50 STATES, 50 FILMS-THE FINAL CHAPTER

To Create and Complete (some final, passing words on the subject of the greatest Wisconsin movie ever made).


The time has come for me to end it all. With this twelfth and closing month in the last full year before the predicted demise of all things, the moment has arrived to address the last standing point of interest in this all consuming, state to cinema pair up. At long, long last I get to slap some lucky bastard of a film up on a metaphoric pedestal as a (hopefully) fitting representative of our oh so totally beloved fortress of dairy and booze stuffs, all-pro sports collectives and plus-size citizens (aka-Wisconsin).

But, which film do I choose? A troublesome dilemma, but not really. Do I go with Rodney Dangerfield mugging his way across the UW-Madison campus in the mid-80s feature length sitcom BACK TO SCHOOL? Nah, how about that grim yet proper, deep Gothic, Black River Falls based checklist of startling fatalities and somber, monochrome psychosis packaged (in book and film as) WISCONSIN DEATH TRIP? Eh, too one-note and stuck in the distant past. Maybe one of them low profile (not to mention quality) horror flicks (SEVERED TIES, THE GIANT SPIDER INVASION) they like to shoot in one of our lesser, remote towns? Certainly not the exaggerated qualities of something like the over hyped, Mid-Western hopping, Johnny Depp led lesson in old school, criminal glamor, PUBLIC ENEMIES?

I can do better, I think.

There is one film far better suited then any and all of these mentioned here (and several more that have slipped my cluttered mind, I'm sure, with good reason) and that film is called AMERICAN MOVIE.

Contained herein we have the perfect, personal saga, captured in the raw and sometimes earnest style of the scrape and scratch independent documentary form, that fully encapsulates many of the finer charms (and even some alarming quirks) that may feel overly familiar to anyone who has logged in a substantial measure of time in the Badger State.

It's all based around the lifeline of an exuberant persona named Mark Borchardt discovered by director Chris Smith while he was working on a separate, earlier project (AMERICAN JOB) at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. Mark is a head strong creative force of the most addictively absurd sort, bent beyond hell at completing a feature film entitled NORTHWESTERN. However, as the tempestuous fate of the grass roots gods would have it, Mark is compelled by way of erratic preparation and ever mounting debt to shift his ambitions to finish off his previously abandoned, but now more manageable short thriller film endeavor COVEN.

From this point, the film dives into an inspired and quite colorful breakdown and delineation (some might add, aberration) of the film making process by virtue of a motley line-up of none too professional, yet attractively rogue Wisconsinites, many well worthy of a film all their own

Mark's ceaselessly loyal right hand man is a deeply substance abused fellow named Mike Schank. A fairly portly and often scruffy looking gentleman with a penchant for acoustic guitar (he even put out a record-'Songs I Know') and gambling on scratch off tickets, Mike accompanies Mark throughout the body of his daredevil stab at cinematic infamy, laughing uneasily and injecting dumbfounding yarns from his drug addled past.

An equally significant compadre in Mark's immediate social circle is his frail and world weary Uncle Bill. Arguably the top bid for a sentimental favorite in the film (or, at least, in a tight tie with Mr. Schank), Bill is a wonderfully weathered ol' miser type who chills about his trailer court palace and endures frequent motor mouth visits from his financially handicapped nephew. Although Willie hems and haws (and hacks and coughs) at the idea of funding Mark's brand of distraction afflicted, stop/start style of movie making, he can often be seen filling space in and around the core action as a sort of begrudging moral anchor. Because, in Wisconsin, family is everything.

Oh, wait...

The remaining human satellites (both blood relation and otherwise) that rotate around Mark's cold hard real life vary wildly in their take on the man and his mission. His parents, though not without a loving respect for their child's flawed obsession, could do without the equally fanatic drinking habit (a shocking trait in these parts, I know) and persistent profanity (the guilty quality that earned this film its R rating) and would rest better if only he would settle into a solid 9-5 routine (a thing Mark loathes passionately). Two male siblings hold contrasting views on their brother and his bombastic exploits, one (the far more 'effeminate') seeing him as suitable for little more than factory labor. Other solid peripheral players include hangers on from the aborted NORTHWESTERN pre production days (a pair of whom, Dean Allen and Matthew Wiesman, earned tangential side coverage by the filmmakers that wound up, largely, as deleted scene fodder), COVEN cast mates and girlfriends past and present (as well as Mark's trio of kids who provide spunky comfort during even some of the lowest points in our hero's journey).

AMERICAN MOVIE earns its place as a chief representative of this Wisconsin by way of the ease in which the picture dips into and reflects back thick, genuine chunks of the state's culture and epic, idiosyncratic delights. The narrative thread covers a pivotal two year span, from 1995-97 and thus places the Mark Borchardt experience on a direct parallel with the rise to triumph of another long suffering (at the time) local institution, the Green Bay Packers. Said NFL forefathers complete their sole championship run of the Favre era just ahead of Mark's final stretch to his own, personal, happy ending, the wrapping up and premiere of COVEN in front of a packed and still disbelieving house of his many co-horts.

