Xanadu

Dir. Robert Greenwald, 1980



It is difficult to explain the appeal of musicals to someone who is either unfamiliar with the medium, not particularly receptive to it, or socially conditioned to believe it is stupid and therefore a waste of time. Musicals contain a unique intersection of whimsy, improbability, hokeyness and entertainment that may seem overwhelming, though one or two of those elements at a time may be perfectly manageable. Fundamentally, musicals exist as a fantastic diversion from reality to a world where everyone knows the words and the dances, or to provide a unique perspective on a social issue placed in an operatic context. For some, it just doesn't work. For me, however, it is the ultimate guilty pleasure.

I had heard about Xanadu multiple times from my old friend, the internet, usually in a joke about bad acting, Olivia Newton John, or having hair reminiscent of a sex toy. Yes, the movie contains all of these things. It is a fabulous display of the 1980's view of modernity and the classics, mixed with recurring roller skating and sass talk. Simply put, Sonny (Michael Beck) is an unsuccessful painter who runs into Kira (Olivia Newton John) when contemplating the purpose of his life. Kira turns out to be one of the Greek muses, and helps Sonny and his geriatric friend Danny (THE Gene Kelly) create a time-warping nightclub called Xanadu. Kira then argues with her parents (presumably Zeus and Hera) and gets to stay on earth forever and ever to be with Sonny. The end, hallelujah.

But the genius is in the details. As I was watching this ridiculous film (streaming from IMDb - and you can too!), I was overcome with a rush like the first time I saw The Rocky Horror Picture Show or Plan 9 From Outer Space: I was witnessing immortalized camp. This was a cultural milestone, completely comfortable in its relative mediocrity, striving for one kind of success but achieving another entirely. Did the filmmakers know that they were creating a terrible movie? I'm inclined to think not, but they did know that Olivia Newton John would essentially carry the movie on her own, and she is a rather flimsy actress. Did they know that it would not only become a cult classic, but an icon of gay culture? Surely not.

The swanky Sonny, who backtalks his boss, is apparently a babe magnet, and meets music legends on the beach, is not as attractive as he is a good backdrop for Kira and her glowing blonde hair. Perhaps he was meant to be a heartthrob for female viewers, and I can't say how many women in 1980 were actually attracted to him, but to me, he was far too reminiscent of Andy Samberg. It's really all about Olivia. She doesn't have the sassy fabulousness of Dr. Frankenfurter or other cult legends, but her magnetic singing voice and Australian charm is enough for some. She beams with sparkling white teeth, roller skates around in chaste white dress and ribbons in her hair, and in the final scene, where she sings the award-winning song "Xanadu," she makes an astonishing 4 costume changes spanning from disco queen to her childish Muse getup.



What really immortalizes Xanadu are the weird, avant-garde moments. There is a scene when they are preparing for the club Xanadu's opening night, and Gene Kelly goes to a trendy clothing shop to try on some sharp new duds. The music montage involves the height of early 80's fashion, and some strange items that nobody has probably ever worn, including the above spiderweb-themed cocktail dresses and catsuits. In another scene, there is a battle of the bands between a 1940's-style swing group and an extremely of-the-minute synth rock band, complete with Devo-esque jumpsuits and flailing limbs. At first, it seems a discordant melange marked by completely different styles of suggestive dancing and sequins, but then the two musical styles blend together so perfectly that one begins to believe that maybe these guys actually had something in mind when they orchestrated that weird, weird scene.

This is not a movie that you either like or don't like. You either love it or you think it's crap. Or both! I fully realize that it is a crappy movie, utter crap, but it is so great. All parties involved act atrociously, and the million-plus dollars they spent on the Xanadu club set was largely wasted, because it really just looked like a gratuitous birthday cake of a set with blinking lights and rotating stages. But at the same time, there are moments of bizarre genius that make it all so glorious. It truly deserves the cult status that it has attained, and was truly enjoyable to watch, in all of its campy glory.

