THE OSCAR 1966

"You finally made it, Frankie. Oscar Night!. And here you sit, on top of a glass mountain called 'success.' You're one of the chosen five, and the whole town's holding its breath to see who won it. It's been quite a climb, hasn't it, Frankie? Down at the bottom, scuffling for dimes in those smokers, all the way to the top. Magic Hollywood! Ever think about it? I do, friend Frankie, I do…."

And thus begins one of the most sublimely terrible movies ever to grace the screen. A speech rife with overelaborate hyperbole (it's hard to imagine anyone taking the Oscars this seriously, even in the '60s), clumsy metaphors, labored clichés, and the name "Frankie" repeated no less than three times in a single breathless paragraph. Remarkably, three (count 'em, three) screenwriters are responsible for the dialogue in this gilt-edged burlesque, which, given how the characters are prone to repeat the name of the very person to whom they're speaking, sounds as though it were written for the radio.

Frankie Goes to Hollywood
Stephen Boyd with Johnny Grant, the real-life honorary Mayor of Hollywood

With nary an ironic or self-aware bone in its bathetic, threadbare body, The Oscar is the kind of pandering-yet-earnest, self-serious Hollywood trash no one has the old-school, out-of-touch naiveté to know how to make anymore. A 1966 film that would have felt warmed-over in 1960 (the year Ocean's Eleven and Sinatra's Rat Pack made this kind of clean-cut, pomaded, sharkskin-suited, ring-a-ding-ding brand of cool into a veritable brand), The Oscar is from the Joseph E. Levine (The Carpetbaggers, Harlow) school of overlit, elephantine artifice. Every interior looks like a soundstage, everyone's clothes look as though they've never been worn before, and the characters are so lacquered and buffed they resemble department store mannequins.
As though encouraged to get into the spirit of things, The Oscars' flirting-with-obsolescence "all-star cast" (eight Oscar winners in all) contribute performances that somehow manage to be mannequin stiff and over-the-top at the same time. Performances wholly unacquainted with human psychology, normal speech patterns, or recognizable human behavior.
With each viewing of this unrelentingly unconvincing take on what I assume was intended to be a cautionary tale about the dangers of unbridled ambition, I grow less and less surprised that one of its screenwriters (Harlan Ellison) is known principally for his work in science fiction.

Stephen Boyd as Frankie Fane
"I'm fighting for my life! And there's a spiked boot for anyone who gets in my way."

Elke Sommer as Kay Bergdahl
"It's that seed of rot inside of you that makes you what you are
that you can't change. You just dress it better!"

Tony Bennett as Hymie Kelly
"You lie down with pigs, you come up smelling like garbage!"

Eleanor Parker as Sophie Cantaro
"You go after what you want. In some men, it's admirable. In you, it's...unclean!"

Milton Berle as Arthur "Kappy" Kapstetter
"You never know you're on your way out until
suddenly you realize it would take a ticket to get back in."

The Oscar, subtitled: Memoirs of a Hollywood Louse, is an unabashed laundry list of every show biz/Hollywood cliché handed down since What Price Hollywood? (1932). A beyond-camp, glossy soap opera whose overripe performance and purple prose present the first male-centric challenge to the women of Valley of the Dolls (and Beyond).

Stephen Boyd, he of the narrow frame and chiseled, Tom of Finland profile, is Frankie Fane; your garden-variety ruthless user with a suitable-for-movie-marquees alliterative name. Side note* I don't recommend anyone try playing a drinking game in which you take a shot every time someone in the film says Frankie's name; you'll be rushed to the hospital with alcohol poisoning by the 20-minute mark.

As this told-in-flashback opus begins, Frankie and longtime buddy Hymie Kelly (Tony Bennett, making his film debut/swansong and looking like he wished he were back in San Francisco with his heart) are eking out a living, largely thanks to the bump-and-grind efforts of Frankie's stripper girlfriend, Laurel Scott (Jill St. John).

Jill St. John as Laurel Scott
"What does he think I am, dirt? Every morning I'd get the feeling
he was gonna leave two dollars on the dresser for me!"

After a nasty run-in with a crooked sheriff—a bulldoggish Broderick Crawford playing the flip side of his Highway Patrol TV character—the vagabond trio thumb a ride to NYC where breadwinner Laurel (who's, of course, basically a nice, decent girl who just wants "a kid") soon tires of Frankie's freeloading. This is in spite of the fact that Hymie, the perennial 3^rd wheel and clearly healthy as an ox, also appears to be living with the couple, yet shows no signs of being any more gainfully employed than his pal.

As audiences wait in vain for Hymie to happen upon a microphone and solve everyone's problems by discovering a latent talent for singing (and, in the bargain, providing a much-needed respite from the film's ceaseless stream of risible dialog and '60s slang); Frankie the hound dog decides to accompany Hymie to "a swingin' party in the village…lots of chicks" where he meets aspiring costume designer Kay Bergdahl (Sommer). In no time, Frankie makes his move:

Frankie- "You a tourist or a native?"

Kay- "Take one from column A and two from column B and get an egg roll either way."

On the strength of that nonsensical rejoinder, one would be forgiven for leaping to the assumption that Kay was suffering a stroke-related episode and in need of immediate medical attention, but not our Frankie. Clearly smitten by Kay's pouting accent, silk-awning bangs, and mink eyelashes, our smarmy antihero instead continues to engage the comely blond in more Haiku-inspired small talk. Kay, perhaps as a nod to the film's title, has a way of making everything she says sound like excerpts from an Academy Award acceptance speech:

"I am the end result of everything I've ever learned...all I ever hope to be,
and all the experiences I've ever had."

