12/25/14 (Part One): The Greatest Movie Never Made

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Alejandro Jodorowsky, Alex Cox, Amanda Lear, ambitious films, auteur theory, Best of 2014, Brontis Jodorowsky, Chris Foss, cinema, Dan O'Bannon, David Lynch, Devin Faraci, Diane O'Bannon, documentaries, Douglas Trumball, Drew McWeeny, Dune, El Topo, favorite films, Film auteurs, film festival favorite, film reviews, films, Frank Herbert, Frank Pavich, George Lucas, H.R. Giger, inspirational films, Jean Giraud, Jodorowsky's Dune, Michel Seydoux, Movies, Nicholas Winding Refn, Pink Floyd, Richard Stanley, Salvador Dali, Santa Sangre, sci-fi, science-fiction, special-effects extravaganza, The Holy Mountain, unfinished films

What is the greatest sci-fi film ever? Depending on who you ask, you might get answers like 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), Silent Running (1972), Solaris (1972), The Empire Strikes Back (1980), Star Trek II: The Wraith of Khan (1982) or Disney’s The Black Hole (1979). The answers probably depend on lots of stuff: the age of the person in question, where they sit on the “Star Wars vs Trek” scale, how “hard” they like their sci-fi…hell, how someone defines the genre can even affect this particular list. One thing is pretty clear, however: ask this one simple question to a crowd of people and expect to get a crowd of answers (unless, of course, you’re at a Trekkie convention, at which point the answer will, obviously, be Silent Running).

The greatest sci-fi film ever made? That’s a hard question. But the greatest sci-fi film never made? That, friends and neighbors, is much easier to answer. After all, which sci-fi movie was supposed to have featured Mick Jagger, Salvador Dali and Orson Welles in starring roles, while Pink Floyd supplied part of the musical score? Which hypothetical extravaganza gave notorious freaknik H.R. Giger free reign over part of the production design, featured eye-popping storyboards by renowned graphic artist Jean Giraud (aka Moebius) and would have rivaled the special effects technology of Star Wars a full two years before George Lucas and his team struggled to make their landmark film?

If all of the above sounds like some sort of acid trip dreamt up in a sensory deprivation chamber, know that it almost came to pass, albeit in the same way that comets “almost” batter the Earth on a constant basis. Who was the mad genius responsible for what would have, without a doubt, been the single most mind-blowing, game-changing, iconic science fiction film in the history of the medium? Why, none other than the mad monk of experimental cinema, the spiritual guru behind essential “midnight” films like Fando y Lis (1968), El Topo (1970) and The Holy Mountain (1973): Alejandro Jodorowsky. As we see in Frank Pavich’s amazing, inspirational new documentary, Jodorowsky’s Dune (2014), the Chilean auteur’s singular, stunning vision for Frank Herbert’s classic sci-fi novel may have been doomed from the get-go but the Technicolor sense of wonder associated with the project will live on forever.

Beginning with a quote from Austrian neurologist Viktor Frankl (“What is to give light must endure burning”), Pavich’s documentary immediately introduces us to one of the most kinetic, passionate, amazing filmmakers to ever draw breath, the inimitable Alejandro Jodorowsky. Instantly infamous after his bizarre, spiritual and surrealist El Topo managed to tear a collective hole in the brain-pans of ’70s-era film audiences, Jodorowsky was riding high after the success of El Topo’s follow-up, the even more “out-there” Holy Mountain. Looking for his next project, Jodorowsky had the good fortune of running into a friend who extolled the virtues of the Frank Herbert book, Dune (1968), a massively popular best-seller. The rest, as they say, was almost history.

Despite never reading the novel, Jodorowsky immediately started to put together a production plan that must have seemed about as realistic as someone attempting to flap their arms and fly to the moon: assemble a dream-team of creative personnel (from all disciplines), shoot for the moon with casting (Jagger at the height of the Stones power, the legendary Dali as “Emperor of the Universe,” Welles when he’d already become a societal recluse, David Carradine, just because), pull out the stops for the musical score (Pink Floyd, fresh off the record-breaking success of Dark Side of the Moon) and aim for a final product that’s more about mind-expansion and “ushering in a new era” than earning box office coin. Had Jodorowsky been able to pull off this amazing mess of an idea, we’d probably still be discussing the film, almost 40 years after its release. Instead, the version of Dune that fans finally received was the troubled 1984 David Lynch version, a film that bore very little resemblance to Jodorowsky’s proposed epic. Despite never being made, however, copious production notes, pictures and sketches exist from the pre-production visualization, production notes and designs which have actually been (subtly) influencing popular film for several decades. A film so influential that it influenced films without ever being made…now that’s a legend!