Female Trouble

Dir. John Waters, 1974



Female Trouble was John Waters' follow-up film to Pink Flamingos, and he employs largely the same cast in similar roles. What differentiates the two films are their focus: Pink Flamingos is clearly about the lows of society and the limitations of cinema and decency, whereas Female Trouble is a feminist film, crassly defending the struggle of women through over-the-top scenarios. It's comical, but the notion is out there that views of women are somewhat tainted by societal norms rather than the content of women's character.

Divine again plays the heroine, Dawn Davenport, a juvenile delinquent who gets knocked up by Earl (also played by Divine; a funny "go fuck yourself" moment) and runs away to Baltimore. There she pays her dues to society starting off as a waitress, then a burlesque dancer, and finally a prostitute and petty thief. She leads a miserable single life with her irritable child, Taffy (played by Mink Stole, whom I love more daily), until she marries Gater, a straight hairdresser who lives next door with his heterophobic Aunt Ida (the inimitable Edith Massey). Then, she is miserable and married with only her ostentatious salon hairstyles to make her happy.



The owners of the hair salon, the Dashers, take notice of Dawn's "unique" beauty and make an offer for her to model for them while enhancing her loveliness with criminal behavior. The Dashers photograph Dawn while she robs houses, beats her daughter, and breaks things in her house. When she kicks Gater out of the house, Aunt Ida comes storming in and throws acid into Dawn's face. She is terribly disfigured, but the Dashers believe this only adds to her beauty. They book her a performing gig where she executes all kinds of repulsive acts, including rubbing dead fish on herself and shooting a member of the audience. Dawn is so wrapped up in her fame and notoriety that she crows about her infamy through her friends' treachery and her eventual dismal end.

Waters holds the female condition near to his heart in this film. At the start, audiences will identify with Dawn as she sasses back to her teacher, smokes in the bathroom, and throws a tantrum when she doesn't get cha-cha heels for Christmas. As she struggles to make ends meet doing a variety of odd (and odder) jobs, the audience may feel sympathy for her. Only when the typical vulgarity of Divine's persona starts to shine through do audiences realize that this has all been a ruse to conjure up some feelings for Dawn Davenport before exploiting her before wealthy opportunists and the media circus. Were it not for Divine's extra-cinematic fame, the audience might have fully invested in the well-being of this girl, but because it is also a cynical romp, we are one step removed.



As this removed audience, even though we feel for Dawn, we still want to know what kind of hijinks she gets into, and we hope to be wowed, grossed out, and offended. Dawn will always remain more an object than a true female heroine, a vehicle for humiliation more than a figure living the American dream. But while audiences of the 1970's could detach from this film as fiction, it was a time when women were still seen as objects for men's amusement, and didn't garner the same respect as men in social issues and the workplace. Feminism had taken huge strides since the early 1960's, but there was still domestic inequity and, to this day, women get paid less than men for comparable jobs.

Perhaps Waters' message was intentional, perhaps not. I have heard him speak, however, and he is quite an intelligent person, so I would not deny him that insight. He is cited as having his finger on the pulse of contemporary society, and of understanding the basest aspects of human nature better than most. Female Trouble might seem like an ironic title at first, but it is very particularly selected. The troubles don't necessarily belong to the main female in the film, rather, it is about the trouble people have with reconciling females as equal citizens, and the disconnect between realizing that the objectification of a film character may not be so different from someone's home situation.

Tropic Thunder

Dir. Ben Stiller, 2008



Dear Ben Stiller,

I must congratulate you on your triumphant return to cinema after your last film, The Heartbreak Kid, which earned a Rotten Tomatoes score of 30%. Your recent run of movies has been pretty uninteresting and uninspiring, which is the most polite way to put it. In fact, not since Keeping the Faith has the idea of you being in a movie not totally turned me off to the point of revulsion. When I heard you actually directed Tropic Thunder, I was pretty surprised. Not very optimistic, but surprised.

