Film Snobs Unite

artfilm101 @ 2008-05-07T03:51:00

2008-05-07T07:51:59Z

Huh; I was just wondering whatever had happened to Bebe Barron, and why she and Louis never did another movie score after Forbidden Planet. (I had had no idea they'd collaborated with John Cage, or Anais Nin.)

An introductory film for an informal movie club?

2008-04-22T21:01:23Z

Friends and I are getting together for a loosely coordinated movie club. I'd like to show something either from the French New Wave or post-war Italian Neorealistic period.

Among my faves from both: Breathless, Band of Outsiders, Nights of Cabiria, Amarcord.

Which would you recommend as a good first film for those not familiar with these genres?

Aaaahhh the life of a hip-hop show prodoucer

2008-04-09T16:27:17Z

THEY KEEP PULLING ME BACK IN!!!
The PR gilr deuce hired for "da show" (www.dashowlouisville.com) turned out to be worth a sack of shit so I' back trying to clean up the mess.
Clarke promises that Da Show will be making money soon.
People do like it.
I got a wonderful email from this local rapper who aparently no one knows about although he claims he is a staple in this area.
Of couse being a popular rapper in Louisville is about as good as being the best toilet in grand central.
Plenty of our-of-towners will toss you some shit from time to time but outside of grand central, you are just another toilet.
Deuce is prodoucing it better although the audio and color matte is compleate shist.
I don't know weather it is WYCS or the final he is kicking out but there it looks and souncs worse then WYOU when we were sill using analoge systems for post.
Da show is on the CW now and despite the lack of income, Clarke insists on paying for more episodes himself.
Deuce is just happy people are paying attention to him.

Meanwhile, Vehicle TV lumbers alog to it's final eating of another hole in my pocket.
But we have our programming fees covored at least.

SEND ME YOUR VIDEOS!!!!
in .avi or .mov format.

I don't care what it is just send it.
We need filler!

Our myspace with technical details, all about our show and shipping info.

http://groups.myspace.com/vehicletv

Vehicle TV also plays music videos.

We also accept music videos for Da Show (rap only).

artfilm101 @ 2008-03-20T20:15:00

2008-03-21T00:17:18Z

Would anyone here want to be the maintainer of the Jim Jarmusch community jarmusch_fans? I just started it because I thought he should have a community but I don't really want to be the maintainer of it. If anyone's interested please let me know!

New Shows and vVideo

2008-03-08T04:44:44Z

So here is Da Show's website with my opening on the frontpage.

www.dashowlouisville.com

BTW, the segments with the pool players, break dancers and club scenes with cheap FX ARE NOT MINE!
The segment with the Fleur de Lis, the time advanced club segment with the HUD, the montages with the logo at the beginning and end and anything that has properly adjusted lighting and color is mine.

This project is currently up on the "wupty shit" list.
It just didn't go the way I expected and the new Director/Producer is a complete "Deuce" bag.
I give it another four months before it tanks.
The good news being that reborn from the snafu is my own production deal.
As the CW and WYCS still see some kind of value in that Da Show is still paying them weekly fees even without actual sponsors or ratings.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAANNND,
THE INTERNATIONAL SAM/IBM JOINT CONVENTION IS COMMING TO LOUISVILLE THIS SUMMER!!!!
Bad choice in cities but I'm glad there will be something to do here from july 21st to the 26th.

I’ve been making some commercials with Music from my Guitar instructor (from high School) Lewis Mathis.

The Metzger’s Country Store/Woodstock Animal Rescue Commercial
-This one I did for Metzger’s not only because they handle all my horse, dog and Chicken feed needs but they just opened an Anex for Woodstock.

The Blue Grass Carpet Cleaning Commercial
-Lewis also owns a carpet cleaning business and there is nothing funnier then doing a commercial about “dirty carpet”….

heh,.... Dirty carpet.

Vanessa Redgrave

2008-01-30T13:11:20Z

Why didn't Vanessa Redgrave get a nomination for the supporting actress Oscar for her work in Atonement?

Madness

2008-01-23T17:54:09Z

For all we know, the academy award statuette that became so famous as "The Oscar" was designed by Cedric Gibbons in the late 1920s and has remained the same ever since. Maybe the Academy should take the cue provided by the grand occasion of the 80th ceremony and commission a new statuette to some contemporary designer. My suggestion is that the new one consists of the old one in a straight-jacket. I mean, nobody who watches films more or less regularly will disagree that there is madness in the way these people decide who's up to get the golden little man.

