Indian Summer Blues

I've been acquainting myself with a collection of solo piano tunes called Indian Summer by jazz legend Dave Brubeck.  Of course, I made it through another working summer seeking enrichment and renewal in many ways.  But in the end, the seemingly endless parade of concerns concurrent with my job take their toll, and I resolved to spend the last two weeks of summer vacation keeping an intentional distance from work, a kind of Indian summer in itself.  And Brubeck helped. 

Summer school's a pretty relaxed and straightforward enough gig, though not entirely conducive to a sense of real "staycation," especially in light of all the fun and trip-taking so many close family and friends seemed to have enjoyed.  I had plenty of fun myself, for sure: saw my lady quite a bit, swam and barbecued, read and wrote, and otherwise tried taking it easy as often as I could afford to.  But here's hoping this was my last summer spent teaching.  Altogether it really wasn't so bad; the kids were great, and all went fairly smooth-like, everything considered.  At the same time, I'm naturally anxious to have a bit more balance,

A Little Revolution

It's been more than a year that I've neglected Serenity Now, and with good reason; the majority of my artistic life has been spent making progress on the most ambitious creative project of my life so far, a novel called Stuart Delaney.  Now that I've managed to make it a quarter of the way through that literary behemoth, I felt like there was a little room to breathe and take a day or two to share some of the thoughts that have drifted through my mind since the recent Criterion blu-ray release of the 1971 dark comedy and downright epically unassuming cinematic treasure Harold and Maude, which is more than a little apropos since many of its themes run through my own opus, not the least of which include a wayward vocational vector, rejection of social mores, and youthful disillusionment.

On Losing Virtue, Part 2

A while back, I wrote an article about the modern cultural fluency that governs sexuality. I argued specifically that our secular humanistic culture exalts sexual gratification out of a conspicuous pandemic of impatient self-indulgence. With this seemingly cavalier attitude toward sexuality, we attempt to “cheat” and acquire a level of intimacy we haven’t truly earned. In other words, we try to get it cheap, and like children having just succeeded in some grand misbehavior, we revel in the freedom from any accountability inevitably tied to the sex act. In biblical Christian doctrine, however, God is glorified by preserving sexual intimacy for the marriage bed, where the solemn promise of fidelity has already been secured, and the requisite emotional attachment, devotion, and all the responsibilities implicit in sexual congress (including the possibility of pregnancy and all the rest of it) are guaranteed, having already been pledged ceremonially through the blessing and sacrament of marriage. Many try to downplay the significance of such ceremony, as if their hormonal impulses alone were blessing enough. We try to get sex cheap, without having to earn it by winning someone’s love and respect and promising lifelong fidelity before God. As I stated in that

Storied in a Box

The summer of 1996 saw me finally adopt two notable tastes as a moviegoer. One values the advantage of letterboxing, while the other is simply the appreciation of black-and-white film. Ironically enough, the same movie happened to cultivate both appetites. My affection for black-and-white in particular afforded a rich new legacy of movies to embrace, beginning right here with Billy Wilder’s bittersweet romantic dramedy The Apartment. Not many people dare to buy a movie they’ve never seen. For me, it was one of those rare moments when I ventured out on such a limb, largely because the odds, I wagered, didn’t appear too steep, since the film had much to recommend itself, in particular its starring Jack Lemmon and Shirley MacLaine and having won the Best Picture Oscar in 1960. As it was, I took a chance and struck gold; not only did it awaken the previously mentioned appetites, but moreover it became a true personal treasure, one of my all-time favorite movies.

