The Deer Hunter

Under Michael Cimino’s Oscar winning direction, The Deer Hunter is a film about three friends from a small steel mill town in Pennsylvania who experience the horrors of the Vietnam War together.  The film starts with a good long look at the men on the eve of their departure.  After a hard day’s work, they stroll down to the bar, sing and drink like they’ve got all the time in the world.  Steve (John Savage) is getting married that evening, but only Steve’s mother feels the hurry.

The wedding scenes of the film take their time, showing the men’s last hurrah together.  The reception doubles as a going away party for Nick (Christopher Walkin) and Mike (Robert De Niro).  And as Steve and his bride, Angela (Rutanya Alda) drive off to spend a night together, the rest of the boys go deer hunting.  The hunt scenes have a mysterious, poetic vibe about them, especially to Mike.  Then the film drops us straight into the madness of Vietnam, where Nick, Mike and Steve are captured and forced to engage in a game of Russian roulette.

The Russian roulette scenes are the most memorable parts of the film.  It becomes a symbol for the intense and random violence that was the Vietnam War.  Each of these scenes are an amazing mixture of suspense, horror and violence that are not for the faint of heart.  With each pass of the gun is the possibility that these men will blow their own brains out, but if they don’t play, they’ll be killed by their captors.

Somehow out of this violent madness, Mike finds a refreshed will to live and carry on stronger than the rest.  We understand that when Mike comes home, he has been changed by his terrible experiences, but he doesn’t show it as much as Steve and Nick.  I’d rather not spoil anything, but they have a great deal of physical and psychological issues to deal with.  Christopher Walken doesn’t earn that Oscar win for nothing.

While at times I didn’t exactly enjoy watching The Deer Hunter, I can appreciate its intensity and quality.  The film did what it was supposed to and did so very well.  After spending so much time at the bar and wedding, I could not help but become very invested in the characters, affected emotionally by their situations and held my breath at every pull of the trigger.  If you can stomach the intense games of Russian roulette, checking out The Deer Hunter is worth it.

“You have to think about one shot.  One shot is what it’s all about.  A deer’s gotta be taken with one shot.”

An Unmarried Woman

Erica (Jill Clayburgh) seems to be the one woman she knows in a steady, loving marriage.  After sixteen years, she and Martin (Michael Murphy) seem to just complete each other.  They look safe, refreshing and stable compared to Erica’s friends, a band of middle-aged women, constantly on the prowl after being jaded by countless men.  But when Martin drops the bomb that he has been having an affair for a year now, and wants to live with this younger woman, it devastates Erica and forces her into major life changes.

The scene where Martin first tells Erica about his affair is spectacularly painful.  Erica was in good spirits just moments before, thinking about plans for summer vacations.  When Martin’s guilt gets to him, he begins crying and tells Erica everything.  The initial look on her face says a perfect you’ve got to be kidding me.  She cannot believe that this is happening to her, it happens to all her friends, but what she and Martin had was different right?  For a while, she is just dumbfounded and walks down the busy street in a haze, but then she is so overcome by the terrible news she becomes physically sick and hides behind something as she vomits on the sidewalk.  The whole scene is amazingly moving and sympathetic in its simplicity.  We are completely on poor Erica’s side, who’s finally fell victim to the male ego.

Erica and Martin’s fifteen year old daughter, Patti (Lisa Lucas), is in interesting breed of teenager.  She tries to act worldly and sophisticated, almost like she’s constantly trying to impress whoever she’s around.  Being an only child, she seems very in tune to what goes on between her parents and is rather blunt about their sex life.  We see that Patti has grown up in a fairly liberal lifestyle, talking about philosophy, pot and how all the girls at school chipped in for another girl to get an abortion.  Of course, once Martin leaves, Patti starts acting out like a typical drama fueled teen.

The major issue for Erica is getting the courage to start dating again.  After sixteen years of marriage, she’s out of practice and it seems everything is different now.  It seems she can never be too careful, every man seems to just be “making a pass” at her with just sexual intentions.  Erica has had a consistent and healthy sex life that has suddenly just stopped, so at first, she starts to date just for sex.  But after a one night stand with Charlie (Cliff Gorman), a coworker who’s always looking for a hookup, she finds sex without love unsatisfying.  Thankfully for Erica, the film seems to work with the idea of kissing enough frogs to eventually find a prince.

Saul (Alan Bates) is an artist setting up for a show in the gallery Erica works in.  The relationship between them goes from work, to just another lay, to a happy and fulfilling love.  As things start to get more serious, Erica realizes she has the choice of being tied down with another man or to be independent and do all the things she’s wanted to do on her own.