Now, let me see if I got it right: five guys were nominated for the award so pompously announced to be destined to "outstanding achievement in directing" and Joe Wright for Atonement is not among them??!!

Either I know nothing about films or the members of the academy must have sworn to some bizarre cinema-hating deity that they would never relent in behaving erratically, since the beginning. All right, then. They have decided that Joe Wright didn't deserve even a nomination. It seems that these people don't like his work. Perhaps he will never win an Oscar.

Charles Chaplin ... Buster Keaton ... Alfred Hitchcock ... Orson Welles ... Ernst Lubitsch ...

I don't know, but I think Joe Wright is in excellent company.

(true) Forgotten Silver trivia

2008-01-06T19:02:24Z

It's not generally known, but Peter Jackson's 1995 mockumentary, Forgotten Silver (which is, incidentally, a brilliant film, and a hilarious salute to early filmmakers), in which diligent explorers find the remains of a city built for a silent film Biblical epic, was partially based on real-life events. (Note that I haven't been able to determine whether or not Jackson knew about this; the similarities are astounding, however.)

When C. B. De Mille wrapped shooting on his full-size set of the city of Karnak for his silent version of The 10 Commandments (later, of course, remade with Charlton Heston), he opted to allow the desert sands to bury the set, rather than demolishing it himself. Researchers discovered the location of the set (near Guadalupe, California) in 1983, and are currently working to explore and preserve the ruins. (No word on whether the young De Mille had a prediliction for stealing eggs, however.)

my artist home...

2007-11-27T18:52:18Z

at least until i build a website.

http://www.virb.com/namelessproductions

there you go. see all the art videos i have made(or will be making).
listen to all my demos as well as an et recording.
download all my demos in 1 large mp3(track listings to be up soon)
read all about my upcoming shows in all facets of the art world(video and djing)
find out about all my current projects and ideas in my artist blog.
leave comments and critiques.
create your own account and do the same.
enjoy!!

and for everyone on this forum, please do feel free to critique, all the videos are over 2 years old, i haven't done much since 2005 when i graduated college, but i am trying to change that. and thanks to those earlier about giving me the website info and everything as well. enjoy.

artfilm101 @ 2007-08-14T01:22:00

2007-08-14T05:31:15Z

I don't know what's prompting me to write this at 1:30 in the morning, but I'm sure nobody will be OFFENDED by it....

I'm a stereotypical film studies student specializing in overblown foreign cinema (Man of Marble/Man of Iron, Andre Rublev, Etre et Avoir, and lots of silly cult shit, especially Troma, to fill voids and gaps) with a dad who fully supports what we gently refer to as 'my habit'. As such, I feel like I've missed out on A LOT of classic cinema.

Evading all of what's considered deathly regular (Woody Allen, Casablanca, Fellini, et al), give me your five most essential art films, things I can't possibly go into a film history class without seeing first. Not your five favorite movies, persay, but just the long and boring things I may have missed out on. :)

(Ps-- What is everyone's opinion on Metropolitan? I'm considering getting a copy but where I live, in rural nowhere, I'd have to buy it in order to see it. It's nearly $40 on Amazon. Is it worth it?)

hey, at least this guy is still alive:

2007-07-31T14:09:21Z

http://imdb.com/name/nm0210701/

he might not be as world-reknown as Bergman and Antonioni (and I've never seen a film of his), but the guy's hanging in there!

So, now who's left 70+?

Alain Resnais
Claude Chabrol
Jean-Luc Godard
Sidney Lumet
Mel Brooks
Woody Allen
Albert Maysles
Peter Bogdanovich

others?

Ingmar Bergman and the Little World

2007-07-31T00:33:46Z

The death of Ingmar Bergman makes me think about how immensely a single human being can contribute in the space of a lifetime for the world to become a better place. He died peacefully in his sleep. It seems that God, whose silence he resented so much as to make an entire trilogy of films about it, wanted it to be known that this was a much loved son who didn't deserve to suffer in the end. He left the stage the right way. The music has come to an end without much noise. Just a few final bars followed by the reverent silence audiences never fail to make when they've heard a masterpiece, before bursting into thunderous applause.

