Framed to Perfection XXXII

THE ADVENTURES OF YOUNG INDIANA JONES: TRAVELS WITH FATHER (1996)

Directors: Deepa Mehta, Michael Schultz

Cinematographer: Giles Nuttgens

No, it’s not a Lord of the Rings fan film, but pretty damn close!

My late best friend always wanted to go through The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles, but never had the spare funds to buy up the boxsets. I was about to treat her to them as a gift but, sadly, fate intervened and she is no longer with us. Well, even though I’m not the biggest Indiana Jones fan in the world, not caring much for how cartoonish things got after Raiders of the Lost Ark, I’ve kept meaning to pay tribute to my departed soulmate by watching said 1990s family adventure serial.

The show did air on British television, that I’m fairly sure of, but I had little-to-no interest in watching it back in the day. No Spielberg. No deal. The same goes for The Dial of Destiny. I have even more of a reason to dislike the show now, since the collaboration between George Lucas and Rick McCallum here would sow the seed for the dreadful Star Wars prequels. Still, my recent piqued interest in history has provided a soft cushion for these fairly-petty feelings, so I thought I’d at least invest in the first volume and see how I got on.

Then the confusion started.

Midway through the first TV movie on the first disc of the first volume, the actor playing the titular Young Indiana Jones suddenly grows a clear foot and finds his voice broken. Uhhh, WTF?! I stopped immediately and did some online research. It turns out these international editions combine certain episodes to form a story chronology. Yeah, but, I was enjoying that first episode! Sigh. So I started going through the discs, one-by-one, trying to find the series proper, which begins with 1993’s “The Curse of the Jackal”, that I had now only seen one half of.

Some time later…

I eventually came across Travels with Father, which is the only thing from the series I vaguely remember giving a try back when I was a kid. I did recall some slapstick running about on a beach, which would certainly have put grumpy-teenage-me off the rest of the goings on. But, hey, since it’s at least familiar, I thought I’d stick with it. Plus I assume Corey Carrier is more likeable a lead than River Phoenix-stand-in Sean Patrick Flanery.

Well, Carrier is certainly a better actor than most of the d-list adult doorknobs surrounding him.

Except for, that is, the delightful Michael Gough. Which is where we come to this post. I was racking my brains who the actor was playing Leo Tolstoy in this thing, scanning every age-appropriate actor I know. Then, after checking, my spirits were buoyed to find it was Alfred Pennyworth himself! I’m hoping that Gough was at least on the shortlist to play Gandalf at some point during Peter Jackson’s casting process, although I believe John Hurt was really second in line. I guess that production needed a more sprightly actor too, with Gough being around 80 at the time of shooting Travels with Father.

Golly, I’m shocked to learn that he kept going until 2011! Blimey. They don’t make ‘em like they used to!

While this TV movie is presented as a complete narrative, it does feel suspiciously over-episodic, with Henry Jones Jr’s excursion with the elderly Tolstoy taking up the first half. After this surprisingly-traumatic adventure, we finally come to the “travels with father” portion of the film. It took them bloody long enough! But, as a reward, there is a marvellous teaching moment for Indy in a colosseum, where Sr instructs Jr on the nature of philosophy, with the director having father and son physically draw closer and closer together as they make a mental connection.

Simple, but clever.

Then we get those slapstick parts and yet more philosophical lecturing, with the latter actually starting to take the fun out of things. If it weren’t for Carrier’s adorable toothy-grin lighting up the screen, I’d have given up entirely at this point. Especially with the “grand finale” seeing Jr and Sr trapped in a lift on the side of Meteora. For about fifteen minutes. Fifteen long-arse minutes. Then things just sort of end abruptly with the credits playing over some awkward b-roll footage.

Fine. Whatever.

Despite the Lucas-McCallum partnership behind the camera, this film, or fix-up of two unconnected episodes (note the two directors), is ably shot and edited and very charming indeed. It’s just a shame the two producers couldn’t command the same show of skill on Star Wars. I believe Lucas “pulled a Hitchcock” with The Phantom Menace, whereby he, like Hitchcock did on Psycho with his Alfred Hitchcock Presents crew, used The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles team to bring us Episode I.

Only with drastically different results. Although I’m pretty sure Norman Bates does use a lightsaber at one point.