Uhmm...O.K.

We return now to Laurel—that hip-switchin', nice-walkin', bundle of loveliness—who, in a late-in-coming display of backbone, lays down the law to Frankie when he returns home:

"If you think I'm gonna work my tail off so you can run around with the village chicks…oh, stop spreadin' the pollen around, Frankie...or else!"

Unfortunately for Laurel, her ultimatum doesn't have the desired effect on Frankie as she'd hoped. After spending the evening with hard-to-get Bergdahl, round-heeled Laurel starts to look like used goods to him, and in record time, Frankie, the village pollen-spreader, beats a hasty retreat. So hasty that he misses out on hearing the joyous news that Laurel is pregnant with his child. 

In much the same way Willy Wonka's shiftless Grandpa Joe miraculously finds the energy to haul his wrinkled carcass out of bed once the prospect of a candy factory tour looms; the heretofore serially unemployed Frankie promptly lands a job in the garment district when it affords the opportunity to see more of the glacial Miss Bergdahl. But it isn't long before Kay's middle-European cool proves no match for Frankie's hotheaded, borderline sociopathic personality.

Koo Koo Frankie shows a wise guy actor (Jan Merlin) what it's
like to be on "the business end of a knife."

Frankie expends so much abusive energy exorcising his inner demons ("The way he sees it, no woman's any better than his mother," intones Hymie, deep-thinker) that Kay scarcely has time to examine her own Bad Boy attraction issues ("Sometimes I get the feeling, Frankie, that you ought to be chained up with a ring in your nose!") before their relationship begins to go south and take on all the dysfunctional sparring rhythms of Robert De Niro & Liza Minnelli in NewYork, New York…minus the warmth & mutual respect.

One particularly theatrical outburst of Frankie's captures the rapacious eye of roving talent scout Sophie Cantaro (Parker), who sees in Frankie's mercurial mood swings the makings of a star (Charlie Sheen, no doubt). Faster than you can say, "Bye-bye, Bergdahl! Hello, Cougar Town!" Frankie is whisked off to Hollywood and becomes exactly the kind of noxious nightmare of a movie star you'd expect. Think Neely O'Hara crossed with Helen Lawson combined with every ego-out-of-control rumor you've ever heard about Jerry Lewis, and you get the idea.

Joseph Cotten as Kenneth Regan, head of Galaxy Pictures
"I find myself repelled and repulsed by you."

Of course, this is precisely when the already dizzying lunacy of The Oscar really swings into high gear. Cue the laughably garish sets meant to signify high-style opulence, the tired visual short-cuts (EVERY scene in a studio backlot features strolling cowboys, gladiators, and showgirls in headdresses), and the standard-issue What Makes Sammy Run? rise and fall of our unscrupulous schnook scenario.

Yes, whether it be the simile-laden narration ("Man, he wanted to swallow Hollywood like a cat with a canary."); the rote, claws-his-way-to-the-top conflicts ("The fact is my 10% before taxes is paying your office overhead. And you stop earning it when you stop giving me what I want!"); or clumsy, tin-eared metaphors ("Have you ever seen a moth smashed against a window? It leaves the dust of its wings. You're like that Frankie, you leave a powder of dirt everywhere you touch."), The Oscar leaves nary a cliché unturned and untouched. And for that, we should all give thanks.

Ernest Borgnine and Edie Adams as lowbrow couple Barney & Trina Yale

WHAT I LOVE ABOUT THIS FILM

The Oscar is artificiality as motif. Without actually intending to do so, director Russell Rouse (who made the must-see Wicked Woman -1953) has crafted a film so phony and plastic, it winds up saying a great deal more about the real Hollywood than this contrived, self-serving fairy tale. A fairy tale that would have us believe that Hollywood is comprised of basically decent, principled, hard-working folks, and that unscrupulous bad apples like Frankie are the rotten exception.

When I watch The Oscar, I always wonder: was this movie pandering to star-struck yokels and hicks from the sticks? Was this fable of Tinseltown-as-Toilet designed to make Nathanael West's "locusts" feel less-resentful of the rich, famous, and privileged? To feed us the comforting fantasy that those beautiful, glamorous people on the screen have it far worse? 

Or had years of lying to itself deluded "The Industry" into believing its own publicity? This can't be how '60s Hollywood actually saw itself, can it? 

In the film's most blatantly parodic role, Jean Hale is hilariously spot-on as the self-absorbed actress Cheryl Barker. The role is an obvious and mean-spirited swipe at Carroll Baker that was likely included at the behest of producer Joseph E. Levine. (Baker and Levine clashed during the filming of Harlow, leading to her suing to get out of her three-picture contract. Baker won, but was blacklisted.)

It's not as though no one knew what a good film about Hollywood looked like: Sunset Boulevard -1950, The Bad & the Beautiful -1952, A Lonely Place -1950, Stand-In -1937. So, I tend to think everyone involved in The Oscar knew precisely what kind of trash they were making (Bennett doesn't recall the experience fondly in his memoirs) and just cashed their paychecks and moved on. But given the expense, effort, and the fact that many equally overstuffed, fake-looking, questionably-acted, and poorly-written films that came before it had somehow managed to find boxoffice success (The Carpetbaggers comes to mind); I can only imagine that the eventual awfulness of The Oscar wasn't as much of a surprise to those involved as was the public's total indifference to it.

