THE COUNTERFEITERS (DIE FALSCHER)

THE COUNTERFEITERS (DIE FALSCHER) by John G. Kays
**** ½ stars

‘A True Tale of Bogus Bills and Shaky Scruples’

We wrestle with some universal issues here, our souls are rattled precipitously by such subhuman atrocities; what is protocol for a prisoner in a concentration camp? Are the instincts of survival exclusively at play, or should one pay homage to ethereal ethical principles? The Counterfeiters, an Oscar winner this year for best foreign film (in German with English subtitles), is a charged package of drama that puts us in the line of fire. You and I are precisely there. No escaping is possible; we are forced to confront the abominations of incarceration by a ruthless throng of bully Fascists. With a staggering story snatched from the pages of history, creditable acting, and resonating themes, I am awarding it four and a half stars out of five. The discriminating acting of Karl Markovics as Sally is a study in emotive nuance and props it (the movie) up on a pedestal. Tonight (April 27th) I will watch Nazi Scrapbooks From Hell, a documentary about Auschwitz done by Erik Nelson, that uses photographs to bring these harrowing events to life. This is a non-fiction complement to the project under scrutiny here. Some films are just for fun, while others are made of the sterner stuff; The Counterfeiters is in the latter category and should be filed in ‘the library of freedom’ under: ‘required viewing for all who cherish democracy’, if such a classification might be uncovered.

The Counterfeiters (Die Falscher) is the story of Salomon “Sally” Sorowitsch (Karl Markovics), a master counterfeiter of currency and a forger of passports and documents. He is arrested and sent to the concentration camp Mauthausen in 1936, surely because he is a Jew, not because he is a criminal. Later he is transferred to Sachsenhausen and is commissioned by Herzog (David Striesow), the same S.S. officer who first arrested him, to create a factory for fake currency. First they perfect British pound notes and even cajole the experts at the Bank of England, then they try to tackle the dollar, but run into some complications in duplicating it. Salomon Sorowitsch recruits a consortium of talented cronies, such as printers, chemists, graphic artists, and typographers for the Nazi enterprise. Specifically, the charge is to flood the western economies with bogus bills in order to sabotage those markets, and champion the charades of The Third Reich. The drama takes place within the confines of Sachsenhausen and is a survival story blearily in the template of Stalag 17 or Bridge Over the River Kwai.

The coveted inmates, in sharp contrast to say the condemned prisoners of Auschwitz, have bed linen, running water, piped in opera, and actual food, but the sound of gunfire and screams leak into their quarters as they play ping-pong or discuss their plight during spotty idle moments. As they succeed in producing the British pound the moral question arises: are we giving aid to the Nazis too freely? They begin to stumble while working on the dollar and are threatened with the gas chamber by Herzog, who is under pressure by Heinrich Himmler himself .

A trademark of this story is its ground in history; the screenplay, written by Stefan Ruzowitzky, (he does a proper job as director too) is culled from Adolf Burger`s (a Communist with scruples) The Devil`s Workshop. These memoirs document the scheme of the Nazis to counterfeit pound notes and dollars, a top secret project called Operation Bernhard, and as proof of its existence over one billion pounds in banknotes were recovered by the allies at the end of the war. The real Salomon Sorowitsch was a Russian Jew named Salomon Smolianoff. The counterfeit operation was directed by the Sicherheitsdienst (SD) and its commander, Reinhard Heydrich, who is also remembered (for certain infamously) as a master architect of the Holocaust. Noteworthy in its irony is the German slogan on the front entrance gate of Sachsenhausen: Arbeit Macht Fre; translated as “work brings freedom”.

The Counterfeiters is a focused character study of Solomon Sorowitsch, who has a knack for surviving in sticky circumstance. “Sally” is ever the pragmatist, who gives the Nazis their every wish, but by contrast, Adolph Burger (August Diehl) is an idealist willing to sabotage the operation for his beliefs. Friedrich Herzog (Devid Striesow), the commander of Sachsenhausen, secretly protects the expert counterfeiter, but as the Russians surround Berlin, he weathers the downgrades with struggle. Hauptscharfuhrer Holst (Martin Brambach) is an S.S. psycho who sadistically shoots prisoners for little reason. One critic has compared him to Colonel Klink or Sergeant Schultz in the TV staple, Hogan`s Heroes. Actually, this is a serious, chilly portrayal of a Nazi criminal, so no trace of comedy is conceivable; Holst is a big player in making the Holocaust a reality, and so the comparison is lame and inappropriate.

