But our actions don’t count for shit. Except for when we fuck up. Then they count good and long. That’s reality.
Care for a dose?
How’s about someone you married for about a minute getting half of everything because your lawyer was high on butane when he drafted the pre-nup?
Is that believable?
No. It’s fucking unbelievable.
Turns out Misty isn’t even her real name. It’s a ‘stage name’. And the reason she travels so much isn’t because she’s fighting for freedom in the Gulf. It’s for a completely different and arguably gross reason.
Who wants to believe that their life is actually happening the way it is? Who wants to discover that when they try to brush off that odd dry dust from their hands that, no, that’s not dust, that’s your skin now, shrunken, yet loose? Who can believe that’s your face in the mirror, its spotted, powdery flesh concertinaing with each involuntary shrug?
No one.
Because perhaps the only way we can find any belief in ourselves is to put what belief we have in other people, people who are no longer believable as actual people: film stars.*
And we pay these people unbelievable amounts of money to do unbelievable things in unbelievable circumstances. That’s why, when people say they didn’t think something was believable in a movie, I lose my lunch. None of it is believable! Brad Pitt is in it! Why isn’t every character continually commenting on how handsome he is?!
We don’t want BELIEVABILITY. We want the continuation of the Terminator franchise.
Folks liked that movie so much they made an unfeeling cyborg state governor!
That’s the power of movies: despite bearing no relation to reality, they can seduce millions into making catastrophic choices in their own reality.
See: PITY LAY
* And yet, in films, only film stars can ‘play themselves’ – Ayo.
BETRAYAL
Most dramas, like most marriages, are built on BETRAYAL.
But betrayal is never true betrayal if you are working undercover. When assuming a fake identity in the fight for justice, the hurt caused by your untruths are, at worst, a ‘complication’. The HERO often carries secrets: secrets that no one else can understand, secrets that often come to light only after some fool dame goes and falls in love with him.
As long as the hero meaningfully breaks off relations before returning to his HOMELY WIFE, this falls under the NO HARM, NO FOUL principle – he’ll swallow the hurt for all concerned. This ‘other’ woman tends to maintain fierce loyalty, knowing that the hero is still basically a DECENT MAN and that what they had was real.
In John Irvin’s 1986 Mafia dramedy Raw Deal, Mark Kaminsky (Arnold Schwarzenegger) fakes his own death so he can infiltrate the Mob and track down some lowlifes who iced his buddy’s kid. Now operating under the name Joseph P. Brenner, he is practically forced to bone a hot chick called Monique (Kathryn Harrold) for fear of blowing his cover. He never wanted to make sweet love to this woman; it’s a mission-specific task that he accomplishes with the kind of masculine majesty that’s long since been lost. Today’s millennials would probably end up swapping trilbies and playing the ukulele to one another by the charming glow of a window display outside an Olden Time Teddy Bear Emporium, before getting unexpectedly caught in a rain shower.*
But when Joseph P. Brenner completes his mission and becomes Mark Kaminsky once more, he BREAKS THINGS OFF MEANINGFULLY, giving Monique a quarter of a million dollars in stolen drug money so that she can start a new life. She is completely different to the drunk, gambling floozy we met at the beginning of Act II, transformed by the transcendence of physical congress done right.
Similarly, in Félix Enriquez Alcalá’s 1997 eco-thriller Fire Down Below, local outcast and beekeeper Sarah Kellogg (Marg Helgenberger) feels betrayed by Jack Taggart (Steven Seagal). She thought he was a handyman affiliated to the local church, not a martial-arts-trained Environmental Protection Agent sent to investigate a series of mysterious deaths.
But Taggart assures her that the rapport they’ve established during the narrative was, and is, real: ‘I loved fixing your porch and I’m very interested in you.’ She knows this is a man of honor whose only flaw is that sometimes he may be too unwavering in his selfless quest to make the world a better place.
Contrast this with the genuine sense of betrayal expressed when he discovers his boss is covertly working for the same shady company that he’s investigating: ‘You’re a piece of shit and I’m ashamed of you.’
