Mike Judge Tried to Warn Us

Monday is Memorial Day. Because we're now underway in a long holiday weekend, you may have time to rent a movie or two. Maybe see a movie that you missed when it was released theatrically. Well, in the case of IDIOCRACY, millions of moviegoers missed it. This futuristic comedy satire came from director and co-writer Mike Judge, For TV, Judge created the animated shows BEAVIS AND BUTTHEAD, aired on MTV, and KING OF THE HILL, aired on Fox. In 2006, I started two surreal years in my broadcast career. Although she did not publicize it much, Whoopi Goldberg had her own national weekday morning radio show out of New York City. Whoopi, back in 1988, was one of my first guests on my VH1 talk show. She wanted someone in her on-air team who could review new films, new TV shows and be knowledgeable enough to talk about classic movies. Fortunately for me, Whoopi remembered me from VH1 and she arranged for my on-air audition. I got the job. I heard about IDIOCRACY and wanted to see it. Then I heard that major U.S. businesses like Costco and Starbucks were so peeved at the way they were portrayed 500 years into the future that 20th Century Fox basically shelved the movie. It went to DVD.  Luke Wilson played the somewhat clueless Army corporal selected for a secret military experiment involving suspended animation. This corporal is selected because he is somewhat clueless. The Army needed an individual who was "most average." Since no female Army soldier was dumb enough to get into that contraption and go along with this experiment, a prostitute was hired. Her name is Rita and she was played by the fabulous Maya Rudolph.

 Rita is just about the most conservatively dressed hooker you've ever seen in a film. She's practically wearing culottes. Terry Crews stars as the former national sports TV celebrity who's now President of the United States.

There's a glitch in the experiment. Joe, the Army corporal, and Rita, the hooker, wind up 500 years in the future. America has changed. Or has it? See IDIOCRACY. That future is now. Here's a trailer. The comedy runs 85 minutes.

I repeat: Mike Judge tried to warn us. Here's a clip.

More of Murphy's HOLLYWOOD

Patti LuPone as a powerful Hollywood wife getting sexually satisfied by a pay-for-play aspiring young actor who glances past her to the Oscars on display that her Hollywood studio boss has won. You just know that the sight of those golden statuettes is what brings him to climax. This is one of many sexual scenes we see in Episodes 2 and 3 of Ryan Murphy's HOLLYWOOD miniseries now available on Netflix. I blogged my feelings for the premiere episode. I love it and I loved its production values. It boasted some fine acting, especially by veterans Patti LuPone and Dylan McDermott. This is Hollywood history a la Murphy. He takes Hollywood facts, does not put them in any particular chronological order and does his own revision on the history, we believe, to make a comment on social issues today within the entertainment industry. In HOLLYWOOD, he mainly gives us a view of how things could have been in the Hollywood of the 1940s and 50s if there had been equal opportunities for people of color and if gay and bisexual men could have been free to be themselves instead of closeted. In the first episode we meet Jack Castello,  a handsome vet home from World War 2. He's married. He wants to be a star. But he's not even getting work as an extra. His wife works as a waitress. He gets recruited by a larger-than-life Hollywood switch-hitter who runs a full service gas station in Hollywood. It's a front for sexual escapades. The gas station attendants are handsome guys who get in the cars with some clients and give them sexual delights for pay. Jack is initially timid about taking the job -- a job which requires him to go off with female and male clients -- but the money is good. He gets caught up with his bills and his first client, a powerful Hollywood wife, could help him get screen test. Jack meets Archie, a handsome young Black man who has written a screenplay. Archie joins the full service gas station crew and drives off with a shy guy named Roy Fitzgerald. But Archie won't take money for his sex with Roy, whose name will be changed to Rock Hudson. He likes Roy. At the end of the first episode, Jack gets in a little trouble with the law.

