From The Pen Of American Communist Party Founder And Trotskyist Leader James P. Cannon

From The Pen Of American Communist Party Founder And Trotskyist Leader James P. Cannon

Click below to link to the “James P. Cannon Internet Archives.”

http://www.marxists.org/archive/cannon/works/index.htm

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Frank Jackman comment on founding member James P. Cannon and the early American Communist Party taken from a book review, James P. Cannon and the Early American Communist Party, on the “American Left History” blog:

If you are interested in the history of the American Left or are a militant trying to understand some of the past mistakes of our history and want to know some of the problems that confronted the early American Communist Party and some of the key personalities, including James Cannon, who formed that party this book is for you.

At the beginning of the 21st century after the demise of the Soviet Union and the apparent ‘death of communism’ it may seem fantastic and utopian to today’s militants that early in the 20th century many anarchist, socialist, syndicalist and other working class militants of this country coalesced to form an American Communist Party. For the most part, these militants honestly did so in order to organize an American socialist revolution patterned on and influenced by the Russian October Revolution of 1917. James P. Cannon represents one of the important individuals and faction leaders in that effort and was in the thick of the battle as a central leader of the Party in this period. Whatever his political mistakes at the time, or later, one could certainly use such a militant leader today. His mistakes were the mistakes of a man looking for a revolutionary path.

For those not familiar with this period a helpful introduction by the editors gives an analysis of the important fights which occurred inside the party. That overview highlights some of the now more obscure personalities (a helpful biographical glossary is provided), where they stood on the issues and insights into the significance of the crucial early fights in the party.

These include questions which are still relevant today; a legal vs. an underground party; the proper attitude toward parliamentary politics; support to third- party bourgeois candidates;trade union policy; class-war prisoner defense as well as how to rein in the intense internal struggle of the various factions for organizational control of the party. This makes it somewhat easier for those not well-versed in the intricacies of the political disputes which wracked the early American party to understand how these questions tended to pull it in on itself. In many ways, given the undisputed rise of American imperialism in the immediate aftermath of World War I, this is a story of the ‘dog days’ of the party. Unfortunately, that rise combined with the international ramifications of the internal disputes in the Russian Communist Party and in the Communist International shipwrecked the party as a revolutionary party toward the end of this period.

In the introduction the editors motivate the purpose for the publication of the book by stating the Cannon was the finest Communist leader that America had ever produced. This an intriguing question. The editors trace their political lineage back to Cannon’s leadership of the early Communist Party and later after his expulsion to the Trotskyist Socialist Workers Party so their perspective is obvious. What does the documentation provided here show? I would argue that the period under study represented Cannon’s apprenticeship. Although the hothouse politics of the early party clarified some of the issues of revolutionary strategy for him I believe that it was not until he linked up with Trotsky in the late 1920’s that he became the kind of leader who could lead a revolution. Of course, since Cannon never got a serious opportunity to lead revolutionary struggles in America this is mainly reduced to speculation on my part. Later books written by him make the case better. One thing is sure- in his prime he had the instincts to want to lead a revolution.

As an addition to the historical record of this period this book is a very good companion to the two-volume set by Theodore Draper - The Roots of American Communism and Soviet Russia and American Communism- the definitive study on the early history of the American Communist Party. It is also a useful companion to Cannon’s own The First Ten Years of American Communism. I would add that this is something of a labor of love on the part of the editors. This book was published at a time when the demise of the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe was in full swing and anything related to Communist studies was deeply discounted. Nevertheless, for better or worse, the American Communist Party (and its offshoots) needs to be studied as an ultimately flawed example of a party that failed in its mission to create a radical version of society in America. Now is the time to study this history.

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BOOK REVIEW

NOTEBOOK OF AN AGITATOR- JAMES P. CANNON, PATHFINDER PRESS, NEW YORK, 1971

If you are interested in the history of the American Left or are a militant trying to understand some of the past lessons of our history concerning the socialist response to various social and labor questions this book is for you. 

This book is part of a continuing series of the writings of James P. Cannon that was published by the organization he founded, the Socialist Workers Party, in the 1970’s. Look in this space for other related reviews of this series of documents on and by an important American Communist.

In the introduction the editors motivate the purpose for the publication of the book by stating the Cannon was the finest Communist leader that America had ever produced. This an intriguing question. The editors trace their political lineage back to Cannon’s leadership of the early Communist Party and later after his expulsion to the Trotskyist Socialist Workers Party so their perspective is obvious. What does the documentation provided here show? This certainly is the period of Cannon’s political maturation, especially after his long collaboration working with Trotsky. The period under discussion- from the 1920’s when he was a leader of the American Communist Party to the red-baiting years after World War II- started with his leadership of the fight against the degeneration of the Russian Revolution and then later against those who no longer wanted to defend the gains of the Russian Revolution despite the Stalinist degeneration of that revolution. Cannon won his spurs in those fights and in his struggle to orient those organizations toward a revolutionary path. One thing is sure- in his prime which includes this period- Cannon had the instincts to want to lead a revolution and had the evident capacity to do so. That he never had an opportunity to lead a revolution is his personal tragedy and ours as well.

I note here that among socialists, particularly the non-Stalinist socialists of those days, there was controversy on what to do and, more importantly, what forces socialists should support. If you want to find a more profound response initiated by revolutionary socialists to the social and labor problems of those days than is evident in today’s leftist responses to such issues Cannon’s writings here will assist you. I draw your attention to the early part of the book when Cannon led the Communist-initiated International Labor Defense (ILD), most famously around the fight to save the anarchists Sacco and Vanzetti here in Massachusetts. That campaign put the Communist Party on the map for many workers and others unfamiliar with the party’s work. For my perspective the early class-war prisoner defense work was exemplary.

The issue of class-war prisoners is one that is close to my heart. I support the work of the Partisan Defense Committee, Box 99 Canal Street Station, New York, N.Y 10013, an organization which traces its roots and policy to Cannon’s ILD. That policy is based on an old labor slogan- ‘An injury to one is an injury to all’ therefore I would like to write a few words here on Cannon’s conception of the nature of the work. As noted above, Cannon (along with Max Shachtman and Martin Abern and Cannon’s long time companion Rose Karsner who would later be expelled from American Communist Party for Trotskyism with him and who helped him form what would eventually become the Socialist Workers Party) was assigned by the party in 1925 to set up the American section of the International Red Aid known here as the International Labor Defense.

It is important to note here that Cannon’s selection as leader of the ILD was insisted on by the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) because of his pre-war association with that organization and with the prodding of “Big Bill’ Haywood, the famous labor organizer exiled in Moscow. Since many of the militants still languishing in prison were anarchists or syndicalists the selection of Cannon was important. The ILD’s most famous early case was that of the heroic anarchist workers, Sacco and Vanzetti. The lessons learned in that campaign show the way forward in class-war prisoner defense.

I believe that it was Trotsky who noted that, except in the immediate pre-revolutionary and revolutionary periods, the tasks of militants revolve around the struggle to win democratic and other partial demands. The case of class-war legal defense falls in that category with the added impetus of getting the prisoners back into the class struggle as quickly as possible. The task then is to get them out of prison by mass action for their release. Without going into the details of the Sacco and Vanzetti case the two workers had been awaiting execution for a number of years and had been languishing in jail. As is the nature of death penalty cases various appeals on various grounds were tried and failed and they were then in imminent danger of execution.

