1985: The Year that Indiana Jones Put the Moves on a Hot Amish Chick

I'm sorry, I just can't get over that. Not that my scarce experiences with the Amish have led me to believe that they're ugly exactly, but this girl was pretty much right off the runway. I'll get to that point when I get to that movie. Anyway, this was a bit of an odd year. Nothing in it was bad per se. Some just didn't meet expectations or weren't as good as they could've been. Which still beats a year full of crap like I've been sitting through lately. So I can't complain. Although I probably will anyway.

Especially about this film: The Color Purple, which was a bit of a major letdown considering that it was directed by Spielberg. You know, Spielberg reminds me of Shakespeare a little bit. And yeah that's probably one of the more random things I've said and to tell you the truth, I actually find that statement insulting (not sure to which man though). But here's why: as I previously stated WAY long ago in a rant about Billy Shakes, when you read or see his super famous pieces of work like "Macbeth" or "Othello" you see why he's as famous as he is. But then you start to notice that he wrote about 30 more plays than the ones you usually hear about and that those plays aren't too impressive (at least by comparison). Spielberg is the same, he has such an impressive variety of work that he's done that we forget that he also did things like this movie and Amistad (which I haven't seen all the way through but it's not that great from what I've seen). Yet still, I expect a lot from the man because he's probably the most well-known director out there today. And this movie is by no means a bad movie. It just has a few things that drag it down, not all of which are its fault. I'm being very cryptic today...what I mean to say is that Oprah drags the movie down and so does Whoopi Goldberg. It's not the movie's fault that I know them as an annoying talk show host and the goofy center square. Because even if Oprah's show was on back then (don't care enough to check) it certainly wasn't as well-known as it is today. Yet still, she's suppoed to be playing this rebellious woman and I couldn't take her seriously at all. The scenes were supposed to be heroic and dramatic and they played like an SNL sketch. And Whoopi has largely become a caricature of herself. When I was running through the entire run of every Star Trek series, after 30-some episodes that she was in I still had a tough time buying her in the role of the wise bartender Guinan. Because she's just a nut, plain and simple. Does she do a good job in the movie? I honestly couldn't tell you. It would seem to me that she did a pretty good job but who knows? I'll tell you who was good: Danny Glover, stepping out of his usual type of role and playing the abusive husband. He pretty much saved the movie for me, even though he's mostly a supporting character. The film's focus is on Whoopi's character and her letters to the sister that was taken from her long ago. And I will say that even with my issues with the film, the events leading up to their reunion was still really powerful. Even with the sub-par music, which wasn't composed by John Williams! What's up with that? Pretty much every other Spielberg movie in existence is scored by Johnny, and his scores are a large part of why the films are so good. This is literally the only film of his that Williams didn't score, and it shows. The music sounds a bit like his, but not enough. A Williams score wouldn't have fixed the problems with the film, but it would've improved the film greatly.

Now here's a shocker for you, the movie that I thought was going to suck the most in this year turned out to be my favorite: Kiss of the Spider Woman. It sounds like a cheap Tarzan serial, but it's actually an intense character study. The reason I thought it would be terrible is because it stars William Hurt, my new least-favorite person. And he's playing a gay guy, so I thought it'd be 2 hours of Hurt putting on a bad lisp. But he gives a pretty incredible performance in the film, and I think it explains why his other roles are no good. He did such a great job here and rightfully won the Oscar, that people wanted him in everything. Even for roles that didn't fit him, like oh say...every other role I've seen him in lately. But let's be positive about the man, because it's probably our only chance. It's largely a two-man show between his character and Raul Julia's. And yes, his name has accent marks at various places but this website makes it annoying to put them there. So live with it. Anyway, Hurt's character is a gay man in a Brazilian prison for, ermm..."corrupting a young boy" and Julia's character is a political prisoner (a revolutionary against the government). The two form an unlikely respect and fondness for one another but not in a traditional "Buddy Cop" movie way. It's a tough road, and both actors are superb and totally sell the relationship. Though there are many differences between the two characters, one of the most interesting is the manner in which they deal with their imprisonment. Hurt decides to indulge in fantasy by "remembering" a movie, a Nazi propaganda film, and relaying it to his cellmate. There are interesting and subtle parallels between the story of the film-within-a-film and the film itself. That's really the whole movie and I know it sounds obscure, but to say more would ruin the experience. It's an excellent movie that can have its entire plot described in fewer words than I used, but the real substance of the film has to be viewed. I will say that it loses a little bit of steam in the last 15 minutes because it changes the dynamic, but it's an appropriate change so they really only lose you for a few minutes. All in all, it was maybe a little too out there to be a winner that year, but I think it was the best film of the 5 selections. It was also the first independent film to be nominated (and still one of the only I believe). So enjoy this nice William Hurt moment while it lasts. Take a good look, because it's the last time.

