The Screengrab : mr. smith goes to washington

Screengrab's Top Guilty Pleasures (Part Four)

Andrew Osborne — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 22:30:00 GMT

HAYDEN CHILDS' GUILTY PLEASURES:

ROCK 'N' ROLL HIGH SCHOOL (1979)

I'm generally bad at guilty pleasures lists because I'm not really embarrassed about my taste in pop culture, bad or good. However, some more serious-minded movie critics might mock my love of these movies. So, for your pleasure, instead of just laughing them off, here's why I like these movies. Rock & Roll High School is a Roger Corman film starring P.J. Soles as the world's biggest Ramones fan, Riff Randall. It's directed by Allan Arkush, who went on to helm such thoughtful, profound movies as Heartbeeps and Caddyshack II. Mary Woronov, the former Velvet Underground/Exploding Plastic Inevitable dancer, plays the tyrannical Principal Togar. And the Ramones play the most awesome and beloved band in the world. In the real world, they were indeed awesome, but nowhere as beloved as this movie indicates, which is what we in the business call "a crying shame." Anyway, Principal Togar has boundary issues and enjoys burning albums and generally overstepping her authority. So when the Ramones arrive in town, all hell breaks loose at her school. There's a subplot about a pretty nerdy girl getting the dorky jock guy, but it's slight enough to pass by without sticking to memory. What's important: footage of The Ramones in their prime. And then the school explodes (spoiler!).

HIGH PLAINS DRIFTER (1973)

I seem to love this movie, which is a mostly indefensible horror-Western starring Clint Eastwood. See, this town's got some bad mojo because they paid some bad dudes to kill off a crusading sheriff and then they double-crossed the bad dudes. And now, a few years later, the bad dudes are getting out of prison. Who could have foreseen this? Since when have prison terms come to an end? So, Eastwood appears out of nowhere at the beginning of the movie and immediately starts killing men and raping women because he's a real man, not some namby-pamby liberal who doesn't kill and rape. Naturally, the townsfolk decide that this guy is the guy to help them beat the bad dudes (this is also the reasoning behind the PATRIOT Act), and they go along with his increasingly insane demands because... uh, I don't know. One guy balks and Eastwood kills him, too, so I guess they're scared or something. Eastwood's character is never named, and the end of the movie suggests that he is either a supernatural entity or a semi-famous celebrity with a high opinion of himself. The supernatural angle ought to be some comfort to the women he raped in town, because ghost-rapes don't count. Or so says Camille Paglia. In the swinging spirit of bad '70s movies, both of the women are really into him after he, y'know, violates them anyway. Progressive! So, yeah, this movie is indefensible. And pretty dumb. And yet I watch some of it every single time I catch it playing on TV, which is pretty much every third night. Does this make me a bad person? My religion of choice says yes. Another note: the Wikipedia page for the film includes a picture of Eastwood on his horse with the helpful subtitle, "The stranger on the white horse is symbolic." Thanks, Wikipedia! You're the best.

MR. SMITH GOES TO WASHINGTON (1939)

Li'l Jimmy Stewart is a golden-hearted guy with a heart of gold. And I don't know if I mentioned it, but he's a guy. This movie takes place in the 1930s, and only white guys like Li'l Jimmy could be Senators in the 1930s. And most were! At least, those that didn't live in Hoovervilles. The upper crust, if you know what I mean. Our humble director Frank Capra believes the best of the common upper-crust man, or at least, he knows that people will pay good money to hear that they're better than those fat cats in Washington. So Li'l Jimmy (known as Mr. Smith in this movie) goes to Washington as a Senator. But those bad fat cats are up to something nefarious. Something to do with earmarks or bridges to unknown destinations or some fat-cat stuff like that. But they didn't count on Mr. Smith and his golden-hearted maverick ways! Although we don't know what party (Republican!) Mr. Smith is in (Republican!), he bucks the fat cats in a crazy, awe-inspiring filibuster. Yes, a filibuster! The parliamentary procedure whereby a legislator talks for an infinite number of hours about anything that strikes them. It's crazy and awe-inspiring, I say! And much better in montage than real time. Anyway, blah blah maverick blah. After 45 straight days of talking (while the awestruck galleries fill up with spectators, because what person in their right mind could resist an extremely privileged white guy talking about whatever comes to mind for hours upon hours? I get chills just thinking about it), Li'l Jimmy is turning into a broken shell of a man. But then! The indulgent Vice-President presiding over the Senate (or is he the Senate Majority Leader? I don't know. Or care.) smiles at him. And IT'S ON! Suddenly Boy Scout-proxies are trumpeting the news all over his state! And in the face of his waning blather, all the bad-guy fat-cats admit that their earmarks are no match for his mavericky ways and then they all cheer and elect Sarah Palin to be President. WOW! Someone give this movie an award!

