Run Silent, Run Deep

Run Silent, Run Deep (Robert Wise, 1957) One of those general entertainment movies that manages to do so many things exceptionally well that one comes away grateful for the experience. Directed by Robert Wise with a true sense of claustrophobia, the script by John Gay maintains a strict military accuracy while displaying a keen sense of drama, psychology and brevity. A psychological drama, a war film, a story of mystery as well as redemption, the film manages to pull everything off with a propulsive rhythm and fine performances throughout.

Produced by Hecht-Hill-Lancaster, Burt Lancaster the producer takes a back-seat to his star, Clark Gable, the older actor in one of his understated roles that takes into account his age. Gable's the flawed figurehead with shades of Ahab who finagles his way into the command of the S.S. Nerka patrolling the Pacific during World War II, having already lost one sub and and a frustrating convalescence at a desk-job.

Lancaster's exec Jim Bledsoe is torqued because Gable's Cmdr. "Rich" Richardson has pulled rank to get command—his command—and is now drilling the men to dive and shoot a torpedo within a record 35 seconds. The already suspicious crew starts to snarl about all this practice with nothing to show for it. Then a lucky strike convinces some of them the new Captain is golden, while the other half think he's out to torpedo their mission. Lancaster turns into a reluctant arbiter.

But, in their first attempt to sink Richardson's unsinkable Japanese war-ship things don't go so well leaving crew-members dead and injured and Lancaster in command.

Robert Wise is a master of filming people at work with a story-teller's eye for finding the perfect angle (without calling attention to it and himself) and an editor's sense of pace and construction. Wise is also a chameleon of style tamping down his presentation of professionals doing their jobs while also being able to ramp up the spectacle for the unreal worlds of musicals and science fiction. Given his work on this film, you could see why he'd be the perfect choice for the similarly set-bound Star Trek: The Motion Picture.

He also makes goods use of the usual crew of character actors who make up the Nerka's lovable mugs: Jack Warden, Brad Dexter, Don Rickles, Nick Cravat and Joe Maross. The close quarters of a submarine makes the authentic plainness of their faces all the more important and brings them to a prominence near the bright lights of Gable and Lancaster. Both those lights are shaded somewhat, with Lancaster doing subtle, measured work, the kind that would dominate his later career. Gable, even subtler, is the King, here in his twilight, still burning brighter than the vast majority of actors. By this time, Gable was moving slower and had learned the power of economy and his Captain Richardson draws you in.

Finally, the story is a cracker-jack construction. Just when you think you've got it figured out, screenwriter Gay throws in an added complication that ramps up the idea that these are men strategizing in chaos and only repeated dips into the boiling oil of battle can make them seasoned enough to think clearly through the smoke and death.

Run Silent, Run Deep is an intelligent tribute to the fighting services without resorting to jingoism, racism or choired flag-waving. The film-makers' respect for the professionalism under duress of sub-crews runs silent and deep.

Plan 9 From Outer Space

It's October (Hallowe'en month!) and Saturday is "Take Out the Trash" Day.

And here's somebody's idea of "The Worst Film Ever Made" (not mine, when I have the nerve I'll put that one up), but it's one of those movies that is merely horrifying rather than a horror film. More often than not, I've tried to watch it late at night and just fall asleep.

Plan 9 From Outer Space (originally: Grave Robbers From Outer Space)(Edward D. Wood, Jr. 1957)

 

Greetings, my friend! We are all interested in the future, for that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives. And remember, my friend: Future events such as these will affect you in the future. 

 

You are interested in the unknown, the mysterious, the unexplainable. That is why you are here. And now, for the first time, we are bringing to you the full story of what happened on that fateful day. We are giving you all the evidence, based only on the secret testimony of the miserable souls who survived this terrifying ordeal. The incidents, the places. 

 

My friend, we cannot keep this a secret any longer. Let us punish the guilty; let us reward the innocent. My friend, can your heart stand the shocking facts about grave robbers from outer space?

In their 1980 book "The Golden Turkey Awards," authors Michael and Harry Medved compiled sent-in suggestions from readers of the book "The Fifty Worst Films of All Time" for the considerations of who would be given their "awards" and the ultimate winner was a movie that hadn't even been mentioned in that earlier book. Plan 9 From Outer Space had the dubious distinction of being dubbed "the worst movie ever made" (I should add the disclaimer "that we know of"). It's director, Edward D. Wood, Jr. was voted worst director.

