America's Poet Laureate: A Jonathan Demme Retrospective

[Raiders]

Yes, I stole a phrase from Slant. Jonathan Demme may not be the greatest living American filmmaker, but few if any have the kind of diverse, remarkable career that he has managed. Few are also as often overlooked in discussions of the best modern directors. Demme may not exactly fit into Truffaut's sometimes useless "auteur" theory (a concept I love to use in cinema exploration but deplore in its use as a qualitative term), but the magnitude and versatility of his output is almost second to none. He switches between fiction and documentary with ease, consistently finding great subjects and narratives to branch out.

I will use my available resources and review, chronologically, the director's canon to date.

Films to be reviewed:

Caged Heat (1974) - 72
Citizens Band (1977) - 91
Last Embrace (1979) - 58
Melvin and Howard (1980) - 84
Swing Shift (1984) - 55
Stop Making Sense (1984) - 86
Something Wild (1986)
Swimming to Cambodia (1987)
Married to the Mob (1988)
The Silence of the Lambs (1991)
Philadelphia (1993)
Storefront Hitchcock (1998)
Beloved (1998)
The Truth About Charlie (2002)
The Agronomist (2003)
The Manchurian Candidate (2004)
Neil Young: Heart of Gold (2006)
Jimmy Carter Man from Plains (2007)

[Sycophant]

Awesome. Looking forward to it. It just struck me how perverse it is that the only Demme picture I've seen was The Manchurian Candidate. With any luck, this thread will shame me into watching more.

[Sven]

This reminds me that I need to work on my Herzog retrospective...

I will read this with intent and correct you when you're wrong! But with the amount you love him, I'm sure you won't be.

:waits for Philadelphia review:

[Raiders]

:waits for Philadelphia review:

This is the one I am most looking forward to watching again for this thread. I didn't care much for it on my initial viewing a couple years back, but I have always kind of wanted to see it again.

[Sven]

This is the one I am most looking forward to watching again for this thread. I didn't care much for it on my initial viewing a couple years back, but I have always kind of wanted to see it again.

I like it. It's populist in the same way that, like, every Tom Hanks movie is populist. But I think its heart is noble, it's not insulting, and it's well-acted and directed.

[Duncan]

This reminds me that I need to work on my Herzog retrospective... You always say this. Do it already!

[Spinal]

Philadelphia was soooo far behind the curve. But it's got Karen Finley and Anna Deavere Smith in the cast, so I've got to respect that.

[Kurosawa Fan]

Philadelphia was soooo far behind the curve. But it's got Karen Finley and Anna Deavere Smith in the cast, so I've got to respect that.

This is why I didn't care much for it. It seemed like a mediocre And the Band Played On. I've never bothered to revisit it.

[Raiders]

Well, then hopefully this thread will open people up to Demme's work outside mediocre mainstream stuff like Philadelphia.

[Spinal]

Something Wild is the one I've been wanting to revisit.

[Eleven]

He's one of the great unsung directors of his generation, especially as a documentarian. In UK critic Ryan Gilbey's It Don't Worry Me, he gives a very appreciative take on his 70s output, saying in the opening chapter that, "From the first frame of his first movie, his irrepressible visual style - gently barmy and buzzing with busy bee exuberance - is so consistent with the compassion dished out to his characters that the movies play like expressions of undiluted joy."

Lots of luck on this take, Raiders, I'll definitely be reading.

[Izzy Black]

Too bad none of those movies are any good.

[Qrazy]

Demme as poet laureate? Blahahahaha... kill me now.

[Sycophant]

I will read this with intent and correct you when you're wrong! But with the amount you love him, I'm sure you won't be.


He's one of the great unsung directors of his generation, especially as a documentarian.


Too bad none of those movies are any good.


Demme as poet laureate? Blahahahaha... kill me now.This thread's gonna be fun!

[Qrazy]

This thread's gonna be fun!

Don't get me wrong I like the guy's movies as much as the next guy. Hell, my family's even personal friends with his 'cousin bobby'. But I'd be hard pressed to describe him as a poet, I'd be even more hard pressed to describe him as a laureate and I'd sooner shit a brick than describe him as a poet laureate.

[Izzy Black]

And I'd be hard-pressed to watch any of his movies more than once.

