the kindness of god to man
30 Days Meme
Day 18 ** Whatever tickles your fancy
Ah.
Well, since I can't think of anything and have just watched the last Jer film I own which I have not already watched, you get a review of The Disorderly Orderly. Yes, I can already see all the excited faces.
Another one I was dreading. And another one that really surprised me in terms of a bloody excellent script.
The comedy was just trippy, man. Which luckily I've gotten to the point of appreciating for its sheer surreality whereas a few years ago I would have absolutely hated it. It's possible over the past few months, I've just been that indoctrinated into the zany excess of Jer's comedy when he takes it that far. So even if I'm not laughing out loud, I've got this wry smile of "You're pushing it, aren't you? Christ, are you pushing it" and admiring him if only for that quality.
Mind you, there were some bits that had me absolutely delighted. The dummy breaking apart bit which totally reminded me of Fujiwara's discussion. And omg, the mindsparking hilarious awesomeness of the Absolute Quiet jokes. Oh god, talk about shriek of joyful laughter. That's the blend of intellectual and visual and aural that I freaking fucking LOVE about Jerry Lewis. So funny, omg. So brilliant.
Like the bit at the beginning when he's talking about the television comedian and says "It was so subtle, so smart. When he tries to put the shoe on the elephant." WAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAA! Oh fuck. The layers of self-referential comedy. *wheezes happily* Just like the little card in the TWA window display that advertises the inflight movie being Jerry Lewis as The Disorderly Orderly. Ahahahahahahhaaa. Postmodern for the win, baby.
And the bit when he brushes the patient's teeth only to discover the patient has no teeth but dentures in the glass. I had already anticipated the joke so wasn't particularly amused but then it went into this whole mouthing bit and I found myself focusing so hard on his teeth and then had this shout of mental laughter when I realised THAT was the punchline. Oh christ, Jer. *hugs him hard*
But in between the completely trippy comedic routines was this story that got so dark I was riveted despite myself. Not just to have two love interests, contrasted as blonde and brunette, but to have one of them suicidal and spewing the harshest most horrible things right at him. God, that was so hurtful to watch, hurtful but utterly compelling. Cos she had so many fabulous lines, not the least of which was "I did everything for him and he did everything to me." God. That got me where it hurt.
Screenplay by Frank Tashlin, directed too. But I know enough from the Fujiwara book to know Jer pretty much co-directed it. I think. *squints*
That script was beautifully structured and this character, Jerome Littlefield, was by far one of the most three-dimensional and wonderfully noble characters I've seen of Jer's films so far. The comedic potential of his trauma was just perfect, especially cos it gave Jer a chance to do it my favourite way, in silence, in reaction to an unseen character's monologue. Here, it was Alice Pearce as Mrs Fuzzby. In The Bellboy, it was the gangster in the canteen. In The Nutty Professor, it wasn't so much a monologue as all those exaggerated sounds exacerbating his hangover.
But then how wonderfully they traced it back to his teenage years and tied that to the suicidal love interest and tied it forward to him becoming a successful doctor. And beyond himself, the narrative logic of him keeping his job at the hospital because of the administrator having an unrequited love for his father --- young pic of Jer as the father, eeee! --- and that reflected in his unrequited love for the suicide blonde. (ha.)
Curious thing, though, and I may have seen this mentioned in Chris Fujiwara's book. Here, his character's problem is an excess of sensitivity. To be successful as a doctor, he needs to be less sympathetic to his patients. Curious little notion, that. Does this make him more or less successful as a man? As a human being. Because we adore him when he's so caring about the blonde that he works himself to exhaustion just to pay for her treatment. If that's not sensitive, what is?
But his trying too hard is exactly what makes him disorderly, his caring too much. Such a disruptive force ... *sighs fondly*
I utterly adored the resolution of the love story. Because right from the start, I wanted him to end up with the brunette. Cos she adored him from the very start and that was so clear. Even though he was chaotic and embarrassing, she loved him. I adored that little distressed sound she makes when he suggests to the hospital administrator that he be sacked. I'm fairly certain that won me over to her side. She was me, distressed and wanting him to not go away. Excellent way to win loyalty, what?
So the way they worked the evolution of his love story with the blonde was fascinating. Bringing it so close, making it so ominous in terms of them being together for all the wrong reasons. It's such an interesting distinction they draw: being with someone because of gratitude is not acceptable. It has to be love. It has to be Fourth Of July fireworks.
God, I love that. Classic Hollywood romantic sensibility. Never mind that he just had to kiss the blonde enough times that I had to arch an eyebrow and think "You getting enough action there, Jer? You manwhore you ..."