What Chris Smith and his main (no, only) direct partner in this necessary crime, Sarah Price have achieved here is nothing shy of a perfect inspirational miracle. It is smoothly and beautifully cut and arranged (with ample sonic assist from many a drifting Schank guitar piece) to best sell the soul and struggle of the entire of this most fascinating of down home, Wisconsin dream come (semi) true scenarios. The filmmakers never truly film down to their subjects and even manage to imbue their key protagonist with a heady level of gravity. By example, at several parts throughout the picture, Mark is shown waxing quasi-philosophical in his own abstract Mid Western reconfiguration of the English language on subjects ranging from basic life lessons to spiritual conflicts and even the juxtaposing of a standard, overcast Wisconsin terrain with the work of Ingmar Bergman.

Like with any piece of art I so self affectingly respond to and deem 'classic', I want to know and absorb every single incremental detail of its very existence. This begins with excessive repeat viewings (for this film, I've logged close to 100 such by now) and later by seeking out the participating parties in the mortal flesh. At a screening for AMERICAN MOVIE held at the upscale think joint, Lawrence University in shit-hot downtown Appleton, circa 2001, I managed to corner Sarah Price in the lobby and quiz her on, among other topics, the chance of ever baring witness to more of the alleged 70 hours of exposed footage apart from the finished film and the near hours' worth of DVD bonus scenes. She dealt with such fanboy gushing with a gentle demeanor and vaguely suggested I keep an eye on the internet for the unveiling of any additional footage. The same event also boasted a drunken Mark Borchardt ranting on about the Sundance Film Festival and porn star gang bangs and Mike Schank taking requests for acoustic renderings of everything from 'Smoke on the Water' to 'Reign in Blood'. Lawrence has never been nor probably ever will be a cooler place to hang in than on that night.

Beyond the success of AMERICAN MOVIE (Sony snapped it up for a cool $1 million) Chris Smith has progressed to helm well regarded work like the Errol Morris inflected HOME MOVIE, THE YES MEN (again with Sarah Price) and the compelling 'one man act' (if you will) COLLAPSE which allows former L.A. cop turned author/radical thinker Michael Ruppert to expound upon the issues and incidents that are corroding our nation's infrastructure and depleting our much coveted oil supply. The duo of Mark and Mike have expanded their cinematic careers as well. Sir Borchardt has made his way onto the David Letterman Show and bit parts in films like THE ONE (with Jet Li), CABIN FEVER 2-SPRING FEVER, THE GODFATHER OF GREEN BAY and BRITNEY BABY, ONE MORE TIME (reunited with Mike Schank as a faux documentary crew following a cross dressing male Spears impersonator as she/he travels to New Orleans to meet her/his idol, much better as a concept than as a finished film). Schank also pops up in Todd (WELCOME TO THE DOLLHOUSE) Solondz's STORYTELLING but he's not forced to press his acting chops too hard.

I can also spot a thread of the story covered in AMERICAN MOVIE living on in the undertakings of several strong willed Wisconsin natives here and now. I see it in Hunter Adams who dived right in and crafted a delightful little Fox Valley based comedy, THE HUNGRY BULL with friends and family in tow. I see it even more in the growing Oshkosh juggernaut Head Trauma Productions, lead by the blessed forces of John Pata and Adam Bartlett. This duo birthed a hokey yet likable zombie short (BETTER OFF UNDEAD) several years ago and are now poised to drop a fat, full length feature (DEAD WEIGHT) in the impending, year to end all years, 2012. It can be seen in guys like Jason Buss and his peers in the Wildwood Film Festival each spring, and in people I know who have taken the influence to such diverse places as Minnesota and California to make it happen on film. I am pretty certain not one of these cats can say they've never crossed paths with the mastery of AMERICAN MOVIE, the greatest Wisconsin movie ever made!

You tell me different. Also, if for some stupid reason you've never seen or heard of this film, either get to it with much haste or move the fuck to Illinois.

Thanks. Experiment over. killpeoplenamedrichard@yahoo.com

Weaving Through Debris.

(originally published in the September 2011 issue of The Scene)


Winding it all down to the wire, I find myself left with a lucky 13 states awaiting proper marriage with a suitable cinematic partner. It’s getting harder to find good lovin’ these days and in the movie/geographic matchmaking scene, it’s hardly any better.

But, I digress, let’s set to business and open it all up with a pair of impossibly dated time capsules wedding the multifaceted quirks of human behavior and mannerisms to their immediate surroundings. Both the ambitious and reverently revealing Middletown (for Indiana) and the playfully stupid Heavy Metal Parking Lot (for Maryland) address their chosen subjects with a strict anthropological objectivity, the goal is simply to share a slice of the American pie with as wide an onlooking crowd as possible.

Shepherded over by its creator, Peter Davis (the mind also behind the essential to watch, Oscar-adorned Vietnam war dissection Hearts and Minds) Middletown takes precious time to meticulously investigate the various, wide-ranging particulars of the populace of Muncie, Indiana. Leapfrogging across six separate episodes (five of which actually made airdates on PBS before unwarranted yet inevitable controversy set in) the project comes as close as any in recent memory to capturing the exact pulse of both a city and, in turn, a specific region.

