#20: You're Gonna Need A Bigger Boat

(Jaws, 1975, Steven Spielberg)

I have many favorite stories about the film industry. My all time favorite is about The Shining, and it involves Kubrick being crafty and cunning and all around incredible. However, the time is not yet here for me to tell that story. My second favorite Hollywood story is about Jaws and its incredible, captivating soundtrack. When Steven Spielberg first heard the score that John Williams had written for the film, he thought it was an elaborate joke. He laughed and said, "that's funny, John, really. But what did you really have in mind?" Of course, John wasn't kidding, and the soundtrack to Jaws became one of the best, most famous, most easily recognizable films scores of all time.

I started with this story not only because I love it, but because it sets an interesting tone when thinking about the success and, let's face it, sheer brilliance of Jaws. While this incident with the score certainly wasn't a "mistake" or an "accident," it certainly was kind of a misstep. I don't know how John Williams convinced Spielberg that his score was actually a good idea, but it's sure a good thing that he did because it's easily one of the most defining elements of the film. Even Spielberg himself has now said that the film wouldn't have been half as successful without the now infamous score. But what about the other signature elements of the film? The shark-eye perspective as the giant man-eater takes down his victims? The incredible cast who seemed to be born to play their respective roles? Were they just things that Spielberg thought were jokes at first? Well... not quite.

The filming of Jaws was plagued with problems. The mechanical shark (which Spielberg named Bruce, after his lawyer) often proved to be a lot more trouble than it was worth, breaking down frequently and famously getting stuck on the bottom of the ocean during its first swim. So how did Spielberg respond? He decided that instead of filming the shark cruising through the ocean, the camera would become the shark, and many of the early attacks would be seen from its perspective. Which, in the end, proved to be a way better idea than just using shots of a very fake looking mechanical shark that adamantly refused to do the job it was built to do. Just like with the score, Spielberg has now admitted that the camera-as-shark technique possibly saved the film from unforgivable cheesiness, and actually contributed to it's overwhelming success.

Another excellent, defining feature of Jaws is its cast. I mean, really. Is there anyone better to play a salty old sailor who's dedicated his life to killing sharks than Robert Shaw? If I didn't know better I'd believe that they actually just found a crusty sea captain, handed him a script, and hoped for the best. And then there's Richard Dreyfuss, whose wit and snark make him the perfect choice to play the marine biologist who's just dying to catch a shark that would seal his place in the academic world. Finally, there's Roy Sheider, who just wants to keep his town safe, despite his complete lack of knowledge of sharkly behavior. These are the men we all know and love as the main cast of Jaws, so it comes as something as a surprise that none of them were the first choice for their respective parts.

Peter Benchley, the author of the novel on which the film is based, wanted Paul Newman, Steve McQueen, and Robert Redford for the three main characters (god knows which man would have played which character). Charlton Heston was originally considered for Sheider's role. Jeff Bridges and Jon Voight were both under consideration for Dreyfuss's. And, while all these men were or are very fine actors, can you even imagine? It's a really good thing that, for whatever reason, these men were unavailable or uninterested because Jaws just wouldn't be Jaws without Sheider, Dreyfuss, and Shaw. It just wouldn't be right.

Jaws was only Spielberg's second feature-length theatrical release. At 28-years-old he was looking to establish himself in Hollywood, and Jaws allowed him to do just that. But holy crap, what a happy accident it was. Imagine if the mechanical shark had worked just fine, if Peter Benchley had gotten his way in the casting department, and Spielberg had convinced John Williams to change the score. What would the film have been? Probably pretty bad, that's what. And Spielberg would have had to struggle to recover from a very serious misstep. We may never have gotten Raiders of the Lost Ark, E.T., Jurassic Park, or Schindler's List, and we would have been the poorer for it. But then, we also wouldn't have had to suffer through Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, so maybe it wouldn't have been all bad.

#19: This Is War! This Is Not A Game Of Cricket!

(Bridge on the River Kwai, 1957, David Lean)

WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD!!

I’m not sure what the reason for it is, but honor has never really been a driving factor in my life. It might be the times we live in, or the society we’re a part of, but I never find myself thinking that when I’m doing something I’m doing it primarily for the honor of it. Let’s be honest, it’s almost always for personal gain. It’s just the way it is. I’m not necessarily saying I’m happy about it, sometimes I think it would be nice to live in a time where a person’s most important quality is their honor, but we live in a world where honor is on the list of important things somewhere far below monetary holdings and good looks. Which is why Bridge on the River Kwai, where honor is valued above all else, is such a fascinating watch.

Bridge on the River Kwai is essentially a story about two colonels, Col. Nicholson of the British army and Col. Saito of the Japanese army, who have to build a bridge. Saito must do it because those are his orders, and Nicholson must do it because he is a prisoner of Saito. In reality, both must do it to preserve their honor. In the interest of time and space, I’m going to focus on Saito, even though Nicholson is played by Alec Guinness, Oscar winner and future Jedi Master. In the end, though, I think Saito is the much more interesting character.  I can talk about Alec Guinness down the road when he’s actually a Jedi.