[transmogrifier]

Not a fan. At all.

[ledfloyd]

i'm not a fan of his fictional work at all. but i'm a huge fan of both stop making sense and neil young: heart of gold. and i intend to watch his jimmy carter doc.

[Spinal]

Too bad none of those movies are any good.

Stop Making Sense? Is it possible not to like that film?

[Bosco B Thug]

I have seen 2 of those, and heard of 5. Looking forward to learning about this guy, I like to tell myself I like his sensibility, even though I'm only a mild fan of 'Silence.'

[Raiders]

Demme as poet laureate? Blahahahaha... kill me now.

It was kind of a joke. It was an offhand comment made during a review of one of his films at Slant. I admitted this in the very first sentence of the first post.


Too bad none of those movies are any good.

Uh-huh. You've seen all of them, have you?

[transmogrifier]

Not a fan. At all.

I should add I'm happy to be persuaded otherwise.

[Qrazy]

It was kind of a joke. It was an offhand comment made during a review of one of his films at Slant. I admitted this in the very first sentence of the first post.

Uh-huh. You've seen all of them, have you?

You said it was from Slant. I had know way of knowing you meant it as a joke.

[Ezee E]

Bah. Everyone is a fan of some Demme movie. They just don't know it yet. He's probably one of the true overlooked directors. He needs to stop with the docs though and go back to fiction films

[Qrazy]

Bah. Everyone is a fan of some Demme movie. They just don't know it yet. He's probably one of the true overlooked directors. He needs to stop with the docs though and go back to fiction films

But he's better at the docs.

[soitgoes...]

I just watched The Agronomist.:eek: An amazing doc. This instills a need to watch some more of Demme's documentaries.

[Raiders]

I just watched The Agronomist.:eek: An amazing doc.

Indeed.

[Raiders]

Caged Heat (1974)

http://a69.g.akamai.net/n/69/10688/v1/img5.allocine.fr/acmedia/rsz/434/x/x/x/medias/nmedia/18/65/03/22/18822482.jpg

Jonathan Demme's directorial debut is a Corman-produced (therefore cheap) little B-movie in the subgenre of "women in prison." Being personally unfamiliar with the particular group of films (which Demme himself also wrote a couple of before directing this one), it is likely I may be giving credit to fairly typical genre themes. Nonetheless, Demme's debut is a rather striking film, equal parts camp and socially biting in its depiction of a group of women held in a strangely run-down, abandoned prison in the middle of nowhere.

The first thing I noticed was the interesting cultural cross-section of the women, which struck me more as a conscious choice rather than merely a generous PC addition (think Carpenter's societal microcosm in Assault on Precinct 13). The women vary in race, nationality and even size. They do not represent a type so much as the gender as a whole. Of course, this being the type of slightly sleazy, campy "skin flick" one expects, perhaps the filmmakers had nothing more than pleasing everyone on their minds, but it works for them nonetheless.

Demme opens up the film, after one of the ladies is captured and shipped to the prison, with a series of dream sequences that show the early visual strengths of both he and frequent collaborator Tak Fujimoto. What's more is the way they set up the hidden desires of the women in the prison, giving a more internal and inclusive milieu for its characters, as well as successfully undercutting and deepening the rather ridiculous events that take up most of the latter stages of the film.

In particular is the prudish warden (wheelchair-bound Barbara Steele), who has a fantasy that contradicts her personality and gives way to her complete disapproval at a later showing of cross-gender sexual dance routine performed by two of our central inmates. The drag routine is a fascinating sequence, giving the undercurrent of feminine liberation and Demme positing that the constraints of a controlling society is not just one freedom of body, but of desire. The warden's reaction mirrors a government's fearful desire to keep such inclinations strictly forbidden and "sinful."

It is a film that is successful in that it is able to sketch a generous selection of women and place them in a story and location that is rife with socio-political subtext. The genre itself lends to this line of thinking, and as one person has said, it is a film that inevitably is better in retrospect. It is overly campy, poorly acted, and despite its occasional artistic and socially relevant moment, the majority of the film is hokey and more akin to midnight Cinemax TV. Nonetheless, Demme's first film is a provocative and well-crafted B-movie, one that benefits from its director's keen purveying of gender and its place in society, but still suffers from the need (likely genre and production-imposed) to stick firmly to its exploitation roots.

