A Change Is Gonna Come: The Life and Music of Bettye LaVette

Imagine growing up with a jukebox and a future music legend in your living room. That was a typical evening in the childhood of Betty Haskins, who would go on to become acclaimed rhythm-and-blues singer Bettye LaVette. Employees at a General Motors factory, her parents moonlighted in the 1950s by selling barbecue sandwiches and corn liquor at their Michigan home. This attracted touring African-American gospel groups, such as the Blind Boys of Alabama and the Soul Stirrers, featuring a then-unknown vocalist named Sam Cooke. They could eat, drink and listen to tunes there; nightclubs were off limits for them during the era of segregation.

Snoozer - Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps

I doubt if there could be a timelier sequel, given the recent economic meltdown, than Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps. But timing is pretty much all it has on its side. Director Oliver Stone returns to the Machiavellian world of high financing that he first examined in Wall Street (1987), but the new picture is enervating and more dramatically conflicted than the original. It’s a snoozer.

Stone had a huge hit with Wall Street, and not just because it neatly reflected the yuppie obsession with junk bonds and insider trading. In his previous films (and screenplays), Stone revealed a split personality. Pictures like Salvador (1986) and Platoon (1986) may have shown Stone to possess a more left-wing perspective on American foreign policy, but the guy who also wrote Midnight Express (1978) and Year of the Dragon (1985) seemed to simultaneously hold some of the same right-wing macho attitudes of John Milius. That split added tension to Salvador (still his best movie) and most of Platoon, but in Wall Street, Oliver Stone smoothed over the cracks in his polemics. He created an American fascist of the financial world in Gordon Gekko (Michael Douglas), an amoral predator, who wrecks companies to score millions as easily as a child dissembles building blocks. But Stone took it an extra step: He cleverly turned his adversary into an appealing character, a reflection of himself, by having his critiques of capitalism cozily couched in Gekko’s swagger. That’s why Wall Street became such a big success with Michael Douglas earning for him an Oscar.

The Gloriously Flawed Jane Tennison: Prime Suspect 1-7

Helen Mirren as Inspector Jane Tennison, in Prime Suspect 2 (1992).

It was with great sadness that I watched the last few minutes of Prime Suspect: The Final Act in 2007 because it meant that I would never again see any new material featuring the character of Jane Tennison – one of the finest character ever created for television. Now that the entire series has just been released as a DVD box set, it's a perfect time to look back at this landmark program. Over the course of 15 years (1992-2007), in seven miniseries, Helen Mirren played Tennison as a work-driven woman who pushed back societal barriers of sexism, misogyny and finally ageism to become a Detective Chief Inspector at a London police division. Later in the series, she became Deputy Superintendent in Manchester and finally ended up back in London. Unlike most shows that would be happy just dealing with the uplift of an independent woman proving her chops amongst the men, Tennison was a deeply flawed woman who paid an expensive price for her ambitions. Prime Suspect never condemned her for her drive, but rather looked compassionately at the high cost of it: failed relationships, alcoholism, unwanted pregnancies, ridicule, petty jealousy and loneliness.

Remembering Claude Chabrol: La Cérémonie

I’ve been thinking of Claude Chabrol ever since news of his death, at age 80, was announced about a week ago. And it occurred to me that like fellow New Wave filmmaker Eric Rohmer, who also died this year (but from the opposite end of the emotional spectrum), Chabrol successfully carved out his own specific niche in a corner of world cinema. Whereas Rohmer, like Mike Leigh, offered up generous portraits of (mostly) middle class people he liked very much, Chabrol used his cinematic canvas to excoriate those he didn’t like at all, namely the bourgeoisie from which he sprung. His films were almost always about the evils and wickedness emanating from the monied classes but he didn’t assail them in a simplistic manner nor did he pretend that the lower classes were paragons of virtue, either. Usually, the downtrodden ‘victims’ of the rich were able to match them when it came to guile and venality, perhaps never more so than in one of his best films, La Cérémonie (1995).

