by ·Comments Off on Don’t Play Us Cheap (1972, Melvin Van Peebles)

A filmed version of his own play, which was a stage adaptation of his own novel, which he wrote in French then translated to English – he filmed first, opened the play with the same cast, then released the movie. Sounds exhausting. Instead of the final film in the Van Peebles box set, Criterion could just as easily have released this as a double-feature with To Sleep With Anger, each of them about a happy Black household infiltrated by forces of evil.

A couple of passing imps decide to stop in Harlem to ruin a party thrown by Esther Rolle of Good Times. Instead of going in together, Trinity arrives first and completely fails to wreak havoc then falls for the birthday girl. When he’s belatedly joined by Devil David (Avon Long, who discovered Lena Horne in the 1930s), they only succeed in chasing off the Johnsons, a late-arriving condescending couple and their giant son, whom everyone else is glad to see go.

It’s a musical, and I wish any of the songs was great – too gospelly for me – but there’s a cool bit at the end when everyone’s singing what’s on their mind at once, the whole party semi-harmonizing and semi-chaotic.

Lisa Thompson:

Van Peebles frequently overlaps two different images to make a contrast that is then commented upon in a third shot, such as on the dangers of evil or the inability to stay true to oneself. Van Peebles occasionally uses the same overlapping technique with sound, playing with dissonance and harmony as multiple characters sing their own signature parts, or a single character sings while the others join in a communal chorus.

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Three Pickup Men for Herrick (1957)

Herrick needs three pickup men, but five showed up. The white boss picks the one white guy, then the tough looking guy, then the young guy, and the rejects walk back home. No dialogue, Light humming and harmonica on the soundtrack.

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Sunlight (1957)

I think the pretty girl married someone else because the guy she danced with at the restaurant said you can’t get married without money… but I don’t think restaurant guy was the hat guy who robs some lady and is chased by the cops and ends up at the wedding… maybe the older guy at the wedding is a different hat guy? Try paying attention next time?

by ·Comments Off on Sublime Frequencies double-feature

The James River Film Society, a mysterious organization which never emails me no matter how many times I submit my address to their subscription link, counterintuitively programmed a pair of hour-long Sublime Frequencies documentaries from director Hisham Mayet at a lovely large theater at noon on a beautiful Saturday, so I came out, along with as many as nine other people.

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The Divine River: Ceremonial Pageantry in the Sahel (2012)

Short riverboat setup, then it gets right into rocking and boogies down for forty minutes or so, each scene in a new location with a new musician or group. Apparently shot in Mali and Niger, there’s much dance, some cool structures and landscapes, and per the Sublime mission, no English translations or narration or titles. I figured the epic animal slaughter scene would be a good time to hit the restrooms – it’s also weirdly where the movie ended.

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Oulaya’s Wedding (2017)

More of a straight doc about a particular event, clearly explained to us. Group Doueh is a famed wedding band in Dakhla, a town on a coastline peninsula in Western Sahara, an area bordered by Mauritania and Morocco. The Doueh musicians’ own daughter is getting married, so they’re throwing the biggest party ever and inviting everyone. We get a behind-the-scenes look at the setup and prep in the first few days, then the event itself under a massive tent. Interviews with family and guests (spotlight on the gay male dancers). Plenty of music, so I could keep on bopping in my seat. We’ve long heard that Mdou Moctar and Tinariwen started as wedding bands, so the main attraction here was to see what these weddings are like.

by ·Comments Off on The Music Lovers (1970, Ken Russell)

Russell is the only person who should be allowed to make artist biopics. He loves the music, doesn’t care about historical truth, and never gets so caught up in plot that he forgets to make wonderful images.

Peter Tchaikovsky (Richard Chamberlain of The Last Wave) has got a boss who doesn’t like his compositions (Max Adrian, title star of Delius), a patron who does (Izabella Telezynskan of at least two other Russell biopics), a libidinous new wife (Glenda Jackson), and a gay lover he can’t be seen with (Chris Gable, Strauss in Dance of the Seven Veils). And I’d just like to point out that Peter’s playwright brother is Kenneth Colley, Life of Brian‘s Jesus. Ends downbeat, Peter dying in hospital after suicidally drinking cholera water, Glenda in a madhouse, both of them obsessed with the question of whether he ever loved her.

Ebert called it “irresponsible” and Kael called it “vile.” Russell wrote a piece in the Guardian, says his life was changed by Tchaikovsky’s music, and twenty years later he succeeded in honoring the man in film. “Great heroes are the stuff of myth and legend, not facts. Music and facts don’t mix. Tchaikovsky said: ‘My life is in my music.’ And who can deny that the man’s music is not utterly fantastic? So likewise the movie!”

by ·Comments Off on That’s Entertainment! (1974, Jack Haley Jr.)

