WoF Top 10 Favorites From The Big Screen in 2019

Obviously I didn't see everything released in theaters this year. And, honestly, I was blown away by only a small percentage of what I did see. Here is my list of my personal favorites among what I saw at the movies in 2019 (no streamed projects).

1. Parasite
directed by Bong Joon-Ho

I started hearing buzz about this film early on, but had to wait until it rolled into theaters in my area. I had a dim idea of what the story was about, but man! My mind was blown. I love films that give me something I have never seen before, and Parasite delivered on every level. Beginning as a kind of dark comedy about class differences in South Korea, the film offers sly commentary on Eastern and Western culture, technology, privilege, economic survival and family relationships through truly impeccable acting, gorgeous set designs, and brilliant cinematography. Four members of the impoverished, live-by-their-wits Kim family slowly con and trick their way into service jobs within the household of the wealthy Parks. But their machinations have unforeseen consequences. The story contains an edge of suspense that steadily increases until the third act plot twist that catapults the film into a whole other level of jaw-dropping events. I really enjoyed the work of actor Song Kang-Ho, who plays the Kims' patriarch, Ki-taek; Song was also featured in director Bong's English-language thriller Snowpiercer. Parasite has to be seen to be believed, and then seen again. My favorite of the year.

2. Queen & Slim
directed by Malina Matsoukas
starring Jodie Turner-Smith, Daniel Kaluuya

This film has been controversial for its subject matter and its brutal ending. But I totally loved the journey of these two characters, out on a first date that isn't going well and then forced by circumstance to go on the run together. We know it's foolhardy of them to think they can outrun the law, but we root for them anyway. Along their journey, we see the layers of their personalities peel away as the characters -- who are not named Queen and Slim but whose real names are only revealed at the end -- learn not only to work together but to love together. The film is also a visual feast, a mid-American road trip that highlights the beauty of the landscape, the humanity of its citizens, and the ugliness of our culture. I loved the performances by newcomer Jodie Turner-Smith as a prosecutor weary of seeing justice distorted, and Get Out star Daniel Kaluuya as a warm-hearted, conscious brother shocked to find himself on the wrong side of the law. Bokeem Woodbine also stands out with another bravura performance, and I loved seeing transgender performer Indya Moore in a movie role. One film critic described Queen & Slim as one of the most honest portrayals of black life, and that may be so. Intricate family relationships, levels of education, the politicization of black lives, how acts of terror and defiance against the powers that be can be commodified and raised to legend.

3. The Last Black Man in San Francisco
directed by Joe Talbot, written by and starring Jimmie Fails

This is a beautiful, elegiac, often surrealist story of a young man clinging to his past to stave off his fear of an empty future. The cinematic imagery and pacing of this brokenhearted valentine to San Francisco is nothing short of stunning. As the film opens a young girl skips along in a childhood game, passing men in HazMat suits picking up trash while a roadside preacher delivers a blistering sermon against the city's neglect and decline. The film comments upon a once vibrant black community inexorably being altered by gentrification and greed as seen through the eyes of Jimmie, who clings to a myth that glorifies and elevates the city's distant golden age and his own fractured family history. It's also about the power of friendship and what it means to be a black man. Raised in foster care because his parents struggled with drug addition, Jimmie is crashing with his best friend Mont and Mont's blind grandfather (SF native Danny Glover). Jimmie is obsessed with the gorgeous and crumbling Victorian house he once shared with his parents before things went radically wrong. Though a white couple occupies it, Jimmie can't stay away, continuing to work on its upkeep even as the couple shoo him away and threaten to call the police. When the couple have to vacate, Jimmie and Mont become squatters, with Jimmie reclaiming what he feels is his birthright. But his world is shattered when the truth about the house's history is revealed. This film feels like a fever dream, a tone poem, a comic tragedy of Shakespearean proportions. Fails' performance tugs at the heart.

4. The Farewell
directed by Lulu Wang, starring Awkwafina

I was moved by this story of a Chinese-American woman with an uncertain future who joins her family on a trip back to China that is ostensibly about attending a wedding, but is really undertaken as a final visit with her ailing grandmother. Per tradition, everyone in the family knows that Grandma has cancer except Grandma herself. Star Awkwafina, who has shown herself to be an adeptly comic scene stealer in Ocean's 8 and Crazy Rich Asians, turns in a quiet, thoughtful performance that pulls the viewer into her deep sadness at losing her beloved grandmother, as well as her confusion over her identity and her future, Equally sad and funny, The Farewell examines also how immigrants are forced to straddle to very different cultures.

5. Rocketman
directed by Dexter Fletcher, starring Taron Edgerton
Though the Freddie Mercury paint-by-numbers biopic Bohemian Rhapsody seemed to get the lion's share of accolades earlier this year, I was more captivated by the imaginative structure of this biographical jukebox musical fantasy about Elton John (I confess, he was one of my favorite artists growing up). The film follows the benchmarks of his story, from chubby wannabe to piano wiz to his momentous partnership with composer Bernie Taupin, through his exploding fame, struggle with drug addiction and recovery, using his distinct discography as a springboard to flights of fantasy, as when the power of his performance causes Elton and the audience at Hollywood's Troubadour to levitate, and full-on musical theater-style production numbers, as with "Saturday Night's All Right." The songs were as often used to convey character and mood as they were to recreate pivotal concert performances. Taron Edgerton does his own singing, and he is truly amazing. The movie is as imaginative, whimsical, and dramatic as John himself, and I loved every minute.

6. Bolden
directed by Dan Pritzker, starring Gary Carr

A portrait of tortured genius during a tortured time in American racial history, the early 1900s, Bolden attempts to tell the story of legendary New Orleans trumpeter Buddy Bolden, who was credited as the father of American jazz. Unfortunately, there are few records of Bolden's existence and fewer recordings of his musical genius. Thus, as a film cobbled together from legend, a few recordings, and faint memories, the film is often dreamlike and foreboding, alternately joyous when Bolden's music is played, and hopeless as when Bolden is exploited and victimized by business partners, white racists, and hubris, and falls into alcoholism and ultimately mental illness. The film begins with a middle-aged Bolden confined to a sanitarium; when he catches the sound of the radio playing his music, he goes into a reverie in which he relives memories of his beginnings on the trumpet through his years astonishing audiences with his syncopated improvisations, then through his decline. As played by the marvelously expressive Gary Carr (a Brit who so deliciously played pimp C.C. in HBO's The Deuce), Buddy Bolden doesn't actually speak until 20 minutes into the film, but through the film's expressive imagery -- including a dreamlike sequence where we see how he learned complex rhythms as a child in the garment factory where his mother works -- give us a window in which to glimpse his spirit.

7. Harriet
directed by Kasi Lemmons, starring Cynthia Erivo

Cynthia Erivo is a riveting screen presence, no matter how you slice it. Here, she makes us understand the pure spinal steel of religious conviction and survival instinct that made real-life she-ro Harriet Tubman an indomitable leader and abolitionist crusader. A movie needed to be made about this singular personality, a woman born into slavery who defied all fugitive slave laws of the land, not to mention braving the elements and risking her life to find freedom not only for herself but dozens of other enslaved people. Still, the film feels slick and contemporized in a movie-of-the-week way. This is not to take away from the achievement of bringing this to the screen, and I enjoyed the performances of Janelle Monae, veteran actors Clarke Peters and Vondie Curtis-Hall, and Hamilton alum Leslie Odum Jr. in supporting roles. I was expecting a bit more from the story, but as a cinema primer for those who were not familiar or had forgotten the legend of Tubman, this is just fine.

