Renoir (Brockway)

Tropic Sprockets by Ian Brockway

Renoir

The arresting French film "Renoir" is as much about the transformation of the image as it is about the legendary painter. Director Gilles Bourdos (Afterwards) showcases the painter (Michel Bouquet) as he faces his mortality including his interaction with his last model, Catherine Hessling.

The film is beautifully rendered with an eye-popping vibrant spectrum.

Catherine Hessling, here referred to as Andree (Christa Theret) is stormy volatile and inquisitive---her body, an ambulation of cream that is suddenly aflame. She turns the Renoir house upside down.

Renoir paints in a crooked wheelchair that could be made from the branches of a windswept tree. His master's hands bound and corded by a poultice of bandages to appease his arthritis. He is transfixed by a liquid dream of carnal flesh, just out of reach and Renoir talks of skin as if it is sacred dust from a faraway star.

Andree is an uncontainable lioness of flame and buttery form. She is prone to rage and biting repartee.

The handsome son Jean (Vincent Rottiers) has just returned from the war and is wounded at the hip. He doesn't know what to make of Andree but neither does anyone else. Renoir desperately needs her to keep his libidinous dream of light alive, to keep painting, and to refresh his ailing spirit.

Although Renoir does have a bit of melodrama it is never gratuitous or out of place and we see quite a bit of painting and more importantly, a little of what it is like to be a painter.

Visually, the film is almost perfect capturing the aura of a Renoir paintings with wondrous color and shadow, together with long pans and sweeps from the camera.

Also intriguing is the subplot of Jean Renoir and his fascination and with the  new found wonders of the motion picture. Jean, in his shiny uniform and wounded in the war is a person reborn from new technology. His scars heal due to medical science, (fragments of bone were removed) and he is thrilled by the speed of the air force, planes and the sorcery of the moving image. Jean begins to channel his desire for the cinema within Andree who wishes to act.

There are some wonderful scenes here. The bordello section in particular with the shocking sight of a horribly scarred  officer wearing a monocle as he lusts after a naked scene of masochism could be straight from of the art of Expressionist Otto Dix.

Gilles Bourdos is known for taking on unconventional material and doing so with a richness of detail. His film "Disparus" (1998) is a political thriller set against the background of the surrealists in Paris during 1938, and he doesn't disappoint here. The characters are all represented as they might have been without sentimentality, overbearing loudness or weepy drama. The narrative is as well rounded as a Renoir work in the flesh and Bourdos' camera, while having affection for Renoir's breezy swirls, nonetheless retains the piercing attention necessary to capture the artist and his son as two passive animals locked in a vexing contest with the sensual.

Write Ian at redtv_2005@yahoo.com

The Great Gatsby (Brockway)

Tropic Sprockets by Ian Brockway

The Great Gatsby

Provocateur and visual man of Oz, Baz Luhrmann offers his version of "The Great Gatsby" with an abundance  of bravado and bijou that borders on the fetishistic and it is all presented with the decadence of 3D. The visuals mesh perfectly with the voluptual theme of wanton excess. The tale could be set in this millennium just as well as the orgiastic 20s with all the references to a greedy and savage Wall Street and its ashen neighborhoods of derelict houses. Then as now, diversion is everything and the bubbling panacea of alcohol, with martini glasses brandished like magic wands, are visible in virtually every frame.

Tobey Maguire, who is appropriately pencil thin and google-eyed, makes a fine passive observer as Nick Carraway. Better still,  he gives an authentic interpretation of Sam Waterston in his role.

This update has a sweeping and glib execution in capturing the mania of action, speed and riotous parties as a vehicle for forgetting grim realities, pushing the gray ocean of the present far from reach.

Gatsby's glare is self created and he is insulated as much by the sheen of his linen as he is by his golden face and allure. Leonardo DiCaprio is pitch perfect as the slick but well meaning bon vivant who will stop at nothing to protect his artifice as a gentleman of good breeding and sophistication. There is something of Redford here in his easy smile and smooth grace, but DiCaprio's emotive rage and wistful torment is all his own.