The Sum of its Parts: Contact's Five On One

Sometimes playing music isn’t about proving anything or making a social statement, it can just as much be about ebb and flow and being sensitive to the emotional nuances asked for by the composer. For jazz musicians, particularly as they age, it is less about ego and more about listening and contributing to the larger, musical picture. For Contact, a new band led by American Dave Liebman, the whole is definitely the sum of the parts.

Five On One is a new album of music featuring Liebman on soprano and tenor saxophones, John Abercrombie on guitar, Marc Copland on piano, Drew Gress on Bass and the remarkable Billy Hart on drums. Recorded in two days last January, Five On One is a sonic pleasure to the ears. The blend of sound is strong here because each musician is listening hard to what their fellow players are doing and having great ears, as I’ve written before, is the real key to making great music. The album opens with a very simple, yet direct 2-bar lick by Abercrombie called, "Sendup." But as usual (with the wry Abercrombie humour) the music is anything but parody. It’s a framework for the players to improvise and draw the listener in and it works immediately.

The Big C Gets a C+

It is no longer necessary to make the point that television is currently a lot better than film. TV series are drawing not only A-list actors (Glenn Close and William Hurt on Damages, Sally Field in Brothers and Sisters, Holly Hunter on Saving Grace, to list just a few), but also A-list directors (Agnieszka Holland has directed episodes of The Wire and Treme, and most recently, Martin Scorsese directed the pilot of the much-anticipated Boardwalk Empire, which premiered last night). Television has come a long way, and TV viewers are richer for it.

To a large degree, the increasing richness of television can be traced to its overall honesty – television’s willingness to show us things which are uncomfortable or ugly, and its ability to illuminate the details which make the lives of our favourite characters so intriguing. But there are shows with all the right ambition, shows which, despite their potential and intriguing subject matter, fail to live up to their own promise. The Big C is one of these shows.

The Fall and Rise of Jonathan Demme

Many fans of the works of Jonathan Demme think he made a major mistake when he directed his Academy-Award winning film The Silence of the Lambs (1981). Although the film was a huge hit and received critical acclaim, it was a step away from the type of funky, loose, music-filled films for which he had become known: Something Wild (1986), Married To The Mob (1988) and Melvin and Howard (1980), etc. Though I'm not among the naysayers (because I've always liked the picture), I appreciate their point of view. After Lambs' success, he got trapped in the world of 'prestige' pictures that seem aimed at garnering awards and attracting acclaim. Though a picture like the overly earnest Philadelphia (1993) won Oscars and was a hit at the box office, he went on to do the disastrous Beloved (1998) and the ridiculous remake of The Manchurian Candidate (2004). By embracing this type of film, he seemed to have lost that light touch (even in darker material like Something Wild) that made his earlier pictures so appealing.

Into the Deep End: Robert Plant’s Band of Joy

Band of Joy, Robert Plant’s highly anticipated new album, drops you into the deep end: a record that combines the swamp of Louisiana with the Celtic Highlands of Scotland. Produced by Plant and the ever-versatile Buddy Miller, Band of Joy is probably the best combination of musical colours Plant has used yet, surrounding him like a woolen blanket.

Originally, Band of Joy was the name of Plant’s first serious rock band and they were only together for a couple of years from 1966 to 1968. He was just 18 years of age when he fronted the group along with John Bonham on drums. He took Bonham to Jimmy Page and John Paul Jones and formed Led Zeppelin: a band that musically re-imagined the blues with close attention to their English folk roots. Both Plant and Page were able to absorb many musical forms and adapt them to Led Zeppelin. This record widens the musical pallete to include sounds that Led Zeppelin dare not tread: gospel, soul and country-blues.

Fizzle and Pop: Easy A

Emma Stone in Easy A (2010).

