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Audience Appreciation Day
Hollyfeld, here, and welcome to the long-awaited Look Closer… Audience Appreciation Day! Good to be here. We've got whopper of a column for you today, and a bunch of first time occurrences in store. We'll start with my first ever guest review from a certain Mr. Gross Point Jack, who would like to recommend Clint Eastwood's High Plains Drifter to all of you.
High Plains Drifter - Review.
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What do you think of High Plains Drifter? |
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It is this sadistic undertone that makes the film what it is, basically Clint took the 'Anti-hero' thing to the extreme when he made this as I can never recall the 'hero' in the movie actually raping someone. This can also be interpreted the religious or supernatural theme of the film (it depends on what way you look at it). None of this is more obvious than when Clint has the town painted red and calls it 'Hell', it really is a creepy moment.
Clint's identity is never revealed to us in the film although it is hinted at...is he an angel? Is he the ghost of the dead sheriff? Or is he (as one townsperson suggests) the devil himself? Who knows...but the trick is to really 'look closer' and you really will see something more than a standard western flick.
- Grosse Pointe Jack
Thanks, Grosse Pointe Jack, for giving us our first ever guest review. As a reward, I'm sending you some free promotional material from a variety of movies released over the last year. I hope you enjoy it, and I hope the rest of you out there will take advantage of my hospitality and send in your own reviews and get some free stuff. My goal has always been to make Look Closer… a very hands-on experience for all our readers. (And an apology to Jack, who lives across an ocean from myself, for taking so long to mail your gift. American residents can probably count on getting their prizes a little sooner than our - apparently quite large - European fan base.)
You know, I don't really get a lot of mail for my column, which is perhaps a LITTLE surprising, considering that Webmaster John assures me that people do, in fact, read it. (And someone has to be participating in my polls.) But I do get at least one e-mail or two a week regarding my work on the site, and mostly in regards to a certain review that appeared in the November 15 edition of the Untitled Deadpool Column. Here's a typical letter:
Hi I am very interested in seeing "A Shot at Glory" with Michael Keaton and Ally McCoist but I have one small problem. I'm from Ireland and it doesn't look like the movie is coming out here! Could you please tell me when it is being released and where I could possibly get a copy. Thank you very much for any advice you can give me.
Okay, I saw A Shot At Glory over six months ago and gave it a favorable review for The Tuesday Night Movie Club, but apparently I am one of, at most, THREE reviewers who have EVER discussed the film on ANY internet news site. While, yes, this does give me a certain sense of notoriety, it also means that I probably get more e-mail about it than Robert Duvall does, and he produced the thing.
I do not know much about A Shot At Glory except what the Internet Movie Database (www.imdb.com) tells me, what I have gathered my own personal experience with the film, and what a very sparse number of other movie sites have mentioned about it. But I would like to impart, right now, what I know, since every time I receive a new e-mail I make a concerted effort to see if there is anything new occurring in regards to this film.
First, a lot of people ask me when it will be released in their neck of the woods. In response to this, I tell them that, as of this moment, 3:41 AM Pacific Standard Time on the morning of May 13, 2001, A Shot At Glory is apparently not scheduled to be released anywhere in the world any time soon. This is unfortunate, as there is apparently a rather high amount of interest in the film. But I assure all of you out there who care about this film's release - those who have already e-mailed me and those to come - that as soon as I hear an official word (or even a plausible rumor) of this film's release, I will not only publish it on the site, but will also e-mail you all personally. In addition, I would like to ask anyone who might have information on this film's progress in ANY way to contact me at the address at the bottom of the page. Thank you.
Secondly, I would like to address a very specific e-mail I received in regards to this film from a television show that has yet to premiere, but will feature some material on A Shot At Glory in its premiere, or shortly thereafter. I am unsure because this e-mail has mysteriously vanished from my e-mail inbox. I would like to assure the author of this e-mail that my lack of response has been unintentional, due to this unfortunate blunder on someone's part. If she reads this, I hope that she will write me back. Although I could not find any pictures or other helpful materials for your show, I wish you the best of luck with your program, and would certainly like to promote it on the site for all these people who are clearly interested in the film. Free publicity - you know you want it. So write me back, as soon as possible, and we will see if there is something we can do. Thank you again.
Moving right along, I would also like to direct you to the poll at the top of the page, asking for any changes in the focus of this column. As stated above, my goal has always been to make this a reader-oriented column, so I am asking you all to let me know if there is anything in particular you would like to see more of in Look Closer… Your opinion does of course count (especially since you can vote more than once - wait an hour), and this column will change according to what you may be interested in. And if there is anything else you would like to see that is NOT listed, be sure to let me know in an e-mail. My address is at the bottom of the page.
And finally, I would like to get to my first ever request review for Look Closer… Take it away, Amanda from the Forums:
"The baseball season is only a couple weeks away. How about a forgotten baseball movie? I'm not really sure what that might be but you're a smart guy, you can figure it out."
