1967's Oscar Nominees (inspired by "Pictures at a Revolution")

this "subtext" thing is more or less an invention of post-70s academia so far as i can tell. never seen audience studies to back it up, just "enlightened" readings.

And there ya have the tyranny of evidence.

This all said, I'd be very interested to see your take on this book, KJB. I don't think it's drunk on the Kool-Aid of easy riders and raging bulls, and even though it takes totally defensible potshots against SOME aspects of Old Hollywood (most of the Dolittle material, though it's rarely used as a strawman IMO), it doesn't needlessly fawn over the supposedly obvious greatness of B&C or The Graduate.

im not sure what 'tyranny of evidence' means. but i've not seen contemporary readings of sirk that notice what crazy radical ideas he snuck into his films. they came later, in the '70s. unless someone has counter-evidence. so in other words, if those films had a subtext, who read it at the time?

But part of what I was getting at is that the Production Code was not federal law. It was not mandated that all films/producers adhere to it.

Nobody stops the studios from making NC-17 films either, and yet here we are.

I don't think it's drunk on the Kool-Aid of easy riders and raging bulls

Sold! I'll get on it ASAP.

if those films had a subtext, who read it at the time?

Gay people, for one.

as i say, i've never seen evidence of that... though haven't look too hard because i don't think sirk's films are very good. moving the goalposts a bit, i don't think saying "well they DID deal with that, but it was all SUBTEXTUAL" is a super argument. audiences will get what they'll get from a film.

sirk begfan to get attention in the late 60s not because of the gays but because he was a former leftist with brechtian connections (yawn) from back in the day.

xpost Did they have a choice? It's not like they had such comprehensive representation otherwise, at least not until the post office were finally allowed to delive them their physique pictorals.

(That sed, I'm definitely in the camp arguing on behalf of subtext.)

An example of a film that's ALL subtext and no text: Far From Heaven.

Imitation of Life and Written on the Wind don't require examination of subtext to be entertaining; that's what's been lost after years of graduate theses written on Sirk. I mean, there's a reason why his films were massive box office hits.

It's not like they had such comprehensive representation otherwise

I don't know. Do the careers of the great priss queens like Franklin Pangborn or Clifton Webb count as representation? There's a good essay in Cinema Journal about the "open secret" of Webb's career.

What about William Haines? Cary Grant (check his Tijuana Bible)? The MGM musicals (Steven Cohan's Incongruous Entertainment is superb on this)?

What counts as evidence of homosexuality?

An example of a film that's ALL subtext and no text: Far From Heaven.

Game, set and match.

far from heaven was an ok exercise de style.

Do the careers of the great priss queens like Franklin Pangborn or Clifton Webb count as representation? There's a good essay in Cinema Journal about the "open secret" of Webb's career.

yea exactly, there's a good essay *many decades later* explaining how something nobody perceived was actually a thing.

arguing that that state of affairs was better seems weird. things aren't perfect now, of course, but there's a kind of process of projection onto the past going on here imho.

yea exactly, there's a good essay *many decades later* explaining how something nobody perceived was actually a thing.

Don't be mad just because Larry Kramer said every American president up to and including Abraham Lincoln was gay.

something nobody perceived

Nobody perceived it? Absolutely nobody? Do you honestly believe this?

maybe this is what you mean by 'tyranny of evidence', but... that kind of thing needs evidence! not a very radical proposition.

even then, as i say, people will project what they want on to a film. maybe they'll be able to read x-character as 'gay', but there's quite obviously going to be massive parts of that that just won't be, could not be put on screen.