Other forces outside the labor movement were also interested in the Sacco and Vanzetti case based on obtaining clemency, reduction of their sentences to life imprisonment or a new trial. The ILD’s position was to try to win their release by mass action- demonstrations, strikes and other forms of mass mobilization. This strategy obviously also included, in a subordinate position, any legal strategies that might be helpful to win their freedom. In this effort the stated goal of the organization was to organize non-sectarian class defense but also not to rely on the legal system alone portraying it as a simple miscarriage of justice. The organization publicized the case worldwide, held conferences, demonstrations and strikes on behalf of Sacco and Vanzetti. Although the campaign was not successful and the pair were executed in 1927 it stands as a model for class war prisoner defense. Needless to say, the names Sacco and Vanzetti continue to be honored to this day wherever militants fight against this system.

I also suggest a close look at Cannon’s articles in the early 1950’s. Some of them are solely of historical interest around the effects of the red purges on the organized labor movement at the start of the Cold War. Others, however, around health insurance, labor standards, the role of the media and the separation of church and state read as if they were written in 2014 That’s a sorry statement to have to make any way one looks at it.

From The Pages Of The Communist International- In Honor Of The Anniversary Of The Founding Of The Communist International (March 1919) -Desperately Seeking Revolutionary Intellectuals-Now- And Then

From The Pages Of The Communist International- In Honor Of The Anniversary Of The Founding Of The Communist International (March 1919) -Desperately Seeking Revolutionary Intellectuals-Now- And Then

Click below to link to the Communist International Internet Archives"

http://www.marxists.org/history/international/comintern/index.htm

Frank Jackman comment from the American Left History blog (2007):

BOOK REVIEW

‘LEFT-WING’ COMMUNISM-AN INFANTILE DISORDER, V.I. LENIN, UNIVERSITY PRESS OF THE PACIFIC, CALIFORNIA, 2001

An underlying premise of the Lenin-led Bolshevik Revolution in Russia in 1917 was that success there would be the first episode in a world-wide socialist revolution. While a specific timetable was not placed on the order of the day the early Bolshevik leaders, principally Lenin and Trotsky, both assumed that those events would occur in the immediate post-World War I period, or shortly thereafter. Alas, such was not the case, although not from lack of trying on the part of an internationalist-minded section of the Bolshevik leadership.

Another underlying premise, developed by the Leninists as part of their opposition to the imperialist First World War, was the need for a new revolutionary labor international to replace the compromised and moribund Socialist International (also known as the Second International) which had turned out to be useless as an instrument for revolution or even of opposition to the European war. The Bolsheviks took that step after seizing power and established the Communist International (also known as the Comintern or Third International) in 1919. As part of the process of arming that international with a revolutionary strategy (and practice) Lenin produced this polemic to address certain confusions, some willful, that had arisen in the European left and also attempted to instill some of the hard-learned lessons of the Russian revolutionary experience in them.

The Russian Revolution, and after it the Comintern in the early heroic days, for the most part, drew the best and most militant layers of the working-class and radical intellectuals to their defense. However, that is not the same as drawing experienced Bolsheviks to that defense. Many militants were anti-parliamentarian or anti-electoral in principle after the sorry experiences with the European social democracy. Others wanted to emulate the old heroic days of the Bolshevik underground party or create a minority, exclusive conspiratorial party.

Still others wanted to abandon the reformist bureaucratically-led trade unions to their then current leaderships, and so on. Lenin’s polemic, and it nothing but a flat-out polemic against all kinds of misconceptions of the Bolshevik experience, cut across these erroneous ideas like a knife. His literary style may not appeal to today’s audience but the political message still has considerable application today. At the time that it was written no less a figure than James P. Cannon, a central leader of the American Communist Party, credited the pamphlet with straightening out that badly confused movement (Indeed, it seems every possible political problem Lenin argued against in that pamphlet had some following in the American Party-in triplicate!). That alone makes it worth a look at.

I would like to highlight one point made by Lenin that has currency for leftists today, particularly American leftists. At the time it was written many (most) of the communist organizations adhering to the Comintern were little more than propaganda groups (including the American party). Lenin suggested one of the ways to break out of that isolation was a tactic of critical support to the still large and influential social-democratic organizations at election time. In his apt expression- to support those organizations "like a rope supports a hanging man".

However, as part of my political experiences in America around election time I have run into any number of ‘socialists’ and ‘communists’ who have turned Lenin’s concept on its head. How? By arguing that militants needed to ‘critically support’ the Democratic Party (who else, right?) as an application of the Leninist criterion for critical support. No, a thousand times no. Lenin’s specific example was the reformist British Labor Party, a party at that time (and to a lesser extent today) solidly based on the trade unions- organizations of the working class and no other. The Democratic Party in America was then, is now, and will always be a capitalist party. Yes, the labor bureaucrats and ordinary workers support it, finance it, drool over it but in no way is it a labor party. That is the class difference which even sincere militants have broken their teeth on for at least the last seventy years. And that, dear reader, is another reason why it worthwhile to take a peek at this book.

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Desperately Seeking Revolutionary Intellectuals-Now, And Then

Commentary

No, this is not a Personals section ad, although it qualifies as a Help Wanted ad in a sense. On a number of occasions over past several years, in reviewing books especially those by James P. Cannon the founder of The Socialist Workers Party in America, I have mentioned that building off of the work of the classical Marxists, including that of Marx and Engels themselves, and later that of Lenin and Trotsky the critical problem before the international working class in the early part of the 20th century was the question of creating a revolutionary leadership to lead imminent uprisings. Armed with Lenin’s work on the theory of the imperialist nature of the epoch and the party question and Trotsky’s on the questions of permanent revolution and revolutionary timing the tasks for revolutionaries were more than adequately defined.

The conclusion that I drew from that observation was that the revolutionary socialist movement was not as desperately in need of theoreticians and intellectuals as previously (although having them is always a good thing). It needed leaders steeped in those theories and with a capacity to lead revolutions. We needed a few good day-to-day practical leaders to lead the fight for state power.

In that regard I have always held up, for the early part of the 20th century, the name Karl Liebknecht the martyred German Communist co-leader (along with Rosa Luxemburg) of the aborted Spartacist uprising of 1919 as such an example. In contrast the subsequent leadership of the German Communists in the 1920’s Paul Levi, Henrich Brandler and Ernest Thaelmann did not meet those qualifications. For later periods I have held up the name James P. Cannon, founder of the American Socialist Workers Party (to name only the organization that he was most closely associated with), as a model. That basically carries us to somewhere around the middle of the 20th century. Since I have spend a fair amount of time lately going back to try to draw the lessons of our movement I have also had occasion to think, or rather to rethink my original argument on the need for revolutionary intellectuals. That position stands in need of some amendment now.

Let’s be clear here about our needs. The traditional Marxist idea that in order to break the logjam impeding humankind’s development the international working class must rule is still on the historic agenda. The Leninist notions that, since the early part of the 20th century, we have been in the imperialist era and that a ‘hard’ cadre revolutionary party is necessary to take state power are also in play. Moreover, the Trotskyist understanding that in countries of belated development the working class is the only agency objectively capable of leading those societies to the tasks traditionally associated with the bourgeois revolution continues to hold true. That said, we are seriously in need of revolutionary intellectuals who can bring these understandings into the 21st century.

