4/27/15: An Army of One

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1960s cinema, action films, auteur theory, Bill Mullikin, Bob Newhart, Bobby Darin, cinema, dark films, Dirty Harry, Don Siegel, dramas, Escape From Alcatraz, Fess Parker, Film auteurs, film reviews, films, frontline, G.I.s, Harold Lipstein, Harry Guardino, Hell Is For Heroes, insubordination, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, James Coburn, Joseph Hoover, Leonard Rosenman, Mike Kellin, Movies, Nick Adams, nihilistic films, power struggles, Richard Carr, Robert Pirosh, set in 1940s, set in France, Steve McQueen, The Killers, war movies, World War II

Filmmaking is a lot like cooking, if you think about it: give five different chefs the exact same ingredients and you’re likely to come up with five very different dishes. Ditto for filmmaking: give five different filmmakers the exact same tropes, conventions, themes and scenarios and you’re going to end up with five very different films. Case in point: action auteur Don Siegel’s Hell Is For Heroes (1962). On the outside, the film looks much like many other World War II-set action films: big cast of well-known actors…intense front-line action sequences…dramatic interplay between the soldiers. Digging deeper, however, it’s easy to see that this particular war film bears more than a passing resemblance to similarly dark, paranoid films in Siegel’s canon such as Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956) and The Killers (1964). The result? A tense, nihilistic and constantly odd study in hubris, obsession and heroism, courtesy of the guy who would, one day, gift us with Dirty Harry (1971).

We jump right into the action on the front-line of the Allied offensive, in France, circa 1944. A small American squadron, led by Sgts. Larkin (Harry Guardino) and Pike (Fess Parker aka TV’s Daniel Boone), has been charged with holding the line against the German offensive. As the squad, which includes motor-mouthed Pvt. Corby (actor/singer Bobby Darin), laconic Cpl. Henshaw (James Coburn), Pvt. Kolinsky (Mike Kellin) and Pvt. Cumberly (Bill Mullikin), celebrate their upcoming return home, they receive a new member: Pvt. Reese (Steve McQueen). Reese is a sullen, surly, standoffish badass who seems to have a past with Sgt. Pike and a problem with the bottle.

While Reese lugs several steamer trunks’ worth of emotional baggage with him, his appearance also foretells a bit of bad luck for the squad: not only aren’t they going to get to go home but military brass has decreed that the squad be split, stretching the already thin crew to a breaking point. While Pike takes most of the men further down the way, Larkin and his tiny six-man crew are charged with holding the line all on their lonesome.

The problem, of course, is that a far larger German force is camped out just over the rise, patiently waiting to bomb the ever-loving shit out of the stragglers. As the extremely unpleasant but eminently capable Reese butts heads with Larkin over their next course of action, the rest of the team are caught in the crosshairs. When Reese comes up with a brazen, impossibly dangerous plan to take out the nearby German pillbox, however, he sets in motion a series of events that will test the squads loyalty, their resilience and their very wills to survive.

Despite its familiar trappings, Hell Is For Heroes is a decidedly odd duck. For one thing, the evocative black-and-white cinematography (courtesy of Harold Lipstein) frequently calls to mind film noir and German Expressionist filmmaking: full of hard, deep shadows and an overwhelmingly sinister atmosphere, there’s something intensely unsettling about the film, even during its lighter moments. There’s also the film’s rigid, almost stage-bound sense of blocking: combined with the sharp dialogue (legendary screenwriter Robert Pirosh wrote the film, along with Richard Carr), the movie often feels like a stage play, although this ends up working to its benefit, heightening the eerie sense of unreality.

Siegel, as expected, is a deft hand with the action sequences (the film’s final 20 minutes are one long, sustained battle that’s a masterpiece of chaos and carnage) but the connecting tissue is where the film really stands out: the midpoint sequence, which consists of the G.I.s setting up an elaborate “early warning system,” is almost ludicrously detailed and leisurely paced, yet still manages to be impossibly tense and pulse-pounding. The human-level drama is even better: McQueen’s thoroughly unlikable Reese swings wildly at any and everyone around him and the audience soaks up the benefit.

In fact, I’m hard-pressed to recall another performance of McQueen’s that is quite this unpleasant and cold: even the flinty-eyed Frank Bullitt had a basic degree of humanity that seems to be lacking in Reese. Obsessed with proving himself right, completely dismissive of authority, misogynistic and arguably misanthropic, Pvt. Reese is, perhaps, one of the single most unqualified heroes in the history of the biz. Look closer, however, and McQueen’s world-weary eyes almost (almost) tell a different story. His latter-half heroism isn’t so much a last-minute Hail Mary as it is the natural culmination of his inherent stubbornness: Reese is more than willing to die to prove himself right.

While McQueen is a reliable marquee draw, the rest of the Hell Is For Heroes cast is a veritable embarrassment of riches. Guardino and Parker are both excellent as the guys (grudgingly) in charge, with Parker possessing the absolutely perfect blend of authority and down-home humility. Nick Adams turns in a slightly goofy, if likable, performance as the tag-along Polish soldier, Homer, while Coburn is great as the reserved Henshaw: you know a film has a fantastic cast when an actor of Coburn’s stature is, effectively, relegated to second-tier status but he brings an easy warmth to the proceedings that are completely expected and always appreciated.