The incandescent acting of Karl Markovics is a bolt of lightning; you are inside his character as he circumnavigates Nazi landmines and plucks his confederates like pop-strings under a warm June sky. His Sally is shifty and criminal-like with a greedy twinkle in his eyes. Markovics masters the ‘life-long offender’ angle of Sorowitsch with his dodgy eyes and angular face. His demeanor is crafty, nuanced, and he ambles about with chameleon-like instincts-he rides his environs with the dexterity of a high-wire acrobat-a Walinsky perchance. Early on while still at Mauthausen he paints some picture-perfect portraits of Nazi officers, gaining their confidence. At Sachsenhausen he assembles a crack-A-squad that grinds out the fake British notes like an efficient Model-T-Ford assembly line. His portrayal is multifaceted though, and he evokes humanity for the prisoner with TB by feeding him and arranging for his needed medication from Herzog. Sally is humiliated by Holst in one scene (Holst urinates on him in a latrine) and he is filled with rage-he yanks out the wash basin in the bathroom! This signals a tell-tale shift in his perspective.

His balanced portrayal is complimented by August Diehl`s role of Adolf Burger as the idealist who is willing to openly defy the Nazis. Devid Striesow as the commander Friedrich Herzog is on middle ground and he too survives through stealth and maneuvering. Finally, there is Holst (Martin Brambach) who is more of the garden variety, nefarious Nazi-robot killer, but that is not to say that just such brutes did not exist in Hitler`s real Reich. Coupled with the somber gray tones of the filming, an ambience of realism and depth projects from the screen; but as an oxymoron the acting is otherworldly!

A revelation for me is the plethora of striking scenes that freely pop into my mind throughout the day, with only a slightest suggestion. The fact that I can keep replaying the tape in my head is testament to its visual caliber. A few of the images are: the exhibition of the perfectly duplicated British pound by the crafty crew to Herzog. Another is a simple ping-pong game that is interrupted by gunfire just over the fence, when yet a further pointless execution is carried out by Holst. I can still see it, if I think on it. Next I envisage the rapid stealing of a mostly eaten S.S. officer`s apple by Sally, then his own consumption of said apple core in a flash of a millisecond. The most vivid though, is one of the final scenes, where Sally carries the dead comrade who has TB to a designated convening point after the liberation of the concentration camp. Sorowitsch`s conversion to a ‘real humanity’ is consummated in this exact scene. Did I not detect a dew-drop-tear in the eye of each and every member of the audience-yes, in just this moment of time? The director of photography was Benedict Neuenfels and kudos should be clipped in at this juncture for the starkness, the clammy grays of his camera images. I actually awoke from a startled dream this very morn with the residue of the final sequence referenced still lodged in my circuits!

The theme of The Counterfeiters is the moral dilemma that Sally finds himself in: “to be or not to be”, in a nutshell. Should he simply appease the Nazis and increase the probability of his survival, or should he defy them for his convictions (if he has any), then in short order be scurried off to the gas chambers? Just such a quandary is the focus of these ninety-eight moisture-brow minutes! My best observation is that Sorowitsch seems as if he is playing both sides of the fence, but favors ‘survival’ over ‘idealism’, in fair measure. I thought of Sir Thomas More in A Man For All Seasons, by way of contrast, who makes very different decisions; he is courageous enough to stand up for his beliefs, and refuses to sanction King Henry VIII`s annulment to his queen, Katherine of Aragon. Thus, he loses his head to the axe man for his lofty principles. Sally ‘outlives’ the war and gambles leisurely in Monte Carlo after some very troubling days.

THE COUNTERFEITERS (DIE FALSCHER)

‘A True Tale of Bogus Bills and Shaky Scruples’

“The Counterfeiters”, an Oscar winner this year for Best Foreign Film, is a powerful piece of film in terms of its story, acting, and theme. The story is grounded in history, since the screenplay is based on the book “The Devil`s Workshop” by Adolf Burger. Salomon ‘Sally” Sorowitsch, the anti-hero master forger here, is commissioned by the Nazis (in 1944 at Sachsenhausen concentration camp) to counterfeit currency with the goal of flooding the western economies with phony bills so that they might sabotage those markets. Sally recruits some experts from the talent pool, such as printers, chemists, graphic artists, and typographers for this brazen Nazi enterprise. The better part of this drama is played out within the cold, gray confines of this “work camp”, just outside of Berlin. Three standout scenes that I must note here are: the presentation of the fake British pounds to Friedrich Herzog (the commander of Sachsenhausen), the ping-pong game that is interrupted by gunfire just over the fence, and the painful liberation of the camp, where the “Operation Bernhard” prisoners are nearly shot by some common populous prisoners.

The understated acting of Karl Markovics as Sally is a study in emotive nuance; his Sorowitsch is shifty and guileful with dodging eyes and an angular face. He wreaks, breaths ‘survival’! An example of this is the way he paints perfect portraits of S.S. officers at Mauthausen (his earlier camp) in order to placate them. Yet at other times he is compassionate and dons a conscience that guides him through his hardships. Other actors offer superb performances as well, such as August Diehl in the role of the idealist Adolf Burger or Devid Striesow as the manipulating commander Friedrich Herzog.

