Sleepwalk With Me

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"Okay's Kind of a Strong Word"
or
"Yeah...No...Yeah..."

The best thing on radio, for many years now, is "This American Life," ("from WBEZ, Chicago") Ira Glass' free-form hour of people telling stories revolving around one theme, with variations. sometimes truth, sometimes fiction, sometimes "found sound" (as the original intention of the show was).   It has vaulted many of its contributors into the literary limelight, like David Sedaris, Sarah Vowell, John Hodgman, David Rakoff, Dan Savage, and Jon Ronson.  For a brief time, Showtime bankrolled a television version of it, which caused some format grief ("will it work in TV, and if it does, will the radio version go away...like Dragnet?") but after two seasons Glass wanted a furlough back to its audio roots—no pictures, please.  There've already been a couple movies made from certain segments, two being Steve Soderbergh's The Informant! and Unaccompanied Minors.  Both started out as first-person narratives of the TAL variety and expanded, quite handily, into movie form and length.  It can work, if the story has enough heft and resonance to it, and complication.  In fact, TAL is made for movie grist, the grain being so different from "normal."

Sleepwalk With Me was born from "This American Life" and a particularly charming comedian named Mike Birbiglia and is based on his stand-up routine, which became a Broadway one-man show, which became a best-selling book and first aired on TAL in 2008.  Birbiglia's story of suffering from a sleepwalking disease, especially when stressed, and the consequences of it just as his comedy career was taking off made for compelling radio.  Birbiglia is honest, self-deprecating, and just a little vulnerable.  And one expected the film version to be a variation of the one-man show/stand-up routine.  

But what works in the hot medium of audio does not in the cold medium of the visual.  Perhaps Birbiglia is not a compelling personality when doing his work, and his strength lies in the "better-heard-than-seen" arena.  Whatever the reason, when he and co-writer Ira Glass decided to expand his career to a new medium, they decided to dramatize the whole bit, as if it were fictional, Birbiglia directed, with a competent crew of actors (I knew he wasn't playing it straight when James Rebhorn and Carol Kane showed up as his parents), and a "talk-to-the-camera"-while-driving narration that links everything together (which kinda, sorta "plays" but only produces one laugh-line, after a particularly surprising incident:  "I KNOW!  I'm in the future, also!" he shock-shouts to the audience).  As a film, it's all over the map, strictly scripted, then ad-libbed, staying on-track, then completely spinning off into a tangent. Birbiglia is also a little scattered as an actor.  Specializing in a brand of comedy that depends on dead-pan cutting down and reduction, it's a little subtle for out-and-out comedy—sometimes a sentence will go by before you realize "oh, that's supposed to be funny," especially when you're not hanging only on words for your information.  Birbiglia is an odd performer, too, resembling Tom Hanks a bit, all forehead and weak chin, he's a tentative line-reader, and frequently a contrary one, often saying two different things one after the other.  The whole thing comes off as weak Woody Allen, and what seemed to work very well as a narrative, comes off as merely "okay" on-screen.

It's disappointing, but also fascinating to see why the magic doesn't work this time out.

Sleepwalk With Me is a Rental.

Robot & Frank

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Future Tense: Past Imperfect
or
Wiping the Memory

Frank (Frank Langella) is a "retired" jewel thief, and getting old.  By day, he sits around the house, getting up late and reading a book—that old, antiquated form of reading in the future.  When he has half a mind to, he'll wander into town and visit the library, and flirt with librarian Jennifer (Susan Sarandon), and do a little light shop-lifting.  At night, he indulges in some light lock-picking...a man has to have a hobby.
But, living isolated, 30 years divorced with two grown kids with their own lives, he's solitary...and failing.  It's tough for son Hunter (James Marsden) to keep an eye on him, so he gets Frank the latest thing...a robot caretaker (performed by Rachael Ma, voiced by Peter Sarsgaard*) to get Frank on a regulated schedule, cook him healthy meals, clean, and program some beneficial activities.

