Change Your Image
xnietzschex
Reviews
Distant Drums (1951)
Perhaps What You Missed...
I thought I spied a sort of subtext in the ever recurring rivalry between the rugged and the smooth. There were (and are) subtle wars among us still being waged between those who want to live in the wild, so to speak, being responsible for much if not all of their physical survival and those who seek a more refined experience in life, at the expense of the natural rawness to be felt. See, there it is again, being shown in the commercial advertising the upcoming broadcast of City Slickers.
Back in 1840 (the year in which this film is set) it seems as if there were different levels of these two halves of the eternal dichotomy, the yin-yang, as it were, of evolution and/or progress itself. The struggle between homeostasis and exploitation, for in order to survive without self-maintaining one's own harmonious internal balance from within, one must begin, by definition, to consume some external resource and thereby jeopardize another entity's existence. The American Indian's milieu then was even more rugged than that of the invading white man's, and there was a struggle between the two ways of world-making. But there was also the struggle between the backwoods families that had tamed what had once been the frontier and who had wished to or been forced to stay away from the burgeoning cities where some new sort of frontier had begun to be conquered, where the "quality" existed, and the people more inclined to seek out that very same city life. Have a listen at some of the dialogue between Gary Cooper and Mari Aldon, his leading lady. They talk secretly about this rivalry.
But then there is the rivalry between men and women themselves. And who, generally, would you think is on the side of crossing new frontiers involving less ruggedness and more affluence and quality? Many of them, I believe, though, have some kind of a nostalgic attraction to the mythic, timeless idea of the rugged, even in the midst of their rapid, epic escape from it, since time immemorial. Women commonly find themselves attracted to the idea of a rugged edge to the men in their romantic and family lives. And yet they still seem to shun it in their own lives, at least many of them do. Pedigrees, manicures, facials, hair treatments, mud baths, massages, soft, slinky (i.e. comfortable but sexy) clothing (ok, given high heeled shoes and other anomalies, this theory will have to be amended later), nice cars, nice houses, etc... and shopping (which sort of follows the stereotypical housewife in the upper class suburbs). She seems to like the idea of evolving past the rough and tumble possibilities of the open range type of living. Many men are on board too, but it would seem that less are as convinced, for whatever reason, that such a course would or should be beneficial or desired.
Ah, but then Judy Beckett, Mary Aldon's character, decides not to go back to fancy city life in the end. She can't "hold a grudge forever." And apart from the obviously inferred meaning of that phrase, local to the surface plot of the film, that she can't expect to be able to right the wrongs in her youthful past by going back and wreaking revenge, there may be another, universal interpretation of the phrase. But I have no idea what that may be. Perhaps, using some new-fangled philosophical filter on the world, you could interpret it as some sort of sage advice on how to evolve by not fearing change, despite the many affronts one has suffered at its hands during the early stages of an evolution.
Really, though, I have no clue. And it doesn't really matter because Flaming Star, "starring" Elvis Presley, has managed to come on and get about 20 minutes in and I have no more desire to make up further discoveries about Distant Drums. Over and Out.
The Big Kahuna (1999)
DeVito's Character is Gay... No really, he is.
I can't believe that i would be the only one to notice the subtle reference to Danny DeVito's character being gay. I've read through quite a few reviews on imdb as well as looked for reviews with search engines. I saw two gay movie review sites and neither even hinted at the notion. Well, perhaps that's what a little aided expansion of the consciousness Will do for you.
Another neglected element is DeVito's whole retelling of his childhood dream, and this has direct bearing on the issue above. If one is completely locked onto this film with his full psyche, he will experience the awful, apocalyptic gloom and sheer visual imagery of the dream, almost a vision. It was one of the, dare i say, high points of the movie. DeVito finds God in a closet in a burned out hotel in the middle of a city laid to waste. And God is scared. DeVito takes him by the hand and leads him 'out of the closet'. Together, still hand in hand (two males?... i, traditionally, assume), they look out over the darkened ruins of the city.
That city was Wichita, KS (and also someone's burnt out life). That closet, while at first guess seeming to be the one Spacey wheeled out of the room, is really the room itself. Remember Spacey, upon entering the room in the first place, called it a 'closet' to show his disgust with the room's diminutive size. The god in the closet, scared, was none other than DeVito's character himself. And therein lies the answer to the surface question (well, surface in terms of where the obvious undercurrent of this film lies): Who is The Big Kahuna? A) God, and B) Ourselves... if we look for God externally we will only find stars and gases and nebulae. "God" resides in humanity, in each of us. At the same time, though, it answers another, and actually more pertinent, question: What's Eating Gilbert Grape? (Gilbert Grape being Danny DeVito's character, of course). The answer? That he has finally come to terms with his homosexuality. This is the real reason why he has finally left his wife (regrets allow "honesty to tattoo itself across your face"-or something close to that. that was another pinnacle in DeVito's career.) This is the real reason we see DeVito truly "reading" Penthouse, not just looking at it (observe the content on the pages he is looking at... text, not skin-toned glossies). This is the real reason he asks Spacey if Spacey loves him. And perhaps why he considers suicide, briefly, as many homosexuals have done (as well as a boatload of heteros as well). I also find it entertaining, if not downright foreshadowing, when Spacey asks the Baptist Bible Boy, just kidding, the religious devotee, if HE is gay.
Well, what can i say? Either I am brilliantly imaginative but dead wrong, or keenly observant and, like a cat's eye, able to discern things in the dimmest of light. You decide.
A Huey P. Newton Story (2001)
Shoot... I didn't know this man ran so deep
frenetic, eclectic, expansive vision inside the mind of Huey. this guy must be exhausted after such a performance. i'm too drained to write more but definitely watch it for the sheer spectacle that is Roger Smith.