The two big surprises, however, end up coming on the lighter side of things: Bobby Darin’s conniving, perpetually scheming Pvt. Corby is a classic character and Darin plays him with complete gusto. At times approximating Lou Costello, Darin provides much of the film’s comic relief and never wears out his welcome, high praise for the type of character that normally gets under your skin, fast. The other surprise is Bob Newhart’s delightful performance as the bumbling, over-his-head Pvt. Driscoll. From his entrance (crashing into a tree with his jeep) all the way to the show-stopper where he commandeers a German phone line and proceeds to feed the enemy fake intel, Newhart is sheer perfection, his timing pitch-perfect and his hang-dog, malleable face so essential to the film’s (occasionally) deeply-set sense of humanity. Driscoll often reminded me of the similarly bumbling Radio O’Reilly, making me wonder if this might have served as inspiration for Gary Burghoff’s iconic character: the mind practically boggles!

Ultimately, Hell Is For Heroes is a continually surprising film, a feat which certainly stands as one of its greatest assets. From the opening all the way through to the purposefully ambiguous finale, which skips the expected emotional payoff and gives us something decidedly more open-ended, Siegel’s film defies conventions and arrives at an altogether more interesting destination. Less interested with easy definitions of “heroism” than he is with the reality of the situation (depending on the angle you view it from, Reese’s actions could easily fall under the umbrella of “insubordination,” “insanity” or even “manslaughter”), Siegel turns in another complex, nuanced and disturbing examination of the evil that men do, even when they do it in service of “the greater good.” In other words, just another day at the office for one of the all-time greats.

2/2/14: The Brutality and the Beauty (Oscar Bait, Part 4)

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12 Years a Slave, 1840s, Academy Award Nominee, Academy Awards, Alfre Woodard, American Civil War, antebellum South, based on a book, Brad Pitt, Chiwetel Ejiofor, cinema, dignity, emancipation, emotional films, Film, forced captivity, freedman, historical drama, Hunger, kidnapped, Lupita Nyong'o, Michael Fassbinder, Movies, Oscar nominee, overseers, Paul Giamatti, plantations, Shame, slavery, slaves, Steve McQueen, uplifting films

My Oscar nominee exploration continues with the second Best Picture nominee that I’ve seen, thus far: 12 Years a Slave.

There can be no greater pain, no more terrible turmoil, than to be torn away from family and friends, taken far from their loving arms. I can’t imagine anything worse than waking up in unfamiliar climes, fully aware that somewhere, some immeasurably far distance away, your old life waits for you…that your family and friends wait for you, not knowing your fate. Unless, that is, you were taken from your family and sold into slavery. This, of course, is the central premise of Steve McQueen’s powerful historical drama, 12 Years a Slave.

Based on the memoirs of Solomon Northup, a free black musician living in New York in 1841, 12 Years a Slave details his struggle to maintain his dignity and sense of self in the face of seemingly insurmountable odds. Bounced between several different plantations during his twelve years of forced slavery, Solomon (Chiwetel Ejiofor) must use his considerable wits and courage, as well as his amiable nature, to keep himself alive and ever vigilant for any chance at freedom. Along the way, he meets a host of people: slave-owner and slave, plantation owner and brutal overseer,  emancipationist and lynch mob. Most of the people he meets will conspire to either use him for their own ends or will abuse and degrade him as they see fit, although he will also find a few kindred souls along the way like Patsey (Lupita Nyong’O), the fiery female slave that can pick four times the cotton that any man can and Bass (Brad Pitt), the emancipationist who, ultimately, leads to Solomon’s freedom.

12 Years a Slave is one of those rare films that is both unremittingly brutal and grim, yet simultaneously beautiful and hopeful. I’m tempted to compare the film, at least aesthetically, to Braveheart, in that both movies have a way of making epic imagery out of grimy, downtrodden humanity. 12 Years is a much more subtle film, of course, freed of the grandiosity and vengeance tropes that gave Braveheart the veneer of a popcorn film, despite its melancholy subject matter. Here, McQueen distills the horrible legacy of slavery down into one character’s personal journey, making a very large story much more compact, while allowing Solomon to be our guide through this pre-Civil War-era.

From a technical standpoint, 12 Years a Slave is quite beautiful, thanks in no small part to its evocative cinematography. Sean Bobbitt, the director of photography behind McQueen’s previous films Hunger and Shame, as well as Neil Jordan’s Byzantium, has a way of shooting even the ugliest events that highlights the beauty of the surrounding countryside, using lighting in such a way as to make everything positively glow. Shot-wise, McQueen and Bobbitt have a tendency to favor close-ups, especially where Solomon is concerned but that ends up being a pretty wise-move: Ejiofor is an absolutely amazing actor, a performer who can say so much with just a quivering lip and tear-filled eye.