To Frank, the robot is one big rectal thermometer, and he spends the initial first few days trying to find a way to turn the thing off or, at least, a way to get under its metal skin (those lock-picks might come in handy!).  Frank grouses, kvetches, protests and Robot (he never gets around to naming it) re-directs, gently persuades, all according to a program that looks for improvement, adjusts its approach and gently pushes.  It is altogether clear that Robot is more capable of change than Frank.  But, they're stuck with each other, in sickness and in health, until the old thief notices the precision and flexibility of the robot.  Maybe they might be of some use to each other, after all.
It's a great idea for a story, and the capacity for old dogs and programs to learn new tricks.  It might be a little too "out there" to make Frank a jewel thief, as the tale would be just as compelling, the interactions (the best part of the film) as interesting without it, but without that angle there wouldn't be much of a plot.  And the movie falls flat in the same area most speculative movies fall flat  the sociological aspect.  Oh, they get little technology details fine (there's one futuristic electric car, all the others are very contemporary) and the fashions are a little forward (but not hysterical ala The Hunger Games), but everything feels exactly the same as now.  There are no details, beside the talk of "brain-centers" and the demise of the bound book, about what the effect of these mechanical man-servants on people's lives, or the plight of the mentally challenged in this world.  This future does not look compelling, and after saying the film is set in "the near future," the idea is pretty much abandoned.**
But, that's the details.  For the most part, Robot & Frank clanks along, with a nicely done performance by Langella, the central interaction between the titular characters being the heart, soul and well-greased gears of it.
Robot & Frank is a Matinee.

* Sarsgaard's performance is in the same soft, reedy, solicitous manner that, I suppose, is de rigeur post-HAL 9000—Kevin Spacey did the same thing in Moon—but one wonders if one can do anything else with it, besides, of course,  fussy butlers.
** I could also quibble about one relationship being a little too neatly tied together, but to say anything else would be spoiling things.

Don't Make a Scene: Rear Window

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The Story: The month of September being a traditional month of doldrums at the movies (although The Master did open up and we'll have a review this week), we here at LNTAM decided to brush some cob-webs off of "Don't Make a Scene" contenders that just made it to the light of your monitor, for whatever reason.  Either I just didn't get around to it (likely), took interest in another scene first (more likely) or just didn't have anything to say about it (most likely) other than "I loved this when I saw it," they didn't make "the cut."

This one (from Rear Window) I really don't have a comment other than I find it hilarious, not only for Thelma Ritter's performance in it—she was a great character actress (even if it only seemed like one character—"the wiseacre") who made the most comic potential out of her work without overdoing it—but for the fact that the dialog is terrific in the "don't bother me with facts" logic of it—everything ties together neatly in Rear Window's screenplay, and this speech is no exception with it's "I know what I seen" sense of certitude that the character of L.B. Jeffries will adopt later in the film (after expressing doubtfulness here).  And the moral ambiguity of "peeping" is spelled out here at the beginning, because pretty soon, "peeping" is going to be an essential part of the plot, and it's going to become antithetical once Jeffries (and we) find it essential to getting answers...and stirring up trouble.

The Set-Up: L.B. Jeffries (James Stewart) is a photographer whose insistance on taking chances to get "THE shot" has left him with a broken leg and a long rehabilitation in his brownstone apartment (with courtyard).  Bored, he starts staring out his window across to his neighbors, who provide endless hours of fascination, much to the disgust of his nurse, Stella McGafferty (Thelma Ritter).


Action!

INT. JEFF'S APARTMENT - DAY - MEDIUM SHOT


Jeff is seated in the foreground, in a waist shot.


Behind him, the entrance door to his apartment opens.


STELLA McGAFFERY comes in. She is a husky, unhandsome, dark-haired woman who is dressed like a district nurse, with dark   coat, dark felt hat, with a white uniform showing underneath the coat. She carries a small black bag.


Stella pauses on the landing to watch Jeff. He doesn't appear to notice her entrance.


STELLA (Loud) The New York State sentence for a peeping Tom... 


STELLA ...is six months in the workhouse!


He doesn't turn.


JEFF Hello Stella.


As she comes down the stairs of the landing, holding on the wrought iron railing with one hand:


STELLA And there aren't any windows in the workhouse.


She puts her bag down on a table. It is worn, and looks as if it belongs more to a fighter than a nurse. She takes off her hat coat, and hangs them on a chair.


STELLA Years ago, they used to put out your eyes with a hot poker. Is one of those bikini bombshells you always watch worth a hot poker?


He doesn't answer. She opens the bag, takes out some medical supplies: a thermometer, a stop watch, a bottle of rubbing oil, a can of powder, a towel. She talks as she works.


STELLA We've grown to be a race of peeping Toms. What people should do is stand outside their own houses and look in once in a while.
(She looks up at him)
What do you think of that for homespun philosophy?


A look at his face shows he doesn't think much of it.


