Whatever Happened to Vera Miles?

Vera Miles? Whatever happened to her? And who was she, anyway? Miles, who’s alive and well at 95, was an Oklahoma-born, Kansas-bred beauty pageant winner who found her way to Hollywood in 1949. She played key supporting parts in films directed by John Ford (The Searchers) and Alfred Hitchcock (The Wrong Man, in which she was the wife of Henry Fonda, playing a real-life jazz musician falsely accused of robbery). She also was several times cast by the Disney folks as a lovable wife and mom, often in tandem with Fred MacMurray or Brian Keith, perhaps reflecting her own real-life role as the mother of four children. She also regularly appeared in featured roles on television. Despite all this, in her forty-five year career she never truly moved beyond second-tier stardom. 

Things might have turned out differently in the late Fifties if Miles, who was then under personal contract to Alfred Hitchcock, had gone through with Hitchcock’s plan to star her as the female lead in Vertigo. Hitchcock favorite Grace Kelly had moved from the soundstages of L.A. to the throne of Monaco, and Miles was singled out as a suitable replacement. Said the Master of Suspense, “Miss Miles is going to be one of the biggest stars of Hollywood because she has understanding and depth and ability and lovely legs.”  To that end, he ordered a fabulous wardrobe for Miles, and cranked up the Hollywood publicity machine. But life intervened. Hitchcock’s need for gall bladder surgery delayed the production, as did time-off requested by the hard-working male lead James Stewart. And then Miles had the nerve to become pregnant with her third child, a move that Hitchcock considered something of a personal insult. (He was to say in later years, “I hate pregnant women because then they have children.”)  So Kim Novak got the plum dual role of Madeleine Elster and Judy Barton instead, though Hitchcock did feature Miles in his television dramas and in a key supporting part as Marion Crane’s sister in Psycho.

I know all the above because of Christopher McKittrick’s new biography, Vera Miles: The Hitchcock Blonde Who Got Away, coming in March from University Press of Kentucky. There’s no question that McKittrick has done his homework. Though he never had the opportunity to speak to Miles directly, he seems to know everything there is to know about her life and times, and in passing fills us in on everyone with whom she ever connected. Though it’s interesting seeing her on the set of masterworks like Ford’s The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, I was most impressed with Miles’ evolution in later years into a woman who knew how to stand up for herself, one who clearly saw the lack of meaty roles for women and became determined to do something about it. (I’d love to know what she thinks about the current crop of films like Anora, The Substance, and Emilia Pérez—as well as last year’s Poor Things—whereby today’s actresses are coming to dominate the industry in which she once played a significant part. As someone always considered ladylike, she might not be pleased by the outrageous roles Hollywood’s women are now undertaking.) 

McKittrick considers it refreshing that Miles, far from becoming a burned-out Hollywood cautionary tale, largely ran her career on her own terms. As he puts it, “If opportunities like that of Vertigo passed her by because she chose other, more personally fulfilling paths for her life, those were decisions she was happy to make and has continued to stand by in her retirement.”  

 

The Fire Next Time: Roger Corman and Disaster Movies

I haven’t wanted to write about the terrible conflagrations in my part of the world because it just makes me too sad. Life in West Los Angeles right now seems, in bizarre and tragic ways, to be mirroring the climactic Burning of Los Angeles as depicted in The Day of the Locust. (This 1939 novella was made into a 1975 John Schlesinger film, but for me its on-screen finale doesn’t match in any way the power of Nathanael West’s original prose.)

 I’m lucky, at least, to be in a Santa Monica neighborhood that’s currently not being threatened, though of course anything’s possible. But friends (some of them elderly) have lost everything, and the heartbreak around here is overwhelming. Still, with stiff upper lip I’m turning away from the tragedy here to write about my late boss, low-budget filmmaker Roger Corman, and how he tried to turn disasters to his advantage.

 While I was Roger’s story editor at Concorde-New Horizons, in 1989,  there was a major earthquake in the vicinity of San Francisco. It’s almost impossible to photograph an earthquake, since (believe me!) quakes happen without warning, so capturing the actual shaking on film wasn’t a consideration. Still, Roger dispatched a small film crew, which came back to L.A. with some unimpressive footage of cracks and rubble. Then there was the matter of a script. At first Roger got caught up with the issue of shoddy infrastructure, and wanted to make the villain of his piece a bureaucrat beholden to private interests who ignored safety protocols when issuing building permits. For this (with my encouragement) he hired a very good writer of prose fiction, Madison Smartt Bell, in hopes that he would become the next John Sayles, a man who could graduate from page to screen.