I consider your best work to be the stoic Chas Tenenbaum, whose humor came from the completely deadpan delivery of your comically tragic lines. This works so well for you, and you did it again in the aforementioned Keeping the Faith, although it was not nearly as good a movie. So with Tropic Thunder, even though your role is anything but subtle, you finally own up to the goofball throwaway actor that you actually appear to be most of the time. (I am sorry, but your father is a lot funnier.) In this film, you seem to embrace your own mediocrity and to the role that you inevitably play in the Hollywood circus: the clown.

Tropic Thunder did not look like a good film at first glance. In fact, after seeing the trailer about twenty times, I was convinced it was the next of a string of disposable gross-out humor flicks like the Farrelly Brothers are prone to making. It was only after people that I truly respected said that it was actually a funny movie, full of Hollywood inside jokes, that I came to look at it differently. I was pleasantly surprised to find that it was actually a very detailed satire of the Hollywood machine, a very complex set up with every stereotype imaginable illustrated in unforgiving clarity. Right off the bat, with the fake movie trailers for actors Tugg Speedman, Kirk Lazarus and Jeff Portnoy, the scene is set for the audience to take in the spectacle of a good, old-fashioned parody.

Seeing this movie so soon after Hamlet 2 was weird and gratifying, because I had just described Steve Coogan's career of self-deprecating roles. In this film, he plays another such loser, a weak first-time director on an out of control movie set. Robert Downey, Jr., as Kirk Lazarus, the Australian, multi-Oscar winning method actor is brilliant, as is Brandon Jackson as Alpa Chino, the rap artist-turned-actor who is at constant odds with Lazarus who is portraying an African-American soldier. Jack Black is still annoying, although here it works, since his character is an annoying comedy actor of vulgar proportions. But it is you, Ben Stiller, as Tugg Speedman, the lousy action star who finds his inner dramatic actor, who makes an interesting point.

You really do play two roles, Ben Stiller. Sometimes you are Tugg, even though you do not actually have the career of an action star, though Tugg's struggle to win an Oscar and prevent himself from going "full retard" might very well be your own struggle. But your role as yourself is substantially present as well. Your name is sloshed around the credits far too generously, even if you did put a lot of work into it. The credits for director, writer, producer, and actor are surely merited, but is it really necessary to top it all off with "A Ben Stiller Film?" I would argue that it is necessary if the point you are making is that the farce continues into real life as well. Having gratuitous credits is very much the M.O. of an overblown egomaniac. Which I would not be surprised to learn that you are.

In sum, the film is a fine one. It is funny and clever, possibly too clever for its own good. I loved most things about it, though there is an obvious over-the-top-ness that will never be absent from films starring you, Jack Black, and Danny McBride (who also does a good job, and is much less annoying than in Pineapple Express). War films are sacred in Hollywood, and it was a clever setting for the ultimate "in-your-face!" gag. At times your douchery was a bit strong, and if I never hear Jack Black make another oral sex joke again, I would be all too pleased. So carry on, and stop returning the Farrelly brothers' phone calls. It'll do you some good.

Hamlet 2

Dir. Andrew Fleming, 2008



This movie. Let me tell you about this movie. There is so much to say, and even though I saw this five days ago, I am still forming the words because this movie just evokes such a range of emotions from me. To save you from reading all the way through before getting to my final conclusion (which I may change my mind about once I get to the end of this article) I should say that I loved it. Not every minute of it, but it is so brilliant. I was pretty lucky to have seen no trailers, no posters, and to go into the film with only the slightest hint of what it was about, plus riding my fascination with Steve Coogan's career.

Steve Coogan is an actor who is charmingly aware of his irrelevance in the entertainment world, and of the overblown importance that we give to the entertainment field. The projects he chooses often feature him playing himself, but a loser version with an inflated sense of self-importance. That, or a character with the apparent awareness that he is a parody of himself. In 24 Hour Party People, Coogan plays a Tony Wilson (legendary record label owner) that is constantly talking to the camera about his portrayal of the real events in the film. In Tristram Shandy, he plays himself as the star of the film based on the un-filmable novel, and is the admittedly weakest member of the cast. These examples from his filmography are a major reason why I was so attracted to this film, and would not rest until I saw it.

