Review: "My Beautiful Laundrette" Tackles Social Issues (Happy B'day, Daniel Day Lewis)

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 16 (of 2004) by Leroy Douresseaux

My Beautiful Laundrette (1985)
COUNTRY OF ORIGIN:  United Kingdom
Running time:  97 minutes (1 hour, 37 minutes)
MPAA – R
DIRECTOR:  Stephen Frears
WRITER:  Hanif Kureishi
PRODUCERS:  Tim Bevan and Sarah Radclyffe
CINEMATOGRAPHER:  Oliver Stapleton
EDITOR:  Mick Audsley
COMPOSER:  Ludus Tonalis
Academy Award nominee

DRAMA/ROMANCE with elements of comedy

Starring:  Saeed Jaffrey, Roshan Seth, Daniel Day-Lewis, Gordon Warnecke, Derrick Blanche, Rita Wolf, Souad Faress, Richard Graham, Shirley Ann Field, Dudley Thomas, Winston Graham, and Garry Cooper

The subject of this movie review is My Beautiful Laundrette, a 1985 British comedy-drama directed by Stephen Frears and written by Hanif Kureishi.  The movie, which was originally intended for television, was one of the first films released by Working Title Films.  My Beautiful Laundrette focuses on an ambitious Asian Briton and his white male lover as they strive to find success with a glamorous launderette (Laundromat).

In My Beautiful Laundrette, director Stephen Frears (The Hit) and screenwriter Hanif Kureishi don’t tackle issues, so much as they present a story that involves the entanglement amongst class, economics, family, politics, race, and sex.  My Beautiful Laundrette subtly presents the issues, but presents them nonetheless.  Because the issues of the film tie everyone together, every character is a legitimate player, and the viewer has to always pay attention to all the characters.  That’s heady stuff in a world where the most popular and publicized pictures are glossy films with lots of throwaway appendages.

Omar (Gordon Warnecke) is an ambitious young Asian Briton of Pakistani decent who convinces his uncle to let him manage his uncle’s laundrette.  He convinces Johnny (Daniel Day Lewis, The Bounty), an old school chum and his gay lover, to join him.  They convert the dilapidated business into a colorful and glamorous establishment as they strive for success amidst familial and social politics – Omar’s mostly immigrant family and Johnny’s racist thug friends.

Warnecke and Lewis are excellent as the young businessman who leaps at every opportunity and the disaffected youth at odds with the world respectively.  In this early role, Lewis smolders, as he would so often in the future, showing the audience that there is more, much more, beneath the surface of his character, unseen and real – the window to the character’s soul.  However, the best part belongs to an actor seldom seen in film since My Beautiful Laundrette, Derrick Branche as Omar’s cousin Salim.  Every bit as racist as Johnny’s buddies and as ambitious as any of his relatives, he is the ruthless and blunt looking glass of this story.

My Beautiful Laundrette takes a while to get going, but its documentary approach to storytelling in which the characters are like real people and not actors acting like people is worth the wait.  Much of the love and romance is tepid, probably because the filmmakers wished to convey how difficult love can be amongst people straddling the borders between warring social groups.  Perhaps, the film could have been a bit more emotional, but maybe the filmmakers wanted to play down the passion of love in favor of presenting a broader picture of the societal pressures weighing upon the characters.  The viewer can decide for himself, especially if he likes films that focus on the common everyman.

7 of 10
B+

NOTES:
1987 Academy Awards, USA:  1 nomination: “Best Writing, Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen” (Hanif Kureishi)

1986 BAFTA Awards:  2 nominations: “Best Actor in a Supporting Role” (Saeed Jaffrey) and “Best Screenplay – Original” (Hanif Kureishi)

Updated:  Tuesday, April 29, 2014

The text is copyright © 2014 Leroy Douresseaux. All Rights Reserved. Contact this site for syndication rights and fees.

