Psycho Alley-Ida Lupino’s “Roadhouse”( 1948)-A Film Review

Psycho Alley-Ida Lupino’s “Roadhouse”( 1948)-A Film Review   

DVD Review

By Film Critic Sandy Salmon

Roadhouse, starring Ida Lupino, Cornel Wilde, Richard Widmark, 1948

There are a lot of whackos in the world, have been for a long time and are not some modern contrivance. Take the bad guy Jefty in this film under review, Roadhouse, a film released in 1948 long before Sir Alfred Hitchcock’s psycho Norman Bates made half of my growing up generation afraid to take showers without an armed guard in the bathroom. This Jefty, played by Richard Widmark who had recently had an Oscar nomination for his role as the sicko hitman gangster who you also would be in need armed guard, but everywhere, in Kiss Of Death so he was primed for the part, is kindred although no one from my parents’ generation would have needed an armed guard after viewing this production-although wise advise to stay far away from this guy was in order.

Here’s the play as my old friend Sam Lowell from this site now out to pasture as that feisty film critic emeritus would say. Jefty ran an aptly enough named roadhouse out in Podunk inherited from his father so he never had to spent much time working hard labor to get where he was-that fact if one checked with a psychiatrist would yield some interesting results. This roadhouse complete with bar, club, bowling alleys and who knows what else was going on in those little side rooms where lots of deep moans were often heard made Jefty the cat’s meow around town although he was nothing but a wanderlust playboy if left to his own devices. The real work, the heavy lifting, the day to day management of the operations was Pete, played by dashing Cornel Wilde, a 1940s heart throb according to my late mother, at least to her. But Jefty made it clear Pete was nothing but indispensable hired help.

On a trip to the Windy City, to Chi town, Jefty picked up Lily, played by doe-eyed Ida Lupino last seen in this space when Sam Lowell reviewed her as gangster Roy Earle’s doll in High Sierra uttering the word breakout when they finally wasted the guy out in the hills, a third-rate singer, maybe had been a B-girl, done a little off-hand whoring she never let on much except what she wanted anybody to know. That kind of dame. (These post-Code films for a long time left the professional attributes of women with a past rather vague by current standards.) A warbler, and as it turned out one with not much left of a voice but they was she dug down deep into some Johnny Mercer (One More For My Baby) and Cochran-Newman tunes it didn’t really matter whether she could hold the high white note or not. One of the characters in the film, Susie, Pete’s soon to be ex-girlfriend noted maybe enviously that she got a lot of mileage out of that ragtag voice and even Pete who initially was skeptical, saw her as just another one of Jefty’s wayward tramps, saw how she held an audience and brought in dough. A keeper.

But let’s back up to that Susie the soon to be ex-girlfriend statement because that will tell the tale. See Jefty’s idea in bringing Lily back from Chi town was to marry her, marry this dame unlike any other dame he had run around with. Problem, no, two problems. Lily obviously could care less about Jefty except as a high-end meal ticket. What would make that a problem was that Jefty did not like his well-laid plans to be busted up by a simple thing like a dame giving him the dust-off. Next, from the get-go, from about scene number one in the club while Lily was singing and Pete was watching with his tongue hung out you know that they will dance around each other, will be getting under the, unseen, silky sheets before long.

Jefty will definitely not like that scenario. And has the evil genius and half-crazed social pathology to screw things up. Simple, our boy Jefty framed Pete for grand larceny, for grabbing the daily take rather than putting it in the night deposit box. Yeah, get rid of Pete for say two to ten in the state pen and he was home free with the now free Lily. As an old corner used to say-nice moves. But remember this Jefty was a long gone daddy, had the weirdest psycho chuckle seen on screen until that time. He was going to bait the bait but good. He got Pete paroled to him, an outstanding citizen in many small town eyes so he could taunt Pete enough to maybe attempt to murder him and face the big step-off. Well you know as well as I do that if you play with fire like our man Jefty you are going to be burned and one of the characters in the end does kill the bastard. See the film to see which one. But also see it to see Ida Lupino hold your attention with her sad weary eyes and croaky voice despite yourself when she is at the cigarette scarred, hers, piano. Just like she did to me. Enough said.                             

Films to While Away The Class Struggle By-"Incident At Ogala: The Leonard Peltier Story"- Leonard Peltier Must Not Die In Jail

Films to While Away The Class Struggle By-"Incident At Ogala: The Leonard Peltier Story"- Leonard Peltier Must Not Die In Jail

Recently I have begun to post entries under the headline- “Songs To While Away The Class Struggle By”-that will include progressive and labor-oriented songs that might be of general interest to the radical public. I have decided to do the same for some films that may perk that same interest under the title in this entry’s headline. In the future I expect to do the same for books under a similar heading.-Markin

DVD Review

Incident At Ogala: The Leonard Peltier Story, Leonard Peltier, various leaders of the American Indian Movement (AIM), defense attorneys, prosecuting attorneys, witnesses and by-standers, directed by Michael Apted, 1991

Let’s start this review of this documentary of the incidents surrounding the case of Leonard Peltier at the end. Or at least the end of this documentary, 1991. Leonard Peltier, a well-known leader of the Native American movement, convicted of the 1975 murder, execution-style, of two FBI agents on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota after he had been extradited from Canada in the wake of the acquittal of two other Pine Ridge residents. In an interview from federal prison in that period the then still relatively young Peltier related that after receiving his life sentences and being told by prison officials that that meant his release date would be in 2035 he stated that he hoped not, for he would then be an old, old man. Here is what should make everyone interested in the case, and everyone interested in the least sense of justice, even just bourgeois justice, blood boil, he is now an old sick man and he is still in jail for a crime that he did not commit, and certainly one that was not proven beyond that cherished “reasonable doubt”