Exterior shots of the Oscar ceremony were shot at the 37th Academy Awards in 1965. Bob Hope was indeed the host that year, but as the stage design was different, I suspect these scenes were shot on a sound stage. The Oscar actually did garner two Academy Award nominations in 1967: art direction (remarkably, given how ugly the sets are) and costume design. 

PERFORMANCES

It's a crowded, competitive field, but Stephen Boyd walks away with the honors for The Oscar's most exaggerated, indicating performance. In a film of parody-worthy performances, Boyd's bellowing, bombastic over-emoting (much like Faye Dunaway's in Mommie Dearest) sets the bar. It serves as the tonal rudder for this Titanic testament to overstatement. It's a performance that towers over the rest. And while one might argue he's no worse than anyone else (certainly not Bennett) and only as good as the knuckleheaded screenplay allows; when there's this much collateral damage, every offender has to be held accountable for their fair share of the carnage. 

Frankie's cutthroat efforts to win an Oscar make up the bulk of the 1963 Richard Sale novel
upon which the film is based, but comprise only the last half hour of the movie 

Indeed, in a reversal of my usual standard in camp movies I adore, the women don't really dominate in The Oscar. Despite their towering hairdos and colorful wardrobes, Elke Sommer, Eleanor Parker, Jill St. John, and a woefully over-rehearsed Edie Adams have their work cut out for them in trying to keep pace with the hambone scenery-chewing of Boyd on one side, and the Boo Boo Bear blandness of mono-expression crooner Tony Bennett on the other.

Robert De Niro and Joe Pesci They're Not
Hope you like Tony Bennett's expression here, 'cause that's it...for two whole hours

Add to this, schticky comedian Milton Berle as another one of those saintly talent agents that only seem to exist in Joseph E. Levine films (Red Buttons, another face-pulling comic, played a similar role in Levine's Harlow). Berle's approach to serious drama is something out of an SCTV Bobby Bittman sketch: go so low-wattage as to barely register any vitality at all.

Not sure, but I think knuckle-biting to convey distress went out with silent movies.

THE STUFF OF FANTASY
As hard as it is to believe that the Motion Picture Academy actually endorsed this sordid melodrama (although it is thought that the embarrassing flop of this film is responsible for the copyright stranglehold the Academy has had on the use and depiction of the Oscar Award in movies ever since). But one has to wonder about the many drop-in guest appearances of so many "stars" adding verisimilitude and unintentional comic relief. Were they contractual, were favors owed, or were they simply prohibited from reading the entire script?

Edith Head (or an animatronic copy) as Herself

Jack Soo as Sam, Frankie's live-in valet

Famed Hollywood columnist, commie-finger-pointer,
and homophobic blabbermouth, Hedda Hopper 

A puffy Peter Lawford is a little too convincing as Hollywood has-been Steve Marks

Ed Begley as Grobard, the scowling strip club owner

A beaming Frank Sinatra and daughter Nancy, in her brunette phase

Waler Brennan (right) as network sponsor Orrin C. Quentin of Quentiplak Products, Inc.
On the left, one of my favorite character actors, John Holland, as Stevens, his associate 

THE STUFF OF FANTASY

The bad film delights of The Oscar are so myriad, I can only speculate that its relative unavailability is to blame for its not having risen in camp stature equal to Valley of the Dolls or Mommie Dearest over the years (it's not on DVD and pops up on TV only sporadically). That, and its lack of an ostentatious drag queen aesthetic or even compelling roles for women. I'm not sure why, but a lot of the best camp is rooted in seeing women presented in the traditional, male-gaze "drag" of ornamental allure (big hair, theatrical makeup, elaborate costumes) but behaving in non-traditional ways--i.e., assertive, aggressive, and with a plot-propelling agency (Faster Pussycat, Kill! Kill!). 

The gender-role incongruity of seeing ornamentally decked-out women behaving in the aggressive, toxic ways movies have traditionally ascribed to male anti-hero types, comes as a pleasant surprise and welcome change of pace. It also probably accounts for why a nasty piece of work like Neely O'Hara in Valley of the Dolls tends to remain in one's memory longer than the passive Jennifer North.

Despite giving lip service to the contrary, the women in The Oscar are a pretty passive bunch and more or less serve a traditional, reactive function in the plot. Pointedly, the poised and elegant Sophie Cantaro, as one of the film's two exceptions (the other being the blowsy but street-smart Trina Yale), is presented as both sexually desperate ("You, you're 42. There are many good minutes left for you," a well-meaning, tactless friend tells her) and unable to prevent her so-called "feminine" emotions from playing havoc with professional decision-making.

It's not difficult to imagine that The Oscar's preponderance of masochistic females is due to its three male screenwriters. This leads me to wonder if one of the reasons The Oscar never became the midnight screening hoot-fest its entertaining awfulness might otherwise guarantee is because the women's roles are so toothless. 

But such wrong-headed thinking prevails throughout The Oscar. Making it one of the best of the worst, the apex of the nadir, and unequivocally one for the books. A book no doubt titled: "What The Hell Were They Thinking?"

BONUS MATERIAL

Update: After being unavailable for decades, a Blu-ray edition of The Oscar was released on February 2, 2020.