The theme of “The Counterfeiters” is the moral dilemma that Sally finds himself in: “to be or not to be”, in a nutshell. Should he simply appease the Nazis and increase the probability of his survival, or should he defy them for his convictions (if he has any), then in short order be scurried off to the gas chambers? Just such a quandary is the focus of these ninety-eight moisture-brow minutes! My best observation is that Sorowitsch seems as if he is playing both sides of the fence, but favors ‘survival’ over ‘idealism’, in fair measure. I thought of Sir Thomas More in “A Man For All Seasons”, by way of contrast, who makes very different decisions; he is courageous enough to stand up for his beliefs, and refuses to sanction King Henry VIII`s annulment to his queen, Katherine of Aragon. Thus, he loses his head to the axe man for his lofty principles. Sally ‘outlives’ the war and gambles leisurely in Monte Carlo after some very troubling days.

JIMMY CARTER: MAN FROM PLAINS

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Jimmy Carter: Man from Plains is directed by Jonathan Demme and is a good snapshot of the former president while on a national book tour for his controversial best selling work: Palestine-Peace Not Apartheid. I`ve read most of the book and acquired my copy at BookPeople when Carter came to Austin. I got to actually see the president and had my copy of the book personally signed. The portrayal by Demme is favorable and shows the courage of Jimmy in the face of criticism for his views about the way Israel treats the Palestinians in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. Carter argument is very sensible, and simply shows the way Israel have fenced these people in and oppresses them the way whites have oppressed blacks in South Africa. This is where Apartheid comes in by way of an analogy. There are no flaws in Jimmy`s argument as presented. “The largest mental institution in the country is the Los Angeles County jail.” Rosilyn Carter gives a speech on the problem of mental illness. Jimmy is still very fit and mentally alert and still a big force for peace in the Middle East…A lot of airports and airplanes…Kenneth Stein, a director of the Carter Center, quits during the book tour. Footage of a bombing in Jerusalem. A bombing in Tel Aviv…Atlanta Georgia at the Carter Center. They discuss Daniel Ortega in Nicaragua. Everyone can enact change…See the world with fresh eyes…Security needs on the West Bank…defense of Israeli position. In a hotel again. Book is very carefully checked for accuracy. Does a reading from one of his book. Contract with Simon Schuster. No negotiations in Middle East since President Clinton. Candidates who oppose Israel will lose their support. Only two check points in the Gaza Strip. Carter rides a bike. Camp David Accords footage. Anwar Sadat and Menachim Begin screaming at each other. I love Jimmy Carter. Gas Crisis was a very odd thing to experience. Not one hostage died as a result of Carter`s reaction to the Iranian Hostage Crisis. I`ve studied the Malaise speech and find it honest and revealing. Sake of peace, Begin speaks…Carter has done it…no one else can. “Musicians Village” build a house. Not enough is getting done for home loans for families…Sound track is reflective…Al Escovedo does some of the songs, all instrumental, acoustic…good background music…Now Los Angeles rap music talking on the cell phone. In dressing room for make-up. Loss of land. Loss of freedom. Jimmy with Edward Norton on Tonight Show with Jay Leno. Do you remember Jimmy Carter in Playboy Magazine? He had lust in his heart…Ignore Arab Terrorism? Let the Gaza people get out of the fence. Fence designed to take land. The Geneva Accords to start with. Aljazeera. Riz Khan. Comprehensive peace agreement. Impediment aggression from Israelis. Casa de Laundry. Drives through LA. Good Spanish but he`s rusty. Rosa and I read the bible in Spanish for thirty years. Last thing of the night. In airport again. Friendly to passengers on plane. Music is New Agy, mellifluous, dreamy, a little country. Phoenix AZ. Book is not about Isreali. Mandatory separation and persecution of people. Noxious. Adobe flats cloudy skies Israelite protests…a book of lies..signs copiesPalestinian side then hatred upon us they treat us like nothing. Carter in car and getaway…publicist with him the whole time…human rights abuse in Palestine. Bound together in the Brother of Abraham. Swimming now. The Department of Energy created in his term…Alan Dershowitz doesn`t like it. I supported him 1976. Reasonable debate. Hitler perpetrated one of the worst crimes, the so called holocaust. Hamas was elected freely…Hamas equivalent of Nazis. Hamas terrorist cockroaches. Speaks at Brandeis. Provocative title. Brings the controversy to the public. I`ve been hurt. Called a liar, and a bigot, a coward, an anti-semite. This hurts me. A Harvard professor is not needed. Jimmy Carter is a genius.

10,000 B.C. YET AGAIN??

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10,000 B.C. -A NUMBSKULL-QUASI-CAVEMAN-GENRE-SPINOFF WITH A SPOT OF SPECTACLE by John G. Kays

‘It was important for me to not over do it National Geographic style.’ Steven Strait on his role as D`Leh.

‘Lana, zug-zug.’ Grunts from Ringo Starr in Caveman 1981.

It looks like the light of day is dimming on this Easter Sunday and I am still rubbernecking the entrails of 10,000 B.C.? I replay the clip of the freeing of the saber-tooth tiger by D`Leh for parallels. Daniel and the Lion perhaps? Curiously, why did Roland Emmerich spend two years on the CGI of 10,000 B.C.; is Tony-The-Tame-Tiger and Wimpy-Wally-the-Wooly-Mammoth all he could conjure in the laboratory? Gadzooks, these cartoons are not that scary! The chomping gargantuan ostriches look like Thanksgiving Day turkeys shot full steroids and hybrid nutrients. This stuck out like a sore thumb, but was pleasant pulp inserted in these meandering (meaningless) excursions through tropical jungles; is this yet another Mayan-laden Central America of yesteryear (see Apocalypto)?