This documentary, narrated by Robert Redford in his younger days as well, goes step by step through the case from the pre-murder period when Native Americans, catching the political consciousness crest begun in the 1960s by the black civil rights movement and the anti-Vietnam war movement, started organizing, mainly through the American Indian Movement (AIM), on the Indian reservations of the West, some of the most impoverished areas in all the Americas. The focal point of this militant organizing effort came in the war zone-showdown, the siege at Wounded Knee in 1973. The tension that hovered in the air in the aftermath of that war between the American government and its Indian agent supporters on one side, and the AIM-led “warrior nation” on the other is the setting for this incident at Ogala.

Through reenactment of the crime scene; eye witnesses, interested and disinterested, voluntary or coerced; defense strategies at both trials from self-defense to lack of physical evidence, and on appeal; the prosecution's case, its insufficient evidence, and it various maneuvers to inflame white juries against unpopular or misunderstood Native Americans in order to get someone convicted for the murders of one of their own; the devastating, but expected effect of the trials on the political organizing by AIM; and the stalwart and defiant demeanor of one Leonard Peltier all come though in this presentation. As a long time supporter of organizations that defend class-war prisoners, like Leonard Peltier, this film only makes that commitment even firmer. With that in mind- Free Leonard Peltier-He Must Not Die In Jail!

Films To While Away The Time By- Humphrey Bogart’s “In A Lonely Place”

Films To While Away The Time By- Humphrey Bogart’s “In A Lonely Place”

DVD Review





In A Lonely Place, starring Humphrey Bogart, Gloria Grahame, Columbia Pictures, 1950

I admit, admit up front, that I am partial to rugged windmill-chasing Humphrey Bogart roles like him as Sam Spade in The Maltese Falcon trying to get a little rough justice in this wicked old world and not afraid to take a beating for the cause, or bust up some wrong gee dreams in the process (although admittedly getting a little thrown off the tracks by a whiff of Mary Astor’s perfume, but that is to be expected). Or another windmill-chaser, Rick, in Casablanca when he knows, knows deep in his soul that the troubles of three love-stuck people in that wicked old World War II Nazi world didn’t amount to a “hill of beans” against the darkening night (although there too he was thrown off by that damn dame perfume). And what about his role in To Have And Have Not when he is again forced, as Captain Harry Morgan, to step it up a notch in that still wicked old World War II world (that time, come to think of it, he too got thrown off the tracks by a woman, by a whistler of all things).

After that big manly, windmill-chasing build-up, complete with cigarette, unfiltered, of course, Luckies probably, in hand it is hard to see old Bogie as kind of troubled, well, dope. A guy who can’t handle his emotions, or his fists, when some little breeze problem come s through the door. Against friend of foe, against some Johnny Rico or some frail. However that is exactly the problem before us as Bogie plays a troubled screen writer (aren’t they all, troubled that is, having to write some pretty tough stuff to earn their dollar a word).

Maybe I had better give you the “skinny” here so you’ll get my drift. Dix (Bogie) is a maybe “has been” writer who is in a dry spell. He invites a hat- check girl from the club home (what club? any club, any gin joint in the world) to give him the story line of a book that he is supposed to do the screenplay for. And that is all he wants. (Ya, I know that “come on” is weak but there it is). The problem: early next morning she is found dead, very dead, in some arroyo road side ditch. And Dix is primo suspect numero uno. Enter one lovely blond alibi, Lauren (played by Gloria Grahame), who had seen Dix sent the hat check girl off alone. Dix is still not off the hook though since downtown (the cops, okay) are not convinced that Dix didn’t do it. This unlikely pair begins an affair. The story then gets tense as Lauren (and others) begin to believe Dix did do it after he exhibited extreme anger (and violent acts) at the accusations. Well, Dix didn’t do it but he lost Laurel by his mad man American Psych 101 demeanor. And so he walks alone at the end, a contrite but broken man.

See, no foggy airfield sent-offs amid the clamor of war next fights, no fast boat get-aways to Free French territory and the fight continues, and no wacko stuff of dreams busted wiser man here, just alone. Bogie alone. Jesus.

For The Late Rosalie Sorrels-To An Old Unrepetant Wobblie- Rosalie Sorrels' Farewell To Utah Phillips

For The Late Rosalie Sorrels-To An Old Unrepetant Wobblie- Rosalie Sorrels' Farewell To Utah Phillips

If I Could Be The Rain I Would Be Rosalie Sorrels-The Legendary Folksinger-Songwriter Has Her Last Go Round At 83

By Music Critic Bart Webber

Back the day, back in the emerging folk minute of the 1960s that guys like Sam Lowell, Si Lannon, Josh Breslin, the late Peter Paul Markin and others were deeply immersed in all roads seemed to lead to Harvard Square with the big names, some small too which one time I made the subject of a series, or rather two series entitled respectively Not Bob Dylan and Not Joan Baez about those who for whatever reason did not make the show over the long haul, passing through the Club 47 Mecca and later the Café Nana and Club Blue, the Village down in NYC, North Beach out in San Francisco, and maybe Old Town in Chicago. Those are the places where names like Baez, Dylan, Paxton, Ochs, Collins and a whole crew of younger folksingers, some who made it like Tom Rush and Joni Mitchell and others like Eric Saint Jean and Minnie Murphy who didn’t, like  who all sat at the feet of guys like Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger got their first taste of the fresh breeze of the folk minute, that expression courtesy of the late Markin, who was among the first around to sample the breeze.

