The Rain Pounds in “Ponyo”

Of course I admire the films of Studio Ghibli, as led by the great Japanese animator Hayao Miyazaki, That being said, although I find much of the master’s work thrilling, I believe some of it is overly complicated and occasionally downright grim. But I’ve just seen Ponyo, a story oriented toward a young audience, and found it thoroughly charming, deftly blending a lively sense of magic with the studio’s long-time commitment to the wellbeing of the natural world.

 In watching Ponyo, I found myself thinking about “The Little Mermaid,” not the Disney animated film but rather the original Hans Christian Andersen story. That’s why I was pleased to discover that Miyazaki recalled reading Andersen’s tale as a young child and being bitterly disappointed by its ending. In Ponyo, which features along with the title character a good-hearted boy and his mother, five-year-old Sōsuke truly loves his mysterious playmate, and his devotion allows her to live on in his world instead of melting into seafoam. Ponyo takes place in and near the ocean: its young heroine evolves in the course of the film from a goldfish-like sea creature into a spunky little red-headed  girl. She’s magical both because of what she’s capable of doing (like expanding a toy boat until it’s large enough to sail on) and because she has an unstoppable love of life.

 In the early 2000s, Miyazaki was such a superstar that major English-speaking actors were eager to voice the characters for his films’ international versions. In 2004’s Howl’s Moving Castle, based on a British children’s novel, the central figure, Sophie, is played as a young girl by Emily Mortimer and as a much older one by the ageless Jean Simmons. Christian Bale voices the exotic Howl, and none other than Lauren Bacall is the Witch of the Waste.  

Four years later,  the English-language dub of Ponyo was directed by John Lasseter and other Pixar honchos. Ponyo herself is voiced by Miley Cyrus’s young sister, Noah, Sōsuke by Nick Jonas, and his mother by the indomitable Tina Fey. Key smaller roles are played by Matt Damon, Liam Neeson, and Cate Blanchett as an ethereal Goddess of Mercy. And the clutch of colorful oldsters (a popular element in many Ghibli films) is voiced by some of Hollywood’s finest: Cloris Leachman, Lily Tomlin, and Betty White.

 As always in Ghibli films, characters reflect anime traditions and do not look especially Asian. For central roles, wild red hair and a tall, thin frame seem particularly popular. For instance, these traits help to identify Neeson’s character, the ambiguous semi-human Fujimoto, who considers himself Ponyo’s father as well as the protector of the natural world. But the film’s landscape, full of seaside crags. step promontories, and wild waves, unquestionably reflects Japan’s own dramatic topography. As, in the wake of Ponyo’s adoption of life on land, the natural order gets skewed, the ocean boils up into a terrifying maelstrom, threatening both ships at sea and homes on the shore. Giant waves rock tiny boats full of fleeing citizens, capturing the sense of heightened natural turmoil we know from Tokugawa-period Japanese woodblock prints (One classic example: Katsushika Hokusai’s iconic 1831 “Great Wave Off Kanagawa”). Meanwhile torrential rain pounds the land, submerging whole villages. The animation in these scenes is powerful indeed, adding hugely to the dramatic force  of what could in other hands be a sugary-sweet little tale.

 The weather gods tell us to expect intense El Niño conditions later this year. That means, at least where I live, heavy rains pounding the very dry earth. Who know? Maybe more Ghibli inspiration. 

 

A Heartfelt Ode to Lovers and Other Strangers

Yes, I’m a bit of a sucker for wedding movies, especially those that suggest that it’s possible to achieve wedded bliss. Lovers and Other Strangers came out in 1970, when I was heading toward marriage myself. I’m not sure this little film acknowledges the possibility of happily ever after, but it’s both romantic (at times) and extremely funny (often).

 Two of the writers of this film are Renée Taylor and Joseph Bologna, a married couple who presumably knew the territory. They first launched this comedy on Broadway, where it was a hit of the 1968 season, with Taylor in a key role. She doesn’t appear in the film, which was co-written by David Zelag Goodman, but the three shared an Oscar nomination for their screenplay. (By the way, Bologna passed on in 2017, but Taylor is still around at the ripe old age of 91.)

