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Forgotten Gems of the 70s: Dynamite Chicken

Imagine for a moment that you are new to this planet, or, better yet, were born in a time where the cornerstones of your cultural awareness are New Coke, Live Aid, and The Goonies. Now imagine that you wish to learn something of the vast American counterculture scene – in politics, the arts, and social movements – circa late 60s - early 70s. Though not the most complete, correct, or even coherent, you could do a lot worse than spending ninety minutes watching 1972's Dynamite Chicken, which functions as a serviceable overview of that turbulent though overly romanticized era. Directed by Ernest Pintoff (best known for his collaboration with Mel Brooks on the wonderful animated short The Critic), Dynamite Chicken is self-described in the opening credits as "A contemporary probe and commentary of the mores and maladies of our age.....with shtick, bits, pieces, girls, some hamburger, a little hair, a lady, some fellas, some religious stuff, and a lot of other things." The roster of names in the opening credits is impressive to say the least, and it includes major boho figures such as Paul Krasner, Peter Max, Alan Ginsberg, Al Goldstein, Lenny Bruce, Joan Baez, Malcolm X, The Velvet Underground, and John & Yoko. The film consists of a series of thematic segments, loosely (very, at that) linked by footage of Richard Pryor (who is listed as the "star" of the film) riffing directly into the camera while wandering around a beat-up playground somewhere in New York City. Pryor occasionally slips into bits that he would become staples of his standup routine, but his presence here is strictly to take us to the bridge – I suspect he was oblivious of the footage that makes up the bulk of the film. Pintoff & Co. were clearly targeting the tuned-in turned-on crowd, and the visual freak-outs begin right about the time the drugs would kick in. The material is strictly short attention span length, designed to make your trip more enjoyable – psychedelic concert footage (of Sha Na Na, believe it or not) is intercut with old movie clips (e.g., Victor Mature in Samson and Delilah) and seemingly endless footage of naked curvaceous hippies dancing or doing calisthenics. (If closeups of the mons pubis is your thing, this is the film for you.) This is supplemented with moments of agit-prop and pop-art; man-on-the-street interviews with toothless patriots talking about the flag, Andy Warhol recording Ondine reading from Warhol's novel a, some Frank Lauria poetry and jazz, and some creepy footage and interviews with workers at one of the first Burger King restaurants that would fit very nicely into Fast Food Nation.

Other highlights include shtick from the Ace Trucking Company, a comedy troupe that featured Fred Willard and Match Game regular Patti Deutsch*, and a remarkable scene with Ron Carey dressed as priest outfitted in Joliet Jake hat and shades doing a dance in front of St. Patrick's Cathedral to Lionel Goldbart's God Loves Rock and Roll while somewhere else a nun does a striptease. (This must-see scene can be viewed here.) It goes without saying that the sexual revolution is addressed, and Pintoff chose some interesting spokespeople – on the one side, Al Goldstein and Jim Buckley, who (in nausea inducing fish-eye closeups) espouse the theory behind Screw magazine, and on the other some unidentified** feminist theorists discussing female sexuality and the use of derogatory language towards women. Dynamite Chicken embraces the then-chic philosophy of McCluhan, and this audio/visual mashup does indeed allow the medium to deliver its message, taking advantage of aesthetic techniques that were embraced in the cinema by both the high (Jean Luc-Godard) and low (Joe Sarno). Watching it nearly twenty-five thirty-five years after its creation, it comes off as a primer of the issues and concerns affecting those whose ideas on government, class, race, and sex clashed with the idealized facade of the American dream. This was a time when dissent was still possible – before it was co-opted and commodified by the likes of Hollywood and Madison Ave. There's something refreshing about its anti-war/violence stance and its jabs at the establishment, as superficial or juvenile as they may be. Yet for a film as issue laden as this one, it's a shame it finds frequent excuses to throw in some gratuitous nudity. Crumbs to the raincoat crowd, no doubt, and a guarantee that people would sit through the whole thing. To call Dynamite Chicken revolutionary is to do a disservice to the true revolutionaries of the era, many of whom coincidentally appear in the film even though some (as in the case of Lenny Bruce and Malcolm X) were no longer alive. Today, all it takes is a laptop and a handful of YouTube clips to create a film like this. Yet in that pre-Interweb age, it required significant effort to cull such diverse voices and images to create an entertaining yet critical take on the status quo, and the resulting film stands as a worthy artifact of the era. Dynamite Chicken appears to be in the public domain. It can be found on DVD for about $3 or $4 dollars. * Special thanks to Glenn Kenny for helping me remember her name ** I'm sure Glenn would know who they are

