Films: 1960s-1990s

Films: 1960s – 1990s

There are 43 posts filed in Films: 1960s-1990s (this is page 5 of 5).

“Blade Runner”: The Miracle of Love

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Hollywood has a penchant for envisioning the future as a wasteland of destruction. When the atomic bomb fell on Hiroshima, little did we know that a black cloud would loom over the imagination of every man and woman born thereafter. Fact might not be far from fiction. The Rodney King riot that erupted in Los Angeles in 1992 resulted in cobwebs of smashed glass on building fronts, flames in the night, and fallen supermarket merchandise from toilet paper to ketchup turning aisle floors into a rocky terrain. Soldiers in black helmets patrolled the streets, their batons raised in attack formation. Citizens of every ethnicity tore at each other like beasts in the wilderness. For a week, Los Angeles spun off its axis. “Blade Runner” (1982) predicts this bedlam, only the Los Angeles of “Blade Runner” is set in 2019. The city’s demise started 27 years too soon. With nuclear arms on the rise in regions across the globe from North Korea to Israel, and with terrorists annihilating civilizations, the rest of the world in the second millennium is just as doomed.

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If Armageddon is the only factor that unites humanity, we wonder why the laws that protect us from theft, murder, and civil violations of all sorts that rob us of our right to be. No sense in waiting for a bomb to do to us what we’re able to do to each other. It’s with this cynicism that Rick Deckard (Harrison Ford) wears a frown. He’s a Blade Runner, a government assassin whose target is Replicants, the term for androids in this dystopian microcosm. Humans created Replicants. The master engineer is a scientist named Dr. Tyrell (Joe Turkel). Their purpose is to work as slave labor in the construction of colonies on other planets, where our species is to flourish onward once the world ends. Molded after our image, Replicants deviate from us in two respects – the capacity for emotion and longevity. Their life span is four years.

As is the case with the oppressed, the Replicants have mutinied, marking them as criminals to be terminated. Four of them have managed to return to earth to seek more life from their maker. Although not as lethal as the A-bomb, they are lethal even so. In their desire for a prolonged existence, they kill in a process that involves the crushing of the skull and the gauging of the eyes. This because Replicants resent us humans for possessing a brain layered with memories that trigger emotions expressed through the one part of our body that speaks when words fail us.

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Deckard himself is a man of few words, a futuristic version of the frontiersman of yore in the vein of John Wayne and Gary Cooper. Like all silent types on a mission for justice, he faces his greatest challenge in an affair that involves the heart – a Replicant named Rachael (Sean Young). While Deckard has no qualms about killing the others, Rachael is different. She is not part of the band of renegades. She is an experiment implanted with memories and who goes AWOL from Dr. Tyrell. Rachael also happens to be statuesque with lips as red and lush as cherry, luminous skin, and hair the black of black onyx styled in retro-1940s bouffant – a cross between Betty Grable and Wonder Woman. Aside from being drop dead gorgeous, the tricky thing about Rachael is that she doesn’t know she is a Replicant.

“I dreamed music,” Deckard tells Rachael in one pivotal scene. She says, “I didn’t know if I could play. I remember lessons. I don’t know if it’s me or Tyrell’s niece.” Rachael’s doubt notwithstanding, Deckard only sees her. “You play beautifully,” he says. They are sitting at a piano in his place. A moment earlier, she saved him from death by shooting a Replicant who was about to empty his skull sockets. She knows now that she is not human, that her memories could be those of another; Deckard told her the truth of herself. Thus, she is on the lam, has nobody to turn to except Deckard. She asks him if he would hunt her down if she were to disappear north, wherever north may be. He tells her no. He tells her he owes her. As he lies in repose exhausted from a day that could have been his last, he falls asleep then awakes to the gentle tap of the piano keyboard. Here they are, man and woman, side by side, two loners connected in chaos. Deckard brings his face close to hers. She runs, but opens the front door only partially when Deckard slams it shut, pushes her back into the living room, where he demands one thing of her unique among living creatures as proof of the possession of a soul: “Say kiss me.”

