Raising Arizona

"Every time I put on a lens, Joel and Ethan would ask, 'Does it look wacky enough?'"

– Barry Sonnenfeld, cinematographer, Raising Arizona

The Coen brothers have an incredible knack for creating rich, detailed films with snappy dialogue and little nuances that make them a real joy to watch. Raising Arizona (1987) is no exception. Fresh from their independent success with Blood Simple (1984), the Coens shifted gears rather dramatically, going from a straight-faced thriller to this gonzo screwball comedy about southern white trash and child rearing. Inspired by the writings of William Wordsworth and the films of Preston Sturges, Raising Arizona was made with four times the budget of Blood Simple and released by a major studio, but under the protective eye of Ben Barenholtz, an unsung hero of American independent cinema (responsible for getting David Lynch’s Eraserhead distributed), which allowed the Coens control over their film.

Considered by the Coen brothers to be the second part of their “hayseed trilogy," Raising Arizona follows the misadventures of H.I. ("Call me, 'Hi.'") McDunnough (Nicolas Cage), an inept, but well meaning hillbilly fugitive with a habit of robbing convenience stores and getting caught, each time being sent back to the same prison. He is booked again and again by a female police officer named Ed ("Short for Edwina."), whom he eventually falls in love with, and marries once he is finished his last prison term. H.I. gets a boring 9 to 5 job at Hudsucker Industries, which is a clever little nod to their future film, The Hudsucker Proxy (1994), written by the Coens with long time friend Sam Raimi. This was the first time that the Coens alluded to a future project. They would do this again in Miller's Crossing (1990), by calling the building that the main character, Tom Reagan lived in the Barton Arms, a reference to their next film, Barton Fink (1991).

H.I. wisely observes that his job isn't much different from prison, except for the paycheck at the end of every week, and tries to settle down to calm, suburban life, "the salad days," as he calls them. Ed (Holly Hunter) wants to have a baby, but as the couple find out, "her insides were a rocky place where my seeds could find no purchase," and so they decide to steal one of the famous Arizona quintuplets: five babies belonging to local unpainted furniture king, Nathan Arizona (Trey Wilson). And so begins a grand adventure that has the babysnatchers cross paths with two dimwitted escaped convicts ("We felt the institution no longer had anything to offer us.") who are just too stupid to ever pull off a really successful heist, and a vicious mercenary, Leonard Smalls ("Friends call me, 'Lenny,' but I got no friends.") who looks like a reject out of The Road Warrior (1981), a biker from hell interested in retrieving the baby at all costs.

The Coens keep things brisk and fast paced, with the occasional calm interlude. In most respects the film is akin to a Road Runner cartoon on fast forward with its wild, how-did-they-do-that camera angles and cheery, hillbilly banjo music (courtesy of long-time collaborator Carter Burwell) forever playing in the background. Perhaps the best example of this technique is the exhilarating pursuit for a package of Huggies. What could have been a simple, mundane task of picking up some diapers is raised to a mock epic level as H.I. frantically tries to elude the initial clerk he robbed, the cops who are now in gun-blazing pursuit, the neighborhood dogs he disturbed, and a burly manager of the supermarket he entered in attempt to lose this large group. The Coens use quick cuts and several clever point-of-view shots to set a frenetic pace that never relents until the chase is over. They also mix in some quirky dialogue and the catchy music, complete with yodeling for good effect. In addition, there are little touches here and there that add to chase. For example, when H.I. enters the supermarket the chase music switches to a muzak version of the same banjo music to fit in with, and poke fun at the stereotype of grocery stores. It is these nuances and attention to detail, plus the innovative camera angles, that elevate this film above your average comedy.

Stylistically, Raising Arizona can be seen as an homage, of sorts, to the films of their long-time friend, Sam Raimi. For example, the Coen brothers applied his most famous technique – the “Shakycam,” a camera nailed to a plank, which is then carried by two people who run as fast as they can with it. This produces a jarring effect where you feel like you a part of the action and it was put to good use throughout the film, This worried the studio who debated selling public shares in the film after seeing dailies. Where Raimi’s films are often criticized for merely being exercises in breathtaking camera techniques and flashy style, the Coens also include insanely quotable dialogue (the kind of which cult films are made of), a strong plot, and colorful, memorable characters. Raising Arizona showed that the Coens had clearly surpassed their mentor.

The crowning touch of Raising Arizona is its excellent cast. With his out of control, Woody Woodpecker hairdo, huge side burns, and cheesy mustache, Nicolas Cage is the epitome of southern white trash. He makes H.I. a comic, yet tragic figure wrestling with his own inner demons. He wants to lead a good life, but the lure of robbing convenience stores seems too strong to resist. Holly Hunter plays Ed with a ton of spunky charm, complete with the thickest southern accent of any of the characters as the finishing touch. The way she delivers some of her lines, you almost need subtitles as her accent is so thick. The Coens are clearly poking fun at the stereotype of such accents. John Goodman and William Forsythe, as the two escaped convicts Gale and Evelle, almost steal the film from Cage and Hunter. Goodman and Forsythe seem to enjoy playing their roles to the hilt, reveling in their dumb crook characters destined to spend the rest of their lives behind bars. Forsythe, who went on to play mostly villains and tough guys in various films and television, shows what an untapped comic resource he is, playing so well off of Goodman, as evident in the scene where they rob a bank. I would love to see these guys team up again for another comedy.

