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OT: Christmas with Kubrick

posted 6 years ago by ecarle (14979)
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Well, I was gifted with a "Kubrick Masterpiece Collection" for Xmas. Its been a fun initial watch.

The collection starts a bit late in Kubrick's career, which had so famously small a list of films made over four decades that one can practically count them on two hands.

All the Kubrick Films:

Fear and Desire
Killer's Kiss
The Killing
Paths of Glory
Spartacus
Lolita
Dr. Strangelove
2001
A Clockwork Orange
Barry Lyndon
The Shining
Full Metal Jacket
Eyes Wide Shut

And that's it. With 7 years from The Shining to Full Metal Jacket. And 12 from Full Metal Jacket to Eyes Wide Shut!(and Kubrick's death at a rather young 70, before the movie was released.)

This collector's edition chops off the first five Kubrick films(including the mega-epic Spartacus) and captures what some call "the true Kubrick movies":

Lolita
Dr. Strangelove
2001
A Clockwork Orange
Barry Lyndon
The Shining
Full Metal Jacket
Eyes Wide Shut

Oh, I dunno. I think Paths of Glory is Kubrick all the way. And he is present in Spartacus, which is a great, moving film on its own merits(tear-jerking at the end, likely producer-star Kirk Douglas doing rather than Kubrick.)

And The Killing is a great tough little caper film(if a bit too close to The Asphalt Jungle and both starring Sterling Hayden -- the A-ist B-movie actor in movies.)

Still, with Lolita, Kubrick started making his name as an auteur artist -- his own producer -- and always of controversial material.

The collection has the eight films above, and a documentary disk with Tom Cruise narrating it and appearing on screen, along with Cruise's ex Nicole Kidman, Jack Nicholson(rarely seen doing interviews, and rather oblique in his answers; dangerously "not smart"), Spielberg, Scorsese, Woody Allen(so wonderfully a screen ACTOR as well as director and yet now so fatally flawed in my eyes), and stray Kubrick players like Shelly Duvall(who says of Kubrick's 100 takes per scene, "Do you know the movie 'Groundhog's Day"? Shooting scenes with Kubrick were like that.") Marie Windsor("The Killing" -- she thought Kubrick was a kid) , Matthew Modine(never got the stardom he deserved.)

The documentary is helpful because it covers all the early films(and makes you hungry to see them) and sets up the eight films you CAN watch, at your leisure, in the collection.

Watching the films(and their "making of" docs, and old promotional films made for 2001) led me to skim some Kubrick reviews and its interesting how -- for a "genius auteur" -- BADLY he was reviewed over time. 2001 was seen as a pretentious art film wannabee(and boring) by some critics(and yet is was one of MGM's biggest hits with the public, ever), A Clockwork Orange bored and disgusted some critics(its my least favorite Kubrick film, and a re-view didn't dissuade me.) Barry Lyndon was scorned as a dull period piece in some corners(even as others extolled its brilliant cinematogpraphy and lighting scheme.) The Shining was seen as a weak horror movie and Full Metal Jacket as "too little, too late" after Apocoplypse Now and Platoon. And with Eyes Wide Shut the art film issue came up bigly again: "Is this truly great art, or a clunky attempt AT art?" The Emperor's New Clothes analogy haunts the films.

In the final analysis, it seems to me, Kubrick's reputation rests with two films, back to back, four years apart: Strangelove and 2001. The first is a perfect episodic comedy with a nuclear war nightmare thriller background, the second is wildly ambitious and entered popular culture as soon as its opening classical music score kicked in. Those are the two big ones in Kubrick. Everything else surrounds them.

And yet, other Kubrick films grew into classics over time. The Shining didn't make much of a splash in 1980(I know, I was there), but I'll bet its the Kubrick movie that gets the most TV airplay, and unlike Strangelove, its in color. Everybody now seems to think that The Shining is one of the greats; it outpolled Psycho in some recent poll.