In Episode 2, we meet Hollywood star Anna May Wong. Wong, a Chinese American, was one of the biggest stars of the silent screen era. She worked in the 1930, when films had sound, but she was not as big a star. She wanted the lead female role in MGM's THE GOOD EARTH, based on the Pearl Buck novel of the same name. The studio would not consider her for the role of the poor Chinese wife in the prestigious 1937 production. The role went to white European actress Luise Rainer. Rainer won her second consecutive Oscar for Best Actress. This is all true. Incidentally, MGM would film another story based on a Pearl Buck novel. 1944's DRAGON SEED also had a young Chinese wife as the lead female role. That part went to -- Katharine Hepburn. We meet Ryan Murphy creation, Raymond Ainsley. Played by Darren Criss, he's an aspiring film director at Ace Studios who wants to make a film with Anna May Wong. He comes out about being half-Filipino. Hollywood assumes he's white. His girlfriend is Black. She's Camille Washington, played by Laura Harrier. 

To recap: Jack Castello wants to be a star. Archie wants to sell his screenplay. Raymond wants to direct a film. These guys are having active sex lives. So much so that, instead of HOLLYWOOD, this miniseries could've been called PHALLUS IN WONDERLAND. Mind you, I have nothing against sex and nudity. But, after a while, I did wonder if Murphy really had a focused, sharpened story to tell or if he just wanted to titillate us with the sex and nudity. I still haven't seen Jack display what could be "star quality" or impressive acting talent. Nonetheless, he gets a screen test for TAP ROOTS. That was a 1948 Civil War era drama starring Susan Hayward. Then Roy Fitzgerald, now Rock Hudson, gets an audition for a bit part in a Barbara Stanwyck movie -- 1955's THE VIOLENT MEN (see how Murphy jumps forward and backward in time in the same scene?). Hudson also feels forced to sexually service his slithery, insulting and lascivious gay agent, very well-played by Jim Parsons. And Roy/Rock falls in love with Archie who is now getting so much work at the full service station that his presence is requested by his boss at one of the notorious George Cukor parties. It was Hollywood lore that the famed director had special Sunday brunch poor parties. These parties were special because the guest list was men only and skinny-dipping ensued. His dinner parties, so it goes, also had guests known for active hormones -- such as Tallulah Bankhead and Vivien Leigh. In one scene, we see Bankhead holding court at the dinner table by telling an anecdote about Errol Flynn. What she says is a quote I'd read from Tallulah Bankhead when I was in college in the 1970s. In the original quote, the name was Montgomery Clift, not Errol Flynn. Which makes more sense. The actress who played Vivien Leigh in that scene -- from Episode 3 -- didn't look as much like Vivien Leigh as I do. She came off more like Karen from WILL & GRACE pretending to be Vivien Leigh. This whole sequence seems to be a set-up for more sex. The gas station boy-toys arrive at Cukor's house. Archie is one of them. Noel Coward takes a lusty interest in Archie. Roy/Rock is present too and gets jealous of Noel Coward hitting on his boyfriend.

I'll use Archie as to illustrate my main problem with Episodes 2 and 3. Remember the Billy Wilder classic, SUNSET BLVD? William Holden played the broke, out of work screenwriter, Joe Gilles. Joe had written more than one screenplay. When we first we see him, he's been working on a screenplay at the typewriter. He's got ideas to pitch to a producer at Paramount. It's just that he's broke and he can't get a job. He's so financially desperate that, when he meets Norma Desmond, he hatches an idea to make some fast cash as her script doctor. She's a faded and wealthy Hollywood star. Joe winds up becoming the kept man of an older woman/former silent screen star.

Archie is a young Black man in late 1940s Hollywood who has written a screenplay. Why isn't he working on another one? Why isn't he jotting down ideas? Does he have any other written work or ideas to pitch? He's paying more attention to sex than to his craft. A Black person at that time -- even now -- would have to work twice as hard as white talent to get half the attention. Archie needs more than one script idea to offer. There's a lot of talk about wanting to be "a star" in those three episodes. None of these young hopefuls talk about wanting to be a professional first ...and if stardom happens, it happens. The one who seems to be putting the most work into her acting is Camille. Unfortunately, she's restricted in bit parts as maids -- and the Hollywood power men want her to play the parts in an exaggerated style with a stereotypical speech pattern. She could not say, "I'll get the door for you, Miss." She'd have to make big eyes and say "I'll git de do' for you, Miss." This is what Hollywood did to Black actors in the 30s and 40s. Let's see if Camille can break through the way Dorothy Dandridge did in the 1950s.

