Alfie (1966)

Alfie (Lewis Gilbert, 1966) This is the film that catapulted Michael Caine to the A-list of stars—a bit of a wonder, that, as he essays the titular lead in this character study of a complete rotter of a misogynist, a taxi-driver/chauffeur whose relationships with women are as transitory as any fare. 

 

One shouldn't be too surprised by this, I guess, as audiences have always had a tendency to gravitate to, and even admire, villains, be they "Scarface" or Darth Vader or Brando's "Wild One" or "The Godfather." Maybe it's the nature of film to be a spectator sport and with the safety of being removed from any hurtful fall-out, we can choose to imprint on "bad guys" and their assertive natures to do harm. Maybe it's just wish-fulfillment on audience's parts—"I wish I could get away with that in my own life" and especially nowadays as there's no Hays Code strictures requiring just punishments be meted out by the end of the picture. There don't need to be ramifications anymore, and in this brave new world, the heroes and villains get all mixed up. Here, the term "anti-hero" need not apply.

"I suppose you think you're gonna see the bleedin' titles now.

Well, you're not, so you can all relax..."

Caine's Alfie Elkins is no anti-hero. He's a bloke trying to make do for himself and making no apologies for it ("You've got to live for yourself in this world, not for others."), certainly not to his conquests, and certainly not to the audience, whom he addresses directly from the get-go, in mid-assignation with a married woman (he may be misogynistic, but he doesn't discriminate). In his first-person discourse* he's as cheekily blunt as he is with his ladies in question (and their questions usually revolve around commitment, something Alfie is adamant he'll have no part of—"I don't want no bird's respect - I wouldn't know what to do with it.").

So, we watch as he tramples over hearts in his own memorial parade: There's that married woman, Siddie (Millicent Martin) cheating on her husband, while Alfie goes back to his cheated-upon girlfriend Gilda (Julia Foster) who lives with him for a time, quite unhappily as he refuses to even consider "settling down" with her ("I told Gilda from the start that I ain't the marrying sort." he says by way of explanation. "And do you know what?" he continues cluelessly, "She don't mind. She's a stand-by and she knows it. And any bird that knows its place in this world can be quite content."). That must include—in addition—the manageress of his dry-cleaners, a "foot-comfort" technician, a woman named "Dora", "the odd bird that came by chance" like Carla (Shirley Anne Field)—the nurse at his convalescent home when he's diagnosed with "spots" on his lungs, the girl he picks up on the motorway (Jane Asher), the wife (Vivien Merchant) of a fellow patient (Alfie Bass) at the convalescence, and a woman, Ruby (Shelley Winters), who he chats up while taking photographs as a side-hustle.

"My understanding of women only goes as far as the pleasure. When it comes to the pain I'm like any other bloke - I don't want to know." And he doesn't want to know; if there are complications, inconveniences—like a couple pregnancies—he'll lay down the law of how it's going to be and any reluctance just spells (for him) merely the end of any consistency in his hook-up schedule. He's a hit-and-run heart-breaker, not sticking around to see the damages. Alfie...and Alfie...show the dark underbelly of "the Swingin' 60's" and what happens when the swinging stops—you're left twisting in the wind, basically; things don't look so "gear" when people are chewed up in them.

Caine plays this cad as charmingly as he can, speaking breezily without much change of expression and little irony betraying any self-awareness. For all the winking at the camera that could have been, Caine avoids it with a mostly passive expression that is betrayed by a speech-ending toothy grin or a darkness around the eyes when the situation—and they're usually those rare instances when he's not totally in control—calls for punctuation. That lack of countenance betrays an empty heart inside.

One of the themes I keep harping on throughout these posts through the years is that love is a form of insanity. It's not a disparagement, just an observation that love—and its inherent selflessness—is the one thing that can circumvent the tendency of our alligator-brains to favor self-preservation above all else. Alfie is a movie that leans into that argument to a horrific degree; his predisposition to his wants and needs (as if he needs anything or anyone) lines up with his absolute disdain for anything resembling a caring regard for other human beings. People are opportunities to be taken advantage of, not fostered. And, for awhile, that's suitable.

But, the armor around his heart does have some dents in it. When his girlfriend Gilda gets pregnant, she decides to keep the child—despite Alfie's initial reluctance—and, for a time, Alfie, uncharacteristically, accepts his role as father to little Malcolm, taking pride in his son and devoting time to him (notwithstanding that a baby in a baby carriage helps attract women). But, Gilda grows weary of his fair-weather fatherhood and leaves him to marry another man. Later, he has to actually confront the consequences of his actions, and, in trying to find another path, gets a comeuppance...of sorts...as he finds himself on the receiving end of his past behavior, leading to some soul-searching and to the film's final "What's it all about?" (Cue Burt Bacharach, sung by Cher...produced by Sonny** at least in the States-side release).