Nestled snug to the east of the state (and sporting a head count roughly comparable to our so beloved Appleton), Muncie fits right and tight under the basic, presumed guidelines of small scale, Bible-belt all Americana. I imagine it stands today much the same as it did in the later 1970s when this program was assembled.
Taking its overlaying cue (and title) from a 1929 publication Middletown: A Study In Contemporary American Culture by esteemed scholars Robert and Helen Lynd, this Middletown digests its subject matter and reorganizes it into its six handy sub-sections. Said films (each helmed by a different party, including Peter Davis himself) focus with separate yet equal objectivity on things political (The Campaign), spiritual (Community of Praise), marital (Second Time Around) and athletic (The Big Game, and it’s basketball, as is to be expected in the Hoosier state) and the pains of youth and the lack there of.





The epic scale and the intimate detail hold hands productively throughout as the disparate citizens of this chosen hamlet extend their lives out in full for the camera eye. Standouts in this rather massive, archival undertaking include a gregarious Irish politico, an ex-marine turned Shakey’s Pizza proprietor and even a collective of lippy high school seniors in full rebellion mode (to be seen in the series closer Seventeen, which piles on enough curse words and touchy themes and ideas as to instigate an uproar and subsequent banning from being aired back in its day).

The success of this work as a whole is care the way it both provides its potential audience with an unsparing insight into a specific community’s pros and cons and how it manages to liken them to much of our own. In a way, Middletown serves as a mirror held up to anyone who chooses to pay it any mind. If one were to attempt a similar project in a different locale in our present here and now, sure the trivia of fashion and hip technology would prove markedly altered and the inevitable given regional inflections would seep through (plus, there would be far less smoking, everybody seems to be cigarette dependent in this damn thing!) but the essentials of the social, financial and emotional aspects of American living have remained largely a constant. Catch it all at icarusfilms.com.

Likewise, albeit on a far more compact, bootleg and some might say downright moronic scale is the mid-80s, Maryland/D.C. area relic Heavy Metal Parking Lot.

Now this baby began as a one-off public access short stunt by two local dudes (John Heyn and Jeff Krulik) seeking to share, in passing, the delirious/drunken celebratory silliness that is the tailgating sub-culture collecting outside a Judas Priest gig somewhere called Largo, Maryland. What came soon after was a steady building cult phenomena born of copious tape trading and rock star endorsement (it was reportedly a tour bus staple of a pre-martyrdom era Kurt Cobain and that one little folk band he played in) and, ultimately, the well-dressed out DVD release I’m now using as reference (get yours off the website heavymetalparkinglot.com) which goes a long way to demystify the legacy of the whole thing and give it a proper historic context.

What essentially consists of about 16 minutes or so of loud, inebriated (and often shirtless) working class dopers, basement rockers, big hair bitches and all around chuggerheads attains a bit of quasi-nostalgic legitimacy by way of numerous sequels, homages and exhaustive “Where are they now?” updates (they even managed to track down the elusive Zebra-Boy! If you have no idea who I am speaking of, watch the film, you can’t miss him).

I do realize the state-based significance of both John Waters and Barry Levinson, but nothing has ever sold me so deeply on Maryland as this retarded little work of art. I’m telling the lot of you now, if it is deep and insightful reportage you seek, if it is lasting mental nutrition you are lacking then this is certainly the place to look for...the exact opposite.

On to more modern meditations and the pristine Virginia-based farmland of What Remains. This location (near Lexington) serves as the living, loving and working space of the pro shutterbug Sally Mann. Mann, best known for her hot button collection of portraits and other captures involving her three children titled Immediate Family (which contained images that fell under the strict designation of child pornography care the religious right), subscribes to a philosophy of finding the appropriate muse within her familiar surroundings. First, she milks her family members for photographic effect (the mostly black and white prints are often glorious) and then moves with gradual progression toward the landscapes that encircle her home. She shoots in large format (film, remember that shit?) and imprints her work with a soul and an openness to the randomness of life or, “the angel of uncertainty” as she dubs it.






Her work addresses the fragility of existence (a trait possibly influenced by her father’s preoccupation with death). The peak exemplification of this comes when she pays visit to a University of Tennessee-based forensic study area and is allowed to shoot various decaying corpses. The set up might seem unsettling but the resulting photos hold an irrefutable power.

We follow Mann through a multitude of highs and lows, from the everyday living variety to the convoluted process of snagging gallery support. A man by the name of Steven Cantor had previously covered the crafting of Mann’s notorious Immediate Family project back in 1990 (a resulting short film, Blood Ties is part of this picture’s bonus materials) and again provides the guiding eye that allows the audience to step inside Sally Mann’s space and observe for a cool 80 minutes. What Cantor does here set up an open mic for Mann’s ample voice, both as an incredibly gifted, born photographer and as a strong-willed woman who makes her way through her life as she sees fit.

