Wake in Fright [1971)

Australia has fallen.

Tiboonda doesn’t exist (apparently).

But Tibooburra does.

And Bundanyabba also appears not to exist.

But Bundanoon does.

Tibooburra is a hot, desert town of about 100 people in New South Wales.

Bundanoon (also in NSW) is of about 2,000 population.

This all fits.

But Bundanoon is a sort of resort town, not the mining town that the Yabba (Bundanyabba) was to be.

We’re dealing with a novel here.

Same name.

From 10 years prior.

By Kenneth Cook.

Cook was born and died (1987) in NSW.

So it would make sense if the towns were somewhere in the state.

Province?

The outback of New South Wales.

We need to talk about mining in NSW.

Adelong [quartz and gold]. too small

Albert [copper]. too small

Alectown [Parkes Observatory]. too small

Wallarunga [silver, lead, feldspar, beryl]. too small

Araluen [gold]. too small

Ardglen [hard rock?]. too small

Ardlethen [gold]. too small

Attunga [limestone]. too small

Barraba [copper, asbestos]. maybe

Baryulgil [asbestos]. too small

Bathurst [gold] maybe too big

Batlow [?]. too small

Bellbird [coal]. too small?

Ben Bullen [?]. too small

Bingara. [diamonds]. too small

Birchgrove [?]. too close to Sydney

Bobadah [silver, lead, gold, copper]. too small?

Silverton [silver, lead, zinc, Mad Max]. too small

Bongongolong [?]. ?

Bredbo [Man from Snowy River]. too small

Broken Hill.

Found you, bitch.

Ocker!

Films like Stork.

The Adventures of Barry McKenzie.

Alvin Purple.

And later, The Castle (1997).

Redneck!

Ozploitation vs. Australian New Wave.

What can Ozploitation help us find that Australian New Wave ignores?

Two-up.

RSL.

Returned and Services League of Australia.

ANZAC.

WWI.

Pay attention.

Doc Tydon and addiction.

Addiction.

Tim Hynes.

A different face on addiction.

Same substance.

Alcohol.

But could just as well be sleeping pills.

Hynes somewhat more respectable.

But not by much.

They are (we are) all addicts.

And now Australia limiting alcohol to one six-pack per day (per person).

During a fucking lockdown!

Get angry, Aussies!!!

https://open.spotify.com/track/1Sg8Sx0ANOiAfu7vJmivyP?si=f524ec215f5a49e7

Me, I got suspended for 12 hours from Twitter for calling Bill Hemmer a “fucking retard”.

It’s true.

It’s all true.

Worth every keystroke, it were!

Just a good natured insult.

Fuck it.

We wouldn’t be in this mess hadn’t Rupert Murdoch’s bitches (like Hemmer) bent us over for a rigged election.

Murdoch’s network, FOX, was the first to call Arizona for Biden.

Biden did not win Arizona.

That will be proven shortly.

The Liz Harris canvass has already proven it.

But it will be proven with unimpeachable precision.

You can check out my song up there.

I posted a link.

“Australia, Here I Come!”

Because it’s been something of a dream to visit down under.

But now all dreams are being crushed like quartz.

Why does John vomit?

Wikipedia says it’s because he drank too much.

My suspicion is because he is gay.

Or because a hentai tentacle comes up Jeanette’s throat to tickle his tonsils.

But I still say he’s a faggot.

I love faggots.

Do you see how this goes now?

We have a First Amendment (free speech) because we have a Second Amendment (our fucking guns!).

Australia got raped by the Port Arthur massacre (false-flag).

Aussies sold their guns back.

The guns went straight to the landfill.

They were melted down.

They don’t exist anymore.

So now, Aussies no longer have free speech (or any freedom whatsoever).

Because they no longer have guns.

Because the government is not afraid to push them around.

Ever wonder why protests don’t go so well in China?

Because it’s hard to fight back with nothing but shovels.

The military has guns.

The people have shovels.

Gardening tools.