It's a tough, funny—in a black-hearted kind of way—film that breaks barriers of subject matter while also shaking its cane at the unraveling moral fabric of its society, both teasing and admonishing with the same strokes, and drives home the scrambled cliche that "Time Wounds All Heels."

* Of, course, it's in first-person—Alfie doesn't think of anybody but himself.

 

** I'm glib about it, but Burt Bacharach's end-credits song is (to my ears) the best of his song-book (reportedly, he thought so, too), providing an "on-the-nose" counter-point to everything that has gone before, with clear-eyed "let-me-spell-it-out-for-you" lyrics by Hal David. Something even non-believers can believe in.

Sink the Bismarck!

Sink the Bismark! (Lewis Gilbert, 1960) Like the titular ship, this is another film that was well-known to me but managed to get away anyway. Based on C.S. Forester's 1959 book "The Last Nine Days of the Bismarck," it tells of the British Navy's concerted effort to stop the Nazi fabled super-ship, the battleship Bismarck, feared for its ability to attack ruthlessly in the channels of the North Atlantic, the largest of any battleship built in Europe and festooned with guns that could blow ships out of the sea and planes out of the air. Its potential for destruction was what made its name and reputation as a Naval "Boogey-man." The ship's entire sailing career lasted but eight months.

Kenneth More plays Captain Jonathan Shepard, who's a bit of a cold-fish, but also appointed by the Admiralty to head the operations to take down the Bismarck, which is the backbone of the Nazi U-boat attacks against shipping and supply vessels on the seas. Shepard is cold, but he has a History that he won't reveal and considers irrelevant. To show he's a bit of a new broom, he's shown noting the surface sloppiness of the command center (junior officers out of uniform, lunches at one's desk) and promptly makes it clear that things will be ship-shape or the offenders shipped out. The script was fashioned from Forester's best-seller by Edmund H. North—a Fox hand who specialized in military themes, even with The Day the Earth Stood Still—who wrote a similar scene in his script (with Francis Ford Coppola) of Patton.  

More, Geoffrey Keen and Naismith: 
"We have to sink the Bismarck, 'cause the world depends on us."

What is occupying Shepard's mind, besides the operation, will become readily apparent in the film's second act once the HMS Hood is blown out of the water by the Bismarck, and other ships are detoured to take part in the battle. At this point in the war, many of the characters have suffered losses that stiffen their upper lips and weigh heavily on their decisions, made hundreds of miles away in theory on charts and display-fields and played out in the waters off the Northern European shores. The film pinwheels between base-command and the conference rooms of various ships in the maneuvers. One can easily get lost, if one doesn't keep an eye on key players like Laurence Naismith, Michael Hordren, and Esmond Knight. But, it's easy to spot the Nazi commanders, like Karel Stepanek's blowhard Admiral, constantly extolling the future of Der Fatherland and vaingloriously associating the Bismarck's fortunes with his own in contrast to his more practical Captain (played by Carl Möhner), who obeys orders, but keeps his counsel.

Director Gilbert has a nice painterly way with widescreen, filling the frame with movement and detail, and the final battle is full of the trademarks of his action films with catapulting bodies, shaking explosions and large battles portrayed with details. They're also fought with models, filmed at a distance to keep the lack of detail hidden and the simulated expanse of ocean dominant. Composition is his strong suit here, as the work directing the actors is as restrained as the performances, not giving up much information about themselves, but constantly discussing "ramifications." Even a rather unnecessary sorta-semi-romantic sub-plot is given a tentative quality as the two are more concerned with their jobs and their effectiveness in them than any shilly shallying.

"Raise the Cinema-scope!"

The most amusing aspect about the film for me was the realization that it would make a very good "drinking game." There is one shot of a German artillery officer in close-up, looking at the camera, yelling in a thick Teutonic accent "Fire!" This shot is used (and often the same "take") repeatedly throughout the film, the reason for which I am not sure. Perhaps it's to goose the drama of the moment of engagement. Maybe it's to bridge the gap between the genuine shots of torpedoes being loaded to those barely-working model shots in a studio tank. Maybe he was Lewis Gilbert's brother (although there appears no resemblance) and he was paying him for a major speaking part consisting of one word used over and over. You'd think that (unless it was a last minute editorial decision by editor Peter Hunt, who was the cutting wizard behind the early Bond films), they might have spared another angle to keep it from being so monotonous. It's inexplicable. But, it's pretty damn funny. Any time a torpedo is sent from the Bismarck, there's "Otto von Feur-Lautsprecher" with his single syllable of dialogue, never to be seen or heard from again...until, of course, the next torpedo (and there are many). As I said, "Spotting Otto" would be a good drinking game.

Die gefälschten Bismarck

The Last Run of the Bismarck (The Real Thing pictured above)