#'70s movies | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

fuckyeahfightlock · 7 days ago

Text

Punk Rock Cool Kid Required Viewing (Batch 4)

Sid and Nancy Suburbia Stranger Than Paradise A Clockwork Orange

(I'm rewatching all the "required viewing" films of my alterna-teen years) Notes on these films below the cut.

Sid and Nancy (1986, dir. Alex Cox)

I fear I could go on forever about this film. So quotable, and I still quote it. The punk generation's Romeo and Juliet story, our great doomed romance, played ably by the reluctant Gary Oldman (he turned down the role twice before being bullied into taking it by his agent) and television actress Chloe Webb in their breakout film roles. Troublingly romanticised, perhaps, but these were big personalities with big-turned-small lives and there's true love and tragedy in their story, blighted by heroin, with a punk soundtrack and attitude. They died young, stayed pretty; for better or worse, there's currency in that sad tale. Better to burn out than fade away; hope I die before I get old--two slogans of glamourous, glorious youth so young it doesn't recognise how much more life there is after 18, or 20, or 25, and that no matter how much "living" you pack into a short life, it's still too damn short.

This film is a cartoon that morphs into a dirge, and I feel Nancy was treated somewhat unfairly in it (I recall many people who met the real Nancy saying how much they hated her because she was loud, bossy, unpredictable, "got Sid hooked on heroin"--I distinctly remember someone described her voice as "honking"), and that Chloe Webb's choices were sometimes a bit superficial--the real Nancy Spungen was a very troubled person with a lifelong struggle against largely undiagnosed and untreated mental illness (her mother's book is a harrowing read; I'm rereading it now as I bought a new copy when I ordered the DVD)--Webb's Nancy comes across as a brat, a climber, and somewhat stupid (the real Nancy was exceptionally intelligent) and her moods in the film are pretty one-note, everything from her playfulness to her romantic feelings to her junkie desperation play out "on 11." Oldman's Sid is a youthful goof-off, not bright but probably brighter than Sid actually was, ultimately aimless, lead around by the dick by Nancy's interest in him and her steamroller personality. Somewhere in the middle of all these extremes probably lies the true nature of their relationship--young, horny, addicted, dumb (not stupid)--but the extremes are what makes it a story worth remembering, worth telling.

This film has some truly beautiful, cinematic moments, like the re-creation of Sid's "My Way" music video, the unforgettable kiss in the alley while garbage rains down, Sid nodding out and Nancy mutely staring as their hotel room burns. Alex Cox knows how to frame a shot.

In some ways it's a caricature, but this film was made with true affection for its subjects, and I will always love it.

Notably fantastic performances by Andrew Schofield as Johnny "He likes to be called John" Rotten, Debby Bishop as Phoebe (a composite character who essentially manages the Pistols and then Sid, under direction from Malcolm MacLaren), and Xander Berkeley (who I have an affinity for, just always) as Bowery Snax, Sid and Nancy's New York dealer. Courtney Love has a minor role in this--she auditioned for Nancy but with her then-fat face and terrible acting it's clear why she was not cast--as is Kathy Burke.

We'll never know what really happened in Room 100 at the Chelsea Hotel, but Nancy had been trying to die for years by the time she was found stabbed in the bathroom there, and it's unsurprising that fresh-from-Rikers Sid overdosed and died as soon as he got out (many people forced into withdrawal overestimate their tolerance when they return to using). Most profound of all: when Nancy and Sid died, they were 20 and 21 years old.

Love Kills.

Suburbia (1983, dir. Penelope Spheeris)

I hadn't seen this one in about 25 years; I'd forgotten the distressing amount of casual racism, homophobia, and rampant misogyny, and I'm sorry but there's no way that "no animals were harmed" disclaimer could have been applied. That said, Suburbia is the most important narrative film of the punk era, by a mile.

Suburban child of an alcoholic single mother Evan takes off to join a group of thrown-away teens squatting in an abandoned tract home, where he gets "a burn" (brand) of the gang's TR insignia--for they are The Rejected. Burnout druggie Keef, faux dad Jack Diddley, skinhead thug with a heart of gold Skinner, silly girls Matie and T'resa, maybe-a-goth Joe Schmo (whose jean jacket I modeled my own after), and recent suburban runaway Sheila are among the characters who inhabit the TR house. Notably, Razzle--who has a fat pet rat and tries to tame the neighborhood's pack of feral dogs (allegedly the Pet Shop Boys' song "Suburbia" is inspired by this film)--is played by an impossibly young Mike B. the Flea, later the bassist of the Red Hot Chili Peppers.

The film is just barely acted by this bunch of amateurs--they were Los Angeles punks Spheeris recruited because "I couldn't make actors into punks, but I could make punks into actors" who mostly showed up for the $100 a day paycheck--and in one scene Jack says, "Which way is it, Flea?" and Flea replies, "My name's Razzle." It's cute, in Hey Kids Let's Put On A Show fashion. The music is alternately pretty good (live performances by D.I., TSOL, and The Vandals) and kind of weird (Alex Gibson's pseudo-alterna score sometimes reminded me of the '70s soft rock dude in Sid and Nancy trying to sell his "I wanna job, I wanna job, one that satisfies my artistic needs" song to Johnny Rotten because "it's got kind of a punky feel"). The aspect ratio makes me think this was a straight-to-video release??? It's made to fit not a movie screen but a 1980s television screen--the movie is square.