  Unfortunately Roger’s concept was too thorny for what was intended as an action flick larded with sex and violence. So the thoroughly-baffled Madison was canned, and Quake was ultimately written in-house by my colleague Rob Kerchner, along with Concorde regular Mark Evan Schwartz. Someone (probably Rob) had the good idea of using the post-quake chaos as a backdrop for a variation on a popular John Fowles novel called The Collector. In 1965 it had become a film starring Terence Stamp as a warped young man who abducts a beautiful woman (Samantha Eggar) and keeps her as a specimen for his “collection.” Our film, directed by Louis Morneau, starred Steve Railsback as a warped young man who abducts a young woman in the aftermath of the so-called Loma Prieta quake.  And what about that rubble footage that Roger had sent his minions to shoot? Quake (aka Aftershock)  was advertised as capturing the actual earthquake on film for the audience’s viewing pleasure.

 It didn’t always take a natural disaster to inspire Roger. The Los Angeles riots of 1992, sparked by the beating of Rodney King, led him to propose another “ripped from the headlines” film, to be called (prophetically, I now realize) Night of a Thousand Fires. He quickly gathered three eager young screenwriters (at least one of them brand-new to L.A.) to create a hard-hitting story that would take in the disparate perspectives of Black rioters, Korean shop-keepers, and the entrenched white hierarchy. With great fanfare, he held a press conference to announce the project. But then, in typical Roger fashion. he quickly lost interest . . . because he realized that with Spielberg shooting a cinematic version of Michael Crichton’s Jurassic Park it was high time for a quickie dinosaur movie, one that would beat Spielberg’s film into theatres.  And so 1993’s Carnosaur was born. 

 

“A Complete Unknown”: Bob Dylan Finds (and roars away from) Fame

Watching the Bob Dylan biopic, A Complete Unknown, was like returning (yikes!) to my college years. Though never a hardcore Dylan fan, I attended a Hollywood Bowl concert that took place soon after Dylan shocked his fans at the 1965 Newport Folk Festival by playing a plugged-in electric set with members of the Paul Butterfield Blues Band. As at Newport, there was booing at the Bowl, with audience members showing their fury that a man they regarded as an earnest young folkie (a poet and an one-man band, in Paul Simon’s terms) was turning toward rock-and-roll.

 Back then, as an atypical Sixties kid more interested in literature than protest, I didn’t quite see what the fuss was about. But in watching A Complete Unknown I was surprised how much I responded to those oh-so-familiar tunes: the wistful “Blowin’ in the Wind,” the ominous “A Hard Rain's a-Gonna Fall,” the jaunty "Subterranean Homesick Blues." And I realized, via the film, how much Dylan—a man who liked to be inscrutable—revealed about himself in his songs.

 It was smart of the filmmakers to focus on the very young Dylan, arriving in New York’s Greenwich Village in 1961 but then—feeling the burden of fame—lighting out for the territory in 1965. In Timothée Chalamet’s sensitive portrayal we see how much he owes to the friends he made along the way, but also how badly he wanted to cut ties that were all too binding.

  According to the film, perhaps the most important relationship he built was that with Pete Seeger, played by an excellent Edward Norton. They meet in the dismal hospital room where Pete is watching over the dying Woody Guthrie, a longtime Dylan hero. From the first, the two veteran folksingers are impressed by Dylan’s original ballads, and see him as the potential messiah who can bring young people into the folk music scene, with its emphasis on social awareness and the beauty of the acoustic guitar. Having survived two Dune films, Chalamet is clearly used to playing messiahs-in-the-making, but the point of A Complete Unknown is that he doesn’t want to be one.

 Nor does he want to be part of a permanent romantic couple. This lesson is ultimately learned by the women in his life. Elle Fanning’s Sylvie Russo (a re-naming at Dylan’s own request of the real-life Suze Rotolo) introduces him to social action, but is unable to penetrate his self-imposed inscrutability. Joan Baez, beautifully portrayed by Monica Barbaro, partners him on the stage and sometimes in bed, but can’t get him to play nice while on tour and refuses to be merely his occasional sexual conquest.

