The Line King: The Al Hirschfeld Story

The Line King: The Al Hirschfeld Story (Susan Warms Dryfoos, 1996) Graphic artists, cartoonists, caricaturists do not make interesting subjects for documentaries. There's only so much you can do with somebody drawing a line—it's not interesting in and of itself because there's always that missing element, which is the magic that goes into it before pencil or pen hit paper. It's the brain at the other end of that pencil that makes it interesting and, if the documentary is doing its job, explains the magic that results in the line.

 

Fortunately, Al Hirschfeld was still alive at the time this was being recorded (he died in 2003, just shy of his 100th birthday). Stationed primarily in New York, he traveled the world in his life and settled back in The Big Apple, where he was a fixture in illustration, primarily for The New York Times art section, but also The New Yorker, Collier's, TV Guide, Rolling Stone, even creating a cover for an Aerosmith album. He did poster illustrations in the silent era, and his art was featured in postage stamps of those same silent comedians. A segment of Disney's Fantasia 2000—the "Rhapsody in Blue" segment—is based on his precise, serpentine, and almost embroidered style. The "genie" in the studio's animated version of Alladin is also based on his work.

Then, of course, there is the puzzle of it. Readers of The Times could count on two brain-teasers every issue—the crossword puzzle and Hirschfeld's drawings. After his signature of every piece would follow a number, that being the number of times he had hidden the name "Nina" (his only child's name) into the filaments of his pieces. It became a part of New York life along with thin pizza, egg creams, and the aggressively walking blind.

At the time of first filming, his second wife—mother of Nina—was still alive. By the time filming was complete, she was dead and Hirschfeld talks about the effect on him. He would dutifully take a pad and paper to a theater before opening night to get a sense of the show, and begin the pain-staking work of getting it ready for publication.

Susan Warms Dryfoos' film is grainy—a lot of it done in low light—with far too many interviews with NY hoi-polloi talking about Hirschfeld on various opening nights before it sinks in that he was an important part of any opening.It times you know they're talking of "the talk around town"—the reputation—than any first-person knowledge, but then, there's gotta be gossip. Those elements are catch-as-catch-can, with celebs and opening night regulars gushing, champagne in hand, about their personal experience with Herschfeld, before they're attention is pulled by some other bright light. The segments with the artist are less hectic, in low-light and lower energy, which is something of a relief. It puts in sharp contrast the hermetic life of a singular artist, even if his subjects are lit by klieg lights.

Those are the parts that are gold, plus the looks at his work semi-contemporary or long past, several of which—of subjects that appear frequently on this site are below:

Three ages of Orson Welles...

The Americanization of Emily

The Americanization of Emily (Arthur Hiller, 1964) Talk about making a silk purse out of a sow's ear.

On this day before the anniversary of D-Day, let's take a look at one of the movies that featured that turning-point in the second World War. But, where most movies or books treat that fateful attack with respect and even reverence, this movie is satirical...and smart....while still being a member of that branch of cinema known as "the service comedy."

The original novel of "The Americanization of Emily" was written by William Bradford Huie (he also wrote "The Execution of Private Slovik", "Mud on the Stars"—which was adapted by Elia Kazan as Wild River—and "The Revolt of Mamie Stover") and although there are some similarities in characters and incidents, characterizations are slightly different as refracted through the typewriter of Paddy Chayevsky. 

The other difference is in attitude. In the novel, "Americanization" is a synonym for prostitution, as British women are assumed to be more loose sexually in the face of having access to wartime contraband normally rationed during the conflict. Chayevsky tones it down a bit by implying that "Americanization" is merely being influenced by American bootlegging. "Influence" might be a polite term.

It's the anticipatory days of the D-Day Invasion of Normandy and Britain is flush with military of every ally and stripe. None are more prevalent than the Americans. Cutting a considerable swath through the vulnerable island-country is Lt. Commander Charles "Charlie" Madison (James Garner), assistant to Navy Admiral William Jessup (Melvyn Douglas), who has assigned him a cushy job—in the parlance, he's a "dog robber," a fixer, although the less colloquial term might be procurer. It is Charlie's heady task to bring comfort to the allies—the entitled officers and the higher-up the better. For the buying of favors and political influence is its own kind of war, strategic and cut-throat. Charlie's had enough of the other kind. Having survived at Guadalcanal, Charlie had a change of heart about his role in the effort; having seen so many brave men die, he has figured out that the best way to survive it is to be a coward. He became as he says "a self-preservationist." Hence, his job change.

