Just Watch.

Mad Men Season 4, Episode 5

Just to keep you updated with what's going on: I've seen episode 4 but not episode 3. This and the lack of write-ups has been due to some frustrating computer problems. I will recap the missing episodes before next week. Apologies for any inconvenience. So on to tonight's episode: love Don's new secretary. Faced with a Times reporter, Don deals with the most uncomfortable situation of answering for himself, something he thinks he's above. When in doubt, denigrate: I've never heard of him. Honda is introduced as a potential new client. Roger displays some wartime anti-Japanese sentiment, further cementing his dinosaur status. The others decide wisely but possibly unfeasibly (hopefully, for narrative purposes) to keep him out of the loop. Phoebe's back, relegated to the sexual reject role of babysitter. (Alternately, maybe she personally decided against repeating the patterns of her alcoholic Daddy.) Don is going on a date on one of his nights with the kids. My first thought was what a horrible father, but we all know I have a weak spot for Mr. D, and I realize that at this point the paradigm of single fatherhood has yet to be well established, and he's a bit moorless here And guess who the date's with? Betty Draper 2.0, aka that no-putting-out chick Roger and Jane set him up with. At least we know Don is taking it not too seriously: three dates in five months or something like that. Credit to Weiner & Co. for showing in just a few short lines what a disastrous marriage this would be. Interestingly, problems of trying to separate/integrate work and marriage rear their heads here, as they did in the Don/Betty marriage. . Meanwhile, Sally's gotten herself a short 'do and a rudimentary, somewhat confused notion of sex. In a great line, Phoebe tells Sally she (Phoebe) is in more trouble than Sally is. It points to the near future: Sally will have more freedom and choices than Phoebe's generation ever had. "Why the he'll would she do that?" Don responds to Sally's coiffure. I always felt a strong sense of simpatico between father and daughter; I expected at least an inkling of understanding here. Perhaps gender and generational gaps are at play, but this show always struck me as more nuanced than that. Betty expectedly acts like a total bitch when she finds out, and Don quite rightly and boldly calls her out of it. In typical Betty fashion she makes it all about her, though it quickly devolves into divorced parents bickering over respective parenting styles. Though we have sexually derided the Betty- Henry marriage (it's true I forgot about that sex in the garage scene, but then it struck me as largely forgettable; just because it's in a semi-exotic locale don't make it hot) he does seem to have a mellow, tempering effect on her It'll be interesting to see how far he can take this. The visit from the Honda folks provides an early look at Western-Asian relations. Joan once again proves her weight in gold by not sending them to Benihana. Of course Pete blows his advantage by blowing the delicate art of gifts and then Roger completely kamikazes the situation (pardon the pun) in a scene that demonstrates everything that continually disappoints me about him even though I love him. Yet his monologue shows us there is honor and dignity and feeling in his racism, one of the best "racists are people too" speeches I've ever seen on television. However Don, in a moment revealing the depth respect and honesty of their relationship, clearly at least somewhat mended after some tensions, delivers him the tough truth that Pete's right in this case Speculations on the Betty/Henry sex life and its future abound as we're treated to a coitus interruptus moment. In the episode's most wonderful scene, we're treated to Sally's tentative experiments with masturbation, aided, I believe, by the Prisoner. (Someone with experience of that show will have to speak to its sexual allure or lack thereof.) Kiernan Shipka is such a fantastically responsive and intuitive actress, and the scene is handled brilliantly; it feels beautiful, wondrous, and completely free of shame. She gets caught, Betty flips out and makes it all about her and public appearances; what will the neighbors think? Also the prevailing pre-60s attitude that these things are done privately but certainly not publicly. (Implied but not spoken is that boys do it but girls don't.) This scene reminded me of the one where Sally gets caught smooching the neighbor boy last season and Betty advises her to (in very Betty-like fashion) to erase the incident from her memory and start over, remembering a first kiss as a moment of lovely pearled net innocence, never to be captured (or perhaps even bested) again. Sally's response: "But it's already over with." My response was a resounding "Attagirl Sally, way to strike a blow against the mystification of virginity and for the claiming of sexual pleasure. (It was actually that moment that made me want to blog the show in the