Just like in the premiere episode, the performances in episodes 2 and 3 that stood out to me the most were the ones delivered by veterans -- Patti LuPone, Dylan McDermott and Holland Taylor.  A big round of applause goes to Michelle Krusiec as the proud, elegant and disappointed Anna May Wong. She's excellent. Click onto the link below to see a trailer:

https://youtu.be/Q3EASLgzOcM.

As far as the gay male aspect, I wish Ryan Murphy had taken a less traditional, less "West Hollywood" approach. I wish he'd given us something based on a fresh story. Ever heard of 1940s actor William Eythe? He was a handsome and talented actor at 20th Century Fox who probably got scripts that Tyrone Power wasn't able to do. Eythe was very good in THE OX-BOW INCIDENT with Henry Fonda and A ROYAL SCANDAL with Tallulah Bankhead. My favorite performance of his comes in THE SONG OF BERNADETTE opposite Jennifer Jones. Jones won the Oscar for Best Actress of 1943 for her work in it. She played the peasant French girl who had visions of the Immaculate Conception, joined a convent, died young and was later canonized by the Catholic Church at St. Bernadette of Lourdes. Eythe played the poor fellow villager who loves her yet realizes she's meant for something greater than a life in their village. William Eythe was gay and the love of his life was another popular actor on the Fox lot. The studio arranged for Eythe to be seen on dates with actresses and eventually maneuvered him into an arranged marriage of convenience. Eythe drank. By 1950, he got a divorce, quit films and lived the rest of his life with the man he loved.

Something like that might have had more weight than the George Cukor boys-only pool parties. In my opinion. Let's see what the other episodes bring.

My Wish for Rita Moreno

I bought and have been reading RITA MORENO: A MEMOIR. It is, like the lady herself, absolutely fabulous and enlightening.

I'm sure you know this already. Rita Moreno, the legend divine, completed shooting her role in the upcoming Steven Spielberg version of WEST SIDE STORY. Rita Moreno starred in the original screen adaptation, Oscar winner for Best Picture of 1961.

That wonderful film is so beloved that many people, myself included, regard it as a cherished friend. It holds that special a place in our hearts. Moreno played Anita in the 1961 film and won the Best Supporting Actress Oscar for her stunning musical and dramatic performance. Her co-star and dance partner, George Chakiris, won for Best Supporting Actor.

Recently, I saw her Skype in for an interview on the CBS daytime talk show, THE TALK. She was sensational. She was lit up with excitement about the opportunity to have acted in -- and helped produce -- Spielberg's upcoming version. Remember the character, "Doc," the storeowner in the 1961 film? He's Tony's friend. He stops the Jets when he sees that they're molesting Anita. Well, Spielberg changed Doc to a female character and we will see Rita Moreno as the storeowner. When we can see it. We've seen production photos from Spielberg's shoot. We read that the new WEST SIDE STORY would open this December.

Then the pandemic hit.

When I saw Rita Moreno on the CBS show enthusiastically tell us how well Steven Spielberg treated her on the set, especially on her last day of filming, I had this wish:

I wish that Rita Moreno's performance will be so strong that she will get another Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actress -- and make history as the first person (I think) to win an Oscar for acting in a film's original version and get a nomination for acting in its remake.  That's my wish.

Love me some Rita Moreno. She has been an inspiration and a motivation to me ever since I was in high school. I'm lucky. I got to hold her hands and tell her that in person one day in 2000. We were backstage at the Kaufman Astoria Studios.