Elke Sommer wore the same Edith Head gown to the actual 1966 Academy Awards she donned in the fake ceremony that bookends The Oscar (top photo). Here's a clip of a somewhat botched dual acceptance speech with Connie Stevens for Doctor Zhivago's absent costume designer, Julie Harris. Watch HERE

Although only an instrumental version plays in the film, Tony Bennett sang the Muzak-ready theme song from The Oscar ("Come September") on the soundtrack album. This 45rpm single was an opening day giveaway at many first-run theaters. 

Copyright © Ken Anderson  2009 - 2016

DREAM LOVER 1986

I will dream a gentle dream

a soft dream.

I am at peace in this dream.

I am safe...

Dream Lover is a not-uninteresting Freudian psychological thriller from the director of Klute, derailed by a too-clinical fascination with the sterile, simultaneously uncinematic and exposition-reliant, world of dream therapy.

In the mid-‘80s, erstwhile child star and ‘70s teen idol Kristy McNichol made a tantalizing bid for adult credibility when cast against type in Alan J. Pakula’s visually persuasive psychosexual thriller Dream Lover. At age twenty-three, the two-time Emmy Award-winning actress (Family) with the easygoing smile and tomboy image was cast in her first truly adult role as Kathy Gardner, an emotionally and sexually repressed music student plagued by recurring nightmares.

Kristy McNichol as Kathy Gardner

Paul Shenar as Benjamin Gardner

Ben Masters as Dr. Michael Hansen

Justin Deas as Kevin McCann

Kathy is a talented and gifted jazz flutist (you’ll just have to take the movie’s word for that) living in a state of infantilized, vaguely incestuous arrested-development under the dictatorial thumb of her overbearing father (Paul Shenar), a prominent D.C. attorney.
After winning a scholarship to a prestigious New York music academy, Kathy, in an uncharacteristic show of independence and in strict defiance of her father's wishes, sublets an apartment in Greenwich Village, and, in short order, becomes romantically involved with her curly-permed jazz improv instructor (Justin Deas). 

Unfortunately, before Kathy even has a chance to adjust to her newfound freedom, Freudian guilt and paternal retribution comes swiftly and brutally in the form of an "I warned you it wasn't safe away from Daddy" apartment break-in and assault, resulting in Kathy killing her assailant with his own knife.
Now, haunted by recurring nightmares in which she is forced to relive the attack, Kathy submits to an unorthodox, experimental sleep therapy. A treatment which, while proving to be successful in quelling her nightmares, may have the unforeseen side-effect of inducing, in her waking moments, the compulsion to act out and upon emotions heretofore confined solely (and safely) to her dream world.

As a fan of psychological thrillers, I recall at the time hoping that Dream Lover—with its themes of violence, sex, dreams, and repression (redolent of Marnie, Spellbound, and Vertigo)—would be Pakula picking up the Hitchcock mantle after serial Hitchcock homagist Brian De Palma at last appeared ready to set it aside following the flop critical reception to his Rear Window-inspired Body Double (1984). If so, I was beyond excited at the prospect of what a director of Pakula's skill and sensitivity with actors could bring to the genre.
Thus, I turned a blind eye to anything negative portended by Dream Lover being released in the dump month of January (a traditionally low-attendance time), and remained blissfully ignorant of the fact that I was one of the few (the very few, as it turns out) enthusiastically anticipating the opening of this, Alan J. Pakula’s first film in four years…since 1982's Sophie’s Choice.
My imagination was tweaked by Dream Lover’s striking, pulpy poster art (my work commute took me past MGM’s Culver City studio, so for over a month I got to gawk at the sight of an enormous and threatening billboard featuring America’s teen sweetheart brandishing a switchblade). I was sent thoroughly over-the-top the first time I saw the theatrical trailer—all fast cuts, Psycho-strings, and ominous voice-over: “Imagine the terror of living a nightmare every time you sleep. Every... time… you sleep….” And I was unaccountably taken with the intriguing notion of seeing squeaky-clean Kristy McNichol in a role that promised to be a dramatic departure.

But what excited me most was the return of Alan J. Pakula (one of my ab fab favorite ‘70s directors) to the suspense thriller genre. To me, Klute (1971): a character drama disguised as a detective story, and The Parallax View (1974): a truly terrifying political paranoia suspenser, are two of the most stylish, distinctive, and chillingly effective thrillers of the decade. Pakula knew how to tell a story and go for the effect, but never at the expense of character. Indeed, he seemed to have the magic touch when it came to actors, often extracting unexpectedly fresh and authentic performances out of long-established stars. In The Parallax View Paula Prentiss, known for her light-comedy roles, gives a nakedly intense dramatic performance, while, conversely, Pakula’s comedy Starting Over (1979) single-handedly reinvented Candice Bergen’s career by unearthing the self-effacing comedienne beneath the actress' much-touted ice-princess veneer.

It’s this latter directorial alchemy I anticipated Pakula working on Kristy McNichol, a talented actress I’d always liked (even in the wretched-but-oddly enjoyable The Pirate Movie), but who, when not busy being the only good thing in a string of mediocre films, appeared headed on a career collision-course that threatened to turn her into Marie Osmond’s answer to Erin Moran.