 Which brings me to the Dylan songs that explain it all. “It Ain’t Me, Babe” (a duet by Dylan and Baez in the film, while a stricken Sylvie looks on from the wings) makes clear he rejects any long-term romantic connection: “It ain’t me you’re looking for.”  The lyrics of “Don't Think Twice, It's All Right” seem to justify an itch to cut ties and hit the road. Most apt of all is the tune whose lyric gives the film its title. “Like a Rolling Stone” is the song of a loner “with no direction home,” one who is ultimately heading out on his motorcycle to points unknown. But perhaps the lyric that stays with me most is Guthrie’s own ditty as sung by Pete Seeger, depicted here as the gentle Mister Rogers of the folk music scene: “So long, it’s been good to know yuh . . . I’ve got to be driftin’ along.”

  

 

A (Semi) Golden Evening at the Golden Globes

Who votes for the Golden Globes, anyway? The top-of-the-year awards ceremony used to be hosted by the Hollywood Foreign Press, a small cadre of foreign journalists known for their eccentricity, their snootiness, and their willingness to be bought by the highest bidder. (A “new star of the year” statuette for Pia Zadora? Really?)

 After an outcry a few years back about the group’s ongoing racist inclinations, there was a complex reshuffling of the Globes’ voting bloc, and I don’t pretend to know who’s in charge now. I do know, though, several key things. First of all, that the event still tries to present itself as the awards season’s best party, with attendees served a festive dinner and booze flowing like water. Secondly, that awards go to both movie and TV bigshots (crafts categories are pretty much ignored). And, thirdly, that best picture and best actor awards are divided between dramas, on the one hand, and comedies or musicals on the other. This divvying up of films by genre perhaps made sense at one time: at the Oscars great comic performances have often been overlooked in favor of actors playing dead-serious roles. But the categorizing at the Globes often leads, as it did this year, to some head-scratching choices. Take the Best Motion Picture—Musical or Comedy category. It’s easy to see that Wicked belongs there. But what about Anora,  A Real Pain, The Substance, and the ultimate winner, Emilia Pérez?  Yes, they might contain hilarious moments, but films in which the heroine suffers a ghastly fate don’t strike me as fundamentally funny. Nor does a movie whose climax is a visit to a Polish concentration camp.

 Host Nikki Glaser, who’s been receiving major plaudits for her performance, got off some good lines in her opening monologue, which nicely skewered Hollywood pomposity. I enjoyed her intro of “two-time Holocaust survivor” Adrien Brody, but particularly appreciated her canny reference to “the hardest-working actors in the room,” the ones that were busy serving the meal on which celebrities in tight outfits were cautiously nibbling. In the later innings, though, Glaser didn’t seem to have much to say. She DID show up in a series of glamorous gowns, each designed to show us she has two breasts in working order.  (Breasts were definitely star attractions among the ceremony’s female contingent.) At one point Glaser started in on a song mashing up Conclave and Wicked’s “Popular.” I had high hopes for comedy gold, but her “Pope-ular” stopped almost as soon as it started. As for other great funny moments, fuhgeddaboudit . . . except when an impish Seth Rogen and a priceless Catherine O’Hara admitted to the awards they’d supposedly won (like The Golden Antler and The Beaver) in their native Canada. Theirs was the only appearance that had me laughing out loud.

 What about the winners? The prize for most emotional definitely went to Best Female Actor in a Supporting Role (yes, that’s how they put it), Zoe Saldaña, who seemed overcome by her win to the point of choking up, and then couldn’t stop talking. Having seen Emilia Pérez, I agree that she earned her award. Almost equally emotional (and equally voluble) was Adrien Brody, Best Male Actor in a Motion Picture--Drama for another much-honored flick, The Brutalist. Demi Moore was articulate and touching in explaining how The Substance (a comedy??) gave her a new lease on her professional life, in keeping with the film’s own themes. But the #1 surprise was Fernanda Torres of Argentina, for the Brazilian I’m Still Here, beating out some of Hollywood’s finest. This I’ve gotta see!  

 

A Change for the Better: “Emilia Pérez”

A friend with a strong interest in movies has chosen not to see Emilia Pérez.  He said he just couldn’t get excited about a film that focused on a Mexican crime lord’s sexual transition from male to female. The fact that it is a musical made it seem, to him, even odder. And I admit I had something of the same feelings. I’m a bit overwhelmed, right now, regarding movies (and other art forms) that focus intensely on gender dysphoria.