An informal company of cast and crew that would become regular additions to many Coen brothers films, begins to emerge with Raising Arizona. Character actor, M. Emmet Walsh, who was so effective as the trashy private detective in Blood Simple makes a cameo as H.I.'s obnoxious co-worker (complete with Hudsucker logo on his outfit), while actress Frances McDormand, who also starred in the Coens’ debut film, makes an appearance in Raising Arizona as an abrasive white trash housewife (“l just love biblical names. If I had another little boy, I'd name him Jason, Caleb or Tab.”). This film was the first of several memorable collaborations with John Goodman who has become a favorite of the Coens. Behind the camera saw the return of cinematographer Barry Sonnenfeld and composer Carter Burwell, both of whom would continue to work with the Coens on subsequent projects.

Like many of the Coen brothers’ films, Raising Arizona is steeped in classic literature. For example, critic, Rodney Hill found references to John Steinbeck's novel, Of Mice and Men. The biker from hell is named Leonard Smalls and the big, mentally slow man in Steinbeck's novel is also named Lennie Small. In addition, William Faulkner wrote a series of stories about the Snopes family and the brothers who break out of prison in the film are Gale and Evelle Snopes. The works of Flannery O'Connor have also been cited as an influence on Raising Arizona. Joel said in an interview that the term, “warthog from hell,” comes from a short story of O’Connor’s, entitled, “Revelation.”

In terms of casting, they wrote the role of Ed with Holly Hunter in mind but only as they worked on it and not during the initial stages. According to Ethan, the character of Ed "wasn't a reflection of who Holly is so much as a part it'd be fun to see her play.” For the ne’er-do-well brothers, William Forsythe came in first and read for the part of Gale but thought he was better suited for the Evelle part. When John Goodman came in to read next, the Coens asked Forsythe to stay so that he could read with Goodman and they tested well together.

The Coen brothers spent ten weeks rehearsing with the actors and running through scenes on various locations. They had a $6 million budget to work with – three million came from Circle Films and three million from 20th Century Fox. The film was shot over ten weeks in Phoenix, Arizona.

Raising Arizona received mixed review from critics. Time magazine’s Richard Corliss wrote, “To their old fascination with Sunbelt pathology, to their side-winding Steadicam and pristine command of screen space, the Coens have added a robust humor, a plot that keeps outwitting expectations and a ... dollop of sympathy for their forlorn kidnapers.” In her review for the Washington Post, Rita Kempley wrote, “The Coens are coming from the New Left-Field with this zany answer to the alarmist milk-carton-kids campaign, a send-up of endearing dolts, desperation and disposable diapers. They got by with murder in Blood Simple and now they get by with baby rustling in the best kidnapping comedy since last summer's Ruthless People.” The Chicago Reader’s Pat Graham wrote, “The snickering humor that percolated through the Coens' debut, Blood Simple, is the whole show here, and it's damn near hysterical.”

However, in his review for The New York Times, Vincent Canby praised the screenplay but found fault with the direction, which he felt was “without decisive style. “Raising Arizona has the manner of a Jonathan Demme film – say Handle With Care or Melvin and Howard – directed by someone else. Its automobile chases are appropriately frantic, but they've been shot and edited with the kind of clumsiness that television producers try to cover up with laugh tracks.” Amazingly, Roger Ebert gave the film one-and-a-half stars and wrote, “It cannot decide if it is about real people, or comic exaggerations. It moves so uneasily from one level of reality to another that finally we're just baffled. Comedy often depends on frustrating the audience's expectations. But how can it work when we don't have a clue about what to expect.”

The Coen brothers aren't afraid to go after any facet of the south, poking fun at everything from H.I.'s boss and his family, who give new meaning to the term inbreeding, to prison life, and southern hospitality. At times, you can never quite tell if they're making fun of this culture or trying to say something serious, instead they leave it up to the audience to decide. Through the use of an outrageous, satirical style, the Coens are really commenting on parenthood, suggesting that raising a child is no easy task. They do this by taking normal problems and situations and exaggerating them to an unbelievable level of caricature. The Coens also developed their own stylistic camera techniques, incredible attention to details, and clever dialogue that would appear in an even more improved state in their later films. The film made a tidy sum, grossing $22 million. The financial success of the Raising Arizona prompted Warner Brothers to offer them Batman (1989) but they wisely turned the studio down and made Miller’s Crossing instead.

Almost Famous

Anybody that bought Zeppelin I knows that the standout song is “Dazed and Confused,” and that’s great. It’s a masterpiece albeit a little too stifled because it is the studio version. If Almost Famous (2000) is the studio version than “The Bootleg Cut” is the live version of “Dazed and Confused” found on The Song Remains the Same in all of its epic grandeur, taking an already great song and making it live and breathe. Likewise, “The Bootleg Cut” of Almost Famous takes Cameron Crowe’s tribute to classic rock of the 1970s and improves on it by adding over 35 minutes of footage, which allows the world he created and the colorful characters that inhabit it to also live and breathe.