first place.) Anyway the two scenes together made me realize that a) cultural changes and shifts in mores start occurring way before the external cultural indications of them start occurring and b) beyond being just a product of her generation, Sally Draper is a helluva girl. The other thing that this whole affair made me think of was can you imagine how much harder it was to get off back then, in the days before Skinemax? No matter how sexy The Prisoner is, I just can't imagine getting off to a primetime TV show; I'd need something more explicit. You had to be much braver and sneakier to get that stuff, and again if you were a girl it was even harder. For me the onset of orgasm would have been delayed considerably, and I actually still think this is a problem impacting heterosexual relations. Sally's incident(s) apparently require a therapist. Betty tells Henry she's been to therapy but remains reticent about it; she's still unable to makeherself completely vulnerable before her husband. This speaks poorly to her ability to conduct a good marriage or (for those of us still keeping score) a healthy sex life. In a great little Bertram scene, we see him display his knowledge of the Byzantine intricacies of Asian politesse. Roger enters and agrees to swallow his pride and deal with the Honda people, all the while still managing to act like a turd. Don, with that sexy evil glint in his eye, suggests Honda might like some American pizazz. We also get our second Mad-Men-inspired ad, this time for Klondike Bars. Pokes a little fun at our dudes, which perhaps they deserve. The experience led me to wonder if a show about advertising leads to better ads during said show. I noticed my dad, a notorious and vigorous muter of commercials during TV shows, does so less often during this one. Don and Betty have a predictably acrimonious conversation about the Sally situation. Of interesting historical note : the term "masturbation" is used. Don, either highly attuned to nuanced or displaying a stubborn male literalism (or perhaps both) asks if Sally was doing it in front of a boy or girl. Don's evil plan: pretend they're doing a commercial to prod the agencies into making them too, thus breaking the rules and losing face. Me likey. God I love evil genius Don. For eye and brain candy purposes, we get to see evil genius efficient Joan in action, wearing that killa dress from Episode 1 no less. We see the guys from the other agencies come up with totL idiot cliche ideas, the kind of stuff Don hates. Fake commercial time. We see Peggy on a scooter which is quite a fun sexy little image. Mod Peggy; it's like a spinoff for a whole awesome new series. Joan, on the other hand, you have to picture as the Anna Magnani type. Pencil skirts and tight sweaters and alternately dancing the tarantella sensually and nobly suffering and enduring. I can't decide whether Don's drinking is becoming a thing or not. Don and Female Don Draper talk in the office kitchen; he opens up to her about how lost he feels as a single Dad. It's unclear if this conversation means anything significant to a woman who listens to people professionally. This could go somewhere interesting, but as much as I love (and let's be honest, lust after) is a match for her or even deserves her. In an intimate conversation, Betty seems to come close to skimming the surface of her Daddy issues. How much has she transferred them onto Henry? Betty meets Dr. Edna, the child psychiatrist. Again the embarrassment of it happening in public, again making it all about Betty: she's punishing me (that part actually could be true.) Edna, the sympatheic ear Betty truly needs, says that must be a terrible feeling. Dr. Edna is also astute enough to note that Betts should seek her own neurological help pronto, though this is of course summarily dismissed. There's a moment with Betty staring wistfully at a dollhouse in Dr. Edna's office which struck me as a little cliched and obvious for this show. Don, the wily fox, totally plays the Honda guys, pretending to bow out of the running due to the unlevel playing field he himself engineered. Another great scene between Roger and Joan. She's understanding but grants him no self-pity on his war record or feelings of ages. In a wonderfully underplayed moment, she shows her hand to him for perhaps the first time, explaining that deploying a willful optimism is a survival mechanism he heretofore had no clue that she needed. The result of Don's power play is that SCDP will have first crack at Honda's new line of cars, derided as basically motorbikes with windows. Lane jokes that the advantage is you can see your brains splattered across the screen, reminding me why I love him. Dr. Edna's waiting room. Carla's back, yay The closing title music is "I Enjoy Being A Girl," another brilliantly ironically inspired choice from this show. For me this was the strongest episode of the series so far for me, perhaps because personally the pieces all fit together beautifully lucidly.