Shoot, I forgot to say what I like about all this hokum. But I think the clip says it better than I could.

HOOPER (1978)

In the coveted Oscar category of Burt Reynolds Movies Involving Rocket Cars, there's little that can stand up to Hooper. Directed by former stuntman Hal Needham and starring Reynolds, Sally Field, Jan-Michael Vincent, Brian Keith, and Robert Klein, it's an attempt to recapture the successful hicksploitation (thanks for the term, Scott!) of the previous year's Smokey And The Bandit. Reynolds plays the greatest stuntman who's ever lived, who finds himself being pushed into an extensive stunt involving multiple explosions and the aforementioned rocket car. Despite the constant jokey macho bullshit in the movie, Hooper features a surprisingly tender and complex relationship between Reynolds and Field. And there's a lot of darkness in the depiction of the downside of stuntman life. Who would have guessed that constantly hurting yourself and risking danger could have potentially dire consequences? Not me.

SWEET TALKER (1991)

I've never actually seen this Aussie romantic comedy starring Karen Allen during her lost years, but the soundtrack was composed and performed by cult musician Richard Thompson. Coincidentally, I wrote a book about an album by Mr. Thompson and his ex-wife called Shoot Out The Lights and, seeing as how the holiday season is almost upon us, I thought I would mention it here. Self-promotion: the guiltiest pleasure of all!

Click Here For More Guilt From Andrew Osborne, Scott Von Doviak, Leonard Pierce, Vadim Rizov & Sarah Clyne Sundberg

Contributor: Hayden Childs

America the Beautiful: 15 Movies That Show What's Right With U.S. (Part Two)

Andrew Osborne — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 20:30:00 GMT

THE RIGHT STUFF (1983)

The title of Tom Wolfe's book refers to the ineffable, super-American quality that Wolfe attributed to the anonymous test pilots who paved the way for the NASA space program -- whose stars, the Apollo astronauts, Wolfe depicted as media puppets by comparison. Phil Kaufman's movie version hangs onto the romantic mythology of the test pilots and treats the astronauts' public packaging as comedy, but it also honors the astronauts as real heroes who, by learning to play the media and sticking together to face down the bureaucrats and the scientists with the Dr. Strangelove accents, proved their mettle and created a new kind of savvy icon for the TV age. Amazingly, this satiric yet stirring popcorn epic wasn't much of a hit in theaters but has since achieved classic status as a home video perennial. It has so many high points that it's practically made for the rewind button.

SOMETHING WILD (1986)

Jonathan Demme's road movie/screwball romance crams every getaway fantasy destination you can think of into one wild weekend: shanghaied from his lunch hour by Lulu, the boho funk priestess (Melanie Griffith) in the thrift shop accouterments and Louise Brooks 'do, Charlie the office drone (Jeff Daniels) stops by the liquor store, gets screwed to within an inch of his life in the roadside motel, meets his new flame's mom, hits the dance floor during the high school reunion, and barely makes it home Monday morning with the small town sociopath (Ray Liotta) in hot pursuit. Demme keeps things fresh with the jumping soundtrack and the crowded supporting cast, which includes fellow directors (among them John Waters, perfectly cast as a used car salesman) and faces from other Demme movies (such as Steve Scales, from Stop Making Sense, as a tourist-shop cashier who offers Daniels the sage advice, "Charlie, attempt to be cool."). They don't just liven up the screen; the way Demme uses them, the many bit players passing through suggest the variety of life that you pass by and rub up against in just a couple of days spent on the American road. The movie seems to be hinting at a hundred other stories that are out there, ready to be told; the camera just happened to latch onto Charlie and Lulu first.