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That Rachael falls under Deckard’s spell is no shock. The shock is in Roy (Rutger Hauer), the leader of the Replicant deserters. He is Deckard’s last target. In a fight to the finish, they smash walls, break fingers, and leap building tops. Roy is the victor. As Deckard shrivels against a post in surrender of his fate, the world is drab and wet from a cloudburst. But rather than meeting his own maker – whether his maker be God or science or some omnipotent force that orchestrates the law of evolution – Deckard confronts a distraught foe. Roy sits before Deckard like a sage opening the gate to knowledge, his eyes not murderous but sad, and with Dr. Tyrell having denied him more years, he recites his own obituary: “I’ve seen things you people wouldn’t believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the darkness at Tannhäuser Gate. All those moments will be lost in time like tears in rain. Time to die.”

Why, Deckard wonders, why is this most deadly of Replicants allowing him the blessing of what he so direly wants for himself? Perhaps Roy isn’t a monster after all, for although memories may not have been implanted in Roy, the memories he did acquire from the day of his inception were rich enough to stir in him the very human feelings of loss and mourning.

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And so Roy dies, Deckard lives, and Rachael runs north. Our hero stays loyal to his oath. He doesn’t follow Rachael. He goes with her. In this most dichotomous of pairings, we understand as “Blade Runner” comes to an end that Armageddon is not what unites humanity. It is the fight for survival. For all our technological advancements and quest for immortality, the warmth of another’s touch is what sustains us, and the sensation of completeness upon witnessing a light enliven a heart as the person whose eyes we are looking into sees us in return as dear and indispensable.

Love has the power to build pyramids, palaces, and civilizations. Love can compel a king to relinquish the throne and drive a queen to end her heartache with a serpent’s venom. Love is the thread that joins every era through the infinite course of history, from the biblical past to the space age present and beyond into the apocalyptic future.

Love is the miracle that turns an android into a human being.

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“The Umbrellas of Cherbourg”: Innocence Immortalized in Rainbow Colors

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Had Matisse been God, he would have created the world of Cherbourg. Rainbow colors burnish the screen with the dewy freshness of paint on a palette. Snow flakes flurry to the ground like raining chips of porcelain china. Buildings possess the geometric precision of cut-out figures in a pop-up book. Add to the mix the music of Michel Legrand and a 20-year-old actress by the name of Catherine Deneuve in her first starring role, and what you have in “The Umbrellas of Cherbourg” (1964) is a piece of French cinema destined to be a winner at the Cannes Film Festival.

Deneuve is Genevieve, a provincial girl in the throes of first love with Guy (Nino Castelnuovo), a mechanic whose ambition is to own a gas station. They stroll on the streets of Cherbourg, sharing thoughts of getting married and having a child, which they will name Francois should it be a boy or Francoise should it be a girl. So sure are they of the future their devotion promises that everything in their midst, be it a house door or Genevieve’s dress, is as delectable as icing on a wedding cake. Conflicts arise, as they always do for young lovers. Genevieve’s mother (Anne Vernon) does not approve of Guy, and Guy receives a draft notice. It is the era of the Algiers War. This proves to be the perfect reason to implement a dramatic device indispensable to some of cinema’s most epic romances, starting with every film adaptation of “Anna Karenina” to “Sunflower” (1970) to “Before Sunrise” (1995) – a train station farewell.

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Not a single misstep happens in this scene. On the contrary, it is prolonged to maximum effect. Genevieve and Guy sing their duet amid hugs and tears and kisses in the station café. The duet is so sensitively rendered (by voiceovers) that it is remembered to this day as one of Legrand’s best:

If it takes forever, I will wait for you. For a thousand summers, I will wait for you. Till you’re back beside me, till I’m holding you, till I hear you sigh here in my arms.

As Genevieve waves adieu to Guy’s departing train, it is raining. She grows ever so small in the distance until exhaust fumes envelop her in a fog.

Cherbourg has lost its sheen.