It is almost a political truism that each generation will find its own ways to cope with the political tasks that confront it. The international working class movement is no exception in that regard. Moreover, although the general outlines of Marxist theory mentioned above hold true such tasks as the updating of the theory of imperialism to take into account the qualitative leap in its globalization is necessary (as is, as an adjunct to that, the significance of the gigantic increases in the size of the ‘third world’ proletariat). Also in need of freshening up is work on the contours of revolutionary political organization in the age of high speed communications, the increased weight that non-working class specific questions play in world politics (the national question, religion, special racial and gender oppressions) and various other tasks that earlier generations had taken for granted or had not needed to consider. All this moreover has to be done in a political environment that sees Marxism, communism, even garden variety reform socialism as failed experiments. To address all the foregoing issues is where my call for a new crop of revolutionary intellectuals comes from.

Since the mid- 20th century we have had no lack of practical revolutionary leaders of one sort or another - one thinks of Fidel Castro, Che Guevara and even Mao in his less rabid moments. We have witnessed any number of national liberation struggles, a few attempts at political revolution against Stalinism, a few military victories against imperialism, notably the Vietnamese struggle. But mainly this has been an epoch of defeats for the international working class. Moreover, we have not even come close to developing theoretical leaders of the statue of Lenin or Trotsky.

As a case in point, recently I made some commentary about the theory of student power in the 1960’s and its eventual refutation by the May 1968 General Strike lead by the working class in France. One of the leading lights for the idea that students were the ‘new’ working class or a ‘new’ vanguard was one Ernest Mandel. Mandel held himself out to be an orthodox Marxist (and Trotskyist, to boot) but that did not stop him from, periodically, perhaps daily, changing the focus of his work away from the idea of the centrality of the working class in social struggle an ideas that goes back to the days of Marx himself.

And Mandel, a brilliant well-spoken erudite scholar probably was not the worst of the lot. The problem is that he was the problem with his impressionistic theories based on , frankly, opportunistic impulses. Another example, from that same period, was the idea of Professor Regis Debray ( in the service of Fidel at the time ) that guerrilla foci out in the hills were the way forward ( a codification of the experience of the Cuban Revolution for which many subjective revolutionary paid dearly with their lives). Or the anti-Marxist Maoist notion that the countryside would defeat the cities that flamed the imagination of many Western radicals in the late 1960’s. I could go on with more examples but they only lead to one conclusion- we are, among other things, in a theoretical trough. This, my friends, is why today I have my Help Wanted sign out. Any takers?

Veterans For Peace-Heading Toward The Danger Not Away In The Struggle Against The Amercian Government's Endless Wars

Veterans For Peace-Heading Toward The Danger Not Away In The Struggle Against The Amercian Government's Endless Wars 

On The 50th Anniversary- Julie Christie and Alan Bates’ Film Adaptation of Thomas Hardy’s “Far From The Madding Crowd” (1967)

On The 50^th Anniversary- Julie Christie and Alan Bates’ Film Adaptation of Thomas Hardy’s “Far From The Madding Crowd” (1967)

DVD Review

By Senior Film Critic Sandy Salmon

Far From The Madding Crowd, starring Julie Christie, Alan Bates, Peter Finch, Terence Stamp, based on the novel of the same name by Thomas Hardy, 1967   

I am sure sometimes readers of these reviews must wonder why a certain film is being reviewed, especially older films which while a big deal in the old days may not seem classical enough to warrant coverage forty, fifty, sixty years later. There are many reasons for choices but for the film adaptation of Thomas Hardy’s Far From The Madding Crowd there is one, and only one, reason. I had a big time “crush” on actress Julie Christie. That crush started not on this film but for her part in David Lean’s Doctor Zhivago about the turbulent period around the Russian Revolution and the early part of Stalin’s reign based on a book, a forbidden book under Stalin if I recall, by Russian writer Boris Paternak. If memory serves I almost lost a girlfriend, the girlfriend that I saw the film under review with, over my unbridled gushing on and on about Ms. Christie’s blue eyes (that gal’s eye were brown and she had come from an all brown-eyed world in Manhattan), figure (hers was very good as well but no young woman then, maybe now as well although body shaming is rightly considered social error, if not political liked to have some other woman’s body commented upon) and long blonde hair (hers again brown from that brown-eyed Manhattan Lower East Jewish quarters world). Not a good move no question but what could you expect of wet-behind-the ears high school student from New Jersey who was a “late bloomer” in the dating/sexual allure world.                

So much for young romantic love misadventures, although I rekindled that crush in re-watching this film so many not so young romantic misadventures since I went on and on to my longtime companion about those blue eyes (hers are brown) although she has that same ethereal beauty Ms. Christie had (and maybe still has since I have not seen her in anything recently). So maybe I am an eternal wet-behind-the ears guy. My big idea in taking this date to see this film is another little quirk I had. We had just finished reading Thomas Hardy’s Mayor of Casterbridge (Casterbridge the scene of many of Hardy’s novels) which I had been enthralled with, had devoured well before the class was supposed to finish the novel and I was trying to see if it was worthwhile for me to read the book this film was based on. I did that a lot then although now it is more likely to be the reverse, to read the book and then see the film adaptation which sometimes, actually many times, is not true to the author’s intention or plotline. That is a story for another day though.    

As Sam Lowell, the previous senior film critic now emeritus, is always found of saying let’s get the “skinny” on this one. Let’s get to why I was enthralled by Thomas Hardy’s novels and this film adaptation beyond short-cuts and Ms. Christie’s blue eyes. I grew up in the city, in urban Trenton (actually just outside but close enough to consider myself a city boy as did my friends) so reading about the rural life in 19^th century England was almost like I was reading a space adventure. The film in some scenes like when the shepherd Gabriel, Allan Bates’ role, loses all his flock when his sheep dog goes berserk and drives them over a cliff into the sea, or when Bathsheba’s, Ms. Christie’s role as the inherited from her uncle landowner, sheep come down with a disease that lays them low and harvesting wheat graphically showed what I had imagined when I read my first Thomas Hardy novel.         

But what we have here in this film is really well beyond some idyllic agricultural ideal a city boy had about the country. Let’s face it and deal with the real subject-the romantic endeavors of Bathsheba’s three, count them, three suitors and her attitude toward each one (and the reason that long ago almost lost girlfriend and the miffed longtime companion both loved the film). As noted poor girl Bathsheba inherited a landed estate from her deceased uncle. Being young and energetic she was determined to run the place herself and show what she was made of against the views of her fellow male landowners, male tenants and employees who believed she was in over her head. And at times, like that sheep sickness time, she relied despite her own judgement, she had to depend on Gabriel who after being spurned on his marriage proposal by Bathsheba before she inherited that land and losing his flock to that berserk dog found himself in her employ. Spurned love number one down.   