The presence of Ingmar Bergman on Earth in the 20th century makes me proud of being his contemporary, proud of being part of the audience when Cries and Whispers, Scenes from a Marriage, Face to Face, Autumn Sonata, and Fanny and Alexander were first released.

Between 1990 and 1991, I was in the cast of a show called Atos de Loucura (literally, Acts of Insanity), which ended with the speech Oskar Ekdahl makes to his theatre company on Christmas eve of 1907, in the wings, after being on the stage with them in the yearly Christmas play, in Fanny and Alexander. He tells them what he thinks being an actor is about, what the theatre is about, extending of course to what the cinema is about. He talks about "the little world" and what happens when it reflects "the big world." Nobody else, not even Shakespeare in his famous Hamlet soliloquy, in which the prince is so astonished by the power of the actor's art, ending with the famous "The play is the thing ...," not even he touched the heart of this great art so truthfully.

Being in charge of Oskar Ekdahl's speech at the end of Atos de Loucura was one of my luckiest breaks in the theatre. The endlessly delicate segment towards the middle of the second movement of Brahms' piano concerto #2 was heard, I looked at the audience around me (it was an arena) as if they were the actors of the Ekdahl company, and said the text quite simply, just looking at people and letting the unbelievably beautiful scene play itself. Invariably, they were so moved that it was possible to see quite a few of them crying very softly. Sometimes they came to speak to me after the show, to tell me how deeply the scene had touched them and to say nice things about my work. It was of course wonderful to hear these compliments from total strangers. But every time it happened, I told them they were being generous. "The scene is from a screenplay by Ingmar Bergman," I said. "Nothing can go wrong when you do something written by a genius."

It was indeed a rare privilege to be able to say his words on the stage to a live audience. There was in the entire monologue a sense of nobility and truthfulness that, for as long as it lasted, seemed to pervade the whole audience and then, as people left the theatre, appeared to stay with them. I never talk much about my work. Certainly not to praise it. But there's no reason for being afraid that telling all this might cause the impression that I have suddenly turned into a self-conceited schmuck who thinks too highly of his own work. I never thought I was responsible for the tremendous impact the scene had on the audience. That kind of scene plays itself. As simple as that. As I said at the time I did it, I believe Ingmar Bergman was a genius and nothing can go wrong when actors do their stuff in something written by a genius.

Although he was 89, and death is part of life, I was shocked to learn that he had died. I tried to keep cool, but in a moment there were tears in my eyes. I felt a little foolish for that. Then I remembered that some ten years ago I went as far as writing the first draft of a letter I intended to send to him, care of Svenskfilmindustri, asking him to consider writing a book with advice for actors--one of those things we all plan to do but never do.

Today, the tears I felt a little foolish about were perhaps due to having just realized that he did leave advice for actors. We are the actors. All of us. The common men in the streets and the ones who rule the world. Every human being goes through life making up characters for himself and for others. Ingmar Bergman knew it and spent his whole life making an unforgettable speech for us to see that "the little world reflects the big world. And because it does, it can make people understand the big world a little better." He wanted us to understand the big world.

Then Oskar Ekdahl finished his speech and said goodbye. Now his final words will be my own private farewell to this great master who managed to make life on Earth so much more dignified quite simply by making the little world reflect the big world. But since I am Brazilian, I'm printing them in Portuguese, exactly as I said them in 1990 on the stage of a theatre called Centro Cultural Avatar, which no longer exists, although for me it will exist forever. It's a widely known piece anyway, and doesn't need translation. Besides, all over the world today, in practically all the languages, with great reverence and gratitude, people will be quoting Ingmar Bergman:

Espero que possamos nos encontrar de novo em pouco tempo, com a alma e o corpo em plena forma. Daqui até lá, eu desejo a vocês tudo de bom. Tudo de bom!

Farewell, Oskar Ekdahl.

the press on film

2007-07-24T06:30:09Z

I'm trying to make a list of movies that deal with the press, reporters, newsrooms, the power of the press... Newspapers.
It's for my roommate. I'm trying to bring him something beyond The Paper or I Love Trouble.
I know there are great movies on the subject and I haven't maybe given the matter much thought or research but below is the list of movies I've come up with.
Do you have any other ideas?