From beginning to end, Jodorowsky’s Dune is an absolute and complete joy, a film that’s more about the never-ending passion to create and a “never say die” attitude than anything as simple as a failed adaptation of a popular novel. Pavich utilizes some truly great talking head interviews, from the likes of directors Nicholas Winding Refn, Richard Stanley and Alex Cox, to genre experts like Badass Digest’s Devin Faraci and Ain’t It Cool’s Drew McWeeny and actual personnel from Jodorowsky’s planned version of the film, including producer Michel Seydoux, H.R. Giger (before his recent death), Dan O’Bannon’s widow, Diane, and legendary graphic artist Giraud. Looming over everything, however, is the formidable presence of the master himself, Jodorowsky: at no point in the film is Jodorowsky ever less than a wonderful, exuberant personality, a true force of nature who comes across as the single greatest cheerleader that the human race has ever had. In fact, I’ll lay a little wager down here: if you don’t feel your heart growing three sizes by the time the film is over, ala that mean old Grinch from yore, I’m gonna go ahead and assume that you’re already dead. Even then, I’m pretty sure ol’ Alejandro would still be able to wring at least a grin from the most somber soul.

While any notion of a “perfect film” is, by definition, rather pie-in-the-sky, Jodorowsky’s Dune is that rarest of things: a perfect film, from beginning to end. Chalk it up to a perfect storm of awesomeness: a fascinating subject, plenty of in-depth information and amazing production notes, excellent commentary from participants and experts, a subtextual underdog story and some of the coolest, funniest and strangest behind-the-scenes stories ever told. It’s almost impossible to pick the best stuff out but one of my personal favorites was the section devoted to Jodorowsky and Seydoux trying to secure Dali for the film. While the notorious surrealist went out of his way to make things difficult for the filmmakers, their ultimate solution was pure genius (let’s just say that, for the briefest of moments, Dali got his wish and really was the highest-paid actor on Earth). The truth is, however, if there’s one good story here, there are at least a hundred: one of the film’s meanest hat-tricks is how it makes the 90-minute runtime feel closer to 15 minutes…if ever there was a film that deserved to be 3+ hours, Jodorowsky’s Dune is that film.

For me, Pavich’s documentary is absolutely essential thanks to my incessant fanboy love of Jodorowsky: I was corrupted by his films at an early age and, thankfully, haven’t looked back since. Even if I wasn’t a huge fan of his work, however, Jodorowsky’s Dune would still manage to capture my heart. At its core, Pavich’s film is really about the never-say-die attitude of true artists, the kind of folks who simply can’t bend and conform to society no matter what they do. There’s something unbelievably empowering about listening to the 84-year-old Jodorowsky talk about his various philosophies: he has a way of making even the impossible seem possible, which also goes a long way towards explaining the appeal of the documentary, itself. Thanks to Pavich’s film, cinephiles and multiplex-patrons alike can revel in some of the most imaginative, insane, epic and impossible cinematic creations never put to film.

Jodorowsky’s Dune may not exist in any way that we can consume but, thanks to Frank Pavich’s amazing Jodorowsky’s Dune, at least we’ll be able to admire the mirage from a distance. If the stars would have aligned all those years ago, Jodorowsky would have been able to make his film…and it very well may have changed the world as we know it. We’ll never have the actual film but we’ll be able to marvel at the imagination and innovation behind it from now until the stars in the sky finally wink out. In a perfect universe, Jodorowsky made his Dune and it was, without question, the single, greatest sci-fi film ever.

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1/16/14: Hidden in Plain Sight

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action-comedies, Akira Kurosawa, character dramas, cinema, classic movies, epic films, Film, Film auteurs, George Lucas, historical dramas, Japanese cinema, John Ford, Movies, samurai films, Star Wars, The Hidden Fortress, Toshiro Mifune

As a rule, I like to watch as many films as possible, wherever possible. If there’s even a possibility of shoehorning yet another film into the day’s viewing, then in it goes. Sometimes, however, I like to take the time to slow down and really savor a film. It doesn’t mean that I watch it in slo-mo (although I have done this, from time to time): rather, it means that I like to allow for plenty of time before and after my screening, a buffer zone that allows me to really think about a film, if I’m so inclined. Last Thursday, I decided to devote the entire evening to a film that surely deserves no less: Akira Kurosawa’s The Hidden Fortress. While this isn’t my favorite Kurosawa film, I’d gladly watch it every day for a week, if the mood struck.

There are few directors, from any era of film, that I respect and admire as much as Kurosawa. Like many cinephiles (although you may be different), my first exposure to Kurosawa came with the peerless Seven Samurai, followed very closely by Rashomon, Yojimbo, Sanjuro, Throne of Blood and Kagemusha. Over the years, I’ve managed to see just about every film the master ever made, many multiple times. As a film fan, I like to keep moving forward yet must always have one foot firmly in the past. Kurosawa has been just such a bridge for the majority of my adult life.

What’s so special about Kurosawa? There’s a beauty and elegance to his films that’s virtually unmatched by anyone else in the business. He managed to bridge Japan’s past with its future, all the way up to his final film in 1993. He was the very definition of an auteur, a filmmaker whose vision was so powerful and singular as to practically define an entire generation of filmmaking. Any discussion of the greatest filmmakers in history would be worthless without featuring Kurosawa front and center. After all, what other foreign filmmaker has become so ensconced in the mind of the American viewer that he inspired not only The Magnificent Seven but Star Wars, as well?