I know guys who can recite the drill sergeant insults of Full Metal Jacket by heart, along with the lines later in a helicopter by a muscle bound machine gunner("How can you shoot women and children?" "Easy...don't lead them so far..." "If they run, they're VC. If they stand still, they're well-disciplined VC." Full Metal Jacket joins Strangelove as a sick macho comedy...it has a cult. And a cult of haters of its "racist, sexist, homophobic" macho satire.

Still, Full Metal Jacket and Eyes Wide Shut don't seem to get much respect. If its a crime that Kubrick never won a Best Director Oscar, those two movies aren't ones that look like he deserved them for.

[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

Some stray thoughts, based on partial views of the Kubrick films in the collection:

Damn, Strangelove IS great. And so, so funny ("Well, General Ripper went a little funny...in..the...head...just a little FUNNY.") Mary Poppins '64 may have to keep second place.

Jack's over-the-topness is just right for The Shining, says I. Spielberg in the documentary says that Kubrick convinced him Jack did right because "he was like Cagney" in the film. I say the movie collapses without Jack there to hold up all the righteous energy and comedy of the piece. I love his interchanges with "Lloyd the bartender" and Jack's extremely slowly paced, mesmerizing interlude with the murderous butler in the bathroom("No sir, you are the caretaker. You've always been the caretaker. I know because I've always been here").

Peter Sellers: a comic genius only sometimes, and not so much anymore. His cornpone accent in the first scene of Lolita with James Mason is overdone; he's good, but not great, in his Strangelove roles. George C. Scott and Slim Pickens and Keenan Wynn are the comedy gold in Strangelove.

Barry Lyndon. For me, this one comes with the memory of seeing it, for free, at a studio screening at 10:00 am in the morning at the Cinerama Dome. I felt very privileged, and I sat through the entire film with interest in its look, its capture of the past, and its orchestral music. I've never seen it since...but now that I own it, I will.

A Clockwork Orange. It brings a heavy surge of 1971-1972 nostalgia. All those violent movies: Get Carter, Straw Dogs, Dirty Harry, The Godfather, Frenzy, Deliverance. ACO is the least of them, IMHO. Sterile, unsexy (though R-rated) overacted or non-acted by everybody other than McDowall. And again(as with Frenzy, and The Sopranos, and now The Americans) I did NOT see the evil protagonist as a hero, and I was NOT happy to see him get away with it. Well, the killer in Frenzy -- much Alex's equal as a sex psycho, is caught, but didn't get hurt bad or die.)

Note: more nostalgia: I remember Time's special "Christmas Movie 1971 Section" on Straw Dogs, Dirty Harry A Clockwork Orange and...The Boyfriend. Hah.

[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

Stray thoughts, cont:

All that classical music actually starts to sound rather "easy" when you watch the Kubrick movies back to back. He certainly chose well-known pieces(often Bugs Bunny had introduced us to them.) And he repeated classical music from A Clockwork Orange to The Shining. Only the famous 2001 overture really seems a brilliant use...and MAYBE the Blue Danube in the same film.

Some Hitchcock connections.

In the 70s, Hitchcock only made two movies: Frenzy and Family Plot. Kubrick only made two movies, too: A Clockwork Orange and Barry Lyndon. The Kubricks were considered works of art; the Hitchcocks, a couple of great-to-good thrillers. Kubrick put more effort into his than Hitchcock. And yet: who had the two more entertaining films?

Hitchcock was Golden Era and Kubrick was Modern Era , but really the two directors were most active, plus put out some of their greatest films in the same 20 years:

1956

The Killing
The Man Who Knew Too Much
The Wrong Man

1957

Paths of Glory

1958

Vertigo

1959

North by Northwest

1960

Psycho
Spartacus (both with John Gavin!)