This next movie is pretty odd, but I loved it: Prizzi's Honor. I'd never heard of it before, not even in passing, but it's a bit of a gem. It stars Jack Nicholson and Kathleen Turner as a pre-modern Mr. and Mrs. Smith. Well, instead of spies they're mob hitmen but it's the same basic dynamic. They fall for each other and are eventually tasked with killing each other, for reasons that are deliberately convoluted and darkly funny. Which is how you could describe the whole movie. It sort of has a similar tone to Dr. Strangelove in that it's dealing with serious things in a completely not serious, and even mundane, manner. But it's either more blatant than Kubrick's masterpiece or less blatant, I'm not sure which. I'm not sure of a lot of things today, either 1985 was a glitch in the Matrix or I'm losing it. Either way, I'll explain the tone in this way: one of the best scenes is where everyone is sitting around plotting the demise of everyone else and then the head honcho mafia don all of a sudden says, "would you like a cookie?" and holds up a plate full of desserts. It's really not funny, but it's hilarious! He's this griseled old Don Corleone type dude, and he discusses killing people while offering cookies. Disturbing, yet awesome. This pretty much describes the whole movie, which has very little actual killing in it but a lot of dark themes. And I normally don't like to spoil stuff, but this is just too good (you've been warned). Instead of ending the movie where they both kill all the mobsters or they run off to Cabo or they both die, they do, in fact, carry out the hits on one another. She misses him with a gunshot and he hits her in the neck with a knife. So after a whole movie of: "I won't go after her, I love her!" and "he's my whole life, I can't kill him!" they just decided they didn't really care. And the movie ends about 30 seconds after Nicholson kills Turner, and he picks up the phone to ask out the daughter of one of the other mobsters. Maybe I'm disturbed in the head, but I thought that was awesome.

Now here's what I was talking about earlier, the little summer blockbuster that could: Witness. I phrase it that way because it has all the elements of a summer blockbuster: romance with hot girl, shootout, humor, warming of the heart, etc. I feel like some network executive pointed at one of his writers and said, "make me a blockbuster that involves the Amish!" Why do this? Because it hadn't been done I suppose. Wikipedia tells me it came out in February, but whatever. You don't have to come out in summer to be a summer blockbuster, plus in February it's summer in Australia or another such place. Anyway, I really found this movie to be a bit goofy. Not because it was bad, just because of the fact that it was nominated and really that it was made at all. I'm just baffled over how the idea for the film came about. Was somebody at a farmer's market while fantasizing about shooting bad guys? Did somebody with an action hero complex find himself oddly aroused by the Amish woman selling the fresh-squeezed orange juice? Maybe both of those things happened and those two screenwriters got together with another one who thought Harrison Ford was the man (this could describe any worthwhile human being). Whatever its inception stemmed from, the movie is definitely enjoyable. It's about an Amish kid who witnesses (oh snap! title of the movie) a cop getting killed, and so he goes into a makeshift "witness protection" (there it was again!) in his own community with Harrison Ford there to protect him, and flirt with his mom. Who was definitely pretty hot. See now, I guess it was impossible to get actual Amish people to play in this movie, given their beliefs, but a lot of it seems like socialites from the big city decided to move out to the country. The way that they speak and act doesn't really mesh with real Amish people that I've seen or with how they've been portrayed in other films/shows. In fact, there was apparently an uproar in the Amish community concerning their portrayal in the film. What the Amish were doing in a movie theater seeing an R-rated movie, I'm not sure. Anyway, the script for the film won for Best Screenplay (for unknown reasons) and the Netflix description touted it as the template for many modern script-writers to this day. I'm not sure why that is, but maybe that's the problem with my script. It could be I'm missing something that this script has and that's why my script won't fly (my best guess is a topless Amish lady). Okay, I've picked on it enough. It's fun and it's even touching at times, but that's all it is. Maybe they were struggling with the same issues back then as today: lacking viewership of the Oscars. So perhaps they wanted to throw in a popular movie just to get people to watch. I can't say I disagree with that as a business decision, and it's nice to have popular movies nominated sometimes. Too bad they couldn't have carried that mentality over to help Batman out in 2008.

