1968--The Year in Review

An incredible year…maybe my favorite of the decade. Music takes over in a new way, with Head, Oliver!, Yellow Submarine, Monterey Pop, Wild in the Streets, Sympathy for the Devil, Petulia, Funny Girl, and even The Producers. Horror comes into a new age with Targets, Rosemary's Baby, Hour of the Wolf, Night of the Living Dead, Witchfinder General, and The Devil Rides Out. The crime movie is re-imagined with Bullitt, Coogan's Bluff, The Detective, Pretty Poison, The Split, The Thomas Crown Affair, and The Boston Strangler. But one profound, gorgeous movie justifiably towers over all. There are many masterpieces surrounding it–in fact, the first 20 works I list are mandatory viewing. But, for me, this year’s victor will always be the single best film that’s ever been made. There is no question about it. NOTE: These are MY choices for each category, and are only occasionally reflective of the selections made by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (aka The Oscars). When available, the nominee that actually won the Oscar will be highlighted in bold. 

PICTURE: 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY (UK/US, Stanley Kubrick)
(2nd: Once Upon a Time in the West (US/Italy, Sergio Leone), followed by:
Oliver! (UK, Carol Reed)
Targets (US, Peter Bogdanovich)
Petulia (US, Richard Lester)
The Color of Pomegranates (USSR, Sergei Paradjanov)
Head (US, Bob Rafelson)
Rosemary’s Baby (US, Roman Polanski)
if… (UK, Lindsay Anderson)
Yellow Submarine (UK, George Dunning)
Monterey Pop (US, D.A. Pennebaker)
Night of the Living Dead (US, George A. Romero)
Shame (Sweden, Ingmar Bergman)
High School (US, Frederick Wiseman)
Faces (US, John Cassavetes)
Bullitt (US, Peter Yates)
Planet of the Apes (US, Franklin J. Schaffner)
Stolen Kisses (France, Francois Truffaut)
Hour of the Wolf (Sweden, Ingmar Bergman)
Romeo and Juliet (UK/Italy, Franco Zeffirelli)
Mandabi (France/Senegal, Ousmane Sembene)
The Lion in Winter (UK, Anthony Harvey)
Witchfinder General (UK, Michael Reeves)
Les Biches (France, Claude Chabrol)
In the Year of the Pig (US, Emile de Antonio)
The Milky Way (France/Spain, Luis Buñuel)
Rachel, Rachel (US, Paul Newman)
The Swimmer (US, Frank Perry)
Pretty Poison (US, Noel Black)
The Producers (US, Mel Brooks)
Dark of the Sun (UK, Jack Cardiff)
Signs of Life (West Germany, Werner Herzog)
The Odd Couple (US, Gene Saks)
Hell in the Pacific (US, John Boorman)
Wild in the Streets (US, Barry Shear)
Play Dirty (US, André de Toth)
Danger: Diabolik (Italy/France, Mario Bava)
Isadora (UK, Karel Reisz)
Symbiopsychotaxiplasm (US, William Greaves)
Madigan (US, Don Siegel)
Memories of Underdevelopment (Cuba, Tomas Gutierrez Aléa)
The Party (US, Blake Edwards)
Je T’Aime, Je T’Aime (France, Alain Resnais)
Sympathy for the Devil (France/UK, Jean-Luc Godard)
Coogan's Bluff (US, Don Siegel)
The Shooting (US, Monte Hellman)
The Split (US, Gordon Flemyng)
The Thomas Crown Affair (US, Norman Jewison)
The Subject Was Roses (US, Ulu Grosbard)
Funny Girl (US, William Wyler)
The Detective (US, Gordon Douglas)
The Devil Rides Out (UK, Terence Fisher)
The Heart is a Lonely Hunter (US, Robert Ellis Miller)
Greetings (US, Brian De Palma)
The Great Silence (Italy, Sergio Corbucci)
Where Eagles Dare (US, Brian G. Hutton)
Countdown (US, Robert Altman)
Thérèse and Isabelle (France, Radley Metzger)
The Killing of Sister George (UK, Robert Aldrich)
The Night They Raided Minsky’s (US, William Friedkin)
The Boston Strangler (US, Richard Fleischer)
Barbarella (France/UK, Roger Vadim)
Charly (US, Ralph Nelson)
Psych-Out (US, Richard Rush))