And, subsequently, it (and its director) became quite well known. I use that phrase because one has to choose between the alternatives "famous" and "infamous" and, frankly, Plan 9 is a little bit of both. Most people know it from Tim Burton's cockamamie film-biography of Ed Wood, where he probably spent more money on recreating Wood's "style" than the original director did himself (He is one of many directors associated with the phrase "He never shot a take he didn't like"). Burton's film is an absurdist comedy, but at its core is the philosophy that one must stay true to their "vision" despite the nay-sayers and...you know..."taste."

Plan 9 has a simple plot, based on the concepts behind The Day the Earth Stood Still, of an alien race visiting Earth to warn of the dangers of scientific advancement without safeguards. Plan 9's aliens have trouble with the whole "take me to your leader" thing and have been unable to communicate with the Earth's governments, so their ninth plan—they're tenacious—is to raise the dead to attack Earth cities to prevent them from discovering "solaronite" (it's pronounced differently by different actors in the thing), which can have the ability to explode sunlight particles, endangering the Universe with an unstoppable chain reaction (well, when you put it that way...).

One can raise all sorts of questions as to why the aliens can't seem to reach the world's governments and why raising the dead is a rather extreme "demonstration" of their abilities, but if one started counting off the absurdities of Plan 9 From Outer Space, one would simply be exhausted by all the inanities, ineptitudes, gaffs, goofs, flubs, fumbles and stumbles that make up the bulk of the film. When you consider that part it of originated with having the last film footage of Bela Lugosi, one has to question if the enterprise was worth starting in the first place.

I have a strange relationship with Plan 9. I've never been able to get through the first hour of it. Just the other day when thinking about the film I couldn't remember how it ended. I'd usually get to the part where the aliens' Commander Eros starts bleating: "Stronger. You see? You see? Your stupid minds! Stupid! Stupid!" and then gets punched in the face in counter-argument...and then I just give up (or fall asleep). So, I watched only the last half-hour and, lord, it's just the same as the first interminable hour—the level of mediocrity (not stupidity, not just ineptitude) becomes overwhelming and one has to turn away in disgust.

 The "complex" cock-pit set from Plan 9 from Outer Space

I know there are people who watch it for the sheer lame-brainedness of it and find that entertaining. But, I've never found it so, instead finding it sad...and not laugh-out-loud funny...and cruel to watch in a weird way. I have no problems with camp. I have no problems with parody. I have no problems with cheap (cheap actually can produce innovative solutions in story-telling). But, the "bad school-play" feeling it generates just makes me depressed, and I know because of my reaction that I'll probably never watch another Ed Wood movie. I love movies, but his break my heart.

Chiropractor Tom Mason playing Bela Lugosi (deceased) as Ghoul Man ("no one'll notice...")

This October in the blog, we've been looking at a lot of poorly-financed horror movies that still manage to eke out some promise on a budget that wouldn't cover the catering in today's market. It wasn't planned that way, it just happened. But, it shows how talented people can make the most out of limitations by imagination and ingenuity and a certain dramatic flair. Ed Wood evidently had none of those because most of the movies I've reviewed this month had a creative spark just edgy enough that monetary problems could be surmounted or, at least, masked.

Plus, script has an awful lot to do with it. Good construction, the sense of pace and revelation go a long way in making a good script and cleverness makes up a good portion in that consideration. Cleverness goes beyond what Wood thinks is "dialogue"—one line building on the previous line as in "Visits? That would indicate visitors!"—the kind of stuff that would pass muster in grade-school as sophisticated, but is put away as "childish things" once one gets over the fact that you can put words on a blank space. Wood seems to have never got over that fascination. I'm sure he must have gotten rejection letters from somebody in Hollywood that he might have learned from. But, evidently, he was good at conning people out of money to make the bare minimum product displaying his ideas and talent that never received the acclaim it supposedly deserved.

 

I would say it's a classic case of reaching beyond one's grasp, but I don't see much evidence of reaching.

Maila ("Vampira") Nurmi reaching...

