Movies revisited
Just recently I downloaded and watched a couple movies I haven't seen in a long time.
First was The Jazz Singer-not the 1927 original, but the remake done 54 years later. For some reason it was a big huge deal in our family when this movie came out in 1980 and we went to see it. I'm guessing my eight-year-old sister had something to do with the enthusiasm; mom and dad weren't rabid about Diamond. Probably this was the first movie we saw after our move from Philadelphia to Denver. I was about five years old, really too young to follow or understand the story; I made what sense I could of it in the usual matter-of-little-kid-fact way (as often displayed by Ruthie and Joe in the One Big Happy comic strip). And that's why watched it again: I wanted to compare the actuality against my recollection of a psychedelically nonsensical, disjointed story line (I certainly didn't wish to watch it for Mr. Diamond's acting!). I'm no real fan of Diamond's songs, myself, but some of them-including most in the film-are tenacious earworms as addictive as tobacco. Now I mention it, I recall my sister brassily pointing out, in the car on the way home from the movie in 1981, that Diamond's character Jess had "wasted his money on cigarettes". True enough, though I suspect that was more an expedient to production than a significant character development device; Diamond was at that time a notoriously heavy chainsmoker.
It's certainly not the worst film I've ever seen, but it does seem to lie in the nadir of the Velveeta Trough-less cheese or more cheese would make the film better. The plot is mostly trite and predictable, its structural integrity compromised by hingeing on ludicrously improbable propositions (cantor flies from NYC to LA and becomes instant star). And some of the gimmicks (Diamond in blackface) are horrifying.
All that said, it was interesting to compare the film seen as a grownup to the film seen as a little kid. Turns out the storyline, faults aside, is reasonably coherent when the five-year-old's lack of comprehension is factored out. When Diamond told his wife "I'm going to LA; with or without you, I'm going to LA", I remembered thinking he was talking about a place called "Allay"-that kind of thing. The whole blackface/brawl/bailout scene hadn't registered for 5-year-old me as anything but randomness, though I am sort of amused to note (heh) that I accurately remembered Diamond's blackup singers singing "Oooh, baby baby…oooh, baby baby now!" as "C-C-C-D-E, E-F-E-D-C-C!" as they strode out of the jailhouse (versus the actual Diamond-approved-and-sung "C-C-C-C-D, E-F-E-F-E-C!").
The music itself…well, I can't call it bad. It's not near my first preference, but it is technically good. It really can't be called "jazz"; it's much closer to Stingian lite/soft rock. I haven't seen the '27 film, but I suspect its jazz is jazzier.
Howe'er we call it, it's very much of its time and genre. And I can think of a whole lot of highly popular songs with much lamer lyrics-Paul McCartney, I'm looking in your direction.
Oh, and hey, lookit: the big agent, Eddie Gibbs, is played by Sully Bowyar-he of "Mulvaney" in "Dog Day Afternoon". And before Diamond's insta-hit makes him wealthy enough to drive a Rolls-Royce, he's driving a new 1980 Lincoln Town Car, which the Foley men made sound like a Chrysler on startup-a kind of sloppiness that really gets up my nose.
Next was Cold Turkey, a bizarre comedy made in 1969 but not released until '71. I first saw this at about age 14 as a VHS rental-I'm not sure why. Surprisingly, this film stands up well to a rewatch; though Dick van Dyke stars, musical numbers do not figure in. Moreover, the film is packed with jokes and pokes and caricatures and mockery done just right: they don't club you over the head, but if you're watching and listening you'll catch them. Big national news anchor Walter Chronic makes his appearance with the sun behind him at just such an angle to create a halo round his head. The local television station's call letters are "W O M B". The leader of the John BirchChristopher Mott Society looks and sounds just like Sen. Joe McCarthy. Van Dyke's character's wife looks and sounds just like Mary Tyler Moore as Laura Petrie, Van Dyke's wife on "The Dick Van Dyke Show". On and on. And Jean Stapleton, whose character could've been Edith Bunker's country-dwelling twin sister, was of course completely awesome. Add to this the old-car eye candy and the fictional "Valiant Tobacco Company" and "United Tobacco Company") cleverly named to enable the use of doctored print ads originally for Valiant cars and United airlines. Then there's the slapstick involved with mistaking a gun for a gun-shaped cigarette lighter, and the leetle old lady-who could've walked off the set of a Sylvester and Tweetie cartoon-walking around declaring everything to be "bullshit!"…just all in all, most of the jokes are subtle enough and neatly enough done to merit a chuckle rather than a groan.