Almost Famous was clearly a labor of love for the filmmaker and his most personal effort to date. It is a fictionalized account of Crowe’s start as a rock music journalist at the age of 15 writing from Creem magazine and then a year later joining the staff of Rolling Stone where he would go on to interview the likes of Led Zeppelin, Van Morrison, Neil Young, and many others. Unfortunately, his very personal journey failed to connect with a mainstream audience and despite being lavished with critical praise and awards (including an Oscar for screenwriting), the film flopped at the box office but has gone on to develop a cult following. However, one wonders if Crowe never fully recovered from its commercial failure. Perhaps he ran out of things to say, making two films adapted from pre-existing works (Vanilla Sky and We Bought a Zoo) and an original film, Elizabethtown (2005) that tanked both with critics and audiences. Regardless, Almost Famous will no doubt be regarded as his magnum opus and rightly so.

“We’re like nobody else I know,” says Anita Miller (Zooey Deschanel) early on in the film. She’s the exasperated sister of William Miller (Michael Angarano) and has directed this comment towards their mother Elaine (Frances McDormand), a very smart teacher who raises her children in a very unorthodox fashion, like celebrating Christmas in summer because it’s gotten too commercial. Yet, for someone so intelligent, she is completely clueless about popular culture, specifically rock music, banning Simon and Garfunkel because they look stoned on the cover of their Bookends album. When she turns 18, Anita leaves home but gives her younger brother a treasure trove of classic rock ‘n’ roll albums – Zeppelin II, The Who’s Tommy, Joni Mitchell’s Blue, the Rolling Stone’s Get Yer Ya-Ya's Out! and so on, which he uses to educate himself, developing a deep love of music, both listening to it and writing about it.

By the time William (Patrick Fugit) turns 15, it’s 1973 and he experiences a life-changing event. He meets his idol Lester Bangs (Philip Seymour Hoffman), the legendary rock journalist at a radio station where he calls Jim Morrison “a drunken buffoon,” and praises the Guess Who for having the courage to be drunken buffoons. Philip Seymour Hoffman kills it as Lester, creating one of the most memorable character introductions in recent memory. We meet the infamous writer trashing the sacred cows of rock before getting the bemused disc jockey to play Iggy Pop and the Stooges while he jumps around like a maniac to the Detroit madman’s blistering rendition of “Search and Destroy.” William and Lester hit it off with the latter recognizing a younger, less jaded version of himself in the former. He also recognizes the same passion for music that he sees in the young teen and tells him, “Music, you know, true music – not just rock n roll – it chooses you. It lives in your car, or alone listening to your headphones, you know, with the cast of scenic bridges and angelic choirs in your brain.” He tries to warn William away from rock journalism by claiming that “The war is over. They won. 99% of what passes for rock ‘n’ roll these days, silence is more compelling.” Ah, how prophetic words these are as they could easily be speaking about the current state of rock music. The best part of this scene is when Lester talks about the love of writing, of staying up all night, “just writin’ and writin’. I mean, like 25 pages, a dribble, y’know, about the Faces or Coltrane. Y’know, just to fuckin’ write.” That bit gets me every time and inspires me whenever I get depressed about my own writing and to keep at it.

So, Lester assigns William to write a 1,000 word concert review of Black Sabbath but once at the venue, the inexperienced writer is unable to get access backstage. Rather fortuitously he meets a group of self-proclaimed band-aids, a strain or rock groupie, led by the charismatic Penny Lane (Kate Hudson) who unsuccessfully tries to get him into the venue. It isn’t until he meets the opening band Stillwater, impressing them with his succinct insights into their music, that he is able to gain access. Little does William know that Penny and Stillwater will change his life. The latter takes him on tour with them across America, while the former shows him the ropes along the way. William’s writing gets noticed by Rolling Stone magazine and they assign him to do a cover story on Stillwater. The more William’s horizons are broadened by the tour the more questions he has, not just for the band but about life and he only finds the answers through experience. By the end of the film you feel as if you’ve really gone on a journey with these characters. By the end of it we have gained some insight into them through their various misadventures.

Almost Famous is an embarrassment of riches when it comes to the talented cast, which consists mostly of young, untested talent (Patrick Fugit, Kate Hudson, Zooey Deschanel) and up-and-coming character actors (Jason Lee and Billy Crudup). In a perfect world, this film would have shot them all through the stratosphere. Most of them went on to future success (Crudup, Deschanel, Lee) and some squandered the buzz acquired from it (Hudson). Speaking of which, Almost Famous marked a breakout performance by Kate Hudson who brings a refreshing vitality and charisma to every scene as the veteran groupie Penny Lane. At first, she is a rather enigmatic figure, refusing to tell William her real name, but over the course of the film she gives him insight into the sometimes sad and lonely girl lurking under her bubbly façade. Hudson captures the layers of Penny with her eyes, specifically the sadness in them during a few moments. This happens in an incredibly touching scene when she finds out that the love her life sold her out for a case of beer. We see all kinds of emotions play out on her face as she tries to maintain a brave front but we catch a glimpse of the hurt and then it’s gone. Penny Lane was a star-making role and unfortunately the actress failed to capitalize on it with the exception of supporting roles in a Merchant/Ivory film (Le Divorce) and a Robert Altman film (Dr. T and the Women), and instead appeared in a string of forgettable romantic comedies.

