Category: 1974

Dracula Lives (1973) #5

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This issue starts with the Roy Thomas and Dick Giordano adaptation of Bram Stoker’s Dracula, which I read in reprint. I’m not going to check the original novel, but I’m not sure Stoker had Jonathan Harker be a shitty racist about China (complaining about how their trains ran in 1897). Harker writes in his diary about how after he and Mina get married, they can get screwing… well, maybe Stoker implied it. Never heard a lot of good about Stoker.

Anyway.

The adaptation covers Harker’s arrival in Transylvania up to Dracula opening the door. He goes from train to village to carriage to Dracula’s carriage; for those familiar with the novel (or faithful adaptations), there are good looks at the carriage driver, who’ll turn out to be Drac in disguise. I’m waiting to see if Giordano has visual consistency.

Harker’s far from a sympathetic protagonist as he Karens his way through Eastern Europe, but the goings-on are mysterious (Dracula’s marking the buried treasure blue flames, though Harker doesn’t know it yet), and the art is absolutely gorgeous. Giordano works his whole ass off on the art. It’s magnificent.

And the writing’s fine. Thomas does Harker’s narration well, does his snooty, British superiority well; so far, there’s nothing else.

Though it’s a relatively quick read, sort of half an act.

While that feature is pretty impressive, the rest of the issue is a less exciting Dracula Lives. And not just because of the text pieces. They apparently ran out of old Atlas strips to run and instead have more original text ones, including Gerry Conway doing a full story. Doug Moench’s Transylvania “travelogue” and Dracula: Prince of Darkness reviews are far more successful. Chris Claremont also contributes a book review (Raymond Rudorff’s The Dracula Archives) and there’s a new feature: “Coffin Chronicles,” upcoming Dracula in other media.

The second original story is also written by Conway, who again does much better in these Lives stories than he did in Tomb, though Frank Springer’s got some odd designs. He does full Bela Lugosi Count Dracula (albeit with an angular, gaunt face), but it’s set before the French Revolution. Dracula goes to France, where he tangles with magician Cagliostro for the first time.

The Cagliostro stories have been running in Lives for a while, only in the present. Dracula’s convinced his old foe’s still kicking and is trying to take him out. This story provides the backstory of their rivalry. Or at least the very beginnings of it.

After surviving an assassination attempt, Dracula bribes his way onto Louis XVI’s court. Cagliostro’s already there and already trying to do away with the Count.

It’s an okay but somewhat awkward story. It’s too short because it’s got a part two coming, and while Springer’s art is often good, his designs are not.

The one reprint is a reasonably solid effort with art by Sid Greene. A reporter goes to a village where they feed their local vampire farm animals, and the vampire’s nice to everyone. Unfortunately, some loudmouth in the village convinces everyone they need to get rid of the vampire, which has terrible repercussions. It’s five pages; maybe it could’ve been four, but okay.

The third original story is a disappointment. Not in terms of art. Gene Colan with Pablo Marcos inking. The art’s remarkable. The story not so much.

Tony Isabella writes based on a Marv Wolfman story. It’s Dracula on a plane. Some incel is going to blow the plane up to watch everyone die, only Dracula’s got to get back to the Big Apple and his waiting coffin. It’s a follow-up to his Hollywood adventure last issue.

While no one else on the plane can handle the terrorist (white guy), Dracula’s sure he can handle it. But apparently, Drac doesn’t understand explosives. He also doesn’t think to mist his way behind the guy. It’s not very well-thought-out by Dracula or Isabella.

But the art’s fabulous. The final gag is neat, though it breaks a bunch of vampire rules continuity, both within the story and elsewhere in the issue. But I was expecting a lot more from it. I wonder if Wolfman had the whole story idea or just the setup. Or maybe just the good punchline.

Then there’s a one-page “The Boyhood of Dracula” strip to close the issue; Isabella writing, Val Mayerik on art. It’s about when the Turks imprisoned young Vlad Tepes and tortured him. It’s a fairly tepid account and seems like filler. I was expecting more from it as well.

Still, the novel adaptation makes it more than worth the read, plus Conway’s writing is good on the too-short France story, and Marcos inking Colan is sublime.

Dracula Lives (1973) #4

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I’m getting to be such a Mike Ploog snob. Seeing him ink his own pencils, then seeing others ink his pencils… the latter always seems to come with qualifications, asterisks, and compromises. Ploog pencils this issue’s first story, written by Marv Wolfman, with Ernie Chan inking him. Chan keeps much of the detail, even much of the personality, but not the energy.

The story’s about one Louis Belski, Dracula actor. I thought Wolfman was doing a riff on Bela Lugosi: switching the initials, portraying the actor in his has-been days, ready for Ed Wood to show up with an offer, but apparently not. Belski’s instead just a hack who never achieved the greatness of Lugosi, John Carradine, or Christopher Lee—according to Dracula himself, who’s come to Hollywood to stop Belski from continuing his career.