ACTOR: Boris Karloff, TARGETS (2nd: Henry Fonda, Once Upon a Time in the West, followed by: Steve McQueen, Bullitt; George C. Scott, Petulia; Alan Arkin, The Heart is a Lonely Hunter; Peter O’Toole, The Lion in Winter; Vincent Price, Witchfinder General; Zero Mostel, The Producers; Malcolm McDowell, if…; Ron Moody, Oliver!) 

 
ACTRESS: Mia Farrow, ROSEMARY'S BABY (2nd: Joanne Woodward, Rachel, Rachel, followed by: Katharine Hepburn, The Lion in Winter; Tuesday Weld, Pretty Poison; Liv Ullmann, Shame; Vanessa Redgrave, Isadora; Julie Christie, Petulia; Barbra Streisand, Funny Girl; Stéphane Audran, Les Biches; Patricia Neal, The Subject Was Roses)



SUPPORTING ACTOR: Gene Wilder, THE PRODUCERS (2nd: Douglas Rain, 2001: A Space Odyssey, followed by: Jack Wild, Oliver!; Roddy McDowall, Planet of the Apes; Harry Secombe, Oliver!; Seymour Cassel, Faces; Jack Albertson, The Subject Was Roses; Kenneth Mars, The Producers; Sidney Blackmer, Rosemary’s Baby; Tim O'Kelly, Targets)



SUPPORTING ACTRESS: Ruth Gordon, ROSEMARY'S BABY (2nd: Lynn Carlin, Faces, followed by: Kim Hunter, Planet of the Apes; Shirley Knight, Petulia; Estelle Parsons, Rachel, Rachel; Sondra Locke, The Heart is a Lonely Hunter; Billie Whitelaw, Charlie Bubbles; Coral Browne, The Killing of Sister George; Kay Medford, Funny Girl; Lee Remick, The Detective)



DIRECTOR: Stanley Kubrick, 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY (2nd: Sergio Leone, Once Upon a Time in the West, followed by: Richard Lester, Petulia; Carol Reed, Oliver!; Sergei Bondarchuck, War and Peace; Sergei Paradjanov, The Color of Pomegranates; Roman Polanski, Rosemary's Baby; Peter Bogdanovich, Targets; Lindsay Anderson, if...; Bob Rafelson, Head)



NON-ENGLISH-LANGUAGE FILM: WAR AND PEACE (USSR, Sergei Bondarchuk) (2nd: The Color of Pomegranates (USSR, Sergei Paradjanov), followed by: Shame (Sweden, Ingmar Bergman); Stolen Kisses (France, Francois Truffaut); Hour of the Wolf (Sweden, Ingmar Bergman); Mandabi (France/Senegal, Ousmane Sembene); Les Biches (France, Claude Chabrol); The Milky Way (France/Spain, Luis Buñuel); Signs of Life (West Germany, Werner Herzog); Memories of Underdevelopment (Cuba, Tomas Gutierrez Aléa); Je T’Aime, Je T’Aime (France, Alain Resnais))

ANIMATED FEATURE: YELLOW SUBMARINE (UK, George Dunning)



DOCUMENTARY FEATURE: MONTEREY POP (US, D.A. Pennebaker) (2nd: In the Year of the Pig (US, Emile de Antonio), followed by: High School (US, Frederick Wiseman); Sympathy for the Devil (France/UK, Jean-Luc Godard))



ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY: Sergio Leone, Sergio Donati, Dario Argento and Bernardo Bertolucci, ONCE UPON A TIME IN THE WEST (2nd: Mel Brooks, The Producers, followed by: John Cassavetes, Faces; Ousmane Sembene, Mandabi; Peter Bogdanovich and Polly Platt, Targets) 

