settima

comedy

Yellow Submarine (George Dunning, 1968)

Apr

28

Clean Comedy Day

Yellow Submarine (1968)

A Blue Meanie pirouetting on a blossoming flower that pushes itself up into the sky. The sky is white while the flower and clouds are multicoloured.

A Gen X-er, I grew up in a completely different world where so many films and TV that kids watched – if watched with today's eyes — were not particularly kid-oriented at all. I fondly remember Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975) and reenacting the Black Knight scene in the school grounds. Yul Brynner as a faceless, rampaging cyber cowboy in Westworld (1973)? Sure, bring it on! Not that the official kid's movies were “clean”. Did you spot the chicken decapitation in Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory (1971)? Well, you will now.

“Once upon a time, or maybe twice, there was an unearthly paradise called Pepperland. 80,000 leagues beneath the sea it lay, or lie. I'm not too sure.”

– narrator

Alright, I'll keep it clean and suggest a dose of Yellow Submarine. A fantastic adventure starring The #Beatles (well, their likeness mostly) who are summoned to save utopian, music-loving #Pepperland from the music-hating Blue Meanies. Trippy fun, and lots to discover the older you get.

Limonádový Joe aneb Konská opera [Lemonade Joe or The Horse Opera] (Oldřich Lipský, 1964)

Apr

27

Kola Loka

Limonádový Joe aneb Konská opera (1964)

A tough cowboy takes a bite out off a fiddle. DP: Vladimír Novotný.

“The Kola Loka is the law!”

– Limonádový Joe

La folie du Docteur Tube [The Madness of Dr. Tube] (Abel Gance, 1915)

Apr

23

World Laboratory Day

La folie du Docteur Tube (1915)

The professor's assistant is a young Black kid, maybe 10 years old. He's wearing a white lab apron over his dark outfit and glances at something off camera (I assume he's waiting for his cue from the director; this is the scene where the hallucinogenic powder is about to reach him and he has to act the part). In the background is Dr. Tube, cracking up under the influence of his own invention. DP: Léonce-Henri Burel.

Dr. Tube (Séverin-Mars) invents a powder that distorts reality and promptly tests it out on some oblivious test subjects, who quickly can no longer recognise the world around them. The brilliance of La folie du Docteur Tube is its use of practical in-camera effects that makes us, the viewer, experience the hallucinogen.

 

This little folly by the great Abel Gance features Albert Dieudonné in a small part, who later would again work with Gance in his Napoleon (1927), as Napoléon Bonaparte.

 

This is one of the few (French) comedies from the time that I'm aware of with a Black character who is not a horrible racist stereotype or a white person in blackface. If you have any idea of who the professor's assistant is, please reach out on Mastodon.

Mighty Joe Young (Ernest B. Schoedsack, 1949)

Apr

12

National Only Child Day

Mighty Joe Young (1949)

Jill playing the grand piano in a ballgown while suspended high up in the air by Joe. DP: J. Roy Hunt.

Young Jill – played by the tragically doomed Lora Lee Michel – grows up on a ranch in an undisclosed African country (aka “Africa”) with her father. One day, two porters pass her house carrying an orphaned baby #gorilla. Smitten, she wants and gets the ape, names it Joe, and raises it until the simian reaches exceptional size. That's when a couple of showman collecting exotic menagerie for a Hollywood nightclub come across the odd couple. After long consideration and desperate for money, Jill decides to take Joe to the States where the two become an overnight cabaret sensation. But like Kong before him, Joe is not made for the concrete jungle.

“Am I dreamin', or did I just see a gorilla? And a beautiful dame!”

– Max O'Hara

One decade and a Hays Code later, the people who brought the world King Kong (1933) present Mighty Joe Young: more drama, more spectacle, and superior special effects by Marcel Delgado, Ray #Harryhausen and Willis O'Brien et al. A box-office dud ánd Academy Award for Special Effects winner, Mighty Joe Young is now recognised as an #animation classic. In particular the nightclub scenes (keep your eyes peeled for Phil “The Swedish Angel” Olafsson!) are a wonderful display of the magic of #StopMotion.

Harvey (Henry Koster, 1950)

Apr

9

freebie: Easter Sunday

Harvey (1950)

Promotional photo. James Stewart as Elwood P. Dowd, holding a stuffed anthropomorphic rabbit. Both man and bunny wear black hats and smile at the camera. DP: William H. Daniels.

James Stewart is Elwood P. Dowd. An ordinary man with an extraordinary claim: his best friend is an invisible, six feet three and a half inches-tall #pooka – a mythological Celtic, shapeshifting creature – who in Mr Dowd's case resembles a rabbit called Harvey. Elwood's sister and niece, who also occasionally see the furry goblin, have their relative send to a sanatorium where the doctors and us viewers learn more about this curious case.

