Scorpio Rising (Kenneth Anger)

Opening scene.

Being one of the more truly divisive films that have since become cult classics, "Scorpio Rising" has always been a curiosity for me, despite of its slightly icky homosexual theme. Indeed, after watching the film in its 28-minute entirety, I can definitely see where numerous film enthusiasts are coming from when they hail the film as an influential piece of underground cinema. Sure, with its psychedelic amalgamation of religious iconography, Nazism and the rising 'rebel' culture of the '60s, "Scorpio Rising" is quite effective in terms of pushing forth a distorted state of mind. But for me, the film lacks the ultimate gut-punch, which Kenneth Anger, its director, could have easily pulled off, especially with the often understated power of terseness on his side.

     

As an experimental film, the film surely has some intriguing moments (the church scene is one of those), but ultimately, I was left quite unsure about the film's focus and where it truly resides. Yes, it is a given that Kenneth Anger is seemingly trying to assert the fact that riders consider their hobby as nothing short of a religion just like how Christians herald Christianity and Nazis highly regard Nazism. But hell, I haven't felt the sense of cohesion needed for such a potentially compelling commentary on hobbyist obsession. And why add the fictitious aspect of homosexuality in the film? For me, whatever the context of this aspect may be, I think it was just injected so that, you know, the film can take on a new layer of pseudo-complexity.

     

Constructively speaking, instead of making the film a befuddling experimental/mood piece just like what it is, Anger could have potentially made "Scorpio Rising" a full-fledged anthropological film about the motorists' alternative lifestyle and whether or not they can bode well with the fabric of mainstream Americana. With that, I think the film could have easily expressed what "Easy Rider" has powerfully done so just 5 years after it. I did enjoy the soundtrack, though. Honestly, I could listen to the songs at any given time.

     

At the end of the day, it's quite easy to see the film's encompassing visual influence on other filmmakers, notably Martin Scorsese and David Lynch. But what is quite difficult now to make sense of is why the film is considered 'great'. If you remove the stock footage from "The Living Bible: Last Journey to Jerusalem" short and half of the film's music, what we're merely left with is a plodding little film that has its sights on nothing but tires and leather boots and its destination to nowhere but the directionless path to pretense.

FINAL RATING

Woodstock (Michael Wadleigh)

"3 days of peace and music". This has been the phrase that has been most associated with the monumental music event that is "Woodstock". But this documentary film itself, aside from being able to highlight just that in an epic (it runs for a staggering 3 hours and 50 minutes) and almost hypnotic kind of way, is a definitive benchmark in documentary filmmaking.

Today, it can be particularly debated that what happened in "Woodstock" is but a niche manifestation of an obscure state of mind not representative of what America really was at the time. There's also some who may argue that the far out, violence-free miracle that has occurred at that vast dairy farm at Bethel, New York is merely a temporary illusion of transcendental happiness completely demystified by what happened at Altamont Speedway (see "Gimme Shelter") when the Rolling Stones held a free concert there less than four months later; a tragically sobering event (one homicide and 3 other deaths) that is commonly regarded as the "Anti-Woodstock".

But still, after more than 40 years since the figurative birth of this 'hippie' counterculture generation at this legendary music festival, "Woodstock" the documentary is truly potent and also often times genuinely powerful and moving in its truly flawless documentation of both a fragment of social history and a particular highlight not just of pot-induced rock and roll but the unparalleled sway of music in general.

Director Michael Wadleigh, supported in editing and directing by the likes of Thelma Schoonmaker and Martin Scorsese (both were then-unknown), who painstakingly covered the whole festival with an unbounded passion and goal to cinematically present and capture "Woodstock" not simply as one of those rock concert documentaries that usually come and go but as a simulated experience of what it could have been to walk through mud and smoke some weed at the time, has pulled off the nearly impossible by way of how he has put this massive Aquarian assemblage into a cohesive cinematic whole without sacrificing the minute details of almost everything that has happened there. So, although "Woodstock" the documentary is a solidly realistic time capsule of a film that has finely preserved the era itself, it has also transformed, after all these years, into a timeless film that is as much a thing of envy for free willing, flower-minded folks today as much as it is a perfectly documented curiosity piece for present social scientists.

