TiVoPlex
By John Seal
June 22, 2004
From the obscure to the obscurest to the merely overlooked or underappreciated; they all have a home in the TiVoPlex! All times Pacific.
Tuesday 06/22/04
9:45am HBO Signature
Big Shot’s Funeral (2001 HK): I recommended this one sight-unseen a few months ago. Having now watched it, I can report that the film is surprisingly good. The film stars Donald Sutherland as a picky American director (probably modeled after Robert Altman) filming a costume epic on location in China. When producer Paul Mazursky shows up to convince Sutherland to pick up the pace or be fired, the auteur refuses to compromise and is replaced by a wet-behind-the-ears studio lackey. The film then spins off on a remarkable tangent about commercialism, as the despondent Sutherland sinks into a coma and has his anticipated funeral sponsored by a wide range of advertisers, including Ho Ho mineral water and the Outback Steakhouse (!). Chinese audiences were drawn to this by the presence of You Ge in the lead role as Yo Yo, a freelance cinematographer who organizes the funeral ceremonies with the unctuous Da Ying, but Western audiences will appreciate Sutherland’s performance here, as he eschews his penchant for phoned-in work and is clearly having a lot of fun. The more you know about Chinese culture and society, the more you’ll enjoy the film - which pokes fun at highbrow directors Zhang Yimou and Chen Kaige - but I liked it, and I’m no Chris Hyde.
1pm Fox Movie Channel
Kiss of Death (1947 USA): If one film sums up the postwar angst of a nation in search of new enemies and a renewed Manifest Destiny, it’s Kiss of Death. The leering, laughing character of Tommy Udo - portrayed brilliantly by Richard Widmark - was a slap in the face to peacetime America, an amoral loose cannon out for revenge against old-fashioned criminal Victor Mature, whose outdated ideas about right and wrong rub him the wrong way, especially after those ideas cause Udo to get sent up the river for a stretch. Mature is the lead in the film, and he delivers perhaps the finest performance of his career, but it’s Widmark everyone remembers, thanks to his encounter in a stairwell with an old lady in a wheelchair. Sharply directed by Henry Hathaway and blessed with a top-notch Ben Hecht script and great New York location photography, Kiss of Death remains one of the quintessential crime films of the late 1940s, and marked the beginning of a remarkable series of down-at-heel Widmark characters in noir classics, including Harry Fabian in Jules Dassin’s Night and the City and Skip McCoy in Sam Fuller’s Pickup on South Street. Also airs 6/24 at 3am.
Wednesday 06/23/04
9:30am HBO
Heir to an Execution (2004 USA): The historical record currently indicates that Julius Rosenberg probably gave the Soviet Union information, and that loyal wife Ethel was a bargaining chip used by brother David Greenglass to avoid prosecution. That's about as much background as one needs to appreciate and enjoy this deeply personal and very moving film about the aftereffects of the Rosenberg executions, and the worn-out "did they/didn't they" arguments are of only peripheral importance. Filled with fascinating interviews with the Rosenberg's children and a surprising number of elderly compatriots as well as some timely and frightening 1950s footage of anti-Communist hysteria, Heir to an Execution is an emotional attempt by director Ivy Meeropol (granddaughter of the convicted "spies") to come to terms with a dark chapter in her family history. Strongly recommended. Also airs at 12:30pm, 6/25 on HBO2 at 1pm, and 6/27 on HBO at 8:30am and 11:30am.
Thursday 06/24/04
12:55am Sundance
American Fabulous (1991 USA): Definitely not for all tastes, this is a very simple documentary that consists entirely of footage of a man sitting in a car. Really. Luckily, that man, Jeffrey Strouth, had some incredibly funny stories to tell about his life as an outcast and a gay man growing up in rural Ohio. Not all the stories hit the mark, but you’ll be hard-pressed not to laugh out loud at least once, and his enthusiasm and joie de vivre - no less amazing considering he was dead of AIDS before the film was released - will win over many viewers. Toothless drag queens, heroin, and potato salad all feature prominently in this fabulous salute to a man who lived life to the fullest.