[72]

[MacGuffin]

I'd be interested in seeing this, but be sure to not see on Bare Behind Bars, another "women in prison" movie.

[megladon8]

Great write-up, Raiders, and you've made me want to see the film.

I've only seen a few of his films.

I like The Silence of the Lambs but do not consider it a masterpiece.

I saw Philadelphia a long time ago, and remember thinking it was OK but a little too heavy-handed...the Bruce Springsteen song is great, though. I think the video to the song was better than the movie.

And I actually quite liked The Truth About Charlie. But, again, it was back when it first came out and I am not sure how I'd feel about it now.

[Raiders]

Citizens Band (1977)

http://www.sensesofcinema.com/images/directors/04/33/citizens_band.jpg

Demme's first non-exploitation film may very well be one of America's lost masterpieces. A funny-sad look at a small town disconnected through that most popular of nemeses: technology. In this film it is the citizens band, or CB, radio that became so popular in the 1970s (likely reaching an apex with Smokey and the Bandit). The various characters in Demme and screenwriter Paul Brickman's film communicate through the CB radios, and their personal lives mirror the lies and manipulation possible through impersonal communication.

The film is a rather obvious metaphor, taking the characters' comfort in dealing over the airwaves and relating it directly to the harmful, careless ways they lead their lives. The characters are a Freudian mop, displaying carefree sexual fantasies through the comfort of CB radios, releasing their repressed ids, and lending to their own false pretense of secrecy. Two brothers have an affair with the same woman; a man cheats on not one, but two wives (with each other, natch), a prostitute manages herself both in person and over the radio. In likely the film's most thematically intriguing moment, a character cannot wake his father in the same room, but calling him on the CB radio snaps the old man awake in a second.

You could consider the film prescient, seeing forward to an age where the Internet gives people the freedom to be whomever they choose. It's not a stretch to see someone from this community winding up on "To Catch a Predator." In fact, Paul Le Mat's character eventually takes it upon himself to confront those who fill the airwaves with false identities and problems. He sees the future, and wants to stop it.

Of course, the film isn't one sided. Near the end, a man becomes lost, and the community comes together to search. The radios become the tools by which the characters operate in their search. There is an image at the end of each character silhouetted against the sun, radio in hand. It shows both the togetherness and anonymity provided by the new technology. But at the same time, it insinuates the loss of seeing a person and knowing what you are getting. Of community built through physical acts instead of mental and aural communication.

Demme is a man fascinated with Americana and the individual's eccentric need to be a part of something. Demme paints a community where the radio has lifted inhibitions and unveiled the somewhat dark, strange and harmful underbelly, proving that in this fictional Lumberton it is not all the happy, genial face we may show. Demme's style is light but stern and straight-faced. The film is both comedy and drama, but in the best tradition of Renoir and McCarey, the characters feel alive because of the director's care and humanity and improvisational sensibility. It is a truly remarkable work.

[91]

[Mysterious Dude]

Out of curiosity, is there a real benefit from seeing all the movies of one director? I took a class on Hitchcock once, and I'll never devote so much time to one guy ever again. Nowadays, after I see a movie by a certain director, I try not to watch a film by that director until after I've seen a lot of movies by other directors. You gotta spread the love, man!

[Raiders]

Out of curiosity, is there a real benefit from seeing all the movies of one director? I took a class on Hitchcock once, and I'll never devote so much time to one guy ever again. Nowadays, after I see a movie by a certain director, I try not to watch a film by that director until after I've seen a lot of movies by other directors. You gotta spread the love, man!

Benefit? No, I've just always been a big fan and really want to see all of his films. Thought this would be a good way to give my opinions on his work and give exposure to some people may not be very familiar with.

It's also not as if I am watching all 19 back-to-back. Only a couple per week. Not to mention I have already seen half of these prior to this anyway.

[Mysterious Dude]

Benefit? No, I've just always been a big fan and really want to see all of his films. Thought this would be a good way to give my opinions on his work and give exposure to some people may not be very familiar with.
Fair enough.