1962

Lolita

1963

The Birds

1964

Dr. Strangelove
Marnie

1966

Torn Curtain

1968

2001

1969

Topaz

1971

A Clockwork Orange(with Michael Bates)

1972

Frenzy(with Michael Bates)

1975

Barry Lyndon

1976

Family Plot

Hitchcock and Kubrick: contemporaries!

[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

More stray thoughts:

Eyes Wide Shut may disappoint some, but its light and color scheme is gorgeous: often rich gold contrasted with deep blue; also the red billards table.

The Shining and Eyes Wide Shut have very similar color schemes and ballroom settings.

The rich, bright lighting and color schemes of EVERYTHING from 2001 through Eyes Wide Shut (even ACO) are great and part of Kubrick's auteurism(regardless of who his DPs were.)

2001 and The Shining each have early "banal interview discussions" (the American scientist with his foreign colleagues, Jack with the hotel manager) which have a certain hypnotic quiet and nothingness to them(but with great portent.)

As noted by many: Kubrick's composition usually takes the center of the frame and has all the sets and people "branch out diagonally" to both sides of the screen from that center. Its very distinctive.

And this: cold and arty the films may be at heart, but yeah, they're great. As Scorsese says in the documentary, "There weren't many Kubrick films, but one Kubrick film is worth ten other films."

I'd say that about Hitchcock's films, too.

[–] swanstep (2715) 6 years ago

Watching the films(and their "making of" docs, and old promotional films made for 2001) led me to skim some Kubrick reviews and its interesting how -- for a "genius auteur" -- BADLY he was reviewed over time. 2001 was seen as a pretentious art film wannabee(and boring) by some critics(and yet is was one of MGM's biggest hits with the public, ever), A Clockwork Orange bored and disgusted some critics(its my least favorite Kubrick film, and a re-view didn't dissuade me.) Barry Lyndon was scorned as a dull period piece in some corners(even as others extolled its brilliant cinematography and lighting scheme.) The Shining was seen as a weak horror movie and Full Metal Jacket as "too little, too late" after Apocoplypse Now and Platoon. And with Eyes Wide Shut the art film issue came up bigly again: "Is this truly great art, or a clunky attempt AT art?" The Emperor's New Clothes analogy haunts the films.

[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

After Strangelove, and especially after The Shining, Kubrick's movies became increasingly over-designed and over-thought so that almost every frame signals its own importance from the get-go and kind of hangs there like a data-point for you to admire and analyze and try to connect with every other data point at your leisure on rewatches.

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Well put. And Kubrick to me is Exhibit A in The Difficulty of Purposely Making an Art Film. Hitchcock would be the first to tell you that he got away with making "modest little thrillers" and never particularly had to worry about sending forth great art. But he DID send forth great art. Kubrick -- somewhat after Strangelove, but definitely after 2001 -- was expected to do something "major and artful" every time. Hell of a burden. He met it as best he could. I might note that for every bad review of 2001 and A Clockwork Orange , there were more raves for those films. Works of genius and art, both of them. We were told.

On the main DVD documentary about Kubrick that comes with the collection, Scorsese(in particular) and Spielberg are "the usual suspects" praising Kubrick's greatness to the sky, with Scorsese saying some of the things above("There was always a higher expectation of greatness with a Kubrick film.") Woody Allen is a bit more "suspect" -- he says that "there are flaws with the writing and the acting in Strangelove -- but the direction is brilliant!"(Huh? How does one direct brilliantly if there are flaws with the acting?) And Woody says he didn't like 2001 the first time, but grew to love it as he met other people who did and he saw it again. Fair enough.

[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

Still, for all the praise being heaped on Kubrick in the documentary, there remains the evidence of the work itself. The Academy famously snubbed him as much as they snubbed Hitchcock(and yet Redford, Costner, and Gibson won Best Director). Kubrick personally won the Best Special Effects Oscar for 2001, though (how?) But...his reviews weren't always good.

But just like there is no such thing as a "bad" Hitchocck movie, there definitely is no such thing as a bad Kubrick movie(granted he had a lot fewer at bats than Hitch.)

