Consolation Champs

Z Channel: A Magnificent Obsession (USA, director Xan Cassavetes): The daughter of the late filmmaker John Cassavetes and actress Gena Rowlands, Xan (Alexandra) Cassavetes grew up surrounded by the culture of film. But in her teens, she began to form her own taste, thanks in part to an innovative Los Angeles area cable channel. Z Channel began in 1974, long before there was a Blockbuster Video on every block, and it showed both neglected American films as well as the greats of European cinema. Xan set out to make a straight documentary about the channel, and in the process found a whole other story.

Jerry Harvey was a film geek’s film geek. He joined Z Channel in 1980 after programming films for a local arthouse cinema. Under Harvey’s direction, Z Channel really took off, competing against heavyweights like HBO. While remaining a local treasure, Z Channel’s influence was disproportionate to its subscriber base, since so many filmmakers lived in the LA area. Harvey was a friend and champion of such filmmakers as Sam Peckinpah, Henry Jaglom, Michael Cimino, Robert Altman, and Paul Verhoeven, and was one of the first to show “director’s cuts” of such misunderstood films as Heaven’s Gate, Once Upon A Time In America, and The Wild Bunch. But he was also a deeply troubled man. His obsessive nature fuelled his work, but it often led to bouts of crushing depression. His mood swings culminated in a terrible tragedy in 1988 when he killed his wife and then took his own life. Remembrances from his friends are still fraught with grief and anger, more than fifteen years later.

While at first, I wondered if I were seeing two films (a portrait of Jerry Harvey, and an appreciation of overlooked films), I realized that the beauty of Cassavetes’ film is that she’s celebrating the life and achievements of Jerry Harvey by talking about some of the films that he brought to her attention through Z Channel. Not his tragic end, but what came before. So often, when a life ends in tragedy or violence, we only remember that part. Sure, you could call Harvey a murderer. But he was also an incredible film lover and filmmaker’s advocate, someone who had a wide ranging influence as well as a group of loyal friends who are still reeling from his loss.

Z Channel only lasted about a year after Harvey’s death, and the many people interviewed (Quentin Tarantino, James Woods, Theresa Russell, Paul Verhoeven, Robert Altman, and Jacqueline Bisset among them) seem almost as wistful about the death of a certain era in cable television as of their friend Jerry Harvey.

P.S. It seems fitting that I should end my 2004 Toronto International Film Festival experience with a film about a TV channel that director Henry Jaglom described as “like a film festival in your house every night.”

(8/10)

Unforgivable Blackness: The Rise and Fall of Jack Johnson (USA, director Ken Burns): It may seem hard to believe, but I’ve never seen a Ken Burns film. I’ve always meant to, of course, but watching a multi-part documentary series is something of a commitment. So I jumped at the chance to see an entire film in one sitting. Clocking in at an impressive 218 minutes (and including a short intermission and a lively Q&A session, I was in the theatre for almost 4½ hours), I was hoping that the quantity would be matched by the quality. I was not disappointed.

Jack Johnson was a true original. The first black man to hold the heavyweight boxing championship, he was a self-assured man who dressed well, drove fast cars, and kept white women as girlfriends. While not unusual now, this was highly irregular a hundred years ago, at a time when black lynchings were at their peak and the press regularly printed offensive cartoons to go along with its racist rhetoric. In the ring, he was a highly intelligent boxer, favouring a defensive style unknown in his day. He was also incredibly sensitive and articulate, especially for a man with only five years of formal education. But the struggles Johnson faced were almost insurmountable. No white champion would agree to fight a black man. Jim Jeffries preferred to retire undefeated rather than face Johnson, and Johnson had to travel around chasing champ Tommy Burns, hounding him to give him a title shot. When Burns finally agreed to a fight in 1908 (for a purse of $35,000, an unbelievable sum in those days), the contest wasn’t even close, with Johnson dancing around, taunting his opponent, and talking to people in the ringside seats. The police stepped in during the fourteenth round to prevent him from knocking out the badly beaten Burns.

Johnson held the title from 1908 until 1915, with his most famous bout in 1910, against ex-champ Jeffries, whom he soundly defeated. This led to race riots all over the country, and many people were killed. From the moment he won the championship, it seemed that white society looked for ways to discredit him. The press were relentless, printing hostile editorials and calling for a “Great White Hope” who would return boxing’s crown to its rightful place (and race). When a 37-year old Johnson finally lost the championship to Jess Willard, a giant man ten years his junior, it seemed to many that the black race had been taught an important lesson.

Johnson’s life was troubled, and he continued to face persecution from the press and even law enforcement, who prosecuted him on charges related to his “debauchery” with white women. He eventually served a year in prison. There would not be another black heavyweight champion until Joe Louis, 22 years later.

This is a remarkable film for many reasons. First of all, in the little-known story of Jack Johnson, Burns has found a microcosm of the racial situation of the day, and one that has many echoes even now. Muhammad Ali, after seeing James Earl Jones portray Johnson in the Broadway play “The Great White Hope” (later made into a film), declared that Johnson’s life story was similar to his own. A black man choosing to live as a free individual on his own terms is something that is still hard for some white people to tolerate.

Burns’ film is also remarkable for the way in which it uses actual archival film of Johnson’s bouts. Using silent film, Burns and his crew have added sound effects such as crowd noise and the sounds of blows connecting, and it gives these scenes the visceral punch they require. Finally, the superb “talking heads” (including the late George Plimpton, James Earl Jones, and the witty Stanley Crouch) and voice talent (Samuel L. Jackson is the voice of Johnson; others include Billy Bob Thornton, Derek Jacobi, Brian Cox, and Alan Rickman) bring the extraordinary story of Jack Johnson vividly to life.