ADAPTED SCREENPLAY: Stanley Kubrick and Arthur C. Clarke, 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY (2nd: Roman Polanski, Rosemary's Baby, followed by: James Goldman, The Lion in Winter; Sergei Bondarchuk and Vasily Solovyov, War and Peace; Lawrence B. Marcus and Barbara Turner, Petulia)



LIVE ACTION SHORT FILM: WHY MAN CREATES (US, Saul Bass) (2nd: The Dove (US, George Coe and Anthony Lover), followed by: Pas de Deux (Canada, Norman McLaren); LBJ (Cuba, Santiago Alvarez); The Big Shave (US, Martin Scorsese))



ANIMATED SHORT FILM: WINDY DAY (US, John and Faith Hubley) (2nd: Winnie the Pooh and the Blustery Day (US, Wolfgang Reitherman); The Magic Pear Tree (US, Charles Swenson); Mickey Mouse in Vietnam (US, Lee Savage); The Alphabet (US, David Lynch))

CINEMATOGRAPHY: Geoffrey Unsworth and John Alcott, 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY (2nd: Tonino Delli Colli, Once Upon a Time in the West, followed by: Yu-Lan Chan, Anatoly Petritsky, and Aleksandr Shelenkov, War and Peace; Pasquelino De Santis, Romeo and Juliet; Oswald Morris, Oliver!)

ART DIRECTION: 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY, Oliver!, Once Upon A Time in the West, War and Peace, The Shoes of the Fisherman

COSTUME DESIGN: OLIVER!, Romeo and Juliet, War and Peace, The Lion in Winter, Petulia



FILM EDITING: BULLITT, Petulia, Oliver!, Once Upon a Time in the West, Head 

SOUND: BULLITT, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Oliver!, Monterey Pop, The Odd Couple



ORIGINAL SCORE: Ennio Morricone, ONCE UPON A TIME IN THE WEST (2nd: Jerry Goldsmith, Planet of the Apes, followed by: Krzysztof Komeda, Rosemary’s Baby; Lalo Schifrin, Bullitt; Neal Hefti, The Odd Couple)



ADAPTED OR MUSICAL SCORE: John Green, OLIVER! (2nd: George Martin, Yellow Submarine, followed by: Walter Scharf, Funny Girl)



ORIGINAL SONG: "Porpoise Song" from HEAD (Music and lyrics by Gerry Goffin and Carole King) (2nd: "Springtime for Hitler" from The Producers (Music and lyrics by Mel Brooks), followed by: "The Windmills of Your Mind" from The Thomas Crown Affair (Music by Michael Legrand, lyrics by Alan and Marilyn Bergman); "Circle Sky" from Head (Music and lyrics by Michael Nesmith); "The Shape of Things to Come" from Wild in the Streets (Music and lyrics by Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil); "Only a Northern Song" from Yellow Submarine (Music and lyrics by George Harrison); "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang" from Chitty Chitty Bang Bang (Music and lyrics by Richard M. Sherman and Robert B. Sherman); "It's All Too Much" from Yellow Submarine (Music and lyrics by George Harrison); "As We Go Along" from Head (Music and lyrics by Carole King and Toni Stern); "For the Love of Ivy" for For Love of Ivy (Music by Quincy Jones, lyrics by Bob Russell); "Wild in the Streets" from Wild in the Streets (Music and lyrics by Les Baxter and Guy Hemric); "Barbarella" from Barbarella (Music and lyrics by Bob Crewe and Charles Fox); "Daddy's Song" from Head (Music and lyrics by Harry Nilsson); "Hey Bulldog" from Yellow Submarine (Music and lyrics by John Lennon and Paul McCartney))

SPECIAL EFFECTS: 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY, Ice Station Zebra

MAKEUP: 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY, Planet of the Apes, Oliver!

Film #167: Harold and Maude

 
MAUDE: A lot of people enjoy being dead. But they’re not dead, really. They’re just backing away from life. Reach out. Take a chance. Get hurt even. But play as well as you can. Go team, go! Give me an L. Give me an I. Give me a V. Give me an E. L-I-V-E. LIVE! Otherwise, you got nothing to talk about in the locker room.