Review: "C.S.A.: The Confederate States of America" is Unforgettable

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 198 (of 2006) by Leroy Douresseaux

C.S.A.: The Confederate States of America (2004)
Running time: 90 minutes (1 hour, 30 minutes)
Not rated by the MPAA
WRITER/DIRECTOR: Kevin Willmott
PRODUCER: Rick Cowan
CINEMATOGRAPHER: Matt Jacobson
EDITORS: Sean Blake and David Gramly

COMEDY/DRAMA/HISTORICAL

Starring: Evamarii Johnson, Larry Peterson, Patti Van Slyke, and Rupert Pate

Writer/director Kevin Willmott’s blistering comedy, C.S.A.: The Confederate States of America, is a so-called “mockumenatry” (a mock documentary). Willmott (an assistant professor at the University of Kansas) puts forth a provocative vision in which the South (or the Confederacy or the Confederate States of America) won the Civil War (the War Between the States?), and slavery is still legal and liberals and free blacks have fled to Canada.

In this film within a film, a C.S.A. television station, Channel 6, decides to show the controversial British documentary, C.S.A., a documentary history of the Confederate States of America, which begins with the Civil War and ends in present day C.S.A. In between the documentary, the station broadcasts commercial advertisements for a number of products with racist brand names and logos and/or inherently racist in nature as they are geared towards pacifying slaves (including a prescription drug available from veterinarians, Contrari, which makes troublesome darkies docile). The C.S.A. documentary features archival footage of the capture of the disposed Union President Abraham Lincoln (in black face and on the run with Harriet Tubman), of the C.S.A. conquering Latin America and exporting its own brand of apartheid there, and of a C.S.A. alliance with Adolf Hitler, among other things.

The best-known “mockumentary” is probably This is… Spinal Tap. Christopher Guest, one of Spinal Tap’s co-creators, has also directed a trio of critically acclaimed mockumentaries including the recent Oscar-nominated A Mighty Wind (a fourth is due Fall 2006). Other examples of mockumentaries are CB4 and Fear of a Black Hat. While C.S.A.: The Confederate States of America is in the tradition of the aforementioned films, it more closely resembles two Robert K. Weiss-produced comedies, The Kentucky Fried Movie and Amazon Women on the Moon both in tone and in temperament. The alternative racial history aspect of C.S.A. is very much like some of pseudo-historical sketches from Dave Chappelle’s now-defunct Comedy Central series, “Chappelle’s Show,” like the one in which black Americans received reparations for slavery.

C.S.A. is, in the end, its own beast. Using humor, some of it relentlessly scathing and much of it surprisingly droll, Willmott comments on more than just race (read: skin color), racism, and race relations in the United States with the C.S.A. as an allegorical stand in. Willmott also discusses imperialism, war, greed, nationalist propaganda, crass commercialism, and ethnic and religious bigotry. Many of the racist products featured in the faux commercials are actual racist products from American history including the ones for the fried chicken franchise, Coon Chicken Inn, and the furniture polish, the Gold Dust Twins.

Keeping in mind what George Bernard Shaw said about using comedy to tell truths because it keeps the audience from killing the storyteller (which Willmott quotes at the beginning of this movie), Willmott exposes the ugly truths about bigotry, doing it all with a disarming sense of humor. Some people will automatically be defensive about this film (especially hypersensitive white Southerners), but this is simply an excellent political and social comedy. It stumbles a bit, and its low budget only occasionally hurts the movie. Still, C.S.A.: The Confederate States of America is an exceptional, offbeat film for those with a taste for black, bold and outspoken.

7 of 10
A-

Sunday, September 17, 2006

You can watch C.S.A. on Amazon's PRIME VIDEO.

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Amazon wants me to inform you that the affiliate link below is a PAID AD, but I technically only get paid (eventually) if you click on the affiliate link below AND buy something(s).

John Pilger on the Recent Riots in London

"Damn It or Fear It, the Forbidden Truth Is There's an Insurrection in Britain"

In an age of public relations as news, the clean-up campaign, however well meant by many people, can also serve the government's and media's goal of sweeping inequality and hopelessness under gentrified carpets, with cheery volunteers armed with their brand-new brooms and pointedly described as "Londoners" as if the rest are aliens.

Go. Read.