That is why there are no successful protests in China.

Yet, Tiananmen Square WAS a success.

8964.

With many martyrs.

And now Hong Kong faces the same fate.

And Taiwan faces the same fate.

Because the New World Order STOLE the American election and installed fake president Joe Biden.

Fuck Joe Biden!

I read it that Doc tries to rape John Grant as well.

Because you fuck anything that moves in the outback.

And you drink all the beer.

If it moves, kill it.

It’s like Texas.

I’ve been to Australia.

Because I’m from Texas.

It’s the same thing.

And I’m goddamned proud of Texas.

Because we are going to save the world!

Us, Florida, Sweden, and Denmark.

And there will be more who join.

We aren’t scared.

We are armed (Texas and Florida).

And we are smart (Sweden and Denmark).

Don’t discount the intelligence of Texans.

Or the tenacity of Swedes.

But each of us has a job to do in the GLOBAL REVOLUTION.

The great reset?

Fuck the great reset!

We want The Great Awakening!!!

Doc Tydon would have prescribed Ivermectin.

Because Ivermectin works.

As a cure (taken with doxycycline) for COVID.

Bangladesh has proven this.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33278625/

But Doc Tyden might also prescribe you an alternate treatment: hydroxychloroquine, Z-Pak, and zinc.

The zinc is important.

And the antibiotic (Z-Pak) is needed because the virus is carried by bacteria.

Read that again.

This is what quack, alcoholic Doc Tyden (Donald Pleasence) might prescribe.

BECAUSE IT FUCKING WORKS!!!

Both courses!!

Either the Ivermectin course, or the hydroxychloroquine course.

Which is exactly why Australia has now effectively BANNED Ivermectin.

Ivermectin is now only to be used in Australia to treat RIVER BLINDNESS.

Australia is fucked.

And the whole world is getting fucked right along with them.

I’m here in Texas.

My doctor is a fucking twat who wouldn’t prescribe me Ivermectin.

Even a doctor friend of mine gave me some load of horseshit on how he thinks Ivermectin doesn’t work.

But guess what?

He thinks 19 guys with boxcutters carried out 9/11.

He also got his vaccine like a good little sheep.

And he shot down this persuasive meta-analysis (as did my own doctor):

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8248252/

Why?

Because doctors are a self-serving, intellectually-lazy, MORALLY-BEREFT cult!

They just wanna keep their jobs.

They are “just following orders”.

They think “do no harm” also means “do no good”.

They never read Jesus’s parable about the talents.

These doctors don’t give a fuck!

There are but a handful of doctors in the world that are worth a shit.

And I hope to make them more well-known with time.

One is Dr. Steve Pieczenik, MD PhD.

MD at Cornell (where he studied under Fauci [whose “crimes against humanity” arrest he is now rightly calling for]).

Psychiatry studies at Harvard.

PhD in international relations from MIT.

There are other medical doctors we will be highlighting as having done THE RIGHT THING during this pandemic.

But now it is time to eat kangaroo.

Now it is time to know why Crocodile Dundee had to shoot the hunters (this movie).

It was a cinematic riposte.

Shoot a rabbit and eat.

Over fire.

.22 rifle.

.22.

Sisyphus ends up back in Bundanyabba instead of Sydney.

All that work.

But he gets his rifle back.

You must understand this movie in order to understand Crocodile Dundee.

John Meillon.

Future proves past.

The truckers have got the right idea.

-PD

Filmistaan [2013)

I consider it an auspicious sign that my survey of Indian cinema begins in earnest with the masterpiece Filmistaan.

Do not mistake this piece of cinema for a half-baked idea.

Do not even attempt to lower it by calling it a comedy.

And not least, do not think only of India.

I wanted to come up with a catchy pigeonhole.

Indian Subcontinent.

The Subcontinent.

But I have too much respect for the great traditions of Bollywood (and Lollywood) to do such a thing.

And so this is very much an Indian film.

India.

And it is very much a comedy.