It is Charlie's heady task to make the lives of the higher rank-and-file officers more comfortable and, thus, more malleable in their negotiations by providing them whatever they want—women (mostly "although individual tastes may vary")—local girls who can be persuaded by giving them dresses, fine food, things they're not used to in their severely rationed country to be escorts and discretely silent—as well as liquor—top-shelf—cigars, fine foods, and the services and linens to display them on, clothes for the women (because the men are in their uniform finery), perfumes...and the ever-present Hershey's chocolate bars. The women are seen as a commodity, like the others, bargaining chips merely. They are supplies as surely as the guns, the ammunition, they shoot and the transports that ferry them to and fro...even to Normandy.

This may be upsetting in the era of "MeToo" but one can also make a case that the soldiers are mere commodities, as well, counting more as strength in numbers, than as individuals. One can fall as long as there are replacements who can take their position and, hopefully, last a foot farther in the advance.

Into this capitalist quagmire steers Emily Barham (Julie Andrews) of the motor-pool and self-described prig, whose job is to chauffeur the uniforms around—men-drivers being in short supply at the moment—and doing their part to help "the war effort" in any capacity they can. She is, at first, repulsed by Charlie and his proffered hedonism in a time of sacrifice, but he's a charming rogue—"a rascal" as she calls him—but, his cynicism and forthrightness about it makes him stand out, as does his philosophy of staying out of the action, which is attractive to a recent war-widow, whose family has its share of empty chairs at the dinner table and pictures on a shrine of a wall. Charlie, given his stance, may be around a bit longer for anyone sentimental enough to be thinking about the future, especially a future without loss.

If it wasn't for the bloody war. World wars have a way of getting in everybody's business. And this one conspires to separate Emily from Charlie and Charlie from his life. The Admiral, suffering from grief over the death of his wife, and seeing the Navy's role in the invasion as merely support, wakes up from a drunken stupor with an overarching idea that just may improve the position of the Navy—"The first dead man on Omaha Beach must be a sailor!" ("Was there a contest?" Emily will ask, aghast, later). And so Charlie is volunteered to storm Omaha Beach while his until-recently roguish friend-turned PR enthusiast "Bus" (James Coburn) commands a film crew documenting his efforts and probable death.

It is Charlie's worst nightmare. Not only is he back in a fire-zone, but he's doing it for the reason he knows and understands best—exploitation. But, if a man has to die for something, shouldn't it be as something more than a mere symbol and a ploy to get attention for a better share of budget appropriations? Sure, a man can get killed for doing the right thing and for being noble—as per Charlie's earlier arguments regarding his belief in cowardice*—but, not as a bargaining chip. Maybe there are distinctions and higher purposes. Maybe Charlie has to be fed some of his own medicine to concede such things exist and are worth the fight.

A lot of people don't get past that first caustic hour of Madison monologing his new religion, and it's too bad because the second half turns it on its ear through the blackest of comedy and the absurdity of herd-instinct, military protocol and "Mad Men" thinking. Chayevsky does not temper his language and uses it with scalpel-like precision. You'll find that in this screenplay, he does some deft "three-peating" to get laughs and make points, and it's not enough for one character to see the error of his ways (as would be a typical, safe goal for a movie resolution), but it's much more tougher for two lovers to switch roles as they grow together and are separated by crossing both intellectual and emotional paths coming through the wry. It's a twist that would challenge O. Henry, while keeping its satiric edge while providing a nice, neat (and slightly provocative) comfort zone.

Both stars, Julie Andrews (this was only her second film) and James Garner, have said that, of all of the films they made, The Americanization of Emily was their favorite.

They would appear together again in Victor, Victoria (directed by Blake Edwards) in 1982.

* A chance to revel in some Chayevsky: 

"War isn't hell at all. It's man at his best; the highest morality he's capable of. It's not war that's insane, you see. It's the morality of it. It's not greed or ambition that makes war: it's goodness. Wars are always fought for the best of reasons: for liberation or manifest destiny. Always against tyranny and always in the interest of humanity. So far this war, we've managed to butcher some ten million humans in the interest of humanity. Next war it seems we'll have to destroy all of man in order to preserve his damn dignity. It's not war that's unnatural to us, it's virtue. As long as valor remains a virtue, we shall have soldiers. So, I preach cowardice. Through cowardice, we shall all be saved."