It took me a few days to get through this plodding soap opera, but I appreciated its educational value and rambling tone. I had an aversion to learning when I was supposed to learn, only finally burying my head in books as a cynical adult, by which time I’d realised that mental illness would indefinitely keep me disconnected from a society I could not and do not understand. Most things I was assured as a child about how society works was a lie. It’s a cold world out there, with everyone suspicious of one another and keen to see their neighbour suffer in order to secure their own unit. That’s the way it’s always been. That’s the way it’ll always be.

I now want as little to do with it as is humanly possible.

But, on the positive side, books won’t hurt you. Unless a particularly large one drops on your head.

Well, I best get back to trying to find the actual first-first episode of the series. I’m sure it’s in there somewhere, unless that doesn’t happen until Volume Two. In which case, I best get my wallet out again. You win, George. You bloody win.

Do stay in touch, darlings.

Toodles!

Subtitles OFF: Taiyô no ôji, Horusu no daibôken (1968)

Now this was a challenge! And I would say a challenge I only-sort-of met.

If you’re new to this blog series, it features a visually impaired idiot trying to understand what’s going on in a foreign-language film without the use of an English dub or subtitles.

My copy of this charming vintage anime didn’t have an English dub anyway, so that sorted that out right away. It also seems to go by many titles: the online department store calls it one thing, the box says another, the hard-stamped subtitles over the opening credits says another, Wikipedia says yet another, and IMDb says yet two more things. Sigh. Like the LGBT community failing to agree on acronyms, it’d be nice if distributors got together to have a meeting prior to releasing stuff in foreign territories.

Even just a quick phone call would solve the problem.

As best as I could tell, The Little Norse Prince, to give it one of its English titles, is about a stout young boy who, after his sole guardian passes away, leaves his hovel for pastures new. The boy eventually comes across a merry rural community, the men and boys of which seem to be under the beguiling spell of a siren-like young girl. The story of this girl, who appears to be rallying against unwanted obligation, proceeds to take up a good third of the middle section of the film.

This leads me to believe the film’s English title is very incorrect and misleading indeed.

After some very-1960s psychedelic bollocks, and a couple of awesome giant monster fights, whatever was at stake is saved and everyone skips off towards the horizon holding hands and laughing.

Right, let’s look up a proper synopsis and see how I’ve done…

…one second…

Ah okay, I didn’t do too badly. It turns out the girl is under an evil spell by the film’s antagonist, so that’s what she’s rallying against throughout. So at least I picked up on that. Oh and the village is where the boy is supposed to be originally from. Or something. There seems to be a few key story discrepancies between the Japanese and English versions, so I’m glad I just tried my best to understand the Japanese one. I know Disney likes to fuck around with their anime translations, with Studio Ghibli severing their ties with the former over such disrespect.

The inclusion of talking animals I found confusing, never being sure if they’re meant to be traditional Japanese “yokai” spirits or just, erm, Disney-style talking animals. I allowed both possibilities to work side-by-side in my head as I watched, which I was comfortable with.

The Little Norse Prince, or The Norse Prince Valiant, or The Adventures of Horus: Prince of the Sun, or Taiyô no ôji: Horusu no daibôkenor, is a cute combination of Laputa and Future Boy Conan and The Mysterious Cities of Gold, which helped keep my early-morning interest in its familiar-yet-different story. Based on the fragmented nature of the storyline, I suspect this is the product of two bankrupt productions hastily stitched together in order to make some money back. But I’m sure I’m wrong about that. Still, the battle scene in which you only get single-frames of the action leads me to believe they didn’t have the cash to literally fill in the gaps.

Perhaps it was a legitimate artistic choice, which only the most minor amount of online research would surely clear up. But who honestly has the time?!

I would say the film is very notable for being one of the few, if the only, anime to be presented in the 2.35:1 aspect ratio, with pretty much every other one I’ve ever seen being in 1.85:1 or 4:3. I dearly hope this is how it was originally made and not dastardly tinkering by the distributors! If there is another one out there in this format, I have yet to find it. This aspect ratio makes the story feel somewhat larger in scope, even though there really are just a few intimate locations within the tale. I’m actually surprised there aren’t more in 2.35:1, but perhaps there’s a strict technical reason why not.

