MIRROR / ZERKALO (1975)

After making the two best Russian films of his generation (IVAN’S CHILDHOOD/’62; ANDREI RUBLEV/’66) , Andrei Tarkovsky’s gaze turned aggressively inward with films that asked not to be watched, but studied.*  With a mere five films before his early death twenty years after RUBLEV, this, second of the five, came right after his one popular title, SOLARIS/’72, ironically a success in the wake of Kubick’s 2001/’68.  (Ironic as Tarkovsky no Kubrick fancier.)   A poetic look back at themes from his youth (not visually poetic, literally poetic, as in they're read to us), it’s less memory piece than memorabilia: newsreel clips, recreated housing and well-worn foot-paths, covered with high-toned classical music (Bach & Purcell) and Da Vinci prints for borrowed gravitas; family sickness and abandonment the main concerns.  There’s quite a cult for these later Tarkovsky films, but the precipitous drop from a shared vision to hermitic interior view is antithetical to a medium that runs at a set speed.  Yes, we can now pause and rewind from the comfort of our sofa, but it still goes against the nature of the medium.  At least this runs under two hours.

WATCH THIS, NOT THAT/LINK:  As mentioned, IVAN’S CHILDHOOD, one of the greatest of all film debuts, along with his masterpiece ANDREI RUBLEV.  https://maksquibs.blogspot.com/2016/09/ivanovo-detstvo-ivans-childhood-1962.html   OR:  While the sensibilities are different, Hungarian Béla Tarr pulls off much of what Tarkovsky tried for.  See: WERCKMEISTER HARMONIES/’00 and THE TURIN HORSE/’11.   https://maksquibs.blogspot.com/2013/05/a-torinoi-lo-turin-horse-2011.html

SCREWY THOUGHT OF THE DAY:  *Stretching to make a point: imagine Robert Altman, after MCCABE & MRS. MILLER/’71 and THE LONG GOODBYE/’73 turning to 3 WOMEN/’77 and QUINTET/’79.  Oh wait, that’s just what he did.

JOHNNY COOL (1963)

Between BEACH PARTY/’63 and MUSCLE BEACH PARTY/’64 (tv’s BEWITCHED with wife Elizabeth Montgomery came next), journeyman director William Asher tried something ‘serious’ to laughable effect with this mafioso crime drama.  Produced by Peter Lawford post-Rat Pack exile (retribution after Lawford’s Kennedy in-laws snubbed Sinatra), he still managed to bag Sammy Davis Jr. & Joey Bishop in roles while Jack Palance stand-in Henry Silva stars as a grown-up Sicilian WWII partisan (speaking Italian rather than Sicilian dialect in the prologue) who’s tricked into coming to America to take out the mob men who informed on Johnny Colini.  Taking the same name, Silva’s tagged ‘Johnny Cool’ and starts crossing names off his list between trysts with an unbecomingly brunette Montgomery.*  The departed include Telly Savalas, John McGiver, Mort Sahl (!), even Jim Backus, who gives us a taste of Mr. Magoo before dying.  (Judging by the haphazard cutting within scenes, I fear the film's editor may also have been  dispatched.)  The mob and the law will catch up with Silva’s Cool, but not before Sammy sings the title track and takes off his eye patch.  That’s a surprise!  Another is seeing how seriously everyone takes this junk and that, in its way, it’s a fun, dumb watch.

SCREWY THOUGHT OF THE DAY:  *Babyboomers of all genders & sexual persuasions knew their fantasies had matured when they graduated from blonde Elizabeth Montgomery in BEWITCHED to Diana Rigg in THE AVENGERS.