The core of the film is about a woman discovering her independence.  She can move on, live without men and is not as fragile as she once thought.  If you’re looking for a sophisticated film to make you feel better after a harsh break-up, may I suggest An Unmarried Woman to go with that wine and/or ice cream?

“Balls,” said the queen.  “If I had them I’d be king.”

Midnight Express

Midnight Express is based on a true story about Billy Hayes (Brad Davis), a man who in 1970 was arrested in Turkey for attempted drug smuggling and made into a harsh example in a Turkish prison.  After being caught trying to board an airplane with two kilos of hashish strapped to his body, he is given the chance to be released if he identifies the person who sold him the drugs.  Rather stupidly, Billy tries to make a run for it in the streets, but is just recaptured and given a harsh prison sentence.  The Turkish prison is brutal, full of sadistic guards who make foreigners a priority for mental and physical torture.  As Billy’s family, lawyer and the American government work hard on the outside to find a way to get him released, the Turkish government decide to make an example out of Billy and raise his sentence to thirty years, when he only had about fifty days left.

Within the prison walls, Billy makes a few friends who teach him about the system.  There’s Jimmy (Randy Quaid), a hotheaded American who stole candles from a church, Erich (Norbert Weisser), a Swedish pacifist.  While Jimmy is bent on finding a way to escape, Erich is much more laid back, and eventually Erich and Billy begin a homosexual relationship.  Later, Billy meets Max (John Hurt) who in his crazy well tells Billy that the only way out of here is to catch the Midnight Express, which means escape.

Director Alan Parker opens Midnight Express with an intense and thrilling scene.  Billy, is about to attempt to smuggle drugs on a flight out of Turkey.  We watch him methodically pack and tape packs of hashish to his body.  Before we even see his face, we hear his heartbeat, a first indicator of the tension.  As he and his girlfriend, Susan (Irene Miracle), get closer to the plane, we sense Billy’s nervousness in multiple ways.  He runs off to the restroom to splash his face with water, take some quick breaths and check that his stash is secure.  The terminal is heavily guarded.  As his bag is being checked, the heartbeat soundtrack intensifies and we see sweat on Billy’s face.  Once he has passed bag inspection, Billy seems to think he has made it and has a new spring in his step next to Susan.  But that is short lived when he sees military personnel surrounding the plane.  He tries to play dumb until the last minute, when someone finally pats him down right outside the plane and the hash is discovered.

The whole smuggling scene is masterfully done.  Everything is shown to us and we have to figure out exactly what’s going on, rather than blatantly be told and narrated to.  And the tension build up is perfect, pitting us at the edge of our seats within the first few minutes of the film.  If you’re lucky, you’ll find yourself sweating with Billly.

Compared to this wonderful opening build up, the rest of the film can feel like a well structured, light torture film.  It is not a torture film, but that suspenseful edge seems to be lost once Billy is thrown in prison and is stripped of any real power.  The conditions in this Turkish prison are brutal and the beatings are worse.  On Billy’s first night behind bars, he sneaks himself a blanket and is strung up by his feet and they are beaten as punishment.  It’s terrible, I was afraid he would be crippled before one full day.  These sort of brutal, sadistic punishments happen all the time in this prison, even to children.  Soon, our hero, Billy, is also dealing out some gruesome punishment, enough to get him tossed in the criminally insane ward.  The scene there, where the men just walk in a circle can feel like The Snake Pit on Turkish steroids.  Unless you’re the kind who can laugh and munch popcorn during movies like Saw or Hostel, Midnight Express is going to make you wince.

“Everyone runs around stabbing everyone else in the ass. That’s what they call Turkish revenge. I know it must all sound crazy to you, but this place is crazy. ”

Coming Home

Coming Home examines three types of people affected by the Vietnam war.  There are the soldiers who come home crippled, unappreciated for their sacrifice and in horrible care.  Then there are the soldiers still out there or about to leave, full of pride and little anxiety at first and then disillusioned and wondering why they get to live or keep their limbs.  Lastly are the women left behind to worry about their men overseas who see the devastation of the dead and paralyzed men returning.

As Bob (Bruce Dern) is about to leave for Vietnam, his wife, Sally (Jane Fonda), tells him she will stay with his mother and not work, just like he wants her to.  Soon she starts volunteering at the Veterans hospital and rents a house near the beach with her friend, Vi (Penelope Milford).  At the hospital, driven mostly by curiosity, she finds an old classmate, Luke (Joh Voight), who is now paralyzed and enraged about the way he is treated.  As Sally becomes closer to Luke, and eventually starts a steamy affair with him, she wants to make people more aware of the treatment the injured veterans are having to endure.