Patrick Fugit, a young unknown actor, was cast as Crowe’s cinematic alter ego and has to anchor the film, acting as our window to this exotic world from another time. It helps that his coming of age as an actor parallels his character’s coming of age. Fugit does an excellent job of conveying William’s idealistic naïveté, his secret crush on Penny and his desire to become a successful rock journalist. William represents the hardcore music fan living the dream: hanging out with the bands he writes about and enjoys listening to. Philip Seymour Hoffman nails the jaded cynicism that made Lester Bangs such a polarizing figure in rock journalism. When William meets him, the veteran writer informs the kid that he’s arrived just in time for the death rattle of rock. Hoffman has little screen-time but he knows how to make the most of it by playing a larger than life figure. You can see why William admired Lester – he’s brash, funny and opinionated. And yet, Crowe also shows the more thoughtful, supportive side of Lester when he gives William much-needed advice and guidance when he’s at a low point, telling him, “The only true currency in this bankrupt world is what we share with someone else when we're uncool.” Billy Crudup is memorable as Russell Hammond, the cocky guitarist who feels that he’s already gone past his bandmates in terms of skill and ability. Against his better judgment he befriends William while repeatedly putting off his request for an interview. One gets the feeling that he doesn’t really care about William, or anyone else for that matter as he just uses people but by the end of the film there is a sense that he realizes and comes to terms with the damage he’s done to others. He finally grants William an interview, which begins with the young man asking him, “So Russell... what do you love about music?” to which the musician replies with a smile, “To begin with, everything.”

It has been said that the devil is in the details and that’s what Crowe captures so well in Almost Famous, like the excitement one feels just before a concert starts, when the lights go out and the crowd roars in anticipation – it’s a goosebump-inducing moment that is authentically recreated in the film. There’s also the faithful recreation of chaotic life on the tour bus with people reading, sleeping and noodling away on their musical instrument to kill time. Best of all, there’s the authenticity of the band playing live – the chemistry between its members when they’re firing on all cylinders. All of the actors learned how to play their respective instruments and it shows. Even though Jason Lee lip-synchs the voice sounds like it could be him singing. With films that involve bands you can usually tell that they’re not playing and the lip-synching is off but this is not the case with Almost Famous. Stillwater looks, sounds and feels like a band from that era and this is due in large part to the behind-the-scenes talent responsible for it, namely Nancy Wilson of Heart and Peter Frampton, both of whom recorded and toured during this time period and drew upon their considerable experience and skills to create songs (along with Crowe) that could have easily come from the ‘70s. The band dynamic is beautifully realized in simple things like how a screw-up on a band t-shirt dredges up all kinds of old grievances between lead singer Jeff Bebe (Jason Lee) and lead guitarist Russell Hammond (Billy Crudup). The singer feels threatened by his guitarist’s mystique. We see the band begin to split apart the more famous they get as they fight to keep it real while becoming successful. Crowe and co. nail it because he’s lived it countless times and it’s burned in his brain, it’s part of his DNA.

And then there are the pre-existing songs from the era that Crowe included that also brilliantly evoke the time period and capture the emotion of a specific scene, like “That’s the Way” off of Zeppelin III that plays over the scene on the tour bus during a beautiful sunset. The most famous musical moment is, of course, the scene on the bus when after a big fight between Jeff and Russell an uncomfortable silence hangs over everyone until “Tiny Dancer” by Elton John comes on. Eventually everyone is singing along and all the disagreements are put aside in favor of the music. This scene shows how the power of the right song at the right moment can transcend almost anything and bring people together. It is one of those rare, magical moments captured on film that perfectly marries music with the visuals.

Crowe has described Almost Famous as “agonizingly true.” He grew up in San Diego and was introduced to rock music by his rebellious older sister. He skipped three grades and graduated from high school at the age of 15. He became a rock journalist by sending writing samples to Lester Bangs at Creem magazine. This led to a job at Rolling Stone. William’s experiences with Stillwater are a pastiche of experiences Crowe had with real bands, like pursuing the lead singer and guitarist for a cover story (Led Zeppelin), hanging out with a dysfunctional band (the Allman Brothers), and taking a turbulent plane ride with another band (Lynyrd Skynyrd). In addition, Stillwater claiming they were misquoted and then sabotaging William’s article really happened to Crowe when he did a cover story on Neil Young and like in the film the musician changed his mind at the last minute and allowed it to be published. The real Penny Lane came from Portland, Oregon and moved to Los Angeles to be with the keyboard player for Steppenwolf. She developed a love for musicians and their scene. When she moved back to Portland, she hung out with bands that rolled into town adopting a vintage 1940s wardrobe and led a gang of groupies known as “the Flying Garter Girls.” Crowe met her 1973 and they became friends. He ended up showing her the film in order to assure the woman that he wasn’t going to sensationalize her life: “a lot of those girls really did believe in the music and she was one of them.”