So funny!

But it is touching in a way to which few films can ever aspire.

Filmistaan, like Roberto Benigni’s magnum opus La vita è bella, takes on a very serious subject with the best weapon of all: humor.

But instead of the Holocaust, we get the Partition.

And yet, Filmistaan is not some laborious period piece.

[leave that to the artless Spielbergs]

No, our film addresses the tension between India and Pakistan in the most deft, feather-light manner imaginable.

And for this we have to thank a new auteur on the world stage: Nitin Kakkar.

I say “new” because Mr. Kakkar has not been graced with the honor of his own Wikipedia page in English yet.

Well, he is wholly deserving of that honor (based on Filmistaan alone).

But Mr. Kakkar had to have magical actors to pull this off.

Luckily for him, he did!

Sharib Hashmi is undoubtedly the star of this picture.

His performance as Sunny goes from the highest highs of emotion to the lowest lows.

It is truly remarkable.

Mr. Hashmi is about one month older than me.

40 years old.

Perhaps that’s why I identified with his youthful optimism and passionate devotion to cinema.

But to understand our film, we must first locate Rajasthan on a map.

It is the biggest state in India.

It is northwest.

And it borders Pakistan.

To understand Rajasthan, we must comprehend the Thar Desert.

Most of the Thar Desert is in Rajasthan, but it extends somewhat into Pakistan.

These are all important details in understanding our film.

Rajasthan is arid.

Like the American Southwest, it’s a good place to get lost…or kidnapped.

But friends are to be found in the most unlikely places.

And the friendship of shared interest, such as two cinema devotees, knows no borders.

For Mr. Hashmi, the brilliance of his performance depends on the artful support he receives from fellow-actor Inaamulhaq.

But let’s examine the divide between India and Pakistan for a moment.

It is a fact that a man from Peshawar (if he speaks Urdu) can communicate with a man from Delhi (if he speaks Hindi).

Peshawar, of course, is in Pakistan.

Indeed, it’s so far into Pakistan that it’s almost in Afghanistan.

Delhi, of course, is in India.

It is in the north-central part of the country.

It is, further, not essential that the two talkers hypothesized above be men.

The salient detail is that Hindi and Urdu are essentially the same language (in their spoken forms).

This is vital to understanding Filmistaan.

But continuing, the two languages could not look more different once they are written down.

[Which is to say, the two hypothesized men might be at loggerheads were they forced to communicate with pen and paper]

Urdu looks similar to its written forebear Farsi (the language of Iran) [which is itself a descendent of Arabic script].

To put it quite simply, a neophyte like myself would probably have a difficult time telling the difference between Urdu, Persian (Farsi), and Arabic.

Hindi is in the wholly different Devanagari script.

You will not confuse written Urdu and Hindi.

It’s at least as obvious as Picasso to Pollock (if not Warhol to Rembrandt).

But enough analogies.

Why should you watch Filmistaan?

Well, for one…it’s currently on Netflix.

Yes, ever since I have joined the streaming service, I have ventured to be a more “worthwhile” film critic by giving you relatively-spoiler-free reviews of current titles to be found on the U.S. version of the site.

But that’s only the beginning.

Yes, there are wonderful performances from Kumud Mishra and Gopal Dutt (as well as a plethora of fine supporting actors).

But the real reason is that Filmistaan expresses the sublime.

The context is terrorism.

The context is border tension.

Indeed, on the Indian Subcontinent, the context is two nuclear states.

Pakistan and India.

But the context goes back.

To Jinnah and Nehru.

And the threads bind.

Cricket. Cinema. Music.

There is an excellent example in Filmistaan which illustrates the situation.

Dilip Kumar.

Now 94 years old.

Like my hypothetical man from earlier, born in Peshawar.

Then a part of “Pre-Independence India”.

Now a part of Pakistan.

Bordering Afghanistan.

In Filmistaan, Inaamulhaq knows him as Sir Yusuf.

Sunny knows him as Dilip.

