Young Törless (1966) Frank and Andrea Van der Snatch survey a small hallway, somewhere near the back of her tiny villa. The walls are decorated with framed media and glamour shots of them as teenagers, newspaper clippings from Hollywood Exposé and the occasional lobby card. Many of the old shots feature Frank and Andrea beaming, at some long forgotten cameraman. These shots make Frank shiver. He fishes the cherry out of his manhattan and frowns at the promotional poster for Monkey Trouble, their first feature together at Uni-Globe studios. Meanwhile, Andrea coos at a hand-toned 8x10 of them cheek-to-cheek. “Look at us back then! To think, that I used to go with Graveyard Frank Trautman!” The coldness that photo hid! Dead eyes in stiff eveningwear! Frank tosses his drink down:“Yes,” he reminisces, “You miss me a lot now that I’m a hot commodity!” What a fool he had been those years ago! But he had forgiven himself long ago. Kids are dumb. At least that was what years of European film had taught Frank. Thanks to the Criterion Collection, Frank could watch years of film school classics in crystal-clear fashion, free of the pops, hisses and scratches rife in your basic art-house videocassette. But if you’ve already shelled out criterion-size prices for the 400 Blows (Truffaut, 1959) and Amarcord (Fellini, 1974) and still want to see some of the “bad boys” of classic cinema, you’ll probably want to check out the new release of Volker Schlöndorff’s haunting masterpiece, Young Törless (1966). Törless is your typical confused, but well to do euro-trash kid, sent off to boarding school at the turn of the century, where he’s more apt to get off on the white flesh of a butchered hog, than the local gals soaping their laundry. But more dammning is his laissez-faire ponderance over the wacky hi-jinx of his classmates, namely the torture and abuse of a Jewish classmate, Basini (who looks and acts much like a pint sized Peter Lorre in M (Fritz Lang, 1931---also on Criterion, but widely available in more affordable formats). It's all philosophical, of course. While Törless crunches candies and debates imaginary numbers with the math prof, the latently homosexual torture-kinder announce that “to rise above the world one must kill off everything that enslaves you to it. Feeling for example…” Törless remains the paralyzed scientific observer, rising only to kill a symbolically tortured mouse and run-off in a pure Antoine Doinel-esque move (400 Blows). What makes Young Törless stand out, however, is its sound design and lighting. Along with a relentless violin score, endless, hollow sfx spotlight poor Törless’ alien boredom with the school around him, from the ticking of the clocking, whining of the trains, ringing of bells---it’s not surprising that a dark excitement in watching the besieged Basini, surpasses any desire to see the punishment stopped. In addition, dramatic lighting further twists the audience’s feelings towards Törless and crew: as Törless debates joining a prostitute, changes in key lighting switches her from slinky voluptuous to hag-like as shadows cross her face and piercing eyes. The crying of a baby completes the scene. Overall, the film is what it portends to be, the forerunner of new German cinema of then 1960s, and one could nitpick the allusions to the Jewish holocaust (namely Basini’s ostracism and its relative acceptance about the school). Schlöndorff, of course, is more famous for his other adaptation, The Tin Drum (1979), also another distressing film, rife with midgets and raw fish. What is a shame is Criterion’s need to place its snobbish price on important films. The Criterion label makes a DVD and easy $30, while Frank’s discount-bin editions of The 39 Steps (Hitchcock, 1935), Straw Dogs (Peckinpah, 1971) and Carnival of Souls (Herk Harvey, 1962) are all quite serviceable without the extra features. Törless, though, is tough to find elsewhere. Still, for a similar Törless-cum-Donnie Darko (Kelly, 1991) feel, check out the Icelandic Nói Albínói (Dagur Kári, 2003), available in most rental stores. In any case, Frank and Andrea’s films are all out of print now. When not playing for the cameras, Andrea used to berate Frank mercilessly. To her lead, he always played the milquetoast friend never geting the girl; she bounced in and out of the trailer of every handsome co-star. But that’s all in the past.Frank soon left Uni-Globe for a three-picture deal as El Huracán, the Latin crime fighter née masked wrestler. He went on to develop a distinguished career, playing kings and heroes on million-dollar budgets. But a pretty face and vapid smile could not sustain Andrea’s fame. Fortune gone, Andrea found a second career in hair and make-up, living vicariously through the gossip of her infamous clientele, and of course, the little shrine to her teenage stardom that kept in the back. “Perhaps,” Frank sneers, “You should have spent some more time appreciating how good I was, dragging you along all the way. And less time fornicating with every other guy on the set.”