I wish I could say that the reason a popular movie was included was because the winner was so much better than everything else, but I was kind of underwhelmed by this year's winner: Out of Africa. I'm a big fan of long movies, and you can't even say I'm opposed to ones that are romances. Because I thought The English Patient was outstanding and I even like Titanic (even though I have its director on my hit list). But this movie had what I call a "complete lack of surprise." Meaning, absolutely nothing happens in it where I go, "hmm that's interesting." I'm not even talking about plot twists, just interesting developments, or interesting scenes in general. There was maybe one in the whole movie, where they both kill a lion and it kind of increases their attraction to each other. That was moderately interesting, but the rest of the movie just sits there. It's beautifully filmed, there's no question about that. A lot of the scenery was just breathtaking, and the acting was really good, and the music was really good. Basically, the movie was done about as well as it could have possibly been done, but it wasn't drawing from anything that I find to be remotely worth telling. Or at least, anything worth telling for 2 hours and 40 minutes. And also, I really don't think Meryl Streep was a good choice for this movie. She put on a great accent, but she still sounded like Meryl Streep. She's like Jimmy Stewart, he always did a great job in a variety of roles but he still sounded like Jimmy Stewart. Jimmy as a lawyer, Jimmy as a killer, whatever. So Meryl always does a great job, but I always just feel like I'm watching her play someone. I never sit there and forget I'm watching someone act (exception: Sophie's Choice). I can't say as I've seen all of her movies, because I haven't seen a ton, but that's my impression from some of her roles. And let's get blunt for a second: I don't think she was attractive enough for this role. I'm going to try to explain myself without sounding like a complete jerk. Robert Redford is a very handsome man even today, back then he was especially handsome. When he was in the African countryside shooting lions looking all rugged and tough, I was about ready to switch teams and make out with this dude. And the woman who he falls in love with is Meryl Streep? She's not ugly, but she's not particularly good looking either. And there are enough ugly jerks going out with gorgeous and nice women in the world that we don't need that kind of dynamic on film too. Apparently Sydney Pollack had the same thought, and Meryl convinced him she was good-looking enough by showing up to her interview with a low-cut top and a push-up bra. Umm...yeah. If that was the only time he thought she was attractive enough then didn't he stop to think that the whole thing takes place in the early 1900s when such things didn't exist? But I digress (about cleavage of all things). Anyway, aside from that whole dynamic some other stuff doesn't work too. Except...wait, that's the whole movie. It's entirely based on their romance. No side plots, nothing. So it's a really beautifully filmed and well-acted representation of not much. Kinda strange. I feel like it had enough big people involved and wonderful scenery that it probably had its name marked down to win from day one, but if you really look at it I don't think there's much there. My mother told me I'd enjoy it more if I was a middle-aged woman. So umm...yeah...as soon as that happens I'll re-blog it and we'll see where we are.

Well I guess that wasn't too painful, as far as the 80s go. And we're halfway through! It seems like just yesterday that William Hurt was forcing me to contemplate which bridge to jump off of. We turned out to be buddies after all, for 1985 anyway. He's returning in '83 so the rivalry lives on...but before that we've got 1984. Which includes 4 movies I know so little about that I can't think up anything clever to describe them, and a winner which is probably one of the best movies I've ever seen. Enticing!