DAVID HOLZMAN'S DIARY (1967)

Country: U.S.A.

Genre(s): Art Film

Director: Jim McBride

Cast: L.M. Kit Carson / Eileen Dietz / Lorenzo Mans

Plot

Perplexed by his own insignificance, a narcissistic filmmaker decides to make a film diary to seek the deeper truths about his life, but instead winds up alienating and confusing himself.

What I Liked

The problem with art is that most of it is bad.  In the case of Jim McBride’s unbelievably low-budget “David Holzman’s Diary” we are given art film that is intentionally bad art, but for the right reasons; which makes it good art.  That might sound convoluted, until you watch the movie.  As long as you understand that the entire thing is fictional, that those with speaking roles are actors and not real people (a la “Blair Witch Project”), then it will be clear that this is actually a well-made film trying to pass itself off as very bad.

With the exception of a couple of conversations, Lead L.M. Kit Carson pretty much has the entire movie to himself, which makes sense since he’s playing a guy who is so self-important that he think it is important to film his entire existence for no purpose but his own gratification.  Needless to say, the David Holzman of the title is that man, a dimwitted loser if there ever was one.  Carson plays the part so convincingly I’m tempted to watch his other performances (including, apparently, an appearance on “Miami Vice”), just to verify he is not the total buffoon he plays on screen.

That dimwitted loser, ironically, is what gives the film its lasting importance.  I’m far from the first to say it: in this era of reality television, Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, Youtube, blogging, and celebrities who are famous primarily for their sex tapes, we are so inundated with and encouraged to participate in narcissism that it seems increasingly to be considered a virtue, certainly a commodity.  “David Holzman’s Diary” somehow predicts all of that and satires it before it even really happens, making it bitingly funny and frighteningly poignant all at once.  Andy Warhol’s famous prediction that in the future everyone will be famous for fifteen minutes left out something important: most people have no business being famous.

One other mildly enjoyable aspect of this movie is how it acts as a time capsule for 1967.  That time in American history has now been so commercialized and synthesized by pop culture as a whole that one would think the entire country was filled with nothing but acid-drenched hippies, black power radicals, and old white men with buzz-cuts.  In "David Holzman's Diary," someone like myself who was not alive then gets to see that in 1967 most people were just plain, average folks trying to get through their own lives like they have in any other time.

What I Didn't Like

That watching an altogether dull person sit in front of the camera and mumble on about how much he loves/loathes his girlfriend has a underlying social meaning intellectually doesn't make it any more thrilling to watch emotionally.  Most of the film is filled with the main character’s annoying pretensions and his absolute disregard for other people, not exactly enjoyable stuff on the surface.  Nor is watching a shaky, hand-held, black and white camera jostled all over the place.   Though I will admit, I found it difficult to stop watching.  It’s the old rubbernecking to look at a roadside accident effect.

Most Memorable Scene

Shortly before the film draws to a close, David sits exasperated in front of the camera, having alienated the few people who could stand him in the first place, and opens up to the camera with a barrage of self-loathing.  He finally laments that he had wasted his time with the film, saying there was nothing to learn.  I just wanted to tell him, “No, you nitwit.  The problem isn't a lack of opportunity for you to learn.  There’s plenty for you to learn.  The problem is your inability to learn any of it.”  Of course this is the lesson McBride and crew are trying to teach here by exposing the waste of time that is human vanity.

My Rating: 3.5 out of 5

THE KID BROTHER (1927)

Country: U.S.A.

Genre(s): Comedy

Director: J.A. Howe / Lewis Milestone / Ted Wilde

Cast: Harold Lloyd / Jobyna Ralston / Walter James

Plot

The weakling son of a pioneer sheriff falls for a performer in a traveling medicine show.

What I Liked

Timing is everything in comedy, regardless of medium.  Watching silent-era comedic star Harold Lloyd in “The Kid Brother” really makes that old adage obvious.  The film’s setting, the simplicity of an idealized frontier America, can cover up the meticulousness that must have gone into the timing of the film’s many gags, chase scenes, and fight scenes.  Lloyd and crew treat us to a great variety of different types of visual comedy, and nearly all of them involve multiple people (or an animal) which must be precisely coordinated with each other and the cameras yet convince the audience that the action on screen is not at all rehearsed.  For if an audience loses that suspension of disbelief then there are no laughs, leaving a movie like “The Kid Brother” a complete failure.  The fact that this film has endured as a classic of silent comedy means that the filmmakers were able to make its audience, and audiences of subsequent generations, believe in the magic.  The first half of the film in particular features some moments that remain inspired and just plain funny nearly 90 years later.