 But then Emilia Pérez showed up on Netflix, which meant I could watch it for free. And I was certainly curious (though not yellow) to see why this film set the Cannes Film Festival abuzz, and won a Best Actress prize to be divided among its featured female ensemble. The actresses included Latin American stars Zoe Saldaña and Selena Gomez, along with Karla Sofía Gascón, a Spanish performer who transitioned from male to female in 2018. Gascón has been mentioned as a possible Oscar nominee, and I can see why. In the film’s early going, she is featured as a gruff, tremendously fearsome cartel boss who is not in the least feminine. As Juan "Manitas" Del Monte  she summons a talented but underappreciated female attorney (Saldaña) and forcefully explains her desire to leave her current life—whatever the cost—and become a woman. There follow several rather goofy musical segments in which Saldaña travels the world, looking for doctors who are both discreet and adept at sexual reassignment surgeries. For the right price, it’s amazing how many services are available. An add-on procedure to remove the “Adam’s apple”? Sure.

 I enjoyed all of the above, but couldn’t see why French writer- director Jacques Audiard was racking up major honors for this film. But once Manitas becomes Emilia, the film radically changes its tone. Whereas Manitas was imperious and cold, Emilia is warmth personified. In her new and quite attractive body, she’s positively glowing. But she’s no longer just interested in self-satisfaction. Now, with Saldaña’s Rita as her lieutenant, she’s started a major charity to help mistreated women. (Rita’s mixed emotions are striking. When Emilia suckers a large group of drug lords into showing up at a banquet to support her group, Rita acts out her contempt for these potential benefactors in a remarkable fantasy number that shows off her stunning dance moves.) 

 The film’s musical numbers have the virtue of reminding us that this story is built on fantasy. But the fantasy co-exists with some tender moments that are deeply felt, like Emilia’s growing longing to be with the young children she once sired, and her little son’s hunch that his newly arrived “aunt” is somehow closer to his absent father than she might seem. Love is in the air in all its iterations: Emilia forms a romantic bond with a needy young wife who’s glad to be rid of her abusive husband. Meanwhile, Selena Gomez’s Jessi, believing herself the widow of the absent Manitas, falls for the slimy Gustavo and helps hatch a desperate plan that will dominate the film’s last section. Alas, surprises await. 

 What’s this movie saying? That women are better (if not necessarily stronger) than men? That seems much too simplistic a conclusion. And Gomez’s Jessi, for all her moments of self-reproach, is hardly saintly. Let’s just say Emilia Pérez is about the value of being true to your authentic self. Manitas was once hated and feared. But Emilia, at film’s end, is recognized as a hero, even a saint. As a woman, she brings her community together, instead of tearing it apart. 

 

Reviving “Shaun of the Dead”

As we all know from movies as varied as Dracula and Twilight, vampires can be sexy. Zombies, though, not so much. A zombie apocalypse means a large (and growing) contingent of slobbering undead humanoids staggering through the streets, on the trail of human victims who are fated (once bitten) to turn into zombies themselves. Yuck! 

 I’ve learned that the concept of a zombie developed out of Haitian folklore, involving the resurrection of dead souls. The word “zombie,” adapted from African languages, entered English in 1819, via poet Robert Southey’s history of Brazil. But our current obsession with zombies can be credited mostly to filmmaker George A. Romero, whose spooky 1954 low-budget horror flick, Night of the Living Dead, was followed by two equally popular sequels. Michael Jackson helped too: in his 1983 music video, “Thriller,” ghoulish creatures rise from their graves and foot-drag down the sidewalk in pursuit of potential victims.

 Clearly, zombies are not a lot of fun. Except when it comes to an unlikely zombie comedy that borrows the title of Romero’s second film, Dawn of the Dead. In that 1978 drama, zombies take over an all-American suburban shopping mall, with bloody results. In 2004, director Zack Snyder came up with a Dawn of the Dead remake: he assembled an all-star cast (Sarah Polley, Ving Rhames, Ty Burrell) as mall clerks and shoppers fending off the inevitable carnage. That same year brought a British film that gave “stiff upper lip” a new meaning. Comic writer/performers Edgar Wright and Simon Pegg set their story in the Crouch End section of London. In their telling, vividly directed by Wight, the zombie apocalypse challenges the laid-back lifestyle of two slackers (vividly played by Pegg and comedian Nick Frost) who are mostly oblivious to the world around them. Belatedly getting their cues from a newsreader on their big-screen TV, they try staving off the marauders by flinging disks from their record collection (like, for instance, the Batman soundtrack), but discover that a cricket bat works better. Still, while Shaun discovers in himself some unexpected leadership qualities, the easily distracted Ed keeps ducking out to eat ice cream and play video games. Eventually a cluster of survivors ends up inside Shaun and Ed’s favorite pub, with zombies trying to break down the windows.