 

Review: 2006 Oscar-Winning Best Picture "Crash" Still Powerful

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 2 (of 2006) by Leroy Douresseaux

Crash (2004/2005)
Running time: 122 minutes (2 hours, 2 minutes)
MPAA – R for language, sexual content, and some violence
DIRECTOR: Paul Haggis
WRITERS: Bobby Moresco and Paul Haggis; from a story by Paul Haggis
PRODUCERS: Cathy Schulman, Don Cheadle, Bob Yari, Mark R. Harris, Robert Moresco, and Paul Haggis
CINEMATOGRAPHER: J. Michael Muro
EDITOR: Hughes Winborne
Academy Award winner

DRAMA

Starring: Sandra Bullock, Don Cheadle, Matt Dillon, Jennifer Esposito, William Fichtner, Brendan Fraser, Terrence Howard, Chris “Ludacris” Bridges, Thandie Newton, Ryan Philippe, Larenz Tate, Michael Peña, Keith David, Loretta Divine, Tony Danza, Nona Gaye, Yomi Perry, Daniel Dae Kim, Bruce Kirby, and Bahar Soomekh

The lives of a diverse cast of characters from various ethnic backgrounds, of different skin colors (also known as “different races”), and including immigrants: a Brentwood housewife (Sandra Bullock) and her District Attorney husband (Brendan Fraser); two police detectives who are also lovers (Don Cheadle and Jennifer Esposito); an African-American television director and his wife (Terrence Howard and Thandie Newton); a Mexican locksmith (Michael Peña); two carjackers (Chris “Ludacris” Bridges and Larenz Tate); a rookie cop and his bigoted partner (Ryan Philippe and Matt Dillon) collide over a period of 36 hours.

Crash is one of the very best films of 2005 and one of the best films about America in ages not just because co-writer/co-producer/director Paul Haggis (he wrote the screenplay for Million Dollar Baby) deftly connects so many Los Angeles-based characters of different “racial” or ethnic backgrounds to a single event with such glowing intensity. It is also great because the film shows the acute problem this country has with such diversity. American’s have created so many stereotypes that they have attached as belonging to particular ethnic, religious, “racial,” and even professional groups. Those stereotypes, in turn, affect how we judge people in those groups, how we interact with others, and what we believe about others. In the end, all that pre-judging and predestination causes us nothing but trouble.

Haggis and his co-writer, Bobby Moresco, give us so many examples of the problems these characters make for themselves because of prejudice and because they make assumptions about people that are often wrong (and sometimes even dangerous), and Haggis and Moresco still manage to make a solid, engaging, and enthralling beginning to end linear (for the most part) narrative. They’ve created so many scenarios, characters, events, actions, and attitudes with which we will personally connect because every American can lay claim to bigotry and prejudice. Crash is as if Haggis and Moresco have turned the American film into a mirror and pointed it at us.

Of the many great scenes, one in particular defines why Crash is such a great American film. A Persian storeowner who is obviously an immigrant goes to a gun store with his daughter to purchase a gun that he really believes he needs to protect himself, his family, and, in particular, his business. The gun storeowner is not patient with a Persian who doesn’t speak English well, and though his daughter tries in vain to mediate the transaction, it goes badly between Persian and the “native” American storeowner – a white guy. The storeowner calls the Persian an Arab (all people from the Middle East are not Arabs), and makes the most ugly, most bigoted remarks about 9/11 connecting all Middle Easterners and/or Arab-types to the terrorist act that I’ve ever heard.

Watch that scene alone, and you’ll understand the power Crash holds in its bosom. If the film has a message, it is that sometimes we should stop and think. Despite differences in what we believe, in skin color, or in customs, we are more alike than we’d like to believe. The static of difference between us can be the thing that stops us from helping or understanding. Allowing the static to remain can lead to tragedy when we crash into each other.

That a message film can come with such powerful ideas and not be preachy, but be such a fine and intensely engaging film is what makes Crash a great one. Add a large cast that gives such potent performances (especially Matt Dillon, who redefines his career with his role as a conflicted, bigoted patrolmen, and Terrence Howard, who adds to his 2005 coming out party with this) and Crash is a must-see movie.