While tending to her land the precocious Bathsheba gathered in another suitor, the older bachelor neighboring landowner, Mr. Boldwood, played by Peter Finch, who developed a late life obsession about her. Spurned love number two. Along comes number three, a young man, Frank, played by bad boy Terence Stamp, a rather dashing cavalry sergeant and she is smitten beyond reason. (As was that almost lost girlfriend and that current longtime companion to Stamp’s blue eyes but I will just charge that to their respective reactions to my going on and on about Ms. Christie.) They eventually marry and this proves a marriage not made in heaven as he is something of a wastrel and philander. Or so it seemed until Fanny, a young woman from Bathsheba’s estate, whom he had gotten with child as they used to say delicately in the old days and was to marry came back to claim her man. Too late since she was very ill and passed away along with that child she bore. That began Frank’s gnashing of teeth over her death and he subsequent alleged drowning at sea.

End of story for the widowed Bathsheba (although since the body was not found she would have to wait the legal seven years in order to remarry). Or so I would think. Re-enter that besotted Boldwood and another marriage proposal. Spurned again. End of story now. Well no that bastard Frank actually had not died but had taken off for parts unknown and wouldn’t you know showed up just when Bathsheba was ready to conditionally accept Boldwood’s marriage proposal. End of Frank as the enraged Boldwood pulled the old rooty-toot-toot and he fell down. Off to the gallows and probably some measure of relief for the unlucky Boldwood. You can’t have a romance end on a sour note, or at least you couldn’t in a 19^th century romantic novel so with two departed lovers finished dear fickle, there is no other word for it, Bathsheba finally, finally gets under the sheets with Gabriel something that kept getting telegraphed throughout the movie as they threw those meaningful glances as each other. And maybe Ms. Christie batted those blues eyes. A fine if long film version of well-done book.   

When Your Rooster Crows At The Break Of Dawn-Hold On To Your Wallet-Or Shallow And Swallow Down Your Love

When Your Rooster Crows At The Break Of Dawn-Hold On To Your Wallet-Or Shallow And Swallow Down Your Love

By Ronan Saint James

That goddam rooster down the road, I am not sure how far down that road but this the fourth day running the sleepy bastard has broken the hell out of my sleep, thought Jack Dolan as he once again, for the fourth time running tried to shake off the tepid sleep of the weary. Yeah, like the song said, Dylan wasn’t it, always that gravelly-throated bugger has an apt phrase to speak to what wearied a man, probably reflecting his own weariness, yeah, his own woman trouble what else would drive a man to write prose or lyric about his malaise blame farmyard animal for his discontents -“when your rooster crows at the break of dawn look out your window and I’ll be gone.” That is what had been keeping one John Dolan weary and wary four days running and not some fucking stone cold-eyed rooster yelling his brains out for whatever he yelled his brains out for at dawn. That Jack weariness wariness too had a name. Lucinda, Lucinda Jolly, the so-called love of his life who had walked out that door four days before without not so much as a by your leave. Left him high and dry in not to be alone Naples, down in Florida, broke and broken-hearted.

He should have seen it coming should have seen that Lucinda had been distracted by something. When they had argued, screamed really, that last night before she took a powder something they generally did not do since both had come up in households where the screaming and disorder had made them very reticent to argue, to yell at each other and maybe that was the problem, maybe what called the day done, she had mentioned that he seemed to be “distant, “ seemed to have been off his “meds” his drugs that kept him on keel. He denied it as usual and maybe that was the day done deal that finally broke things in her overheated head.

Hell that was all bullshit, all crap, what it was she had found another guy, a guy he did not see coming either although he should have since lately she had been going out by herself and coming in late. Didn’t make any excuses, lame excuses anyway, about being over at some girlfriend’s house but that she needed to be alone. That was when they decided to take whatever money they had and head to Naples, not a natural place like Big Sur out in the California coast where they could wish the Japan seas would solve whatever ailed their relationship and be washed clean by the fresh air and dreams of Jack Kerouac. dreams she had been spoon-fed on growing up in the French-Canadian Acre section of Lowell, Jack’s hometown, but what they could afford and had been a place to head for in fast sunnier days. Now she was gone, left him with no dough in godforsaken Naples of all places.

Maybe Jack should have taken those rooster crows for a sign, better should have listened to the whole Dylan lyric where he talks about it not being him (her) he (she) was looking for-after having given their, her, his bet shot, best shot maybe not up to some abstract standard they could never reach and a while back had both agreed could never reach that the whole thing had been a house of cards, had been a waystation for both after divorces, his three her pair and after those deep unhappy childhoods that seemed to glue them for a while. The whole thing had been so freaking fragile from the night they met in The Garden of Eden bar in downtown Albany near Russell Sage College when he had had plenty of dough and a full to the brim credit card that got them within a couple of days out to Big Sur, out to where he believed he had been washed clean and wanted her to see life through the prism of Pfieffer State Park complete with stone ass totems once she mentioned Jack Kerouac and that Lowell Jack park set in stone too with some his words, especially about looking for some dead-beat father they never knew. Hit right home with that one.             

In his mind, in his rooster-disturbed mind as Jack started to meditate, real meditation, and not just dwell on her being gone, who the hell that other guy was that he had not seen coming but should have when they were in their down in the mud days who maybe had not been divorced a million times, maybe didn’t drink, didn’t need “meds” and even need to meditate to keep an even keel, him with no dough and Albany many miles north but some old-time Allan Ginsberg in lieu of his now depleted “meds” he unwound the whole affair. Saw for the first time that what they had had was made of more smoke and mirrors than he could have figured when she was like a breath of fresh air coming through the fields after that first date to Saratoga field the day after they first spent the night together (he still had a hard time around “sleeping together, damn, sex so spent is what anybody would get who asked when they “did it”). She had been staying with her sister, a Russell Sage graduate and former denizen of “the Garden,  over in Ballston Spa, a sleepy little town that suited her just then but she was restless, needed to see some city lights and so the Garden of Eden had been her stopping place since Guy Williams, an old favorite, was playing a few sets there and her sister assured her that no guys would hit on her. Before she got out the door that sister Kate would amend her statement given what a breath of fresh air beauty he emitted even if she thought herself not particularly pretty, at least not too hard. Guys hitting on her. And hence Jack and his credit card and shy manner around her. (Lucinda was always amazed that he was ready to shake her hand, which he did, softly that first night and leave it at that he was so shy around women even after three marriages and a bunch of affairs. She had been the one who mentioned taking a walk along the Mohawk River to “talk” although that was not the only thing on her mind that night.) 

Jack hoped that tomorrow, tomorrow the fifth day running that rooster would lay off so he could gather himself to hit the road back to Albany and pick up the pieces of his now shattered life. The meditation, a new routine, which she had introduced him to calm him down when he was wired, when he was distant too but that was probably too little, too late.   

The next morning Jack did hit the road, well, not really hit the road like he was some second coming of Jack Kerouac or his buddies Allan Ginsberg and Neal Cassidy ready to throw caution to the wind and put his thumb out but go on his computer to look on-line for some ride-sharing opportunity. After setting up a meet with a guy going to New York City he sat around for a couple of hours in the place they had rented through Air B&B and which needed to be vacated by noon and rewound the spool of their two- year relationship now in tatters wishing all the time that he thought about it that morning that she had given a better signal, better signals that he was not what she was looking for, not the one she wanted and Dylan came lyrically back into view with his phrase from some forgotten 1960s song about “leaving at your own chosen speed.”        