In Hamlet 2, Coogan plays Dana Marschz, a washed up "actor" teaching drama in Tucson, AZ. The first minutes of the film show some footage of commercials from Marschz's erstwhile career with Coogan's giant toothy grin hawking the Magic Bullet and herpes medication, paired with dramatic voice-over by someone who sounds exactly like Jeremy Irons. It starts the film off with such a bang that I nearly squealed with excitement at what greatness I could be witnessing. Rather than simply teaching drama to a couple of schmaltzy, overeager thespians, some disaffected roughs join the class because of the dissolution of elective programs due to budget cuts. At the provocation of a wry sophomore journalist, Marschz decides to put on an original play rather than an adapted one (the last of which was Erin Brockovich), and reinvents Hamlet with time travel, forgiveness, Jesus, and musical numbers involving the harrowing experience of getting raped in the face. (It's about his relationship with his father.) Needless to say, nobody wants him to put this show on, and staging it becomes a struggle of epic proportions.

Abortions of cinema like Meet the Spartans ultimately fail because the filmmakers don't understand the line between imitation and parody. Movies of that kind simply imitate other films, piling pop-culture references upon each other until the result is a completely meaningless string of profanity and gross-out "humor." Hamlet 2 is an excellent example of parody gone so, so right. The film pokes fun at the Inspirational Teacher movie so blatantly that Marschz tries to engage the class by asking if anyone has seen Mr. Holland's Opus. More than just name-drop, later in the film, at the peak moment where The Quiet One gives the Get Off Your Ass Speech and says "carpe diem," Marschz desperately whimpers "That's from Dead Poets Society!" as though that was the culmination of all of his effort.

But, like good parody, Hamlet 2 brings so much more to the genres satirized here. The film is so self-aware that every known actor in the film plays a meta-parody of his- or herself. For example, Elisabeth Shue plays Elisabeth Shue, a "retired" actress working as a nurse in a fertility clinic; Steve Coogan reprises the aforementioned role of the hapless, talentless loser; Catherine Keener plays the devious bitch from the Being John Malkovich era; and David Arquette plays the role he was meant for: the impossibly dumb, clueless roommate. The less known actors play archetypal roles (the rabid drama types, the gangsta who's an amazing actor with disapproving parents, etc.) with such flair, you'd think it was completely original. Even the voice of Jeremy Irons (if it is actually him) is such the perfect choice for the narration of something overblown and dramatic.

Where the movie does not always succeed, however, is in overall execution. Occasionally, the jokes are a little too easy and too crass for how utterly brilliant the rest of it is. Amy Poehler (unfortunately, the weakest part of this ensemble) enters as the ACLU agent hired to protect Marschz's freedom to put on his play, and drops the most baffling line: "I have nothing to lose, I'm married to a Jew." Normally an epithet of this type doesn't bother me, even if I belong to the scorned demographic. There is clearly a reference here that I am missing, because it seems like the line is just thrown in to complete the offensive spectrum, even though it is not clever at all. While there are some parts that are so split-second hilarious, like Marschz's theatrical jump-kick to reveal a flash of unclothed genitals (to the horror of the high school class before him), there are also many parts that are so bluntly slapstick (like repeated head injuries to the same Quiet Student) that I wonder if the two writers simply didn't collaborate much. I wonder if the good stuff came from Pam Brady, writer for South Park, or from director Andrew Fleming, whose last notable work was Nancy Drew.

I am willing to forgive those lapses in cleverness and funniness for the overall success of the film. I knew so little about it going in that I could only be impressed, and I was. It is one of the better comedies of the year, and the only one that comes to mind that actually made me laugh out loud recently. If the ultimate goal of a comedy is to make someone as picky and uptight as me actually laugh by my own accord rather than riding the wave of paroxysmal audiences, then Hamlet 2 passes with flying colors. Dare I even say, I would see it again.