Filmbrain's Screen Capture Quiz: Round 11, Week 12

Here I was thinking that last week's quiz was too simple, yet surprisingly only a few managed to correctly identify Richard O'Brien, Patricia Quinn, and Nell Campbell from the mother of all midnight movies, The Rocky Horror Picture Show. This brief scene, from the beginning of the film, is about the only one that wouldn't have made it a dead giveaway. Like that great scene in Fame, I too spent many Saturday nights during High School with the legendary Sal Piro and the gang at the 8th Street Playhouse, back when the weekly showing of TRHPC was still a major event in New York City. In fact, it wasn't until I bought the DVD that I realized I'd never actually heard much of the dialog in the film. While it's not as fun without the audience participation, there's still a lot to admire about the film, and I do mean more than just a young Susan Sarandon running around wearing only a bra and panties. Any film with a song that name drops both Claude Rains and Fay Wray is pretty cool in my book. Well, here we are at the final week of the all-singing all-dancing musical round. Looking back, there are several films I wish I had included, and choosing one for the final quiz hasn't been easy. I wanted something slightly more obscure, but not too taxing. Here's what I've come up with: one of the strangest musicals to have ever been produced in Hollywood. Though politically incorrect, and full of songs barely memorable, its visual style (was it shot on mars?) and overall oddness factor make it a worthwhile gem. Name the film, and for a bonus point connect this film to Twin Peaks in two hops or less. Be sure to check back next week for the Round 11 winners! Good luck. Submit your answers to this address. Good luck!

Filmbrain's Screen Capture Quiz: Round 11, Week 11

Not a lot of love for the sailor man, judging by the (mostly) negative comments from the select few who were able to recognize Olive Oyl's girlfriends from Robert Altman's let's-go-to-Malta-and-make-a-movie adventure that was Popeye. A shame, for even with its flaws this circus of a film finds Altman at his insane best. Easily the director's most excessive work, the film's production problems (and off-set antics) are somewhat legendary. There was the nearly yearlong construction project to build the town of Sweet Haven (which included lumber shipped from Holland, and shingles from Canada), the intentional sinking of seaworthy vessels and construction of a breakwater to prevent flooding, and of course the rumored fistfights between Altman and producer Robert Evans. Then there are the reports of helicopters making regular deliveries of cocaine to the set (Evans was arrested for drug trafficking during the shoot) which served to make the film that much better. The songs by Harry Nilsson are wonderful, especially Olive's ballad He Needs Me, which Paul Thomas Anderson brilliantly co-opts in Punch Drunk Love. My message to Popeye haters -- give it another go, it's a real gem. Well, at the very least it's better than Quintet! With only two weeks to go, I'll toss out an easy one to make up for the past two, which seemed to stymie many of you. What can you say about this film? It's astounding. Name it. Submit your answers to this address. Good luck!