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What do you think of The Jackie Robinson Story? |
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I have a soft spot for Jackie Robinson for several reasons. I feel that he was not only a great athlete but, from what I've read and heard, also a genuinely good person. It also helps that he went to my college AND high school alma maters. But enough about me. As I have said before (I know I said enough about me, but I'm going somewhere with this), baseball comes across as a rather reserved sport on the big screen compared to some of the more violent past times. So I find myself more attracted to the films that deal with the characters off the field as much if not moreso than when they are playing the game. The Jackie Robinson Story is a perfect example of this. Very much a product of the cinematic methods of its time, it is simply told both story-wise and visually. The baseball scenes are somewhat interesting, but don't have that visual "oomph" that many modern sports films strive for. It's baseball, pure and simple. Nothing particularly special about that in THIS film.
What The Jackie Robinson Story chooses to focus on instead is the personal struggles of the man while he was trying to break into the sporting world, beginning with his more humble ambitions (at first he seems only to worry about finding a coaching job), and eventually moving on to deal with the importance of his incorporation into the mainstream baseball leagues. The film may not deal with racism in as severe a manner as the more serious works of Spike Lee or even mainstream Hollywood fare like A Time To Kill, but it doesn't dodge the issue like many other Production Code-era films. Robinson is used to dealing with racism - when first approached by the Dodgers' talent scouts, they tell him to meet them at the train station in the morning. Cut to the next morning, and Jackie is sleeping in. When they angrily ask where the hell is has been, he incredulously replies, "You mean you're REALLY from the Dodgers?"
As a film, The Jackie Robinson Story has a tendency to be rather pedestrian in some matters. The dialogue is typical mainstream Hollywood cheese much of the time, and the direction is uninspired, though serviceable. I think Leonard Maltin said it best, however, when he said that the film is at its most fascinating when taken as a "social history." Indeed, there are numerous factors that make The Jackie Robinson worth watching for that reason alone. For example, a film that is largely about racism featuring a front page referring to the Japanese in World War II as "nips" has a certain thread of irony running through it. It is also notable for the way it attempts to portray an African-American leading man using many of the Hollywood conventions, while also allowing him to strive to overcome societal limitations. He is surrounded by other African-Americans who are stuck in the unfortunate positions of the time, and is often subject to those situations himself, but is allowed by history AND the script to overthrow some of those stereotypes.
But perhaps most fascinatingly of all, The Jackie Robinson Story stars Jackie Robinson as himself. This element alone has gotten numerous teachers I know to make the film required viewing in their elementary school classes, because it is a cinematic history taken approximately at the time the events occurred, and with obvious influence from Robinson, himself. Which of course begs the question, "Can he act?" Well, no, not really, even though he IS playing himself. He seems to come across genuinely sweet and as having a disarming innocence, which of course makes him likable, but makes certain dramatic scenes seem less than credible.
The Jackie Robinson Story is not an absolutely fantastic film, but is certainly engaging in its own way, though more because of the circumstances of its production than any real talent that went towards making it. There are moments when it is genuinely powerful scattered throughout, however - my personal favorite is a scene in which Jackie meets the owner of the Dodgers, who makes the very important point that the Dodgers took a huge chance on Robinson. If he failed in his duties either to the team, the public, or even his detractors, it could have been another twenty years before anyone attempted to integrate organized sports. And he was right, too. (Most of Jackie's management throughout the film is depicted as completely colorblind - certainly a bit of an exaggeration considering the fact that these people were still in positions of power at the time of this film's production.) The Jackie Robinson Story is available, though hard to find, on video, but it was recently released on DVD, which should be easier to pick up. Check it out - it's an increasingly important piece of Americana.
Well, that about wraps it up for Look Closer's… first ever Audience Appreciation Day. We'll have more of these as the needs arise, but until then, participate in the poll, let me know what you think in the forums or with an e-mail, and send in those reviews! Any and all input from our readers, for any reason whatsoever, is appreciated. Thank you, and I'll see you soon!
As always, Hollyfeld can be reached at hollyfeld_@hotmail.com
You there! You think you could do this job better than I can? Well, you might be right! Look Closer… is always looking for guest columnists, and you might as well be one of them. Just write a review of reasonable length for a movie that you think is under-rated, over-rated, no one knows, etc., and if it makes the grade we will print it in an edition of this column! Those whose reviews are published will also receive a free piece of (slightly cheesy and really inexpensive) promotional merchandise from a movie, to be sent when their review is published, courtesy of me. Just send any and all reviews to the above address. Thank you for reading and participating in the site!
Lazlo Hollyfeld is the pseudonym of an aspiring writer/actor/director located in Southern California. With one screenplay under his (collaborative) belt and more to come, he is sure to work his way up in the world with the help of his talented and close-knit group of friends, co-workers, and penguins. Yes, you heard me, penguins. A film student since before he can remember, he has devoted much of his life to the study of the silver screen and its related art forms.