Absence of Malice
Zodiac
The Killing Fields
Gandhi
All the President's Men
His Girl Friday
Three Days of the Condor
Lonelyhearts
Ace in the Hole (The Big Carnival)
La dolce vita
The Year of Living Dangerously
Veronica Guerin
Citizen Kane

There are obviously a hundred movies I'm missing. The Insider, maybe?
He's an aspiring newspaper man and I feel like he has an appreciation for realistic depictions of newsrooms and investigative reporters and what-not. We saw Blood Diamond and it evoked from him a very compelling speech about the power to change the world with journalism.
Oh yeah. And I included La dolce vita here but I haven't yet convinced him of the error of his ways regarding his aversion to subtitled films...

artfilm101 @ 2007-04-03T12:03:00

2007-04-03T16:03:26Z

Here's a question for you all: what's a move that could particularly stand to be remade? Not a classic like The Godfather or Citizen Kane (mercifully, that one relies too much on Welles's own presence and mystique to ever make a remake likely); rather, a movie that had a fascinating idea, or central character, or setting, whose execution was botched. (My own nominee? The Black Hole. Wretched, wretched movie- but a fascinating central notion.)

artfilm101 @ 2007-03-23T11:41:00

2007-03-23T15:42:11Z

The Oscar-winning cinematographer and director Freddie Francis (he shot Glory, Dune, Return to Oz, and The Elephant Man, among many other films) has passed away at 89, following complications from a stroke. (I have a very strong memory of being so struck by his photography for The Elephant Man that I actually made a point of looking up the name and credits of the cinematographer; it was very possibly the first time I ever specifically researched a filmmaker's credit.) Rest in peace, mister Francis.

Film Survey

2007-02-26T22:54:04Z

If you have a lot of time to kill and want to take this survey, it's in two parts:

Part I
Part II

So, if you complete the whole thing, which will take quite a bit of time, and want to post it, you might have to do so on two different entries or host it somewhere else, because the whole thing is too large for one entry I found out.

Have fun!

artfilm101 @ 2007-02-19T00:50:00

2007-02-19T08:51:40Z

It's not as difficult as you might imagine to watch the latest movies way in another corner of the world. In fact, in some cases we even get to see them before those privileged citizens of New York and Los Angeles. Of course, over here in Vietnam we have to make due with the odd disruption--a disclaimer running along the bottom of the screen warning us that this screening is intended for members of the Academy only or a shadow suddenly appearing in front of the picture (a cap-wearing audience member or a stray arm that unknowingly stepped in front of the bootlegger's camera). Sometimes mid-movie the sound will suddenly cut out and some shrieking Vietnamese woman will take over. But despite their imperfections, I'm grateful for our illegal copies. In at least one area of pop culture, I am still in the loop.

What we don't get is the hype. The commercials, the promotions, the constant barrage of opinions. I watch movies without preconceptions. I haven't seen the trailer, I don't know who the actors are, it unfolds for me like a book I haven't read the back of. My judgments are pure and unaffected. Maybe they're "wrong," but they're unquestionably mine.

Here are mini-reviews of the last ten movies I've seen, ranked from my best to my worst:

Before we begin, "best" means the movie that made me go, "Whoah, that was gooood!" the hardest and the longest. Even with that criteria, it's still a bit hard to compare "Borat" with "The Queen." I'd say all but perhaps the last one or two on my list were a worthwhile way to spend a couple of hours even if they didn't all blow me away.

1.Babel by Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu (Average Critic Score: B)

I'm sure it's all already been said about this one. Just, wow. I was outside of myself, swept around the globe, and heart booming from start to finish. Intense and brilliant.

2.The Pursuit of Happyness by Gabriele Muccino (Critics: B-)

I never thought I'd say this about Will Smith, but: This movie without him would've been nothing special, but his performance was GOLDEN. And he made the movie what it is: really lovely. It was inspiring without being too Hollywood. Sweet and simple, and one of the most enjoyable movies I've seen this year.

3.Little Miss Sunshine by Valerie Faris and Jonathan Dayton (Critics: B+)

Great. With some moments that were really great. Especially little Olive's freaky final tribute.

4.Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan
by Larry Charles (Critics: A-)

It's rare that a movie will make me REALLY laugh--big, embarrassing belly laughs--and even rarer that it'll do it from beginning to end. Thankfully, it wasn't just me--not a dry seat in the house. Totally over-the-top, totally hilarious.

