dear mr director
So day before yesterday I finally watched the rest of The Patsy. For two reasons, one being the Jerry fan at work telling me I really should, and two because of the exuberance of that article. Both of which made me verrah curious and somewhat sheep-like. baaaa.
And the weird thing is I'm still thinking about it, still turning it over in my mind. This is why you're up at six on a Sunday morning? No, that would be last night's pizza.
Basically, I feel quite vexed with Jer about this film. Cos the cover image is horrible and offputting and makes me wince every time I see it. But then I kinda feel that way about all the DVD covers I own of his, especially the Norman Rockwell art for Cinderfella so NER! They just make him look so unattractive and I know he's not so it makes me even madder. And damnit, the opening and the credits are fucking awful and so garishly coloured and badly photographed that I hated them from the very first moment. I HATED that set, it was too big and too awkward to cover and the colours were all clashy and unsubtle and I Didn't Like It. *jabs insistent finger*
As a result, the movie totally got my back up. And as a result, I had only a little qualm turning it off less than a third in. And now I'm really fucking annoyed with Jerry because he did it deliberately. He totally fucking set me up. He sets up the viewer from the get-go to be put off and now I finally get why he makes people and viewers uncomfortable.
It's a damned uncomfortable film. The humour is so dark it's almost vicious and he makes himself the target of all that meanness. He degrades himself so thoroughly that I can't laugh, I can't laugh at him. It's exactly the kind of overblown farcical comedic style that I'm always afraid I'll finally see from him and aaarrgghhh! Okay, yes, I kinda loved the elegance of the falling vases bit but then I was immediately repulsed by the stupid chair bit which was totally unfunny to me as was the voice lesson bit which everyone seems to post on YouTube. That was the point I turned it off, totally disgruntled at my favourite artist of the moment.
He set me up. *scowls* And I fucking fell for it, man. Even when I watched it this second time, skipping the bits I'd seen, I hated the film right until the moment it began to turn. And then I was completely riveted and a little mystified, wondering if I was reading too much into it or whether the poignancy and tragedy really was on the screen, outside of my own rabid fannish self.
It's such a marvellous scene, that turning point when he flashbacks to the high school dance and then tops it with that quite emotionally and filmically naked conversation with Ellen. I mean filmically cos there's absolutely no artifice about it, no dramatic flourishes or cinematic grace about the way it's plotted, written, acted or filmed. It's just there, bam, and you can't look away. Though it's only short, it seemed to go on forever because it was so huge in terms of content and tone. It was unnerving because firstly, it echoed my sentiments exactly and secondly, it felt like it was Jerry addressing the audience directly about his philosophy of comedy and film.
Interesting then, that it comes from the only female character in the film. And I was noticing the way it's filmed because it focuses on her for the longest time which makes sense because she's the articulate one. Except that the shots of him just sitting there listening with his chin on his hand (and that mindbogglingly hot signet ring) are so ... eloquent in their silence. Interesting gendertyping, wouldn't you say? The female soul voicing the male inner workings? Or what?
Goddamnit, I want to kick him. For being such an elegant filmmaker but burying it in all the CRASSNESS! And I want to kick myself for not realising/remembering that sooner! Argh! *wallops self in the head*
The use of music in that flashback just kills me, man. There are no words for how powerful and wonderful and utterly hair-raising the juxtaposition of music and plot is there. And I didn't even realise it was David Raksin until I looked up the full credits on IMDb yesterday. David RAKSIN!! Who did Laura! And I was just telling the Gorgeous Graphic Designer Girl at work on Wednesday about Laura! Goddamnit to hell. And how beautifully it comes together at the end of the flashback with that impossible pullback, so much so that my heart soars and melts, so utterly glad to finally see some sweetness for this completely misused character. *sighs heavily* David Raksin, man. Jerry.
It took me far too fucking long to realise the point of all that meanness. Cos if his character wasn't so thoroughly demeaned, I wouldn't feel so glad and proud on so many levels --- as a viewer, a film lover and a writer --- when he triumphs at the end. The smoothness and dignity and adorableness of him at the end wouldn't be so effective, so thrilling and satisfying. And hee, how the romance got resolved was perfect timing and toning. Cos it could have been played so highhanded and arrogant and demeaning to her but it wasn't cos he got all uncertain at exactly the right moment and she said exactly the lines a Nineties feminist like me wants to hear from a woman in the Sixties.