JEFF Readers' Digest, April, 1939.
STELLA Well, I only quote from the best.


She takes the thermometer out of its case, shakes it down. Looks at it. Satisfied, she walks to Jeff.


She swings the wheelchair around abruptly to face her.


INT. JEFF'S APARTMENT - DAY - MEDIUM SHOT


Jeff starts to protest.


JEFF Now look, Stella --


She shoves the thermometer into his mouth.


STELLA See it you can break a hundred.


As she leaves him holding the thermometer THE CAMERA PULLS BACK as she crosses to a divan. She takes a sheet from underneath, and covers the divan with it. Talking, all the time.


STELLA I shoulda been a Gypsy fortune teller, instead of an insurance company nurse. I got a nose for trouble -- can smell it ten miles away.
(Stops, looks at him)


STELLA You heard of the stock market crash in '29?


Jeff nods a bored "yes."


STELLA I predicted it.


JEFF (Around thermometer) How?


INT. JEFF'S APARTMENT - DAY - SEMI-CLOSEUP


Stella stops for a moment, and looks at Jeff challengingly.


STELLA Simple. I was nursing a director of General Motors. Kidney ailment they said. Nerves, I said. Then I asked myself -- what's General Motors got to be nervous about?
(Snaps her fingers)


STELLA Overproduction. Collapse, I answered. When General Motors has to go to the bathroom ten times a day -- the whole country's ready to let go.


INT. JEFF'S APARTMENT - DAY - CLOSEUP


A patient, suffering look comes over his face. He takes out the thermometer.


JEFF Stella -- in economics, a kidney ailment has no relationship to the stock market. Absolutely none.


STELLA It crashed, didn't it?


Jeff has no answer. Defeated, he puts the thermometer back into his mouth.


INT. JEFF'S APARTMENT - DAY - CLOSEUP


Stella goes on with her work.


STELLA I can smell trouble right in this apartment. You broke your leg. You look out the window. You see things you shouldn't. Trouble. 


STELLA I can see you now, in front of the judge, flanked by lawyers in blue double-breasted suits. You're pleading, "Judge, it was only innocent fun. I love my neighbors like a father." --


STELLA The Judge answers, "Congratulations. You just gave birth to three years in Dannemora."


THE CAMERA PANS HER over to him. She takes out the thermometer, looks at it.


JEFF Right now I'd even welcome trouble.


STELLA (Flatly) You've got a hormone deficiency.


JEFF How can you tell that from a thermometer!


STELLA Those sultry sun-worshipers you watch haven't raised your temperature one degree in four weeks.


Rear Window


Words by John Michael Hayes


Pictures by Robert Burks and Alfred Hitchcock


Rear Window is available on DVD from Universal Home Video.

Don't Make a Scene: Moonstruck

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The Set-Up: Another of those scenes that I see and go "classic."  But I have nothing more to say about this scene from Moonstruck, other than why I love it.  It's all Nicholas Cage—not one of my favorite actors, but when he's "on," he's "on."  Cage ramps up his game with good material and John Patrick Shanley wrote a great script full of indelible characters and great lines.  But this scene is all Cage going over the top with high comedic result, playing a wolf of a character who hangs back in bitterness, waiting for a moment to explode in dramatic self-pity.  No wonder Cher's Loretta reacts with a taken aback "who is this yay-hoo?" expression.

The whole scene is so overdone ("Bring me the big knife!" "Maybe I should come back another time"), it's hilarious, and the stunted reactions of the observers only makes it more so—right to the punchline of the mousey baker-girl who professes her love for this goof-ball.

Love is over-the-top in this one.  You might say it's over the moon.

The Story: After years of widowhood, Loretta Castorini (Cher) has accepted the marriage proposal of her boyfriend Johnny Cammareri (Danny Aiello), who leaves for Sicily to care for his dying mother.  Johnny asks Loretta to see his estranged brother Ronny (Nicholas Cage) to invite him to the wedding.  Loretta goes to the basement bakery where Ronny works.

Action!

This script had some changes on its way to film.  Deletions are in red.  Additions are in green.

INT. THE BASEMENT OVEN ROOM - DAY


There are two coal-fired ovens, one at either end of the room. There is a large wooden table roughly center. And various pieces of baking equipment, dough-mixers, etc., scattered willy-nilly. And everywhere there is bread.
PIETRO, a baker, is working at one of the ovens with a long wooden spatula. RONNY is working at the other oven.
Actually, he is just staring in the open door at the baking bread and burning coals. He's dressed in black jeans streaked with flour, a white restaurant shirt, white cotton gloves, and around his neck, a red handkerchief. He is black-haired, handsome and intense.
ROCCO Ronny!