Now close your eyes, my pretty! You are getting drowsy, you are falling into a deep, deep slumber. I command you to jump through the white canvas screen and now you are literally in the movie 10,000 B.C. The plot, if you can detect one, is packaged in a frame of three periods. The first third covers the Ice Age (shot in New Zealand) and just includes some military training (see 300) and then the big wooly mammoth hunt, where d`Leh snags a big bull and gets the sacred white spear. The second third is the Amazonian Tropical Rain Forest segment (shot in South Africa), or the Jungle Book period, and includes the capture of some tribes people of Yagahl by the “four-legged demons” (Tartar-like equestrian warriors that are teeming with evil). Especially noteworthy is the snagging of the princess Evolet (Camilla Belle) whose destiny is mostly prophesized as a ‘pivotal one’.

Alright, I hope you are still drowsy. Oh, I am certain of it after snacking on this pompous piece of pie. Your eyelids could use some close-pins, I do believe. Nonetheless, the third and final portion of B.C. is the Egyptian-Desert-Pyramid-period (shot in Namibia), where stupid slaves are building leviathan pyramids with beaucoup Wooly-Mammoths at the behest of some odd anteater-looking high priests with real long, spooky claws. I don`t have the slightest idea what they are up to, I just know that they are evil critters of the highest caliber, and they seem to mirror some of the tricks of the bad guys in the movie Matrix. Go ahead and see for yourself? Oh yea, the “four-legged demons” are employed by this goofy priest cult. The finale is a Coors Light Spartacus with mostly fake violence.This is the crescendo and resembles the ‘let my people go’ loop (from The Ten Commandments), and as such D`Leh amasses an army of down and outs and commences to bust up this greedy party of golden-calf-idle-worshippers. Evolet plays a key part in the liberation too, but I am not certain just how? I do know she comes back from the dead, yea, resurrects right before your eyes, when the shaman-medicine-woman, Ma-Ma from the Adam`s Family back at the homeland, channels some magic across the universe. I know it turns out happily ever after, but the scrapping is ‘but a light affair’, as Santa Anna once said in conjunction with the siege of the Alamo. Gee whiz, that is most of it.

Anachronisms flourish like moldy fungus in and on B.C., but thrill you with their audacity. “Roland and I never intended for 10,000 B.C. to be a documentary.” Words of Kloser again. No problem, comprende senor! A few fauxpas` for ya: pyramids in 10,000 years ago? Dreadlocks on hunter-gatherers? Proper English diction? Weren`t wooly mammoths already extinct at this time? Military sailboats on this fake river Nile? Did One Million Years B.C. have as bountiful of a basket of anachronisms? At least we got to see Raquel Welch in that rockin` Flintstones` bikini! Ostriches the size of giraffes snapping at the little tickie boy? Can D`Leh cross time zones by multiple millenniums too? It doesn`t matter actually, in fact, it makes it funnier. A narcissistic comment here is in order. I was hoping to make this piece inspired, logical, and even with smooth transitions, the way good writing is suppose to be (as Judyth Piazza, the editor here, would want it, I surmise), but B.C. is so stupid, banal, irrational, historically inaccurate, and lopsided, that I don`t think it would be possible for me to apply any writing virtues in its portrayal. This is a clever rationale for the imperfections of this writing, don`t you think?

“Only time can teach us what is truth and what is legend.” Omar Sharif provides the narration that is overview for the gospel of the oppressed Yagahl, a tribe of Rastafarian cavemen with exquisite English diction. The screenplay is written by Roland Emmerich and Harald Kloser; it would be comical to read it in a script format. They created their own theology for this Paleolithic culture of hunter-gatherers. I do not need to see all the specifics, but it looks like a zany kaleidoscope (from my tree nest) of classic fragments, ransacked from say Cecil B. Demille`s The Ten Commandments or Mel Gibson`s Apocalypto, arbitrarily glued together into a tripping, fanciful collage of a B movie. I did not see Ice Age but it has been suggested that some of this was chunked in the mix as well. My own spot of gray matter senses some lifts from Jungle Book; they can be seen through the shop window, if you look hard enough.

I will be brief on the acting and music. Steven Strait, Camille Belle, and Cliff Curtis are manikins, crash test dummies for this empty caveman genre spectacle. They might as well have just twiddled their thumbs on the sets, but not that they didn`t do just that. The acting is easy to describe: it`s a polar bear in a snow storm, white on rice, lifeless bodies that phone it in. The music score by Harald Kloser contains misplaced notes, out of sync fanfares, obnoxious and intrusive; the football is greasy and squirts out of his hands, yea, he fumbles on the twenty yard line and the audience grabs for their earplugs but can not find them in the nick of time. Even Red Skelton himself is a better composer than that Kloser dude!