HOLLYWOOD Black & White

In my previous post, I wrote how I felt about the first episode of Ryan Murphy's HOLLYWOOD miniseries now airing on Netflix. In it, he uses Hollywood history and does a Murphy twist on it. Folks may have been able to cut up and carry on in Old Hollywood in such a way that made scandalous behavior seem commonplace but, for all its looseness, it was still restricted. In the 1940s and 50s, Black actors could go only so far. They were denied equal opportunities. Gay and bisexual actors had to live their sexual lives in the shadows and have secret loves. Rock Hudson and Montgomery Clift could not be openly gay and employed like actors today.  In my post, I wondered if Murphy would stick were the standard vintage Hollywood stories we know -- like the story of Hattie McDaniel being the first Black person nominated for an Oscar and the first to win. Or the story of Rock Hudson. In episodes I've yet to see, Queen Latifah plays Hattie McDaniel.

The Hattie McDaniel story fascinates me. She absolutely deserved that Best Supporting Actress Oscar for 1939's GONE WITH THE WIND. McDaniel could do drama, comedy and musical comedy. Look at her musical performance with Paul Robeson and Irene Dunne in 1936's SHOW BOAT and her lively number in Disney's 1946 hit, SONG OF THE SOUTH (if you can find it). She had definite screen charisma and could hold her own in a scene opposite top Hollywood stars such as  Shirley Temple, Katharine Hepburn, Jean Harlow, Bette Davis, Vivien Leigh, Clark Gable and James Cagney. However, even after her groundbreaking Oscar victory, Hollywood studios still treated her like a bit player. Look at the credits billing and the cast of the 1942 Warner Bros comedy, THE MALE ANIMAL. The stars are Henry Fonda, Olivia de Havilland, Jack Carson, Joan Leslie and, as the maid, Hattie McDaniel. Of those cast members, Hattie is the only one who'd won an Oscar by that time. Yet, she has traditional Black maid lines like "Yes'm. I'll get the door." The same applies to the sweet 1946 Fox comedy, MARGIE, starring Jeanne Crain. Margie is a teen in the 1920s. Hattie McDaniel, again, is the Oscar-winning actor in the cast. She plays the maid who answers the door.  In 1949, Jeanne Crain -- a white actress -- would play a light-skinned Black woman in the race drama, PINKY, and get a Best Actress Oscar nomination.

Wednesday afternoon, May 13th, a Warner Bros romantic drama airs on TCM (Turner Classic Movies). It doesn't get a lot of mention when folks discuss the films of its two leading stars -- Gary Cooper and Ingrid Bergman -- however, it's interesting to watch. You get a sense of how the studio system regarded Black actors. The first Black performer nominated for an Oscar was Hattie McDaniel for the 1939 classic, GONE WITH THE WIND. The next Black performer to get an Oscar nomination was Ethel Waters for her dramatic performance as the poor, uneducated grandmother to Jeanne Crain's light-skinned nursing school character in 1949's PINKY.

Both McDaniel and Waters were nominees in the Best Supporting Actress category.

In between GONE WITH THE WIND and PINKY, there was another performer who got an Oscar nomination for playing a Black character. A white British actress who had played England's Queen Elizabeth in two films and starred as one of the nuns in 1946's BLACK NARCISSUS, was covered with dark make-up and played a Black Haitian maid in SARATOGA TRUNK.

The actress, Flora Robson, got a Best Supporting Actress Oscar nomination for her performance.

I wonder if Ryan Murphy knows this Hollywood fact.

If the role of the Black maid was good enough to bring an actress an Oscar nomination, why didn't Warner Bros give the role to a Black actress? By 1950, four actors had received Oscar nominations for playing Black characters. The actors were Hattie McDaniel, Flora Robson, Jeanne Crain and Ethel Waters. Only two of them were Black.

SARATOGA TRUNK airs on TCM at 4:15p ET on Wednesday, May 13th. Now I'm gonna go watch more episodes of Ryan Murphy's HOLLYWOOD.