So here’s the deal: Saito is bound by the Japanese traditions of honor. He must have the bridge built by his deadline, or he has to kill himself. It sounds harsh, but to not have the project completed by the time his superiors say it must be would be extremely dishonorable and disrespectful, and the only way to regain that honor would be to commit seppuku and remove himself from the world. Saito uses a number of methods (mainly torture) to try to convince Nicholson and his men to build the bridge for him in order to meet his deadline and avoid having to end his own life. However, Nicholson refuses to defy the Geneva Conventions and allow his officers to work, so Saito is stuck. Well, kind of. After a few days in a hot box without food or water, Nicholson changes his mind and says he will help get the bridge built as long as Saito upholds the Geneva Conventions and doesn’t make the officers do manual labor. The shake on it, and the both go on their merry bridge-building way.

Long story short, they get the bridge built by the deadline, and everyone’s honor is restored, right? Wrong! Because now Saito must contend with the fact that the building of the bridge has essentially become a British project. The Brits designed the bridge and built the bridge, and all he did was order them to do it. Due to his inner torment, Saito brings his ceremonial knife with him to the bridge during it’s unveiling, and we are left to presume that he is going to commit seppuku anyway. Because, you know, a bridge built entirely by British hands is just as dishonorable as no bridge at all. And then it gets complicated.

While Saito’s inner battle is raging, Nicholson discovers that the Brits have rigged the bridge with explosives so that it will blow right as the first train crosses over it. When Saito and Nicholson get down to the exposed wire, the audience knows that Saito has the knife in his coat. But does he cut the wire? NO! Why? HONOR! If the bridge is destroyed by British forces, Saito cannot be punished because the evidence of his lack of involvement in the project will be reduced to toothpicks. And he would have still met his deadline, solving the initial “meet the deadline or kill himself” problem. He’s saved. Well, kind of. Until he gets shot at least. But that’s really not the point.

I guess that after 4 rewrites I still don’t really know where I’m going with this, except to pose this question. If Saito had lived, and the bridge had exploded because he didn’t cut the wire… would that really have restored his honor? In my mind, not really. By not cutting the wire he allowed the bridge to be destroyed, causing Japanese deaths and a huge inconvenience for the Japanese army. I guess this question is kind of irrelevant because he did die, but I didn’t really know what else to write about this movie. Which, by the way, I really liked. Just don’t ask me to explain why.

 

A Very Brief Update

So I know that my contingent of loyal readers is very small, but I thought I'd provide the few of you that do exist a reason for why there haven't been any new posts for the last week.

I am currently working book rush for The Duck Store, and while it's great for making money it's not super conducive to watching movies and writing blog posts about them. I've been trying very hard to maintain a regular update schedule, but it's just not happening this week.

Updates should be back to normal next Tuesday. Expect that in the very near future I will be talking about prisoners of war and what happens when you go into the water. See you all on October 5th.

#18: With Great Power Comes Great Responsibility

(Spider-Man, 2002, Sam Raimi)

I was going to start this post by thanking (or blaming) Spider-Man for making superheroes America's favorite film subject for the last eight years, but then I realized that X-Men came out in 2000, so that point wasn't really valid. I will say this, though: Spider-Man was my first exposure to the new generation of films about superheroes, so I can at least thank (or blame) it for hooking me on the genre. Because I've never been a wild comic book fan I can safely say that if Spider-Man had sucked I may never have seen another movie about superheroes. But we all know that it didn't suck, and I know that I saw many a superhero flick since then, so here we are.

I have to start with a little side story. My mom and I love to re-watch movies from 10-ish years ago because we often get a kick out of seeing people who are now major stars in random, small roles. For example, James Franco is in Never Been Kissed. I'm not sure he even has any lines, but he's in it as one of Guy Perkins' cronies, and we think it's pretty funny. Anyway, re-watching Spider-Man gave me one of those little treats. I finally started watching True Blood this summer, and one of the especially pleasing pieces of eye candy on that show is the werewolf Alcide, who's played by Joe Manganiello. Who is in Spider-Man early on as Mary Jane's boyfriend Flash. I have to admit, I prefer him as a werewolf (scruffy and muscular), but it was fun to see him in one of his earlier roles. Okay, moving on.

Something about a nerdy kid who is constantly tormented in high school being transformed into a muscly, web-slinging superhero by a spider bite strikes a good chord with me. I don't know if it's because I was kind of a nerdy kid in high school, but something about Spider-Man just makes me feel really good. Maybe it's because a part of me has always wanted to wake up with some kind of super power (a part of me still wants to believe that my Hogwarts letter is coming, too), and even though I'm terribly afraid of spiders I'd be happy to let one bite me if I knew that afterward I'd be able to climb walls and sling webs and have spidey senses. No matter what makes me love it so much, the truth is that I find joy in watching Peter Parker discover his new abilities and secretly wish for the day that I find mine, even though I know it's almost certainly never coming. But a girl can dream.