Although I'm sure there could be some academic justification for it. ;)

[Ezee E]

Out of curiosity, is there a real benefit from seeing all the movies of one director? I took a class on Hitchcock once, and I'll never devote so much time to one guy ever again. Nowadays, after I see a movie by a certain director, I try not to watch a film by that director until after I've seen a lot of movies by other directors. You gotta spread the love, man!
Every Hitchcock is a long long time.

[Raiders]

Last Embrace (1979)

http://www.pianosequenza.net/public/segno_hannan.jpg

Demme abandons the quirk of America's society for the paranoia of the mind, the kind Hitchcock was reveling in over two decades before, and the kind of government, big business distrust that will come to fuel his masterful retake of The Manchurian Candidate. But for now, Demme is stuck in a place of relishing visual audacity and Hitchcock homages to space out a rather flimsy, unintriguing piece of spy intrigue.

Where the material for his first two films allowed the director's fascination with Americana to grow and fueled his genuine human interest, this film plays like a one-up reel, constantly trying to lay it on thicker and twistier than the scene before. Roy Schieder is stuck in a maze of who-knows-what, constantly running and turning from the government organization he once worked for that now seemingly wants him dead.

While on a mission outside El Paso, Scheider is ambushed and his wife killed. After recovering from a sanitarium, he begins a quest for revenge and truth while his paranoia grows ever stronger. He meets a woman and attempts to fill his void with an attraction to her. This all leads to a showdown atop Niagara Falls. Can you spot the Hitchcock references? Oh yeah.

Unlike other famed Hitchcock purveyors (Argento, De Palma), Demme's concern isn't with identity and truth filtered through layers of cinematic foolery and falsity, and thus he feels merely like an imitation. The film thankfully never has many lofty pretensions, and Demme and Fujimoto's camera is a great tool. Scouring the scenes, looking from all angles, roaming in and out, it is as though the director is looking for the truth along with all of us. That the ultimate narrative reveal is as predictable and lame as we expect is likely just as much a disappointment to Demme and his camera as it is to the viewer. Though thankfully, Demme has the last laugh as his final Hitch homage, pulled from The Birds, is a howler.

[58]

[Raiders]

Melvin and Howard (1980)

http://www.altfg.com/Stars/posterm/melvin-and-howard.jpg

The opening strains of the film set up Demme's milieu with perfect precision. There is a dusty, lost and rambling sense of the American dream drifting amongst the sage bushes and tumbleweeds of the American west. There's an aimlessness to the film's proceedings, a scattered prosaic on the way the promises of fortune and "easy living" often are merely mirages drifting in the vast expanse of the dreamer's mind. Howard Hughes is riding his motorbike through the desert. The visual metaphor is only realized at the end of the film. The elusiveness of latching on to a piece of America is like the zipping motorbike ranging the vastness of the American west.

The film's central character is Melvin Dummar, a real-life man who claimed he had once picked up a crazy old man in the Nevada desert who was Howard Hughes and produced the "Mormon will" upon Hughes' death which gave Melvin $156 million. The will was never authenticated and Melvin got nothing. Demme and screenwriter Bo Goldman take Melvin's story at face value, though, making the fantasy story a basis for their look at the aimless American dream scrounging in the suburban west.

The film is very much a social comedy, and certain scenes are near perfection. There exists in the middle of the film a scene at a small Vegas chapel where Melvin and Lynda get married (for the second time). They are married to the "Hawaiian War Chant," and when the chapel suddenly needs new witnesses, Melvin quickly offers to step in. There's a sweetness to the wedding scene and a poignant, satirical jab in the subsequent whoring of themselves for money that essentially sums up the film's tone.

The film opens with the central basis as Melvin, driving home along the roads of Nevada, finds a man calling himself Howard Hughes along the side of the road (we have seen that he crashed his motorbike). Melvin gives the man a lift, all the way to Las Vegas. Along the way, Melvin has Howard sing a song Melvin has written (he paid $70 that have a company set his lyrics to music in the hopes it is going to be a hit). It's a terrible song, but Howard relents and sings. Later on, Howard begins to sing his own song, "Bye, bye Blackbird," and the film only hints at the sadness and potential madness underneath the surface. Howard is not the main character, but the film's insinuation and Robard's performance gives depth to the character. There is a haunting past underneath the surface. But, eventually Howard is gone, and the film shifts entirely to Melvin.