4:15am Cinemax
The Molly Maguires (1970 USA): Though tending to the stodgy side - the film clocks in at an overindulgent 124 minutes - this story of intrigue in the coalfields of 1870s Pennsylvania is worth a look for those who like their fiction leavened with a serving of historical accuracy. Directed by Martin Ritt, The Molly Maguires stars Richard Harris as a Pinkerton man hired by the neighborhood robber barons in order to infiltrate the titular secret society of miners, whose thwarted efforts to unionize have led them to take up sabotage and militancy. Oligarchs and imperialists never learn, do they? The film is rich in period detail and does a fine job recreating the nasty, short and brutish lives of the emigrant Irish miners, and features Sean Connery in his first serious post-Bond performance as the leader of the angry proles. Co-starring Anthony Zerbe, Samantha Eggar, and Frank Finlay, The Molly Maguires also airs at 7:15am.
Friday 06/25/04
8am Turner Classic Movies
O’Shaughnessy’s Boy (1935 USA): TCM has a schedule chockablock with Big Top-themed films today, some of which I’ve recommended in past columns - most notably Charles Chaplin’s The Circus (1928) at 4:15am and Tod Browning’s Freaks (1932) at 6:45am - but this three-ring drama is arguably the most intriguing item on the agenda. Starring Wallace Beery as an animal tamer and child actor Jackie Cooper as his estranged son, O’Shaughnessy’s Boy details Beery’s search for his offspring after wife and circus acrobat Leona Maricle absconds with young Cooper (played somewhat confusingly in early scenes by Spanky McFarland) in order to save him from a life of roustabouting. Superbly shot by James Wong Howe and featuring a nasty turn by Sara Haden as Maricle’s scheming sister, this is a predictable but never boring weepie that was the last of six very popular Beery-Cooper couplings.
11pm Turner Classic Movies
The Seventh Seal (1957 SWE): This just in: The Seventh Seal is, in my humble opinion, one of the 100 or so greatest films of all time. Even folks with an aversion to director Ingmar Bergman’s work may grudgingly cut the morose one some slack when it comes to his riveting recreation of plague-ridden medieval Europe. Though it lacks the visceral thrills of 1960’s similarly-themed Virgin Spring (still shamefully unavailable on DVD), The Seventh Seal matches it for clammy chills and is guaranteed to stay with you for the rest of your life in some way, shape or form. Odds are that no one who’s seen is will ever forget Bengt Ekerot’s brilliant manifestation of Death, the black-robed, pallid spirit engaged in a metaphysical game of chess with Max Von Sydow’s back-from-the-Crusades knight, or the astonishing black-and-white cinematography of Gunnar Fischer. If you’ve never seen it and have even a passing interest in world cinema, tonight’s the night. No more excuses.
Saturday 06/26/04
1am HBO Signature
Los Lunes al Sol (2002 ESP-ITA-FRA): This week’s speculative pick, released oh-so-briefly last summer in the United States as Mondays in the Sun, stars the always-excellent Javier Bardem as an unemployed shipbuilder who hangs around in a bar with his buddies lamenting the outsourcing of their jobs to Korea. Doesn’t sound like the most promising of premises, but the film was Spain’s selected entry for the 2003 Academy Awards (it ultimately wasn’t nominated) and cleaned up at the Goyas.