Despicable Me

Written at the time of the film's release and before I developed my distaste for Minions. 

 
"Assemble the Minions!"

You can't swing a pixelated bug-eyed cat in a multi-plex these days without hitting a new digi-toon, being ground out like so many linked sausages, but with different degrees of quality.  The technology is now such that the makers no longer have to worry about working around the complexities of the images; such strides have been made in the field over the last 15 years that the work approaches photo-realism, if that is the intention of the pixel-wranglers. What is exciting now, with the constraints no longer a factor, is seeing what the various creators around the world DO with it, and the visions that they create, whether their source be in the world or the mind. Now that reality is no longer a problem, the makers of these visions can effectively throw it away.

So, here's Despicable Me.  You've been seeing the trailers for months, and for me, the impression has been a little "meh." Oh, the comic timing has been crack and the sensibility behind them a little twisted. But, whether that translated to a 90 minute feature is always the $20 million dollar question.

And Despicable Me is terrific. Frequently laugh out-loud funny, with breathless timing and a constant willingness to push the envelope in technology and story-telling. Sure, it has the obvious arc of a children's story, and you know how things will turn out, but the journey is the fun thing.

Gru (Steve Carell) is a "Fester-ish" super-villain on hard times. Oh, sure, he's not exactly hiding out in some super-secret headquarters somewhere—he only drives vehicles that pollute outrageously with a maximum of sparks and smoke, his is the only house in the neighborhood painted in dark, dingy colors and furnitured with Bondian uber-tech and stuffed animal corpses. Underneath is a vast gleaming complex linked by pneumatic tubes and what look like habi-trails, kept running by what appear to be thousands of animated twinkies.*He may seem like a villain who has everything (and what he doesn't have, he can obtain by ice-shackling the person who does with his "freeze-ray"), but there's a new villain named Vector (Jason Segel, voicing a character who's equal parts Bill Gates and Phil Silvers) who's just topped everybody by stealing one of the Pyramids. Good score. And the Bank of Evil ("formerly Lehman Brothers") likes the reaching entrepreneur with enough gall to think big when it comes to crime (call it "professional courtesy"), so they'll only dispense loans to those baddies with outlandish schemes. There's no greater "out-land" than The Moon, and so Gru sets his sights on it—a dream he's held since it was first pa-shawed by his crank of a Mum (Julie Andrews, wickedly unrecognizable).

But, you need a plan.  And his involves orphans ("We got adopted by a bald guy...I thought it would be more like Annie"), a "Spy vs. Spy"-style industrial espionage plot, and...cookie-robots.

The thing is witty in look and happenstance: the people are bulbously malleable as in The Incredibles, and the sets have a Burtonesque retro-engineering feel to them, but because the animation is done in France, the flow and pace, and attention to detail, is quite unlike things state-side, making it intriguing and refreshing. The voice-actors are spot-on by being nearly impenetrably unidentifiable...you won't recognize Will Arnett, or Kristen Wiig (two of my favorite comic actors of the moment) or Russell Brand, and Steve Carell's Gru is an amazing comic performance featuring crack timing, muttered asides and a nicely Slavic accent that tortures its way through idioms. 

And I love the buried movie references, little echoes of the past that tweak the unconscious, be they from It's a Wonderful Life, The Wrath of Khan, The Empire Strikes Back, or The Godfather (the last is so wickedly placed, I couldn't believe the writers were so sick to think of it). But, it's all done with its heart in the right place and a warmth of spirit tough to find in movies these days. It'll yank your heart strings to a ridiculously cartoonish length and never let them go.  This is one for the whole family, even though the parents will need to do a bit of explaining along the way (some of the jokes will just sail past the heads of kids, which is always a sign of a good cartoon).

I saw Despicable Me in 2-D, but it might actually benefit a 3-D screening, especially for the end-title sequence where the Minions attempt to bridge the gap between the screen and the audience—a hilarious concept that's a bit mind-blowing when you think of it (and evidently there's a phone app that allows you to translate what they're saying during it—will wonders never cease?).