Where's The Mad Men Post?

So Sunday night I got a little wrapped up in Infinite Jest and totally forgot what I was supposed to be watching. I kept hoping to catch a repeat but missed those too. I am downloading from iTunes this very as we speak. I have a busy couple days but I'll squeeze in at least one viewing and have a recap (or whatever you want to call it) at least before the new episode airs.

Sorry.

October

Sergei Einstein, 1928

I've been watching a chockful of Eisensteins lately -- both Ivans, Alexander Nevsky -- hoping they would match the masterful strokes of Potemkin. October, ostensibly celebrating the 10th anniversary of the Russian Revolution is the only one that comes very close.

October prides itself on it's accuracy -- filmed inside the actual Winter Palace with the cooperation of those revolutionary guard who were actually involved -- but in the most major, obvious way October lacks the courage of it's convictions. Revolution, no matter how necessarily and noble, often requires terrible and brutal sacrifice. Sparing the viewer the execution of the Romanovs whitewashed and diminishes what was achieved.

Aside from the whole "Bang bang he shot me down," element, I would guess that October captures the political aspects of the Revolution with at least a feeling if not a degree of accuracy. I studied all this in 9th grade but most of it washed over me here. I almost think it's better that way; you get the abstract oblique notions of strife discord and momentum build and wash over you, aided and augmented by the montage of Eisenstein's eccentric twisted faces of the common man. And as always Eisenstein's acute sense of construction and momentum sweeps you along in the emotion of the story even if you don't fully grasp the ramifications .

The Tramp's Finest Hour

"The Kid," Charlie Chaplin, dir., 1921

I use that title phrase more in the Scott Pilgrim sense of the term, rather than to indicate that this is Chaplin's best picture.

Though by no means up to the amped-up-to-eleven pathos and tragedy of Limelight,this film does share that one's ability to highlight Chaplin virtues beyond the joys of slapstick, most notably the multi-faceted elements of the tramp. On the one hand he displays an almost hard-wired allergy to hard work and responsibility, on the other a profound and instantly communicable sense of heart and empathy. Furthermore he will at times demonstrate a wildly, manic inventive side that sets a fire under his will to survive.

This last skill takes on an unusual bent in this film, where the Tramp finds an abandoned baby and takes the child under his wing. Faced with the responsibility of parenthood, we see him take on his new charge with this own charmingly inventive take on the parental version of the Levi-Straussian bricoleur, cutting up new diapers, fashioning a hammock/bassinet, and gerry-rigging a baby bottle out of a coffee pot tied up with string. I think scenes like these have two functions, seemingly incongruous: first we laugh at the apparent ineptitude of the Tramp's child-rearing skills, but I think the real parents feel a palpable sense of recognition and acknowledge that parenting is all about having crazy (sometimes literal) shit thrown at you and having to come up with solutions on the fly.

Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles

Chantal Akerman, 1975

Hmmm, this is a kind of...well, significant movie I guess you'd say and I'm feeling a little crazy lately so thigs could get weird.

First off, something you should know about me going into this one. I have, as I mentioned, been reading Infinite Jest, a major premise of which is that our national obsession with entertainment (particularly in filmic form) is decidededly Not. Good. For. Us.

Now despite (or more likely, because of) my personal obsessions and affinities, I feel that there is some profound truth behind this assertion. And while this affirms developments in certain areas of my life, I am faced with a certain feeling of panic that the (right now) central and ruling passion of my life is basically a fool's paradise that will only lead me into the arms of rapidly cycling, repetitious misery. (Adding not insignificantly to my fretfulness is the fact that the community of film scholars is treated not exactly derisively but with more than a touch of ridicule in the book.)

On my more equivocal days I can comfort myself with the notions that certain films have know been very decidedly ensconced as art, and I've sort of made it my job to discern the thematics and stylistic elements that elevate certain films beyond the level of mere entertainment. On the other hand, there's this sort of paradox developing in me as a viewer where my sensibilities are becoming more demanding and refined but at the same time a very stubborn insistence that a film must be interesting to watch has developed within me. And then I realized that the experience I had been seeking -- the one I finally experienced watching Limelight -- was one of being thoroughly captivated, moved and... well, entertained. And because I don't have an incredibly strong sense of self and am highly suggestible, I thought "Oh shit, is my whole life in some serious trouble here?"

Which is about when denial and the old defense mechanism kicked in: Film can be moralistic and edifying! I shall show you, Wallace! I know what I'll do! I'll watch Jeanne Dielman! And that's how I went into this film, thinking of it as the most boring and punitive movie I could imagine, and hoping that fact alone would lead to some sort of morally or spiritual experience.