Being as I am a wanna be camera nerd my own damn self, I managed to cull many informative tidbits in relation to this wonderful art form and certain methods that I may wish to emulate and apply to my own approach to imagemaking. Thus, What Remains stands as both a compelling biographic portrait and as an information well for those seeking to learn and/or polish their “eye,” so to speak. (zeitgeistfilms.com)

Lastly, we slap this whole uneven thing upward to our nation’s very first state.

I Can See You marks yet another challenging entry from the New York-based, East Coast-minded mini-studio Glass Eye Pix. Founded in 1985 in good faith by actor/writer/director Larry Fessenden, this outfit has steadily produced some rather striking pictures. Key works of note include Ti West’s efforts The House of the Devil and The Innkeepers and Jim Mickle’s more ambitious than it can afford to be vampire opus Stakeland. They also found the time to fund this severely under the radar ditty from Graham Reznick and it’s a fitting fable for Delaware.





It all comes together so simple, a trio of upstart Big Apple ad campaigners abscond themselves to the deep woods to camp, frolic, snag photos and brainstorm ideas in prep for an impending big dog client. All progresses smooth and tidy I suppose as the lads wander and drink some with various fellow campers and even find the time for a little free-spirited skinny dipping. Soon, however, a fattening level of menace creeps into play and the tone of each passing situation shifts into a sort of collision of David Lynch savvy shadow mystery and Stan Brakhage abstract experimentation.

The whole thing is pieced together with an admirable level of skill and the story feeds its three leads (including one eerily Conan O’ Brian-looking sad sack who basically fills the obnoxious blowhard role all too well) with a heady succession of surprises and ultimately sets them on a course with things better left seen than explained. The fear of the unknown and all that, you dig? Our founding fathers would be so proud. There’s probably still a smattering of their tortured souls wandering them diabolical Delaware forests, creepy. (icanseeyoumovie.com)

And one more thing.....JOHN CARPENTER’S THE WARD.

After flirting with a near decade of non-activity, save a pair of underwhelming Masters of Horror episodes, the frail old gentleman who blessed us with Escape From New York, The Thing and several other major genre pieces (say, what’s the one with that masked dude knifing people?) is back to making movie babies and the first result is, well, meh.

This time out Carpenter follows the fateful trials of a troubled lass (the admittedly fetching Amber Heard), who is placed in a nuthouse for gals after she is found oblivious in front of a burning farm house. The script then finds various ways for our lovely young anti-heroine to clash with staff and inmates and wander dark hallways so that she may cross paths with a number of ghostly cliches.

It all plods along with unremarkable abandon toward yet another one of those twist endings you’ll never see coming unless you’ve already seen a lot of movies with twist endings before. In all good truth, I have seen much worse from an upper shelf genre brand name (i.e. Wes Craven’s woeful My Soul To Take), but that hardly excuses the middling vibe that embodies this thing. Oh well, welcome back John and better luck next time.

Outta words, outta time.

killpeoplenamedrichard@yahoo.com

THE EMPIRE OF WISCONSIN DESERVES A BALD EAGLE KISS (Flag Day 2011)

bring out your dead (from the neck up) sons of Gawd, the stars an' stripes is a wavin'



SALUTE?

SOMETIMES, A BEAUTIFUL DELIRIUM.

50 Films/50 States Part 5.

I have trouble dissecting the eccentricities of the human mind sometimes. Even though I am a card carrying member of this so-called 'race', I find that many of my fellow man, woman and child things possess a measured degree of character differentiation that sets them at sharp odds to my given perspective. Because of my nerdy predilection for cinema, I often find myself scrapping for clues to the how, what and why of the human mechanism within the confines of the motion picture medium. I got several choice examples of what I'm on about right here, plus it will serve to knock off a few more states in the process.
Take, for handy instance, the irresistible, eye sore of deliberate tragedy that is the life of Jonathon Sharkey. Here is a feller so bent in the direction of wrong that he can justify maintaining a lifestyle mash-up of blood drinking, neo-satanism and all around pagan/goth/macho posturing while fostering such lofty political ambitions as running for the part of Governor of the state of Minnesota! His bold and (some might add) dunder headed attempts at such serve as a sort of spring board for an awkward yet functionally amusing, shot for the bare minimum documentary/case study titled, in all fair taste, Impaler.
Said title hails from Sir. Sharkey's blunt platform of discipline in relation to a wide range of criminals and lowlifes. Sharkey states plainly, early on in the film, that any and all terrorists, drug dealers and baby rapers (for scant example) will be subject to blunt force trial, torture and eventually decapitation and impalement. This warped unit sees himself as a bastion of hope for his beloved America (Sharkey also holds future plans of a Presidential run, something that should fitfully suit another film, likely already in the works) and not some weak kneed failure like George W. Bush (himself a ripe target for Sharkey-esque impalement).