See, that's the thing. I really don't understand why people think Jerry Lewis is an awful man. Look at the way the characters in his films treat each other, the way his own characters evolve and behave with dignity. Like Jack Kruschen's line in The Apartment: "Be a mensch. D'you know what that means? A human being." They always are. For all their immediate crassness and oddness, they always triumph as noble beautiful people, even if it is quietly. And I can't help but adore and admire him for that, whether he's the writer or the actor.
Perhaps that's naive of me. Maybe it is true that the most horrible of writers can create the most beautifully nuanced characters. But I never could believe that. You can't write something you don't know, don't feel or don't aspire to on some level, however deeply buried that level is, however nasty or noble it is, Buddy Love to Herbert Heebert. That awareness has to be there otherwise you don't do it right. Maybe.
Mind you, I found myself quite intrigued by the way he humanised the lone female character. Stanley, I mean, not Jerry. When the movie begins, Ellen's fucking terrifying and inhuman, from the way she's made up and presented to the way she behaves. And gradually she softens until that remarkable scene where it's made overt that this woman does have a soul. And from that point it's taken to the natural resolution of ethics over amorality. I suspect even her clothes change over the course of the film. I did notice the severe black at the start but then got so into the characterisation and, well, Jerry that I didn't really pay as close attention to the colours of her as I should have. But there was a sense of more feminising.
It got me thinking about the women in Jerry's films. Like the masculinity thing, there's something intriguing and not quite kosher going on there. His women aren't really ... real. Never as much as the men, never so fully rounded or deeply nuanced. In some way or the other, they're always denied one aspect and most of the time it seems to be a sexual power. Kathleen Freeman is never given an opportunity to demonstrate her sexuality except for a brief sideline appreciation of Buddy Love. She never gets given anything really, just used as a plot device in all the films I've seen so far.
Or if they are sexual like the scary lady in The Ladies Man --- and yes, that article did say this for me before I had a chance to --- they're a dangerous sexuality. Stella in The Nutty Professor is sexy but only externally, and obviously so in that bit where he looks at her in her drab peahen outfit and imagines her in all those racy guises. She never gets to express it or act on it. Even the bit where she's sexual on film got cut, it's in the deleted scenes. And this realisation is making me want to growl at Jer. What the fuck is going on there, man?
Mind you, it doesn't really surprise me. Men of a certain generation, after all. Which manifests even in the kisses. I've been noticing across all the movies I've watched so far that, with one notable exception being The Stooge, every kiss is stupendously chaste, the most innocent pecks on the lips. Which, yeah, knowing now about Jer's offscreen habits kinda makes me see red. The hypocrisy of him! *fumes*
But in terms of film inheritance, the all around entertainment history he's inherited, that coyness makes a certain kind of sense. He is kinda oldfashioned and gallant that way. And I'm only now teasing out this theory about the women. Maybe I'll come across a Jer film that will totally blow this to smithereens. One can only hope. Although one doesn't hold out much hope. Sokay, Jer. You objectify women all you want. I'll even it out by objectifying you to fuck. *snort*
Ahem. Anyway. The Patsy. Dear god in heaven, that ending blew me away. I mean, I was completely unprepared. It felt like I was staring at the words 'The End' with wide eyes and open mouth, utterly shellshocked, mind reeling. And I even thought I knew where it was going. "Yep, he's gonna fall off the balcony exactly like he did at the start. Okay, now I get why that happened in the beginning, now I can forgive you for it. Don't worry, Ellen, you watch, he's gonna bounce right back up like he did at the start in that utterly ludicrous fashion which I am now going to admire for its symmetry." So when he popped up at the side, I was startled but recognised it immediately from the Ovaltone sketch in The Colgate Comedy Hour and I was just about to grin when they TOTALLY BROKE THE FOURTH WALL, OMG!