(I should tell you here in parentheses so you will keep it to yourselves that the former three mentioned above never got over that folk minute since they will still tell a tale or two about the times, about how Dave Van Ronk came in all drunk one night at the Café Nana and still blew everybody away, about catching Paxton changing out of his Army uniform when he was stationed down at Fort Dix  right before a performance at the Gaslight, about walking down the street Cambridge with Tom Rush just after he put out No Regrets/Rockport Sunday, and about affairs with certain up and coming female folkies like the previously mentioned Minnie Murphy at the Club Nana when that was the spot of spots. Strictly aficionado stuff if you dare go anywhere within ten miles of the subject with any of them -I will take my chances here because this notice, this passing of legendary Rosalie Sorrels a decade after her dear friend Utah Phillips is important.)

Those urban locales were certainly the high white note spots but there was another important strand that hovered around Saratoga Springs in upstate New York, up around Skidmore and some of the other upstate colleges. That was Caffe Lena’s, run by the late Lena Spenser, a true folk legend and a folkie character in her own right, where some of those names played previously mentioned but also where some upstarts from the West got a chance to play the small crowds who gathered at that famed (and still existing) coffeehouse. Upstarts like the late Bruce “Utah” Phillips (although he could call several places home Utah was key to what he would sing about and rounded out his personality). And out of Idaho one Rosalie Sorrels who just joined her long-time friend Utah in that last go-round at the age of 83.

Yeah, came barreling like seven demons out there in the West, not the West Coast west that is a different proposition. The West I am talking about is where what the novelist Thomas Wolfe called the place where the states were square and you had better be as well if you didn’t want to starve or be found in some empty arroyo un-mourned and unloved. A tough life when the original pioneers drifted westward from Eastern nowhere looking for that pot of gold or at least some fresh air and a new start away from crowded cities and sweet breathe vices. A tough life worthy of song and homage. Tough going too for guys like Joe Hill who tried to organize the working people against the sweated robber barons of his day (they are still with us as we are all now very painfully and maybe more vicious than their in your face forbear). Struggles, fierce down at the bone struggles also worthy of song and homage. Tough too when your people landed in rugged beautiful two-hearted river Idaho, tried to make a go of it in Boise, maybe stopped short in Helena but you get the drift. A different place and a different type of subject matter for your themes than lost loves and longings.  

Rosalie Sorrels could write those songs as well, as well as anybody but she was as interested in the social struggles of her time (one of the links that united her with Utah) and gave no quarter when she turned the screw on a lyric. The last time I saw Rosalie perform in person was back in 2002 when she performed at the majestic Saunders Theater at Harvard University out in Cambridge America at what was billed as her last go-round, her hanging up her shoes from the dusty travel road. (That theater complex contained within the Memorial Hall dedicated to the memory of the gallants from the college who laid down their heads in that great civil war that sundered the country. The Harvards did themselves proud at collectively laying down their heads at seemingly every key battle that I am aware of when I look up at the names and places. A deep pride runs through me at those moments)

Rosalie Sorrels as one would expect on such an occasion was on fire that night except the then recent death of another folk legend, Dave Von Ronk, who was supposed to be on the bill (and who was replaced by David Bromberg who did a great job banging out the blues unto the heavens) cast a pall over the proceedings. I will always remember the crystal clarity and irony of her cover of her classic Old Devil Time that night -yeah, give me one more chance, one more breathe. But I will always think of If I Could Be The Rain and thoughst of washing herself down to the sea whenever I hear her name. RIP Rosalie Sorrels 

CD REVIEW

Farewell To An Unrepentant Wobblie

Strangers In Another Country, Rosalie Sorrels and various artists, Red Barn records, 2008

The first paragraph here has been used in reviewing other Rosalie Sorrels CDs in this space.

“My first association of the name Rosalie Sorrels with folk music came, many years ago now, from hearing the recently departed folk singer/storyteller/ songwriter and unrepentant Wobblie (IWW) Utah Phillips mention his long time friendship with her going back before he became known as a folksinger. I also recall that combination of Sorrels and Phillips as he performed his classic “Starlight On The Rails” and she his also classic “If I Could Be The Rain” on a PBS documentary honoring the Café Lena in Saratoga, New York, a place that I am also very familiar with for many personal and musical reasons. Of note here: it should be remembered that Rosalie saved, literally, many of the compositions that Utah left helter-skelter around the country in his “bumming” days.”

That said, what could be better than to have Rosalie pay musical tribute to one of her longest and dearest folk friends, her old comrade Utah Phillips, someone who it is apparent from this beautiful little CD was on the same wavelength as that old unrepentant Wobblie. Here Rosalie takes a wide scattering of Utah’s work from various times and places and gives his songs and storytelling her own distinctive twist.

For example? Well, right from the first song “Starlight On The Trail” about being adrift in America in the later part of the 20th century with its prologue taken from some thoughts on the writings of author Thomas Wolfe (of “You Can’t Go Home Again” fame). Or the stirring “He Comes Like The Rain” a fair description of Utah himself if one thinks about it. Or to get political (and worry about the next generations) “Enola Gay”. And political memory about the forgotten “pre-mature anti-fascist” heroes of the Abraham Lincoln Battalion of the International Brigades that fought in Spain when it counted in “Eddie’s Song”. Finally, how about the appropriate ‘Ashes On The Sea” complete with Kate Wolf/Woody Guthrie story. If there were more than a five star spot here I would click it. Utah, rest easy, Rosalie did good, she did very good by you here. Adieu, old working class warrior.