One could say that Crowe had been preparing for this film for much of his life. He actually started writing the screenplay in the late 1980s and continued to work on it between other projects, biding his time until he had enough clout to get it bankrolled. He got that opportunity thanks to the massive commercial success of Jerry Maguire (1996) and cut a deal with DreamWorks. When it came to casting, Canadian actress Sarah Polley was originally set to play Penny Lane with Kate Hudson taking on the role of Anita, William’s older sister, but as Crowe and the actress worked on the part he realized that she wasn’t right for the role as he envisioned it. Polley dropped out during pre-production and Hudson begged Crowe to replace her. Interestingly, Crowe almost cast Natalie Portman as Penny but felt it would have made it “a totally different movie – one where Penny Lane was a child, and her innocence was so important to all of them that they all protected her,” but with Hudson, “you believe she had a past.”

Other casting choices included a desire to cast Meryl Streep as Elaine, William’s mother but she turned Crowe down and he almost went with Rita Wilson but opted for Frances McDormand instead. The filmmaker told his real mother not to approach the actress during the production but she defied her son. McDormand remembers, “She said, ‘I find the character to be written a little shrill and I hope that you don’t intend to play it that way.’ And I said right back that I’m an actor, so it’s not going to be me or you, it’s going to be [the character].” Likewise, Brad Pitt was originally cast as Russell Hammond but he dropped out shortly before filming began and Crowe went with Billy Crudup in his place. Crowe said, “His role was the most underwritten part in the movie, and Brad had taken a flier on other scripts that weren’t fully on the page and he couldn’t bring himself to do it again.” To prepare for the pivotal role of Lester Bands, Philip Seymour Hoffman listened to audio tapes of interviews with the rock journalist.

A lot of time and money was spent on getting the period details right, from dressing all the extras in the concert scenes in vintage clothing from thrift shops and warehouses all over the country to minutia like period cigarette packs, gum packs and ashtrays full of cigarette butts in the background of scenes. The inventor of the original pull tab beer can was tracked down and hired to make dozens of cases for the film. Crowe went to even greater lengths for authenticity. The production spent $100,000 on getting a 727 plane bearing the original Eastern logo with a decent-sized airline terminal set for the scene where Penny leaves for Morocco.

When it came to the music for Stillwater, Crowe and his wife Nancy Wilson decided that they would feel like a blend of Bad Company with a little Led Zeppelin, Cream and the Allman Brothers mixed in for good measure. Once Crowe and Wilson wrote the songs they had to find a singer that could do “a certain rock accent in 1972 that no longer exists … a certain bluesy way of singing.” They found L.A.-based musician and producer Marti Frederiksen who co-wrote songs with Aerosmith, Def Leppard and Sheryl Crow. During pre-production, Wilson teamed up with another ‘70s rock mainstay Peter Frampton to teach the actors how to be rock stars, like not wearing the guitar too high and to have a “slouchy, sloppy body language.” Crowe also had the actors study live concert footage of bands like the Who and Led Zeppelin.

With a budget of $60 million, Almost Famous was expected to do as well as Crowe’s past box office successes but it struggled to break even, baffling and disappointing the filmmaker and DreamWorks. Hollywood insiders criticized the film’s large budget, lack of marquee name movie stars and an R rating, which limited its audience. The studio felt that it was simply “the right movie at the wrong time” and this resulted in poor attendance. Another DreamWorks executive felt that Almost Famous was hard to describe in 30 seconds and that made it difficult to market.

Almost Famous received mostly positive praise from critics. Roger Ebert gave it four out of four stars and found it “funny and touching in so many different ways.” In his review for The New York Times, A.O. Scott wrote, “The movie's real pleasures are to be found not in its story but in its profusion of funny, offbeat scenes. It's the kind of picture that invites you to go back and savor your favorite moments like choice album cuts.” Time magazine’s Richard Corliss praised Patrick Fugit’s performance: “The movie's real pleasures are to be found not in its story but in its profusion of funny, offbeat scenes. It's the kind of picture that invites you to go back and savor your favorite moments like choice album cuts.” Entertainment Weekly gave the film an “A-“ rating and Owen Gleiberman wrote, “the performances by Crudup, Hudson, Lee, McDormand, Hoffman, and newcomer Fugit have a beautiful, unforced naturalism, and the movie is laced with memorable moments.” In his review for the Los Angeles Times, Kenneth Turan praised Kate Hudson’s performance for being “so delicate, authentic and accomplished that this is probably the last film for which anyone will feel the impulse to identify her as Goldie Hawn's daughter.” Rolling Stone’s Peter Travers wrote, “Crowe triumphs not by copping an attitude about the industry of cool but by capturing the ravishing thrill of losing your cherry to rock & roll. Almost Famous is a winner because Crowe dares to wear his heart on his sleeve.”

In her review for the L.A. Weekly, Manohla Dargis wrote, “Like much great art, Almost Famous is about the search for some glimmer of authentic meaning. Everyone searches differently. Lester Bangs took a swan dive into the gutter and died at the age of 33. Cameron Crowe wrote for slick magazines and studios. He kept living, no doubt very comfortably, but as it so happens, he never did stop listening to Bangs‘ voice, which is why, on his fourth try as a director, he’s gotten it right.” However, The New York Observer’s Andrew Sarris was a rare gate-crasher to the party. He felt that, “For whatever reason, too much of the dark side has been left out. Mr. Crowe was not obliged to revisit Altamont, but there was something faux in the depravity of the young extras Mr. Crowe and his associates have recruited to provide atmosphere. They reminded me too much of the kids in the audience, who were too young to remember the 60′s and 70′s but are persuaded by Mr. Crowe that they ‘get’ the period just the same.” Likewise, the Washington Post’s Desson Howe wrote, “There's a scene in which Stillwater and friends, riding in a tour bus, suddenly sing along to Elton John's 'Tiny Dancer,' which is playing over the radio. This is meant to be a scene of unabashed innocence, as everyone forgets their petty differences and simply enjoys the sensation of being a sing-along fan. But it's very hard to see these long-haired kids as products of the 1970s instead of dressed up actors from the Seattle-Starbucks era.”