When he opened the section in the balcony, I went rigid with shock. I think I also went deaf for a while too cos I didn't understand a single word he said until the moment she called him Mr Lewis and I had this huge mental gasp. And holy fuck, for the rest of it, I don't think I had a single thought in my head. Just gibbering with ecstasy.
GOD, THAT IS SO AWESOME!!
Why is it I find shit like that so thrilling? I mean, really, why? Cos it occurs to me maybe other people don't, maybe other people look at that and shrug and go "yeah, so? You know it's a set, it's a set, so what?" And then I'd have to flail a little and go "No, but, you see, we're not supposed to see it's a set! We're not supposed to see behind the veil, we're only meant to see the trick, not the wires. So when they show you the wires on the actual film, it shatters the entire concept of film as a world in itself and that, that is so dangerous because the film may never recover from such an eviscerating shock. You've basically ripped the film apart when you do that, you rip the whole cinematic viewing experience apart. And it doesn't always work! I'm still trying to figure out what the point was of doing it in that Pierce Brosnan film which I totally cannot name right now --- Murder 101? --- and I saw that like a decade and a half ago. Maybe I need to watch that again because it so totally left me bamboozled."
Except here it fits right into the whole concept of reality versus illusion, of seeing the way the entertainment industry really operates, the uncomfortable truths behind the veil. It takes that concept to the ultimate reveal. And that is just aaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhh brain fizzingly fabulous. It could have totally ended with the scene on the balcony, the way I thought it would. He falls off, bounces back up into her arms, cue big musical theme aaaaaannnnnd kiss aaaaaaaannnd The End. The curtains close on a kiss. That would have been the easy conventional ending so how much do I love Jer for twisting it completely? Hee!
Jer and Bill Richmond, that is. *nods sagely* Which reminds me: it was too awesome to see Bill pop up as the piano player. Strangely attractive man, that. And the same with Kathleen Freeman from the back. So totally recognised that voice. There were prolly tonnes of other people I should have recognised but didn't but oh well.
And yeah, see, she's in pink in that ending scene. Ellen is. Fascinating. Bit obvious but I like the evidence of intelligent filmmaking there.
But seriously, I think I may have enjoyed the bloopers far more than the actual movie. The bloopers were just hysterical and nothing delights me more than seeing Jerry crack up during a take. And the way he goes "ooh", snorts and falls off the couch at the flight suit practical joke just ... oh man, I heart him so much. I love seeing comedians actually finding things funny, it's so refreshing and utterly adorable. He says "ooh" like I do, okay but a little manlier. *giggles madly* And he's so hot when he's in his director clothes, all casual and sexy with the rolled up shirtsleeves and bare forearms and open collar around the throat. Rrruff! Oh shut up. But aaaawwwww at how much Gary looks like him with the mouth and the chin, and how utterly embarrassing Jer is with the tacklehugging of him. Hee.
Mind you, I never really warmed to the cinematography. Sometimes the shots held too long on one person when I wanted them to cut to the other person talking, and sometimes they went from too wide an angle to too narrow a focus. And Jer was in some godawful ensembles sometimes, the way sometimes Sixties film costumes will be just a little too excessive with the colour combinations. To the point of me saying to the television: "Yes, fine, but what the FUCK are you WEARING, Jer?!" But it all evened out in the end. That ending pretty much made the whole film, man!
*sigh* Is good having a film obsession that yields valuable results, that makes you think and discover new things about art and the making of creative things.
Especially if it includes sexy chin clefts and signet rings.
And ha, I just remembered I've been thinking about the Buddy Love/Julius Kelp dynamic in The Nutty Professor for weeks now because it just won't resolve itself in my head and I keep finding new aspects to untangle, and then I rewatched Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi which does the exact same dual self opposition but takes it to a much higher degree, and I wanted to post about all this. But The Patsy totally drove everything out of my mind. Too many THOUGHTS! *head explodes*
Plus I need to buy a replacement copy of The Nutty Professor cos I gave it to my Kuwaiti cousin in a fit of unthinkable generosity. Don't ask me, I don't know, I just felt she needed to have it cos now she loves Jer too and every Jer lover should own that movie. And now I feel like I'm missing a toe or something. *snorts and does the silent guffaw lean back*
I think I might go back to sleep.