Like most of Kurosawa’s samurai films, The Hidden Fortress is epic in scope but intimate in execution. In a nutshell, the film concerns the adventures/misadventures of Tahei and Matashichi, a pair of bickering, greedy, co-dependent peasants in feudal Japan. Due to a combination of bad luck, bad timing and bad attitudes, the two have found themselves on the run and penniless. They end up falling in with a mysterious, stoic swordsman and his young female charge, a couple that sound suspiciously similar to the princess and general that are currently on the run from the ruling Yamana clan. Despite their suspicions as to their true identities, the peasants agree to lead the two out of Yamana and into the (relative) safety of neighboring Hayakawa. They’ve been promised gold but they also have their eye on the reward being offered for the return of the princess. Will the princess and general make it to safety? Will the Akizuki clan ever be restored to their former glory? Will anything ever go right for Tahei and Matashichi?

As mentioned earlier, The Hidden Fortress is epic in scope (a huge, rollicking samurai adventure full of big fights, lush locations and glorious wide-shots), yet manages to hone in on a pretty specific, microscopic view of the action. At the beginning, we focus on the two peasants, despite the hustle and bustle around them. Shortly after, the swordsman (played by the always amazing Toshiro Mifune) is added and our duo becomes a trio. After that, we add Princess Yuki and our intimate trio has now become a quartet. Kurosawa paces his film in such a way that these additions are subtle: by the time we’ve become used to Tahei and Matashichi, Kurosawa has already introduced General Makabe, a pattern which will be repeated with Princess Yuki later on. This gradual introduction of characters is much more organic and natural than the usual “Ocean’s 11” approach to character building (introduce twelve characters at once and let ’em fight it out for supremacy, cage-match-style), an approach which necessitates a shotgun rather than a sniper rifle.

There’s also a truly wonderful and subversive sense of humor underlying the proceedings. Whether it’s the hang-dog bickering of the peasants or Makabe’s gleefully wry observations on life, The Hidden Fortress is no glum exercise in history-book actualization. Rather, this is a vibrant, alive and kinetic film, one that sees no danger in following up a spectacular sword-fight with a silly pratfall. In any other hands, this blending of styles would come across as a little ham-fisted (if you think you can name several good action-comedies, try naming all of the bad ones that come to mind: I bet I can tell which hand filled up faster.) Not only does Kurosawa make this work, however, he makes it work so invisibly as to be almost subliminal.

Like all Kurosawa films, there are lots of big themes running around in here: loyalty; honor; service vs personal gain; classism; the death knell of the feudal era; state vs self. More so than many of his films, The Hidden Fortress is very much indebted to the John Ford-era of the classic Hollywood Western: look at all of those wide-open vistas, check out how the hidden fortress of the title could almost be an abandoned cliff-dwelling and dig how Toshiro Mifune is just one upturned sneer away from being the perfect synthesis of Eastwood and van Cleef. Seven Samurai may be the one that always gets compared to the classic oaters but The Hidden Fortress definitely deserves to be part of that conversation.

As far as big, memorable set-pieces go, The Hidden Fortress has them and then some: General Makabe’s thrilling pursuit of Yamana soldiers right into the Yamana garrison; his spear fight with the enemy general; the prisoner revolt from the Yamana castle (one of my favorite scenes ever); Princess Yuki rebuffing the two peasants with every branch and tree limb in the forest; Tahei and Matashichi pantomiming bringing the horses to drink; Makabe’s wonderful ruse involving the Yamana and the Akizuki gold…they’re all here, along with another bakers’ dozen of equally memorable moments.

There are also some quieter, more evocative moments that are equally powerful. My two personal favorites would be the part where Princess Yuki decides to buy the Akizuki refugee and the conflict between Makabe and the enemy general. This conflict, in general, illustrates a very important aspect of Kurosawa’s filmmaking: the disparity between doing the honorable thing and doing what it is ordered. Despite being on opposite sides of the battle, the generals have nothing but respect for each other and their abilities: this marks a nice change of pace from the usual good guy/bad guy dynamic. I would also be remiss if I didn’t mention the Fire Festival segment, featuring one of the single most haunting songs I’ve ever heard. This part is beautiful, a bracing reminder that very few filmmakers could compose a shot and set the atmosphere in quite the way that Kurosawa could.

As an added bonus, the Criterion Edition of The Hidden Fortress features a short but worthwhile interview with George Lucas, wherein he explains the importance of Kurosawa, in general, and The Hidden Fortress, in specific, on his career. I’ve never been the biggest Lucas fan, to be honest, finding the gentleman to be somewhat of a pretentious twit. The interview is quite down-to-earth and informative, however, and I found myself warming to Lucas by the end. I still don’t really care for the guy but it’s hard to dislike someone who appears to enjoy Kurosawa films as much as I do.

And, yes, it’s true: when I squint my eyes, Tahei and Matashichi do kind of look like C-3PO and R2-D2.