Category Archives: American culture

RIP Mort Abrahams (1916 – 2009)

Mort Abrahams (born 1916 – died 28 May, 2009) was an American film and television producer.

Among his credits are nine episodes of spy series The Man from U.N.C.L.E. and, as associate producer, Doctor Dolittle (1967), Planet of the Apes (1968), Goodbye, Mr. Chips (1969), Beneath the Planet of the Apes (1970), co-writing the story of the latter.

The Man from U.N.C.L.E. theme[1] by Space Age Popper Hugo Montenegro

Pam Grier@60

via here.

Pamela Suzette Grier (born May 26, 1949) is an iconic American actress. She came to fame in the early 1970s, after starring in a string of moderately successful women-in-prison and blaxploitation films, and has generally remained in the public eye, starring in B-movies such as 1974’s Foxy Brown, and in mainstream films such as Quentin Tarantino’s 1997 film, Jackie Brown.

James Mason @100

James Mason @100

via img.youtube.com James Mason @100

James Mason (15 May 1909 – 27 July 1984) was an English actor who attained stardom in both British and American films. He acted in such films as Madame Bovary (1949), The Tell-Tale Heart[1] (1953) (animated short subject) (voice), 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (1954), North by Northwest (1959), The Trials of Oscar Wilde (1960), Lolita (1962) and Mandingo (1975).

[Youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W4s9V8aQu4c]

To me the man is remembered by his voice, there are even spoken word albums by him. Listen to it in the Youtube clip of The Tell-Tale Heart, the cinematic animated adaptation of Poe‘s story about the compulsion to confess, a psychological complex first described by Theodor Reik in The Compulsion to Confess in 1925.

Harvey Keitel @70

Harvey Keitel (born May 13, 1939) is an American actor best-known for the “tough-guy” characters he portrays and for his memorable roles from Quentin Tarantino’s Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction, Martin Scorsese’s Mean Streets and Taxi Driver, Ridley Scott’s The Duellists and Thelma and Louise, Jane Campion’s The Piano and Abel Ferrara’s Bad Lieutenant.

Bad Lieutenant (1992) – Abel Ferrara [Amazon.com]

But surely, his most unsettling film is the Bad Lieutenant by bad boy of American cinema Abel Ferrara.

The film is squarely located in the oasis of American cinema known as the NC-17 pond. Its thematics are religion, rape revenge and general hardboiled existentialism. Its protagonist is Keitel who is tagged as Gambler. Thief. Junkie. Killer. Cop. Keitel’s nameless character is a corrupt police lieutenant who, throughout the movie, is spiralling rapidly into various drug addictions, including cocaine and heroin. His lack of success at gambling reflects his lack of faith. The turning point in the film arrives when the Lieutenant investigates the rape of a nun and uses this as a chance to confront his inner demons and perhaps achieve redemption.

The film features male frontal nudity of Keitel, a rarity in American cinema.

Most recently, erotic photographer Roy Stuart, in his Roy Stuart, vol. 5 reenacted the scene when Keitel stops two young girls in their car, discovers that they have no driver’s license and forces one to bare her behind and the other to simulate fellatio, while he masturbates.

Werner Herzog is to release a similarly titled film in 2009: Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans starring Nicolas Cage and Val Kilmer. According to Herzog, the film is not a remake of the original. In fact, Herzog claims to have never seen Bad Lieutenant, nor to know who Abel Ferrara is.

Bad Lieutenant is World Cinema Classic #101.

Lex Barker @90

Lex Barker @90

Image via www.tarzan.com

On the cover: Lex Barker

Lex Barker (May 8, 1919 – May 11, 1973) was an American actor best known for playing Tarzan of the Apes and leading characters from Karl May’s novels. What I find interesting in his career is that he emigrated to Europe when his American career was faltering, like so many with and before him. He ended up in  German paracinema.

Audrey Hepburn @80

Audrey Hepburn (May 4, 1929 – January 20, 1993) was an Anglo-Dutch actress, performer, ballerina, fashion model, gay icon, sex symbol and humanitarian, noted for her performances in films such as Breakfast at Tiffany’s and her waiflike appearance.

The waif look was then known as “gamine”.

The “gamine” look of the 1950s, associated with actresses like Audrey Hepburn, Leslie Caron and Jean Seberg, was, to some extent, a precursor of heroin chic.

Pete Seeger @90

Pete Seeger @90

Pete Seeger (born May 3, 1919) is an American folk singer, and a key figure in the mid-20th century American folk music revival, best-known in my canon for penning “Turn! Turn! Turn!“[1]

[Youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MWg3b15ITS8&]

“Turn! Turn! Turn!” (1965) by  The Byrds

The most successful recorded version of the song is the #1 hit single by pioneering folk-rock band The Byrds, released in October 1965.