While visiting Bob on leave in Hong Kong, we understand more of the current soldier’s plight.  Before Bob left, he was much more laid back and calm, but now overseas he seems drained and tense.  He talks about the horrible things he’s seen, like how his men cut off victims heads and put them on spikes as warnings, and how everything just seems like bullshit, not at all the patriotic duty everyone makes them think it will be.  We also get the real reason he doesn’t want Sally to work, or volunteer (her once justifiable loop hole).  Bob is really just afraid she will be unfaithful while he is away.

For Sally, it seems that she is on a path of self discovery while her husband is away.  It felt like she and Vi always had men to depend on all their lives, but now with just the two women running a house, they realize they can exist without men.  Sally is more taken care of than Vi though, who still works regular shifts while her husband is away.  With Sally realizing how wonderfully privileged her life has been, she feels more obligated to give back and volunteer.  And once she finds Luke, she finds more purpose in helping him, both with his physical setbacks and political agenda.  Then, as they become lovers, Sally learns that men can be sexually giving as well, but no one really wants to see Jane Fonda in that explicit of a position.  You have been warned.

By this tail end of the film journey, I’ve seen multiple movies about the mistreatment and plight of paralyzed Vietnam veterans.  I’d say that this gives the viewer a broader perspective by not just focusing on a man in the wheelchair, but becomes watered down to a love triangle.  Sadly, the only character I really liked here was Luke, he gained my sympathy while Sally and Bob seemed to be setting themselves up for their problems.

“And I know some of you guys are going to look at the uniformed man and you’re going to remember all the films and you’re going to think about the glory of other wars and think about some vague patriotic feeling and go off and fight this turkey too.  And I’m telling you it ain’t like it is in the movies.”

Heaven Can Wait

Wait, didn’t we review this already?  Nope, there are two Best Picture nominations named Heaven Can Wait, one in 1943 and the other here in 1978.  In the earlier Heaven Can Wait, a man tells his life story to Satan.  Here is a completely different story, the remake of the 1941 film, Here Comes Mr. Jordan.

Joe Pendleton (Warren Beatty) has just become starting quarterback for the Los Angeles Rams.  While he is out for a bike ride, he is about to be in a horrific crash, but The Escort (Buck Henry) in charge of taking Joe to the other side takes him just before the crash, to lessen Joe’s suffering.  Big mistake, it seems that Joe would have lived through it and was not scheduled to die for another fifty years.  Now Joe feels cheated and angry because he had his heart set on taking the Rams to the Super Bowl.  So Mr. Jordan (James Mason) promises to find him a new body to occupy, one that he can play football in.  They find a millionaire, Leo Farnsworth, who’s just been poisoned by his wife and accountant.  Joe steps into his body to help a young woman, Betty Logan (Julie Christie), and is suddenly in charge of a huge corrupt company and makes some changes, which includes buying the Rams so he can try out for quarterback.

Compared to how fun and zany Here Comes Mr. Jordan was, this remake feels like a bunch of garbage.  Though the plot is basically the same, it feels so outlandish and silly, somehow I couldn’t take it seriously.  The characters are way too flimsy.  Mr. Farnsworth’s murders are just dopey lovers who run around like headless chickens until they find a new means of murder.  And this Joe is just a football jock.  The heart that Robert Montgomery gave him in Here Comes Mr. Jordan seems to have been muted and forgotten.  He’s dead up in clouds but he runs around with a soprano sax and does pushups because that’s all he knows.  It’s a cute little motif and his big halftime pep talk in a board meeting is amusing enough, but it’s harebrained.  I never felt that Here Comes Mr. Jordan was this silly.  The whole thing goes way too far once he buys the Rams.

Once this film hit its final act, I could see every event right to the end (not just because this is a remake) and it takes too long to get there.  I became annoyed with the whole eye being a portal to the soul reference; do we really need to watch people stare at each other so much?  That idea came through perfectly in Here Comes Mr. Jordan without a staring contest.  There needs to be a rule that when an ending is so blatantly obvious it shouldn’t be so stretched out unless you can create some decent suspense.

Here Comes Mr. Jordan worked wonders in 1943, but somehow the charm and heart was lost in this remake.  Maybe it was entertaining enough in 1978, but honestly, I think this film is better off parodied by South Park.  The jokes would be funnier and we would not be pressured to take Beatty’s version of Joe so seriously.  I would love to see a little wide-eyed construction paper Joe running around in the clouds, carrying his soprano sax saying in a South Park voice:

“I gotta get the Rams to the Super Bowl!”