Ship of Fools

It’s true, the world is quite the bowl of mixed nuts.  Some of the most interesting interactions you will ever see are of complete strangers from all walks of life crammed into one place.  As the title suggests, this ship, sailing the Atlantic in 1933, is full of all kinds of fools and their time together can be just as enlightening as it can be disheartening.

Stanley Kramer directs a whole slew of characters and big name stars in this film voyage. Some of the passengers include a proud German spouting Nazi ideals (José Ferrer), a young artistic couple with a rocky relationship (George Segal and Elizabeth Ashley), a lonely old rich woman (Vivien Leigh), a crass American man (Lee Marvin), a kind Jewish salesman (Heinz Rühmann) and a little person who observes life onboard and narrates to us (Michael Dunn).  Along the way, the ship picks up hundreds of poor Mexicans immigrating to Europe.  Since the accommodations are all accounted for, they have to sleep on the lower deck, but are just happy to be aboard.  There’s also the ship’s doctor (Oskar Werner) who becomes close to a woman being transported to a prison (Simone Signoret).

When dealing with so many different people in a film, it’s especially important to make sure every character has a distinct voice, motive and style.  Characters too similar to each other can easily confuse the viewer, but thankfully that is not a problem at all here.

It is easy to see that all these characters represent their present world of 1933.  Ferrer’s character is often rambling on about his pure German race, and most people just shrug and turn away.  Rühmann’s Jewish man doesn’t believe anything will really come of the German’s blind hatred of his people.  Sadly, it is only Dunn’s character who is separated enough from the rest of society to see that it will happen.  And Segal’s passionate artist becomes more and more disheartened as upsetting events unfold around the ship.

Some of the most memorable scenes are when the Flamenco dancers are entertaining.  The dancers costumes are beautiful and around the room passengers are enjoying the festive atmosphere wearing party hats.  Ferrer appropriately wears a devil horns cap.  All around the dancing are the little personal stories unfolding more.  Segal refuses to dance, Marvin is drunkenly trying to lure one of the young dancers to sleep with him and a teenage girl is upset that no one has asked her to dance.  It’s all entertaining drama to watch at a distance.

There is a story and a character for everyone in Ship of Fools.  It might not make a bad party film, if hosted well  Perhaps try the murder-mystery style of assigning characters to your guests.    It is not often that a good film can mold so many memorable characters and compelling stories into one solid film.  Between the intelligently constructive narrative and the beautiful black and white cinematography, I completely recommend Ship of Fools.

“I have my own minority group.”

A Touch of Class

It is always exciting to find a romantic comedy that doesn’t suck.  A Touch of Class is exactly what the title suggests, classy, but just a touch so we can still be comfortable.

Here’s the story, Steve (George Segal) is a businessman and Vicki (Glenda Jackson) is a fashion designer, they both live in London and after a few chance encounters they admit to the obvious attraction and decide to go on a getaway to Spain together.  Of course, it’s never that easy.  Roadblocks start popping up before they even leave for the airport, for a while it looks like Steve will be taking his family along for his romantic getaway.  By the way, Steve is American, married and has kids.  So many things go wrong on that first part of the trip that it could look like Clark Griswold’s honeymoon.  Thankfully, Vicki and Steve keep the antics more witty and less slapstick.

It’s only after everything has gone wrong that Vicki and Steve finally connect.  From there on the film turns to a forbidden love story.  We’re happy that they’re happy, but how long can it last?  When they get back to London, Steve still has a family.  The lengths they go to keep their relationship alive are smart, funny, but heartbreaking in that slow realistic way.

So, why is A Touch of Class a great romcom?  Oh, let me count the ways:

1.  It isn’t all about sex.  Though it is the goal that sent the two to Spain, the first attempt is hilarious and only ends in Steve’s humiliation and the second attempt doesn’t exactly move the earth.  It really does focus on their real relationship and near the end they just want to have dinner together.