8. Once Upon A Time in Hollywood
directed by Quentin Tarantino, starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Brad Pitt, Margot Robbie

Not among my favorite Tarantino works, but still a fascinating meditation on a more innocent era of Hollywood, and how the prospect of war, television, politics, and violence wrought havoc on those ideals. DiCaprio gives a layered performance, showing the insecurities of a complicated persona caught at a crossroads in his career, while Brad Pitt plays it laconic as his longtime friend and factotum. I found the Sharon Tate storyline confusing, as Tarantino reimagines history, but this film leaves a lot to chew on and has plenty of great acting moments.

9. The Good Liar
directed by Bill Condon
starring Ian McKellen, Helen Mirren

The Brits have a way of using the English language with whip-cracking accuracy and archness, something that only a handful of American actors can do with the same fluency. In Ian McKellen you have one of the masters of British acting, and Helen Mirren is no slouch. Far from being a geezer flick (like the dreadful Poms with Diane Keaton), The Good Liar is a twisted tale of an aging English con man deciding to do one last job, swindling a rich widow out of her holdings. But since that widow is Helen Mirren, we know that things will not go according to plan. Adapted from a book that I haven't read, the plot featured this elaborate WWII-era back story from Nazi occupied Austria involving teen rape, espionage, swapped identities, and thwarted love that seemed both way too complicated and way too convenient. Mirren gets her revenge, but her machinations leave you wondering how she kept focus after so many decades and got so much information at just the right time. And of course, any sort of battle scene between seniors is bound to give the audience visions of broken hips, lost dentures, and heart attack. Still, it's a sly film and worth it to see McKellen slip, slide, and give great line readings.

10. Us
written and directed by Jordan Peele
Starring Lupita N'yongo, Winston Duke

Jordan Peele's unique sensibilities -- infusing the horror genre with social commentary, existential paranoia, and racial fears -- has struck a chord with the viewing public. But, while I'm not a fan of psychological thrillers or horror, I nevertheless appreciate the achievement represented by this film, which reveals more of its unique brilliance upon repeated viewings. US is more of a psychological thriller that a straight horror film, especially once you get over the visual shocks of hollow-eyed, mechanical doppelgangers threatening to kill their mirror images. And yes, there is an element of the slasher film, in which the body count multiplies as victims fall prey to stabbings, bludgeonings, deliberate car attacks, immolation, and more. US provides constant dread, anxiety, tension, and small shocks as the killers keep popping up and doing their worst. When the elaborate explanation for all these goings-on is finally revealed, I really had to suspend all belief in a rational reality. So is it scary? It depends on your perspective. The best films are able to have you, the viewer, identify so closely with the protagonist, that you feel personally menaced by any physical threat to them. And we definitely root for plucky Lupita to get to the bottom of this and survive. A rollercoaster thrill ride.

Honorable Mentions for the actors:
"Gloria Bell" by Julianne Moore; "Judy" by Renee Zellweger; "Uncut Gems" by Adam Sandler; and "Hustlers" by Jennifer Lopez; and "Miss Bala" for Gina Rodriguez.

Great Documentary: "Toni Morrison: The Pieces I Am"

Thanks for supporting Words On Flicks and I will see you in 2020. - Janine

This "Cats" Could Have Been Saved

CATS
directed by Tom Hooper
starring James Corden, Judi Dench, Jason Derulo, Idris Elba, Jennifer Hudson, Ian McKellen, Taylor Swift, Rebel Wilson, and introducing Francesca Hayward

No surprises here: Cats is a bad kitty.

I've read many of the reviews excoriating the film as beyond bad, but as a fan of musicals I felt I had to see it for myself and form my own opinion. I also have the (questionable) advantage of having seen the original musical on Broadway, and of reading the source material, poet T.S. Eliot's whimsical "Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats." In truth, I wasn't a big fan of the musical (I thought the costumes were weird then), though I am fond of the original book, as it is a truly imaginative collection of poems that describe a variety of cats as having human traits, to humorous effect. However, the collected poems are very British and were first published in 1939 -- 80 years ago! Composer Andrew Lloyd Webber's NYC stage adaptation premiered in 1980, which is also quite a while back.

Why It's Bad
1. It's out of its time:
The time lapse is a large part of the problem. The material is significantly dated. Why the producers thought they could take this ancient monstrosity, which was an oddity in its time, and transfer it largely untouched to the screen is a mystery. In our high-tech, short-attention span, Disney-fied, action world, this kind of old-fashioned show fails miserably. Despite the efforts of an Oscar winning director, stunt casting, a couple of new songs, a lot of choreography, and CGI effects, the film is mostly dull, ugly and weird.

2. The cats are frightful:
I think of cats as elegant, attractive animals. These humans looked like something from the Island of Dr. Moreau, or from Dante's Inferno. They were mostly a repulsive-looking bunch other than the angelic young ballerina cat (Heyward) who wants to be a Jellicle. Jennifer Hudson looks like she'd been dragged over the streets on her face. Judi Dench seems to have been mummified. The venerable Ian McKellen appears to have been electrocuted. Idris Elba looks like the devil, both literally and figuratively, in a shiny dark leotard and tail, ice blue contact lenses, and ears set like horns -- in a way that skirts both taste and racial sensitivity. They don't really look like cats. There have been many musicals that cast humans as animal characters (The Wizard of Oz/The Wiz's Cowardly Lion, Johnny Depp as the Big Bad Wolf in Into The Woods, every other contestant on TV's "The Masked Singer"), and none of them looked this freakish.

3. The music is bad:
To me, the most unforgivable part of this film musical is the music itself. Other than "Memory," the songs are universally awful and what's worse, they are badly produced. Many a half-baked screen musical has been elevated in my mind because the soundtrack production was so fantastic (the Bee Gees' Beatles fantasia Sgt. Pepper, Andrew Lloyd Webber's superior Evita, even the recent The Greatest Showman). The minute I heard those cheesy synthesizers (unfortunately, synth is an apparent signature sound that imitates the mewling of the cats) and bubbling pseudo-disco basslines -- so emblematic of early 80s music -- my heart sank. Not-great songs can be updated, adapted, and produced to enhance their appeal and timeliness for modern audiences, but in Cats, nobody bothered. Andrew Lloyd Webber himself produced the music, and I can only imagine that he was either too married to the original arrangements, or he didn't have the time or money to reimagine them.

4. Bad songs/bad singing/ho-hum dancing:
Further, as a sung-through musical with literally no spoken dialogue, the singing is woefully second-rate. Rebel Wilson as Jennyanydots and James Corden as Bustopher Jones play it for laughs, and they seem to be in a completely different movie. The other characters should have taken a page from them. Taylor Swift does a sexy "Macavity," but it's unclear to me why Idris Elba's Macavity isn't singing his own song. Jennifer Hudson over-cries and over-sings her setpiece "Memory." Jason Derulo as Rum Tum Tugger tries to inject some soul into a corny uptempo number, but you can hardly understand his lyrics. Judi Dench doesn't even try to sing, nor does Ian McKellen, whose spotlight number is a snoozy dead spot. And speaking of Cats' lyrics, since they are adapted from poems, there are either too many words (as the Skimbleshanks the Railway Cat, Bustopher Jones, or Mungojerrie & Rumpleteazer) or simple phrases repeated ad infinitum (as with Mr. Mistoffelees). Specific references to London locales and British colloquialisms also go over the heads of most Americans. As for the dancing, its is ... unremarkable. A lot of cat writhing that is overwhelmed by the large-scale sets they take place in. There have been complaints that the dancing is oversexualized, but I didn't feel that. Have you ever watched cats move? They're slinky, sensual, seductive creatures. It never occurred to me that they were horny.

5. Not enough character development.
A lot of the cat characters aren't named in the film, but apparently they all have names and relationships. I didn't even know that the main tomcat's name was Munkustrap or that TaySwif was Bombalurina until the credits. Indeed, the plot is very thin; much like A Chorus Line, you meet all the characters in a kind of "I Hope I Get It" audition line, with the cats hoping to get picked to go to the Heaviside Layer, which I assume is the next life in their nine-lives cycle, though that is never explained.