Almost Famous is a film for music fans made by one and this is evident in the loving attention paid to every frame as seen through the filter of nostalgia. Or, as Crowe said in an interview, “a movie that was a tribute to the way that music makes you feel, if you can get the movie to make you feel like a song you just sort of discovered that you want to hear life eight times in a row.” A truly great film magically transports one into its cinematic world and in the case of Almost Famous it transports one back to the time period it depicts, achieving this through authentic period details like costumes, production design and music. Almost Famous is as much of a love letter to the joy of listening to and experiencing music as it is to writing about it. A good writer wears their heart on their sleeve and one can feel the passion for their subject in every sentence and this is evident in Crowe’s rock journalism and his best films. His film believes in the power of music to change how we feel about things and people and its importance in the fabric of our lives. It has the ability to move us, to make us laugh and cry – the entire emotional spectrum. You have to give Crowe credit for putting it all out there and creating a deeply personal film.

SOURCES

“Almost Autobiographical.” Newsweek. September 8, 2000.

Cagle, Jess. “As the Crowe Flies.” Time. September 18, 2000.

Carrillo, Jenny Cooney. “Stone the Rolling Crowes!” Urban Cinefile.

Fretts, Bruce. “Kate Hudson – Almost Famous.” Entertainment Weekly. February 23, 2001.

Green, Jesse. “Billy Crudup: Almost Infamous.” The New York Times. October 10, 2004.

Kelly, Maura. “Nancy Wilson. The Believer. August 2007.

Lyman, Rick. “Slump Vexes Creators of Almost Famous.” The New York Times. October 19, 2000.

“The Decade is in the Details.” Newsweek. October 18, 2000.

Thernstrom, Melanie. “The Enchanting Little Princess.” The New York Times. November 7, 2004.

Darkman

After the phenomenal success of Tim Burton’s Batman (1989), everybody and his brother wanted a piece of that lucrative pie and tried to produce their own franchise of super hero films. For Universal Pictures it was Darkman (1990) – the greatest comic book film not actually based on a comic book. While its director Sam Raimi did an admirable job with the first two Spider-Man films, I have always felt like he was holding back stylistically. I miss the unbridled fun and pulpy charm of the Raimi who made Darkman, a dark, R-rated super hero film that fused together the sensibilities of Beauty and the Beast, The Phantom of the Opera and The Shadow. It demonstrated that Raimi could make the jump from low-budget independent films to Hollywood without compromising the Gonzo style that endeared him to his fans. Darkman also showed that he was maturing as a filmmaker by creating a dramatic and tragic love story while still featuring his show-stopping action sequences.

Raimi sets an appropriately comic book super hero-ish tone right from the get-go as two criminal gangs engage in a violent turf war. The action starts when a gang member reveals that his wooden leg conceals a machine gun. All hell breaks loose as cars come flying out of big wooden crates (?!) and miscellaneous henchmen (one sporting an eye patch so you know he’s a bad guy) are dispatched en masse with nary a drop of blood. Pretty soon, one side is sufficiently decimated and the dominant one, led by Robert G. Durant (Larry Drake), deals with the survivors, in particular, their leader Eddie Black (Jessie Lawrence Ferguson) in a way that establishes the film’s darkly goofy gallows humor. This sequence also sets up rather nicely that Durant is not a guy to be messed with as he has a rather nasty habit of collecting severed fingers from his victims.

Dr. Peyton Westlake (Liam Neeson) is a brilliant scientist trying to create liquid skin that could help disfigured people or burn victims lead normal lives. However, after 99 minutes in the daylight the skin disintegrates. His girlfriend Julie Hastings (Frances McDormand) works in real estate and comes across something fishy in a deal she’s working on for Strack Industries. Mr. Strack (Colin Friels) has a lot of money riding on the deal and she discovers that he has ties with Durant. When Julie confronts Strack about it he sends Durant and his goons to recover the incriminating memorandum she has in her possession.

Unfortunately, it’s located at Westlake’s lab (which is also where he lives) and Durant and co. arrive right when he is on the verge of a breakthrough with his synthetic skin. Raimi shows off his innate understanding of the way action is depicted in comic books when Durant and his cronies attack Westlake and trash his lab. Raimi employs all sorts of skewed camera angles, unusual point-of-view shots and snap zooms that evoke the vivid, panel bursting action of Jack Kirby’s explosive, panel-bursting artwork. Durant beats Westlake viciously and leaves him to die in an explosion that destroys his lab. Westlake is blown clear but burned beyond recognition.