[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

irst time through (or even the first couple of times), however, the sense that you're stuck *watching* something that's telling you it's *really* meant to be decoded later can be *very* galling.

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That's an interesting point. The folks being interviewed on the doc say that Kubrick films were ALWAYS controversial (sometimes in content, sometimes in whether they were found to be good or not), and the folks also said you need more and more viewings of a Kubrick film to "get it at all levels." Fair enough.

---

I'm sure I would have given most of Kubrick's post-Strangelove films bad reviews if I'd had to say something in print immediately.

---

That's true for a lot of "first impression" reviews, isn't it? For the rest of us, it takes time and a number of viewings to get the message and ascertain the greatness..or not.

I recall when Eyes Wide Shut came out -- after Kubrick's death at 70 -- Roger Ebert on his show convened a bunch of critics around a table to discuss: "Is this movie great...or not." The amusing part: this was pretty much a group of out of shape middle aged white men in sweaters. Their critical powers seemed diminished in the flesh. But they sat there, and argued and indeed: some found Eyes Wide Shut a masterpiece, some thought it was anything but. Nobody sounded sure of his position.

---

After a while, you know the routine: Stanley (over-)designed all the coded details and symmetries that will eventually (as your reactions to a film become increasingly intellectualized and over-thought over time) become salient for you too, so his crossword puzzle-like way of thinking about film always ends up colonizing you and absorbing you. This is unpleasant!

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Nifty analysis. "Colonizing you and absorbing you." Like the best Hitchcock, these movies MATTER. They pull you in. You never forget them. Any of them.

Even if a lot of them are kinda cold and kinda weird.

[–] swanstep (2715) 6 years ago

But just like there is no such thing as a "bad" Hitchocck movie, there definitely is no such thing as a bad Kubrick movie(granted he had a lot fewer at bats than Hitch.)

Agreed. I argue with (especially late) Kubrick a lot - and honestly I'd take The Killing and Paths of Glory over FMJ and EWS any time - but his films *are* all pretty amazing and *do* all repay many many viewings.

BTW, I recently got around to looking over some early drafts of Strangelove's screenplay, e.g., this one:
http://scifiscripts.com/scripts/strangelove.txt
This is a draft from 31 August 1962 and credited solely to Kubrick.

It begins and ends with narration from an alien film producer Nardac Blefescu of Macro-Galaxy-Meteor Pictures who's been tasked with figuring out how life on Earth came to an end for this latest episode in his galaxy-wide series, 'The Dead Worlds of Antiquity'. And, of course, there's a pie-fight in the war room before Blefescu returns at the end. The whole thing is definitely broader and less sobering than Kubrick's final version.

[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

Agreed. I argue with (especially late) Kubrick a lot - and honestly I'd take The Killing and Paths of Glory over FMJ and EWS any time - but his films *are* all pretty amazing and *do* all repay many many viewings.

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I suppose its sorta/kinda the Hitchcock thing about the late films simply not living up to the earlier ones -- somebody like me can like Topaz, Frenzy, and Family Plot but Hitchcock was older and in bad health when he made them and they AREN'T(not even Frenzy) as energetic and intricate as his earlier masterpieces. (Damn Frenzy -- take it out of the bunch and Hitchcock has a straight decline from The Birds through Family Plot; but its too GOOD not to take note of it working -- EVEN THOUGH it was directed by a tired old man.)

This pheneonmenon is more odd with Kubrick: Full Metal Jacket and Eyes Wide Shut are his last two films, but they are 12 years apart! And Kubrick made FMJ at age 57 or so -- Hitchcock's age as he began the Vertigo/NXNW/Psycho/Birds super-run. Perhaps the reclusive Kubrick simply lost touch as the 80s went on; he wasn't "pushed" or competitive, his powers of concentration may have been subsiding. Who knows?

