It’s bad enough he’s gone from wunderkind to critical whipping auteur — a trend that the reviews of Mr. Shyamalan’s new horror flick are continuing. But then, perhaps unaware of Motown history — he gives his attempt at regaining the mantle of the master of thrills and chills, the same name as an insanely catchy, actually borderline annoying, but nevertheless reasonably groovy tune from the Hitsville USA archives. Who knows how many people will go to see The Happening this weekend, only to have this pop into their heads.

Okay, it’s far from the best song in the Supremes’ catalog, but pretty much the opposite of frightening (except, perhaps, in the earworm sense) and it’s all I can think of every time the film is mentioned. It won’t help any. It’s also not a hopeful omen that the song actually came from another flick, unseen by me, of the same name starring Anthony Quinn, Faye Dunaway, Oscar Homolka and Tarantino fave Michael Parks that nobody seems to have liked much, back in 1967 or now.

Even though he pretty much lost me with both the unnecessarily morose and misconceived Unbreakable and the world’s lamest defense of the existence of God in the otherwise watchable Signs, I really was kind of profoundly moved by The Sixth Sense — though I’ve been afraid to see it again, for fear of feeling like an idiot for being so moved. In any case, though I’ve avoided his films more recent films, and I make not entirely pleasant fun of MNS above, I’m not exactly happy about it. 17% Tomatometer score or no, it’s not cool to assume too confidently that a film you haven’t seen is bad. Still, maybe he’ll get he’ll get his curse removed, such as it is, if he finally goes back to making low budget movies, a possibility I wouldn’t rule out.

UPDATE: There’s more from me on The Happening and other new films over at Premium Hollywood, where my twice weekly “Multiplex Mayhem” series continues..

There’s a couple of typos I need to have fixed in it, but check out my rave review of A Dirty Carnival, a self-reflexive gangster film from Korean poet-turned-director Yun Ha that defies everything expectation you might have about a self-reflexive gangster film — there’s nothing glib here. This is a remarkable piece of work that stands comparison with The Departed (which I thought was superior to the Hong Kong gangster film it was based on, Infernal Affairs) or any other recent crime movie you care to mention — or any other recent movie, period.

Brutally violent and deeply emotional, both sentimental and cynical — Billy Wilder never made a straight gangster film, but if he had, it’s spirit would have been a little like this one, though there’s also definitely a bit of John Woo (in his Bullet in the Head phase) and Sam Pekinpah in the mix as well. Maybe a bit of Jean-Pierre Melville (who influenced Woo, but still).

Speaking of great directors, I mention in the review that an American remake seems almost inevitable, for better or worse. I doubt Martin Scorsese would want to do another remake of an Asian gangster flick any time soon, but he might be a little bit tempted by this one. Among other reasons, the title, literally translated, is Mean Streets. And here’s a very good trailer (unsubtitled).

And here’s something from that other Mean Streets. (Might not be safe for work — exotic dancers in pasties and some racially charged dialog.)

I think, finally, we’re pretty much ready to go. After a break, we might even be fired up.

So, now, here’s the big question — and has nothing to do with the Vice Presidency. Am I the only person in existence who thinks the Obama campaign should use the song below? Any thoughts? Even if no one cares, I just love this song/performance. To me, it pretty much captures what this thing is all about, even if there is a bit of slightly dated male-centric language right at the start. I’m sure the great songwriter/producer Alan Toussaint would only be too happy to do a quick rewrite.

Yet another departure of a show-biz artist of some note. This time, Mel Ferrer, an underrated actor who was also a producer and director, has passed away just a few months shy of his 91st birthday.

He doesn’t deserve it, but with his lengthy list of appearances in now little-known films of some quality (or at least seriously attempted quality), and fair amount of out and out schlock, Mel Ferrer is the kind of figure who causes people to snap their fingers as they try to sort out there memory of him and just who he was. Unless I’ve missed something, he was no relation whatever to that other noted actor and director, José Ferrer, and therefore no relation to his son, Miguel Ferrer (to whom Mel had a slight coincidental resemblance, I think), the outstanding character actor and noted comic book geek. And, as the headline of his WENN mini-obit cruelly emphasizes, Mel Ferrer was probably best known as the former husband of a fully fledged movie star, Audrey Hepburn. According to his obits, even he tended to downplay his lengthy acting resume in favor of his producing and directing work.