Carey Mulligan has a solid outing too, as the shaky and superficial delicious demimonde who trembles ten finger-petals on every syllable. Her performance is nimbly fragile and her performance as well is an echo of Mia Farrow's Daisy.

There are many sensory flourishes here in keeping with Luhrmann's spinning, zooming and opulent style. We see glitter on top of glitter that has an actual force and velocity as it shoots into space. And here is Jay Gatsby's creamy yellow car as it roars with a lunatic ferocity, careening off the road. More meaningful though is the haunting creme de menthe beacon as it winks across the bay and into Gatsby's heart in three dimensional perspective. But my favorite remains the apartment scene, a zipping and picaresque tour de force in which we all become voyeurs free to peer into whatever mad domestic scene we choose to observe couples as they fight, scream and copulate and holler. The panoramic shots will delight and certainly recall the breadth, detail and attention from "West Side Story".

Although deeply rooted in the 1920s, Luhrmann borrows from different modes and periods. In a highway scene, flappers dance in a car bouncing their cleavage crazily, jumbling a froth of  gold coins and champagne in the style of a rap video. And, in bookend scenes, Carraway is in a state of near dereliction recuperating in a sanitarium. A pall hovers over everything in the room and snow encrusts on the window like phlegm in what could be a scene from Francis Ford Coppola's "Dracula".

As a whole, "The Great Gatsby" is an engaging and colorful adaptation. The 3D visuals inject some addictive motion and verve giving the story a carbonated flavor. The film is  an accessible classic with a hyper pop-up book tone that is upbeat as well as eerie in its theatricality---a Luhrmann trademark.

At last, as the green light of envy and desire flashes in the distance only to fade away, there is something of the genuine Fitzgerald here.

The Baz Luhrmann flair faithfully carries the beat throughout, adding some swell zip and pizazz, but also respectfully retaining  the courage to leave a beloved Old Sport alone.

Write Ian at redtv_2005@yahoo.com

Portrait of Jason (Brockway)

Tropic Sprockets by Ian Brockway

Portrait of Jason

In a daring venture,The Tropic unveils Shirley Clarke's uncompromising and infamous 1967 film "Portrait of Jason". The film is an intense black and white character study monologue which focuses without pause on a man who calls himself Jason Holiday. He is a gentleman  of many guises: a male hustler, a social critic, a house boy, a bon vivant, a drag queen, a con man, an addict and a bum. This film caused quite a stir when it first came out, some critics were reportedly disgusted by such a look at a babbling and unapologetically druggy man.

Indeed, those who are inclined will make a bold choice. Here is a bespectacled, flamboyant boozy man, who caterwauls, dances and clowns and who uses an assumed name because of burglaries he committed. In watching the film, you might be reminded of  Warhol and his static camera films. According to research Andy Warhol himself wanted to put Holiday on screen with Edie Sedgwick but it did not happen.

Shirley Clarke was the one to do it. When the camera opens, we see a blurred, somewhat scary image. Who are we watching? A  talking skull? An alien? A cadaverous vampire? No, this is Jason Holiday. He is a self important hipster, a  jazz muse, a man about town. With thick coke bottle glasses, a devil-made smile and a cigarette that winds and winds with an ash-trail as long as a caterpillar, Jason seems fiery and plugged into the world of New York City, 1967. He can seem like a  Sinatra Rat Pack, lounge lord, a man of  sophisticated stars who knows many and is on a first name basis with Miles Davis. But he is also whining and selfish, awhirl in an ocean of alcohol, cheap drinks and self pity. Jason rants and raves, grimacing and screaming.

He gnashes his  nervous teeth. At such times "Portrait of Jason" is not easy to watch. It is tempting to label the film and Jason himself, as wheezy self indulgence, but hang in there.
Jason was beaten as a kid by his father for being a gay man and for always doing the forbidden thing. His father, known only as Brother Tough, overpowered him and knocked him silly every day.