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Genevieve is left not only crestfallen, but also pregnant. She tells her mother that she will kill herself, which generates a balk and the line that a love suicide only happens in the movies. So Genevieve goes on to marry, not Guy but a traveling jeweler by the name of Roland (Marc Michel), who assures her comfort in Paris and a father to her child. Upstanding character that he is, Roland does not rescind on his word. Guy returns, and though he goes through a period of dejection over the loss of Genevieve, he finds another woman to love in the form of Madeleine (Ellen Farner), the caregiver to his ailing aunt (Mireille Perrey). This is not entirely a surprise. From the start, we sense that Madeleine will play a crucial role in our hero’s life or else she would not have been so pretty.

Every man is handsome. Every woman is beautiful. Neither villain nor villainess exists. Everybody ends up happy. Cherbourg regains its sheen. Yet “The Umbrellas of Cherbourg” is a tragedy all the same because the undying love between Genevieve and Guy on which the film stands fails to be an enduring foundation after all. Despite the oath of till death do us part, the begging to stay, and the declaration of life as worthless without each other, Genevieve and Guy are able to put their love to rest.

From a practical perspective, this is a healthy depiction of first love. No Romeo and Juliet are Guy and Genevieve nor, hopefully, are all young lovers in real life. (http://www.rafsy.com/films-1960s-1990s/romeo-and-juliet-till-death-and-beyond/) Nonetheless, we cannot deny its sadness.

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For me, however, this was the beginning of my love affair with Catherine Deneuve. I am not alone here. Such is the world’s shared fascination with her that in the five decades since the premier of “The Umbrellas of Cherbourg,” her oeuvre has made for popular screenings in art theaters. On top of that, her current works merit an American release. Even in black and white, Deneuve glows. Case in point is her second film, “Repulsion” (1965), which reveals a drastic departure from the role of a pristine young woman. It is also as dark as a film could be, both visually and content-wise. Deneuve plays a schizophrenic whose hallucinations of sexual abuse lead her to murder. As erotically charged as “Repulsion” is, Deneuve does something that is a testament to her early flourishing as a great actress; she escapes being tawdry on account of her ability to imbue her character with psychological and emotional depth.

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Directors from Luis Bunuel to Francois Truffaut would seize upon this talent for the first half of Deneuve’s career, establishing her persona as a snow capped volcano. No other blonde beauty in the world could have conveyed both aloofness and debasement as the bored wife of a Ken doll in “Belle de Jour” (1967), one who gets her kicks by moonlighting as a whore to thugs marred with the hideous looks of a James Bond villain. (http://www.rafsy.com/films-1960s-1990s/on-her-majestys-secret-service-redemption-in-time/) In “The Last Metro” (1981), Deneuve is a fusion of regality and sexuality as the inaccessible wife of a Jewish theater owner during Nazi occupied Paris whose passion flares when she succumbs to her attraction to an actor.

Deneuve is now in her seventies. Her star is far from faded. She remains not only a fine actress, but also a beautiful woman. The secret to her longevity is not complex; she accepts her age. In one of her latest films, “On My Way” (2013), she plays Bettie, a former beauty queen on a road trip with her grandson that leads to an older person’s revelations of regrets and a desire to make amends. During one night of drinking, a young man picks her up. The next day, as sunlight bursts through the window and reveals how a woman of a certain age can look the morning after, the man says, “Wow. You must have been really beautiful when you were young. A real stunner.” For an actress to embody the role of a head turner whose looks have waned takes guts. Name any actress of Deneuve’s generation – Jane Fonda, Sophia Loren, Ann-Margret – and it is unlikely you would ever see them in a vulnerable confrontation with reality filmed for posterity.

Someday, Catherine Deneuve will no longer be. Such is the passing of the seasons, the way of life. Not to despair. We are all aware of this; hence, our duty to create art. Granted the immortality of Deneuve’s films, tomorrow’s viewers can regale in her first foray onto the world stage: in a small town called Cherbourg, as a lass named Genevieve in love with a bumpkin named Guy, joined hand in hand in lighting the universe with the incandescence of youth.

