AN INTERRUPTION TO REGULAR SERVICE
(Before regular service is even vaguely established)

Since the kind of work that has $$ signs attached to it has kept legs, head and buttocks in a perpetual state of akimbo the last three weeks here at Leapster Towers, I haven’t had much time left over for knocking out those cute, if snaggletoothed, little bits of verbal packing material for the new-fangled Web O’ Leaps.

So rather than let the previous blob just kind of congeal or heal over, I come up with an idear.

Everyone who orders wine with the meal, by grape variety, has been going kind of beresk in the media lately, over a recent – and I’m using this next word in the loosest possible sense – “special” which aired on our national media sheltered workshop, the ABC.

Featuring the inestimable talents of Marge “Spot the Valve” Pomerantz and the de-lovely “Farmer” Dave Stratton, the racket here was that they’d temporarily jerked the ABC audience away from their scones, needlepoint, and/or obscure gallery openings, and polled them on the ten greatest movies of all time. From this slapstick research methodology, they jury-rigged a list, and then a panel of pencil-necks, needle-noses and general coffee-shop layabouts alternately trilled or snooted about it in lieu of entertainment. Apparently. Even if I hadn’t been buried under a solid hillock of sport videotape for aforementioned $$-based reasons, wild hearses couldn’t have dragged me kicking and screaming to within ten miles of this bright new shroud in Australian entertainment history.

The inevitable upchuck was twofold. One is that if you poll people on something like this – movies, albums, great dried flower arrangements throughout history, whatever – without priming their brains like a lawn-mower engine first (and even if you do), what you’re going to end up with is a list that has too much recent crap on it that hasn’t stood any test of time and most likely won’t, has too much crap on it in general, and will be a list of people’s favourite pictures for home and personal brain/groin scratching purposes, and not their attempt at a more objective list of “great movies”.

The “Favourite vs Best” furphy is an old chestnut for general communal confusion, and will doubtless be the subject for a further Leapster blob down the line. It’ll show up right alongside a personal expression of anguished dyspepsia over the endemic Australianism – now as good as a part of the national constitution – that “Everyone is entitled to their opinion.”

(To nutshell/preview my take on this, yeah sure, everyone’s entitled to their opinion, but if there’s a fire blazing across the street, I’d prefer to hear the TRAINED FIRE-FIGHTER’S opinion over every other schlub in the street, if you smell what the Leaps is cookin’ there.

To put it another way, just because everyone’s got an opinion on every subject virtually by law in this country, doesn’t mean I have to HEAR theirs; or give equal weight to all opinions, particularly those held/expressed by folks, who in another piquant Australianism, “Couldn’t find their arse in the dark with both hands.”)

The second upchuck of the ABC greatest-movies “special” was the minor plague of snooty articles emitted by the aforementioned amateur wine-writers guild, who unanimously declared that any list of “great movies” was inherently a shop-worn exercise in hair-splitting, seconds before they started manically hair-splitting like a battalion of Edward Beale salons.

Excreting a latte-flavoured mist of disdain for the appalling choices of the common herd – a group, incidentally, who regularly have little to do with anything which appears on the ABC, and you can check any ratings figures you like on that, or alternatively, just run an eyeball down the ABC programme roster – Wine-Writers-Anonymous went right on ahead to produce a list of their own for the edification of the grubby-collared masses, one inevitably riddled with celluloid detritus which was more posturingly high-browed, but arguably every bit as appalling.

All this was about as predictable, enjoyable, if not enlightening as the inevitable attraction between brand new shoes and dog-poop.

However, it gave me the aforementioned idear. A while back, a mate who labours deep somewhere in the media snaggle, and is movie-friendly, but never really had time/inclination to research all that deeply into the subject, asked me for a little list of some pictures that might be worth his time, since he knew I was kind of a nutball on the subject. Off the top of me head, I duly knocked him out such a list, with a word or two of hopefully enticing description. I aimed for a mix of styles and eras, and the only consistent theme was that I thought each movie was substantially successful at what it tried to do, that what it tried to do was worth something, and that each offered engrossing entertainment and, unlike virtually all megaplex packing-material of the last twenty years or so (minimum), left a unique, lasting impression, whether the picture in question tickled your particular petunia-patch or not.

What follows here is the first publication of that list, which was, admittedly, never intended for publication in the first place. (And if you think it should have stayed there, well, “Chacun a son gout”, which is French for “Every Australian has a right to their own opinion.”)

I’ve tickled it up with a few gags and elaborations for public consumption, partly because it probably needed it, and partly because, much like the guy you always seem to end up sitting diagonally opposite from on the Friday night tram, I’m an inveterate fiddler.

What follows is not – please Lord, NO – another list of some goober or other’s Ten Greatest Movies of All Time That You Must See Before You Develop a Terminal Condition. It’s pretty much what I said it is before – some movies that will probably repay your time if you haven’t got around to seeing them yet, as recommended by a well-meaning, cheek-pinching, avuncular old fart who has watched a Titanic-sized shipload of movies. I hope you get some use out of it, even if only as a bar-room argument starter.