All this rant savvy 'look at me, I'm weird!' type nonsense leads to, really is a patchwork dissertation on the punishing particulars of living under the grip of mental illness. In this instance, the filmmakers (Texas native W. Tray White being the main man) have gleaned acute evidence of this man's suffocating urge to dance in the proverbial spotlight. You see folks, in addition to his proclaimed status as a devil adoring, vampiric lord, Jon claims to have plied his natural genius in such arenas as Nascar, pro-wrestling and Law (for a more expansive rundown on all this, check his IMDB profile- http://www.imdb.com/name/nm2652647/bio- it'll enrich your life! no really!). Of course, all of this grows more and more pathetic as the film strays from in house chats with Sharkey and his school bus driver lady friend in snowbound Princeton, MN to outside parties (ex-spouses, pals and legal officials) who tend to highlight the copious holes in Sharkey's train of logic. Overall, not an unbearable slice of 'you can't make this shit up' style of human interest reportage. Plus, it always does my heart good to see any form of social commentary in relation to that lake and lousy sports team saturated state with the often odd-duck political representatives (Jesse 'The Body' Ventura, Al Franken, Brett Favre) that resides just to the west of us. Impaler can be readily snatched off of netflix...probably about all the effort one needs to expend on it.






A man of equally potent, yet immensely more positive, self design is humble, God fearing, workaholic South Carolina resident Pearl Fryer. The man is a self taught topiary wonderkind and honed local institution who finds himself in front of the camera lens for the quint little feature A Man Named Pearl. Like Impaler, this film serves as a small scale (though more effectively rendered) intro to a genuine American curio at large just off the beaten path. The precise setting is Bishopville (pop. 3,600-ish), located (in Lee county, what's said to be the poorest county in the state) out in the open spaces between the more sizable state populaces of Florance and Columbia. It is here that ol' Mr. Fryer has carved and maintained one of his state's (and most certainly his town's) more esteemed attractions.




Since relocating to Bishopville in the mid 1970s, Pearl has managed to stun and bewilder his mostly simple and set in their ways neighbors by transforming the yard of his domicile into an organic gallery of sprawling art. Pearl toils tirelessly at sculpting, trimming and nurturing the many elaborate designs in his 3+ acre garden that has earned a word of mouth legend that attracts bus loads of tourists to this sleepy little stop off the road that may have otherwise never even registered on most folks' radar. This ongoing life's work now works to solidify this community and keep it healthy. Mr. Pearl lends his knowledge and a shade of his potent work ethic to area (and, sometimes, statewide) children and students, attempting to instill in them a level of self value that can only grow and mature along with them. As a character, Pearl is a gentle, labor worn yet vigorous individual with an even balance of traditional rural morals and free spirit impulse. His thick east-southern drawl and wiry, lanky stance make for one memorable screen figure. Credit to directors Scott Galloway and Brent Pierson for collaborating on a warm and informative piece that always respects this southern gentleman and true artist for every quirky aspect that fuels him. Well shot and economic, A Man Named Pearl never wares out its welcome. Available from the good folks at Docurama, don't believe me? Check here- www.docurama.com/docurama/a-man-named-pearl-dvd-cd-set
A slight bit of pace changing for this next entry in that it is not so much a standard issue feature, per se, but more of an epic and on going small screen offering that breaks down the graphic dramatics of one urban locale yet plays it off as wholly symbolic of many of the other cityscapes in the given region.
Brick City, as the title suggests, is a deep rooted delineation of the largest city (Newark) in what is commonly passed off as the Garden State (New Jersey). Now, I know I could have easily picked this state off of my convoluted 50/50 checklist by virtue of some dispensable dick, tits and fart joke addled Kevin Smith movie or, maybe even something a tad more upscale, say the Louis Malle opus Atlantic City or....hell, there's even a movie called Garden State .
Nah brah, I'm sticking to the real shit. This here Brick City thing is a Sundance Channel backed series (season one covered here, season two recently completed) that covers the modern day quest of positivity obsessed mayor Cory Booker to restore order and integrity to the long impoverished and crime ravaged city he now oversees. Booker and his all star team of do good types and various, assorted low income street citizens work though the tension and turmoil of urban renewal and the challenges of slapping order over top of the kind of embedded chaos that doesn't conveniently subside.