His career’s incredibly long; Belski started at the studio when it was constructed in 1927. It’s the early seventies; the actor’s apparently in his early to mid-sixties, which kind of explains why he’s not doing well in the part. He’s also a raging drunk who starts pretending he’s really Dracula after shooting’s stopped, attacking those who wrong him, and trying to seduce an ingénue. So the actual Count doesn’t just have to contend with an obnoxious actor; he’s also got to intercede in that actor’s drunken, murderous rampage.

It’s a jam-packed story, with Wolfman sort of overwriting it but never thinking about it—Belski’s age, for instance, but then also the idea Dracula got his stake pulled in Tomb and went out to revival theaters to catch up on how he’d been portrayed in popular media. Also, Belski’s a lousy lead to follow around. It’s like a horror comic where you’re waiting for the villain’s comeuppance, but the collateral damage on the comeuppance is almost too much.

While not bad, it’s definitely disappointing. Especially for the only Ploog in Dracula Lives so far.

Then there are some text pieces; lots of text pieces this issue. And the movie stills with new text are back, though not as jokey as they’ve been before. Now they’re just interstitials. The first two text pieces are a book review about the real Dracula from Chris Claremont. The book’s called In Search of Dracula (and appears to still be in print if one’s interested), but the review’s way too overwrought with Claremont trying to be personable, then the typesetting on movie stills makes it hard to read.

Then Dwight R. Decker contributes a one-page joke vacation text about real Romania? It’s too bad the filler’s not better in Lives. Especially since they appear to be upping the text and lowering the reprint count. There are only two reprint stories.

The first is about a village where everyone thinks this lovely lady is a vampire seducing the local boys, then killing them. The truth’s more complicated and not particularly rewarding, but Joe Maneely’s art’s really good, and it’s only six pages.

The following story is another original (thank goodness they’re still doing three an issue). Gardner Fox writes, Dick Ayers does the art. It’s Dracula versus Countess Elizabeth Báthory. She’s the one who bathed in human blood to stay young. Dracula doesn’t like her getting in on his business, especially when she’s a poser. It’s a tedious twelve pages, partially because the idea’s one-note, but also because Fox’s script isn’t great, and then the Ayers art is a considerable downgrade from the rest in the issue. Not just the new features either, the reprints as well.

Then comes a couple more text pieces. One’s a jokey biography of Marv Wolfman, and the other’s a review of Horror of Dracula by Gerry Boudreau. It’s more a combination of behind-the-scenes and scene-by-scene recap with some scant critical commentary. They threaten more reviews at the end.

The second reprint is a short one, art by Tony Mortellaro, and it seems like they should’ve run it in the first issue because it’s so well-suited for Lives. A German villager only wants his daughter to marry royalty, so he kills off her poor suitors, sometimes letting vampires feed on them for cover. Despite his daughter wanting to choose her own destiny, he decides for her and makes an exceptionally bad selection.

The final story is the third original, written by Gerry Conway (easily his best Dracula in Lives or Tomb and some of his best writing from this era), with art by Vicente Alcazar. Alcazar has maybe two less than perfect panels, but otherwise, the art’s consistently breathtaking.

It’s another of the Dracula origin stories, with the former Impaler retaking his castle from the invading Turks. He’s got to deal with the newly installed regional commander but also the neighborhood Catholic priest who’s got a fairly big secret. Then, of course, there’s still the castle, which the Turks have occupied, and the local girls they’ve enslaved.

The feature’s a page shorter than the issue’s other two—eleven pages instead of twelve—, and it’s a bummer they didn’t give Conway and Alcazar more pages because it’s outstanding. Conway’s characterization of Dracula as vampire king is rather thoughtful, and—given the particulars—Drac gets to be an unproblematic protagonist. Everyone else is doing far worse things than just retaking from occupiers.

Alcazar gets a variety of action to visualize, with Dracula fighting soldiers but also finding himself in his first vampire transformation duel. It’s great.

I had been thinking I’d jump off Dracula Lives after a while, so long as Tomb doesn’t keep citing it; I don’t think I can give it up. Not just for the art either; the Conway writing on the last story is fantastic. Plus, the fifties reprints are surprisingly good. I’d always assumed fifties horror comics would be rote and stale, but nope. They’re succinct enough their initial impulse carries through.

The text material, obviously, is take or leave. Meaning leave.

Lenny (1974, Bob Fosse)

If Lenny has a single highlight scene, it’s at the end of the second act, when comedian Lenny Bruce (played by Dustin Hoffman) does a set on dope. The film’s got a fractured narrative, simultaneously showing posthumous interview clips with the people in his life—ex-wife Valerie Perrine, mom Jan Miner, and agent Stanley Beck—recounting Bruce’s life story, but then also footage from nearer his death, after he’d made it. With Hoffman in nothing but a bathrobe and a single sock, losing track of his routine as he roams the stage, that scene is the first time we’ve gotten to see what everyone’s been talking about. It’s a seven-minute, uninterrupted take, and it’s absolutely devastating. Stellar work from Hoffman, director Fosse, screenwriter Julian Barry, and the sound department (led by Dennis Maitland). In a singular film, it’s a singular scene.