It’s rare to see a movie star so willing to express hurt in an open and real way. Perhaps that’s why we are forever bound to Seagal.
See: BASICALLY DECENT MEN; BREAKING THINGS OFF MEANINGFULLY WITH FINANCIAL SWEETENERS; HERO, THE; HOMELY WIVES; UNDERCOVER EXTRAMARITAL SEX, DE FACTO NO HARM/NO FOUL RULE FOR
* And for some reason find it funny! – Ayo.
BIOPICS
There’s a line in David Lean’s punishingly long 1962 desert flick, Lawrence of Arabia: ‘Truly for some men nothing is written unless they write it.’
Duh.
I don’t have a secretary either. I type my own pamphlets.
BIOPICS would have you believe that every Great Man got to be ‘Great’ (so-called) because of their merit. But oftentimes the road forks and you wind up on a bum prong.
It’s luck.
Some people have great luck and some people have shit luck – that’s all there is to it.
And the people who turn out ‘Great’ – through luck, nothing more – those people become the subject of movies that star a bunch of other lucky fucks, who then get awards because they did a ‘good’ impression. And why is their impression so ‘good’? Because they were lucky enough to look and sound like the guy in the first place! Look at Benny Kingsley!* He’s lucky he already looked and sounded like Gandhi! Life’s a lottery! He got the golden ticket!
People think that a ‘Great Guy’ deserved what he got because of his character or his drive or his talent, and how amazing it is that he overcame obstacles and triumphed over adversity, while they completely ignore the fact that he was just lucky, lucky, lucky.
There’s a butt-load of people who could’ve been just as successful if only the world hadn’t taken a giant dump on them for no reason.
Where are their biopics?
There’s never going to be a movie about a young screenwriter who had a bad reaction to a bottle of Mai Tai and punched out a sixteen-year-old kid on a golf course – a sixteen-year-old kid who got mad because he found out that this really promising screenwriter had been sort of fooling round with his definitely-over-seventeen twin sister, who then threatened to kill herself (in a pretty unserious way – she hadn’t even settled on a method) because she found out that there wasn’t exactly full disclosure with regard to one of the parties’ marital status – a pretty self-righteous sixteen-year-old punk who then turned out to be the beloved only son of the golf course’s owner, who happened to be inappropriately tight with a development executive at the studio – like, are you going to develop or are you going to be the physical embodiment of someone else’s retributive rage? – and the next thing you know this actually very sweet screenwriter’s hot script isn’t so hot anymore – in fact, it’s cold as old shit – and this really quite thoughtful artist’s marriage breaks up because of his then wife’s complete refusal to even try to understand that this really fairly minor infidelity (barely lasting a summer or so) was nothing more than an appeal – a cry for the then wife to sit up and take notice that there were maybe some issues that needed (at the very least) to be addressed – but there was this complete resistance to communicating in any way whatsoever – and this unfairly maligned guy – I mean, aren’t we all responsible for each other at some kind of basic level? – isn’t that in the Bible? – are we actually saying there are Good People and Bad People? – is that really what we’re saying at this point in Human History? – this Christ-like martyr ends up drifting and not using alcohol as a crutch
exactly – but more like a buffer – as bubble wrap between his exposed, once-impetuous heart and the acid air – and before he knows it, he starts to see himself as being permanently bubble-wrapped – and he sees himself getting married to these various people – but he’s not there – he’s just operating this avatar of himself – air goes in and out of his body – but not because he wants to breathe – in fact, he becomes more and more aware of how involuntary these breaths are – how greedy and relentless they feel – and that if he could just decide to stop – if it were like pressing ‘off’ on a remote control and he could lie down and not get up again – with no pain – or not too much – just a letting go – like a dimming LED merging into the glassy black of the surrounding glass – he would do that – and although there might be some limited sadness on the part of others – they would be fine – they would most likely prosper – so why not lie down for ever?
