Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Series
ALIAS: THE COMPLETE THIRD SEASON
I have betrayed Jennifer Garner.
Regular readers may recall that I was enthusiastic about Garner in CATCH ME IF YOU CAN, which is the first thing I saw her in, and then later in ALIAS seasons one and two. I also thought she was the best part of THIRTEEN GOING ON 30 despite being the main part (it doesn't always work out that way, you see), and I have a theory that if Uma Thurman hadn't been available to do KILL BILL, Tarantino would have turned to Garner (the movie is as tailor made for her as it is for Thurman). Garner has a tom boyish energy that conflicts with girly roles like THIRTEEN, but her athleticism and being game to dress up maker her perfect for ALIAS.
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But my love for Garner — yes, love (she's one of about 25 media crushes I have going at any one time) — has been overthrown. With the beginning of season three the series introduces a new character, Lauren Reed (Melissa George), the wife of Sydney Bristow's old flame Michael Vaughn (Michael Vartan), whom Vaughn married during the two years that Sydney was MIA, that deuce occurring between the 39th minute of the last show of season two and the 40th minute.
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Lauren Reed is a blonde with an overbite. She has an overbite so huge it's a speech impediment. That was all I needed to know in order to betray Jennifer and pass my allegiance to George. She is in the grand tradition of overbite stars, from Gene Tierney and Lizbeth Scott down to the Olivia D'Abo, Gena Davis, Roseanna Arquette, Beverly D'Angelo, and the chick who plays Lace (Robbie Lee) in SWITCHBLADE SISTERS, whose screeching voice is not caused by her dentition. If you have seen Patricia Hitchcock in STRANGERS ON A TRAIN, you know what George sounds like. Blondes tend to be steely and determined, cinematically speaking, the clean scrubbed look folding naturally with a prim, almost inhuman mien despite the ultra-feminine blondeness of the hair. The overbite brings them down a peg or two. Suddenly a blonde is vulnerable, damaged, stigmatized. Suddenly she needs us in a way she customarily doesn't.
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Season three picks up from season two an eye blink after the end of season two, and the bulk of the season is preoccupied with Sydney's attempts to find out where — and who — she was. This occupies just about the first half of the season, than is wrapped up in a rather awe inspiringly talking mid-season show set almost wholly in an airplane, as the head of an even more secret agency, played by conspiracy specialist Terry O'Quinn. Here we learn that the reason Sydney doesn't remember the last two years is because she chose to have it all erased, like Clementine Kruczynski. Meanwhile, the Rambaldi narrative from the first season kicks up again, with numerous close encounters of the Sark kind, as Sydney invariably arrives at some warehouse or bank vault to find Sark there first. Shootouts ensue in which no one gets hit, and if Syd and company rescue that week's McGuffin, be it Rambaldi artifact, witness, or turncoat, it will be stolen back/shot later in transit. As Syd says at one point, with the dispirited somnambulism of a red diaper baby looking at the polls, "Everything gets stolen." The Rambaldi plot brings the oily Sloan (Ron Rifkin) back to the surface like a particularly heavy turd and with his usual aplomb manipulates the hell out of everybody, even when he is a dead man walking, or a doomed man lying on the assisted suicide gurney.
ALIAS remains, even in its third season, one of the best-acted and best cast films on TV. Garner is amazing, but so is Victor Garber, who plays Sydney's dad. Vartan has the most expressive forehead in all cinema, not only expressing surprise with it, but also contempt, affection, and a request for anchovies with his pizza. Meanwhile the show is populated with unusual guest stars, including director David Cronenberg, SHAFT's Richard Roundtree, THE OFFICE's Ricky Gervais, an almost unrecognizable Griffin Dunn, and in a strange symbiosis with KILL BILL, Quentin Tarantino, John Carradine, and Vivica A. Fox (who may become a recurring character). Then there is Isabella Rossellini, who doesn't have any scenes with George, though if they did it would be a Battle of the Network
And it is amazing how many changes the writers can ring out of this finite collection of characters, settings, and plot motivators. Season Three is less "funny" and has fewer garb changes for Garner and her associates, but it does get its licks in. I like the moment when Sydney tells O'Quinn's Kendal that she has never heard of his agency and he replies with a sprightly "Thank you!"