Despite the fracturing, the film’s got a straightforward narrative. Someone’s recording interviews about Bruce, starting with Perrine, then Beck and Miner join in. It’s mostly Perrine, whose story is juxtaposed against Hoffman’s. Flashbacks reveal and inform what the interviewees are talking about, then there are flashforwards to some of Bruce’s final sets. The film intersperses bits from those final sets, showing the matured comic throughout the film. Lenny’s never easy, but Fosse and Barry don’t make the narrative plotting difficult.

The film’s first act is hacky young comedian Hoffman meeting stripper Perrine. He immediately falls in love, and she thinks he’s cute. They’re married pretty soon after. Fosse introduces Perrine in the present-day interview, then through her dance routines, with he, Perrine, cinematographer Bruce Surtees, and editor Alan Heim creating a transfixing sequence. It’s an entirely objectifying one, but then the rest of the film is just realizing that object as a person; Perrine’s the protagonist of the film, while Hoffman’s the literal subject. And also, for reasons, when Lenny gets to the biopic summary montages, they work differently for Hoffman and Perrine. Hoffman wouldn’t be able to stay protagonist with them, while the devices don’t affect Perrine.

The film and Hoffman are wholly entranced with Perrine, and their salad days are fun, sympathetic, and exuberant. And then tragedy strikes, and their whole lives change. They end up in L.A. and get hooked on heroin. They clean up long enough to have a kid to save the marriage, only it doesn’t work, with Hoffman staying off but Perrine getting back on and worse.

Hoffman doesn’t have to account for any of that period outside flashback moments and intercut references in his routine, but Perrine goes through it in the interview. It’s harrowing, with Perrine getting two distinct arcs, one in flashback and one in the interviews. It’s an exceptional performance; maybe not better than Hoffman’s, but far more complex. Perrine builds her performance one way, winding through the narrative and its fractures, while Hoffman gets to build from scratch. And to a goal. In the later comedy routine, the film shows where Hoffman’s going to end. It’s just a matter of getting him there.

The thing about Hoffman (and Bruce) is there’s no early moment in his failures to foretell future greatness. At the film’s start, he’s usually bad and rarely middling. He’s affable and cute, but it’s Perrine who gets him out of the proverbial Catskills comedy circuit (whether she wants to or not). His social commentary routines start as filler between introducing dancers at one strip club or another. He initially gets those gigs because Perrine’s dancing there.

Hoffman grows his performance along the same trajectory; it’s all a coincidence of person and time. The film’s got a lengthy Bruce routine about racial slurs (which dates poorly as social commentary but provides exceptional historical insight); it’s post-integration, and people are figuring things out. It’s the time and place, not the person. There are numerous bits about men and women, husbands and wives, and even some (albeit slurry) anti-homophobia commentary. For a brief, shining moment (in the second act), Hoffman sees the world better than anyone else with a microphone. Then the third act is revealing he’s still profoundly naive about the whole thing. Initially, the film bakes that revelation and resulting tragedy into a pseudo-comedic courtroom scene. Lenny’s got great courtroom scenes. The last one kills and in the wrong way.

The finale ought to be a lot more abrupt than it plays; in the present, night has fallen after the days of interviews; there are a handful of flashbacks, shorter, with the interviewees directing attention to specific details instead of setting up. But, thanks to some pointed questions and answers, the film can stay firmly on its path, Fosse bringing it to the unavoidable but not inevitable finish. The film pulls in all the threads of the previous almost two hours, jumbles them up, then elegantly lays them out, lucidly but not obviously. Fosse’s got one last incredible move in a film of spectacular moves.

All the acting is excellent. Obviously, Hoffman and Perrine are the stars, with Miner and Beck both getting some fine moments. None of the other supporting players get more than a few short scenes, with Rashel Novikoff and Gary Morton standouts. But also pretty much the only other two actors with significant scenes. Novikoff is Hoffman’s unintentionally hilarious aunt, and Morton’s a Catskills comic gone Hollywood, so basically Hoffman’s best-case future.

Technically, it’s superlative. Fosse’s direction, composition and of performances, is great. Heim’s editing, Surtees’s black and white photography, Joel Schiller’s production design, the occasional but actually perfect Ralph Burns music.

Lenny’s remarkable.

Parade (1974, Jacques Tati)

Parade somehow loses the plot after intermission. Given the plot is just a night at the circus, usually showcasing director Tati’s pantomiming, it shouldn’t be possible to lose such a thing. But Parade does.