Dilip Kumar was born Muhammad Yusuf Khan in Peshawar in 1922.

Sir Yusuf.

Dilip Kumar.

Same person.

It’s like the World Wars.

fenêtre in French

das Fenster in German

window.

fenêtre /\ Fenster

But when you look through a window (or a border), everything can look backwards.

You’re so close, in reality.

But you’re reading the word as if in a mirror.

Nitin Kakkar directed a masterpiece with Filmistaan because he put his heart and soul into evoking peace.

There are no winners in a nuclear war.

And peace is a rare commodity on the world stage.

Geopolitics…

But we must reach out that hand.

And shake it.

I congratulate Nitin Kakkar and Sharib Hashmi for their dedication.

It is evident.

Though I speak neither Hindi nor Urdu, I was able to watch.

And understand.

I needed the subtitles.

But sublime emotions may be mutually intelligible across cultures.

What a film!

-PD

3 Comments

M [1931)

Perhaps we pay too much attention to the story.

We all love a good story.

But the mark of the genius filmmaker may be found in their method of narrative. The art of how they tell their stories.

To be quite honest, I wasn’t thrilled to return to this Fritz Lang masterpiece, but I’m glad I did.

It is very much how I feel about Hitchcock’s Psycho. It is a wonderful film, but it’s not something I want to throw on once a week during the course of kicking back.

M, like Psycho, is a supremely tense film. Nowadays, when we think of Hitchcock, we might reflect on his tastefulness. Think about it (says Jerry Lee). In Hitchcock’s day (a long, productive “day”), things which are now shown with impunity were positively disallowed for a Hollywood filmmaker. Blood and guts…no. Hitchcock was forced to artfully suggest.

The strictures guiding Fritz Lang (29 years earlier) were even more conservative. But even so, M is a genuinely terrifying movie.

Terrifying films are rarely relaxing. They are not meant to be.

But as I had seen this one before, I was able to focus more on the method employed by Lang. The truth is, M is a masterpiece. It really is the treatment of a brute subject (murder) with incredible subtlety.

What is most radical about M is its counterintuitive take on crime.

Within this film, crime is divided into capital and noncapital offenses.

In M, a band of criminals exists which seeks to put a serial killer out of business. It may seem a strange turn of phrase, but this killer is bad for the business of other criminals (mainly thieves and such).

A town in terrorized. The police regularly raid establishments. You must have your “papers” with you at all times.

And so those who survive on crime are so desperate as to adopt (temporarily) the same goal as the police: catch the killer.

It is not giving much away to tell you that Peter Lorre is the killer. This is not a whodunit. It’s a “what’s gonna happen”. That I will leave to your viewing pleasure.

While I am on the subject of Lorre, let me just say that this is one of the finest, weirdest performances in cinema history. The final scene is one of absolutely raw nerves. Lorre is not the cute, vaguely-foreign character he would become in The Maltese Falcon or Casablanca. Lorre is stark-raving mad.

His attacks of psychosis are chilling to observe. But really, it is his final outburst which tops any bit of lunacy I’ve ever seen filmed.

Today there would likely be plenty of actors ready to play such a macabre role, but in 1931 this was a potential death wish.

That Lorre put his soul into it tells us something important about him. First, he was capable of being more than a “sidekick” (as he was in the previously-mentioned Bogart films). Second, he was dedicated to the art of acting. Lorre was not “mailing it in”. Playing such a role can’t be particularly healthy for one’s mental state.

But there’s a further thing. His final monologue is filled with such angst. Let us consider the year: 1931. In the midst of the Great Depression.

But also we must consider the country: Germany. These were the waning years of the Weimar Republic. Three important dates would end this democratic republic: Hitler’s appointment as Chancellor (Jan. 30, 1933), ~~9/11~~ the Reichstag fire (Feb. 27, 1933), and the Enabling Act (Mar. 23, 1933).