"Bullitt" (1968) Frank grits his teeth and waves off his last chance to not get the busty green mermaid inked unto his right forearm. Instead, he wonders, why he’d ever gotten himself into this particular racket. That damned so-n’-so of a recruiter! Frank had enjoyed spinning vinyl in the clubs. An art form few truly understood. Riding the gains, skipping over the muds. Deftly, maneuvering a cross-fade with a snappy outro timed to not step over the vocals. And of course, the US Military kept its own radio stations, and the bigger the ship commission, the more non-coms it needed that at least knew their way around an audio console and a mic. But now, as the rains came down in huge dollops watering down soup cans full of ink and teacups full of gin on a back street in the Wan Chai district, he knew the real reason he had signed up for the Navy and headed off for the East: Steve McQueen in the Sand Pebbles (1966). Of course, McQueen himself was a tank driver in the Marine Corps, and died horribly in the movie, (shot by the Chinese), and in life (lung cancer at age 50, 1980). But in his tragically short career he packed in a whole lot of cool. Sheer, unadulterated cool, from his Italian driving shoes to his Rolex to his Jaguar XK-SS. He was “The Essence of Cool,” as proclaims the documentary contained on the new double-disc release of Bullitt (1968), which Frank had picked up on bootleg on Arsenal Street this morning along with some hand-stitched silk shirts of the kind you can’t get state-side. Of course, our law-abiding, upright readers will have to wait until June 7th for the Warner Bros. re-release. Bullitt stands out not only as McQueen’s debut as a good guy---a cop, here, later a fireman in The Towering Inferno (1974), but often a bank robber or thief on the run---but also as the first film in a genre movement toward gritty police “reality-based” films later epitomized by Clint Eastwood as Dirty Harry (1971). The dialogue is as curt, terse and occasionally stoic, as would befit real police officers following Mafia hit men in San Francisco. Not to mention an unprecedented use of the word “bullshit.” And there is some realistic commitment to procedural matters ranging from the tedium of McQueen and partner searching suitcases, to intense ER scenes following the hit on Bullitt’s star mafia witness. And plenty of action goes down, too, including a runway foot chase at San Francisco International and, of course, the infamous Mustang/ Charger car, which became the standard for all future cop movies. The French Connection (1971), note, offers a viable alternative, but cannot compete, to the simple ballet of Ford vs. Dodge (vs. Green Beetle. One cannot deny the scene, shot at multiple angles, contains the same VW and tire skid marks a distracting amount of times as the chase, seems to progress through the city.) The cast is rounded by Jacqueline Bissett (The Deep; 1977) as a weepy, disapproving girl friend and Robert Vaughn (also with McQueen in The Magnificent Seven; 1960), as a sleazy politician.But the true treat of the film is in McQueen himself. It’s in shotguns vs. his Colt in its quick-draw holster. It's in black turtlenecks and Tod’s boots. It’s in a GT Mustang Fastback vs. a Magnum Dodge Charger. After all, what other actor managed the covers of both Harper’s Bazaar and Sports Illustrated? Could read the Bible and suck down the Milwaukee’s Beast? Or rode horses flew planes with equal ease? Frank, meanwhile, feels racked with aches and fever, somewhere between the tattoo parlor and the dance club. But still his own, clunky boots (Frye’s Engineers, not up to McQ’s standards!) wearily drag him through the Hong Kong rain as he decides between liquor store and returning to his bunk for the night. He sighs, remembering her as the savviest, coolest, bitchin’-est chick he had ever known. But she was no Bissett, and he no McQueen, and so, whoosh ---she had run out between his fingers like sand through a goose---no, that wasn’t right.

Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia (1974)

Hearing the yelling, Frank recaps the fifth of Seagram’s and stashes it in the shadow of a dumpster before entering the alley. He first sees Iris wringing her hands, slumped against the tattooed brick wall. Her red hair merciless. Woodrow paces in front of her, bellowing:“How dare you, you fucking bitch!” To which she could only mew back, “Woodrow—I!” before he is in her face yelling again. You’re with me. Get it?” Iris lifts a hand to placate him but he merely repeats even louder than before, “Get it!?” Frank, meanwhile, fights to leave them to their own train wreck love. She chose the bastard, after all. Leaving the ugly Frank all alone in this ugly town. But, fuck. Frank loved her. There was never any secret about that, was there? “Woodrow?” Frank is already at a loss for words as his animal rival turns and scowls. Frank must think: “I don’t like the way you’re treating her.” With this, a surprised Frank is able to edge past Woodrow. Woodrow is equally surprised that he, himself hasn’t hurt anyone yet. “Iris,” Frank pats a creamy shoulder, “You want to go?” Iris tears and makes a move to embrace him. Woodrow moves closer to Frank, “She doesn’t want to go with you.” “Well, you know what they say,” Frank buys time, hoping Iris will sneak away, “Two’s company, three’s a crowd, and four and five are nine.”Iris does not move, Frank continues “Its like this, Woodrow. Its like dropping your toothbrush on the floor. You could rinse and rinse it out, but it still looks unclean. Worse still, you know that if you put it back on the sink, you’ll stick the thing in your mouth tomorrow, completely forgetting it was on the floor today. Such is the fleeting nature of one moment of reality.” Woodrow, incensed, grabs Frank by the shoulder and whips him around away from Iris.Frank then feels the buck-knife slide into his lower abdomen—“Spleen territory,” Frank muses, “Too bad. A little to the right would be preferable. The liver was already fucked up anyway.” The blade jerks up slicing and tearing god knows what on Frank’s insides. Frank stares at the deer antler handle now poking out of his stomach, as Woodrow lets go of it. But, Woodrow is soon taking him by the neck and slamming him into the bricks. Frank crumples at Iris’s feet. He eyes her red Chuck Taylor’s an inch from his head and misses her dearly. Failing to notice it sticking out of Frank, Woodrow, at this point in the proceedings, cannot find his knife. He opts to pull a small .22 from the waistband of his jeans. “Let’s go,” he grunts leveling the revolver alternately between Iris’ chest and Frank’s fallen form. “The fuck you do,” mutters Frank as what begins as a comic struggle to his feet, ends with a desperate lunge at Woodrow. Two shots ring out and Woodrow and Frank tumble into some trashcans, and, Iris unscathed, both slugs were surely now lodged in Frank. Hitting the ground, however, Frank smiles. As the metal cans dive out of the way, he realizes that the sickly squish of head on cement emanates from Woodrow, not himself. Woodrow’s unconscious tongue is lolling out of his mouth. Frank breathes heavily. He begins to drag himself toward Iris’s red sneakers, which are, still, all he can see. She is soon by his side, and he is left to lie still and stare up at the night sky while Iris quickly ministers to him. He is finally alone with her, but drifts away in doubt, catching her quick glance back at her fallen lover. She debates whether or not to pull the buck out of Frank’s abdomen. He sighs and turns heavily on the ground, away from Iris and back towards the fifth—which he can spy, intact under the dumpster at the open end of the alley. Frank feels something like—exactly like— Warren Oates, in Peckinpah’s classic, Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia (1974), available on DVD Spring 2005, by MGM. A great film, but there is no time for that now— “It’s OK,” Frank burbles, “I scream into the void, but even cocking an ear an listening, I do not hear the slightest echo in return!”