If I Could Be The Rain-"Utah Phillips"

Everybody I know sings this song their own way, and they arrive at their own understanding of it. Guy Carawan does it as a sing along. I guess he thinks it must have some kind of universal appeal. To me, it's a very personal song. It's about events in my life that have to do with being in love. I very seldom sing it myself for those reasons.


If I could be the rain, I'd wash down to the sea;
If I could be the wind, there'd be no more of me;
If I could be the sunlight, and all the days were mine,
I would find some special place to shine.

But all the rain I'll ever be is locked up in my eyes,
When I hear the wind it only whispers sad goodbyes.
If I could hide the way I feel I'd never sing again;
Sometimes I wish that I could be the rain.

If I could be the rain, I'd wash down to the sea;
If I could be the wind, there'd be no more of me;
If I could hide the way I feel I'd never sing again;
Sometimes I wish that I could be the rain.

Copyright ©1973, 2000 Bruce Phillips


THE TELLING TAKES ME HOME
(Bruce Phillips)

Let me sing to you all those songs I know
Of the wild, windy places locked in timeless snow,
And the wide, crimson deserts where the muddy rivers flow.
It's sad, but the telling takes me home.

Come along with me to some places that I've been
Where people all look back and they still remember when,
And the quicksilver legends, like sunlight, turn and bend
It's sad, but the telling takes me home.

Walk along some wagon road, down the iron rail,
Past the rusty Cadillacs that mark the boom town trail,
Where dreamers never win and doers never fail,
It's sad, but the telling takes me home.

I'll sing of my amigos, come from down below,
Whisper in their loving tongue the songs of Mexico.
They work their stolen Eden, lost so long ago.
It's sad, but the telling takes me home.

I'll tell you all some lies, just made up for fun,
And the loudest, meanest brag, it can beat the fastest gun.
I'll show you all some graves that tell where the West was won.
It's sad, but the telling takes me home.

And I'll sing about an emptiness the East has never known,
Where coyotes don't pay taxes and a man can live alone,
And you've got to walk forever just to find a telephone.
It's sad, but the telling takes me home.

Let me sing to you all those songs I know
Of the wild, windy places locked in timeless snow,
And the wide, crimson deserts where the muddy rivers flow.
It's sad, but the telling takes me home.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
STARLIGHT ON THE RAILS
(Bruce Phillips)

I can hear the whistle blowing
High and lonesome as can be
Outside the rain is softly falling
Tonight its falling just for me

Looking back along the road I've traveled
The miles can tell a million tales
Each year is like some rolling freight train
And cold as starlight on the rails

I think about a wife and family
My home and all the things it means
The black smoke trailing out behind me
Is like a string of broken dreams

A man who lives out on the highway
Is like a clock that can't tell time
A man who spends his life just rambling
Is like a song without a rhyme

Memories of North Adamsville-With The 250th Anniversary Of The Birth Of John Quincy Adams In Mind (2017)

Memories of North Adamsville-With The 250^th Anniversary Of The Birth Of John Quincy Adams In Mind (2017)

By Jack Callahan 

WTF. Normally I could give, as we used to say in the old Acre neighborhood of North Adamsville, a rat’s ass about the birth of a long gone President of the United States (POTUS in the new newspeak of early 21^st century America just to show I am not out of the loop on some things). Even a President, John Quincy Adams, number six, who the town where I grew up was named after, or at least he was a member of the family the town was named after. Maybe it was his father also a President, John, number two or some other damn Puritan brethren even before him. I could care less about old time Puritans who gave my forebears, the Irish who came over on the “famine ships” a hard time when they moved from Boston, South Boston really, to the Acre as a way of creating their upwardly mobile version of the pot of gold after they landed here back in the day.               

Like I said if left to my own devises I would have ignored as I have for my whole existence I think the celebration JQ’s 250^th birthday except for one reason, for one thing, for one person if you need to know. That person my old long gone friend and a guy who I first met in Miss (Ms.) Sullivan’s third grade class Pete Markin (whose mother always called him Peter Paul which he hated and who was known from junior high school on as “the Scribe” after our acknowledged leader Frankie Riley dubbed him that one night after he had written a glowing article in the school newspaper, The Magnet, laying it on about some Frankie exploit).

The Scribe you see was a history nut, or maybe better to call him a guy who needed, and I mean this, needed to know about then thousand facts or he could not operate in the world. He was crazy to know about guys like JQ, about his father and about his mother Abigail. One time in sixth grade I think it was he told me that he needed to know all that information in case some girl wanted to know something and that would give him his lead-in but I think it was deeper than that silly idea. I think he really was a curious guy, was really full of wonder about where the next fact might lead him. 

The Scribe was a funny mix in a way. He was almost a chemically pure corner boy, a guy like me and Frankie and a bunch of other guys who were too poor to do much else except hang around Harry’s Variety Store and plot ways to get dough any way we could up to and including various forms of larceny. The Scribe was the guy who would think up the schemes but after one night when we almost got thrown in the slammer because Pete didn’t remember to put a look-out in front of the house Frankie Riley ran the operations.