Rewatching Hal Ashby’s Harold and Maude again for the first time for what must be at least a decade, I’m struck most–in my middle age–by its naivete and glorious youthfulness. With its gorehound death fascination and breathy strivings for an actively-voiced life, it feels like a movie written by a smart, frustrated teenager (actually, screenwriter Colin Higgins penned it in his mid-20s while attending Stanford University, studying alongside Taxi Driver screenwriter Paul Schrader; sadly, he had little chance to best this work as he died unfairly at 47 after having penned such funny but not nearly as heartfelt classics as Silver Streak, Foul Play, 9 to 5, and The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas). As a screenplay, it is an assured work that cleaves to simple wisdoms, and it's further seasoned by Hal Ashby’s then-still nascent but preternatural filmic style. Roger Ebert, who hated it upon release, slammed the movie for not having a strong visual sense, but I vehemently disagree; it’s the first of Ashby’s works sporting a meticulously designed look, and it's the entry point into that great director's limited but almost unassailable body of work (even though his debut film, 1970's The Landlord, is also essential).

To go even further–way further–I don’t think it’s out of order to declare Harold and Maude one of the most loved movies ever made. Ask anyone who’s seen it and they’ll tell you it’s among their favorites. Lots of guys dig it but women, especially, seem to respond remarkably to its quirky grace (when I worked at video stores, 9 times out of 10 when the film was being rented, it was by a woman, and most likely one going back for seconds or thirds). I’m not usually one to react de facto to rashly popular movies, but this is one I stand behind with gusto. Even today, I see a lot of what is admired in, say, Wes Anderson’s work as dependent on this film both in style and emotion (just take a look at some of Ashby's perfectly centered images and tell me Wes Anderson doesn't worship this movie).

As a kid, after years of seeing it advertised in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, I pretty much fell into an immediate crush with Harold and Maude. I can easily flash back to my first time seeing it at 14 years old, circa 1981, at Atlanta's now-defunct Rhodes Theater. I remember the look of the deep red velvet chairs in the theater auditorium being mirrored by the warm browns and reds of that sly opening sequence set to the first of Cat Stevens’ many contributions to the soundtrack, the gentle and ultimately vociferous “Don’t Be Shy.” I remember the vaguely cola-tinged smell of the theater, and feeling disturbed that Ashby and cinematographer John Alonzo chose not to reveal Harold’s face until way deep into its its oddly-paced, strangely-framed single-shot opening (Harold isn’t seen until he suitably blows out a match).



Meanwhile, Cat Stevens’ work had long been a staple on our turntable at home, thanks to his Greatest Hits record, so hearing his voice so brilliantly used throughout must have made full impact on my rather instant love for this film (Stevens’ creaky vocal style is unmistakable). Years later, after I had tried to hunt down a soundtrack to no avail, I finally realized watching Harold and Maude was the only way I would ever hear some of these tunes (“Don’t Be Shy” and “If You Want to Sing Out, Sing Out” were written specifically for the film, and a soundtrack has now been properly compiled here; I’m dismayed that Stevens wasn’t nearly well enough considered for the Best Song Oscar in 1971). But he was way ahead of the pack then, so I guess I shouldn't be surprised.

In all the right places, I laughed hard with Harold and Maude upon first seeing it. Like a true cultist, my deep adoration for the film grew from that very first glimpse. I suspect I also share with many of its fans a feeling as if it were a movie made especially for me. The opening’s punchline–the revelation of Harold’s penchant for so literal gallows humor–felt so fresh, so perfect for the misplaced 14-year-old kid I was, with a similar dark view of things. I’m pretty positive almost every teenager has had at least fleeting fantasies about ending their life, fueled mainly by the wonder of how the news would be received by the living (this is something that powers Harold’s love of his bizarre hobby).