2.  Steve and Vicki are believable, unique characters that pair well with each other because they’re so different.  Let’s think about characters like balloons.  Most romcoms (and other craptastic films) decide to fill their plot with over-blown regular helium balloons (air heads) and all they can do is bump against each other the same way every time and make that horrible squeaking sound.  Now, let’s think of Steve and Vicki as balloon animals (perhaps a dog and a bird).  They can bounce and bump into each other in so many ways it could be an aerial ballet and that squeak hardly happens.

3.  There is a real problem.  It’s not cute and quirky but it won’t end or save the world; what about their real lives?  What was first agreed to was “what you Americans call a quickie” turns into a relationship that can’t really happen, yet neither is willing to let go of it.  This movie takes place in a real world, not happy romcom land.  If it ever was there, they left in Spain.

Of course, you cannot take an American to Spain without a bullfighting scene.

But seriously, if you’re looking for a good romantic comedy that you feel you haven’t seen twenty times in the past ten years, check out A Touch of Class.

“Don’t cross-examine me in the rain. I’ll be there. Wet. But I’ll be there.”

Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?  Huh, sounds like a dare.  When this film first came to theaters, it was accompanied by the MPAA tag: “No one under 18 will be admitted unless accompanied by his parent.”  That make is a double-dog dare, but really, it’s triple and for the big kids only.

Late one evening on a New England campus, middle aged professor George (Richard Burton) and his wife Martha (Elizabeth Taylor) invite a young couple over for drinks.  As the booze flows, the conversations turn to ugly, dark secrets within each couples lives, like a booze ridden Mad Hatter’s tea party.  Basically, George and Martha use their guests as fuel and audience to rip apart their dirty secrets that only bring pain.

Now, George and Martha aren’t your typical couple who lob a few softballs when dinner’s a little overdone or pick and bitter just for entertainment.  Their language is course, ruthless, and brutal.  Every other sentence between them can arguably be emotional abuse.  With George’s professor intellect eloquently flowing out of his mouth, his verbals slaps to Martha are engaging and often poetic.  Martha is more gruff and straightforward, as she describes herself, “I’m loud and I’m vulgar, and I wear the pants in the house because somebody’s got to.”  There’s more on Martha’s agenda tonight than a fight, after all, it seems she invited the couple.

Nick (George Segal) and Honey (Sandy Dennis) are the young, unsuspecting couple.  Nick is a handsome, well built and smart man, while Honey is, well, are you familiar with the term butterface?  Actually, it’s not just her face, it’s everything.  She’s sickly skinny, talks like she didn’t pass the third grade and her eyes carry all the inner beauty of a rodent.  And when she’s drunk, she’s sloshed and vomits often.  Those beady eyes can hardly stay open.  She made me think a twelve year old walked onto the set and got into the brandy.  So yeah, I think Dennis deserved the best supporting actress win, especially with the lines like,”No, if I can’t do my interpretive dance I don’t want to dance at all, I’ll just sit here.” And my personal favorite: “Hump the hostess!”

It seems George becomes master of ceremonies and uses the other three like puppets.  When Nick and Honey want to leave, he banters and says the night has just begun.  He shares stories with Nick and Nick shares in return, only for those private moments to be used against him later.  “And that’s how you play get the guests,” George explains.  In the final act, George’s last little game, oh, what a riveting climax, I cannot even allude to it.  I will say that I found myself standing in front of my television, hands over my mouth unable to pull away as my mind made the necessary connections that I could hardly believe.  I don’t even remember the last time a movie made me do that, it was amazing.

Of course, I’m odd like that.  Now, who would enjoy this movie as much as I did?  I don’t know, I think it takes some real love for dialogue, mental stamina, and a very open mind.  If you get some laughs out of this film, they’re probably not good natured, unless you find the term “monkey boobs” hilarious.  Some people won’t know how to handle the mental anguish you witness in the film.  The bottom line is these people are messed up and you’re going to find out more than you really want to about them, and oh, that last scene is a shocker.  The real question is not Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? but Who Can Handle Virginia Woolf?