Jason learned the hard life of the street. He stole entire inventory from a house then became a male prostitute, then a houseboy and then  settled in a consensual gay relationship.

Though it all Jason never stopped looking over his shoulder.

As an openly gay man he had to.

Although much of the film is composed of Jason's laughing fits and histrionics and a one bad Mae West impression, we get a lot of the serious and pointed observer that he is. Jason relates tales of having to endure the double bigotry as a gay black male, and listening to unabashed racism. He is unsentimental but not without sympathy. Throughout the interview, he yearns to cut a record and become a performer with a cult of fame. His ambition is right out of Tennessee Williams, an unattainable dream---a reach for The Emerald City.  After a pointed story about his mother, the camera blurs once more and the extra-terrestrial form appears over Jason's speaking mouth. The camera snaps into focus and we see that Jason has been drinking scotch straight from the bottle. He is a drunk, a lost soul ultimately bamboozled by himself or others.

Despite his decrepit state, in watching Jason we have grown to know him as a genuine quirk, be he man, or manic figment of invention. We live for 90 minutes along with him.

 "Portrait of  Jason" remains on film as  an intimate experiment that is certain to disquiet some and annoy others. Yet that disturbance is not without heart or poignance. Jason Holiday (or Aaron Payne) may not be as charismatic as Joe Dallesandro or Taylor Mead from The Factory, but the energy contained in his weird personality does grow on you while his social commentary is untempered by convention and  scathingly truthful.

Write Ian at  redtv_2005@Yahoo.com

Week of May 31 to June 6 (Rhoades)

Tropic Cinema Selections Transverse Both Time and Space…

Reviewed by Shirrel Rhoades

Francophiles rejoice. Nostalgia fans get in line. And seekers of gritty realism step up to buy a ticket. This week’s lineup at the Tropic Cinema has a little of everything, including an extravaganza filled with parties, confetti, chandeliers, and jazz babies.

The title of “Renoir” telegraphs its subject. But does the film focus on the famous French director or his father, the impressionist painter. Well, more so about the painter but both are there. A woman named Andree Heuschling connects the two in this biopic by Gilles Boudon. She was not only the last model of Pierre-August Renoir but the first actress to appear in the films of young Jean Renoir. Set during the last years of the painter’s life at Cagnes-sur-Mer, the film stars Michel Bouquet as the elder Renoir and Vincent Rottiers as the son. Christa Theret is outstanding as their muse. The Austin American-Statesman observes that the film “really does have the lush glory of a Renoir.” And The Oregonian says it revels “in the pristine sunlight and unhurried pace of an era gone by.”

Another French film at the Tropic is “Something in the Air,” a look at the aftermath of the student uprisings in Paris. Here it’s 1971 and young Gilles (Clement Metayer) is carrying the flame of unrest, giving political speeches to fellow high school students and protesting for worker’s rights … while at the same time pursuing romance. The Wall Street Journal observes the film is “worth seeing for what it says of the turbulent state of France in the early 1970s.” And Salon.com says “It's a terrific film, wonderfully atmospheric and alive ...”

Another coming-of-age film is “Mud,” a modern-day homage to Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn. Living on the edge of the Mississippi, two youngsters (played by Tye Sheridan and Jacob Lofland) come across a man on the lam (Matthew McConaughey) and get caught up in his quest to reunite with his true love (Reese Witherspoon). The Toronto Star observes that it’s a “fairy tale, steeped in the sleepy Mississippi lore of Twain and similar American writers, and with a heart as big as the river is wide.”

Less idealistic is “The Iceman,” the true story of a mob hitman (brilliantly played by Michael Shannon) and his mentor (Chris Evans), a pair who store dead bodies in an ice cream truck. Brrr. “Kneel before Shannon,” says Total Film. “His primal, powerhouse turn drives this criminal biopic.”

Even more dark is “Portrait of Jason,” a 1968 experimental documentary about an unhappy gay hustler. “By the end of the long night's shoot,” says The Nation, “Shirley Clarke knew she had captured one of the most involving, uncompromising and revelatory human documents in the history of cinema.” And Village Voice observes that it “says more about race, class, and sexuality than just about any movie before or since.”