“Did I miss something?”, I asked myself as I exited the theater. I scratched my head in befuddlement as I pondered the convoluted theology that was generated by the flickering footage. When I got home I thumbed through the Bhagavad Gita for clues to fathom Emmerich`s vision. The Bhagavad Gita was created in 10,000 B.C. so it must contain keys to the universal understanding of say, the shaman-medicine-woman (Ma-Ma) draped in bone-beads who saw it all. I knew that D`Leh (Steven Strait) was a prophet and savior for the indigenous hunter-gatherer tribes seeking freedom from the bondage of the priest cult now ruling over the ‘new pyramid culture’. I fancied D`Leh as a Lord Krishna dictating a new philosophy to his troubled people. The blessed Lord Krishna said: “Fire, light, day, the moon`s brightness, the six months of the north-turning sun: dying then, men who are free go to absolute freedom.” Eureka, I was starting to see it now!

Surely there is something in 2001 A Space Odyssey that explains the events that unfold randomly on the screen? There is a beginning, middle, and end to both films so maybe that is the connection. Then I rehashed the tenets of eHarmony, a club that I have just joined, to divine an intersection; maybe D`Leh and the blue-eyed Evolet (Camille Belle) with the spiffy dreadlocks had met on eHarmony? Twenty-seven levels of compatibility would explain the harmonics between the two, wouldn`t it? Banality and boredom set in, then ultimately despair. I thumbed through the images again. Desperately, I turned the leafs of the Old Testament for harbingers. Icelandic legend anyone? A petrified scrap from the blind poet Homer? Come On! Reveal your secrets unto me, oh Karnack The Magnificent?

Why yet another dry review of an obvious cut-out-bin toss off, that will never see the light of day for even another nanosecond, much less a handful of millenniums? For one thing I have the flu currently and am trying to amuse myself until I recover (I will return to a more serious project in short order). Another reason is that readers love to witness shark-jawed critics rip the fatty flesh away from bone on such a paltry piece of pseudo-prehistoric fluff. B.C. is a plump partridge (probably in a pear tree) of caveman days` hocus-pocus; i.e. ripe meat for the carrion crow (film critics). The reader himself likes to join in on the act, yea, this is much appreciated audience participation; then they too can tear off a slab of chi kabob and devour it ritually, then guffaw defiantly at its .09 rating on the Rotten Tomatoes` Tomatometer. This may account for my perusal of all coverage of said film and the actual vacating of my condo to visit my local cinema for a viewing of 10,000 B.C., in person. The irony here is that this film is wracking up big receipts and the critics are receiving more reads, as dumb-down amateurs jawbone `bout the water cooler. Bravo! Everyone comes out a winner! That is cool, my fair weathered friends! B.C. is an oddity preserved in a bottle, a relic of P.T. Barnum that folk can Wow! over; it is a Hindenburg, a Tiny Tim, a Jumbo the Elephant that brushes us with a feather unmercifully. Have you seen Aretha Franklin lately? She fits in (but it is a tight fit) somewhere here, don`t you think?

10,000 B.C. The Legend. The Battle. The First Hero. Huh? This is the cornball slogan that is printed on the arcade poster that you stare at dumbly (that word is coming up a lot) as you enter your favorite local suburban multiplex, in every city known to man, in our great big country. Oh yea, Lost In Time. Duh! 108 minutes of Cheese Whiz and Ritz Crackers? Let`s try to snuff out the light here before a CGI herd of mastodons gets back up and starts charging us! Please bring closure to this thing, Mister John! Before you know it I`ll be pushing up old goat daisies! What we have here really, is a hefty bale of plastic, Pleistocene cotton candy, that gives you a whopper of a stomach ach as you wander through the Neanderthal ‘mall of life’. 10,000 B.C. is the new 2001 A Space Odyssey, April Fools, you gullible buffoon!

COMIN` UP DAISIES-hey, i`m a ginsberg or ferlinghetti too...!!!