Maybe intermission not coming halfway through the film should be a sign. And at least the post-intermission material sails by relatively quickly, even as the content itself starts to strain. Probably because it’s entirely focused on the orchestra, which wasn’t in the opening half, and the film kind of gives up on the idea of verisimilitude and narrative distance.

Obviously, being a combination of a videotaped live performance and—I guess—staged and filmed material (i.e. not all the shots from the live videotaping), Parade gets some stylistic allowances but post-intermission, all of the insert shots fail. The lengthy orchestra sequence has numerous problem framings where people and settings change, not to mention lighting, and no one seems too concerned with it, which is rather strange given at least the dedication to showcasing the talent in the pre-intermission part of the film.

The first half has at least three good Tati pantomimes and another one where he’s “in character” too much and it feels like it should be in a movie, it has a great magician sequence, and a phenomenal juggler sequence. Plus there’s a cute mule sequence. The cute mule sequence goes on way too long and gets cloying at the end, but there are some really good laughs in it. It’s also where the audience starts losing the plot themselves and can’t quite gin up the enthusiasm.

Not audience as in Parade watcher, but the audience in the film, the live circus audience there for when Tati videotaped. There’s a whole subtext just to their attitude as the film progresses and it’s hard for it not to be contagious. At times it’s difficult to get enthused about the onscreen action—Tati showcases the performer doing a bit, not the performer, so all long shots—because the audience has checked out and they’re a big cue as to how impressive an act should play.

There’s also this “subplot” involving two kids at the circus—who happen to be the only two kids at the circus; the audience is otherwise entirely some very groovy French hippies from the early seventies who all came on moped—and it seems like Tati’s saving them up for something and it goes nowhere. It goers nowhere fast, which is kind of nice—once Parade gets tiring post-intermission, which is in the last third, it’s at least a speedy run downhill.

Parade has some great parts—and some exceptional performers—but it doesn’t come together, which is a bummer. It seems like the initial impulse could’ve gone somewhere. Instead, it ends with a bunch of tedious gag inserts and manages to screw up Tati’s exaggerated dancing, which should be a great sequence. The videotaped portions of Parade are its best, capturing the speed and grace of the performers. The filmed sequences never match the intensity.

Like I said, it’s a bummer.

Dirty Mary Crazy Larry (1974, John Hough)

I’m not sure how Dirty Mary Crazy Larry played on its original release—like, did audiences actually sympathize with “leads” Peter Fonda and Susan George—but whatever shine time has scrubbed off it has left something of an endurance test. Fonda and Adam Roarke (who’s more the protagonist than Fonda and often more than George) are a would-be NASCAR team. Fonda’s the driver, Roarke’s his mechanic. There’s not a lot about their history but basically Roarke’s a drunk and Fonda’s just never had a good enough car. Fonda’s got the driving skills to be a champion driver, which are more potential than realized given they drive around a mostly empty Central Valley California and there’s only like two actual chase sequences, albeit decent ones. He just can’t get the speed.

So he and Roarke decide they’re going to rob a supermarket of its cash delivery… by taking the store manager’s wife and daughter hostage and forcing him to open the safe. Roarke is the hostage-taker. He’s really good at being scary. Fonda’s in charge of getting the manager (an uncredited but rather good considering the performance calibers Roddy McDowell) to open the safe. Fonda’s not good at it. The film never explains how they come up with the plan (or target); as grocery store cash delivery robberies go, it’s not the worst plan but… Fonda and Roarke don’t seem to have any concept of possible consequences. Roarke maybe, he just stays quiet about his concerns; Fonda’s an idiot.

George is the local woman he hooks up with the night before the robbery. She tracks him down and refuses to get out of the getaway car and then outsmarts Fonda whenever he tries to ditch her. We later find out she’s an ex-con (serial shoplifting) with nothing better to do than hang with Fonda. When she first ambushes him, she goes on a little about how he’s just afraid because of their great connection the night before… but given the utter lack of chemistry between Fonda and George (and her best line being about his romantic failings)… well, it’s not like Leigh Chapman and Antonio Santea’s screenplay contributes much to the film. In fact, when it’s more surprising when it’s not terrible than when it has the occasional funny line. Deputy Eugene Daniels, who does one of the two chase scenes, is occasionally hilarious but it’s a combination of the bad script, Hough’s inept direction of his actors, and Daniels’s wanting acting chops.

Both Fonda and George are awful. George manages to be more likable because Fonda’s so unlikable, but she’s still terrible. Fonda often acts with his sunglasses on, obscuring his expressiveness… which might be a plus given the film.

Hough’s direction is occasionally incompetent—he and cinematographer Michael D. Marguiles lean into shaky camera work sometimes to the point it’s impossible to see follow a scene—but then he (and Marguiles) will have these great, elaborate long shots of the vehicular mayhem. They work at the vehicular mayhem. Nothing else. Though there’s this one strange perspective shot at the beginning with a car going down a hill where it seems like Hough’s going to try some things.

