive from justice. Hatfield (John Carradine) the gentleman gambler. Samuel Peacock (Donald Meek) the mild mannered whiskey salesman returning to his family. And then there's Henry Gatewood (Berton Churchill) the bank president absconding with the payroll. If you guessed that the crooked businessman is our blustering reactionary, you win the Kewpie doll. (He's pictured above getting busted.)

My oh, oh my you should hear this self righteous, bloviating pompous swindler go on. He complains about taxes. He complains about government regulations. He insists on this and demands that. He looks down on drunks, whores, Indians and Mexicans and anyone else not up to his lofty standards. All the while there's a bag full of ill-gotten loot sitting on his lap. Here are his own words:

I don't know what the government is coming to. Instead of protecting businessmen, it pokes its nose into business! Why, they're even talking now about having *bank* examiners. As if we bankers don't know how to run our own banks! Why, at home I have a letter from a popinjay official saying they were going to inspect my books. I have a slogan that should be blazoned on every newspaper in this country: America for the Americans! The government must not interfere with business! Reduce taxes! Our national debt is something shocking. Over one billion dollars a year! What this country needs is a businessman for president!

Sound like a certain political "philosophy"?

Director John Ford was known as a bit of a conservative himself but at a time when the right wing, as dead wrong as they were, gave respectable arguments for their positions not laced in hyperbole and hypocrisy. Ford's films often had corrupt characters such as Gatewood who got their comeuppance. Indeed the FDR years were not only unkind to practitioners of rapacious capitalistic practices, the films of those years also made their ample girths a target. (Looks like I've set myself up for a future post, movies versus the super rich in the FDR years...coming soon?)

Despite the reminder of the government-loathing right wingers, I thoroughly enjoyed today's viewing of Stagecoach, one of my all-time favorites films.

Ford's camera work during the indoor scenes is particularly noteworthy, especially how he contrasts those cramped scenes with the wide open paces of Monument Valley. The cast is exceptional, especially Mitchell and Trevor though I think George Bancroft as the Marshall gives an underrated performance. He is the strong center of the nine travelers. Not stained by scandal, not weak, not quirky. A man determined to do what's right, even if it means stretching the law. He's essential to the success of the film and Bancroft couldn't be better.

Look here, if you've never seen Stagecoach, you've got an assignment for the weekend. if you've enjoyed it, re-visit this extraordinary film. Just beware you may be reminded of those noxious conservative blowhards.

Never Heard of Him

I am second to no one in my appreciation of the world's greatest website, the Internet Movie Database (IMDb). It is absolutely, positively the most comprehensive film website in existence. It's the first place I go after watching a movie (unless I really need to use the bathroom). Want to learn more about the director? Check IMDb. Want to figure out where you'd previously seen that the guy who played the ranch hand? Check IMDb. Looking for reviews of the movie? Check IMDb. Trivia? Alternate Versions? Release date? Awards won? Filming locations? All on IMDb.

How about TV shows? IMDb is your one stop source. Fancy a discussion on a film or TV show? Try their discussion boards. How about if you want to get out of the house? (To see a movie, of course. ) You can find showtimes for theaters near you without leaving the comfort of the good ole IMDb.

Want some news or gossip from the film world? Guess who's got it.

Why they've even got links to some really cool blog posts (occasionally from this very site).

Yes ladies and gentleman, meine Damen und Herren, naiset ja herrat, signore e signori, Mesdames et Messieurs, señoras y señores, the IMDb is practically the only surfing center you'll ever need for everything and anything cinematic.

So what's Mr. Grumpy here got to complain about, then?

A "seemingly" trivial matter. Every day IMDb presents a poll asking readers a film or TV related question such as which is your favorite Paul Newman film or how many movies do you go to a year or what was the best film of the 1980's. The answers may sometimes astound you.

I enter into evidence today's poll question: "Only three directors have won the Academy Award for Best Director three times or more. Which one of these guys is your favorite filmmaker?" The choices were, of course, these notables:

Frank Capra (pictured above) (It Happened One Night; Mr. Deeds Goes to Town; You Can’t Take It with You)
John Ford (The Informer; The Grapes of Wrath; How Green Was My Valley; The Quiet Man)
William Wyler (Mrs. Miniver; The Best Years of Our Lives; Ben-Hur)


Guess who won. No, go ahead, guess....If you said the leading answer, with an astounding 36%, was "I am not familiar with these directors" you are correct.