But the Scribe was also a book crazy guy as you could imagine of a guy who needed to have plenty of facts in his arsenal and spent a lot of time at the library. The summer between sixth and seventh grade we didn’t see much of the Scribe because he had decided after getting into all kinds of trouble at school and having a couple of bouts in juvenile court that he would lay low. That is when he started reading if you can believe this biographies about various members of the Adams family. And at night when we were hanging out later in the school year he would bore us to tears with all kinds of stuff especially I remember about mother Abigail (John’s wife) who he thought was the smartest and most interesting one of the lot. From now on though whenever I think about my old lost comrade I will also think about one John Quincy Adams and how the Scribe loved to talk about him and his crowd as well. Happy birthday JQ.    

In Honor Of The Late Rocker Chuck Berry Who Helped Make It All Possible-Coming Of Age, 50s Style-Another Encore

In Honor Of The Late Rocker Chuck Berry Who Helped Make It All Possible-Coming Of Age, 50s Style-Another Encore

In Honor Of The Late Rocker Chuck Berry Who Helped Make It All Possible-Coming Of Age, 50s Style-Another Encore

CD Review

Oldies But Goodies, Volume Two, Original Sound Record Co., 1986

I have been doing a series of commentaries elsewhere on another site on my coming of political age in the early 1960s, but here when I am writing about musical influences I am just speaking of my coming of age, period, which was not necessarily the same thing. No question that those of us who came of age in the 1950s are truly children of rock and roll. We were there, whether we appreciated it or not at the time, when the first, sputtering, musical moves away from ballady Broadway show tunes and rhymey Tin Pan Alley pieces hit the radio airwaves. (If you do not know what a radio is then ask your parents or, ouch, grandparents, please.) And, most importantly, we were there when the music moved away from any and all music that your parents might have approved of, or maybe, even liked, or, hopefully, at least left you alone to play in peace up in your room when rock and roll hit post- World War II America teenagers like, well, like an atomic bomb.

Not all of the material put forth was good, nor was all of it destined to be playable fifty or sixty years later on some “greatest hits” compilation but some of songs had enough chordal energy, lyrical sense, and sheer danceability to make any Jack or Jill jump then, or now. And, here is the good part, especially for painfully shy guys like me, or those who, like me as well, had two left feet on the dance floor. You didn’t need to dance toe to toe, close to close, with that certain she (or he for shes). Just be alive…uh, hip to the music.  Otherwise you might become the dreaded wallflower. But that fear, the fear of fears that haunted many a teenage dream then, is a story for another day. Let’s just leave it at this for now. Ah, to be very, very young then was very heaven.

So what still sounds good on this CD compilation to a current AARPer and, and perhaps some of his fellows who comprise the demographic that such a 1950s compilation “speak” to. Of course, Danny and The Juniors, At The Hop, one of the first rock songs that I heard (and heard over and over again) on the local radio stations. Naturally an “angel” song, this time on a happier note, Pretty Little Angel Eyes. Naturally, in a period of classic rock numbers, Fats Domino’s Blueberry Hill (or, like Chuck Berry from this period, virtually any other of about twenty of his songs).

But what about the now, seeming mandatory to ask, inevitable end of the night high school dance song (or maybe even middle school) that seems to be included in each CD compilation? The song that you, maybe, waited around all night for just to prove that you were not a wallflower, and more importantly, had the moxie to, mumbly-voice, parched-throated, sweaty-handed, asked a girl to dance (women can relate their own experiences, probably similar). Here the classic Goodnight My Love fills the bill. Hey, I didn’t even like the song, or the singing, but she said yes (a different she that the one from the Volume One review, oh fickle youth) this was what you waited for so don’t be so choosey. And, yes, I know, this is one of the slow ones that you had to dance close on. And just hope, hope to high heaven that you didn’t destroy your partner’s shoes and feet. Well, one learns a few social skills in this world if for no other reason that to “impress” that certain she (or he for shes) mentioned above. I did, didn’t you?

***********

Blueberry Hill-Fats Domino Lyrics

I found my thrill
On Blueberry Hill
On Blueberry Hill
When I found you

The moon stood still
On Blueberry Hill
And lingered until
My dream came true

The wind in the willow played
Love's sweet melody
But all of those vows you made
Were never to be

Though we're apart
You're part of me still
For you were my thrill
On Blueberry Hill

The wind in the willow played
Love's sweet melody
But all of those vows you made
Were never to be

Though we're apart
You're part of me still
For you were my thrill
On Blueberry Hill

In Honor Of The Late Rocker Chuck Berry Who Helped Make It All Possible-*Coming Of Age, 50s Style-One More Time

In Honor Of The Late Rocker Chuck Berry Who Helped Make It All Possible-*Coming Of Age, 50s Style-One More Time

In Honor Of The Late Rocker Chuck Berry Who Helped Make It All Possible-*Coming Of Age, 50s Style-One More Time


CD Review

Oldies But Goodies, Volume Four, Original Sound Record Co., 1986

I have been doing a series of commentaries elsewhere on another site on my coming of political age in the early 1960s, but here when I am writing about musical influences I am just speaking of my coming of age, period, which was not necessarily the same thing. No question that those of us who came of age in the 1950s are truly children of rock and roll. We were there, whether we appreciated it or not at the time, when the first, sputtering, musical moves away from ballady Broadway show tunes and rhymey Tin Pan Alley pieces hit the radio airwaves. (If you do not know what a radio is then ask your parents or, ouch, grandparents, please.) And, most importantly, we were there when the music moved away from any and all music that your parents might have approved of, or maybe, even liked, or, hopefully, at least left you alone to play in peace up in your room when rock and roll hit post- World War II America teenagers like, well, like an atomic bomb.