Somehow, doctors get a hold of him and perform a procedure so that impulses of pain are no longer transmitted to his brain. This also amplifies his emotions, including uncontrolled rage accompanied by surges of adrenaline which produce augmented strength. With everyone (including Julie) thinking he’s dead, Westlake takes refuge in an abandoned, run-down warehouse where he recreates his lab and plots revenge against Durant. Westlake uses his synthetic skin to pose as members of Durant’s gang and to recreate his old visage in an attempt to reconnect with Julie in the hopes of restoring things back to the way they were. But let’s face it, Westlake is only fooling himself and herein lies the tragic element of the story.

Raimi depicts Westlake’s first surge of uncontrolled anger rather imaginatively with a heady montage of starbursts, flames, fireballs, a skull, and other bizarre images that evoke some of the go-for-broke imagery of the first two Evil Dead films, especially the second one when Ash (Bruce Campbell) becomes possessed. Perhaps the two most obvious influences on Darkman are Beauty and the Beast and Phantom of the Opera which are evoked when the bandaged and disfigured Westlake, having just escaped from the hospital, finds temporary salvation in an alley one stormy night. He even dresses a bit like a cross between the Phantom and The Shadow, adopting the latter’s persona as an elusive avenger who strikes fear in the heart of men.

Raimi infuses the film with his trademark darkly comic slapstick like when Darkman dispatches Rick (Raimi’s brother Ted), one of Durant’s goons. The henchman pleads for his life, “I told you everything!” to which Darkman replies, “I know, Rick. I know you did. But let’s pretend that you didn’t!” The vigilante proceeds to stick Rick’s head up through a manhole into oncoming traffic and he meets the wheel of a transport truck with a sickening splat. Raimi also has a lot of fun with Westlake posing as Durant and his goons which gives the actors playing them an excuse to act out of character.

At one point, Raimi considered Gary Oldman to play Westlake but went with Liam Neeson instead and now it is hard to see anybody else in the role. Neeson gives his character the necessary gravitas and makes us feel sympathetic for his plight, even when he becomes horribly disfigured and the actor’s marquee good looks are buried under all kinds of make-up. This is due in large part to Neeson’s natural charisma but Raimi never lets us forget Westlake’s tragic dimensions, like when he takes Julie to a carnival and his emotions boil over after a sideshow barker pisses him off. Westlake breaks two of the man’s fingers, terrifying her. He can never be with Julie like before the explosion so long as his synthetic skin lasts only 99 minutes. Westlake will always be an outsider, an emotional mess living on the fringes of society.

Julia Roberts was initially considered for the role of Julie but Raimi cast Frances McDormand whom he had worked with on Crimewave (1985). Raimi had to fight to cast her in the role as the studio wanted Demi Moore to play the part. According to Raimi, he cast her to “bring that soul to the picture” so that audiences would care about what happens to her character. Although, he found it difficult directing her, despite knowing the actress personally for many years. He said, “our conception of the best movie to make differed, arguing in trying to make the best picture possible. We did come across disagreements, but they were very healthy.” At times, she admitted to having trouble separating her long-standing friendship with Raimi and his role as director. She said, “there are times when I was mad ... and I didn’t try to be diplomatic about it.” McDormand is an unconventional choice for the film’s love interest. She doesn’t have the typical Maxim magazine model looks (thank god!) that seem to be all the rage now, but rather seems like someone you’d actually know and not some unattainable beauty. Unfortunately, the script doesn’t really give her much to do except pine tragically for Westlake and become a hapless damsel in distress at the film’s climax.

Years before Darkman ever became a reality, Raimi had been interested in adapting an established super hero or comic book property to the big screen. He tried and failed to secure the rights to Batman and The Shadow (both went on to become films). Raimi decided to create his own super hero. Darkman started as a short story entitled, “The Darkman,” written by Raimi and then, with the help of his brother Ivan, he expanded it into a 40-page treatment. Ivan was a doctor and grounded the medical aspects in reality. Originally, it was a story about a man who lost his face and had to take on other faces only for it to evolve into a story about a man who uses this power to fight crime.

Raimi pitched this idea to Universal Pictures who liked it and gave him a budget of $11 million. At the time, this was the biggest budget and crew he had worked with. The screenplay went through several drafts and several people. Ex-Navy SEAL Chuck Pfarrer wrote the first draft of the script, followed by another draft by Sam and Ivan. During this stage, Raimi and co-producer Robert Tapert toyed with the notion that Darkman could become a franchise (indeed two sequels have been made). For this to happen, the script needed improvement and writers Daniel and Joshua Goldin were brought on board to write the fifth draft. The Goldins made sense of the various drafts and “lots of little story documents,” into a coherent script. It was also their job to build suspense in the story and work on the emotional aspects, like Westlake trying to reunite with the love of his life. They worked on the project for a month before moving on to another film and Ivan and Sam took over, writing drafts six through twelve.