The Apartment was shot with a fairly wide anamorphic lens, the result of which requires letterboxing on just about any standard or widescreen television set. Letterboxing is, of course, quite common these days, but I suspect a great many people still don’t fully understand the history of the word widescreen and how it relates to the viewing of movies and television programs. I don’t mean to criticize; I was once among the same ranks throughout a time when I was certainly an avid movie-goer and considered myself an admirer of film as art. So, for those who aren’t familiar, the issue of letterboxing and the novelty of widescreen TVs both concern what is referred to as the aspect ratio of an image. Since nearly all motion picture and photographic images are rectangular, the ratio concerns only two dimensions: width and height. 60 years ago, this wasn’t much of an issue, since a great many motion pictures were still shot and presented in a standard 4 to 3 (width to height) aspect ratio. With the advent of television in the 1950s, broadcasters and manufacturers adopted the same standard ratio. However, as far back as the 1920s, filmmakers were experimenting with wider-angle (or anamorphic) lenses, and by the 1950s, a variety of wide-angle lenses and film resolutions were commonly used. Eventually, the 4:3 ratio was virtually abandoned in cinema, and for many years now, 21:9 has been the widest lens ratio commonly used in motion picture photography, and is the specific ratio in which The Apartment was filmed. When I worked for Edward Cinemas during my years as an undergraduate in college, we referred to the 21:9 ratio as “scope,” which was short for CinemaScope—the trademark name for the anamorphic process of widescreen motion picture presentation. The alternative was the smaller 16:9 image, which we called “flat.” These two types of film actually required us to alternate between two different projector lenses. And if one of our theaters was presenting a “flat” movie, a switch on the projector would extend masking curtains in the auditorium, obscuring the edges of the screen not used in the presentation of a “flat” film. Likewise, the curtains would have to be opened to present a “scope” film.

Now, like many people, I initially avoided home videos presented in letterbox format, since it seemed to be limiting the composition of the image, even though the situation is actually the exact opposite; most movies actually have to be cropped on the sides to completely fill a 4:3 screen, with the image occasionally panning and shifting to comprise the characters and the majority of the action within this limited frame, which is how we got the term pan-and-scan. Whenever a video box or a broadcasting station mentions that a film has been “formatted to fit your TV screen,” this is exactly what they’re talking about, and it always means that the image has been cropped. It was my training and work as a projectionist that finally allowed me to understand the purpose and advantage of letterboxing on a TV screen. But not until The Apartment did I appreciate it. Letterboxing is nothing more than a way of “cropping” the area of the screen itself, similar to what the masking curtains achieved in the auditoriums at Edwards, and presenting the wider image of a film, thereby retaining the full composition of the frame in its complete, albeit dilated (or slightly smaller), form. Now, there was, I admit, a short period during which I continued to dislike letterboxing simply because I found the notion of a smaller image too unappealing. But The Apartment was where I began finally to value seeing everything and to ignore the somewhat reduced image. Of course, with a widescreen TV, this diminution is all the more negligible.

While presented in letterbox format, the story is "boxed" another way, too—a story, in a manner, told “in a box,” as it depicts the tale of “loyal, resourceful, cooperative,” friendless, and wed-to-his-job insurance clerk C.C. Baxter, played by Jack Lemmon, who permits the use of his apartment for executive flings. Such a premise might seem almost dramatically trite by today’s standards, but the moral quandary explored here was certainly an adequate propellant in 1960, particularly when Baxter realizes that Fran Kubelik, the elevator girl with whom he’s so sweetly taken, played by Shirley MacLaine, is actually his boss’s own mistress. However, at 21, budding film aficionado that I was, what struck me so about The Apartment was only in part its subject matter. There are plenty of romances (comedic and otherwise) set to film and plenty of stories that canvas the complexities of corruption and corporate politics. Like many films, what makes it stand out is the execution, the manner in which the story is brought to life by virtue of script; performances; directing; music; and yes, despite the limited setting in the second half of the film, cinematography. In particular, what makes it still a compelling work today is the sharp wit demonstrated in the writing of Billy Wilder and I.A.L. Diamond, which is legendary for being so well-crafted as to only be diminished by improvisation. These were skilled writers whose work continually bears the mark of excellence, like the tasteful use of a rhetorical refrain, such as corporate exec Mr. Kirkeby’s habitual use of the –wise suffix to qualify a statement, which becomes a kind of catch-phoneme adopted by the two principle characters and by which a number of important conversations and themes unfold. It would almost become irritating, but as with so many things in life, as Baxter himself observes at a key moment in the film, “That’s the way it crumbles, cookie-wise.”

