cinema obscura: annoyingly altmanesque

Robert Altman in 1978, directing Mia Farrow and Vittorio Gassman in "A Wedding."  Not good.

As a working critic, I was often in the minority on films and filmmakers, guided by a rather simple, but rigid, personal theory - namely, that there is no place for loyalty (actually, blind loyalty) in movie criticism.

I was embarrassed by a colleague who developed a crush on a movie or moviemaker early on and willfully refused to grow or move beyond that.

I was impossible.

Which brings me tone of my early heroes of the cinema - Robert Altman.

Altman was already something of a Hollywood veteran when he made his breakthrough film, "M*A*S*H" (1970), at age 45. As rebellious as the young audience to which it appealed, "M*A*S*H" restlessly defined the New Hollywood of its time, and with both that film and the one that followed, "Brewster McCloud" (1970), Altman perfected an improvistory style driven by a lot of rapid, energetic, overlapping verbal outpouring.

I was half Altman's age (part of his target audience) and I was in love.

What he created was a cinematic riff, a cool-jazz style to which he would invariably return during his up-and-down career, arguably hitting something of a peak with "Nashville" (1975), his most defining film.

"Buffalo Bill and the Indians, or Sitting Bull's History Lesson," "Quintet," "The Player," "Short Cuts," "Prêt-à-Porter," "Dr. T and the Women," "Gosford Park," "The Company" and "A Prairie Home Companion," (his final film in 2006, the year he died) carefully followed the same formula - and were all over the map in terms of hits, misses and in-betweens.

But the formula turned rancid with two titles in particular - "A Wedding" (1978) and "Health" (1980), which is alternately known as "H.E.A.L.T.H." and "HealtH."  (Don't ask me why.)  These two films, both made for Twentieth Century-Fox, find Altman at his most condescending and most cynical, a filmic trademark of his that was starting to wear terribly thin.

His rancor, which was so bracing in "M*A*S*H" and so trendy in "Nashville," was beginning to leave a vaguely nasty aftertaste.

And the two are also painfully unfunny, with "A Wedding" serving as a rather snide, brutal attack on the titular event - which was already something of a cliché in movies - and "Health" aiming at the facile political correctness and hypocrisies of health-food devotés - an idea that was ahead of its time and very promising. But a missed opportunity here.

Both have huge casts, the usual ragtag Altman collection of disparate actors.  "A Wedding," a true narrative mess, details the coming together of two families - Eurotrash on one side (Vittorio Gassman and Nina Van Pallandt as the parents of the groom), vulgar WASPS on the other (Paul Dooley and Carol Burnett as the wannabe parents of the bride, named Snooks and Tulip, no less).  Neither is spared Altman's vitriol or judgment.

Lillian Gish, Mia Farrow, Geraldine Chaplin, Howard Duff, Dina Merrill, Viveca Lindfors, Lauren Hutton and literally dozens of other familiar actors come and go and bump into each other in the film's monied setting, a sprawling Oak Park mansion.  "A Wedding" is easily Altman's most (over-)populated movie, but no one here is companionable.

 James Garner and Ann Ryerson trying to resuscitate Lauren Bacall (and "Health")

"Health," meanwhile, takes jabs at health-food fanatics holed up at a convention in Florida. Seeing it again recently, I was struck by how much I've disliked Robert Altman's taste in actors (frankly, his ever-changing "stock company" always left me cold); by his misuse of his occasional celebrity players (in this case, Lauren Bacall, Glenda Jackson, James Garner and, again, Burnett) and by how self-conscious, obvious and shrill Altman could be when attempting decidedly odd/oddball touches.

Case in point: The wildly annoying strolling singers in "Health" who warble inane numbers while wearing ridiculous "vegetable" costumes. (FYI: "Health" originally clocked in at 105 minutes, but for some reason, the Fox-owned print of it that would unreel with some frequency on the Fox Movie Channel runs five minutes less - 100 minutes. Curious.)