Murphy's HOLLYWOOD, Ep. 1

Ryan Murphy certainly has received lots of attention on Twitter for his new Netflix mini-series. He takes us to Hollywood in the late 1940s and gives us a look at how big screen images from the West Coast dream factory known as Hollywood could have been different if gay and bisexual had not been forced to live the sexual area of their lives in the shadows and if people of color had received equal opportunities. Last night, I watched the first episode of Ryan Murphy's HOLLYWOOD. As it's a Ryan Murphy creation, I feel that I must watch it or else my Gay Card will be revoked. I loved the first episode. It hit me like a tall, tasty glass of lemonade -- with a shot of Grey Goose vodka in it. There was good acting. Some snappy writing. The production design dazzled me. The person or persons who did the wardrobes must have hit every single vintage shop in the Hollywood area. The costumes were on point. Visually, the color palette in the art design is rich, vibrant and accurate. For me, the soundtrack was from Heaven. Vocals by Perry Como and Peggy Lee. Artie Shaw's "Begin the Beguine." The retro music selections made me wish stores like Tower Records were still aplenty so I could've purchased a CD of the HOLLYWOOD soundtrack and a portable CD player so I could hear it over and over again. The first episode whets your appetite for future installments that could delve into the politics of sex and race in Old Hollywood in order to make a comment on the industry today.

If you were of my generation, a classic Hollywood film enthusiast and you were a gay youth, there are certain things that were familiar to you.  You read Kenneth Anger's Hollywood Babylon, you knew that Bette Davis and Joan Crawford could not stand each other. You learned that high profile actors who were not openly gay did some of their best work opposite Elizabeth Taylor. The two actors were Rock Hudson and Montgomery Clift. You knew that Oscar winner Hattie McDaniel was the first Black person nominated for an Oscar and that Dorothy Dandridge was the first Black woman ever to nab an Oscar nomination for Best Actress. And you read that Scotty Bowers was a handsome Marine who served in World War 2 and, after he served, became a gentleman pimp in Hollywood. He arranged discreet same-sex hook-ups out of a gas station. His clients were Hollywood stars. My generation isn't the only one that knew those items. Murphy's did too. In fact, you'd have been taught them in a university course called "Gay 101." If you'd never heard of Scotty Bowers and you saw the first episode of HOLLYWOOD, you might have just said "Wow. That kind o' thing really happened?" Bowers died last year, well into his 90s. According to his 2012 memoirs, Full Service, he was an attendant at a gas station on the corner of Hollywood Blvd and Van Ness after the war. Actor Walter Pidgeon drove in, took a gander at Bowers and wanted the gas station attendant to do more than just fill 'er up and check his oil. They went back to Pidgeon's place for a lovely afternoon that included nude swimming. Enterprising Bowers, by his account, hit on the idea of helping handsome down-and-out buddies make some cash by entertaining closeted show biz types. The matchmaking office would be the gas station. When the Bowers book came out, some folks slapped it down because the names mentioned in it were mostly deceased stars who could not confirm or deny their association. Some of the stars named were Spencer Tracy, Leon Ames, Cole Porter, George Cukor, Cary Grant, Randolph Scott and Rock Hudson. I myself was critical of the book and Bowers. Then I saw him in a 2017 documentary and my attitude softened. What softened it was hearing that Bowers acted like an agent. If he took anything at all for his matchmaking, it was no more than 10%. The Bowers-like character in first episode of HOLLYWOOD sends the hunky attendants out on drive-away sexual assignments, clients pay him and he splits the take with the hired boy-toy 50-50. Another thing, Bowers kept in touch with some of his former employees through the decades. When they were well into their AARP years, he checked to make sure they weren't broke and lonely. His occupation may have been socially unsavory, but Scotty Bowers' heart was in the right place.