Kathy, Scat Singing With a Jazz Combo
Remarkably, this is NOT the reason someone tries to kill her a few moments later.
(McNichol also played a flutist in 1984's Just The Way You Are)

However, when I say Alan J. Pakula is one of my favorite ‘70s directors, I say it with emphasis on the “70s” part, for I tend to be a tad less fond of the late director’s post-1979 output (Pakula died in 1998). Starting with the soporific financial thriller Rollover (1981), Pakula's work during this period vacillated between ambitious (Sophie's Choice), banal (See You in the Morning - 1989), conventional (The Pelican Brief -1993), and, in the case of Dream Lover, fascinating but flawed.

Kathy's dreams are affected by the repressed, conflicted feelings
she has about her love-hate relationship with her controlling father

WHAT I LOVE ABOUT THIS FILM 

As contemporary psychological thrillers go, Dream Lover is very much up my alley. Yet, due to reasons easily attributable to its script (a first effort by one-time Pakula assistant and co-producer Jon Boorstin), and less verifiably ascribed to Pakula’s directorial choices; Dream Lover proves itself to be one of those high-concept, high-style thrillers that start out promisingly, only to later develop serious problems sustaining suspense and maintaining a consistent tone. 

To Kathy's growing roster of father-related hang-ups, add male trust issues and sexual anxiety.
"Someday your father's gonna have to find out you're a woman."
"Not today."

Before its script gets hijacked by the self-serious contributions of a phalanx of sleep-research technical advisers (presented with the kind of grave earnestness guaranteed to make it sound absolutely crackpot), Dream Lover at least has the benefit of a marvelous setup. From the outset, the central conflict is established as one both emotionally subjective (Kathy’s unresolved feelings about her father) and psychologically reactive (resultant of the discrepancy between Kathy’s dream reality – aka her desires - and her actual existence). In being made privy to the content of Kathy’s dreams, we’re made aware of how her rather vague daily persona as a dutiful daughter contrasts significantly with her vivid and active dream life.

In her nocturnal life, Kathy variably casts herself as a child; her own late mother (dressed, significantly, in red); and as an imprisoned figure capable of escape only through means of literal flight. Meanwhile, her father, for whom Kathy in real-life serves as a combination surrogate wife figure and eternal child, appears alternately as an idealized figure of warmth and acceptance, or a threatening, faceless specter. 

In her peaceful dreams, Kathy places herself within the pastoral scene depicted
in a painting that hangs (significantly, again) over her father's bed.

Since Dream Lover is presented from the exclusive perspective of Kathy’s reality—the perspective of a repressed, bordering-on-regressed grown woman with serious daddy issues; the film makes an interesting case of positing Kathy’s attack (though psychologically scarred, she comes to no physical harm due to unleashed pent-up rage) as being a physical manifestation of guilt (she defied her father) and sexual panic (the attack occurs moments after what may have been her first sexual encounter).

"I stabbed him...he dropped his knife, so I picked it up and I stabbed him!
And...I never felt so good as when I stuck that knife in him!"

Dream Lover’s Freudian overlays are metered out with such style; its intensifying cycle of recurrence and repetition so measured and deliberately paced…it’s a little too bad that the gripping psychological thriller we’ve been primed for never actually shows up. The introduction of the sleep therapy angle —precisely when things should accelerate—takes what had heretofore been a fairly gripping, fun/trash psychological melodrama, and tries to turn it into a serious exploration of the scientific advancements made in the area of dream research. Zzzzzz. 

Movies themselves are dreams. If a director wins over an audience’s confidence, he/she can make us believe and accept almost anything, no explanations necessary. Thrillers grind to a pedantic halt the minute they find it necessary to try to ground the primarily emotional pleasures of the genre in sober factualism (especially when, in order to accommodate a patently preposterous climax, the film chooses to jettison all laws of physics and logic). Hitchcock had the good sense to leave all the psychological mumbo jumbo for the end of Psycho, and even then it still came across like the most superfluous scene in the movie.

Top: The red-walled apartment Kathy sublets is festooned with vivid animal prints, patterned drapes, and nude artwork hanging on the wall. It's like someone's libido has exploded all over the room. Below: Once moved in, uptight Kathy substitutes virginal whites for the blazing reds and bold patterns, removes the artwork, and covers the animal-print furniture with sheets. In this screencap we have the mysterious stranger (Joseph Culp) in search of the whereabouts of the unknown "Maggie."

Throughout the film, Kathy's surroundings consistently reflect her emotional conflicts, reinforcing the theme of Kathy's dream reality having an increasing influence on her real life.


THE STUFF OF DREAMS
From a literal standpoint, the phrase “Dreams are what le cinema is for” is no idle claim. Dreams have been depicted in motion pictures since their Inception (a little dream-related film-geek joke there…heh, heh) dating as far back as the early 1900s.
If asked to cite directors whose visual sense best captures what my own dreams look like, I’d have to say Ken Russell and Roman Polanski (making musical room for Busby Berkeley and Vincente Minnelli); but such baroque theatricality isn’t always necessary to make the fantasy world of dreams feel authentic to me.

Dream Lover presents dreams in a relatively straightforward, decidedly Freudian manner. All corridors, portals, vivid reds, and symbolism, one could likely reference any of the film’s images in a dream interpretation manual and arrive at precisely the intention Pakula intends. Dream Lover was lensed by longtime Ingmar Bergman cinematographer Sven Nykvist (Fanny and Alexander), who gives Kathy’s dreams an austere luster of atmospheric dread.
Unfortunately, Dream Lover came out just around the time of MTV over-saturation. Freudian symbolism had become such a clichéd, overused mainstay of music videos at this point that Dream Lover’s imagery (as beautiful and fitting to the plot as it is) was met with a lot of been-there, done that.