10 of 10

NOTES:
2006 Academy Awards: 3 wins: “Best Motion Picture of the Year” (Paul Haggis and Cathy Schulman), “Best Achievement in Editing” (Hughes Winborne), and “Best Writing, Original Screenplay” (Paul Haggis-screenplay/story and Robert Moresco-screenplay); 3 nominations: “Best Achievement in Directing” (Paul Haggis), and “Best Achievement in Music Written for Motion Pictures, Original Song” (Kathleen York-music/lyrics and Michael Becker-music for the song "In the Deep"), and “Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role” (Matt Dillon)

2006 BAFTA Awards: 2 wins: “Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role” (Thandie Newton) and “Best Screenplay – Original” (Paul Haggis and Robert Moresco); 7 nominations: “Best Cinematography” (J. Michael Muro), “Best Editing” (Hughes Winborne), “Best Film” (Cathy Schulman, Don Cheadle, and Bob Yari), “Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role” (Don Cheadle), “Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role” (Matt Dillon), “Best Sound” (Richard Van Dyke, Sandy Gendler, Adam Jenkins, and Marc Fishman) and “David Lean Award for Direction”( Paul Haggis)

2006 Golden Globes: 2 nominations: “Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role in a Motion Picture” (Matt Dillon) and “Best Screenplay - Motion Picture” (Paul Haggis and Robert Moresco)

Wednesday, January 4, 2006

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Another White Cleopatra...

BET.com's "What the Flick" blog is not happy about Angelina Jolie being cast as Cleopatra in an upcoming film.  Elizabeth "Caucasian" Taylor famously/infamously played Cleopatra 5 decades ago, and some are angry that another white woman is playing the Egyptian queen again.  Who really knows what skin color the historical Cleopatra had?

I don't think it's that big a deal, and the movie will be a flop, anyway.  If Jolie's character isn't performing oral sex or waving a pistol around, the box office isn't big.

Review: First "Imitation of Life" is Less Attractive Over Time

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 59 (of 2004) by Leroy Douresseaux

Imitation of Life (1934) B&W
Running time: 111 minutes
DIRECTOR: John M. Stahl
WRITER: William Hulburt (from a novel by Fannie Hurst)
PRODUCER: Carl Laemmle, Jr.
CINEMATOGRAPHER: Merritt B. Gerstad
EDITORS: Philip Cahn and Maurice Wright
Academy Award nominee

DRAMA

Starring: Claudette Colbert, Warren William, Rochelle Hudson, Ned Sparks, Louise Beavers, Fredi Washington, Juanita Quigley, Sebie Hendricks, Marilyn Knowlden, Dorothy Black, Wyndham Standing, Henry Armetta, and Alan Hale

Although the 1959 color version directed by Douglas Sirk is better known, the 1934 version of Imitation of Life earned three Oscar nominations including one for Best Picture. If you’ve seen Sirk’s Technicolor cult classic of high melodrama, you really don’t need to see the older film (which covers the same themes), other than for the sake of curiosity.

In this black and white version, Beatrice “Bea” Pullman (Claudette Colbert) is a widowed, single mother of two-year old Jessie (Juanita Quigley). By chance and opportunity, she befriends a coloured domestic, Delilah Johnson (Louise Beavers), and her high yellow/mulatto daughter Peola (Sebie Hendricks). Delilah becomes Bea’s housekeeper and friend, and together they start a successful pancake restaurant (and later boxed pancake mix empire) that takes them from poverty to wealth.

But wealth doesn’t bring happiness. The adult Peola (Fredi Washington) comes to hate that she can’t pass for white because her dark-skinned mother has an irritating way of being part of her daughter’s life, so she eventually abandons Delilah, her “mammy.” Bea doesn’t have a man in her life, but when she finally meets Stephen “Steve” Archer (Warren William), teenage Jessie (Rochelle Hudson) falls in love with him.