In addition to a sterling script, I’ve come to realize that its rather understated yet clever art direction and the manner in which The Apartment was photographed were significant factors in its having won my affection. There’s something about the setting itself that Lemmon’s character explains so simply and perfectly in the opening minutes of the film: “nothing fancy, but kind of cozy, just right for a bachelor.” Baxter’s apartment has an intimate and, at the same time, an expansive quality when delivered by the anamorphic lens and how Wilder used it. The frame is composed in such rich and stylized ways but with objects and characters of seemingly ordinary significance. The film then has the remarkable quality of drawing the viewer into its world so as to lend extraordinary significance to these otherwise mediocre people and their lamentably corrupted lives. It invites us to look closer, particularly at Baxter himself, to see a tenderness and a kindly simplicity, despite his immoral motivation and the lengths to which he extends himself for professional advancement. You almost get the sense that Lemmon’s character is simply too nice for his own good, too naïve, not quite accustomed to saying no. In another respect, a simple and unassuming goodness seems to permeate his character, which fortifies the modest and unassuming nature of the film itself.

Adding to its considerable allure is a charming score by Adolph Deutsch, at times buoyant and wry, at others jazzy and pensive, infused with a bewitchingly bittersweet theme originally titled “Jealous Lover” by Charles Williams. If ever music could inspire the tenor of nostalgia in an instant without any familiarity or association, this is it. And as the score is wound wistfully through the narrative, we find ourselves drawn into a world both sad and sweet, bitter and beautiful. And the apartment itself, specifically the manner in which it’s photographed, sets the ideal tone in which the themes of the story are so poignantly developed. The fact that the majority of the action occurs in this “box” is a testament to the narrative powers of Billy Wilder and art director Alexander Trauner, who used an array of wiles to create the cozy but shabby look of Baxter’s domicile. It was this domicile that so affected me along with the subtle manner in which Wilder continually composes the frame, with such vivid warmth and scenic charm, in tasteful combination with the contrasts of black-and-white film, creating a winning and comfortably threadbare, dog-eared kind of tone that saturates the entire story, made all the more beguiling by Lemmon and MacLaine’s endearing performances.

Perhaps the aspect of the film, then, that appeals most to me is a kind of lighthearted counterpoint between pathos and levity, which makes it feel, in a sense, very real. There is a broad menu of conflict at work here, particularly in the two principle characters. And yet the plot and its themes unfold in such an engaging way. In the hands of Wilder and Diamond, the story tackles some considerably dark terrain, including infidelity, corporate greed, emotional alienation, suicide, prostitution, and romantic angst, all with a delightfully refined wit, a teary but tasteful sweetness, and a plenitude of captivatingly mundane ambience. It’s truly as touching and tender as they come. If you’ve never seen it, do so, with my heartfelt endorsement. Take a step inside The Apartment and make a memory which, in all its treasury of toil and tenderness, will never disappoint. Invite your significant other, a sibling, or a dear friend; pop some corn; and keep on hand a tissue or two in the event your eye starts to leak.

Too often compared to its hilarious cousin Some Like It Hot, Billy Wilder and I.A.L. Diamond’s claim to comedic immortality made only a year before and also starring Jack Lemmon (however tempting the comparison may be since AFI crowned Some Like It Hot the funniest movie of all time), The Apartment is a preeminent achievement, multi-faceted and thematically embellished, that quite defies echelon and type. Is it comedy? Is it drama? A tale of corporate intrigue? Or your standard naïve-boy-meets-indifferent-girl story turned on its drearily optimistic ear? Well, yes. Imagine, if you will, the least likely to draw your attention in a box of adolescent pups, the most diseased and flea-ridden, mangy and mongrel, but the quiet, quirky, and wide-eyed spirit of which makes it the most ironically fitting and altogether wonderful choice to take home. Okay, that’s a bit of bias speaking. But still… It’s a keeper. Story-wise.