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Garner spends most of the season staring doe-eyed at Vaughn and worrying about her past, and much less time in blue latex dresses. The sexpot aspect show shifts over instead to George who has no less than two different lengthy underwear scenes. Garner has moved beyond using her body and sexy clothes to attract viewers. Henceforth she shall concentrate on the acting, and the show's sexiness will reside in the subsidiary characters, such as Lauren Reed and whomever else they come up with. George's full sexiness doesn't come out until the second half when she is "revealed" (as if we hadn't guessed) as a double agent. Then she falls into a frenzied affair with Sark, in which shootouts and car chases turn her on so much they have to stop in the nearest garage and fuck. Killing makes her hot. When the change in the otherwise prim and icy Reed comes, it's dramatic. She goes from sensible gray suits and pulled back hair to black leather jackets, and evinces a ruthless evil I haven't seen since Angelique (Lara Parker) in DARK SHADOWS.
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The six-disc set comes from Buena Vista Home Video in excellent enhanced widescreen transfers with great sound. The extras are modest. There are four audio commentary tracks, the most engaging being with Erin Dailey, who writes the episode recaps for Television Without Pity.com, and Jennifer Wong, a civilian fan who won a contest. They are funny both love the show, yet are not averse to pointing out the occasional flaws. Dailey hits a key concept when she points out that the show is addictive because you want to find out what will happen next — ALIAS is probably the most plot driven show on TV. That commentary goes with episode one; the others comprise Garner, George, and director Ken Olin on episode nine; Lawrence Trilling, Jesse Alexander, and production designer Scott Chambliss on episode 11; creator J.J. Abrams, director Jack Bender and actor Greg Grunberg on episode 15.
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The rest of the supplements are on disc six. "Animated ALIAS" (7:25), an episode from Sydney's lost two years, animated by Noodlesoup Productions. There is no explanation as to where this cartoon came from. The making of material is confined to a one big featurette, "ALIAS Up Close" divided up into sections on The Guest Stars (Fox, yes, but no Tarantino or Carradine interviews), The Assistant Directors, The Stunt Team, The Effects Team, Creating Props, and Set Dressing. The whole thing is 55:41. It's followed by "Burbank to Barcelona" (9:29), about making Los Angeles look like Ibiza and the series's 200 other locations. "Bloopers" (7:03), with Rossellini saying, "I am your sister's mother," which is not what she meant at all, seven deleted scenes (7:18) and "Monday Night Football Teaser" (1:17) and "Michael and the Stanley Cup" (2:30). And for those with PCs there is a scriptscanner feature. There doesn't appear t be a chapter menu. Alias the complete third season retails for $69.99, and hit the streets Tuesday, September 7.
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What Else Can You Show Me?
THE LADYKILLERS
I found myself a little mad at most movie reviewers this March when the Coen Brothers' remake of THE LADYKILLERS came out. Their views seemed to have a sickening uniformity. Not only did they bring the usual knocks against the Brothers — coldness, formalism — but they also attacked the movie for being "potty mouthed."
I'm not exactly sure where that criticism came from, beyond one of them saying it first and the others chiming in like monkeys. Since when have good ole' mainstream movie reviewers not liked films with lots of cursing in them? When was the last time swear words were singled out as "inappropriate" for a given work, or who was the last normal reviewer (as opposed to a crackpot) to rise up and take a stand against slang? I don't remember. To me, it came out of nowhere. It's as if they couldn't think of anything else to stab the Coens with so they picked the easiest, most obvious tool, notwithstanding the fact that they had never cared about cursing in films before. My interpretation of this tempest in a teapot is that the Coen Brothers make films so good so consistently that they get kinda mad at 'em, and want to take them down a peg or two. And reviewing a Coen movie is hard work. You actually have to use your brain, unlike with most of the teen comedies and action films they usually review. You have to analyze and interpret a Coen film, which is probably something most reviewers haven't done since college.