(and sure enough things did not change overnight in 1967, but are you really arguing that it's better to deal with things 'subtextually' than not. i think denby agrees with that.)

and sure enough things did not change overnight in 1967

Hence, as I'm just getting to in the book, Beatty and Penn backing out of the original script's fairly explicit acknowledgement of Clyde's homo- or bisexuality. While Harris doesn't cut either any slack, he also points out that 1966 was the year that Time Magazine could print out-and-out antigay vitriol and sell it as journalism without anyone batting an eye.

are you really arguing that it's better to deal with things 'subtextually' than not

But to what extent were Franklin Pangborn's characters subtextually gay? Did these characters NEED to say "Yo, I am homosexual. Now let's get on with some Sturges slapstick!"? Did they NEED to passionately kiss other men in the first shot? Yet again, what counts as evidence? And what does it mean to perpetually require such evidence?

Look, I'm not being naive here. I'm not saying that millions of Americans were hip to homosexuality or whatever pre-The New Hollywood/1967/Stonewall. But we have diaries and letters and photographs that even predate cinema which offer the kind of evidence you seem to require. It's not for nothing Tom Waugh called his remarkable book of pre-Stonewall gay male photography Hard To Imagine. But there's your evidence?

Now what?

But there's your evidence. (period)

Did these characters NEED to say "Yo, I am homosexual. Now let's get on with some Sturges slapstick!"? Did they NEED to passionately kiss other men in the first shot?

actually i don't know! i'm not a gay guy in the 1940s. i think if i were, i would maybe not want to be in such a homophobic society whose popular culture was unable directly to address large parts of my experience or the obstacles i faced. having elements of gay eroticism in certain parts of the culture a la tom waugh would maybe not make up for that? idk.

waugh's book is not exactly a work on audience response.

(sidebar: were there characters in '30s films who were 'subtextually black?')

'the studio' is a classic.

think i'd go 'heat of the night' -- haven't seen it in 10 years but it didn't strike me as soft-serve at the time -- or 'graduate'.

― FREE DOM AND ETHAN (special guest stars mark bronson), Friday, April 24, 2009 9:53 AM (4 days ago) Bookmark

knew i could trust u ~~~ heat of the night by a mile for me

tyranny of evidence'

I keep reading this as 'tranny of evidence'

do not get the love for In the Heat of the Night, which I thought was okay but rather boring, and the murder mystery element of it was very "um duh"

having elements of gay eroticism in certain parts of the culture a la tom waugh would maybe not make up for that?

That was just an example of hardcore (!) evidence (for some; others would no doubt still poke holes in it and rightfully so perhaps). My point is that Franklin Pangborn's demeanor was evidence enough. So was Clifton Webb's as Leonard Leff's Cinema Journal piece makes VERY clear (although you might feel differently).

waugh's book is not exactly a work on audience response.

Well, that's debatable, esp. since so much of it concerns amateur photography. Certainly Otis Wade was audience to the men he photographed in a 1938 locker room ('hard to imagine?' more like 'boggles the mind!').

(sidebar: were there characters in '30s films who were 'subtextually black?')

An excellent question. I dunno really. The 1934 Imitation of Life springs to mind although I'm not sure how subtextual race is in that film. Can one say that race is subtextual to some of the characters but not the audience? Perhaps Richard Dyer's White would offer some clues for other films. Jezebel (1938) maybe?

Beyond subtext, one of Haskell's points in From Reverence to Rape is that the screwball comedies of the 1930s gave women a mobility they lacked in 1970s cinema when they hadn't disappeared altogether in the spate of New Hollywood buddy films.

Certainly subtext is at play here too. Was the end of Stella Dallas (1937) really sad for all women in the 1930s?

OK, I just finished reading the sequence involving the shooting of Spencer Tracy's climactic speech and I'm fucking tearing up ... for a movie that I'm positive I'll think is laughable and ridiculous whenever I actually get around to seeing it.

It's really the classiest moment in a vulgar film.

arguing that that state of affairs was better seems weird.

for myriad reasons, the peaks of the art were more frequent.

just finished reading the sequence involving the shooting of Spencer Tracy's climactic speech and I'm fucking tearing up

but not at the scene itself? it's all about the Bazinian doubling of the Kate-Spence real-life relationship.

nuthin kills a thread like "Bazinian doubling"

Should be getting this book from my library any day now...really looking forward to reading it.