5.Blood Diamond by Edward Zwick (Critics: B-)

Leo and co. kept me right along with them and at the edge of my seat. Good story, good shots, good acting. Okay, so it was a little Hollywood, but sometimes Hollywood is very, very good.

6.The Queen by Stephen Frears (Critics: A-)

This one was a nice surprise. It started like a book that was ever so slightly getting on my nerves. It was too British or too stuffy or too...something. But I kept with it. And in the end, I think that's what you're meant to do. Keep with her. And eventually see beyond a stuffy British queen, hellbent on following protocol, and see a woman. Helen Mirren did a brilliant job of showing us Queen Elizabeth, the woman.

7.The Painted Veil by John Curran (Critics: B)

Exotic, pretty, interesting. A kind of complicated sort-of love story set in China in the 1920s.

8.Apocolypto by Mel Gibson (Critics: B-)

Don't know. I appreciate the effort--the costumes, the language, the sets. It all feels more or less possibly authentic, which is what keeps you with it, wanting to know the outcome. But, come on, Mel. What is UP with the sadism? This is as over-the-top brutal as Borat is over-the-top funny. You can argue that the gratuitous violence serves a purpose in Passion of the Christ, but I'm not sure you can make the same claims with this one, and in the end, it just makes him seem psychotic. Still, if you can get over massive amounts of blood, it is an interesting movie.

9.The Last Kiss by Tony Goldwyn (Critics: C+)

I'm not sure why, but I get very easily uncomfortable watching movies that deal with the subject of infidelity. My tummy gets all queasy and anxious as if it's actually happening to me. I hate the feeling. In this movie, Zach Braft seems to have it all, but he's not happy. He feels if he has it all, he'll never again have any surprises and he might as well just die right now. So he cheats on his pregnant perfect girlfriend with a flitty, flirty little sorority girl. I spend the rest of the movie feeling upset. In the end we're supposed to forgive him. I don't. (I wouldn't have opened the door.)

10.Dreamgirls by Bill Condon (Critics: B+)

Oh, Dreamgirls. I gave you the benefit of the doubt after seeing you all over the Golden Globes. But it takes more than Beyonce to get me to get over spontaneously breaking into song. I actually didn't stay until the end of this one.

***

artfilm101 @ 2007-01-28T23:05:00

2007-01-29T04:06:34Z

If this isn't allowed, deleat it.

</a></font></b></a>merylstreepfans
The old community was languishing, so we made a new one. Hope to see you there!

Anchorage International Film Festival

2006-12-02T01:05:49Z

They have a bumper sticker up here in Alaska that says, "Support bacteria, they're the only culture in Fairbanks". Well, Anchorage isn't quite that bad - we have a film festival.

Anyway, I'm having a hard time finding much information about the movies, so if any of you has seen them and can provide more information, I'll be happy to listen.

The Host
One Last Dance
Middletown
Pope Dreams
The Standard
Keeping Mum
Mojave Phone Booth

Anyone else here planning to go? The theater that's showing most of these actually sells beer during the show, so it can't be a total loss.

Title Sequence vs Opening Credits

2006-12-01T20:27:21Z

I have a question for the more persnickety (and I say that with love) film buffs out there. I know the terms "title sequence" and "opening credits" are synonymous, but is there one that is considered more professional/authoritarian than the other? Does the industry prefer one term more than the other?

Seriously, I'd love to know your opinions. Thanks!

artfilm101 @ 2006-11-24T11:18:00

2006-11-24T11:18:48Z

i recently saw an old, black & white film, i think from the 1970s. it was a surrealist film about a couple, & the woman was legless. she relied on her boyfriend to wheel her around on this cart. then they went on a journey through the hills, with disastrous results.

what is the name of this film?

The Fountain (Critics Burn)

2006-11-24T07:32:12Z

We live in an upside down world. I don’t know of a better way to put it. A fecal mass film like Bond has met with near universal critical praise, while an unabashedly sincere, heart-felt, courageous film like The Fountain finds itself not only fighting market convention, but the very people who should be in a position to champion creativity and risk.

The Fountain is a masterpiece, and a film the likes of which we haven’t been gifted with in years. Aronofsky treats the audience with a respect that seems beyond reason given the parameters the marketing machine of Hollywood generally allows filmmakers to work with. The film isn’t concerned with thrilling the audience; it’s precise rhythmic and thematic cutting lulls one into a state of contemplation. The film has greater aims than thrills, it aims at holy wonder and awe, that encounter with the luminous that Richard Otto speaks of, an encounter that is overwhelming, all meaningful and beyond words and reason.