Funny she had actually “discussed” with him several times her feeling she had to leave, no, that is not right, feeling that they could not go the distance, that they were too similar in their quiet desperations to stick and that whether he was expecting too much from her or she had too many non-negotiable demands the thing had not been despite Kerouac, despite being washed clean at Big Sur and a few times in Naples as well built to last. She never got to the door then, they would patch things up by having sex, or doing some dope or something to keep the embers alive. But he knew deep down that she was looking at that door and that a time would come, a time would come. 

Maybe a couple of months before when he mentioned that he had after several months had been diagnosed with bladder cancer and he begged her to leave and find her path since the treatment procedure, damn, maybe his whole life said he had to face this alone had triggered something. Or maybe so gallant had seen her and taken his best shot. Who knows. Just as he was to run a new train of thought he heard the honking of the car that would take him North-north and aloneness. He put the key in the mailbox as requested, picked up his suitcase and headed out the door to the waiting automobile. 

As he entered the vehicle and said hello to his new-found friend driver and savior Jack got pensive for a while after throwing his knapsack in the backseat and adjusting his seat-belt. Started recounting, no, re-living all the steps he and she should have taken to bring them to some understanding, if possible. He was not naïve enough after three marriages, a million affairs and his stint with her to think that it would have been a done deal but maybe. How many times had she made it plain that it was him, him and his mercurial ways that would drive her from his door, their door when they decided to move in together. How many times had he had the words in his stinking overactive head that would not come out, would not come out making any sense.

And about the night when both high but still in contact with their emotions they talked the whole night away about his “problem” of not being able to say the words she wanted to hear, that maybe they would make it with a little more communication. About too how that mother constant brow-beating made it very reticent to express any emotions, about the child being future to the man. About how in the end, she must have taken a hint from her ever practical side and realized that continuing would not work out, that the percentages were too low for her own fragile existence to count on.         

As Jack started to talk to that driver he thought  well at least he wouldn’t haven’t to listen to that cocksure rooster and his king kong king of the hill crowing … 

Murder Anyway You Cut It- With The French Film Tell No One In Mind

Murder Anyway You Cut It- With The French Film Tell No One In Mind

By Zack James

Phil Larkin, the locally well-known private investigator from Gloversville about sixty miles west of Boston, loved to go to the National Private Investigators Association (NPIA) annual conventions not so much to inspect the inevitable new technological gizmos which were touted as the P.I.s next best friend by their producers but to gather up old acquaintances and over a few whiskies to find out about some new interesting case one or more of them might be working on. They are not all interesting by any means whatever the individual P.I. might be hyping about by virtue of his or her prowess in solving the riddle of the age –usually some missing husband who was ready to go home after a couple of months with some floozy who spent all his dough and blew for places unknown, a guy who fled town for some reason and wants to remain missing but something got him up from the underground, some scared kid who blew home and is out in Topeka somewhere and can’t get out of the caboose until some adult accompanies him or her home, or a skipper you would be amazed at how much P.I. work is “repo” stuff which keeps many guys in clover and a full scotch bottle in that bottom desk drawer for those long stretches between jobs. Or about a case they might have heard about. That is how he heard from his old friend Artie Shaw about the Beck case, the case that had half the public coppers, gendarmes they call them there, in France baffled and Artie too until things fell into place by virtue of that over-rated prowess that every P.I. hung out like single in front of his or her shabby sixth floor office in some seen its day office building filled with failed dentists, cheapjack insurance agents, seedy repo men (guys who do it full-time) and discount wholesale jewelers.

[By the way for those who are confused, or only know of the more famous American Forensic Investigators Organization (AFIO), the one the famous detectives Jack Dolan, Robert Parker, and Shane Chandler, the latter a distant relative of the crime writer Raymond who practically invented the hard-boiled detective genre that has misled several generations of readers and average citizens about the real lives of P.I.s, belong to, the NPIA and AFIO work two very different tracks. The AFIO had split, an acrimoniously split, from the NPIA over the issue of working with the public coppers. The NPIA historically had deferred, meaning “butted out on,” once a case went onto the police blotter. The AFIO made up of a bunch of “hot-doggers” who spit on the public coppers and their half-ass work went on the premise that all cases were better done through private hands. Phil an old time public cop himself would have been railroaded out of business in Gloversville if he had made step one to mess with the open police cases in that town. Would have been run out of town on a rail if not put under some very loose ground especially when Nick Devine was chief copper in that burg and was so “connected” to the boys with grunts and funny noses that he well might have done it himself-or had it done.]     

Every NPIA member in attendance could hardly wait for the banquet that closed each convention to hear the words, to hear the deep dark secret of the profession that the difference between the actual numbers of cases between the two organizations was minuscule or NPIA’s were better. The reality was that despite the few headline cases like the Galton kidnaping and ransom case which some guy, some almost amateur sleuth named Ross MacDonald solved there was as much co-operation between AFIO and public coppers as the NPIA.             

Artie, originally from Boston, had worked with Phil when he had started out on a couple of cases, key-hole peeping cases which in the 1950s was bread and butter work for most private detectives in the days when getting a divorce was heavy lifting without an army of reasons adultery being the primo reason a court would accept. Phil eventually moved on from that work saying to anybody who would listen that he would rather try to solve mass murder cases, solve serial murder stuff than have to swallow the lies associated with guys and gals shacking up once they got to court and practically accused him of breaking up happy homes or being the fall guy for some kind of abuse.  Less strain on the nerves. Artie, knowing his limitations, always stuck with key-hole peeping which is how in a roundabout way he got the Beck case.

The wife of a big Boston international banker had hired him to get the goods on her husband and his French mistress whom said banker had established, had set up in a Paris apartment for when he travelled there on business. Artie, really a pro then at getting the dope, getting the photos necessary to close a divorce case in court, rapped that one up tight, no problem. What Artie had found out in Paris as the 1950s turned into the 1960s was that there was still much key-hole peeping work to found there through the still pretty much intact cumbersome French Napoleonic civil code and so he stayed around there to pick up the pieces, especially when that Boston banker’s divorcee set up herself in Montmatre.      

That banker’s ex-wife connection got him the Beck case, got it to him at least indirectly through her lawyer in Paris who was also the lawyer that this Doctor Beck had retained once he got into serious trouble, or rather he and his sister, Anne, a devotee of the horsey set, but loaded with dough from her husband’s fortune had retained. The case would have seemed to be on the face of it way over Artie’s head as it involved a “cold case,” a case that the French gendarmes had closed up tight. But the ex-banker’s wife and Beck’s lawyer both agreed that a non-French P.I. would have less hurdles to cross than some Parisian private dick who was bound by law to turn everything over to the coppers under penalty of losing his or her license. (Artie was working off his U.S. permit courtesy of influence with the public coppers by a friend of that banker’s ex-wife).

Artie had moreover gotten on the case after the thing had been dead for about seven, eight years. Years after this Doctor Beck was cleared as far as could be of his wife’s murder out in the country while they were out for a swim on the lake. The doctor’s story then had been that he had been knocked unconscious by a party unknown and dumped into the lake when he heard his wife’s screams. Except he was found on the dock. As such things went the public coppers had to let it go when they couldn’t shake his story and his wife’s father, a public copper himself, identified his daughter’s body and vouched for his son-in-law.           