First was The Jazz Singer-not the 1927 original, but the remake done 54 years later. For some reason it was a big huge deal in our family when this movie came out in 1980 and we went to see it. I'm guessing my eight-year-old sister had something to do with the enthusiasm; mom and dad weren't rabid about Diamond. Probably this was the first movie we saw after our move from Philadelphia to Denver. I was about five years old, really too young to follow or understand the story; I made what sense I could of it in the usual matter-of-little-kid-fact way (as often displayed by Ruthie and Joe in the One Big Happy comic strip). And that's why watched it again: I wanted to compare the actuality against my recollection of a psychedelically nonsensical, disjointed story line (I certainly didn't wish to watch it for Mr. Diamond's acting!). I'm no real fan of Diamond's songs, myself, but some of them-including most in the film-are tenacious earworms as addictive as tobacco. Now I mention it, I recall my sister brassily pointing out, in the car on the way home from the movie in 1981, that Diamond's character Jess had "wasted his money on cigarettes". True enough, though I suspect that was more an expedient to production than a significant character development device; Diamond was at that time a notoriously heavy chainsmoker.
It's certainly not the worst film I've ever seen, but it does seem to lie in the nadir of the Velveeta Trough-less cheese or more cheese would make the film better. The plot is mostly trite and predictable, its structural integrity compromised by hingeing on ludicrously improbable propositions (cantor flies from NYC to LA and becomes instant star). And some of the gimmicks (Diamond in blackface) are horrifying.
All that said, it was interesting to compare the film seen as a grownup to the film seen as a little kid. Turns out the storyline, faults aside, is reasonably coherent when the five-year-old's lack of comprehension is factored out. When Diamond told his wife "I'm going to LA; with or without you, I'm going to LA", I remembered thinking he was talking about a place called "Allay"-that kind of thing. The whole blackface/brawl/bailout scene hadn't registered for 5-year-old me as anything but randomness, though I am sort of amused to note (heh) that I accurately remembered Diamond's blackup singers singing "Oooh, baby baby…oooh, baby baby now!" as "C-C-C-D-E, E-F-E-D-C-C!" as they strode out of the jailhouse (versus the actual Diamond-approved-and-sung "C-C-C-C-D, E-F-E-F-E-C!").
The music itself…well, I can't call it bad. It's not near my first preference, but it is technically good. It really can't be called "jazz"; it's much closer to Stingian lite/soft rock. I haven't seen the '27 film, but I suspect its jazz is jazzier.
Howe'er we call it, it's very much of its time and genre. And I can think of a whole lot of highly popular songs with much lamer lyrics-Paul McCartney, I'm looking in your direction.
Oh, and hey, lookit: the big agent, Eddie Gibbs, is played by Sully Bowyar-he of "Mulvaney" in "Dog Day Afternoon". And before Diamond's insta-hit makes him wealthy enough to drive a Rolls-Royce, he's driving a new 1980 Lincoln Town Car, which the Foley men made sound like a Chrysler on startup-a kind of sloppiness that really gets up my nose.
Next was Cold Turkey, a bizarre comedy made in 1969 but not released until '71. I first saw this at about age 14 as a VHS rental-I'm not sure why. Surprisingly, this film stands up well to a rewatch; though Dick van Dyke stars, musical numbers do not figure in. Moreover, the film is packed with jokes and pokes and caricatures and mockery done just right: they don't club you over the head, but if you're watching and listening you'll catch them. Big national news anchor Walter Chronic makes his appearance with the sun behind him at just such an angle to create a halo round his head. The local television station's call letters are "W O M B". The leader of the John BirchChristopher Mott Society looks and sounds just like Sen. Joe McCarthy. Van Dyke's character's wife looks and sounds just like Mary Tyler Moore as Laura Petrie, Van Dyke's wife on "The Dick Van Dyke Show". On and on. And Jean Stapleton, whose character could've been Edith Bunker's country-dwelling twin sister, was of course completely awesome. Add to this the old-car eye candy and the fictional "Valiant Tobacco Company" and "United Tobacco Company") cleverly named to enable the use of doctored print ads originally for Valiant cars and United airlines. Then there's the slapstick involved with mistaking a gun for a gun-shaped cigarette lighter, and the leetle old lady-who could've walked off the set of a Sylvester and Tweetie cartoon-walking around declaring everything to be "bullshit!"…just all in all, most of the jokes are subtle enough and neatly enough done to merit a chuckle rather than a groan.