The scope of this subject matter is intricately addressed within the project's 260 minute sprawl. Subplots, asides and effectively placed injections of humor work as second and third tier support systems to the greater central ambitions of community, family, economy and the cancerous detriment that the city's ever present criminal element brings (murder's the word, ya heard?!). At the front of it all is Booker, the bright light of hope or frustrating pain in the metro ass (all depending on which talking head's speechifying one buys into). The mayor and his tireless quest to reverse his city's negative level of notoriety and maintain the sanity of both himself and his loyal crew (gruff Director of Police Garry McCarthy most notably) veers back and forth from the cruel reality of gang related homicide, which is haphazard and unyielding, to a cheerful downtown distraction for the positive like a visiting big ticket circus troupe. Intermixed with Booker's renovation campaign are the immediately related struggles of several reformed gang banger cum social activist types, feuding politicos and even a feisty lawyer pulling to save one key (and very pregnant) young lady out of jail.
This truly is what one might legitimately refer to as 'quality television', the dearth of such stuff on the small screen in recent years (shows like 'Lost' and 'Dexter' not withstanding) makes a rare breakthrough like this one here ever more special. The team of Marc Levin and Mark Benjamin have assembled and finessed a staggering amount of material into a still fat and epic dissertation on the pains of urban discipline and the harsh truths of classism and social/economic imbalance that could well serve as a metaphor for most sizable cities in the state of New Jersey (I've been to Newark and been told by those in the know there various 'ghetto' anecdotes, with all the worst signs pointing to Camden). The show was first aired on the Sundance Channel but can easily be obtained in the ever dependable DVD format with a sprinkling of bonus features including input from executive producer Forest Whitaker (one can also obtain further background nuggets on Cory Booker care a defacto prequel of sorts titled Street Fight and covering Booker's initial trial and error attempts to become the Newark mayor-par excellence). So, without fail, you must get your Jersey learn-on the real way, track the first, five part, season of Brick City at all costs starting with this website; firstrunfeatures.com
Backing away from documentary overkill, it is time now to pay respects to a film I find is one of the best and most complete experiences of recent years. That and it all takes place in and all over my birth state of California. Paul Thomas Anderson's fifth feature, There Will Be Blood (Paramount Vantage) is, for me, a complete beast of a film that executes on such a high and consistent level of sheer film making finesse that reminds me once again what being a film geek is all about.
This is the movie that finally made full and robust usage of that most particular and fascinating of quality modern screen actors, Daniel Day-Lewis, that possessive screen presence that made the most of his place in such otherwise underwhelming A-list affairs as Gangs of New York and In the Name of the Father. Here, Lewis is given no restriction and the picture is his to dominate and he never disappoints, plowing through an epic (158 minute) saga of gusto, greed and the savage means to which the main character, an oil obsessed entrepreneur named Daniel Plainview hell bent on monopolizing the turn of the century California landscape, pursues his meal ticket, no matter the social, moral or spiritual cost. Plainview uses methods of keen manipulation and smooth oratory skills to rest area folk assured that his goals are lofty and genuine enough to prove beneficial toward them and their related communities in the long run. Meanwhile, he proceeds to dig and drill his way toward increasing wealth and a rapidly distancing attitude toward the very nature of mankind. Plainview finds direct conflict in the shape of several pesky, intrusive bodies such as a dodgy, alleged long lost sibling (Kevin J. O'Connor, hailing from, you guessed it- Fond Du Lac!) as well as an equally shifty young vessel for the good lord's word, a preacher named Eli Sunday (Paul Dano) who ultimately shares in Plainview's descent to the very bitter end.
What P. T. Anderson has done with this film, by far his best, is fashioned a magnificent, fully realized work of art, not simply dispensable commercialized 'entertainment' as fodder that passes by the eyes well enough without ever entering the brain for any substantial measure of time. He has even surpassed his previous, very good, Robert Altman in the time of Tarantino style fables Boogie Nights and Magnolia in terms of storytelling, strength of character and virtually every facet of technical prowess one can think of. The film looks grand, is cut great and boasts one immaculate sound mix topped, above all, by the eerie/beautiful minimalist score from Radiohead lead guitarist Jonny Greenwood. Yes, my friends, this is, as in the parlance of the drunken youth of this sad modern hell, the shit. Eternal props to Anderson, D. D. Lewis and the rest of the There Will Be Blood commune. This is the perfect mix of light and dark, art and actuality, elegance and cruelty. Probably not the type of graphic banter many will agree upon in the direction of this film but, no matter say I, this is a glorious slab of misanthropic poetry set to separate the deep thinker with the keen sense of cinema from the gaggle of 'bros' in vapid search of the next big Hangover.
Ugh, all out of words. Next month, more movies, more states, more brotherly love for one and all!

SOME OF GOD'S CHILDREN ARE A BIT 'OFF'

(can't stop them from doin' what it is they do.)
Continuing on with my savage, metaphoric bastardization of this great nation we all live and breathe and shit and sleep in, I have, for this handy fourth installment, chosen to zoom my mental lens in on five films mashing salt of the earth types (good, bad and well beyond ugly) up with the substantial place they occupy in their given states of residence. We will test moral waters, walk a crooked path with Jesus and fight the good fight as bread and butter folks cross mountains, scour the belly of mother earth and even stalk beasts of myth hoping to flush them out into cold reality.
Let's touch down first in the place that both the fictional Dorthy Gale and the very real William S. Burroughs once called home.
Kansas.
In recent memory, no one member of its population has the 'Sunflower State' been given less to boast about then the one Reverend Fred Phelps. Phelps is the prolifically hateful guiding force behind the Topeka based Westboro Baptist Church. Subscribing diligently to severely outdated Calvinist principles and preaching his thick headed brand of cruel, old god doctrine to a congregation of , mostly, his own family members, Phelps has worked the majority of his life at battling the filth of the earth and securing his place at the high ranks of an afterlife to be made up exclusively of a limited company of ultra-righteous brethren.





