Query
A new project has crossed my desk, one which will require me to familiarize myself with the Bollywood musical, a genre which with I am utterly unfamiliar. And so I turn to you, my hip, multiculturally-saturated readers, to educate me. What are the landmarks of the genre, the key works, the inarguable masterpieces? Who are the undisputed masters, whose filmography is unmissable, which stars express the purest expression of the form? As James Cameron is to action movies, as John Ford is to westerns, as Vincent Minnelli is to musicals, who best represents Bollywood?
I thank you in advance.
Eastwood report: Magnum Force
Magnum Force does the respectable sequel thing and turns the original on its head, or perhaps inside-out. If Dirty Harry is about society’s need to have tarnished knights who look out for the rights of the many, Magnum Force is about society’s need to be protected from those who would circumvent due process in their zeal to punish. In other words, it’s about Harry Callahan confronting the world he helped create in the original movie.
Eastwood report: The Beguiled
I gotta say, The Beguiled took me by surprise. It’s an extreme rarity for Eastwood, a movie that takes his character and puts him in a situation where he’s utterly out of his depth, where his skill set doesn’t serve him, and, most importantly, he doesn’t figure a way out of his troubles.
Natasha Richardson
I am shocked, nay, stricken by the news of the death of Natasha Richardson. Back in the 1980s, she was, all by herself, a good enough reason for me to go see a movie. I loved her as Mary Shelley in Ken Russell’s absolutely stark-raving-mad Gothic, then as Patty Hearst in Paul Schrader’s movie of the same name, then in The Handmaid’s Tale and again with Schrader in The Comfort of Strangers. I knew that if Natasha Richardson was in it, it was bound to be smart, daring and a little bit crazy. I regret not seeing her on stage in New York when I lived there and she doing O’Neill with Liam Neeson. I have nothing else to offer, except my deepest sympathy for her family.
Eastwood report: Coogan’s Bluff
It’s instructive, cinematically speaking, to watch Coogan’s Bluff and Dirty Harry back to back. A star/producer and a director, working in consonance, on modern-day urban police thrillers, three years apart, and yet Dirty Harry still rivets the viewer’s attention while Coogan creaks and groans.
Eastwood report: The Rookie
The Rookie is known these days as "The Movie Clint Eastwood Made Just Before Unforgiven." Looking back on it now, it almost seems designed as a supreme fake-out: knowing he had his masterpiece in his hip pocket, Eastwood lowered everyone’s expectations with this formulaic, rote cop-buddy movie.
Some more thoughts on Watchmen
I’ve been thinking a lot about Watchmen this week, which I think is a good sign, and paying attention to the online response to it. I’ve seen everything from "This movie is evil and you are evil if you want to see it" to "It puts me into a state of homosexual panic because it shows the penis of one of the characters" to "My favorite panel was not dramatized in the way I imagined and therefore Hollywood is evil and should be destroyed."
Eastwood report: Honkytonk Man
Honkytonk Man makes a nice companion piece to O Brother, Where Art Thou? Both tell stories about musicians making their way across the Depression-era South on their way to an important appointment, both are weak on plot yet high in thematically-resonant incident, both endeavor to reveal the character of a nation through an examination its music, and both feature 11th-hour graveside Negros who spontaneously burst into spirituals. The Depression-era South of Honkytonk Man is about 85% less kooky than the one in O Brother and its narrative aims to be about 75% quieter. Like many Eastwood movies, it ambles along at its unhurried pace as it scrutinizes its title character.
Blog fever — catch it!
Kriota Willberg, choreographer, anatomist and creator and co-director of The Bentfootes, now has a blog, in which she painstakingly analyzes movies from a medical perspective, with an accent on the fantastic. Could the events of Face/Off really happen? If so, how? What are the realities of the science of Fantastic Voyage, Young Frankenstein or Mr. Sardonicus? Only The Cinematologist knows.
Eastwood report: Any Which Way You Can
Pauline Kael, in her 1974 review of The Godfather Part II, remarked that the only sequels that are better than the originals are Huckleberry Finn and the New Testament. Ms. Kael, in her youthful ignorance, had of course not yet seen Any Which Way You Can, the sequel to Every Which Way But Loose that towers above its predecessor as Everest towers over Kilimanjaro.