Even when the film looks good, it’s not trying anything.

The supporting cast lacks goodness but is occasionally mediocre. Kenneth Tobey mildly embarrasses himself as a blowhard sheriff guy. Vic Morrow is an iconoclast captain in the sheriff’s department (it’s unclear if Tobey’s boss or what); Morrow doesn’t carry a badge or a gun or wear any kind of uniform, he’s just a hardworking Cali farmer guy who takes the robbery personally. Apparently because of the kind of car Fonda and Roarke have. It seems like it’s going to mean something. It doesn’t. Nothing means anything in Dirty Mary Crazy Larry, including the title, which seems to be slut-shaming George (or not) and Fonda’s not crazy, he’s just a sociopathic jackass.

But it’s only ninety minutes, moves well, has the occasional good vehicular mayhem sequence, and has one hell of an ending. And Roarke’s often really good. Roarke deserves a better script, director, and so on. Fonda and George? They’re right at home in the dismal.

The Sugarland Express (1974, Steven Spielberg)

After setting up Goldie Hawn and William Atherton as the protagonists, Sugarland Express takes about an hour to get back to them. Hawn and Atherton have an amazing setup–he’s about to get out of prison and has been transferred to pre-release. Hawn comes to visiting day but to break him out. She’s just gotten out of jail and the state took away their son. So she wants Atherton to come with her to get him.

They make it out all right only to end up kidnapping a state trooper (Michael Sacks) within the first twenty or so minutes. There’s a big car chase sequence–pretty much the only one of the movie, which eventually has about 80 cars in a shot–where Hawn and Atherton get the upperhand. Well, they bumble into it. But then Sacks isn’t really particularly with it either. Once the cops figure out what’s happened, they call in the boss, Ben Johnson.

So until Johnson gets into the movie, it seems like Sacks is going to take over as protagonist. But then he doesn’t. Because Johnson dominates the film. Intentionally. Director Spielberg, screenwriters Hal Barwood and Matthew Robbins, they pull back from Hawn and Atherton’s story and fill it out with the ginormous police response. It’s the kidnappers followed down the highway by a line of a dozen cop cars. It’s quirky. Johnson takes an immediate liking to Hawn after she grins at him through the back window. Because Johnson doesn’t want to be a hard ass, he wants to help these crazy kids (they’re supposed to be twenty-five but he’s a softey), and he’s never killed a man in ninteen years on the Texas highway patrol.

The movie is based on events from 1969. Texas in 1969. So that character motivation raises all sorts of possibilites for further discussion of portrayal of law enforcement in popular culture. But for the purposes of Sugarland, Johnson’s an old softey and he wants to help all these kids–including Sacks–get out of the situation okay.

Eventually they have to bed down for the night–cops and kidnappers–and that break from the Express is when the film catches back up with Hawn and Atherton. There hasn’t been time for them to get a moment. And it’s kind of when it becomes clear how far Spielberg and the writers want to keep the viewers from Hawn and Atherton. They don’t want to dig too deep. Just like they don’t want to dig too deep on Sacks, who Stockholms way too fast to be an effective state trooper unless they’re really all supposed to be sensitive doofuses (no other cop in the movie is sensitive–just Sacks and Johnson–the rest are gun-happy). And they don’t want to dig too deep on Johnson, because, well, he’s in his late fifties and it’s a still Goldie Hawn movie, after all.

So there’s not going to be character exploration. There’s also not going to be much more comedy; Atherton is realizing the gravity of the situation. The adrenaline has worn off and he sees his death. Meanwhile Hawn’s convinced because they’re famous–oh, yeah, they’re folk heroes–they’re going to get their baby back. Only they can’t really talk about it because, well, they aren’t bright. The moments when you do actually find something out about Atherton and Hawn–about their backgrounds or situation–it’s a sympathy moment. Not just for the audience, but for Johnson and Sacks too. Because even though Sacks is a doofus, he’s not a dope like Atherton or Hawn.

Then there’s the next morning there’s the next big action sequence–involving the kidnappers, there’s a big car crash without them that Spielberg plays without absurdity but still want some humor in the danger–and it’s a doozy. Texas gun nut vigilantes go out after the kidnappers. They shoot up a used car lot, with Hawn trapped in a camper while Atherton goes after an escaping Sacks through the lot. It’s intense. And sets the direction of the rest of the film. The energy of it too. The first half has a lot of great editing from Edward M. Abroms and Verna Fields and it’s fast but it’s not hurried. In the second half, with Atherton deciding to officially offer to trade Sacks for the baby, the Express–save narrative-driven slowdowns–is accelerating all the way to the finish. Spielberg and the screenwriters are intentional with how they use their time.