I don't want to just pile on, though. I love musical theater. So could anything have been done to make it palatable for contemporary audiences? I think so.

How I Would Have Fixed It

How could Cats have been saved for 2019? Put it through a contemporary lens. Think of the framing of The Princess Bride, for example.

I would have made Judi Dench a kindly, modern-day grandma with a house full of cats that her young granddaughter comes to visit. Grandma keeps a copy of "Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats" and shares it with her granddaughter, telling her that every cat in her house and the neighborhood is a Jellicle cat with a story. They go to the market, passing the junkyard, the theater, the railway station, a garbage dump, and Grandma points out all the cats. The perspective could then shift to the cat-ified human personifications singing and acting out their theme songs. And if these characters are identified as cats, they don't have to be drowned in makeup and fake fur for us to understand they are cats!

Back in modern times, Grandma tells the girl that there will be a full moon, a Jellicle Moon, and that it's a special night for the cats. Then the movie can shift back to the cat characters and their Jellicle Ball, Dench can still show up as Old Deuteronomy, Macavity can still be evil, and Grizabella can still ascend. Back in real time, Grandma sings about how to address cats and treat them with respect. They hear meowing at the back door, and it's a tiny multicolored kitten. "Hello, Grizabella," says Grandma. "Welcome to the Heaviside Layer." THE END.

Yes, some of the cats' song and dance numbers would have to be trimmed quite a bit, but I don't think that would be a loss, since so much of the movie is a slog. So what do you think of my fix?

Thoughts On Tarantino's "'Once Upon A Time ... In Hollywood"

Once Upon A Time ... In Hollywood (2019)
written and directed by Quentin Tarantino

I consider myself a fan of Quentin Tarantino, so I was really anticipating this one. I have to say, though, that I haven't always liked his output. This new one is touted as the director's ninth screen outing as writer/director. So let's see:
1. Reservoir Dogs. Saw it on video years after release. Enjoyed it.
2. Pulp Fiction. Saw it opening night at the Chinese Theater in Hollywood. Loved it.
3. Jackie Brown. This may be my favorite.
4. Kill Bill, Vol. 1 & 2. Loved it.
5. Death Proof. Have yet to see it all the way through, so no opinion.
6. Inglorious Basterds. Seen it. Was left cold.
7. Django Unchained. Liked it until the last quarter. Not anxious to see it again.
8. The Hateful Eight. Can take it or leave it. A slog that delivers its payoffs at a glacial pace.
And now
9. Once Upon A Time ... In Hollywood.
While critics and folks whose film opinions I value have raves for it, I've been having trouble processing it.

The film took my expectations of what a Tarantino film is -- fast, witty, hip, and violent -- and didn't so much defy them but twist, thwart, and sidestep them. While still managing to be witty, hip, and violent. It's simply that the story is rendered at a different pace; the tale of how middling actor Rick Dalton (Leonardo DiCaprio) and his stunt double turned friend and factotum Cliff Booth (Brad Pitt) spend their days and nights in 1969 L.A. and ultimately cross paths with real-life starlet Sharon Tate (Margot Robbie) unspools in an episodic fashion, though -- unlike in Pulp Fiction -- Tarantino doesn't scramble the timelines.

See, our awareness of the timeline is pivotal in this picture. The previews for the film don't shy away from showing that these affable bros and their ethereally gorgeous neighbor are impacted by followers of infamous "Helter Skelter" psycho Charles Manson. Anyone who knows history is familiar with the gruesome Tate-LaBianca murders that horrified the country and cast a pall over the freewheeling Hollywood lifestyle that Tarantino so lovingly recreates here. Because of that, I spent my entire watch time at attention, waiting for the inevitable to happen, and of course, it does -- or does it? The conclusion left me emotionally exhausted and mentally confused. Also confusing to me was the intermittent use of a narrator. Was it an omniscient narrator? Or was the narration from a character in the story, because it sounded a lot like Kurt Russell (who plays a role) to me.

Once Upon A Time does offer numerous notable episodes, classic dialogues, monologues, moments of tension and chuckles along the way, as Dalton scrambles to keep himself from sliding into alcoholism and keep his acting career on a forward trajectory, while Booth is satisfied to run Dalton's errands and get his kicks stunt driving around L.A's sun dappled neighborhoods with the radio blasting the latest groovy pop rock hits (in classic QT style, the soundtrack is filled with gems from the Mama & the Papas, Paul Revere & the Raiders, the Rolling Stones, Jose Feliciano, Deep Purple, Neil Diamond, and many others).

It's an era of spaghetti westerns and swinging 60s pseudo private eye stories, of flower power and political assassinations. Though it's a tale about the Hollywood lifestyle, and the film studio system that birthed it, the story is as much a tribute to the then-seminal medium of television as it is to movies. The film is crammed with details and homages, to goofy TV variety shows, the kind of Wolfman Jack radio DJs, inane radio jingles, the stern TV westerns and crime procedurals, the TV producer screen signatures, the Hollywood landmarks and institutions from Musso & Frank;s, the Brown Derby, Schwab's, El Coyote, the Cinerama Dome, the Pantages Theatre, the Capitol Building. Viewers who don't know the city may not get all of the references, including how far it is from Hollywood & Vine out to the abandoned film studio in Chatsworth where Manson's followers have taken up residence. It's fun to see how many real-life characters (Bruce Lee, Steve McQueen, Michelle Phillips, Mama Cass, Roman Polanski) and cameo appearances (Kurt Russell, Clu Gallagher, Dakota Fanning, Al Pacino, Luke Perry. Michael Madsen, Bruce Dern, Rumer Willis, Lena Dunham) are crammed into the flick.

As we watch their days unspool, we learn that Dalton is volatile, emotional, insecure, and often clueless; Booth is laconic, laidback, philosophical, and capable of explosive violence. They make a perfect odd couple, and it's a treat to see two men easily enjoy each other's company and not fret about their employer/employee status. Meanwhile, Tarantino gives a lighter touch to Tate, who after all was a real-life figure whose existence was cut short, so she does little but prance around the city looking beatific, as though she is a symbol of angelic purity in THE City of Angels. (<--- edited)

DiCaprio and Pitt have earned raves for their performances in this flick. DiCaprio is universally acknowledged as one of the greatest actors of his generation with an impressive number of roles under his belt, except I personally don't find him all that accessible as an actor. It's that little something that makes the audience identify with the actor as they take on the role; it's a quality that Denzel Washington and particularly Tom Hanks have in droves. It's a quality of magical engagement -- or charm, if you will. For all DiCaprio's skill, he leaves me cold.

Pitt, who has impressed me over the years as he's grown from a pretty face to an actor with some depth (Kalifornia, Moneyball, Snatch, Thelma & Louise, Fight Club) is far more engaging in my book. But truth be told, Pitt has done too many roles where he is called on to be the pretty, mysterious/sad brooder (Benjamin Button, Babel, Interview with A Vampire, A River Runs Through It, Meet Joe Black, the Ocean flicks).

If I had my druthers, I would have cast 50something Pitt as challenged actor Rick Dalton and made 40something DiCaprio play the iron-fist-in-a-velvet-glove Cliff Booth -- imagine the creative possibilities of that! Brad, world-weary, weepy and insecure, and Leo, caged fury with a smile.

As one of my movie compadres and I repeated to each other as we hashed it over, it's not that I don't like the film, exactly. I just may have to do a re-set on my expectations and watch again.

Poms: A Frail Tale of Senior Cheerleaders

Poms
directed by Zara Hayes, with Diane Keaton, Jacki Weaver, Rhea Perlman, Pam Grier

This is a sad movie, on multiple levels.