The Westboro posse's greatest contribution to 'can you believe that shit' style popular culture has come by way of a succession of wholly inappropriate protests of the funerals of various American soldiers and homosexuals, most infamously that Mathew Shepard, a Wyoming collage student who committed the deplorable crime of not being straight. Westboro protests are punctuated by a plethora of loud and obnoxious pickets signs that cover the full spectrum of unapologetic hate and disdain with oddly hypnotic abandon. The majority of all this could inspire knee-jerk laughter care the epic level of cold ignorance employed, then one is reminded that these bible bashing social terrorists really, REALLY believe this shit with all their (dare I say) hearts.
The antics of the Westboro knuckle draggers and their lanky, menacing front man Fred serve as the topic of a concise little number titled 'Fall From Grace'. The director, K. Ryan Jones gained access to the inner workings of the Westboro/Phelps complex and has scored interview time with most of the principal players, most significantly big Fred himself. The film does its best to try and dredge up the true demon behind the doings, but, for the most part, the Phelps family sports a decent poker face and adheres to its belief system with a wide fascist grin. Ole Fred displays a basic level of tolerance for the young punk behind the camera, but the whole thing feels smothered beneath a facade of meticulously managed fear. No one person in this family can truly manage a sane and sober mindset, not with the way they've been reared. The film even includes input (via telephone interviews) with two of the Phelps children who have long detached themselves from the madness and share potent details of abuse born of poorly misdirected anger issues that have long gone unaddressed. The Phelps saga is one of incredible, head scratching and very primitive delusion. It's a shocking waste of too many lives and a stark embarrassment in a low-key state mostly shrugged off as being made up of little more than farms, fields and flat spaces.
'Fall From Grace' is a worthy, if not landmark, documentary that can be culled from Netflix or this site here-fallfromgracemovie.net
Second up-Kentucky.
In the early 70s, a young and zealous filmmaker by the name of Barbra Kopple embedded herself deep in a brassy and ultimately violent standoff between nearly 200 coal miners and the thug level bullies representing the best interests of the big corporate entity that would never dain to walk in their shoes. The resulting film, 'Harlan County U.S.A.', charts the intense struggle of the strike from the frontline, with Kopple and her crew getting their hands way more than dirty and sweaty in the process.
Kopple's film, one of the first of its fashion to garner a substantial release (in the less glamorous, pre-Michael Moore world) works as an addictive, grunt level portrait of working class dog soldiers in a brutal war against a soulless disregard for basic human rights. The people of this Harlan County place (located at the far south-east portion of the KY) are a collective of amazing, hard faced country souls who have weathered ungodly hours, black lung, bent backs and lackluster wages in order to scrape by and live another day in rural hell. Their townships are of the most rickety and marginal fashion. No running water, garbage and plentiful rust raped reminders of how close to the bottom this community really is.
To wrap her camera around this elephantine struggle between have alls and have nots, Kopple and co toiled long hours for time on end, digesting the picket lines, court room drama, fierce pride and recollection of mining history (often brutal) and even a field trip style picket in Manhattan to spread the word to Wall Street stockholders, to build an epic stockpile of footage (to wit-not an anomaly for a documentary project) with which to sculpt a film that would live on to first win itself an Oscar (in 1976) and later a place in the National Film Registry (a segment of the Library of Congress). This director had her skills honed putting down alongside the Brothers Maysles and gleaned from them an ample respect for the particulars of persona and place. 'Harlan County U.S.A.' thrives off the richness of character in these rough but honest working folk and their powerful desire to set things to right.
The Criterion Collection (and they tend to do right by a lot of fine films) has the best possible edition of this thing on DVD (spine # 334, look it up at criterion.com) that slaps on outtakes, interviews, commentary and even a reissue panel from the Sundance Film Fest (circa-2005) featuring Kopple and a still vocal Roger Ebert. Another classic to add to the list, and the list is ever growing.
Sticking to the countryside and moving up and over a ways-Montana.
A strange little left field piece of work called 'Sweetgrass' seeks to bring the untrained eye in touch with the laborious practice of prepping and herding a mass of, sometimes unruly, sheep from point A-the ranch to point B-the grazing pasture, all via the less than forgiving Absaroka-Beartooth mountains (a mass of wild natural abandon that sprawls some 900,000 + acres, even bleeding over into neighboring 'frontier' state Wyoming).
The film tags along behind a small collection of all-pro ranchers as they enact the deed of pushing and prodding a mass of wholly bastards up and through the impressive terrain all the while balancing workman like resolution with occasional lapses into frustration (most deliciously evidenced in a very profane outburst played out against one of the film's many sumptuous landscapes shots.