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“Grease”: A Celebration of Adolescence

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“Grease” (1978), the movie, will live forever. It’s been nearly 40 years since it premiered, and “Grease” sing-a-longs across America are as much of an event as Halloween, complete with character look-alike contests and a bag of accoutrements to be brandished at certain scenes. Light wands sway in the dark like candle flames in lament of Danny (John Travolta), stranded at the drive-in, as he bears his heartbreak in song over Sandy (Olivia Newton-John). Blow bubbles are for Frenchy (Didi Conn), bubbly beauty school drop-out that she is, during her visitation from Teen Angel (Frankie Avalon). You’ve got a pair of sunglasses, as well, because “Grease” is a sunny frolic of friendship and love with never a raindrop in the horizon. I’ve experienced the fun at the Castro Theater, the perfect venue given its history. Constructed in 1922, the San Francisco theater has a viewing room that boasts murals of Greek colonnades and a chandelier molded after a colossal lotus. Although “Grease” may not be as old as the Castro Theater, the movie shares its status as a historical landmark.

The magic of “Grease” is that it is not a deep film. Music erupts at the moment an inkling of seriousness threatens the lightness. When a group of girls scorn Rizzo (Stockard Channing) for getting knocked up, she doesn’t cry but sings instead that nobody shall ever witness any tears, and Sandy, in her pureness and innocence, can only express the pain of yearning in melody. In happy moments, of which exists a plethora, a song isn’t enough. These teens need to break out in a dance of high jumps and twirling limbs in the gymnasium, on the football bleachers, atop a car painted with lightning bolts, everywhere, anywhere. Both the cast and the crew must really have been immersed in merriment for the camera to have transmitted all that joy with such palpability. They so acutely capture the frivolity of adolescence that you can overlook the discrepancy in age between the actors and actual high schoolers. More importantly, they did something that spoke to the subconscious of viewers back then and that would continue to do so to that of generations after; they made every single character in “Grease” cool, from nerdy Eugene (Eddie Deezen) to stuffy Principal McGee (Eve Arden).

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Indeed, coolness is the magic ingredient to the film’s immortality. Every teenager deserves the right to be cool, to be included in some group or other. The friends made in high school form the first tribe outside of family. You share the same taste in music, clothes, and books. You talk about sex and disclose your crushes. You approve of each other in a way your parents don’t. Time and maturity will generate a rift, but the bond will never quite be broken because the seed of acceptance planted back then has instilled a sureness of self that will flourish with age. You’re a comic geek, not a jock or a brain or a beauty queen, and that’s okay. You’ll never be alone. The world is full of comic geeks, so much so that a Comic-Con convention is held annually in San Diego. Besides, cliques are as transient as the latest hair trend, and the bravado with which the ordained gods and goddesses of high school strut the corridors is as slippery as grease. Danny can’t shoot a ball into a hoop. Sandy’s all-American boy toy (Lorenzo Lamas) can’t carry a conversation. Rizzo disparages herself when it comes to love. Everybody has got an issue.

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As a result, high school becomes a battle field on which you bear arms against your insecurities, the most prevalent among your peers being body issues that a number of conditions ranging from premature balding to fatness propel. (Mine was acne and a lack in height.) You’re called names. Your locker is vandalized. Nevertheless, you survive, as you should. In retrospect, you realize that puberty was a necessary rite of passage, one that actually had moments of laughter and belonging, and you find that you have emerged a stronger person on account of it. Look at how happy the graduating class of “Grease” ends up. Rizzo’s pregnancy scare is just that – a scare. Kenickie (Jeff Conway) gets to keep his girl without the burden of fatherhood. Sandy blossoms into a fox. Danny takes Sandy for a ride on his fancy set of wheels to the sky. Who knows what our hero and heroine are going to do up there? Probably lose their virginity in a union of heavenly bliss.

Heed to the message of “Grease.” Forget the isolation, fights with your parents, and bullying. Remember instead the mischievous pranks, the bitter sweetness of first love, and friendship. Especially the friendship. The mystery of adolescence happens only once, in all its ecstasy and damnation, which is why “Grease 2” (1982) was a flop.

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