And the weird thing is I'm still thinking about it, still turning it over in my mind. This is why you're up at six on a Sunday morning? No, that would be last night's pizza.
Basically, I feel quite vexed with Jer about this film. Cos the cover image is horrible and offputting and makes me wince every time I see it. But then I kinda feel that way about all the DVD covers I own of his, especially the Norman Rockwell art for Cinderfella so NER! They just make him look so unattractive and I know he's not so it makes me even madder. And damnit, the opening and the credits are fucking awful and so garishly coloured and badly photographed that I hated them from the very first moment. I HATED that set, it was too big and too awkward to cover and the colours were all clashy and unsubtle and I Didn't Like It. *jabs insistent finger*
As a result, the movie totally got my back up. And as a result, I had only a little qualm turning it off less than a third in. And now I'm really fucking annoyed with Jerry because he did it deliberately. He totally fucking set me up. He sets up the viewer from the get-go to be put off and now I finally get why he makes people and viewers uncomfortable.
It's a damned uncomfortable film. The humour is so dark it's almost vicious and he makes himself the target of all that meanness. He degrades himself so thoroughly that I can't laugh, I can't laugh at him. It's exactly the kind of overblown farcical comedic style that I'm always afraid I'll finally see from him and aaarrgghhh! Okay, yes, I kinda loved the elegance of the falling vases bit but then I was immediately repulsed by the stupid chair bit which was totally unfunny to me as was the voice lesson bit which everyone seems to post on YouTube. That was the point I turned it off, totally disgruntled at my favourite artist of the moment.
He set me up. *scowls* And I fucking fell for it, man. Even when I watched it this second time, skipping the bits I'd seen, I hated the film right until the moment it began to turn. And then I was completely riveted and a little mystified, wondering if I was reading too much into it or whether the poignancy and tragedy really was on the screen, outside of my own rabid fannish self.
It's such a marvellous scene, that turning point when he flashbacks to the high school dance and then tops it with that quite emotionally and filmically naked conversation with Ellen. I mean filmically cos there's absolutely no artifice about it, no dramatic flourishes or cinematic grace about the way it's plotted, written, acted or filmed. It's just there, bam, and you can't look away. Though it's only short, it seemed to go on forever because it was so huge in terms of content and tone. It was unnerving because firstly, it echoed my sentiments exactly and secondly, it felt like it was Jerry addressing the audience directly about his philosophy of comedy and film.
Interesting then, that it comes from the only female character in the film. And I was noticing the way it's filmed because it focuses on her for the longest time which makes sense because she's the articulate one. Except that the shots of him just sitting there listening with his chin on his hand (and that mindbogglingly hot signet ring) are so ... eloquent in their silence. Interesting gendertyping, wouldn't you say? The female soul voicing the male inner workings? Or what?
Click to viewGoddamnit, I want to kick him. For being such an elegant filmmaker but burying it in all the CRASSNESS! And I want to kick myself for not realising/remembering that sooner! Argh! *wallops self in the head*
The use of music in that flashback just kills me, man. There are no words for how powerful and wonderful and utterly hair-raising the juxtaposition of music and plot is there. And I didn't even realise it was David Raksin until I looked up the full credits on IMDb yesterday. David RAKSIN!! Who did Laura! And I was just telling the Gorgeous Graphic Designer Girl at work on Wednesday about Laura! Goddamnit to hell. And how beautifully it comes together at the end of the flashback with that impossible pullback, so much so that my heart soars and melts, so utterly glad to finally see some sweetness for this completely misused character. *sighs heavily* David Raksin, man. Jerry.
It took me far too fucking long to realise the point of all that meanness. Cos if his character wasn't so thoroughly demeaned, I wouldn't feel so glad and proud on so many levels --- as a viewer, a film lover and a writer --- when he triumphs at the end. The smoothness and dignity and adorableness of him at the end wouldn't be so effective, so thrilling and satisfying. And hee, how the romance got resolved was perfect timing and toning. Cos it could have been played so highhanded and arrogant and demeaning to her but it wasn't cos he got all uncertain at exactly the right moment and she said exactly the lines a Nineties feminist like me wants to hear from a woman in the Sixties.