First, it's sad from the beginning, not because its protagonist, Martha (Diane Keaton), is an older single woman with no children who reaches the age at which it's no longer smart to live alone in the city. It's sad because the film finds her trying to sell off her belongings on the street in New York. Haven't we've all seen the news stories about how grown children don't want to inherit their parents' antiques? Haven't we been through it ourselves? Or heard the stories of adults faced with the overwhelming task of disposing of a lifetime of accumulated furnishings, papers, and clothing in the wake of a parent's death? Of people begging thrift stores or consignment shops or the Salvation Army to take the things they used to take and being refused? Articles about great historic finds like photographs and scrapbooks and audio recordings being rescued from trash bins? So watching her futile little sales efforts are already sad. We watch her lower her prices, practically give items away then have things hauled away so she can clear out of her apartment.

But Martha has packed up for a new life, and has gotten behind the wheel for a sun-dappled drive down the 95 to Atlanta to take up residence in a 55-plus retirement housing community. Things seem to be looking up, as the community offers numerous amenities, activities, active neighbors, security, and a beautiful house for Martha to live in. But Martha's a sourpuss with a not-so-secret secret. She scowls, smirks, and shakes off attempts by residents to embrace her, informing them that she's come there to die. In the moment of the quip, it seems funny only it's not. We know at this point that Martha has canceled all of her New York City doctor appointments and is refusing chemotherapy, so she's decided to just ... die. And not tell anyone.

Though she initially resists her wacky, live-out-loud neighbor Sheryl (Jacki Weaver), she gets sucked into a friendship based on their flouting of the community's many rules. The film's attempts to build comedy around the community's hysterical by-the-numbers Southern belle directress Vicki (Celia Weston), the hen-pecked bumbling security captain (Bruce McGill), and elderly deputy are just desperate and ... sad. There's that word again.

As it happens, Martha has held on to her high school cheerleading outfit and confesses that she never became the cheerleader she once dreamed of being. Next thing you know, in an effort to live out her dreams, give the ladies something to do, and also backhandedly stick it to the community's rules on club-forming, Martha is auditioning and rehearsing a group of sprightly senior cheerleaders, a group that also includes recently widowed Alice (Rhea Perlman), married Olive (Pam Grier), and Helen (Phyllis Somerville), whose life is over-managed by a overbearing, meddlesome adult son.

In another review of this film, the reviewer complained that Poms was wrongheaded for trying to sex up these old ladies with pom poms and short skirts, equating their efforts with a misguided attempt, both by the women and the Hollywood machine portraying them, to seem young and sexy again. But this view is totally off-base. First, this presumes that older women, by definition, are NOT sexy. Cheerleading for these ladies is about agency, about bucking conventions and stereotypes about what it means to be an older woman. And it's about injecting fun back into their lives. The movie could have been about older women riding horses or cliff diving or playing competitive poker and the message would be the same.

One of the most misguided aspects of this script is that Martha's cheerleaders are narratively pitted against a team of high school cheerleaders, who employ mean girl tactics against the seniors as if they are their equals, which is ridiculous. Don't these girls have mothers, aunties, and grandmothers? Where is the respect? They threaten one of the mean girls with exposure to her parents about a wild party that trashed her house, and get her to coach their team. As if!

The movie is presented as a comedy, and it tries to milk the situation for cheap gags about grannies who drink, gamble, defy their husbands, grown kids and other authority figures, and about the seemingly frivolous lives and petty concerns of seniors with time on their hands. But we never come to understand how or why Martha winds up alone in this community. Also the other actresses in the squad have little to do in the film. Rhea Perlman is underutilized as a woman finally freed from her husband's edicts, and poor Pam Grier is completely wasted. The movie doesn't really examine the perils and challenges of growing older or of facing down infirmity, or even delve into the risks and benefits of cheerleading for this crew. It could have been done in a clever way, but these issues are glossed over.

To me, the saddest part of Poms is that for a film about a group of senior cheerleaders who gain a sense of self-esteem, identity, and even respect for engaging in this high school activity, their final performance routine was so dang underwhelming. I know that they are seniors, women in their 60s up to their 80s. They were not going to do handsprings, cartwheels, towers, dives, or other athletic or bone-fracturing moves. But their choreography is basic, boring, uncoordinated, and ... sad. No one on this silver squad has any sense of rhythm, apparently. I love Diane Keaton as an actress, but all she has going for her here is enthusiasm. So much more could have been done with the choreography to brighten it up; even the director and the cinematographer seem to know how awful it is by panning the camera around so that we only see bits and pieces of their triumphant performance at a cheerleading competition.

In the end, it's not about having the ladies win the competition. It's about their camaraderie, their efforts to exert control over their bodies and their circumstances. As the tagline says, "It's never too late to follow your dreams." But Poms could have been a stronger vehicle for that message.

The Sun Is Also A Star: A Fairytale Teen Romance, A NYC Valentine

The Sun Is Also A Star
directed by Ry Russo-Young, starring Yara Shahidi, Charles Melton

The Sun Is Also A Star is a fairy tale, adapted from the popular YA novel by Nicola Yoon. It's a day in the life of Natasha Kingsley (grown-ish's Yara Shahidi), a high school senior from a Jamaican immigrant family in Brooklyn who makes a last-ditch effort to prevent them all from being deported the very next day. By pure chance, on the way to INS in Federal Plaza, she crosses paths with Daniel Bae (Riverdale's Charles Melton), a high school senior from a Korean immigrant family in Queens who, while on his way to a future he doesn't want as a Dartmouth medical school student, decides that Natasha is his destiny. All of this information is easily gleaned from the many TV promos and theater previews we've seen of the film. To add a twist, Natasha is presented as a smart, data-obsessed realist who doesn't believe in love while Daniel is willing to buck a medical career because of his obsession with poetry.

For reasons that I don't get, and only serve the film, the two are obsessed with the concept of Deus Ex Machina, which as I understand it is a term applied to narratives like this one where an unexplained and totally contrived miracle save the day. There are numerous coincidences in the film, first with Daniel spotting Natasha in Grand Central Station and trying to follow her (stalker), then in randomly seeing her again on the downtown subway and then snatching her back from being hit by a reckless driver on the street. And that's just for starters. For these two lovebirds, the term "Deus Ex Machina" (emblazoned on the back of Natasha's satin jacket) seems to simply mean fate and miracles. But for those who craft narratives, it's a cheap solution for wrapping up a plot that has become way too hairy to resolve in a realistic way. And that's exactly what we get here.

It's a fairy tale to think that love can be achieved in one single day. In this story, though Natasha states early on that she doesn't believe in love, after a few hours with this tall, handsome stranger she is eagerly making out with him (hormones, people.) It's also a distinctly female fantasy to have a gorgeous young man be completely dedicated to making love happen within a day, and Daniel is sexy and persistent without seeming creepy. And only in a fairy tale would a busy immigration lawyer (played by John Leguizamo) turn into a fairy godmother who takes on the case of a last-minute teenaged client. It would also take a fairy tale for a pair of teenagers to spend the night together sleeping outside in the park and not be a. mugged, b. arrested, or c. beaten within an inch of their lives by worried parents.

Like the walking-and-talking-across-the-city film tradition it follows, most notably the Ethan Hawke-Julie Delpy trilogy Before Sunrise/Before Sunset/Before Midnight and even the Chris Rock-Rosario Dawson comedy Top Five, The Sun Is Also A Star has the two leads pose leading questions that pull these two met-cute young folks into thoughtful discussion and instant intimacy while making the rounds of appointments and errands across the city. They encounter some hurdles, most notably when Natasha finally reveals that she's on the verge of leaving the country for good and that they have no viable future. Their only culture clash seems to come from his family; when Natasha comes along as Daniel delivers a bank deposit to his father's business, it turns out to be a black hair care emporium in Harlem (Daniel gives us a history of how Koreans cornered the black hair market). While there, his lunkhead brother makes a racist joke about her being a shoplifter and his father offers her the economy sized jar of relaxer to tame her natural hair. The scene is awkward and mortifying; out on the street again with Daniel, Natasha shrugs it off.