RONNY What!


ROCCO Somebody here to see you.


Ronny turns and takes in Loretta.


RONNY Have you come from my brother?
LORETTA Yes.
RONNY Why?


LORETTA I'm going to marry him.


RONNY You are going to marry my brother?
LORETTA Yes. Do you want... RONNY I have no life.
LORETTA Excuse me.

RONNY I have no life. 


RONNY My brother Johnny took my life from me.


LORETTA I don't understand.


Everything in the oven room has stopped and everyone is watching.


RONNY And now he's getting married. He has his, he's getting his.

RONNY And he wants me to come?

RONNY What is life?


He picks up the wooden spatula and slides it into the oven.


LORETTA I didn't come here to upset you.


Ronny slides a bunch of loaves out of the oven on the spatula, turns them around, and slides them back in.


RONNY They say bread is life.

RONNY So I bake bread, bread, bread.

(He's picking up loaves of bread from one of the boxes on the floor, and casually tossing them across the room.)

RONNY And the years go by! By! By! And I sweat and shovel this stinking dough...

RONNY ...in and outta this hot hole in the wall...

RONNY ...and I should be so happy...

RONNY ...huh, sweetheart?

RONNY You want me to come to the wedding of my brother Johnny?!!

RONNY Where is my wedding?

RONNY Chrissy! Over by the wall!

RONNY Gimme the big knife!


CHRISSY No, Ronny!


Barbara appears in the doorway and comes down the stairs into the room.


RONNY Gimme the big knife!

RONNY I'm gonna cut my throat!


LORETTA Maybe I should come back another time.


RONNY No, I want you to see this!

RONNY I want you to watch me kill myself so you can tell my brother...

RONNY ...on his wedding day!

RONNY Chrissy, gimme the big knife!


CHRISSY I tell you I won't do it!


RONNY (to Loretta) She won't do it. 

RONNY Do you know about me?


BARBARA Oh, Mr. Cammareri!


RONNY (To Barbara) WHAT?! 

RONNY (To Loretta) Do you know about me?

RONNY  'Kay. 

RONNY Nothing is anybody's fault, but things happen.

(holds up his left hand to Loretta)

RONNY Look.


He pulls off the glove. The hand is made of wood.


RONNY It's wood. It's fake.

RONNY Five years ago I was engaged to be married.

RONNY Johnny came in here, he ordered bread from me. And I said "Okay, bread."

RONNY I put it in the slicer and I talked with him and my hand got caught cause I wasn't paying attention.

RONNY The slicer chewed off my hand. It's funny 'cause - when my fiancé saw that I was maimed, she left me for another man.


LORETTA That's the bad blood between you and Johnny?


RONNY That's it.


LORETTA But that wasn't Johnny's fault.
RONNY I don't care!
RONNY I ain't no freakin monument to justice!
RONNY I lost my hand, I lost my bride! Johnny has his hand, Johnny has his bride!
RONNY You come in here and you want me to put away my heartbreak and forget?

He goes to the big table, which is floured and covered with bread. He sweeps everything off the tabletop during the next.


RONNY Is it just a matter of time till a man opens his eyes and gives up his one dream of happiness?

RONNY Maybe.

RONNY Maybe.

RONNY All I have... Have you come here, Stranger, Bride of my Brother, to take these last few loaves from my table? Alright. Alright.


The table is bare. He stares at it blankly. He wanders away, to the back room where the flour sacks are kept. We hear a single sob escape him from that room, and then silence.


Everyone in the oven room looks after him. Then Chrissy approaches Loretta. She holds the big knife at her side.


CHRISSY This is the most tormented man I have ever known. I am in love with this man.

CHRISSY He doesn't know that. I never told him cause he can never love anybody since he lost his hand and his girl.




She holds out the knife.


CHRISSY Here. Why don't you just kill him? It would be so much more kind than coming here and inviting him to a wedding like he'll never have.


Loretta considers Chrissy, decides what she's going to do,
and goes to the flour room.


Moonstruck


Words by John Patrick Shanley


Pictures by David Watkin and Norman Jewison

Moonstruck is available on DVD from M-G-M Home Video.




Awww, they leave out the best line....