And the fact that Julie, our brunette, was willing to throw herself out a bus window for him said it all, really. Hee. Actually, that kinda reminds me of the other Frank Tashlin Jerry film that features a sexually forward female love interest. Connie Stevens. She's very similar to Julie here. How verrah interesting ... they're the only women in Jerry's films I've seen so far who are actually allowed to be sexually empowered and positive.
Hmmm. Wasn't Artists And Models Frank Tashlin too? And doesn't Shirley MacLaine pursue Jerry rather hilariously in that? I've only seen bits and pieces of it on YouTube so reserving judgement at the moment. But hmmm. Yeah, of course it's Tish rather than Jer. Hrm.
Anyway, yeah, totally excessive climactic sequence which had me snorting just in terms of the cans and the cars angled in such a fabulously ridiculous fashion. But I'm going to cherish this film for the darkness and the whole discourse about sensitivity and compassion and love versus gratitude.
And Jer was rather hot at several points although I did get severely distracted by whatever was in his back pocket cos I could see the shape of it and couldn't figure out WHY he would have anything in the back of such tight fitting white scrubs. Goddamnit, it drove me ... bonkers. WHAT WAS IT?!
Ah me. Still it was particularly beautiful to watch him on the Aunt's big LCD screen as opposed to my tiny analog telly back in Sydney. Hee.
I'm really gonna have to read up on Technicolor sometime soon. Because just like the other colour films, the outtakes are in black and white which makes me wonder if they shoot the whole movie in black and white and then actually colour everything in processing which, god, just sounds like so labour-intensive, omg. *boggles* That's prolly exactly what they did, didn't they? 1964, we're talking here.
Oy vey.
Day 19 ** A talent of yours
Day 20 ** A hobby of yours
Day 21 ** A recipe
Day 22 ** A website
Day 23 ** A YouTube video
Day 24 ** Whatever tickles your fancy
Day 25 ** Your day, in great detail
Day 26 ** Your week, in great detail
Day 27 ** This month, in great detail
Day 28 ** This year, in great detail
Day 29 ** Hopes, dreams and plans for the next 365 days
Day 30 ** Whatever tickles your fancy
And now I have no more (new to me) Jer films to watch ... *sniffle*
Tomorrow the Aunt and I are going to buy her a new laptop so hopefully I'll get to watch YouTube again. And if so, then I get to watch all the Jer films that I don't have and can't get on DVD. Hopefully. *crosses fingers and wishes so so so hard*
Day 18 ** Whatever tickles your fancy
Ah.
Well, since I can't think of anything and have just watched the last Jer film I own which I have not already watched, you get a review of The Disorderly Orderly. Yes, I can already see all the excited faces.
Another one I was dreading. And another one that really surprised me in terms of a bloody excellent script.
The comedy was just trippy, man. Which luckily I've gotten to the point of appreciating for its sheer surreality whereas a few years ago I would have absolutely hated it. It's possible over the past few months, I've just been that indoctrinated into the zany excess of Jer's comedy when he takes it that far. So even if I'm not laughing out loud, I've got this wry smile of "You're pushing it, aren't you? Christ, are you pushing it" and admiring him if only for that quality.
Mind you, there were some bits that had me absolutely delighted. The dummy breaking apart bit which totally reminded me of Fujiwara's discussion. And omg, the mindsparking hilarious awesomeness of the Absolute Quiet jokes. Oh god, talk about shriek of joyful laughter. That's the blend of intellectual and visual and aural that I freaking fucking LOVE about Jerry Lewis. So funny, omg. So brilliant.
Like the bit at the beginning when he's talking about the television comedian and says "It was so subtle, so smart. When he tries to put the shoe on the elephant." WAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAA! Oh fuck. The layers of self-referential comedy. *wheezes happily* Just like the little card in the TWA window display that advertises the inflight movie being Jerry Lewis as The Disorderly Orderly. Ahahahahahahhaaa. Postmodern for the win, baby.
And the bit when he brushes the patient's teeth only to discover the patient has no teeth but dentures in the glass. I had already anticipated the joke so wasn't particularly amused but then it went into this whole mouthing bit and I found myself focusing so hard on his teeth and then had this shout of mental laughter when I realised THAT was the punchline. Oh christ, Jer. *hugs him hard*
But in between the completely trippy comedic routines was this story that got so dark I was riveted despite myself. Not just to have two love interests, contrasted as blonde and brunette, but to have one of them suicidal and spewing the harshest most horrible things right at him. God, that was so hurtful to watch, hurtful but utterly compelling. Cos she had so many fabulous lines, not the least of which was "I did everything for him and he did everything to me." God. That got me where it hurt.