At the risk of getting as pretentious as Edward D. Wood, Jr., it's got me to thinking of how things go right...until they go wrong; how the country is polarized, but more than just in political leanings, but in how we dance around the thin veneer of competence—where you either do the best that can be done or you merely stop, saying "that's good enough" and hope that you don't get caught when things fall apart. We let standards slip just enough to make things easier...until we're no longer accomplishing the job we set out to do and are actually working against it. Things fall between the cracks and we become indifferent to it. If you want to go all-Dr. Strangelove on it, we suffer from a "competence gap" of whether to make a larger profit or do a better job...and we always choose the larger profit.* Then, we scratch our heads and wonder when things start to come crashing down...or we have a market down-turn every ten years.

You'd think we'd learn...but we don't...("You see? Your stupid minds! Stupid! Stupid!"). No wonder I don't get any enjoyment out of Plan 9 from Outer Space: It takes the superior attitude that people are knuckle-dragging monkey-people and proves its point by looking and acting like it was made by knuckle-dragging monkey-people! It makes its point by its very existence! I hate that!

Maybe it's because I'm so steeped in the "work ethic" culture I was propagandized into ("If, at first, you don't succeed, try, try again"...until you get to Plan 9, anyway), or I never bought into the "get-by" mind-set, where "if you can't dazzle them with brilliance, baffle them with bullshit."

But, for my part, Plan 9 From Outer Space, in all senses, leaves me baffled.

"But one thing's sure. Inspector Clay is dead, murdered, and somebody's responsible."

 

Colonel Tom Edwards: This is the most fantastic story I've ever heard.

Jeff Trent: And every word of it's true, too.

Colonel Tom Edwards: That's the fantastic part of it.

 

* Thank you, and with that, I'd like to offer up my services as CEO of Boeing. (Now, about that severance package...)

 

Don't Make a Scene (Redux): Paths of Glory

Last Friday would have been Stanley Kubrick's 95th birthday. I don't know if this blog will be around for the centennial, but, for the moment, here's another look at a classic scene from a classic Kubrick film.

The Set-Up:  The Kubrick Trap. There are those who see it as a maze, but it is usually more lethal than that. People don't just lose their way...they're constantly being threatened with losing themselves...or their lives. The machinations that threaten to grind the souls in Kubrick's movies take many forms: they may be societal or social—political systems, class systems—military, technological, even supernatural. They may even be hard-wired into the folds and curves of the protagonists' grey-matter (talk about your mazes!). And the people who populate in the chess-master Kubrick's films are merely pawns to those designs.

But even pawns can occasionally take a King.

Rarely.

Because I don't talk about Stanley Kubrick enough,* I'll be eventually putting up some scenes from Kubrick films that show those traps being set. This one is one of the best, from an early film in Kubrick's career—Paths of Glory—a controversial** small-budget film set during World War I, for which Kubrick had the luck to get an actor the caliber of Kirk Douglas to star.*** Paths of Glory tells the story of one attack that goes wrong, slipshod in planning and impossible in execution. The general whose idea it was to launch it in the first place is outraged and humiliated that the troops could not pull it off. And so he decides to set an example by court-martialing and executing members of the troop. He cynically decides that he will bury the evidence, blaming the men for the failure, and blustering his demands for satisfaction. He has the power and he will use it. In the chateau headquarters of the generals, the war is a game of advancement, and General Mireaux will not fall on his sword for anyone.

This meeting, directly after the attack, is a triangulation between strata of power—Mireaux will dress down his subordinate, Dax—in command of the troop—in front of the older, craftier General Broulard, who serves as referee, negotiator and Master of Ceremonies. Broulard is a political animal in the military game, assuaging egos, keeping his eye on both The Big Picture and his ambitious subordinates. Far from the front, he specializes in watching his back. He is the master manipulator by not choosing sides—other than his own. Mireaux, however, is a martinet—vain, egotistical and callous, seeing the war as a personal stepping stone for advancement and his greater glory. Dax, on the other hand, is literally in the trenches, making due with the situation as it is handed to him. Orders are orders, but orders come from men and men are flawed.

But you can't say that. Not to the men who control your life...and see lives as disposable...and a means to an end. So, Dax is in the uncomfortable position of being caught between the men who depend on him and the men who don't care. He is fighting two fronts: the simpler fight at the trenches with a common enemy with its deadly consequences, and the more complicated political fight above, with the men who control all Fates.