Horizontal shot & freight train in frame he sleeps in all day movies…what a dreadful day I want to see blood pond & treeline screech of train rewind rotten wood grinding political posters weapon da nang in the jungle failure of commonwealth peace mission histoire de art newsreel tunes camera eye on audience rewind to start janus films Gerard beytoud ominous tones gainst red characters anna karina superstar of French new wave velasquez captures shimmering colors ethereal waves imperceptible dust still together in celluloid painter of evening open spaces torrid sunshine ciggies bathtub art book blue floral wallpaper pink skirt director of standard oil scandale girdle ad its invisible age of ass sounds of life babysitter Balzac 5th of Beethoven infrared soap washes fresh aerosol uncommon elegance live through past in past Samuel fuller in paris flowers of evil what is cinema infragreen lamore violence hate emotions hairdo stays light & soft golden silk infrable lingerie loses its lure ciggies in frame necklace earings party jazz toss the cake home sleepy girl you`re alone? Bland days wondering about yourself thunder and lightning four years since we met to want something you have to be alive are you still American car lights garrison massacred by Vietcong loves women his wife his mistress what makes me so sad…in car still and neon red Marianne whistle kissing you all over you`re beautiful my pet see Renoir anna karina good voice cabaret singer barrelhouse piano …so happy in same bed blue eyeliner blank white screen yoko & john imagine love & mirth in film bonnie & clyde again hurral judy garland sad but wistful rosy girls in Renoir red lamp Hitchcock again Bernard herman riffs remember janet leigh fleeing same pathos here Ferdinand & Marianne escape their daily lives for greener pasturesblue bathrobe & bacj Picasso on wall citylife match mag on wall green bottles guns & corpses ditty then edith pioff of golden screen new wave spontaneous words of love rose…bric a brac we could live together ordinary lives…romping tectures bit by bit never let go simple flat bob Dylan with a typewriter allen ginsberg karoac types undulous words groovtflick pounds character art homicide in Toulouse golden armchairs flats & office buildings pathos in white mao se tung gainst manichens gun-running sail away Simbanese liberation army free long time ago paris eifel tower seine sixties brown hair flip red auto ambience total gas…laurel & hardy abbot castello lewis martin mcmanon Carson giant total tender is the night starry night an off w/ear Angola congo revolution in Africa have you ever killed a man strobes of cherry red paranoid park but time ago bring it back look at yourself kisses and pathos rendezvous entering central france student born in 1936 viviane blassel andy Warhol video portraits blue gainst white anna jean-paul liberty equality perfume…film extra fall of Constantinople William of orange study crusades for foibles of west 30,000 saracens gone what bout Algiers again blue brick & door lovers long for warm evening air cartoon arcades pensive piano Copeland & billy the kid were dead ya ever see lost weekend? Sympathy for devil saw at unionhall in 70s revolution anarchy depicted 1965 early radical themes flames in field telephone wires a season of hell narrative of characters in river…themes again wistful tones bucolic greens in wood spring on rack w/ strings stones corn stalks grinding riffs gainst yellow wildflowers van gough café in arles maybe? Natural aire an sounds buses cars wind military fatigues sedan Chinese hat noise gainst fins oil change repair ford gas pumps melancholy mania blue skies anna jumps in jumpsuit carnival toons arcade themes coney island lampoon horns naked together in bed ciggie silhouettes flashback cabarets chatter chaos give us a ton a doe rewind…in one take to park afternoon delight sunglow look at the fool! Car in ocean love must be reinvented…begin to cry ocean blue & sky Riviera back to yesterday waves shells sounds want to start over fetal position beaming rays & stingrays kill in florida…moon is only inhabitant stuff his head full of Lenin ¾ moon birdseye shot fuck me seagulls sand bright sunlight mingle in sand parrots & sanddunes flats stucco white cupids arrow diary an tractors singing in sunshine surreal language poetry wildflowers colors addlib mister godard but shoot naturally no script no story but maybe content cactus shoots and parrot squabbles bread & brooms cham cham cham labo close up shadows wander in water sing & chant parrot & poetry wash out `til footage fades….

10,000 B.C.