Another movie that begins with sparkle and pizazz, but ends as a tragic romance is “The Great Gatsby.” Opening at the Tropic this week, Baz Luhrmann’s extravaganza based on F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel about a self-made man (Leonardo DiCaprio) who throws lavish parties in hopes his lost love (Carey Mulligan) will show up. “Employing the stylish grandiosity we’ve come expect from him, Luhrmann's trademark razzle-dazzle is entirely appropriate for the extravagant excess of Gatsby's world,” observes Flix Capacitor. And Richard Roper says it’s “the best attempt yet to capture the essence of the novel.”

Quite a lineup of films. Romance, heartbreak, anger, murder, lush beauty -- it’s all here at the Tropic.

srhoades@aol.com

The Great Gatsby (Rhoades)

“The Great Gatsby”

As Fitzgerald Imagined It

Reviewed by Shirrel Rhoades

Years ago when I lived in Asheville, North Carolina, some people still remembered F. Scott Fitzgerald who came there to visit his wife Zelda. She was institutionalized at the nearby Highlands Hospital, where she later died in a fire.

“He was a friendly man,” one old-timer told me. “Didn’t put on airs. Few people knew who he was. His high-living days were behind him.”

Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald had been the chronicler of the Jazz Age –and he’d dubbed his Southern belle wife as “the First American Flapper.” Charter members of the so-called Lost Generation, he and Zelda had hung out in Paris with Hemingway, Picasso, Gertrude Stein, Cole Porter, and Josephine Baker (delightfully parodied in Woody Allen’s “Midnight in Paris”).

His writing consisted of five novels (one published posthumously), and volumes of short stories that he penned for such publications as Esquire, Collier’s Weekly, and (my old alma mater) The Saturday Evening Post.

His most famous work is “The Great Gatsby,” which has been called “a flawless novel” and “the first step that American fiction has taken since Henry James.” Modern Library listed it as the second best novel of the 20^th Century. It is required reading in many high schools and colleges – so you have no doubt read it at some time in your life.

As you’ll recall, “The Great Gatsby” recounts the story about an enigmatic millionaire named Jay Gatsby who throws lavish parties at his Long Island mansion in hopes that the girl he once loved will find her way there. We see it all through the eyes of Nick Carraway, who has rented the house next door and gets drawn into his old war buddy’s world of high society, gangsters, and thwarted love. Set in the ’20s, it provides a dazzling look at that age of prosperity and abandon, taking the reader from Long Island’s Gold Coast (with its clash of old money and new money) to Manhattan’s Plaza Hotel and the Valley of Ashes in between.

The book has been described as a “cautionary tale of the decadent downside of the American dream” – but it more accurately deals with the “human aspiration to start over again.” While set against a backdrop that emphasizes the excesses of the rich, it tells the tragic tale of a man who aspired to wealth in order to impress the woman he loved, a man trying to relive the past.

When Nick tells him you can’t repeat the past, Gatsby cries, “Why of course you can.”

“The Great Gatsby” has been filmed five times, including the 3-D version by Baz Luhrmann that’s currently playing at the Tropic Cinema.

Luhrmann is the Australian director known for his Red Curtain Trilogy – “Strictly Ballroom,” “Romeo + Juliet,” and “Moulin Rouge.” Here, he teams again with Leonardo DiCaprio, his star of the modern-day MTV-style retelling of Shakespeare’s tragic romance, to give us another tragic romance.

In addition to DiCaprio (“Titanic,” “Django Unchained”) starring as Jay Gatsby, we have British actress Carey Mulligan (“An Education,” “Shame”) as the elusive Daisy Buchanan and Tobey Maguire (“Spider-Man,” “Cider House Rules”) as the narrator, Nick Carraway.

