In recent viewing, we've encountered a phenomenon I'll call The Fifty Year Gap, in which we've screened flicks I hadn't seen since childhood. I think the first time we took note of it was in 2018, when I went to the Cinerama Dome to see "2001". That was, in fact, a 50th Anniversary showing of the film (released in 1968), and I made mention of it in my review, not only because of the passage of time and greatness of the movie, but also because I'd only ever seen it twice, both times in the same theater (the first time with my Dad), and most remarkably - fifty years apart, the first time being in 1968, the second during it's 2018 re-release. It was a minor mindblower, how that set of circumstances occured, and it kind of set in motion a desire to re-visit other long-lost movies that I hadn't seen since I was a kid. This in part led to our quest for Epic Films this year, some of which have fallen into The Fifty Year Gap, such as "Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines" and it's automotive sequel, "Jaunty Jalopies".
Now we can add another film to the list : "The Blue Max"(1966), starring George Peppard as a German World War One flying ace. There's another story behind the Fifty Year Gap this time. First of all, I believe the Gap is actually fifty four years in this case, which would make it the second longest in passage-of-time between screenings, behind only "Those Magnificent Men" (56 years). "Blue Max" was a 20th Century Fox production, which meant it had Color by Deluxe. Dad was the VP there at the time, and I'm pretty sure we went to the premier of the film, but more than that, what really sticks in memory is that he showed it at my 7th birthday party. Yep. Back then, Dad had enough cache to bring a print home (likely 16mm), along with a movie projector and screen. He did this twice when we lived in Reseda - for my 6th birthday he brought home "The Longest Day", and the next year it was "The Blue Max". On a side note, nowdays in our overprotective era of Helicopter Parenting, you could look back and say "what kind of Dad would show war movies to little boys? The horror"! And indeed, I recall that a Mom or two took their sons home in the middle of "Longest Day" ("I don't want Little Johnny watching this"!), but all in all, despite the way things are now, it was fairly common in the 1960s for Dads to take their kids to war films. The only difference here is that Dad brought the films home.
So yeah, in 1967 at my 7th birthday party, we watched "The Blue Max" (Dad brought along a projectionist from the lab to handle the technical details). As I say, I'm pretty sure we'd already seen it at the premier, and it would've made quite an impression on little ol' me, not only because of the airplanes and flying sequences, but because of Ursula Andress. I remember being both entranced and somewhat frightened by her, and more on that later. Though over five decades would pass before I saw it again, I never forgot "The Blue Max", and was inspired to seek it out by our pursuit of Epic Films in 2021. It wasn't available at the Libe, so I bought a copy from Amazon. Last night I settled in to watch it.
Peppard plays "Lt. Bruno Stachel", a veteran of the German Infantry who later joins the Air Force. As the film begins, we see him in the muddy trenches of the Western Front, in France. Explosions and death are all around. His experience is horrifying, but he looks up in the air at a dogfight and sees another way to serve his country, in which he will be the attacker instead of the attacked. Cut to an aerodrome in the countryside. Two years have passed. It is now 1918, the final year of the war. Peppard has become a pilot and is reporting for duty with his squadron.
As was true at the time, most of the pilots in Germany (and probably England, too) were all from aristocratic backgrounds. Peppard takes one look at these men, sipping their champagne in the Officers Room, reeking of class with their in-joke conversations, and takes an instant dislike to them, especially "Willi", who comes from wealth and is the squadron's best pilot. Though they aren't particularly insulting to him, Peppard is standoffish from the men. His farming background is a source of shame that he reverses, to boost himself above them. "I come from nothing, and yet I'm just as good in the air as you are, if not better".
He sees Willi's medal, a beautiful Maltese Cross framed in blue (don't know the gemstone; Topaz perhaps?). "How many kills does it take to earn one"?, he asks. The answer is "twenty", and Peppard sets out immediately to get his first kill. But the English fighter he shoots down is unconfirmed. "There are no witnesses", the Captain tells him. Peppard is furious, further estranging him from his group. He also has a questionable incident where he shoots down a plane that appeared helpless; it's gunner was dead, or so it looked. The captain believes in chivalry and is ready to court-martial Peppard : "You never attack an unarmed pilot"!, he yells.
Peppard has worn out his welcome with the squad, but then Chames Mason steps in.
Did I mention he was in the movie? Oh yes. We love Chames Mason (we love to say his name!), and he plays "General Count von Klugermann", the regional head of the air group. He's been watching Peppard and likes what he sees. "I'm asking you to drop the court-martial", he tells the Captain. "We need men like this, men who are ruthless, if we are to win the war". Being a man of honor, the Captain strenuously disagrees, but his protest falls on deaf ears. Peppard becomes a pet project for Mason, who wants to use George for publicity purposes, to encourage more men from the lower classes to join the air force. "You've seen the bread lines in Berlin", he explains to the Air Marshall. "The people are fighting, losing hope. The poor need a hero, to show them we can still win this war, which we will surely lose without their support".
Now, instead of getting court-martialed, Peppard becomes the poster boy for the Air Force, but what The Count doesn't know is that George has eyes for his wife, Ursula Andress. Okay, now we're getting to her as promised. Peppard first meets her at a party, where she's dancing with Willi, his arch rival. George can see that they're more than just friends, so he inquires around and discovers that Ursula is Willi's Aunt "by marriage". In other words, Mason is his Uncle, so Andress is not a blood relation, leaving Willi free to cheat with her. At the party, she and Willi go upstairs to his room. There's no question what's taking place. George Peppard is now royally pissed that Willi has something he doesn't - i.e. Andress - and he vows to get even, right under the nose of Chames Mason, his champion. This leads to the seduction scenes between Peppard and Andress that left such a memory when I was a kid.