A Face in the Crowd (1957) Pouring Rain. Frank stumbles down the street in the driving rain.The hurricane meant little to him. On a regular basis, he had begun to contemplate shooting himself; however, three-day waiting period notwithstanding, he simply dreaded the mere act of going to the gun shop. Damn it, he mused, if only the liquor store sold razor blades he’d be in business. So, when the TV urged the parish to prepare to evacuate, he had merely stocked up enough booze to hold him until the crisis was over. TV tends to have that power over one… Frank laughs. A big, hearty guffaw. Just like the spiky-haired meth cook his ex was seeing——or, more importantly, just like Andy Griffith in Elia Kazan’s A Face in the Crowd (1957), available on DVD May 10 on Warner Home Video. Griffith plays “Lonesome” Larry Rhodes, a “drunk with a gee-tar,” discovered in an Arkansas jail by Patricia Neal (The Day the Earth Stood Still), a radio producer who believes that only true American music “comes from the bottom up.” With a couple pints of the ol’ snake medicine for good measure, Neal launches Lonesome’s soon skyrocketing career, in which he pushes everything in his will Rodgers-esque manner from Vitajex kidney pills to political candidates. Like Rhodes, Frank now felt the comfort of an always-handy bottle. And right now, he smiles again, knowing a case sitting in his bedroom with a full eleven fifths (the twelfth in his current possession) of Old Crow bourbon. He’d be safe for a couple of days, anyway. Other than that, his stomach had long since turned at the thought of food, as it was usually weakened by the alcohol.For his part, Rhodes’ trip to national acclaim is over-the-top quick (in one montage, they even name a mountain and a ship after him), and the dialogue is trying too hard to be clever all the time (“A job?” exclaims Rhodes, “That sounds too much like work.”). This leaves a long melodramatic plot slump in which in the middle of the film in which Rhodes dabbles in presidential politics and dumps the gawky Neal for Lee Remick (The Omen), a young southern belle and majorette in a scene, for the less backward-thinking, reminiscent of Kevin Spacey and Mena Suvari in American Beauty. Still Griffith remains charming in the part and has great chemistry with Neal, who clutches the top of her blouse shut coyly, even though the NYC backdrops show visible seams between the panels. And Remick’s presence doesn’t help one not think of Baby, the Rain Must Fall (with Steve McQueen) or Your Cheatin’ Heart with George Hamilton), but to be fair, these movies didn’t come out til the mid-1960s.But, despite the movie's flaws, what stands out is its early commentary on television and media and its effects on social mores and politics; it is very on-target with its talk of TV product, punditry and profitability. However, after the initial fun romp with Griffith’s Rhodes, the movie is slow-paced social commentary at best. It’s far from as powerful as the better-known Kazan-Brando vehicles (A Streetcar Named Desire, Viva Zapata!, On the Waterfront). It is as if Kazan, like Lonesome Rhodes, gets out of his element, when moving the story out of the backwoods and populist climes to the big city society. It is still a notable performance by Andy Griffith, known to most only as Sheriff Andy Taylor—or Matlock. And now, with the city empty of all but essential personnel, Frank staggers through downtown, drenched and damning the curfew, but needing to get out of his dark little apartment for a minute. He hates to be wet but the wind and a good film is invigorating nonetheless. The breeze whips through his jacket and he immediately reaches to assure that the 1st of his 12 soldiers remained safe in his pocket. It is. So he pulls it out, uncaps it and takes a substantial hit...