Screenplay by Frank Tashlin, directed too. But I know enough from the Fujiwara book to know Jer pretty much co-directed it. I think. *squints*
That script was beautifully structured and this character, Jerome Littlefield, was by far one of the most three-dimensional and wonderfully noble characters I've seen of Jer's films so far. The comedic potential of his trauma was just perfect, especially cos it gave Jer a chance to do it my favourite way, in silence, in reaction to an unseen character's monologue. Here, it was Alice Pearce as Mrs Fuzzby. In The Bellboy, it was the gangster in the canteen. In The Nutty Professor, it wasn't so much a monologue as all those exaggerated sounds exacerbating his hangover.
But then how wonderfully they traced it back to his teenage years and tied that to the suicidal love interest and tied it forward to him becoming a successful doctor. And beyond himself, the narrative logic of him keeping his job at the hospital because of the administrator having an unrequited love for his father --- young pic of Jer as the father, eeee! --- and that reflected in his unrequited love for the suicide blonde. (ha.)
Curious thing, though, and I may have seen this mentioned in Chris Fujiwara's book. Here, his character's problem is an excess of sensitivity. To be successful as a doctor, he needs to be less sympathetic to his patients. Curious little notion, that. Does this make him more or less successful as a man? As a human being. Because we adore him when he's so caring about the blonde that he works himself to exhaustion just to pay for her treatment. If that's not sensitive, what is?
But his trying too hard is exactly what makes him disorderly, his caring too much. Such a disruptive force ... *sighs fondly*
I utterly adored the resolution of the love story. Because right from the start, I wanted him to end up with the brunette. Cos she adored him from the very start and that was so clear. Even though he was chaotic and embarrassing, she loved him. I adored that little distressed sound she makes when he suggests to the hospital administrator that he be sacked. I'm fairly certain that won me over to her side. She was me, distressed and wanting him to not go away. Excellent way to win loyalty, what?
So the way they worked the evolution of his love story with the blonde was fascinating. Bringing it so close, making it so ominous in terms of them being together for all the wrong reasons. It's such an interesting distinction they draw: being with someone because of gratitude is not acceptable. It has to be love. It has to be Fourth Of July fireworks.
God, I love that. Classic Hollywood romantic sensibility. Never mind that he just had to kiss the blonde enough times that I had to arch an eyebrow and think "You getting enough action there, Jer? You manwhore you ..."
And the fact that Julie, our brunette, was willing to throw herself out a bus window for him said it all, really. Hee. Actually, that kinda reminds me of the other Frank Tashlin Jerry film that features a sexually forward female love interest. Connie Stevens. She's very similar to Julie here. How verrah interesting ... they're the only women in Jerry's films I've seen so far who are actually allowed to be sexually empowered and positive.
Hmmm. Wasn't Artists And Models Frank Tashlin too? And doesn't Shirley MacLaine pursue Jerry rather hilariously in that? I've only seen bits and pieces of it on YouTube so reserving judgement at the moment. But hmmm. Yeah, of course it's Tish rather than Jer. Hrm.
Anyway, yeah, totally excessive climactic sequence which had me snorting just in terms of the cans and the cars angled in such a fabulously ridiculous fashion. But I'm going to cherish this film for the darkness and the whole discourse about sensitivity and compassion and love versus gratitude.
And Jer was rather hot at several points although I did get severely distracted by whatever was in his back pocket cos I could see the shape of it and couldn't figure out WHY he would have anything in the back of such tight fitting white scrubs. Goddamnit, it drove me ... bonkers. WHAT WAS IT?!
Ah me. Still it was particularly beautiful to watch him on the Aunt's big LCD screen as opposed to my tiny analog telly back in Sydney. Hee.
I'm really gonna have to read up on Technicolor sometime soon. Because just like the other colour films, the outtakes are in black and white which makes me wonder if they shoot the whole movie in black and white and then actually colour everything in processing which, god, just sounds like so labour-intensive, omg. *boggles* That's prolly exactly what they did, didn't they? 1964, we're talking here.
Oy vey.
Day 19 ** A talent of yours
Day 20 ** A hobby of yours
Day 21 ** A recipe
Day 22 ** A website
Day 23 ** A YouTube video
Day 24 ** Whatever tickles your fancy
Day 25 ** Your day, in great detail
Day 26 ** Your week, in great detail
Day 27 ** This month, in great detail
Day 28 ** This year, in great detail
Day 29 ** Hopes, dreams and plans for the next 365 days
Day 30 ** Whatever tickles your fancy
And now I have no more (new to me) Jer films to watch ... *sniffle*
Tomorrow the Aunt and I are going to buy her a new laptop so hopefully I'll get to watch YouTube again. And if so, then I get to watch all the Jer films that I don't have and can't get on DVD. Hopefully. *crosses fingers and wishes so so so hard*