I'm gonna add a disclaimer that I know it's Ursula Andress. Right - of course she's a beautiful woman with an Amazonian body. She was the first Bond Girl and all that. Okay, okay, she's hot. We all know that.
But there's something about her, in this movie at least, that's a bit repulsive. Feel free to disagree but let me explain. I know it's supposed to be her character, "Countess Kaeti", who's a man eating viper, whose lust for sexual conquest is insatiable (and uncaring), but there's a hardness to Andress the actress that makes me wonder if she was this way in real life. Perhaps I'm being unfair, and she's a nice lady who just excelled at playing those kinds of characters, but her sexuality in this movie is so overt, so aggressive and overconfident - while lacking in any feeling - that it verges on pornographic for what I assume was a PG movie. Now, I'm no prude, far from it, but I think this is what left a confused mark on 7 year old me : the bloodthirsty lust of Ursula Andress, who seemed to use her considerable attributes as a blunt instrument. Am I being too harsh? Well at any rate, I'll let it - and her - go. She's just not my type, no matter how stunning, and I'll take my nice 1940s gals over her any day.
Now again, and in all fairness, perhaps it's just her character in the movie, because George Peppard can sense it too. After having his way with her a couple times (or rather, after she has her way), he knows what she's all about. She's the female version of him, utterly ruthless and only after conquest. For George, the ambition is twenty kills and The Blue Max; for Ursula it's to screw as many pilots as she can get her hands on. So they both have basically the same goal, and when the sex is over, they can't stand each other.
Peppard takes his frustration out in the air, by challenging Willi to a game of "chicken" that will have fateful consequences. I can't reveal what happens, but it will lead to the climax of the plot : a make or break test flight for Peppard in the new German monoplane, which is being heralded as a game changer for the war. Mason (aka "The Count" aka "The General") wants George to demonstrate it for the press, to show off it's aerial prowess. But does Mason know of his affair with Andress? If so, does he even care? Or could there be a secret, involving Willi and the coveted Blue Max?
It's a tremendous film, though unusual in the sense that the two leads are deliberately unlikable. I suppose that makes it a commentary about envy and personal ambition at the expense of others. Those traits have no place in war (nor anywhere else) but sometimes they drive dishonorable men (and women) to rise above their chivalrous peers, with disastrous results. Maybe because the characters were German as opposed to English or American made the "antihero" concept more palatable in box office terms, I dunno, but in any event "The Blue Max" is a must-see. The aerial sequences are incredible, graceful and terrifying all at once. They're beautifully shot (as is the entire film) in 70mm Cinemascope, using authentic WW1 biplanes and even a few tri-planes, including one belonging to The Red Baron who makes a brief appearance. Many fans at IMDB identify "The Blue Max" as the greatest flying film ever made and it's hard to disagree, but even as a war film it's few battle scenes compare with any newer motion picture. During the depiction of trench warfare I was thinking "this is just as good as anything in '1917' ".
I can't recommend it highly enough, you could even screen it for your kid's 7th birthday. I'll bet he or even she will come back to watch it again fifty years later. Two Huge Thumbs Up. /////
The previous night Grimsley came over with a comedy, modern of course and one that I had never seen before : "Office Space"(1999). I'm a fan of Mike Judge, at least his "King of the Hill" series (not crazy about Beavis and Butthead), so I thought "okay, let's give it a shot".
I'm usually not interested in a lot of modern comedies, because........er...um....most of 'em are stupid. I made an attempt about ten years ago with "Stepbrothers", and it was so bad I had to turn it off. "Deuce Bigelow, Male Gigilo".......I mean c'mon. And anything by the Farrelly Brothers or Judd Apatow, you can have it. I like older comedies, they're funny without being crude or dumb.
At any rate, "Office Space" was a cult hit. You've probably seen it; it is a funny movie, in a goofy but sophisticated way. It isn't going for big guffaws but rather the situational humor that results from working in a soul-deadening environment. and what could be worse than a cubicle office, with an A-Hole middle management boss looking over your shoulder all day long. Such a fate was my worst nightmare when I was young, and Mike Judge is aware of the dread it creates. He nails every aspect of what it must be like, right down to the patronizing tones and phrasing of Gary Cole's nagging instructions to his employees at a tech firm.
"Yeaaaaahhh.......why don't you go ahead and file that TR report for me again, Milton. If you could do that it'd be terrrriffic......". Arrrrrrgghh! I'd jump off a bridge on my first day if I had to work for a guy like that. Ron Livingston and his pals feel the same way, but have a better method of dealing with Cole and all the other A-Holes who run the place, including the cost-cutting "consultants".
The plot is clever and has an easygoing tone, reminiscent of the spirit of the 1990s. Those were great years, doncha think? It's fun to see the boxy computers in use at the time, and there were still no cell phones, even just twenty years ago. "Office Space" is a revenge movie for everyone who ever hated their job, but there's an opposing message also : you aren't stuck in life, you can always find something else. Jennifer Aniston plays Livingston's girlfriend who works in an inane theme restaurant. Her boss is an A-Hole, too.
Two Big Thumbs for "Office Space", and by the way - did you know that Stephen Root, who plays Milton, was also the voice of Dale Gribble on "King of the Hill"? He's pretty good at mumblin'.
That's all for the moment. I hope you had a nice afternoon and I send you tons of love as always.
xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo :):)
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