See, that's the thing. I really don't understand why people think Jerry Lewis is an awful man. Look at the way the characters in his films treat each other, the way his own characters evolve and behave with dignity. Like Jack Kruschen's line in The Apartment: "Be a mensch. D'you know what that means? A human being." They always are. For all their immediate crassness and oddness, they always triumph as noble beautiful people, even if it is quietly. And I can't help but adore and admire him for that, whether he's the writer or the actor.
Perhaps that's naive of me. Maybe it is true that the most horrible of writers can create the most beautifully nuanced characters. But I never could believe that. You can't write something you don't know, don't feel or don't aspire to on some level, however deeply buried that level is, however nasty or noble it is, Buddy Love to Herbert Heebert. That awareness has to be there otherwise you don't do it right. Maybe.
Mind you, I found myself quite intrigued by the way he humanised the lone female character. Stanley, I mean, not Jerry. When the movie begins, Ellen's fucking terrifying and inhuman, from the way she's made up and presented to the way she behaves. And gradually she softens until that remarkable scene where it's made overt that this woman does have a soul. And from that point it's taken to the natural resolution of ethics over amorality. I suspect even her clothes change over the course of the film. I did notice the severe black at the start but then got so into the characterisation and, well, Jerry that I didn't really pay as close attention to the colours of her as I should have. But there was a sense of more feminising.
It got me thinking about the women in Jerry's films. Like the masculinity thing, there's something intriguing and not quite kosher going on there. His women aren't really ... real. Never as much as the men, never so fully rounded or deeply nuanced. In some way or the other, they're always denied one aspect and most of the time it seems to be a sexual power. Kathleen Freeman is never given an opportunity to demonstrate her sexuality except for a brief sideline appreciation of Buddy Love. She never gets given anything really, just used as a plot device in all the films I've seen so far.
Or if they are sexual like the scary lady in The Ladies Man --- and yes, that article did say this for me before I had a chance to --- they're a dangerous sexuality. Stella in The Nutty Professor is sexy but only externally, and obviously so in that bit where he looks at her in her drab peahen outfit and imagines her in all those racy guises. She never gets to express it or act on it. Even the bit where she's sexual on film got cut, it's in the deleted scenes. And this realisation is making me want to growl at Jer. What the fuck is going on there, man?
Mind you, it doesn't really surprise me. Men of a certain generation, after all. Which manifests even in the kisses. I've been noticing across all the movies I've watched so far that, with one notable exception being The Stooge, every kiss is stupendously chaste, the most innocent pecks on the lips. Which, yeah, knowing now about Jer's offscreen habits kinda makes me see red. The hypocrisy of him! *fumes*
But in terms of film inheritance, the all around entertainment history he's inherited, that coyness makes a certain kind of sense. He is kinda oldfashioned and gallant that way. And I'm only now teasing out this theory about the women. Maybe I'll come across a Jer film that will totally blow this to smithereens. One can only hope. Although one doesn't hold out much hope. Sokay, Jer. You objectify women all you want. I'll even it out by objectifying you to fuck. *snort*
Ahem. Anyway. The Patsy. Dear god in heaven, that ending blew me away. I mean, I was completely unprepared. It felt like I was staring at the words 'The End' with wide eyes and open mouth, utterly shellshocked, mind reeling. And I even thought I knew where it was going. "Yep, he's gonna fall off the balcony exactly like he did at the start. Okay, now I get why that happened in the beginning, now I can forgive you for it. Don't worry, Ellen, you watch, he's gonna bounce right back up like he did at the start in that utterly ludicrous fashion which I am now going to admire for its symmetry." So when he popped up at the side, I was startled but recognised it immediately from the Ovaltone sketch in The Colgate Comedy Hour and I was just about to grin when they TOTALLY BROKE THE FOURTH WALL, OMG!
When he opened the section in the balcony, I went rigid with shock. I think I also went deaf for a while too cos I didn't understand a single word he said until the moment she called him Mr Lewis and I had this huge mental gasp. And holy fuck, for the rest of it, I don't think I had a single thought in my head. Just gibbering with ecstasy.