Raimi told production designer Randy Ser that the look of the film would be a homage to the 1930s Universal horror films. For example, they designed Darkman’s laboratory with Dr. Frankenstein’s in mind. Ser saw Westlake as someone “living in a world filled with light and golden hues” and his lab was painted a golden sun yellow and lit to reflect the sunlight coming in. In contrast, Darkman’s lab “becomes a place of darkness and more chaos.” His lab was a real location, a former refrigerated food warehouse in downtown Los Angeles. It was converted into soundstages for the production. Ser also faced the challenge of creating key props for the film, chief among them Westlake’s skin-making machine. The result was a hybrid of a computer, a photocopier, a hologram and skin mold, which allowed the artificial skin mask to push and bulge visibly. The skin mold portion was modeled on a real-life device known as pin molds, popular in the 1970s and 1980s. Ser consulted with David Copperfield’s people and told them he wanted to build an illusion that would operate all the way through the sequence with no edits.

Raimi pulls out all the stops for the film’s climactic action sequence where Darkman hangs onto a cable dangling from a helicopter flying through the city, slamming into buildings in a way that eerily anticipates a very similar sequence in The Matrix (1999), only without all kinds of CGI. There is something real and exciting about seeing a stuntman actually hanging onto a cable from an honest to goodness helicopter that is missing from the Wachowskis’ film. The second part of this sequence takes place on the top floors of an unfinished skyscraper and allows Raimi to have a blast with several characters nearly plummeting to their death... and a few who do. This sequence took two-and-a-half weekends to complete because they were flying through the city below five hundred feet and had to have special permits to do it. A stunt double was used and was hooked up on two cables in three different spots in case one failed. The filmmaker had to shut down several blocks of downtown L.A. on consecutive weekends. The results speak for themselves and are exciting and dynamic.

Raimi had a problem with the editor that the studio assigned. Eight weeks into assembling the rough cut and he wasn’t following Raimi’s storyboards, had a nervous breakdown and left. Tapert and Raimi had a difficult time dealing with the studio. Tapert remarked, “it isn’t the picture we thought it should be, based on the footage we shot ... The studio got nervous about some kind of wild things in it, and made us take them out ... We fought until the very last minute to get some of it back in.”

Raimi was surprised by the commercial success of Darkman because Universal told him that it had tested badly with some people who rated it the worst film they had ever seen. According to executives, it was one of the worst-scoring pictures in the studio’s history. However, Raimi liked the “brilliant” marketing campaign the studio came up with, releasing posters in advance with a silhouette of the main character and the question, “Who is Darkman?” According to the director, “the marketing made the film a money-maker.”

Darkman garnered mostly positive reviews from mainstream critics. In his review for the Los Angeles Times, Michael Wilmington felt that Darkman was the only movie at the time "that successfully captures the graphic look, rhythm and style of the superhero books.” The New Yorker’s Terrence Rafferty wrote, "Raimi works from inside the cheerfully violent adolescent-male sensibility of superhero comics, as if there were no higher style for a filmmaker to aspire to, and the absence of condescension is refreshing.” Entertainment Weekly gave the film a "B" rating and Owen Gleiberman wrote, "The movie is full of jaunty, Grand Guignol touches (the main gangster enjoys snapping and collecting fingers), but Raimi's images also have a spectral, kinetic beauty.” In his review for the Washington Post, Joe Brown wrote, "Though Raimi seems to be trying to restrain himself, his giddily sick sense of humor still pops out all over the place – Darkman is a frenetic funhouse ride that has you laughing and screaming at the same time.” However, Time magazine’s Richard Corliss felt that Raimi wasn’t "effective with actors" and People magazine’s Ralph Novak called Darkman, a "loud, sadistic, stupidly written, wretchedly acted film."

While Raimi’s Spider-Man films are plagued by a protagonist that is a little too angsty for my tastes (especially the awful third film), he gets it just right with Darkman. I’m a fan of his early films with their wild and loose style as typified by his hyperactive camerawork. Darkman proved that he could bring this kinetic approach to a prestigious Hollywood blockbuster and anticipates his work on the Spider-Man films in many ways. However, this is a project that originated with Raimi and so it has a more personal feel that is missing from his later films where he was basically a director-for-hire (which makes his recent Drag Me to Hell feel like a return to form). Darkman also features Raimi’s trademark slapstick humor which deflates some of the pretentiousness of the more angst-ridden aspects of its tragic protagonist. The film doesn’t take itself so serious all the time and this results in a fun, entertaining ride.

This post was inspired by Mr. Peel's excellent take on Darkman over at his blog.

SOURCES

Arnold, Gary. "Sam Raimi's Flair Makes Darkman A Reel Delight." Washington Times. August 23, 1990.

Counts, Kyle. "Heart of Darkness." Starlog. December 1990.

Counts, Kyle. "Black Heart." Starlog. January 1991.

Italie, Hillel. "Beauties, Beasts and 'Biff!' 'Bam!' 'Pow!'" Associated Press. September 12, 1990.

Johnston, Sheila. "Beauty Within the Beast." The Independent. November 9, 1990.

McDonagh, Maitland. Filmmaking on the Fringe. 1995.

Muir, John Kenneth. The Unseen Force: The Films of Sam Raimi. Applause Books. 2004.

Portman, Jamie. "Horror can be a labor of love." Toronto Star. August 16, 1990.

Stanley, John. "Darkman Brings Director's Talent to Light." San Francisco Chronicle. August 26, 1990.

Warren, Bill. "The Man Behind Darkman." Fangoria. September 1990.

Warren, Bill. The Evil Dead Companion. St. Martin's Griffin. 2001.