The era of M (1931) was the era of Heinrich Brüning’s “deflationary” monetary policy as German Chancellor. I put deflationary in quotation marks because Wikipedia’s current description might better be termed contractionary monetary policy.

As Wikipedia would tell it, Brüning was essentially instating fiscal austerity (that hot-button term of recent times) concomitantly with the aforementioned monetary approach. This was, of course, the failure which paved the way for Adolf Hitler to take control of Germany.

And so we find that the historian Webster Tarpley is right when he refers to certain modern-day policy makers as austerity “ghouls”. Either conservative/fascist leaders across the globe have no grasp of history, or they are looking forward with anticipation to the next Hitler or Mussolini.

It should be noted that Tarpley is coming from a socialist perspective rooted in the Democratic Party of FDR. His opposition, therefore, would likely brand him as liberal/communist and through slippery-slope logic see the policies he espouses as paving the way for the next Stalin or Mao.

And so goes the political circus…ad nauseam.

Returning to film, we must at least consider this situation in Germany. The country was still paying war reparations from WWI (though this was becoming impossible because of the internal economic woes).

What is perhaps most astonishing is how much Peter Lorre’s character prefigures the Hitler caricature which has come down to us from history.

War-based societies have a compulsion to kill. Germany found out the hard way that this is not a healthy default. Sadly, today’s Germany has not checked the most warmongering modern country on Earth (the United States) enough to make any difference.

The United States has, for a long time now, been breathing…seething for a war. The “masters of war” are all wearing suits. Only suits want to go to war. A true warrior does not want war. Only those who will go unscathed actively invite war.

But there is an insanity in suits. A compulsion. Don’t let the suit fool you. A suit is, for us grown-ups, the equivalent of a piece of candy…or an apple…or a balloon for a child. A suit advocating war is saying, “Keep your eyes on my suit. I know best. Trust in me. Look at my impressive degree.”

The suits like places such as Raven Rock Mountain. The suits won’t be on the battlefield. And don’t let the 10% who actually fought in a war fool you: they were in non-combat operations. Their daddies made sure of it.

So keep your eyes open for the M of American cinema. Who is the next fascist to take the stage? Hitler had a Charlie Chaplin moustache. How dangerous could he be? Trump has a ginger comb-over. Surely he’s harmless, right?

-PD

2 Comments

Madame de… [1953)

The last romantic.

Staggering into the 20th century.

We would like to think it was Brahms, but no…1897.

It is perhaps more like Rachmaninov.

You will get the better recordings with that spelling.

Deutsche Grammophon.

Staggering into the 20th century with a morose remembrance.

Born in 1873. Died in 1943.

How disorienting.

To be 41 when WWI started.

We don’t know with which powers we are fooling.

And so the only way to watch Max Ophüls’ masterpiece Madame de… is to imagine.

It takes imagination to be unhappy.

The great generals are actually incapable of unhappiness.

Up early every morning.

Drinking raw eggs.

Running 10 miles.

And so the last romantic in this film is none other than the Italian director (but here an actor) Vittorio De Sica.

And the cynic who melts is Danielle Darrieux.

I will say quite plainly, sometimes boring films are the best.

It is counterintuitive, but I will provide one theory as to their efficacy.

The boring film takes a long time to “play out”.

It is an older style of filmmaking–an older style of storytelling.

They say Frederick the Great didn’t think much of Shakespeare.

In some ways I don’t blame him.

Freddie.

But don’t get me wrong: much art of the past lacks the pizzazz we are used to as humans in the 21st century.

And so if you give this film a chance, you might just wind up as a resurrected being.

I’m being awfully cryptic. As always.

I don’t want to spoil it.

This is merely a letter from the heart. Tear it up and let it snow in the breeze.

Little pieces of paper from the train window.

Letter never sent. R.E.M.

-PD

2 Comments

Secret Agent [1936)

If this is propaganda, it is among the most artful of all time. For it seems to emanate from the mind of an individualist and patriot. Alfred Hitchcock.

We get our subject material from Somerset Maugham. Ashenden.