 

The filmmakers of Easy A have a clever idea working Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter into a comedy about the impact of high school gossip. But they don’t seem to know what to do with it. Clean-cut Olive Penderghast (Emma Stone) gets overheard saying that she recently lost her virginity (although she hadn’t) and, within hours, it’s all over school. Her reputation is both sullied and enhanced (depending on who you ask). But her false confession leads several boys (including a gay friend who desperately wants to be recognized as straight) to seek her out and pretend that they lost their virginity with her – they’re so desperate they even pay her. Before long, the benefits of being perceived as the school sex queen pale when she begins to resemble Hester Prynne (even leading to her affixing the scarlet ‘A’ to her clothing).

The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet's Nest: A Fully Satisfying Conclusion to Stieg Larsson's 'Millennium' Trilogy

The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet’s Nest is the final book in Swedish writer Stieg Larsson’s ‘Millennium’ trilogy, after The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and The Girl Who Played with Fire. A finer, more satisfying dénouement to the mystery series would be hard to imagine.

Having now finished all three books, which revolve around Lisbeth Salander, an angry and highly antisocial young woman who has been horribly mistreated by the Swedish legal and medical systems, and her friend and protector, crusading investigative journalist Mikael Blomkvist, I can only add more bouquets of effusive praise to what I wrote about the first two novels. Suffice it to say that the concluding ‘Millennium’ novel, in a series which had already managed to touch on everything from Sweden’s vicious sex trade to the country’s past flirtation with Nazism to the prevailing sexist atmosphere in most of that nation’s major institutions, among many other subjects, widens the scope even further by unveiling a political and constitutional scandal that makes Watergate look like a minor kerfuffle. (This is not a spoiler as much of this was revealed in the previous two books, particularly in The Girl Who Played With Fire). And The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet’s Nest does all this without ever losing the thread of the unique, moving but unsentimental relationship between Salander and Blomkvist. It literally picks up minutes after the exciting conclusion of The Girl Who Played with Fire when – SPOILER ALERT – Salander confronts her vicious father, a Soviet double agent who defected to Sweden, with dire results. That confrontation rips the lid off many a long-held secret as the chickens -- namely, the revelations behind the myraid injustices endured by Salander -- finally come home to roost.

Learning to Fly: Peter Bogdanovich’s Runnin’ Down a Dream (2007)

Until I recently caught up with director Peter Bogdanovich’s highly engaging four-hour documentary Runnin’ Down a Dream (2007), I didn’t realize how much I had taken for granted my love of Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers. While I have collected and enjoyed Petty’s music for years, I’ve never taken the time to contemplate why his best songs (and there are many) have always brought me such happiness. What Runnin’ Down a Dream helped me realize is how Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers, for the last 33 years, have kept some of the idealistic dreams of the sixties alive. They didn’t, however, do it by showing a nostalgic reverence for the era and its music. Rather they captured the music’s urgency, its uncompromising demand for freedom which lies right at the heart of all rock & roll. Whether it’s in an anthem like “I Won’t Back Down,” plaintive ballads like “Southern Accents,” or a scorching rocker like “You Wreck Me,” Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers created an immediacy that made each song sound both fresh and fully alive with possibility. For those who remember the joy they felt when a great song came through their tiny earphone on their transistor radio, Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers brought that instant delight to the music they played.

An Actor's Life: Kevin McCarthy

“They're here already! You're next!”

Kevin McCarthy, who passed away on September 11th, was a journeyman actor who worked constantly from his uncredited debut in Winged Victory (1944) right up until earlier this year when, at the age of 96, he starred in the short film Drawback. He is and always will be best remembered for playing Dr. Miles Bennell in the original version of Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956) for which the line quoted above is his best (and probably only) remembered line of dialogue. Journeyman actor he may have been, but his talent always shone through in whatever he did. A committed stage actor, his filmed credits were mostly guest shots on TV shows. His first was The Ford Theater Hour (1949), but many other shows he guested on from the 1960s through the 1990s are still remembered today: The Twilight Zone (1960), Ben Casey (1961), The Fugitive (1966), Burke's Law (1966), The Man From Uncle (1966), The Invaders (1967), Mission: Impossible (1971), Columbo (1973), Hawaii Five-O (1976), Flamingo Road (1980-1982 – he had a role for the show's entire run), Matlock (1989) and Murder, She Wrote (1992). There were dozens of others – shows you've heard of and ones nobody but agents and trivia buffs remember.