Santo y Blue Demon contra Dracula y el Hombre Lobo Frank sits on the observation deck of the Connecticut-bound ferry. His 1973 Chevy Impala is stowed (he hopes) safely in the berth below. He sips a lukewarm black coffee from the snack bar and wishes that either A. It wasn’t $1.63 a pop or he’d shell out for another shot, or B. The warm apple pie Portuguese girl shivering next to him would notice his plight and offer him some from her own black and red plaid thermos. Still, he had already disturbed her for a sheet of ruled notebook paper to jot his thoughts down about the shipboard movie: Santo y Blue Demon contra Dracula y el Hombre Lobo (1973). Thankfully, the El Santo series (ca. 1961-1982) featuring the crime-fighting Mexican wrestler and his friends are now available, (along with some new features; the original El Santo passed in 1984) from Rise Above Entertainment. Meanwhile, the Portuguese-girl reads and her tiny little foot in mountain boots occasionally rubs up against his leg like a lost kitten and Frank loves this very much. Santo and Blue Demon, for their parts prefer black beatle boots and colorful sweaters while not in the ring. While Dracula dresses in his familiar perma-eveningware but with kickass sideburns, Rufus the Wolf-man (El Hombre Lobo!) arises from his 400-year slumber ready to do the Hustle in an open-chested gold number with braided leather belt. But! Somebody has broken into a silver Bronco and soon the boat ride will come to an end and Frank isn’t going anywhere except to get out of the city for a moment and Jennifer was in a girl’s home-slash-sanatorium in Nassau County and Iris had hooked up with an acting troupe and peyote ritual circle in Austin and Frank was plugging away at a six hour shift spinning adult contemporary on a low-wattage station in Queens and supplementing his income at the Belmont and in various dog-tracks and Indian casinos. Of course this wasn’t a huge feat. Santo was indebted to maintain his undefeated wrestling career against the likes of Angel Blanco and Renato the Hippie, defend his girlfriend’s (Nubia Marti is lovely despite small pox inoculation scar) family from Dracula and the Wolf-man and still have time to take tag-team partner, Blue Demon, in a no-holds-barrded game round of masked chess. Note, here, that some have complained of the non-seamless insertion of the wrestling bouts into the film, but while clumsy, they are a metaphor (i.e. While Angel/Dracula, Hippie/Wolf-man) for the action of the film.Over-stimulated, Frank is glad when the coffee bean-eyed Portuguese girl puts down her childhood development textbook (Pshaw! Poor Frank! She cannot be but all of 19 or 20.) And totters over to the ladies room to pee. Frank takes a break from both Santo and the various burnouts and gamblers and retirees and WASPy tourists to check out the racing form. There is a chocolate-colored 3-year-old named “Carnivale Season” and this seemed to Frank to be an omen for the first race. Surely he would lose. His heart was breaking already and he chose a firebrand named “Davy Jones’ Locker” in the second race.The Santo Collection, however, is a pure win. Santo y Blue Demon is delightful romp for the hardcore kitsch fan; remember its not only camp, but Mexican camp! Special effects are often silly or poor (watch Dracula appear several feet away from where the rubber bat hangs before the jump cut) and plot points are whimsical (With Santo armed with a magic dagger, Dracula send his henchman after him, for it has no power over mortals---but, dude! Its still a DAGGER!), and the sfx are the same for every hit (kicks sound like wood blocks dropping). Also Santo and Demon sport two-way wrist radios ala Dick Tracy, though they seem to be just regular watches with the wrestlers desperately twisting the winding knobs for use. However, the dialogue is immediately priceless and worth he cost of admission:· Dracula: “Santo is a retrograde man: He still believes in good and justice.”· Blue to Santo: “When you say more than ten words together, I know you are worried.”· Eric the henchman, stabbed by magic dagger: “I’ve committed so many crimes, I’ve ceased to be human!” But, it is good to see the good-guys win after a brave bout with evil. That sure don’t happen in life so much, thinks Frank; the Portuguese girl has returned and he sighs longingly at her now-dozing form and circles “Whiskey Bottle” in the final race.