In a Ryan Murphy creation, one that takes us back to glory days of Hollywood, his revised history can recreate the tone of an era yet some details lack accuracy. In his mini-series about the Joan Crawford v. Bette Davis feud during the making of WHAT EVER HAPPENED TO BABY JANE?, he had Crawford (Jessica Lange) up at the crack of dawn to hear the Oscar nominations. In the 1960s, and for a couple of decades to come, the Oscars were held in April and the nominations were announced in mid-afternoon. In HOLLYWOOD, the first episode, we meet handsome Jack Castello (David Corenswet), back from WW2, married and longing to be a movie star. He's in a group of eager, starving actors waiting outside the gate of a top Hollywood studio in hopes of being picked for a day of employment as "background actors." In those days -- and even when I got my Screen Actors Guild card in 1988 -- they were still called "extras." "Background actors" is the modern-day term. Jack waits at the Hollywood studio gate with his nebbish-y buddy who tells him that Billy Wilder is lensing a new Bing Crosby musical co-starring Joan Fontaine. Wilder's movie was the 1948 Paramount release, THE EMPEROR WALTZ. The soundtrack vocal that plays over this scene as the casting director approaches the gate to select background actors is Perry Como singing "Catch a Falling Star." That hit Como record came out in 1957.

Jack's wife is a waitress. She's working. He's not and he can't get a bank loan. Dejected, he goes to bar for a drink. While drowning his sorrows, a nattily attired and macho middle-aged character buys him a drink. Ernie is a larger than life Hollywood survivor who's a member of the Forrest Tucker club. He's well-endowed and proud of it. Dylan McDermott is a hoot in this role, knocking out one of the most energetic performances I've ever seen him give. Yes, the same Dylan McDermott who played Shelby's husband in STEEL MAGNOLIAS. Ernie breaks down the facts of Hollywood life to Jack and coaxes Jack to join his "special service" gas station team. Jack's first assignment is a wealthy Hollywood wife. She was a silent screen star but, when sound came in, Hollywood execs felt she came off too "Jewish." In a Beverly Hills hotel room, she tells Jack that her financially thriving but sexless marriage is a reason why "I'm paying for company." Patti LuPone is expectedly delicious in this role. She's given some Broadway-esque dialogue to say that sounds like a lead-in to a musical anthem of self-survival like Stephen Sondheim's "I'm Still Here." She gives us a glimpse of heartbreak and loneliness behind the eyes of her lusty character. Before the ex-silent screen star and the Hollywood hopeful go horizontal, she says to him "Make me feel like I matter."

Jack chickens out when he encounters his first male client -- songwriter Cole Porter. (This would've been a perfect place for the soundtrack to play either "Love For Sale" or Ethel Merman's recording of "You're the Top," both Cole Porter hits.) Again, Ernie has to hip him to the facts of Hollywood life. As many were in those days, Ernie is a smoker. Occasionally, he coughs. In a production like this, you sense that such a cough will be the cough of doom.

Jack, who has yet to show us that he's got the stuff to be a movie star, decides to take a walk on the wild side. This means going to costume shop, getting a policeman's uniform and going to a gay male porno movie theater where he poses as a cop. He locks eyes with a handsome young Black man there and pretends to bust him. The young Black man thinks he's being taken to a police station. Jack takes his to Schwab's drugstore. In a way, it really doesn't make sense but it sets us up to learn that the African American Archie, well-played by charismatic Broadway actor Jeremy Pope, is an aspiring screenwriter. Jack brings Archie to Ernie. Ernie digs Archie and makes him a new member of the full service team. Archie hooks up with a shy guy named Roy Fitzgerald. Roy will later become famous as Rock Hudson.

Episode 1 ends with gas station pump boy Jack snared in a work-related crisis.

I'm really keen on seeing if Ryan Murphy sticks with his "Gay 101" knowledge of Old Hollywood or if he digs deeper to reference facts not commonly known. Facts about the politics of sex and race within the old Hollywood studio system. In her youth, my aunt took piano lesson in Los Angeles from the mother of the famous Nicholas Brothers. A few months ago, my aunt and I chatted about that. She said that Mrs. Nicholas commented on her extraordinarily talented sons. "They could do a great dance number for a 20th Century Fox movie," Mrs. Nicholas said, "but they couldn't eat in the studio commissary." Here's a clip of the Nicholas Brothers in the 1943 Fox musical, STORMY WEATHER. This number received high praise from screen legend, Fred Astaire.