It was the release of this film when I started to seriously question my enthusiasm for Altman, a fascination that started in my youth but dwindled as both he and I aged. Towards the end, I found his films as annoying as those singers. Anyway, I realize that Hollywod rarely remakes bad films, but given how health-conscious that present-day society pretends to be, "Health" should be an exception. Time has caught up with it.

The material is definitely ripe for a revamping. Perhaps Wes Anderson or Alexander Payne could get it right. Just a suggestion.

Essential Altman: That said, there are a number of Altman films that mean the world to me, starting with "Brewster McCloud," which remains a vivid seminal movie experience from my lost youth.  Following closely behind it are "California Split," Come Back to the Five & Dime, Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean," "Popeye," "Fool for Love," "Cookie's Fortune," "Prêt-à-Porter," "A Prairie Home Companion," "Dr. T and the Women"and the very idiosyncratic "A Perfect Couple," not the usual Altman suspects.

And, yes, "M*A*S*H" remains a revelation.  As for "Nashville," it's addictively watchable, but knowing that Altman originally shot it as an eight-hour film, I'm way too aware of its many narrative gaps.

HBO and the bane of 'edge'

Lena Dunham, HBO's poster girl

It came as little surprise to learn this week that Michael Lombardo is leaving his current post, or that his exit comes on the heels of his colleague Michael Ellenberg doing the exact same thing last January. And until this week, I had no idea that Lombardo and Ellenberg even existed.

I guess I should explain.

Ellenberg was HBO's executive in charge of drama, replaced in January by someone named Casey Bloys, formerly HBO's executive in charge of comedy.  (Got that?)  And Lombardo is/was HBO's programming president.  I'm not sure what these three guys do exactly, but from where I sit, none of them was doing an impressive job. For about two years now, I've been burdening my wife with complaints about HBO, specifically its erratic, largely unsatisfying programming and the anemic number of episodes aired for each show - usually 6 or 7, tops, for its comedies.

I'm using the word "comedies" loosely here because precious few HBO comedies of late have been funny.  They've mostly been "edgy," a quality which has become the new porn for the average TV viewer.  (But more about that later.)  Anyway, despite gobbling up umpteen undeserving Emmy awards every year, HBO has become a dim shadow of itself, coasting on the dusty credentials created in its heyday by "The Sopranos" and "Sex and the City" (and, much later, "Curb Your Enthusiasm") and pushing the "edge" envelope instead of anything remotely creative.

Its shows have become naggingly similiar.

It's difficult to pinpoint when the decline started but I trace it back to such shows as "Big Love," essentially little more than a trendy re-do of "The Sopranos." and "Hung," a puerile, one-joke affair about a guy's infamously huge penis which, for some reason, HBO refused to show. Yes, HBO!

But let's move to the present.  Beyond "Games of Throne," which has become something of a franchise (if there is such a thing in the world of cable TV), and the initial season of "True Detective" (which was terrific on every level), what else is there on HBO?  There's Bill Maher shamelessly pontificating (and, much worse, generally repeating himself), an occasional worthwhile film (the current "All the Way") and a collection of recurring sitcoms, each of which, at best, was worthy of one good season.

"Girls," by wunderkind Lena Dunham, got off to an edgy start (there's that word again) but has been stale for about three years now - although its enthusiastic depiction of nasty, dirty sex sets it apart from anything else on TV or even in movie theaters. (Virtually no one is modern film has sex anymore and, when they do, the woman usually wears a brassiere.  Huh?)  The Duplas Brothers' "Togetherness" was smart and had promise but actually disintegrated during its painful second and final season.  And the mercifully short-lived "Looking" only confirmed every bad idea that homophobes have about gay men. Did it really intend to do that?

Then there's "Ballers," a show whose humor is limited to that dubious title.  (Real mature, HBO.)  Mike Judge had a good idea with "Silicon Valley," but after season one, it went on an endless loop with the same storyline repeated ad infinitum (i.e., some heartless shark is always trying to steal the clueless techies' progressive ideas and bastardize them).  And "Veep" has been so reduced that it now exists as an excuse for the talented Julia Louis-Dreyfuss to end every lame joke with the word "cock," or "balls," or "pussy" or worse. This is Emmy-worthy? What happened to the sophisticated humor that "Veep" promised and delivered in its first season?

