The MPAA’s movie rating system–the one that brands a film R, or G, or NC-17–is very much like democracy. It’s only redeeming feature is that it’s better than the alternative. The alternatives to democracy and the rating system are totalitarianism and the Production Code that kept movies in line from 1934 through 1968. Not much of a difference.
And like democracy (at least the American variety), the rating system often acts like enforced morality by committee. Committees, filled with people who never quite agree on anything and are under pressure from all sides, do some strange things.
For instance, have you noticed how the MPAA has stretched the PG-13 rating beyond all reasonable meaning? What does it tell parents when a film as violent as Return of the King or as sexy as Something’s Gotta Give gets the same rating as Whale Rider?
It didn’t used to be that way. Twenty-five years ago, when there was no PG-13, the MPAA had no choice but to stretch the PG rating beyond all reasoning. I sometimes wonder if parents with short memories, having learned that PG-rated films are fine for their youngsters, ever come home from the video store with MPAA-approved, PG-rated old movies like Jaws, Tommy , Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom , and Annie Hall. That kid’s gonna need a lot of explanations. And possibly therapy.
Speaking of therapy, nothing helps the brain like a good movie. Here’s what’s worth seeing–and worth talking about–this week.
Recommended: Sunrise, Randall Museum, Friday, 7:00. Haunting, romantic, and impressionistic, F. W. Murnau’s first American feature represents the silent drama at its absolute best. The plot is simple: A marriage, almost destroyed by another woman, is healed by a day in the city. But the execution, with its stylized sets, beautiful photography, and talented performers, makes it both touchingly personal and abstractly mythological. Esthetically a silent, Sunrise is technically an early sound film; the original 1927 release contained a recorded Fox Movietone musical score. Part of the Art & Film Cineclub series for teenagers, it’s a DVD, not film, presentation.
Noteworthy: The Wild Bunch, Pacific Film Archive, Friday, 7:30. Sometimes I think I’m the only male, heterosexual cinephile who doesn’t love The Wild Bunch. I don’t object to violence in movies. I even love The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly, which also presents violent, amoral protagonists and asks us to root for them. But it’s tongue-in-cheek about it, while The Wild Bunch takes itself seriously and gets all sentimental. It’s one thing to vicariously enjoy fictional characters with few if any scruples; it’s another to get all weepy about them.
Recommended: North By Northwest, Spangenberg Theatre, Friday and Saturday, 7:30. Alfred Hitchcock’s light masterpiece, not as thoughtful as Rear Window or Notorious but more entertaining than both of them combined. Cary Grant plays an unusually suave and witty everyman mistaken by evil foreign spies for a crack American agent, and by the police for a murderer. A great movie for introducing pre-teens to Hitchcock.
Noteworthy: Sarah Silverman: Jesus is Magic, Lumiere, Act 1 & 2, and Rafael, opening Friday. Sarah Silverman’s scene in The Aristocrats is the best moment in that wonderful movie, but her combination concert/concept movie only occasionally hits a bullseye. At her best, her raunchy, intentionally shocking humor leaves you laughing so hard you can’t breathe. But she falls flat as often as she delights, and when shock humor isn’t funny, it’s just offensive.
Recommended: The Aristocrats, Roxie, returning Friday. “A man walks into a talent agent’s office and says ‘Have I got an act for you.’ Thus begins an old joke that professional comics never tell audiences but love to tell each other. But what goes between that opening and the punch line differs with every telling, and often includes incest, bestiality, scatological acrobatics, and stuff that’s really disgusting. But as famous comics retell the joke, you laugh more than you cringe. And as they discuss the art of telling it, you learn something about how humor is fashioned.
Recommended: Trouble In Paradise, Balboa, Sunday. What’s so fascinating and entertaining about witty, sophisticated crooks that makes us want to root for them? Yet another wonderful Lubitsch comedy about sex, love, money, and larceny. As part of it’s Sin in Soft Focus series, the Balboa is showing presenting Trouble in Paradise on a double-bill with Smiling Lieutenant.
Noteworthy: Night After Night, Balboa, Tuesday. Not a great film, but significant as the movie that introduced Mae West. Already a star on Broadway, she got a supporting role in this so-so drama, rewrote her own dialog, and proved that “Goodness had nothing to do with it.” On a double bill with Madame Racketeer as part of the Balboa’s Sin in Soft Focus series.
Recommended: The Graduate, Parkway, Tuesday, 9:15. Maybe it’s no longer the breakthrough movie it was in 1967, but The Graduate is still a well-made romantic comedy with serious overtones. And, of course, it gets Bay Area geography all wrong. A free Audience Appreciation Night presentation.
Recommended: Monkey Business and International House, Balboa, Thursday. The Balboa closes its Sin in Soft Focus series with two of the strangest comedies ever made. The Marx Brothers’ Monkey Business (their first movie that wasn’t based on one of their hit stage plays) isn’t concerned with story. It just throws its plot to the wind as the world’s greatest Marxists bring anarchy to an ocean liner. The result is one of their funniest. International House isn’t as funny as Monkey Business, but it’s even stranger. Virtually plotless, the story of a Chinese inventor is just an excuse to bring multiple stars together for comedy routines and musical numbers.
Recommended: The Thief of Bagdad (1940), Rafael, Thursday, 7:00, and the following Sunday at 1:00. One of the greatest fantasy adventures ever made, and made decades before Star Wars clones glutted the market. The special effects lack today’s realism, but they still pack an emotional punch (my daughter finds this giant spider scarier than the ones in Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings). The sets are magnificent, the dialog enchanting, and the story’s randomness gives it a true Arabian Nights flavor. And all in glorious Technicolor. Part of the Rafael’s Michael Powell series, even though Powell was only one of three directors.
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