We are constantly in touch with the immensity of the cosmos in The Fountain, when gliding through the nebula towards a star on the cusp of going nova, in the quiet of a softly lit bedroom, in an operating room, or in a royal court – everywhere the pattern of stars that enwrap us, illustrating the struggle for life against a vast and empty nothing.

That nothing is what Tommy (Jackman) is grappling with. We are presented with three entwined threads, all dealing in some way with the love between Tommy and Izzy (Isabel in Spain, the Tree of Life in the future, Izzy in the present), and in all three, the incarnation of the ideal love is at risk, and the story of the man is the story of the love, the end of which will snuff out both. But the relationship is subtly out of balance. It’s not about love or the end of love; it’s about singular, personal mortality. Tommy’s inability to cope with Izzy dying, his drive to cure cancer, all of it has little to do with love, and everything to do with the things that portend his own inevitable end. Izzy lives in the moment, is there for him, but his fear keeps him from truly connecting, and so he fails to capitalize on the living woman, and the enjoyment they could share in the time allotted. His love breathes only in a realm of abstractions and ideals. We sense this in Izzy, her need for him, her desperation and fear at facing her death alone.

The rings of an aging tree, the ring of marriage, the rings of stars scattered through space, spiraling forever, The Fountain is tightly packed, and cross-references itself and portions of itself constantly through the cutting, always seeking to elucidate its themes.

And if the point of a film is the search for capturing new images, as Werner Herzog states, then Aronofsky has succeeded admirably – the film is beautifully captured in soft sepia/amber glows and greens, and there’s some awe inspiring stuff here, the walk to the tree of life, the final moments of flight towards the dying star (little touches like the small bubble breaking off from the larger one, and leaving a droplet in its wake is particularly effective), and the conquistador Tommy facing down a Mayan priest with a flaming sword.

Certainly ego goes into the making of a movie like this (as it goes into any movie), but despite that, a filmmaker still has to accept the limited market, and the unlikelihood of celebration and acceptance, and thus, it is greater parts sacrifice than career building, and I accept these sacrifices as gifts. There is no reason that anyone seeking to make money should make a film like The Fountain, and yet every so often we’re still given these pearls, and that in itself is a miracle.

The film, despite its short running time, will feel to be an hour longer than it actually is. This is due to the film conventions audiences have become accustomed to. I hope all of you go see it and enjoy it, but I guarantee nothing. Last time someone saw a critically panned movie at my recommendation they hated it. All I can do is write my reaction, and hope that you’ll have a similar encounter.

Polymorphism and film genre

2006-11-22T19:26:59Z

[Disclaimer: I realize that in general we're here to discuss smaller, lesser-known 'art' films, and this topic addresses several large-scale studio productions. But I've always thought that art is where you find it and try not to discriminate.]

Polymorphism in fiction is as old as fiction itself. Yet the 1980s saw a relatively high production of polymorphic themes in science fiction and horror films: Landis' An American Werewolf in London, Schrader's Cat People, Carpenter's The Thing, Cronenberg's The Fly, Verhoeven's RoboCop, Russell's Altered States, and Tsukamoto's Tetsuo are a handful. That decade obviously marks a turning point in visual effects technology. Even so, the human being morphing into something else seems to be a running theme.

Historically this has been viewed romantically as godlike or with some sense of awe, yet genre films of the 1980s see this as abominable and fearsome, the byproduct of disease, mutation, corporate culture, etc. One might also note that the films by Schrader, Carpenter and Cronenberg were all Hollywood remakes of older films, yet instead of implying horror, all took a highly realistic, 'flesh-based' approach to their creatures. Are these the 20th Century descendants of the wraithlike figures in medieval literature or the Death's Head motif or the monsters of Hieronymous Bosch? If that's true, are we to then impose a social commentary, as historians of visual culture do with the art of the middle ages?

Discuss.

Remembering Jack Palance

2006-11-16T22:54:32Z

I thought I would share my latest newspaper column here:

Jack and Cody Palance were truly special

Cody Palance was my best friend here shortly after we moved to Tehachapi. We met when he pulled over in his huge older Lincoln to see if he could help when my Corvette stalled by the telephone company building on Banducci just outside Stallion Springs.