There is no denying the physical beauty and sex appeal of the film's two stars, and the camera lingers lovingly on their faces to make sure that we fall in love with them, too. What's more, they are given interesting and romantic backdrops from the big city in which to fall, adding to the spell the film attempts to weave. The idea of a romance that could occur in one day between two apparently thoughtful and aware young people seemed appealing to my middle-aged sensibilities. Even though I am old enough so that the pillow-lipped Shahidi and dimpled Melton could be my grandchildren. As I watched the film I became deeply and profoundly affected, yea, near tears with sentimental longing and romantic regret. Did my tears well up in response to the burgeoning and rather hasty and oh so unrealistic teen romance beign presented as the film's primary narrative? No. My emotions were pricked by my love of New York City.

Big Apple, I miss you so much! Though we had to break up our love affair, I still treasure our precious memories.

You see, New York City is the town where I was born and raised. I haven't lived there for a few decades now. But glimpsed lovingly through the lens of cinematographer Autumn Durald, as lead characters Natasha and Daniel spend a day wandering, the city today looked as appealing, challenging, beautiful and grimey as ever. In The Sun Is Also A Star, viewers ride the subway along elevated tracks from the boroughs, and underground from Wall Street to 125th Street, from Borough Hall to East 86th Street. We revisit Caffe Reggio, a landmark of Greenwich Village. We glide through the Hayden Planetarium on the upper East Side, watching the sky show. We stroll through Chinatown and SoHo and along the East River. We get to ride the tram to Roosevelt Island. We traverse 125th Street in Harlem. We cross Broadway and Lincoln Center and spend moments in the marble great room at Grand Central Station considering its zodiac-emblazoned ceiling. The camera pans over the city's bridges, Central Park, the Chrysler Building. And I'm swooning.

I was instantly brought back to the days of my teenage years, when I knew almost every corner and every neighborhood of Manhattan and felt lucky to be there. Because mine was an untraditional school, our gym classes were held in Central Park or Hunter College or at the 14th Street Bowl-Mor Lanes (now demolished) and we had to get ourselves there on time the best way we could, as though we were already in college. We frequented foreign films on East 68th street, and midnight showings at blockbuster cinemas in Times Square or on 96th Street, we went clubbing around the East Side, shopped bargains along Delancey and Canal Streets, went to the Jazzmobile shows outside by Grant's Tomb on Riverside Drive, went roller-skating indoors in the meatpacking district, took dance and music lessons in Harlem, rode the Staten Island ferry back and forth for fun. Living in the outer boroughs, as some of my friends and I did, meant that when we went into The City on the weekends or during the summers, we stayed for the day; we found ways to kill time in department stores, hotel lounge areas, park benches, the museums, the 42nd Street Fifth Avenue Library, neighborhood cafes and luncheonettes, and movie matinees. When carfare was an issue, we walked the city blocks from the east side to the west side, from uptown to midtown and back, particularly in the summers. The food we ate -- the bagels and street cart hotdogs and knishes and hot pretzels and toasted chestnuts and Jamaican meat patties and cuchifritos and Chinese dumplings and pizza -- oh the pizza! We didn't have cars, we didn't go to high school dances, we had no prom, our parents didn't belong to clubs. We were very independent big city kids. And that's what this movie reminded me of, the golden days when New York was my playground.

But I digress. As in most fairy tales, eventually there is a happy ending. Though things looked bleak for our modern-day Romeo and Juliet, and they were lost to one another, coincidence -- nay, Deus-ex-Machina aka an act of God -- puts the erstwhile lovers in the same place at the same time and the film ends with a kiss, as all good love stories should.

The story doesn't make a lot of earthly sense, but it's sweet and a great vehicle for its stars. In the meantime, I'm planning to head back to the Big Apple for a visit quite soon.

Words On Flicks Podcast Notes: Re-Examining Rodgers & Hammerstein Musicals

The following are extended show notes from the May 16, 2019, episode of the Words On Flicks Show podcast on BlogTalk Radio.

This week’s topic is the screen musicals of Rodgers & Hammerstein. I would daresay they are the most popular and most influential musical collaborators of modern times. Their partnership would push the musical form forward in ways that were then considered groundbreaking, if you can even imagine that. Richard Rodgers had previously worked with lyricist Lorenz Hart on several projects, resulting in well known songs – one of my favorite musicals from their partnership is Pal Joey, which was made into a movie with Frank Sinatra, Kim Novak, and Rita Hayworth. Oscar Hammerstein II had teamed with others on operettas and the like, including Showboat with Jerome Kern.

They were the team that really championed the song as a vehicle for the characters to push the story forward, to advance the narrative. While this was done previously, more often Broadway performers sang tunes that showed off their range, or tunes popular at the time. The story kind of loosely linked songs together, but the R&H musicals really used them in new ways.
These musicals were wildly popular and because they first appeared on Broadway, the music was widely available on original cast albums. The songs were recorded and rerecorded by the biggest pop stars of the day, so when I was a kid in the 1960s, before rock & roll took hold, these tunes were on the radio and on the television variety shows. You couldn’t get away from them.

Also, my mother was a big fan of musical films and we often watched old movies on television. The Rodgers & Hammerstein musical was its own special thing, because it was going to take me far from the world that I knew. These musicals dropped us into the customs, cultures, costumes, and historical moments that many people knew little about and gave us stories of moral and cultural conflict.

They formed a backbone for the evolution of musicals today. The Disney animated musicals owe a lot to the Rodgers & Hammerstein template. While there are more contemporary styles that are reverting to the jukebox-style of building a story around existing songs, and other musicals that play with the song form.

But since the Rodgers & Hammerstein canon was sort of the bedrock of my youth, I wanted to spend some time with them. So let’s get started.

1. OKLAHOMA (1955) with Shirley Jones, Gordon McRae, Rod Steiger, Gloria Grahame

Did you know what it was like to live in an American territory out in the west back in the early 1900s? Me neither. The territory didn’t become a state until 1907, the same year jazz pioneer Buddy Bolden [who I talk about at the top of the show] was blowing jazz in Storyville. Out here in cow and corn country, pioneers had settled the frontier through farming and ranching – as we learn in the musical’s "The Cowman And The Farmer Should Be Friends" song. This ditty points to the very real land conflicts that historically led to violence and political maneuvering across the western frontier, something seen in other films like Kevin Costner’s Open Range (2003).

Anyway, this is a charming piece of Americana centers on the romances of two couples: primarily good girl Laurie (Jones) and amiable cowboy Curly (McRae), a pairing that is threatened by a claim from ranch hand Judd (Steiger), who wants Laurie for his own. The musical includes the dark dream sequence ballet taken from the stage musical, that was considered to be pioneering in its day. The ballet plays out Laurie’s fears about Judd muscling in on her and hurting Curly. These two spend a lot of the musical pretending to others that they don’t care for each other. The secondary romance in the film is about the character Ado Annie (Grahame), who is famously the "Girl Who Cain’t Say No," and efforts by boyfriend Will Parker to make her settle down.

Though the film is set in Indian Country, nary a Native American is seen in the film. And there is a carpetbagger character with a Muslim name: Ali Hakim. Played by Eddie Arnold, he’s a cartoon foreigner, a Persian, who only has an accent. But we get a lot of info about old-timey customs like ladies taking naps in the hot afternoons, and about newly married couples being stranded on top of a hayloft, and I love Ado Annie’s tune “I Cain’t Say No,” because it’s an attempt to see sexuality from a woman’s perspective. Ado Annie doesn’t get much condemnation for her flirtatious ways in this. But Rod Steiger terrified me as Judd. He was portrayed as brutal, dirty and unscrupulous. And somehow the fact that he didn’t need a dance double in the dream ballet made him that much more terrifying.