The story is a suburban tragedy, of wasted youth (though it's clear these kids have been failed and betrayed by their families, schools, and society, through no fault of their own--which is probably why it had such strong appeal to '80s misfit teens like me and mine) and the hollowness of life in the ruins of pre-fab utopias. The kids do their best in the face of indifference, anger, and fear. When one of them dies by suicide, the friends don't know what to do, and a lingering shot of the punks standing silent in the front yard of a tract home as they return their friend's blanket-wrapped body to her stunned parents is an image that lingers.

Maybe clumsy, maybe melodramatic, but Suburbia really tries to say something about punk culture, the real mental anguish of teenagers, the value of found family, and the empty promise of the Reagan '80s. In its way, it's similar to Rebel Without a Cause, The Outsiders, or Bless the Beasts and Children--reminders that young lives have depth. Absolutely worth the time; I was glad to watch it again.

Stranger Than Paradise (1984, dir. Jim Jarmusch)

Well, this sure is a Jim Jarmusch movie! I don't know exactly how this ended up in my crowd's Required Viewing clump, except to perhaps thank/blame the Cool Older Guy Who Worked At Our Video Store. There's not really anything punk about this film, except that it's pure indie, which was rare and exciting back in the '80s--much rarer than it is now. It's a New York story of a jobless hipster, Willie, whose teenaged cousin Eva comes from Hungary for a weeklong visit. Willie's friend and shadow, Eddie, tags along as the three roadtrip from Cleveland to Florida, and the whole thing is a very long walk to a single punchline.

It has its moments, certainly. Eva walks through barren, early-'80s New York City streets carrying a tape recorder playing Screamin' Jay Hawkins' "I Put a Spell on You" and later when Willie tells her he doesn't like it, she says, "That's Screamin' Jay and he's a wild man, so bug off," a line I remembered as soon as the film started. Scenes with Aunt Lotte ranting at them in Hungarian, Eva taking the men to see "the big lake" in Cleveland in the dead of winter when there's really nothing to see but a snowy whiteout, and a mistaken-identity moment outside a motel in Florida that leads to a silly mixup that closes the film on a bit of a laugh.

Stranger Than Paradise is a very important independent film, and if you love Jim Jarmusch, this is one of his best. It's pretty fucking DIY, which I guess makes it punk. I take it back--this film is punk. But not in the expected ways. Well worth a watch for punks and film buffs; it's mild and amusing and pays off, but it's not exactly a wild ride.

A Clockwork Orange (1971, dir. Stanley Kubrick)

Another important cult film, made in consummate Kubrickian style (ie, technically intense, wildly perfectionist), which I think was favoured by punks and artsy types more for its unflinching, near-technicolour, bright-lit "ultraviolence" as any more highbrow concerns. It feels subversive, especially the first act, with its serial rapes, beatings, and overarching aura of menace. Youth gangs, mindless violence, music obsession (in this case, classical, most especially Beethoven). . .it all fits in with the youth sub- and countercultures.

Alex and his gang of "droogs" are unrepentant violent criminals, until he is imprisoned for murder and undergoes an experimental psychological "treatment" which replaces his lust for violence with nausea over it. Through a series of coincidences, he finds himself free (now a "clockwork orange"--organic outside, robotic inside) only to become the subject of torture by one of his former victims, which drives him to a suicide attempt. The government, embarrassed by this outcome for the poster child for their "cure," undoes his brainwashing and even offers him a government job, if only he promises not to publicly blame them for his grave injury.

This film is definitely of its moment, and it's a faithful adaptation of the novel, which I appreciate. The violence probably seemed shocking to early '70s filmgoers, but it is hyper-stylized and in some ways almost mild by 21st century standards. I kept thinking through the whole film how very different this might look if it were made today. There's a lot to be said for wanton violence committed in the garish light of day, with a blaring soundtrack of classical marches and symphonies--it's certainly, as we might say now, A Look. But I thought of other, more recent films which enact violence in daylight that are far more shocking, and I think a well-designed reboot of A Clockwork Orange might actually make me squirm. This film almost seems quaint. I mean, it's good. And Malcolm MacDowell was undeniably sexy when at his most unhinged. But I can think of many more contemporary films that do the same things this film does just as well, or better.

The overarching themes of psychology, free will, government overreach, and untamed youth are all well placed and explored, I just don't know if A Clockwork Orange weighs the same as it did 50 years ago. I won't need to watch it again, probably ever.

#punk rock cool kid required viewing #'80s movies #'70s movies #cult movies #exploitation films #Sid and Nancy #Suburbia (1983)#Stranger Than Paradise #A Clockwork Orange

10 notes · View notes