Full Metal Jacket is dazzling at the boot camp but it gets darn diffuse thereafter. I liked Eyes Wide Shut for its color and its beautiful naked women(yep) and I found the orgy scene to be sinister and mesmerizing --the music; the chanting, the idea that rich and powerful men and women were under those masks (Trump? The Clintons? Bill Gates? Wall Street leaders?) and the chilling moment when Cruise is told by the imperious masked host: "Yes, you have given us the correct password for entry...but what is the password for the house?" Still, aside from that ritual/orgy sequence, EWS is too much incident, too much sex that DOESN'T happen, too much Cruise....(thought: Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman were to Kubrick as Paul Newman and Julie Andrews were to Hitch?)

[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

PART TWO: Agreed. I argue with (especially late) Kubrick a lot - and honestly I'd take The Killing and Paths of Glory over FMJ and EWS any time - but his films *are* all pretty amazing and *do* all repay many many viewings.

---

The Killing, despite Sterling Hayden and the "gang on a caper" links to The Asphalt Jungle, is clearly meant to be a "calling card to Hollywood" by Kubrick -- its his "Reservoir Dogs" and similarly looks at dishonor among thieves.

The way the film keeps backing up in time to cover the caper from different viewpoints is very QT(which means the famous copycat QT stole this FROM Kubrick); and there is shock in a 1956 film when one of the baddies uses the n word, angrily, AT a black man. You've also got the great milquetoast wimp Elisha Cook Jr. being dominated by his femme fatale wife , Marie Windsor, and how that leads to disaster. The Killing is a muscular, sharp-edged and cinematic little thriller. The Kubrick DVD shows a great travelling shot of the crooks walking through an apartment and through walls -- you can see Kubrick showing off there (when his DP Lucian Ballard tried to film this with the wrong lenses and the camera closer to save time, Kubrick told him "use the lenses I said with the camera where I told you to put it -- or leave this set and never come back." Ballard did as told.)

Paths of Glory is a stunningly grim and enraging war movie about a little-covered war: WWI. You've got a do-nothing general condemning some soldiers to death for cowardice, to cover up his incompetency. There's always shown on Kirk Douglas tributes this great clip of Kirk Douglas being asked to apologize to his evil General bosses and revving up to an explosive "...and you can go to HELL! before I ever apologize to you!" Man, Kirk Douglas on full power could really punch up on his pipes. (In the 50's, acid critic Stanley Kauffman saw only Brando and Douglas as screen actors of any real talent. Hmm...)

[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

I recall ABC showing Paths of Glory as a "special event" hosted by some single corporate company (IBM, maybe?) with no commercials. In the 60s, probably when 2001 was being released. A Kubrick film was seen as "special."

And a nice tidbit about my parents. They were both movie buffs(of the mainstream variety) and my mother always spoke highly of two movies: "Paths of Glory" and "Tunes of Glory" (with Alec Guinness). She made sure that I, and other young family members, knew that the two movies had similar titles, but were completely different stories. But she said they were both great. This is the kind of early training I got on movies. I was probably 10 or so when she briefed me on the "Glory" movies. Thanks, mom. Wherever you are....

So...yes, The Killing and Paths of Glory probably do have it all over Full Metal Jacket and Eyes Wide Shut. The early movies were made by a young tyro out to prove himself to the world. Kirk Douglas, who had quite the ego himself, called Kubrick "Stanley ThePrick" and told the press, "Stanley's great, but I think he needs to fall on his face once or twice, to get humility." Didn't happen, Kirk. Even Stanley's lesser films got raves from SOMEBODY.

BTW, I already own Path of Glory. So my Kubrick collection is now almost complete. Time to buy The Killing....

[–] swanstep (2715) 6 years ago

You've also got the great milquetoast wimp Elisha Cook Jr. being dominated by his femme fatale wife , Marie Windsor, and how that leads to disaster.