Attic of My Dreams: Richard Thompson's Dream Attic

Richard Thompson's Dream Attic calls up the familiar sounds of Fairport Convention: an eclectic mix of instruments with just enough American blues and Celtic jigs to compliment one another, and it’s probably no fluke. As a result, Thompson gives way to the ensemble rather than his extended guitar solos. (The band features Pete Zorn on flute, saxophone, mandolin and acoustic guitar. Joel Zifkin is prominent on violin and the rhythm section features electric bass player Taras Prodaniuk up front in the mix.)  As one of the most unique and interesting players in music, Thompson makes his short solos count within the context of the song. This is evident on "Demons In Her Dancing Shoes," a tightly arranged sea shanty about the girls of Chapel Street in London. Thompson does stretch out on the moody “Crimescene,” but it’s a short, pointed solo expressing the blood and darkness of a murder.

The Singularly Humane Filmmaking of Mike Leigh

British writer-director Mike Leigh, whose latest film Another Year makes its North American debut at the Toronto International Film Festival on September 13, is the most generously humane filmmaker working today.

His films, and Another Year is no exception, invariably present sympathetic multi-faceted portraits of ordinary Britons, middle-class, lower middle-class or working-class folk, who are simply trying to get through life, be they the disillusioned socialists of High Hopes (1988), the determined chef trying to make a go of his own restaurant in Life is Sweet (1990) or the troubled families coping on a run down council estate in All or Nothing (2002). The beauty of Leigh’s films – and most of them are fully successful efforts – is that his protagonists are drawn so sympathetically and with such complexity that you feel that you know them and come to care about them deeply. That’s not nearly so common in our current cinematic age of crass, facile and empty movies like Kick-Ass, Life During Wartime and Grown Ups, to name just three of the year’s most offensive movies. (Leigh also made a film called Grown-Ups for TV in 1980 but any commonalities between it and the puerile Adam Sandler movie stop at the title.) I actually saw the word humane used by a reviewer to describe Todd Solondz’s Life During Wartime, which only goes to suggest how one can pervert the English language. Solondz’s films are anything but humane while Leigh's movies are suffused with humanity.

A Chronicle of Warriors in the Kill Zone: Restrepo

When Tim Hetherington ventured behind rebel lines while covering the Liberian civil war in 2003, an order for his execution was handed down by dictator Charles Taylor -- now on trial in the Hague for crimes against humanity. Luckily, the British photojournalist was never captured but, once you’ve had that sort of fatwa on your head, why the heck not trek to the most treacherous part of Afghanistan to report on American troops under constant attack by the Taliban? That’s exactly what he did, along with New York City colleague Sebastian Junger, from June 2007 through August 2008. They went to the hazardous region on behalf of Vanity Fair, ABC News and their own documentary, Restrepo, a harrowing look at a U.S. military operation in the remote Korengal Valley.

Split Down the Middle: A History of Violence & Act of Violence

Unlike most critics, I wasn't terribly impressed with David Cronenberg's 2005 crime thriller A History of Violence which is based on the graphic novel of the same name by John Wagner and Vince Locke. It features Viggo Mortensen as Tom Stall, the owner of a diner in fictional Millbrook, Indiana, who gets thrust into the public spotlight after killing two criminals in self-defense. While initially perceived as a peaceful man married to a lawyer (Maria Bello), with a teenage son (Ashton Holmes) and daughter (Heidi Hayes), we soon discover that he's not the man he appears to be. The idea of the conflicted hero is nothing new to movies -- especially film noir -- but that isn't the problem with the movie. What doesn't work in A History of Violence is the credibility of the story itself.