I also love how lyricist Hammerstein adapts the local accent for the rhyme structure of the songs – scare become skeer, pretty becomes purty so it can rhyme with flirty, can’t becomes cain’t so it rhymes with faint, etcetera. So many songs became staples: "The Surrey with the Fringe On Top," "People Will Say We’re In Love," and "Oh What a Beautiful Morning." It was the first feature to be filmed in ToddAO 70 mm Widescreen, so it’s eye-fillingly gorgeous.

Note: The musical, which was first performed on Broadway in 1943, is so enduring that there is a brand-new revival on Broadway right now. It is stripped down, darker, presented in the round with a bluegrass band performing all-new orchestrations and getting rave reviews.

2. THE KING AND I (1956) with Yul Brynner and Deborah Kerr

Oklahoma was adapted from a book called "Green Grow The Lilacs," and The King And I was also adapted from Margaret Landon’s novel “Anna and the King of Siam.”

Once again, Rodgers and Hammerstein create a major musical in a foreign country, now known as Thailand, at a pivotal point in history, the 1860s. The King of Siam, played by Brynner in his career-defining role, decided to hire a British governess to educate his many children to help modernize the country – more like Europeanize – and she ends up educating everyone, most especially the king. Can this be categorized as a White Savior movie? I think so. It’s unusual in the fact that the savior comes in the form of a woman, because the status of women was not particularly high at that time in that country.

It’s also a film that strongly suggests that the widowed Mrs. Anna and the King of Siam have a silent and unconsummated love affair, and that their big production number “Shall We Dance” is evident of their affection. Despite constant threats to leave his employ because he refuses to give her the house she is contracted to received, Anna ends up staying and advising the King until his death.

What the musical glosses over and considers quaint is the reality of female slavery within the country at that time. This is expressed in the fate of the concubine Tuptim, here played by Puerto Rican performer Rita Moreno. She has been given to the king as a gift but she is in love with another but she is not free to marry. She runs away and when she is found, Anna stops the king from lashing her. But in the original book, as well as in the previous nonmusical version with Rex Harrison as the king, the slave girl Tuptim is killed. Apparently Anna gets over this as part of the country’s customs.

What I loved MOST about this film is when the ladies and children of the court put on a Siamese version of Uncle Tom’s Cabin for the visiting English dignitaries. Watching this as a kid, this was my favorite part. First, because it was a showcase of traditional Thai dance, music, and theater. And perhaps even more importantly, it was a production of an anti-American slavery tract in another country before an audience of the world’s Number One colonizers and enslavers! The English! And they didn’t seem to bat an eye, they thought it was quaint.

This is also a film where most of the main roles are not played by Asians. Yul Brynner is Russian.

[On the show] I played "Hello Young Lovers" because it was among the songs from it, but while many people remember "Shall We Dance," I like this because it tells us that the main character Anna Leonowens isn’t thirsty. She’s not desperate for love, she’s satisfied in who she is, and she isn’t bitter over losing the love she had. My mother particularly loved a song from this, called "Something Wonderful." It seems to express women’s frustration with being with a strong man. It also falls into the R&H formula of having a big inspirational anthem sung by an older female character at the end of Act I. You have this again with "Climb Ev'ry Mountain" in The Sound Of Music and "You’ll Never Walk Alone" in Carousel.

3. CAROUSEL (1956) with Shirley Jones, Gordon McRae

How many of you had to sing ("You'll Never Walk Alone") one at a graduation or recital? This is from CAROUSEL, one of the saddest and most miserable of the Rodgers & Hammerstein musicals. I remember seeing it as a kid on TV and what I really liked was the carousel music theme with the horses spinning around, and then there was a beautiful ballet sequence on the New England seashore with a young girl. But I saw it again a few years ago and I was kind of appalled by it. Because it seems to condone the idea of domestic violence as a form of love.

Carousel reteams Shirley Jones and Gordon McRae in the lead roles, and they look good and sound good together. And the music is lovely and a bit more evolved than R&H's previous work. But the book is …?

First, the main character, Billy Bigelow, is DEAD when this starts. He’s dead, he was kinda lousy in life, and the Starkeeper in heaven or wherever he’s gone to afterward tells him to recount all his earthly missteps and then gives him one chance to go back and do a good deed to redeem himself. When the main character is already dead, how depressing is that?

The story is set in Maine at end of the 19th century. Billy is a carousel barker known to have ladies everywhere the carnival lands. So he’s a player. The older woman who owns the carousel attraction uses him as bait to bring young ladies to the ride, but is kind of possessive. It doesn’t spell it out in the musical but you get the sense that they’re more than just employer and employee. But once he claps eyes on young millworker Julie the two of them are done for and they quickly marry. Except Billy leaves the carnival and is basically an unemployed layabout. The couple ends up moving in with Julie’s cousin, who owns a restaurant where Julie works to pay the bills.

Meanwhile, Julie’s best friend from the mill, Carrie, hooks up with an enterprising fisherman, Mr. Snow. Though he smells like fish, he makes plenty of money and treats his girl like a queen. By contrast, Julie struggles to make ends meet, doesn’t know where Billy is half the time, and then it is revealed that he beats her. Ain’t that romantic? So of course Julie is pregnant, so Billy hooks up with a ne'er-do-well friend in a scheme to rob the mill owner while a big island clambake is going on. Not only does he get nabbed by police, he accidentally falls on a knife and is killed. Boo hoo. Julie is heartbroken, of course, but it cracks me up that she’s literally standing over her husband's body with her cousin singing "You’ll Never Walk Alone" within about two minutes.

So the part of this flick that really makes me go WHAAAA???? is toward the end. Billy’s daughter is now 16, about to graduate high school and deeply unhappy after having been taunted all her life about being poor, dead criminal Bigelow's daughter. Billy comes down to earth and becomes visible to her briefly to give her a bit of advice. But in that moment, she pulls back from him because he’s a stranger, and he goes to slap her. When this child tells her mother that this strange man tried to put his hands on her, she says it didn’t feel like a slap but a kiss. Julie, who seems to have caught a glimpse of Billy before he disappears, smiles and says: "YES, IT IS POSSIBLE, DEAR, FOR SOMEONE TO HIT YOU, HIT YOU HARD, AND IT NOT HURT AT ALL."

No. No no no no no no no.

Anyway, the songs in this bittersweet tale of marital violence became popular, including "June Is Busting Out All Over" and "If I Loved You." But to be honest, even though the Maine scenery and shots of the fishing boats on the water are gorgeous, the choreographed scenes are marvelous, and all of that clambake lobster looks delicious, I don’t need to ever see this again.

4. CINDERELLA (1957)

This is not technically a big screen musical, because it has always aired on television. The 1957 production aired to the largest TV audience up until then with Julie Andrews as Cinderella. But because videotape back then didn't exist, it was a one-off! So when the powers that be decided to air it again, it was in a new production. This is the version I grew up with, televised in 1967 with Lesley Ann Warren as Cindy and Stuart Damon as the Prince, with Celeste Holm as the Fairy Godmother, and Ginger Rodgers and Walter Pidgeon as the Queen and King. It is available for viewing on Amazon Prime, and I saw it again within the last six month. It's the ultimate fairy tale redone in R&H style. Because it’s fairly short compared with the others, this is among my favorites, And it’s got some really clever lyrics, as demonstrated by the "Stepsisters Lament" in which they cleverly downplay all Cindy's charms and threaten to break her arm and pull her hair out, ha ha. I also love other songs from this project, including "Do I Love You Because You’re Beautiful," "In My Own Little Corner," and "Lovely Night."

"Cinderella" was reproduced for the Disney Channel in 1997 with Whitney Houston as the Fairy Godmother -- and as co-producer -- and Brandy as Cinderella. This version also featured a diverse cast, with Bernadette Peters as the Stepmother, Whoopi Goldberg as the Queen, Victor Garber as the King, Jason Alexander as a courtier and Paolo Montalban as the Prince. But some of the reviews of this diverse-cast, updated version weren't very kind.