But they’re never going to make that movie! It’d be a total bummer! Even though I know for a fact that all these things happened to a guy I know!
And when this guy who isn’t me tells other people, they’re riveted.
They’re like, ‘Wow … death … heavy … Don’t die, Gordy. Please. You’re not allowed to die. You owe us money.’
Because death can be a powerful tool in storytelling. Many biopics (incl. the interminable Lawrence of Arabia) start at the end of their subjects’ lives. But be careful not to start too far after, lest you have to account for the time elapsed: e.g. 1980 is an appropriate start for a biopic about John Lennon, but 2280 may seem arbitrary. Or that was the ‘note’ I got on my script, Lennon A.D.(e)., despite the fact that without the framing device of a rusting, Beatles-obsessed cyborg in post-virus Stockport, the whole thing would have no context. Intercutting it with the zombie material was what made it so fresh! See below:†
We flashback to 1965. John Lennon is trying to carry four mugs of tea: three for the other Beatles and one for himself. But he’s overfilled them! Tea starts to spill onto his suede Cuban heels (which stain very easily). He calls out …
JOHN
Help!
We see his three band mates exchanging glances. Their looks seem to say, ‘Perhaps our musical colleague needs somebody,’ though they don’t say it out loud for reasons of copyright.
JOHN
Help!
A very old studio technician struggles toward him with noticeably shaky hands.
Lennon’s eyes seem to qualify the initial exhortation, suggesting that this extremely old/fragile person is not going to be able to provide the assistance he so desperately needs. The band see John’s modifying glance, causing a lyric that cannot be printed for legal reasons to pop into their respective moptops.
Top shot: the four mugs of tea tumble to the ground.
Cut to: the four Beatles in the studio cutting the track ‘Help!’. Scouse smiles all round.
Dolly in on George Martin, looking like an off-duty BA pilot. He’s nodding along with the wry smile of someone who knows how to land a plane in any weather conditions. We cut to George, Paul and Ringo listening to playback. John comes in once more with four teas.
JOHN
Lads – help! I know we just got a fab song off the back of your previous lack of response, but this time I mean it. I don’t want to smash yet more mugs. I need a little help from my friends!
The band exchange looks.
Cut to: low-angle shot. Four mugs smash on the ground, one after the other.
John and George are in the mixing booth, listening to Ringo sing the last note of ‘With a Little Help from My Friends’. George turns to John.
GEORGE
You see, John Lennon, if we had helped you out with carrying those four overfilled mugs like you’d requested, Ringo Starr would never have had the opportunity to struggle with that long high note at the end.
JOHN
I guess you’re right, George Harrison. It’s like when I told Mick Jagger to get off that cloud. My sole motivation was to prevent an accident! It was such an unsafe surface for standing … I know the guy’s light, but even so! Little did I know it would propel them to the toppermost of the poppermost. Which reminds me, where’s Paul McCartney, the Beatles’ bass player, got to?
GEORGE
He’s with his current girlfriend, the aspiring actress Jane Asher.
JOHN
The red-headed woman who later goes into business, specializing in cakes?
GEORGE
That’s right. She and Paul are trying to attain mutual satisfaction.
JOHN
Are you talking about the Rolling Stones again, George Harrison?
GEORGE
Not in this instance. I’m talking about how Paul McCartney and Jane Asher are right this moment trying to achieve simultaneous orgasm.
JOHN
So, in other words, you’re saying that they’re trying to –
Cut to: boiling kettle.
JOHN
Excuse me, George Harrison. That’s the distinctive whistle of a kettle.
John Lennon stands by a boiling kettle. He picks it up to pour himself a lovely cup of Abbey Road tea.
JOHN
(to himself)
Why does George Harrison think I’d care whether Paul McCartney and Jane Asher come together?
Close-up: boiling kettle water cascades to the floor, soaking John Lennon’s Carnaby Street moccasins.
We dolly into John Lennon’s face – he’s had another song idea! Then a sudden change of expression.