Which leads us, of course, to the stellar ensemble cast. As befits a modern historical drama, 12 Years a Slave is packed to the rafters with top-shelf star talent and more “Oh-that-guy!” pointing than a Woody Allen film. There’s SNL-regular Taran Killam as one of the connivers who kidnaps Solomon; Paul Giamatti as a mean-spirited slavery broker; Benedict “Sherlock” Cumberbatch as a plantation owner that’s just about as “nice” and “fair” as Solomon ever finds; Paul Dano as Ford’s ridiculously venomous overseer, Tibeats (the scene where Solomon whips the shit out of Tibeats has to be one of the single most uplifting moments in the history of moving pictures); Michael Fassbinder (picking up a Best Supporting Actor nod) as the vicious Mr. Epps; American Horror Story’s Sarah Paulson as the equally vicious Mrs. Epps; Alfre Woodard as the slave “wife” of another plantation owner; Raising Hope’s Garrett Dillahunt as the treacherous Armsby and the aforementioned Mr. Pitt as Bass, Solomon’s eventual savior.

The acting, across the board, is exceptionally good, but Ejiofar is a complete revelation as Solomon Northup. He is such a visually expressive actor, particularly those big, emotional eyes of his and he conveys a world of character with just a smile, here, or a tear, there. The scene where the camera focuses on Solomon’s face as he sings a spiritual, Ejiofor cycling through more emotion in a few moments than most actors do in an entire film, is amazing.  Thus far, I’ve only seen one other Best Actor performance, Christian Bale in American Hustle, and Ejiofor resoundingly mops up the floor with him. This is the kind of performance that not only deserves an Oscar nomination but the actual award, itself. When Solomon finally looks on his family after his time in captivity and says, simply, “I apologize for my appearance but I’ve had a difficult time these past several years,” it’s impossible not to be completely and utterly destroyed: another actor might have made the moment too cloying, too precious. Ejiofor makes each syllable sting with so much pain, sorrow, joy and dignity that they become knives, cutting as much as they comfort.

In fact, Ejiofor’s portrayal of Solomon is so towering, so absolute, that other worthy performances tend to get a bit lost in the shuffle. Newcomer Nyong’o is perfect as Patsey, radiating a complex mix of sensuality, fear, anger and pride. If anything, I really wish that her character had more screentime: folding the Eliza character into Patsey would have given Nyong’o more screentime and given the film, in general, a stronger female presence. As it is, it’s quite telling that there wasn’t really a leading actress role to give a nomination to. Cumberbatch is excellent as the nicer-than-most slave-owner: there was quite a bit of nuance to his performance, proving that Cumberbatch’s stuffy eccentricities play out quite well on the big screen.

Much has been made of Fassbinder’s portrayal of the slimy Edwin Epps but, for my money, his was mostly a serviceable performance, too given to the kind of odd tics and quirks that Joaquin Phoenix usually uses to better effect. I thought there was much too much flash and a near constant attempt to “show” us the things that Epps was feeling. Ejiofor’s performance is almost completely internal, seeping into his mannerisms and expressions in a very organic manner. Fassbinder, on the other hand, comes across as much more “actorly” and presentational: his performance never seems to truly penetrate through to the character’s soul.

Ultimately, as with any other film (especially any awards nominee), I find myself asking the same questions: Is this really that good? Is this film worth the hype? Will we even remember it in 10-15 years? In the case of 12 Years a Slave, I’m leaning towards “yes” for all of those. McQueen has fashioned a real monster of a film, subtle but powerful, beautiful yet constantly grim and ugly. There are two scenes in the film, in particular, that strike me as being the kind of thing that proves the intrinsic quality and subtly of the film. One scene is the edge-of-the-seat moment where Solomon is hung from the neck in a muddy courtyard and must shift from foot to foot, side to side, for at least an entire day: one false move and he’ll effectively hang himself. The scene is absolutely perfect, nearly Hitchcockian in its perfect marriage of suspense and irony.

The second moment comes from the parallelism of Solomon joyously playing music for the white party at the beginning of the film, as a free man, versus him playing music for another white party, later on, as a slave. We see the difference in Solomon, of course, in his posture and his face, even in the slightly mournful cast to his trademark fiddle. McQueen is also careful, however, to let us see the difference in the very atmosphere, modulating the music so that it becomes not so much a product of Solomon (as in the beginning) but a part of the soundtrack: background music, if you will. Just as Solomon has lost his individuality and become part of the faceless, voiceless horror of slavery, so too has his music been subsumed, made a part of the machinery.

12 Years a Slave is not an easy film to sit through: the brutality, degradation and suffering on display is not sugar-coated, nor is it presented with anything less than the fact-of-live mundanity that slavery, unfortunately, was for many people. Despite everything that the world throws at him, however, Solomon Northup never once loses his personal sense of honor and dignity. He knows that they can take anything away from you – your livelihood, your freedom, even your name – but they can never take your humanity away from you…unless you let them.

Solomon never lets the slavers take away his dignity and it’s to Steve McQueen’s great credit that he never lets the film take it away, either. I’m not sure if 12 Years a Slave really is the best film of 2013 but I can wholeheartedly say that it’s certainly one of them.