5. SOUTH PACIFIC (1958) with Mitzi Gaynor, John Kerr, Ray Walston, Rossano Brazzi

Rodgers & Hammerstein adapted this from a couple of short stories from "Tales of the South Pacific" by James Michener.(Side note: Michener was also the author of the giant-sized novel "Hawaii," which was made into a non-musical film starring Julie Andrews and Richard Harris, and that hair-raising tale of missionary work, colonization, disease, poverty, culture clash, and racial superiority could take up another show). Here, American GIs during WWII are stationed in the South Seas. The story centers on two characters, a nurse named Nelly Forbush (Gaynor) who falls in love with a widowed French planter (Brazzi) only to find that her racial prejudice won’t allow her to marry a man who has been in a relationship with a native islander. And the other character is young soldier named Joe (Kerr), who despite having a girl back home, is lured into a relationship with a young local beauty (played by a young France Nyugen) by her mother, played by Juanita Hall. The musical was reportedly supposed to send a strong anti-racism message.

The musical contrasts the stories of a young American woman conflicted in her love affair with a white man by prejudice against his mixed-race children and a young American man conflicted in his love affair with a young native girl by duty to his family and the girl he left behind. But there is so much else going on in the film in terms of a love triangle, a big show-within-a-show, the WWII maneuvers, that the Don’t Be Racist message gets a bit muffled. Moreover, the message seems to only extend to Asians and Pacific Islanders, as African Americans continued to catch hell Stateside, and there are no African American characters.

Which brings me to Juanita Hall. Who is African American, and was a prominent figure on Broadway for many years. Here she plays Bloody Mary, the mother of the young girl Liat. She plays a local Tonkinese islander, speaks pidgin English, and is throwing her daughter at the young lieutenant Joe to get frisky with. So is it because she imagines her daughter’s life will be better with an American who has some financial means? Is it because there are no Tonkinese men available? And the American Seabees as they’re called totally make fun of Bloody Mary constantly. It is Bloody Mary who sings "Bali Hai" to entice Joe to the island and into her daughter’s bed, and I never understood exactly why.

South Pacific has a lot of song and dance numbers like "Gonna Wash That Man Right Outta My Hair," "There Is Nothing Like A Dame," the standard "Some Enchanted Evening," and the anti-racism song "You’ve Got To be Carefully Taught." Another very strange thing about South Pacific, is these colored lenses that come over the scenes. You’ll be watching and suddenly it will go green, or red, or yellow. Apparently the director wanted these to be subtle color changes, but this is not subtle at all and detracts from the film, I think.

Many people love this movie. I can take it or leave it.

6. FLOWER DRUM SONG_(1960) with Nancy Kwan, James Shigeta, Miyoshi Umeki, Jack Soo, Juanita Hal

Several years ago TCM was having an “Asian Images In Film” festival. They showed this, one of my all-time favorite musicals, one I had not seen in its entirety or without commercials in many years. This was the Crazy Rich Asians of its time, with a mostly Asian cast, with two of the main Chinese-American roles played by Japanese actors. Set in San Francisco’s Chinatown, and centering on a well-to-do Chinese American family and their attempts to keep to tradition and find a suitable wife for the oldest son from the old country, Flower Drum Song was also adapted from a popular 1950s novel. I had so many fond memories of seeing it as a kid, mostly because it presented an entirely different culture and place to me. But seeing it again more recently was eye opening. It’s a little frayed around the edges and showing its politically incorrect age as it concerns Asian stereotypes. It's still a delightful story with strong performances and amiable music; but many of the jokes are just wrong. (A completely re-jiggered book and staging was done in Los Angeles a few years ago by playwright David Henry Hwang is an attempt to clean it up and update the story.)

When I was a kid watching Flower Drum Song, Nancy Kwan was just IT. She was hip and happening and gorgeous, and I felt like I was just enduring the movie until she hit the screen again to do “I Love Being A Girl” or “Sweet Sunday” or “Fan Tan Fanny.” I loved her jazz dance moves, her wardrobe and her smooth patter. I didn’t understand that she was the conniving bitch of the movie -- I wasn’t sophisticated enough. But now, the movie for me is all about how precise, how precious, how heartbreaking Miyoshi Umeki was. Watching FDS this time, I fell totally in love with her, with her simplicity, her acting, her graceful long hands. She was utterly amazing. She won the first Academy Award ever given to an Asian actor, not for this but for Sayonara. She deserved it. I also remember her clearly from TV's The Courtship of Eddie’s Father with Bill Bixby as well. She had such a quiet, sweet intensity; some critics say she was successful because she was the very picture of the subservient Asian stereotype.

Anyway, this is the classic immigrant story. People who settle in America from another country for a new life; yet while the older generation insists on clinging to the ways of the old country, their children become completely Americanized. In this story, a young Mei Li (Umeki) and her father stow away on a boat from China to San Francisco to fulfill a marriage contract they forged with a local matron for her son, Sammy Fong (played by the hilarious Jack Soo, who was a stock character on 70s TV comedy Barney Miller). However, Sammy Fong is a swinging playboy nightclub owner with plans to marry the club’s lead attraction Linda Low (Kwan). He pawns off the Chinese newcomers on another local Chinatown matron. Madame Liang – played by our African American friend Juanita Hall – so Mei Li can become the bride to her brother’s college age son, Wang Ta, played by dreamboat James Shigeta. Complications predictably ensue.

At first Wang Ta is unaware of this arrangement and romances Linda Low himself. Linda goes out with him just to make Sammy jealous. Mei Li is quietly in love with Wang Ta and just waiting for him to pick her and finalize their marriage. Meanwhile, another local woman, Helen the seamstress, is also in love with Wang Ta. There are crossed signals, broken hearts, cross-cultural and cross-generational jokes, and a lot of song and dance numbers, some of them painful. Linda Low has a great number with "I Love Being A Girl," which reminded me of Ann Margret’s "How Lovely To Be A Woman" in Bye Bye Birdie (1963), and Wang Ta’s younger siblings and elders sing “The Older Generation,” which reminded me of "What’s The Matter With Kids Today," also from Bye Bye Birdie.

But some of the numbers I now see are awful, too, like the nightclub showgirl tune "Fan Tan Fannie" with a lot of fans and what Americans think of as Chinese musical flourishes, and "Chop Suey," a song of culture clash involving long lists of then-new concepts, sung by the cast. And "I Love Being A Girl" is a prehistoric artifact of a song. Nothing wrong with pride in being female, but the tune concentrates on women being girly, frilly, interested only in curly eyelashes, cold cream, dates with boys, and phone calls. We’re about much more than that. One of the best songs in the film is by a minor character, Helen the seamstress, who is in love with Wang Ta. She sings the torch song "Love Look Away," which leads into one of R&H’s infamous dream ballet sequences.

And early on in the musical, there are bad jokes about Chinese cuisine, including Tiger Bone Wine, Shark Fin Soup, and "Send me some 100-Year-Old Eggs, and make sure they're fresh!"

Still, the cast gives it their all, and some of the scenes were actually shot in Chinatown. A charming relic of a movie.

7. THE SOUND OF MUSIC (1962) with Julie Andrews, Christopher Plummer

This is the crown jewel of the Rodgers & Hammerstein ouevre, judging by the fact that it is shown on TV every year, it is constantly being revived on theater stages, and there are live orchestral sing-alongs all the time. Who doesn’t know the story of the plucky young nun novitiate Maria, whose rambunctious ways are a trial to the Mother Superior who sends her to be a governess to a motherless family in 1930s Austria. Not only does Maria tame the children, she wins the love of their stiff and joyless naval captain dad, launches them as international singing sensations, evades the evil Nazis and helps lead the family to freedom over the Alps in Switzerland.

