"Mad Men" is one of my favorite shows of this past year. I love the period-specific details, from the clothes to the furniture. I also love the writing. Each character seems fully realized, full of secrets and complexity. And the settings and dialog perfectly demonstrate the larger theme of how America had been changed by three generations of war.
At the center of the series is Don Draper, the enigmatic creative director at Sterling-Cooper, who is both wonderful and horrid, a man who feels deeply, but hurts everyone around him. This clip, from the first season's last episode, shows him doing what he does best: spinning words into gold.
The level of emotion that is slowly and subtly reached in this scene is sublime. So many elements have come together by this, the end of the season, to make his simple pitch pack the emotional punch that it does. It shows all that Don has and all that he has lost in a lovely little tale of a happy family. And indeed it reflects the series' overarching themes: is family enough? How do you witness cruelty and horror and then function in the world? How much of yourself is consciously created and how much is made against your will?
Friday, April 18, 2008
Wednesday, April 16, 2008
David Bowie's Rock and Roll Suicide
This is my favorite David Bowie song so imagine my delight when I found this video. David Bowie and... puppets. Wonderful!
My husband and I have a theory that the best songs are often ones by legendary artists that are not typically played incessantly. Like the best Beatles songs are "Norwegian Wood" and "Here, There and Everywhere," not "Revolution" or "Hey Jude" mainly because they're less common and therefore more precious. This is absolutely true for David Bowie. When I hear "Fame" on the radio, I race to turn the station. "Changes" is similarly boring, and don't even get me started on his 1980's ouevre. But "Rock and Roll Suicide" is amazing. From the opening guitar riff to the buildup in the middle to (you're not alone... give me your hands...) to the ending chorus of "Wonderfuls," this is Bowie at his best.
Monday, April 14, 2008
Jimmy Stewart in The Philadelphia Story
Why is it that current movies have such a hard time getting the light comedy right? Have they seen The Philadelphia Story? This is a movie about sex and drinking and marriage and love that only gets better with every viewing. It's a movie about talking where, even amidst the talents of Jimmy Stewart, Katherine Hepburn and Cary Grant, the dialogue is the star. And each of the actors inhabit their roles so naturally that even when the words dance ahead of them they manage to catch up and make the people and situations feel both real and brilliantly staged. For the viewer, it’s a little like watching a ballet. You know that every movement and every note is choreographed, yet it feels naturally beautiful. You just appreciate the time and effort it must have taken to arrange all of the elements into one place.
The speech that starts around 4:48 in the clip above was a wild risk. It’s so patently absurd and unnatural that a young man in the middle of a drunken revelry would never be able to pull it off. I even saw an interview where Jimmy Stewart said he struggled with how to act that part of the script. And yet, it works because it is the perfect speech at the right time, and both characters walk away feeling a little different about themselves and their places in the world.
Mike Connor (Jimmy Stewart) is a would-be novelist who barely has a dime to his name and is slumming at Spy magazine. The fact that he's able to improv such phrases as "...there's fires banked within you, Tracy... hearth fires.. and, and ... holocausts..." is a perfect demonstration of his inner artist released. He is a writer after all.
Tracy (Katherine Hepburn), the lifelong heiress, is moved by his words, because what Mike is saying is the exact opposite of the conversation she previously had with her ex-husband C.K. Dexter Haven (Cary Grant) in which he accuses her of being a remote, untouchable goddess.
The whole reckless conversation has an edge of daring to it that comes from the fact that they’ve been drinking. And the drinking is the perfect device for both of these characters to really talk and admit their attraction to each other, even if they both know they won’t fall in love. Even if they both know that Tracy’s already in love, although she’s too stubborn to admit it. Brilliant.
The speech that starts around 4:48 in the clip above was a wild risk. It’s so patently absurd and unnatural that a young man in the middle of a drunken revelry would never be able to pull it off. I even saw an interview where Jimmy Stewart said he struggled with how to act that part of the script. And yet, it works because it is the perfect speech at the right time, and both characters walk away feeling a little different about themselves and their places in the world.
Mike Connor (Jimmy Stewart) is a would-be novelist who barely has a dime to his name and is slumming at Spy magazine. The fact that he's able to improv such phrases as "...there's fires banked within you, Tracy... hearth fires.. and, and ... holocausts..." is a perfect demonstration of his inner artist released. He is a writer after all.
Tracy (Katherine Hepburn), the lifelong heiress, is moved by his words, because what Mike is saying is the exact opposite of the conversation she previously had with her ex-husband C.K. Dexter Haven (Cary Grant) in which he accuses her of being a remote, untouchable goddess.
The whole reckless conversation has an edge of daring to it that comes from the fact that they’ve been drinking. And the drinking is the perfect device for both of these characters to really talk and admit their attraction to each other, even if they both know they won’t fall in love. Even if they both know that Tracy’s already in love, although she’s too stubborn to admit it. Brilliant.
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