He was a great guy whom I have missed dearly over the years since his untimely death in July of 1998. Now, with the passing of his legendary father, I am compelled to share some of my personal memories.

Cody once told me how excited he was when he got to meet Bob Dylan, and yet how surprised he was to find Dylan was equally excited to meet him because Jack Palance was his favorite actor.

Cody always demonstrated a lot of love and respect for his father, whom clearly established himself as one of the most loved “tough guys” on both the big screens and television.

Jack Palance was one of those extraordinary persons of many talents and accomplishments. As a young man, he had a 12-2 record as a professional boxer. Then, after requiring extensive facial reconstruction from a World War II crash while serving as a bomber pilot, he studied journalism and became a sportswriter for the San Francisco Chronicle while also working for a radio station.

It was in 1950 that he took an actress friend’s recommendation and went to Broadway, where within a couple of weeks he was in a play. Not only was he also Marlon Brando’s understudy in “A Streetcar Named Desire”, but he won a “most promising personality” award for his performances in “Darkness At Noon”. This led to Hollywood and his film debut in Elia Kazan’s “Panic In The Streets”. Within two years he was nominated for his first Academy Award for his performance as a dangerous husband in “Sudden Fear”, and the following year he was nominated again for his hired gunslinger role in “Shane”.

On my first visit to the Palance ranch house, I quickly noticed the Emmy he was awarded for his Playhouse 90 television performance in “Requiem for a Heavyweight”.

Appearing in over 100 pictures and countless television shows, Jack was not just a favorite of fans, but an actor’s actor as well, finally receiving an Academy Award for “City Slickers” most memorably in 1992 when he delighted everyone with a stunning display of one-armed push-ups.
Years later, Jack would say, “I get off an airplane in South America and I am called Mr. Push-ups.”

That performance became so legendary that the 1993 Academy Awards ceremony began with Jack using his teeth to pull out a giant 20 foot tall Oscar statuette ridden by host Billy Crystal, and Ford used him to promote the toughness of their trucks.

But Jack was also a very sensitive, compassionate man. Once, with a big loving smile on his face, Cody told me about how Jack had spent hundreds of dollars to save a calf that would eventually be sold for a lot less. And, as a surprise to many, in 1996 his poetic book, “The Forest Of Love: A Love Story In Blank Verse”, was published.

One day on the ranch, Jack approached us as Cody was feeding a calf.
“You know,” he said, “this may not be for me because I’m getting kind of tired. But, with medical advances being what they are, I think a cure for cancer and other diseases will be discovered soon and both of you may live to be a very healthy 150 years old.”

When Cody asked me to manage his gifted blues-singing career, we decided we might be able to convert the then-closed Sizzler’s on Valley into a nightclub, where his blues band could perform weekends. We could have purchased the building, with a first-class kitchen, for less than half what it had recently cost to build. But, when we found it had only two urinals for each gender, we realized we’d have to design and build our own venue. The plans we came up with would have provided this area with a much-needed facility. But it would have cost three million in late 90s dollars. Cody did not want to even burden his father by asking for his help. However, Jack, who had accompanied us to inspect the closed restaurant, pulled me aside and told me, “I know Cody doesn’t want to ask for my help, but I want you to know that I’ll do whatever I have to do to help him.”

This was so true that Jack had often insisted that his only son also appear in films he starred in.

Tragically, Cody, an equally remarkable man who preferred ranching and singing to acting, was soon discovered to have melanoma cancer. Despite Jack’s best efforts, we all lost Cody in July of 1998. This was such a tremendous blow to Jack that the memorial service was not held until the following month. Then, when Jack followed others who lovingly remembered Cody, he too began to speak movingly only to soon raise his hands to his face and run off in tears.

His on screen persona shall forever be of a tough man’s man whom often portrayed the bad guys.

To me, Jack Palance shall forever be a wonderful, sensitive loving man hurt by one of the cruelest fates any parent can ever experience.

-30-

This photo was captured from a two hour VHS compilation and shows Cody, Anna and Jack outside the Zevallos’ Stallion Springs home as Jack begins to rave about Anna Zevallos making “the best chicken tacos in this…(“house”, Anna volunteers) …area, state, possibly the world.”