O BROTHER, WHERE ART THOU? (2000)

Just your typical Depression-era musical comedy based on Homer's Odyssey, O Brother Where Art Thou is often dismissed as one of the Coen Brothers' sillier efforts. Well, sure, it is pretty silly at times, but it's also the Coens' richest, most satisfying serving of pure Americana to date. While Blood Simple, Raising Arizona, Miller's Crossing and Fargo had drilled into very specific subcultures, regionalisms and genres, O Brother is as expansive as the American South itself – a melting pot of prison flicks, road movies, musicals, social issue pictures and screwball comedies. From the golden-hued landscapes beautifully photographed by Roger Deakins (and later computer-enhanced) to corny-but-right images like a pie cooling on a windowsill to the Ku Klux Klan/Wizard of Oz mash-up that might have been disastrously offensive in the hands of less skilled filmmakers, the movie is a technical marvel. But more than that, it's a love letter to the pure American music forms of folk, country and blues – the Harry Smith Anthology come to life. And in moments as when the casually integrated Soggy Bottom Boys take the stage to a raucous ovation from an audience that literally runs a racist politician out of town on a rail, it's a celebration of community, holding a cracked mirror up to the best aspects of our national character.

DAVE (1993)

Like all nations, the U.S. has its share of assholes, but even our critics generally concede that Americans, by and large, are basically decent people: optimistic, can-do types, generally willing to help out and do the right thing, especially when our leaders quit pandering to our fear and greed and inspire us to roll up our sleeves and achieve worthy goals. Of course, for all the talk of elites, political insiders, change and the American mainstream in the current election, no president, congressman or media pundit is ever really an average citizen, living as they do in a bubble of power and privilege the nation’s true average Joes (and Daves) can only dream about...which is part of what makes Ivan Reitman’s good-natured political comedy so appealing. Released during the honeymoon period of the Clinton administration, when Bubba was still viewed as a charming, sax-playing, fast-food noshing everyman, Dave tells the story of part-time presidential impersonator Dave Kovic (Kevin Kline) who winds up in the Oval Office after the real president (Kline again) suffers a stroke while cheating on his imperious wife (Sigourney Weaver). Oily, Cheney-esque chief-of-staff Bob Alexander (Frank Langella) arranges the charade, intending to use Kovic as a puppet mouthpiece for his own agenda, but the plan goes awry when the impersonator starts acting more presidential than the corrupt president he started off imitating, using his newfound power to actually, y’know, help and support the American people rather than fleecing them like a vast herd of sheep. After outsmarting Alexander, romancing the First Lady and ensuring that a conveniently upstanding deus ex machina of a vice president (Ben Kingsley) will take his place, Kovic leaves the White House behind and returns to his regular life, where he decides to run for his local city council, echoing the film’s underlying message that our government functions best when our best people are in government.

MR. SMITH GOES TO WASHINGTON (1939)

He's often cited as America's most patriotic filmmaker, and there's no doubt that to a certain degree, Frank Capra – born in Sicily, and the very image of an immigrant boy made good – deserves the title. But most of his films aren't simply pro-American jingoism: they're patriotic in the truest sense, in that they recognize the flaws of Capra's adopted country and seek to address them, never pretending that this isn't a nation with profound problems, but likewise never succumbing to cynicism and always holding out the hope that even one individual can make a difference. Nowhere is this more evident than in the wonderful Mr. Smith Goes to Washington. Although today, the film – buoyed by a tremendously charismatic performance by Jimmy Stewart as the naïve but determined junior senator Jefferson Smith – is considered a classic depiction of grass-roots democracy and the way the little guy can succeed in his struggle against entrenched forces, it wasn't quite so warmly received at the time. Since Capra didn't flinch from portraying Washington as a deeply corrupt place full of crooked politicians and smear merchants, both Democrats and Republicans denounced it as a vicious attack on our noble democracy; some even pegged Capra as a communist agitator determined to stir up trouble. But in the end, the image of Sen. Smith's desperate filibuster has stayed with us as a lasting reminder of Capra's philosophy that one man, no matter how many forces are arrayed against him, can triumph against evil – and what could be more American than that?

Click here for Part One & Part Three

Contributors: Phil Nugent, Scott Von Doviak, Andrew Osborne, Leonard Pierce