Answers on a postcard!

I discovered this film whilst searching for whatever-it-was I originally mistook Sailor Moon for, the identity of which remains a mystery. This was one of the few titles that came up that looked promising, even though I was wrong. I’m glad it’s accidentally come into my life and, now that I know for sure what the bloody hell is going on, will definitely be watching again.

Even if you can’t find a physical copy, I’m sure there are plenty of digital services out there that carry it. Whether they have the right to or not.

Do stay in touch, darlings.

Toodles!

Heathen Chemistry

Whether the product of the Gallagher brothers actually sitting down to a quiet Sunday dinner and patching things up privately, or the lucrative machinations of their respective agents meeting “secretly” in upmarket London restaurants, Oasis are, rather unsurprisingly, back together and touring.

Meh.

We’ve had promises like this before in recent years, from The Stone Roses to The Verve to Supergrass, with things eventually falling apart once everybody remembers why they fell out in the first place. Saying that, Supergrass appear to still be going. I just think they’re nervous about entering a confined and stressful studio space.

In the 90s, you couldn’t avoid the sound of Oasis even if you tried. They were the prophesied-return of The Beatles (even though Oasis’ sound is more 1970s glam rock), in that their edgy rock songs crossed over into pop hysteria.

Good grief it was annoying, with even the band’s official logo looking like something you’d see printed on the side of a pair of cheap trainers.

(What’s the Story) Morning Glory was the album that really hit the wider audio and visual media hard. At one point, you could walk down the high street and pretty much hear the entire album played out from shop to shop. I actually hadn’t heard a single track from their Definitely Maybe debut until I finally sat down to get into the band in 2004.

But let’s back up a bit.

Apart from the odd tease here and there, for the first two decades of my life I’d been mostly listening to film scores and classical music. Little me would gleefully sit there with compilation tapes lost in his own messed-up world. Good times. But things were destined to change. After my parents had a messy break-up and divorce around the 2001-02 period, suddenly I felt safe listening to something slightly more mainstream than Elliot Goldenthal and Richard Wagner. My conservative mother had moved out in order to return to her Merseyside roots and dad was busy shagging his new girlfriend, so nobody was around to mock my burgeoning change in musical tastes.

And they usually would have done.

Now earning a living in offices, where radios pierced the deafening silence of bureaucracy hard at work, I started to notice the tunes I kept hearing over and over again. Who knows whether it was because of what was going on at home or just the music of the time resonating with me, but I gently entered the shallow end of the, erm, rock pool. Beginning with Travis and Stereophonics and Coldplay, I soon waded in deeper with Radiohead and The Smashing Pumpkins.

But not Oasis. I had been bludgeoned over the head with them too much over the years, so they were on the back-burner until I felt ready.

Right, let’s jump forward now…

Yes, I eventually bought up all of Oasis’ albums at once and went through them one-by-one, in a very workman-like fashion, as I still do with artists to this day. It’s the one thing I’m formal and organised about. While I found the ambition and petulant whine of their first two albums memorable, I warmed more to the obscene decadence of Be Here Now. Which still, to this very day, remains a tragically under-appreciated album. I mean, I just don’t hear what everyone else seems to have a problem with. “Too many guitars”?! What?! Have you actually listened to Definitely Maybe and (What’s the Story) Morning Glory?! Move along if that’s your problem with Be Here Now. Let’s face it, people don’t like it because the band were just generally overplayed on the airwaves anyway and the press turned against the Manchester five-piece.

Be Here Now is a fine album, full of great songs that are lusciously produced.

But we’re not here today to talk about that release, are we? No. You see, general opinion was/is that Don’t Believe the Truth was the band’s big comeback after the dreary and uninspired Standing on the Shoulder [sic] of Giants, but it wasn’t. Heathen Chemistry was. It’s a record that revealed the band’s joyful sound as having returned, being brim-full of passion and colour, without outstaying its welcome. Which is what music in the late-90s had been thoroughly lambasted for.

Opening with the greatest wake-up call in modern rock history, “The Hindu Times”, this album became the start to my Saturday/Sunday mornings for quite a few years. How one can listen to this bombastic introduction and not punch the air and pogo dance as they brew their morning coffee, as I would do, is beyond me. I am a morning person though, so perhaps I am alone there.