Taking Flight

PERFORMANCES

I know a great many people don’t care for Kristy McNichol in this film (if the words “great many” can be used in reference to a film as obscure as Dream Lover), but I find her to be absolutely riveting. Given what I consider to be the low to marginal quality of most of her films (Only When I Laugh and White Dog being the exceptions) it’s perhaps not saying much to credit this as my favorite of her screen performances, but it really is…she gives an authentic performance and absolutely makes the film for me.

It must be quite the challenge for actors to portray individuals who are emotionally shut-down, but McNichol gets under the skin of her character, infusing Kathy’s low-flame jitteriness with a great deal of poignance. McNichol has several really remarkable scenes, one of my favorites being when she is afraid to go to sleep and is asked by the empathetic sleep therapist to relate a sleep ritual from her childhood. Just absolutely marvelous work.

All of the performances in Dream Lover are uniformly fine, some suffering at the hand of their utilitarian service to the machinations of plot more than others. But I particularly like Ben Masters as the sleep researcher. He shares an easy rapport with McNichol and his genuine, seemingly nice-guy vibe plays well to the elements of the story centering on Kathy's suppressed distrust of (and impaired judgment regarding) men.

Gayle Hunnicutt & John McMartin appear in brief roles as family friends 

THE STUFF OF FANTASY
Dream Lover embodies two of my favorite things in off-beat films: 1) So-called "serious" directors tackling genre material, 2) Actors cast against type.
Alan J. Pakula can't help but bring a lot of technical skill and intelligence to this thriller (in spite of a screenplay that too often has intelligent characters regularly engaging in dumb behavior in order to keep the plot moving), but Dream Lover has the feel of a melodrama too proud to revel in its own enjoyably schlocky premise, instead, it keeps trying to convince us of the soberness of its subject matter. Too bad, because for at least 60 of its 104 minutes, Pakula looks like he's willing to go for broke and serve up a tasty, low-calorie thrill-ride. It only falls apart when he tries to shoehorn in the substance.
As for Kristy McNichol, her participation in the film was a major draw for me back in 1986, it's nice to report that her subtle and affecting performance looks even better to me 30-years later. Not so much the '80s fashions and Kenny G-type sax musical interludes.

The '80s were not fashion-forgiving

BONUS MATERIAL

 The theatrical trailer that got my pulse racing back in 1986

Copyright © Ken Anderson   2009 - 2016

DAUGHTERS OF DARKNESS 1971

“I’m just an outmoded character, nothing more. You know, the beautiful stranger, slightly sad, slightly…mysterious...that haunts one place after another.” 

In spite of their vast number and long history, I’m not sure I can name even five vampire movies I like. There’s Andy Warhol’s Dracula (1974), Werner Herzog’s Nosferatu the Vampyre (1979), The Hunger (1983), and… OK, looks like I hit the wall at three. Well, make that four; for topping this very short list and ranking #1 as my absolute favorite vampire movie of all time is Belgian director Harry Kümel’s sleek, sexy, and exceedingly stylish Daughters of Darkness.

A Belgian/French/Italian/U.S. co-production, Daughters of Darkness combines—with wit and flair—‘70s arthouse sophistication with good ol’ grindhouse exploitation in the telling of a modern-day Countess Dracula myth set in a desolate, cavernous hotel in Belgium. Conceived as a strictly commercial venture contingent on the internationally market-friendly ingredients of bosoms and bloodshed, Daughters of Darkness, in the hands of Harry Kümel (whose other work I’m unfamiliar with) undergoes a kind of alchemic transformation. A transformation wherein the alternatively limiting factors of a low budget, brief shooting schedule, somewhat trashy material, and a minimal cast of unevenly-skilled actors with clashing accents—become the very elements that, when combined, contribute the most to defining the offbeat allure and eerie fascination of this film.

Delphine Seyrig as Countess Elizabeth Bathory

John Karlen as Stefan Chilton

Danielle Ouimet as Valerie Chilton

Andrea Rau as Ilona Harczy

Paul Esser as Pierre

When the train of a honeymooning couple jumps the track (literally and metaphorically), the pair, having wed in Switzerland just three hours hence and now en route to England, is temporarily waylaid in Ostend, Belgium. Stefan, the groom (Karlen), strangely reluctant to reach their destination and have his bride Valerie (Ouimet) meet her aristocratic mother-in-law, suggests a brief stay at an off-season beach resort where they are the only guests.“It’s rather dead around here this time of the year,” intones Pierre (Paul Esser) the concierge.

That is, until night falls and an exquisite, 1940s vintage Bristol motorcar arrives at the hotel, from which emerge a mysterious, vaguely predatory, smoky-voiced Hungarian countess (Seyrig) and her exotically overripe “secretary,” (Ilona (Rau). Descending upon the establishment like a couple of, well...vampire bats, upon catching sight of our unwitting honeymooners (who, given the degree of duplicity and discord already manifest between the two, appear to have met and married in haste) our chichi new guests immediately lay claim. 