But they couldn't eat in the studio commissary.

Ryan Murphy's HOLLYWOOD is on Netflix.

Brian Dennehy in DRIVEWAYS

Young director Andrew Ahn has delivered a lovely, modest piece of work. It's a movie that features a performance from veteran actor Brian Dennehy who passed away recently at age 81. The film is titled DRIVEWAYS and paired Dennehy with the remarkable Hong Chau. She plays the single working mother overwhelmed by but handling a serious family matter. A heartbreaking one. She does this while keeping an eye on her lovable, soon to be 9, little boy. If you made it through a long, brutal winter, you know that feeling you get when taking a walk in the spring and you see green breaking through again on trees? You get the sweet sensation that warmth and color are coming back. That surge of joy to the heart is what you may feel watching DRIVEWAYS. Dennehy is obviously in the winter of his years here as he gives one of his final screen performances. He's physically slower. He appears slightly infirm due to age. This isn't the big bear Brian Dennehy of SILVERADO, F/X, TOMMY BOY and COCOON or Broadway's DEATH OF A SALESMAN. However, his talent is still sharp and true.

Hong Chau is an actress who doesn't get nearly the attention she deserves. She's a New Orleans native whose parents fled Vietnam in the 1970s. Hong Chau was marvelous in the sci-fi social satire, DOWNSIZING, a 2017 drama starring Matt Damon. It was cowritten and directed by Alexander Payne. Like a movie from the 1950s, DOWNSIZING commented on society by presenting characters in a community where people have been willingly shrunk to five inches tall.  They do this for a more comfortable life and to ease the world's over-population. The message of the movie is a good one. But, like a 1950s sci fi movie with shrunken characters, it should've run about 1 hour and 45 minutes instead of 2 hours and 15 minutes. It dawdled too long on the extensive shrinking process. The fire and soul of the movie really enter when Hong Chau does as the blunt, no-nonsense Vietnam war refugee. She's on a relentless quest to help others and be of service in the world. She's disabled. She has only one leg. That does not deter her. She is, to use an overused phrase, a force of nature. I prayed that Hong Chau would get a Best Supporting Actress Oscar nomination for that performance. She didn't, but she was definitely deserving of one. Last year, Hong Chau was seen on the HBO production, WATCHMEN, as Lady Trieu.

In DRIVEWAYS, Hong Chau stars as Kathy, a devoted and emotionally taxed working mom who hails from Michigan. She handles medical transcriptions. Because she works online, this gives her the flexibility to make a road trip with her son. She has her laptop and she can work on the road. Kathy's older sister died. Her sister lived alone in a house and, apparently, she had grown reclusive over the years. She developed a serious problem with hoarding that Kathy didn't know about. The two sisters had not visited each other in quite some time. Some emotional distance existed between them. The hoarding proves to be a shock to Kathy and Cody, her little boy. Kathy must deal with clearing out the house and preparing it to go on the market. She's heartbroken because some of her history is mixed in with her late sister's belongings. The cleaning out is like being forced to discard some of her own life, her own history. Del is the retiree next door. He seems to be a crusty old coot. Kathy, understandably, is wary when first she meets him because his initial contact was with Cody. All is fine. Cody likes Del. Eventually so does Kathy because he treated her sister with next door neighbor kindness.

We watch a warm, gentle friendship bloom between Del and Cody. Del lets Cody experience life at his own pace. Cody is relaxed and open with Del. Del is grateful for the companionship. It's something fresh and new, different from his usual weekly activity of playing bingo with other seniors.  Not much really happens in DRIVEWAYS. We see that it's about loss, letting go and moving on. The little boy and senior citizen widower friendship may remind you of the wonderful animated feature, UP. But DRIVEWAYS is different. It reaffirms that keeping in touch and reminding loved ones that they are loved are great gifts we must never forget to give.