I just know I’ll never feel as fresh and full of energy as I do in those first few hours. I’m simply no good to anyone after midday.

I would argue “Force of Nature” is something of a minor early misstep, as I really believe you should keep the pace going after your opening track. “Force of Nature” just grinds things momentarily to a halt. “Hung in a Bad Place” or closer “Better Man” would have been wiser choices, but hey-ho. “Force of Nature”’s bouncing percussion is just off-putting, as is the pinky-plonk piano part and raspy lead guitar riff. Not that I’m complaining or anything. It’s a fine song, with attitude to spare and certainly should have made the cut. It’s really the production of it that mildly bothers me.

So, yes, “Hung in a Bad Place” picks up the pace wonderfully, leading us into the delightful “Songbird”. This one feels like a sketch scribbled on a cool summer evening in a picturesque garden. Ahhh. Like the album as a whole, it gets in and out without upsetting the professional music press with too much instrumentation or runtime. They do have other things to be getting on with, after all.

And then Noel gets his ballad, in the form of “Little by Little”, which is the song from Heathen Chemistry that received the most airplay. I must’ve seen the music video floating about on television at least twice a day at the time. Remember music television? When they used to show music videos and concerts? I believe they’ve all been infested by reality bollocks now. Sigh. Progress, huh?

Instrumental side changer (if you’re listening to this on vinyl, I guess) “A Quick Peep” is the sort of thing I really want to be producing. You know, as a hobby. I have no excuse now that the weather is gloriously cold again, so I shall start literally dusting off my instruments and recording gear and get my arse into action. Oh I do so love a mid-album instrumental! I wonder if somebody has compiled a playlist of the greatest examples of this. Or perhaps I should do it. Hmmm…

I really enjoy how “(Probably) All in My Mind” bleeds gracefully into the campfire romp “She is Love”, with the former’s title displaying an unnecessary but fun use of brackets. These two songs, representing a loose medley of sorts, pre-empted Green Day’s American Idiot by a couple of years. Not that such devices hadn’t been used in the past, even the recent past, but this one certainly presents an early example of such a thing in the post-Britpop years.

I still find it amusing how, initially, retrospective articles and documentaries about 90s music attempted to downplay “Britpop” as an actual genre, claiming it was just an invention of the music press. That attempt at “Britpop denial” has given way to embracing the idea wholeheartedly, which is in everyone’s best interest.

The haunting “Born on a Different Cloud” is just a pinch too creaky to be on here, sounding more like a Standing on the Shoulder of Giants-era slog, but the piercing feedback, creating a ghostly howl, is interesting enough to warrant inclusion. And, of course, “Better Man” is a driving standard that gives us a crowd-pleasing end to things.

So, there you have it. A bit of a random post by me this morning, but my mood has lifted enough over the weekend to risk listening to something other than comforting Dutch power-pop. Which I’ve been clinging too for weeks now. I’m blaming the summer, as I will until the day I die, for sapping my will to indulge in other stuff. I’m seriously considering getting my passport sorted and disappearing off to Greenland between June and August from now on.

We shall see.

Let me know which is your favourite Oasis album, as it is a matter debated across the British Isles as regularly as the fucking weather. I’ve actually still never listened to their as-now final album, Dig Out Your Soul, so perhaps that may turn out to be my favourite. Stranger things have happened. I don’t know what I’m afraid of, so I should probably just bite the bullet and stick it on.

Do stay in touch, darlings.

Toodles!

Tom Sawyer (1973) - film review

“My! This IS big!”

“That’s nothin’, wait till you see what’s up ahead!”

Well, I guess many phrases can sound inappropriate when taken out of context.

I’ve had a song stuck in my head for a few years now. I was pretty sure it was either a movie or TV theme, as certain imagery tended to come with it. Mainly an old-fashioned steamboat. At first, I thought it might be from classics like Sons and Daughters or The Sullivans, but, considering I hadn’t heard the song since I was a child, its true origin kept eluding me. I honestly thought I’d never remember where this pesky earworm came from.