Not "familiar" with the directors of The Letter (1940) Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939) My Darling Clementine (1946), Dodsworth (1936), Meet John Doe (1941), Stagecoach (1939), Arsenic and Old Lace (1944)The Grapes of Wrath (1940), The Roman Holiday (1953) and many, many more? Sacrebleu!

This is a classic example of the abyssal ignorance you come across on the IMDb. There is a huge number of little tykes, or people with the brains of little tykes, who come on the site and vote.

Another feature of the site is that for each movie and TV show you can assign a rating from 1-10. All films thus have a composite rating and you can look up what age groups and genders particularly liked or disliked a film. IMDb also keeps track of its top 250, the ratings leaders. Of all movies ever, guess what's number one? The Shawshank Redemption. A nice enough film, but number one? Ever? The Dark Knight clocks in at number six! Of all time! Two installments of the Lord of the Rings trilogy grace the top 20. Gran Torino, which popped in and out of theaters a few months ago is somehow number 82. Who even knew it had a cult following? Another recent Clint Eastwood offering, The Changeling, appears on the list as do The Incredibles, Finding Nemo and the recently released Caroline.

The top 250 is not surprising heavy on films released in the past ten years.

I am reminded of last year when I was still toiling as a middle school history teacher. I told the class I was going to show them a movie about a mountain man, called Jeremiah Johnson (1972). One student asked if there was anyone famous in it. When I replied, Robert Redford, she smirked "who?" as if I had told her Pernwickle Pennyllcker was the star.

So what we have here is a crotchety old man complaining about all the young whippersnappers who know of nothing pre MTV. Right? Well yes but it goes a lot deeper. Not so many years ago when I was a lad (and dinosaurs roamed the Earth) us young uns knew all the old baseball players and movie stars and even many of the long deceased presidents. Despite the efforts of such teachers as yours truly, today's younger set not only doesn't have a clue, it doesn't much seem to care.

So I could now launch into a lecture on our disposable society, but I think if you've made it this far you get the point.

Anthony Hopkins in the role of John Quincy Adams in Amistad (1997) said, "who we are is who we were." Our culture is in very serious trouble if the younger generations have no awareness of what built it and no appreciation for what those building blocks were. Whether in film, music, sports or politics, to recognize and appreciate those who came before enhances the appreciation of those around today. We are moving so fast so far so recklessly that we are leaving behind some very precious memories. Thank God for DVDs and Turner Classic Movies (world's greatest TV station) and the reverence many sports institutions hold for the past. Still I fear that it is too many of us old fogies who are fondly remembering and enjoying Jimmy Cagney, Benny Goodman and Willie Mays. We need to get our young people on board. For their sakes and the sakes of future generations. We lose something of ourselves as a culture when we lose links to our past.

Now will someone help me down off this soapbox?

Who Do You Think You Are?

Ostensibly Mephisto (1981) is about an actor who sells out to the Nazis in mid 1930's Germany.

Klaus Maria Brandauer plays Hendrik Hoefgen whose ambition to become Germany's most revered actor is realized at the expense of his soul. That he has earned much renown for his portrayal of Mephisto is clearly symbolic.

We first meet Hendrik in Hamburg, Germany where he is part of a vibrant theater scene. He throws himself into a production that clearly embodies the ideals of socialism more than fascism. But it is the very early 1930’s, the Nazis are just one of several competing parties at this point and Hendrik is not a political animal. He is driven to success -- his own.

Fast forward to the second half of the movie and the protagonist is now the most renowned stage actor in Germany. The Nazis are in power and he is their lapdog. Hendrik has some influence in this relationship and uses it to protect friends who have run afoul of the Nazis. The revulsion with which he spoke of the Nazis is gone (as is his black lover). Hendrik and the Nazi elite, one general in particular, are the best of friends.

Mephisto can be viewed as a story about the extent to which a person will subsume their own beliefs in the pursuit of fame and fortune. One can also be intrigued by what the film says about the profession of acting. It can similarly be viewed as yet another indictment of the Nazis. Of course Mephisto may easily be seen as a 20th century re-telling of Goethe’s Faust.

But I see director Istvan Szabo's film as an examination of an empty man. Hendrik Hoefgen is, like so many politicians, a man who will do anything for anyone to achieve his goals. The journey and its means are of little or no import. It is all about the arrival and the maintenance of that position at the top.