The soundtrack to the film very much makes it seem like a road movie, as does Demme and Tak Fujimoto's camera which often is either inside a car or tracking upward, casting Melvin against the vastness. The spatial relationship is a key one, and there is a shot where the camera pans upward, displaying Melvin's trailer against other similar abodes and the open spaces of undeveloped land; Melvin is a signifier for the many broken dreams, of lives lived through a series of repossessions.

Of course, the film doesn't absolve Melvin. He's not a realist, and when good luck does strike, he flounders it with dreams of living a life unattainable. The film's central sequence is a game show called "Easy Living" where Melvin's wife Lynda has to tap dance to the Stones' "Satisfaction." She ultimately wins $10,000, which Melvin immediately wastes on a Cadillac and a yacht. The shot of Melvin sitting in his backyard to his unfinished house pretending to be a yachtsman calling to the Coast Guard is remarkably poignant.

They are "investments" he says, but the immediately question is, to what? But, the following sequence makes it all too clear: Melvin is stuck in his childhood, of seeing the nice cars and boats pass him by, and he is investing in his dream. His defiance that they are "broke" but not "poor" hints at Melvin's resiliency that with dreams and ambitions people are wealthy. The scene ends with a hint of Demme and Goldman's satirical view as the radio comes back, answering Melvin's call.

The Court case involving the will has little screen time, but the film makes the most of it. The disbelief in Melvin is strong, and Demme's revolving camera which captures the callous faces of those who disbelieve is a striking image. It pits Melvin, the eternal optimist, in the center of a room of "realists," and makes the American system itself the force working against Melvin. There's a suffocating, holier-than-thou attitude at work here, and Demme chastises a system that brings hope to a good deed while crushing it with their preconceptions.

Melvin, in the end, already knew he could never win the Court case, that someone like him would never receive that kind of good fortune from the government ("you think they were going to give Melvin Dummar $156 million?"). But, his consolation is key. The film opens with its flight of fancy, of Melvin meeting and picking up an old man calling himself Howard Hughes. At the end, Melvin looks back and says "Howard Hughes sang my song." Finally, Melvin has a piece of himself ingrained in Americana. Perhaps for him the American dream is not money, but to have a piece of himself that nobody else can have. It is a consolation for the eternal dreamer that such a chunk of America like Howard Hughes once acknowledged Melvin. The final shot which returns to the beginning for a scene not previously seen shows Melvin drifting into sleep, to a world where he has what he wants, bring driven by the piece of America that, at least he knows, is his.

[84]

[Raiders]

After that last viewing, I'm starting to see why Slant used the phrase for Demme. He very much is a great purveyor and explorer of America. Eclectic, yet the vision is quite clear.

Oh, and don't worry. I'm sure I'll get to something someone else has seen eventually.

[Raiders]

Since either a) nobody cares or b) people haven't seen any of these, I'll just give my recent viewing of Swing Shift a 'meh' and move on.

[Boner M]

Boner's still up for this thread; he's just too discussion-apathetic at the moment to express his interest.

Good review of Melvin and Howard, and I'm very keen to see some writing on Something Wild.

[soitgoes...]

Since either a) nobody cares or b) people haven't seen any of these, I'll just give my recent viewing of Swing Shift a 'meh' and move on.
I'm interested and reading. Sorry I haven't commented. The only one thus far that I've seen that you've reviewed is Melvin and Howard. While I don't regard it quite as highly as you, I did find it to be an entertaining albeit not too memorable film. After watching The Agronomist not too long ago, I'm eager to delve deeper into his filmography.

[Sycophant]

Since either a) nobody cares or b) people haven't seen any of these, I'll just give my recent viewing of Swing Shift a 'meh' and move on.It's certainly "b" for me. Sorry. I'm not doing much more than skimming these currently for want of going into these films as unbiased as possible when I finally do get to them. The thread is certainly reminding me that I need to get some Demme pictures on my queue soon.

