Fako and some Movies

12/12/2009 Journal notes on Fako and movies.
Fako continued to harass me this morning, and then in the afternoon he said he all along was just trying to get my dander up. So my feelings were just his playthings for a week. I should shoot the bastard.
To an extent he reminded me of my problems with Dick Wist who had a similar hostility toward me and my work. Wist, who was the Art Historian at UNLV when I was there, said to me “You draw witches and lack universality,” and then he’d stab me with “You have to have legs to run.” In other words I don’t have what it takes to make a mark on the world of “serious” Art. I am poor cripple who doesn’t have the stuff that it takes to soar. Christ, its tough enough to wrestle with aesthetic solutions to an inner complex that is compelling you to search for a form to reveal what you know in your heart of hearts, let alone having to listen to the critical ravings of outsiders who have no appreciation of the dynamic you have been swept up by. Fako’s contention is without endurance & public acknowledgement an artist is just a nowhere man. He has no understanding of the compulsion to create and the intrinsic value of creativity. My relationship with Wist died on the vine 40 years ago and if Fako keeps it up ours will too.
I saw “Julia and Julie” two nights ago, a comfort movie built around food and two women goony about cooking. Meryl Streep has done it again—what a performance! She was spot on in terms of sounding just like Ms. Child, and she also moved like she did. Nora Ephron, the writer and director also had her wearing elevator shoes because the real Julia was 6’2” (and her sister was 6’5”.) Amy Adams, who is a cute as can be, is adequate in her role but her skills can’t be compared to the fluid authority of Streep as an actress who can inhabit a character so completely. Julie’s story is interesting, but like her cooking, it lives in the shadow of the master cook. One aspect of her story that I paid some interest to was how she did with her blog. At first no one seemed to be reading it; then a few people, so on and so forth until a mass of people were reading it and reacting to it. I am in that first stage and it looks doubtful I’ll ever go beyond it.
The biggest surprise in the Julia Childs section was how sexual her relationship to her husband Paul was. Once more Streep was teamed with Stanley Tucci, like in “The Devil Loves Prada.” He’s perfect as Paul, loving, encouraging, and apparently the perfect sex partner. The chemistry between them could not be better. He was some kind of low level diplomat in Paris, which enabled her to go to cooking school in Paris and to eventually begin working on her book THE MASTERING OF FRENCH COOKING, which made her reputation, along with the popular PBS program on which she spread the word. Prior to catching on at the cooking school, she was at a loss what to do with herself. It took a while for things to come together for her, but getting there was half the fun. Julie was about 30 when she found herself as both cook and writer. Incidentally, the two women never met. Paul Child died at 91 about ten years before his wife who was 90 when she passed away. I’m sure that when she got to heaven she went in the door marked “French Eatery,” and Paul was there waiting for her.
“The Other Man” I had never heard of it but it had a good cast so I thought I’d give it a look. It was a downbeat movie about the ravages of male jealousy. A businessman, played by Liam Neeson, discovers that his wife had a passionate love affair before she died of cancer. One night he decides to check her laptop and he comes across a file named LOVE, but he doesn’t know the password. He tries many things and finally remembers her trips to Lake Como on business (she was a shoe designer.) Lake Como was it. He is shocked to see his beloved wife naked in bed and cavorting with her lover, played by Antonio Banderas. Laura Linney played the wife, but was actually seen little in the movie. You can see the rage well up inside Neeson’s emotional body. By the next morning he is totally in the grip of a madness he can’t get beyond. Due to love notes from the man he knows his name is Ralph; he asks his security person at his firm to find who he is and she does. His address is in Milan, so off he goes to confront the guy with murder in his heart.
When he gets there he follows the guy around for a few days, discovering that he likes to go to a particular bar and restaurant with a room for people who want to play chess. He strkes up a conversation with Ralph (pronounced Raf) and the two men start to play chess together, and while they play Raf starts to talk about his love for the other man’s wife. At one point he has a hammer in hand and considers killing Raf. But he refrains. He also discovers the guy is a sham, heavily in debt, only posing as a man with money and style, actually living on the cheap. He was not what he seemed to be, a bon vivant and high roller. But Neeson can’t resist setting a trap for the poor bastard. Since he doesn’t know the wife has died so Neeson pretends to write him for a get-together, just like old times, something Rav has been dreaming about. But it is him waiting in the restaurant and he lays the truth on Raf, that he is the husband and that is wife is dead, which first crushes him, then infuriates him that the husband could be so cruel, as he knew how much he had loved the woman too. That last fact finally sinks in to the husband; it softens his attitude and by the time of the memorial for the wife he even feels some compassion for the man he once wanted to kill, and both toast what a wonderful woman she was. He goes home with his daughter, his heart calmed and perhaps, even healed.
I liked the dynamic of going from complete rage and jealousy to sympathy and understanding. If only it would happen like that more often.

The new interpretation of the “The Taking of Pelham 123,” is an updated version, with technological add-ons and with villains that look more like the ex-cons and tough guys of today. The hard core of the film remains the same as in the 1974 film: It’s a hostage crisis that’s designed to extort big bucks for 4 criminals and the basic tension in the story is supplied by the lead gangster and the subway dispatcher. In the original story Robert Shaw played the villain and in the new version John Travolta is the brains and chief spokesman for the four hoods. Walter Matthau was a police detective who was the other half of the duet and duel between the two main adversaries. Travolta, besides looking the part, is loudmouthed, vulgar, a serial curser, a psychotic killer, but he also likes the dispatcher, Walter Garber, an ordinary man in an extraordinary situation. Ryder (Travolta) will deal only with Garber. He wants $10 million in one hour or else he will start shooting one hostage every hour thereafter We don’t find out what Ryder’s true motivation is until near the end of the film. He was a high stakes player on Wall Street who stole some money and as a consequence had gone to prison for 9 years and had only recently got out of jail, as did his technical helper Pedro Ramos (Luis Guzman) who used to work for the subway system. They want revenge on the system that sent them up the river. Garber and Ryder engage in a dialog that links them in tension and respect—and in irony, as the ending of the film will show. The four get away with the money, but they don’t get far.
The director of the film was Tony Scott, Ridley’s brother who specializes in urban crime dramas. The last film Scott made with Denzel Washington was “Man on Fire.” In the special features he discusses all the difficulties and handicaps of making a film in New York City. It was a riveting story from start to finish, and the relationship between the two main characters had the right admixture of respect, fondness, and fear.