Not all of the material put forth was good, nor was all of it destined to be playable fifty or sixty years later on some “greatest hits” compilation but some of songs had enough chordal energy, lyrical sense, and sheer danceability to make any Jack or Jill jump then, or now. And, here is the good part, especially for painfully shy guys like me, or those who, like me as well, had two left feet on the dance floor. You didn’t need to dance toe to toe, close to close, with that certain she (or he for shes). Just be alive…uh, hip to the music.  Otherwise you might become the dreaded wallflower. But that fear, the fear of fears that haunted many a teenage dream then, is a story for another day. Let’s just leave it at this for now. Ah, to be very, very young then was very heaven.

So what still sounds good on this CD compilation to a current AARPer and, and perhaps some of his fellows who comprise the demographic that such a 1950s compilation “speak” to (and here some early 60s songs as well). Of course, Bob Dylan’s It Aint Me Babe. Carl Perkins original Blue Suede Shoes (covered by and made famous by, and millions for, Elvis). Or the Hank William’s outlaw country classic I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry. Naturally, in a period of classic rock numbers, Buddy Holly’s Peggy Sue (or, like Chuck Berry and Fat Domino from this period, virtually any other of about twenty of his songs).

But what about the now, seeming mandatory to ask, inevitable end of the night high school dance song (or maybe even middle school) that seems to be included in each CD compilation? The song that you, maybe, waited around all night for just to prove that you were not a wallflower, and more importantly, had the moxie to, mumbly-voice, parched-throated, sweaty-handed, asked a girl to dance (women can relate their own experiences, probably similar). Here the classic A Teenage Prayer (although what we were praying for, and why will be very different for each rememberer) fills the bill. Hey, I didn’t even like the song, or the singing, but she said yes this was what you waited for so don’t be so choosey. And, yes, I know, this is one of the slow ones that you had to dance close on. And just hope, hope to high heaven that you didn’t destroy your partner’s shoes and feet. Well, one learns a few social skills in this world if for no other reason that to “impress” that certain she (or he for shes) mentioned above. I did, didn’t you?

********
Teenage Prayer Lyrics

My friends all know it
How I adore him
I whisper to angels
What I'd do for him
He is the answer
To a teenage prayer

He won't go steady
The crowd has told me
But I keep waiting
To have him hold me
Why won't you listen
To a teenage prayer?

I await by the window at seven
And chill when my thrill passes by
His kiss could send me to heaven
Into his arms I would fly

My girlfriend Betty tells me he's lazy
But i know Betty loves him like crazy
He is the answer
To a teenage prayer

Yes
He is the answer
To a teenage prayer

In The Matter Of The Centennial Of The Birth Of Film Actor, Noir Film Actor, Robert Mitchum (2017)

In The Matter Of The Centennial Of The Birth Of Film Actor, Noir Film Actor, Robert Mitchum (2017)

By Lance Lawrence

Film Editor Emeritus Sam Lowell is like something out of a film noir which he has always been fascinated by ever since he was a kid down in cranberry bog Carver south of Boston and would catch the Saturday matinee double-headers at the Bijou Theater (now long gone and replaced by a cinematic mega-plex out on Route 28 in one of the long line of strip malls which dot that road). That fascination had a name, The Maltese Falcon, starring rugged chain-smoking tough guy Humphrey Bogart as a no nonsense, well almost no nonsense, private detective, who almost got skirt-crazy, almost got catch off guard by some vagrant jasmine scent from a femme over the matter of an extremely valuable bejeweled bird which the theater owner, Sean Riley, would occasionally play in a retrospective series that he ran to keep expenses down some weeks rather than take in the latest films from the studios.     

The reason that I, Sandy Salmon, current film critic at the American Left History blog and also at the on-line American Film Gazette can call the old curmudgeon Sam Lowell “something out of a film noir” is because once he decided to retire from the day to day hassle of reviewing a wide range of current and past films he contrived to get me to take his place on the blog along with my other by-line. That based on our years together as rivals and friends at the Gazette.  He did this “putting himself out to pasture” as he called it to the blog’s moderator, Peter Paul Markin, when he mentioned the subject of retirement with the proviso that he could contribute occasional “think” pieces as films or other events came up and curdled his interest. I had no particular objection to that arrangement since it is fairly standard in the media industry and is an arrangement that I would likewise want to take up in my soon to come retirement from the day to day grind. (To that end I am grooming an associate film critic Alden Riley for that eventuality.)

This business all came tumbling down on my head recently after he had read somewhere, maybe the Boston Globe, yes, I think it was that newspaper  that the centennial of the birth great actor, great film noir actor,  Robert Mitchum, was at hand. Without giving me a heads up he, Sam, decided that he wanted to do a “think” piece on this key noir figure and someone whose performances in things like Out Of The Past, Cape Fear, and Night Of The Hunter were the stuff of cinematic legend. But you see I wanted, once I became aware of the centennial to write something to honor Mitchum although I have the modesty not to call it a “think” piece. My idea, as was Sam’s in the end, had been to write about that incredible role he played as a low key private eye in Out Of The Past against the dangers of a gun-addled femme. We resolved the dispute if you want to call it resolved by having “dueling” appreciations of that classic film. Sam’s potluck article has already been published and now I get my say. Enough said.          