So I remember adoring each of Harold’s fake suicides; the film’s first thirty minutes basically exist as a series of truly black blackout sketches. Cort’s Harold often seems to be playing to an unseen camera, even turning to regard it and the audience beyond at one point (a moment I absolutely love). However, the only actual audience member here (outside of Harold himself, and maybe a couple of his ill-fated dates) is Harold’s widowed mother, played with utmost snootiness by Vivian Pickles. As she barely reacts to the pranks, we can see she’s a humorless, self-absorbed prune, or at least one who’s failed to address in any meaningful way the underlying issues in Harold’s life (Harold’s absent father is barely mentioned and one is left to assume the man’s troubles at home led him to an early grave). As Harold floats face down in the pool in another call for attention, the mother gently swims past his corpse-like body as if it were an errant leaf on the water’s surface. In the opening, he hangs himself and, with his tongue turning blue, Pickles’ exasperated Mrs. Chasen (she might be the widow of the famed restaurateur Dave Chasen, of Hollywood’s Chasen’s) utters the film's indelible first line “I suppose you think that’s very funny, Harold.” And it’s difficult for even the toughest countenance to shake the shock of its bloodiest scenario, where Pickles walks into a darkened bathroom and, with a joltingly split-second zoom-out, discovers its mirrored walls splattered with red plasma while Harold, tongue out, lies in a sanguine bathtub pose. His mother turns and promptly has a well-deserved breakdown (I like that the movie has some sympathy for her). Meanwhile, all Harold wants to do is feel something, anything, even if it’s unpleasant.

Harold and Maude famously didn’t perform very well box-office-wise upon its 1971 release. A clearly confused Paramount Pictures saddled the film with possibly the ugliest ad campaign in movie history, badly illustrated with criminally underdone graphics. The reviews were cruelly dismissive, even by smart critics like Ebert and the New York Times’  Bosley Crowther. Remember, this was the era of A Clockwork Orange, McCabe and Mrs. Miller, The Last Picture Show, Punishment Park, Sunday Bloody Sunday, Carnal Knowledge, The French Connection, The Beguiled and Two-Lane Blacktop. Not many smiles or expressions of love in those films, so maybe the executives and pundits were befuddled (though Ebert never, ever updated his opinion). Luckily, there was a hungry audience lying in wait for some true blue feelings, and by the mid-1970s, it was a midnight movie and repertory theater staple guaranteed to pack the house (I remember seeing it, up until the mid-80s, in well-attended theaters and often paired with a lesser sanity-juggling film, Philippe de Broca’s King of Hearts). I wonder now if Harold and Maude would have found wider success more quickly had Harold been portrayed as a more traditionally attractive hippie dude rather than as an ahead-of-his-time proto-goth type. Still, I’m extremely glad Ashby and Higgins (and Cort) decided to go another way. Harold now seems so much more approachable (the film would feel much more dated with a longhair in the lead). And now, as it should be, Ruth Gordon’s Maude is the de facto flyer of the freak flag here.

Sweetly inexpressive as Cort is in the film' first half–and it’s easy to love the pale-skinned, wide-eyed damaged child in him–Ruth Gordon is the presence who makes the movie sing. She’s central to many of its most memorable images: fiddling with her still-red hair and eating an orange while sitting on a gravestone; in a field of flowers, admiring an average daisy while sticking up for the subtle differences between each one; confidently carrying a bright yellow umbrella through a rainy funeral procession; dancing and singing to a jangly player piano; coquettishly telling Harold his words of love makes her feel like a schoolgirl (oof, this kills me!); throwing the coin that Harold just made for her into an errant corner of the sea “so I’ll always know where it is.” She has all the best dialogue and so cheerfully gives endless hell to a variety of authority figures (the clergy, the police, the military–they’re all skewered here, which surely contributed to its anti-establishment cult status). Maude has lived through much–there’s a wonderful scene where she begins to tearfully ruminate on her long-gone husband--and we find ourselves constantly wanting to know more about her. But she’s had a hard life and is so aware that going over and over this misery is not going to do anyone–certainly not Harold nor herself–any good.