When this was filmed almost all the featured performers were still alive (exceptions: Judy Garland & Clark Gable, who get nice tributes, and Jean Harlow & Maurice Chevalier). There are two more of these musical clip shows, which we’ve previously watched, now Katy wants a That’s Entertainment for Westerns.

by ·Comments Off on Don Juan (2022, Serge Bozon)

Tahar from A Prophet misses Virginie from Benedetta after their almost-wedding and becomes very sad, returns to his theater career where he keeps seeing her as different characters around town, then the actual Virginie arrives to act in his show. Nice-looking sophisticated movie full of song and dance, so I feel bad that I remember so little of it.

by ·Comments Off on Inu-oh (2021, Masaaki Yuasa)

Cursed Mutant kids meet up and share a musical connection. Tomona was blinded by the magic sword that killed his father, and Inu-Oh was born a mutant due to a deal his serial killer father made with a magic mask. Stories of mutants and curses are usually good, and Yuasa’s animation is playful and unusual, especially when visualizing how blind Tomona “sees” the world through sounds. But then after a half hour it abruptly becomes a hard rock musical… returning to sum up the kids’ stories at the end, but too late. And while some directors will shoot the plot scenes normally then make the style come alive during musical numbers, Yuasa does the opposite. The whole hour of rock & roll theatrics is full of repeated shots and movements and angles, third-rate early-MTV stuff.

by ·Comments Off on The Magic Flute (Ingmar Bergman/Paul Grimault)

A stagebound musical comedy Bergman released in 1975 in between some of his most severe movies.

Prince Tamino is rescued from a dragon by three women who fight over him while he’s still comatose. Papageno is a cheerful fellow in green with panpipes. Despite their seeming useless, Prince and Papa are roped into a rescue mission by the queen, given the flute, and assigned guardian spirits (three boys in a hot air balloon). The rest is a long, tiresome adventure, all meant to look like it’s happening onstage (with cutaway closeups of audience members). I did enjoy when the Prince bumped into a librarian when seeking the Evil Sarastro, and they argue since the librarian sees Sarastro as a wise king and the Prince as a stupid intruder. It turns out both sides want the prince to marry the princess, so all’s well, but the queen still wants to fight, so she teams up with an Evil Black Man for a final showdown against Sarastro and company. I may have gotten into jazz this year, but opera is a step too far. Conclusion: Mozart is boring.

Sarastro would later narrate Lars von Trier’s The Kingdom:

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The Magic Flute (1946, Paul Grimault)

No feuding royalty and beautiful daughters here. A colorful birdie transforms into a magic flute that makes people dance themselves into trouble, and the Chimney Thief uses it to barge into a castle and torment everyone inside.

by ·Comments Off on Sign o’ the Times (1987, Prince)

Filmed in Rotterdam and Minnesota. Formerly known as the greatest concert movie ever made, Stop Making Sense has a new challenger.

“Sign” – Just dance and vocal over the tape until Prince stops whipping his guitar around and gets down to playing it, camera flying over the stage, the rest of the group arriving marching-band-style.

“Sunshine” – Sheila has so many drums… the risers are 6 feet high… this camerawork is too composed to be spontaneous.

“Corvette” – Prince is suddenly at a piano in a different outfit, or did he just lose the glasses and the lighting changed?

“Housequake” – Haha they cut Corvette short for this. Not a great song but everyone gets to sing and P does the splits.

“Slow Love” – Crooner P tears his shirt open, lighters in the crowd, the backup singers are doing a little relationship skit, the sax player is dressed like a monk.

“I Could Never” – Brass-heavy, this time the skit has dialogue, oh no, but otherwise this is pure fire, closes with a wandering guitar section.

“Hot Thing” – Definitely a costume change, more of a sexy dance routine to a drum machine beat than a song (that’s not a complaint). All the songs I skip on the album work great in the stage show. Some of the crowd has lost their shirts at this point.

“Now’s the Time” – A staged brawl while the band jazzes out.

“U Got the Look” – Just a music video, we’re not pretending this one is being played live. Opens with a complex montage, then P duets with some redhaired woman, neither of them have mics, everyone in the band is dancing.

“If I Was Your Girlfriend” – The band is sidelined, P in fur coat with wind machine, he has sex with a dancer.

“Forever In Your Life” – Costume change, now P looks like a train conductor. You can kinda hear the acoustic guitar, but mostly it’s voice and beats, and goes on forever like the title says.

“Beautiful Night” – Falsetto in police hat, P and Sheila swap jobs.

“The Cross” – Skits reprise over a stripped-down first half, going big at the end.

by ·Comments Off on West Side Story (2021, Steven Spielberg)

None of my notes are useful (see Goodbye Dragon Inn instead) because I assumed I was going to rewatch it with Katy, and maybe someday I will. The lyrics to “America” and “Gee Officer Krupke” are so great, the actors and camera work are swell, and it’s all a Lincoln Center origin story.

Nov 2023: Watched again with K (who liked it) and M (who did not). Since this came out two years ago, Maria and her boyfriend’s killer Chino have appeared in the Hunger Games prequel, Ariana DeBose has become a Disney/Marvel star, and Riff is doing films with Luca Guadagnino and Jeff Nichols.