“The wrong man! Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha.” Thus laughs “the General” Peter Lorre…a sort of lovable psychopath (if such a thing is possible). Yes, the wrong man. It is to Hitchcock’s oeuvre what prostitution is to Jean-Luc Godard’s. But it is a grotesque moment. The wrong man. In this case, it went all the way: they killed the wrong man. Just an innocent old man with a wife and a dog. All in a day’s work for a covert operative…Lorre’s laughter seems to tell us.

No. Lorre is no typical agent. He’s a hitman. He doesn’t mind killing. In fact, he kind-of enjoys it. Takes pride in his craft (as it were). Very clean, he says…strangling, a knife…no guns…too noisy.

But let’s back up to John Gielgud. To make a spy, you kill the man. It is quasi-Christian. The old is gone. Behold, the new has come.

The perfect spy has no past. This sort of agent wakes up to read his own obituary. Before long, he has a new identity.

Though this film predates WWII, its subject matter of WWI is certainly infused with the building tension of a second continent-wide conflagration.

And again we witness James Bond far before Ian Fleming birthed him. The milieu is the same. Gielgud reports to “R”…like the “M” we would all come to know and love. And of course Lorre…himself an M of another type (see Fritz Lang).

Trouble in the Middle East. Why can’t it be Tahiti? Where’s Leonard Bernstein when you need him???

“The Hairless Mexican” a.k.a. “The General” Peter Lorre…kinda like the Federal Reserve: not Federal and no reserves. Yes, Lorre is quite hirsute. As for his rank, it is as dubious as his other winning personality traits.

Gielgud’s not very careful…right from the start. I suppose they should have trained the chap in the dark arts before sending him out into the field. At least the field is Switzerland (Allen Dulles’ future stomping grounds).

Back to our Bond parallels…the gorgeous Madeleine Carroll, like Eva Green in Casino Royale, stipulates a separate-bed rule as part of her cover (Gielgud’s “wife”). We wonder whether her character, like Hitchcock and Green’s Vesper Lynd, is of Catholic upbringing.

But for the main course…we get some rather convincing ethics from Hitchcock–a morality which we would scarcely see again in the future of film through to the 21st century. To wit, espionage is the dirtiest of jobs. Never mind the old trick of digging though a rubbish bin: the whole operation is filthy and loused up with sickening concessions. Hitchcock gets right to the point quite forthright: murder. Many of the darkest jobs are just that! One can spin it anyway one wants, but it is still cold-blooded.

It’s not all fun and games, Gielgud tries to convey to Madeleine. If you’re here for a thrill, you’d best recalibrate your perspective: things are about to get real ugly!

It is some scary shit. Imagine Olivier Messiaen and Giacinto Scelsi collaborating with Morton Feldman for a 45 second piece. It’s called Sonata for Corpse and Organ. Their contact has been murdered. The assassin pulled out all the stops. Just after the prelude, a fugue of struggle ensued which left a button from the killer’s garments clutched in the dead organist’s hand. We get a rich, chromatic chord until Gielgud and Lorre realize there’s far too little harmonic rhythm to this chorale. The bloke’s been whacked (slumped upon the keys).

This button, a single-use MacGuffin, leads them to offing the wrong man. Poor old Percy Marmont…

At this, Gielgud is ready to quit…sickened by the thought of having innocent blood on his hands. Credit Madeleine Carroll with a nice performance…especially when she plays the straight (horrified) woman to Lorre’s laughter.

And so, again like Casino Royale, Gielgud and Carroll (madly in love) decide to dispense with the whole mission and pack it in (complete with a resignation letter to “R” from Gielgud).

I won’t give away too much. Lorre is fantastic: both ridiculously awkward in his humor and deft in his acting.

Unfortunately, the artfulness of the film which Hitchcock had lovingly built up is marred by a somewhat daft, abrupt ending.

Like this.

-PD

7 Comments

paulydeathwish

cinema dossier

Tag Archives: WWI