Laura Dern's now-forgotten "Enlightened" was a true original, a tiny gem, but even that went on one season too long. TV has yet to learn when to call it quits, a good case in point being CBS's "The Big Bang Theory," a once-oddball delight which has been neutered into a conventional sitcom success.

Aaron Sorkins' "The Newsroom" kept getting renewed, even though one season was quite enough, thank you.  And, this year, the much-touted "Vinyl" was an unwatchable mess, despite the behind-the-scenes, high-powered presence of Martin Scorsese and Mick Jagger (or perhaps because of it).

But it had "edge," something that AMC successfully introduced (and milked) with "Mad Men" and "Breaking Bad," hooking viewers on bad behavior and rationalized amorality - and inspiring the three tired major networks to do the same with the likes of "Scandal" and "The Good Wife."

The negative result of the network's lazy preoccupation with edginess is that it has conditioned the average TV viewer to except and accept nothing less.

"Nashville," an exceptional, old-fashioned piece of serial storytelling which refreshingly eschewed "edge," never received much love from ABC, which continually showed its preference for the aforementioned "Scandal," and it was prematurely canceled this week. Its audience was reportedly smaller than "Scandal's" but I'd wager that it was a lot more intelligent and discerning. (ABC's earlier obsession was the overrated sitcom, "Modern Family," which despite a bit of diversity, isn't modern at all but rather retro and dated, what with its doofus dads and self-satisfied, know-it-all moms.)

Perhaps viewers picked up on ABC's disinterest. The Emmy voters certainly did, ignoring "Nashville" every year of its four seasons. But kudos to Connie Britton (pictured above with Charles Esten), Hayden Panettiere and their leader Callie Khouri for fearlessly remaining true to their mission, namely telling an on-going story straight, with no frills. Or edge.

The same Emmy disinterest seems to have plagued A&E's exceptional "Bates Motel," which, week-in and week-out, boasted world-class performances by stars Vera Farmiga and Freddie Highmore (pictured below), whose strange, intricate acting duet has very carefully prepared us for events that will take us (in its fifth and final season) to the Hitchcock film that inspired it, "Psycho." So, why has this show been ignored?

Perhaps because A&E lacks Emmy credibility?

Who knows. All I know is that both it and "Nashville" have acquired loyal cult followings that a more responsible, astute television executive would have nurtured and exploited to the advantage of both show and network.

But those days - and those men (yes, they're mostly men) - are gone.

Sadly.

Still it was a joy to encounter the intelligence and rare adventurousness of "Bates Motel" and "Nashville," both more satisfying than the edginess that the networks now covet to the extreme and that HBO sells as high art.

Note in Passing: The media have been deeply invested in the rise of "edge" on television, particularly the Arts & Leisure section of The New York Times, which provides recaps of only the trendiest shows, the usual suspects.  Can't get enough of "Scandal" or "Girls"?  Well, check out the Times, which has been complicit in the hasty elevation of such shows.

elvis & ann & george & janet

The curious split-screen finale of "Viva Las Vegas"

In "My Lucky Life In and Out of Show Business: A Memoir" (Three Rivers Press), Dick Van Dyke reminisces about his debut movie, "Bye Bye Birdie" (1963), and director George Sidney's infatuation with Ann-Margret.

In one chapter, Van Dyke describes the moment when he and co-star Janet Leigh walked on to a sound stage to find Ann-Margret sitting on Sidney's lap.  Both looked at each other and, in unison, said, "Uh-oh."

Later, after the first preview of the film, Leigh (who was supposed to be the star of the film and who had worked with Sidney on several films prior to "Birdie") walked up to Sidney and asked, "Where did that song come from?"  She was referring to the new title song that (1) was never in the stage version, (2) apparently was filmed in secrecy and (3) shamelessly showcases A-M. There were other reports - althought not in Van Dyke's book - that Leigh then slapped Sidney across the face. She felt betrayed.