Limelight

Charlie Chaplin, 1952

This was it, kids. This. Was. It.

By that I mean two different things. First of all, on the Film Forum site I read this blurb from Andrew Sarris saying basically Chaplin is the single most important personality ever to come out of the cinema. My initial response was "whoa there, big talk" but I couldn't necessarily think of anyone bigger. Well this was the film that thoroughly convinced me of Chaplin's genius. While recent experience has suggested to me that one ought not overanalyze such a come to Jesus moment (if you will), I'll tempt fate and say I think it's because the slapstick isn't really present, so everything else comes to the forefront and really flourishes.

Also: I've been fretting and kvetching (mainly to myself, not too much to you I hope) that I haven't been thoroughly moved by a (new) movie in a really long time. This was the one that reached out with both hands and grabbed me by the gut. Watching this film was absolutely fucking excruciating and I was so grateful for it. It's kind of like unrequited love; yeah it blows but in a way you're just happy to be feeling those feelings again. 

Though to my mind a bit of a lesser film (not much of a dig when going up against my tied-for-number-1-of-all-time), Limelight traverses much of the same territory as Children of Paradise (and yes, I realize I now have to write about that one as it risks bleeding into every other post on the site.) While Children actually has many main characters, one of them, like Chaplin's Calvero here, is a famous, accomplished clown and the profession opens up several thematic avenues, namely what does it mean to have high art aspirations in a field where people just want to see you fall on your ass? The mutually driving and inspiring relationships between love and art are also explored, often to quite heartbreaking effect.

There's something going on here that I can't quite parse out. We're led to believe from all outside sources that Calvero is over the hill and no longer funny. The only time we really see his routines are in dream sequences; they have an old vaudeville feel to them (this is the era the film was set in) and while they don't teach the heights of Chaplin's great slapstick set pieces, they work admirably. It doesn't always come out but sometimes Chaplin displays a surprising eye for dialogue; he has a way with the subtle put-down, and some banter between him and Claire Bloom's suicidal dancer in one routine shines with real charm. Are we supposed to be laughing here or not? Is this just an excuse for subpar comedy or is it a dark furthering of the sad clown motif? The film's big finale features an "encore" performed by Calvero and another old clown played by Buster Keaton. Getting two giants like these together you expect something utterly riotous; it doesn't quite reach those heights but still at times touches the sublime.

Peek Into My Private Correspondence

This is basically because I'm too lazy to do a proper post write now. Well not too lazy exactly. It just seems like sometimes putting the amount of time I'd like to into this project and having a social life are completely at odds. Like I get out of seeing a great movie, and I think I need to walk home so I have some time to process it, and then I bump into someone on the sidewalk and we spend like two hours having this amazing conversation and then by the time I get home I think "Jesus it's ungodly hot outside and if I don't have some diet 7-Up and a double-lime popsicle and put my feet up post-haste I'm going to be in trouble." And then you fall asleep and you get up and you've got to associate with some other characters and you think "Where does the time go?" but you're not actually doing that much, technically speaking. Sigh.

So while this is slightly lazy, it nonetheless touches on a topic that is important to me.

My father sent me this article, some more (if thoughtful) musing on the long tortuous death of the romantic comedy.

The Circus

Charlie Chaplin, 1928

You know, it's hard to get motivated to write these posts when Alan Vanneman does it so much better than I do over at Bright Lights. In his piece, he posits that Garcia (Pierre Revel), the brutish, frustrated circus director in this film, is a caricature of Chaplin himself:

Chaplin liked to fantasize about being an imperturbable homme du monde in the manner of Adolphe [Menjou]/Pierre,  but he was surely aware that his paranoid manic-depressive lifestyle was scarcely sans souci, and it's not hard to imagine that Garcia's character is a shrewd, bitter self-portrait — Charlie as a tiny, willful king, reigning over a pathetic kingdom of overweight leading ladies  and fat, old, unfunny clowns.

I never even though of that! And one of my favorite movies, Lola Montes, is all about a circus where everything is a metaphor! Also, I never thought to think about the spectacle put on in Children of Paradise as a circus; I wonder if it will change my perspective on the film. (I must write about that one of these days to My Five Favorite Movies If I'm Forced at Gunpoint to Choose.)