Caretaker of a Nation's Memory: The Films of Patricio Guzmán

Chilean filmmaker Patricio Guzmán has been chronicling his country's turbulent history for close to four decades now. Ever since he captured the 1973 coup led by Augusto Pinochet against Marxist President Salvador Allende in his stunning trilogy The Battle of Chile, Guzmán has made himself the caretaker of his land's national memory. At this year's Toronto International Film Festival, his latest film Nostalgia for the Light takes Guzmán to Chile's Atacama Desert to follow a group of dedicated astronomers who look to the cosmos for the origins of life, while nearby, a group of women search for the body parts of loved ones who "disappeared" during the Pinochet regime. (The movie premieres at TIFF on Monday September 13th at the new Bell Lightbox, with two subsequent screenings later in the week. Check the schedule for times.)

Arms Wide Open: Youssou N'Dour Concert – Yonge-Dundas Square – September 6, 2008

I've attended many concerts in my life, some great, some pleasant and some god awful. Even with the great ones, rare is the concert where several years down the road I can still recall the event with such near perfect clarity that it is like it happened only yesterday. In fact, it has happened only once. Two years ago this week, the great Senegalese singer, Youssou N'Dour, gave a concert that, for me, is one of the finest, if not the finest, I've ever seen. In town for the 2008 Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) to introduce the documentary about himself, Youssou N'Dour: I Bring What I Love (it has since opened in New York, but never here), he agreed to perform a free concert at the city's core, the Yonge-Dundas Square.

Dining at the Table of Faith: The Holmes Brothers' Feed My Soul

Most gospel music recordings offer songs about testifying to one’s faith in God or seeking forgiveness for one’s sins. So it’s rare to hear religious songs that sometimes question one’s faith. For The Holmes Brothers, whose career has relied on faith-based music, it comes as something of a surprise to hear a few songs about doubt on their new album, Feed My Soul. But considering Wendell Holmes’s bout with cancer in 2008, one might question a lot of things including one’s faith.

For one, Wendell Holmes offers a sad story of loneliness during a time of need on his poignant song, “Fair Weather Friend.” Its subtle indictment of the American medical system speaks to the effects of having his faith shaken by his doctor (“No one would have guessed/That you’d leave me in this mess”). Describing this physician as a fair weather friend was probably the nicest way he could have put his angry response to the treatment proscribed. This song is immediately followed by the up-tempo and inspirational, "Put My Foot Down," where Wendell sings, “You’ve got to put your foot down/So you can hold your head up.” Now the song is really about his woman leaving him for another man, but I can’t help but extrapolate a deeper, more positive meaning for Wendell and his health.

Excerpt from Reflections in the Hall of Mirrors: American Movies and the Politics of Idealism

Back in 1994, when I was just beginning a free-lance career, I had an idea for a book about American movies. That year, I'd seen Ivan Reitman's comedy Dave, starring Kevin Kline as a conservative President who falls into a coma and is replaced by a look-a-like (also played by Kline) so as not to send the public into a panic. Of course, the "new" President is more liberal and ultimately alters the policies of the true President. To my mind, it was as if we were watching George H. Bush morph into Bill Clinton in one movie. From that comedy, came the idea for Reflections in the Hall of Mirrors: American Movies and the Politics of Idealism.

I wanted Reflections to examine how key American movies from the Kennedy era onward had soaked up the political and cultural ideals of the time they were made. By delving into the American experience (from Kennedy to Clinton), I thought the book could capture, through a number of films, how the dashed hopes of the sixties were reflected back in the resurgence of liberal idealism in the Clinton nineties. After drawing up an outline, I sent the proposal off to publishers who all sent it back saying that it would never sell. One Canadian publisher almost squeaked it through, but their marketing division headed them off at the pass. From there, I went on to co-write a book (with Critics at Large colleague and friend Susan Green) on the TV show, Law & Order, plus later do my own books about Frank Zappa, Randy Newman, the album Trout Mask Replica and The Beatles. All the while, I kept updating Reflections, seeing my idea change in the wake of Monica Lewinsky, Clinton's impeachment, the 2000 election of Bush, 9/11, and finally the rise of Barack Obama.