Is it especially easy for Hendrik to adopt whatever role is necessary when that is exactly what he does professionally? Superficially, yes. But the magic of acting is that the transformation, as real as it may seem to audiences, is illusory. The point being that on stage or film actors are interpreting or embodying another human being. Off stage or camera they are, presumably, their very own person.

Hendrik, like a lot of people, is no person at all. He charms men, he seduces women, he befriends many. He knows exactly who is to be pleased and who can safely be ignored. There is a Zelig-like ability to adapt to situations but it is coupled with an unquenchable desire to succeed. That he plays whatever role necessary on stage to further his career is a perfect metaphor for what he does off stage -- the very same thing.

The film’s closing line, given by Hendrik is, “What do they want from me now? After all, I am just an actor.” He speaks not just of his profession, but his basic essence.

As I suggested such people are numerous. They have no core values, no strong belief system. They live to continue living in as much comfort as possible. They are abundant in politics and in bureaucracies. (As a teacher I can’t tell you how many I saw positively thriving as administrators.) Such soulless bureaucrats are often, like Hendrik, excellent at their chosen professions.

There is not, with Hendrik, as in the case of Jabez Stone in the Devil and Daniel Webster (1941) a single moment in which a deal is struck to sell his soul. No, with the Hendrik’s of the world this is a process, a life long journey, if not to hell to nowhere in the truest sense.

Very seldom does fiction tell such a compelling story of a nowhere man.

When the Moon Hits Your Eye Like a Big Pizza Pie That's Gomorra

In the introduction to his new book, "Have You Seen...?" film critic and historian David Thomson says of praising beloved movies: "There is a monotony to writing or reading about just the splendid....Enthusiasm is too easy and can lead to lazy writing formulaic writing."

Guilty as charged.

That being fresh in my mind it makes it all the more difficult to write about the film I saw yesterday, Gomorra. All manner of glowing adjectives apply to this recent import from Italy. So I'll have to do without such well worn encomiums as "powerful, tour de force, brilliant, stunning, wonderful, unforgettable," to name but a few. Hmm, this won't be easy.

Gomorra, which won the Grand Prix at the Cannes Film Festival last year, is a stark look at the Camorra, the Neapolitan version of the Mafia. (I doubt that the two names rhyming is mere coincidence.) They use their vast criminal enterprises such as drug trafficking and toxic waste disposal to fund legitimate business ventures. Both their annual revenue and number of homicides committed are astronomical. Robert Saviano wrote the 2006 book Gomorra upon which the movie is based (he co-wrote the screenplay) and is consequently now living undercover under 24 hour protection. Clearly the Camorra are very much a going concern and a lethal one at that.

The film follows five separate strands all concerning individuals within the Camorra -- from the young to the old -- who reckon they can go their own way within the crime syndicate. None really succeed (is there any form of success attendant to such a life?) but neither do all suffer death.

The violence in Gomorra is not stylized. There is not slow motion, there is no accompanying rock music. Indeed you feel at times you are watching a documentary. Characters are not colorful or engaging. There's virtually no one to root for. Director Matteo Garrone eschews such devices, instead giving us a realistic look at an ugly, depressing world. Hardly sounds like entertaining stuff but it Gomorra is utterly compelling from start to finish. There is nothing gratuitous in the movie. There is no affect to any of the performances. Indeed, the word performance seems an odd way to describe the manner in which the actors go about the business of playing their roles.

Sometimes a movie succeeds because of the style and world it creates. Gomorra is more a re-creation of a world that already exists. ( One that we'd like to wish away.) As such it makes Slumdog Millionaire look like High School Musical.

The Godfather, Goodfellas, The Sopranos all speak different sort of truths about organized crime. Perhaps they are guilty (quite by accident) of glamorizing the Mafia. Gomorra -- no better or worse a depiction than these three, merely different -- makes it look the ugly, brutal business it really is. As there is more than one way to skin a cat (not that I know of any) there are innumerable ways to reveal the reality behind the mob.

One of the countless signs of the Oscars irrelevance in actually selecting the best films and performances of the year is the fact that Gomorra, to the astonishment of many, didn't receive a Best Foreign Film nomination.

If you're lucky enough to be living in an area where Gomorra plays, go see it. Otherwise dutifully wait for its DVD release and rent it right away. You'll be glad you did.