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Whatever. Fuck them. The film is out on DVD and I can enjoy it to my heart's content in the privacy of my own living room. There, I can enjoy the wonderfully over the top performance by Tom Hanks as the ersatz "professor" who moves into a rooming house which will serve as a base of operations for his casino heist. I can also enjoy the ragtag conglomeration of fellow thieves and wannabes he has collected to help him with the heist, including J. K. Simmons (of OZ) as Garth Pancake (a sort of Walter Sobchak 2.0), and Marlon Waylans as Gawain, the "inside man." The dispute between Garth and Gawain (note the similar names) comes down to talk. They have different worldviews and different perspectives are contained in the very way they talk, Gawain in street lingo, Garth in an arch techno speak. Meanwhile, Hanks's G. H. Dorr has his own bizarre locutions. In fact that is what the movie is all about: communication, or the lack of it, among people with wholly different styles of speech. (By the way, ALIAS's Greg Grunberg has an amusing cameo.)
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The Coen Brothers have made 11 great or near great movies in a row and their work has a precision and style and thoughtfulness better than 90 per cent of the crap that everyone else does, and I am getting a little weary of reviewers parsing and demurring and quibbling. But then, I'm a loyalist. I carry a sense of obligation or connection to filmmakers from film to film, while others seem to take the stance, "Hey, win me over again, and it better be good," so that filmmakers have to start all over again with them.
The disc, from Buena Vista, looks gorgeous (1.85:1, enhanced), and has great sound (DD 5.1, with a French track, and French and Spanish subtitles). The extras, typically for a Coen disc, are modest. There are full accounts of two gospel songs only heard in part in the film. There's "Danny Farrington: The Man Behind the Band" (11:04), a profile of the guy who made the bizarre instruments seen in the film. There is a blooper reel (1:36), consisting entirely of Irma P. Hall, as the landlady, slapping Wayans. There is also a script to read and follow against the movie if you happen to have a PC. THE LADYKILLERS retails for $29.95.
Blessed Saint
VENDETTA FOR THE SAINT
When I was a kid I must have seen almost all the episodes of THE SAINT (it was a family thing) without ever seeing the same one twice — which is easy to do given that there are 180 episodes in the series — and without ever quite knowing what Simon Templar (as played by Roger Moore did for a living. Today THE SAINT shows come across as bland talky shows, and I've resisted the impulse to look up DVDs of the series because, unlike THE PRISONER, it's a show you can probably only really appreciate when you have absolutely hectares of free time to kill, as only kids do.
A dip into VENDETTA FOR THE SAINT did little to augment this stance. Based on a 1964 novel by the man who invented the character, Leslie Charteris, it's a bland, talky, enjoyable show, a blending of a two part story from the color years fused to create a TV movie for NBC, and lamentably with different credit music. Nevertheless, Moore remains an engaging TV personality, his dimensions just right for the small screen, his assertive hair like the red lazar dot of a high-powered rifle, always keeping him within your sight.
Roger Moore, I would argue, rather than Cary Grant, was the first Hugh Grant. The lightness of touch without hidden gravity, the way with woman without appearing to be really interested in them, the Teflon adventursomness, all come to Grant via Moore. Grant is Roger Moore with self-esteem issues. If they were to revive the series, Grant would seamlessly fit into Moore's Saint Guccis as he couldn't so easily slide into his battleship gray Bond suit.
VENDETTA FOR THE SAINT is harmless hooey finding Templar embroiled in some Mafia shenanigans in Naples. It's a good full frame transfer with audible mono sound. But distributor MPI knows how to package cult media objects such as DARK SHADOWS and the Rathbone Sherlock Holmeses, with the additional machinery of good audio commentary tracks and a general spirit of celebration. VENDETTA has series producer Bob Baker, Johnny Goodman, the associate producer, and an aged-sounding if still alert Roger Moore, in a track that has Marcus Hearn playing host. Among the interesting tidbits that I hadn't known before is that the producers approached Patrick McGoohan, who came across in the audition as very difficult and humorless, before they turned to Moore. Also they tell us that Moore had been short-listed for the Bond movies along with Connery and McGoohan again. It's a nifty little package, and hit the street on August 31, retailing for $14.98.