Yet that moment where she lets loose may be the movie’s center. It’s revealed late in the film, in a quick don’t-blink glance, that Nazi-commandeered tattoo on her wrist, which leaves us to understand her lust for life and impatient conquering of death. Harold, meanwhile, has lived through nothing, and nothing is exactly what’s left in his soul. It takes Maude’s joie de vivre, seasoned with a true and not at all funny intimacy with eternity, to shake him out of his prison…yet she never holds this against him. Maude generously realizes each life must have its path. Gordon is wonderful in the film–always strong, at times girlish, totally sexy, consistently lively and interesting. She’s a prize who doesn't deserve to be alone, and it’s natural to see how Harold could fall for her without even considering the difference in their age as an impediment. Even though Gordon won her Oscar for her malevolent turn in Polanski’s Rosemary’s Baby, her later career owed so much more to her lovely showing here. She later always arrived in movies as the elderly person one totally wishes to be in their own advanced years (I particularly like her subsequent turns in Tony Bill’s My Bodyguard and Steven Verona’s Boardwalk). Interestingly, in today’s present cinema where there seems to be no space for the aged, there is no one who matches Ruth Gordon’s gorgeous likeness.

Arguably, Harold and Maude is a one-joke film, overtly simple and appealing. I can envision having a hard time battling a smart person who has no affection for it. But it’s a tale goosed by Ashby’s deadpan visual style (the editing is always sumptuous, and often his setups, particularly in the psychiatrist’s office, look downright Kubrickian; I also love the wider tableaus in the film, most especially in the field of daisies and then, in a later matching shot, a field of gravestones, and of course, the final shot). The movie is far from perfect: a couple of its most ratcheted-up scenes still make me wince, most notably the final “date” with the actress (Ellen Geer) who joins Harold on the Hari-Kiri mat, and then the unbearably far-fetched scene that has Harold, with Maude’s help, ducking the draft by feigning an overdone madness.

Instead, I prefer its more subtle and quiet moments: the replanting of the “little tree,” Harold’s suggestive caressing of that vaginal wooden sculpture in Maude’s boudoir or his enjoyment of the evocative scent machine, or the two of them sharing a junkyard lunch and a seaside sunset. Fortuitous is the landing of both the movie's leads (Maude was very nearly played by Peggy Ashcroft or Celia Johnson, and both Richard Dreyfuss and Bob Balaban were considered as Harold). Its music, too, was arrived at by chance (Elton John, after having to drop out of the project--even as a possible lead for the film--wisely suggested Ashby contact Cat Stevens). These essential elements support each other as the crux of the film’s most luminous minutes, where Stevens’ heartbreaking tune “Trouble” plays over a smartly cut montage that directs our eyes one place and then tricks us so perfectly to another (gosh, this sequence is so absolutely superb; it brings me to tears every time, and I still get goosebumps as I see Harold piloting that absurdly cool Jaguar/Hearse down the road, rolling down the window to feel the wind in his face as that ethereal piano plinks away on the soundtrack).

Finally, this movie just seems like it had to happen. I mean, where would cinema be without the image of Bud Cort and Ruth Gordon clutching each other in such gentle, understanding ecstasy? Years after seeing it for the first time as a young romantic, I still happily regard much of Harold and Maude‘s slightly-flawed brilliance as an essential part of who I am now. I imagine that those excited moviegoers–all who rescued such a humble daisy of a movie from obscurity, and who long showed such undying devotion for it–feel exactly the same way. Ashby and company, maybe with an abandon they had little note of, ultimately made us in this wildly strange tribe of lovers want to go out and love so much, much more.

Trouble / Oh trouble, set me free / I have seen your face / And it’s too much, too much for me / Trouble / Oh trouble, can’t you see / You’re eating my heart away / And there’s nothing much left of me / I’ve drunk your wine / You have made your world mine / So won’t you be fair / So won’t you be fair / I don’t want no more of you / So won’t you be kind to me / Just let me go there / I have to go there / Trouble / Oh trouble move away / I have seen your face / And it’s too much for me today / Trouble / Oh trouble, can’t you see / You have made me a wreck / Now won’t you leave me in my misery / I’ve seen your eyes / And I can see death’s disguise / Hangin’ on me / Hangin’ on me / I’m beat, I’m torn / Shattered and tossed and worn / Too shocking to see / Too shocking to see / Trouble / Oh trouble, move from me / I have paid my debt / Now won’t you leave me in my misery / Trouble / Oh trouble, please be kind / I don’t want no fight / And I haven’t got a lot of time.