“Harvey and I sit in the bars… have a drink or two… play the juke box. And soon the faces of all the other people they turn toward mine and they smile. And they're saying, 'We don't know your name, mister, but you're a very nice fella'.”

– Elwood P. Dowd

Harvey, based on Mary Chase's #PulitzerPrize​Play with the same name, is guaranteed to bring a smile on your face, this humbug's scout's honour! Have a nice #Easter, CineMastodons!

Mickey One (Arthur Penn, 1965)

Apr

8

Step Into The Spotlight Day

Mickey One (1965)

Mickey (Warren Beatty) bent over, holding a microphone with a bright spotlight aimed at him. DP: Ghislain Cloquet.

Warren Beatty plays Mickey, a #StandUpComedian who has it all, then gambles it all away. Well, that's the first 5 minutes of Arthur Penn's Mickey One. Beatty is out of his element, and the movie's still too indebted to the cheery 60s to carry that New American Cinema grit.

“I'm the king of the silent pictures. I'm hiding out till talkies blow over.”

– Mickey One

Having said that, there are several great small surreal moments that are carried by uncredited character actors alone. And then there's a sole spotlight, stealing it all away.

Red & Rosy (Frank Grow, 1989)

Apr

1

National Handmade Day

Red & Rosy (1989)

Big Red (Rico Martinez) high on adrenaline. DPs: Frank Grow, Ralph Hawkins & Rico Martinez.

All you need for a movie is a gun and a girl. Or a girl with a glue gun. Or skip the girl, get yourself a piece of cardboard, some foam latex, and a six pack of beer. Frank Grow's Red & Rosy is the embodiment of a special staple of #DIY culture that appears to be long-lost. Really kids, you don't need much of a budget. Or tomorrows latest equipment. The hottest Hollywood hotshot? Forget about it, ask your drunk uncle to yell at the camera for 10 minutes. You want authenticity? Tape some random medical footage straight from your teevee. Need a shot of adrenal juice?

 

Well, just watch this.

Playtime (Jacques Tati, 1967)

Mar

31

Eiffel Tower Day

Playtime (1967)

A woman in a long grey overcoat holds a glass door of one of the many impersonal, grey modernist buildings. For a brief moment the Eiffel Tower can be seen reflected in the glass, providing a much needed flash of colour. DPs: Jean Badal & Andréas Winding.

Never was or will I be a fan of Jacques #Tati, the loveable Luddite who wouldn't be as big as he became if it wasn't for the technological wonders of the 20th century. Having said that, his Playtime (1967) holds a special place in my heart.

 

Tati's alter ego Monsieur #Hulot roams a hyper-modern #Paris, actually an enormous soundstage dubbed Tativille. People, buildings and gadgets interact with and against each other, each and everyone as plotless as a prop. In unison, it becomes a perfectly orchestrated symphony of maddening modernism.

 

But Tati wouldn't be Tati if it wasn't for a glimpse of quiet nostalgia. A woman holding the glass-and-steel entrance door of yet another concrete office building. In the glass, a burst of warm light and colour and movement. And then it's gone, and we remember how that tower once was the thorn in the Luddite's eye, that “baroque and mercantile fancy of a builder of machines”.

 

I'm going to take Mr Ebert's words to heart for my long overdue revisit to #Tativille:

”'Playtime' is a peculiar, mysterious, magical film. Perhaps you should see it as a preparation for seeing it; the first time won't quite work.”

– Roger Ebert

Multiple SIDosis (Sid Laverents, 1970)

Mar

27

National Acoustic Soul Day

Multiple SIDosis (1970)

Clockwise: Sid playing a ukulele, Sid whistling, Sid playing improvised chimes (metal pipes and one cymbal hanging from an overhead microphone stand), Sid blowing a tune on champagne bottles, one metronome. DP: Sid Laverents.

There's a handful of notable amateur films in the National Film Registry. One of them is the Zapruder film, another Sid Laverents' Multiple SIDosis.

“In terms of sheer entertainment value, I think that it demonstrated that one eccentric genius alone in his garage can rival the best of the Hollywood studios””

– Ross Lipman, UCLA Film & Television Archive restorationist

 

Catch it here.

Steamboat Bill, Jr. (Charles Reisner + Buster Keaton, 1928)

Mar

23

National Near Miss Day

Steamboat Bill, Jr. (1928)

In Steamboat Bill, Jr., former vaudevillian Keaton narrowly escapes the façade of a house crashing down around him.

“I'm trying to teach you to run it – not wreck it!”

– William 'Steamboat Bill' Canfield

Both the man and the stunt lived on, probably most famously in Keaton aficionado #JackieChan's Project A Part II (HK, 1987).

 

Despite all the well-meant tributes, none of the later stunts are as nail biting as the pre-OSHA original.