SOME OLD FLICKS LEAPSTER RECKONS ARE WORTH CHECKING OUT

THE CONVERSATION (1974) *

Watergate-era story about a quirky, nondescript, surveillance guy (Gene Hackman) who’s “all-business, no moral qualms”, thinks he’s on just another case, and finds out that this one’s complicated, dangerous and involves all sorts of illicit government involvement, abuse of power and exploitation of citizens. Cold, creepy and engrossing movie that probably hasn’t dated in much except fashion in thirty years. In recent years, has become a bit of a “critical consensus Best Movie of the 70s”. It’d run close, and the 1970s was a good period for challenging, off-kilter, coldly brilliant pictures in the movie-mainstream, before that practice was effectively outlawed.

M. HULOT’S HOLIDAY (1953) *

A bunch of suburban types go on the sort of genteel seaside resort holiday that people used to back then. That’s really about the whole film right there. It’s an observational comedy piece that picks up the quirks of the characters and humanity in general and gently milks them for running gags and spot humour. The driving force is Monsieur Hulot (played by the writer/director, Jacques Tati) who is a gawky, awkward, polite chap who can’t help following the beat of his own glockenspiel, and inadvertently, and invariably causes chaos in his wake. It’s slow and deliberate, but just builds and builds in laughs. A ton of really hilarious gags in there. For me, the scenes with the fireworks, the tennis match and the canoe are the show-stoppas, but as the poet observed regarding the human nose, you’ll pick your own favourites. It’s a little like “The Party”, but subtler, in that Tati leaves you to pick up a lot of the humour for yourself. Kind of a silent comedy movie that happens to have a soundtrack.

THE HARDER THEY FALL (1956)

Boxing has probably provoked more good movies than any other single sport. This is one of the best ones. It’s an adaptation of a Budd Schulberg novel of the same title, which was basically a fictionalised version of the career of former world heavyweight champion, Primo Carnera, and probably not too far from the truth. Kind of a behind-the-scenes look at old-style corruption in boxing. Humphrey Bogart plays the sour press agent guy who is the main character, and can’t stomach the bullshit and exploitation any more – this was his last movie. Curiousity Shoppe Note - the guy who the ersatz-Carnera meets in his last fight in the movie is the guy who beat Carnera in real life for the title 20 years earlier – Max Baer Sr. Tough, hard, good picture.

THIS SPORTING LIFE (1963) *

Maybe it’s a bit of a shame from a parochial Melbourne point of view that arguably the best movie to date about any code of football is about rugby league, of all things. One of the so-called “kitchen sink” period of English movies of the ‘60s, which means realistic, bleak and depressing, about a young hard-nut who will do whatever it takes to make a name and money for himself via the only break he’s going to get, which is sport. This is a view of the real, old-fashioned rugby league – when it was the northern England, working class, professional code. Richard Harris as the lead, and Rachel Roberts, as his landlady and eventual love-interest, give blow-away performances. Really great movie, tougher than your granny’s old ironing board.

KING OF COMEDY (1983) *

As a comedy of embarrassment, it’s set at at least “Fawlty Towers” levels of intensity, and as a movie examining the more terrifying aspects of the triangle involving the media, the public, and the obsession with celebrity, it’s probably about as good as you’ll find, and was, though timely enough in one way, probably at least 15 years ahead of its time in others, and still feels plenty contemporary now, in the dregs days of the “Every garage attendant is a celebrity” reality TV poopfest. A celeb wanna-be, with no apparent talent except a drive to be a celebrity (Robert De Niro – one of his best performances) finds an unorthodox way to live out his dream of getting on a major tonight show. Very dark comedy, with some funny, funny bits in it. To be honest, I think it gets funnier with further viewings. The first time, it’s probably going to be mostly a case of peering through the fingers covering your face and going “Oh. My. God.” a lot. Jerry Lewis gives the acting performance of his career as a Johnny Carson-type tonight show host. Tony Randall is very funny in a much smaller role sending himself up. One of the absolute top-shelf Scorsese pictures, and you could make a case for it being THE best.

THE THIRD MAN (1949) *

A guy who writes stories for pulp magazines (Joseph Cotten) is in a suspicious and spy-heavy Vienna after WWII, looking for an old acquaintance, Harry Lime (Orson Welles) who has apparently disappeared, and as the picture goes on, seems to have been behind a lot of the nastier spy and agitating-type stuff that’s happened in that part of the world during and after the war. Mystery-thriller type approach, way more convincing and engrossing than most, probably because the picture’s not just about that, and Joseph Cotten’s loss of gung-ho US college-boy innocence is eerily reflected in a number of oblique observations about the changes in US/European world order in the post-WWII upchuck. Welles didn’t make this – an excellent and generally way underrated director called Carol Reed did. Apparently Welles wrote his own dialogue though. One of his greatest performances too, without a great deal of doubt. Everyone always talks about the Harry Lime theme (played on a zither) sticking with them, but you won’t be forgetting Harry Lime in a hurry either.