Film #26: My Bodyguard

Dave Grusin's jazzy, string-flecked score hits me first every time I see My Bodyguard. It takes me back to 1980 instantly and I am happy for it. It's bouncy, joyful, mopey, and erudite. It exemplifies Chicago--where this movie was filmed--all in a few bars. In fact, the only things that remind me of Chicago more than My Bodyguard are John Hughes movies, The Bob Newhart Show, and...Chicago. Chris Makepeace, here playing the teen who acquires special protection from the school bullies threatening him, had one good period as a film moppet--1979-1980. With My Bodyguard and the Bill Murray vehicle Meatballs, he got his tow-headed mug in front of a lot of young moviegoers that year. But I think his crazy-unruly hair and his intensely serious face likely hurt his further progression. Even though Makepeace was fine in both films, most kids (then, at least) preferred their on-screen counterparts to NOT look like they'd be good at chess.

Matt Dillon brings his usual roughneck energy to Moody, the lead bully. This means he commands the screen, and this is only his second movie (after the memorable cult hit Over The Edge). His bathroom torture of Cliff, for instance, stops the movie; he yells unexpectedly, slams the kid against the wall, takes deadly aim with a giant spitball, and keeps his stare going straight into Clifford's soul. Tight-shirted, hair slicked back, aviator glasses on, he's the epitome of the asshole that everyone wanted to avoid, in school or out.

Then there's Adam Baldwin. As Ricky, the hulkster that Clifford hires to be his bodyguard, he is smudged and shell-shocked. His size and inner rage are great, but look at those big eyes and you can see this guy's a lover, not a fighter. Baldwin (who is not, I repeat, not one of the Baldwin brothers) would graduate into playing full-time warriors like Animal Mother in Kubrick's Full Metal Jacket and as the gruffest member of the crew in the sadly short-lived Joss Whedon series Firefly. He still has a believeable gentleness about him, I think.




One kid here, redheaded Paul Quandt, never made a movie again, but he stands out as a screen presense. As Carson, Cliff's acerbic classmate with a scientific interest in the gum stuck under the desks, Quandt is certainly the one child actor participating whom you WILL NOT forget. And it goes on, this cast: look closely and you'll see Joan Cusack debuting as one of Cliff's most sympathetic buddies (the Cusack family is famous for their Chicago acting school). Look real close and you'll see glimpses of a pre-Flashdance Jennifer Beals. And, of course, you have the adults: an understated Martin Mull as Cliff's hotel manager dad, Kathryn Grody as his concerned teacher, and best of all, Ruth Gordon as his rowdy grandmother (what other kind of maternal figure did Gordon play?). I look forward to Gordon's scenes with Makepeace. They genuinely look like they're having fun (like when she surprises him exclaiming "Bats!" "Bats!" and flapping newspapers in his face). When they talk about the smell of a new book, or when Gordon calls someone a "greasy wimp" and Makepeace can't hold back a chortle--this is all very real stuff.

The writer, Alan Ormsby, never betrayed that he'd something this sweet in him, having been previously most famous for collaborating with Bob Clark on Children Shouldn't Play With Dead Things and Deranged. And director Tony Bill--a former actor-turned-producer (The Sting, Taxi Driver, Close Encounters of the Third Kind)--captures the freedom of youth and of standing your ground with equal parts honesty and good old fashioned corn (I can like me a corny movie, I have to admit). Bill has sheaperded a lot of films to us the past 35 years, most recently the 2007 WWI aviator epic Flyboys. But none have stuck with me like My Bodyguard. It has punch and punch is enough.