The fight for the Ant Hill done (a spectacular sequence, shot with only two simultaneously running cameras), Kubrick concentrates next on the fallout, away from the close-quarter muddied trenches and the chaos of the battlefield, in the immaculately airy rooms of the Neoclassic French headquarters that don't look like they've ever seen the destruction of war. Kubrick stages it literally for its triangulation (as he will stage the subsequent court-martial as a chess-match). The set-ups reflect the politics and advantages of the argument and the participants' relative position in it. Isolating medium shots of individuals. Close-ups for emphasis. Bonding two-shots (if one can call it bonding).

The editing more closely follows reactions than words (as usual, with the Sunday "Scene" we put the dialog only contained in the individual shots, and here the dialogue is pointedly broken up, emphasizing the visual rather than the dialog), eyes darting from one man to the other searching for political advantage, seeking the important "two against one." Even when Mireaux is at his most emotional ("For cowardice!"), Kubrick is focusing on the reactions of Dax and Boulard, the former surprised and outraged while the latter looks away, betraying a slight embarrassment at the out-burst and Mireaux's lack of civility. Kubrick saves his most looming close-up for Broulard, who must finally rein in Mireaux's self-pitying melodrama ("I was talking of [executing] a hundred men. Now we're down to 12.") for the sake of a compromise that neither of the other two parties is comfortable with.

And the dialogue is blunt, direct and brutal...but not without insinuating nuance. A product of Kubrick, Calder Willingham and early Kubrick collaborator Jim Thompson—he of the brutal pulp fiction novels, including The Killer Inside Me—it reflects Thompson's ability to see the worst in people and have them express it without their having any sense of self-examination or discretion—the ultimate in ego, bordering on pathology. The frankness of the dialogue—despite the political under-pinning that restrict it—has a tension all its own; add Kubrick's insistence on focusing on the reactions to it and you have a very full, very tense scene of one-ups-manship. Production will be starting soon on Lunatic at Large, a "lost" Kubrick project,**** written by Thompson in the late 50's. 

The Story:  The French attack on The Ant Hill, an insignificant scrap of land save for advantage and the vain-glorious ambitions of General Mirieuax (George Macready) has not gone well. Led by Colonel Dax (Kirk Douglas), the infantry were cut down almost immediately—some of the men not even able to leave the trenches.  Incensed, Mirieuax even attempted to have French guns fire on the troops to provoke them. The aftermath of the battle is a debriefing and dressing down of the Colonel by Mirieux in the luxurious headquarters of General Broulard (Adolphe Menjou), both mens' superior and a particularly political military man.

Action!

MIREAUX: I ordered an attack. Your troops refused to attack.

DAX: Our troops did attack, sir, but they could make no headway.

MIREAUX: Because they didn't try, Colonel. I saw it myself. Half of your men never left the trenches.

DAX: A third of my men were pinned down because the fire was so intense.

MIREAUX: Don't quibble over fractions, Colonel.

MIREAUX: The fact remains that a good part of...

MIREAUX: ...your men never left their own trenches. Colonel Dax, I'm going to have ten men from each company in your regiment tried under penalty of...

MIREAUX: ...death for cowardice.
DAX: Penalty of death? -
MIREAUX: For cowardice!

MIREAUX: They've skim milk in their veins instead of blood.

DAX: It's the reddest milk I've ever seen. My trenches are soaked with it!
MIREAUX: That's just about enough out of you.
DAX: Well, I'm not going to mince words and stand by when--
MIREAUX: Colonel Dax...

MIREAUX: ...If you continue in this manner, I shall be forced to place you under arrest.
BROULARD: I believe the colonel has a point, even though he makes it rather bluntly. This is not a trial...

BROULARD: ...but it does bear certain aspects of one, and Colonel Dax technically is cast...

BROULARD: ...in the role of the defense. In view of the gravity of the charges, a court of law would grant him all possible latitude in...

BROULARD: ...presenting his case.
MIREAUX: Latitude is one thing, insubordination another.

BROULARD: I am merely offering an opinion, General. Please do not feel constrained to accept it.

MIREAUX: I'm perfectly willing to accept it, General Broulard.

DAX: I'm sorry, sir. I certainly didn't intend to be insubordinate.

DAX: My only aim is to remind you of the heroism these men have shown on every...

DAX: ...occasion in the past.
MIREAUX: We're not talking about the past. We're talking about the present.

DAX: But don't you see, sir? They're not cowards, so if some didn't leave the trenches, it must have been because it was impossible.

MIREAUX: They were ordered to attack. It was their duty to obey that order.

MIREAUX: We can't leave...