10,000 BC is one of the corniest prehistoric epic flicks that I have ever seen, but I`ve seen quite a few other bloopers as well, in my time. Caveman with Ringo Starr comes to mind along with One Million BC with the rockin` Flintstones` bikini of Raquel Welch. 10,000 BC is racking up the customer count at the box office too, & this says something about peoples preferences for viewing. My guess would be a need for hollow entertainment with pretty good dinosaurs and Geico cavemen that get too much in the way of the action. The reading of 9 % on the tomatometer was shocking, I don`t believe I have ever seen such a low score! This boomeranged for me & caused me to go see it since I was curious about the disconnect between the large quantity of people who want to see it and the universal axing it`s got from the critics! What doesn`t kill you makes you stronger! Oddly, For some unknown reason (none of these could have been strong enough) I actually got in my truck & drove over to Southlake Meadows, `cuz I still had one more flick to burn off on a gift certicate. I should get the congressional medal of honor for braving this mirage of cottoncandy on the eye sockets! The special effects could not have been the draw since they were abysmal compared to say Ray Harryhausen who`s the all-time genius for dinosaur action figures come to life. The plot was one of the dumbest I have ever seen and the acting was double bogey tanker-takes that couldn`t even substitute for blooper-takes. The mamasita-shaman-medicine-woman draped in bone-beads was kind of a nice touch and the dread-lock-rastafarian-hunter-gatherers were out-a-time weirdoes with too much cake-make-up & crusty scabs & lice. Tony the saber-tooth tiger was too wimpy & didn`t devour hardly any cave-boy types. The hordes of woolie mammoths run about recklessly, but are dumb beyond belief & just fill the screen with hair and feet & tusks `til you think ya will upchuck your popcorn. Did anyone get the bit about the daddy splitting to found a new colony? I was having trouble putting that together too,…a with the Egyptian-like slave culture who were building those funky new pyramids, what did that have to do with diddlysquat? Half of the action takes place in white cold regions and half happens in hot tropical rainforest terain, & this is a good move in terms of contrast & composition. & what about that kinky ant-eater looking leader with the long claws of the New Civilization Cult? It was hard to tell what he was up to or where he came from. Was he maybe the hero`s dad? & that was weird the way the princess comes back to life after the shaman mama blows out that icy breath? I missed something…but will be able to review the chapters once the DVD comes out. It wasn`t really that violent, but I don`t know that it would be improved with more gratuitous killing…but maybe it would? It could have benefited from some meaner dinosaurs, like T-Rex, but I suppose they were extinct by 10,000BC. But why try to be accurate about the prehistoric timeline with this clunker? It doesn`t make sense but it don`t matter anyhows! Almost thirty-six million take home so far, this is the most important thing to remember at this point. I did love the costumes & make-up, the wild hairdos and grease paint galore and sandy thick cake makeup on their pusses. I will study the look again for next year`s Halloween costume. For the plot i`m wondering if they were looking at Homer or maybe retelling a story from the Old Testament, but it looks like the writers were covering their tracks pretty good. I know there was some Egyptian stuff in there, but the hieroglyphs were beyond my ken! One good thing is I`m considering putting the aforementioned titles with Ringo & Raquel to the top of my Netflix queue. I have to reconsider why this caveman thing is so appealing. Once I do that I can figure out the charms of 10,000 BC. Now that`s a stupid goal that will chew up lots of time! Oh well…I`m just that stupid I suppose. I do have a working theory as to why the caveman genre films are so popular. People want to think back to the way things were eons & thousands of years ago, & they like to channel how they would survive in the thick of things-wooly mammoths, four-legged crusaders, & dinosaurs of course. The dumber the producer makes the flick, the better the box-draw will be! That`s the formula & that Roland Emmerich knows that. In fact, if he made it series it would flop. A series loop would be 2001 A Space Odyssey, the beginning part. But this is not a pure caveman genre product, so it does not count. People want it to be corny so they can praise there own empty lives! Now you see it, don`t you? The worst the reviews, the better the draw too. This has an inverse function-formula on it that can make someone millions in receipts by recognizing the secret pattern. The pecking flamingoes are really obnoxious & this helps the movie too. The slave rebellion was cool & was kind of a Spartacus thing. The hero dude is a savior for the repressed cave-people on this bummer mission of building the city of gold or whatever it is? The theology here is illusive but one can vaguely comprehend multiple spirits at work here, but the mama mia-supremo gets it & reads the tea leaves with precision. I think everyone lives happily ever after in the end, but it`s a little hard to tell. Is that the impression that you got? Another epiphany I just had is this is Drive-In fodder, & that can translate into big bucks, but that type of outlet does not exist anymore! IE the Cinemarks of the world can absorb that business!