The script from Barwood and Robbins is precise. Spielberg’s direction is always in rhythm with it, even when he’s slowing down or speeding up. He gets flashy at times, but always to further the story–or affect its pacing. And there’s this patient, lush Vilmos Zsigmond photography so it’s never too flashy. Then there’s that great editing. And the effective (and simple) John Williams score, which enthusiastically promises hope then takes it away. It’s a technical feat.

Of the performances, Atherton and Johnson stand out. Sacks and Hawn have a lot less to do. Well, Hawn has more to do occasionally but it’s really just more screentime. The first half of the film is Atherton in a panic, the second half is Hawn in a different one. Again, Spielberg and the screenwriters stay back from the characters. They’re caricatures the actors have to fill out, because if you fill them out too much in the script, then Sugarland can’t be Sugarland. Part of the film’s charm is Spielberg and the screenwriters ostensibly keeping things light. Because it’s a Goldie Hawn movie and she’s so cute and bubbly. Only there’s a sadness around the cute and bubbly. Because it’s a tragedy, not a comedy. It’s a tragedy with some funny parts and some exciting parts. But it’s such a tragedy instead of trying to cover all the factors, the filmmakers just implied them and the actors informed them through their passive performances. Because it’s a lot of Hawn, Atherton, Sacks, and Johnson in close-up. There’s a lot of time with these characters together. And they have to develop together. And they do. The filmmakers are able to bake in all the sadness without doing any excess exposition dumps.

Sugarland’s great. It all works out.

Peanuts (1965) s01e12 – It’s the Easter Beagle, Charlie Brown!

Easter Beagle has a really strong script from Charles M. Schulz. Everything is balanced just right. It’s not balanced equally. The proportions are just right. Besides the lovely musical sequences–where Beagle goes for being lovely and graceful (lots of dancing Snoopy, set Vince Guaraldi, some Bach, and some Beethoven)–most of the special is spent with Peppermint Patty (Linda Ercoli) and Marcie (Jimmy Ahrens). Patty is trying to teach Marcie how to make Easter eggs. Things go wrong in very amusing ways as Marcie apparently has no understanding of how eggs work.

That subplot keeps up the whole special–but is actually completely independent of the “twist”–and just gets funnier. By the final few screw-ups, Peppermint Patty’s frustrations are possibly less than the viewer’s. It’s perfectly plotted by Schulz and director Roman. Really funny, really good plotting.

Other subplots include Sally (Lynn Mortensen) needing new shoes, Linus (Stephen Shea) trying to convince Sally and the other kids the Easter Beagle will give them all Easter eggs so why make them, and Woodstock needing a new bird house. Charlie Brown (Todd Barbee) and Lucy (Melanie Kohn) are around, but mostly just to be exasperated by their younger siblings.

There’s a great department store sequence–where everything is all Christmas (Easter Beagle has a couple moments of big commercialism commentary from Schulz; the department store works a lot better than the stuff in dialogue)–and only Snoopy is able to find the Easter section, on his way to picking out a bird house for Woodstock. Because even though Snoopy is a bit of a jerk to Woodstock–there’s a lot of almost mean slapstick violence–he does want to get him a new bird house.

Great music, some fantastic sequences (like, lots of them–Easter Beagle is mostly fantastic sequences), and strong performances from the cast. Kohn is maybe the weakest, but she comes around–though Barbee does have the worst part in the special–and Ercoli and Ahrens do some great work. Oh, and Mortensen and Shea. The Easter Beagle stuff is excellent.

And it’s got a great finish.

It’s the Easter Beagle, which has almost zilch to do with Easter, is a constant, consistent success.

Peanuts (1965) s01e11 – It’s a Mystery, Charlie Brown

It’s a Mystery, Charlie Brown opens with this adorable five minute Woodstock sequence. He builds a new nest, then goes and takes a swim in a bird bath. A storm comes in–whatever its faults, Mystery does have some rather ambitious animation for a “Charlie Brown” special–the tranquil clouds changing into storm clouds looks awesome. Woodstock then has to survive on the water until Snoopy can save him. Once Snoopy comes in, things start to get less adorable. Mystery starts going for gags, because whenever Snoopy tries to help Woodstock, something goes wrong because of Snoopy’s callousness. For a while it seems like a subplot is going to be Woodstock snapping.

But it’s not. Because Mystery doesn’t have any subplots.

Once the storm is over and Woodstock is dry, Snoopy walks him home. Only the new nest is gone, so Snoopy dons a Sherlock Holmes outfit and they get investigating.

Wait, did I forget to mention Sally (Lynn Mortensen) has a science project due and the subject is nature. She needs something from nature.

Hint, hint.