Still, his acting at its best had a low-key intensity and commitment I always looked forward to. Admittedly, I’m a bit biased by having seen perhaps his best work at a young age in one of my favorite movies — the (also underrated) action, romance, and comedy packed sword-fighting classic Scaramouche. As I mentioned in a previous ode to the film, his character in the film is a murderous sociopath with men and a sensitive, lovestruck schmo with the noblewomen in his life. Ferrer pulls off both ends of the equation perfectly. He builds believable chemistry with both Nina Foch as Marie Antoinette (the illicit love of his life) and Janet Leigh as a debutante he is set-up and later falls for, but he also portrays convincing, even chilling, cold thirst for blood on numerous occasions, making him probably the most simultaneously nasty and pitiable villain in any classic-era Hollywood production.

The film also follows a common quirk of classic era swashbucklers, in that the bad guy is nearly always the better fencer than the hero, and here he about outdoes Hollywood’s most practiced bad-guy fender, Basil Rathbone (not that it ever stopped him from getting run through in the end by lesser fencers and lesser actors). Ferrer pulled that feat off despite little experience with that kind of stage combat prior to the film — he credited his background as a dancer.

Anyhow, there are other notable films in Ferer’s filmography. I recently saw him in the offbase movie version of The Sun Also Rises as yet another lovestruck schmo (this time an actually Jewish one), and I guess he did as well as anyone in that film. But for the most part, I always seems to see only portions of Ferrer’s movies. There’s the offbeat, racially charged, science fiction film, The World, the Flesh and the Devil with Harry Belafonte and Inger Stevens, which I lost interest in and summarily deleted from my DVR a couple of years back — though it wasn’t any of the actors’ fault. And then there was Tobe Hooper’s Eaten Alive (originally titled Death Trap) which I saw, my famed gorephobia notwithstanding, partly because Mel Ferrer was in the cast (he’s second billed) — how bloody could the film be, I reasoned, with old Hollywood guys like him in the cast? However after a crazed hotel manager (played by Neville Brand, no less) graphically scythes a young woman to death and and begins to feed her to his pet crocodile, I decided that this was one R-rated film I really was too young to see (I still may be) and I’d rather sit in my big sister’s car and listen to an old episode of “Suspense” on the radio than continue with the film. Mumblety-mumblety years later, I’ve never seen Ferrer’s performance in that one. Perhaps I’ never shall — but I’m sure he was a pro in it.

There’s more on Mel Ferrer, including a nifty piece from the mysterious horror maven, Arbogast and, of course, Greencine is the place for meeting all of your obituary and appreciation needs.

The original rock and roll primitive is dead at age 79. Bo Diddley invented the most copied beat in rock music history — and he was one of the prime copiers, using that beat for a great deal of his personal repertoire, but his shows were never one bit dull. I saw him twice during the eighties and early nineties and he was not only a great, if basic, musician but a funny, consistently engaging performer.

This appears to be from that period.

And he created songs, including this ultra-primal classic, from which entire careers were built. (I’m looking at you, Ronnie Hawkins and George Thorogood.)

His signature beat became the basis for countless great records by better known artists (in this case two better known artists).

Everyone under the sun covered such baseline tunes as “I’m a Man” (even if they didn’t quite have the haircut to sing it).

Others messed with it, slightly….

And others used it as a jumping off place for entirely new songs that were great in their own right — here’s a version of my all time favorite Bo Diddley rip-off.

RIP Bo Diddley. We’ll miss you a lot, but the beat isn’t going away any time soon.

Larry Aydlette has another great video up at his place.

UPDATE: And Brian Doan has another one.

It’s looking like one of those weeks…..

How ironic that in the midst of Madeline Kahn Appreciation Day, would mark the sad passing of another of her Blazing Saddles costars, Harvey Korman, a fine comic actor and inarguably one of the greatest sketch comedy comedians in television history and, obviously, as a huge fan of The Carol Burnett Show growing up, a personal favorite of mine. Like M. Kahn, Alec Baldwin, Phil Hartman and his most frequent scene partner, Carol Burnett, he could either be the silliest character on stage or the straightest of straight men — and generate gigantic laughs by doing next to nothing. In either role, he nearly always made the scene funnier, finding just the right note of eccentricity or concealed bombast to make the moment sing.

As the scenes below show, he was also a consummate ensemble player, never hogging the spotlight and allowing the scene to kind of take shape. As his slapstick collaborations with Tim Conway made all too clear, he had no problem with being upstaged. Watching the four-person scenes below show him as a virtuoso ensemble player among virtuosos.

First, an example of probably my favorite series of Carol Burnett Show sketches, which paired him and Burnett as a sort of comic opera version of Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Phillip (though he refers to himself as a king in the sketch below), inevitably facing off against Conway as an imbecilic American war hero. (The push-up bra wearing actress playing the soldier’s “friend” is, yes, Dame Maggie Smith.)