Baz Luhrmann’s movie is as opulent as the society it presents, with magnificent sets, perfectly choreographed parties, and winsome stars. The sparkling chandeliers and spouting fountains and dancing jazz babies bespeak of an era known as the Roaring Twenties – all filmed in 3-D.

But Luhrmann insists, “The ‘special effect’ in this movie is seeing fine actors in the prime of their acting careers tearing each other apart.”

Nevertheless, the director asserts that F. Scott Fitzgerald would have approved his use of 3-D to tell the story. “He was a modernist,” Baz Luhrmann says. “He was very influenced by the cinema.”

srhoades@aol.com

Portrait of Jason (Rhoades)

“Portrait of Jason” --

Old Is New Again

Reviewed by Shirrel Rhoades

Yes, the Tropic Cinema shows some pretty cutting-edge indie films. Many are newly released; others only a year or two old. So what’s it doing with “Portrait of Jason,” a shopworn old 1967 film by Shirley Clarke.

Known for her kaleidoscope style, experimental filmmaker Clarke died back in the late ‘90s. You’ve probably never even heard of her.

“Portrait of Jason” is not a pleasant film. Not because of its Avant-Garde style, but rather because of its subject. Clark turned her camera on Jason Holliday, a despondent black male prostitute, and as the title suggests she gives us an unflinching portrait of Jason.

Jason Holliday (né Aaron Payne) was an alcoholic, drug-addled hustler who sometimes worked as a houseboy when not turning tricks. He wanted to become a cabaret performer, an unlikely career path. Jason’s not a very likeable subject, but Clarke seemed determined to find out who he was underneath the black anger and gay confusion.

“Whether Jason is laughing or crying, he holds you rapt with tales that conceal as much as they reveal,” observed John Powers of NPR.

Back in the ‘60s, mainstream critics found the film “disgusting.” However, Swedish director Ingmar Bergman famously declared it to be “the most fascinating film I’ve ever seen.”

Modern-day critics seem to agree with Bergman. The New Yorker terms it “a masterwork of grand-scale intimacy ...” The New York Times calls it “a curious and fascinating example of cinema verité …” And The Nation describes it as “one of the most involving, uncompromising and revelatory human documents in the history of cinema.”

That’s because “Portrait of Jason” is more than just a profile of a down-and-outer. It explores important cultural themes -- including class stratification, homosexuality, and racial politics. Also it is a testament to the development of cinema verité and underground cinema during the ’60s in New York City.

Will you enjoy it? Maybe not. Will you find it thought-provoking and fascination. Absolutely.

srhoades@aol.com

Something in the Air (Rhoades)

“Something In the Air”

Is Whiff of Student Protest

Reviewed by Shirrel Rhoades

Truth is, I prefer James Jones’s book “The Merry Month of May,” but this French film titled “Something In the Air” tries to capture some of the aftermath the Parisiene student riots of May 1968.

Note that the film’s original title was “Après mai” -- or “After May.”

In this semi-autobiographical story we meet Gilles (Clement Metayer) who serves as filmmaker Olivier Assayas’s stand-in. Gilles is a politically-driven high school student trying to find himself. Should he become a painter or a filmmaker or a political activist? Well, he likely did a little of each in real life, but on-screen we see him and his friends caught up in the radical leftist fervor that came out of the riots of May 1968.

However it’s now 1971 in the film -- and while Gilles makes speeches to his classmates and mimeographs inflammatory pamphlets and organizes Italian workers one summer, “Something In the Air” lingers on him being dumped by his girlfriend Laure (Carole Combes) for an older man in London and taking up with Christine (Lola Creton) who goes on the lam with him after a security guard gets injured during a night of protest and vandalism.

 “Something In the Air” -- currently playing at the Tropic Cinema -- was selected to compete at the Venice International Film Festival where Assayas won the Golden Osella for Best Screenwriting.

That so, Assayas doesn’t tell us much about student politics in France, other than sharing a few protest songs and homilies about workers’ rights. What the film is really about is finding yourself. Here, that sometimes seems confused with finding romance. But perhaps that’s true of any teenager, French or not.

srhoades@aol.com