Taking a look at my approach to Chaplin, I think the problem stems from the fact that I focused on two (admittedly important) things, the gags and the emotional side, and I threw everything out. (It's true there's not much focus on camera work, editing, and lighting here; the technique only functions to put the gag to best display, which is fine.) I don't know why I didn't look for what Zizek saw in the ending of City Lights. It's times like these that I get paranoid and worry I'm not insightful enough to do this properly.

Netflix calls this one of Chaplin's little-known features; a new print just ran at the Film Forum and it also played at MoMA, so one can presume this is changing. If any other director had made this film, it would be hilarious; as it is, it falls just short of the mark of the great comic set pieces in Modern Times and The Gold Rush. 

The Circus

Charlie Chaplin, 1928

You know, it's hard to get motivated to write these posts when Alan Vanneman does it so much better than I do over at Bright Lights. In his piece, he posits that Garcia (Pierre Revel), the brutish, frustrated circus director in this film, is a caricature of Chaplin himself:

Chaplin liked to fantasize about being an imperturbable homme du monde in the manner of Adolphe [Menjou]/Pierre,  but he was surely aware that his paranoid manic-depressive lifestyle was scarcely sans souci, and it's not hard to imagine that Garcia's character is a shrewd, bitter self-portrait — Charlie as a tiny, willful king, reigning over a pathetic kingdom of overweight leading ladies  and fat, old, unfunny clowns.

I never even though of that! And one of my favorite movies, Lola Montes, is all about a circus where everything is a metaphor! Also, I never thought to think about the spectacle put on in Children of Paradise as a circus; I wonder if it will change my perspective on the film. (I must write about that one of these days to My Five Favorite Movies If I'm Forced at Gunpoint to Choose.)

Taking a look at my approach to Chaplin, I think the problem stems from the fact that I focused on two (admittedly important) things, the gags and the emotional side, and I threw everything out. (It's true there's not much focus on camera work, editing, and lighting here; the technique only functions to put the gag to best display, which is fine.) I don't know why I didn't look for what Zizek saw in the ending of City Lights. It's times like these that I get paranoid and worry I'm not insightful enough to do this properly.

Netflix calls this one of Chaplin's little-known features; a new print just ran at the Film Forum and it also played at MoMA, so one can presume this is changing. If any other director had made this film, it would be hilarious; as it is, it falls just short of the mark of the great comic set pieces in Modern Times and The Gold Rush. 

Day of the Dead

George A. Romero, 1985

Note: As I believe I've already mentioned, in July I watched a lot (read: four a day) films over about a two week-period. This is the first of what may be a series of shorter posts about those films, which I didn't take notes on and can't recall in great detail.

Sometime in I believe my sophomore year (or, as we called it at the University of Chicago, second year) of college, I was waxing on about how great Dawn of the Dead (original) was, which I'd just seen for the first time. Then my friend Dan, who's impossibly cool in a geeky but definitely pre-hipster sort of way, piped in enthusiastically "Have you seen Day of the Dead?" "No, I said," shamefacedly, schooled in the cool. "Dude, that's the best one." "Really?" I said, excited for what was still ahead of me. "Oh yeah he said," nodding and closing his eyes stolidly like some kind of sage. 

Well now that I've finally gotten around to it, my memory of the first two (even though I own them) is so distant that I can't really tell you whether I agree with Dan's assessment or not; all I can say is that Day is really quite excellent. Watching it you see how Romero not just influenced, but single-handedly created the entire world of current zombie movies. The insane military troop who attempt to conscript the heroines as breed mares in 28 Days Later clearly derive from the cretinous army forces here. I actually sort of wondered if they weren't a little bit too awful, but you need it for what's coming later to be truly satisfying.

Romero is also known for really opening up the possibilities of what a horror film could be with his sensitivity to issues of race and class. Here he shows those cards again, featuring a diverse cast and treating one interracial romance and the possibility of another like they're no big deal. He also show's a really incredible awareness of gender, all the more so for the fact that he, you know, has a penis. (Actually, I don't know if that in and of itself makes this quality in him more remarkable. I mean, Max Ophuls existed in this world and thank God he did. People, regardless of the kind of heat they're packing, are either sensitive to the vicissitudes of the human condition or you're not, and the difference will definitely show in your filmmaking. Of course, people who show a true appreciation and understanding of, and empathy for the opposite sex -- it runs both ways, ladies, if you want to get it, give it -- are far thinner on the ground than they should be.)