 The centerpiece of the film is the wedding of two attractive young New Yorkers, Susan (Bonnie Bedelia) and Mike (Michael Brandon). Though their parents don’t know it, they’ve been sharing an apartment for a year. Now, on the eve of their wedding, Mike isn’t sure he wants to change the status quo. But Susan, who seems to have good insight into the working of her boyfriend’s mind, cheerfully proceeds with the gown fitting and other plans for the elaborate out-of-town nuptials to which they’ve committed. In the course of their pre-wedding errands, we come to know their families. Mike’s lower-middle-class Italian parents (Beatrice Arthur and the Oscar-nominated Richard Castellano) seem in many ways to be a mismatch: she’s devoutly Roman Catholic and he has had a few extramarital flings, but doesn’t see the point in going to confession. Yet though they bicker constantly and don’t pretend to be entirely happy with one another, they’re unified in their horror that older son Richie is on the brink of divorce. (His pretty young wife is Diane Keaton, in her first film role. She’s a romantic who laments that since a year or two of marriage, Richie’s hair no longer smells like raisins.)

 Meanwhile Susan’s affluent Irish-Catholic parents (Gig Young and Cloris Leachman) present themselves as an attractive married couple. This is a façade, however, because the very smooth Hal is juggling his marital commitments and a fling with the woebegone Kathy (Anne Jackson). Kathy, alas, always seems to be weeping in the bathroom as Hal weasels out of promises to divorce his wife. And there’s one more screwball coupling, between a hot-to-trot cousin (Bob Dishy) and a ditzy bridesmaid (Marian Hailey) who’s really into Camus and Khalil Gibran. (When she mentions taking part in the recent student protests on the campus of Columbia University, he’s impressed that she’s an Ivy Leaguer. No, she earnestly explains, she was one of the “outside agitators” there.) 

 With all this going on, it’s remarkable that the wedding comes off as planned, leaving us hoping that at least one couple will find joy in holy matrimony, at least for now. The film won favor both from audiences and Oscar voters, earning three nominations. (Its only victory was for its song, “For All We Know,” which became a hit for The Carpenters and a staple at weddings from that day to this.)

 An eerie postscript: Gig Young, the one-time Oscar-winner who plays the straying father of the bride, was married five times. His last marriage, in 1978 when he was 64, was to a 31-year-old German magazine editor. Three weeks later, he apparently killed his wife and then himself. So much for happily ever after.

 

 

 

 

 

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Tears and Chuckles in the Newsroom: Ed Asner Bites the Dust

It’s been a tough year for The Mary Tyler Moore Show. The workplace sitcom, set mostly in the newsroom of a Minneapolis TV station, ran from 1970 to 1977. For me it was essential viewing, as part of a Saturday night CBS comedy line-up. Though not nearly as in-your-face outrageous as 1971’s All in the Family and some of the sitcoms that followed, Mary Tyler Moore contributed to an adult kind of comedy by focusing on a young single woman more focused on her career than on her marital prospects. The show’s most endearing trait, though, was its well-established sense of camaraderie between Mary and her newsroom pals, whose interactions would seem familiar to anyone who’s ever toiled in an office setting. The grumpy boss; the eager assistant; the sardonic sidekick; the social climber; the doofus who somehow succeeds beyond everyone else’s expectations: all of these familiar types make their appearance on the show. But they’re more than simply caricatures: talented writer/creators James L. Brooks and Allan Burns make them real, complex individuals (well, maybe aside from smarmy news anchor Ted Baxter, who gives egotism a bad name). And, from all accounts, the actors playing these roles happily worked together to produce, week after week, can’t-miss TV.