I will say one thing for Sam although I would have noted it myself in any case that both our headlines speaks of a film noir actor although Micthum did many more types of films from goof stuff like the Grass Is Greener where he played some kind of rich oil man adrift in England and infatuated by some nobleman’s wife and Heaven Help Mr. Allison where he got all flirty with a fellow marooned nun to truly scary can’t go to sleep at night without a revolver under the pillow stuff like Cape Fear to the world weary, world wary former standup guy  pasty/fall guy in the film adaptation of  George V. Higgin’s The Friends Of Eddie Coyle. That said to my mind, as to Sam’s his classic statement of his acting persona came in the great performance he did in Out Of The Past where between being in the gun sights of an angry gangster played by Kirk Douglas and the gun sights of a gun crazy femme played by Jane Greer he had more than enough to handle.

Yeah, if you think about it, think about other later non-goof, do it for the don’t go back to the “from hunger” days paycheck vehicles he starred that film kind of said it all about a big brawny barrel-chested guy who had been around the block awhile, had smoked a few thousand cigarettes while trying to figure out all the angles and still in the end got waylaid right between the eyes by that damn femme. All she had to do was call his name and he wilted like some silly schoolboy. I like a guy who likes to play with fire, likes to live on the edge a little but our boy got caught up badly by whatever that scent, maybe jasmine, maybe spring lilac but poison that he could never get out of his nostrils once she went into over-drive.

Sam in his review went out of his way to make Mitchum’s character, Jeff, let’s just call him Jeff since for safety reasons he had other aliases seem like, well, seem like the typical “from hunger” guy who got wrapped up in a blanket with a dizzy dame and that his whole freaking life led to that fatal shot from that fatal gun from that femme fatale. She had a name, Kathie, nice and fresh and wholesome name but nothing but fire and fiery although Sam insists that it could have been any one of a thousand dames as long as she had long legs, ruby red lips and was willing to mess up the sheets a bit. Yeah, Jeff as just another from nowhere guy who got caught between a rock and a hard place.      

No, a thousand time no. Robert Mitchum, ah, Jeff in those scenes has those big eyes wide open from the minute he hits Mexico, no, the minute he got the particulars from Whit, from his new employer of the moment he was no fall guy but a guy playing out his hand, maybe well, maybe badly but playing the thing out just as he always had done since he was a kid. (Sam, maybe reflecting his own “from hunger” up-bringing in working class cranberry bog Carver if you look at his reviews of those luscious black and white films from the 1940s and 1950s that he feasted on always overplayed that fateful “from hunger” aspect of a male character’s persona, a failing to see beyond his won youth in many cases beyond his fatal error here)

As Sam would say here is the play, the right way to see Mitchum’s cool as ice character. Whit, a shady businessman, hell, call him by his right name, a gangster, a hood, played by cleft-chinned Kirk Douglas wanted to hire Jeff (and by indirection his partner Fisher who will undercut him reminding me of that friction between Sam Spade and Miles Archer although Sam wound up doing right by his old partner Fisher just bought the farm trying to move in on Jeff’s business) to find his girlfriend who left him high and dry minus a cool forty thousand and plus a little bullet hole as a reminder that not all women are on the level. The minute Jeff heard the particulars he was in, not for the dough, although dough is a good reason to take on a job in any profession including his, private detection, but to see what kind of dish ran away from a good-looking, rich guy with plenty of sex appeal and a place to keep her stuck in the good life. Sam missed the whole idea that Jeff already had a head of steam for this elusive Kathie before he went out the door of Whit’s mansion (or whatever her name really was played by sultry sexy, long-legged, ruby red-lipped ready for a few satin sheet tumbles Jane Greer).   

For a professional detective Kathie was not hard to find, maybe intentionally if she had Whit figured out which I think she did, and you could palpably feel the tension as Jeff waited to meet his quarry. If you followed the way he was thinking, if you in this case followed the scent that you would have known that Jeff was no more a victim of some bad childhood that I was. Everything follows from that first prescient presence in that run-down wreak of a cantina and those first drinks between them. The sheets followed as night follows day as did the plans they had to flee from whatever dastardly deeds Whit would do once he knew that a real man had taken his pet away-without flinching. The key was the dodge Jeff, remember it was Jeff who led the misdirection when Whit showed up in sunny Mexico wondering what the fuck was going on. Jeff had them in Frisco town before you say goodbye. Nice work.          

Hey Jeff knew, knew as any man knew who had been wide awake after the age of thirteen knew, that his grip on Kathie unlike the later tryst with good girl Anne once he had to go into exile when Kathie flipped her wig, would only last as long as he could keep her interested. I will grant Sam this that maybe Jeff should have been a little more leery of what crazy moves Kathie could make when she was cornered, maybe should have thought through a little better why she put a slug in Whit just for the hell of it. But in his defense Jeff was playing his hand out and it was just too much bad luck that his old partner Fisher got on his trail. Got on his trail, and hers, which she stopped cold when she put the rooty-toot-toot to Fisher. Then blew town leaving Jeff to pick up her mess.

Did Jeff call copper, did he go crying on his knees to Whit. No he went into exile waiting for the next move, waiting to see what Kathie would come up with next. He may have built him a nice little gas station business in Podunk, have gotten a dewy fresh maiden in Anne but anybody could see once he was exposed by one of Whit’s operatives he played his hand out to the very end. Went to see what was what including learning of Kathie’s opportunistic return to Whit’s embrace. And her return to his embrace. Of course such a course was bound to not turn out very well for anybody. Whit wasted by Kathie and then Jeff wasted by her as well once he knew the game was up. Don’t make though too much of that play at the very end when Anne asks Jeff’s deaf gas station employee whether he was really ready to leave everything for Kathie and the kid said yes. Yes with the implication that Jeff did the whole play to spare Anne. No, that is too pat Jeff wanted to go with Kathie, wanted to play with fire, knew that the game was up and just didn’t care any longer as long as he was with Kathie. Couldn’t Sam see in Jeff, in Robert Mitchum’s, eyes that he didn’t care what she did, that was the way it was between them. No fall guy there.

