When You and I Were Young, Maggie

Daisy Miller (1974)
directed by Peter Bogdanovich
rating: 4 out of 5 cravats
on DVD from University of New Mexico Interlibrary Loan

The lovely animated credit sequence at the end of The Grand Budapest Hotel includes a special thanks to "our old friends", among them Polly Platt. I assigned Karina Longworth's Polly Platt: The Invisible Woman podcast in my class on New Hollywood, taught during the pandemic a couple of springs ago, but I could tell that my students were unconvinced by my insistence, at the end of the term, that the man who threw Platt over for Cybill Shepherd continued to make great movies without his first wife. 

I mention Platt's acknowledgment in Wes Anderson's 2014 film, released after her death in 2011, because the patron saint of this blog (ill-served as he may be by its slapdash commitment to the pictures) always cared about credit sequences. They are full of gratitude to cast (typically expressed in picture credits), crew, and residents of whichever corner of the earth hosted both for a period of weeks or months: Archer City, or McCracken, or the Plaza Hotel.

In "Daisy Miller", it's a straightforward, gracious 

WE ARE INDEBTED TO THE CITIZENS OF
ROME, ITALY
AND
VEVEY, SWITZERLAND.

In an interview included on the DVD, PB hits the highlights: Orson Welles anecdote, Cary Grant impression, tender recollection of dead pals and lost loves. As he usually does, he struck me as altogether sympathetic and decent in his understanding of life's injustices and disappointments, echoing the timbre of this wonderful film. 

There's no need to return to Wes Anderson, but I liked both "The Grand Budapest Hotel" and The French Dispatch so much for the qualities in each I can only describe as Lubitsch-adjacent, which I think (apropos "our old friends") came to Anderson less through the movies of Lubitsch himself than through Peter's mentorship and career.

The highlights here are Mildred Natwick sipping tea over gossip with Barry Brown in a communal heated pool between a floating sterling tea service, the easy swing of dolly shots Bogdanovich relies on to reframe conversations in the middle of long takes, and the extent to which those long takes serve both to reinforce the strength of Shepherd's bright and lovestruck (with the role, with herself, with Peter) performance and to underscore the artificiality of the entire production, waiting for days for the fog to clear from Lake Geneva in order to shoot a sunset over the promenade.

"It's only a paper moon..."

Cousin Countin' Rednecks

Bernie (2011)
directed by Richard Linklater
rating: 4 out of 5 cravats
watched on Tubi

There is no mention of sports at all in this movie, which to me is a testament to Linklater's inherent curiosity about Texas as a place beyond just the repository for his own memories and lived experience. His affection for 1997 slice-of-life East Texas masterpiece Hands On a Hardbody extends to casting himself in a cameo as the fastest deadbeat dad on the lot, but the filtered afternoon light through the pines as the camera cranes into the scene is beautiful—as is his loyalty to the great Sonny Carl Davis (named just plain "Sonny Davis" as he jokes through the credits about his St. Augustine neighbors "digging a hole in the backyard" to cook their dinner). Sometimes Linklater's projects completely baffle me, and sometimes there's no one better.

The Love Song of Sheriff Nat Bell

The Hardest Working Cat in Showbiz (2020)
directed by Sofia Bohdanowicz
rating: 4 out of 5 cravats
watched on Vimeo

"We name and love our pets as a protest against the anonymous extinction of countless forgotten animals. Does the legend of Orangey ultimately lead us back to the nothingness it was intended to keep at bay?"

A movie I regularly show my Intro to Film students because of the beautiful way it frames what movies do best: retain the transient gesture, expression, or face against forgetfulness, decay, and time. Additionally, it's a lovely tribute to Dan Sallitt's cat Jasper, who I never would be able to meet, of course, but take comfort in knowing is somewhere, and loved, in the world.

Where's a Mike Mandel Selfie in Dodger Stadium When You Really Need It?

Los (2001)
directed by James Benning
rating: 2 out of 5 cravats
on DVD from University of New Mexico Interlibrary Loan

It isn't that Benning's compositions are cold; there's plenty of sun and movement, and a marble-run pleasure in watching each section play out. But people, not industry, make cities compelling, and I saw a tourist's perspective in the director's shyness in only framing LA at distances that favor vehnicles, grids, and construction. Is he better in rural spaces in part because natural surroundings can't help but overwhelm faces and gestures?

(He's attentive to Los Angeles voices, at least: the soundtrack, recorded in an eavesdropper's earshot, is warm with the accents and languages of the city.)

New York Metropolitans

An Autumn's Tale (1987)
directed by Mabel Cheung
rating: 4 out of 5 cravats

on DVD through University of New Mexico Interlibrary Loan

Rescue from an apartment gas leak, a ride to the station to meet your louse of a boyfriend, late night screenings of "The Beyond" and "The Fly": who better to share it with than the gentle man "with a chin like Richard Gere's"?

If "a country is as good as its people and its people as good as their food", as Chow Yun-fat tells Cherie Chung, then what's nicer than seeing his Figgy drink a can of Coca-Cola next to the bookshelf he made for her Sis 13 in her New York City apartment as an afternoon train rolls by? Heaven is pals (watchband salesman, gambling buds, seagulls on the pier).