Speaking of Peter Parker, is there any better casting choice than Toby Maguire as the nerd turned superhero? Maybe just one, and that's Willem Dafoe as Norman Osborn/The Green Goblin. Willem Dafoe is kind of a terrifying man, even when he's not playing a villain. That craggy face and raspy voice just scream "BAD GUY," and Dafoe nails Osborn's struggle between his real self and his evil alter-ego. It's a tragedy that the Green Goblin has to die at the end of the movie, because his presence probably would have improved the second and third installments in the Spider-Man franchise. Not that I have anything against Alfred Molina, but just like I feel like Michael Caine should be the only person allowed to play Ebeneezer Scrooge, I also feel that Willem Dafoe is the best choice to play pretty much every villain ever.

So there it is. I love Spider-Man because I am a nerdy person who hopes that one day I'll be able to fly or read minds or something. I love Toby Maguire as Peter Parker, but not as much as I love Willem Dafoe as Norman Osborn. And even though it's completely unrelated to this movie, I secretly hope that my invitation to study at the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry is on it's way to me as we speak. Because I am a nerd. And Spider-Man is a movie for nerds.

# 17: Bluffing. The Word Is Bluffing.

(Quiz Show, 1994, Robert Redford)

I'd heard from a number of people that I needed to see Quiz Show. I think the recommendations began when people started realizing that I watch Jeopardy with my parents almost every night, and that we don't only watch it, we keep track of how many of the questions me manage to get right (which usually isn't many). Trivia is something that I've always been kind of good at because I have the ability to store random, seemingly irrelevant bits of knowledge for shockingly long periods of time. I don't really know why, I just can. Because of that, watching a movie about people who are good at trivia (or at least are pretending to be) was really enjoyable.

Quiz Show was one of the films that I was really excited to see on The List. It was one of those happy instances in which something that I wanted to do and something that I had to do were actually the same thing. I mean, I don't really have to do this, but I've committed myself to this project and it's nice when watching the films doesn't feel like a chore. So when I sat down with my parents (my Jeopardy partners in crime) to watch Quiz Show I found myself actively looking forward to it, which was kind of a nice change of pace. And I certainly wasn't let down.

I don't want to spend a lot of time on the plot because I actually have other things to say about this film, but here's the gist: Quiz Show is based on the true story of the quiz show scandals of the 1950s, which led to the cancellation of many quiz shows and serious format changes in others. The film focuses on Charles van Doren, a charming and intelligent college professor who won a staggering amount of money on Twenty One and was later revealed to have been coached by the shows producers, as were many contestants that came before him. Contestants and producers were brought in front of the House Committee for Legislative Oversight to testify, with contestants generally admitting that they were guilty of accepting assistance from the producers and the producers generally claiming that it was all in the name of good television. But in the end, the shows were proven to be rigged and that was that. 

But wasn't it good television? I'm going to bring up a more contemporary example of someone on a quiz show making good television: Ken Jennings. In 2004, Jennings appeared on Jeopardy and won a staggering 74 times before finally losing during his 75th appearance. Unfortunately, I didn't watch the Ken Jennings episodes, but when I watched Quiz Show I couldn't help but bring him to mind. Ken Jennings was unstoppable, much like Charles van Doren. In 75 appearances on the show there were only 14 instances in which his total after the Double Jeopardy round wasn't insurmountable. That means that in 61 of his 75 games he had over double the money that the next closest contestant had going into Final Jeopardy. He was unstoppable. Then, suddenly, on his 75th appearance he just seemed to give up, giving an incorrect answer to a Final Jeopardy question that many believe he should have known. And the age of Ken Jennings was over.

While Jennings appeared on the show, viewership for Jeopardy increased by over 20%. Suddenly, Americans cared about the quiz show again. Sure, a lot of people were probably tuning in just hoping to see him lose, but they were tuning in nonetheless. Much like when Charles van Doren was on Twenty One. Now, I'm certainly not saying that Ken Jennings was coached, or that the game was rigged in his favor, or that he was asked to throw the game during his 75th appearance because audiences were getting tired of see his face. I am saying that watching Quiz Show after Ken Jennings is a very different experience than watching Quiz Show before Ken Jennings.

No one suspected anything of Charles van Doren until he confessed his indiscretions in front of the Congressional committee, all while the producers were saying that they didn't do anything wrong. They were just creating good TV. If Herbert Stempel (the man van Doren defeated in his first victory on Twenty One) had never come forward and revealed that he had been coached on the show, there may never have been any quiz show scandals. Charles van Doren and all the people who came before and after him would have only been remembered as being good TV. Or maybe they wouldn't have been remembered at all. But we definitely wouldn't have Quiz Show, and that would be a real shame.