Tag Archives: John Barry

Twin Peaks “Traces to Nowhere” [1990)

Before 9/11.

Before the Oklahoma City bombing.

There was a skeleton key.

Dangling.

Word.  To the wise:

it is not easy to pick this show back up after a long hiatus.

Leaving the Rosetta Stone in the mud…to return knee-deep in crypticism.

Almost makes you want to become an FBI agent.  A special agent.

Because your mind likes puzzles…

Plenty of shows on TV like that now.

It’s the law enforcement arm of the propaganda machine which gives us the sexier James Bond.

Word.  To the wise:

Never Say Never Again is really painful (unbearably so) without John Barry.

Or Monty Norman.

Even Kasparov lost to Deep Blue.

On a rematch.

Maybe.

Barely.

And we’ve discussed the much-vaunted anti-Semitism of Fischer.

Word.  To the wise:

there’s a fish in the percolator.

And so Duwayne Dunham (who?) turns in a masterfully-directed episode of Twin Peaks.

The first real episode (after the lengthy pilot).

Which is to say (viz.)–don’t neglect your studies.

Only you are you.

And you are fighting the greatest enemy in the known world.

The hydra-headed logarithm.

Ask my log.

I thought so.

Sherilyn Fenn is painfully attractive.

Like Martha Vickers in The Big Sleep.

C’est-à-dire, Twin Peaks is the Picasso of television.

A once-in-a-lifetime experience.

That this show was broadcast on a major American TV network (ABC) is a miracle.

It was the Armory Show of 7-Eleven culture.

The priceless amidst a shitstorm of mediocrity.

Sometimes the rag pickers find a gem in our disposable civilization.

At which point we chiffonniers are mandated to return it…to its rightful owners.

You.

America.

America is everywhere.

An amoebic blob phenomenon bleeding porn and missiles.

Hasta la vista!  Hava Nagila!

Git er done.

We all need to return to the beginning.

In matters so complex.

And I wish you sharp swords in slicing through the bollocks.

Sincerely.

 

-PD

 

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Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland [1972)

First off, this film has never been properly restored (to my knowledge) and the copy I have on disc makes this quite apparent.  From the opening titles one can hardly read a word.  It’s as if a taxi driver in Cairo went into a local cinema and set up his camcorder pointed at the screen.  Suffice it to say that the medium is the message to this extent.  The story would be almost psychedelic enough just based on the thoroughly bizarre film transfer.

Fiona Fullerton is actually quite good as Alice.  The Nigerian-born actress would go on to appear in A View to a Kill (1985).

It’s hard to quibble about a film which employs a dodo bird.  This, of course, is to the credit of author Lewis Carroll.  Peter Bull is oddly cast as the Duchess.  You might remember him from Dr. Strangelove as Soviet Ambassador Alexei de Sadeski.

The disembodied head of Roy Kinnear as the Cheshire Cat adds a rather clunky touch near the end of the film.

But this film really is worth it if for none other than the ten-or-so minutes of Peter Sellers as The March Hare.  With prim and proper accent he, along with the Mad Hatter and Dormouse, regales Alice with a pun or two (“spook only when spooken to”).  This really was my whole reason for watching, but I’m glad to have experienced the whole slice of mind-altering pie.

Dudley Moore seems a bit misused as the Dormouse as he spends most of the film asleep.  For fans of The Goon Show one can spot Spike Milligan as the Gryphon.  The scene with the Mock Turtle is when the film really gets going.  One even gets the sense that perhaps the production was shot in sequence (due to the comfort the cast seems to have by that point…a characteristic apparently missing in earlier scenes).

Of special notice in this film is the music of John Barry.  The world knows him best as the official James Bond composer.  His work here lends this production a timeless sheen of orchestral mystery.  Perhaps it’s just my faded copy, but there are some truly magical moments every now and then.  I wouldn’t call it on the whole a masterpiece, but director William Sterling did an admirable job.  This was, in fact, Sterling’s only foray into non-TV film directing.  Not bad at all, sir!

The song credits even give one an opportunity to view sous rature in the flesh (“How Doth The Little Busy Bee Crocodile”).  Whether or not Isaac Watts would be pleased, we can assume Heidegger and Derrida would find some jollies.

And so, plenty of croquet and even a Lobster Quadrille.  Someone call Gérard de Nerval.

 

-PD

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On Her Majesty’s Secret Service [1969)

Lazenby.

Not Connery.  Not Moore.

After the bloated disaster of You Only Live Twice, my expectations were not very high.

I couldn’t have been more wrong.

This is perhaps the best Bond movie up to this point in the series.  I know it is blasphemy to say so.  I love Connery.  I adore Moore.  The achievement in question is perhaps best attributed to the director (new to the series in this capacity):  Peter Hunt.

Telly Savalas is masterful as the cat-petting Blofeld.  He adds a depth to the character which was missing in the previous depiction by Donald Pleasence.  It is interesting to note the similarities of Blofeld’s allergy institute (a cover for brainwashing) to the CIA’s dirty program Project MKUltra which was headed by Dr. Sidney Gottlieb.  The ghastly “research” was administrated from 1953 onwards by Dr. Gottlieb.  Blofeld’s methods in this film bear a striking resemblance to those of MKUltra’s head experimenter Dr. Ewen Cameron.  The world can thank CIA agent William Francis Buckley (“Bill”, but not the one of which you’re probably thinking) for blowing the whistle on this dark, dark period in CIA misadventure.  Buckley observed the deplorable results in Montreal at McGill University.

But back to fun stuff 🙂  High-speed chases!  The Bond series from Eon Productions redeems itself with a great ski chase down Piz Gloria (atop which is Blofeld’s “clinic”).  While not as epic as the underwater battle in Thunderball, it is much more entertaining that the autogyro sequence in You Only Live Twice.

I really must compliment Lazenby.  His was no easy task.  It was the right decision for him to not speak in an affected Scottish accent after Connery.  Lazenby could have been a great long-term Bond.  Thankfully he contributed this one fine performance to the annals.

Peter Hunt is to be equally (if not more so) congratulated.  This was a unique ending for a Bond movie.  It was handled deftly and had just the right amount of suspense to keep the incredulous at bay.  I’m speaking of course about 007 getting married.  You’ll have to see it for yourself to find out just how Eon Productions managed to finagle a continuance of the series after this “blow” to the womanizing lead character.  Of course, in today’s world marriage wouldn’t be a hindrance at all in a similar dramatic case.

This film is really an odd duck, but it should stand as an example for the series.  It is a bit humorous to hear John Barry give the famous 007 guitar line to a harpsichord in the opening credits.  The effect is similar to “Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds.”  Louis Armstrong even sings a song especially recorded for this film!  He was near the end of his life and it is as touching as Billie Holiday’s album Lady In Satin.  Armstrong never recorded another song (dying two years later from a heart attack).

 

-PD

 

 

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