Suicide Club (English Release Title); directed by Sion Sono, 2002 Frank greedily slips his next selection into the DVD tray in hopes of bolstering his latent maleness on some asian school girls…The packaging of Sion Sono’s Suicide Club makes it clear that despite a series of festival presentations (most notably resulting in a jury prize at the Fantasia Festival?), this film is difficult to pin down in genre. Is it mystery, horror, black comedy? This not surprising. Despite self-proclaimed what is a “wicked social critique,” on the DVD summary, a film that hinges on illogical plot points and silly gore effects that would make John Waters weep is decidedly unclassifiable. That is not necessarily a good thing, though some directors have made gore-horror-humor-satire work. Check out Bruce Robinson’s 1989 How to Get Ahead in Advertising, or Belvaux et al.’s 1992 Man Bites Dog (English release title). But, an overall muddling of plot and blood in Sono’s film is more than a bit distracting. The film opens a group of Japanese schoolgirls throwing themselves from a train platform in a mass suicide. This sequence is cut against an all-girl pop music video, and then against a couple of nurses listening to the afore-mentioned pop video. Frank doesn’t think it takes an Einstein (or even an Eisenstein) to guess that one of the nurses would be the next to do herself in. So, at five minutes in we already know that the evil, self-promotional, money-grubbing pop industry is somehow involved with leading young girls to their death. Sit back for 85 more minutes in developing this theme.Down at the police station, bad dialogue ensues. “A suicide cult? Ridiculous.” The cops, except your token non-conformists, are not suspicious about the incident. It is just an accident. An accident? What the hell? And note that after the film goes out of its way to show how atomized a group of schoolgirls falling under a subway car gets, forensics has miraculously already pinned an exact death toll at 54. By leap of faith, a mysterious Internet miner soon turns up a web site which predicts the deaths with red and white circles. Now Frank has been told that as an American blockhead, he simply just doesn’t “get” Japanese film. But, the entire line of police involvement and investigation, is far from naturalistic. It cannot be said to be formulaic, either, as that would imply an obvious narrative course. Still, there’s three words that kept Frank from flicking off this DVD at this point in favor of some more entertaining gore, such as Jesus Christ: Vampire Hunter. And those words are: Wheel-O-Skin. Frank watched the movie until the end just to find out how a bunch of giant toilet paper rolls of sewn-together human flesh are appearing at the scenes of the mass suicides. The distractingly too-silly answer (forgive the spoiler): Wood Planer.Two highlights in the film include Det. Kuroda’s melancholic ride on the subway—A poignant look at how alone everyone can be in a crowd—and a second intriguing scene that shows some teen one-upmanship atop a school building. Discussing the suicide club scandal, a group of students find themselves on the roof of the school. Of course, this plays out in another silly bloodbath featuring a flap of skin and an ear stuck to a window ledge. The scene portends a false lead that should stir up the middle of the mystery. Was it another strike by the suicide club, or just a bizarre and unfortunate accident? Sadly, a bunch of gross-out gags again muddy up the intrigue. Finally, a note on production values. A film that so overwhelmingly relies on shots of computer monitors, should give a thought to temporal aliasing. The flickering scan lines throughout the film are more then a bit annoying. A tip: Either shell out for film and a light meter or move on to DV. Also, jump cuts to things like a character’s tattoo are played out. Of course we know from such forced details, that we will soon see that same tattoo hanging off the skin-wheel a few scenes later. Suicide Club, in this ignorant gaijin’s POV, offers a lot of gory black humor mocked-up as scathing social commentary. In any culture, this is the earmark of a cult film, but not a cult classic. In short, this film proves one thing; it isn’t easy, but there is one way to make Japanese school girls less then attractive to the normally-oriented male: show them being sliced up with a wood planer, or turn them into exploding bags of blood. And, if that’s your trip, dude, then viva, Suicide Club! “Ugh!” quoth the Frank “Eject and fire up the whiskey and cigarettes.”