 Though it’s impossible to take any of the above too seriously, there’s still some real pathos in Shaun’s valiant attempts to protect his ex-girlfriend (who eventually finds new respect for this doofus) and his mother (who does her best to accept some dramatic changes in her comfortable life). I’ve read that none other than Helen Mirren was offered the mother’s rather surprisingly poignant role, though she turned it down; veteran actress Penelope Wilton (of The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel) is a fine substitute. But perhaps the single most vivid performance is turned in by the always memorable Bill Nighy, who plays Shaun’s stepdad. At first he’s a grouchy middle-class type, proud of his Jaguar and carpingly critical of his stepson. But as the supernatural invaders close in, his deeply-felt apology to Shaun is touching . . . and then, well, Nighy is singularly creepy when he’s undead.

  I won’t spoil any more of the plot. But it’s worth noting that George Romero—Mr. Zombie himself—was delighted by Shaun of the Dead, to the point that he offered Wright and Pegg roles in his 2005 Land of the Dead. Both turned down the parts he had reserved for them and insisted on appearing as zombies, among hordes of others. They wanted, I’m guessing, to know how the other half “lives.”  

 

The Colorful Drama of Purple Noon

The recent passing of French leading man Alain Delon called my attention to the fact that, at the start of a long career, he first hit it big in René Clément’s 1960 thriller, Plein Soleil, known to American moviegoers as Purple Noon. I never saw this film until recently, but its title instantly had meaning for me. Back when I was in high school, my French teacher handed out extra credit for various experiences involving the French language. If you dined at a local French restaurant and swore that you’d spoke en français to the waiter, you got points. (This proved very popular with my family, all of whom loved the opportunity to further my scholastic career by dining out.) You also got points for attending a French-language film and trying hard not to read the subtitles. Most of us kids, thoroughly brainwashed by Hollywood, had no interested in checking out a film in French. And our teacher, in recommending Purple Noon (then playing at a local art house), said nothing to convince us that we’d actually find this film entertaining. As a consequence, I missed out on more extra credit, as well as a chance to see a really fascinating cinematic game of cat-and-mouse.

 Purple Noon (certainly a garish title) turns out to be the first screen adaptation of Patricia Highsmith’s famous 1955 thriller, The Talented Mr. Ripley. Forty-four years later, Anthony Minghella wrote and directed a much more complicated English-language version. It starred a young Matt Damon and featured such rising talents as Gwyneth Paltrow, Jude Law, Cate Blanchett, and Philip Seymour Hoffman in a tale of a young man who’ll go to any lengths (including bloody ones) to achieve the lifestyle he feels he deserves. Highsmith herself strongly preferred Delon’s take on Tom Ripley, which relies less on pathos and more on the audience’s ability to identify with a young man whose creative improvisations help him get what he wants out of life.

 It's been pointed out that Ripley’s story goes well into film noir territory, but shifts the formula by being shot in brilliant color in some of the world’s most beautifully sunlit places. Much of the action of Purple Noon takes place on a gorgeous yacht off the coast of Italy. That’s where a feckless, and very wealthy, young San Franciscan named Philippe Greenleaf sets out on a cruise along with his fiancée, Marge, and his amusing new buddy, Tom Ripley. Philippe is not a very gracious host, especially after he discovers Tom trying on his clothes. What happens between them sets the stage for a series of deceptions in which Tom, back on shore, creatively pretends (with the help of a portable typewriter and some glue) that Philippe is alive and well, happily ensconced at a local hostelry. His on-and-off masquerade as Philippe leads to additional mayhem, as well as to his passionate wooing of Marge, for reasons that eventually become all too plain.

 It's curious (and perhaps disturbing) that British author Highsmith imagined Tom Ripley as a born-and-bred American. Her multiple follow-up novels to The Talented Mr. Ripley have led to several additional films as well as a 2024 Netflix miniseries. Obviously, this is a young man whose exploits we love to follow, even if we don’t consider him a model of wholesome behavior. The French version, Purple Noon, largely sidesteps the novel’s obvious homoerotic subtext: what else would you expect in 1960? Still, this is a marvelous intro to a sinister but fascinating world. Too bad it’s too late for me to get extra credit.