And here’s another sketch featuring the four main players from the Burnett show — Korman, Conway, Burnett, and the underrated Vicki Lawrence — working like a well oiled machine on a scene which, once again, milks class warfare for laughs.

And, though it runs a bit long, a scene for us film geeks with references sure to baffle large majorities, but who doesn’t understand a pratfall?

There’s more from the esteemed Will Harris (who stole my pic!) over at my other blog home, Premium Hollywood.

UPDATE: There’s more, of course. Brian Doan adds a great deal and Dennis Cozzalio eulogizes Hedley Lamarr and joins the “let’s all use the same picture club.” Also, the Los Angeles Times has a more complete obituary that includes some poignant reminisces from Tim Conway.

I don’t really have time this day for the full-fledged, full-throated appreciation that the late Madeliene Kahn deserves on this, her official day of appreciation as declared by Stinky Lulu but, suffice it to say I still have gigantic admiration and a lingering crush — a gorgeous woman with astutely disciplined talent and an insane sense of humor…what more could anyone ask for?

So, before anyone beats me to it, I’m presenting two variations on perhaps Ms. Kahn’s signature moment, performing “I’m Tired” as the temptress Lili Von Shtupp from Blazing Saddles. I thought this song was hysterical even as a kid who’d never even seen the Mel Brooks film, much less knew anything at all about Marlene Dietrich, to whom the performance plays such perfectly wacky tribute. It’s safe to say that, even in the seventies, only a small percentage of moviegoers had seen Dietrich, so the song had to stand on its own. And Ms. Kahn, with her total commitment makes it work even better than anyone could have imagined.

Her Wikipedia entry implies that she may have deliberately gotten herself fired over “artistic differences” from the misbegotten film version of Mame (turned into an ill-fitting vehicle for comedy uber-diva Lucille Ball) because she wanted to do the movie with Brooks, then a still somewhat culty comedy director and ex gag writer. Good move.

It’s a great moment in film comedy — but since most of you have likely seen that (and Stinky Lulu himself has discussed the moment in detail, pretty much nailing the topic), I’m presentingbelow a recreation of the same from a 1986 Comic Relief telethon. Her joy in performing the great moment before a genuine live audience gives it an extra kick.

And, with its far greater pictorial quality, here is the cinematic version for you comparison and contrast pleasure.

When I stumbled over the sad news of Sydney Pollack’s death about half an hour ago, it hit me a bit harder than a lot of celebrity or filmmaker deaths. I guess I felt like I knew him. Maybe because he was both a consistently wonderful actor as well as a strong director, though somewhat inevitably far less consistent. Also, I’ve seen him speak more than once in person — including passionately discussing film preservation and, in those pre-DVD days, the importance of making letterboxed versions of widescreen films available, a subject which obviously speaks to the film geek in me.

Then there are also the weirder personal connections. A good actor and good guy who once tolerated me in acting classes some years back, worked for him and spoke with great respect of the man. And then there was the film that I think might actually be his best (though there are a few I’ve still yet to catch), Three Days of the Condor, a favorite film of my good pal, Randy Reynaldo — which for reasons shrouded by the mist of time eventually resulted in a very silly spoof featuring Randy’s character, Rob Hanes, for which I am mostly to blame.

And, speaking of my acting class, I once had the fun of recreating the scene below. Safe to say, I think, I was pretty godawful by comparison, still, fun to try to avoid stepping too deeply into the man’s shoes.

My favorite acting bit of Pollack’s might actually be as one of the few actual right choices in the otherwise gloriously wrong Eyes Wide Shut. There was something about a Pollack performance that also applied to his best acting, a kind of dark, if not quite cynical, perhaps tough, view of life mixed with a kind of compassion, even when he was playing gigantically untrustworthy people, and always a touch of humor that was frankly Jewish, culturally speaking.

And he made good movies, well, a lot of the time. Here’s an example of Mr. Pollack’s mastery of a nearly lost art in a Hollywood thriller. People talking. No wonder I’ll miss him.

UPDATE: The invaluable David Hudson of Greencine has a huge round-up of reaction to Pollack’s passing. Also, the above referenced Randy R. has his say.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Brian Doan has a more detailed appreciation of Mr. Pollack’s works as a director, which I think nails a lot (though I can’t say I agree about Out of Africa, which didn’t work for me at all). He also has several more links that I hope to have time to get before I forget.