Brian Dennehy is excellent in DRIVEWAYS. His final scenes in this movie are beautiful. Beautiful, poignant acting. No special effects. No car chases or fancy costumes Just a man sitting on a front porch and talking to a little boy about life.  Young Lucas Jaye is endearing as Cody.

DRIVEWAYS is available to stream staring May 7th. It runs about 85 minutes.

He Wore DEERSKIN

This is one absurd little black comedy. A French import, it's subtitled. There's the old saying, "The clothes make the man." In DEERSKIN, the clothes make the man...crazy. Psychotic, if you will. Remember THE ARTIST, the black and white Oscar winner for Best Picture of 2011? It's brawny and handsome French leading man, Jean Dujardin, took home the Oscar for Best Actor. Then we didn't hear much from him in connection to Hollywood films. A big man who is obviously most comfortable in his own skin, and actor skilled at delivering sophisticated drama and goofy comedy performances, it seemed to me that his Hollywood reps dropped the ball on utilizing his skills for American audiences. After THE ARTIST, he should've had an American film and TV exposure to make him as visible as Jon Hamm or Daniel Craig. He is a top star in France.  THE ARTIST, like the classic musical SINGIN' IN THE RAIN, takes place in the Hollywood of the 1920s when it was the brink of a historic revolution in technology. Sound had come to films. The silent era was over. Movie-making and movie careers would be instantly and drastically changed. Dujardin played the arrogant, selfish and highly popular silent screen star whose career may not survive the transition. He must learn humility, reinvent himself as a man and an artist. Besides being in black and white, THE ARTIST is mostly silent like films of the 1920s. Dujardin is exceptional. He deserved that Oscar.  DEERSKIN is not as satisfying. It's a different kind of film. However, it does remind you that Dujardin is quite a presence onscreen. He's a good actor.

 In DEERSKIN, Dujardin again plays a member of the film industry. Or so he claims.

In DEERSKIN, he's a middle-aged man who's recently divorced. For some reason, he's obsessed with owning a vintage deerskin jacket. He purchases one and desires to be the only person who wears it. He wishes no one else in the world wore a jacket. Just him. The film opens with a few folks vowing to never again wear a jacket as the discard the jackets they own. He's purchased the jacket. He's basically broke and heads to a little alpine village inn. His masculinity is now on the wrong road. He's a big irresponsible macho shithead who hears the jacket talking to him when he's alone in his room/ Yes, the jacket speaks to him. At the nearby bar, he's having a drink and spins this tale that he's a filmmaker working on a project. The young slacker female bartender buys him a drink and buys his story. Her dream is to be a film editor. She wanted to re-edit PULP FICTION. She gets him money while he gets even more irresponsible and starts stealing people's jackets. Those people also believe he's an indie filmmaker. The deerskin makes him, in a way, a movie director who is a crazed hunter in lunatic fringe. Here's a clip.

DEERSKIN, in its last act, provides you a big "What in the hell just happened?!?!?" moment.

It's interesting to watch the dynamic between Georges, the fake director, the young female bartender. She's not as gullible as he may think. In her way, she knows how to get a project funded and on its feet. She knows what a film needs. When it comes to filmmaking, the female is smarter than the macho monster director. Unlike the 1920s actor Jean Dujardin played in THE ARTIST, the alleged modern-day movie director in DEERSKIN lacks humility. Also, he demented. He believes he owns a talking jacket. He lies to the editor but she gives him a fabulous deerskin gift to complement his jacket. They are collaborators. In this weird tale of masculinity gone awry, we just hope Georges won't flip out and lock her in the trunk of car the way he did other people's jackets. DEERSKIN was written and directed by Quentin Dupieux.

For information on where you can see DEERSKIN, click onto this link:  Deerskinmovie.com.

If you never saw Jean Dujardin as THE ARTIST, do so. He's worth watching in it.