The film version of "Bye Bye Birdie" got off to a bumpy start.  It was supposed to be directed by Gower Champion, who helmed it on Broadway. It was to be his first as a filmmaker.  Champion hoped to cast Jack Lemmon and Debbie Reynolds in the leads. He had wanted Lemmon for the stage version - the two had co-starred years before in a Betty Grable musical, "Three for the Show" (1955) - but Lemmon was already committed to a straight play, "Face of a Hero," the same season. 

And so the stage role went to Dick Van Dyke. Chita Rivera, of course, was his co-star on Broadway, playing the self-described "Spanish Rose."  I've been critical of Ann-Margret's miscasting in the film - and I've no idea if that decision was made by Champion or Sidney - because she's supposed to be playing a character who is either 15 or 16.  But Leigh was also serioulsy miscast as a Latina, as would have been Debbie Reynolds.

Either change the backstory of the character or hire a Hispanic actress.  Why not Rivera?  Or Rita Moreno who has just won an Oscar?

But the casting became a moot point after Champion read Irving Brecher's bowdlerized adaptation of the play and quite the Columbia production, taking Reynolds with him. They went over to Paramount where they made "My Six Loves" instead, which would be Champion's debut as a director. 

And "Birdie" was inherited by Sidney, an old movie-musical veteran who, for some reason, tried to turn the property into a Frank Tashlin film.

But George Sidney was no Frank Tashlin.

It was a huge success, so much so that Sidney and A-M went off to Metro to participate in an Elvis Presley property, "Viva Las Vegas," in which A-M plays a character closer to her own age. The pairing of Elvis and A-M seemed perfect, given that they were essentially mirror images of each other, gender notwithstanding. And publicists wasted no time implying that they were romantically involved, although Elvis himself never verified it.

Turner Classic Movies occasionally airs a fascinating featurette in which Elvis's surviving handlers discuss the making of "Viva Las Vegas" and Geroge Sidney's "crush" (their words) on Ann-Margaret in particular.

There were apparently problems with Sidney giving A-M more close-ups than Elvis until his people tuned him up and explained to Sidney that "Viva Las Vegas" was an Elvis Presley film, not an Ann-Margret vehicle.

Which makes one wonder if there ever was a "relationship."

The final scene in "Viva Las Vegas" is particularly telling.  It's a reprise of the title number featuring Elvis and A-M but they aren't actually in the same shot together, although they are both on screen.

Why?

My guess is that Elvis' people wanted this to be his moment and vetoed the idea of his filming it with A-M.  So did Sidney get around this dictum by filming Elvis separately and then adding A-M to the scene with a split screen?  Whatever the explanation, it's an incredibly awkward finale. 

For those who care, Turner is airing both "Viva Las Vega" and "Bye Bye Birdie" back-to-back Thursday (April 28), starting @ 4:30 p.m. (est).

cinema obscura: prince's "under the cherry moon" (1986)

The death of Prince brings to mind his misunderstood movie masterwork, "Under the Cherry Moon," released by Warner Bros. in 1986.  At the time, it was as reviled as his 1984 debut film, "Purple Rain," was overpraised.

"Rain" was directed by Albert Magnoli, who would make five other theatrical films, but "Cherry Moon" was directed by Prince himself, who would helm only two other titles - the documentary "Sign 'o' the Times" (1987) and "Graffiti Bridge" (1990). Much like Alfred Hitchcock's "Vertigo" (1958), Prince's movie largely drew sneers from outraged critics.  But unlike the Hitchcock, "Under the Cherry Moon" has never been sought out for a serious reassessment and undeservedly remains a lost film.