 But 2021 has hardly been kind to the Mary Tyler Moore alumni. Over the years, many of the eight regulars passed away, starting with Ted Knight (much acclaimed for playing popinjay Ted Baxter) dying of cancer back in 1986, and the radiant Mary herself succumbing to illness in 2017. Two years later, we lost Valerie Harper, who was unforgettably acerbic as Mary’s lovelorn pal, Rhoda. But 2021 saw the demise of three of the series’ stars. In January it was Cloris Leachman, hilariously neurotic as the narcissistic Phyllis Lindstrom, but also an Oscar-winning dramatic actress (for The Last Picture Show). February brought the death of Gavin MacLeod, who played perennial office wiseacre Murray Slaughter, then went on to other good-guy TV roles. And, of course, last week it was everyone’s favorite newsroom boss, the crusty but fundamentally tender-hearted Lou Grant, played by the invaluable Edward Asner. Asner had a long run as Lou Grant, both on the Mary Tyler Moore Show and later heading up a serious take on newspaper journalism, called simply Lou Grant (1977-1982). So closely was Asner identified with this role that when he appeared in other dramatic contexts, as in the 1977 miniseries Roots, you couldn’t help wondering why in the world Lou Grant was commanding a slave ship.

 Like all other fans, I have my favorite episodes. One is the much-acclaimed “Chuckles Bites the Dust,” in which a local TV clown has dressed up as a peanut for a local parade, only to be mauled to death by a confused elephant. The heart of episode takes place at Chuckles’ funeral, where the staff of WJM desperately try to keep from laughing at the whole tragic but absurd situation.  But in tribute to Ed Asner, I just watched the series’ last two episodes. In one, Mary and Lou try – at long last – to get romantic, but quickly realize that their work relationship makes courtship impossible. The very last show of all highlights the dispersal  of the WJM team after an ownership change and mass firing. The valiantly unsentimental Lou can’t help blurting out, “I treasure you people.” Personally, I feel the same way.

 Kudos to sole survivor Betty White. She’s 99 now: may she continue to live long and prosper. Right now I don’t want to lose any more of the show’s alumni.

 

 

 

Larry McMurtry’s First Picture Show

In homage to the late Larry McMurtry, chronicler of the American West in all its complexity, I’ve been watching movies made from his work. There’s a whole slew of those, including Oscar winners Terms of Endearment and Brokeback Mountain. The very first was Hud (1963), adapted from a McMurtry novel. But The Last Picture Show (1971) was the first film (though not the last) for which McMurtry provided a screenplay, working with director Peter Bogdanovich to transform his own prose fiction for the screen.

 By the time he made The Last Picture Show, Bogdanovich was a veteran of Roger Corman’s B-movie world, responsible for the macabre thriller, Targets. But The Last Picture Show was his leap into the bigtime, and he made the most of it, turning out a moody tribute to a dying Texas town and its lonely, love-starved denizens. The opportunity to participate must have thrilled McMurtry, who was known to lament in later years that “Movies have largely lost interest in character. It is not without significance that two of the most publicized characters in the cinema have been a shark and a mechanical ape.”

 The Last Picture Show, filmed in evocative black & white, mostly in the tiny Texas town where McMurtry grew up, is all about character. In contrast to the year’s big Oscar winner, The French Connection, it moves forward slowly, exploring the intricate relationships of the town’s citizens, who are played by some of Hollywood’s finest actors. Cloris Leachman won an Oscar for her poignant role as a neglected housewife; other acting nominees for this film included a young Jeff Bridges (as the hero’s laid-back buddy) and Ellen Burstyn as a mother who sees her daughter’s character flaws—and her own—with all too much clarity. For Randy Quaid, in the small but sharply observed role of a well-to-do high school kid, it was the start of a major Hollywood career. 

 And of course The Last Picture Show marked the cinematic debut of model Cybill Shepherd, who plays Jacy Squires. Shepherd’s blonde beauty is electric on screen, and in one sense the entire town is shown to revolve around her haughty sense of sexual entitlement. But there’s a sad footnote to her presence in the film. Bogdanovich was apparently as bedazzled as his cast of characters. By the end of the shoot, he and Shepherd were together, leaving his wife and longtime artistic partner Polly Platt out in the cold. The multi-talented Polly, whom I was fortunate to interview at length in 2008, eventually recouped and went on to have a major Hollywood career of her own. But this film marked the end of the strong husband-and-wife collaboration that had seen them through their Corman years.