I am emerging from my blogatorial hibernation to post this late entry in the amazing and screencapalicious Production Design Blogathon curated by Too Many Projects Film Club. Check it out. This post partially answers the question about “what the hell have you been doing, Bob?” — one answer is that I’ve been watching a lot of movies that I “have to” for one reason or another, including a 4.5 hour silent Fritz Lang epic as preparation for the later Mabuse talkies I REALLY want to see. The following are just some great pictures, and a few slightly fuzzy thoughts.

“Expressionism is just playing about. But–why not? Everything is playing about–!” says the wily Dr. Mabuse in a rare moment of extremely early post-modern meta in Lang’s two-part Dr. Mabuse: The Gambler, the massively popular adaptation of novelist Norbert Jacques potboiler which became the subject of several more films (only two more of which were by Lang), eventually making Mabuse, played by Rudolf Klein-Rogge in the first Mabuse films, into one of the most recognized names in Germany and undoubtedly influencing, directly or indirectly, such latter day supervillains as Ernst Stavro Blofeld, Lex Luthor, and Keyser Söze.

I’m no expert on expressionism, German or otherwise, as an artistic or theatrical/cinematic movement — but I will say that the first Mabuse film expresses one of my favorite tendencies in production design: sheer artifice. Realism and location shooting are fine for many projects, but unrealistic material (and I think realism is kind of overrated) usually works best with unreal locations. This tactic was standard, of course, during the set-bound days of classic era Hollywood, but it’s largely returned in today’s CGI-driven comics/animation adaptations and certain more contemporary filmmakers have been keeping it alive over the years, including Alan Rudolph’s work with Steven Legler on films like Choose Me and The Moderns, Warren Beatty’s ultra-ambitious and underrated work with Richard Sylbert on Dick Tracy, as well as in with Quentin Tarantino’s collaborations with ace production designer David Wasco, most obviously in Kill Bill (which also had Yohei Taneda on board), which has more than a touch of the Lang/Mabuse spirit to it.

Killer feng-shui.

Of course, since these are all movies, they are all “expressionistic” in the sense that, of course, everything in them, production design includes, reflects an emotion. One supposes in more traditionally expressionistic filmmakers like David Lynch and others who come from what you might call the Caligari-school, production design often reflects the mentality of the characters. In films like Kill Bill, they reflect a world which reflects our own, but is not quite a part of it. Lang and his four-man team of art directors, I think, actually split the difference, commenting on both the world and his characters’s mentality. Certainly, that has something to do with this….

But sometimes we’re not talking about an individual so much as a group or social class, such as the patrons of a new casino whose slogan is “a taste for decadence fuels the soul.”

And gambling halls in general are (all too invitingly) pits of unreality.

Pretty much every place where humans enjoy themselves is called into question. For example, a dining table.

And, of course, theaters, those houses of illusion, are gloriously art deco sinister.

And, for Dr. Mabuse the master hypnotist, a theater is just a venue for mass hallucination.

Even the clock at the other house of illusion, the stock exchange, isn’t exactly to be trusted.

Other places seem a bit more real — jails, for example.

And the setting for a mad, sociopathic, dreamer’s destruction.

Note: These screencaps come from the gorgeously restored Kino release. An earlier, somewhat shorter and definitely less beautiful 2-disc release from Image Entertainment, which I watched about 50% of several years back until my vid-stores copy gave out, is less complete and less clear, but contains an extremely illuminating commentary by David Kalat and, I’m thinking, a better score by silent movie stand-by Robert Israel. Of course, I only got to hear 50% of both. Mabuse maniacs (not sure I yet qualify) will, I suppose, want both!

I’ve been ignoring you. The time I should have been blogging here I spent instead reading a great, long piece on Speed Racer by Dennis “the voice of film geek generation” Cozzalio, reading the forty comments that it generated, and then making it forty one. And tonight’s a Premium Hollywood blogging night for me.

So, here, have an old Bullz-Eye DVD Review of Wristcutters: A Love Story. And here’s my somewhat contrarian takes on Herzog’s epic Fitzcarraldo and the late film noir/early hitman cult fave, Blast of Silence.

And here’s a nice capsule blog review that Shakespeare fans will want to read, seeing as its a little known 1970 TV production of Twelfth Night with Joan Plowright, Alec Guinness, Ralph Richardson…and Tommy Steele.

And, keeping up with the Wristcutters suicide theme, I’ve got another short review of a much less jaunty take on the subject — a great, incredibly and poetically sad, perfect little known early Louis Malle film, The Fire Within that Criterion just put out. Easily the most real film I’ve seen dealing with depression that was a strongly cathartic experience for me, I think. That one’s sticking with me.