MIREAUX: ...it up to the men to decide whether an order is possible or not.

MIREAUX: If it was impossible, the only proof of that would be their dead bodies lying in the bottom of the trenches.

MIREAUX: They're scum, Colonel. The whole...

MIREAUX: ...rotten regiment is a pack of sneaking, whining, tail-dragging curs.

DAX: Do you really believe that, sir?

MIREAUX: Yes, I do. That's exactly what I believe. And...

MIREAUX: ...what's more, it's an incontestable fact.

DAX: Then why not shoot the entire regiment?

[Broulard scoffs at the notion]
DAX: I'm perfectly serious.
BROULARD: Well, now, Colonel, you're missing the point entirely. We don't want to slaughter the French army. All we want to do is to set an example.

DAX: Oh, well, if it's an example...

DAX: ...you want, then take me.

BROULARD: Take you? 

DAX: Yes, sir. If it's an example you want...

DAX: ...one man will do as well as a hundred. The logical choice is the officer...

DAX: ...most responsible for the attack.

BROULARD: Come now, Colonel. I think you're overwrought.

BROULARD: This is not a question of officers.

BROULARD: Paul, we don't want to overdo this thing.

BROULARD: Suppose we just make it a dozen.

MIREAUX: I was talking of a hundred men. Now we're down to 12.

BROULARD: Paul, let's not haggle over this thing anymore.

BROULARD: Let's get it settled once and for all...

BROULARD: ...so we can all live with it.

MIREAUX: Well, perhaps I was a bit too anxious to see proper justice meted out. I've spent my entire life in the army. I've always tried to be true...

MIREAUX: ...to my principles. That's the only mistake I can ever be...

MIREAUX: ...accused of. I'll settle for this: Have the company commanders select one man from each company in the first wave. Three...

MIREAUX: ...in all.
BROULARD: Well, that's very reasonable of you, Paul.

BROULARD: The court martial will meet at the chateau at 3:00 this afternoon.
MIREAUX: Will that be...

MIREAUX: ...convenient for you, General? -
BROULARD: Oh, I won't be there, Paul.

MIREAUX: You won't be there?

BROULARD: No. I think it best that you handle this matter on your own.

MIREAUX: Probably so.

DAX: General Mireau,

DAX:...if it's at all possible...I'd like to be appointed counsel...

DAX: ...for the accused.
MIREAUX: I'll take the matter under consideration.
BROULARD: Oh, we can permit that here, Paul.

BROULARD: Consider it settled, Colonel.
DAX: Thank you, sir.
BROULARD: Well!

BROULARD: Noon straight up, Paul. I hope that you can stay for lunch, Colonel.

MIREAUX: George, I'm afraid the colonel won't have time.

BROULARD: Don't deny it, Paul, you've been hiding this man. Keeping him for your own. I think that was very selfish of you.

DAX: Thank you for your courtesy, General, but I'm afraid there isn't much time between now and 3:00.

BROULARD: Of course, Colonel. I shall look forward to the pleasure of seeing you again.

Dax snaps a salute, and exits the room.

Paths of Glory

Words by Jim Thompson, Calder Willingham and Stanley Kubrick

Pictures by Georg Krause and Stanley Kubrick

Paths of Glory is available on DVD from M-G-M Home Entertainment and on DVD and Blu-Ray from the Criterion Collection.

* This is sarcasm.  If anything, I talk about Kubrick and his films too much, and actually I try to avoid it, spacing them out to avoid some sort of overload.

** Because of its harsh depiction of the French military, it was banned in France—and if it was shown at Cannes, no doubt Kubrick would have been made "persona non grata," as Lars von Trier was in 2011.

*** Subsequently, Douglas, when producing Spartacus, replaced director Anthony Mann (no slouch in the directing department) with his young "find," Kubrick. The experience created a fine film, but soured Kubrick from ever again making a "Hollywood" picture again. From then on, it would be his projects with his rules.

**** Literally, it seems. Kubrick was going to film it after collaborating with Marlon Brando on the pre-production of One Eyed Jacks but Spartacus became his next project. Then, amidst his notes and papers and books on just about everything, the script was misplaced—something that Kubrick, it is reported, always regretted. I wrote the above piece in 2011. In 2010, it was reported that "Lunatic at Large" was being pursued for production with actors Sam Rockwell and Scarlett Johannson slated to star. As of 2024, nothing has come of it. Yet.