Faking It

Lee Yoon-ki's This Charming Girl, which I first saw at the 2005 Berlinale, remains one of the most impressive debut features in recent years. It heralded the arrival of a truly unique and independent voice in Korean cinema, and the film quickly became one of my favorites of the year. His follow-up, the Los Angeles-set ensemble piece Love Talk was an ambitious and admirable effort that suffered from Lee trying to do too much with too much. The foreign locale (and language) combined with the multi-threaded plot found Lee keeping too great a distance from his subjects – the exact opposite of This Charming Girl, which was almost a micro-portrait of a woman silently suffering from a personal trauma. With his third film, Ad Lib Night (seen at this year's Berlinale), Lee has crafted a hybrid of sorts – an amazingly powerful film where the internalized suffering of one character is countered by the frequent and repeated emotional outbursts from a group of others. The film opens in Seoul, with two young men approaching a woman they see on the street (Han Hyo-ju), convinced she is Myeong-eun, who ran away from their village several years ago. Though she denies this several times, they aren't entirely convinced. Regardless of her true identity, they ask if she will accompany them to the village to say goodbye to her (or Myeong-eun's) father, who is on his deathbed. For reasons that aren't entirely clear, she agrees to join them. The bulk of the film (which takes place over a single night) is set in the dying man's home, where an extended group of inheritance-hungry family members alternates between bickering and shedding crocodile tears while waiting for the old man to shuffle off this mortal coil. Surprisingly, the focus shifts from the mystery woman, whose function as ad-libbing stand-in daughter becomes secondary to the various mini-dramas played out between family members. The transition is quite subtle, and the film even becomes comical for a time before slowly drifting back to the question of the identity of the still-unnamed woman. The dynamic Lee creates between the dysfunctional (albeit tight) family unit and the outsider is nothing short of brilliant. The film is bookended by two extended (and beautifully shot) driving sequences, and it is on the journey back to Seoul that we learn a bit more about this woman. As it was in This Charming Girl, the information doesn't function as a third act reveal or a simple answer for audience placation. Instead, we are sharing a cathartic moment, a first step, perhaps, towards healing. Lee's aesthetic intimacy – filming mostly in close-ups, limiting the perspective (mostly) to that of the woman – allows him to pull this off without a hint of schmaltz or sentimentality. Lee is often mentioned in the same breath as Hong Sang-soo, and though their work stands apart from the more commercial fare being produced in South Korea, their differences outweigh their similarities. Whereas Hong often presents us with characters who won't (or can't) own up to their weaknesses, failings, or emotional scars, Lee taps into something quite different. His is a cinema of loneliness that casts its gaze on damaged souls, while quietly documenting their unarticulated suffering. There's little in the way of traditional dramatic tension; instead we are simply shown the mundane and ordinary day-to-day events of his character's lives – the little things that lead towards acceptance or reconciliation. Hong's characters turn to others for support, and express themselves through drink, sex, and misguided emotion, while Lee's choose a more internalized, solitary approach. Yet Lee isn't a nihilist, quite the opposite in fact. Though his character's problems are never brought to resolution, there are at least glimmers of hope. It's a remarkable approach that in lesser hands would fail miserably. Like Hong, the influence of European cinema is obvious, yet the characters, relationships, and social constructs are unmistakably Korean. Ignoring the sophomore slump that was Love Talk, there is remarkable progression in Lee's writing and directing between This Charming Girl and Ad Lib Night, and I'm both curious and excited as to where Lee will go next. Ad Lib Night is a tremendous film that positions Lee as one of the most absorbing directors working today. Ad Lib Night has been selected for this year's San Francisco International Film Festival. Don't miss it.

