Film&Fun Du Jour
Made in USA, this movie is AWESOME! I would love to watch it more than once and lucky me, Criterion just released the DVD as part of it's national release. It was shown in 35 mm and Wow. I am uber happy we all made it to the screening. This is a rich, rich, highly saturated film. It's oozing with color, references, narrative strategy,politics, and Anna Karina. Film Forum has an excellent page on this film. They printed out a glossary done by Rialto pictures regarding some references in the film. Just to give you an idea, I have copied and pasted only some of it here to entice you go and watch it on DVD.
A Made in U.S.A. Concordance
Following is an attempt to identify the myriad literary, cinematic,and political references in Godard’s Made in U.S.A.
Adieu la vie, Adieu l’amour Karina is seen reading Kiss Tomorrow Goodbye by Horace McCoy (1897–1955), published in Gallimard’s famous Série Noire crime collection as Adieu la vie, Adieu l’amour in 1948. The book (filmed in 1950 with James Cagney in the starring role) follows its thoroughly ruthless criminal protagonist from chain gang escape to his return to a life of crime. McCoy is perhaps best known for his existential Depression novel They Shoot Horses, Don’t They? (1935).
As Tears Go By Pop star Marianne Faithfull sings an a cappella version of “As Tears Go By,” the first song written by Mick Jagger and Keith Richards of The Rolling Stones and the song that launched Faithfull’s career in 1964 at age 17. Her original record remained on the Billboard charts for 9 weeks; the song was subsequently recorded by the Stones as the B side to “19th Nervous Breakdown” in the U.K.
“Atlantic City” The location is Gallicized as Atlantic-Cité, “cité” in its contemporary sense usually referring to a housing project.
The “Ben Barka Affair”On October 30, 1965, Le Monde ran an article about the mysterious arrest of Mehdi Ben Barka, exiled leader of the left-wing Moroccan opposition. It was an arrest the police denied making. Ben Barka’s disappearance was at the center of the news for months, during which the French secret police was revealed to have conspired with the criminal underworld to deliver Ben Barka to Moroccan agents. Morocco’s interior minister was reported to have visited the hideout where Ben Barka was being held and to have tortured him to death. (Excerpted from Everything is Cinema by Richard Brody.)
Goodis, David American noir fiction writer (1917–1967), particularly popular among French directors, notably Truffaut, who adapted his novel Down There as Tirez sur le pianiste (Shoot the Piano Player, 1961).
“Hey, Philippe!” The journalist is Philippe Labro (born 1936), playing himself, a reporter for the Europe 1 radio station. Author and journalist, he had been a soldier in the Algerian war. He later became a film and TV director.
Korvo, Dr. Samuel Reference to Dr. David Korvo, a villainous hypnotist played by José Ferrer in Otto Preminger’s 1949 thriller Whirlpool.
Left, Year Zero Godard photographs the cover of the paperback edition of a 1964 political study of the French left by Marc Paillet. The title is also a reference to Rossellini’s Germania, anno zero (Germany, Year Zero, 1948).
Widmark, Paul Reference to Hollywood star Richard Widmark (1914-2008), memorable as the psycho bad guy of several film noirs of the late 40s and early 50s, most notably Kiss of Death. Widmark’s one film for director Otto Preminger, 1957’s Saint Joan, would prove to have significance in Godard’s career: it introduced his Breathless star Jean Seberg.
“You still work at Radar?” The comment finally reveals that Karina works for a sensation-seeking true crime magazine, hardly the periodical for a journalist with “principles.”
Written & compiled by Lenny Borger n Edited & with additional material by Bruce Goldstein© 2009 Rialto Pictures LLC n rialtopictures.com
Though I had seen Shoot the Piano Player before, never at the Paramount.
I really hate to see the movie series come to an end. We could watch movies here all year long. Between movie watching and Tuesday night skating fun, I think I have a weekly schedule I can stick to. But no more movie after August, wah. The skating continues and I woke up this morning wanting to just get into some quads and head for Playland. We might try and see if we can skate on Sunday's.
Oh! One thing that always makes me happy is camera porn. Check out these sexy cameras.
Labels: du jour
1 Comments:
Man, i'm really missing out...
xo p
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