4:30pm HBO
Sinbad: Legend of the Seven Seas (2003 USA): I’m going out on a sizable limb with this pick, but Sinbad: Legend of the Seven Seas was a bust at the box office, and most readers probably didn’t see it. However, some easily manipulated parents (who shall remain nameless in this column) occasionally get dragged to films they’d ordinarily avoid at all costs (hello, Catch That Kid; how you doin’, Garfield?), but every now and then one of these kiddie epics turns out to be, well, not as bad as anticipated. Recent examples would include The Emperor’s New Groove (I’d still like to know how they came up with that title), Treasure Planet, Teacher’s Pet, and - of course - this big-budget animated fantasy featuring the voice of Brad Pitt as seafaring hero Sinbad. Though no overlooked classic (paging Iron Giant), Legend of the Seven Seas is a pleasant surprise that was unfairly treated by the critics and deserved a much wider audience than the one it got. The story - revolving around the acquisition of a magical volume entitled The Book of Peace - is unremarkable but serviceable, the voice talent impressive, and the hand-drawn animation stunning. There’s not much else on tonight, so why not take a look at the film that single-handedly put the kibosh on DreamWorks', er, dreams of operating their own high-powered animation division. It’s making its television debut this evening and also airs at 7:30pm and 6/28 on HBO Family at 4pm and 7pm.
Sunday 06/27/04
12:30am Turner Classic Movies
I Do (1921 USA): Originally a three-reeler cut down to two by director-star Harold Lloyd, I Do is one of the silent master’s forgotten films, though with its impending digital resurrection as part of Kino’s Slapstick Symposium collection, that may be about to change. The film features Harold as the henpecked child-minder of his two appalling nephews, who - amongst other transgressions - nail his slippers to the floor and hide his booze in a baby carriage. It’s followed at 1am by 1924’s feature-length Hot Water, which stars Lloyd as a new husband contending with truculent in-laws, uncooperative automobiles, and a turkey in a streetcar. Really.
Monday 06/28/04
5:05am Encore Mystery
Women’s Prison (1955 USA): The granddaddy - or should that be grandma? - of the women-behind-bars sub-genre, Women’s Prison stars Ida Lupino as the brutal wardress of a correctional facility for wayward females. Chronologically, the film came five years after John Cromwell’s Caged (1950), but this was the first film to truly try to leverage the exploitation value of catfights, prison brutality, and veiled lesbianism, and really can’t be compared to the serious, neo-realist approach of its predecessor. So there’s not much redeeming social value on display here, just plenty of entertainment courtesy of Lupino and her cast of inmates, including Audrey Totter, Phyllis Thaxter, and Warren Stevens (who breaks in from the neighboring men’s lockup, in case you’re wondering). Lupino’s real-life spouse Howard Duff is on hand as the concerned but cautious prison doctor, and old-timer Mae Clarke puts in an appearance as one of the matrons. If you ever wondered where films like Ilsa: She Wolf of the S.S., The Big Bird Cage, and Violence in a Women’s Prison got their ideas from, look no further. Also airs at 5pm.
1pm Turner Classic Movies
The Trouble With Harry (1955 USA): One of Alfred Hitchcock’s lesser-known films, The Trouble With Harry is also one of his few out-and-out attempts at a comedy. This being Hitch, of course, it’s a very dark comedy, but one filled with plenty of mirthful moments nonetheless. Since the film bombed at the box office during its initial run - apparently a title character who was dead from the start of the film was a bridge too far for middle America - it’s languished in semi-obscurity, and continues to divide Hitchcock fans, many of whom loathe it. Set in the bucolic backwoods of rural New England, the film stars Edmund Gwenn, John Forsythe, and Mildred Natwick as locals who can’t quite figure out how to keep Harry’s body from popping up without attracting the attention of local sheriff Royal Dano and implicating themselves in his demise. The Trouble With Harry can, perhaps, be considered a through-the-looking glass reinterpretation of Hitchcock’s 1948 flop Rope; in that film, two murderers try to conceal their victim from a roomful of inquisitive eyes. In this one, a town full of innocents try to conceal Harry from each other whilst trying to solve the crime (if, indeed, a crime has been committed at all). This film also marked the first collaboration between Hitchcock and composer Bernard Herrmann, and includes the screen debut of Shirley MacLaine as a guileless local mother whose cute but meddlesome child is portrayed by the Beaver, Jerry Mathers.
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