The film is typical old school Hollywood drama replete with gorgeous art direction, sets, and costumes. The meat and bones of the story are, however, weak. The acting is suspect and lame, not because of technique or skill, but because of effort. The entire cast (except for the brassy Ned Sparks as Bea’s manager Elmer Smith) seems to be half stepping, as if they’re not really into it. They may have given their all, but appearances and results say otherwise. A melodrama needs intense and/or over-the-top performances; that makes the drama palatable. The filmmakers just don’t give that here. There is one thing they do with a passion: Ms. Beavers’ Delilah is a hideous stereotype that is so awful and stomach turning that I could almost believe the KKK financed this film.

3 of 10
C-

NOTE:
Academy Awards 1935: 3 nominations: “Best Picture,” “Best Assistant Director” (Scott R. Beal), and “Best Sound, Recording” (Theodore Soderberg, sound director)

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Review: "Pinky" Remains a Pointed, Relevant Drama

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 177 (of 2003) by Leroy Douresseaux

Pinky (1949)
Running time: 102 minutes
DIRECTOR:  Elia Kazan
WRITERS: Philip Dunne and Dudley Nichols (from the novel by Cid Ricketts Sumner)
PRODUCER: Darryl F. Zanuck
CINEMATOGRAPHER: Joseph MacDonald
EDITOR: Harmon Jones
Academy Award nominee

DRAMA

Starring: Jeanne Crain, Ethel Barrymore, Ethel Waters, William Lundigan, Basil Ruysdael, Evelyn Varden, Kenny Washington, and Griff Barnett

Actress Jeanne Crain died Sunday, December 14, 2003, a day before I began writing this review. She earned an Academy Award nomination for her work in the film, Pinky.  Patricia Johnson (Ms. Crain) is a (very) light-skinned black woman living in the north. Years ago her grandmother (Ethel Waters) sent her north so that she could go to school to become a very well trained nurse. Now a graduate nurse, Patricia, better known as Pinky in the dirty, bigoted South where she was born, comes home to help her ailing granny. Pinky, however, is not ready to live again in the pre-Civil Rights South, with all the requisite stepping, fetching, and bowing to crackers that Negroes had to do then.

Her grandmother also uses guilt and guile to get Pinky to watch over an ailing white woman, Miss Em (Ethel Barrymore), who once ran a boarding school on the grounds of her palatial plantation estate. When Miss Em dies, she bequeaths her property to Pinky, which causes anger and consternation amongst the small town’s backwoods, inbred peckerwoods; it especially infuriates the trashy wife (Evelyn Varden) of Miss Em’s only living relative. Pinky doggedly fights the relatives who contest the will in court, and everyone is against her, from her grandmother to a reluctant retired judge who is acting as Pinky’s lawyer.

That’s just a few of the many hilarious highlights of the film Pinky, which like both film versions of Imitation of Life deals with light-skinned black women trying to “pass” as white women. Many of you would like to believe that there is no need for mulattoes, quadroons, octoroons, etc. to pass as white because skin color doesn’t matter any more, or at least not as much as it used to matter. Michael Jackson is trying to make himself white for a reason – it matters. Who would chose to have a dusky or dark complexion over being lighter? This film is timeless as we will always face hate, prejudice, and bigotry based on physical appearance.

The film is well acted (even if Ms. Crain and Ms. Waters are a bit hammy at times) and very well directed. Pinky captures with disheartening accuracy the pain and horror of racism and bigotry. Ms. Waters as granny or Miss Darcy (as she’s also known) plays the quietly suffering mammy a bit too heavily, but the humility and grace in the face of hate she gives the character serves the film quite well. It is also not naïve to believe that Pinky would stand up for herself at the great risk of personal injury. Back in the day it was nothing for evil white Christians to brutally and viciously murder black men and women, and that’s what Pinky faced, demanding that the legal system honor her property and inheritance rights.

Most importantly, Pinky is very entertaining, even though at times it is outrageously hilarious. It is, too, an inspirational film about doing the right thing, a feel good movie about triumphant black folks that will hopefully stand strong over time.

7 of 10
A-

NOTE:
1950 Academy Awards: 3 nominations: Best Actress (Jeanne Crain), and Best Supporting Actress (Ethel Barrymore, Ethel Waters)

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