Strikingly photographed in black-&-white by Michael Ballhaus, Prince's movie is part Antonioni, part Hawks, part Warhol, part whatzit - all jumbled together and seemingly influenced also by the mental landscape of its kinetic, eccentric auteur.  Prince's decidedly modernist presence is never quite embraced by his own film's nostalgic Art Deco elements. It's a movie involved in a moody tug-of-war with itself. Which is hugely affecting.

Thirty years later, "Cherry Moon" remains gnawingly elusive, difficult to contain but now has a timelessness. And 30 years later, I still like it. A lot.

The film gets off to a rather curious start with a sequence in which everyone on screen is behaving like a vampire from one of those trendy Andy Warhol/Paul Morrissey horror collaborations from the 1970s.  When bats appear - flying into a cabaret in France, no less - the joke is made clear: This is Prince's "Portrait of the Expatriat as a Young Zombie."

After the bats appear, liberating everyone, "Under the Cherry Moon" settles into what it really is - a stylish romp that could be titled ... "Two Gals in Paris." Only in this case, we get two guys - Prince and sidekick Jerome Benton. Only they're not in Paris, but in Nice, on the Côte d'Azur.

It could have been glib and amoral but instead has a vulnerable charm.

The boys, gigolos hoping to sponge off the jet set and get rich themselves, are shrewd male variations on the characters played by Marilyn Monroe and Jane Russell in Howard Hawks' "Gentlemen Prefer Blondes" (1953).

That's right.

Prince is Christopher Tracy, an entertainer who performs nightly in a piano bar and dares to fall in love with a swell (Kristen Scott-Thomas), much to her parents' chagrin, and he plays the part with a mixture of his usual wild-eyed randiness and a certain '50s insouciance.

There's no question in my mind that Prince is doing Monroe here (at times, he affects the same sweet, startled, slightly addled facial expression) or that the speedboat escape at the end smacks of the finale of Billy Wilder's "Some Like It Hot" (1959). This is gender-bending at its most creative.

I've referenced a lot of film titles and filmmakers here and, yes, Prince the director is able to mesh them all.  "Under the Cherry Moon" was a daring risk following the success of "Purple Rain" and in the weeks prior to its release, the buzz labeled it stinker.  Far from it.  It was the boldest film of the summer of 1986.  As well as the most misundersood. Check it out.

... and, now, about kelly...

Michael Strahan may be ABC's superhero, but the personality who’s really indispensable in the very strange world of Daytime Television is the peerless Kelly.  Yes, Kelly Ripa

Let's talk TV today - daytime TV, to be specific.

Now, before you ask what daytime TV has to do with movies, I hasten to note that there are no longer any barriers that separate the various arts from each other or from the assorted media (including, and especially, social media).  And on daytime TV, it's all one giant mash-up of bold-faced names, film clips, tie-ins, name-dropping and shameless self-promotion.

It's also - except for a quartet of exceptions - dated, repetitious and as depressing as hell.  You have ABC's solitary soap, "General Hospital," which has been an unwatchable mess for about a decade now; the network's "The View," which should be put out of its misery (and misery is indeed the operative word here) and CBS's antiquated game shows "The Price Is Right" and "Let's Make a Deal" where, with scant encouragement, the contestants are more than happy to behave like hapless buffoons.

And so, it came as no surprise that the The 43rd Annual Daytime Emmy Awards (scheduled for May 1^st ) would not be televised this year.  I mean, really, how often can one watch the same game shows, the same talk shows and the same soaps win awards that interest no one?

BTW, there are currently only four soap operas remaining on daytime TV and guess how many of them have been nominated this year.

That's right - all four, only one of which is notable.

That would be CBS's "The Young and the Restless," one of the aforementioned four exceptions that make daytime TV bearable and a top TV drama in general (although it is currently being overseen by refugees from the unfortunate "General Hospital," a reason for pause).

The other three are CBS's "The Talk" (despite the fact its five co-hosts, all incredibly personable, have taken it on themselves to do non-stop damage control for spoiled celebrities who pay people to do exactly that for them); Rachel Ray's fabulous food-and-talk show on ABC, and, in a class all by itself, "Live with Kelly and Michael," also on ABC. ("Rachel" and "Live" are both Disney-syndicated but air on ABC channels exclusively.)