GOD, THAT IS SO AWESOME!!
Why is it I find shit like that so thrilling? I mean, really, why? Cos it occurs to me maybe other people don't, maybe other people look at that and shrug and go "yeah, so? You know it's a set, it's a set, so what?" And then I'd have to flail a little and go "No, but, you see, we're not supposed to see it's a set! We're not supposed to see behind the veil, we're only meant to see the trick, not the wires. So when they show you the wires on the actual film, it shatters the entire concept of film as a world in itself and that, that is so dangerous because the film may never recover from such an eviscerating shock. You've basically ripped the film apart when you do that, you rip the whole cinematic viewing experience apart. And it doesn't always work! I'm still trying to figure out what the point was of doing it in that Pierce Brosnan film which I totally cannot name right now --- Murder 101? --- and I saw that like a decade and a half ago. Maybe I need to watch that again because it so totally left me bamboozled."
Except here it fits right into the whole concept of reality versus illusion, of seeing the way the entertainment industry really operates, the uncomfortable truths behind the veil. It takes that concept to the ultimate reveal. And that is just aaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhh brain fizzingly fabulous. It could have totally ended with the scene on the balcony, the way I thought it would. He falls off, bounces back up into her arms, cue big musical theme aaaaaannnnnd kiss aaaaaaaannnd The End. The curtains close on a kiss. That would have been the easy conventional ending so how much do I love Jer for twisting it completely? Hee!
Jer and Bill Richmond, that is. *nods sagely* Which reminds me: it was too awesome to see Bill pop up as the piano player. Strangely attractive man, that. And the same with Kathleen Freeman from the back. So totally recognised that voice. There were prolly tonnes of other people I should have recognised but didn't but oh well.
And yeah, see, she's in pink in that ending scene. Ellen is. Fascinating. Bit obvious but I like the evidence of intelligent filmmaking there.
But seriously, I think I may have enjoyed the bloopers far more than the actual movie. The bloopers were just hysterical and nothing delights me more than seeing Jerry crack up during a take. And the way he goes "ooh", snorts and falls off the couch at the flight suit practical joke just ... oh man, I heart him so much. I love seeing comedians actually finding things funny, it's so refreshing and utterly adorable. He says "ooh" like I do, okay but a little manlier. *giggles madly* And he's so hot when he's in his director clothes, all casual and sexy with the rolled up shirtsleeves and bare forearms and open collar around the throat. Rrruff! Oh shut up. But aaaawwwww at how much Gary looks like him with the mouth and the chin, and how utterly embarrassing Jer is with the tacklehugging of him. Hee.
Mind you, I never really warmed to the cinematography. Sometimes the shots held too long on one person when I wanted them to cut to the other person talking, and sometimes they went from too wide an angle to too narrow a focus. And Jer was in some godawful ensembles sometimes, the way sometimes Sixties film costumes will be just a little too excessive with the colour combinations. To the point of me saying to the television: "Yes, fine, but what the FUCK are you WEARING, Jer?!" But it all evened out in the end. That ending pretty much made the whole film, man!
*sigh* Is good having a film obsession that yields valuable results, that makes you think and discover new things about art and the making of creative things.
Especially if it includes sexy chin clefts and signet rings.
And ha, I just remembered I've been thinking about the Buddy Love/Julius Kelp dynamic in The Nutty Professor for weeks now because it just won't resolve itself in my head and I keep finding new aspects to untangle, and then I rewatched Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi which does the exact same dual self opposition but takes it to a much higher degree, and I wanted to post about all this. But The Patsy totally drove everything out of my mind. Too many THOUGHTS! *head explodes*
Plus I need to buy a replacement copy of The Nutty Professor cos I gave it to my Kuwaiti cousin in a fit of unthinkable generosity. Don't ask me, I don't know, I just felt she needed to have it cos now she loves Jer too and every Jer lover should own that movie. And now I feel like I'm missing a toe or something. *snorts and does the silent guffaw lean back*
I think I might go back to sleep.