"GUNSMOKE" TV'S BLAST FROM THE PAST

          The show that trended off of John Ford films carved itself a longevity record and still appeals to a passel of Western aficionados every blessed day.
          The radio show version starred William Conrad first. For the TV series, John Wayne was too busy to play Marshal Matt Dillon, but he gave his stamp of approval in a 1955 TV plug for newcomer James Arness.
          Dennis Weaver played sidekick Chester Goode for nine years before moving on from the show, at which point John Ford's son-in-law Ken Curtis assumed the role of the squinty-eyed, squeaky-voiced Festus from 1965 through the show's final season in 1975. Weaver, by the way, a pioneer of environmentalism, lived in a house built from recycled materials. Before becoming an actor, Curtis was a singer with the Sons of the Pioneers.
          Gunsmoke revolves around the Wild West town of Dodge City, Kansas. Like all the great TV shows of the past, Gunsmoke features many an actor who went on to further fame--Warren Oates, Strother Martin, and Leonard Nimoy to name a few. Even Burt Reynolds got his start on the show.
          The main characters who hold the series together include Amanda Blake as Miss Kitty Russel, owner of the Long Branch saloon, Milburn Stone as cantankerous old Doc Adams, the aforementioned sidekicks, and of course Arness as the all-around sturdy and decent US Marshal who maintains the law in an otherwise lawless town.
          A law of the show stipulates that if two guys come into town, then they shall be bickering slobs up to no good, and generally ripe with bad traits and low character. Usually one beats up on the other, both in tattered rags.
          One of the main reasons why the show lasted so long (only The Simpsons lasted longer as a scripted prime-time series) has to be because James Arness was also the producer. He'd had a bit role as a big alien monster in Howard Hawks' The Thing From Another World (1951). Apparently having had enough of that, when he found a good role, he stuck with it.
          In one of the many excellent episodes, Marshall Dillon shows real character by not only giving the first drink of water from a canteen to a man he's taking into Dodge City for his resemblance to a man on a Wanted poster, but also when he realizes he has the wrong man, he's big enough to admit his mistake and apologize.
          A common theme to the show is that Wild West folks don't cotton to the law. They all got their own ways, and don't like outsiders interfering. But as intractable as these folks generally are, they find Matt Dillon's determination is the determination that counts.
          And yet he never takes advantage of his authority. On top that, he gets results. When, for example, he hears about a crooked sheriff in another town, he pays a visit to an overpriced saloon run by the sheriff's thugs, who want to charge him five times the price for a beer. A couple of sniveling goons trying to intimidate him find themselves miserably unable to carry through with their threats. Dillon finishes his beer, chucks the appropriate price at the barkeep, and strolls out unfazed.
          Hunt down a packaged season box-set, and when you find one...hold it!




By the way, I'm Stew, I'm a writer, and I don't care if people see my art. All I'm motivated by is creating it. Enjoy, or not. All righty then, take ease!




       

"SILENCE" GOLDEN

          First of all, it's as least as much of a Jekyll and Hyde story as Beauty and the Beast. With the emphasis on a synthesis favoring Hyde, but showing important glimpses of Jekyll.
          Thomas Harris' incredible novel became the film that anchors Anthony Hopkins' titanic career. More than that, The Silence of the Lambs (1991) offers up a magnificent role for Jodie Foster to hit her great actor stride. And on top of that, we get Ted Levine in the immortal role of Jame "It Puts the Lotion in the Basket" Gumb.
          A film so very influential, its effect can be recognized in The X-Files--the autumnal hues, FBI agents as protagonists pitted against modern monsters, lower left-corner notations, and a general aesthetic clearly referring to director Jonathan Demme's Oscar-winning film.
          Upshot: FBI agent-in-training Clarice Starling (Foster) is called on in classic hero myth fashion to face a monster, in this case Dr. Hannibal "The Cannibal" Lecter (Hopkins) as a sort of (hopefully unwitting) perverted Sherlock Holmes-ish "consulting criminal" to help catch a naughty boy known in the press as Buffalo Bill because he "skins his humps."
          It's not the first Hannibal Lecter film. That distinction goes to Manhunter (1986), which was later re-made as Red Dragon (2002). But it's the best of the lot because it has an original vision excellently executed, a vision with something to say about gender and power.
          Haunted by the memory of her dead father, who was himself a law enforcement officer, Clarice is driven to succeed in becoming an FBI agent. And she is also keenly aware of her outsider status in a field dominated by white male privilege.
          Featuring inspired music from Howard Shore (originally associated with Saturday Night Live, he would eventually write the celebrated music for the Lord of the Rings trilogy), and a terrific screenplay adapted by Ted Tally, plus the fantastic photography of Tak Fujimoto, The Silence of the Lambs hits every cinematic note resoundingly.
          As the star of the show, Anthony Hopkins delivers a convincingly cold, reptilian performance, probing dull little minds with calm, precise speech and nostrils that delicately flare like a serpent's tongue tasting the air as Lecter feeds, not off of blood, but fear.
          When the slimy Dr. Chilton, who hits on Agent Starling, reveals his chilling character--"From a research point of view Dr. Lecter is our most prized asset," he gloats--we begin to have a weird empathy for the good doctor. Indeed, the worn stone steps near Lecter's cell call to mind those of Dr. Frankenstein's tower laboratory, casting a favorable classic monster shade on one of film's most memorable baddies.
          Meanwhile, off to the side, hearkening to Psycho, The Tenant, and Dressed to Kill, the true horror: a man who wants to become a woman by wearing a skin-tight suit comprised of various women's flesh stitched into the means of his transformation.
          Thrall your acumen with liver, fava beans, a nice chianti, and the timeless classic.


THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS
Starring Jodie Foster,
Anthony Hopkins,
Ted Levine,
Scott Glenn
Directed by Jonathan Demme
Written by Ted Tally
Based on the novel by Thomas Harris
Runtime 118 minutes
Rated R


Stewart Kirby writes for
THE INDEPENDENT
and
TWO RIVERS TRIBUNE

"SHINING" WORTH AXING ABOUT

          Celebrating horror's premiere hotel.
          When the director of Dr. Strangelove, 2001: A Space Odyssey, and A Clockwork Orange saw the financial success of The Exorcist, The Omen, and Halloween (having lost a ton on his artful Barry Lyndon), Stanley Kubrick turned Stephen King's best book into a movie masterpiece.
          King famously hates it. But he shouldn't. The 1980 hit is far and away the best of the Stephen King movies. (Misery and the major motion picture It are excellent but don't exceed.) King wrote the teleplay for the 1997 3-part miniseries based on his 1977 novel, and this was supposed to be the superior version to the film by one of cinema's all-time top-tier directors. The result isn't even close. No comparison at all.
          Horror's other hostile hostel, the Bates Motel in Psycho, falls into the Ann Radcliffe school of Gothicism, meaning there is no element of the supernatural, and as such is the lesser of two evil lodgings. For that matter, Alfred Hitchcock's 1960 classic isn't even horror, but rather suspense.
          King's book and Kubrick's film, however, exemplifies the Matthew "Monk" Lewis Gothic brand, which is to say that the ghosts are definitely real.
          The Shining is a haunted house story--maybe the ultimate one--Shirley Jackson's The Haunting of Hill House probably the other best contender. It involves a high school teacher, Jack Torrance, a man with a wife, a son, a drinking problem, and a new job as the winter caretaker of a swanky remote Colorado hotel called the Overlook.
          Which just happens to be built on sacred Indian burial ground.
          The cast of The Shining is brilliant, particularly two actors from the highly respected One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, Jack Nicholson and Scatman Crothers.
          The reason why Stephen King is wrong to complain about Kubrick's film is because, in spite of all King says, the movie simply works so well. There are plenty of other King movies to hate, but not this one.
          That said, interestingly, one can find on YouTube an unexpected side-by-side comparison between the film's most famous scene with Jack taking an ax to a door before uttering the film's most famous line, "Heeeeeere's Johnny!" and a scene from the 1921 film The Phantom Carriage, wherein most of the same thing occurs the same way long prior with too much similarity to be a coincidence.
          Kubrick's geometric style, his eye for filling the frame (he was a Life magazine photographer in his youth), his erudite use of music, the intense performances he extracts from his players, and much more make The Shining an unforgettable experience.
          As Danny Torrance, the little boy with strange telepathic abilities, Danny Lloyd gives one of the all-time great child performances. Can't think of a better. He's totally underrated. (Grew up to become a math teacher, by the way.)
          Shelley Duvall is the perfect Wendy Torrance, just totally believable.
          And starring Jack Nicholson, aka Jacky-Boy, as the ax-wielding caretaker he was born to play.
          Check into the Overlook wherever fine films are available, chop-chop!


THE SHINING
Starring Jack Nicholson,
Shelley Duvall,
Scatman Crothers,
Danny Lloyd,
Joe Turkel
Directed by Stanley Kubrick
Written by Stanley Kubrick, Diane Johnson
Based on the novel by Stephen King
Runtime 146 minutes
Rated R


Stewart Kirby writes for
THE INDEPENDENT
and
TWO RIVERS TRIBUNE