I don’t know about Sam but I am ready to move on to speak out about other major Mitchum films. I agree with Sam those payday check films in a career where he played in over one hundred are not worth blowing any smoke about but there are still plenty worthy of attention. More later. 

When Just An Average Joe Gets Waylaid By The Strange Fate Sisters-Anthony Mann’s “Desperate” (1947)-A Film Review

When Just An Average Joe Gets Waylaid By The Strange Fate Sisters-Anthony Mann’s “Desperate” (1947)-A Film Review

DVD Review

By Si Lannon

Desperate, starring Steve Brodie, Raymond Burr, Audrey Long, directed by the legendary Anthony Mann, 1947

You know not every guy who did his service, did his military time and came back to what we who were in Vietnam during the 1960s called the “real” world couldn’t hack it, couldn’t back to the nine to five idea once he had seen enough craziness, had committed stuff he never though he would commit, and saw others do the same. Bad stuff all around. This publication has been filled with many sketches, even a few expanded pieces, detailing the experiences of a bunch of corner boys from North Adamsville and their troubles trying to readjust after their fucking war. I was one of the guys who had trouble, drifted in and out of towns, relationships, jobs, friendships, larcenies and drugs before I got my head screwed back on somewhere near the right way. Of course nobody associated with this publication in even an attenuated form can forget the toll that war business took on one Peter Paul Markin, the Scribe, who although we didn’t appreciate it that much at the time took his Vietnam time real hard. Not right away, but several years after having done an incredible job detailing the lives of a bunch of fellow veterans who were so bummed out by the world they came back to that they eventually formed an “alternate universe” down along the railroads and riverbanks of Southern California. Whatever haunted Markin, the Scribe, was just too deep for him to keep his own head on straight and he succumbed to serious drugs and treachery down in Mexico in the mid-1970s.

Like I said not every guy reacted the same way as I did, as Markin did and just went back to the real world and forgot about the past or at least didn’t let it get in the way. Probably most guys who served followed that road. And some guys, some straight-shooters still got fucked around with. Take the guy in Desperate, take Steve Brodie as straight a guy as ever wore shoe leather. Maybe the guys who came back from World War II were different from us, although the more stories I hear the more it sounds like the same old, same old only guys like my father and a couple of uncles kept it tightly under their lids. Steve came back after European Theater time, a few medals, a skill as a mechanic and truck driver to tide him over on cold night. Married a country girl from Wisconsin or one of those cow country places, started up his own small independent trucking operation in some Every town, they were, are legion. Hell, started out in a dinky cold water flat, didn’t even have a personal telephone but had to keep a stash of nickels like some rooming house joker which that country-bred blonde kept bitching about, had ideas about living in a ranch house and raising a parcel of kids and dogs. Sticking with his Anne, his love of his life through good times and bad. Then all hell broke loose, and he got caught in a grinder he couldn’t work his way out of.

The problem with Steve, like a lot of guys who are clueless about the ways of the world, is he couldn’t pass up a buck in order to help put up that down payment on his, their dreams. For fifty buck the world could toss and turn him around and spit him out. See the monthly payments, the bane of small dream guys, the truck insurance, or something was a little behind (Anne parceling out the weekly white envelopes each a little short in each bill packet, Jesus) so he took the job from an old friend, a guy from the old days back in the old neighborhood. Easy dough. Problem, problem is that old corner boy, a guy named Walt, but I knew him as Ray, Ray something, never got off the corner, always had to have the best of it, play every crooked angle. The job, the need a Steve truck job was a heist of some dark alley warehouse. Except things went awry as they do when you have small time crooks working the inside dope. Steve, once he knew the score took a pass, or tried to but the fate sisters weren’t rolling his way that night and he went for a fall. Worse, the botched job got a cop killed which meant the squeeze was on, somebody had to step off, take the big fall in the state pen for this one.         

This is where thing gets weird. The guy who got caught, the actual cop killer, a guy named Johnny, something like that, was this small- time hood Walt’s kid brother. Walt had an unexpectedly strong fondness for this brother and didn’t want to see him get the chair, the electric chair sitting waiting for him. Ray, Walt wouldn’t dream of taking the sword himself even though it was his botched caper so he came up with the bright idea that Steve should take the fall. Nice guy. At least Steve had sense enough to put a big bite into that plan once he got free from Walt’s clutches. The problem was that Ray, no, Walt threatened to do bodily harm to his wife, to Anne of the nickels, if he didn’t play ball, tell the coppers he was the cop-killer. Jesus, again.  They had to blow town, blow town fast and without a lot of fanfare.

Steve had to get his Anne to safety especially when she told him she was pregnant, was with child (she would deliver a daughter on the run, nice way to start life). But Walt was relentless especially after a jury put an X next to Johnny’s name. No matter where they went Walt and his cronies caught up to them. Finally, on the night Johnny was to meet the grim reaper, was to what did Seth Garth call it in a recent film review of Fallen Angel hear the noise of wings very close Walt cloistered Steve and expected to have a join execution with Steve as the sacrificial lamb who would cleanse the world for Walt over his Johnny boy. After a little gunplay Walt took a fall, although Steve did too. Yeah, not every guy had trouble coming back to the real world from their respective wars but trouble came their ways no matter what.