So Snoopy and Woodstock investigate the Peanuts kids, starting with Charlie Brown (Todd Barbee) under a hot lamp. Then Lucy and Linus, then Marcie, then Pigpen, then Peppermint Patty. None of the scenes stand out except the Peppermint Patty one, where Patty decides Snoopy is playing cops and robbers and plays as the robber and attacks him. It might be a good scene if Donna Le Tourneau’s voice work on Patty were better. There’s got to be something special in the voice of a character who thinks a bipedal dog in a costume is a funny-looking kid and Le Tourneau doesn’t have it here.

After all the investigating, they go to the school and find the bird nest. Even though they’re just following the footprints from the tree, which Mystery previously implied led to Charlie Brown’s house and maybe the plot would move along a little faster. The trip to the other kids’ houses is narratively pointless. Other than to keep doing this sight gag where Snoopy’s bubble pipe makes a big bubble. The big bubble always pops on Woodstock, soaking him once again. Given Woodstock almost drown to death in the opening scene, it’s a little mean. Mystery is a little mean to Woodstock, who’s basically the only not annoying character in it.

Because Sally gets really, really, really annoying. Mortensen plays her a little sociopathic, which is funny, but she’s fighting with Woodstock, who’s sympathetic.

The last third is a series of unfunny jokes. Mystery goes out on a particularly bad one.

It took six guys to come up with the story for Mystery–Charles M. Schulz isn’t credited with them, though he wrote the teleplay. They didn’t come up with much. For a while it seemed like it’d be focused more on Snoopy and Woodstock, so dialogue-free comedy. But no.

It’s not terrible, it’s just not successful. It doesn’t really try to succeed either. It’s also not assured enough to be rote.

Sister Street Fighter (1974, Yamaguchi Kazuhiko)

Sister Street Fighter should be campy. With the constant horns in Kikuchi Shunsuke’s score, lead Shiomi Etsuko’s colorful outfit, villain Amatsu Bin doing an Elvis impersonation, the countless and intentionally weird martial arts villains… it ought to be campy. But it’s not, because somehow Sister Street Fighter manages to keep its melodrama sincere.

Lead Shiomi is a Hong Kong martial arts champion who goes to Japan to search for her missing brother. He too is a martial arts champion, but like many good martial arts champions, he’s also a secret drug agent. Shiomi isn’t just a concerned sister or martial arts champion, she’s got the assignment of finding him. It’s unclear if she regularly works as a secret agent or just this one time.

Shiomi’s a likable lead. Sister Street Fighter never goes out of its way to require anything like acting from its cast; likable’s about as high as you can get. Especially since Shiomi gets the more tedious half of the movie. The other half is all of Amatsu’s villainy, which gets pretty awful, or something with his goons. Even though the goons are sort of played for laughs and aren’t especially good at being eccentric martial arts villains, the film always takes them seriously. Somehow staying straightfaced through the absurdities does more for pacing than Shiomi’s dramatically inert search for her brother.

In Japan, Shiomi gets herself a bunch of friends and allies, including Sonny Chiba in an extended cameo. Chiba himself had a Street Fighter franchise, but playing a different character (with Shiomi appearing in the final entry, not as the same character as here). There’s no baton-passing to Shiomi, just the relatively effective too slight mentorship. Chiba’s a karate man, Shiomi’s a karate woman, they believe in the good karate schools. They’re pals and they’ve got the most star power in the picture.

Sadly, they barely get any time together.

Amatsu’s an okay villain. He’s an evil jackass, walking around with his sunglasses on all the time and his Elvis capes. Ishibashi Masashi is Amatsu’s overconfident henchman who can’t deal with Shiomi beating him up. Ishibashi’s all right too.

As for the eccentric villains, none of them stand out good or bad. Director Yamaguchi shoots all the fight scenes in long shot with very few cuts. It’s about seeing the fight progress. The fight choreography isn’t great, but what it does well, Yamaguchi knows how to showcase.

He also knows how to do the ultraviolence quite well. Sister Street Fighter is often bloodless, but only because they’re saving all the gore for the finale. It should’ve been peppered throughout, especially given Shiomi’s plot is so bland and it could use all the help.

Most of the film involves Shiomi at Amatsu’s estate, which is a mix of Bond villain, bikini bimbos, and dungeons. Lots and lots of dungeons, but with tech. Shiomi has to break in after the second or third time everyone thinks she’s dead. Sister Street Fighter is short but repetitive. Unfortunately it’s not to reinforce information gathering, but because the writers don’t have any other ideas. So why not just do this one thing again. And then again.

But the scenes with Shiomi on the estate take up a lot of runtime. It’s got a great pace. It doesn’t have the best direction in the film, but it definitely moves the best.

In the end, Sister Street Fighter doesn’t succeed, it just doesn’t fail. It’s like it isn’t even ambitious enough to fail.

1/4★

CREDITS

Directed by Yamaguchi Kazuhiko; written by Kakefuda Masahiro and Suzuki Noribumi; director of photography, Nakajima Yoshio; edited by Tanaka Osamu; music by Kikuchi Shunsuke; production designer, Nakamura Shuichiro; produced by Takamura Kenji and Yoshimine Kineo; released by Toei Company.