Close-up of the steaming moccasins. We hear a scream.
John Lennon is on a hospital gurney. A large-breasted woman wheels him into a white room.
JOHN
Look, nurse, my foot will eventually heal! I only need it for tapping in time. I must urgently return to my Beatles colleagues – I’ve got an idea for a song! I need to get back!!
The words ‘GET BACK’ start to repeat, echoing. The image starts to flash with bright lights.
We cut to Paul McCartney, in bed with Jane Asher. He stops mid-pump.
JANE ASHER
What do you think you’re doing, Paul McCartney? I’m not even close. Not by a long shot, if you don’t mind.
PAUL McCARTNEY
I have my reasons, Jane Asher. That was a psychic message from John Lennon, and I need to get to one of my musical instruments ASAP. The only problem is that I left my favorite bass at Moscow airport – which is a real drag because I can always rely on it to inspire me melodically!
JANE ASHER
You finish what you started, Paul McCartney. We made a deal, in case you forgot.
PAUL McCARTNEY
Fair enough, but let’s not muck about.
Macca and Asher recommence lovemaking.
JANE ASHER
I can’t believe you left your bloomin’ bass guitar in Moscow. That’s back in the U.S.S.R.!
PAUL McCARTNEY
OH, DARLING!
JANE ASHER
Did you just climax? Because so did I!
Off their look, a montage of the Beatles recording ‘Come Together’, ‘Get Back’, ‘Oh! Darling’ and ‘Back in the U.S.S.R.’, intercut with savage assaults from the roaming, rotting undead.
Dynamite, right? And they threw it all back in my face over what was barely a slap.
See: WOW, BEING LIKE
* Sir Benny Kingsley … – Ayo.
† Gordy insisted on including this extract from his rejected script, hoping to reignite interest in the project – Ayo.
BRAWN
Just because a HERO has BRAWN don’t mean he ain’t got brains to spare. In Rowdy Herrington’s 1989 bar-security dramedy Road House, Dalton (Patrick Swayze) is a professional ‘cooler’: an expert doorman able to handle the rowdiest clubs and make them safe for chicks in CLINGY DRESSES.*
But when a cowardly lowlife shanks him in the abs, forcing Dalton to go to Outpatients, we find out he has a degree in philosophy from NYU. The attending physician, Doc (Kelly Lync
h), who’ll look hot later when she takes off those damn glasses and stops acting like such a tight-ass, tries to hide her surprise:
DOC
Any particular discipline?
DALTON
No. Not really. Man’s search for faith. That sort of shit.
DOC
How’s a guy like you end up a bouncer?†
DALTON
Just lucky, I guess.
One thing’s sure as shit: Dalton will be giving this dame his secret meat by the Act II mid-point.
Sure, he looks like Zeus descended from downtown Olympus’s exclusive salon district, but it’s Dalton’s subtle use of psychology that seals the deal.
Even though he was meaningfully engaged in unlocking the code to the universe, he’s not going to bring that shit up unless directly prompted by a SMOKIN’ SEÑORITA. He ain’t some pencil-neck tuggin’ it at his laptop while the other hand double-clicks. He knows brain has its place: second in line to your ASS.
College don’t teach you to have a body that broads just want to lose themselves in. You get that rock-hard bod on the streets, busting heads and pounding ass. Fuck his mouth, his torso does the talking!
Any other kind of diploma don’t mean diddly.
See: ASS; CLINGY DRESSES; DIPLOMAS, NON-DIDDLY; HERO, THE; SEÑORITAS, SMOKIN’
* I’ve allowed the repetition of plot summations, presuming that those capable of reading this book in sequence are inured to tedium – Ayo.
† Perhaps Dalton dropped out of NYU when he realised he’d mistakenly enrolled on the theology course? – Ayo.
BRITISH CINEMA
François Truffaut said BRITISH CINEMA was a ‘contradiction in terms’. But what the hell did he know? The guy died before Rancid Aluminium was even written.
The Grip of Film Page 5