But aside from being limited into what it merely is (a documentary film), what this documentary can be specifically proud of aside from the very content itself is its utter display of great cinematography and skillful editing. Jumping back and forth between simple interview footages and complex multi-image coverage of every musical performances ranging from that of Richie Havens' to that of Janis Joplin's and Jimi Hendrix's (all spine-chillingly great performances, mind you) that seemingly converge in a trance-inducing visual feast, the film, as it progresses, slowly changes form from being your usual documentary feature into a full-fledged experience; from your usual cinematic collage into a kaleidoscopic wonderland.

As equally fascinating as the musical performances themselves are the slices of existence during the 3-day event that were finely captured by Wadleigh and company's ever-observant lenses with poignant subtlety, which is what makes it a documentary film that is on the league of its own. Just like the great "Gimme Shelter", "Woodstock" is also devoid of any post-production voice-overs or narrations that may simply render the whole film as thematically contrived and emotionally artificial. Instead, the film lets the whole event and all the people speak for themselves in a quasi-surrealistic presentation of images and music that has been masterfully put together to create a potent statement on its own with little to no spoken words.

Commonly branded as the definitive rock concert documentary, I think it's much more than that. For many people including myself, "Woodstock" is not just a simple music festival. Boundless in its audacity and rich in love, it is a cultural revolution that has thankfully found its place in the annals of socio-cultural history, much the same way as how this film has deservedly found where it truly belongs: in the shortlist of the most important documentary films ever made.

FINAL RATING

A Hard Day's Night (Richard Lester)

The Fab Four.

"A Hard Day's Night" opened with the fab four being chased by their crazed fans. They stumble, they impersonate, they hide. But contrasting their attitude towards the mob to, say, Buster Keaton's in "Seven Chances", which he is helplessly chased by a hysterical crowd of unmarried women, is quite fitting. Unlike Keaton who ran for his life through bulging boulders and all, John, Paul George and Ringo ran for their lives just for the hell of it. They just wanted to be chased, make fun of the idea of it, and have a good time.

From those starts this energetic film that is part documentary, part quirky comedy film that cemented the, at the time, emergent phenomenon that is "The Beatles". As what the summary states, "A Hard Day's Night" puts into perspective a day in their exhausting, almost cyclic lives as music heartthrobs and recording artists. But just about when we are going to think that 'fame' is a thing pleasurable only in the start, the bumbling "Beatles" added their own peculiar twist into it, creating a refreshing milieu of the concept of 'celebrity' where constant tumbles, pressures and shows are nothing but snippets of fun and every troubles found along the way absorbed with carefree enthusiasm.

Before the band's journey into a more experimental style of music later in their careers with non-matching outfits and a more indifferent John Lennon, they have been an icon for their 'cool' fun and humorous, Liverpudlian antics, which "A Hard Day's Night", directed by Richard Lester (who also directed "Superman II & III") has captured with crisp black and white photography (by Gilbert Taylor) and a seemingly endless source of energy. The film was, as expected, virtually plotless, with countless vignettes and small adventures commonly caused by a person in the wrong place at the wrong time with the wrong age: Paul Mccartney's 'other' grandfather, played irritatingly (I do not know if that is a complement) by Wilfrid Brambell.

Yes, the four are having a great time, playing pranks, drinking booze and having clean flirts with various girls, but it was further enhanced, with potentially consequential outcomes, by this old man with an insidious intent to steal scenes and demand attention. He is by no means the weak part of the film, as the entirety of it was written splendidly by Alun Owen with an unrelentingly contagious wit and fast pace (though with some ad-libs here and there). But the scenes specifically intended to be dominated by John, Paul, George and Ringo's showcase of their ensemble, spontaneous comedy were at times overshadowed by this pesky old-timer's countless attempt to act without accord.

Of course, "A Hard Day's Night" is a comically trivial deconstruction of "The Beatles'" larger-than-life fame, but the old man's numerous acts of idiocies should have been, at least for me, a separate film on its own. In all fairness, if ever the character was envisioned as very exasperating as what was materialized on screen, I think Wilfrid Brambell performed well and did it justice, but the character really just bothered me, just like what he did to John and company.

"A Hard Day's Night" is the testament of the band's career's highest peak, and after many years, although some may find the jokes a bit dated, it is still a potent time capsule of a film that brings us into an era where mindless fan adoration is purely and outwardly reciprocated with substantial artistry. Nowadays, the first will always be somewhere out there waiting to be unleashed on the sight of a new celebrity phenomenon, but the latter may just really be nearing the gutters.

FINAL RATING