"...both so perfect. So good-looking. So sweet."
The concierge recognizes the unchanged Countess from 40 years earlier,
when he was just a young bellboy at the hotel

Veiling steely determination behind a charming smile and the kind of languid savior faire unique to the very rich and well-traveled, the glamorously debauched countess wastes no time insinuating herself into the lives of the newlyweds (think Eva Gabor as Marlene Dietrich cast as a lesbian Auntie Mame). Corruption of the innocent is the goal and possession of that which is most desired is the objective, but the countess and her protégé soon find the path to seduction is not without its obstructions.

There’s the persistent interference of the suspicious and bewildered hotel concierge who always seems to materialize on the periphery of the action (“He’s already up…when does he sleep?” snaps the countess at one point). And then there’s that other figure from the countess’ past, a retired policeman (Georges Jamin) engaged in the amateur investigation of a recent rash of murders of young women.

But it is Stefan, the not-quite better half of our virtuous couple, who may not be all that he seems. Sharing with the countess an eerily simpatico affinity for brutality and the hypnotic allure of decadence, Stephan is both match and pawn to the countess’ femme fatale charm. And true to form, Stephan is yet another self-assured male who enters into a game thinking he holds all the cards, only to discover that the women in his life have rewritten the rules.

The Happy Couple
Both Roman Polanski (Bitter Moon) & Paul Schrader (The Comfort of Strangers ) have made 
interesting films about debauched couples intent on seducing innocent, unsuspecting couples

Daughters of Darkness is a knowing (and sometimes winking) take on the vampire film, alternately sending up and paying homage to a genre that, by the '70s, was in dire need of a transfusion. In playing it straight, yet with a touch of clever malice, the film‒not unlike the countess herself ‒ exists tantalizingly between two worlds: it’s both a deliberately leisurely, aesthetic horror film and an amusingly camp Eurotrash skin flick. The unified benefit to each is that the arty side never has the chance to become pretentious, and the exploitation side is surprisingly, refreshingly restrained and imbued with a great deal of sophistication and sly wit.

Stylistically, Daughters of Darkness is a knockout, making subtle visual reference to other genre films and cinema in general. Among them: Hitchcock’s Psycho, Garbo, Louise Brooks, the horror tropes of F. W. Murnau and Tod Browning, and Dietrich’s von Sternberg collaborations. It's a film so comfortable in its self-awareness that at one point a character (the detective) breaks the fourth wall, looks directly into the camera and identifies the film's tone and wry perspective.

Georges Jamin as the Retired Policeman reminds us not to take what is to follow too seriously

 “The kind of thing you read about in medieval manuscripts. You know, silly tales about ghosts chased away by garlic…and vampires shrinking from crosses and running water and daylight. Satan’s ritual under a full moon.”

   

The neoclassic opulence of the desolate Belgian sea resort makes for a picturesque alternative to the usual gothic vampire castle, while the desolate backdrop of a vacation spot in the bleakness of winter predates Nicolas Roeg’s similar use of Venice, Italy in the 1974 supernatural thriller Don’t Look Now (especially the scene where Stefan & Valerie explore the canals of Bruges and happen upon the scene of a brutal murder). 

I can’t attest as to what a horror/vampire film fan makes of Daughters of Darkness (my sense is that it’s too slow and lacking in scares and gore to be satisfying), but everything about this movie is as suited to my tastes as a Ken Russell-Roman Polanski film festival.

WHAT I LOVE ABOUT THIS FILM

There’s a kind of predictable, to-be-expected adherence to form and structure that comes with the territory of genre films. Filmmakers deviate from it at their own risk. As a movie fan, I can’t help but give historical credit to horror films in general for their vast stylistic influence on the art form, as such. But as a non-fan of vampire films, it helped a great deal that I came to Daughters of Darkness with little in the way of expectations and devoid of an awareness of any vampire film "traditions" I longed to see upheld. I simply hoped the film wouldn’t live up to its limp U.S. ad campaign and that cheesy title, which made the film sound like a made-for-TV movie starring Donna Mills and Kay Lenz. 

To my delight, Daughters of Darkness proved to be one happy surprise after another. It felt both old-fashioned and invigoratingly fresh. An arty exploitation film that I fell in love with the moment Delphine Seyrig’s elegant vampire makes her memorable entrance.

"I want to be loved. I want everybody to love me."

In addition to what I find irresistible about the concept of Daughters of Darkness (for my money, female vampires are just waaaay cooler than their male counterparts) is the way it looks. I would stylistically compare it to the works of Roman Polanski and Ken Russell. Director Harry Kümel, who has stated he was influenced a great deal by surreal and expressionist cinema in devising a look for the film, gives Daughters of Darkness an operatic theatricality reminiscent of Ken Russell (as much as its meager budget allows). The vivid use of color abounds (pointedly, red, black, and white) and the compositions are arresting in their beauty and in creating atmosphere. 

The similarities to Polanski arise out of the film’s measured pacing, claustrophobic atmosphere, and emphasis on psycho-sexual conflict. Manipulation is indistinguishable from seduction. Evasion is revelatory. Pain is pleasure. Harry Kümel has taken stock characters and genre tropes and created one of the most gleefully sleek, consistently surprising, intriguingly stylish horror films I’ve ever seen. 