Then a couple of bodies surfaced in that same area and a couple of cops from the old case started to put two and two together and come up with the doctor. The frame was on but the point was how was Artie to get enough evidence to get the doctor off the hook. As it turned out a couple of pieces of evidence surfaced that got the ball rolling. The doctor’s wife, who along with his sister were seriously into steeplechase horse shows, had been beaten badly by someone a few weeks prior to her death. The coppers figured that Doc Beck did the deed, a wife-beater not uncommon among certain high profile types. As it turned out the wife, Margot was her name, had had his sister take photographs of the wounds but had also swore her to secrecy that this horse set guy, this Phillip Neuville, the son of Baron Neuville, a guy with a pile of money as well had done the beating when she confronted him with evidence of child sexual abuse of a bunch of kids who worked the stables as a part of program she was involved with.     

That confrontation as it turned out resulted in the death of young Philip. The photographs were taken after the Doc’s wife had killed the bastard.  

Switch up to the film made of the Beck case minus, at his request since it might be bad for his business in America do, Artie….

Nowadays in order for a thriller to pass muster there have to be many little twists and turns or else the film get very tedious, get very boring, never gets, as a friend of mine who is into both written and cinematic thrillers has suggested, off the slow-moving track which spells death to the film, makes one reach for the remote very quickly. That is not the case with the thriller under review, the French film, Tell No One, although frankly I thought that the film would in its opening scenes succumb to that slow-moving death every thriller has to dodge.

Here are the twists in this “cold file” case. Doctor Beck’s wife, Margot, had been killed, senselessly killed by a serial killer, several years earlier and he was just beginning to put his life back together when a whole ton of hell started coming down on his head. Reason: a couple of male bodies filled with bullets had been found out in the country where his wife had been killed. Beck had just barely gotten out of the clutches of the law back then since the law thought under the odd-ball evidence in the case that he was the mastermind behind the deed. He had been mysteriously found unconscious on the dock despite his assertions that he had been hit and fallen into the water by the killer being a chief reason that he had been suspected by the cops.    

Lots of things begin to pop up that had the cops interested in reopening the case, hoping to see the big frame placed around his head. Unaccounted for bruises to his wife’s face on photos that survived, a gun found in secret place in his house, the murder most foul of his wife’s best friend are just some of the examples that dog him. Put those together with Beck’s taking it on the lam to figure out what the hell was going on and for the average cop never mind what country he or she works in and you have an “open and shut” case of consciousness of guilt and an easy and early wrap-up to the cases.

But hold on. This Doctor Beck actually loved his wife, was not faking the trouble he had trying to put his life back together. Something else was going on, some nefarious plot to get him to take the big step-off and let him rot in prison forgotten after a while. Not only was something going on in the frame department but the good doctor was getting information via his e-mail that his wife was still alive. So two trails of events were going on at the same time (always a good sign in a thriller): the net tightening over his head by the coppers and his frenzy to find his wife knowing now that she is not dead. That’s all I will tell you because I have been asked to “tell no one” in order not to spoil the ending, okay. Except old Doc Beck was not crazy, was not wrong in assuming that nefarious forces were out to get him although it would take a while before he learned that it was because of something that Margot had knowledge about shortly before her “death” which had people in high places ready, willing and able to do her in. Watch this award-winning film.    

Releasing Your Inner Michael Feinstein-Amy Adams and Alec Newman’s “Moonlight Serenade” (2009)-A Film Review

Releasing Your Inner Michael Feinstein-Amy Adams and Alec Newman’s “Moonlight Serenade” (2009)-A Film Review

[Occasionally a reader will write in asking how a particular staff member gets an assignment for a particular film. In short has an interest in learning about the inner working of an on-line operation where most of us are not in the same room together making decisions. Most of the time it is pretty straight forward. Films get handled by Sandy Salmon and Alden Riley with Sandy taking the older films that he would have maybe watched when he was younger and Alden the more current films. Although one time earlier this year I overrode Sandy and “forced” Alden to watch and write a review on a documentary about the first Monterey Pops Festival in 1967, the year of the Summer of Love out in San Francisco which we promoted the 50^th anniversary of heavily this year, when he told Sandy that he did not know who Janis Joplin was. I still bristle at that since Monterey in 1967 was where the ill-fated snake-bitten Janis made her smash break-through. But that is the exception.

Another exception is the reviewer of the film here Moonlight Serenade where Seth Garth who usually handles music reviews got the nod from Sandy since neither he, a child of rock and rock in his youth, nor Alden much more attuned to hip-hop and techno-rock had a clue about the American Songbook Tin Pan Alley style. Knowledge of that genre for this film is critical and so Seth drew the assignment. Pete Markin]    

******

DVD Review 

By Seth Garth

Moonlight Serenade, starring Amy Adams, Alec Newman, Harriet Samson Harris, 2009   

My old high school friend and fellow corner boy down in Carver, down in cranberry country in Southeastern Massachusetts, Gilbert Rowland used to kid me mercilessly about my knowing more of the American Songbook than he could ever dream of. He did not know that term “American Songbook” but what he meant was clear. Although I, he, we were indeed children of rock and roll (and it off-shoot the blues a little later and still later folk music during that folk minute in the early 1960s) I knew, would hum or sing what were essentially show tunes, tunes created by those who inhabited mythical Tin Pan Alley like the Gershwin Brothers, Jerome Kern, Irving Berlin, Cole Porter, Rodgers and Hammerstein and the like to the jeers of the corner boys who only cared about what the latest Chuck Berry composition was about, whether Jerry Lee’s High School Confidential was youth nation of the time’s national anthem or whether Bill Haley and the Comets still jumped after Rock Around The Clock. Stuff like that not “sissy” (he, they used a more derogatory word than that but you get the drift) music like our parents might like-or even know about since the heyday for most of that was in their 1930s and 1940s growing up times.  Don’t ask me how I came by it, maybe hearing it on a vagrant radio station sometime up in my room listening to music on my transistor radio and it stuck, but it was surely not around the house much since I was after certain young age not around the house much.

But enough of genesis and get to the why of this assignment since I don’t usually do film reviews. This Moonlight Serenade (title from an old Glen Miller smash hit back in the long ago day) is a quirky little movie that is both a romantic comedy of sorts and a semi-musical since the three main characters are ready to sing at the drop of a hat (and maybe with less prompting). Nate, played by Alec Newman, is nothing but an up and coming Wall Street money manager who has along with his associate Angelica, played by Harriet Samson Harris been selling “short” as a strategy for making tons of money for their clients and plenty of commissions for themselves. Not a strange phenomenon in 2000s New York City. What is slightly, no more than slightly, askew is that Nate is a denizen of a jazz club and also a more that fair piano player which is how he gets his relaxation after those hard-boiled hours hustling stocks around the clock. What Nate plays is not some Jerry Lee made rock and roll piano and not even Fat Domino since no way was he a child of rock and roll, way too young, but the old Broadway and cabaret show tunes made famous by the likes of Billie Holiday and Mabel Mercer and written by Tin Pan Alley legends like Cole Porter, Jerome Kern, the Gershwins and the like.             