'Sweetgrass' is the feature result of husband/wife filmmaking tandem Lucien Castaing-Taylor and Ilisa Barbash devoting a reported eight or so years studying, learning and documenting this nearly outdated and romantic throwback industry of cowboys making their way, big country style. The pair relate this ambitious endeavor by way of long, dreamy studies of the sheer scope of these 'Big Sky' spaces, takes that are (thankfully) bereft of the cumbersome inclusion of some narrator flooding your ears with the painfully obvious and/or trite. 'Sweetgrass' is a blend of cool, hypnotic dream state and hard, rigorous slice-of-life truth. The film waivers between the punch in/punch out mundaity attributed to getting a job done (cowboys banter, tell hick savvy jokes, doze off mid day) to the blunt facts of life (sheep giving sloppy, juicy birth, calves being pruned and tagged), all unblinkingly processed through the video camera eye.
It should come as no real surprise that Castaing-Taylor is a Harvard based Professor specializing in Anthropology and Social Sciences, he has an obvious affinity for cultural process and the little human details that give flesh and blood vibrancy to an act that would, otherwise, read as soulless and mechanical. He also know how to photograph those big open Montana expanses. sweetgrassthemovie.com
Speaking of Montana, you all remember that one 'weird' guy, David Lynch? Well he sites Missoula, the states' second largest city, as his birthplace. Now, while most folks fondly recall Lynch as the gleefully warped brain-trust behind such ready made eccentricities as 'Blue Velvet' and the short lived, small screen phenom 'Twin Peaks', I prefer to instead to do a quick run through of the true curio of his filmography, the G-Rated, Walt Disney distributed and Iowa based 'The Straight Story'.
The, based on a true, story goes like this, Alvin Straight (Richard Farnsworth) is a twilight era old-timer who has just received word that his long estranged brother, Lyle, as come under ill health. Hoping to amend long standing bad blood and maybe even come to terms with his own very immediate mortality in the process, Alvin (legally blind and sporting duel crutches) makes haste on a retro John Deere riding lawn mower, under speech impeded protest from his daughter Rose (Sissy Spacek) from his root down in small scale Laurens, Iowa all the way east and up a fair bit to his brother's shack in Mt. Zion, Wisconsin (more on THAT state in a future issue). It's the journey between that fills out the near two hours that encompass this charming, philosophic and breezy slice of Lynch-Lite. En route toward his fated fraternal reconciliation, Alvin trades flavor, favors and wisdom with folks from all walks along the green, farm friendly sprawl of the thick of the corn belt.
'The Straight Story' marked a sharp measure of departure for Lynch in that it gained him accolades and attention from a whole different demographic then his patented film school hipster fan base. Farnsworth was Oscar nominated and most critics refrained from picking it apart. Though this film may never earn cult cred on par with the 'Eraserheads' and 'Mulholland Drives' that made and maintained his reputation, it still clings to several key aesthetic and thematic Lynch traits. The frame is still painted with striking and even rather poetic images, with special attention given to the vast, brooding properties of darkness and the running score is all haunting-romantic, as is the norm with Angelo Badalamenti on board. Quirky he may be, but David Lynch is a genuine film (as art) maker, now if only he can set aside that Transcendental Meditation bullshit and get on with the cinema!
Last Stop=Ohio!
Well, center-south in the state, around Scioto County seat Portsmouth, reside two infectiously driven, fully skewered mindsets who have forged a friendship, pastime and pursuit of dreams based entirely around the steadfast conviction that Bigfoots (not just one, mind you) do exist and are at plentiful large in the woods and countrysides of their immediate area. Wayne Burton and Dallas Gilbert have spent years contrasting the fairly bleak circumstances they subsist in (poor employment options and a dire lack of cultural stimuli) by attempting to position themselves as ambassadors and scholars of this whole Bigfoot mythology that (at least for some people) is just begging to be proven as fact.
The movie, entitled 'Not Your Typical Bigfoot Movie', running just above an hour and slapped together on the HD low-end by someone named Jay Delaney, works better as a charming examination of two old pals who refuse to surrender their chief passion, regardless the cost. Think of it as lesser variant on the likes of that one 'Anvil' movie ('The Story of Anvil') with the guitars and other rock trinkets supplanted by largely unseen hairy man beasts (though not for lack of vague, unfocused snapshots). These determined gents weather all manner of mockery and false hope to steady their course and the odd humanity on display as a direct result is what informs the film away from just being another geek-show farce where the dip shit bumpkins serve largely as easy fodder for drunken ridicule (not that I've ever been guilty of indulging as such). Do the boys ever actually land proof of their elusive grand prize? For all their ramblings and religiously adhered to backwoods wanderings, the truth remains a matter of faith, a shadow captured by camera more then once but never rising above the many common prejudices of individual interpretation.
'Not Your Typical Bigfoot Movie' is up for grabs on DVD care the oddball distributor Oscilloscope Laboratories (www.oscilloscope.net) or, more to the point, one can visit the real deal-notyourtypicalbigfootmovie.com which will link you up to all manner of stuff, including Dallas and Wayne's own website and a even a youtube channel for those who need to see it all (relatively speaking).
Seek and find, people.

A CITIZEN

(UN) ACCOUNTED FOR......

this wisconsin is MOST WISCONSIN!

IN GENERAL, THEY SAY WHAT THEY MEAN SOME.

WHAT?

LET THE RIGHT ONE....UGH.

'LITTLE BASTARD'S PROLLY A COMMUNIST OR SUMPTIN'

THIS OCEAN HAS MANY FACES.....

...SMILING AGAINST THE RIDDLE THAT IS WISCONSIN POLITICS.