I've seen the scene itself, and to the extent that I doubt it would have much power without knowing or being aware of the backstory, yeah, I guess it's a Bazinian double.

well, the original audience knew some of it as Tracy was dead before it was released, and were aware of T&H's 25-year partnership onscreen if not off (and I'd guess the savvier movie-mag readers knew that too).

Heat is on TCM right now, caught the greenhouse slap.

How savvy? Harris floats the possibility/probability that, respectively, Tracy/Hepburn were not hetero.

I don't believe those Tracy homo rumors; and, yeah, the scene isn't half as poignant without knowing it's a perfect obit moment.

I don't believe those Tracy homo rumors

Me neither; but you know me ... I don't even believe the Paul Newman homo rumors.

i'll send you some remixes Paul did

And now we get to the Kael vs. Crowther fites. OK, this book does seem a little bit flattering to pre-standing notions of modern cinephilia.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

In the end, I went with my favorite, though the making of Bonnie & Clyde is probably the least interesting story in the whole book.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

Without having seen it, I find myself wishing Dinner had managed maybe one or two more votes.

the extent to which people fetishize the good old days of "sophistication", "wit"

we know you don't admire those qualities even w/out the quotes!

nice xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxpost

?

Found this used for $7! I'm fighting sleep just to make it to the next page. Very gripping throughout choked with tons of amazing stories/factoids. Bout 1/4 of the way through and I have some reservations. But overall, fantastic book! Thanx for the tip, Eric H.

Great, though I imagine you're going to really loathe the section describing the Oscarcast that year. Harris really lets the facade drop and comes out cheerleading for the new gen.

Very entertaining book.

Finally got tired of waiting for my local library to get a loaner copy of the Harris book, bought a copy Friday.

OK I've finished this and I thought the cheerleading was actually quite muted (save for the very last paragraph). Or rather, it comes through less in any specific statements of Harris' than in the structure of the book, i.e., what he chose to leave out. The truncated epilogue creates the illusion of a revolution more than anything in the book. So reading it was an absolute pleasure. It's only now, recollecting the argument in its entirety, that I feel snippy. In short, revolution my foot.

I rewatched most of these films while reading. Don't need to see The Graduate for a long time again since I've taught it so many damn times. But basically, my order of preference hasn't changed:

Bonnie & Clyde
In the Heat of the Night
The Graduate
Guess Who's Coming to Dinner - I want to like it more than The Graduate and Spencer Tracy deserved the Oscar no matter how much it would have set back the, um, revolution. But ugh, even on purely dramatic terms, it's insufferable.
Doctor Dolittle - A complete nightmare. This cannot be the same Richard Fleischer who directed one of the tightest thrill rides ever, The Narrow Margin! Could any two narrative films be more different? And the "songs" were godawful! I must be familiar with another version of "Talk to the Animals" because this one made no impression whatsoever. More than once, the musical notes surrounding the closed captioning were seriously the only way I knew a "song" had started. I admit with no guilt that I fast-forwarded the last third or so (right past those charming natives). And the pink snail money shot! Sadness. Still, the precise extent to which this film represents "old Hollywood" should have been explored a bit more in the book.

OK this book obviously hit me a bit harder than I imagined. I had a dream last night in which I won the Best Supporting Actor Oscar in 1967! (I have no clue for what film.) I must have been very young too because a lot of people treated me like a kid, saying things like "Aw, I can see your movie star face coming in now." (!!!)

Warren Beatty was using a cheesy cardboard sign to push me out of the auditorium to get me to go to a party with him. Annoyed, I said "What the hell are you doing? I want to stay and talk with my well-wishers and fans." "Fine!" he said all snippy and walked away from me in a huff.

I woke up with my heart beating very rapidly.

Wtf???

wow, you upset George Kennedy!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ikk0xfbtVKM

http://filmexperience.blogspot.com/2009/07/were-1967-1979-oscars-most-fascinating.html