What I Didn’t Like

Harold Lloyd is often called the third genius of silent comedy, which puts him in the company of the likes of Chaplin and Keaton.  It is a fact that his films were more popular than Keaton’s at the time.  There are even those who still suggest that Lloyd was superior to both of his competitors.  They’re wrong.  While “Kid Brother” has some moments that made marvel at both his craft and his imagination, at no point did I break out with more than a smirk of amusement.  Indeed, by the time I was half way through the movie I was beginning to get bored, as the gags gave way to a lackluster plot.  The films of Chaplin and Keaton, any of them, will make me laugh out loud, through multiple scenes.  Lloyd was a daring and talented comedian.  Chaplin and Keaton were geniuses.

Most Memorable Scene

I spoke earlier of timing.  That quality is as important behind the camera as it is in front of the camera.  For example, perhaps the signature moment of “The Kid Brother” is not a comedy moment at all, but more of a piece of romantic special effects.  As Harold watches his newfound love walk away, he climbs a tree to keep her in view.  As he does so, the camera rises with him, looking over his shoulder to see the panorama of the valley below.  Today we’re used to watching a camera rise and fall with the characters.  But for the makers of this film, putting a camera on a lift and having it rise with their main character, and having their actor synchronize the speed of his climb with the lift, was a true innovation, one that changed filmmaking forever.  It must have been a stunning experience to see happen for the first time on screen back in 1927

My Rating: 2.5 out of 5

THE KILLING OF A CHINESE BOOKIE (1976)

Country: U.S.A.

Genre(s): Crime / Drama

Director: John Cassavetes

Cast: Ben Gazzara / Seymour Cassel / Azizi Johari

Plot

The owner a sleazy strip joint falls in debt to some local gangsters, who persuade him to commit murder as means of payback.

What I Liked

While I watched “The Killing of a Chinese Bookie,” I couldn’t help but be reminded of “Mean Streets.”  Both films are relatively low-budget 1970s films; both are street-level crime dramas about men who wind up in over their heads with the wrong crowd; both feature highly improvised scripts and naturalistic performances.  So it was no surprise to later learn that director/writer John Cassavetes planned the film with the help of Martin Scorsese, the man behind “Mean Streets.”  I really enjoyed “Mean Streets,” and this movie kept me pretty well entertained as well.

“The Killing of a Chinese Bookie” shows off a lot more flesh and violence than does “Mean Streets,” and it’s clearly intentional.  You can’t set your film in a strip club and cast it with half a dozen mind-bogglingly buxom starlets from various porn and exploitation films without making an obvious ploy to pull in and entertain a certain kind of audience.  Thus Cassavetes and crew certainly cross-cross the line between sleaze and art and back again, but I really have no problem with that.  When the story slows down, at least one can always stare at the objectified women decorating the background.  Besides, and independent filmmaker Cassavetes problem couldn’t have gotten the funding to make his movie without a “sex sells” hook to convince investors that people would pay to watch it.

Even more captivating than the tits and murder, though, is the performance of lead Ben Gazzara.  One could argue that Gazzara always plays sleazeballs and criminal-types, which is exactly what he plays here.  What that argument misses, however, is that Gazzara brings a depth to the roll of main character Cosmo Vitelli that makes his character charming, repulsive, and, most unexpectedly, sympathetic.  Vitelli is a man who gets by on pure charisma and ego, charming the low-lifes and nitwits in his insular world into thinking the world revolves around him.  However, when he steps outside of that sphere of influence, he is just a man who is lost, desperate, and worst of all, uncomfortable.

What I Didn’t Like

“The Killing of a Chinese Bookie” is that kind of independent 1970s filmmaking that one just doesn’t find anymore.  Killed off by the big-budget, slick, corporate productions of the next decade, they featured looser storytelling, improvised performances, a notable lack of special effects, sometimes bad lighting, and main characters who were sometimes difficult to like.  I personally enjoy many of these movies, this one included.  But those who aren’t used to this kind of filmmaking might find “The Killing of a Chinese Bookie” difficult to endure.

Most Memorable Scene

*spoiler alert!*

The further and further away Cosmo Vitelli moves from his club, the more insecure and frightened he becomes.  This is never more true than during the event described in the film’s title.  Right in the middle of the film we’re given the film’s most intense sequence as Vitelli, who can seemingly do no wrong in his own world, is reduced to nothing but a desperate, paranoid murderer, on the run for his life and seeking any way he can to return to the comfort of what he knows.

My Rating: 4 out of 5