The shoot-out with Elijah Cook late in the movie strongly influences Jules and Vincent killing Brad. It all plays very differently but many of the shots are the same just in a different order:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tg3A7u83stA

[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

One of the comments says that QT finds The Killing to be his favorite Kubrick film...which certainly makes sense in terms of "Reservoir Dogs" and does pay off in some of the shot borrowing here.

A great scene, by the way, "the jerk" flying out of the room to get his revenge on his wife's lover but getting literally everybody in the room killed.

Also noted in the comments -- the other robber who comes in with Vince Edwards is Joe Turkel, who would most famously be the utterly calm Lloyd the Bartender in The Shining, but who is also one of the three wrongly condemned men in Paths of Glory. I don't know if Kubrick used him elsewhere.

Speaking of "repeaters" ---the ultra-polite but scary butler in The Shining turns out to have played McDowell's father in A Clockwork Orange. What a powerfully weird face that actor has. Somehow "milquetoast but menacing."

And I think Patrick Magee from A Clockwork Orange -- an awful overactor in that one -- repeats as some sort of gambling dandy in Barry Lyndon. Better performance. Better film. (Aw, I dunno though --I've read a lot of four star raves of the "classic" ACO -- I guess I personally missed the boat on that one.

Such are the rewards of spending much of this week lookin' at Kubrick. What a strange canon,,,

[–] swanstep (2715) 6 years ago

Elisha Cook Jr discusses The Killing:
https://youtu.be/1TP2NlB50Do
The 'Eyes on Cinema' channel for that vid is one of the best for Hitchcock materials too:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCtPx9e7WNFtvtHaAU6WqXlA

Update: A video insightfully comparing The Killing with Asphalt Jungle (1950):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o1JfyETV8BY

[–] swanstep (2715) 6 years ago

In the final analysis, it seems to me, Kubrick's reputation rests with two films, back to back, four years apart: Strangelove and 2001.....All that classical music actually starts to sound rather "easy" when you watch the Kubrick movies back to back.

If one ever needs to be re-convinced of 2001's genius (and of its music's greatness), just watch the Hyams-directed sequel, 2010 (1984), which I saw for the first time a few days ago.

Hyams had a good budget (the same as Temple of Doom and 4-5x what The Terminator had that year, and 1.5x what Back To The Future would have the following year), a sequel novel by Arthur C. Clarke to work from, and a good cast from Scheider to Mirren and Lithgow to returners Keir Dullea and Douglas Rains (voice of HAL). Hyams also had Kubrick's blessing for what it's worth.

[–] swanstep (2715) 6 years ago

2010 is a dully adequate space exploration ('Mission To Jupiter') adventure with Clarke's simpleton politics pushed forward (which Kubrick shrewdly omitted from 2001), e.g., the view that astronomical discoveries can solve complex political problems on Earth.

Whereas Kubrick makes every set feel real, and designs and blocks scenes so that, e.g., you feel what weightlessess and low-gravity is all about, and constantly frames shots and extends shots in surprising memorable ways so you feel the intelligence at work, Hyams is all bland functionality. Weirdly, things like control panels and video displays look much more primitive and dated in the 1984 film: lots of clunky '80s PC keyboards and briefcase-like laptops rather than the more iPad-like faked-up tech a of the 1968 film. And the specially filmed and animated, faked up computer graphics from 1968 look prescient and still futuristic whereas the real but horribly rough computer display graphics from 1984 look like..... 1984.

Effects shots in 2010 are OK but are never rapturous or especially memorable either themselves or in their musical accompaniments. The speeded up Richard Strauss pieces are complete embarrassments.

In fact watching 2010 is a little like watching Psycho (1998): in both cases, the master's special, weird sauce that was there in every second of every shot in the original is gone and what you're left with is an image of films that could have been. Someone else could have made Bloch's novel into a movie in 1960 and probably the result would have been not Van Sant's exactly but indifferent and disappeared without a trace. Hyams's film is probably what 2001 would have been like - very like Marooned or Countdown - if anyone other than Kubrick had developed it.