* Called "Minions," they have all sorts of uses and are voiced by the co-directors and "Flight of the Conchords" Jemaine Clement.  Yee-es.

Despicable Me

Written at the time of the film's release.

"Assemble the Minions!"

You can't swing a pixelated bug-eyed cat in a multi-plex these days without hitting a new digi-toon, being ground out like so many linked sausages, but with different degrees of quality.  The technology is now such that the makers no longer have to worry about working around the complexities of the images; such strides have been made in the field over the last 15 years that the work approaches photo-realism, if that is the intention of the pixel-wranglers.  What is exciting now, with the constraints no longer a factor, is seeing what the various creators around the world DO with it, and the visions that they create, whether their source be in the world or the mind.  Now that reality is no longer a problem, the makers of these visions can effectively throw it away.

So, here's Despicable Me.  You've been seeing the trailers for months, and for me, the impression has been a little "meh."  Oh, the comic timing has been crack and the sensibility behind them a little twisted.  But, whether that translated to a 90 minute feature is always the $20 million dollar question.

And Despicable Me is terrific.  Frequently laugh out-loud funny, with breathless timing and a constant willingness to push the envelope in technology and story-telling.  Sure, it has the obvious arc of a children's story, and you know how things will turn out, but the journey is the fun thing.

Gru (Steve Carell) is a "Fester-ish" super-villain on hard times.  Oh, sure, he's not exactly hiding out in some super-secret headquarters somewhere—he only drives vehicles that pollute outrageously with a maximum of sparks and smoke, his is the only house in the neighborhood painted in dark, dingy colors and furnitured with Bondian uber-tech and stuffed animal corpses. Underneath is a vast gleaming complex linked by pneumatic tubes and what look like habi-trails, kept running by what appear to be thousands of animated twinkies.* He may seem like a villain who has everything (and what he doesn't have, he can obtain by ice-shackling the person who does with his "freeze-ray"), but there's a new villain named Vector (Jason Segel, voicing a character who's equal parts Bill Gates and Phil Silvers) who's just topped everybody by stealing one of the Pyramids. Good score.  

And the Bank of Evil ("formerly Lehman Brothers") likes the reaching entrepreneur with enough gall to think big when it comes to crime (call it "professional courtesy"), so they'll only dispense loans to those baddies with outlandish schemes. There's no greater "out-land" than The Moon, and so Gru sets his sights on it—a dream he's held since it was first pa-shawed by his crank of a Mum (Julie Andrews, wickedly unrecognizable).

But, you need a plan. And his involves orphans ("We got adopted by a bald guy...I thought it would be more like Annie"), a "Spy vs. Spy"-style industrial espionage plot, and...cookie-robots.

The thing is witty in look and happenstance: the people are bulbously malleable as in The Incredibles, and the sets have a Burtonesque retro-engineering feel to them, but because the animation is done in France, the flow and pace, and attention to detail, is quite unlike things state-side, making it intriguing and refreshing. The voice-actors are spot-on by being nearly impenetrably unidentifiable...you won't recognize Will Arnett, or Kristen Wiig (two of my favorite comic actors of the moment) or Russell Brand, and Steve Carell's Gru is an amazing comic performance featuring crack timing, muttered asides and a nicely Slavic accent that tortures its way through idioms. 

And I love the buried movie references, little echoes of the past that tweak the unconscious, be they from It's a Wonderful Life, The Wrath of Khan, The Empire Strikes Back, or The Godfather (the last is so wickedly placed, I couldn't believe the writers were so sick to think of it). But, it's all done with its heart in the right place and a warmth of spirit tough to find in movies these days. It'll yank your heart strings to a ridiculously cartoonish length and never let them go. This is one for the whole family, even though the parents will need to do a bit of explaining along the way (some of the jokes will just sail past the heads of kids, which is always a sign of a good cartoon).

I saw Despicable Me in 2-D, but it might actually benefit a 3-D screening, especially for the end-title sequence where the Minions attempt to bridge the gap between the screen and the audience—a hilarious concept that's a bit mind-blowing when you think of it (and evidently there's a phone app that allows you to translate what they're saying during it—will wonders never cease?).

* Called "Minions," they have all sorts of uses and are voiced by the co-directors and "Flight of the Conchords" Jemaine Clement.  Yee-es.