Starring Etsuko Shiomi (Li Koryu), Emi Hayakawa (Emi), Sanae Ôhori (Shinobu Kojo), Xiu-Rong Xie (Fanshin), Hiroshi Kondô (Li Gyokudo), Tatsuya Nanjô (Jiro), Nami Tachibana (Reiko), Hiroshi Miyauchi (Li Mansei), Bin Amatsu (Shigetomi Kakuzaki), Masashi Ishibashi (Kazunao Inubashiri), and Sonny Chiba (Hibiki).

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The Streetfighter's Last Revenge (1974, Ozawa Shigehiro)

The title, The Street Fighter’s Last Revenge, doesn’t really refer to anything in the film itself. The Street Fighter is Sonny Chiba. He’s gone for psychotic killer karate man (from the first film, Last Revenge is the third) to suave, romantic ladies man. Complete with a secret room to put on his disguises. He also does disguises now. Last Revenge is often like a cheap James Bond knockoff, but then there’s some fighting and everything’s okay for a while.

Anyway. Chiba doesn’t wantonly kill everyone anymore but he still does get cheated by the criminals who hire him for the odd jobs. Only Last Revenge is more interested in the Chiba the ladies man than Chiba the killer karate man. So instead of fighting his way through the bad guy’s organization, Chiba instead romances the guy’s evil sister (Ike Reiko). It’s a family thing–there’s Ike, smart brother Kitamura Eizô, and stupid brother Shioji Akira.

Except it’s not a Romeo and Juliet thing, Ike’s really always just trying to kill Chiba. Sometimes involving mafia karate man Frankie Black, who has a magic power (really) to cut heavy objects with his mind. Black’s also dressed like a Mariachi. He’s really tall too. So sometimes Street Fighter’s Last Revenge will have this giant white guy Mariachi fighting Chiba.

It’s absurd and bad and awesome at the same time.

Kitamura–the smart brother–has this whole subplot about government corruption where he ends up teaming up with Wada Kôji’s corrupt prosecuting attorney. Wada’s also a karate man, ten years more advanced than Chiba.

Oh. Yeah. In addition to just having straight-forward, usually well-choreographed fight scenes, Last Revenge reduces Chiba’s badassery. He gets his ass handed to him a few times by Wada, with the film unable to figure out how to be sympathetic to Chiba. Luckily he’s a karate man and just needs to visit Suzuki Masafumi for some tips. Suzuki runs a karate school and is a real good guy, not a de facto one like Chiba.

It’s basically an excuse for director Ozawa to showcase some karate. The fight scenes have more jumping than intricate technique.

Though Shiomi Etsuko, as a young karate woman, gets some nice technique showcasing. She’s ten years too young to take on Chiba, or so he says; he’s ten years too young to take on Wada, or so Wada tells Chiba. Not being developed enough in your karate and hitting people with time-delayed fatal wounds are the big script gimmicks. Neither ever feel like anything but gimmicks.

However, it’s cool seeing Shimoi has a fun arc of rejecting Kitamura and family to be an antihero like Chiba. It gives him a protege, whether he wants one or not. There are lots of ladies interested in Chiba–the film’s first subplot involves his message service receptionist deciding she has to track him down because of his sexy voice. It makes his “romance” subplot with Ike all the more plausible.

Not good, but plausible. Even though Ike’s performance as a deceptive femme fatale is probably the film’s best bit of acting. And Ike gets no favors from the script or Ozawa’s direction. Ozawa doesn’t really do the directing performances thing. He’s patient with his composition, giving the actors space and time, but he doesn’t do anything to help them. It doesn’t really matter for any of the guys. But it matters for Shimoi and Ike.

Wada’s a good villain. Not so much to Chiba, rather as a foil in Kitamura’s plans.

So it’s a shame when none of it comes through at the end. Last Revenge has a chance to be this violent but benign martial arts thriller and screws it up so much it’s difficult to remember how or why it got the goodwill to burn.

Mostly it’s because Chiba’s got such a weak part.

Good photography from Yamagishi Nagaki. Decent score. Street Fighter’s Last Revenge is perfectly well-produced, it just can’t overcome a bad script and that script’s temperate Chiba.

0/4ⓏⒺⓇⓄ

CREDITS

Directed by Shigehiro Ozawa; written by Takada Kôji and Shimura Masahiro; director of photography, Yamagishi Nagaki; released by Toei Company.

Starring Sonny Chiba (Tsurugi), Ike Reiko (Aya), Wada Kôji (Takera Kunigami), Shiomi Etsuko (Huo-Feng), Suzuki Masafumi (Masaoka), Kitamura Eizô (Ôwada Seigen), Murakami Fuyuki (Iizuka), Shioji Akira (Ôwada Gô), and Frankie Black (Black).

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