The lovely folks at The Auteurs’ Notebook are hosting a wonderful series of pieces commemorating the publication of the splendid volume of Manny Farber’s film writings, Farber on Film. Regular followers of this blog know that I’ve been doing a retrospective series examining Farber’s “best films” of 1951; this week, I move the series over to The Auteurs’ to look at a pick that’s become an immortal classic, Robert Wise’s wonderful The Day The Earth Stood Still, theremin-laden score by Bernard Herrmann. The piece is here. And by all means do check out the other pieces in the Farber category, including David Phelps’s wickedly brilliant “Outside-In” and appreciations of the critic by Library of America editor and spellbinding film writer Geoffrey O’Brien, and the all-time great Phillip Lopate. Very nice company to find myself in, I have to say.
In moderately related news, I am compelled to report that whenever I do a Google Image search on The Day The Earth Stood Still, the image reproduced at right is invariably the fourth in the top row on the very first page. I had long thought that the 2008 remake of Earth was a completely unjustified travesty, but I understand now that it very well may have been of some moderate usefulness after all. Just goes to show, I suppose.
That’s the best Jennifer Connelly picture in a universe practically full to the brim with wonderful Jennifer Connelly pictures.
This related picture isn’t too shabby, either.
http://www.popcrunch.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/01/jennifer-connelly-picture-05.jpg
If I’ve started this comment thread off on a creepy note, then I apologize.
I don’t want to live in a world where anyone needs to apologize for posting that link, bill. LABYRINTH came out when I was 11. Ms. Connelly’s presence in said film placed her in a neck & neck tie with gold bikini Princess Leia in my personal “hey, there’s more to girls than just cooties” sweepstakes. I’ve sat through any number of lesser films on cable just because her name was in the credits. Oh, and she’s a fine actress. I hope that mitigates the creepy a bit.
Yes, otherbill, she was a mighty important to me, too. In my formative years and to this day (well, obviously). I’ve never even seen this film, but just the commercials for CAREER OPPORTUNITIES were incredibly, ahm, striking to my teenaged self, and to any number of other teenage boys with whom I conferred.
And yeah, she’s a very good actress. I remember reading, a very long time ago, a fluff piece (in Parade, if you must know) about Billy Campbell, back when THE ROCKETEER came out. He was dating his co-star Connelly at the time, and in the article she came off as overwhelmingly girly, and a bit vapid. But I think we can all agree she’s hardly vapid (she may well be overwhelmingly girly, but I got no beef there). She’s much better than most of the roles she’s been given. Hell, she elevates the utterly pointles DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL remake. That movie didn’t deserve her.
I just feel really old when I see hot pictures of her (which is most of them), the first time I saw her she was a child in Once Upon A Time In America.
SLURP.
(gonna go dig out Rocketeer VHS.)
‘Earth’ was a big influence on ‘The Man Who Fell To Earth’, Bowie has said he based his performance on Michael Rennie’s and the inside of Thomas Jerome Newton’s spaceship looks an awful lot like Klaatu’s.
I remember getting THE HOT SPOT on DVD and it wouldn’t play in my player. So I bought a new DVD player.
She still is something, but she really was something. In the CAREER OPPORTUNITIES trailer, when he says she would be beautiful even if she was covered in spiders, I thought about how PHENOMENA had already proved his theory. In ROCKETEER and MULHOLLAND FALLS, it actually hurts to look at her.
Sigh. Thanks for the stroll down pervert memory lane, Glenn.
Geez, I feel a little bad that you fellows are going so sheepish/apologetic; it’s not as if I didn’t know what I was doing when I put up the photo in the first place.
Yes, I was 24 going on 25, and JC was about 14 when I saw her in “Once Upon A Time In America.” No, I did not entertain any perverted thoughts about her then, honest, but by the same token I DID think, “She’s not gonna grow up to look like Elizabeth McGovern.” And she did not. From then on I remember being intrigued by the movies she was in, and by the fact that she was uniformly good in them, and that they were unusual movies: “Phenomena,” “Labyrinth,” that sort of thing. The one-two punch of “The Hot Spot” and “Career Opportunities” was both illuminating and distracting, let’s say. The nude stuff stopped being “fun” with “Requiem For A Dream,” of course. But she’s remained a genuine presence, and an underrated actress.
Oops, that’s David Phelps’ article, not David Cairns’. Not that I wouldn’t be glad to have written it!
@Glenn – hey you’re right…the nude stuff DID get less funn after REQUIEM FOR A DREAM. What the fuck, Darren Aranofsky???
What did it for me, and this should speak to her talent as much as to her indelible beauty (and, yes, way-hotness) was her role in Blood Diamond. For me, a very mediocre film that was redeemed as a worthwhile experience by Connelly’s presence. I had seen Requiem and a few other performances, and for some reason, it took the sexy, self-reliant-yet-vulnerable war correspondent role to shake up my world.
She’s a lot of fun in THE ROCKETEER, an underrated adventure movie (RIP, Dave Stevens).
Nice work over at newcriterion.com, Glenn.
Brian, I agree – THE ROCKETEER is an absolute blast. A great adventure film, and genuinely funny.
CLIFF (building up the courage to reveal his secret): I’m the Rocketeer.
BETTY: The Rocka-who?
And yes, RIP Dave Stevens. That was a real shock.
Oy! That was a terrible shock about Stevens. I never met him but I had some friends in and about the periphery of that part of the comic world (by means of which I once was able to go to a Halloween bash at Bernie Wrightson’s place!) and Dave was known not just as a major talent but as a complete sweetheart. Very interesting, the evolution of “The Rocketeer“ ‘s Betty: from Page to Connelly!
Glenn, that’s cool you got to go to Wrightson’s place! I was a little too young for those Marvel and DC horror comics when they were first published, but I was reading an article on them the other day, and Wrightson’s work (and the lush Colan/Palmer work on TOMB OF DRACULA that the article reprinted) made me think I should catch up with them.
And I’d read that about Stevens, too– that he was a real mentor for young artists, and very accessible at conventions and the like. He also did some concept paintings and storyboards for Lucas on RAIDERS and EMPIRE, didn’t he? From what I’ve read he was also a good friend to Page, helping her with various legal and career things later in her life, I think.
I’ve always been annoyed (and, well chauvinistic) when I point out that NO ONE ever gets on Connely’s case for clearly having a breast reduction. I mean, people looove to attack gals with fake boobs so why not share the wealth when they taketh away? Damn it.
@Glenn -
“by means of which I once was able to go to a Halloween bash at Bernie Wrightson’s place!”
I hate you. I mean, I don’t really, but I hate you.
Wrightson’s ILLUSTRATED FRANKENSTEIN is amazing, by the way, in case any of you haven’t checked it out.
@ D Cairns: Ooops! And fixed.
I watched THE MIST the other night and was surprised to see Bernie Wrightson’s name among those credited with the creature design. I used to love his stuff as a comic-collecting kid, particularly Nightmaster and those horror books, like Creepy and Eerie.
Jbryant – I forgot about that. I think you can especially see his work in that Lovecraftian brontosauras thing that walks across the road (best moment in the whole film).