Train Wreck
TERROR TRAIN
TERROR TRAIN has a particularly important if nearly invisible role in the annals of serial killer movies. It was made two years after HALLOWEEN, and was Jamie Lee Curtis's fourth film, all of them horrors to that point, and was released just a bit before the first FRIDAY THE 13TH, which ushered in definitely the teen slasher as a viable franchise and no lose investment.
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But TERROR TRAIN, made in Canada, also shows evidence of the tug and strain between old style horror and the new slasher cult. It can't quite let go of what it takes to be the general audience, and so includes a subsidiary character, Carne, played by Ben Johnson, the conductor on this novelty train rented out for parties, and which, in the night here in question, is enjoyed by a rabble of college seniors and frat boys. Long disquisitions by Carne on the state of the world dissipate the energy the other half of the film is trying to maintain. It's the result of the conflict between old doddering movie minds and the nouveau cruelty, which doesn't care about old people, the past, or ideas. Also, with its sex change elements, it harks back to older William Castle PSYCHO-inspired films such as HOMICIDAL.
Curtis is again the victimized heroine, and among the other passengers are Hart Bochner, as the callous future doctor, and David Copperfield, as Ken, the rented magician. It's a costume party and Curtis is dressed up as a pirate, with a white "puffy shirty, "tight pants, and burgundy thighboots. When I first saw the movie, I reacted like fashion designer Kenneth Jay Lane in the famous anecdote about him catching Greta Garbo in QUEEN CHRISTINA and, upon seeing her arrive on the scene in thighboots, admitted to "thinking dirty."
In any case, TERROR TRAIN comes care of Fox Home Video on a double sided single layered disc with a fair transfer of a film that didn't look so good the first time around, and DD stereo, mono, in English and Spanish (with English and Spanish subtitles), with a full frame edition on the B side. The extra consists of a 2:48 minute trailer that exhibits a lot of throat clearing for such a short ad. It hit the street September 7th, and retails for $14.95.
Made For Walking
HARDCORE
And speaking of pirate boots, Season Hubley has the King of all pairs (or is that Queen) in HARDCORE. But then, she is permitted this footwear as a daily regimen because she is a stripper-dancer-hooker. She is in the employ of one Jake Van Dorn (George C. Scott), a Wisconsin furniture manufacturer, and Calvinist who is in Los Angeles looking for his daughter. She disappeared while on a school trip, and the private eye (Peter Boyle) he has hired to find her reveals that she is now the star of porno movies. As in the later 8MM, Van Dorn must descend into the labyrinthine world of smut, which gets dirtier and kinkier the lower he sinks to the bottom.
Hubley, who was married to Kurt Russell at the time, is very charming and touching as the hooker Niki (Hubley, who is a natural blonde, painted in black roots), and Scott is at his rectitudinal best as a firm, hard man who has to learn to be flexible if he is going to get anywhere on his own in La La Land.
It's a great idea for a movie, and as a "journey" or "quest" film fits well into current theologies about how screenplays can and should work. It's Paul Schrader's second film as a director, and is obviously highly personal in some ways since he came out of the same milieu as Van Dorn has.
Unfortunately, it doesn't feel personal. It feels icy and chilly and you grasp quickly that Schrader is at root taking the "side" of Van Dorn regardless of however much sympathy he accords to Niki. It's an "incoherent text," because Schrader wants to judge Sodom, without admitting how much appeal it had and has for him. The movie is like a married guy denying he ever jerked off to PLAYBOY.
Schrader does very good audio commentary tracks, and he might addressed some of these incoherencies there, but this Columbia Tristar Home Entertainment disc comes bereft of extras beyond some trailers for BIG FISH, SECRET WINDOW, and THE OPPOSITE OF SEX. The widescreen image (1.85:1, enhanced) looks great, however, and the DD sound is adequate to the task of enhancing Jack Nitzsche's harsh, judgmental score.
NEXT TIME: VIDEODROME, MORE FROM THE ARCHIVES, THE GIRL NEXT DOOR, several STAR TREKS, and more!
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