Filmbrain's Screen Capture Quiz: Round 11, Week 10

Nous sommes deux sœurs jumelles/Nées sous le signe des Gémeaux. Though in reality Françoise was a year older than Catherine, that didn't stop Jacques Demy from casting the Dorléac sisters as twins Solange and Delphine Garnier (born under the sign of Gemini) in the deliciously wonderful Les Demoiselles de Rochefort from 1967. The 'manly dame' in the alt-text clue (which I suspect inspired many to submit Hedwig and the Angry Inch) refers to Michel Piccoli's character Simon Dame, whom Danielle Darrieux doesn't marry for fear of being known as Madame Dame. Much lighter than his previous musical, the romantic weepie Les Parapluies de Cherbourg, The Young Girls of Rochefort is a playful, campy romp that finds a handful of characters (including Gene Kelly!) finding love and song in the streets of Rochefort (while shilling for Honda no less.) With a great score by regular collaborator Michel Legrand, the film might just be the best musical of the decade. (Please, no hate mail from members of The Sound of Music fan club.) Congrats to the few that managed to guess it. This week: They're not pop stars, but it shouldn't be hard to ID this quartet. Name the film. Submit your answers to this address. Good luck!

Ode to a Flea Market Economy

Dubbed "A eulogy for shoppers by shoppers", Fish Kill Flea, which has its world premiere at this year's South by Southwest Festival, is a fascinating little documentary about the mauling of a mall, and the decay of the American dream. The once thriving Dutchess mall in Fishkill, New York closed its doors in the early 90s, a victim of the mega-mall and superstore phenomenon that has been spreading like cancer across this country in recent years. The dilapidated structure became home to a large flea market, where vendors offered everything from old camera equipment, slot machines, junk jewelry, and even the odd bit of Nazi memorabilia. Shot mostly cinema vérité style, the film does a wonderful job at capturing the last throes of a subculture that is nearly extinct thanks to the rise of eBay and other virtual flea markets. Full disclosure: the talented trio that created this film -- Brian Cassidy, Aaron (Cinephiliac) Hillis, and Jennifer Loeber -- are all friends of Filmbrain, so naturally I'm a bit biased. However, this truly DIY project, shot on a shoestring budget over a period of about six months, has a markedly un-amateurish quality to it, both in its visual aesthetic (Jennifer and Brian are both professional photographers) as well as its unintrusive approach to the subject, which in the wrong hands could easily play out like a bit of patronizing hipster posturing. All three are quite passionate about documentary film (Aaron and I have had a few heated debates on the subject), and in an age where video docs are churned out at a seemingly ever-increasing rate, they've skillfully managed to make Fish Kill Flea a genuine standout in a crowded genre. With an almost Marxist gaze, yet devoid of commentary or editorializing, Fish Kill Flea paints a depressing but honest portrait of the cannibalistic nature of a market based economy. If you're anywhere near Austin, Tehas this weekend, be sure to check out the premiere on Saturday 10 March @ 4:30 at the Alamo Lamar 1. Complete screening information here. For those in the New York area, be sure to check out Jennifer Loeber's photographs from the film, which will be on display from March 13-24 at the Humble Arts Foundation's 'group show' at the New Century Artists gallery, 530 West 25th St., Suite 406.

Filmbrain's Screen Capture Quiz: Round 11, Week 9

Here's what I want to know: what sort of coercion tactics did Robert Stigwood employ to convince nearly 100 celebrities -- including such diverse names as Peter Allen, Carol Channing, Donovan, Sha Na Na, Curtis Mayfield, and Keith Carradine -- to come together to record a painfully vanilla rendition of Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band for the so-bad-it's-good film of the same name? And who for a second believed that Peter Frampton and the brothers Gibb would make for great leading men? Oh, and another thing, how did Michael Schultz, director of such quality 70's black cinema as Cooley High, Which Way is Up?, and personal favorite Car Wash come to direct one of the whitest films of the decade? Janet Maslin summed it up best in her Times review: "This isn't a movie, it's a business deal set to music." Producer-mogul Robert Stigwood's greatest miscalculation (in 70mm no less) began with the idea of marrying the Beatles' music with two of the biggest musical acts of the day, followed by the decision to pad the cast with individuals who shouldn't come within fifty yards of a Lennon-McCartney tune, including Frankie Howerd, Donald Pleasance, and Stargard. A feeble attempt to tie about thirty of these rock classics into something resembling a plot is about the best you can say for Henry Edwards' screenplay. The film does have its saving graces. Aerosmith's take on Come Together is still pretty darn good, and Steve Martin (who was riding high at that time) has a bit of fun in his screen debut with Maxwell's Silver Hammer. I'll admit that I loved the film at 12, but now it's almost too sad to watch. Peter Frampton and the Bee Gees' attempts at emoting, especially during the I Want You scene, is about as bad as acting can get. This week: Something to warm the heart on a cold March night. In what film will you find this quintet of PVC-clad beauties? Submit your answers to this address. Good luck!

