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The Lone Ranger (2013)
At the crossroads of Little Big Man and Heaven's Gate.
This film stands at the crossroads of Heaven's Gate and Little Big Man. It stays there because of not deciding on what road to take. But Johnny Depp is a brilliant Tonto. He is like Charlie Chaplin's tramp wandering around after eating peyote. He shape shifts into a Comanche, the straw hat transforms into a dead crow prop, and the cane becomes distributed bird seed. Tonto has moments of facial expressions communicating. "Why am I in this film?" There are detailed magnificent sets of the wild west like Heaven's Gate. There is even a stand-in for Chief Dan George of Little Big Man. The casting for the Lone Ranger is a miscue. Who is Armie Hammer? The chemistry between the two does not work for me. I would prefer a screen veteran. But it did keep me going to wonder what was next. Johnny Depp made the film. For Johnny Depp fans, go for it!
On the Road (2012)
On the sideline waiting for On The Road.
One of the aspects this film really lacked was an understanding of the zeitgeist of Beat America in the late forties and fifties of Post-World War Two America. The conservative middle class that Ronald Reagan defended was in full swing and there were those who did not fit in and did not know where to go, and this is where the Beats fit in. It was L seven heaven square land and people with creative vision didn't have the flavor for materialism. The idea in the mind was just as secure as house in the suburbs. Plus I saw no James Joycean stream of consciousness with the speed, booze and the jazz. Where was the poetry? You see people moving around, dancing, snapping fingers and being "hip" but no expression of what was going on within. The characters I saw were 21st century self-centered users, dopers, and boozers who could not afford a day of tasting wine in Napa Valley, so it's everyone else's fault. The most real character in the film that captures the sense of the time was Viggo Mortensen's Old Bull Lee/William S. Burroughs. That worked. Carlo Marx, the Ginsberg attempt should have been called Harpo Marx. I was howling at the idea that this was suppose to be the person that wrote Howl. The art direction and cinematography did keep me watching instead of leaving. But remember, it does say based on the book On The Road.
Smile (1975)
Smile
SMILE hits home as it was filmed in the summer of 1974 when I graduated from high school, in Sonoma County, where Santa Rosa is. It is an accurate representation of Santa Rosa, 1974. I know many of the people in it, and my friends white 62 Chevy Impala is used. I can point out to many faces in the audience during the pageant, including an old high school history teacher. For me now it is a ghost town movie, as the current Santa Rosa has grown 3 times the size. The town you see in the film has been developed out of existence, and now seems like a dream. SMILE is based on the Junior Miss Pageant, which use to be held at The Veteran's Memorial, where the filmed pageant takes place. Mark Ritchie coached the paid actors well, as I could believe they were like local folks acting out as Santa Rosans. As a Cultural Anthropology study Smile is a gem. It is a time capsule to 1970's Santa Rosa. Another film to see is Hitchcock's Shadow Of A Doubt. It too takes place in Santa Rosa around 1942, and has many points of location gone by the time Smile was filmed. Thorton Wilder wrote the Hitchcock screenplay for Santa Rosa, as he saw it as the best example of a American small town. The same can be said about Smile, but now Santa Rosa is an edge city.