There was a time I loved this musical, because Julie Andrews brings her freshness, her impeccable English diction, pristine soprano, and perfect comic timing to this as she does to just about everything. But I’ve seen it so many times it’s lost its charm. Even the travelogue of downtown Vienna, the scenes on the estate, and the Alpine vistas – I’m over it. I also used to find the idea of committing oneself to a nunnery fascinating (I also love the 1959 film A Nun's Life with Audrey Hepburn -- highly recommended).

But for me the takeaway of The Sound of Music is as simple as its name. It was true then and it is true now: Music heals.

I’m also amused by the fact that the song "My Favorite Things" has become synonymous to many with the Christmas holiday. It was not written nor intended as a holiday song, and in the film is sung during a decidedly warm weather thunderstorm. Because of the lines about :silver white winters" and "snowbells and sleigh bells," it keeps getting recorded alongside "Walking In A Winter Wonderland" and "Silver Bells."

So there it is, my take on the biggest Rodgers & Hammerstein movie blockbusters. For me, and perhaps my generation -- we the latter-year Baby Boomers-- these are the standards by which other modern musicals are judged. But they are also showing their age. So much has changed in our cultural politics, particularly our evolved attitudes about race, immigration, and the roles of women, that sometimes enjoying them now can feel like a guilty pleasure.

Black History Month: Looking Back at "The Brother From Another Planet"

As February is Black History Month, I thought it would be interesting to take a look back at some screen projects that have been overlooked, unsung, or considered also-rans in the canon of African America film.

Brother From Another Planet (1984)
Written, Directed and Edited by John Sayles
Starring Joe Morton

This film is a personal favorite of mine. Eight years after David Bowie was The Man Who Fell to Earth, and the very same year that Jeff Bridges portrayed an alien who just wants to get home in Starman, Joe Morton made his breakout performance in this John Sayles indie as a dreadlocked, goodhearted alien who crashlands on New York's Ellis Island and tries to understand what earthlings are all about. His journey is complicated by the fact that he is mute and can hear the voices of humans embedded in the objects they used. He appears mostly human, but his three-toed feet -- not to mention his extra-sensory perceptions -- mark him as different.

He manages to cross the Hudson and arrive at 125th Street in Harlem, where his skintone helps him blend in. But soon he is assaulted by the sounds of multiple languages, hip-hop, salsa, and video games, and confronted by images of a crucified Jesus, street crime, and drug use. Living by his wits and an alien ability to heal wounds and manipulate machinery, the Brother is helped by a local social worker (Tom Wright) and winds up with a job and a place to live with a chatty single mother (Caroline Aaron) and her young biracial son.

The brilliance of this film is that we see the complete absurdity, violence, variety, vice and mayhem of contemporary life through his eyes. What's more, in the presence of a man who doesn't speak, nearly every person he runs across becomes a virtual motormouth, giving sway to their beliefs, fears, prejudices, memories, and hopes as he listens, wide-eyed and agog.

As it turns out, the Brother is a fugitive from his planet's justice, and when white bounty hunters in black arrive (played by David Strathairn and Sayles himself) it becomes clear that on his planet, he was held as a slave.

Perhaps best known today as "Papa Pope" on TV's Scandal, Joe Morton is in nearly every scene and he is absolutely brilliant. His eyes say everything about the predicament he finds himself in, and his physicality communicates the sensory discomfort and surprise of being in unfamiliar surroundings.

He is surrounded by an ace troupe of reliable stage and screen character actors, including Broadway and recording legend Dee Dee Bridgewater as a local singer who turns on her love light; Carl Gordon (known as Charles Dutton's father on '90s sitcom Roc) as a romantic rival; busy character actor Bill Cobbs (seen on Greenleaf) as a barroom philosopher; funnyman Leonard Jackson (Carwash, Boomerang, The Color Purple) as another barroom pal; Caroline Aaron, who's appeared in dozens of films and plays the mother of The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel; and Tom Wright, a stalwart from dozens of TV shows (including Punch from Ray Donovan) as a helpful social worker. Even Josh Mostel shows up for two minutes as a Casio keyboard vendor.

Sayles has made a career of making independent movies that look at the impact of race, sex, and class on the intersected lives of community members (his 1996 film about a Texas border town Lone Star and a southern Florida town in 2002's Sunshine State are other personal favorites). He also adds clever references to other films, including The Treasure of the Sierra Madre ("we don't need no stinkin' badges!"), the Invasion of the Body Snatchers, and other films. Here Sayles makes us consider just what we have wrought as a society.

While we have a long way to go in terms of a truly harmonious planet, freedom from bondage on Earth -- strange as it is -- looks like Heaven to this Brother.

Black History Month: Looking Back at "Paris Blues"

As February is Black History Month, I thought it would be interesting to take a look back at some films featuring African American actors and African American stories that have been overlooked, unsung, or also rans in the pantheon of favorite or important films about us.

Paris Blues (1961).
Directed by Martin Ritt
Starring Paul Newman, Sidney Poitier, Joanne Woodward, Diahann Carroll

A product of the post-civil rights sensibility, Paris Blues has to take place across the water to show us how we can really all get along.

The film is about two expatriate American jazz musicians, trombonist Ram Bowen (Paul Newman) who leads his own combo, and his saxophonist Eddie Cook (Sidney Poitier), who live in sophisticated, freewheeling, bohemian Paris. The pair sketch out new compositions by day and hold court nightly as the main attraction in a fashionable jazz club into the wee hours. What are they performing? Music by Duke Ellington, naturally, though it is credited to the Ram Bowen group.

Ram initially meets two pretty American tourists, Lillian (Joanne Woodward) and Connie (Diahann Carroll), when he goes to meet the train bringing in noted jazz player Wild Man Miller (played by Louis Armstrong) who will sit in with Ram (as if the great Armstrong could play second fiddle to anyone on a bandstand). After a flirtation with Connie, who introduces him to Lillian, Ram invites the ladies to show up at his gig, which they do.

After some initial bad behavior and crossed signals, romance ensues along "race-appropriate" lines. Lillian makes a calculated play for Ram, impressed by his commitment to his music. Eddie finds himself drawn to Connie. As feelings deepen, the two couples must decide what happens when the ladies' two-week vacation is up. Do the women stay in Paris? Or will the mad lads return to America?

Newman and Woodward, already married in real life, portray the primary story in this black and white film, and Ram and Lillian's struggle is purely about the artistic freedom (not to mention a dalliance with a world-weary French chanteuse) that Paris affords Ram in his career as a composer and performer. While Lillian presses for a commitment, Ram isn't interested and initially breaks it off.

After confessing their love, Eddie and Connie talk marriage but can't agree on a future. Connie has a teaching gig to return to that's she fought too hard to get. She's also deeply connected to her roots, her family, and her home; regardless of the problems back in the U.S. of A., she is committed to being part of the solution. Eddie has been in Paris five years, finally feels free, and has no interest in a return. In a painful scene, Eddie tells Connie that he will never go back to America, where racism, segregation, abuse, and disrespect await a black man. "I don't beg for anything anymore! I'm not interested in The Cause," he says, "I'm only interested in us." "No, you're only interested in you," Connie responds.

Meanwhile, music is the great harmonizer. The Ellington soundtrack is swoon worthy, and a scene where Wild Man enters the subterranean jazz club with his entire band blowing their hearts out in a challenge is totally jazzalicious. Resplendent in its hand-clapping abandon, the music percolates with Satchmo displaying all the trumpet skills he's known for. Both Newman and Poitier studied with noted players to make their performances look authentic.

In addition to being a great travelogue of Paris by foot, Paris Blues is supposed to be about the travails of love, but the romances are too easily tied with a bow. The flick is about the cost of freedom. Unfortunately, the issue of freedom for African Americans is relative: Stay in America and Love it, defend it, and fight to change it, or leave its shores for a country where tolerance for racial differences seems to be higher. Even today, Paris is filled with numerous African American expats who came to shake off the shackles of America's deeply ingrained racism.