THE BANK DICK (1940) *

W.C. Fields was kind of the last of the first generation of ridiculously talented movie comedians who could do everything. His gimmick was that he was a crusty, irritable curmudgeon - but strangely easy to identify with – victimised by family life, work and authority figures – not a million miles away from the Al Bundy character in “Married With Children” many decades later. He made at least three great pictures, “Man on the Flying Trapeze”, “It’s a Gift” and this one. In this, he foils a bank robbery completely by accident, and ends up as the bank’s security guard. It’s made abundantly clear that you’d struggle to find anyone less inherently suited to the job. Somewhere in there, a Hollywood movie company comes to town to shoot a picture, and Fields ends up exploiting his dubious local celebrity to get himself involved, and winds up directing it. He was such a funny man.

MY FAVOURITE YEAR (1982)

If you’ve never seen this in its many airings on regular TV or cable, it’s worth catching up with. One of the best of the “behind the scenes in US 50s television” movies. (Other real good ones are “Quiz Show”, “The Front” with Woody Allen, and “Mr Saturday Night” with Billy Crystal.) It’s a fictionalised version of one of the big 50s TV comedy stars, Sid Caesar, and his hit sketch-comedy program, “Your Show of Shows”, focussing on the chaos behind the scenes. (The Caesar character is called “King Kaiser” here, so they don’t leave a lot of room for interpretation on what it’s about.)
The guest on an upcoming show is noted alcoholic and on-the-skids movie star Allan Swann (played by Peter O’Toole, and clearly intended to represent Errol Flynn.) He’s a ticking time-bomb re booze, so they assign a brash young writer on the show (played by Mark Linn-Baker) to babysit him and keep him sober enough to perform. Bizarre adventures ensue. (This character is probably a composite of guys who really worked on the Caesar show, but my guess is that a lot of it’s meant to be Mel Brooks.)
It’s a feelgood type comedy, and there’s a conventional plot in there, but it’s got a ton of laughs, very enjoyable characters, and really gives you some of the fly-by-the-seat-of-the-pants feel of what it must have been like working on a massive hit show like that in the frontier days of big-time television.

ED WOOD (1994)

Brilliant premise has a guy (Johnny Depp) of no apparent talent in anything in particular obsessed with making movies and by sheer hustle, flim-flam and complete self-delusion, he succeeds, making one astoundingly awful picture after another. Any references to Yahoo Serious, Nick Giannopoulos and the entire Australian film industry by extension are purely coincidental.

Don’t know whether this makes the premise more or less brilliant, but it happens to be a true story. There was a real Ed Wood, and back in the ‘50s he actually made all the unbelievable movies depicted in this one, and while not everything in this is documentary-accurate, most of the really unbelievable stuff is pretty much guaranteed to have happened, as can be readily observed if you ever see the original Ed Wood movies, which are still available. (One even showed up on Channel Seven once, which must have been by mistake. They never showed it again. Smart money would be on the concept that they never will.)

Very funny movie, and not without some heart in its own strange way. Martin Landau deservedly won an Oscar playing a dilapidated, drug-addicted, post-stardom Bela Lugosi in this – he’s incredible. Depp is very funny as the endlessly peppy Ed Wood, and Bill Murray and Jeffrey Jones have gift roles as a couple of Ed’s invariably bizarre accomplices.

ACE IN THE HOLE (1951)

As old as it is now, I suspect that plenty of journos, news organisations, and networks would still find this a little too near the knuckle for comfort.

In some no-horse, desert-bordered yokel town, some local gets trapped under a bunch of rubble or something, in an old native American ruins. A not noticeably scrupulous reporter (Kirk Douglas) turns up, his career on pretty much its last legs and looking for one big shot – and manages to manipulate this into a massive beat-up of nationwide impact – the biggest story of the day. Soon the area is awash with the smell of media circus, and the worst elements of human nature have a field day.

Unlike a lot of the other movies on this list, I didn’t grow up with this one – I only saw it once, in relatively recent years, on cable. It’s the kind of movie that sticks with you. You may find it under the alternative release title “The Big Carnival”.

They could remake it right now, and all they’d have to change is some technological details.

——————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————–

(* - The asterisk means I think this is confusable with being a “great movie”, by any objective standards I could think to conjure up. The ones “unasterisked” I’ll guarantee for entertainment, sustained atmosphere, craftsmanship and the qualities any half-bright person over the age of about 14 might look for in an enjoyable movie-watching experience, but I probably feel there’s some quality or qualities lacking which may make them fall short of that ultimate land-grab for posterity, “greatness”.

If you disagree with any of these assessments, console yourself with that famous Latin consumer warning “Caveat Emptor”, which is a reference to the content of my, Robbie Williams and Noel Gallagher’s heads, and translates to “Cavity Empty”.)

***************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************

[Postscript from the Website Super-Hombre: Eons ago, we started a mailing list for this site. The intention was to send folks updates about the site; to let them know when articles had been added, the pot pourri had been agitated and was smelling nice again – that kind of thing. It happened once or twice like that, then fell silent. But as part of the v2.0 2005 Mega Overhaul, we’re resurrecting it. For real. You can sign up here. It’s not an open discussion forum - you’ll only get messages about the site updates from us.]