The Kelly and Michael of the title are, of course, the peerless Kelly Ripa and the ever-surprising Michael Strahan, a former NFL star who has evolved into an unexpectedly pleasing TV personality - so much so that ABC has elected to remove Strahan from "Live" and situate him on its more valuable morning show, "Good Morning, America," which is arguably the definitive mash-up of all those ingredients listed in the second paragraph here (plus some sociopolitical news for legitimacy).

Strahan has been a twice-a-week contributor on GMA, starting there approximately the same time he joined "Live," where he replaced Regis Philbin.  The pairing of Kelly and Michael, which seemed wildly off-beat on paper, turned out to beterrific -  a match of perfection.

According to Wikipedia, after Strahan teamed with Ripa, "ratings instantly surged, impressively generating year-over-year time slot gains across all key demographics, towering over its nearest competition, the fourth hour of NBC's 'Today Show,' by 87 percent."  As it is with Wikipedia, I'm not exactly sure who wrote this impressive info/blurb, possibly a Strahan assistant. Anyway, ABC apparently took note and, shortly after his debut on "Live," Strahan joined GMA for occasional weekly appearances.

Since then, Strahan has been seemingly everywhere and dabbling in seemingly everything. He has an eponymous men's clothing line and a motivational book, "Wake Up Happy: The Dream Big, Win Big Guide to Transforming Your Life"; he's been the spokesperson for the P&G Meta products; and his other TV work includes his role as a FOX NFL Sunday analyst and the host of the upcoming ABC (yes, ABC) game-show reboot, "The $100,000 Pyramid," airing this summer. Have I missed anything?

Whew!

So his ascension to a top spot on GMA is just the latest stride for Michael Strahan and, while no one would begrudge his apparently unquenchable ambition, the circumstances surrounding this latest move seem dubious at best.  It's great that Strahan is going to GMA and terrible that he's leaving "Live."  What's disturbing in the secrecy about the move - so secret that reportedly (if one is to believe reports) not even Ripa or (reportedly) "Live" producer Michael Gelman knew about it until it was announced by an ABC honcho, James Goldston, president of its news division.

And one would think that Ripa and Gelman, of all people, deserved the courtesy of a heads-up at the very least. Strahan's stock has risen largely because of "Live" in general and his chemistry with Ripa in particular.

Strahan has been admired for his accessible "everyguy" demeanor and I guess ABC is counting on that quality to help GMA as it struggles to surmount its rival, NBC's "Today Show," which has snapped up the "people between 25 and 54" demographic so valued by advertisers.

But the questionable way this has been handled, the perceived deception, is not something that viewers associate with Strahan's "brand."  (Full disclosure: Having worked for newspapers for an unhealthy number of years, I'm accustomed to overpaid people making bad decisions.)

This could be potentially damaging.

As for Kelly Ripa, I have every confidence that she will do just fine.  She has that rare ability to pair up perfectly with just about everyone, not just Michael Strahan, as evidence by the revolving-door of guys who auditioned for the seat that Strahan successfully won four years ago and who have replaced him during his days off.  Plus, unlike many of her co-hosts (Strahan included), Ripa is quick on her feet and a natural comic.  And she's immensely likable. I guess what I'm saying is, she's perfect.

Or at least, the perfect TV host.  And on morning TV, she's like a tonic.

She's also a pro, a top professional.  But even a pro can be pushed too far.  And so it came as no surprise that, the day after Goldston's big Strahan announcment, Kelly was absent from today's "Live" telecast. Ana Gasteyer filled in. She was competent.  But she's no Kelly Ripa.

Michael Strahan will be easy to replace - I have no doubt about that - but "Live" is unthinkable without Kelly. And so, the next time ABC and Goldston are looking to clandestinely snare someone away from an ABC syndicated show, I suggest that they aim higher (read: Kelly Ripa).