Worthy of Polanski
A nightmarish shot of the pre-dawn disposal of a dead body as two figures
 (looking like winged creatures in black & white) retreat into the distance

PERFORMANCES

Successful casting is always a result of a great deal more than simply hiring capable actors. Many an enjoyable film has been populated with folks who couldn’t act their way out of a broom closet (Beyond the Valley of the Dolls), while numerous stinkers feature casts who have to move their Oscar & Tony Awards out of the way to get to the door (August: Osage County). It's easy to understand why Kümel was able to secure financing for Daughters of Darkness exclusively due to the participation of French film star Delphine Seyrig (Last Year at Marienbad); she is the main reason the film is worth seeing at all. Everything about the film – from décor, cinematography, screenplay, and supporting cast – feels as though it is in service of and silent acquiescence to, her extraordinary presence and canny performance. She’s really that good, and so incredibly fascinating to watch.

Things That Make You Go Hmmm
Stefan is brought to a state of ecstasy recounting the bloody atrocities of Elizabeth's ancestor 

Possessing an unforgettably seductive voice, Seyrig conducts herself with a kind of otherworldly regal aplomb making plausible the film’s conceit that her character is not (as she claims) the ancestor of Countess Elizabeth Bathory (a notorious true-life 15th-century serial killer) but the genuine, ageless article.

Best of all, Seyrig’s characterization is a refreshing interpretation of the female vampire. She dispenses with the clichés of the predatory vamp or femme fatale (no dark, sultry gazes or feline stalking); rather, she plays Countess Bathory as though she were a pampered cinema queen: eager to please, desperate to be liked, all disarming smiles and solicitous attentions, yet underneath it all, a despotic monster. 

"I wish I could die."

Another personal fave in the film is Ilona, the countess' pouty companion with the sexy 3-D lips. As embodied by German pinup model/actress Andrea Rau (who lends camp appeal by resembling a kewpie-doll Sally Bowles) her limitations as an actress are more than compensated for by her striking presence, appealing screen charisma, and a vague "otherness" that comes across in stilted line readings befitting her status as an alluringly louche member of the undead.

My general antipathy toward vampires accounts for my not recognizing - until fairly recently - actor John Karlen as Willie Loomis of the popular mid-60s vampire TV soap opera Dark Shadows (I was practically the only kid in my school who didn't watch it). As Stefan, Brooklyn-born Karlen, the only American in the cast, oozes so much Eurotrash skeeviness, I always assumed he was European. So, on that score at least, he certainly succeeds, and gives a solid, tensely mercurial performance.

Though it pains me to say so, hands-down prizes for the film's worst performance go to former Miss Quebec, Danielle Ouimet. It pains me because Ms. Ouiment’s barely discernible acting ability (she’s singularly inexpressive of voice and face) strangely works to her advantage in the context of the film. Surrounded by the morally desiccated people in a surreal environment under fantastic circumstances, Ouimet’s somewhat dazed countenance comes off as stylized and subtextural; as though the sole character in the film in possession of a soul is the one least able to express emotion.

"Be sure to tell the young woman 'Mother' sends regards."
Stefan is revealed to be the kept "Ilona" in a homosexual May/December pairing.
The feared "Mother" is portrayed by Dutch film director Fons Rademakers

THE STUFF OF DREAMS

Whether considered an arty trash film or a trashy art film (I personally think it’s a special kind of high-style pop masterpiece), Daughters of Darkness is a great deal of campy fun. I know next to nothing about Harry Kümel, but were I to go by the way this film makes me feel and how it engages me with its visuals, its sharp screenplay (credited to Kümel, Jean Ferry, Pierre Druot, and Manfred R. Köhler), and Seyrig’s knowing evocation of the film sirens of yesteryear; I would say he is a man who not only loves movies but understands them. It’s evident in every frame.

I'm a sucker (Hee hee!) for thematic a visual duality in movies

Les Lèvres Rouges (Red Lips) is just one of Daughter of Darkness' 14 international titles

Ever the illusionist, Elizabeth carries a mirrored compact despite (her being a vampire and all) not being able to see her own reflection

THE STUFF OF DREAMS
Apropos of the timeless beauty of Seyrig's Countess Bathory herself, Daughters of Darkness is a film that looks better to me with each passing year. Save for a rather harrowing shower scene and a still-creepy nighttime burial sequence, the sex and violence that once seemed so sensational is now rather tame. Similarly, with movies now becoming faster and busier, yet saying less; the deliberate pacing of Daughters of Darkness feels like a welcome extravagance.
Even the film's camp elements, in this age of overkill and overdetermination, sparkles on a far more ingenious plane than what I seem to remember ("Good day to be alive, eh?" remarks the countess in forced jocularity to the concierge upon returning to the hotel after a particularly grisly homicidal outing).

It's Not Easy Having A Good Time

In the end, you've got to hand it to a director told to go out and make a commercial film with plenty of sex and violence, and he comes back with an erotic expressionist feminist lesbian arthouse camp vampire horror mini-classic.

BONUS MATERIAL

Director Harry Kümel talks about Daughters of Darkness in the excellent BBC documentary Horror Europa (2012) by Mark Gattis. He's the first director interviewed, and he sheds fascinating light on the reasons behind his choices for the look of the countess and the dominance of the colors red, black, and white. 

I also understand that the DVD release is loaded with commentaries and extras.
*6/10/16 Update - Just watched the DVD and listened to Harry Kümel's commentary. Incredible evidence that one can be handed a genre film and still imbue it with an aesthetic sensibility. Of course, I especially love when he says "Films are not reality...they are dreams. They are the stuff that dreams are made of." A man after my own heart.

Copyright © Ken Anderson   2009 - 2016