AND GOD CREATED WOMAN...THE SEQUEL

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Bonnie & Clyde...Bonnie & Clyde...And God Created Woman started something Dionysian for the stiff Americano. Brigitte loosens us up and Cold War paranoiac behaviors vanish into the atmosphere. The paparazzi came into being with pics of Brigitte. Maybe it initiated the sexual revolution of the 1960s. Brigitte Bardot was free and natural and visually stunning. The 1950s in the U.S. were stiff and inhibited with Doris Day epitomizing lady stardom with corny parts and bellowing songs. And God…came out in 1956 and suddenly things have changed. The superstar looked stunning to Americans, in part because she was French, and the French Riviera, and sunny, free St. Tropez was an exotic place of Americano dreams…escape from the states to romantic interludes where you play on the beach all day and cha, cha, cha in the cafes by night.
The brilliant blue Mediterranean was gorgeous beyond belief and the French language poetry to stodgy local farm boys. Bridgette silhouetted against a jukebox with lounge guitar, rolling sandy locks and green panels, cut…Roger Vadim knew what he was doing…see the connection with Jane Fonda…see Barbarella for Bardot look-alike. Big Machito jazz band sounds against Brigette strutting up the stairs, in bed, tucked into white cotton sheets and giggling. Camera through panels coastline blue waves cascading boats on the mooring. She falls on the sand cut to docks with boats and she shoots it up for kicks, laughs and fires the pistol out the window…The Phocaeans colonized Provincia 4th century BC wanders the bedroom blue pajamas jealous lover in doorway…Juliette sleeps away cut to boats again…regular at the Cannes Film Festival, rocketed to stardom…Brigitte Bardot the ultimate bikini siren, (read this discreet bikini essay) gingham becomes the rage…languorously on the beach then romance scene buttons back up the back to bed. St. Tropez king of bikini…why am I dwelling on these silly matters…watching And God Created Woman for the first time ever, behind the curves but in the shot and biography of animal rights…Will see Contempt this weekend…they`re still raving about it…shots of coastline…wonders down winding roads goin` nowhere Havas Exprinter concrete walls motorcars and cafes Coco Chanel and the bathtub revolution…Bar de Amis…Les Amis gone the Bardot of my youth? Play the café wild dance scene again with Latin afro-jazz maracas, bongos cowbell jazz and Brigitte begins to move claps twist and albums on wall Juliette pulls her hair up twirls like a wild dervish the jass swings changes syncopation pulls up skirt wilder and wilder grinds the dance floor gone further and further husband jealous takes the stage legs grind wilder and wilder sweats hair flowing bongo furry she is gone caught in passion faster and faster shot fired and the moment is gone and so am I….created more jealousy then anyone thru time…
These picture galleries of Brigitte Bardot should keep you busy for a while… Couple that with some Serge Gainsbourg ala “Bonnie and Clyde” and you will be in a cloud…Uh la la…Raoul Dufy (1877-1953) is the best artist for the Cote d`Azur for food, palm trees, hotels, ocean, & sky…the natural light floods his canvas with joy and innocence. Study something of The French Riviera too before you watch this movie…it will enrich your experience. Shot of hills and seas laundry on the lines…away on bike flowers and shops Les Batounos cage liquore will build the casino by the road…bus and blue dress Antoine!! Fun in Toulon smiles and giggles…suitcase goodbye! Boats and green hills eici de tous tems s`ccampe you`re doing the mambo…cha cha cha troubadours from a lowly lot of jugglers ..kiss me cool jass café tabacs journaux frescoes cocktails bamboo accordion frescoes…vibes and dancing the Duke of Aquitaine & Frederic Mistral verse provencal verse romance and spices cool nightclub knights at the crusades lonely ladies …you`re a nasty drunk darts industrialist makes a play for Juliette hotrod kisses are you taking the first bus…Japanese fan take you back to st. Mary`s orphanage flowing golden hair plate of fruit and red curtains rabbits galore and greens go by Socrates the rabbit flees…yachts or Mister Hale shameless impolite & lazy daily news is stale a proper young lady? Le provencal give me a big kiss boats & birds blue azure motion & business easter Sunday graveyards and chapels play games ciggies marry juliette floral wreaths leave tomarrow sad postcard racks blinds and bikes stroll away Steve Reich`s 18 Musicians in the background…got to get to Flatstock poster show…free Michel I want you married to Juliette wedding day white wedding gown bells they chime…shadows & roman arches lawful wedded husband veil of tears matrimony you`re still in love? Husbands wearing horns punch and fight Hotel kick kick poupette old castles wine & chandeliers handsome you know passion and simple sets with bouchets cakes & fruits & bread stripped robe panorama syrupy music Saint Tropez is dazzling deep blue shutters afro-jass blast cha cha cha go in the car and twist Bridgitte is bored silhouettes and seas palms and cars scotch Venetian blinds architects plans golden balustrades skinny dipping at Hippie Hollow huh?? Sprigs of green wild nights spritely days of haze and smilesteal my heart and away sweet jukebox again stagey scenes are fashion shots Bardot`s got um quick as a fax & away she`s the queen of the parking lot…gear up for tango guitar charley christianson hollow body dream riff tell me something sweet revolution is starting bundle of fire playboy foldouts started here…chauvinism spinning and trouble female trouble bubbles under later with Gloria Steinem pound spoons slap then cuddle and croon exotica born too lotta staircases smooth horns cotton sheets are cool white as lamb idle cards no brainer Juliette is made for you..poster before movie international sex star the first of her kind go on to chores but more Bardot first blue and sand stucco I`m scared to the ground romance in the cote d `azur (here`s a nice, simple map) it`s 1956 and I`m three shoots and laughs target practice on bottles squabbles Stone Age hairclips orange stucco into room diary dear god…black & white marriage snaps riffs loop over seduction buffoonery boats jeeps chatter Marseilles to do books phone ahlo ahlo…vibes piping hot bowties orange lamps casino royale princess of Monaco grace Kelly drives off a cliff…why sleeping beauty with the flowing golden hair age of innocence …camarat lighthouses blue waters calm sailboat mister dufy smoky explosion & fire woman overboard floating & swimming shoreline longshot calm breezes salt water taffy palms beige open dress saving grace foam and swirl beach pose biting kissing broken trees you`re feverish miserable stop drinking drag a ciggy `gainst white stucco walls I don`t love him maybe I wanted a friend…drunk in the kitchen blue blinds snap to super vixen in the sack again want to talk she`s fine…putting on blue/green skirt pots & pans spices arrayed songs project piano cascading down the scales hills & fortress country life is gone walks medieval corridors winding to forbidden fruit…struts the pole & into café again bar reads the paper downs a drink bar de amis again icebox in here a double oh it`s awful…moans to a girlfriend a bar where the whores go?...yesterday she was screaming in my arms?...gun fires…penny arcades of oldtimes yankee doodles where the theater was pinball machines for real unreal been a long time one million bc & rachel welch swinging jass up over swoonin muted horns alto sax dances again and finale catharsis this time sways gyrates cha cha amazons miads wild wood woman hair is swingin rhythms jam & twirl twirl twirl crescendo coils to a boil swings & sweats free love is born!