 The Last Picture Show was nominated for a total of eight Oscars, including Best Picture. Aside from Leachman’s win, the only other Oscar for the film was taken home by Ben Johnson, in the small but commanding role of the town’s moral conscience, known as Sam the Lion. The story is that he had to be persuaded by his mentor, John Ford, to accept the part. He was sought after by Bogdanovich, a true student of cinema history, partly because of his association (as stuntman and actor) with Ford and John Wayne, whose sidekick he often played. The Last Picture Show draws to a close with a final screening at the town’s one cinema. The movie on the screen is the 1948 classic western, Red River. This film, as well as Ben Johnson’s casting, represents a fond look back at the glory days of the silver screen.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Age Enhances Beauty: A Salute to Cloris Leachman and Cicely Tyson

We’ve just lost two Hollywood icons who enjoyed long showbiz careers. Both Cloris Leachman, who passed away January 27 at age 94, and Cicely Tyson, who died the following day at 96, were performing on film and television almost until the very end. It’s wonderful to see that talented, award-winning actresses are not always put out to pasture when their glamour days are behind them.

 This thought, that women past a certain age can continue to have acting careers, is an encouraging one. The British have always been better than we are at appreciating their well-seasoned performers, as witness the leading roles that are still being played by such stars as Maggie Smith, Helen Mirren, and Judi Dench. I’m old enough to recall seeing Dame Judi as a sexy Titania in a long-ago TV performance of Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream: I’ll never forget how she was described in the press as “toothsome.” Today, at 86, she doesn’t flaunt her sex appeal, but she still plays stellar roles and wins awards.

 In the U.S., Meryl Streep (going on 72) contains to play leads, even getting the guy in last year’s The Prom. Still, we have a long tradition of shying away from the whole ageing process, especially when it applies to women. This was emphatically brought home to me last week when I watched a Hollywood classic, 1950’s All About Eve. This exhilarating backstage drama claims to be about stage actors, but its implication for the ladies of the silver screen can’t be overlooked. In All About Eve, Bette Davis (at 42) plays Margo Channing, a beloved stage actress, one for whom Broadway’s best playwright creates leading romantic parts. Though at the top of her game, Margo remains insecure—and with very good reason, because a ruthless young understudy named Eve Harrington is ready and willing to take over her roles and her place on the Great White Way. No one disputes Margo’s talent, but it’s strongly suggested that she’s hopelessly past her prime.

 All About Eve may be an oldie, but—regarding ageing actresses—times have not entirely changed for the better. In 2015, a viral video captured Amy Schumer being schooled by fellow Hollywood icons Tina Fey, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, and Patricia Arquette on the danger of approaching her “last fuckable day.” Once, it’s implied, she’s no longer sexually appealing, her bright career will quickly dim.

 Cloris Leachman came out of television to win a supporting actress Oscar in 1971’s melancholy The Last Picture Show. Rarely a leading lady, she played the hilarious supporting role of Frau Blücher (insert horse whinny here) in Mel Brooks’ Young Frankenstein, and also showed off her rambunctious side in a Roger Corman outlaw flick, Crazy Mama. I remember her most fondly as Phyllis Lindstrom, Mary Tyler Moore’s TV neighbor, who copes hilariously with an off-screen husband who’s been canoodling with Betty White’s “Happy Homemaker.”

 Cicely Tyson made a big impression in the Seventies as a sharecropper in Sounder (best actress Oscar nomination) and in the title role of The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman (Emmy award). The two roles shaped her determination to play dignified African-American characters who advance the cause of civil rights. Thereafter she continued to rack up honors for stage and TV work. Lucky me: I saw her starring in a stage revival of The Trip to Bountiful. Her part was that of an ancient woman returning to her small-town Texas home one last time. Then nearly 90, she was charming but convincingly feeble—until she strode out for her curtain call.  Then it seemed fair to call her ageless.