While leafing through Jodi Foster’s filmography, I can’t recall why, I noted how much work she’d actually done prior to Taxi Driver and Freaky Friday, which is where I always assumed she’d started off. Nothing was really of note, with a television episode here and there, but this musical version of Mark Twain’s The Adventures of Tom Sawyer stuck out as potentially-interesting. No hardcopies in the UK exist, of course, but it is available digitally. So, despite not being a big fan of musicals or stodgy early-American literature, I thought I’d give it a whirl, what with Foster being “family” and all that.

I would call this a very loose attempt at a musical indeed, as the songs feel rather functional, almost last-minute additions, than coming from a genuinely creative place. They’re neither memorable nor performed or shot with any kind of flourish. They’re not the worst things ever, they’re just somewhat forgettable. Mercifully, they’re also incredibly short, which also adds to my theory that this was not conceived as a musical.

Who knows, perhaps the production received extra funding or tax breaks if there was singing and dancing involved.

I’m not terribly familiar with Twain’s Tom and Huck stories, but I get the idea. They’re ingrained enough in pop culture that they filter down even to a posh English cunt like me. However, the experience of watching this film was positive enough that I now actually want to sit down and read the original novels, especially since the audiobook for Tom Sawyer is read by the fabulous Nick Offerman.

Sold.

It’s amusing watching Foster playing a girly-girl, complete with frilly dress and bonnet, especially knowing her true self is closer to her awesome tomboy persona in Freaky Friday. She doesn’t have a great deal to do here, and you don’t get a sense she’ll be going off to do impressive things, but it’s still a delight to see her climbing that career ladder at speed.

The film sure does look pretty, although it lacks generous closeups of many of its supporting actors. Well, it sort-of-does, but the widescreen is so, erm, wide that the intimate moments feel as vast as the establishing shots. In fact, I had no idea Warren Oats was in the damn thing until the very end. There’s one really jarring moment of editing, which makes me believe something major was cut out, when the scene in which Sawyer is packing to run away from home suddenly jumps awkwardly to him already on a raft with Huckleberry Finn with a steamboat about to capsize them. I even exclaimed: “Wait! What’s going on?!”, which your audience really shouldn’t be doing.

After a murderer goes on the run when Sawyer fingers him in court, the screenplay wisely keeps reminding us that the fugitive is still out there and may come back at some point to wreak his revenge on our diminutive hero. I can’t fault the writers for holding our hands like this, as we surely would have forgotten the matter had they not mentioned it again, but characters discuss the whereabouts of said fugitive once too often, making such moments feel like the parody of what a screenplay needs to do. I was all like: “Oh, golly-gosh, I do so wonder if that guy will appear right at the very last minute!”.

And he does. Spoiler alert.

Leading “man” Johnny Whitaker is charming enough that it’s actually a shame he hasn’t done much worthy of his potential since. His vast mop of red hair stands out like a beacon amongst the pretty sets and locations and costumes, and his cute friendship with the seemingly-homeless Huckleberry Finn, with whom he can’t not go skinny-dipping with on a regular basis, certainly does explain why he isn’t too fussed about fighting for Foster’s character after she angrily rejects him.

Bless.

I also admire the fact that the film doesn’t utilise a vocal “stand-in” for Whitaker, as he clearly is no gifted singer. Perhaps the inclusion of musical numbers was so last minute that the producers couldn’t book session vocalists in time. Which would explain a lot.

The film rambles on gently, as if Robert Altman was behind the camera, which is fine by me. I do enjoy a chilled-out movie experience with an ensemble cast and unchallenging goings on. You know, when I’m not watching action movies featuring epic shootouts and car chases and spaceships falling out of the sky. Basically, Tom Sawyer is one to stick on when you feel like spacing-out on a lazy Sunday afternoon. Which is no bad thing.

If I gave out star ratings, this would be a solid 3 out of 5. But I don’t. So I won’t.

It just needs stronger musical numbers or pulling them out entirely.

Oh and the earworm that plagued me isn’t from this, but is from the 1979 Huckleberry Finn and His Friends TV series, which I guess must have somehow found its way onto British television at some point in the 80s. While I don’t remember anything about the show itself, the tune is haunting enough to have had a lasting effect on my subconscious. This film just brought those vague-memories back to the surface.

You can find the song here.

Do stay in touch, darlings.

Toodles!