[Raiders]

Stop Making Sense (1984)

http://silverdocs.com/media/images/films/lg/StopMakingSense-a.jpg

Most concert films that I can think of are about the musicians, often alternating footage off the stage with the concert on the stage. Most concert films are also very much about the audience interaction and response to the musicians on the stage. But Jonathan Demme's tribute to the Talking Heads is not very concerned with those ideas; at least not directly. His film is much more about the idea of performance and choreography, of the way movements reflect personality and the extensive preparation necessary to pull of an event of this nature.

At the center of both the band and the film is frontman David Byrne. The film starts as the concert starts; with spartan sets and a blank slate of a stage. Then emerges Byrne, all alone with a boombox, which he cranks up after announcing it like Al Pacino showing us his machine gun. The song is "Psycho Killer" and immediately Byrne's unflinching, wide-eyed and disorienting performance (which begins with a full body shimmy) is a marvel to behold. Immediately, the distinction is made between the feelings one gets from simply listening to the music and when they experience the music, staring at the performer and wondering what it is going through their mind as they intone the lyrics.

As each song begins, a new member appears. The concert builds along with the music, each musician adding a layer of sound that was previously missing. Demme occasionally throughout the film will highlight the stagehands who are transporting equipment about the set. They contrast the manic musicians with an intense focus on their job. Demme equates the two sides to the performance, both doing their job with intensity and only enabled by the acts of the other.

By now, Demme has shown himself a purveyor of the heart of American society, and though he is more transparent here (which is natural given the material), there are flourishes that still retain to me the heart of the filmmaker (even if perchance he had no real say in their formation). In particular is a moment that defines Demme's cinema and the Talking Heads' music. The two backup singers, both black, start a back-and-forth with Byrne, he mimicking their movements and them mimicking his (in particular is a humorous air guitar riff). There is a bleeding of culture under the surface here, an acknowledgment of the inspirations between people and musicians, and in particular is the various influences of the music of the group. It is a rather transcendent moment, and like everything else in the film, beautifully spontaneous choreography.

The songs and band are the highlight, and as a fan of the music, I am never disappointed. From the haunting opening song to the gorgeous "Naive Melody," the film-as-celebration of the band's creativity both on stage and in the studio is sublime. I personally don't care much for the Tom Tom Club, and as much as I love the energy, movement and personality of the rest of the group, the lack of Byrne's presence has always left me rather uninterested in that section of the film. Nonetheless, the film as a whole stands as the most intriguing and artistically refined concert film. From the set design to the exquisite choreography, it is a sight to behold. And with a gaze that never leaves the stage, Demme's camera intuits the truth: that there is nothing we could learn that would improve upon the real treat of the band: its exquisite performance.

[86]

[Eleven]

One of the most fun times you can have in a theater. I saw screening a few years ago and more than a few people danced in the aisles.

[Spinal]

I've got a tape I want to play.

Awesome movie.

[ledfloyd]

One of the most fun times you can have in a theater. I saw screening a few years ago and more than a few people danced in the aisles.
Wow, that would be an awesome experience.

I think your score is slightly low but I agree with the write-up wholeheartedly.

I have to put on the Heads now.

[Sven]

More energetic or athletic than pretty much any film I can think of. One of my favorites. Excellent review.

[Adam]

Dang, this dream died before you even hit mid-late '80s Jonathan Demme

And that's the best Jonathan Demme

[Raiders]

: sigh :

I had just gotten to his best film, too. I'll see about starting this up again.

[Qrazy]

Wow, I was especially cantankerous in this thread. Sorry about that Raiders. I would like to see more entries as well.

[Grouchy]

Didn't realize this was an old thread. I've only seen Silence of the Lambs and Rachel Getting Married, and I thought both were magnificent.

Also, I just have to see a women-in-prison movie where Barbara Steele is the warden.

[B-side]

I've yet to bother with Demme, but he has a few passionate fans on the boards I visit, so I'm thinking I need to.

[Ezee E]

I've yet to bother with Demme, but he has a few passionate fans on the boards I visit, so I'm thinking I need to.
Uh, yes.

[Grouchy]

It feels weird to me that people say they haven't seen any Demme when he made Silence of the Lambs. I mean, these people did at one point in their life own a TV, right?

[B-side]

I've seen Silence of the Lambs. Just seems like less of a Demme movie, and more of a Hannibal movie, if that makes sense. Probably not.