That high strung money manager versus his inner Michael Feinstein, the fairly recent famous cabaret performer of this kind of music, is what drives the Nate end of the plotline. Enter Chloe, played by fetching Amy Adams, a hat-checker (formerly hat check girl but that is passé now) at that jazz club Nate frequents and who turns out to be a struggling torch-singer in the mold of Peggy Lee it appears whose paramour and piano player is some strung out junkie. They “meet” while he is singing a song in his open window apartment and she is walking along the sidewalk below and begins a duet (the drop of a hat phenomenon). When they actually do meet though they are frosty, or rather she in the throes of what to do about that junkie boyfriend is, and standoffish although you could tell from minute one that they would hit the satin sheets before long-and they did.

What Chloe needed was a big change and eventually got it at that jazz club when Nate who has been providing the owner with good stock tips for this portfolio gave her a break. Smash home run hit. Except two things are amiss. Nate is torn about taking stab at making a musical career and tearing up Wall Street with his expertise and Chloe has to confront what to do about that junkie boyfriend. In the end you know what happened-or can guess. Here is the big problem for me though having first seen Ms. Adams doing her torch-singer thing in Miss Pettigrew Lives For A Day burning up the screen with her version of the old Inkspots’ tune If I Didn’t Care which even I recognized was one of the best versions ever done on that number. Either the song selection here was wrong although there were plenty of can-do Cole Porter tunes which Billie Holiday hit out of the park or Chloe’s jaunty way of performing them was off but except for one torch she didn’t ready hit the mark in the music department. He was off as well although Nate never claimed to be the cat’s meow as a singer. Maybe having imbibed this stuff third-hand (at least given their ages that seems right) their New York 2000s sensibilities saw the tunes differently. Still a good film to hear those old classics getting a workout and seeing the chemistry develop between Nate and Chloe.            

All That Glitters Is Not Gold-The Latest Find From The Crime Novelist Raymond Chandler’s Trove

All That Glitters Is Not Gold-The Latest Find From The Crime Novelist Raymond Chandler’s Trove 

By Book Critic Josh Breslin

A link to an NPR Morning Edition interview in 2017 with the editor of the Strand magazine on his find in the Raymond Chandler trove.

https://www.npr.org/2017/11/17/564752462/new-raymond-chandler-story-takes-on-health-care-industry

Reader in this space know of my great respect for the pioneer work of Dashiell Hammett and Raymond Chandler in bringing hard-boiled no nonsense basically anti-heroic private detective novels to the fore against the plethora of prissy parlor pink amateur detectives previously dominant in the genre. Guys, okay private eyes,  like grizzly street wise Sam Spade who was ready, willing and able to go the distance with the likes of Briget O’Shaunessey and the “Fat Man” Gutman until the bodies started piling up and he had to send darling Briget over, sent her to the big step-off to clear his own path over some fucking silly bird in The Maltese Falcon or, for example, wily gin-stained Phillip Marlowe skewering one Eddie Mars just to save an old man from believing that he had sired the devil’s own spawn in his wild and wayward daughters in The Big Sleep. Those characters will endure as long as people, young people, young men in particular seek adventurous tales. Hell even Hammett’s Nick and Nora Charles in the seemingly endless The Thin Man film series when they have to go mano a mano with some nefarious foes was like a breath of fresh air in its day.         

Of course both men have now long gone beyond the pale and no one would have assumed any and all of their work product, finished, scraps, letters, etc. would not have already gone under the microscope of the Dashiell/Raymond academy with nothing left to find. Apparently that is not the case for Chandler. A recent discovery of a short story, a very short story found in the Bodleian Library in England (Chandler was born there) has now been published in the Strand magazine. From what I understand from the interview on NPR with the editor this is a complete story unlike the unfinished Phillip Marlowe Poodle Spring story which the Chandler Estate commissioned crime novelist Robert Parker to complete many years ago.            

The question for me, and the question posed by the interviewer to the Strand editor, was whether he thought that Chandler would have approved of the publication of this little piece at this late date. The editor gave his reasons for saying yes based on what he knew of Chandler’s thoughts about his works and of his literary perspective. I am not so sure. There is an on-going argument among scholars of writers that not every piece of possible scrap written under who knows what conditions and expectations is either worthy of publication or was meant for publication. In the case of Poodle Spring Chandler died before he could complete the novel which showed Marlowe after he had been house-broken, after he had lost some speed or so the nefarious foes there thought, and it can safety be assumed that it would have seen the light of day if Chandler had been able to finish it on his own. This short story was written in the early 1950s, so perhaps he was “doodling” given its brevity and its quick look at the fate of a hapless homeless man spit out by the system. In any case, for good or evil, it is out in the public prints. Still I wish it had been an undiscovered Phillip Marlowe story-finished or not.  

One Less Johnny Rocco, Uh, Johnny Vanning Is Not Worth Dying Over-Bette Davis And Humphrey Bogart’s “Marked Woman” (1937)-A Film Review

One Less Johnny Rocco, Uh, Johnny Vanning Is Not Worth Dying Over-Bette Davis And Humphrey Bogart’s “Marked Woman” (1937)-A Film Review

DVD Review

By Leslie Dumont

Marked Women, Bette Davis the girl with the Bette Davis eyes who put her hips in her back pocket Bette Davis style, Humphrey Bogart last seen uttering those prophetic words about the Johnny Roccos of the world, 1937

Yeah, Humphrey Bogart, a guy who knew a thing or two and a guy who my old flame Josh Breslin who works at this publication still and Sam Lowell the acknowledged king of film noir and black and white films in his salad days idolized had it right, had it figured exactly right when he was down in Key Largo, down in the Keys sweating like a pig and he had to tell some luscious but dizzy dame what was what about guys like Johnny Rocco being always with us, always wanted more, always wanted to run the easy street rackets just like in the old days. (By the way, as an aside, water cooler rumors that Josh and I are an “item” to use an old-time high school term are just that-rumors. After Josh’s three divorces and my two we are in no rush to jump into anything so things are murky. At this time by mutual agreement murky is good, very good.)

Of course, that didn’t stop old Bogie from bang-bang dead Johnny, made Johnny sleep with the fishes when he tried to mess with his woman, with that luscious if dizzy dame. Get this though Mary, what the hell, Mary Smith since these kinds of women have a million aliases, played by the girl with the Bette Davis eyes, was way ahead of him, ahead of Bogie when she cut the deal of deals with another Johnny, Johnny Vanning who wanted what all such Johnnies wanted-more. Had it figured to make herself the best of it as detailed in the film under review, Marked Woman. Had to do what a girl had to do no fooling around.

Of course in post-Code 1937 Hollywood Mary’s profession had to be dolled up, hostesses they called that sort, B-girls, whores really if you want the unvarnished truth working not the streets but the night club expensive booze, some gambling then hit the sheets and make the bastards, the Johns pay through the nose. Yes, a girl has got to do what a girl has to do. Mary had all the angles, had guys like gangster king Johnny Vanning figured as nothing but trouble in a girl’s life if she didn’t work an alliance. So Mary, what are we calling her, oh yeah, Smith went along and got along. What people didn’t know, what her roommate so-called fellow hostesses didn’t know was she was hustling drinks and guys in order to put her sister, her babe in the woods sister through some swanky elite college.     