Edwardian Camp

Angel, François Ozon's first English language feature, is, if nothing else, a particularly odd film. At least that was the shared reaction between Greencine's David Hudson and me following the early morning press screening at the Berlinale. It also happens to be Ozon's most audacious work since 1998's Sitcom, though it appears the joke was lost on some. Based on the 1957 novel by Elizabeth Taylor, Angel opens with the fifteen year-old Angelica Deverell (the fearless Romola Garai) standing at the gates of Paradise, the stately manor near her home town of Norley that she dreams of one day owning. The daughter of a grocer, Angel is a precocious youngster who spends her days and nights locked in her tiny room churning out dreamy romantic fiction about places and experiences that exist only in her overly-active imagination. Her purple prose ("into the vast vacuity of the empyrean") leaves her mother perplexed and her teachers launching accusations of plagiarism. Fed up with the narrow-minded in Norley, Angel drops out of school and decides she will become a famous author. Enter Theo Gilbright (Sam Neil, doing his best James Mason), a London publisher who is the key to her success, though his wife Hermione (Ozon staple Charlotte Rampling) is both contemptuous and a bit jealous over the pale teen firecracker. Angel's second-rate potboilers (with titles such as On Velvet Banks and Butterflies Never Die) are immensely popular with the masses, and she soon finds herself drenched in the type of wealth she always dreamed of. Like many of today's young starlets, Angel's enormous success arrives before she's had a chance to live, resulting in her making a series of poor choices, both financially and romantically. (I couldn't help but find parallels to a certain recently bald pop star now doing time in a pricey rehab center.) Her relationship with a moody, somewhat-shady artist (Michael Fassbender) has tragedy written all over it, due, in part, to Angel's (mis)conceptions of love and romance, which stem from the twaddle she invents in her novels. Her slow downward spiral over several decades (which comes as no surprise) is the stuff of supreme melodrama. Like Todd Haynes and Pedro Almodovar before him, Angel finds Ozon paying tribute to the Hollywood of yore, and in the grandest style possible. From his use of rear-projection and cheesy two-dimensional backdrops to the overly-dramatic (and overly-delivered) line readings that are followed by a Max Steiner-esque swell of strings, there are references to just about every master of the Hollywood weepie, and it's not difficult to identify nods to Mervyn LeRoy, Victor Flemming, Douglas Sirk, etc. Though the camp factor is high – even more so than in his musical mystery 8 Women -- Ozon transforms Taylor's novel (itself a satire) to the big screen without a hint of irony. It is possible to read the film as straight melodrama (as the woman next to me did, going through at least four tissues), but to do so is to miss out on the fun. Ozon's approach is slightly meta – recounting the life of Angel Deverell as if it was lifted from the pages of one of her superficial novels. The artifice Ozon employs, in everything from the film's look, dialog, and performances, is entirely intentional; entirely appropriate for a woman who lived her life as if in a fairytale. (Angel believes she can end WWI by simply tossing pacifist themes into her novels.) The few negative reviews I came across were consistent in that they all took the film at face value, judging Angel as if it was a Merchant-Ivory production. Were Ozon's intentions not clear enough? Is a healthy familiarity with his oeuvre a prerequisite to appreciating its charms? I'm not sure. Regardless, Angel is a remarkable achievement from one of Europe's most consistently interesting (and continually evolving) directors.