As an added bonus, you get to hear James Earl Jones say “balls”. Twice.

P.S. Ken Burns is involved in a campaign to have Johnson legally pardoned for his alleged violation of the Mann Act. Other supporters include Samuel L. Jackson, Senators John McCain and Ted Kennedy, and the Rev. Jesse Jackson.

Film’s Web Site: www.pbs.org/unforgivableblackness/

Director’s Web Site: www.pbs.org/kenburns/

(9/10)

Bad Education (La Mala Educación) (Spain, director Pedro Almodóvar): I’m really having trouble coming up with things to say about this film. I’m new to Almodóvar films (Talk to Her was the first one I saw), and maybe I just don’t “get” him yet, but I must say I left this film with a vague feeling of disappointment. Outlining the plot is difficult, but it begins as a story of two childhood friends reunited in adulthood. One is a film director and the other a struggling actor who shows him a short story that he’d like to see developed into a film. It is a partially autobiographical account of the sexual abuse experienced at the strict Catholic school where both boys met. The two boys also fall in love there, and the jealousy of a priest conspires to separate them forever. To be honest, this section of the film was the most enjoyable for me. Despite the horror of abuse, it’s very discreetly implied, and the innocence of childhood love is refreshing. Unfortunately, this section, seemingly so important, only lasts about ten or fifteen minutes. The rest is a tangled telling and retelling of events that came later, when sex becomes a commodity for everyone involved. The plot is complicated by the fact that each character is being played by two or three different actors, and despite having only a handful of characters (all male, by the way), the film never really lets us get to know them or their motivations.

Despite that, it’s a cleverly constructed film, and shot beautifully. It’s hard to think that even a disappointing Almodóvar film can be better than most Hollywood product, but alas, it’s true.

Film’s Web Site: www.lamalaeducacion.com

Director’s Web Site: www.pedroalmodovar.es

(8/10)

Mondovino (USA/France, director Jonathan Nossiter): Since I work in the wine business, I had been quite eager to see this documentary, and I wasn’t disappointed. Reportedly drawn from over 500 hours of footage, the good news is that Nossiter will be releasing not only a theatrical cut, but a ten-part, ten hour series of the film on DVD by next Christmas (ThinkFilm is distributing it). The bad news is that it’s still a bit of an unwieldy beast. When it was shown in Cannes, it was close to three hours long. For Toronto, he’s cut about half an hour but it still clocked in at 135 minutes. Now, for me, that’s fine. I love wine and I love hearing about the controversies raging in my business. But not everyone wants that much.

Nossiter flits around the globe, from Brazil to France to California to Italy to Argentina, talking to winemakers and PR people and consultants and critics about the state of the wine world. The theme that emerges is that globalization and the undue influence of wine critic Robert Parker are forcing a kind of sameness on wine. Small local producers are either being bought up by larger conglomerates (American as well as local), or are being pressured by market forces to change their wines to suit the palate of Mr. Parker, who dictates taste to most of the American (and world) markets.

It’s a complicated subject, and I can understand why Nossiter wants to let his subjects talk. There is Robert Mondavi, patriarch of the Napa wine industry, and his sons Tim and Michael, whose efforts to buy land in Languedoc faced opposition from local vignerons and government officials. There is Aimé Guibert, founder and winemaker of Daumas Gassac, iconoclastic opponent of Mondavi’s plans and crusader for wines that express local terroir. There is Robert Parker himself, expressing some discomfort with his influence while refusing to stop writing about the wines that he favours. There is “flying winemaker” Michel Rolland, consultant for dozens of wineries all over the world, advising them how to make Parker-friendly wines. There are many many more fascinating personalities in this documentary.

If you are a wine lover, you will want to seek out the ten-part series as well as the theatrical version of this film. But even if you’re not into wine, the film is an interesting look at how the forces of globalization are changing many of the world’s oldest and most established traditions. The effects on local cultures and economies cannot be ignored.

(8/10)

Les Choristes (France/Switzerland, director Christophe Barratier): Les Choristes is an unabashedly sentimental film that reminded me very much of Italian films Ciao Professore! and especially Cinema Paradiso. It tells the story of a failed musician named Clement Mathieu who finds himself taking a job in desperation as the supervisor of a reform school in 1949. The school is run by an authoritarian tyrant and the students are a bunch of delinquents who taunt him immediately with shouts of “Baldie!” and “Bullet Head!”. Mathieu decides to begin a choir as a sort of project to help with discipline and soon has the respect of the students. He also discovers a boy with a remarkable voice and does his best to encourage this gift while harbouring a crush on the boy’s mother. This is not totally original stuff, but the story is told well and the performances are strong, most especially by Gérard Jugnot as the rumpled and lonely Mathieu. The resemblances to Cinema Paradiso are quite strong. Both films use a flashback structure. In Cinema Paradiso, a famous film director is called home to his village to attend the funeral of his old mentor, the projectionist at the local cinema. In Les Choristes, it’s a famous orchestra conductor, called home to bury his mother, but the event triggers a visit from an old school chum who unfolds the tale of their music teacher Mathieu. The film is a “man behind the man” tribute to those quiet souls who push others to greatness while often not feeling very successful in their own lives. As someone who studied to be a teacher, I love this kind of story, even if it is not always fashionable in “serious” cinema circles. The emotions are real and are helped tremendously by a fabulous musical score and beautiful choral pieces.

The director was proud to be presenting the film in Toronto after its huge success in France, where it sold eight million tickets and a million copies of its soundtrack CD. We were also treated to a performance after the screening of two of the songs from the film by another boy’s choir, and the standing ovation was almost inevitable.

Film’s Web Site: www.leschoristes-lefilm.com

(9/10)