That little sidebar would change things for Mary in a big way once little sister got into the act, came to visit her not knowing that she was really a call girl, whore, oh well let’s go with the fantasy night club hostess laugh. Yeah a real babe in the woods who would get more, very much more than she bargained for when she saw the glitter of the big city, when she saw that she couldn’t go back to that swanky college once the kids there knew what older sister was doing with her silky sheets nights. Little sister, Bette I think her name was but who knows, got tangled up with the wrong gees, got tangled up with one Johnny Vanning. Took a funny little fall down the staircase at one of Johnny’s swank parties. So Bette too slept with the fishes in some East River dumping ground courtesy of thoughtful Johnny Vanning.

Whore or not if your sister gets wasted you have to do something about it, have to change modes of operation so Mary became a snitch, a stoolie for the Assistant D.A, a guy named of all things Humphrey Bogart in the days before he wised-up, before he knew that one Johnny more or less was not worth dying for. Funny Mary in her salad days had played Bogie for the fool in his attempts to bring Johnny, Johnny Vanning to some rough justice, but it could have been Johnny Everyman for all that mattered when Bogie thought Mary was on the level but who was working for Johnny’s lawyer to foul up Bogie’s case. Nice moves. The little sister thing though choked things off. It didn’t help when Mary decided after finding out what happened to sis to because a snitch that Johnny, sweet as pie Johnny, had one of his boys work her over to make her less talkative.

See even if guys like Johnny Vanning, Johnny Rocco, Johnny Blade from my old neighborhood up in Olde Saco, Maine before that town took a nose-dive after the mills started shutting down and heading first to the South and then off-shore didn’t want to rule the world on the cheap a gal like Mary once the sister thing became known was a loose cannon and Bogie played on that assumption. Brought her around to see that she was going nowhere except maybe hustling on the means streets giving head, blow jobs, in some back alley for dimes and doughnuts (left unspoken in coded Hollywood okay but that was the reality). So Mary talked, talked loud and clear, brought her “hostess” roommates along, and one Johnny Vanning was toast was doing some serious time for the death of little sister. Here is the funny thing as rough justice is done for a minute when Johnny V. tags a few nickels in the big house but somewhere in the big city another Johnny will be working his way up the food chain, will have his “wanting habits” on. In some odd way one more Johnny or one less is not worth dying for-still it was nice to watch Johnny Rocco sleeping with the fishes and Johnny V. heading to the big house for some rest.        

The Theft That Made The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum Theft Look Like Child’s Play-Burt Lancaster’s “The Train” (1965)-A Film Review

The Theft That Made The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum Theft Look Like Child’s Play-Burt Lancaster’s “The Train” (1965)-A Film Review

DVD Review

By Leslie Dumont

The Train, starring Burt Lancaster, Paul Scofield, Jeanne Moreau, 1965

The world, or at least the art world, those interested in art anyway is still in wonder, dismay, confusion about how the robbery of a bunch of extremely valuable paintings including work by Rembrandt and other masters from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston which after all these years still have not resurfaced in public. Wonder how what is something like a half a billion dollars’ worth of art has never seen the light of day. In some quarters, and not just among the street junkies and hipsters you can make serious money betting on who ordered the heist, who carried it out and who has kept the lid on this mystery for so long. Maybe Whitey Bulger went to his recent merciless grave with the secrets intact, maybe Myles Connors who I interviewed one night when he was in one of his short time out of jail moments in the role of President of Rock and Roll when I was a stringer at this publication although that night was about music not artworks, stolen or not, maybe Sid Larry, who is my personal chose if for no other reason that he was one of the great night crawlers of all time and never saw a jail cell. (In the interest of today’s necessary notice of transparency I have a one thousand dollar bet riding on him as the villain with his brother Ned, who I dated for a while after Josh Breslin and I split up.)   

(By the way every time patrons goes to the Gardner they are reminded of the theft by the empty framed spaces where the artwork had been prior to the theft. The interest in what happened that night and how is still high as a local Boston NPR continuing series has yet again explored what happened.) 

After viewing the film under review, The Train, which is based on a French non-fictional book which has documented the thefts by the German Army and other allied forces of major artworks from museums and private collections in France (needless to say and sadly from Jewish art collectors with a vengeance) as they roamed stealing everything not nailed down, and some stuff that was, throughout Europe, roamed particularly through Paris when that city was the epicenter of the art world before World War II that Gardner heist seems like small potatoes. Moreover, the Germans thought that their mere possession of the confiscated property meant that they were entitled to ship the entire looted works back to Germany as the Allies started their serious counter-offensive in 1944 to take back the night from the night-takers. This film details ficticously efforts by the French Resistance to stop the train from leaving the country playing off the real situation where a Free French officer Rosenberg actually did stop a train leaving for Germany with a lot of his art dealer and collector father’s artworks. The real story seems more intriguing in some ways especially since it has taken the equivalent of a legal civil war to get even some of the art works back to their rightful owners.

But the storyline here has its own intrigue and its own sense of logic at a time when the world had gone mad, a time not so very different than our times, or what could be our times if some social tinder gets stoked with the current madness afoot in the land. The whole expedition was planned by one German officer, Waldheim played by Paul Scofield, an art aficionado who apparently did not care that in Germany most works of modern art, meaning art by guys like Otto Dix, George Groz, Picasso, Matisse, damn, even innocuous guys like Degas and Cezanne were “degenerate.” Many a German smoke-filled night saw such works put to the torch. This mad man German officer was a walking bundle of contradictions since on the one hand he had something of a snobbish elitist concept of art and culture as being exclusively the domain of cultured gentlemen like him. On the other he had no problem killing every opponent who tried to stop the shipment’s passage to speak nothing of wasting everybody who got in the way of the German advances to the West, to blood stained Paris earlier in the war when the Germans seemed invincible. He was more than willing, thought it was clever, maybe even a brilliant advance for humankind to have civilian hostages on the locomotive of the train to avoid the damn thing being blown up. Shed not one tear when he ordered the hostages machine-gunned when he plans went awry, when he couldn’t get the art out of the country.    

Of course such a man needed an adversary, a worthy opponent to check his every move. A man or a group, here agents of the French Resistance, who while not having a refined sense of art, maybe even sense that with the world going to hell in a handbasket that some baubles were not worth the effort but who nevertheless made the call to arms when some who saw art, great art or small, an accrual in humankind’s struggle to emerge from the mud took matters into their own hands to stop the looting of French national treasures. That man, Lebite, played by ruggedly handsome Burt Lancaster last seen in this space according to Sam Lowell taking a few unaccounted for slugs over some wayward dame in the film adaptation of Ernest Hemingway’s The Killers, no man of culture, a man who could have given a damn about this load of art. Except somebody, some comrades, went back down into the mud on Waldheim’s watch for trying to stop, excuse my English, but my French heritage, my Quebecois heritage is showing, his fucking train full of loot.

So the chase was on between these two uneven forces. Naturally once the line-up was set up, and knowing the outcome of World War II, Waldheim would not be successful in his thefts, although it really was a close thing. In the end nobody could, or should have, shed tear number one when our French Resistance fighter took one glance at those machine-gunned civilians and wasted Waldheim without remorse, walked away. Yeah, that Gardner Museum heist was peanuts when you think about it-and that is the unvarnished truth.